Dear ST reader,
De-risking has emerged as the latest term in vogue on the global stage following the G-7 summit in Hiroshima last month, with leaders of the seven advanced democracies saying that it is different from “decoupling”. De-risking is framed as not over-relying on any one country for the supply of materials or as a market, in critical supply chains such as semiconductors and minerals.
In Tokyo for a conference the following week, Singapore’s Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong delivered a pointed speech, cautioning that de-risking could similarly result in a more fragmented and decoupled global economy. Mr Wong, a trained economist, said: “It is hard to see how de-risking, at its current ambition and scale, can be strictly confined to just a few strategic areas without affecting broader economic interactions.” In a later interview with the Singapore media, he was asked by The Straits Times’ Japan correspondent Walter Sim if the Japanese political and business leaders he met were receptive to his message. Here is what he said.
For a decade and more, Mr Ashok Kumar Mirpuri has observed at close quarters America’s politics and its intensifying competition with China. Singapore’s ambassador to the United States – throughout the Obama, Trump and Biden years – is coming home. Read his interview here with US bureau chief Nirmal Ghosh and US correspondent Charissa Yong where he talks about how there is agency for Singapore and Asean in navigating great-power rivalry, and what he has learnt travelling to 49 out of the 50 American states.
And lastly, a farewell of a different sort: earlier this year, two prominent Taiwanese died. Buddhist monk Hsing Yun and political scientist Chu Yun-han’s Academia Sinica were both champions of unification with China. Taiwan correspondent Yip Wai Yee delves into the fast-dwindling group of Taiwanese who, like the two men, believe that the island should unify with China, and their fears of being cancelled.
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