China

Congress is giving President Obama new powers to help seal the deal on an ambitious Asia-Pacific free trade agreement, a move that angers many Democrats and unions.

China says 57 countries have signed on as members of the new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, but the U.S. is not among them. Some analysts say the bank is a sign of diminished U.S. power.

The State Department has released documents from 1865 that highlight the disbelief and profound sympathy over the president's death from governments and private citizens the world over.

The move, NPR's Frank Langfitt says, is "designed to assuage Hong Kongers angry with mainlanders who buy up goods." Critics say visitors from the mainland have driven up prices in Hong Kong.

The scale of China's construction in the South China Sea's Spratly Islands is clear in new satellite images released by the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, whose director speaks with NPR.

In the past, rural Chinese seeking success left their families and found work on the coast. Now, high wages mean factories are shifting inland and migrants are delighted to be following them home.

Bi Fujian, one of the country's most popular television presenters, recently ran afoul of his employer, state-run CCTV, for a parody song he performed at a private banquet.

Satellite imagery of a coral atoll in the South China Sea shows the reef is growing. A U.S. military official likens Beijing's land reclamation to building a "great wall of sand."

In his new book, exiled Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng tells the story of growing up blind, being beaten under house arrest and finding refuge in the American Embassy in Beijing in 2012.

The Shanghai exchange is on a tear, but there could be trouble ahead for ill-informed investors. Analysts say the current upswing is driven by perceptions rather than fundamentals.

Japanese and Americans surveyed say they want the two nations to remain close, or get closer. And they share a suspicion of China.

NPR's Frank Langfitt, who has been driving Chinese people around Shanghai to meet a variety of people and better understand the rapidly changing country, takes his experiment to a whole new level.