Following on our annual conference, in which China’s Belt and Road Initiative was discussed in detail, Philippe Le Corre of the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at the Harvard Kennedy School writes about the perceptions that Beijing will have to overcome in Kazakhstan, where the government is keen on investment, but the people less so.

The U.S. is pressuring allies to bar Huawei equipment from telecom networks, saying the company has strong ties to China's government. Some allies push back saying they can mitigate security risks.

While Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin were busy gathering for a high-profile summit in Helsinki on Monday, a far less publicized meeting between two other world powers was simultaneously held in Beijing. The twentieth EU-China summit was maybe less attention grabbing but is still significant in its own right. Although the EU-China relationship is becoming more fraught, both sides shared an interest in a summit marked by more positive tone this time around.

Over the past year, Berlin has toughened its stance on China as German business and political elites’ concerns about Chinese economic practices, including in Germany itself, have intensified. But during Angela Merkel’s trip to Beijing this week – her eleventh as chancellor – she struck a more conciliatory tone.

As President Donald Trump prepares to welcome his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, for the first ever state visit of his presidency, Paris and Washington are closer now than they have been since the early days of the Iraq War.

The newly-released U.S. National Security Strategy (NSS) is the most detailed document on President Donald Trump’s international agenda so far. It paints a sharp picture of a world order marked by growing strategic competition where China and Russia are seeking to “challenge American power, influence, and interests.” China, in particular, clearly appears as America’s main challenger economically and even geopolitically.