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My Take

My Take
My Take, a popular and sometimes controversial daily column of the South China Morning Post, analyses a variety of hot-button issues concerning Hong Kong, mainland China and the region.
Canada’s Liberal Leader and Prime Minister-elect Mark Carney in Ottawa on March 9, 2025. Photo: AFP via Getty Images
Mainland China

My Take | Canada cannot decouple from China or de-risk from the US

Winning a full-term premiership is the easy part for Mark Carney, who must now lead a country squeezed between two rival superpowers.

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Electric & new energy vehicles

My Take | China’s ambitions in electric vehicles go beyond making lots of cars

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US-China relations

My Take | Tariffs caused many sad endings during the 1930s

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My Take | We are witnessing the end of the United States as we know it

Far from being the guarantor of global liberty, prosperity and security, America has become a threat to all three pillars of human civilisation.

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US President Donald Trump has signed over 100 executive orders during his first 100 days in office. Photo: Getty Images/TNS
Mainland China

My Take | When it comes to a ‘civilisational state’ is there really such a thing?

Former Reddit CEO Yishan Wong poses some intriguing questions about being Chinese, though his conclusions seem quite off the mark.

China economy

My Take | Could China ever learn to live with GDP growth of less than 5 per cent?

Three Chinese economists argue rigid growth target causes local governments to misallocate resources and take on excessive debt.

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Hong Kong

My Take | Wise pope tamed retired Hong Kong bishop and reached out to Beijing

Francis sidelined Cardinal Joseph Zen, restraining his anti-communist opposition to stabilise relations between China and the Vatican.

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Pope Francis delivers his Christmas Urbi Et Orbi Blessing and his traditional Christmas Day message from the central balcony overlooking St. Peter’s Square on December 25, 2022 in Vatican City, Vatican. Photo: Getty Images

My Take | Can US tariffs really choke the life out of Hong Kong?

The US is after Hong Kong’s survival, top Beijing official says. But the free port and trading hub must weather the storm with vigilance.

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Ukraine war

My Take | China does not want the West’s Ukraine and Mideast quagmires

Western propaganda alleging direct Chinese military support for Russia and Yemen has become so outlandish it is bordering on the absurd.

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Hong Kong economy

My Take | Magic of Hong Kong’s coastal areas must not be lost in drive for tourist dollars

While development seems inevitable, the priority must be sustainability and, most of all, preservation of these valuable natural assets.

Workers clean Upper Cheung Sha Beach on Lantau island on May 28, 2024. Photo: Eugene Lee
Britain

My Take | Don’t blame China’s Jingye for failing to save UK steel industry

There was no communist plot behind British Steel’s collapse. If anything, the government takeover may amount to nationalising Chinese property.

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British Steel’s Scunthorpe plant in northern England, Britain, March 31, 2025. Photo: Reuters
Diplomacy

My Take | It’s time for the European Union to do a ‘Kissinger’ with China

If Brussels wants to achieve ‘strategic autonomy’ in what has become a multipolar world, the only option that it has is to draw closer to Beijing.

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Hong Kong courts

My Take | Hong Kong cannot allow its system of foreign judges to wither and die

Such justices can still play an important part in the city’s future. The judiciary needs to make some big signings, however difficult that may be.

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Hong Kong

My Take | Donald Trump will make China, not the United States, great again

As with Napoleon’s blockade of Britain under the Continental System, American economic and tech wars have already led China to innovate.

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US President Donald Trump talks to members of the press on April 6, 2025. Photo: Reuters
United States

My Take | Why Trump tariffs have resulted in Canada and China fightback

Both countries want to cut deals with the US president, but know they must go all out to deny the White House bully a cheap and easy win.

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US President Donald Trump announces a new round of “reciprocal tariffs” on multiple countries at the White House’s Rose Garden in Washington. Photo: TNS
US-China decoupling

Opinion | As Trump’s tariffs roil markets, will new global order bypass the US dollar?

Amid fears of full-blown trade war and demise of rules-based globalisation, Beijing signals it will resist economic coercion and guard free-trade system.

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US-China trade war

My Take | The United States, not China, turns out to be the real bogeyman

The significance of Trump’s tariffs is that they have destroyed the credibility of America on which its global alliances have long depended.

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Hong Kong economy

My Take | Football feast to be the highlight of the city’s summer mega-events

With four of the biggest European teams to play, Hong Kong must put in a performance of the highest level, free from scandals or blunders.

Fireworks light up the Kai Tak Stadium’s opening ceremony on March 1, 2025. Photo: Eugene Lee
United States

My Take | Donald Trump’s tariff madness targets not only allies but animals

Penguins, seals and seabirds have not been spared in America’s global trade war, likewise territories with significant US or allied military assets.

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United States

My Take | Once again, pointless sanctions are imposed on Hong Kong by America

Washington has neither moral nor legal standing to punish top officials, from the secretary for justice to a now retired commissioner of police.

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2025 Myanmar earthquake

China leads relief for quake-hit Myanmar. But will civil war stymie aid efforts?

China can play critical role in persuading junta and rebel groups to stop fighting to allow for relief work following devastating earthquake.

Rescuers dig through rubble in Mandalay, Myanmar on Monday following a devastating earthquake. Photo: Xinhua

My Take | A ‘no limits’ partnership that will be an unstoppable global force

US-China ties have dominated the 21st century so far, but pact between Moscow and Beijing may be the most consequential from now on.

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Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks with Chinese President Xi Jinping as other participants in the outreach/BRICS Plus format meeting pose for a photo during the BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia on October 24, 2024. Photo: Maxim Shipenkov
US-China relations

My Take | How Western classics are now weaponised against the West

Since the Tiananmen crackdown, a generation of mainland public intellectuals and scholars have turned classical study on its head.

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Israel-Gaza war

My Take | Cancelled HKU event offers a chance to address fate of Gazans

Antisemitism is a heinous form of racism, but the most pressing moral question of our time is whether Palestinians still have the right to exist.

China technology

My Take | DeepSeek has changed China’s AI model landscape – what’s next?

The start-up has emerged as the unlikely winner of a dizzying domestic competition. Can it reshape the global market as well?

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An AI conference in Tianjin, China. Photo: Xinhua
United States

My Take | The West just ain’t what it used to be – and we all should welcome it

Europe is breaking away from America, and an Anglosphere may finally emerge from the US shadow out of necessity and self-preservation.

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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky talks with US President Donald Trump at the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on February 28. Photo: TNS
United States

My Take | A ‘toxic masculinity’ explanation of Donald Trump’s foreign policy

In his relations with other nations, the US president exhibits the same pattern of abuse of power as his alleged treatment of women.

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Climate change

My Take | China steps up charge on climate change fight as the US turns away

While it remains to be seen how effective Beijing’s policies will be, having the largest emitter fill the leadership void can hardly be bad for the planet.

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