Free Republic

Workers installed a 5.5-meter (18-foot) statue of Karl Marx in Trier’s city center on Friday ahead of celebrations to mark the 200th anniversary of his birth. The huge bronze figure was mounted atop a pedestal right in front of the former Marx family home, but it won’t be unveiled to the public just yet. That spectacle has been reserved for his birthday on May 5. […] The 2.3 ton statue was a present from the People’s Republic of China — a fact that has fueled plenty of debate in the community in recent months. “The glorifying Marx monument is a...

There is a furore in Australia over concerns China is aiming to make a huge wharf it has built at Luganville in Vanuatu a naval base. According to Fairfax media in Australia there have been reports that China has discussed with Vanuatu using the new 360 metre wharf at Luganville as a naval base. The wharf was built by a Chinese company funded by a soft loan from China. Don Wiseman spoke with the director of the Lowy Institute's Pacific programme, Jonathan Pryke, and began by asking him if there is any credence in the report that China is chasing...

Stocks in the U.S. are rising Thursday and major indexes in Europe are surging as global markets continue a rally that began late the previous day. Wall Street is getting more optimistic that a trade dispute between the U.S. and China, the two largest economies in the world, will be resolved without too much pain. Some of the biggest gains are going to technology companies, retailers and banks. The S&P 500 index climbed 18 points, or 0.7 percent, to 2,662 as of 12:45 p.m. Eastern time. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 237 points, or 1 percent, to 24,501. It...

The Bible appears to have been removed from online marketplaces in China, as Beijing clamps down on how its citizens practice religion. China has always controlled sales of the Bible, only allowing it to be distributed and printed by state-sanctioned churches, but in recent years it had been available to buy online. That loophole now appears to be firmly closed. Searches for "Holy Bible" did not return results on JD.com, and results on Amazon.cn did not include the main text, but did include study guides and the Koran. On Taobao, China's biggest online marketplace, a search returned results for the...

Western media and the Chinese chattering classes have been in an uproar since China’s National People’s Congress approved constitutional changes that included lifting the two-term presidential limit. China approves “president for life,” proclaimed Western media. But this misinterprets the nature of the development. And the world appears to be overlooking consequential political reforms taking place in China that will impact our collective future for the better.

THE REMAINS of an out-of-control Chinese space station are expected to light up the sky with “fireballs” before crashing down to Earth within days. China’s defunct space station, named Tiangong-1 or “heavenly place”, is expected to fall to Earth between March 30 and April 2, latest estimates suggest. Most of the eight-tonne space probe, launched in 2011, should “burn up” in the atmosphere before crash landing, Chinese space officials say. China’s space agency, CNSA, have never fully explained why Tiangong-1 "ceased functioning" on March 16 after reaching its "final phase of life". According to space experts, the odds of being...

Raymond Tam, a local deputy to the National People’s Congress, has suggested that the city’s top government officials should swear to uphold China’s constitution. Tam, the former secretary for constitutional and mainland affairs, made his suggestion at an earlier meeting of the national legislature. Article 104 of the Basic Law stipulates that when assuming office, the chief executive, principal officials, members of the Executive Council, members of the Legislative Council, judges and other members of the judiciary should swear to uphold the Basic Law and swear allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. […] Article 31 of the Chinese...

Premier Li Keqiang said Tuesday that China doesn’t want to see a “trade war” with the United States and hopes to reach a negotiated settlement of disputes. Speaking at a nationally televised news conference, Li said rash action would hurt all sides. He made no mention of a possible Chinese response to any increase in U.S. import controls. Beijing faces mounting pressure from the government of U.S. President Donald Trump over complaints it hampers access to its markets, pressures foreign companies to hand over technology and is flooding foreign markets with unfairly low-priced steel and other goods. That has prompted...

US President Donald Trump’s “Taiwan Travel Act” continues to draw ire from Chinese authorities. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lu Kang said Saturday the bill “severely violates” the “one China” principle and sends “very wrong signals to the ‘pro-independence’ separatist forces in Taiwan.” “China is strongly opposed to [the bill],” Lu said in a statement. “We urge the US side to correct its mistake, stop pursuing any official ties with Taiwan or improving its current relations with Taiwan in any substantive way,” he added. In a separate statement, Chinese defense ministry spokesman Wu Qian said the act “interferes in China’s internal...

Europe’s top monetary official criticized U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposal to put tariffs on steel and aluminum imports as a “dangerous” unilateral move. Mario Draghi, the president of the European Central Bank, said that the “immediate spillover of the trade measures … is not going to be big.” But he said such disputes should be worked out among trade partners, not decided by measures initiated from one side. “Whatever convictions one has about trade … we are convinced that disputes should be discussed and resolved in a multilateral framework, that unilateral decisions are dangerous.” “There is a certain worry or...

Germany’s economy minister on Saturday suggested tightening the rules on foreign investment, following concern over Chinese influence on European firms. Last month, it emerged that Chinese billionaire Li Shufu had quietly bought a near-10-percent stake worth around €7.2 billion ($8.9 billion) in German car giant Daimler — making him the group’s largest shareholder. “We must always adapt our law on the external economy according to new developments, including the threshold at which (the government) can become involved,” Economy Minister Brigitte Zypries told the weekly Der Spiegel. Currently, Berlin can scrutinize a transaction and possibly prevent it, if the foreign investor...

When China's legislators gather Monday, they are expected to set the stage for President Xi Jinping to rule indefinitely, as they vote on a constitutional amendment to end presidential term limits.  

Argentina’s coast guard said it fired on a Chinese boat illegally fishing in its waters before embarking on an almost eight hour chase to capture it. Nobody was reportedly injured and no fishermen were detained. The Argentine Naval Prefecture said in a statement Friday that its officers fired shots at the Jing Yuan 626 after the vessel was caught illegally fishing in the country’s exclusive economic zone. The Chinese embassy in Argentina did not immediately provide a statement about the incident, which occurred Thursday after four other vessels also flying under a Chinese flag attempted to ram into coast guard...

The party's Central Committee proposed to remove from the constitution the expression that China's president and vice president "shall serve no more than two consecutive terms," the Xinhua News Agency said. "Xi Jinping has finally achieved his ultimate goal when he first embarked on Chinese politics — that is to be the Mao Zedong of the 21st century," said Willy Lam, a political analyst at the Chinese University in Hong Kong, referring to the founder of communist China. Xi, 64, cemented his status as the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao in the 1970s at last year's twice-a-decade Communist Party...

President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday promised measures to help prevent foreign investors buying agricultural land in France after a string of international controversies over Chinese purchases. “For me, French agricultural lands are strategic investments on which our sovereignty depends, so we can’t allow hundreds of hectares of land to be bought by foreign powers without us knowing the aims of these purchases,” Macron told a crowd of young farmers at the presidential palace. He was referring to news last year that a Chinese fund had bought 900 hectares of land in the cereal-growing Allier region in central France, following an...

China's J-20 stealth fighter has entered combat service, the country's armed forces confirmed on Friday, expanding the military's air power options as it presses on with a massive modernisation programme. People's Liberation Army Air Force spokesman Shen Jinke said the deployment of the J-20 to combat units would "help the air force better shoulder the sacred mission of safeguarding national sovereignty, security and territorial integrity". Shen said the air force was moving towards a modernised military service that could operate in all fronts, and had become an effective force to control, contain and win a war. (please see link for...

While criticizing the US Mons. Sorondo believes that the Chinese communist dictatorship is the one that best carries out the social doctrine of the Church According to Andres Beltramo at the Vatican Insider, Bishop Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo, chancellor of the Pontifical Academy for Sciences, assured that "at this moment, the Chinese people are the ones who best realize the social doctrine of the Church."

A Vatican source says the deal would give the Holy See input on the appointment of future bishopsAn accord between the Vatican and China’s Communist government could be signed within the next few months. Reuters reports that an unnamed “senior Vatican source” said the deal would allow the Holy See to have a say on the appointment of future Chinese bishops. “It is not great agreement,” the source said, “But we don’t know what the situation will be like in 10 or 20 years. It could even be worse.” “Afterwards we will still be like a bird in a cage...

President Donald Trump threatened Friday to cut off aid and slap sanctions on countries that refuse to accept nationals the U.S. tries to deport. Trump said during a briefing with Department of Homeland Security officials at the Customs and Border Protection National Targeting Center in Virginia that he knows how to change the trend. “If they don’t take ’em back, we’ll put sanctions on the countries, we’ll put tariffs on the countries,” Trump said. He added: “They’ll take ’em back so fast your head would spin.” He’s also threatened to cut off aid to the countries, which include China and...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Thursday warned countries in the Western Hemisphere to beware of Chinese investment, saying it is reminiscent of European colonialism. He also derided Russia for selling weaponry to unfriendly, authoritarian governments in the region. Before embarking Thursday on a five-nation trip to Latin America, Tillerson said China seeks only to enrich itself with investment and development projects. He said regional governments should protect themselves against "predatory actors that are now showing up in our hemisphere," specifically mentioning China. He said Chinese investment may look good but comes with a heavy price. (please...