Cindy Yu is an assistant editor of The Spectator and presenter of our Chinese Whispers podcast. She was brought up in Nanjing. She tweets at @CindyXiaodanYu
37 min listen
It’s easy to forget that, as recently as the start of this century, the US was China’s biggest ally. Washington saw Beijing as a necessary bulwark against Moscow, and consistently supported China’s entry into the world economy ever since rapprochement in the 1970s, including its accession to the World Trade Organisation. These days, the relationship
19 min listen
Slashing the winter fuel allowance, maintaining the two child benefit cap, cutting international aid, cutting the civil service, axing NHS bureaucracy, possibly slashing welfare expenditure… you’d be forgiven for thinking the Conservatives were in power. But no, these are all policies pursued by the current Labour government. So on today’s Saturday Shots Cindy Yu asks
43 min listen
Walking around Taipei a couple of years ago, I spotted a familiar sight – a bronze statue of a moustachioed man, cane in his right hand, left leg striding forward. The man is Sun Yat-sen, considered modern China’s founding father. I recognised the statue because a larger version of it stands in the city centre
12 min listen
Keir Starmer is in D.C. for what will probably be one of the most important bilateral meetings of his premiership. The goal is to charm Trump and secure some guarantees for Ukraine’s security after a negotiated peace in the war. Can he succeed? Cindy Yu talks to James Heale and Peter Quentin, Rusi Associate Fellow
12 min listen
For the second week in a row, the leader of the opposition seemed to struggle at Prime Minister’s Questions, ending up accusing Keir Starmer of being ‘patronising’ after having a couple of her questions rebuffed. Cindy Yu talks to James Heale and Isabel Hardman. Produced by Cindy Yu.
29 min listen
Just before the end of 2024, Chinese state media Xinhua slipped out an announcement – the long discussed mega-dam in Medog County, Tibet, has been greenlit. When built, it will generate three times more energy than China’s Three Gorges dam, currently the largest in the world. The Xinhua write-up gave few other details, but the
9 min listen
Donald Trump’s latest comments on Ukraine and its leader have united the British political spectrum in condemnation – almost. Nigel Farage has tread a careful path given his friendship with the U.S. President, but also the fact that the majority of the British public disagree with Trump’s critical attitude towards Ukraine. Can he keep this
57 min listen
Beginning in the first Trump presidency and expanded under Joe Biden, the US has taken a strategy of technologically containing China through restricting its access to cutting edge semiconductors. As Chinese Whispers has looked at before, these chips form the backbone of rapid advances in AI, telecoms, smartphones, weaponry and more. Washington’s aim was clear: to
22 min listen
‘An absolute moron’ – those were the words used by Chris LaCivita, a senior campaign advisor to Trump, to describe Peter Mandelson. Lord Mandelson is Keir Starmer’s choice for the next ambassador to the US, but Trump may yet refuse his letters of credentials. How wise is this appointment at the dawn of an uncertain
15 min listen
Tuesday night’s Reform fundraiser was designed to spook the Conservative party, says Conservative peer and journalist Paul Goodman on today’s episode. He talks to Cindy Yu and James Heale about whether Kemi Badenoch can keep her cool under Reform’s domination of the airwaves. Produced by Cindy Yu.
34 min listen
When Chinese spy scandals break, like the latest involving Prince Andrew and his Chinese business associate, one organisation often comes up – the United Front. Mao Zedong had dubbed it one of the Chinese Communist Party’s three ‘magic weapons’. So what is this mysterious ‘United Front’ and how important is it to advancing the CCP’s
16 min listen
Starmer and Trump have finally spoken, with a 45 minute phone call taking place between the two leaders. The pair reportedly discussed the ceasefire in Gaza, and trade and the economy, with Starmer attempting to find common ground by talking up his plans for deregulation. Cindy Yu speaks to Katy Balls and Kate Andrews about
I turned to Xiaohongshu during the pandemic. At a time when I couldn’t visit China, the Chinese social media app (also known as ‘RedNote’) was a little slice of the motherland when I was bored with Instagram or Twitter. I was hooked immediately: like Instagram, the app is good for beautiful pictures and well-produced reels.
49 min listen
Chinese Whispers is nominated in the Political Podcast Awards 2025. Vote for it to win the People’s Choice category here. Among the casualties of Donald Trump’s trade war with China in his first presidency was the telecoms giant Huawei. Founded by former military engineer Ren Zhengfei, the company is a world-leading manufacturer of everything from telecoms
How far should a government go to stamp out people smuggling? This month, the Home Office is set to introduce powers that will allow courts to place expansive restrictions on those suspected of people smuggling and other serious crimes. Penalties are set to include social media bans, restrictions on banking and even curfews, imposed pre-arrest. Infringement of
11 min listen
The war between Labour and Elon Musk continues to rage. Today the Financial Times reports that the tech tycoon has had discussions about ousting Keir Starmer before the next election, while the Mirror holds a report that the Home Office has been assessing Elon Musk’s tweets as a part of their efforts to tackle online
19 min listen
The grooming gangs scandal is back in the news this week after Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips rejected calls for a government inquiry into historic child abuse in Oldham, prompting a conservative backlash. Robert Jenrick, the Shadow Justice Secretary, called it ‘shameful’; Liz Truss, the former Prime Minister, labelled Phillips’s title ‘a perversion of the English
38 min listen
On this week’s 2024 Out Loud: Cindy Yu examined Chinese work ethic (1:13); Michael Simmons declared his love of the doner kebab (6:28); Angus Colwell reported from Israel in July (9:27); Igor Toronyi-Lalic explained the inspiration behind the cinema of Marguerite Duras (14:41); Mary Wakefield analysed the disturbing truth of the Pelicot case (20:38); Fraser Nelson
34 min listen
Why do so many Chinese people choose such curious English names? You must have come across this phenomenon – whether they are names from a past century, or surnames, nouns or even adjectives used as first names, or words that aren’t real at all. I have a particular interest in this because my English name
28 min listen
It’s been a historic year in British politics. At the start of 2024, the UK had a different Prime Minister, the Tories had a different leader, and The Spectator had a different editor! Michael Gove, Katy Balls, and Quentin Letts join Cindy Yu to review the biggest political stories of 2024. On the podcast, the panel discuss
