WASHINGTON (Reuters) – FBI Director Christopher Wray told a Senate panel on Wednesday that the law enforcement agency is “deeply concerned” about any company like China’s ZTE gaining positions of power in the U.S. telecommunications market.
Read Full Story Here: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-china-zte-fbi/fbi-chief-says-agency-deeply-concerned-about-any-company-like-chinas-zte-idUSKCN1IH2T0
Chinese railway police are using facial-recognition sunglasses to catch suspects at train stations in Zhengzhou, the capital of central Henan province.
New York, January 18, 2018) –The Chinese government under the leadership of President Xi Jinping expanded its sustained offensive against human rights both at home and abroad in 2017, Human Rights Watch said today in its World Report 2018. The death of the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo in a hospital under heavy guard in July epitomized the authorities’ deep contempt for people’s rights. China used its increasing global influence to threaten the protection of rights internationally.
Liu Xiaobo died from cancer in a Shenyang hospital, surrounded by state security, after serving nearly 9 years of his 11-year prison sentence for “inciting subversion.” During his hospitalization, authorities isolated Liu and his wife, Liu Xia, from family and supporters, and denied Liu’s request to seek treatment outside the country. Since Liu’s death, authorities have forcibly disappeared Liu Xia.
Read Full Story Here: https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/01/18/china-rights-crackdown-goes-global
(Reuters) – Chinese wind turbine maker Sinovel Wind Group Co was convicted on Wednesday of U.S. charges that it stole trade secrets from AMSC, causing the Massachusetts-based company to lose more than $800 million.
A federal jury in Madison, Wisconsin, found Sinovel, once AMSC’s largest customer, guilty on all charges it faced, including conspiracy, trade-secret theft and wire fraud, the U.S. Justice Department said.
The conviction exposes Beijing-based Sinovel to hundreds of millions of dollars in potential fines, according to the Justice Department. It is scheduled to be sentenced on June 4.
Sinovel, which saw its shares slide 4 percent in Thursday morning trade on the news, will take legal measures to protect its rights and interests as well as those of its shareholders, it said in a filing to the Shanghai stock exchange.
The stock has lost 46 percent since the charges were brought in June 2013, giving it a market value of about $1.4 billion.
The charges were announced amid heightened concern about Chinese theft of U.S. trade secrets and a legal battle in the Chinese courts pitting Devens, Massachusetts-based AMSC against Sinovel, one of the world’s largest turbine makers.
The conviction also comes as the United States studies possible intellectual property action against China. U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said on Wednesday China’s tech ambitions represent a direct threat that is being implemented by disrespect for “intellectual property rights, by commercial espionage.”
Read Full Story Here: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-sinovel-wind-gro-usa-court/chinas-sinovel-convicted-in-u-s-of-trade-secret-theft-idUSKBN1FD2XL
A pyramid scheme in China has been revealed to have ensnared millions of investors, who have jointly lost 30 billion yuan (about $4.7 billion) in investment capital.
Back in December 2017, Zhang Xiaolei, founder of online platform Qianbao.com, turned himself into the police, admitting that he had been running a Ponzi scheme since the company’s founding in 2012.
Caixin, a Chinese business publication, reported that the case involved total funds of roughly 70 billion yuan (about $10.9 billion).
A report published on Jan. 20 by the Chinese regime’s mouthpiece, Xinhua, revealed how the company defrauded its customers.
The company’s purported business model was an online platform that would reward its users for their activity on it, eventually attracting enough users to start selling advertising on the site.
Read Full Story Here: https://www.theepochtimes.com/how-a-massive-pyramid-scheme-in-china-defrauded-millions_2421983.html
Sens. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Tom Carper (D-Del.) on Wednesday released the results of a nearly yearlong bipartisan investigation showing the ease of which drug traffickers in China can ship powerful synthetic opioids into the United States.
The 100-page report found that when it comes to fentanyl — which can be up to 50 times more potent than heroin — those selling online in China prefer to ship the drug into the country through the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) rather than private mail shippers, reportedly because the sellers think there’s less of a risk that U.S. Customs and Border Protection will seize the package.
Lawmakers and the White House are grappling with how to curb an opioid epidemic that’s led to skyrocketing death rates. The number of deaths from drugs like fentanyl more than doubled from 2015 to 2016, according to the latest numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“This bipartisan investigation has uncovered how incredibly easy it is to buy these deadly drugs online and have them shipped here through the mail,” Carper said in a statement.
“We have also learned how ill-equipped federal agencies were to prevent drug smugglers from taking advantage of a massive surge in recent years of e-commerce and international mail to ship synthetic opioid, like fentanyl, into our communities.”
The report’s release comes ahead of a hearing on the issue Thursday, where officials from various agencies will be called to testify before a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs subcommittee on investigations led by Portman and Carper.
In performing the investigation, subcommittee staff told reporters that they googled “fentanyl for sale.” Though they didn’t ultimately buy the drug, they said they communicated with six sellers over the course of three months.
Read The Full Story Here: http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/370598-congressional-probe-finds-synthetic-opioid-easily-shipped-from-china-to-us
Taiwanese businesses that operate and invest in China face many risks: getting scammed, bullied, and beaten by local mafia, and getting ensnared in local political infighting—all this without any form of legal redress.
The latest hurdle comes in the form of restrictive environmental protection regulations that have suffocated businesses, forcing them to close down.
Since China enacted laws to open up trade and business with Taiwan in the 1990s, many companies from the island across the strait have capitalized on the opportunity of China’s sizeable market.
However, for some, the investments haven’t paid off.
Late last year, a leaked online document revealed that Kunshan City in Jiangsu Province—a hub for Taiwan businesses—had requested 270 factories to stop production from Dec. 25 to Jan. 10 because the local freshwater quality was not up to standard. About a half of the affected companies were Taiwanese, according to the BBC.
Read much more here: http://www.ntd.tv/2018/01/16/protecting-the-environment-is-chinas-latest-excuse-to-bully-taiwanese-businesses/
