Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶) encouraged North Korea to allow “market mechanisms” help revamp its economy, state media said on Saturday, and laid down other preconditions as China tries to wean its impoverished ally off its dependence on Chinese aid.
Wen’s comments followed his meeting with Jang Song-thaek, the powerful uncle of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, in Beijing on Friday. Jang is the highest-profile North Korean official to visit China since Kim came to power in December last year.
As well as allowing freer rein to market forces, the Chinese premier also recommended Pyongyang encourage economic growth by improving laws and regulations, encouraging business investment and reforming its customs services.
Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) also met Jang in a clear show of support for the North and its new leadership. Jang is seen as the driving force behind reforms that the isolated and destitute North is believed to be trying and for which it desperately needs Chinese backing.
Beijing has had difficulty managing the relationship with North Korea, which it views as a strategically critical buffer between itself and US military forces in South Korea.
North Korea is often more cantankerous than China would like, in particular toward South Korea, even though the economic relationship between China and South Korea is far more important. Bilateral ties are also not always smooth.
In May, North Korea seized a number of Chinese fishermen and boats in the Yellow Sea and demanded 1.2 million yuan (US$188,700) for their release.
China has expressed unhappiness with North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, particularly with nuclear tests that have been conducted near the Chinese border, and is quietly lobbying against future tests. Beijing has supported international sanctions against the North in the past, and has also occasionally cut off economic aid, including critical oil shipments, but the desperate state of the North’s economy has limited its leverage over Pyongyang.
Experts and government sources say China cannot go too far with such sanctions for fear of destabilizing the regime entirely, prompting a flow of refugees across the border into China.
China and North Korea have moved to intensify economic cooperation through development zones in Rason on North Korea’s east coast, and in the border area of Hwanggumphyong.
So far, North Korea has received about US$300 million in non-financial direct investment from about 100 Chinese companies, mainly in the food, medicine, electronics, mining, light industry, chemicals and textile sectors.
China’s exports to North Korea rose 20.6 percent last year to US$2.28 billion from 2010, while imports plunged 81.4 percent to US$147.4 million, according to Chinese customs figures.
Those numbers are dwarfed by trade with South Korea, China’s third-largest trading partner.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) on Wednesday said that a new chip manufacturing technology called “A16” is to enter production in the second half of 2026, setting up a showdown with longtime rival Intel over who can make the fastest chips. TSMC, the world’s biggest contract manufacturer of advanced computing chips and a key supplier to Nvidia and Apple, announced the news at a conference in Santa Clara, California, where TSMC executives said that makers of artificial intelligence (AI) chips will likely be the first adopters of the technology rather than a smartphone maker. Analysts said that the technologies announced on
NO RECIPROCITY: Taipei has called for cross-strait group travel to resume fully, but Beijing is only allowing people from its Fujian Province to travel to Matsu, the MAC said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday criticized an announcement by the Chinese Ministry of Culture and Tourism that it would lift a travel ban to Taiwan only for residents of China’s Fujian Province, saying that the policy does not meet the principles of reciprocity and openness. Chinese Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism Rao Quan (饒權) yesterday morning told a delegation of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers in a meeting in Beijing that the ministry would first allow Fujian residents to visit Lienchiang County (Matsu), adding that they would be able to travel to Taiwan proper directly once express ferry
CALL FOR DIALOGUE: The president-elect urged Beijing to engage with Taiwan’s ‘democratically elected and legitimate government’ to promote peace President-elect William Lai (賴清德) yesterday named the new heads of security and cross-strait affairs to take office after his inauguration on May 20, including National Security Council (NSC) Secretary-General Wellington Koo (顧立雄) to be the new defense minister and former Taichung mayor Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) as minister of foreign affairs. While Koo is to head the Ministry of National Defense and presidential aide Lin is to take over as minister of foreign affairs, Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) would be retained as the nation’s intelligence chief, continuing to serve as director-general of the National Security Bureau, Lai told a news conference in Taipei. Koo,
MANAGING DIFFERENCES: In a meeting days after the US president signed a massive foreign aid bill, Antony Blinken raised concerns with the Chinese president about Taiwan US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday met with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and senior Chinese officials, stressing the importance of “responsibly managing” the differences between the US and China as the two sides butt heads over a number of contentious bilateral, regional and global issues, including Taiwan and the South China Sea. Talks between the two sides have increased over the past few months, even as differences have grown. Blinken said he raised concerns with Xi about Taiwan and the South China Sea, along with China’s support for Russia and its invasion of Ukraine, as well as other issues