US authorities designated the A7 financial network as a "significant transnational criminal organization," the latest in a series of steps by Western authorities to try and choke the sprawling Kremlin-backed sanctions-evading scheme.

TOKYO – China gave global investors one of 2026’s biggest AI thrills. Yet the country that helped ignite excitement about artificial intelligence is home to one of the worst-performing major stock markets. While AI fever has propelled Seoul, Taipei and Tokyo higher, Chinese shares are stuck in reverse.

So what gives? Several forces, actually. Weak household demand, for one. Consumer spending continues to disappoint, weighing on the earnings potential of mainland internet companies, automakers, and retailers.

The post Why China is missing the big AI rally appeared first on Asia Times.

The reconstructed face of a man who lived over 8,000 years ago was unveiled yesterday in Zhengzhou, the administrative center of Henan Province in central China, shedding light on the region’s prehistoric inhabitants. The sculpture was created based on human remains discovered during excavations at the Jiahu archaeological site in Henan. The reconstruction combined physical […]

The artificial intelligence (AI) race between the United States and China has accelerated in model protection, supply chains and talent controls, even as the two nations’ leaders agreed last week to open a new dialogue on AI safety. A string of moves announced or uncovered this week shows that both sides are now guarding their […]

The post US bans Chinese data center gear as Beijing grounds its AI talent appeared first on Asia Times.

The Lenin District Court in Bishkek found activist and politician Mavlyan Askarbekov guilty and sentenced to two years in prison on offenses related to a law on incitement of racial, ethnic, national, religious, or interregional hatred, a verdict he called "absurd."

The U.S. government set off conventional explosives inside a tunnel deep in the Nevada desert this week in a test designed to replicate a so-called “decoupled” nuclear detonation. Data collected is now being used to help improve methods for detecting this kind of nuclear testing. Just earlier this year, American authorities accused China of using decoupling to conceal new nuclear tests despite the country’s stated moratorium on such activities.

The test, which involved the use of chemical high-explosives and radiotracers, was conducted yesterday inside P Tunnel in Area 12 of the Nevada National Security Site (NNSA), according to a press release from the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The NNSS, which is situated within the boundaries of the U.S. Air Force’s Nevada Test and Training Range (NTTR), is used for a wide variety of testing purposes today. An agency under the Department of Energy, NNSA’s main jobs are to oversee the development and production of nuclear weapons, as well as manage America’s nuclear deterrent stockpile.

“This experiment is especially focused on further enhancing the U.S. capabilities to detect a ‘decoupled’ explosion,” per NNSA’s release. “Data collected from the experiment will be used to validate scientific models and refine algorithms that are critical to U.S. nuclear explosion detection efforts.”

“Just as a stealth aircraft looks smaller on radar, decoupling can greatly muffle the signals detected by nuclear detection sensors, making a large explosion appear smaller,” the release explains. “In a conventional, or ‘coupled,’ underground nuclear test, a device is placed deep in a hole in close contact with the rock, allowing much of the explosion’s shockwave to reach sensors. In a decoupled test, by contrast, the device is detonated inside a large underground chamber, substantially reducing the explosion’s seismic signature.”

“In this experiment, researchers gathered measurements using a broad suite of advanced sensors, including accelerometers, seismometers, infrasound sensors, electromagnetic sensors, chemical and radiotracer samplers, and meteorological sensors,” it adds. ”Together, these measurements will improve scientists’ understanding of the signatures produced by underground explosions and strengthen the United States’ ability to detect and characterize nuclear explosive events.”

The U.S. already maintains a U.S. Atomic Energy Detection Systems (USAEDS) network, which is overseen by the U.S. Air Force Technical Applications Center (AFTAC). USAEDS is made up of more than 3,600 sensors positioned around the world. USAEDS is also tied in with the International Monitoring System (IMS), which is managed by the organization responsible for overseeing the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT). AFTAC also supports the mission to monitor for potential nuclear testing globally using a fleet of specially configured WC-135R Constant Phoenix aircraft. In addition, those planes are used to help keep watch for unusual spikes in atmospheric radiation that could point to nuclear or radiological accidents or other incidents leading to the spread of potentially dangerous radioactive material.

With regard to the USAEDS network specifically, “once a disturbance is detected underground, underwater, in the atmosphere or in space, the event is analyzed for nuclear identification, and the findings are reported to command authorities,” according to AFTAC’s website.

As mentioned, the U.S. government has accused its Chinese counterparts of using decoupling to conceal new nuclear testing, and NNSA’s press release draws explicit attention to these allegations. At the annual Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, Switzerland, in February, Thomas DiNanno, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, said that China had conducted at least one such test at Lop Nur on June 22, 2020. The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) subsequently said the IMS had not detected an event matching that description at that location on that date. For its part, the Chinese government has denied the accusation.

The social media posts below include satellite imagery showing activity at Lop Nur that could point to new nuclear testing activities in recent years.

参考
Satellite Imagery Analysis of China’s Alleged 2020 Nuclear Test at Lop Nurhttps://t.co/aafvU5Szh7
CSIS 20260213
ROLES SAT ANALYSIS No.7　中国に核実験実施の動き ー Lop Nur核実験場の画像分析 ーhttps://t.co/n66yYk0hLg
ROLES 20250522

— KAROTASU (@type36512) May 24, 2026

While China is a signatory to the CTBT, the country has never ratified it. The Chinese government last acknowledged a critical-level nuclear test in 1996, after which a self-imposed moratorium was put in place, at least publicly. As an aside, the United States has also signed, but never ratified, the CTBT, and has a similar self-imposed moratorium on nuclear testing since 1992. It is worth noting that the treaty does not ban so-called sub-critical testing, which involves fissile material, but does not result in a full-fledged nuclear reaction.

Last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Trump administration has been holding new talks with the Chinese government regarding various aspects of the country’s massively and rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal, including the testing allegations. That story immediately preceded a state visit by China’s President Xi Jinping to Washington, D.C., to meet with Trump.

“The discussions between American and Chinese officials have centered on measures to reduce nuclear risks and haven’t been aimed at negotiating a formal arms-control pact, an effort Beijing has sharply rebuffed in the past,” according to that report. “The Trump administration has begun to highlight the possibility of implementing new verification measures.”

“Independent experts say seismic instruments might be placed on or near test sites,” The Journal‘s story also noted. “Another possibility, which was floated during the Biden administration, is to install radiation-detection equipment at test sites.”

NNSA’s announcement about the test at the Nevada National Security Site is certainly an example of the development underway already of new means of verification that could be deployed at sites around the world.

The United States has separately accused Russia of conducting lower-yield nuclear testing in secret in the past. Russia is a signatory to the CTBT and had previously ratified it. In 2023, President Vladimir Putin revoked that ratification in line with the provisions of a law passed by the country’s parliament, or Duma.

President Trump has also floated the idea of the resumption of U.S. nuclear testing in response to Russian and Chinese activities, though other U.S. officials have downplayed the possibility of doing so. The United States is otherwise in the midst of a huge nuclear modernization effort that impacts the air, sea, and land-based legs of the deterrent triad. American authorities are also now pursuing these efforts in an environment fully unbounded by relevant arms control agreements following the sunset of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) earlier this year.

The Russian government has said it is ready to conduct new nuclear tests if the United States pursues this course of action. The last official nuclear test in Russia came in 1990 right before the fall of the Soviet Union.

“It takes nuclear expertise to detect nuclear activities and experiments like these [to] ensure America remains unmatched in detection,” NNSA Administrator Brandon Williams said in a statement yesterday in light of the test in Nevada. “The Trump Administration has made it clear that the United States will lead from a position of strength. You cannot evade American innovation. With this experiment, we are sending a clear message: under this administration, America will never be outmatched.” 

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

The post U.S. Mimics “Decoupled” Nuclear Detonation By Blowing Up A Tunnel Conventionally appeared first on TWZ.

Xi’s recent visit to Washington was merely a tactical step rather than a genuine reconciliation. Beneath the façade of conspicuously displayed friendliness lies a persistent antagonism across various domains—an antagonism that both sides have learned to “manage,” including in ways that serve their respective domestic political objectives. Both fully aware that the perception of China […]

Press TV – September 30, 2026 

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s prediction that Iran’s economy would soon collapse underscores the depth of delusion within the current American leadership.

“Iran is absolutely not sanctionable,” Deputy Economy Minister Mortaza Zamanian said this week as Tehran worked to keep trade flowing despite Washington’s latest sanctions campaign.

Zamanian cited Iran’s extensive borders, established commercial routes and longstanding trading relationships, saying that they make it impossible for external pressure simply to switch off the country’s economy.

His remarks came as Washington intensified its economic terrorism against Iranian oil, shipping, aviation, finance, technology and foreign companies supporting those sectors.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that Iran would probably make its final oil deliveries to China within two weeks, after which, he asserted, “they will have nothing.”

That prediction deserves comparison with history, because American administrations have imposed increasingly severe sanctions since 1979 while repeatedly expecting economic pressure eventually to produce decisive Iranian economic collapse.

The economy did not disappear under those campaigns; instead, Iran developed domestic industries, expanded regional commerce, strengthened Asian trade and accumulated extensive experience operating outside Western financial systems.

The proposition that an economy which has absorbed American sanctions for almost half a century will suddenly become economically empty within two weeks therefore indicates the depth of delusion among the current US leadership.

Iran enters the current confrontation with a large domestic market, substantial productive capacity, enormous energy resources and deeply established commercial relationships extending across neighboring countries and wider Eurasian markets.

The World Bank describes Iran as relatively diversified for an oil-exporting economy, with substantial manufacturing, agricultural and service activity supported by a large population and significant domestic consumption.

That domestic market sustains production across food, pharmaceuticals, construction materials, steel, petrochemicals, machinery and consumer goods, meaning Iranian production does not depend entirely upon continuous access to Western consumers.

Iran has also developed major industrial capabilities suited to its own resources and infrastructure, including steel, refining, petrochemicals, cement, power generation, construction, food processing and pharmaceutical manufacturing.

These capabilities have continued developing despite restrictions on Western investment and technology, demonstrating that Iranian industrial activity does not depend upon permanent participation by Western companies.

Iran’s prolonged exposure to sanctions has produced accumulated technical and commercial knowledge, giving Iranian companies decades of experience managing restricted supply chains and unreliable access to foreign suppliers.

When foreign manufacturers withdraw, Iranian companies have learned to redesign equipment, substitute components, develop domestic suppliers and cooperate with businesses from countries willing to maintain commercial relationships.

Academic research has documented this process, showing that sanctions can simultaneously restrict foreign technology while encouraging domestic technological development and adaptation within affected Iranian industrial sectors.

The resulting knowledge extends beyond individual companies, because engineers, technicians, procurement specialists and managers have accumulated practical experience managing shortages, substitution and alternative sourcing.

Iranian manufacturers therefore do not design procurement systems around the assumption that every international supplier will remain available indefinitely, making adaptation part of ordinary commercial planning.

Iran’s geography provides another economic advantage, because the country borders Turkey, Iraq, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan while possessing coastlines reaching the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman.

Those borders connect Iranian commerce with the Caucasus, Central Asia, South Asia, the Persian Gulf, Turkey and Iraq, while transportation corridors also connect Iran with Russia and wider Eurasian markets.

Financial sanctions can make transactions more difficult, but they cannot physically relocate Iran or eliminate its access to neighboring markets, suppliers, transportation routes and established regional trading relationships.

Iran has consequently developed commercial links involving Iraq, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Caucasus, Central Asia and China through years of sustained economic interaction.

The World Bank has documented Iran’s increasing trade orientation toward neighboring countries and China as sanctions restricted conventional international relationships, making this regional pivot an established economic feature.

China adds another dimension because it combines enormous industrial capacity with sustained demand for Iranian energy while supplying machinery, manufactured products and industrial inputs required throughout Iran’s domestic economy.

The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission identifies China as Iran’s largest trading partner and estimates that China imported approximately 1.4 million barrels of Iranian crude daily during 2025.

Chinese independent refiners have continued purchasing Iranian crude through commercial arrangements designed to reduce their exposure to American financial restrictions and sanctions enforcement.

That relationship demonstrates why Iran does not require unrestricted access to every Western market when Chinese demand and extensive regional commerce provide alternative markets for Iranian commodities.

Iran’s energy resources provide enormous economic depth, with the World Bank ranking the country second globally in proven natural-gas reserves and fourth globally in proven crude-oil reserves.

Those resources provide export potential while also supplying abundant domestic energy and petrochemical feedstocks supporting manufacturing, electricity generation, transportation and numerous energy-intensive industrial activities.

Iran has consequently developed a substantial downstream economy converting hydrocarbons into refined products, petrochemicals and industrial inputs rather than depending exclusively upon crude-oil exports.

The World Bank has noted that sanctions encouraged additional processing of hydrocarbons into petrochemicals, illustrating how restrictions contributed to changes within Iran’s export structure.

Iran has also developed financial mechanisms outside conventional Western banking, including bilateral currency arrangements, exchange houses, barter, intermediary companies and indirect settlement channels supporting international commercial activity.

The World Bank has documented growing use of bilateral currency exchange, barter and indirect payment mechanisms as Iranian trade shifted increasingly toward neighboring countries and China.

These arrangements provide alternative methods for exchanging value when conventional dollar-based transactions become unavailable or prohibitively difficult.

Their existence helps explain why Washington increasingly targets third-country banks, intermediaries and commercial facilitators, because Iranian commerce extends through extensive international networks beyond domestic financial institutions.

Against this background, Bessent’s prediction assumes that eliminating a major source of oil revenue would effectively remove the broader economic foundations supporting Iran’s productive system and commercial institutions.

Iran’s economic structure is considerably broader, because oil exports represent one component of national activity alongside manufacturing, agriculture, services, domestic consumption and regional commerce.

The World Bank estimates that Iran’s economy contracted during the Iranian year ending March 2026, while simultaneously describing adaptation through changing trade patterns and alternative payment mechanisms.

Economic contraction, however, is fundamentally different from the disappearance of productive capacity, infrastructure, commercial institutions and domestic relationships sustaining millions of Iranian consumers and businesses.

American sanctions have repeatedly targeted Iranian banking, oil exports, investment, technology, shipping and foreign companies, yet Iran has retained its industrial base and redirected substantial trade toward neighboring countries.

Washington possesses powerful financial tools, but financial restrictions cannot physically eliminate Iran’s factories, oilfields, farms, engineers, consumers, ports, borders or commercial relationships accumulated over decades.

The central question is therefore whether American pressure can erase the productive, geographical, resource and commercial foundations Iran has accumulated across nearly half a century of economic adaptation.

Nothing in Iran’s economic history demonstrates that those foundations can disappear within two weeks, particularly while the country retains domestic production, regional markets, energy resources and established commercial relationships.

Iran therefore enters the present confrontation with domestic capabilities, energy resources, industrial capacity, geographic advantages and international relationships capable of keeping its economy operating despite intensified American terrorism.

Space is becoming an increasingly contested domain as major powers expand military capabilities, satellite infrastructure, and counterspace systems, while the U.S. Golden Dome initiative reshapes strategic stability and raises new questions about the future of space governance. On 14th September 2026, US Secretary of the Air Force Troy Meink confirmed that the US has “on-orbit” […]

Recent warnings from American AI leaders have created the impression that the world is only beginning to confront the dangers of advanced artificial intelligence. Dario Amodei, chief executive of tech company Anthropic, has called for governments to intervene to slow the development of increasingly powerful AI models. His proposal begins with independent evaluators embedded inside […]

The post As US tech leaders call for rules on AI, China already has them appeared first on Asia Times.

They’ve been shown to raise electricity bills, pollute drinking water, do little to boost local employment while threatening millions of jobs in a variety of industries, and top executives have warned that the technology they support could wipe out all of humanity by the end of the decade. But rather than take widespread public opposition to artificial intelligence data centers at face value, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) announced he had […]

The post US House speaker sees AI data center worries as ‘Chinese psyop’ appeared first on Asia Times.

Beijing may let its technology giants buy more Nvidia high-end chips, giving the US chip designer a fresh foothold in China and keeping Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) developers tied to its software after months of stalled trade. China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has asked major domestic companies, including ByteDance, Alibaba and Tencent, […]

The post After Trump-Xi summit, Nvidia RTX PRO 5500 gains export prospects appeared first on Asia Times.

The MEPs steering the EU’s key industrial law want “Made in Europe” to mean that goods are actually produced in the EU.

Their draft report on the Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA), presented to three parliament committees on Monday (28 September), would reserve the label, and the subsidies and public contracts that come with it, for goods produced in the 27 member states.

Partner countries such as Japan or Korea could be added later, but only if they meet set criteria.

This is a break with the EU commission’s proposal, which would apply to virtually every country with a free-trade or procurement deal with the EU. 

This article continues, but the full version is available only to EUobserver.com subscribers. Visit account.euobserver.com/membership

The Trump-Xi summit did not mark a US-China rapprochement, but it demonstrates that sustained diplomacy and strategic guardrails are essential to prevent intensifying competition from becoming direct conflict. The recent summit between Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Donald Trump in Washington has demonstrated a significant paradox in contemporary international politics: the two superpowers […]

President Donald Trump rolled out the red carpet for Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit to Washington, greeting him in person at Joint Base Andrews, a rare gesture for an American president. Critics in both parties warned that the pageantry would reward a rival. However, the red carpet, the state dinner with its exquisite menu, […]

The post Trump-Xi summit bade farewell to ‘China plus one’ appeared first on Asia Times.

Torn between its Russian, Chinese, Iranian and North Korean issues, American foreign policy has nonetheless revealed, over the decades, a constant hierarchy: the Sino-American rivalry remains the major geopolitical issue that structures Washington’s Asian policy. With one month to go before the midterm elections, the American election campaign, despite being structured by deep partisan divides, […]

By Prof. Glenn Diesen | September 26, 2026

The following are excerpts from my speech in Istanbul on September 26, 2026.

The unipolar world order has collapsed, and we should conduct a post-mortem to reflect on what went wrong and to understand the current turbulent transition of the world. In 1989, Francis Fukuyama famously published his article on the ‘End of History,’ which was largely adopted as an ideological guide by the political West. The world only had one superpower and one ideology, and the expectation was that the world would unify under US leadership and liberal democratic values. The dominance of the US would end international anarchy and security competition, as there was only one centre of power, and the US hegemon would elevate the role of liberal democracy to form an inclusive community of universal values. For more than three decades, the West produced a new generation of politicians who believed that the collective hegemony of the West was for the benefit of all mankind, and they were the administrators who would manage the transition from the chaotic world of the past to perpetual peace. So what went wrong?

The Contradiction of Hegemonic Universalism

The unipolar moment was always destined to be a temporary phenomenon, as the US would predictably exhaust its resources and incentivise rising powers to collectively balance the US. However, there is also an inherent contradiction in hegemonic universalism, as universal values are linked to one entity of power. A hegemon claims to represent universal values such as freedom, democracy, and human rights, albeit this universalism is promoted through a particular historical, cultural, and geopolitical order.

Universal values advocating for equality are used to institutionalise a dominant position for the US. Universal values advocating for inclusion are used to build exclusive blocs such as NATO rather than developing an inclusive pan-European security architecture. John Herz noted as early as 1950 that the more democratic states were at home, the more they seemed to insist on a dominant position in international institutions to defend liberal values from the rule of the majority. Liberal values build on the idea that tolerance is imperative, as all people and states have different ideas about the good life and their own path to development, yet the universality of values suggests that all states must develop along the same path, and the political West, as the champion of liberal democracy, is the civilizational teacher seeking to “socialize” the rest of the world. Liberalism has subsequently been promoted as a hegemonic norm.

The Revisionism of Hegemonic Universalism

The modern world order was established with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, in which a hegemonic system legitimised with universalist claims was replaced with a multipolar system based on the cultural distinctiveness of states. The past 80 years have been a historical anomaly, with a bipolar system that collapsed and gave way to a unipolar system with one centre of power. The normal situation of the world has been a multipolar Westphalian system with a power equilibrium.

Over the past decades, hegemonic universalism transformed European states as national competencies were transferred to the US. US military dominance meant that Europe largely outsourced its security and foreign policy to the US within the format of the alliance system. US economic dominance meant that the international economic architecture, with banks, currencies, payment systems, and trade agreements, was largely administered by the US. Civil society in Europe and beyond has been managed by “non-governmental organizations” financed by the US government and cooperating closely with US intelligence services. The European political system is premised on the idea that loyalty to international institutions is more vital and moral than national interests, as Europe’s linkage to the US within the political West is the main source of stability and prosperity.

Return of Civilizational Distinctiveness

The hegemon is now gone, and the universal claims are rejected by the wider world. A multipolar world is already here, and the rising powers are demanding a return to a Westphalian world order of sovereign equals based on civilizational distinctiveness. As Xi Jinping insists, all civilizations have their own path to development, and no aspiring hegemon has the right to tell others how to develop. The return of rhetoric about civilizational states across the Eurasian continent signifies a rejection of unipolarity and universalism. New institutions such as the SCO and BRICS attempt to accommodate the multipolar world, yet new members are joining faster than institutional efficiency can adjust to.

The US has reluctantly already begun adjusting to these new realities, as it recognises it cannot be everywhere and must prioritise, while the language of liberal universalism is being replaced with national interests. New political forces are rising in the US that want to scale back the empire to save the republic, as a strategic retreat would allow the US to rebuild its strength and end the collective balancing by other great powers. What makes Europe so dangerous today is its weakness and panic due to the failure of finding a new role in the multipolar system. Security can no longer be based on the dominance of the collective West; there is no clear economic model; and the claims of representing universal values are no longer convincing. Yet the Europeans are not willing to recognise new realities and adjust accordingly by diversifying economic and political connectivity. The available evidence suggests that this will be a very turbulent transition from unipolar universalism to multipolar distinctiveness, and the new world will more likely be born through war than diplomacy

A mounting standoff over allegations of covert Chinese nuclear testing and rapid arsenal expansion has collided with an intensifying domestic debate within the US over whether it must abandon its decades-long test moratorium. US officials are pressing China in confidential diplomatic talks over suspected low-yield nuclear testing and a rapid strategic expansion across at least […]

The post US challenges China on secret nuclear tests as arms race looms appeared first on Asia Times.

Al Mayadeen | September 26, 2026

China called on Saturday for an immediate end to the blockade on Cuba, in a speech to the UN General Assembly that stopped short of naming the United States.

Vice President Han Zheng urged the “relevant country” to “immediately stop using the threat of force against Cuba” and to “immediately and completely lift the blockade and sanctions.”

He also pushed back against the US on Iran, saying “China holds that the sovereignty and security of countries in the Middle East, including the Gulf, should be respected,” though he did not mention the US at any point in his remarks.

The comments come as a US pressure campaign has largely cut off oil supplies to Cuba. The US oil blockade began in January and has deepened blackouts, with the island’s electrical grid suffering a total collapse earlier this month that left millions without power.

Equality among states

Han said major countries carry special responsibility for international peace and security and should lead by complying with the rules, upholding the rule of law, and “doing what’s right.”

He also cast China as a reliable partner and a steadfast defender of developing nations, saying all countries, “big or small, are equal members of the international community” and that world affairs should be handled through consultation.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov spoke at the UN shortly after and made a similar appeal, urging Washington to end its siege of Cuba and ease trade restrictions on the island.

He also said the US should remove Cuba from its list of state sponsors of terrorism.

Trump-Xi summit

US President Donald Trump hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping at the White House earlier this week, welcoming him with military flyovers and a lavish state dinner, according to Reuters.

During the talks, Trump told Xi that China should refrain from providing support to Iran in the US war on Iran. The US ambassador to China claimed on Friday that Trump received assurances from Xi that Beijing would not do so.

This followed reports that China had supplied Iran with shoulder-fired air-defense missile launchers and that Tehran had found ways to evade sanctions on its oil sales with Chinese help.

Beijing has repeatedly rejected the US sanctions campaign against Iran. In August, the Foreign Ministry said that sanctions and pressure “will not help resolve the issue” and that China opposes “illegal unilateral sanctions” lacking a basis in international law.

Chinese support for Cuba

Cuba was the first Latin American country to establish diplomatic ties with the People’s Republic of China, and 2025 marked 65 years of relations.

China’s practical support has centered on energy. Reuters reported that Beijing financed 55 solar projects in Cuba in 2025, including a 21-megawatt plant near Jatibonico, with 37 more planned by 2028. Cuban media reported that a shipment of 5,000 solar panels arrived in September, the third of its kind in recent months.

Beijing has also committed 90,000 tonnes of rice to Cuba in 2026, of which 30,000 tonnes have been delivered and 60,000 tonnes pledged.