China

Taiwan is asking the United States for fewer new F-16 fighters due to budget concerns, according to media reports.

Taiwan is cutting its previous request to Washington for 66 F-16C/D fighters to just 24 of the advanced F-16 planes, according to Agence France-Presse, citing media reports in two Taiwanese newspapers on Monday.

The Taiwanese defense ministry dismissed the reports in the Taipei-based China Times, which quoted an “authoritative military source,” and The Liberty Times, according to AFP.

The Obama administration last year agreed to a $5.9 billion deal to retrofit Taiwan’s current fleet of 145 F-16A/B planes, rather than selling Taiwan new F-16C/Ds, which are more advanced than the F-16A/Bs Taiwan currently operates.

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The senators ask China's ambassador to get his country to crack down on companies producing fake IDs.

Your morning global affairs speed-read

Congress and the State Department both mark the end of the 7th U.S.-China Human Rights Dialogue with their own take on China's record and how it affects bilateral relations.

Michael Posner, the assistant secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, will give a read-out of his two-day meeting with Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs Director General for International Organizations and Conferences Chen Xu, whose delegation visited the Supreme Court and nongovernmental and media organizations. “Rule of law, freedom of religion, freedom of expression, labor rights and other human-rights issues of concern were discussed during the two-day event,” says the State Department.

For its part, the House Foreign Affairs Committee will hear from experts on Tibet, Falun Gong and the Muslim Uyhgurs of western China at a hearing titled “Investigating the Chinese Threat, Part Two: Human Rights Abuses, Torture and Disappearances.”

Iranian threat: The Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee on the Near East hears from a panel of think-tank experts about “Iran's support for terrorism in the Middle East.” Former Ambassador to Iraq James Jeffry is also slated to testify.

African trade: In the afternoon, the full Senate committee holds a hearing on Sen. Dick Durbin's (D-Ill.) Increasing American Jobs Through Greater Exports to Africa Act, which would require the president to designate a Special Africa Export Strategy coordinator to boost trade and investment in Africa. The Commerce Department's undersecretary of international trade is slated to testify about the bill, along with the chairman and CEO of the Export-Import Bank.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hinted Wednesday that China could win exemptions from U.S. sanctions targeting financial institutions in countries that import Iranian oil, according to a news account.

The United States has granted India, Japan, South Korea and other nations a waiver from the sanctions, which are slated to start taking effect in late June, because they have reduced their purchases of Iranian crude.

Clinton said Wednesday evening that China, a top buyer of Iranian oil, is moving in the same direction, according to Reuters. “We've seen China slowly but surely take actions,” she said.

The sanctions, required under a fiscal 2012 defense programs law, are part of broader efforts to pressure Iran over its nuclear program.

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.) on Tuesday night said Chinese government officials are the "Adolf Hitlers of our day," and accused them of murdering Christians and people of other religions.

Rohrabacher made these remarks during debate on his amendment to the Energy and Water spending bill for 2013. He offered an amendment that would prevent $7.5 million from being spent by the Department of Energy on a Clean Energy Resource Center in China.

"I'm not opposed to all cooperation," Rohrabacher said after another member defended the project. "I'm opposed to cooperation with the Adolf Hitlers of our day, the people who are murdering Christians and other religious people as we speak. No, we should not be cooperating with that government in developing their technologies."

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The Chinese government on Monday blasted the Obama administration for commemorating the 23rd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre.

“The U.S. side has been ignoring the facts and issuing such statements year after year, making baseless accusations against the Chinese government and arbitrarily interfering with China's internal affairs,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Liu Weimin said at a daily briefing, according to CNN. “The Chinese side expresses strong dissatisfaction and resolute opposition to such acts.”

The spat comes at a time of heightened tension between the United States and China on the eve of a once-in-a-decade power transition this fall that's been unusually rocky this year. A top contender for one of the nine spots on China's Politburo Standing Committee, leftist governor Bo Xilai, was purged from the party over allegations of corruption, while then-Beijing Mayor Chen Xitong in a new book says the June 4, 1989, crackdown should have been prevented.

If published reports prove true, the incident could be the biggest breach of Chinese intelligence operations to date.

Chinese officials Monday said they were “firmly opposed” to an amendment requiring the sale of 66 fighter jets to Taiwan.

White House officials said they were pleased that Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng had left China for the U.S.

Chen Guangcheng, the blind human rights activist whose case became a diplomatic crisis for the administration, has left China.