Recently, according to foreign media reports, China issued the "Regulations on the Management of Rare Earths" on June 29, which clearly stipulates that rare earth resources belong to the state and shall not be occupied by any organization or individual, and emphasizes that the state implements "protective mining" of rare earth resources. The mainland is the world's largest producer and reserve of rare earths, accounting for 90% of the world's smelting output, and is the world's largest rare earth processor.
The whole world knows that the United States has generalized the concept of national security, abused state power, and semi-forced the West, Japan and South Korea to jointly carry out an extreme technological blockade of the mainland's semiconductor chip industry, in an attempt to strangle the mainland's semiconductor industry in the cradle. In this regard, we have also announced the implementation of export controls on gallium, germanium and other materials, as well as some graphite, and restricted the export of rare earth refining and processing technology.
This time, the mainland's issuance of the "Rare Earth Management Regulations" is undoubtedly once again hitting the "seven inches" of the United States, Western countries, Japan and South Korea, which will further weaken the manufacturing capacity of developed countries in the field of high-tech industry and the production capacity of the military industry. There is no doubt that this will certainly make the West jump again, and we are certainly ready for them to retaliate again.
But what I didn't expect was that it was Indonesia that was the first to attack the mainland. According to a report by Hong Kong Satellite TV on the 29th, Indonesian Trade Minister Zulkifli Hassan said on the same day that Indonesia will impose 100%-200% import tariffs on footwear, clothing, textiles, cosmetics and ceramics made in China. The rationale is that Indonesia wants to protect the survival and development of its MSMEs and industries.
Indonesian Trade Minister Zulkifli Hassan
In fact, Indonesia's trade minister also explained that this is directly related to the trade war between China and the United States. Due to the trade war launched by the United States, Chinese products faced the dilemma of being rejected by Western countries, so they increased their exports to the markets of third world countries such as Indonesia. Indonesia is also in the process of drafting a new ministerial regulation to address concerns about the influx of Chinese products.
It has to be said that Indonesia, as the quasi-leader of ASEAN, has long become one of the basic plates of the mainland's economy. In 2023, the bilateral trade volume between China and Indonesia will reach US$139.4 billion, of which the mainland imports US$74.2 billion from Indonesia and exports US$65.2 billion, and Indonesia has a surplus of US$9 billion. China has been Indonesia's largest trading partner for 11 consecutive years.
And Indonesia has so openly set up obstacles to the mainland's commodity exports, and I don't know what is inside that cannot be told. But this is obviously not good news, and it is unlikely that other ASEAN countries will follow suit. But Indonesia also needs the Chinese market very much, and if we retaliate against it, they will be very uncomfortable.
Compared with Indonesia, in fact, the country with the greatest hostility to the mainland in ASEAN is definitely the Philippines. Since Marcos Jr. became president of the Philippines, the Philippine military coast guard has tried to challenge the mainland's bottom line on Scarborough Shoal, Ren'ai Jiao and other islands and reefs in the South China Sea, but all of them have failed. A few days ago, he was violently beaten by our coast guard commando at Ren'ai Jiao and captured 8 special forces.
According to Taiwan media reports, the Philippines has recently colluded with the Lai Qingde authorities and sent 30 coast guard members to Taiwan Island to receive professional coast guard training. Not only that, Taiwan's "Coast Guard" specially invited Philippine coast guard personnel to the site to participate in "observation and study" during the "Haian 11" exercise last year.
The intention of the DPP authorities to cooperate with the Philippines and target the mainland coast guard has become very obvious. The two sides said that in addition to establishing a long-term and normalized "training" exchange mechanism. A high-level official of Taiwan's "National Security Bureau" also revealed that it wants to share regional intelligence with the Philippines.
I have to say that these two guys, one in the Taiwan Strait and the other in the South China Sea, are arrogant and stupid. However, in the end, they will all become victims and cannon fodder of US hegemony, which is really pitiful, pathetic, hateful and hateful.