https://www.scmp.com/news/world/united-states-canada/article/2183780/canadian-pm-justin-trudeau-sacks-ambassador-china

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Saturday that he fired Canada's ambassador to China over remarks about a high-profile US extradition case.

Trudeau issued a statement saying he had asked for, and received, the resignation of Ambassador John McCallum.

The firing came after McCallum made comments picking apart the US extradition request for Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou, apologised, then again weighed in on the case, telling The Toronto Star that it would be “great for Canada” if the US dropped the charges.

That appeared to be the final straw.

McCallum's comments sowed confusion about whether the Trudeau government secretly opposes the US charges against Meng, who was arrested in Vancouver in December, and whether the government was sending two different messages in Ottawa and in Beijing.

Jim Nickel, McCallum's current deputy head of mission, will now represent Canada in China, Trudeau said.

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/2183466/chinas-plan-use-nuclear-bomb-detonator-release-shale-gas

Is China’s plan to use a nuclear bomb detonator to release shale gas in earthquake-prone Sichuan crazy or brilliant?

Despite being home to the largest reserves of shale gas on the planet – about 31.6 trillion cubic metres according to 2015 figures from the US Energy Information Administration, or twice as much as the United States and Australia combined

The problem is that 80 per cent of its deposits are located more than 3,500 metres (11,500 feet) below sea level, which is far beyond the range of hydraulic fracturing, the standard method for extraction.

But all that could be about to change, after a team of nuclear weapons scientists led by Professor Zhang Yongming from the State Key Laboratory of Controlled Shock Waves at Xian Jiaotong University in Shaanxi province, released details of a new “energy rod” that has the power to plumb depths never before thought possible.

Zhang’s torpedo-shaped device uses a powerful electric current to generate concentrated, precisely controlled shock waves to achieve the same result.

He told the South China Morning Post that while the technology had yet to be applied outside the laboratory, the first field test was set to take place in Sichuan in March or April.