China
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Could China’s Consumption Trap Destabilise the Global Economy?
In 2025, China recorded a merchandise trade surplus of nearly $1.2 trillion—the largest ever registered by any nation. Yet, behind this extraordinary export performance lies a deep macroeconomic paradox. While the world’s second-largest economy produces more than any other industrial power, dominates global manufacturing in clean energy sectors, and remains…
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Can Specialised Infrastructure Become a Geopolitical Vulnerability?
As strategic commodities have become central to contemporary geopolitical competition, governments are racing to secure the supply resilience of strategic resources such as rare earths and speciality gases. However, industrial strategies concentrate on mining and processing, with less attention given to the important nub that production alone does not ensure…
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Has Russia’s War Created a More Nuclear, Independent Pyongyang?
When Xi Jinping arrived in Pyongyang on 8 June 2026—his first overseas trip of the year—Kim Yo Jong had already demolished the diplomatic ground beneath him. Two days earlier she declared North Korea’s nuclear status an “irreversible and final conclusion,” dismissing denuclearisation as an “anachronistic dream.” Five days prior, Kim…
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Is a Chinese Invasion of Taiwan Actually Imminent?
The People’s Republic of China (PRC) has long maintained that Taiwan is an inalienable part of China, and that there is only one Chinese state, with Beijing as its sole legitimate government. Despite having two separate governments and operating as two independent states since the end of the Chinese Civil…
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Are the Balkans Becoming China’s Gateway to the EU?
Over the past decade, Chinese investment and trade in the Balkan region of Europe has sharply increased, facilitating the construction of over a hundred major projects totalling tens of billions of Euros. This investment is part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, which seeks to expand China’s economic and strategic…