Politics

While it is still unclear if the Anwar Ibrahim administration has a clear China policy in place, the general trajectory is a positive posture towards China. Even so, the relationship can be expanded and strengthened beyond economic numbers to channelling the benefits of cooperation to local SMEs, and broadening cooperation to areas where the prime minister has shown great personal interest, such as inter-civilisational dialogue.

For years after the Cold War, given its military dominance, the US saw itself as instrumental to maintaining an “Asian peace”. With that mindset, the more it perceives China as a threat to its Asian primacy, the more it will be on the defensive. In truth, Asian peace was achieved through various efforts, and Asia-Pacific countries all have a stake in seeing it maintained.

Zaobao’s associate editor Han Yong Hong notes that amid the US’s strong response to the recent incident of a Chinese balloon intruding into US airspace, there are other more pressing issues at hand, whereby the US and China need to communicate and cooperate. Both sides will need to keep their focus and work out their priorities.

US academic Zhu Zhiqun notes that the Chinese balloon incident highlights just how fragile US-China relations are, and the uphill climb it will be to rebuild mutual trust.

If ASEAN can’t tango with China or the US, who else? Pragmatic as always, ASEAN’s favourite choices for hedging partners remain the EU and Japan but attention appears to have also fallen on India as its third choice this year.

Lance Gore explains why navigating China’s “new era” requires out-of-the-box thinking on managing the knowledge economy, such as redefining employment and value beyond the capitalist labour market, and managing the uneven distribution of creativity and innovation. Moreover, the country needs to be wary of a reversion to large-scale centralisation of power and rule by the voice of one.

US-China tensions have heightened in the aftermath of the Chinese balloon incident. The Republicans are seizing the opportunity to criticise the Biden administration over the threat to national security, while China accuses the US of overreacting and violating the spirit of international law and international practice. Zaobao correspondent Yang Danxu notes that if the situation is not managed properly, the strained relations could have an impact on other issues, such as the South China Sea.

China’s anti-corruption agency announced on 5 February that three CCP cadres were under investigation for disciplinary issues — specifically, corruption. While the CCP’s anti-corruption efforts have apparently shown results, those under investigation usually come under scrutiny after they leave their posts. Zaobao correspondent Yu Zeyuan looks at how effective such crackdowns are.

Japan's new National Security Strategy states that China's stance and activities are "a matter of serious concern”. Part of the assessment hinges on the fact that China’s leaders are changing their policy preferences, such as by placing emphasis on a holistic approach to national security and moving from collective to personal leadership.