China’s Li Qiang delivers a warning to South Korea’s new president

Good morning and welcome back to the working week. In today’s newsletter we’re covering:

• A ban on ‘China’s Kim Kardashian’

• Keir Starmer’s stunning transformation

• The declining popularity of dating apps among young women

But we’re starting in Seoul, where South Korea, China and Japan will today hold their first three-way summit in almost five years.

Just yesterday, Chinese Premier Li Qiang, Xi Jinping’s top-ranking official, warned South Korea against politicising economic issues as the two countries agreed to restart trade talks on the eve of the summit.

Li said on Sunday that the supply chains of China and South Korea were “deeply intertwined” and added that the two sides should “oppose turning economic and trade issues into political or security issues”, according to a report from Xinhua, China’s state news agency.

The trilateral summit comes as Beijing has been pushing back against snowballing US controls on chip sales to Chinese companies and Joe Biden’s rising tariffs on Chinese cleantech exports. Japan and South Korea are central to US efforts to restrict Chinese access to cutting-edge semiconductors and related technologies.

Our reporters explain the backdrop of today’s meeting, and give a look at what’s on the agenda.

Here’s what else is happening today:

• Bank of Japan: Governor Kazuo Ueda speaks at the central bank’s Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies International Conference in Tokyo.

• UK Spring bank holiday: Financial markets will be closed

• World Health Organization: The 77th World Health Assembly opens in Geneva.

Five more top stories

1. Exclusive: SoftBank is prepared to commit close to $9bn a year to artificial intelligence investments. Founder Masayoshi Son believes AI will be the source of future growth, and the billionaire is trying to reshape SoftBank, and its risk-taking Vision Funds, to remain relevant in what he considers humanity’s next stage.

2. Taiwan has descended into domestic political turmoil less than a week after its new President Lai Ching-te took office. The opposition has sought to curb the president’s administration, as China’s military conducts exercises that it has called “punishment” of Lai, a staunch defender of his country’s de facto independence. Voting on a sweeping expansion of parliamentary powers is expected tomorrow.

3. Dozens were killed and wounded after airstrikes hit a camp for displaced persons in Rafah on Sunday, according to authorities in Gaza, who said the strikes came from Israel. The Israeli military said it had struck a “Hamas compound”, but that it was looking into the specific incident at a UN-run “safe zone”. Earlier in the day Hamas fired long-range rockets at central Israel for the first time in months, including past Tel Aviv. Here’s what we know.

4. Twelve people were injured because of turbulence during a Qatar Airways flight from Doha to Ireland, Dublin Airport said on Sunday. The incident comes five days after a bout of extreme turbulence on a Singapore Airlines flight from London to Singapore resulted in a fatality and more than 100 injuries. 

5. An influencer known as “China’s Kim Kardashian” has been banned from Chinese social media networks along with dozens of others who bragged about splurging on luxury goods. The abrupt online disappearance of Wang Hongquanxing is part of the government’s latest campaign to maintain its dominance over China’s social media culture.

Big Read

The UK Labour party’s Keir Starmer has engineered one of the most stunning transformations in recent political history. And while he’s been consistently ahead of his Conservative rivals since late 2021, his net approval is still in negative territory. The FT’s deputy political editor Jim Pickard explores why Starmer is yet to capture the public imagination.

We’re also reading . . . 

Chart of the day

Young women are falling out of love with dating apps. The declines in users on dating apps such as Tinder and Bumble come amid increasing reports of so-called dating app fatigue and “burnout”. Here’s how companies are trying to to win users back.

Take a break from the news

Why do we buy clothes for a life we don’t lead? In what I found to be a highly relatable story, one FT writer documented her outfits for a month in a bid to understand why so many of her clothes go unworn.