Free Republic

The Obama administration backed off Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s statement last week that China is “manipulating” its currency. In an interview with CNBC on Thursday, Vice President Joe Biden said the administration has made “no judgment” on whether the Chinese have manipulated their currency, an accusation that would have international legal ramifications. “The policy of this administration is going to be to say to China, which occasionally the last administration was reluctant to do. `You're a major player on the world scene economically, and you've got to play by the rules that

There were no diamond-studded stilettos on display for what Drudge called, "The Night of the Golden Statue" last night. As Hollywood stargazers watched their faves arrive for ceremonies in green cars, a worldwide hunger strike to protest China's recent attacks on Human Rights defenders was getting underway

TOKYO — Yukio Edano, chief of the Constitution Research Committee of the opposition Democratic Party of Japan, proposed Sunday to deploy Self-Defense Forces troops to the disputed Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea to avoid invasion by other countries. "The Senkaku Islands are effectively controlled by Japan. I believe the SDF should be stationed there so other countries will not be able to invade them," he told a TV news show. The Senkakus, about 400 kilometers west of Okinawa Prefecture's capital Naha, are controlled by Japan and also claimed by China and Taiwan.

Chinese communist officials are still hobnobbing with Afghanistan's deposed Taliban, a Pakistan newspaper reports. According to Karachi's Ummat newspaper, personal representatives of Mullah Omar and higher officials of the Chinese Foreign Ministry reportedly held consultations in Beijing two weeks ago. The paper reported that a three-member Taliban delegation paid a secret visit to Beijing at the invitation of the Chinese Government. The American Foreign Policy Council (APC) cited the Pakistani paper as revealing that a high-level source in the Chinese Foreign Ministry told them the contacts had been established to pre-empt any possible eruption of unrest among the Muslims of...