海角大神

A year after overturning Roe v. Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court is now turning its attention to a commonly used drug in abortions.

Republicans in the House of Representatives voted for an impeachment inquiry of President Joe Biden. We explain what the next steps might be, and what the evidence is so far.

As we saw in the recent COP28 summit, the best environmental intentions often run up against economic realities. It is easiest for wealthy people to adapt, as London is discovering.聽 聽聽

The European Union wants to make artificial intelligence 鈥渢rustworthy鈥� and 鈥渉uman-centric.鈥� It will be a landmark test of whether that鈥檚 possible 鈥� and how.

Presidential candidate and liberal activist Cornel West sits down with the Monitor鈥檚 Linda Feldmann and members of the press for a Monitor Breakfast to talk about his candidacy and the future of America.聽

The Monitor鈥檚 critic says 鈥淭he Zone of Interest鈥� is the most powerful film he鈥檚 seen this year. It reveals not so much the banality of evil, he writes, as its聽nothingness 鈥� the deafening silence at the center of a moral void.

Seldom does a staff mutiny within so small a firm cast so broad a ripple.

Last week, the German automaker Volkswagen said a Chinese-led inspection of its plant in Xinjiang, a province where state repression has drawn international criticism for years, found no evidence of forced labor. The assessment was endorsed by L枚ning, a Berlin-based business consultancy focused on human rights. Yesterday its roughly 20 employees publicly challenged the audit鈥檚 credibility.

The dispute is a reminder that the economic and security interests of nations cohere through transparency, the rule of law, and regard for human dignity. It comes at a moment when China, grappling with its worst economic slump in decades, faces new demands for openness.

European leaders confronted Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing last week with a list of 13 China-based entities they accuse of breaking international sanctions imposed on Russia over its war in Ukraine. They have also taken steps in recent months to finalize a new European ban on goods made with forced labor.

The new law includes a framework for investigating companies and supply chains. It would take direct aim at the rapidly growing electric vehicle industry in China, where companies like Volkswagen are partnering with state-owned counterparts.

鈥淐learly, the Europeans are taking a much more robust stance than the Chinese were expecting or wanting to see,鈥� Steve Tsang, director of the SOAS China Institute in London, told The Diplomat yesterday.

At a meeting last week, the Communist Party Politburo declared that it was 鈥渘ecessary to鈥�... strengthen economic propaganda and public opinion guidance鈥� to boost China鈥檚 economic recovery in the new year. That nod toward secrecy, however, tells an incomplete story.

In an agreement signed last year with Washington, Beijing opened access for foreign regulators to audit Chinese firms listed on overseas exchanges. Those audits cover both financial matters and social concerns such as labor practices. In most cases so far, foreign assessment teams have had to partner with local counterparts who collect and interpret the data. That is what led to the dispute at L枚ning. An unnamed Chinese law firm conducted the Volkswagen audit. The top two officials at L枚ning merely reviewed the assessment.

But a door once opened may be hard to shut. The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, the main U.S. watchdog, has undertaken an audit of all 200 Chinese companies listed on American stock exchanges this year. It is also auditing the auditors. In a midyear report, the board found that three-fourths of the assessments it reviewed by U.S. and Chinese auditors contained an 鈥渦nacceptable鈥� level of deficiencies.

Such steps toward transparency and accountability may help seed a gradual shift in China鈥檚 governing culture based on secrecy. 鈥淒emocracies ... have their own competitive advantage: openness,鈥� wrote Christopher Walker, a vice president at the National Endowment for Democracy, in the journal Foreign Affairs. A small office in Berlin has sent Beijing a big reminder.