A congressional advisory panel said yesterday that Chinese spying in the US represents the greatest threat to US technology and recommended lawmakers consider financing counterintelligence efforts meant to stop China from stealing US manufacturing expertise.
The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission also said in its annual report to Congress that small and medium US manufacturers, which represent more than half the manufacturing jobs in the US, "face the full brunt of China's unfair trade practices, including currency manipulation and illegal subsidies for Chinese exports."
Beijing's economic policies create a trade relationship that is "severely out of balance" in China's favor, said the commission, which Congress set up in 2000 to investigate and report on US-China issues.
Commission Chairperson Carolyn Bartholomew told reporters that "China's interest in moving toward a free market economy is not just stalling but is actually now reversing course."
Messages left with the Chinese embassy in Washington were not immediately returned. Chinese officials have reacted to past reports by warning against what they see as outside interference in Chinese affairs.
The report comes about a year before US presidential and congressional elections, and candidates have been critical of what they see as China's failure to live up to its responsibilities as an emerging superpower. China is often singled out for its flood of goods into the US; building a massive, secretive military; abusing its citizens' rights; and befriending rogue nations to secure sources of energy.
US officials also recognize Washington needs Beijing, a veto-holding member of the UN Security Council, to secure punishment for Iran's nuclear program and to persuade North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons.
The commission's Democratic and Republican appointees have begun meeting with congressional staff and lawmakers to discuss the report's 42 recommendations.
In the report, the commission said China's spies allow Chinese companies to get new technology "without the necessity of investing time or money to perform research."
Chinese espionage was said to be straining US counterintelligence officials and helping China's military modernization.
While the report praised China for some economic progress this year, improvements were undertaken "with great hesitancy and, even then, only with the prodding of other nations and the World Trade Organization."
China, it said, "maintains a preference for authoritarian controls over its economy" and has done too little to police widespread copyright piracy of foreign goods sold in China.
The commission also faulted China for keeping its currency artificially low. US manufacturers have complained that a low yuan makes Chinese goods cheaper in the US and US products more expensive in China.
China's dependence on coal, lack of energy efficiency and poor enforcement of environmental regulations, the report said, "are creating devastating environmental effects that extend throughout the region and beyond" to the US.
The commission said tensions between Taiwan and China have created an "emotionally charged standoff that risks armed conflict if not carefully managed by both sides. Such a conflict could involve the United States."
The US has hinted it would go to war to protect Taiwan if nuclear-armed China were to attack.
The report also described what it said was China's tight control over information distribution, which allows Beijing "to manage and manipulate the perceptions of the Chinese people, often promoting nationalism and xenophobia."
Beijing, the report said, uses its control of the media to influence its perception in the US, which could endanger US citizens if reports on food and product safety and disease outbreaks are manipulated.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats
RSS