i m not sure there will be a blockade forever, but they did declare before pelosi s visit that they no longer considered the straits international waters. now, those are very important international waters, a great deal of shipping goes through them. and if china sticks to that, that will inconvenience the entire neighbourhood and international shipping, as well as taiwan. so there is a risk that things get ratcheted up and certain things are not retreated from. the other great casualty of this, however, which i think is more serious, is they announced today they will no longer cooperate on climate change with the united states. this was one of the big announcements at the glasgow summit, out of the blue almost, president xi wasn t there, the americans announced they had this agreement. it was with the chinese john kerry equivalent, and john kerry, the envoy, it was the only bit of momentum at cop26, because so many things
hello, and welcome to the programme in which leading uk columnists discuss the week s news with foreign correspondents who write, blog, podcast, and broadcast to audiences in their home countries from the dateline: london. 18 months after margaret thatcher first became prime minister, underfire even in her own party as half a million more people lost theirjobs and facing calls for a policy u turn, she delivered a speech that still defines her, you turn if you want to, the lady s not for turning . this week, the woman who would be her successor u turned. america s third lady, nancy pelosi, did not, going ahead with a visit to taiwan, despite chinese warnings, beforehand and missiles after. nor did the bank of england u turn, going ahead with the half point rise in interest rates. the governor had said the bank was minded to impose the largest
which it argued helped during the credit crunch, it was not part of the problem. so there is a political conflict opening up between the woman most likely to be prime minister and the government. and her reaction has been to suggest she could curtail the bank of england, which is characteristic of this contest, every time an independent body, whether it be the bank of england or electorate commission, produces a result that is inconvenient politically for the candidates, they suggest they can abolish the very factors that made them valuable and the factors that made them trust us. it s a depressing prognosis, frankly. and to agree, brexit. i was a brexiteer, but i ve become a remainer. it s a bit late! |the fact is that brexit is making itj difficult to take advantage of even
something about this debate that it s become too narrow? it s notjust for the conservative party, but for the public as well, since after all, this is the debate that will help determine who is prime minister? indeed, prime minister of the whole united kingdom, i must point out. i ve not read the article, but it seems to me since the one nation tories were expelled by boris johnson for not supporting brexit, what we have is instead of the conservative and unionist party, we have an english national party. the remarks liz truss made about the leader of the scottish parliament today which were frankly shocking. you can tjust accuse a serious politician of being attention seeking. the snp has been repeatedly voted into power by the scottish people, what does that say to the scottish people? it says there s no future for us, whether liz truss s england,
from the us. and also, the latest war waged i by china in 1979 against vietnam was a resounding defeat. we are not sure of the preparedness and how good they are. but hong kong is a real warning that china is an authoritarian regime, if we forget it. 0n the whole, the americans, the official admitted democrat american administration, as isabel said, pelosi imposed it herself. so i don t think we are heading. really for a clash between america and china directly. it s more an event in a difficult situation. i taiwan is the part of china where the nationalists fought against the communists in 1949, but what is it about its status that matters so much to beijing?