Lula and Xi; National security cases; US indictments of PRC police officers; Yi Gang on the RMB; Spy balloon disclosures
Lula and Xi; National security cases; US indictments of PRC police officers; Yi Gang on the RMB; Spy balloon disclosures
Summary of the Essential Eight:
Lula in the PRC - Brazil’s President Lula has completed his visit to the PRC. While the two sides signed lots of deals and agreed on the need for a multipolar world,it does not sound like Lula fully aligned with the PRC on Ukraine, nor does it sound like much progress was made in getting Brazil to join the BRI.
PRC Defense Minister in Russia - Li Shangfu, the new PRC Defense Minister, is on a visit to Moscow, and met with Putin. The PRC side says people should not overreact as traditionally a new defense minister visits Russia early in their term. That may be true, but at best the optics are not great, and given Xi’s recent visit it is not unreasonable to speculate about more defense cooperation.
National Security Day cases - April 15 is National Security Education Day, and every year the Global Times seems to get a “scoop” from the MSS about “model cases”. This year’s included some related to Xinjiang and NGOs, among others. One of the cases sounds like …