The dimensions of Beijing and its minimalist architecture are alienating, and murals of China’s founding father, Mao Zedong, at odds with Prada stores, says Margaret Hickey.           

Tobin Harshaw talks to non-proliferation expert Jeffrey Lewis about North Korea’s nuclear programme and why the regime’s recent ICBM launch shouldn’t have come as a surprise

PRESIDENT Trump’s relentless, dishonest attacks on media might be seen as a back-handed compliment to those who report on his inanities, ineptitude, and his disdain for much that is good in our world but far too many of his supporters swallow the Barnum and Bailey harrumph hook, line, and sinker to make that indulgence possible.

Ryle Dwyer reads a trilogy that traces the life and crimes of the tyrant responsible for the deaths of millions of his fellow countrymen. 

While Brexit is hogging the headlines, it is not the only threat to the stability of the business world, writes Kyran Fitzgerald.

The conservative elite encourage anti-intellectualism because it maintains an unsustainable status quo, writes Suzanne Harrington

Consumerism isn’t just about buying goods and services. It has come to define the way we shape our identities and how we interact socially every day, as JP O’Malley discovers in a supersized tome that traces its history.

“WHEN Teresa May slipped into her slinky red dress on Wednesday morning, she knew exactly the effect her outfit would have,” wrote somebody in the Daily Mail the other day.

A former journalist with China’s official news agency says he has been blocked from travelling to the US to accept a Harvard University prize for a 2008 book uncovering the devastating toll of the great Chinese famine of 1958-1961.

After a lavish display of Chinese military muscle in Beijing Rana Mitter assesses the future path of the Eastern colossus.

Hank Paulson is the ultimate insider. He worked with Nixon, was US treasury secretary, but hit the jackpot working for Goldman Sachs in China. Gerard Howlin discusses a career built on, among other things, charm.

Stephanie Meadow and Graeme McDowell both won nine times during their US college careers but Leona Maguire could blow their records out of the water after a sensational start to life at Duke University in North Carolina.

INTERNATIONAL Women’s Day will be celebrated on Sunday.

JUNG CHANG set the literary world alight with her electrifying debut, Wild Swans, a family memoir of three generations of Chinese women. It was released in 1991 and sold 13m copies, becoming the highest selling non-fiction paperback ever.

Venue: Bord Gais Energy Theatre, Dublin

It is a matter of taste, or maybe conviction. Either way the relics of St Anthony have prompted the devotion of thousands in all-weathers around the country.

Ousted politician Bo Xilai recanted a confession of bribery when prosecutors alleged he used his wife and son to help collect more than €2.9m in illicit funds as he stood trial in China’s biggest political scandal in decades.

A Welsh university lecturer who made it to the last 16 of 'China's Got Talent' has claimed he's been 'dropped' by show producers.

From Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Cuba’s Raul Castro, about 30 heads of state joined the funeral of Hugo Chávez in a last goodbye to the charismatic but divisive Venezuelan leader who changed the face of politics in South America.

MY IRELAND-SIZED sense of distance had got me in trouble-again.

Between 1958 and 1961, some 36 million Chinese people starved to death because of Mao’s obsessive and dishonest Great Leap Forward, finds Neil Robinson

Tuesday’s Irish Examiner editorial was entitled Learn from history — more than the economy at stake.

Today, May 1, was, for those of us old enough to remember, one of the great set pieces of the Cold War’s propaganda battles.

Most of the English-speaking world’s view of the 20th century is neatly enough book-ended by two entirely avoidable human tragedies.

In the Year of the Dragon, Amy Chua profiles four Chinese powerhouse women who bucked tradition to get rich — very, very rich

In the final part of our three-day series, Caroline O’Doherty says China’s influence is growing across the world but its leadership is increasingly aware of the need to pick its corporate battles carefully

WHEN US vice president Joe Biden visited China last August, he spent many hours bonding with his Beijing counterpart, Xi Jinping.

WHEN Professor Fan Hong returned to China after studying abroad, she stopped in the neighbourhood where she thought she had lived and wondered where her home had gone.

IF EVER Florence Welch creates her own fragrance, it should be called Vintage, and for authenticity its top note would be the musty tang of second-hand clothes.

NORTH KOREA will shift to collective rule from a strongman dictatorship after last week’s death of Kim Jong-il, although his untested young son will be at the head of the ruling coterie, a source with close ties to Pyongyang and Beijing said.

The Fear Index

KATE VEALE (West Waterford) set a world best time of 21 mins 45.59 secs to win Ireland’s first ever gold medal in the 5k walk at the World Youths Athletics Championships in Lille yesterday.

Despite his Machiavellian morals, Henry Kissinger’s tale of the Asian nation’s newfound significance is a fascinating read, says TP O’Mahony.

WORLD SILVER medallist, Olive Loughnane, faces her first big assignment of the year when she lines up for the European Cup Race Walking in Olhão on the Algarve on Saturday.

My Flirtation with International Socialism

People with knee or hip problems could in future “grow” their own replacement joints using their own stem cells, scientists said today.

PEOPLE with knee or hip problems could in future “grow” their own replacement joints using their own stem cells, scientists said.

The Atlantic and its Enemies: A Personal History of the Cold War

GREAT news. Green shoots, at last. One of the key drivers of the Irish economy has officially emerged from recession. Yes, the Cassandras are back in business. What with bombs here and shootings there, the Troubles junkies can hardly believe their luck.

WHEN Anchee Min wrote Red Azalea, she realised that it was not just her own story “but also the story of China, its yesterday, today and tomorrow”.