Chatham House released a paper this week discussing how climate change will affect the Arctic, shaping a new geopolitical and economic environment. Authors Charles Emmerson and Glada Lahn argue that the fragile Arctic environment is likely to be adversely affected by economic development, while geopolitical sensitivities over territorial claims in the area are only likely to intensify. Melting ice caps in the Arctic also offer a potential alternative trade route to Asia, making this paper a invaluable read for anyone interested in Asian economics.

"The resilience of the Arctic’s ecosystems in terms of withstanding risk events is weak, and political sensitivity to a disaster is high," the authors say. "Worst-case scenarios may be worse in the Arctic because the ability to manage evolving situations is limited by environmental conditions and the lack of appropriate infrastructure."

Read the full report here.

Also this week, Cheng Li, a research director at the Brookings Institutions, looks at the Bo Xilai scandal and whether it could actually be a blessing for China.

"Before the Bo crisis, there was great division among the leadership, intellectuals, and the public on China’s path forward. Now there is an opportunity to reach a new consensus and seriously pursue political reforms. This crisis has revealed the flaws in China’s political system, including the danger of allowing a demagogue like Bo to emerge, as well as the nepotism and corruption within the system."

Find out more here.

China Power

The scandal surrounding ousted rising star Bo Xilai continued this week, with the Chinese widow of murdered British businessman Neil Heywood having been gagged by local police in Beijing, Reuters says. Heywood was murdered last November, and Bo’s wife has been named a prime suspect. The whole affair has leftists up in arms over what they see as a political purge, but it has given Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao an opportunity to revive his claim that corruption is China’s greatest threat. 

Elsewhere, crippled rights defender Ni Yulan and her husband remained detained despite calls by U.S. Ambassador to China Gary Locke for their release. Wen’s call has more than a hint of irony, considering Ni was working to protect victims of illegal land grabs by corrupt government officials.

Politics aside, China has proposed new music copyright rules that would give its government control over music royalties, including those from foreign music distributed in China. Meanwhile, there’s further proof that state companies still rule in China: CSR Corp, which produced the bullet trains that malfunctioned in the horrific Wenzhou train accident last year, was reportedly awarded a billion dollar contract for the Beijing metro.

Across the Strait, Taiwan has called up its reserve troops for a military exercise that simulates a full scale attack by China. The exercise comes despite dramatically improved ties between China and Taiwan. Somewhere ties aren’t improving, though, is the South China Sea, where a row with the Philippines keeps rumbling on. Beijing this week summoned a top Philippine diplomat to discuss the “harassment” of Chinese fishing boats.

Indian Decade

Indian train drivers are protesting a circular that instructs them to remove dead bodies from train tracks to reduce delays. It’s a morbid but very real a real issue considering the high accident rate on Indian railways. Meanwhile, in a somewhat gruesome case of missing body parts, families in one north Indian state suspect organ trafficking abetted by corrupt hospital personnel, and have filed suits against the hospitals involved. Also in northern India, a couple decided to bury their own child alive. Why? Because it was written in the stars apparently. An astrologer told them that the ritual would prolong their child’s life. The infant survived, and is now in state custody.

In Kashmir this week, Indian police questioned 16 men about Facebook posts that were supposedly inflammatory and anti-India. But a call by an Indian state minister underscored that the disputed territory isn’t the only place politics gets personal on the subcontinent. West Bengal Food Minister Jyotipriya Mallik says his party’s members should keep their daughters from marrying or even mingling with opposition supporters. We’re waiting for similar calls between the Republicans and Democrats sometime before November’s U.S. presidential election.

India also made international headlines this week, with the successful launch of a long range, nuclear capable missile. While India has claimed the missiles are for deterrence only, their ability to reach major Chinese cities has caused some controversy in Beijing.

Guns

The fallout continues from North Korea’s recent attempted rocket launch. Joel Wuthnow noted in The Diplomat that a very Chinese looking mobile missile launcher was paraded through the streets of Pyongyang last weekend.  According to U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, this should perhaps come as no surprise. “I'm sure there's been some help coming from China. I don't know, you know, the exact extent of that,” he told the House Armed Services Committee. 

But if China has helped North Korea fire a rocket, its advanced fighter deal with Russia is misfiring. The Diplomat reported recently that China was believed in talks to purchase 48 Russia SU-35 fighter jets for $4 billion, a deal that the Chinese side at one point denied. This week, media outlets declared the rumored talks “frozen.” China has a history of “borrowing” inspiration from Russian designs, and the deal may have stalled over Russian efforts to push for a large order.

Speaking of orders, Russia's state agency for arms sales said this week that Asian countries have become Russia’s leading military technology buyers, VOA News reports, with 43 percent of Russia’s arms exports last year going to Asia. One of those destinations is Malaysia, which has just forked out $35 million on acquiring PBB-AE (P-77) air-to-air missiles.

Butter

The IMF thinks that China is headed for a soft landing. Despite a fifth consecutive quarterly downturn in the first quarter, there was scope for optimism in certain March figures, including record steel output. The fund also thinks that a Beijing move to loosen its grip on exchange rates will help reorient the economy towards domestic demand.

A Chinese strengthening will be a relief for Australia, which worries over the implications of a slowdown in demand for its commodities. For now, though, the IMF still sees Australia as the best-performing developed economy in the world, with growth of 3 percent this year. Japan has been among the worst-performing developed economies, ever since its bubble burst at the end of the 1980s. The man who burst that bubble, then-Bank of Japan Gov. Yasushi Mieno, died this week aged 88.

Cambodia has opened a securities exchange; Burma is planning one. Singapore’s exports are down. The Reserve Bank of India surprised observers with a 50-basis-point cut in interest rates this week, with further cuts in the offing. Meanwhile, the Korean pop culture boom (known as hallyu) has created a new export industry: plastic surgery. Fans from its Asian neighbors are apparently flocking to South Korean plastic surgeons hoping to look like their Korean idols.

Related posts:

1. The Week in Asia
2. The Week in Asia
3. The Week in Asia

Red it here.

With this week’s standoff between China and the Philippines, the Council on Foreign Relations’ Senior Fellow Bonnie S. Glaser analyzes the potential for armed clashes in the South China Sea, sets out the implications, and presents some options for what can be done. For a start, Glaser suggests the United States and China cooperate on risk reduction measures, while advocating economic cooperation to help reduce tensions in the area.

“Political and military hotlines have been set up, though U.S. officials have low confidence that they would be utilized by their Chinese counterparts during a crisis,” Glaser writes. “An additional hotline to manage maritime emergencies should be established at an operational level, along with a signed political agreement committing both sides to answer the phone in a crisis. Joint naval exercises to enhance the ability of the two sides to cooperate in counter-piracy, humanitarian assistance, and disaster relief operations could increase cooperation and help prevent a U.S.-China conflict.”

Read the rest here.

Brookings Senior Fellow Sunil Dasgupta meanwhile offers an interesting perspective on the recent feud between Indian army Chief Gen. V K Singh and the Manmohan Singh government, arguing that it could actually boost democratic mechanisms within the country by increasing the transparency of government operations.

Red it here.

China Power

Scandal’s the keyword for this week in China, starting with the ongoing confusion surrounding the recent high-profile sacking of former Chongqing Communist Party chief Bo Xilai. China’s internet monitoring system has gone into overdrive, with authorities deleting thousands of online “rumors” as part of the purge. Included in the crackdown has been Utopia, a leading pro-Bo Xilai website. But the whole affair has taken on a Hollywood worthy twist, with Bo Xilai’s wife being accused of plotting the murder of a British businessman, while The Telegraph says Bo’s son Bo Guagua was escorted from his Harvard University home by law enforcement officials. The fall of the flashy Bo senior offers an interesting contrast of sorts with the rising status of U.S. Ambassador to China Gary Locke, who has been winning praise in China recently for his frugal habits.

In other news, a group of political dissidents, including leaders of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protest, have issued an open letter to the Chinese government asking for the right to return to China. With lower than expected economic growth, the specter of inflation and the biggest political scandal in decades – China’s leaders have plenty to think about at home as they prepare for the leadership transition later this year. But foreign policy isn’t on hold while they grapple with all this – China and Japan agreed to cooperate over increased contributions to the International Monetary Fund, while Beijing underscored the growing distance with the Assad regime in Syria by calling on it to honor the peace deal (and ceasefire) agreed with former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan.

Indian Decade

Negotiations between the Indian government and Maoist rebels bore fruit as Italian tour guide Paolo Bosusco was released, despite previous threats of mutilation and execution. A teacher in North India wasn’t so lucky: Hindi teacher Rakesh Kumar was crushed to death by the car of two of his own students for not allowing them to cheat during examinations.

In New Delhi, a traffic law making wearing helmets compulsory for men but not for women has drawn criticism from women’s groups, who see it as yet another example of the inferior status of women in the country. Writing in Indian Decade, Sumit Ganguly worries about much the same thing as a 3-month-old baby dies after being beaten by her father for being a girl.

In more upbeat news, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari’s visit to India was described as “fruitful” and “satisfying,” with Zardari and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh discussing issues such as Kashmir and Hafiz Saeed, accused of masterminding the 2008 Mumbai bomb attacks. This show of diplomatic goodwill coincides with the opening of the largest ever Pakistani trade show in India, perhaps a sign that economic opportunity will boost the prospects for peace. Or perhaps not, says Ganguly.

Meanwhile, India filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization over rising visa application fees in the United States, which it claims discriminates against Indian IT firms. (Compiled by Calvin Wong, Editorial Assistant).

Guns

The (not particularly effective) rocket launch by North Korea this week has dominated the news, and the implications are being discussed around the region and beyond. The BBC noted Chinese media has been split on the issue, but have warned the U.S., South Korea and Japan not to overreact. The Yomiuri Shimbun suggests that Japan’s government may not reacted quickly enough, noting that the speed of the rocket failure took the government off guard and meant it was too slow to relay this information to the public.

Speaking of early warnings, Singapore has started operating four Gulfstream jets, equipped with a sophisticated mission suite that includes an active electronically scanned array radar to detect, identify and track aerial targets, AsiaOne reports. The government described the platforms as “critical for a small country like Singapore.” Next door Malaysia, meanwhile, is the first and longest stop this weekend in the Airbus Military A400M's three-nation Asia tour, marking the first time the A400 has been seen in Asia, according to Bernama.

Butter

While most China watchers are focused on the Bo Xilai earthquake, China’s first quarter economic growth was actually 8.1 percent, below forecasts and the lowest level in nearly three years. However, Chinese officials welcomed the rising weight of domestic consumption, suggesting a more balanced economy. The Asian Development Bank sees India growing 7 percent this fiscal year, rising to 7.5 percent the year after, but says that the country needs to move forward on reforms that encourage investment. The Japanese government and the Bank of Japan, meanwhile, agreed this week that the domestic economy continues to improve moderately, with signs of an increase in export performance. The assessment was buttressed by figures released Monday showing Japan returned to a current account surplus in February.

Officials in the Philippines are anticipating an upgrade in the country’s sovereign debt rating soon. External debt to GDP is only 27.5 percent. Sri Lanka achieved record post-independence growth of 8.3 percent in 2011; the Australian dollar has eased from recent highs on slower Chinese growth; the Wall Street Journal thinks sanctions on Burma should now be dropped; while sanctions on Iran are biting, or not.

Related posts:

1. The Week in Asia
2. The Week in Asia
3. The Week in Asia

Canada had been asleep at the switch when the TPP, which had begun life modestly as a grouping of just four small economies (New Zealand, Chile and Singapore, joined at the last moment by Brunei), expanded its membership at the APEC summit in Peru in 2008. The TPP had limited traction until the administration of George W. Bush, looking for an initiative to take on the trade front in the face of a hostile Congress, latched on to the TPP as a possible vehicle to promote trade liberalization, potentially leading to a future Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific (FTAAP). Once the United States was on board, Peru, Australia and Vietnam all enthusiastically signed on through unilateral declarations. Malaysia expressed cautious interest and was eventually admitted. Canada, still mired in a minority government that hadn’t yet bought into the realization that Canada’s future lies as much, or more, in Asia rather than across the Atlantic or exclusively in North America, did nothing.

Over the past couple of years, though, the TPP has started to gain momentum. With the reaffirmation of U.S. commitment by the Obama administration, negotiations started in earnest in 2009, leading to a declaration in Honolulu in November 2011 at the APEC Summit that the TPP leaders had achieved the broad outlines of an “ambitious 21^st Century agreement.” They expressed the hope that the agreement will be completed by the end of this year.

As the TPP started to move toward reality, and as Canadian trade relations with Asia continued to mark time (Canada has signed a number of free trade agreements in recent years, but none with an Asian economy), Canadian officials started to realize that they were on the outside looking in. They quietly started to sound out the United States on the possibility of Canada joining the negotiations, but it’s fair to say that Canadian participation wasn’t a U.S. priority.

First, there was the issue that adding participants would complicate a negotiation that was already challenging, given the varied economic interests of the participants, ranging from fully developed economies like Australia and New Zealand to emerging, state-directed economies like Vietnam. Second, there were some very real concerns regarding Canada’s willingness to make a positive contribution to achieving the kind of ambitious outcome the U.S. was seeking. Canadian intellectual property rights (IPR) laws were notoriously lax, and several attempts to update them had gone nowhere. Canada has also always been keen on carving out a wide exception for a broadly-defined range of “cultural industries.”

This is something not designed to appeal to important interests in the U.S. and, perhaps of more importance to New Zealand than the United States, Canada clung to an outdated supply-management system for dairy, eggs and poultry, the effect of which was to more or less seal off the Canadian market for these products (with the exception of specialty items that couldn’t be produced in Canada). In short, Canada wasn’t really welcome at the table, although no one wanted to say so publicly, and Canada didn’t want to run the risk of a rebuff by asking publicly.

Related posts:

1. Canada’s Asia Fixation
2. Canada’s Head Fake Asia Policy?
3. Canada Plays its China Card

The first lesson is that a rising regional power will seek to displace an external status quo power. While intra-regional competition among established and new powers is common (as witnessed by centuries of European history), the position of a foreign status quo power in any given region is particularly vulnerable. It was relatively easy for the British to rule various divided territories in Asia since the East India Company first set up shop in Madras in 1639 and began spreading eastward. But the emergence of a cohesive, ambitious, and aggressive imperial Japan ultimately set up a clash between a Britain seeking to preserve its exposed position and a Japan bent on rewriting the regional security order. In fact, the British failure to renew its alliance with Tokyo in 1921 helped speed Japanese expansion in Asia, by ending cooperation between the two and removing restraints on Japanese ambitions. Ultimately, American sanctions on Tokyo threatened to derail its military strength, and Japan’s leaders decided to gamble on attacking all Western powers in Asia in a bid to secure vital raw materials and destroy European colonial holdings.

The second lesson is that miscalculating an adversary’s operational intentions (or misreading his doctrine) can lead to early and insurmountable reverses. Japan’s surprise attack on Singapore and its unorthodox strategy was crucial in knocking the British off balance and preventing them from effectively regrouping, even though they outnumbered the Japanese forces they faced. The British had long assumed that any Japanese attack, if it came, would be from the sea, and Singapore’s great guns were all emplaced facing out over the water. Gen. Tomoyuki Yamashita, who would be executed for war crimes in 1946, devised a brilliant plan to neutralize Singapore by capturing British Malaya first, then invading the island fortress from the north. He launched his invasion on December 8, 1941 and his force of approximately 30,000 combat troops took just two months to reduce the peninsula, before advancing on Singapore in a pincer movement. Fighting in Singapore itself lasted just a week before the smaller Japanese force captured over 80,000 British, Australian, Indian, and Malayan troops.

The third lesson is that tyranny of distance helped doom the British. For generations, Singapore was assumed to be impregnable, the very symbol of British might overseas. Yet, as Percival knew all too well, it was also isolated, undersupplied, and unprepared for war. The British were simply too far from home to be able to effectively resupply the island in the short crisis before collapse. The Japanese dominated the air, and had been bombing the island since December, with only token British resistance. The Royal Navy was driven from the seas around Singapore when HMS Prince of Wales and Repulse had been sunk off Malaya just two days after Pearl Harbor. The British had difficulty maintaining communications with their regional commands on the island. The Japanese attacked the island’s water stations, and it was this, along with dwindling food supplies, that finally forced Percival to heed the entreaties of his subordinate commanders and surrender. The war in Asia would rage for three more years, and the British would play only a marginal role in defeating Japan.

Related posts:

1. What COIN Teaches Thailand
2. Getting Real About Taiwan
3. Insult to Injury in Okinawa

Since the end of World War II, Washington’s approach to this region was largely a by-product of other overarching international objectives. During the Cold War, the United States saw maritime Southeast Asia as a bulwark against communist expansion. Then, with the end of the Cold War and the onset of the Asian financial crisis, the region became ground zero in a US-led effort to save the global economy. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the emergence of al-Qaeda-affiliated groups in the region—and their successful bombings of Western targets in Bali and Jakarta—transformed the area into a battleground in the war on terror.

But the US approach to the region is now undergoing yet another change.

Maritime Southeast Asia matters. Situated at the strategic crossroads of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, the region plays a vital role in securing global trade flows. The region contains a US ally (the Philippines), a long-time US friend (Singapore), and an up-and-coming regional heavyweight (Indonesia) who in recent years have improved diplomatic and security ties with the United States.

Economically, the region has come a long way since the dark days of the 1997 financial crisis. Singapore has joined New York and London as a top-tier financial centre; Indonesia has become one of the world’s leading emerging markets and is a member of the G-20; and Vietnam has achieved growth rates rivalling those of China. The region’s 465 million people produce a gross domestic product of nearly 1.5 trillion dollars and together constitute a vital market for US exports. Maritime Southeast Asia also hosts considerable US foreign direct investment (FDI). Indeed, its stock of US FDI is more than twice China’s and almost six times that of India.

In addition, the region lies on the front line of China’s rise. Over the past two decades, a booming China has economically permeated the region, surpassing the United States, Japan, and Europe to become its largest trading partner. At the same time, maritime Southeast Asia’s defining body of water, the South China Sea, has become a regional flashpoint. Beijing asserts sovereignty over most of the South China Sea while a number of littoral states advance more modest territorial claims.

In recent years, China has employed blustering language and military exercises to intimidate other claimants and overlaying these local tensions in the South China Sea is an emerging maritime rivalry between the United States and China. In contravention of established international law, for example, Beijing has harassed US ships navigating areas of the South China Sea that fall within its exclusive economic zone. Whether China’s ‘peaceful rise’ amounts to more than mere rhetoric will be tested in maritime Southeast Asia early—and often.

Enter the Obama Administration

Having spent part of his childhood in Indonesia, US President Barack Obama came to office with a particularly strong interest in the region. He declared that the days of US withdrawal from the region had ended, and billed himself as ‘America’s first Pacific president.’ In addition, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s inaugural foreign trip included maritime Southeast Asia, signalling a renewed US commitment to the region.

This initial emphasis on maritime Southeast Asia translated into a series of initiatives aimed at strengthening US ties with the region.

Related posts:

1. Korea: A Model for Southeast Asia?
2. Obama’s Vital Asia Trade Mission
3. Pentagon Turns Eyes Toward Asia

Now, Malaysia wants to relive those glory years. It’s planning to build another tower, this one to be the world's second tallest after Dubai's Burj Khalifa. Warisan Merdeka, or Freedom's Legacy, is supposed to be a private venture managed by asset management company Permodalan Nasional. But the government's hand is clearly visible. Prime Minister Najib Razak announced it during his 2011 budget and the company's chief executive claims government backing. Razak has said the government isn’t contributing a cent, but no one really believes him. Most suspect the government will use other tools besides equity funding—like tax breaks or plain old political influence—to support the project.

The trouble is that Warisan Merdeka makes no economic sense. The developers say the project will yield between 8 percent and 10 percent a year. But there’s already a glut of office space in Kuala Lumpur—occupancies are only around 80 percent—and adding 3 million square feet of space certainly won’t help. Permodalan Nasional has also remained unhelpfully tight-lipped about where funding is actually coming from.

The opposition has relentlessly attacked the UMNO (United Malaysia National Organisation) government about the project, while tens of thousands have joined an anti-Warisan Merdeka Facebook group.

Many Malaysians are furious because the project is a complete policy non-sequitur. Aside from raw material exports, the Malaysian economy is clearly underperforming, while foreign direct investment has slowed to a trickle in the past few years. The Wall Street Journal's editorial page has pointed out that on a net basis; money is flowing out of the country—partly because there are few investment opportunities. Cheap labour can no longer drive the country's growth—Vietnam and China are more competitive here. Meanwhile, educated Malaysians, whom the country desperately needs to move up the value-chain, don’t actually want to live in the country. Instead, they’re fleeing for better pay abroad, in part due to affirmative action policies. Building a tower solves none of this. In fact, far from a symbol of economic dynamism, it suggests a lack of imagination at best, and stagnation at worst.

The other reason Malaysians are opposed to the tower is more psychological. Many resent the relentless benchmarking the government has foisted upon them. Perhaps no Asian government, not even China's, has announced more ‘economic transformation programmes’ or  ‘national key result areas’ or ‘strategic reform initiatives’ than Malaysia. No other nation exhorts its citizens more to strive for ‘developed nation status’—a harsh yet self-imposed reminder that it still can’t call itself one. After a decade of hard-charging leader Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad, the national mood is much like a mother who has delivered a baby—grateful but exhausted. In his recent budget speech, Razak told Malaysians:  ‘to attain developed nation status, we cannot remain complacent. We must change our mindset.’ But what if Malaysians aren’t ready for someone to out-Mahathir Mahathir?

Related posts:

1. Malaysia Rally Turns Ugly
2. Malaysia’s Militant Headache
3. India’s Soaring Fighter Ambition

Leaving her family in Guangdong, China, Li (who asked her real name not be used) says adapting to what she calls a ‘pseudo-Western’ lifestyle has been difficult. But she says that although her new lifestyle has been an awkward fit, what has been hardest is overcoming the hostile attitude of natives in a country known for being a melting pot of different cultures.

‘I disagree with some of the practices and habits of Singaporeans, but I’m here to make a living’, she says, adding that her feelings about her host country, and the prejudice she says she has encountered, are to her quite separate issues from trying to make a successful career.

Li says her working day usually begins at 7 a.m., when she begins manning a cart selling trinkets outside one of Singapore’s private universities. She says the job isn’t glamorous by Singaporean standards, but that the wages are high enough compared with what she could earn in China to allow her to send enough money back to help her parents out. And she says her job is better than what many of her compatriots are left doing–long hours in karaoke lounges, waiting tables in the city-state’s restaurants and hotels–work she says is traditionally shunned by native Singaporeans, who have seen immigration as a way of filling such vacancies.

But although she admits she has it better than many immigrants (adding that life has been made much easier since she acquired Permanent Residency status through marriage, something that gives her most of the rights of a citizen) she says she doesn’t see her long term future in Singapore. ”One day, I’ll just go back to China because China is prospering’ she says.

Li’s comments reflect a growing tendency among many Chinese and Indians to view Singapore as a temporary home and springboard that helps them further their educational and material pursuits while reserving the option to return to their home country. But such views are increasingly causing resentment among native Singaporeans, a frustration that was given full voice by Singaporean bloggers last month after a former resident who had returned to China resident flashed her permanent residency card in front of Chinese camera crews during China’s National Day celebrations.

China-born Zhang Yuanyuan, who had studied in Singapore for five years and landed a lucrative job here, caused outrage among Singaporean netizens when she flashed her residency card while apparently proclaiming her loyalty to China, an act many saw as indicating a lack of gratitude for the opportunities afforded her in Singapore. But even before the so-called Zhang Incident, a prominent former civil servant, Ngiam Tong Dow, had already penned an op-ed warning over the island’s ‘liberal’ immigration policy, writing that Singaporeans risked becoming ’strangers’ in their own country and expressing concern that the island was being seen simply as a ’stepping stone’ by many immigrants.

According to a recent government report, Singapore’s population had risen to 4.99 million (of which 1.37 million were said to be foreigners), meaning the tiny country, which is far smaller than the tiny US state of Rhode Island, has almost 7,000 people per square kilometre squeezed into its borders.

But the tight physical squeeze is only part of the problem facing policymakers as many newcomers find themselves facing growing accusations of job-snatching and claims they are changing local areas for the worst. ”I don’t recognise Geylang any more.I’m beginning to wonder which is the real Chinatown?’ one reader wrote recently in the Straits Times, commenting on the transformation of a one-time Malay (the indigenous people of Singapore) area, before going on to note the replacement of English signposting on some restaurants in Geylang with Putonghua (Standard Mandarin) typefaces.

Related posts:

1. China-Russia Border Poison
2. China’s Russian Invasion
3. No, the US Isn’t Japan