China | Pakistan

Hundreds gathered to say farewell to two popular pandas departing Tokyo for China on Tuesday, leaving Japan without any of the beloved bears for the first time in 50 years as ties between the Asian neighbours fray. Panda twins Lei Lei and Xiao Xiao were transported by truck out of Ueno Zoological Gardens, their birthplace, disappointing many Japanese fans who have grown attached to the furry four-year-olds. “I’ve been coming to watch them since they were born,” Nene Hashino, a woman in her 40s wearing a panda-themed jacket and clutching a bear stuffed toy, told AFP. “It feels like my own children are going somewhere far away. It’s sad.” The pandas’ abrupt return was announced last month during a diplomatic spat that began when Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi hinted that Tokyo could intervene militarily in the event of an attack on Taiwan. Her comment provoked the ire of Beijing, which regards the island as its own territory. The distinctive black-and-white animals, loaned out as part of China’s “panda ...

China’s President Xi Jinping said Beijing and New Delhi were “good neighbours, friends and partners” as he wished Indian President Droupadi Murmu congratulations on the South Asian nation’s Republic Day, the official Xinhua news agency reported on Monday. Xi said that over the past year, China-India relations have continued to improve and develop and are of “great significance for maintaining and promoting world peace and prosperity,” according to Xinhua. Xi said China has always believed that being “good neighbours, friends and partners” is the right choice for both China and India. He referred to China and India as the “dragon and the elephant dancing together,” Xinhua said. Xi said he hoped that both sides would expand exchanges and cooperation and address each other’s concerns to promote healthy and stable relations. The nuclear-armed Asian neighbours share a 3,800 km border that is poorly demarcated and has been disputed since the 1950s. Ties between the countries were shaken by a 2020 clash in which 20 ...

US President Donald Trump on Saturday said he would impose a 100 per cent tariff on Canada if it makes a trade deal with China and warned Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney that a deal would endanger his country. “China will eat Canada alive, completely devour it, including the destruction of their businesses, social fabric, and general way of life,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “If Canada makes a deal with China, it will immediately be hit with a 100pc Tariff against all Canadian goods and products coming into the USA.” Carney during a recent visit to China called the Asian superpower a “reliable and predictable partner” and in Davos encouraged European leaders to seek investment from the world’s second-largest economy. Trump suggested that China would try to use Canada to evade US tariffs. “If Governor Carney thinks he is going to make Canada a ‘Drop Off Port’ for China to send goods and products into the United States, he is sorely mistaken.” Tensions between the U.S. and its northern neighbour have grown...

China said on Saturday the senior vice chairman of its powerful Central Military Commission (CMC) and another high-ranking official were under investigation for suspected “serious violations of discipline”, a common euphemism for corruption. The announcement marks the latest push in a sweeping drive to root out graft at all levels of the party and state since President Xi Jinping came to power more than a decade ago. “Following a review… it has been decided to initiate an investigation into Zhang Youxia and Liu Zhenli,” the defence ministry said in a statement. The two men were “suspected of serious violations of discipline and the law”, the ministry said. Zhang Youxia, 75, is China’s highest-ranked general as the more senior CMC vice chairman. He is also a member of the powerful Politburo, the 24-member executive body of the Chinese Communist Party. Vice chairman of the CPC Central Military Commission and vice chairman of the Central Military Commission of the People’s Republic of China, Zhang Youxia, salute...

A parliamentary delegation led by the Speaker National Assembly of Pakistan, Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, on an official visit to China, held a meeting with the Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of China, Zhao Leji, in Beijing.

National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq-led parliamentary delegation will undertake an official visit to China from January 19 to 21, the NA Secretariat said in a statement on Sunday. The development comes after Prime Mi­­nister Shehbaz Sharif, in a meeting with a Chinese delegation, had reaffirmed Pakistan’s unwavering commitment to the One China Policy and lauded China’s generous support to Pakis­tan, especially through China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). “The visit will be undertaken on the special invitation of the Chairman of the National People’s Congress (NPC) of China, Zhao Leji”, the statement said. “The visit marks the first state-level and maiden official visit of the Pakistani Parliament in the year 2026 to the friendly People’s Republic of China.” It further added that the visit of the Parliament delegation would coincide with the 75th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Pakistan and China, serving as a “milestone reflecting the enduring and time-tested friendship b...

Canadian PM Mark Carney shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the People’s Great Hall in Beijing.—Reuters BEIJING: Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed on a raft of measures from trade to tourism on Friday at the first meeting between the countries’ leaders in Beijing in eight years. The Canadian premier hailed a “landmark deal” under a “new strategic partnership” with China, turning the page on years of diplomatic spats, retaliatory arrests of each other’s citizens and tariff disputes. Carney has sought to reduce his country’s reliance on the United States, its key economic partner and traditional ally, as President Donald Trump has aggressively raised tariffs on Canadian products. “Canada and China have reached a preliminary but landmark trade agreement to remove trade barriers and reduce tariffs,” Carney told a news conference after meeting with Xi. Under the deal, China — which used to be Canada’s largest market for canola seed — is expected to reduce tar...

Beijing has rejected New Delhi’s claim over the Shaksgam valley in Kashmir and said that the territory “belongs to China”. At a press conference on Monday, when asked by the Press Trust of India (PTI) for comment on the Indian criticism of China’s infrastructure development projects in the Shaksgam valley, China‘s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Mao Ning said that it was “fully justified” for China to conduct infrastructure construction “on its own territory”. “The territory you mentioned belongs to China,” she said. India’s foreign ministry spokesperson had on Friday said that it reserved the right to take necessary measures to safeguard its interests as the Shaksgam valley was “an Indian territory”. “We have never recognised the so-called China-Pakistan boundary agreement that happened in 1963. We have consistently maintained that the agreement is illegal and invalid,” he said at a press conference in response to a question from India’s state-owned public television broadcaster Doordashan. The Indian spokespe...

US President Donald Trump said “it’s up to” Chinese President Xi Jinping what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be “very unhappy” with a change in the status quo, according to an interview the New York Times published on Thursday. “He (Xi) considers it to be a part of China, and that‘s up to him what he’s going to be doing,” Trump told the newspaper on Wednesday. “But I‘ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he‘ll do that. I hope he doesn’t do that.” Trump made the comments in the context of an exchange about what lessons Xi might take away from Trump‘s audacious military operation in Venezuela and the abduction of the country’s president, Nicolas Maduro. The Republican president said he did not view the situations as analogous because Taiwan did not pose the same type of threat to China that he has said the government of Maduro posed to the United States. He also repeated his belief that Xi would not make a move against Taiwan during his presidency, which end...

ISLAMABAD - Federal Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi on Wednesday visited the headquarters of China’s Ministry of Public Security, where he was warmly received by Chinese Interior Minister Wang Xiaohong and senior officials.

China commends measures taken by Pakistan to combat terrorism and protect Chinese personnel, projects, institutions.

Pakistan and China issued a joint communique on Monday calling for more “visible and verifiable” actions to dismantle and eliminate all terrorist organisations based in Afghanistan, and prevent them from using Kabul’s territory for militancy against any other country. The joint statement came after the conclusion of the 7th round of the Pakistan-China Foreign Mini­sters’ Strategic Dialogue, for which Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar travelled to Beijing. “The two sides called for more visible and verifiable actions to dismantle and eliminate all terrorist organisations based in Afghanistan which continue to pose serious threats to regional and global security, and prevent terrorist organisations from using the Afghan territory for terrorism against any other country and to endanger any other country,” the statement said. “The two sides agreed to keep in close communication and coordination on the Afghan issue, work with the international community to encourage the Afghan government to build an inclusive politi...

North Korea launched ballistic missiles on Sunday, the day the leader of rival South Korea starts a state visit to China, Pyongyang’s chief ally, and just hours after the US attacked Venezuela. The firings of at least two missiles, the country’s first in two months, further heighten global tensions after US President Donald Trump launched the attack that captured President Nicolas Maduro. South Korea said peace on the Korean peninsula would be on the agenda during President Lee Jae Myung’s visit to Beijing, which will include a summit with his counterpart, Xi Jinping. The launches from the capital Pyongyang into the sea between the Koreas and Japan represent “a message to China to deter closer ties with South Korea and to counter China’s stance on denuclearisation”, said Lim Eul-chul, a professor at the Institute for Far Eastern Studies in Seoul. North Korea signals ‘we are different from Venezuela’ Eul-chul said North Korea also wanted to send a message that “we are different from Venezuela” — as a nuclear a...

Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar on Saturday arrived in Beijing to co-chair the seventh round of the Pakistan-China Foreign Ministers’ Strategic Dialogue, which is scheduled for January 4 (Sunday), the Foreign Office (FO) announced in a post on X. In an earlier statement, the FO said the foreign minister will be the “first foreign dignitary to visit China in 2026“, at the invitation of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, with whom he is co-chairing the dialogue. In the X post, the FO said that Dar was received at the airport by China’s Special Representative on Afghanistan, Ambassador Yue Xiaoyong, Pakistan’s Ambassador to China and officials from the Pakistani Embassy. “DPM/FM will also attend events marking the beginning of the 75th year of Pakistan-China diplomatic ties, with both countries planning initiatives and commemorative activities throughout 2026,” the post added. The FO has said that the dialogue “will review the full spectrum of bilateral cooperation, identify new areas of part...

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan on Friday reiterated its firm support for the One-China policy, stat-ing that Taiwan is an inalienable part of China, while also welcoming efforts by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates aimed at restoring peace in Yem-en.

The Foreign Office (FO) on Friday reiterated that Pakistan regarded Taiwan as an inalienable part of China. The statement from FO spokesperson Tahir Andrabi came in response to media queries seeking Pakistan’s response to “developments in the Taiwan Strait”. “Pakistan and China are iron-clad friends and all-weather strategic cooperative partners. We reiterate our consistent support to China on all matters of its core interests, including Taiwan,“ he said. “We will continue to adhere to the One-China principle and regard Taiwan as an inalienable part of China,” he said. The FO spokesperson had made similar remarks during yesterday’s weekly press briefing in response to a question regarding the sale of arms to Taiwan by the United States. China claims Taiwan as its own territory, while Taiwan rejects China’s claims. Although the statement released by the FO on Friday did not make a specific mention of the exact developments it was referring to, it comes after China completed military drills around Taiwan that i...

NEW DELHI: India’s opposition Congress party said on Wedne­s­day it was concerned by Beijing’s claims on helping broker the India-Pakistan truce after the military flare-up in May and asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to clarify the issue. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Tuesday that the conflict between India and Pakistan in May was among the contentious matters mediated by Beijing in 2025. India has repeatedly rejected claims made by US President Donald Trump that Washington had mediated the ceasefire. India’s Ministry of External Affairs has not reacted to the claim made by Mr Wang. But it has maintained that the ceasefire with Islamabad was not the result of mediation. The decision to stop the firing was taken after the Pakistani director general of military operations had called his Indian counterpart, New Delhi has said. “China’s claims of mediating betw­een India and Pakistan are concerning — not just because they contradict what has been told to the country’s people so far, but also because ...

China launched missiles and deployed dozens of fighter aircraft and navy vessels around Taiwan on Tuesday for a second day of live-fire drills aimed at simulating a blockade of the self-ruled island’s key ports and assaults on maritime targets. Taipei, which slammed the two-day war games as “highly provocative and reckless”, claimed the manoeuvre failed to impose a blockade on the island. China claims Taiwan as part of its sovereign territory and has refused to rule out military action to seize the island. AFP journalists in Pingtan, a Chinese island at the closest point to Taiwan’s main island, saw a volley of rockets blast into the air at around 9:00am (6am PKT) on Tuesday, leaving trails of white smoke. At least 10 were launched in quick succession, sending a booming sound reverberating across the sky and drawing tourists towards the seafront to snap photos and videos on their phones. Taiwanese authorities counted 27 rockets fired by Chinese forces on Tuesday. A Taiwanese Air Force Mirage 2000 fighter jet ...

China’s military moved army, naval, air force and artillery units around Taiwan on Monday for its “Justice Mission 2025” drills, as the island vowed to defend democracy and mobilised troops to rehearse repelling a potential Chinese attack. The Eastern Theatre Command announced the drills will involve live-fire exercises on Tuesday, in a statement containing a graphic demarcating five zones surrounding the island that will be under sea and air space restrictions for 10 hours from 8am (5am PKT). This marks China’s sixth major round of war games since 2022 after then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited the democratically governed island, and follows a rise in Chinese rhetoric over Beijing’s territorial claims after Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi suggested a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could trigger a military response from Tokyo. The exercises began 11 days after the United States announced $11.1 billion in arms sales to Taiwan, the largest ever weapons package for the island, drawing a prote...

ISLAMABAD - The fourth Hangor class submarine of Pakistan Navy named GHAZI has been launched at Wuchang Shipbuilding Industry Group Company Ltd, Shuangliu Base at Wuhan, China.