US Secretary of State Marco Rubio cautioned Panama about China's influence and control over the Panama Canal, calling the situation "unacceptable" and said that the US will take "necessary measures" if changes are not made.
As China celebrates the Lunar Year of the Snake, the first angpow (red packet gift) was the DeepSeek AI software that shook Wall Street to the tune of nearly $1 trillion in market capitalization.
For decades, the prevailing assumption in technology circles has been that the West, led by the United States, enjoys an unassailable dominance in advanced research and innovation.
The global artificial intelligence (AI) landscape has witnessed a new shift with the emergence of China’s DeepSeek, a powerful AI model developed to counterbalance American AI giants like OpenAI, Google, and Meta. The release of DeepSeek sent shockwaves through the stock market, causing NVIDIA, one of the biggest players in AI hardware, to lose nearly $500 billion in market capitalization overnight
The European Commission presented the Competitiveness Compass, a strategic blueprint aimed at restoring the European Union (EU)'s economic edge and driving technological leadership as it seeks to close the gap with the US and China.
During this week's General Conference of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia proposed an amendment to an IAEA safeguards resolution in an effort to legitimize their submarine deal in the context of the NPT.
Amid heightened Chinese aggression, Australia and the US reaffirmed their "unwavering commitment" to a free and open Indo-Pacific, saying all countries in the region are "free to choose their own destinies".
There is a combination of issues that many countries in developing Asia are facing but we do see the Chinese government responding quite strongly to some of these headwinds through a combination of fiscal and monetary policy measures," said Safdar Parvez, advisor at the East Asia Department of the ADB, during a virtual media briefing.
Tensions have cast a shadow over dialogue between the Japanese and Chinese leaders, and the realization of the “constructive and stable relationship” that both countries have sought is not in sight.
"Although the element of lithium is not scarce in nature, the process of extraction and refining takes time, leading to a situation where supply lags demand. This situation has some appeal to investors. With investment inflows, supply will pick up and prices might fall. The change is cyclical," Lin said.
