Innehållsförteckning för Vol.68/No.47 från Beijing Review

The National Games, China’s premier multi-sport event, opened in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, on November 9. This year’s 15th edition of the games is the first to be co-hosted by the country’s two special administrative regions, with Guangdong Province sharing its hosting responsibilities with neighboring Hong Kong and Macao. This year’s games are a landmark project in the development of the Greater Bay Area, a national initiative that enhances integration between Hong Kong, Macao and nine nearby cities in Guangdong Province, including Guangzhou. The joint hosting by Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao has further broken down administrative barriers between the three regions, more fully aligning rules, standards and recognition of qualifications, and bringing about joint innovation in the management of sports and events. At the same time, through the hosting of…

YOUNG MATHEMATICIAN WINS AWARDS Wang Hong, a Chinese mathematician, received two prestigious mathematics awards in late October, the 2025 Salem Prize and the International Congress of Chinese Mathematicians (ICCM) Gold Medal, cementing her status as a rising star in the mathematical community. The Salem Prize, launched by the U.S.-based Institute for Advanced Study, is widely regarded as a predictor for the prestigious Fields Medal, with 10 of its 56 recipients between 1968 and 2024 later winning the Fields Medal. Meanwhile, the ICCM Gold Medal is often called the “Chinese Fields Medal.” The 34-year-old mathematician’s academic journey includes undergraduate studies at Peking University, followed by advanced degrees from France’s École Polytechnique and Paris-Saclay University, and a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is now a professor at the New…

The 15th National Games aren’t just for professional athletes—they also feature 166 events in 23 sports for amateurs, ranging from Chinese chess to taijiquan. Most of these events took place before the games officially opened on November 9.…

Computing power, algorithms and data are the core factors for the digital economy. According to figures from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, as of the end of June, China had built 10.85 million standard racks, and its intelligent computing power had reached 788 EFLOPS, an indicator of system speed equaling 1 quintillion floatingpoint calculations per second. China tops the global large language model count with 1,509 models having been released. The central authorities now aim to ensure the country’s digital development continues this rapid acceleration by making the supply of these factors more efficient. In its Recommendations for Formulating the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development, adopted at the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Communist Party of China Central Committee on October 23, the…

The annual China International Import Expo (CIIE) is no longer merely one of the world’s largest trade fairs. Now in its eighth edition, the Shanghai event has cemented its status as the world’s premier “First Show Stage”—a critical launchpad where global innovators debut their most disruptive technologies and visionary products. Held from November 5 to 10, this year’s CIIE hosted participants from 155 countries, regions and international organizations, including 290 Fortune 500 companies and industry-leading firms. With over 600 more exhibitors than last year, the total exhibition space and overall participation hit a new high. The value of intended deals exceeded $83.4 billion. Hub for global firsts Data from the CIIE Bureau, the organizer of the expo, showed a total of 461 products, technologies and services made their China debuts…

Wang Xiao (a pseudonym) remembers the scene vividly when he enrolled at Taiyuan Wantong Vocational Skills School in Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, this May. Stepping onto the campus, he was greeted not with the sprawling green lawns and grand, imposing teaching buildings commonly seen in universities, but rather with a cluster of highly specialized training facilities, hi-tech equipment and the operational hum of machinery. Though initially daunted by the fast-paced instruction, Wang felt a surge of excitement. “Finally, I can get my hands on real equipment,” he told China Newsweek magazine. Having graduated with a bachelor’s degree in environmental engineering from a university in Shanxi last year, Wang opted against a career in his field. He instead set his sights on the electrical automation industry, drawn by its broader career opportunities.…

The 20th Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee held its fourth plenary session in Beijing on October 20-23. The plenary session’s central task was to deliberate on the framework of the country’s next national development roadmap: the 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-30), which will be formally adopted at next year’s full session of the National People’s Congress, China’s top legislature. Every five-year plan is important but this one arrives at a truly pivotal moment in terms of China’s development trajectory and the global environment. The CPC’s 20th National Congress in October 2022 laid out a two-step strategic proposal for building China into a “great modern socialist country in all respects” by the middle of the century. The first step is to “basically achieve socialist modernization” by 2035. The period from…

The publication of Tokyo Trial: Evidence and Judgment of the Nanjing Massacre by the Foreign Languages Press in September is very timely. It has particular relevance in today’s global context, marked by increasing armed conflicts, growing tensions between countries and numerous situations of ethnic and religious persecution. The Nanjing Massacre of winter 1937-38 committed by the Japanese invaders included the killing of more than 300,000 Chinese civilians and unarmed soldiers, the rape of tens of thousands of women, the torture of detainees and the looting and plundering of the population’s material goods. Chinese society and its government have always honored the memory of the victims and demanded justice. However, in much of the West, this barbarity committed by the Japanese armed forces remains little known. One of the aspects of…

Early this year, a new phrase began making waves across China’s tech world: the “Six Little Dragons of Hangzhou.” Each company in this group—UniTree Robotics, BrainCo, ManyCore Tech, DEEP Robotics, Game Science, and DeepSeek—is based in the capital city of the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang and has made headlines with breakthroughs in AI, robotics and digital innovation. Months after their rise to fame, the “Six Little Dragons” finally came together for their first-ever joint appearance at the World Internet Conference (WIC) Wuzhen Summit in Wuzhen, Zhejiang, on November 7. In Chinese culture, there’s a saying from an ancient poem: A mountain need not be high; it becomes sacred with the presence of an immortal; a river need not be deep; it comes alive with the presence of a dragon.…

As the United Nations (UN) marked its 80th anniversary on October 24, the international system it helped establish in 1945 finds itself at a profound inflexion point. When the UN Charter first affirmed the organization’s purpose “to maintain international peace and security,” “to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights,” “to promote social progress and better standards of life,” and to “ensure justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law,” it did so in a radically different world—one defined by the aftermath of a global war and the promise of collective security. Today, the UN counts 193 members, compared with 51 at its founding and its mission has expanded to include development, humanitarian response and sustainability goals. Yet the 1945-built architecture of global governance…

At this year’s China International Import Expo (CIIE), Michael Hart, President of the American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) in China, was on a tight schedule. On November 6 alone, he visited more than 40 member companies at the expo including Dell, FedEx, GE Aerospace, Johnson & Johnson, Nike and Walmart. The Eighth CIIE was held in Shanghai from November 5 to 10 and Hart told Beijing Review the event provided useful insights into the bilateral trade relationship. “The CIIE does actually help us understand how interconnected our economies are. It has been a great chance for American and other foreign companies to meet their clients in China,” he said. As the world’s first national-level expo dedicated to imports, the CIIE has been held annually since 2018. Over the years, it…

Among China’s coastal cities, Sanya in the southern Chinese island province of Hainan is relatively young. It was established in 1987, riding the very wave of the country’s reform and opening up. In less than four decades, it has transformed from a fishing town to a premier tourist destination and pivotal trade port. By the end of September, the number of foreign nationals entering and exiting through Hainan’s ports had reached 980,000, a surge of 46.3 percent year on year, surpassing pre-pandemic 2019 levels. As of early November, Sanya Phoenix International Airport had handled 795,000 passenger arrivals, a 60-percent year-on-year increase. Among these travelers, 83 percent are foreign nationals, with 93 percent of them entering visa-free—both metrics ranking among the highest for air hubs nationwide. Currently, passengers from 86 countries…

A wave of supermarket closures has swept across China in recent years, with community grocery stores and large chains equally affected. One much-discussed example is Yonghui Superstores. According to the China Chain Store and Franchise Association, Yonghui Superstores ranked fourth in sales among Chinese supermarkets last year, but the company’s 2025 mid-year report reveals it closed 277 loss-making outlets in the first half of this year. Many pundits are now examining the cause of these closures and conjecturing on their inevitability. Yang Yeying (Dazhong Daily): The notion of “supermarket” has existed in Chinese households for only roughly four decades and now the once-booming Supermarket Age appears to be in decline. Two main factors account for this shift: First, lease expirations. Most brick-and-mortar supermarkets operate on 20 to 25-year leases, and…