US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s week-long visit to China, the second in less than a year, which began on 3 April, represents a remarkable development in relations between the world’s two leading powers. Among other things, it is noteworthy because it came almost immediately after the telephone conversation between the two leaders, which was the first contact between them since they met in San Francisco on the sidelines of the next APEC summit in November 2023. In the six months since then, the long process of accumulation of various kinds of negativity in the bilateral relationship has continued…

On the 2^nd of April, US President Joe Biden had an almost two-hour-long phone call with China’s Xi Jinping, where both leaders discussed the future of US-China ties and issues that underpin it. A bone of contention was restrictions on the transfer of US technologies to China. While Biden argued that restrictions were meant to protect US “national security”, Xi pointed out that restrictions were hurting China’s smooth growth. But despite this clash, a key outcome of the phone call was Washington’s announcement that the US Treasury Secretary…

Two weeks after the meeting of the Chinese parliament, commonly referred to as the “Two Sessions”, held in the first half of March this year, two equally noteworthy forum events were held in Beijing and immediately afterwards in the resort town of Boao (on Hainan Island), attended by Chinese and foreign experts. The main theme of the latter was the implementation of a fundamentally innovative trend in the country’s economic policy, the main provisions of which had been outlined by the Chinese…

The Taiwan issue was last discussed in the NEO in the context of the increasingly visible presence of two new centres of influence emerging in the Indo-Pacific, namely India and Japan. The latter is particularly active there. However, the two major world powers, China and the United States, remain the main players in the games around Taiwan. And from the point of view of the former, everything that is somehow related to Taiwan concerns only China and no one else. Washington’s official position can be described by the formula “Yes, but…”, which has three main components…

We last addressed the topic of exchanging significant signals in the lines of communication between the two leading world powers (the United States and China) in connection with the regular “Davos Forum” and “Munich Security Conference” held at the beginning of this year. However, a number of subsequent events, as well as a certain “trail” left by U.S. Secretary of State Blinken’s speech at the latter event, allow us to return to the same topic once again…

On 26-27 January, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, a member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, and Jake Sullivan, National Security Advisor to the US President, met in the Thai capital Bangkok. This event should be considered an important stepping stone in the overall process of re-establishing lines of communication between the two leading world powers, which was launched during the summit of their leaders held in San Francisco last November. NEO more or less regularly comments on any noteworthy developments in this undoubtedly positive process…

So, on 13 January, one of the most notable events of the current stage of the “Great World Game” took place, which was the “calendar” general election in Taiwan. According to their results, the island will now be governed by a new president (since Tsai Ing-wen, who held this post for two consecutive terms, could not once again run for office) and a completely renewed parliament. It seems appropriate to express at once the author’s assessment of this whole action, which, however, has already been outlined earlier. Its significance was rather overestimated by months-long efforts of the leading actors…

Earlier, the NEO discussed the forecasts by representatives of Chinese academia of a possible scenario for the development of relations in 2024 between the two current leading world powers, i.e. the United States and China, which were presented by the Global Times at the end of last year. We would like to emphasise once again that the nature of changes on the table of the “Great World Game” as a whole will depend on this scenario. The results of the work carried out by the newspaper’s editorial staff were expressed in two words: “stabilisation” and “uneven”. These are responsible words…

On January 16th, President Biden of the United States invited leaders of the US Congress to meet with him to discuss military assistance to Ukraine and Taiwan. On July 29^th, 2023, the USA announced that it was providing a military aid package to Taiwan of 345 million dollars to be used to allocate already existing US stockpiles of weapons and ammunition including missile, manpad air defence systems, intelligence and surveillance equipment to “maintain Taiwan’s self-defence against China”…

The election of a candidate from the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which supports Taipei’s independence and closer ties with the United States, may result in increased tensions with Beijing. The situation regarding the conflict around Taiwan is becoming increasingly complex. On January 13 of this year, international experts were making preliminary forecasts for the general elections on the island and possible developments…

On 21 December of this year, the Chinese official publication Global Times, whose target audience is mainly abroad, published a remarkable article with the positions of representatives of Chinese academic science on the current state and prospects for the development of U.S.-China relations in the coming year. The extreme urgency of the issues raised in this publication is explained by the obvious fact that we are talking about the relations between the two main participants of the current stage of the “Big World Game”, which significantly determine the nature of the transformation…

The island-nation of Taiwan seems to feature much more in strategic considerations in the great game between the two superpowers of our time than its size alone would suggest. Home to less than 25 million people and a third the size of KPK in Pakistan, the country is one of the most important in the world; almost exclusively due to its position as the world’s leading manufacturer of computer chips. The history of American support for Taiwan against China’s claims to it as part of its own territory comes as a legacy of the Cold War. Upon the rise to power in China…