Torbjørn Færøvik's Blog, page 249

Xi’s authority dented by sudden Covid U-turn but iron grip on power is undimmed

Just a few months ago, the thought of questioning the strength of Xi Jinping’s leadership was inconceivable. He had just secured his third term, conducted a brutal purge of factional rivals and ensured he and his beliefs were inextricably and existentially tied with the Chinese Communist party. The zero-Covid policy – despite some societal grumblings – had been enshrined as the best and only way

A tragedy pushed to the shadows: the truth about China’s Cultural Revolution

For the most part, the authorities today do not speak of the Cultural Revolution. The exile of the educated youth is the one aspect that is remembered in official discourse, even celebrated. Among their number was Xi Jinping: now China’s most powerful leader since Mao, but at that time, the adolescent son of a disgraced senior official, Xi Zhongxun. Propaganda has stressed how the leader grew and

Torbjørn Færøvik: Kina har nådd et historisk vendepunkt

En ulykke kommer sjelden alene. Mens økonomien skranter og et stort antall kinesere dør av covid-19, melder Kinas statistiske sentralbyrå at landets folketall i fjor falt med 850 000. Nyheten var ikke uventet, men gjør likevel inntrykk, for Kina er kommet til et historisk vendepunkt. Fra nå av blir det færre kinesere i verden, ikke flere. Kinesiske eksperter er ikke helt enige om hvor stort

China announces lunar new year censorship crackdown to silence Covid ‘rumours’

Chinese cyber authorities have announced an internet censorship crackdown to ensure there are no “gloomy sentiments” caused by pandemic “rumours” during the lunar new year festival. It comes as health forecasting firm Airfinity estimated more than 600,000 people have likely died since zero-Covid restrictions were lifted in December – 10 times more than Chinese authorities have officially declared

China’s population is shrinking. The impact will be felt around the world

China may be one step closer to losing its place as the world’s most populous country to Indiaafter its population shrank for the first time since the 1960s. The country’s population fell in 2022 to 1.411 billion, down some 850,000 people from the previous year, China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) announced during a Tuesday briefing on annual data.The last time China’s population

After ‘Zero-COVID,’ China’s Families Face a Lunar New Year Dilemma

For decades, the Lunar New Year holiday has only meant one thing for Wen Guoqiang: a family reunion at his mother’s house in east China’s Jiangsu province. The 63-year-old and his four siblings live in cities across eastern China these days, but the trip back to their hometown has always been sacred.The family, however, has been forced to break with tradition this year. With COVID-19 spreading

Torbjørn Færøvik: Alt kan skje i Kaninens år

Kinas årlige folkevandring er i gang. Flere hundre millioner er på vei hjem for å feire kinesisk nyttår. Hva har de i bagasjen bortsett fra nyttårsgavene? Trolig et virus. Når feiringen er over, vil landets travle krematorier bli enda travlere.  Nyttårsfesten innledes 22. januar med festlig lag og rikelig konsum av durrabrennevinet maotai. Der det er tillatt, prydes nattehimmelen med fyrverkeri.

Covid: China 2022 economic growth hit by coronavirus restrictions

China's economy grew last year at the second slowest rate in almost half a century - in a sign of how the country's strict coronavirus regulations have affected businesses. Official figures show the gross domestic product (GDP) of the world's second largest economy rose 3% in 2022. That is way below the government's target of 5.5% but better than most economists had forecast.Last month Beijing

China's population falls for first time since 1961

China's population has fallen for the first time in 60 years, with the national birth rate hitting a record low - 6.77 births per 1,000 people. The population in 2022 - 1.4118 billion - fell by 850,000 from 2021. China's birth rate has been declining for years, prompting a slew of policies to slow the trend. But seven years after scrapping the one-child policy, it has entered what one official

Industrial espionage: How China sneaks out America's technology secrets

It was an innocuous-looking photograph that turned out to be the downfall of Zheng Xiaoqing, a former employee with energy conglomerate General Electric Power. According to a Department of Justice (DOJ) indictment, the US citizen hid confidential files stolen from his employers in the binary code of a digital photograph of a sunset, which Mr Zheng then mailed to himself. It was a technique called