Sorted by date Results 1 - 25 of 27
BEIJING (AP) — A military history buff in China appears to have made an alarming discovery after picking up four discarded books for less than $1 at a neighborhood recycling station: They were confidential military documents. The country's Ministry of State Security told the story in a social media post on Thursday, praising the retired man for calling a hotline to report the incident. It identified him only by his family name, Zhang, and did not say what the documents were about. "Mr. Zhang thought to himself that he had 'bought' the country's...
LIVONIA, Mich. (AP) — A tiny, low-priced electric car called the Seagull has American automakers and politicians trembling. The car, launched last year by Chinese automaker BYD, sells for around $12,000 in China, but drives well and is put together with craftsmanship that rivals U.S.-made electric vehicles that cost three times as much. A shorter-range version costs under $10,000. Tariffs on imported Chinese vehicles probably will keep the Seagull away from America's shores for now, and it likely would sell for more than 12 grand if i...
GUANGZHOU, China (AP) — U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Saturday that upcoming U.S.-China talks will tackle a top Biden administration complaint that Beijing's economic model and trade practices put American companies and workers at an unfair competitive disadvantage. "I think the Chinese realize how concerned we are about the implications of their industrial strategy for the United States, for the potential to flood our markets with exports that make it difficult for American firms to compete," Yellen told reporters after the a...
SHANGRI-LA TOWN, China (AP) — First-grade students, hands folded on their desks, watch a teacher write a brush-like stroke on a blackboard in their Tibetan alphabet. Outside, craggy mountains climb toward the brightest of blue skies. The air is clean and crisp at 2,800 meters (9,100 feet), if a bit thin. The Shangri-La Key Boarding School is an example of bilingual education, Chinese-style. Tibetan activists have a different term for it: forced assimilation. The issue is getting official attention this year, with U.N. human rights experts a...
BEIJING (AP) — China on Tuesday welcomed a virtual meeting between President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Joe Biden as raising hopes for better relations, while the U.S. was more muted on the talks as the world's two biggest powers sought to ratchet down more than a year of tensions. The leaders appeared to put aside the language of acrimony in their first formal meeting since Biden took office. Xi greeted the U.S. leader as his "old friend," and Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said the exchange was candid and constructive. "...
GENEVA (AP) — A joint World Health Organization-China study on the origins of COVID-19 says that transmission of the virus from bats to humans through another animal is the most likely scenario and that a lab leak is "extremely unlikely," according to a draft copy obtained by The Associated Press. The findings offer little new insight into how the virus first emerged and leave many questions unanswered. But the report does provide more detail on the reasoning behind the researchers' conclusions. The team proposed further research in every area...
DANDONG, China (AP) — China was expected to open the first trial Friday for one of two Canadians who have been held for more than two years in apparent retaliation for Canada’s arrest of a senior Chinese telecom executive. Canada said its consular officials were not given permission to attend the proceedings despite several requests. They have been notified that a court hearing for Michael Spavor would be held Friday, and one for Michael Kovrig would follow on Monday. China has not publicly confirmed the court dates, and calls to the court in D...
BEIJING (AP) — The United States said Wednesday that it has ordered China to close its consulate in Houston "to protect American intellectual property" and the private information of Americans. China strongly condemned the move, the latest in a series of steps by the Trump administration as it ratchets up pressure on the world's second-largest economy over trade, technology, human rights and security. In Houston, firefighters responded to reports of papers being burned on the consulate grounds Tuesday night but were barred entry, according t...
BEIJING (AP) — Last month, Wuhan was overwhelmed with thousands of new cases of coronavirus each day, but in a dramatic development that underscores just how much the outbreak has pivoted toward Europe and the United States, Chinese authorities said Thursday that the city and it's surrounding province had no new cases to report. The news offered a rare glimmer of hope for the rest of the world as it battles the virus, and perhaps a lesson in the strict measures needed to halt its spread. It came as President Donald Trump likened the fight to "...
BEIJING (AP) — Infections and deaths from the new virus in China ballooned for a second straight day Friday, on paper at least, as officials near the epicenter of the outbreak struggled to keep up with a backlog of patients' lab work. The acceleration in cases was not necessarily an indicator of a surge in the illness known as COVID-19 because the hardest-hit province of Hubei and its capital of Wuhan changed the way it counted cases. But public health experts wrestled with what exactly could be deduced from the numbers given the shift in appro...
BEIJING (AP) — China on Thursday finished building a second new hospital to isolate and treat patients of a virus that has killed more than 560 people and continues to spread, disrupting travel and people's lives and fueling economic fears. A first group of patients was expected to start testing a new antiviral drug, as China also moved people with milder symptoms into makeshift hospitals at sports centers, exhibition halls and other public spaces. The health care system in the central city of Wuhan, where the outbreak was first detected in D...
BEIJING (AP) — The death toll in mainland China from the new type of virus has risen to 425, with the total number of cases now standing at 20,438, officials said Tuesday. The new figures come after the country opened a new hospital built in 10 days, infused cash into tumbling financial markets and further restricted people's movement in hopes of containing the rapidly spreading virus and its escalating impact. Japanese officials were deciding whether to quarantine more than 3,000 people on a cruise ship that carried a passenger who tested p...
WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States on Friday declared a public health emergency and took drastic steps to significantly restrict entry into the country because of a new virus that hit China and has spread to other nations. President Donald Trump has signed an order that will temporarily bar foreign nationals, other than immediate family of U.S. citizens and permanent residents, who have traveled in China within the last 14 days. The new restrictions, which take effect at 5 p.m. EST on Sunday, were announced by Health and Human Services S...
BEIJING (AP) — World health officials expressed "great concern" Wednesday that a dangerous new virus is starting to spread between people outside of China, a troubling development as China and the world frantically work to contain the outbreak. For a second day, the number of infections grew dramatically. The new virus has now infected more people in China than were sickened there during the 2002-2003 SARS outbreak. On Wednesday, the number of cases jumped to 5,974, surpassing the 5,327 people diagnosed with SARS. The death toll, which rose t...
BEIJING (AP) — China moved to lock down at least three cities with a combined population of more than 18 million in an unprecedented effort to contain the deadly new virus that has sickened hundreds of people and spread to other parts of the world during the busy Lunar New Year holiday. The open-ended lockdowns are unmatched in size, embracing more people than New York City, Los Angeles and Chicago put together. The train station and airport in Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, were shut down, and ferry, subway and bus service was h...
BEIJING (AP) — China's most festive holiday began in the shadow of a worrying new virus Saturday as the death toll surpassed 40, an unprecedented lockdown kept 36 million people from traveling and authorities canceled a host of Lunar New Year events. The National Health Commission reported a jump in the number of people infected with the virus to 1,287 with 41 deaths. The latest tally comes from 29 provinces across China, including 237 patients in serious condition. All 41 deaths have been in China, including 39 in Hubei province, the epicenter...
BEIJING (AP) — A Chinese city of more than 11 million people planned to shut down outbound flights and trains Thursday as the world's most populous country battled the spread of a new virus that has sickened hundreds of people and killed 17, state media reported. Everyone in the city of Wuhan was to be restricted to some degree. The state-owned People's Daily newspaper said no one would be allowed to leave. The official Xinhua News Agency said no one would be permitted to leave without a specific reason. Train stations and the airport were t...
HONG KONG (AP) — Frustration among protesters in Hong Kong boiled over Monday, with one group attacking the legislative building and tens of thousands of others marching through the city to demand expanded democracy on the 22nd anniversary of the former British colony's return to China. Black-clad protesters wearing hard hats and face masks smashed a large hole through the bottom of a floor-to-ceiling window at the legislature in the early afternoon. They repeatedly rammed a cargo cart and large poles into the glass while police with riot s...
HONG KONG (AP) — Hundreds of protesters swarmed into Hong Kong's legislature Monday night, defacing portraits of lawmakers and spray-painting pro-democracy slogans in the chamber before vacating it as riot police cleared surrounding streets with tear gas and then moved inside. The three-hour occupation, which ended early Tuesday, came on the 22nd anniversary of the former British colony's return to China, a city holiday, and reflected mounting frustration with Hong Kong's leader for not responding to protesters' demands after several weeks o...
BEIJING (AP) — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, meeting in Pyongyang with Chinese President Xi Jinping, said Thursday that his country is waiting for a desired response in stalled nuclear talks with the United States. "North Korea would like to remain patient, but it hopes the relevant party will meet halfway with North Korea to explore resolution plans that accommodate each other's reasonable concerns," he said, according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV. Xi's trip to North Korea, the first by a Chinese president in 14 years, raises the possi...
BEIJING (AP) — China is creating a system to protect its technology, according to state media, as the U.S. restricts the access of Chinese companies to American technology in a spiraling trade dispute. The People's Daily newspaper said Sunday that the system will build a strong firewall to strengthen the nation's ability to innovate and to accelerate the development of key technologies. "China ... will never allow certain countries to use China's technology to contain China's development and suppress Chinese enterprises," the main paper of t...
BEIJING (AP) — All systems are go as a Chinese spacecraft and rover power up their observation equipment after making a first-ever landing on the far side of the moon, the Chinese National Space Administration said. The Jade Rabbit 2 rover has succeeded in establishing a digital transmission link with a relay satellite that sends data back to the Beijing control center, the space agency said in a posting late Friday on its website. The rover's radar and panoramic camera have been activated and are working normally, it said. A photo released b...
BEIJING (AP) — China's burgeoning space program achieved a lunar milestone on Thursday: landing a probe on the mysterious and misnamed "dark" side of the moon. Exploring the cosmos from that far side of the moon, which people can't see from Earth, could eventually help scientists learn more about the early days of the solar system and maybe even the birth of the universe's first stars. Three nations — the United States, the former Soviet Union and more recently China — all have sent spacecraft to the side of the moon that faces Earth, but t...
BEIJING (AP) — A Chinese space rover explored the lunar terrain on Friday in the world's first mission on the surface of the far side of the moon. Jade Rabbit 2 drove off a ramp the previous night and onto the soft, powdery surface after a Chinese spacecraft made the first-ever soft landing on the moon's far side. A photo posted online by China's space agency showed tracks left by the rover as it headed away from the spacecraft. "It's a small step for the rover, but one giant leap for the Chinese nation," Wu Weiren, the chief designer of the L...
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — It's been more than a decade since the leaders of the two Koreas have held a summit. Could it happen now? South Korean President Moon Jae-in told reporters Wednesday that he remains open to a meeting with North Korea's leader, if it would improve the strained relations between their two countries and help resolve the global standoff over the North's nuclear weapons development. It's not a new position for Moon, who took office in May, but it took on new meaning coming one day after high-level officials from the two K...
