Determined to push back against online falsehoods, the French state is turning to facts, humour and a new digital voice to challenge misleading narratives wherever they spread. France has set up a new digital rapid-response unit – titled “French Response” – to push back against what it sees as a rising tide of online disinformation, and it wasted little time making its presence felt. When the US secretary of state Marco Rubio took a swipe at European culture on X this week, the English-language account run by the French foreign…
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The renewed campaign by United States President Donald Trump to acquire Greenland has escalated, with tariff threats against European allies. Asked on Tuesday how far he is willing to go to “acquire” Greenland, Trump replied: “You’ll find out”. This is the latest episode in a long-running effort under Trump 2.0 to remake the international order with major geopolitical implications: There is a chance of both escalation and de-escalation when Trump holds meetings this week on Greenland with European leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. US–Greenland relations and…
Amid the first cold wave of this year, several southern cities including Shanghai and Nanjing, East China’s Jiangsu Province, witnessed snowfall on Tuesday, while some southern cities saw their daily high temperatures fall below zero for the first time this winter. Affected cities have taken response measures, with some leveraging big data to facilitate smoother traffic flow, while others stocked up on vegetables in advance to ensure adequate supplies for residents. Shanghai Meteorological Bureau said on Tuesday morning via its official Sina Weibo account that light snow fell intermittently in…
Across the country, community leaders gathered to celebrate the life and legacy of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on Monday. Some leaders took the opportunity to criticize the Trump administration. Early in the afternoon, there were no significant disruptions being reported. Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebrates the Jan. 15 birthday of the civil rights leader on the third Monday of January. He would have been 97. King delivered his “I have a Dream” speech on Aug. 28, 1963, in sight of the Lincoln Memorial and Washington…
U.S. allies in Europe are banding together against President Donald Trump’s ultimatum: tax imported goods from their countries unless Denmark surrenders control of strategically important Greenland. Trump said that U.S. ownership of Greenland – an 800,000-square-mile Arctic island and Danish territory – is vital to national security. He says Denmark cannot defend its mineral-rich territory from China and Russia. On Monday, Trump criticized NATO, saying the alliance has failed to compel Denmark to comply. “NATO has been telling Denmark, for 20 years, that ‘you have to get the Russian threat…
There are no Chinese warships operating in Greenland and no significant Chinese investments in the region, Denmark’s Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said in Washington on Wednesday, as he countered US threats to seize the Arctic island. Rasmussen, together with Greenland’s Foreign Minister Vivian Motzfeldt, had an hourlong meeting with US Vice-President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the White House, the first face-to-face meeting between the high-level officials as Washington’s rhetoric of taking full control Greenland has run high. “It was a great opportunity also for…
Amid global tensions involving Venezuela and Iran, there is hope that the scheduled meeting between US President Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in Beijing in April 2026 could arrest America’s aggressive and predatory policies. A possible Trump-Xi détente could also reduce risk-taking in the Taiwan Straits, and push China to take a different position on the Ukraine war. In 2025, Trump accepted an invitation from Xi to visit Beijing in April 2026. The call, as US media reported, was initiated by Xi. This was preceded by a…
When Donald Trump pulled back on his plan to impose eye-watering tariffs on trading partners across the world, there was one key exception: China. While the rest of the world would be given a 90-day reprieve on additional duties beyond the new 10% tariffs on all U.S. trade partners, China would feel the squeeze even more. On April 9, 2025, Trump raised the tariff on Chinese goods to 125% – bringing the total U.S. tariff on some Chinese imports to 145%. The move, in Trump’s telling, was prompted by Beijing’s…
Shanghai ranked first nationwide in overall science and technology innovation performance, according to the China Regional Science and Technology Innovation Evaluation Report 2025. The top ranking reflects the steady strengthening of Shanghai’s innovation ecosystem in recent years, underpinned by sustained increases in funding. From 2022 to 2025, the city’s fiscal spending on science and technology grew at an average annual rate of more than 20 percent, while investment in basic research increased by 85 percent. During the 14th Five-Year Plan period (2021-25), R&D expenditure as a share of GDP rose to around 4.5…
China launched a group of internet satellites into orbit late on Tuesday night, according to China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp, the leading State-owned space contractor. The satellites, part of the 18th group of low-orbit hardware in China’s State-owned internet network, were lifted by a Long March 8A carrier rocket that blasted off at 11:25 pm from the Hainan International Commercial Aerospace Launch Center, a coastal spaceport in Wenchang city, and soon reached their orbital positions, CASC said in a news release. The satellites were designed and made by the…