Environment

07.06.16

China-Backed Hydropower Project Could Disturb a Sensitive Siberian Ecosystem

from Rivers without Boundaries
Lake Baikal contains 20 percent of the world’s freshwater resources and affects the regional climate of North Asia and the Arctic Basin. The lake is home to 2,500 aquatic species and local communities in Mongolia and Russia revere the lake as the “...

View from Moscow: China’s Westward March

Paul Haenle & Dmitri Trenin from Carnegie China
China and Russia are solidifying their bilateral relationship as the former looks westward and the latter turns to its east borders. In this podcast with Paul Haenle, Dmitri Trenin discusses the conditions that are leading to stronger China-Russian...

Environment

05.13.16

Why China's Nuclear Exports May Struggle to Find a Market

from chinadialogue
China’s nuclear power industry has eyed up a big push to export its technologies as countries around the world consider low-carbon alternatives to coal.But despite an increasingly clearer field for Chinese nuclear exports—mainly because of the woes...

Environment

04.20.16

Book: ‘Black Dragon River’—Russia’s Wild Window into China

from chinadialogue
Russia’s Far East is supposedly a strategically important area for President Vladimir Putin’s administration, with the government repeatedly declaring that development of the remote territory is one of its top priorities. But, as any Russian expert...

Russia Deals Deepen India Hold in China Oil-Buying Backyard

Debjit Chakraborty and Saket Sundria
Bloomberg
India is replacing China as the center of the world’s oil demand growth as its economy expands faster than any other major country.

Invisible Bridges: Life Along the Chinese-Russian Border

New Yorker
Is the new friendship between Russia and China real?

Invisible Bridges

Peter Hessler, photo by Davide...
New Yorker
Over the past two centuries, there have been periodic tensions between Russia and China, including some serious border conflicts, and historically Russia has usually held the upper hand. But nowadays, at the personal level, Monteleone notices a...

Postcard

01.18.16

A People’s Friendship

James Palmer
It takes a brave man to jump off a moving train for the sake of a sale, but the clothes hawkers had the easy courage of men who did this on the regular. I watched as they leapt off the front carriage as the train chugged into a station with no stop...

China and Russia’s Orwellian attacks on Internet freedom

The Editorial Board
Washington Post
Xi Jinping’s recent speech suggests that China won’t give up nudging global Internet governance toward the “sovereignty” model.

The China-Russia-Mongolia Trilateral Gains Steam

Bochen Han
Diplomat
The Asian trilateral no one talks about is seeing some interesting new developments.

Space: China Plays the Russia Card?

Kent Johnson
Diplomat
Russian engines could offer China a fast track for its ICBM capability building.

A Remote Corner of China Wants Access to the Sea. The Obstacle Is North Korea.

Anna Fifield
Washington Post
You can almost smell the sea air from here, at the point where China, Russia and North Korea meet.

China Says Not Planning to Send Military Ships to Syria

Megha Rajagopalan and Ben Blanchard
Reuters
China said it had no plans to send military ships to Syria to fight with Russian forces.

Features

09.14.15

Sino-Russian Trade After a Year of Sanctions

Alexander Gabuev from Carnegie Moscow Center
After a year of intense flirtation, the Sino-Russian relationship is beginning to look like a one-sided love affair. Indeed, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to China last week—his first since the United States and European Union enacted...

China Says More than 10 Countries to Join Unprecedented WW II Military Parade

Megha Rajagopalan
Reuters
Russia and Kazakhstan are among those countries joining a parade in Beijing in September to commemorate China's WWII victory over Japan.

China Parliament Ratifies BRICS Bank Agreement

Ben Blanchard
Reuters
The BRICS Bank, is one of two international development banks that China is promoting as an alternative to western institutions such as the World Bank.

Russia Delivers Submarine To Vietnam For Defense Over South China Sea Dispute

Elizabeth Whitman
International Business Times
The submarines are Vietnam's effort to deter China's military from building up in the South China Sea.

In North Korea: Wonder & Terror

Ian Buruma from New York Review of Books
The northeast of China used to be called Manchuria. Another name was “the cockpit of Asia.” Many wars were fought there. A French priest who traveled through the region in the 1920s wrote: “Although it is uncertain where God created paradise, we can...

As Russia Remembers War in Europe, Guest of Honor Is From China

Jane Perlez
New York Times
China’s leader, Xi Jinping, is an imperfect symbol of the wartime past and an uncertain one for Russia’s future.

The BRICS Bank: China’s Drive to Shake Up Development Finance

Eric Olander, Cobus van Staden & more
Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (aka the ‘BRICS’) are moving forward with an ambitious plan to shake up the clubby world of development finance. The new BRICS bank announced over the summer 2014 is expected to have a profound impact on...

China Opposes Proposed EU Sanctions Against Russia

Sui-Lee Wee
Reuters
EU proposed sanctions against Russia over accusations Moscow was sending troops into Ukrainian territory, saying the European Union's push to draw up more measures would only complicate the crisis.

Mongolia's ‘Rebalance’ Towards Russia and China

Gabriel Dominguez
Deutsche Welle
In a bid to boost its ailing economy, Mongolia is refocusing its foreign policy on its traditional partners Russia and China. But experts warn Ulan Bator runs the risk of becoming increasingly dependent.

Russia Signs 30-Year Gas Deal with China

BBC
Russia's President Vladimir Putin has signed a multi-billion dollar, 30-year gas deal with China, 10 years in the making, and worth some $400 billion.

The Chinese Take Manhattan: Replace Russians as Top Apartment Buyers

Michelle Conlin and Maggie Lu Yueyang
Reuters
Many Chinese buyers are switching their interest away from markets like Shanghai, Hong Kong and Singapore amid fears that prices have soared to frothy levels in those cities.

Russia, China Block Central African Republic Blacklistings at U.N.

Louis Charbonneau and Michelle Nichols
Reuters
The United States and France proposed U.N. sanctions of former Central African Republic President Francois Bozize for "engaging in or providing support for acts that undermine the peace, stability or security."

Caixin Media

04.08.14

Crimea Rattles the Chinese Dream

At the Sochi Winter Olympics, President Xi Jinping professed his affection for Russian letters. Pushkin, Lermontov, Gogol, and other literary giants made up the reading list of his youth, and his generation was raised on a diet of Russian culture...

Media

02.07.14

Why Chinese Media Is Going Soft on Sochi

Ready or not, Putingrad (aka Sochi) is now on prime time. The opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics will take place in the subtropical Russian resort town on February 7. In the Twittersphere, Western journalists and visitors have assailed Sochi’s...

Snowden Says He Took No Secret Files to Russia

James Risen
New York Times
He also asserted that he was able to protect the documents from China’s spies because he was familiar with that nation’s intelligence abilities, saying that as an N.S.A. contractor he had taught a course on Chinese...

U.S. Giving China a Free Pass on Syria

Josh Gerstein
Politico
As American officials bitterly denounce Russia for blocking the United Nations from endorsing action over Syria’s alleged use of chemical weapons, another global power that has taken a similar stand seems to be getting a free pass from the U.S:...

China’s Voyage of Discovery to Cross the Less Frozen North

Robin McKie
Guardian
Global warming means that the Arctic's fabled Northern Sea Route could soon be ice-free in summer, slashing journey times for cargo ships sailing from the Far East to Europe. Which is why the Yong Sheng, a rust-streaked Chinese vessel, is on a...

Where Is China’s Gorbachev?

Matt Schiavenza
Atlantic
Why China hasn't had—and isn't likely to have—a political reformer in the mold of the former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.

China Media on the Snowden Saga

BBC
Media in China see further embarrassment for the United States after whistleblower Edward Snowden gets temporary asylum in Russia.

Viewpoint

07.11.13

China at the Tipping Point?

Carl Minzner
What will be the future of China’s authoritarian political system?Many predicted that China’s rapid development over the past several decades would inevitably lead to gradual liberalization. Economic growth was expected to generate a cascade of...

Putin: Snowden Still At Airport, Won’t Be Extradited

Kathy Lally, Anthony Faiola
Washington Post
Putin said Snowden arrived in Moscow unexpectedly and had committed no crime in Russia. He has not crossed into a part of the airport that requires him to show his passport to Russian authorities. Because Russia does not have an extradition...

Snowden, in Russia, Seeks Asylum in Ecuador

Peter Baker, Ellen Barry
New York Times
The foreign minister of Ecuador confirmed receiving an asylum request from Mr. Snowden. As of early Monday morning in Russia, Mr. Snowden was believed to be staying the night inside the transit zone of a Moscow airport where he was visited by an...

Sinica Podcast

03.29.13

Xi Jinping Goes to Russia

Kaiser Kuo & Jeremy Goldkorn from Sinica Podcast
Xi Jinping’s trip to Moscow earlier this week, his first journey abroad as China’s new Head of State, has raised interesting questions about China’s ambitions in Asia, and coupled with Washington’s “pivot to Asia” is resurrecting the specter of a...

A Highly Public Trip For China’s President, And Its First Lady

Bill Bishop
New York Times
President Xi Jinping, accompanied by his wife Peng Liyuan, is on his March2013 inaugural overseas trip. The trip started in Russia last week, and is now passing through Africa with stops in Tanzania, the Republic of Congo and South Africa...

Xi Pivots To Moscow

John Garnaut
Foreign Policy
Will Xi’s late March 2013 trip to Vladimir Putin’s Russia -- a bastion of authoritarian state capitalism -- symbolically define China’s path ahead, like Deng’s 1979 U.S. tour? 

Environment

11.28.12

Russia’s Siberian Dams Power “Electric Boilers” in Beijing

from chinadialogue
The underdeveloped, sparsely populated Eastern Siberia region that shares a 4,000-kilometer border with China has vast resources to offer its heavily populated and fast-developing neighbor. Hydroelectricity is key among them.A major new...

Environment

11.02.12

Clampdown on Gold Dredging in China Sees Switch to Mongolia and Russia

from chinadialogue
The Heilongjiang basin, in northeast China, was attracting gold prospectors as early as the late Qing dynasty, which collapsed in 1912. Panning for gold is damaging for rivers and wetlands, but at the time the region was sparsely populated and only...

There Were Worse Places

Jonathan Mirsky from New York Review of Books
In the mid-1980s I made occasional trips to Harbin in Manchuria to report on the Orthodox White Russians who lived there, the remnant of a community that had fled from the new Soviet Union after the revolution. There were once so many of them that...