
China's antitrust probe into Google seen as warning shot to the US
The move against Google showed that 'Beijing has effectively fired a warning shot to Washington, signalling its readiness to retaliate,' said Angela Zhang, a law professor at the University of Southern California and author of Chinese Antitrust Exceptionalism: How the Rise of China Challenges Global Regulation. US President Donald Trump, left, sits with Chinese President Xi Jinping during a bilateral meeting in Florida in 2017. Photo: AFP/Getty Images/TNS
While the one-line statement from China's market regulator contained no details about the investigation, state media has suggested it was related to Android – Google's open-source operating system.
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South China Morning Post
36 minutes ago
- South China Morning Post
Chinese firms in Vietnam upbeat over US tariff deal: ‘better than expected'
Chinese manufacturers in Vietnam breathed a sigh of relief on Wednesday, after Washington and Hanoi agreed a 'better than expected' trade deal that will reduce US tariffs to 20 per cent and bring an end to three months of uncertainty. Advertisement Most Chinese exporters are likely to continue operating in the Southeast Asian nation in the wake of the agreement, with firms viewing the final tariff rate as manageable, analysts and businesspeople in the country told the Post. US President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday via a social post that the United States would impose a 20 per cent tariff on imports from Vietnam – plus a 40 per cent duty on goods deemed to be transshipped – under a new trade agreement, calling it 'a great deal of cooperation between our two countries'. The new rate is significantly lower than the 46 per cent so-called 'reciprocal' tariff on Vietnamese goods that Trump announced in early April, before subsequently pausing for 90 days. Hanoi and Washington reportedly held three rounds of negotiations to reach the deal, which also slashes Vietnamese duties on US goods to zero, eventually confirming an agreement just days before the 'reciprocal' tariff pause was due to expire on July 9. Advertisement


AllAfrica
2 hours ago
- AllAfrica
China goes after Marcos ally over South China Sea
MANILA – Adding fuel to a raging fire over the South China Sea, China this week imposed sanctions against a key ally of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. who was instrumental in passing the Philippines' maritime zones act. The move is seen here as a politically aggressive act at a time when both sides had been seeking to calm territorial tensions. Beijing has accused former Senator Francis Tolentino, who ran unsuccessfully for re-election to the Senate under Marcos's ticket in May, of espousing allegedly unacceptable behavior on issues related to the South China Sea, and barred him from entering China, Hong Kong and Macau, China's foreign ministry said in imposing the sanctions on Tuesday. 'For quite some time, driven by selfish interests, a handful of anti-China politicians in the Philippines have made malicious remarks and moves on issues related to China that are detrimental to China's interests and China-Philippines relations,' the ministry said. The ministry said that Tolentino showed 'his egregious conduct on China-related issues,' but failed to point out the specific actions on the Filipino legislator's part that led to the action. 'The Chinese government is firmly resolved to defend national sovereignty, security and development interests,' the statement said. Tolentino campaigned on a nationalist platform questioning China's aggressive behavior in the South China Sea. In November last year he accused China of misleading the international community by accusing the Philippines of allowing itself to be used as an American proxy in a race for power in the strategic sea region. LIKAS ISLAND (WEST YORK ISLAND) – Filipino soldiers serving as lookouts on Likas Island (West York Island), a Philippine-controlled territory in the disputed region, on June 5, 2025. Photo: Jason Gutierrez. The Philippines is the United States' staunchest ally in the region, and both nations are bound by a mutual defense treaty that dates back to 1951. That treaty calls on both sides to come to each other's help in times of aggression, and Washington has said that it will not hesitate to back Manila in times of conflict with any aggressor, even China. The terms of the treaty have been refined over recent years, with Washington last year reiterating that the treaty covered attacks on the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) after what it said were 'escalatory and irresponsible actions' by the China Coast Guard for harassing a Filipino resupply mission to an outpost on Second Thomas Shoal (which Manila refers to as Ayungin Shoal). Both China and the Philippines, however, have worked to settle their differences diplomatically, through a 'bilateral consultative mechanism' designed to dial down the tension between the two Asian maritime states. While this mechanism is working, China nevertheless has not stopped patrolling waters in the West Philippine Sea – or areas that are under the Philippines' exclusive economic zone. Manila, meanwhile, has continued to reach out to what it calls right-minded countries around the world, including Australia, Britain and France as well as Asian allies such as Japan, which itself has a separate maritime dispute with Beijing. OVER THE SOUTH CHINA SEA – A man wears a shirt proclaiming, 'The West Philippine Sea is Ours,' during a military flight to Pag-Asa Island. internationally called Thitu Island, which is controlled and occupied by Manila, on June 3, 2025. Photo: Jason Gutierrez The latest controversy then appears to put more pressure on Marcos's government, which has pivoted back into the embrace of America – contrary to the policy of the previous administration of Rodrigo Duterte, who had embraced Xi Jinping unabashedly, even setting aside a 2016 legal victory that refuted any basis in law for nearly all of China's expansive maritime claims. Duterte is now in detention in the Hague for crimes against humanity for his war on drugs, which killed thousands. His daughter, Sara Duterte, ironically, is Marcos's vice president, and is also seen as pro-China. She faces an impending impeachment trial before the Senate over corruption. Senator Jinggoy Estrada on Tuesday urged the Department of Foreign Affairs to summon China's envoy to Manila, Huang Xilian, to explain what he said was the 'unjust move' against Tolentino and to convey Manila's 'strong displeasure over the imposition of sanctions. Tolentino, he stressed, was well within his mandate and his actions were fully backed by Congress. Tolentino as a senator, he noted, had been the prime mover behind two key pieces of legislation – the Philippine Maritime Zones Act and the Philippine Archipelagic Sea Lanes Act – that were signed by Marcos in November. The laws bolstered the country's maritime claims in the disputed region. 'His (Tolentino's) actions were fully aligned with our democratic processes and legal frameworks,' Estrada argued. 'For years, despite the Arbitral Ruling that favored our claims over portions of the West Philippine Sea, China has continued to bully, harass, and subject our maritime scientists, personnel and fisherfolk to inhumane and provocative actions. It is appalling that efforts to defend our territorial claims are now being branded as 'egregious conduct.''China should be ashamed.' China's action 'clearly undermines mutual respect and regional stability,' Estrada said. 'Critical voices are not threats to diplomacy; they are expressions of patriotic duty.' Terry Ridon, a House of Representatives member, called on the Philippine government to take a stronger action. Manila should 'impose similar travel sanctions on current or previous high-level Chinese officials who had been undertaking disinformation against [Philippine] interests in the West Philippine Sea.' Ridon had previously led House investigations into alleged disinformation campaign against the Philippines by the Chinese embassy here.


RTHK
3 hours ago
- RTHK
Hang Seng Index opens flat amid Wall Street highs
Hang Seng Index opens flat amid Wall Street highs The Hang Seng Index opened marginally higher on Thursday morning. File photo: AFP The benchmark Hang Seng Index gained 12 points, or 0.05 percent, to open at 24,234 on Thursday. That came after mainland Chinese stocks opened higher, with the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index up 0.04 percent to open at 3,456 and the Shenzhen Component Index opening 0.18 percent higher at 10,431. The ChiNext Index, tracking China's Nasdaq-style board of growth enterprises, was up 0.33 percent to open at 2,130. The Chinese gains came after major US stock indices closed at fresh records on Wednesday following a US-Vietnam trade deal, while oil prices jumped after Iran suspended cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog. Both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq finished at records for the third time in four days after Trump reached an accord with Vietnam. "Little by little, we are coming to agreements," said Sam Stovall of CFRA Research. This "should be regarded as positive." The Vietnam announcement bolsters hopes about additional US trade accords and helped offset a report that showed private-sector US employers shed 33,000 jobs in June. The strong performance in US stocks also came in spite of a rise in US Treasury yields that suggests unease in the bond market as Congress weighs Trump's massive tax and spending package that has been projected to swell US debt. Optimism over the bill's extension of deep tax cuts has been offset by concerns it will add around US$3 trillion to the US national debt. "It's driven a wedge between stocks and bonds," said Jack Ablin of Cresset Capital Management. "Equity markets are applauding the tax cuts... bond markets are concerned about the long-term effects." (Xinhua/AFP)