China

Could the giant panda be real?

5 July 2025 9:00 am

Even in the past century the animal was considered so exotic that many doubted its very existence

Is Xi Jinping’s time up?

14 June 2025 9:00 am

Stories about Xi Jinping’s father, Xi Zhongxun, are blowing up on social media. He died in 2002, so why the…

The disposable vape ban has changed nothing

7 June 2025 9:00 am

I felt a mixture of annoyance and relief when I bought my first non-disposable Elf Bar last weekend, ahead of…

Donald Trump can be sensible

12 May 2025 10:21 pm

We’ve learnt three things about the future of world trade from the temporary reprieve over tariffs that the US has…

Letters: Our private schools are China’s next target

10 May 2025 9:00 am

Ka-shing in Sir: Ian Williams highlights (‘Chasing the dragon’, 3 May) the degree to which the Chinese state has acquired…

How China bought Britain

3 May 2025 9:00 am

Somewhere in the bowels of the Foreign Office, civil servants are still working on the government’s ‘China audit’. The report…

The Chinese tried to get me drunk

19 April 2025 9:00 am

China: what next? Around the time of the millennium, I wrote that during this century, many of the world’s great…

Britain needs a Rearmament Isa

5 April 2025 9:00 am

The City’s self-styled ‘cheerleader in chief’, Lord Mayor Alastair King, on a recent visit to Beijing and Shanghai found leading…

The Boden Belt: the Lib Dems are the new party of the posh

29 March 2025 9:00 am

The English social season has begun, kicking off with Gold Cup day. But this year, there is a new common…

China is not the West’s environmental ally

22 February 2025 9:00 am

In the fight against climate change, China loves to present itself as the world’s White Knight. Armed with wind turbines…

Channel 4 shouldn’t get to decide the next Archbishop

15 February 2025 9:00 am

Obviously, it is difficult to defend the leadership of the Church of England, and I am inexperienced in that art;…

Is the future of democracy in the balance?

15 February 2025 9:00 am

Economic insecurity, intolerance and fear, combined with public expectations that the state will fix everything, are seriously endangering western democracy, warns Jonathan Sumption

What economists don’t get about Trump’s tariffs

8 February 2025 9:00 am

We already knew that most economists are quite bad at economic policy. Unfortunately, foreign policy appears not to be much…

DeepSeek’s cheap information comes at a high price for the West

1 February 2025 9:00 am

This week, Chinese technology has shown the West the challenge it faces – ruthless, implacable and impossible to ignore. The…

Rachel Reeves owes Brompton bikes an apology

18 January 2025 9:00 am

I long to write less about Rachel Reeves and more about world-beating British businesses – such as Brompton, the folding…

Time is running out to tackle the dangers posed by AI

18 January 2025 9:00 am

While we can all appreciate the benefits of AI, it is developing faster than anyone imagined, with no consensus on what constitutes acceptable risk

Give Trump’s realism a chance

12 January 2025 4:30 pm

In one place at least, the reaction to Donald Trump’s threats to annex Greenland, Canada and the Panama Canal has…

Keir Starmer wants to redefine crime and punishment

12 January 2025 4:30 pm

How far should a government go to stamp out people smuggling? This month, the Home Office is set to introduce powers that…

The architectural provocations of I.M. Pei

11 January 2025 9:00 am

When first considering architects for the new Louvre in 1981, Emile Biasini, the project’s head, liked that I.M. Pei was…

‘They don’t want me to rise again’: China’s gene-editing scientist on why he’s back in the lab

4 January 2025 9:00 am

Before he agrees to be interviewed, He Jiankui has one request: that he is introduced as a ‘gene editing pioneer’.…

A dreamy, if overly ambitious show: Silk Roads, at the British Museum, reviewed

4 January 2025 9:00 am

Towards the end of the British Museum’s Silk Roads show, there is a selection of treasures found in England. Among…

Will China soon rule the waves?

23 November 2024 9:00 am

On Sunday morning, a communications cable between Sweden and Lithuania was damaged, almost certainly deliberately. Just hours later, the C-Lion…

Labour’s Chinese takeaway

23 November 2024 9:00 am

I was thrilled to learn that our government intends to enjoy an ‘open’ relationship with China – one of my…

Stalemate over Taiwan is the best we can hope for

9 November 2024 9:00 am

A good outcome is the tacit recognition on all sides that we currently lack the means to solve this intractable problem, says the former diplomat Kerry Brown

Why billionaires are fleeing China

30 October 2024 7:43 pm

‘To get rich is glorious’ is perhaps the most over-used slogan attributed to Deng Xiaoping, the paramount leader who reformed…