EJ Insight

Kim Il-sung was the son and grandson of Christian converts. Growing up, he went to church every Sunday, taught Sunday school, played organ in church and performed in holy plays. He was the son of the “Jerusalem of the East”, the name given to Pyongyang during the first half of the 20th century. In 1945, one sixth of its population was Christian – the highest proportion per capita in Asia – with dozens of churches and a major Presbyterian seminary founded in 1901.

For six months, Ukrainian soldier Vyacheslav lived in a basement, was attacked by chemical weapons, did not take bath, ate no fruit and vegetables and was supplied only by robots and drones. On a rare foray outside, he and his partner found a Russian soldier hidden in a house. The Russian killed his partner and he killed the Russian. In his 50s, thin, bearded and with his face wrinkled, Vyacheslav gave a rare first-hand account of life on the front line in the Russo-Ukrainian war.

Mainlander Mr Lin used to work in Hong Kong where opened an account with a stockbroker. He moved back home but continued to trade with HK$1 million in the stock market, collecting dividends and interest. “Last summer out of the blue I received a telephone call from someone who knew all my personal information and told me to pay a 20 per cent tax on my Hong Kong earnings. I thought it was a scam until my friends were summoned to the city government to pay the tax.

These were scenes Russians could not imagine. More than 1,000 construction workers surrounded vehicles of the armed police and National Guard and forced them to release from a vehicle a worker they had detained. Over 200 workers marched through the street of a city in Khabarovsk, in the Far East, demanding back payment and help from President Vladimir Putin. How could they get away with it?

Driven by surging global demand for AI hardware and advanced semiconductors, Taiwan will this year post its highest GDP growth since 1987 – 11.05 per cent. The government has announced a gift of NT$10,000 to every citizen as an “AI bonus”. At a news conference last weekend in Taipei, Chen Shu-tzu, Minister of the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said that exports were the biggest contributor to economic growth.

The Chinese government is so frustrated with Donald Trump that it may postpone or cancel his summit with President Xi Jinping in Washington in September. That is the view of Ker Gibbs, who was President of the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai under Presidents Obama, Trump and Biden and has worked in China for 40 years.

Liberalism has long been associated with individual freedom, constitutional government, and protected rights. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, liberal democracy has been widely viewed as the most dominant political model in Western societies. Yet the rise of political strongmen has since challenged this consensus.

Kim Jong-un is sending tens of thousands more of his soldiers – perhaps up to 50,000 – to fight in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. They have a 50 per cent chance of survival. Citing intelligence reports, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on August 9 that up to 50,000 North Korean soldiers would be deployed in Russia. They are going because Russian President Vladimir Putin is running out of soldiers.

The European Union has become the largest foreign investor in Taiwan, as it seeks to reduce its dependence on China, especially in the hi-tech sector. “Big European companies are investing in traditional areas, to sell cars or machinery and also to support the Taiwanese semiconductor ecosystem,” said Lutz Gullner, head of the European Economic and Trade Office in Taipei, the EU’s de facto embassy. “Our 27 member states have invested more in Taiwan than the U.S. and Japan combined.

In mid-July, Intel announced an investment of five billion euros in its semiconductor centre 20 kilometres west of Dublin. Since 1989, the company has invested more than 30 billion euros in Ireland. “This represents a commitment to maximise capacity at our Leixlip campus and increase what we can deliver to Intel Foundry customers,” said Naga Chandrasekaran, Executive Vice President of Intel Foundry, when making the announcement.