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Jekaterina Koort¡¯s research focuses on the connection between ideology and visions of technological development. In understanding the rise of Chinese technology, it is important to pay attention to the nationwide strategic vision curated by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which involves all parties in creating a technological ecosystem based on Chinese technology. In order to explain this obscure vision, Jekaterina Koort¡¯s research specifically focuses on key terms used by Chinese state leaders to describe technological development, such as the concept of ¡°Chinese-style modernisation¡± in Chinese political and academic discourse.

During Xi Jinping¡¯s time in office, China set the goal of achieving a global leading position in science and technology by 2035. In order to achieve this, China must create technological autonomy independent from the West by increasing its strategic capabilities. In the journal Qiushi, which deals with the ideological strategies and concepts of the CCP, Chinese leader Xi Jinping has written that since 2012 China has implemented an innovative development strategy, the ultimate aim of which is the thorough reform of science and technology in pursuit of technological independence. The foundation of ¡°Chinese-style modernisation¡± is the complete modernisation of science and technology, ensured through strengthening the potential of fundamental scientific research, increasing the breakthrough capability of enterprises, attracting world-class talent to China, and the coordinated governance of the technology sector based on the idea of a community of countries with a shared future.

The aim of such academic research is to interpret the concept of ¡°Chinese-style modernisation¡± through the analysis of Chinese political and academic discourse. The study offers interpretative possibilities for the terminology defining the idea of ¡°Chinese-style modernisation¡±, which in turn would allow for a clearer understanding of the risks associated with the implementation of China¡¯s science and technology development strategy.

Jekaterina Koort Profile

Jekaterina Koort is a researcher of Chinese culture and philosophy whose academic work focuses on traditional Chinese culture, aesthetics, and philosophical thought. Her primary field of research is cultural studies within the broader framework of social sciences and culture.

Since 2008, she has worked as a lecturer at the Estonian Institute of Humanities of Tallinn University. Between 2015 and 2017, she was a lecturer at the School of Humanities of Tallinn University, and between 2017 and 2020 she served as Director of the Confucius Institute at Tallinn University. Jekaterina Koort obtained her doctoral degree in Cultural Studies from Tallinn University in 2017. Her doctoral dissertation, ¡°Landscape in the Discourse of Chinese Power and Spirit: A View through the Process Philosophy of the Song Dynasty¡±, was supervised by Margus Ott and Rein Raud. She obtained her Master¡¯s degree in 2008 from Tallinn University with the thesis ¡°The Way of the Daodejing and the Divergence of Paths¡±, supervised by Rein Raud. Her Master¡¯s studies focused on the cultural history of the Middle East and Asia, specialising in East Asian Studies (cum laude). She obtained her Bachelor¡¯s degree in Asian Cultural History at the Estonian Institute of Humanities between 1998 and 2003.

Her academic work has been recognised with several awards. In 2018, she received first prize in the humanities category at the Tallinn University student research competition for her doctoral dissertation. In 2017, she received third prize at the national student research competition in the field of social sciences and culture for the same work. In 2008, her Master¡¯s thesis was recognised with first prize both at the Tallinn University student research competition and at the national student research competition.

In his research, Laur Kiik focuses on China¡¯s desire to control access to rare earth metals through the example of Myanmar. China¡¯s global control over rare earth metals has long been significant, and its leading position in this field has far-reaching economic and geopolitical consequences for other countries. China produces approximately 60¨C70% of the world¡¯s rare earth metals and processes more than 85¨C90% of them, thereby holding an undisputed global leadership position in this strategic sector. China¡¯s role is particularly important in relation to heavy rare earth elements such as terbium and dysprosium, which are used, for example, in wind turbines, electric vehicles, and various military-technological applications, with terbium specifically addressed in the Myanmar case study.

In addition to production, China effectively holds a monopoly in processing as well. Although the United States, Australia, and several other countries also mine rare earth metals, they often lack the necessary technology and industrial capability to process them. As a result, a large share of raw materials is still sent to China. China also dominates the rare earth magnet market ¡ª approximately 90% of the world¡¯s magnets produced from rare earth raw materials are manufactured in China. These magnets are key components in many high-technology and green transition-related products, giving China strategic leverage over the entire global supply chain.

In recent history, China has also used rare earth metals as a tool of political pressure. For example, in 2010, exports to Japan were restricted in the context of a political dispute, demonstrating China¡¯s intention to use strategic dependency as a geopolitical instrument of pressure. During the trade war that evolved from the tariff war between the United States and China in the spring of 2025, China also began selectively restricting rare earth exports through calibrated decisions. Considering the magnet factory built in Narva, Estonia, in 2025 ¡ª one of the few such factories outside China ¡ª the Myanmar case study helps to better understand China¡¯s strategic vision of securing access to strategic mineral resources and thereby assess the risks of critical dependency for Estonia.

The Myanmar case study examined within the framework of the 2025¨C2026 one-year project is a narrowly focused case concentrating on the rare earth mines in northern Myanmar seized by the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) in 2024. The loss of control over these mines dealt a major blow to China¡¯s supply chain and interrupted nearly half of the world¡¯s production of heavy rare earth elements. China¡¯s imports from Myanmar, which had previously controlled the mines, fell by 89%, while global market prices for rare earth metals increased. At the same time, China¡¯s rival India has shown growing interest in the region, similarly seeking ¡ª like the West ¡ª to reduce dependency on Chinese supplies. Long-term instability in northern Myanmar may make the global rare earth market more volatile and affect the development of global green technologies. The Myanmar case study illustrates the contemporary geopolitical reality of how control over natural resources ¡ª that is, the raw material component of supply chains ¡ª affects the balance of geopolitical power. With the magnet factory located in Narva, Estonia has its own role in this innovative technological sector, and possible critical dependency on China may prove to be a vulnerable component of Estonian industry.

Laur Kiik Profile

Laur Kiik is an environmental anthropologist and specialist in Asian Studies whose research focuses primarily on Southeast Asia, Myanmar/Burma, and China. His fields of research include cultural studies, history and archaeology, as well as environmental policy, economics, and law. According to the CERCS classification, he works in the fields of cultural anthropology and ethnology, regional history, and social geography.

He obtained his doctoral degree in Anthropology from the University of Oxford in 2020. His doctoral dissertation, ¡°Saving Nature or Nation in the Kachin Hills: An Ethnography of Encounters¡±, was supervised by Laura Rival, Matthew Walton, and E.J. Milner-Gulland. Previously, he obtained a Master¡¯s degree in Anthropology from Columbia University in 2012, where his research focused on the interconnections between environment, nationalism, and ontological approaches in the Kachin region of Myanmar. He received his Bachelor¡¯s degree (cum laude) from the Estonian Institute of Humanities at Tallinn University in the field of Middle Eastern and Asian Cultural History, specialising in China. In addition, he studied at the Beijing Foreign Studies University between 2007 and 2008, where he obtained a diploma in Chinese language studies.

Between 2013 and 2016, Laur Kiik worked at Tallinn University in the field of Southeast Asian Studies, first part-time and later full-time at the School of Humanities. Between 2011 and 2013, he participated in the Estonian Science Foundation grant project ¡°Power, Networks and Identities in Burma/Myanmar¡± (ETF8618), where he served as an externally funded researcher.

His academic work has been recognised with several awards and scholarships. He received first prize in the Estonian national student research competition both at Bachelor¡¯s level (2009) and Master¡¯s level (2013) in the field of social sciences and culture. In addition, he has been a Fulbright Scholar (2010), received support from the Sasakawa Young Leaders Fellowship Fund (2011), and was awarded a research grant from the Estonian Institute of Humanities (2010)

In his research, Raul Allikivi focuses, in the case of Japan, on the analysis of measures adopted both by the Japanese state and by companies themselves to mitigate threats arising from the technological risks associated with China. At the same time, he also examines the possible negative effects of these measures, as well as the positive effects driven by forms of protectionism on the development of Japan¡¯s own technological capabilities. The primary focus is on the impact of these measures on corporate research and development activities, the growth strategies of start-ups, and venture capital investments seeking new capabilities.

The Japanese case study offers an opportunity to examine how a country that is deeply intertwined with the Chinese economy, while simultaneously maintaining close defence cooperation with the United States, is able to skilfully navigate difficult choices. In a broader context, this topic is situated within the framework of the deepening trade conflict between the United States and China. Japan largely follows the guidelines of the United States in implementing anti-China restrictions, but at the same time it must also strengthen its own technological and innovation capabilities in parallel.

Japan¡¯s situation is in many ways similar to Estonia¡¯s, offering a parallel analysis for assessing various risk analyses of possible threats originating from China. On the one hand, anti-China restrictions are imposed based on security considerations and the desire to support the development of domestic technology, while on the other hand, reality and critical dependency on China may prove to be significant obstacles to the full implementation of these restrictions and the achievement of the desired results.

In addition to analysing restrictive measures, the Japanese case study also involves conducting interviews with key stakeholders within Japan¡¯s ecosystem. The results of the research would provide Estonia with valuable knowledge on how to navigate a global environment in which interdependence has become a strategic tool (¡°weaponized interdependence¡±).

Raul Allikivi Profile

Raul Allikivi is an entrepreneur and former public official who has been connected with Japan for more than 20 years and has contributed extensively over the years to the development of Japanese-Estonian business relations. His interest in Japan began already during his school years when he read a serial story about ninjas in the crossword magazine Murakas. At university, alongside his studies in political science and economics, he began studying the Japanese language. When the opportunity arose 20 years ago to go to Japan as an exchange student for a year, he took it. Upon returning to Estonia, he kept looking for opportunities to return to Tokyo and was admitted to the Master¡¯s programme in International Relations at Waseda University.

By today, Raul has lived in Japan for more than a dozen years in total, and last year he co-founded the company Giga, which provides banking services for foreigners working in Japan. In addition, he has for many years been involved in importing Japanese craft beverages to Estonia

Toomas Hanso¡¯s research focuses on various topics related to China.

One of these is a publication on data security entitled ¡°More Than Meets the AI: China¡¯s Data Centre Strategy.¡± It discusses how Beijing launched the national mega-project ¡°Eastern Data Western Compute¡± (EDWC) in February 2022, with the aim of processing data from China¡¯s developed eastern regions in the country¡¯s western rural areas, which possess regional advantages due to abundant renewable energy resources and lower average temperatures. Artificial intelligence is the most transformative technology of the 21st century and plays a key role in future geopolitical influence. Its development and implementation depend on computational power (¡°compute¡±) located in data centres ¡ª the hardware infrastructure that powers AI.

Toomas Hanso¡¯s analysis examines the origins and implementation of EDWC, its role in Beijing¡¯s multi-layered AI industrial policy, and its successes, failures, and impact on China¡¯s position in the global AI race. Despite implementation challenges, EDWC has quantitatively increased China¡¯s national computational capacity, improved data centre efficiency, and increased the share of renewable energy in data centre electricity consumption. Since the launch of the project, China has made progress in constructing data centres, although logistical problems persist. Although EDWC is a domestic policy measure, it has broader geopolitical implications:

• Strengthening the global competitiveness of Chinese AI companies
• Positioning China as a leader in the global data centre industry
• ¡°Data centre diplomacy¡± ¡ª integrating data centres into Beijing¡¯s Belt and Road Initiative offerings
• Increasing China¡¯s technological sovereignty
• Developing and facilitating the deployment of artificial intelligence capabilities for the People¡¯s Liberation Army (PLA,½â·Å¾ü)
• Harmful exploitation of data from third countries (including Europe)
• Narrowing the computational power gap in US¨CChina great power competition

For Beijing, greater national computational capacity strengthens its position in the global AI race ¡ª and the West should pay attention to this.

Report available at:

Toomas Hanso¡¯s second publication, ¡°The 2026 National Defence Strategy: US¨CChina Dialogue for Strategic Stability in a Shaky Environment,¡± focuses on the latest United States National Defence Strategy and China¡¯s role within it. The US Department of War (DoW) has published its 2026 National Defence Strategy (NDS), which calls for ¡°peace through strength¡± in the Indo-Pacific region and ¡°strategic stability¡± with China.

Although the document emphasises the importance of the Western Hemisphere, the People¡¯s Republic of China (PRC) remains a strategic priority, even though the United States employs different tactics toward it.

A new emphasis has been placed on promoting communication between the US and Chinese militaries in order to avoid potential clashes. At the same time, the situation in the Taiwan Strait is more tense than ever, and communication is hindered by domestic political developments in both countries, including the 24 January purge of China¡¯s Central Military Commission (CMC), which reduced the number of commission members from seven to only two. In such an environment, the objective of the 2026 National Defence Strategy to promote cooperation between the US military and the Chinese People¡¯s Liberation Army (PLA, ½â·Å¾ü) is extremely difficult to achieve.

Report available at:

Toomas Hanso¡¯s second more extensive analysis, entitled ¡°Taiwan Strait Crisis Scenarios and the Security Implications of the Crisis for Estonia,¡± focuses on possible scenarios in the Taiwan Strait. The report was co-authored with Urmas H?bepappel, a substitute researcher for Tauno T?hk at ICDS.

The report analyses the background of the Taiwan Strait crisis and possible escalation scenarios. Since 2022, the armed forces of the People¡¯s Republic of China (PRC), namely the People¡¯s Liberation Army (PLA), have increased military pressure around Taiwan by conducting extensive military exercises, implementing hybrid warfare measures, operating illegally in Taiwan¡¯s air and maritime space, and attempting to normalise an increasingly large military presence in the Strait. All of this forms part of the broader systemic rivalry between Washington and Beijing.

Taiwan holds both symbolic and strategic importance for Beijing. For the Chinese leadership, reunification is connected to regime legitimacy, national rejuvenation, and long-term geopolitical objectives. The report emphasises that Beijing has not abandoned the option of using force and continues modernising the PLA in order to reunify Taiwan with the mainland by force if necessary. At the same time, competition between the United States and China is deepening across military, technological, economic, and ideological dimensions.

Even if a temporary diplomatic stabilisation were to occur, it is unlikely that the situation in the Taiwan Strait would remain peacefully stable in the long term. Taiwan therefore represents a potential trigger point in broader great power competition. Beijing¡¯s decision to launch an invasion depends on several factors, but the decisive factors are the domestic political trajectories of the PRC, Taiwan, and the United States.

The report highlights four interconnected scenarios forming a possible escalation chain:

• Status quo (hybrid warfare): persistent grey-zone activities, cyber operations, disinformation, economic pressure, and military exercises. This scenario describes the current situation and may continue into the future.
• Quarantine: imposing limited maritime and air traffic restrictions on Taiwan under legal or administrative pretexts. The goal is to test the international reaction while avoiding the declaration of an official blockade.
• Blockade: a large-scale attempt to cut off Taiwan¡¯s foreign trade and energy supplies. Considering Taiwan¡¯s economic structure, even a temporary blockade would cause immediate global economic consequences, especially in high-technology supply chains.
• Invasion: amphibious assault combined with missile strikes and operations across the air, maritime, and information domains to achieve dominance.

The report emphasises that these scenarios are not mutually exclusive. Escalation may occur step by step, and non-kinetic pressure (hybrid warfare or quarantine) may quickly develop into armed conflict.

For Estonia, a Taiwan Strait crisis would constitute an indirect but serious security risk.

Report available at:

Toomas Hanso Profile

Research areas: China; Chinese infrastructure, technology and security; Taiwan and cross-strait relations; China¨CRussia relations

Languages: English, Estonian, Chinese, Spanish, French, German, Swahili; beginner level: Russian, Portuguese

Toomas Hanso joined the International Centre for Defence and Security (ICDS) as a junior researcher in October 2024. His research focuses on China, its domestic and foreign policy, and international relations.

He holds a Bachelor¡¯s degree with distinction in Chinese and Linguistics from the University of Edinburgh. Toomas Hanso spent one year studying in Hualien, Taiwan, at National Dong Hwa University as a recipient of the Taiwan-Europe Connectivity Scholarship during 2021¨C2022, and one year studying in Kunming, China, at Yunnan University under a Confucius Institute scholarship during 2023¨C2024, where he passed the HSK6 Chinese language examination

Tauno T?hk returned to the International Centre for Defence and Security (ICDS) in early 2026 after parental leave, but his latest publication dates from March of the previous year and is entitled ¡°More Than a Systemic Rival: China as a Security Challenge for the European Union.¡± In it, he argues that from the perspective of the European Union, only transatlantic ties are more important than relations with China. As China is one of the EU¡¯s principal trading partners, economic opportunities have long been at the centre of the relationship. However, in recent years the EU has re-evaluated its relationship with China and now describes China in three different dimensions: as a cooperation partner, an economic competitor, and a systemic rival.

China is increasingly discussed as a systemic rival and as a factor influencing Europe¡¯s economic security. Nevertheless, security risks arising from China still remain secondary within EU China policy. It is time for the European Union to close this gap and clearly define China also as a security challenge. This would mean supplementing the EU¡¯s current three-part approach with a fourth dimension ¡ª security.

This would not merely constitute a rhetorical change, but rather a necessary step in aligning EU policy with the real security risks arising from China. It would create a clear common basis for the EU and its member states to develop a more comprehensive and balanced China policy and would deepen cooperation in a situation where different member states often have highly divergent attitudes and interests regarding China.

Report available at:

Tauno T?hk Profile

Since October 2024, Tauno T?hk has worked as a researcher at the International Centre for Defence and Security, focusing on China and Chinese influence operations. Before joining ICDS, Tauno worked for more than four years at the European External Action Service (EEAS) in Brussels, where he led a team focused on countering Chinese information operations and information warfare.

Prior to that, he was a member of the cabinet of the Vice-President of the European Commission responsible for the Digital Single Market, where, among other duties, he coordinated the European Union¡¯s activities against disinformation.

Tauno has previously worked as a media adviser to the Estonian Government and Prime Minister, as well as a communications adviser during Estonia¡¯s Presidency of the Council of the European Union. He has lived and studied in China and has delivered lectures at Estonian universities on contemporary Chinese politics.

Tauno graduated from the University of Tartu and also studied at Central China Normal University in Wuhan, China.

Non-resident Researcher

Urmas H?bepappel has been cooperating with the International Centre for Defence and Security since the spring¨Cwinter period of 2025. His primary research topic is Chinese politics (more specifically Chinese political psychology), but within ICDS he focuses primarily on researching the image of Russia in Chinese social media.

Urmas is also an analyst and lecturer at the Asia Centre of the University of Tartu. He has delivered lectures on Chinese politics, Asian cultural history, and theories of nationalism, and has published several articles and reports introducing the history, politics, and culture of Asia ¡ª especially China. Among other works, he is one of the co-authors of the book ¡°The Birth of Estonian-Chinese Relations¡± (2018)