Erdogan hints at larger nuclear partnership with Russia, unsettling Turkey’s allies
rfi, 12/09/2026
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is signalling a move to expand nuclear power cooperation with Russia, just as his country’s first Russian-built nuclear station prepares to go live later this year. The deepening partnership is likely to unsettle Turkey’s western allies.
On the sidelines of a recent gathering of regional leaders in Kyrgyzstan, Erdogan told his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, that Russia and Turkey “will take steps together to open some new power plants, along with the opening of the Akkuyu nuclear power plant”.
The Akkuyu nuclear power plant, built by Russia’s state nuclear company Rosatom on Turkey’s Mediterranean coast, is due to go online later this year.
Erdogan’s announcement comes amid strained ties with Russia, as the Turkish leader has deepened relations with United States President Donald Trump.
Ozgur Unluhisarcikli, head of the Ankara office of US think tank the German Marshall Fund, describes Erdogan’s move as a “gesture” to Putin.
“Although Turkey is competing with Russia geopolitically, and although Turkey is firmly anchored in NATO and is improving its relationship with the United States, it does not intend to sever all ties with Russia,” Unluhisarcikli explained.
“Indeed, Turkey sees the Turkey-Russia relationship as a long-term strategic one. And this is, by the way, consistent with Turkey’s balancing act.”………………………………………………………………………………… https://www.rfi.fr/en/podcasts/international-report/20260912-erdogan-hints-at-larger-nuclear-partnership-with-russia-unsettling-turkey-s-allies
N Korea has built two-storey uranium enrichment facility, says watchdog
Yvette Tan, BBC 9th Sept 2026
North Korea has built a new two-storey uranium enrichment facility, the head of the world’s nuclear watchdog said this week, calling it a cause for “serious concern”.
The new building is part of the main Yongbyon nuclear complex, and reportedly capable of housing up to 28 centrifuge cascades used to enrich uranium.
In a report published late last month, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said Pyongyang had also begun operating an expanded annex at another enrichment site.
These findings point to a steady expansion of the North’s sancitoned nuclear infrastructure. The agency, which has no inspectors in North Korea since it was expelled in 2009, relies on satellite imagery for assessments.
“The continuation and further development of the DPRK’s [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea] nuclear programme are clear violations of relevant UN Security Council resolutions and are deeply regrettable,” IAEA director Rafael Grossi said in a statement earlier this week.
The IAEA first referred to the existence of the building in June, although Grossi had mentioned the possibility earlier in the year.
In June, the agency said that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visited a “newly inaugurated nuclear materials production factory” on 3 June, which it identified as the Yongbyon enrichment facility.
Kim had praised the country’s “greatly expanded production capacity”, adding that this would “offer the possibility of carrying out larger plans”, according to the agency’s report……………………………………………………………………..
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy0zqk2w92lo
China v. US: The Great Mideast AI Race Heats Up
Officials, activists and academics have warned that while economically Middle Eastern states may benefit from the race between the US and China to offer them investment and technology, this will likely come at an environmental cost.
September 8, 2026, Neil Thompson, https://www.juancole.com/2026/09/china-great-mideast.html
London– Last week, China’s President Xi Jinping made his first state visit to Egypt since 2016, amid deepening economic and security ties between Beijing and one of Washington’s major Arab allies. Egypt’s government said the two sides agreed to launch the third phase of a cooperative industrial zone in the Suez Canal, as Cario seeks to diversify its major foreign policy relations beyond just the US. The latter still supplies Egypt with $1.3 billion in military aid each year but faces growing geopolitical competition from China.
In a statement clearly designed to appeal to Egyptian audiences, where the Suez Canal is a major economic engine, Xi said that China “stands ready to work with countries in the region to safeguard the security of international shipping lanes, advance development cooperation … and eliminate the breeding grounds for conflict.” Instability in the Red Sea since 2023 and the US-Iran conflict since February have caused maritime traffic through the canal to drop sharply, though the major Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd shipping lines signalled last month that they were planning a phased return. hottest year on record in 2024, and that heatwaves there are becoming longer and more intense.
It is also during these months that the region’s new AI infrastructure needs the most water and energy to cool its server farms, too. Even without higher temperatures, the average data centre has the equivalent water demand of around 1,000 households per day, while a large one uses around 5 million gallons a day, the same as a town of up to 50,000 residents. Gulf countries like the UAE are engaged in massive construction of more desalination plants to meet this expected AI-related upsurge in water (and power) demand as a result. UAE regulators have denied the increase in water demand will cause them problems, with the head of regulatory affairs at Abu Dhabi’s Department of Energy saying in April: “We rely on desalination [plants] that have proven in the last 50 years to be a very reliable source for potable water.”
Conclusion
Middle Eastern countries outside the GCC will face similar problems with rising temperatures driving household power and water demand just as AI-related demand also increases. AI infrastructure projects may outpace regional water and power development without careful planning. In May, Egypt said it planned to meet future AI data centre power demand there using renewable energy. It is investing significantly in wind farms and other projects, including expanding regional interconnections with other countries’ power grids in Saudi Arabia, Europe and Sudan. However, these projects are vulnerable to timetable slippages from obstacles like construction sector supply chain disruption or port congestion at Egyptian terminals. With a growing population seeking jobs, Egypt’s government seems likely to press ahead regardless.
China’s expertise in both AI and green technology could likely help ease many Middle Eastern countries’ attempted transition to a digitalised and clean-energy powered economic future. But geopolitical competition with the US will add a political and diplomatic dimension to any projects with Chinese participation. The US is still a major security partner for many Middle Eastern governments, and Washington could threaten to withdraw military aid in response to a growing dependence on Chinese AI systems in allied regional governments or economies. The US fears Egypt allowing Chinese AI systems in its public sector would create cybersecurity risks for its agents and companies there. US fear of China could impede Middle Eastern states’ uptake of Chinese AI infrastructure and models, but also their uptake of Beijing’s greener gifts.
China Dangles Growth, Security Partnership
Beijing has also made Egypt’s government another offer of economic and technological development through state-linked firm Huawei. Egypt has ambitious plans to expand AI’s contribution to its economy to 7.7% of GDP by 2030, offering China an opening to challenge the US lead on global AI infrastructure by starting with a small project in the Middle East. Huawei bid on an Egyptian government tender in August to build public sector AI data centers there, in partnership with iFlytek, a Chinese surveillance company. Both Chinese companies are on a US blacklist, and Washington has approached US firms including Nvidia, AMD and Microsoft to put together a counterbid. Egypt has yet to announce a decision, but the move signals an intensifying race between Beijing and Washington to recruit more regional states into their respective AI stacks.
China’s Middle Eastern AI Footprint Expands Elsewhere
China and the US have each launched their own multinational AI alliances; in China’s case, this is the World AI Cooperation Organisation (WAICO), while the US set up the Pax Silica in December. Both groups contain a few Middle Eastern states so far, with Iran, Algeria and Oman joining WAICO, and Israel, Qatar, and the UAE have joined the Pax Silica. However, Chinese companies have launched AI-related projects in multiple Middle Eastern countries prior to WAICO’s launch, and Beijing’s AI-infrastructure footprint is likely to extend well outside the alliance’s formal Middle Eastern members. Middle Eastern firms are increasingly willing to use Chinese technology to launch their own AI models indigenous to the region, too.
In October, Chinese firm Alibaba opened a sector data centre in Dubai. In January, the UAE’s Emirate of Sharjah signed an agreement with Chinese AI infrastructure and cloud computing services provider DataCanvas to examine establishing data centers there. Finally, in September Saudi technology firm Humain released an Arabic-language AI model based on a Chinese one created by Chinese AI firm MiniMax. Chen Jing, a vice president of China’s Technology and Strategy Research Institute, told state media there that: “Unlike in the past, when Chinese LLMs primarily entered overseas markets through APIs or application products, in this collaboration, MiniMax M3 has directly become the foundational model for overseas indigenous model development.” Humain is financed by Riyad’s Saudi Public Investment Fund, indicating Saudi state backing for the firm’s project, despite Saudi Arabia not being a member of WAICO.
AI Growth, Environmental Cost?
Officials, activists and academics have warned that while economically Middle Eastern states may benefit from the race between the US and China to offer them investment and technology, this will likely come at an environmental cost. In April, the Qatar-based Middle East Council on Global Affairs research centre published a report warning that water and power demand for AI data centres presented a significant ecological challenge to Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states. GCC members already struggle to meet power and water demand during the summer months, when temperatures traditionally soar. This issue is getting worse. In December, the World Meteorological Organization issued its first report on the state of the climate in Arab states. It warned that these states had their
The historical fascists are preparing to take their revenge
SOTT – Signs of the Times, Thierry Meyssan, Voltairenet.org, Tue, 01 Sep 2026
Before our very eyes, the historical forces of fascism are reorganizing.The losers of World War II, those who massacred millions of Soviets, Chinese, and Jews, are once again in power in Japan, Israel, and Ukraine. They hope to take their revenge. It is up to us to denounce their preparations and prevent them from unleashing the apocalypse.
The losers of World War II are demanding revenge. They have no interest in it. They just want to win and reorganize the world hierarchically, with themselves at the top. Here’s what they have to say.
For the “militarists,” Japan never lost the war.
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi is a staunch supporter of the Emperor. Every August 15th, the anniversary of the surrender, she visits the Yasukuni Shrine. This shrine honors all those who gave their lives for the Emperor during the “Fifteen Years’ War” — that is, the invasion of the Far East and World War II. She regularly pays her respects at the graves of those convicted of crimes against humanity, something she is legally prohibited from doing since becoming Prime Minister.
This year, unable to attend, she sent offerings. Four of her ministers and about one hundred and fifty parliamentarians who were able to go, did so.
For them, the crimes of the Imperial Army never existed. They are merely fabrications by Japan’s enemies. But Koreans and Chinese have a different memory: the Imperial Army treated all those who did not acknowledge the Emperor’s divinity as subhuman.Japanese conscripts were trained to massacre and torture these individuals, and if they refused, they were severely beaten. In Nanjing, 100,000 women and children were raped and enslaved to satisfy the Emperor’s soldiers, and then 300,000 people were massacred. In Korea, Unit 731 performed vivisections on prisoners without anesthesia; crimes that inspired Dr. Mengele at Auschwitz.
The same crimes were repeated in Singapore, Malaysia, Indochina and Thailand, although the population did not have as strong a memory of them as in Korea and China.
The Japanese militarists are not seeking to repeat their crimes. They know full well that in modern times, they cannot demand the worship of an emperor who has acknowledged that he is no longer a god. But they are rearming their country.
While commemorating the massacres of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9, Sanae Takaichi carefully avoided mentioning that they had been perpetrated by the United States under President Harry Truman. Similarly, unlike her predecessors, she expressed neither remorse nor offered any apology for Japan’s role in World War II.
Japan only admitted its defeat in 1945 with the declaration of socialist Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama on the 50th anniversary of the event, on August 15, 1995. This was called into question by liberal-democratic Prime Minister Shinzō Abe on the occasion of the appointment of the Minister of Self-Defense Forces on August 3, 2016. This is now the official position of Japan, defended by Shinzō Abe’s protégé, Sanae Takaichi [ 1 ] .
It was with full knowledge that Mrs. Takaichi violated the pacifism of the Japanese constitution and supplied military trucks to Ukrainian “integral nationalists” and soldiers to NATO HQ in Wiesbaden on May 29 [ 2 ] .
For the “revisionist Zionists,” it is time to resume the war against the “Zionists.”
The Kahanist (that is, the disciple of the terrorist rabbi Meir Kahane) Itamar Ben-Gvir, Minister of National Security, announced on August 28 that his men had located the wreck of the Altalena. This was a ship, chartered by the “Revisionist Zionists,” with nearly 900 militiamen on board, which the “Zionist” Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion had sunk before it reached Israel on June 22, 1948.
The “revisionist Zionists,” that is, the followers of the Ukrainian Vladimir Zeev Jabotinsky, and the “Zionists” proper, that is, the followers of the Hungarian Theodor Herzl, engaged in a fierce hatred. Herzl wanted a homeland where Jews would escape pogroms, while Jabotinsky wanted a Jewish empire like the Italian and German empires………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………And now
We can no longer ignore what is happening. The forces of historical fascism — not some nostalgic eccentrics clinging to parades in uniform, but those who aspire to continue the Second World War — have awakened. They have begun to rewrite history. They have used our indifference to erase the memory of their crimes.
Our immediate responsibility is to deny them any political responsibility before they attempt to take their revenge and trigger the apocalypse. We must demand immediate elections in Ukraine and Japan. Elections have been called in Israel, but we must ensure that the election campaign is fair.
References:……………………………………………….. https://www.sott.net/article/508192-The-historical-fascists-are-preparing-to-take-their-revenge
North Korea hits out at Trump’s ‘pointless’ demands and vows to strengthen nuclear force
Trump has been seeking another summit with Kim Jong-un, following three meetings in 2018 and 2019
Kyu-seok Shim, 31 August 2026
North Korea declared on Monday that Washington’s hostile policy remains unchanged and pledged to continue strengthening its nuclear capabilities, rebuffing repeated American calls for denuclearization.
In a statement released via state media KCNA, a Foreign Ministry spokesperson accused Washington of maintaining a confrontational stance through demands for Pyongyang’s “complete denuclearisation,” criticism of its human rights record, and upcoming joint military exercises with South Korea and Japan.
“The Trump administration has thus fully reconfirmed its invariable hostile policy to wantonly violate the sovereignty, political system and security interests of the DPRK,” the spokesperson said, referring to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
The official described the country’s nuclear arsenal as “an absolute guarantee for defending its sovereignty,” adding that U.S. demands would not weaken its nuclear status………………………………………………………………………………………… https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/north-korea-trump-nuclear-force-hostile-us-policy-b3042186.html
Japan Govt Asks Eastern City to Accept N-Waste Site Survey
Hitachiomiya, Ibaraki Pref., Aug. 31 (Jiji Press), https://jen.jiji.com/jc/eng?g=eco&k=2026083100449
–The industry ministry Monday asked the city of Hitachiomiya in Ibaraki Prefecture, eastern Japan, to accept a literature survey for selecting a final disposal site for high-level radioactive waste from nuclear power plants.
If realized, Hitachiomiya would become the fifth site in the country to accept a literature survey, after the town of Suttsu and the village of Kamoenai, both in the northernmost prefecture of Hokkaido, the town of Genkai in the southwestern prefecture of Saga and Minamitorishima, a remote Tokyo island in the Ogasawara chain in the Pacific.
This is the second case of the central government seeking approval for the survey without request from local communities.
Senior ministry officials visited Hitachiomiya and handed a written request to Mayor Sadayuki Suzuki.
“I view the request very positively,” he said, adding that he wants to make a final decision after hearing from the city assembly.
Evacuees from Fukushima nuclear meltdown reach settlement with Tepco
Aug 26, 2026, https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/08/26/japan/crime-legal/tepco-fukushima-settlement/
SAPPORO – A total of 176 people who fled Fukushima Prefecture following the March 2011 nuclear disaster have reached a settlement with Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings in their damages lawsuit filed against the firm and the government.
The settlement was reached on Aug. 18 at the Sapporo High Court, according to lawyers for the plaintiffs.
All the plaintiffs withdrew their damages claims against the government. The decision came on the heels of the Supreme Court’s June 2022 ruling, and a series of similar court decisions that followed, that the government was not liable for the nuclear accident.
The plaintiffs evacuated from Fukushima Prefecture to Hokkaido in the wake of the triple meltdown at the tsunami-stricken Fukushima No. 1 plant.
Under the settlement, Tepco apologized for the irreparable damage the plaintiffs suffered because of the accident.
The settlement amount was not disclosed. The plaintiffs’ lawyers said the sum was “not sufficient but took into account their claims to a certain extent.”
Seiichi Nakate, head of the plaintiffs, and his family evacuated from the city of Fukushima to Sapporo in 2012.
“The settlement is far from enough to make up for our indescribable suffering, but we decided (to accept it) because we cannot endure any more exhaustion,” he said.
In its March 2020 ruling, the Sapporo District Court ordered the government and Tepco to pay about ¥53 million in total to some of the plaintiffs, finding both liable for the accident. The plaintiffs, Tepco and the government all appealed the ruling.
AI robots and drones to assist in Fukushima nuclear plant cleanup
Three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant contain 880 tons of debris. (Photo by Akitoshi Sugiura)
Japan government, TEPCO to launch consortium as decommissioning progresses
MASATOSHI IDA, August 30, 2026
AI robots and drones to assist in Fukushima nuclear plant cleanup. Japan
government, TEPCO to launch consortium as decommissioning progresses……..(Subscribers only)
Nikkei Asian Review 30th Aug 2026, https://asia.nikkei.com/business/technology/artificial-intelligence/ai-robots-and-drones-to-assist-in-fukushima-nuclear-plant-cleanup
Three years on, Fukushima’s fishers still deal with impact of treated water release
Japan Times, By Phoebe Amoroso, Aug 24, 2026
March 11 is a date of indescribable weight in Japan — one that conjures images of the devastating earthquake and resulting tsunami that killed nearly 20,000, displaced hundreds of thousands and caused catastrophic damage to the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
But Aug. 24 has also become a date of significance for the Tohoku region and the rest of East Asia. On this day three years ago, power plant officials began releasing treated water into the Pacific Ocean — a move that, while necessary, is continuing to have an economic impact on the region’s seafood.
“There’s no single perfect method that will ensure understanding among the public (when it comes to the safety of Fukushima’s seafood),” says Tadaaki Sawada.
Sawada is deputy manager of the guidance section for the Fukushima Prefectural Federation of Fisheries Cooperative Associations (FS Gyoren). Even three years on, he laments the difficulty of eliminating the stigma attached to the northeastern coastal prefecture of Fukushima and its produce.
On the day Sawada spoke with The Japan Times, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. (Tepco) completed its 21st discharge of treated water currently held in storage tanks at the No. 1 nuclear plant. Three years into this process expected to take three decades in total, fears of reputational damage have not explicitly emerged within the domestic market, but other consequences have been profound: geopolitical tensions and an exposure of the vulnerabilities that underlie Japan’s fishing industry as a whole.
Difficult choices
Though the primary disasters of March 2011 are in the past, the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant is far from decommissioned.
Nuclear debris remains inside the damaged reactors and still produces heat, so water has to be circulated through the damaged reactors to keep them cool and eventually discarded. A method known as Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS) can remove up to 62 radioactive compounds from this water to very low concentrations, but it can’t remove tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen. After ALPS and dilution with seawater, the concentration of tritium in the water reaches 1/40 of the maximum threshold mandated by government regulations.
With on-site water tanks nearing capacity, Tepco — backed by the Japanese government and the International Atomic Energy Agency — announced in 2021 that it would conduct periodic, controlled ocean discharges while monitoring the resulting tritium levels.
The decision provoked strong reactions, not least within Fukushima’s fishing industry. The government had promised fishermen that it wouldn’t release the water without the understanding of local communities, and the move was perceived by many as reneging on that commitment, provoking strong fears over further reputational damage.
But three years on, a strong consumer backlash within Japan has not materialized.
Takeshi Hamada, a professor of fisheries science at Sapporo’s Hokkai-Gakuen University, has studied the economic impact on Japan’s fishing industry. He argues that one key difference between domestic reaction in 2011 compared to the years that followed is related to media coverage.
“Following the Great East Japan Earthquake, most media outlets — including major ones — viewed government information with skepticism,” Hamada says via email. “However, during the ocean release of ALPS-treated water, there was relatively little coverage questioning its safety.”
Instead, criticism mostly emanated from somewhere far away from Japan’s northeastern coast: China.
On the day the first batch of ALPS-treated water was released, Beijing banned the import of all Japanese aquatic products (the ban was partially lifted in June 2025 before being reinstated that November after Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comments on Japan’s role in a hypothetical Chinese naval blockade of Taiwan).
The impact of the import ban on Japan’s fishing industry has been hard to quantify, but experts believe it has been significant. Compared to the year prior, Hamada calculates that Japanese seafood exports fell by about ¥75.8 billion (about $476 million) between September 2023 and August 2024. Analysis of the next 12 months found that exports had improved in some areas, but total seafood exports were still below the prerelease level.
For Fukushima, the exact costs cannot be isolated. Although it exported almost no seafood to China, export-bound Japanese seafood was redirected into the domestic market, weighing on prices. Based on shirasu (whitebait) prices, which were driven down by bumper catches elsewhere, Hamada estimates that average prices decreased by 8.2%.
The lack of clarity has a direct knock-on effect on compensation promised from Tepco as a condition of the water release. Fishers must demonstrate lower catch volume, catch value and sales value compared to pre-2011 to receive funds for the shortfall. Seafood processors, wholesalers and other retailers can also claim compensation by demonstrating reduced sales due to consumers or buyers avoiding their seafood products.
However, many of the costs remain hidden. In a November 2025 symposium held by the Tokyo Fisheries Promotion Foundation, Soichiro Kato, a lawyer representing affected businesses, said fishers were better placed to seek compensation because fishery federations could negotiate collectively, while many seafood processors without the same collective organizations in place had to deal with Tepco individually. He also criticized Tepco’s criteria as being too rigid and not capturing losses from reverse flow effects.
Fishing for solutions……………………………………………………………………..
Coastal landings are still subject to official radiation monitoring by Fukushima Prefecture, while FS Gyoren also conducts voluntary screening at fish markets to reassure buyers. After more than 100,000 inspections, the federation relaxed its system in April this year to cover fewer species and reduce screening from each landing or sales day to at least once a week. It hopes that this will speed up distribution and make the overall system more efficient, paving the way for expanded sales.
But each step back toward normalcy for Fukushima’s fisheries is a double-edged sword.
“When it comes to how wholesalers and distributors have reacted (to relaxed regulations), naturally, to be honest, no one directly criticizes us,” Sawada says. “But I think some people do have concerns internally. That may naturally result in transactions disappearing or decreasing. It does not appear openly, and it is difficult for us on the fisher and producer side to see.”…………………………………………………………………………….
Although Tepco has made progress toward reducing newly generated water, the discharges are set to continue for decades to come. However, FS Gyoren’s call for more support for Fukushima’s fishing industry is unchanged.
“We want to continue fishing in Fukushima Prefecture as a livelihood, not only in our generation but into our children’s and grandchildren’s generations,” says Sawada. “We want the government and Tepco to provide firm support for that.”
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/08/24/japan/fukushima-seafood-treated-water-three-years-impact/
Beyond China’s humanoid robots, a quieter machine revolution is unfolding
Laura Bicker, 25 Aug 26,
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c62m4zn1q6mo
“I take a nap and the world changes,” says Chen Tianyu.
His world certainly does. The 28-year-old keeps up with the latest technology by spending his spare time in factories that are switching to automation. That way he knows what to prioritise when teaching his class about artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics.
In front of him, around 30 college students are studying code. One of them is typing furiously as his eyes dart from the screen to the robot: “The idea is it will grab that cylindrical piece and move it over there.”
A line of industrial robots are waiting to be programmed, and in another part of the classroom, students are trying to develop robotic medical instruments. As he guides them, Chen declares: “If you are not needed by the world of AI and robotics, then you’ll definitely be among those eliminated”.
For the people in this room, this is a step – or rather a leap – towards a future that China is meticulously building: Xi Jinping’s $20bn (£14.7bn) plan to put his country at the forefront of innovation and in direct competition with the US.
The evidence is all around them. They are in the Hangzhou Technician Institute, one of several huge, purpose-built vocational schools that want to churn out the next generation of tech-savvy engineers. The campus sits on the outskirts of Hangzhou, a former imperial capital whose futuristic skyline is just the first hint of its role as a global tech hub.
Across the country, there are more than two million robots working in China’s factories – which is more than anywhere else – and they are continuing to scale up at extraordinary speed.
It is a commitment that will surely change the world, much like the last time the Chinese economy underwent a massive transformation. It is already shipping its robots across the globe: more than half of the world’s industrial robots are now made in China.
What is less clear is the impact of such sweeping automation in a country that sits at the heart of global manufacturing, trade and innovation. What does this mean for China’s human workforce, for instance? And how would we be able to truly measure the cost of this transformation in a regime that controls information so tightly?
The future of China’s workers is uncertain in the industrial revolution the world has been watching: gleaming solar grids, peak hours made noiseless by electric vehicles, machines that run faster than Usain Bolt. Over the weekend, China hosted the second edition of the World Humanoid Games where robots boxed, sprinted and marched.
What is fuelling this spectacle is another, less visible revolution happening inside factories and classrooms.
The BBC has visited industrial sites where we have been shown robots that do not look human, or dance or leap on stage but weld, paint, lift, assemble and work around the clock without a break or benefits. Some are designed to build more robots. We have also been inside academies where China is training the people who will work alongside its robotic workforce.
This is a front-row seat to what Xi calls China’s “new productive forces” – and how they could reshape the country.
On a factory floor in the southern city of Chengdu, the old and and the new are working side by side.
An assembly line of around 30 middle-aged men and women is screwing, drilling and polishing CRP Technology’s signature product: a robotic arm which performs various industrial tasks. Also in the room are four young engineers crowded around a console, trying to crack the code for a prototype, a new robot that they hope will help build other robots.
One of them, 31-year-old Pang Kai, who is part of the research and development team, pushes the sleek skeleton across the room. Because China’s future workforce is not quite ready to strut out. For now, it can only do simple repetitive movements, such as scan a QR code.
“Maybe in another half year, it can do another task,” Pang says, smiling wistfully. It’s a long road and the team are celebrating every small win.
CRP Technology, which employs around 300 people, has been building robot arms for nine years. Each arm can be tailored to a factory’s needs to help build cars, electronics or wind turbines. The firm says a single arm can be programmed to perform more than 90% of repetitive tasks.
The engineers also wonder if, one day, they can replace the company’s workforce. “We want our new robot to be like human beings. We hope it can think by itself,” says Pang. “We need these kinds of robots because maybe in 10 years, we won’t have enough workers in China.”
A shrinking population and an ageing workforce is another reason Beijing is in a hurry to revolutionise its factories. By 2035, more than a third of China’s population will be over 60, according to official estimates. The country will also lose nearly 60 million people in the next decade – almost equivalent to the population of France – according to some estimates.
The hope is that increased automation will fill this looming gap in the workforce before it starts to affect an already sluggish economy. But the speed of the transition is key. Around 120 million people still work in the manufacturing sector. If China moves too quickly, job losses could follow dealing a catastrophic blow to millions who depend on factory wages.
“In theory, machines can work 24 hours a day, which is certainly an advantage compared with human workers. But machines also require maintenance. Every day we need time for that, and each month the production line also requires inspection and repair,” says Cao Li, vice-president of EV maker Leapmotor.
Increasingly popular in Europe and the UK, the company’s budget-friendly, tech-focused cars come together at the Hangzhou factory with robots aiding the process at every step. At the end of the assembly line, more humans emerge.
The company has more than 25,000 workers and hundreds of them make the final checks as the sparkling new vehicles roll past. Will there be a day when they are no longer needed?
“It’s entirely possible,” Cao says. “And it may come relatively quickly. In workshops, including stamping, welding, and painting, we’ve basically achieved 100% automation.”
China has the edge over the US due to its enormous manufacturing base. Motors, batteries, electronics, gears, sensors – everything needed to build the body of a robot is all at hand.
“China also has an idea. It has a plan. They know where they want to be in five years. They plan at a top level, but they break it down to the regions, to the municipalities,” says Dr Susanne Bieller, General Secretary of the International Federation of Robotics.
“If you want to build a robot in Shenzhen – there’s an entire ecosystem. It takes you less than one hour to source the components you need to make a robot. In Europe it can take you up to a week.”
However, she acknowledges that while China is good at building the body, the US is still leading at building the “brain”, which includes developing the AI to programme robots. And yet Chinese firms, from DeepSeek to Moonshot, have been unveiling new AI models that they say can compete with top US firms.
Driven by an “open-source” approach, where AI start-ups share their code, Chinese innovation has been able to catch up faster than expected, despite US export controls over critical advanced chips. Analysts now believe that the next leg of this race will be determined not by who has the best language model, but who can put this intelligence into millions of machines.
And that is why China is also investing in producing a generation of students learning to imagine what could come next.
At the Hangzhou Technician Institute, for example, children can start from the age of 15. And the scale of what is being taught can feel staggering. There is an entire building dedicated to engines and aeronautics, and a restricted floor for students who will work to keep China at the forefront of processing rare earths – another crucial commodity in the battle with Washington.
Some see this as a solution to China’s stubbornly high youth unemployment rate, with one in five struggling to find a job. “Our students are in demand and can even be pre-booked by companies. They don’t need to worry about employment at all, and we hold competitions as part of their training,” Chen, the young teacher, says.
“It’s better to find your position within the technological wave. In the process of progress, structural changes are bound to occur, and these structural changes are exactly where students’ future employment opportunities lie.”
But China still faces serious economic challenges, from a property crisis that continues to drag on to huge local government debt and persistently low consumption.
Fukushima nuclear wastewater discharge marks three years amid concerns
In a statement issued on Sunday, Masanobu Sakamoto, head of the National Federation of Fisheries Cooperative Associations (JF Zengyoren), said the group’s position has not changed, stressing that it remains opposed to discharging wastewater without the understanding of fishermen and the public.
24-Aug-2026, CGTN
It has now been three years since the Japanese government began to discharge contaminated wastewater from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station into the Pacific Ocean despite strong opposition and concerns at home and abroad.
Japan unilaterally launched the ocean discharge of nuclear-contaminated water from the Fukushima Daiichi plant on August 24, 2023. Since then, Japan has conducted 22 rounds of ocean discharge, releasing around 173,000 tonnes of wastewater containing tritium, a radioactive substance that purification equipment cannot remove, according to Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO).
The latest round, held from July 30 to August 17, involved discharging nearly 8,000 tonnes of wastewater.
Over the past three years, TEPCO has paid a total of 96.7 billion yen (roughly $600 million) in compensation for about 1,100 claims as of August 5, including claims related to losses suffered by fishermen and businesses that have had to temporarily suspend or scale back their fishing activities due to the discharge plan.
According to The Japan News by The Yomiuri Shimbun, people in the fishing industry said most of the compensation claims were filed by those outside Fukushima Prefecture, as fishermen in Fukushima receive separate compensation for temporarily suspending their operations.
Despite the compensation, opposition to the controversial operation and worries about local fisheries’ development remain.
In a statement issued on Sunday, Masanobu Sakamoto, head of the National Federation of Fisheries Cooperative Associations (JF Zengyoren), said the group’s position has not changed, stressing that it remains opposed to discharging wastewater without the understanding of fishermen and the public.
Sakamoto noted that some countries and regions continue to impose restrictions on imports of Japanese seafood, while products such as sea cucumbers have been affected by falling prices.
“The markets that have been lost have yet to fully recover, and there are concerns over whether they can be recovered at all,” Sakamoto said, underscoring the serious challenges facing the fishing industry.
He also said government support measures were “insufficient for fishermen.”
According to The Japan News by The Yomiuri Shimbun, abalones from Iwate Prefecture had an average wholesale price of about 120,000 to 140,000 yen per 10 kilograms before the treated water discharge began. However, prices have remained low due to the suspension of exports. In 2025, the price fell as low as 60,000 yen per 10 kilograms.
To ensure food safety, fisheries cooperative associations in Fukushima Prefecture have set their own limit of 50 becquerels of radioactive cesium per kilogram for shipping marine products, stricter than the Japanese government’s standard of 100 becquerels per kilogram, according to the report.
Local fishermen remain committed to ensuring the safety of their products based on scientific standards and rebuilding consumer trust, The Japan News by The Yomiuri Shimbun reported, citing the Soma Futaba Fisheries Cooperative Association.
Japan to Reuse Fukushima Soil in Regional Cities
Tokyo, Aug. 25 (Jiji Press)
https://jen.jiji.com/jc/eng?g=eco&k=2026082500738 —
The Japanese government decided Tuesday to begin the reuse of soil generated from decontamination work following the 2011 accident at Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc.’s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in regional cities.
At a meeting at the prime minister’s office in Tokyo, the government decided to begin the soil reuse program at an early date for flowerbeds at buildings in Sendai in Miyagi Prefecture, northeastern Japan, and the city of Saitama, north of Tokyo, where central government branch offices are located.
It will be the first time for the soil from decontamination work to be used outside Tokyo, except for its use in demonstration projects in Fukushima Prefecture, home to the TEPCO plant, which suffered a triple meltdown following the massive earthquake and tsunami that mainly struck northeastern Japan in March 2011.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara said at the meeting that the reuse of soil from decontamination work will be key to achieving the government’s goal of completing the final disposal of the soil outside Fukushima by March 2045.
Kihara urged attendees to expand the reuse of the soil to regional branch offices in other cities and strengthen public communication about its safety.
South Korea helps Egypt expand Russian-built nuclear plant
South Korea’s growing role in Egypt’s Russian-built El Dabaa nuclear plant has helped shield the project from sanctions and enabled expansion
The New Arab Staff, 22 August, 2026
South Korea’s growing role in Egypt’s Russian-built El Dabaa nuclear power plant has helped Cairo shield the project from Western sanctions and paved the way for a major expansion of the site, according to senior Egyptian energy officials.
Electricity and Renewable Energy Minister Mahmoud Esmat said in televised remarks that Egypt was studying the addition of at least two more nuclear units at El Dabaa, with the possibility of eventually expanding the complex from four reactors to six or even eight.
Senior sources at Egypt’s Ministry of Electricity and Energy told The New Arab that the proposed expansion reflected “a state of confidence” surrounding the project following South Korea’s entry as a partner alongside Russia’s Rosatom.
They said South Korean involvement had enabled Egypt to gain access to Western-linked technology while limiting the exposure of companies working on El Dabaa to US and European sanctions imposed on Russian firms following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
According to the sources, the South Korean government is expected to provide financial and technical support for future expansions of El Dabaa, alongside its existing role in completing control systems and turbine-related work.
The arrangement has allowed Russia to retain control of the project’s nuclear core while South Korean companies handle major elements of its conventional power-generation infrastructure.
The sources said South Korea had taken on work that US company General Electric did not proceed with following the outbreak of the Ukraine war.
Egypt currently plans four Russian-designed VVER-1200 reactors at El Dabaa, with a total capacity of 4.8 gigawatts.
The proposed expansion could eventually increase capacity to 9.6 gigawatts by 2040, according to the sources.
Nuclear energy experts said Esmat’s remarks “open the door to transforming El Dabaa from a four-unit plant into a larger nuclear complex”.
No cost estimate, reactor models or timetable have yet been announced for the additional units.
However, the experts said Cairo increasingly views El Dabaa as “the nucleus of a long-term nuclear programme, rather than a standalone project that ends with the operation of four reactors”.
South Korea’s involvement in the project expanded rapidly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine complicated Western-linked supply chains.
Experts at Egypt’s Nuclear Energy Authority told The New Arab that Russian nuclear energy company Rosatom accelerated moves to bring Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power into El Dabaa as the key supplier for the turbine island and associated control systems for the four Russian units.
Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power signed a $2.25 billion contract with Russia’s Atomstroyexport in Cairo on 25 August 2022, months after the outbreak of the war and the introduction of Western sanctions…………………………………………………
https://www.newarab.com/news/south-korea-helps-egypt-expand-russian-built-nuclear-plant
Tepco begins removal of radioactive spent fuel from Fukushima No. 2 reactor
Japan Times 18th Aug 2026,
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/08/18/japan/tepco-fuel-removal/
Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings said Monday it has started removing spent nuclear fuel emitting high-level radiation from the pool of the No. 2 reactor at its disaster-stricken Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
Last month, the company removed 28 unused nuclear fuel assemblies, which have a relatively lower risk, from the same reactor. Tepco hopes to complete the removal of spent fuel by the end of fiscal 2028.
Tepco has already finished removing seven of the 587 spent fuel assemblies from the No. 2 reactor. Removed fuel assemblies are transferred to a safer common storage pool at the nuclear plant in Fukushima Prefecture.
The fuel removal will be suspended from October due to checks on the facility and to secure space in the common pool.
Work related to the transfer of spent fuel started in June. Spent fuel assemblies are put into a container called a cask inside the reactor pool using a remote-controlled crane. Once a cask is filled, it is lifted up from the pool and then down to a trailer outside the reactor building, and the assemblies are moved to the common pool.
Tepco has completed fuel removal from the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at the nuclear power station, which was heavily damaged in the March 2011 powerful earthquake and tsunami.
Fuel removal is slated to start in fiscal 2027 or fiscal 2028 at the No. 1 reactor, where work to remove debris is still being carried out.
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