In this week's Chinascope, we will follow the reaction of Chinese social media to the death of General Bipin Rawat, the appearance of Qi Fabao, a soldier of the People's Liberation Army, on national television, Nicaragua's shift of relations from Taiwan to Beijing, and other important stories of development in China and the world.

The death of General Biping Lavat, the chief of Indian defense staff, has become a topic of discussion on Chinese social media platforms.

Soon after the news came out, the search trend of "The Chief of Staff of India's Defense Staff died in a crash" ranked fourth on Baidu's hot search list. Baidu Trends reached 4.63 million page views on Wednesday and continued to grow. The label "Indian Chief of Staff Helicopter Crash" has been viewed 93 million times on Weibo.

On Friday, the Chinese Ministry of National Defense "expressed sympathy" for Lavat's death and expressed "consolation" to the Indian side.

Weibo users shared an old video of Chinese military commentator Zhang Zhaozhong responding to Bipinglawat’s remarks about China. Taking the Indian plane crash as an example, Zhang countered Rawat, who called China a strategic threat. Weibo users said Zhang’s prediction was “fulfilled”.

“Although Rawat has'limited capabilities' on the issue of military reforms, he seems to be'full of vitality' on diplomatic issues. Rawat has long played up the'China threat', which not only creates obstacles to the stable development of China-India relations, but also gives him a lot of trouble. Diplomatic colleagues have brought trouble," wrote Wang Siyuan, a South Asian researcher.

Since the conflict between the Chinese People's Liberation Army and the Indian Army, Beijing has tried to control the narrative surrounding the conflict in Galvan in June 2020.

China’s state-run TV station CCTV invited Qi Fabao, one of the People’s Liberation Army fighters surviving in Karevan, to share his experience of “defending the motherland” against “foreign troops”. In the nationalist broadcast for domestic audiences, Qi told about his experience of being injured and defending "the motherland from foreign troops" in June 2020.

"When I regained consciousness, I was wondering whether the enemy was stopped and whether my soldiers were safe," Qi said. "I would rather die than retreat. We can't lose the territory of our motherland!"

Qi Fabao told CCTV that he was ready to "return to the battlefield." He did not name India and referred to the Indian army as a "foreign army", but he did talk about Karakorum as the front line of the Chinese People's Liberation Army.

The nationalistic color of the radio shows that Beijing is still investing heavily to control the Galvan conflict.

Despite the recovery in manufacturing, China’s real estate bubble continues to send distress signals to the rest of the world. Last week, after the company failed to pay coupons twice, Chinese real estate developer Evergrande was officially marked by Fitch Ratings as a defaulter.

The bankruptcy of Evergrande may trigger a debt default of 19.2 billion U.S. dollars. The company's lenders have seized more than $600 million worth of shares belonging to Evergrande Chairman Xu Jiaren.

Faced with growing concerns about the severe challenges that the epidemic will bring to the Chinese economy, Xi Jinping convened the Central Economic Work Conference in Beijing. Xi Jinping stated that China is facing three major pressures: “shrinking demand, volatility on the supply side, and weakening expectations”.

"To achieve the goal of common prosperity, we must first make the'cake' bigger and do a good job through the joint struggle of the people of the whole country, and then divide the'cake' well through reasonable institutional arrangements," he said. Xi Jinping also emphasized support for small businesses, technological innovation and green development.

Also read: A new white paper insists that China is a democratic country. It wants you to forget Tiananmen Square

British spy chief Jeremy Fleming rarely accepts interviews about the work of his agency GCHQ (the country’s technical intelligence agency)

Fleming warned in an interview with the Financial Times that the digital renminbi would become a surveillance tool. "This gives them the ability...to control the operations performed on these digital currencies," he said.

Fleming called China and Britain the "biggest strategic issue", and it is investing heavily in the management of the rules of the digital world in the future.

As Beijing tries to poach out the rest of the countries that maintain official relations with Taipei, Taiwan's diplomatic relations continue to grow tense.

Last week, Nicaragua officially switched relations from Taipei to Beijing and recognized Taiwan as part of China. Nicaragua’s official statement said: “The government of the Republic of Nicaragua broke off diplomatic relations with Taiwan today and no longer has any contact or official relations.”

Taiwan now maintains formal diplomatic relations with 13 countries and the Holy See (Vatican). The Central American government of Honduras recently stated that they may also establish diplomatic relations with Beijing.

A U.S. official told Reuters that Nicaragua did so to resist sanctions imposed by the U.S. and other countries. The United States is trying to ensure that Honduras will not change its relationship with Beijing because the country has a U.S. military unit called the Joint Task Force Bravo Air Base.

Singapore’s balancing foreign policy behavior between the United States and China is well known. Former Singapore Foreign Minister George Yang said that China needs "charm in a multi-polar world."

Yang talks with students from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. Singapore's Think China website initially published Yeo's remarks, which were later widely shared by some Chinese official media.

Read also: Vanity, Charm, and Gambling: Behind China's Secret Societies and Criminal Groups

Xi Jinping's New World Order-Elizabethan Economy

Beijing silenced Peng Shuai for 20 minutes and then spent weeks on damage control-New York Times

"However, China is a country shaped by the concept of civilization history, and it is also the only large-scale civilization in the world with an uninterrupted history. Such a civilization absorbed and changed foreign civilizations and civilized the "barbarians." Foreign rulers did not occupy China. The 200-year-old America wants to become a 5,000-year-old China. This strategy is the product of a lack of understanding of Chinese history,” wrote Yang Guangbin, dean of the School of International Relations at Renmin University of China.

Nirupama Rao, the former ambassador of India to China, recently published her new book "The Broken Himalayas: India, Tibet and China, 1949-62". Rao and Milan Vaishnav, host of the Grand Tamasha podcast, talked about her new book and the state of India-China relations. Chinascope recommends listening to the conversation.

Hong Kong media mogul Li Zhiying and seven other pro-democracy activists are likely to be sentenced by the court on Monday for participating in a candlelight vigil.

The author is a columnist and freelance journalist. He is currently studying for a master's degree in international politics at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, with a focus on China. He used to work as a Chinese media reporter in the BBC World Service Department. He tweeted @aadilbrar. Views are personal.

This is a weekly review of hot topics in China written by Aadil Brar. This will soon be available as the only product for subscribers.

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