ExclusiveUS Hosts 50 Nations to Address Critical Minerals Supply Chain

Welcome to China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. Our top story, an alliance of more than 50 countries with a single goal to weaken China's dominance over the critical mineral supply chain. The group held its first meeting in Washington on Wednesday. An expert explains why it matters and how nations hope to diversify beyond Beijing. There's one country that controls it and that country is controlled by one party and that party is controlled by one man and therefore that's pretty critical. Chinese regime leader Xi Jinping held back-to-back phone calls with Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. What they discussed amid rising global tensions. An investigation underway over a suspected biolab at a Las Vegas home. The owner, a Chinese national, is in custody for operating another biolab with mice engineered to carry COVID-19. And from handbags to hashtags, Japanese Prime Minister Takaichi rides youth-led craze into Sunday's election. If she wins, Japan's tough stance toward China is expected to remain unchanged. There's a sharpened focus on critical minerals in Washington this week. Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio hosted more than 50 countries in Washington, D.C. The goal is to band together and weaken China's grip on critical minerals. InToday's Melina Wisecup has the report. The Trump administration is racing to lessen global dependence on China for critical minerals. These minerals are used to make everyday products, especially high-tech and EV products. Right now the U.S. relies on China for nearly 90 percent of minerals. And then once they control that industry and they're the only ones in the world that do it, then they can charge you anything they want, but they can also use it against you as leverage or it could be disrupted if there's any sort of global disruption. The national security concerns became more evident last year when Beijing imposed export controls on rare earths, causing production delays and shutdowns for auto manufacturers in America and Europe. We want to eliminate that problem of people flooding into our markets with cheap critical minerals to undercut our domestic manufacturers. The people who undercut them then jack up the price to a completely unfair level. The vice president announced at today's critical minerals meeting that the U.S. will establish a price floor system for critical minerals. He and the secretary of state today welcomed more than 50 nations to the meeting, including South Korea, Japan and Germany. As geopolitical risks continue to rise, we will redouble our efforts to secure alternative supply sources. The nations are banding together to kick-start an international push to diversify critical mineral supply chains. Several countries have signed on to a trading bloc put forth by the White House. It's an opportunity at self-reliance that we never have to rely on anybody else except for each other for the critical minerals necessary to sustain our industries and to sustain growth. Today's meeting comes after President Trump earlier this week signed an executive order to create a new strategic private sector critical mineral stockpile. We even expect the American taxpayer to make a profit from the interest on the loan used to start the Project Vault. Project Vault already has buy-in from some of the biggest U.S. companies like General Motors, Boeing and Google. With growing attention on rare earths and critical minerals, what are they and how do they impact everything from our daily lives to the military? Joining us to unpack all this and the geopolitical implications is Thomas Petrofsky. He is a portfolio manager at Ambest's Turidin Critical Minerals Fund and author of Mineral War, China's Quest for Weapons of Mineral Destruction. Thomas, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me. Well, as we've been seeing, stocks are going up and down with all the developments with rare earths, critical minerals. What even are these? Let's just first dive in. What is a rare earth? Rare earths are 17 different chemical elements that tend to co-occur together in subsoil in different parts of the world. And the main problem is that unlike other elements that we can just simply mine, like copper or iron ore or gold, we tend to extract all of them together. And the biggest problem is how to separate those valuable ones from those that are less valuable. And that's the big problem for the industry. And then when it comes to critical minerals, there's a lot of minerals. So what makes a mineral critical? So certainly what doesn't make them critical is geology, because rare earths can be found in many places. What's critical is control and who controls the production and the extraction and the processing of these minerals. And there's one country that controls it. And that country is controlled by one party and that party is controlled by one man. And therefore, that's pretty critical. I'm going to get into all that, but first for, say, the average Joe on the street, why should they care? How do rare earth critical minerals play into everyday life, but also our military? It's very important because the main application for rare earths is in permanent magnets. Now you may say, why do I care about permanent magnets? Well, because about 60% of our electricity uses magnets and 70% of those magnets use rare earths. Which means that almost half of all the electricity that we use is dependent on rare earths, mostly because of electric motors that contain those. So imagine that someone could basically switch off half of our electricity. That affects all of us. Now, it's not going to happen for the existing infrastructure, but it also means that you cannot build anything new, whether it's infrastructure, industry, or of course, the military. How did we end up here where China has essentially monopolized this entire sector? What was China seeing? What did China do to become the dominant player here? So to get into this in detail, I'll have to send you to my book. But let me just very briefly say that probably it's our own fault that we didn't pay attention to the economic structure imposed on China by the Chinese Communist Party. And that's a structure that's essentially Marxist. You have to control what they call means of production. So essentially, different parts of the economy, which are critical, not only for national security, but for the economic control. And that has been done by operating in upstream sectors. The upstream sectors were never privatized, whether it's basic chemicals, mining and metals that concern us here, whether it's banking, telecom, oil and gas, or power generation. That stayed in the hands of the state. And the state could therefore control input prices for areas which were more liberalized, especially in the 90s and early 2000s after China joined WTO. And so mining and metals were part of that scheme. And the second thing is that generally totalitarian regimes care a lot about metals. Because when you think about metals, you think about defense and potential kinetic conflict and so on. So they viewed these minerals as a strategic asset. Whereas in the West, we view them as a commodity, something that we can trade. And on that note, what would be the solutions here? What are the next steps needed to start moving away from having all the eggs in that one basket? So I love music on vinyl. I'm going to sound like a broken record. But the record says capital market has to follow. We have to incentivize somehow by a tax system, by price floors, maybe reference prices, and then protect those reference prices with tariffs so that private capital really participates in rejuvenation of that sector. Because right now, this is not the case. Right now, unfortunately, it's still a very marginal piece. So our administration really cares a lot about artificial intelligence and critical minerals for good reason. But artificial intelligence dominates our equity market largely, right? The top seven companies that wouldn't exist suddenly, if you ask about Taiwan, wouldn't exist anymore if we lost access to foundries in Taiwan. These are the top seven companies. They're about a third of our capital market. Critical minerals, not represented there at all. Tiny companies, by comparison to the others, improving a little bit since last year. There's a little more attention to this. But less than 1% of S&P 500 is represented by mining companies. And it's such a critical industry. So we have to do something. As I said, maybe through the tax system, maybe through coordination with other countries to incentivize more investment into this space. And sooner rather than later. Well, Thomas Nijovsky, thank you so much for your time. Thank you for having me, Tiffany. Chinese regime leader Xi Jinping held back-to-back phone calls with his Russian and U.S. counterpart Wednesday. The talk with President Trump came hours after Xi's call with Putin. The talks took place amid rising tensions between the U.S. and Iran. They also happened as rare trilateral discussions between Ukraine, Russia and the U.S. began. Russia and China said both sides should deepen strategic coordination. Putin has agreed to visit China in the first half of the year. He also plans to attend the APEC regional summit hosted by Xi in November. And regarding the dialogue between President Trump and Xi, Trump posted on Truth Social saying the call was long and productive. Trump said many important subjects were discussed, including trade, military, the April trip that he will be making to China, Taiwan, the war between Russia and Ukraine and the current situation with Iran, the purchase of oil and gas by China from the United States, the consideration by China of the purchase of additional agricultural products, including lifting the soybean count to 20 million tons for the current season, airplane engine deliveries and numerous other subjects, all which Trump said were very positive. Trump added that the relationship with China and his personal relationship with Xi is an extremely good one and that they both realize how important it is to keep it that way. He believes that there will be many positive results achieved over the next three years of his presidency having to do with Xi and the PRC. Xi and Trump last spoke by phone in late November. Federal authorities are now investigating a suspected biolab at a home in Las Vegas. The owner is a Chinese national who is currently in custody. He was arrested three years ago for running an unlicensed biolab in California, where officials found about a thousand mice engineered to carry COVID-19. Entity's Juliet Song has more. Investigations are underway over a suspected biolab found inside a Las Vegas home. SWAT teams and the FBI swooped in on Saturday. Within a locked garage, they found refrigerators and vials with unknown substances. A local sheriff says the materials could be biological or hazardous. Those materials have been transferred to an FBI lab for testing. Investigators say there is no threat to the public. The property manager of the home has been taken into custody. The owner of the home, Jia Beizhu, is already in federal custody. He was arrested after officials discovered an illegal biolab he operated in California. There, authorities discovered a thousand mice whose DNA has been engineered to catch and carry the COVID-19 virus. Officials also uncovered at least 20 potentially infectious agents, including HIV, tuberculosis and the deadliest known form of malaria. Zhu has been charged with making misbranded medical devices. His attorney says he has no involvement in any alleged biolab tied to the Las Vegas investigation. He's also wanted in Canada for stealing millions of dollars' worth of intellectual property from U.S. companies. He's scheduled for trial in April in the California case. Julia Song, NTD News. A handbag she carries is sold out, her pink pen has gone viral, and even her favorite snacks are in hot demand. Japan's 64-year-old leader, Sanae Takahichi, has sparked an unlikely youth-led craze that could propel her to a big election win on Sunday. What does it mean for China if Takahichi wins? Japan's tough stance toward China isn't expected to change. Japan's military spending is expected to stay high and may even rise. However, tensions are not expected to escalate further, as many experts predict. Japan's 64-year-old Prime Minister Sanae Takahichi has become an unlikely pop culture phenomenon, and the craze surrounding her could help deliver a decisive election win this Sunday. What fans are calling Sanakatsu or Sanamania has taken off among young voters. Everything the conservative leader touches seems to sell out, including the $900 Hamano leather handbag she carries. Well, she's the first female prime minister, so a lot of young people, like myself, are curious about what kind of apparel she uses. And I saw a lot of posts going viral about it. So, you know, I think it would be nice if I could use the same things as her. So I was curious about it and looked it up. Polls suggest that momentum could translate into political power. Surveys this week show Takahichi's ruling coalition could capture as many as 300 seats in the 465-seat lower house, a sharp reversal after her predecessor lost control of both chambers over the past 15 months. What's more surprising is who's driving the support. Among voters under 30, Takahichi's approval has topped 90 percent in at least one recent poll, far above her already strong overall rating of around 60 percent. Part of that appeal is her social media presence. Takahichi has amassed 2.6 million followers on X, dwarfing her rivals. Analysts say her greatest asset may be her personality, revitalizing a ruling party whose grip on power had been slipping. Koichi Nakano is a political science professor at Sophia University. Well, actually, being more popular than the past leaders of the LDP is not so difficult, given that all of them, not even most of them, but all of them have been middle-aged, boring men, or even elderly, boring men. And therefore, they had this very stagnant image that were not very communicative and were harder to understand. And so, in some ways, Takahichi, you know, cut a fresh image. Because even though Takahichi and her entourage are doing their best to present this election as about her and hoping that there's going to be some sort of eye-catching Sanakatsu moment that is going to take place, the actual votes take place on the constituency level, in the regional level, on the basis of the candidates and the party name, rather than Takahichi herself. And so, I think, you know, for her to try to sort of make the most of her sort of, you know, personal popularity is understandable. But how much of that is actually going to translate into the vote? Coming up, Panama ends a Chinese-linked port contract near the canal, triggering backlash from Beijing. As part of a broader shift, as countries in America's backyard rethink ties with China in all major aspects, including trade, defense and infrastructure. More on that after the break here on China In Focus. Welcome back to China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. Panama Supreme Court has thrown out a decades-long contract that allowed China to control its key ports. The ruling has sparked retaliations from China Wednesday, adding geopolitical tension around one of the world's most critical shipping routes. Hong Kong-based CK Hutchison says it intends to dispute the ruling and warns this could have major economic consequences. CK Hutchison says it's seeking extensive damages after Panama ended its agreement to operate the Balboa and Cristobal ports. Meanwhile, Panama's authorities have already begun inspections on the ports. They ordered the company to grant full access to property, data and staff. Chinese officials called the recent ruling absurd. They warned Panama could face serious political and economic consequences. Panama's president says the country is asserting its sovereignty. It's now in talks with Denmark-based APM Terminals to keep the ports running while a new public bidding process is set up. The Panama Canal handles roughly 40 percent of U.S. maritime cargo traffic and about 5 percent of global trade, making control over nearby ports critical. Analysts warn Chinese control near the canal could threaten U.S. national security, disrupting trade and military access during a conflict. Last year, President Trump said China shouldn't be controlling the canal, adding that the U.S. handed it over to Panama and now wants it back. Panama's ruling is a major win for the U.S. as Washington aims to decouple Chinese influence from the Western Hemisphere. And the development of the Panama Canal is just one sign of a bigger geopolitical shift playing out across Latin America this year. In just the first month of this year, China's influence in parts of the region has faced new pressure. It comes as countries rethink military deals, economic partnerships and their strategic alliances amid growing U.S.-China tensions. Panama's decision to end a Chinese-linked port contract marked one of the biggest blows to China so far this year. It's part of a broader push by some countries to reassess Beijing's role in critical infrastructure. Taking a look at Argentina, the country moved forward with a deal to purchase U.S. fighter jets instead of a Chinese-made alternative. Meanwhile, Peru signaled interest in closer defense ties with Washington. Economic shifts are also underway. Some countries are turning towards Western financial institutions backed by the U.S. dollar. Latin American countries are also reconsidering long-term debt and development deals tied to China's Belt and Road Initiative. China uses the Belt and Road Initiative to gain leverage in developing countries by funding key infrastructure projects. But when partner countries can't pay back the massive loans, China takes control of these strategic assets, including ports and energy infrastructure. At the same time, disputes within alliances like BRICS show nations are rethinking where they stand between the U.S. and China. What role does technology play in modern religious persecution? The International Religious Freedom Summit here in Washington, D.C. is highlighting how digital tools are being used to target faith-based communities. NTD's Chris Bobb has the story. At the International Religious Freedom Summit in Washington, D.C., speakers highlighted how surveillance systems, artificial intelligence, and online propaganda are being increasingly used to facilitate religious persecution. The persecution of Falun Gong has really spanned the rise of technology in China to persecute people, primarily Golden Shield, the Great Firewall, Skynet. These mechanisms for censoring, for surveilling, for correlating with databases of the identification cards, and using actual cameras and these types of technologies to identify where people are, pick them up, detain them, which eventually, of course, in Falun Gong's case, leads to torture and so forth. As you probably all know, have seen the Shen Yun posters that were started by Falun Gong practitioners to show the true culture of China, show the tyranny of the CCP on the world stage. On Platform X last year, they found that one of these articles going after Shen Yun was the most shared article of Ultima on the X platform. They found that strange. X investigated and found that this was happening because thousands of China-linked fake accounts were the ones sharing this article. The role of social media in fueling religious persecution emerged as a prominent theme of the summit, prompting speakers to call for stronger regulation. What shapes public policy more than lobbyists? The media, including social media. And yet, these kind of transparency measures are not in place for media. We've got some of our main media companies have tens of millions of dollars of deals inside China. They have personal staff with personal business and other ties to communist China. They're far alike regulations. Have to find the answer for how we handle social media, the importance of having free discussion and free discourse on social media, but don't allow it to continue to be a vector for hatred. And often that hatred gets weaponized. Summit co-chair Sam Brownback is scheduled to testify before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday. Brownback told me that he plans to warn lawmakers that authoritarian regimes see religious freedom as a direct threat to their hold on power. I'm going to point out that there is an axis of evil that is organized and action oriented of China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and a number of other countries that are diametrically opposed to religious freedom. And we need to, and yet they fear religious freedom more than they fear our aircraft carriers or nuclear weapons. Because if there's religious freedom in China, the Chinese Communist Party could lose control. Reporting from Washington, D.C., Chris Bobb, NTD News. That's all for today's China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. If you have any feedback on the show or have something you'd like to see us cover, send us an email at ChinaInFocus at ntd.com. We'd love to hear from you. For on the clock original news coverage, visit us at ntd.com or download our NTD app. Thanks for watching. See you tomorrow.