Tiffany & Co. is quietly building a diamond-polishing factory in Cambodia, a country popularly associated more with killing fields and land mines than baubles.

HONG KONG — The Chinese government announced Monday that it had filed a case with the World Trade Organization accusing some European Union member countries of violating free trade rules with policies that favor the purchase of solar energy equipment produced in Europe.

BEIJING — The United States on Monday filed a broad trade case against China at the World Trade Organization, alleging unfair subsidies for exports of cars and auto parts.

HONG KONG — As China’s leaders have been preoccupied with a political struggle leading up to a once-in-a-decade leadership change this autumn, there are increasing signs that the Chinese economy may be running into trouble.

BEIJING — In the name of fighting pollution, China has sent the price of compact fluorescent light bulbs soaring in the United States.

HONG KONG — A broad trade case filed Thursday by an American labor union, accusing China of unfairly subsidizing its clean energy industry, pressed a hot-button jobs issue in the United States during a congressional election season.

ZHONGSHAN, China — Striking workers at a Honda auto parts plant here are demanding the right to form their own labor union, something officially forbidden in China, and held a protest march Friday morning.

Just eight months ago, thousands of Chinese workers rioted outside factories closed by the global downturn.

The global economic downturn, and efforts to reverse it, will probably make China an even stronger economic competitor than it was before the crisis.

The free ride for American consumers is ending. For two generations, Americans have imported goods produced ever more cheaply from a succession of low-wage countries — first Japan and Korea, then China and now increasingly places like Vietnam and India.