China showed off its rapidly advancing military technology by unveiling a string of cutting-edge hardware at the country’s largest airshow last week.

The biennial event in the southern city of Zhuhai has become a rare public window into the military and industrial might of the rising communist-controlled superpower, while also providing international experts with an opportunity to assess its capabilities.

Many of the new Chinese weapons are seen by experts as having been developed to match the United States, as authoritarian Beijing pushes to modernize its armed forces and assert its growing military presence in Asia.

This year’s event featured a range of new weapons systems, including fighter jets and missiles. It also for the first time featured a dedicated area for drones, in a sign of their increasingly critical role on battlefields, including in the Ukraine war – and any potential future conflict over the self-governing island of Taiwan.

The six-day exhibition drew in nearly 600,000 visitors and more than 280 billion yuan ($39 billion) in global orders – as well as a stopover by Russia’s former defense chief, according to state media.

Here are some of the most notable new weapon systems put on public display at the show.

J35-A stealth fighter

More than a decade in the making, China’s much-anticipated new stealth fighter jet, the J-35A, is widely seen as part of Beijing’s bid to match the United States’ stealth fighter capabilities.

The J-35A is China’s second stealth fighter, after the J-20 entered service in 2017. Its commission makes China the second country after the US to have two types of stealth fighter jets.

Some observers have noted a resemblance in appearance between the J-35A and the US’ F-35. Though unlike the F-35, which features a single turbofan engine, the J-35A is equipped with two engines.

Its maximum takeoff weight is likely to be approaching 30 tons, Song Xinzhi, a Chinese military expert and former researcher in the PLA Air Force, told state broadcaster CCTV, hailing it a “breakthrough” for China’s new generation of medium-sized stealth fighters.

He added that the J-35A is an air force variant of the fighter. “(It) also has a twin navy variant, which is expected to be unveiled to the public soon,” Song said.

Wei Dongxu, a military commentator, claimed a key feature of the J-35A is its apparent versatility.

“It can not only perform air combat missions, but also … execute precise strikes on both ground and maritime targets,” he told CCTV, noting that the jet can carry a wide range of precision-guided munitions within its internal weapons bay, including small air-launched cruise missiles.

HQ-19 anti-ballistic missile system

Experts have been quick to compare the HQ-19, China’s new-generation surface-to-air missile system, to the US’ Terminal High Altitude Air Defense (THAAD) system.

Mounted on an 8×8 high-mobility vehicle, the HQ-19 carries six interceptor missiles and uses a “cold launch” mechanism that reduces the stress on the launcher and allows it to rapidly redeploy interceptors, according to state media reports.

China has not revealed the technical specifics of the system, and it remains unclear whether it can match the operational range or hit speed of THAAD. The US Defense Department’s annual report on China’s military in 2020 said the HQ-19 interceptor has undergone tests to verify its capability against 3,000 kilometer-range ballistic missiles.

Chinese military experts say it is tasked with intercepting ballistic missiles outside the atmosphere, significantly extending the interception range of previous models like the HQ-9.

Most notably, Chinese experts and state media have also claimed the HQ-19 is capable of intercepting hypersonic glide vehicles in the atmosphere.

Such weapons are “challenging due to their unpredictable trajectory,” said PLA Senior Col. Du Wenlong of the PLA Academy of Military Sciences.

“Our radar system, however, can track these complex trajectories and guide missiles for a final strike. Many countries address hypersonic warheads by deploying multiple rapid warheads, ensuring at least one hit. But with the combination of the HQ-19 missile and our radar system, we’ve resolved this issue with a single radar and a single missile,” he told CCTV.

Drone mothership ‘Jetank’

A massive mothership drone that can carry a payload of up to six tons, Jetank has a wingspan of 25 meters (82 feet) and a maximum takeoff weight of 16 tons, according to state media, making it among the largest such weapons in China’s arsenal.

The jet-powered attack and reconnaissance unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), features eight external hardpoints to carry missiles and bombs, as well as a quickly replaceable mission module that can carry different types of smaller drones.

“It takes the concept of an aircraft carrier from the sea to the air, enabling the deployment of numerous drones onto the battlefield by launching them in the air,” Chinese military expert Du Wenlong claimed, hailing it a “significant innovation.”

Stealth drone ship ‘Orca’

Known as the “Orca” the JARI-USV-A is a high-speed stealth unmanned surface combat vessel.

The 500-ton vessel is designed to be highly radar resistant and features a unique trimaran structure that gives it stability in harsh seas, state media reports say.

Measuring 58 meters (190 feet) in length, 23 meters (75 feet) in beam and 4 meters (13 feet) in depth, the “Orca” can operate at speeds up to 40 knots with a range of 4,000 nautical miles, allowing for prolonged missions without resupply, according to China Military Online, the official English-language news website of the Chinese military.

“As an autonomous combat vessel, it is like a mobile fortress on the sea which is capable of undertaking tasks such as beyond visual range fire strike, air and missile defense, and anti-submarine search and strike,” the China Military Online claimed in an article Tuesday.

“Such platforms can regularly carry out non-military and military operations of low to medium intensity, such as patrol and guard around strategic points, base ports, islands and reefs, and key waterways,” it added.

Equipped with four phased array radars and a vertical launch system, the vessel is said to be able to carry rockets, anti-ship missiles, air defense missiles and remote-control weapon stations. It also features a takeoff and landing platform for unmanned helicopters in the rear and a small docking bay at the stern, which can be used to launch small underwater devices or sensors for submarine detection, the article said.

PL-15E Air-To-Air Missile

China also unveiled a new version of its PL-15 long-range air-to-air missile. It comes with folding tailfins, a design that allows for more compact stowage to fit the country’s stealth fighter jets.

At the airshow, the PL-15E was displayed next to a model of the J35-A steal fighter jet.

The PL-15 is one of China’s most potent air-to-air missiles, with a range of around 200 kilometers and a peak speed above five times the speed of sound, according to the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

It’s often compared to the US’ AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile.

Su-57 stealth fighter

Also on display at the airshow was the Su-57, Russia’s most advanced fighter jet, which made its first appearance away from home.

The overseas debut of the Su-57 in Zhuhai sent an unequivocal message about the close military cooperation between China and Russia.

Sergei Shoigu, Russia’s former defense minister who was in China for annual strategic security consultations, stopped by airshow to check out the Su-57 on display, according to the state-run Global Times.

At the airshow, the first contracts were signed for Russia to export its Su-57 to overseas customers, Russian news agency Tass reported, though it did not disclose the identity of the buyers.

A vital humanitarian organization said it will suspend activities in Haiti’s capital on Wednesday following a “series of threats” by local police, in a move that threatens to bring a further deterioration of conditions in the Caribbean nation that has struggled for years with gang warfare and political turmoil.

Doctors Without Borders, also known as Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), accused authorities of repeatedly stopping its vehicles and threatening its staff with violence, including death and rape.

Following that attack, the organization said it faced four additional encounters with police.

“This series of incidents have left us with no choice but to suspend our activities in Port-au-Prince,” MSF said in a statement.

In recent years, police, civilian vigilante groups and even rival gangs in the lawless capital have been repeatedly accused by doctors and medical staff of breaking into health care facilities where they suspect wounded gang members to be seeking treatment.

“As MSF, we accept working in conditions of insecurity, but when even law enforcement becomes a direct threat, we have no choice but to suspend admissions of patients in Port-au-Prince until the conditions are met for us to resume,” MSF head of mission Christophe Garnier said.

MSF said it will stop admitting and transferring patients to its five medical facilities in the Haitian capital from Wednesday, impacting thousands of people in need of treatment.

“MSF provides care to everyone on the basis of medical needs alone. Each week on average in the Port-au-Prince metropolitan area, MSF provides care to more than 1,100 patients on an outpatient basis, 54 children with emergency conditions, and more than 80 new survivors of sexual and gender-based violence,” the organization said in a statement.

Brutal gang violence in the capital has resulted in the kidnappings of hundreds of people, and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Haitians from their homes.

MSF is the latest international group to halt operations in the Caribbean nation.

Last week, US-based airlines suspended flights to Haiti after three of their jets were struck by bullets while flying over Port-au-Prince. Haiti’s transitional presidential council blamed armed gangs for the gunfire that struck one of the flights, accusing them of aiming “to isolate our country on the international stage.”

Last month, a United Nations helicopter was also hit by bullets while flying over Port-au-Prince. And in a separate incident in October, gangs targeted US Embassy vehicles with gunfire, later prompting the evacuation of 20 embassy staff.

In late February and early March, coordinated gang attacks forced the closure of both the airport and main seaport in the Haitian capital, choking off vital supplies of food and humanitarian aid to the Caribbean nation.

Brazilian police have arrested five people, including a former adviser to ex-President Jair Bolsonaro, over an alleged plot to assassinate President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in 2022, authorities said.

The coup plot was conceived in late 2022, before Lula took office, according to Federal Police. In addition to killing the then-president-elect, the plot also included plans to capture or kill Lula’s Vice President Geraldo Alckmin and Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the Supreme Court said in its arrest order.

The order, signed by Moraes on Sunday, authorizes the preventative detention of the five suspects, including retired general Mário Fernandes.

The alleged plot also involved other military personnel with training in special forces, the Federal Police said.

“The planning drawn up by those under investigation detailed the human and military resources needed to carry out the actions, using advanced military operational techniques,” police said.

The plan envisioned the eventual creation of an “Institutional Crisis Management Office” in Brazil’s government that the coup plotters would control, according to the police.

According to the court order, the alleged plotters also considered several methods to carry out the political assassinations, including the use of poison or explosive devices.

“For the execution of President Lula, the document describes, considering his health vulnerability and frequent visits to hospitals, the possibility of using poisoning or chemicals to cause an organic collapse,” reads Moraes’ order, citing an investigation into the plot.

In addition to the five arrests, police said the suspects would be prohibited from leaving the country or contacting other people suspected of involvement in the plot, documents show.

In February of this year, Bolsonaro was placed under investigation over the alleged plot. The investigation is expected to be finished later this month, Reuters reported, citing a source with direct knowledge of the probe.

According to a police warrant carried out on Tuesday, Bolsonaro allegedly met with officials from the army and navy as well as the minister of defense in December 2022 to present a document detailing the legal framework that would keep him in power.

The former president has repeatedly denied allegations of attempting a coup. His son, Flavio Bolsonaro, who is a senator in the Brazilian Congress, suggested in a post on X that the five suspects had not committed a crime.

“As disgusting as it may be to think about killing someone, it is not a crime. And for there to be an attempt, the execution must be interrupted by some situation beyond the control of the perpetrators. Which does not appear to have happened,” he wrote.

In October 2022, Lula narrowly beat Bolsonaro in the presidential election. Bolsonaro’s supporters rejected the results and rioted in the capital Brasilia, storming government buildings on January 8, 2023.

Jimmy Lai, the pugnacious Hong Kong media tycoon whose now shuttered tabloid Apple Daily was a regular thorn in Beijing’s side, is expected to testify on Wednesday at his own national security trial in a high stakes court battle that could see him spend the rest of his life behind bars.

The 77-year-old, known for his decades-long support of the city’s pro-democracy movement and outspoken criticism of China’s leaders, hasn’t been heard from since he was arrested nearly four years ago amid a deepening crackdown on dissent.

But he will take the stand to defend himself for the first time later on Wednesday.

In US court rooms, defense lawyers often advise their clients against testifying in court. But in Hong Kong, court testimony offers a rare chance for detained democracy figures to have their voices heard in a system where national security charges have resulted in months and years of pre-trial detention as well as restrictions on speaking out.

On Tuesday, more than 40 of Hong Kong’s best known pro-democracy figures were sentenced to prison terms of up to 10 years on subversion charges at a separate national security trial. Among them was Joshua Wong, a former student leader and poster child of the city’s once thriving pro-democracy movement, who shouted “I love Hong Kong” before he left the dock.

Lai’s testimony comes just weeks after Donald Trump, who has previously vowed to free the media tycoon, won the White House and has announced a proposed cabinet stacked with multiple China hawks.

Britain has also called for the release of Lai, who has a British passport. On Monday, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer raised the issue with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Brazil. “We’re concerned by reports of Jimmy Lai’s deterioration,” Starmer told Xi in their first meeting.

Lai has been in jail since December 2020 awaiting trial on multiple charges linked to his support for Hong Kong’s democracy protest movement through his media business. He was the founder of Apple Daily, a pro-democracy, anti-Beijing newspaper that was forced to shut down in 2021.

Lai faces two counts of colluding with foreign forces, a crime under a sweeping national security law introduced in 2020 that has transformed Hong Kong, as well as a separate sedition charge. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges and faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted.

The trial, which began in December 2023, is the most high-profile prosecution of a Hong Kong media figure since the city was handed over from British to Chinese control in 1997. It is resuming from a lengthy pause after Lai’s attorneys’ unsuccessful attempt to have the charges dismissed.

Around 100 people waited in line under cold rain on Wednesday morning ahead of the trial testimony, with some expressing support for the media tycoon.

Prosecutors allege that articles published by Apple Daily violated Hong Kong’s national security law by calling for overseas sanctions against the city’s leaders following the imposition of a landmark national security law in 2020.

Chinese and Hong Kong officials say the law, enacted in the wake of anti-government protests in 2019, has “restored stability” and closed loopholes that allowed “foreign forces” to undermine China.

But critics say it has decimated Hong Kong’s freedoms and altered the city’s legal landscape.

Like all national security trials in Hong Kong, Lai’s trial does not have a jury and is presided over by three judges picked from a national security committee that is approved by Hong Kong’s leader.

Lai reached out to Trump

Lai, a businessman who made a fortune selling clothing before becoming a publisher, has long been an unapologetic thorn in Beijing’s side, openly using Apple Daily as a vehicle to criticize Chinese leaders since its founding in 1995.

A devout Catholic and a known vocal supporter of Trump, Lai had lobbied extensively overseas for foreign governments to apply pressure on China over Hong Kong, something that infuriated leaders in Beijing. At the height of the protests in 2019, Lai traveled to Washington, where he met with then Vice President Mike Pence and other US politicians to discuss the political situation in Hong Kong.

Lai had long held a conviction that Trump and the US government should not shy away from supporting Hong Kong’s civil liberties, which are key for the city’s status as a conduit between China and international markets.

Prosecutors have argued that Lai’s actions and his newspaper’s publishing amounted to lobbying for sanctions against Beijing and Hong Kong, something that is prohibited by the national security law. His lawyers have countered that Lai stopped doing so after the national security law came into effect on June 30, 2020.

During Trump’s first term as president, the US government ended Hong Kong’s special trade status and signed into law an act that authorized sanctions on the city’s officials over China’s crackdown in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong’s current leader, John Lee, the city’s security chief during the landmark 2019 protests, is among those on the US sanctions list, which also includes the city’s former leader and current chief justice.

At a news conference earlier this month, Lee did not directly answer questions about how he would deal with Trump’s return to the presidency.

Lee said there should be “respect for the non-interference with local affairs, internal affairs” of the city, and said Hong Kong values the rule of law.

“We desire mutual respect with all countries, including the US, because trade is beneficial for both sides,” he said.

Last month, conservative podcast host Hugh Hewitt asked Trump whether he can speak with Xi and free Lai, if he is re-elected.

Trump replied “100%, I’ll get him out” and said that it would be “so easy” to free the detained media tycoon, without providing further details.

But Chinese and Hong Kong leaders have long bristled at any criticism leveled by Western governments at the national security crackdown in Hong Kong and have repeatedly condemned Lai in statements issued both before and throughout his trial.

“Jimmy Lai is a key instigator of anti-China activities, and his collusion with external forces to disrupt Hong Kong and incite division is well-known,” China’s foreign ministry office in Hong Kong said in a statement last week. “Hong Kong courts are conducting fair trials on actions that threaten national security, which is a necessary step to uphold both national security and the rule of law.”

How Hong Kong has changed

After the national security law was imposed, many opposition and pro-democracy figures responsible for organizing the protests were arrested without bail, and many civil organizations have since shut down.

A once outspoken city of 7.5 million, where protests were once common, has turned into something resembling a mirror of the authoritarian Chinese mainland with a who’s who of opposition figures behind bars and other critical voices silenced or fled overseas.

In March, Hong Kong lawmakers unanimously passed a second national security law, known as Article 23, expanding powers to cover acts of treason, espionage, external interference and unlawful handling of state secrets, following an unusually hasty debate that lasted just 11 days.

Dozens of pro-democracy leaders have been sentenced to lengthy jail terms in recent years, while Hong Kong police have issued HK$1 million ($128,000) bounties for self-exiled activists.

The day before Lai began his testimony, more than 40 of Hong Kong’s best known pro-democracy figures were sentenced to jail terms of up to 10 years on subversion charges at the largest national security trial to date.

Once a bastion of press freedom in China, Hong Kong has seen its once vibrant local media landscape wither since Beijing imposed the national security law on the city, with Chinese-language media hit particularly hard.

Outspoken local news outlets, such as Apple Daily and Stand News, were forced to shut down in recent years.

Several foreign media and non-governmental organizations have also since chosen to relocate their headquarters elsewhere, citing the changing political landscape. However, many international media outlets still operate in the city – and it remains home to many foreign journalists.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) ranked Hong Kong at 135 out of 180 places in its annual press freedom ranking. Its 2023 ranking was a big drop from 73rd in 2019 and 18th in 2002. China ranked 179, according to the press rights organization.

Lee, has repeatedly denied media freedoms have faded, and urged both local and foreign press to “tell good stories” about the city.