SCMP China·Saturday, January 17, 2026

SCMP China - Saturday, January 17, 2026

10 stories~15 min

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Stories Covered

CO2 + H2O = cleaner recycling of dead lithium batteries?

Chinese scientists have found a way to recycle lithium batteries using only carbon dioxide and water – eliminating the need for harsh, polluting chemicals to extract the lithium and upcycle cathode materials. The team from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Beijing Institute of Technology said they used a “three-in-one” strategy to improve lithium recovery, upgrade transition metals like cobalt and nickel, and sequester carbon to eliminate waste by-products. Their method achieved a lithium...

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Trump shrugs off concerns over Canada-China EV deal, calls it a ‘good thing’

US President Donald Trump on Friday brushed aside concerns over a Canada-China trade deal involving Ottawa agreeing to reduce tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, saying it was “a good thing” for Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney to pursue the deal. “That’s OK. That’s what he should be doing. It’s a good thing for him to sign a trade deal. If you can get a deal with China, you should do that,” Trump said, when asked about the agreement announced earlier in the day. The remarks not only...

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Counting China’s wins and losses among ‘swing nations’ in new era of power rivalry

It took the United States less than three hours to stun the world with its abduction of the sitting leader of a sovereign state, but the strategic ramifications of that dramatic operation are likely to reverberate for decades. In laying bare the limits of China’s economic-centric diplomacy towards third countries in its competition with the US, the Venezuela crisis has delivered a stark reminder that spheres of influence continue to shape global politics in this new era of great power...

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China’s charm offensive: Beijing bypasses Brussels in bid to soften EU trade push

Hua Chunying, China’s foreign vice-minister, beamed this week as she presented a leading Czech lawmaker with a decorative porcelain plate – a gift that signalled a possible thaw in ties between Prague and Beijing. The image sent tongues wagging in Europe: a symbol that a new Chinese charm offensive towards a Europe jilted by its erstwhile ally across the Atlantic had reached even its most hawkish capitals. China has spent the opening weeks of the year courting European governments, offering...

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Tesla’s defeat, Harvard’s success, Trump ‘top global risk’: 7 US-China relations reads

We have selected seven of the most interesting and important news stories covering US-China relations from the past few weeks. If you would like to see more of our reporting, please consider subscribing. 1. BYD’s win, Tesla’s defeat, Ford’s pivot: the widening gap in US-China EV markets After years of competing head-to-head with China in electric vehicles, the United States is now widely seen as falling behind – a reality increasingly acknowledged even within Detroit. Read the full story...

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AI is reshaping US-China tech race – can electricity tilt the balance?

China’s state-owned power grid giant has pledged to increase fixed-asset investment by 40 per cent over the next five years, at a time when some analysts view electricity capacity as a strategic asset in the US-China rivalry amid soaring demand from artificial intelligence (AI) and other power-hungry industries. The State Grid Corporation of China expects the investment amount to reach 4 trillion yuan (US$574 billion) through 2030, a company record, as it accelerates efforts to build a “new-type

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Taipei hails US 15% tariffs ‘home run’ despite fears over US$500 billion cost

Taiwan has secured a US deal slashing export tariffs to 15 per cent after more than nine months of talks, with Taipei hailing the result as a “home run” that will put the island on an equal footing with Japan and South Korea. But observers and opposition parties have raised sharp concerns over Taiwan’s commitment to invest up to US$500 billion in the United States in exchange for the tariff cut. The arrangement could hollow out Taiwan’s industrial base – particularly its prized semiconductor...

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China dumps more US debt, buys other assets as Trump targets Powell

China trimmed its holdings of US Treasuries in November to the lowest level since 2008, diverging from a global trend that saw total foreign ownership of the debt instruments hit a record high. Analysts say the prospect of a politicised Federal Reserve chairmanship under Donald Trump’s presidency has deepened Beijing’s concerns over its exposure to American debt, with more cuts expected. Beijing’s stockpile fell to US$682.6 billion in November, down from US$688.7 billion in October, according to

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Why ‘monumental’ China duty-free trade deal has Kenya wanting more

Kenya has reached a preliminary trade deal with China for duty-free exports of key products including coffee, tea and cut flowers – a major step towards narrowing the East African nation’s long-standing trade gap with Beijing. The “early harvest” framework grants duty-free access to the Chinese market for 98.2 per cent of Kenyan exports, as announced by the Kenyan Ministry of Trade on Thursday – less than a month after negotiations closed on December 19. While the deal provides an immediate...

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Chinese scientists unlock possible key to dark matter after almost 90 years

Chinese scientists have made the first direct observation of a quantum effect that was proposed almost 90 years ago and could help detect dark matter, the universe’s invisible “glue”. Soviet physicist Arkady Migdal developed a theory in Leningrad in 1939 about what would happen when a neutral particle – such as dark matter – collided with an atomic nucleus. Migdal believed that the collision would cause the nucleus to recoil and trigger a secondary electronic recoil, generating a detectable...

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