The China Mogul

China seals off town after Pneumonic Plague outbreak

2009-08-04T16:21:00.003-05:00

Chinese authorities have sealed off a remote town in northwestern China after three people died of pneumonic plague and eight others were infected with the highly contagious lung disease. The Qinghai province health bureau said a 32 yr old herdsman and a 37 yr old neighbor in Ziketan, a Tibetan town of 10,000, have died. A doctor at a nearby hospital where patients are being treated said a third victim, who was 64, also died Monday.

Chinese authorities have said most of the other infected patients are in stable condition, but Wen Xin, a physician at the Tibetan Hospital of Xinghai County in Qinghai, said the wife of the herdsman was in serious condition and coughing up blood. He said an additional 13 people are being quarantined at the hospital for observation.

"City leaders, plague experts and cadres from national and local disease control and prevention departments are all in the village," Wen said.

Pneumonic plague is caused by the same bacterium as bubonic plague, or Black Death, which is estimated to have killed 25 million people during the Middle Ages. While bubonic plague is transmitted by infected fleas, pneumonic plague moves person-to-person through the air, according to the World Health Organization. Patients typically become infected by being in close contact with someone who has the plague and is coughing, or by handling contaminated articles. If left untreated, pneumonic plague can cause death within 24 hours of the onset of symptoms.

Vivian Tan, spokeswoman for the WHO in Beijing, said that the origin of the pneumonic plague outbreak in China is unknown but that similar outbreaks have occurred sporadically over the years in Africa, the former Soviet Union, the Americas and some Asian countries. In 2003, the most recent year for which figures are available, 2,118 people in nine countries were infected and 182 died.

Tan said that the agency was informed of the infections over the weekend and that it is monitoring the situation but has not sent personnel to the affected region. "According to the information we received, the situation is under control and the Chinese authorities have the experience to deal with this," she said.

Reporter Freedom in China

2008-10-17T12:46:00.002-05:00

Rules that gave foreign reporters greater freedom during the Beijing Olympics are due to expire. The BBC asked a range of reporters in China what difference the rules have made to their working lives.

Jamis Miles - The Economist
It was mainly a psychological difference, we had been widely flouting the rules before, leaving Beijing to report in the provinces without seeking advance approval as was officially required.

"So when the new regulations were introduced, we were still travelling just as much but without the fear of the knock on the door by the police, without the need to change from hotel to hotel to remain under the radar screen. But we were still frequently encountering local officials who either didn't know or said they didn't know about the new Olympic regulations or were determined to ignore them. There was one remarkable incident, shortly after the new regulations were introduced early last year, when I went to Henan province.

As I expected, I was stopped by local officials. But I called the Foreign Ministry in Beijing, and remarkably, the local officials apologised to me and disappeared, leaving me with startled villagers who said this was the first time they'd ever managed to openly speak with foreign journalists. But since then, I've encountered the same kind of difficulties as before the regulations. A few days ago, I was out in the western region of Xinjiang, and was detained for several hours by local police. There are key parts in the country that remain very difficult to get into, and the most obvious one is Tibet. Tibet wasn't mentioned specifically in the Olympic regulations, in theory they apply to the whole of China, but orally Chinese officials said Tibet remained excluded and we still had to seek permission."

Calum Macleod - USA Today
After the rules came in, they said we could organise things ourselves, which was not always easy." The biggest beneficiaries of these rules were TV and radio journalists because they require more people and equipment to do their jobs, and so are more visible. For the print media, it's easier to be less conspicuous. In the past, the rules stated that all foreign journalists needed approval before interviewing people outside Beijing and Shanghai , but these rules were largely ignored. What the new regulations did, in effect, was to legitimise reporting activities that were already taking place. Even while these rules were in place, I've still been detained in local areas and had my reporting restricted by officials who did not know the rules or did not care about them. But, as foreign journalists, it did mean we had a piece of paper to show them. We need these very minimal rules to be continued, and extended to China's own journalists."

Anonymous Chinese journalist
"The government's attitude towards the media has always been on a need-to-know basis. Officials feel that if they have something to say, they hold a press conference. They have no need to answer journalists' questions individually. They don't work to the media's timings. The Olympics itself will not bring changes overnight, regardless whether its for the foreign or domestic media. It is just one among many things that will only change gradually. The government has done things differently for the Olympics, but I can't say whether they will regress or keep improving things after the Games. All I can say is, I haven't seen much change in how I do my job."

China Vows To Help with Global Financial Crisis

2008-10-10T23:43:00.002-05:00

China's central bank has pledged to continue international cooperation to tackle the global financial crisis and maintain market stability, according to state media. The pledge on Friday came after China this week joined the US Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank and other major central banks to cut interest rates in response to the global financial turmoil and fears of a domestic slowdown.

"The PBOC (People's Bank of China) will continue close contacts and cooperation with counterparts and international financial organisations to jointly maintain stability of global financial markets," PBOC spokesman Li Chao told Xinhua news agency.

The PBOC would monitor the crisis and take action to guard against financial risks, Li said. The global economic slowdown had reduced demand for Chinese exports and affected China's economy, he added. But Li was confident that China could ride out the crisis, according to Xinhua.

"China has a huge domestic market and the liquidity is abundant," he said.

"As long as we take strong measures to boost domestic demand, the economy has big potential for sustainable growth."

A PBOC statement on the third quarter meeting of its monetary policy committee said it would take flexible and prudent macroeconomic control measures to boost economic growth, according to Xinhua. Foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang said Thursday that the international community should remain confident and work together to overcome the current difficulties.

China has the world's highest foreign reserves at more than 1.8 trillion dollars, the second most US Treasury bills and an economy expected to grow nine percent in the next year.

Some experts say China is likely to be the main driver of global growth as some of the developed world slides into recession in the wake of the credit crunch which sparked the global financial crisis.

China's Trade Gap Widens as Inflation Drops

2008-09-10T14:20:00.003-05:00

China's politically sensitive inflation eased to a 14-month low in August while export growth dipped, the government reported Wednesday, and analysts said Beijing might shift from fighting price rises to revving up the slowing economy. Chinese leaders have made a priority of fighting an inflation surge that began in mid-2007 and have imposed price controls and credit curbs. But they face an unexpectedly sharp downturn in economic growth, which could cost jobs and fuel social tensions.

Consumer prices rose 4.9% in August over the same month last year, the National Bureau of Statistics said. That was down from July's 6.3% and well below February's 8.7% rate, the peak of the inflation surge. China's trade surplus hit a record $28.7 billion in August, but export growth slowed to 21.1%, down from July's 26.9%, the government reported.

Wednesday's data "suggest that policymakers will continue to take a prudent and gradual approach in shifting its policy focus from inflation to growth," said Lehman Brothers economist Minchun Sun.

Chinese stocks edged up on the news. The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index finished the day up 0.2%. Analysts have cut growth forecasts this year to as low as 9%, down from 2007's explosive 11.9%. That still would be the fastest rate for any major country, but Beijing wants to keep growth high to reduce poverty and create new jobs.

"There are increasing noises that this tightening policy has lasted too long, and more and more worries about growth skidding seriously," said Standard Chartered economist Stephen Green in a report to clients.

Green cautioned that despite the impressive trade figures, Chinese exporters face tougher times ahead. "As Europe now slows, though, the biggest destination for exports, this will change in the last few months of the year," he said. "This may well be the lull before the storm."

Adding to pressure to improve business conditions, Chinese companies were squeezed in August as wholesale inflation accelerated to a new 12 yr high of 10.1%, according to the government data. Beijing reacted to a similar decline in export growth in June by increasing tax rebates to textile producers. Economic planners are expected to roll out measures targeting other struggling industries.

China's trade surplus grew by 14.2 percent in August from a year ago, topping the previous monthly high of $27 billion in October 2007. Exports reached $134.9 billion, while imports rose 23.1% to $106.18 billion. China's inflation surge was blamed on shortages of pork and grain. Beijing responded with price controls and subsidies to raise farm production. But its efforts were hampered by winter storms, a jump in oil prices and China's devastating May 12 earthquake. Food prices rose sharply in August, climbing by 10.3%, but that was down from July's 14.4% and well below February's peak of 23.3%.

"The continuous decline of the CPI is a positive sign as it shows that the government's measures to ease inflationary pressures were effective," said the bureau's chief economist, Yao Jingyuan, quoted by the official Xinhua News Agency.

Communist leaders worry about the political impact of high inflation in a society where families spend up to one-third of their incomes on food. Bouts of high inflation in the 1980s and '90s sparked protests. The recent rise in wholesale costs adds to pressure on Chinese companies to raise retail prices. But many are in industries with intense competition that prevents them from passing on higher costs to consumers. That is squeezing corporate profits and could lead to job losses.

"The focus in terms of inflation has shifted toward non-food prices," said Jing Ulrich, chairwoman of China equities for JP Morgan Securities, in a report. "With power shortages occurring in many parts of the country, anticipated further hikes in energy prices would feed into higher costs for various items."

China's trade surplus with the United States grew 16.6% to $17.5 billion in August, the government reported. The gap with the 27-nation European Union, China's biggest trading partner, swelled 25% to $16 billion. Also in August, monthly growth in spending on factories and other assets, a key economic stiumulus, accelerated to 27.4%, the government said.

China Wins Gold Medal Count for First Time Ever

2008-08-23T10:12:00.002-05:00

China will finish as the top gold-medal winner for the first time in Olympic history, becoming the only nation other than the US and Soviet Union to win the most titles at a Summer Games since 1948. The decisive moment came not from a Chinese athlete but after Russia's Rakhim Chakhkiev won the heavyweight boxing title today, the second to last day of the Beijing Games. With a lead over the US of 49 golds to 33 and only 15 events left, the Chinese team can't be caught.

China, which has poured billions of dollars into sports in preparation for its first Olympics as host, ended the American run of three straight Summer Games atop the gold-medal standings. The Chinese have won the most golds at an Olympics since the Soviet Union grabbed 55 at the 1988 Games in Seoul. The US leads the total medal table in Beijing, 105 to 96. Its 83 golds in Los Angeles in 1984 is the all-time record. Peter Ueberroth, chairman of the US Olympic Committee, said yesterday that China had a ``magnificent team'' and that he expects the US to beat its Athens mark of 36 gold medals.

``They're taking a lot of medals but they didn't take it out from our hide,'' Ueberroth said at a news conference. The US or the Soviet Union topped the gold standings at the past 15 Games.

China's Medal Haul Eases Pain of Liu Xiang Exit

2008-08-19T14:32:00.003-05:00

China's seemingly unassailable medal haul and cleanest air in a decade helped dull the host nation's pain on Tuesday over the injury to track idol Liu Xiang. In Day 11 sports, Germany's Jan Frodeno, a man who only took up triathlon to impress a girl, won the swim-bike-run endurance test on a hot day in Beijing. The United States and Britain, second and third in the medal table, grabbed another gold apiece in sailing.

Chinese leaders and people alike showered injured Olympics 100m hurdles champion Liu with get-well messages a day after he limped forlornly off the track, depriving the hosts of what they hoped might be their greatest single moment of glory. Liu, who along with basketball player Yao Ming is China's most idolized sportsman, put a brave face on.

"When I was warming up, I felt my foot was no good," he said, promising not to quit. "There'll be opportunities next year ... I'm still in peak condition. I need to be optimistic."

Liu took gold in Athens in 2004, becoming the first man to win a track-and-field event for China and transforming himself into a national symbol and multi-millionaire. His, and China's, great dream was to repeat the feat at home. But local fans who openly wept at Liu's exit were cheered by a glance at the medal table. Finally reaping the benefits of their 1.3 billion population and a Soviet-style training system, China have 39 golds, seven more than their total haul in Athens, when they came second.

"There is basically no worry about top spot," state news agency Xinhua said.

Chinese fans are loving it, one man even cycled more than 1,300km (800 miles) to tow his 98-year-old grandmother to the Games in a pedicab. Traditional Olympics table-toppers the United States, whose only serious rival in the past was the Soviet Union, have a less-than-expected 24 golds. Britain follow with 13. Further cheering the Chinese national mood, environmental authorities said on Tuesday Beijing had enjoyed its cleanest air in 10 years this month. Officials pledged not to let air quality slide again once the Games were over.

China took drastic efforts, including shutting factories and taking several million cars off the road, to improve air quality before the Games. And despite fears ahead of competing, no athletes have yet raised serious concerns during events. China's post-Olympics challenge is to keep pro-environment policies while maintaining the near double-digit growth rates that have made it an emerging global economic superpower.

"We will take some new measures to ensure that air quality will reach a new level after the Olympic Games," environmental official Du Shaozhong said on another sunny day in Beijing.

One man whose lungs definitely were not affected by Beijing's summer heat, or any lingering smog, was Germany's Frodeno.

"It was a moment I had dreamed of so many times in my head," said the former swimmer and lifeguard after his triathlon win. "During the race I told myself: 'Boy, be greedy, it's champagne or fizzy water'."

Britain's latest gold came from Paul Goodison who made up for disappointment in Athens, where he nearly quit, by winning the sailing Laser title in Qingdao, on China's east coast. Britain's 13 golds is already its best performance since 1920 and could not be better-timed with the 2012 Olympics taking place in London. Experts attribute British success, which has come chiefly in cycling, rowing, sailing and swimming, to a decade of heavy investment in facilities, much of it from a national lottery.

"We can rule the waves again," Britain's top-selling Sun said, catching the wave of patriotism.

Though the "beautiful game" has long played second fiddle to other sports at the Olympics, a mouth-watering semifinal on Tuesday night between soccer superpowers Argentina and Brazil has excited fans around the world. Brazil have won five World Cups but never an Olympic gold. China is looking for more golds in diving and gymnastics on Tuesday, and Jamaica's Usain "Lightning" Bolt is back in action in the Bird's Nest venue for a 200 meters semi-final.

After his showboating win in the blue riband 100m, Bolt wants the first sprint double gold since Carl Lewis in 1984. Gymnastics fans still had calculators out to decipher how American Nastia Liukin came second to China's He Kexin on Monday. The pair had an identical score of 16.725 but a convoluted tiebreak system, involving an A jury of two judges, a B jury of six judges, elimination of highest and lowest marks, then averaging and various deductions, gave it to He.

"That makes no sense," commented Bela Karolyi, who once coached Romanian champion Nadia Comaneci.

Chinese authorities are delighted the pre-Olympics focus on human rights and pollution has died down. They have set aside "protest parks" for would-be demonstrators but have not yet approved any of the 77 applications lodged to use them. The only noise there to trouble official ears is the birds.

China Ready for Opening Ceremonies Despite Weather Worries

2008-08-08T03:29:00.003-05:00

China was putting the final touches on what promised to be a spectacular Olympic opening ceremony on Friday, but gloomy weather and tight security left a cloud hanging over its coming out party. The three-hour show at Beijing's iconic "Bird's Nest" national stadium is set to see more than 15,000 performers showcase the nation's ancient history and its rise as a modern power.

The ceremony will begin at 8:08 pm, on the eighth day of the eight month of 2008, a tribute to the number eight that many Chinese deem lucky as it represents prosperity. But potential bad luck loomed as the thousands of athletes who will march through the National Stadium woke on Friday to see heavy clouds and haze
across the city and the weather forecast for the day was for rain.

Ceremony organisers have long said one of the greatest concerns for the party and the 90,000 people who will attend is rain, especially as one of the high points of the night is scheduled to be an enormous fireworks display. Another worry is terrorism, and China rolled out heavy security throughout Beijing and elsewhere across the country, with authorities closing off the politically sensitive Tiananmen Square in the heart of the Chinese capital.

More than 100,000 security personnel are patrolling Beijing, anti-missile barriers have been set up near the Olympic venue, and the military and police are on guard around the country for any signs of trouble. For China, the Games are an opportunity to show the world how far it has come since the communists came to power in 1949 following a brutal civil war, and particularly the past three decades of phenomenal development.

The event offers to highlight China's social and economic transformation, similar to the 1964 Games for Japan and the 1988 Olympics for South Korea. And despite the many controversies that have surrounded the build-up to the Games, particularly over the government's attitude towards human rights and its rule of Tibet, organisers declared the Olympics could be the best ever.

"We have prepared for the Beijing Olympics for seven years and now we are ready ... we are very confident indeed that we will stage a successful Olympics," organising committee spokesman Sun Weide told AFP. Of course we hope that these will be a great Games, even the greatest."

Despite the human rights controversies and deep concerns over Beijing's notorious pollution, International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge has shown no signs of regret in China being chosen to host the Games.

"China is a nation in transition, with a great future, tremendous potential and some challenges," Rogge said this week. I believe history will view the 2008 Olympics as a significant milestone in China's remarkable transformation."

However pro-Tibet campaigners and rights activists have been protesting around the world this week to further pressure China's communist rulers ahead of the Games. There have been protests in France, the United States, India and Nepal over issues such as China's rule of Tibet and the heavily Muslim Xinjiang region, arrests of dissidents and Internet censorship.

Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders also took over a frequency on China's tightly controlled airwaves Friday in a symbolic protest calling for free speech. And US President George W. Bush, who is in Beijing to attend the opening ceremony, made a new plea for freedom of expression in China.

"I strongly believe societies that allow the free expression of ideas tend to be the most prosperous and the most peaceful," Bush told reporters at the official opening of the new US embassy in Beijing.

China has repeatedly insisted that politics should play no part in the Games. Although apparently of higher concern for them was the threat of terrorism. uthorities' repeated warnings over "terrorists" from home and abroad attacking the Games swung into focus again late Thursday when a separatist group claiming to represent Xinjiang Muslims made a new video threat. It followed an attack in Xinjiang on Monday that killed 16 policemen, which China blamed on Muslim terrorists there who are seeking an independent state.

Solar Eclipse for Friday

2008-08-01T01:50:00.002-05:00

A total eclipse of the sun Friday should fascinate millions of lucky skywatchers in Greenland, Siberia, Mongolia and China. If the weather cooperates, people along a narrow path who venture out and look up will see stars during the day as the sun is gradually devoured and ultimately blotted out by the moon.

Unlike ancient times, when eclipses were viewed as bad omens in many cultures, fewer people should be expecting doom this time around. Still, myths persist, especially in remote regions, so it's likely there will be some banging on pots and other creative tactics employed to drive the "evil spirits" away. Billions of people along the path, including most of Europe and Asia, have a chance to see an interesting but much less foreboding partial eclipse. The northern half of Maine and the Canadian Maritime Provinces will be graced with a partial eclipse at sunrise.

China's Olympic Quandry

2008-07-18T13:34:00.003-05:00

Like a marathoner at the finish line, China seems whipped. It struggled two decades to host the Olympics that open in three weeks. It has spent about $50 billion, pumped up its athletes, spiffed up Beijing, and fended off calls for a boycott. Now it may wonder if the effort will be worth it.

The Games themselves will, of course, be the world's main focus for two weeks after the August 8 opening ceremonies. And thousands of athletes will fulfill once again the purpose of the modern Olympics, as stated by founder Pierre de Coubertin: "to bring together in a radiant union all the qualities which guide mankind to perfection."

But these Olympics also came with two political expectations, both of which are not even close to earning a medal. One is human rights in China . The International Olympic Committee, in awarding the Games seven years ago, pointed to the Communist Party's record in suppressing dissent and said it expected that "openness, progress, and development in many areas will be such that the situation will be improved." The IOC also said athletes have "an absolute right" during the Games to speak out. The party itself did not publicly agree to improve its record, but the head of China's bidding team did say the Beijing Games would "benefit the further development of our human rights cause."

If anything, China's human rights record has worsened, as seen clearly during this spring's crackdown on Tibet's Buddhist monks. Last year, the number of arrests for "endangering state security" was at their highest since 2000. And China's hand in world atrocities, such as Darfur and Zimbabwe, has also worsened. Steven Spielberg quit as artistic adviser for the Olympic ceremonies over China's backing of Sudan.

Why would China do this? These Olympics may simply serve as a pretext for the party to keep an authoritarian hold over 1.3 billion Chinese, who are increasingly revolting against corrupt rule. Not only do the Olympics justify crackdowns, but Chinese leaders have shown again and again that they will use foreign protests to whip up nationalist pride.

Those actions undercut the second expectation of these Olympics: to celebrate China's economic progress and its emergence as a power. China's leaders may have thought the Beijing Olympics would serve the same purpose as the 1964 Games did for Japan: a coming-out party. Instead, the many protests, such as the interruptions of the torch relay, and the strong possibility of protests in Beijing during the Games, are likely to lower the PR boost.

The 2008 Olympics could end up like the 1936 Berlin Games, in which Hitler tried to promote Nazi (and Aryan) superiority, only to have American blacks, such as Jesse Owens, win track events. But these Games may not be the PR disaster of the 1980 Moscow Games that were widely boycotted after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union were overturned within years after their Games. A better model for China would be the 1988 Seoul Games. During the runup to those Olympics, the South Korean people used the coming event to rise up and force an end to a dictatorship. Now that was an example of "qualities which guide mankind to perfection."

Ronaldinho will break Barcelona contract to play for Brazil in Olympics

2008-07-13T00:03:00.003-05:00

Ronaldinho will reportedly break his contract with FC Barcelona if need be to go to the Beijing Olympics . Newspaper O Globo reported Saturday that the two-time FIFA player of the year will next week tell the Spanish club of his plans to help Brazil win its first Olympic gold medal.

"On Tuesday, Ronaldinho will announce that nothing will keep him away from the Beijing Olympics," the newspaper said. "And if Barcelona insists on not allowing him to play, he will break his contract with the Spanish club. The first demonstration of his determination will take place on Monday when he will not report to (Barcelona coach) Josep Guardiola for training."

The Associated Press was unable to contact Ronaldinho's agent and brother, Roberto de Assis, for comment. The Brazilian Soccer Confederation said on its Web site that Ronaldinho is in the southern city of Porto Alegre where he is "training intensely to play for Brazil in the Beijing Olympics."

The confederation said Ronaldinho will hold a news conference on Tuesday in Porto Alegre. Earlier this week, Barcelona said Ronaldinho "will have to report for training on Monday, the first session of the 2008-09 season."

"The Olympics do not form part of the official FIFA calendar, and no official decision has ever been made in that respect, so the club is under no obligation to allow its player to travel," the club said in a statement.

The Brazilian star, who last played on March 9, is under contract with Barcelona but has been linked with transfers to Manchester City and AC Milan.

Olympic Sailing Host Battles Invading Algae

2008-07-07T12:06:00.002-05:00

In China's Olympic co-host city Qingdao, sea breezes that usually bring relief from baking summer temperatures now bring a cloying stench from a massive algae bloom that locals fear will harm the city's bucolic image during the Olympic Games.

"If we don't clean this up, we're done for," said local businessman Zhang Longfei, pointing at a blanket of green weed stretching far out to sea at Qingdao's No. 3 Bathing Beach.

You think tourists and Games visitors want to see this?" Zhang said, taking a break after lugging a sack full of green weed onto a growing pile offshore. Zhang is one of an army of troops, marine officials and common volunteers battling to clean Qingdao's shores as the host city for Olympic sailing events enters peak tourist season and puts the final touches on Games preparations.

Local authorities say 30,000 people and have now been drafted into the cause, and have drawn a line in the sand demanding that the algae, which invaded Qingdao in mid-June, be completely expunged from sailing competition areas by July 15. On beaches usually packed with sun-seeking Chinese tourists, khaki-clad troops and sweaty volunteers strive to shift mounds of green weed washed in by the tide. The epic battle is winnable, officials insist, at least within the confines of the sailing competition area, currently being reinforced with 20 miles of marine fencing.

"I'm absolutely confident that our government can take effective measures to clean, not only the venue area, but also protect the beautiful beaches, Yuan Zhiping, assistant to the president of the Qingdao Sailing Committee, told Reuters.

Sailing events are scheduled to start on August 9.

China over 100 million people with no siblings due to one child law

2008-07-07T12:02:00.002-05:00

China now has more than 100 million people with no siblings since introducing rules in the late 1970s that limit many couples to only one child, a state news agency reported Monday. China is the world's most populous country, with 1.3 billion people. The government says the one-child rule has prevented about 400 million births. The 100 million-plus only children make up about 8 percent of China's population, Xinhua News Agency reported, citing information from a weekend forum hosted by the Shanghai Population Welfare Charity Fund.

The one-child policy was designed to control China's exploding population and ensure better education and health care. The law includes exceptions for ethnic groups, rural families and families where both parents are only children. In 1982, Chinese households averaged 4.4 people. In 2005, the average was 3.1 people, the agency said.

Critics say the policy has also led to forced abortions and sterilizations as local authorities pursue birth quotas set by Beijing, plus a dangerously imbalanced sex ratio as families abort girls out of a traditional preference for male heirs. Though commonly called a one-child policy, the rules offer a welter of exceptions and loopholes, some of them put into practice because of widespread opposition to the limits. For example, in large parts of rural China , most families are allowed a second child, especially if the first was a girl.

Devastating Earthquake Hits China, Over 5,000 Could be Dead

2008-05-12T08:30:00.000-05:00

A powerful earthquake struck central China on Monday and state media reported that as many as 5,000 people were killed in a single county while nearly 900 students were trapped after their school collapsed. The official Xinhua News Agency said 3,000 to 5,000 people had died in Beichuan county in Sichuan province after the 7.8-magnitude quake. Another 10,000 people there were believed to be hurt.

The earthquake sent thousands of people rushing out of buildings and into the streets hundreds of miles away in Beijing and Shanghai. The temblor was felt as far away as Pakistan, Vietnam and Thailand. Four of the dead were ninth-grade students killed when their high school collapsed, Xinhua said. Photos showed heavy cranes trying to remove rubble from the ruined school. Xinhua did not say how many of the students were feared dead.

It said its reporters in Juyuan township, about 60 miles from the epicenter, saw buried teenagers struggling to break loose from underneath the rubble of the three-story building "while others were crying out for help." Two girls were quoted by Xinhua as saying they escaped because they had "run faster than others."

The earthquake comes less than three months before the start of the Beijing Summer Olympics, when China hopes to use to showcase its rise in the world. Shanghai's main index inched up Monday, but the advance was capped by worries over inflation and potential damage from the earthquake. Analysts said that shares of companies located in the Sichuan region may fall in coming sessions due to the quake.

It struck in the middle of the afternoon when classes and office towers were full, about 60 miles northwest of Chengdu. There were several smaller aftershocks, the U.S. Geological Survey said on its Web site. Calls into the city did not go through as panicked residents quickly overloaded the telephone system. The quake affected telephone and power networks, and even state media appeared to have few details of the disaster.

"In Chengdu, mobile telecommunication convertors have experienced jams and thousands of servers were out of service," said Sha Yuejia, deputy chief executive officer of China Mobile.

Although it was difficult to telephone Chengdu, an Israeli student, Ronen Medzini, sent a text message to The Associated Press saying there were power and water outages there. "Traffic jams, no running water, power outs, everyone sitting in the streets, patients evacuated from hospitals sitting outside and waiting," he said.

Xinhua said an underground water pipe ruptured near the city's southern railway station, flooding a main thoroughfare. Reporters saw buildings with cracks in their walls but no collapses, Xinhua said. The earthquake also rattled buildings in Beijing, some 930 miles to the north, less than three months before the Chinese capital was expected to be full of hundreds of thousands of foreign visitors for the Summer Olympics.

A magnitude 7.8 earthquake is considered a major event, capable of causing widespread damage and injuries in populated areas. The last serious earthquake in China was in 2003, when a 6.8-magnitude quake killed 268 people in Bachu county in the west of Xinjiang. China's deadliest earthquake in modern history struck the northeastern city of Tangshan on July 28, 1976, killing 240,000 people.

China Alerted to Deadly Virus as 23 Die

2008-05-03T11:59:00.000-05:00

China ordered authorities on Saturday to tackle hand, foot and mouth disease aggressively ahead of the Beijing Olympics after a rapidly spreading outbreak killed at least 23 children and infected nearly 4,000.

"Our doctors will leave hospitals to find potential patients rather than sitting in the hospitals to wait for them," deputy health minister Liu Qian told state television in the worst-hit area, Fuyang city in the eastern province of Anhui.

The Ministry of Health said cases of the disease might increase in coming months because its peak season was in June and July. Cases in some Chinese provinces, as well as Taiwan and Singapore, are running above levelsfrom a year ago. It ordered health authorities across the country to report all cases within 24 hours and step up controls ahead of the Olympics in August.

Officials will visit nurseries and primary schools to educate staff on hygiene and prevention steps, and Chinese scientists will increase research into the disease. In Fuyang, 22 children have died from hand, foot and mouth disease and 3,321 have been infected. Fifty eight are critically ill or in a serious condition, the ministry said.

State television showed pictures of anxious mothers bringing their children to hospital and of frightened children lying in hospital beds, one of them with bandages around his head. The ministry said special equipment was being installed in children's wards of Fuyang hospitals to treat patients. Local authorities are strengthening supervision of food safety and water quality in an effort to stop the disease spreading.

Kindergartens in Fuyang, which had been due to reopen on Monday after a holiday weekend, will stay closed until May 12. The disease began spreading in Anhui in early March. But a delay in reporting it to the public until last weekend triggered heated discussion and criticism in the Chinese media, which said local government officials should be sacked. Health officials say there was no cover-up in Anhui and the reason for the delay was that medical teams were trying to work out what the illness was.

An initial cover-up of the SARS epidemic in 2003 led to the sacking of Beijing's mayor and the health minister. Hand, foot, and mouth disease, characterized by fever, sores in the mouth and a rash with blisters, is a common illness among infants and children and is usually not fatal, according to the National Center for Infectious Diseases in the United States.

Human error said to be cause of terrible train wreck

2008-04-29T04:22:00.000-05:00

Chinese officials reported that human error is to blame for China's worst train accident in more than a decade. The terrible accident in which two passenger trains collided in eastern China's Shandong province Monday morning, killed at least 70 and injured 420. Additionally, one of the trains was traveling over its speed limit, Chinese authorities were quoted as saying in the official Xinhua News Agency.

One train on its way from Beijing to Qingdao, a city in eastern China, derailed and crashed into a train which was traveling from the Shandong city of Yantai to Xuzhou in the eastern Jiangsu Province, according to a report by the state-run Xinhua news agency. The crash happened in the city of Zibo in Shandong Province at 4:43 am, the report said. Xinhua said the collision was the deadliest train accident in the country since 1997.

"It toppled 90 degrees to one side and then all the way to the other side," a passenger named Zhang was quoted in Xinhua. "When it finally went off the tracks, many people fell on me and hot water poured out of their thermos flasks."

Local villagers joined police officers and medical workers in the rescue effort, breaking train windows with farm tools to pull out stranded passengers. Survivors also joined in, using blankets from sleeper cars as stretchers to lift the seriously injured from the stricken carriages. A 38 yr old woman called Yu told Xinhua she had escaped through a crack in the floor of the carriage with her 13 yr old daughter.

"We were still sleeping when the accident occurred," she said. "I suddenly woke up when I felt the train stopped with a jolt. In a minute or two it started again, but soon toppled."

Trains Collide in China over 40 dead and 250 injured

2008-04-27T23:36:00.000-05:00

Over 40 people were killed and 250 injured when two passenger trains collided in China early on Monday morning. Carriages were toppled into a ditch, Xinhua news agency reported. One train was en route from Beijing to the eastern city of Qingdao when the accident happened in Zibo, Shandong province. The second train was traveling between Yantai, in Shandong, and Xuzhou in the neighboring province of Jiangsu. Both were likely operating at full speed when the accident happened a cargo worker said. It is the worst train accident in over a decade in China.

Xinhua quoted the Jinan Railway Bureau based in Shandong as saying 51 of the injured were in critical condition. Officials at the Zhoucun District People's Hospital in Zibo and at the district's Number 148 hospital contacted by Reuters said they were dealing with dozens of injured but did not give a detailed count or say how many had died.

"Most are slight cases and more people are being sent in every hour," Xinhua quoted a worker at the first hospital as saying of the injured.

Witnesses and a government spokesman also said there were heavy casualties in the collision in Shandong, which happened at a bend in the tracks and which caused the carriages to topple into a ditch, Xinhua reported.

China and USA to open Olympic Basketball Tourney

2008-04-27T12:09:00.000-05:00

The host China mens basketball team will face the United States Dream Team in the opening game at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games as the draw of mens and womens basketball competitions was held Saturday. China was drawn into Group B with the Americans, defending world champion Spain, African champion Angola and two qualifiers from the Olympic qualifying competition on July 14th-20th in Greece.

In the other group, European champion Russia will face Olympic gold medalist Argentina, Lithuania, Australia, Iran and a qualifier. The womens draw took place earlier, with China, the USA, New Zealand and Mali in Group B, while South Korea, Australia and Russia were placed in Group A. Another five berths are to be decided on June 9th-15th in Spain.

"It will be an eye catching opener between the host and the USA," FIBA President Bob Elphinston said.

Li Yuanwei, vice president of the Chinese Basketball Association, said the men's team has a tough group while the women's draw is okey. "It's a difficult group with opponents like Spain and the USA. The women's group is okey," Li said.

Greece, Germany, Brazil and Canada have better shot at the men's qualifying tournament, with Slovenia, Croatia, New Zealand and Purto Rico not ready to give up. Two of the three qualifiers will join Group B to make it tougher than Group A. The Chinese women's team is aiming high as world champion Australia and runners-up Russia are bracketed into the other group. China has little chance to beat three time Olympic champion USA, but has better record against New Zealand and African teams. The Olympic basketball competitions will set off from August 9-24 at the Beijing Olympic Games at the Wukesong Arena.

A Visit to China's Terracotta Army

2008-04-26T22:16:00.000-05:00

It has been said that going to China and not seeing the Terracotta Army is like going to Egypt and missing the Pyramids. A visit to the terracotta army is made from Xi'An (pronounced She-ahn), the capital of Shaanxi province. Xi'An lies to the southwest of Beijing. It is approximately a one-hour flight, or an overnight train ride from Beijing. Xi'An is China's first historic capital, made primary city by the first emperor, Qin Shi Huang. The Qin Shi Huang Terracotta Wariors and Horses Museum is located about thirty minutes outside Xi'An proper by car.

The Terracotta Army was buried with the Emperor of Qin (Shi Huang Di) in 209-210 BC (his reign over Qin was from 247 BC to 221 BC and unified China from 221 BC to the end of his life in 210 BC). Their purpose was to help rule another empire with Shi Huang Di in the afterlife. Consequently, they are also sometimes referred to as "Qin's Armies". Some people think that the army was also built for protection.

The Terracotta Army was discovered in March 1974 by local farmers drilling a water well to the east of Mount Li. Mount Li is also where the material to make the terracotta warriors originated. In addition to the warriors, an entire man-made necropolis for the emperor has been excavated.

According to the historian Sima Qian (145 BC-90 BC) construction of this mausoleum began in 246 BC and involved 700,000 workers. Sima Qian, writing a century after its completion, wrote that the First Emperor was buried with palaces, scenic towers, officials, valuable utensils and 'wonderful objects', with 100 rivers fashioned in mercury and above this heavenly bodies below which he wrote were 'the features of the earth. Some translations of this passage refer to 'models' or 'imitations' but in fact he does not use those words. Recent scientific work at the site has shown high levels of mercury in the soil of Mount Lishan, appearing to add credence to the writing of ancient historian Sima Qian.The tomb of Shi Huang Di is near an earthen pyramid 76 meters tall and nearly 350 square meters. The tomb remains unopened, with hopes that it remains intact. Only a part of the site is presently excavated.

China Offering to Meet with Dalai Lama

2008-04-25T09:36:00.000-05:00

China is planning to hold talks with envoys of the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism whom it blames for a long wave of unrest, state media reported on Friday. The same day the Olympic flame arrived in Japan. The move comes after concerted pressure from the West to talk to the Dalai Lama. It also marks the first serious step to defuse tensions aside from coming down hard on protesters and lambasting Tibetans' spiritual leader. China has increased its harsh rhetoric towards the Dalai Lama since anti-government protests rippled across ethnic Tibetan parts of China over the last couple of months.

"In view of the requests repeatedly made by the Dalai side for resuming talks, the relevant department of the central government will have contact and consultation with the Dalai's private representative in the coming days," the official Xinhua news agency quoted an unnamed official as saying.

An envoy to the Dalai Lama said on Friday that they had received notice of China's offer to hold talks. "We have been told verbally, through private channels, that a meeting has been proposed," Dalai Lama envoy Kelsang Gyaltsen told Germany's Deutsche Welle broadcaster. "We neither know the date, the location, nor the topics that must be addressed at the meeting," he added, speaking in German.

China denounces the Soccer Mogul , who fled Tibet after a failed 1959 uprising against Communist rule, as a traitor and has accused him of orchestrating the unrest, a charge the 72 yr old Nobel laureate denies. But Tibet has become a flashpoint for anti-Chinese protests that have disrupted the Olympic torch relay around the world and has led to calls for state leaders to boycott the Beijing Games, which open in August.

"It is hoped that through contact and consultation, the Dalai side will take credible moves to stop activities aimed at splitting China, stop plotting and inciting violence and stop disrupting and sabotaging the Beijing Olympic Games so as to create conditions for talks," the official was quoted as saying.

Recent official denunciations of the Dalai Lama had usually referred to the Dalai "clique," rather than Dalai "side." The United States and France have urged the Chinese to hold talks with the Dalai Lama, while British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said he would meet the Tibetan leader when he visits Britain in May.

France and the United States welcomed the announcement of talks. "This is a major step. This renewed dialogue carries real hope," French President Nicolas Sarkozy's office said in a statement.

The American embassy in Beijing also said in a statement that the dialogue would be a very positive development in the situation. The European Commission also backed the talks. "As far as I understand the Chinese position, the Chinese say they are ready to discuss everything except sovereignty for Tibet," EC President Jose Manuel Barroso said.

Reporters were allowed into Tibet on Friday and there was a heavy troop presence lining the road between the capital Lhasa and Shigatse, the second largest city in Tibet. Japan called for calm but braced for trouble with tight security, as low key protests began ahead of its leg of the torch relay that begins on Saturday in the central city of Nagano, following emotional scenes at other venues.

Nagano police did end up arresting a man carrying a knife near the site of the relay start on Friday. The man claimed to be a monk and was carrying a documents that protested the relay, news agencies said. The flame is meant for messages of peace and friendship, but its journey has been unfortunately turned into a political event and the torch has been granted the sort of security usually reserved for state leaders. The flame's arrival in Nagano was greeted by right-wing activists in trucks roaming the streets, displaying huge Japanese flags and blaring "go away."

Chinese Stocks Soar on Stamp Tax Cut

2008-04-23T22:08:00.000-05:00

Chinese stocks soared Thursday after the government cut a tax on stock transactions in a move widely seen as a signal of support for the markets. The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index surged almost 10% to 3,590 as investors resumed buying after weeks of holding back in hopes of market boosting news.

The jump came after the government announced late Wednesday that it was cutting a stamp tax on share transactions to 0.1% from 0.3%, reversing a move it made May 30 when it was seeking to cool surging stock prices. The measure, which took effect Thursday, was approved by the State Council, Finance Ministry and State Administration of Taxation, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.

The Shanghai market has been hit hard recently, dropping to levels last seen in March 2007. Alarmed by an 11% slide in the Shanghai index last week, late on Sunday night the China Securities Regulatory Commission announced new restrictions on sales of large blocks of shares newly freed from lockup periods. That move, showcased in front-page headlines of state-run newspapers, was explicitly aimed at reassuring investors fretting over some $430 billion in previously nontraded shares due to enter the market this year. But it did little to spur buying.

The stamp tax reduction seems to have done the trick, for now. The Shanghai index was helped Thursday by a 7.1% advance in PetroChina's stock, to 17.70 yuan. Its shares account for about one-fifth of the benchmark's total value.

Olympic Torch Relay bringing criticism rather than glory

2008-04-19T09:37:00.000-05:00

The Olympic torch relay was meant to kick off China's moment in the sun. Unfortunately it has turned into a public relations disaster as ever larger squads of police in foreign capitals must shield the torch from protesters. China has given no sign that it will cut the relay short, which continues its 21 city global odyssey Saturday in Thailand and Monday in Malaysia. Yet frustration has set in that the troubled torch relay may signal further minefields ahead for the Summer Games in August, including a loss of face for China rather than a boost for the world's most populous nation.

"All that has happened is a kind of humiliation," said Hu Xingdou, a political analyst at the Beijing Institute of Technology . "The government never expected this."

At nearly every stop, authorities have altered the route or cut it short to keep protesters from disrupting the relay, as they did in San Francisco, London and Paris. Observers in China voiced relief that a torch stop Thursday in New Delhi came off without major incident, crediting a massive police turnout that deterred exiled Tibetan residents (numbering near 100,000 in India) from protesting China's handling of Tibetan uprisings within its borders last month.

"India sent 15,000 police out, and there was not a single incident. And they arrested 160 to 170 protesters," said Shen Dingli , an international relations scholar at Fudan University in Shanghai . "Why can't those rich countries . . . do a better job than India does?"

China had hopes that the Summer Games would showcase the nation's dramatic economic rise, its glittering new skyscrapers and its ability to host the most expensive Olympic Games in history, with the best facilities. Instead, the noisy protests among Tibet supporters have triggered anger among many ordinary Chinese, who think that the West wants to hobble China's rise, and have proved embarrassing to the International Olympic Committee.

"Everybody's losing. No one comes out looking good in this exercise," said Kishore Mahbubani , the dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore . "The tragedy of the protesters is that they've stoked a very powerful Chinese nationalism, and that's not going to be very helpful to Tibet."

In the Thai capital, police prepared not only for pro-Tibet protesters but also for demonstrators who are unhappy with China's support of army generals ruling in neighboring Myanmar and of weapons sales to Sudan , where violence racks the troubled Darfur region. As the torch relay moves around the world, organizers deploy greater numbers of police officers and keep the public farther away. Olympic Games sponsors have notably distanced themselves from the relay, not wanting to associate with an event that's producing images of police clashing with demonstrators.

A chartered jetliner carrying the torch landed before dawn Friday in a military controlled area of Bangkok's Don Muang Airport , far away from the public. Later next week, the torch will be taken to Australia , where authorities face the prospect of massive numbers of Olympics supporters from within a large resident ethnic Chinese community facing off with pro-Tibet demonstrators.

"There's talk of tens of thousands from both sides congregating in Canberra ," the site of the torch relay, said Malcolm Cook , the Asia and Pacific program director at the Lowy Institute for International Policy in Sydney . "The worry is that emotions on both sides are very high."

After Australia , the relay continues to Japan , South Korea , North Korea , Vietnam and Hong Kong and ends May 3 in Macau before beginning a lengthy journey through China , including Tibet. Amid the troubles earlier this month, some IOC officials considered cutting short the global torch relay but later abandoned the idea.

One IOC member said he thought that the international relay should be scrapped. "I have always thought the international torch relay is not a particularly good idea," IOC member Dick Pound , a Canadian who directed the investigation of corruption at the Winter Olympics in 2002 and helped fight the widespread use of performance drugs in sports, told "The Diane Rehm Show," a nationally syndicated US public radio program. "You can't do it thoroughly enough. It costs a fortune. The logistics are terrible."

Some Chinese, meanwhile, said the protests signaled that the country must boost its vigilance to prevent demonstrators from upstaging the games once they begin. "We have to be prepared for something to happen during the Olympics," Hu said.

China falls to Mexico in mens soccer friendly

2008-04-17T09:36:00.000-05:00

Cesar Villaluz scored early and previously reeling Mexico dominated China in a 1-0 friendly victory Wednesday before a crowd of 56,416 that roared, chanted, sang and blew horns throughout the match. The fourth largest soccer crowd in Seattle history was so joyful it did "The Wave," the 1980s fan phenomenon allegedly founded in Seattle, during the United States national anthem just before the game. Fans displayed their disapproval of some officials calls by throwing paper airplanes from the upper deck of Qwest Field, which will be home to the expansion Seattle Sounders FC of Major League Soccer in 2009.

Only exhibitions with Real Madrid and DC United in 2006 and Manchester United and Celtic in 2003, plus a 1976 NASL exhibition game between Seattle and the New York Cosmos (Pele scored two goals in the first event held in the old Kingdome) drew more in Seattle than Wednesday night's match.

"It was impressive, honestly," Mexico interim coach Jesus Ramirez said. "It made me happy that we could send them home tonight happy."

China coach Vladimir Petrovic added of the night long fiesta at his team's expense, "It was very difficult for us. The fans for Mexico was its 12th player on the pitch."

The game played out like one might suspect between a team ranked 16th in the world and one ranked 82nd, even with Mexico minus its stars from overseas leagues. China had just three shots and it didn't get the ball into Mexico's penalty area more than a few times. That left veteran goalkeeper Oswaldo Sanchez, one of the only recognizable names on Mexico's roster, mostly idle. He made just one save.

In the 14th minute, Mexico's Jorge Hernandez lofted a pass into the center of the penalty area to Sergio Santana. Santana's short pass found Villaluz, who was making plays near the goal all night. Villaluz drilled a high shot over goalkeeper Song Zhenyu for the lone goal that had the crowd, essentially all for Mexico, throwing sombreros.

"In the first half, we didn't know how to play Mexico, their style," Petrovic said.

Mexico easily could have led 5-0 at halftime. Song made two diving saves on breakaways by Mexico, including one by Villaluz on a shot from 15 yards. Song also made a sliding stop on a point blank shot by Sergio Amaury Ponce in the 26th minute. Then, just before halftime, Santana kicked an open shot from the top of the goalkeeper box over the crossbar.

China's lone chance to score came in the 59th minute. Wu Weian sent a high centering pass in front of the goal. But Gao Lin's leap couldn't keep the ball from sailing harmlessly over him.

"It was a fantastic match, a good experience for us," said Petrovic, adding he was pleased with how his young players controlled Mexico better in the second half. "It was a pity we didn't get a goal."

China is tuning up to host the Olympics in August.

China takes over top spot among polluting nations

2008-04-16T20:49:00.000-05:00

China has already surpassed the US as the world's largest carbon polluter, a California study said Tuesday. "Our best forecast has China's carbon dioxide emissions correctly surpassing the United States in 2006 rather than 2020 as previously anticipated," said the study by researchers at the University of California.

The report, written by economic professors Maximilian Aufhammer of UC Berkeley and Richard Carson of UC San Diego, is to be published next month in the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management. Researchers compiled information about the use of fossil fuels in various Chinese provinces and forecast an 11 percent annual growth of carbon emissions from 2004 to 2010.

Previous estimates had set the growth rate at 2.5% to 5%. The rise in
air pollution by China has largely cancelled out efforts by other countries' attempts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in accordance with the Kyoto Protocol, the authors said.

The researchers predicted that by 2010, "there will be an increase of 600 million metric tons of carbon emissions in China over the country's levels in 2000." That growth would "dramatically overshadow the 116 million metric tons of carbon emissions reductions pledged by all the developed countries in the Kyoto Protocol," the report said.

"Put another way, the projected annual increase in China alone over the next several years is greater than the current emissions produced by either Great Britain or Germany.

Researchers studied pollution data from China's 30 provincial entities in order to obtain a more precise snapshot of greenhouse gas emissions.

"Everybody had been treating China as single country, but each of the country's provinces is larger than many European countries, both in geographic size and population," said Carson. "In addition, there is a wide range in economic development and wealth from one province to the next, as well as major differences in population growth, all of which has an effect on energy consumption that cannot be easily addressed in models based upon aggregate national data."

Aufhammer said the results showed the "emissions growth rate is surpassing our worst expectations, and that means the goal of stabilizing atmospheric CO2 is going to be much, much harder to achieve."

China to field largest Olympic team ever at over 500 athletes

2008-04-12T16:54:00.000-05:00

China has over 500 athletes already qualified for the 2008 Olympics to be held in Beijing this summer and plans to field about 50 more to make up its largest ever Olympic team. Chinese athletes have met the qualifying criteria in 27 of 28 sports, with only tennis missing thus far, deputy sports minister Cui Dalin was quoted as saying. In all, China expects to enter more than 580 athletes in the Games, Cui said, while cautioning against expectations that the depth will see it top the medal standings.

"This is the first Olympics where our athletes are competing at home and they face a whole new competition environment and a whole series of difficulties never encountered before," Cui was quoted as saying. "The gap between the Chinese competitors' performances in swimming and athletics and those of foreign competitors is vast. The sports China excels at are under assault, and China's performance in other sports has been unsteady,"

The United States won 36 gold and 102 total medals to finish top at the 2004 Olympics, 20 medals more than Russia and 39 more than China. China won 32 golds, second to the Americans.

China has enjoyed almost exponential improvement in recent Olympics, going from five to 32 gold medals from 1988 to 2004. Dating to 1996, Summer Olympic hosts have experienced an 8 percent increase in medals over the previous Olympics. Australia enjoyed a 41 percent increase from 1996 to the 2000 Sydney Games. China has nearly 20,000 athletes involved in its staterun training program.

China irked at US Resolution on Tibet

2008-04-10T22:52:00.000-05:00

China expressed outrage at a resolution by US lawmakers urging Beijing to end a crackdown in Tibet and open dialogue with the the Dalai Lama. The condemnation was in response to a US House of Representatives resolution which urged China to open dialogue with the Tibetan Buddhist leader and end its crackdown on non-violent Tibetan protestors and its continuing cultural, religious, economic, and linguistic repression inside Tibet.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said her government was "strongly indignant and resolutely opposed" to the American move. Jiang said the United States lawmakers should instead direct their ire at the Dalai Lama's clique, which China has blamed for deadly rioting in Tibet on March 14 and protests across Tibetan areas.

"It is confusing black with white and is vicious minded of certain members of the US House of Representatives to not only fail to condemn the attacks, smashing, looting and arson in Lhasa, but rather to point the spear at the Chinese government and people," Jiang said.

Chinese public opinion has swung strongly behind the government's case that the Tibetan protests were intended to disrupt the Beijing Olympic Games in August, and that criticisms of its policies in Tibet are illfounded. Beijing has also condemned protests focused on Tibet that have followed the Olympic Games torch relay through London, Paris and San Francisco. Jiang said the US lawmakers' resolution would only strengthen Chinese resolve to keep a grip on Tibet.

"We warn these members of the US Congress that the more you protect the Dalai clique and meddle in preparations for the Beijing Olympic Games ... the more determined the Chinese people will be to protect Tibet's social stability and ethnic unity and hold a successful Beijing Olympics."

Chinese Officials foil Terrorist plot to disrupt Olympics

2008-04-10T10:24:00.000-05:00

Chinese authorities have detained 45 East Turkestan terrorist suspects, and foiled plots to carry out suicide bomb attacks and kidnap Olympic athletes to disrupt the Beijing Olympics. Uighur militants have been making calls to establish an independent East Turkestan in China's predominantly Muslim northwestern region of Xinjiang bordering Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia. The Chinese authorities raided two terrorist groups, one of which belonged to the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), Ministry of Public Security spokesman Wu Heping told a Beijing news conference.

ETIM is currently listed by the United Nations as a terrorist group and has links to Al Qaeda. The group asked its members to do trial runs using poisoned foods, poison gases and remote control explosive devices, Wu said. Their aim was to create an international incident with the goal of disrupting the Olympic Games, the spokesman said.

The first group, led by Aji Muhammat, bought explosive materials and carried out 13 test explosions, Wu said without giving the nationality of the ringleader. Suspects in custody confessed they were ordered to commit suicide if arrested, he said.

Police detained 10 suspects and seized 16,000 yuan ($2,300) in cash and a large quantity of Holy War training materials, Wu said. Several other suspects are on the run. At the end of last year, the group ordered its members to enter China and had planned to be ready by April to carry out the terrorist activities in Beijing and Shanghai, using explosives and poison, the spokesman said.

In the second case, authorities in Xinjiang's regional capital Urumqi detained 35 suspects including Abdurahman Tursun, the ringleader of a terrorist group that had plotted to kidnap foreign journalists, tourists and athletes during the Olympics, Wu said. Authorities had also seized 9.51 kg (21 lb) of explosives, eight detonators and some Holy War propaganda material, Wu said, adding that the group had also planned to carry out suicide bomb attacks in Urumqi and other cities in China, the spokesman said.

It had been secretly recruiting people "willing to sacrifice their lives for Jihad," or holy war, Wu said.

"We are facing a real terrorist threat. All walks of life and the public should maintain a high degree of vigilance," the spokesman added.

Oil-rich Xinjiang is home to 8 million Uighurs, a Turkic, largely Islamic people who share linguistic and cultural bonds with Central Asia. Many resent the growing presence and economic grip of Han Chinese.

US Protesters on hand, but no plans to cut Olympic Torch relay short

2008-04-09T10:13:00.001-05:00

Olympics chief Jacques Rogge said there are no plans to cut short a global relay even as protesters marched in San Francisco ahead of the Olympic Torch's arrival. The protesters were demonstrating against China's crackdown in Tibet and China's civil rights record. The torch will be carried through the West coast city during the flame's only US stop, and activists fuelled by anger about Beijing's policies in Tibet and its reaction to deadly rioting in the Himalayan region last month are gathering for protests.

Several hundred paraded through the city's streets on the eve of the torch procession, many carrying Tibetan flags and signs and chanting "Shame on China."

Hours later in western China, a group of Buddhist monks interrupted a state-sponsored media tour of a Tibetan region, demanding the return of the Dalai Lama and yelling that they had no human rights, a move that could inflame overseas activists. Authorities in San Francisco, famous for its demonstrations, already feared a repeat of aggressive tactics that marred the relay in London and Paris. An Olympic official said he also worried people could be injured in all the confusion. But Rogge told the Wall Street Journal that reports the International Olympic Committee executive board would consider scrapping the torch relay outside China, to avoid more ugly scenes, were "based on a misunderstanding."

"I am saddened that such a beautiful symbol of the torch, which unites people of different religions, different ethnic origin, different political systems, cultures and languages, has been attacked," Rogge said of the disruptions.

The troubled procession has kept Tibet in the international headlines, and become a magnet for other groups unhappy about a range of China-related issues, from its involvement in Sudan's Darfur region to its treatment of animal rights. China has been fiercely condemned the protests, and they have stirred up patriotic resentment among many ordinary Chinese who feel they politicize a sporting event that should be a celebration of 30 years of economic development and opening to the outside world.

Western leaders are facing a delicate balancing act as calls mount for them to boycott the opening ceremony, though there have been no serious suggestions that athletes should skip the Games. Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said in a speech to Chinese students that it was important to recognize that there were "significant human rights problems" in Tibet, although he did not back calls for a boycott of the Beijing Olympics.

"I believe the Olympics are important for China's continuing engagement with the world," Rudd said, according to a transcript of the speech made on Wednesday.

Asked to comment, Tibet's Governor Qiangba Puncog said the human rights of more than 95 percent of Tibetans have never been better and that the remarks of some leaders were unnecessary. The government-in-exile has said about 140 Tibetan protesters were killed in a government crackdown, but Qiangba Puncog said the list of names was fabricated. China says 19 "innocent" civilians were killed by Tibetan mobs. Sita, a Communist Party vice-minister responsible for co-opting ethnic minorities, said the door for dialogue between China and the Dalai Lama's envoys was open but the riots had undermined "basic conditions and atmosphere" for talks.

Visit Smorty Today to get paid for Blogging!

2008-04-09T09:57:00.000-05:00

Bloggers love to write! Why not earn money while doing what you love? Blogging is tons of fun and allows an avenue to speak about anything a blogger sees fit. How about being able to blog to your heart's desire and get paid for it also? Sounds great, yes? Here's where Smorty is there for you! Smorty allows the opportunity for talented bloggers like us to earn paypal for writing blogs, while allowing an avenue for advertisers to promote their services on our blogs. All Smorty requires is you blog your opinion on the advertiser's ad campaigns within your blog. It's just that easy. It takes a few minutes to complete a Smorty task and you will get paid for it within a week or so straight into your paypal account.

Registratio at Smorty is simple and totally free. You can register as many blogs as you like as long as they all meet Smorty's blog standards. There is absolutely nothing to lose as you can accept as many Smorty assignments as you like or you don't have to do any at all. Bottom line Smorty is a wonderful opportunity for a blogger to make extra income doing what they love to do and that is blog. Make sure to visit Smorty today and learn more. Start get paid for blogging today!

Hillary Clinton Urges President Bush to Boycott Beijing Olympics

2008-04-07T14:51:00.000-05:00

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton urged President George W. Bush on Monday to boycott the Beijing Olympics opening ceremonies this summer unless China improves human rights. Clinton cited violent clashes in Tibet and the lack of pressure by China on Sudan to stop "the genocide in Darfur."

"At this time, and in light of recent events, I believe President Bush should not plan on attending the opening ceremonies in Beijing, absent major changes by the Chinese government," the New York senator said.

Bush plans to attend the Summer Olympics ceremonies in Beijing in August and so far has resisted pressure to change his plans in response to a violent crackdown against protesters in Tibet by Chinese authorities. China has also been accused of refusing to use its influence on the Sudanese government to get it to stop what the United States calls a genocide in the Darfur region. Clinton joined U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California in calling on Bush to boycott the ceremonies.

"I encourage the Chinese to take advantage of this moment as an opportunity to live up to universal human aspirations of respect for human rights and unity, ideals that the Olympic games have come to represent," Clinton said.

Speaking before Clinton's statement was released, White House spokesman Tony Fratto said that, "We have a great deal of concern about human rights in China. We have never been afraid to express those views," he said.

He said the Bush administration expects American athletes to participate in the Olympics. (Reporting by Steve Holland and Toby Zakaria, editing by Lori Santos)

Olympic Torch extinguished to avoid protestors in France

2008-04-07T08:08:00.000-05:00

The Olympic torch had to be extinguished and rushed onto a bus for protection at least twice Monday as it moved through Paris. The Olympic Torch relay encountered numerous and heavy protests, including at least one attempt to rush a torch bearer. A man identified as a Green Party activist was grabbed by security officers as he headed for 1997 400 meter world champion Stephane Diagana, who was carrying the torch at the beginning of its relay from the first floor of the Eiffel Tower. The man was tackled before he got close to Diagana.

Later in the day, French police were forced to threw other protesters to the ground and carry some away. The torch was put out and placed on a bus for safety. Less than an hour later, it was extinguished and put on a bus again as protesters booed and began chanting "Tibet!" although none appeared to rush the torch. The relay resumed but protesters were planning more demonstrations along Monday's route.

On Sunday London police repeatedly scuffled with protesters decrying China's human rights record and a recent crackdown on Tibetans. One tried to grab the torch, while another tried to snuff out the flame with what appeared to be a fire extinguisher. Thirty-seven people were arrested. The flame's round-the-world trip is the longest in Olympic history, and it is meant to shine a spotlight on China's economic and political power. But activists have used to publicize anger at Beijing's policies at home and abroad.

There have been protests since the flame embarked on a 85,000-mile journey from Ancient Olympia in Greece to Beijing for the Aug. 8-24 Olympic Games. The torch relay is expected to face demonstrations in San Francisco, New Delhi and possibly elsewhere on its 21-stop, six-continent tour before arriving in mainland China on May 4. Paris police conceived an elaborate security plan to keep the torch in a safe "bubble."

French torchbearers were to be encircled by several hundred officers, some in riot police vehicles and on motorcycles, others on skates and on foot. Three boats were also to patrol the Seine River, and a helicopter was to fly over Paris, police said.
About 80 athletes planned to carry the torch over a 17 mile route that starts at the Eiffel Tower, heads down the Champs-Elysees avenue toward City Hall, then crosses over the Seine before ending at the Charlety track and field stadium.

In Beijing Monday, International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge said he was "very concerned" about unrest in Tibet, his strongest comments to date on the political storm surrounding the Games.

"The International Olympic Committee has expressed its serious concern and calls for a rapid peaceful resolution in Tibet," Rogge said. He added that violent protests, "for whatever reason," are "not compatible with the values of the torch relay or the Olympic Games."

An Olympic Boycott won't change China's ways

2008-04-02T14:15:00.000-05:00

The rumble of protest is growing louder. Outrage over China's treatment of Tibetans has led to calls for a boycott of the Beijing Olympics. There are all sorts of reasons not to stage a boycott of the 2008 Games, many of them thoughtful. Two immediately come to mind: The Olympics are supposed to be beyond the reach of politics, and athletes don't deserve to be punished for international conflicts. But one reason matters more than the others: Boycotts don't seem to accomplish much when it comes to the Olympics.

Exhibit A is the 1980 Moscow Olympics, in which the United States and 61 other countries refused to participate as a protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. At the time, it seemed to make some sense in the context of the Cold War. The evil Soviets were supporting a Marxist government against a resistance army of Muslim fighters. But to understand just how silly that protest looks right now, you need only turn to the front section of this newspaper and check out who is fighting in Afghanistan now: That would be us.

That's not to say a protest of China over its policies regarding Tibet is useless. Tibetan exiles say that 140 people have died during recent protests centered on China's claim of sovereignty over the region. Chinese media have referred to some of the protesters as "loyal running dogs of the Dalai clique," referring to the Dalai Lama, the exiled Buddhist spiritual leader. Clearly, there are human-rights abuses going on, as well as the suppression of dissent. But a boycott of the Games likely won't do much. The Soviets responded to our 1980 boycott by boycotting the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, and it's almost impossible to find anyone who believes the dueling boycotts did anything other than hurt the athletes who weren't allowed to compete.

China sees the Olympics as a way of legitimizing itself on the world stage, and critics are concerned if voices aren't raised over the country's horrible human-rights record, it will be seen as the same sort of capitulation that allowed Nazi Germany to hold the 1936 Olympics. France has talked about boycotting the Games, and Britain's foreign secretary said demonstrations over Tibet would be allowed Sunday when the Olympic torch travels through London. Protesters already tried to disrupt the torch-lighting ceremony in Greece.

In the middle of that is the answer. Exposing the Tibet problem to the light of day will bring more attention to the situation than a boycott. This might be the one time when words speak louder than actions. Putting continued pressure on China, rather than shutting the door, is the way to go. That might include having dignitaries skip the Opening Ceremony on Aug. 8. Such a scaled-down boycott would leave out the athletes, who should get to enjoy the pomp and circumstance of the event, while letting Chinese officials understand the depth of international anger aimed at them over Tibet. It would be deeply embarrassing to China, which is big on appearances.

The International Olympic Committee, which prides itself on its neutrality, might want to reconsider its position in light of the situation in Tibet, as well as Darfur, where mass murders have taken place at the hands of Sudanese soldiers. Imagine the effect if the IOC, known for its silence, spoke up. The IOC ideal is a noble one: The Games are supposed to be above politics. There is only one world, not a fractured planet of countries. But that's not reality, and although ignoring reality for three weeks every other year is a good thing, sometimes you have to speak up for the powerless. Reporters Without Borders, which tracks press freedom throughout the world, recently released a statement that neatly summed up the best moral approach.

"Calling for a complete boycott of the Olympic Games is not a good solution. The aim is not to deprive athletes of the world's biggest sports event or to deprive the public of the spectacle. But it would be outrageous not to firmly demonstrate one's disagreement with the Chinese government's policies."

The only people who pay are the athletes. The best revenge for Jesse Owens against the racism of his day was to compete in Berlin, where Adolph Hitler had some strange ideas about ethnic purity. And that 1980 U.S. boycott over the invasion of Afghanistan? Not what you would call a catalyst for change. The Soviets didn't completely pull out of the country until 1989. Let the athletes compete. But let's not let China off the hook.

Chinese Stocks on Downward Trend

2008-04-01T00:14:00.000-05:00

The month of March couldn't end fast enough for investors in the China stock market after the Shanghai Composite Index suffered through its worst monthly performance in 14 years. But now after finishing lower in five of its last six sessions, April doesn't look much better as the market prepares for trade on Tuesday. The market draws reasonably positive global cues, but the regional bourses are still trying to figure out how to respond to the Bush Administration's much anticipated regulatory overhaul of the financial market system, outlined on Monday by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson. The Treasury's Blueprint for Financial Regulatory Reform was set in motion in March 2007 and is designed to lead to a more effective and appropriate financial market system.

Paulson emphasized that working through the current crisis remains the first priority of the administration. Although the reforms proposed through the Treasury's blueprint are designed to help prevent further such problems with the regulatory structure, they will not be implemented until the current turmoil is a memory rather than a present reality. The market was sharply lower on Monday after regulators failed expectation that they might introduce stimulus measures over the weekend. Investors were disappointed to find no such assistance, so shares resumed their decline - although strength in the oil, coal, airline and banking sectors lifted the market from its daily low.

For the day, the index dropped 107.43 points or 3 percent to close at 3,472.71 after trading between 3,445.56 and 3,555.82 on turnover of 97.4 billion yuan. The Shenzhen Component Index fell 390.71 points or 2.85 percent to close at 13,302.14. There were 726 decliners and 65 gainers in Shanghai and 570 decliners and 49 gainers in Shenzhen. Among the actives, heavyweight PetroChina fell 3.64 percent, while China Life lost 3.71 percent and China Shenhua Energy reduced 5.99 percent. Bucking the trend, Sinopec gained 1.34 percent, Air China climbed 0.18 percent and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China was up 1.32 percent.

Wall Street offers a cautiously optimistic lead after ending the final session of the first quarter notably higher on Monday, boosted by a better than expected reading on manufacturing in Chicago. Investors were also digesting Paulson's speech on the planned changes in the regulatory arm of the financial sector. The markets moved to the upside after the National Association of Purchasing Management - Chicago released its report on business activity in the Chicago-area manufacturing sector in the month of March, showing that its index of activity in the sector came in above economist estimates. The report showed that the purchasing managers' index rose to 48.2 in March from 44.5 in February, although a reading below 50 indicates a continued contraction in the sector. Economists had been expecting the index to edge up to 46.7.

After trading briefly in negative territory in the morning, the major averages stayed well above the unchanged line through the majority of the session, closing with notable gains. The Dow closed up 46.49 points or 0.4 percent at 12,262.89, the Nasdaq closed up 17.92 points or 0.8 percent at 2,279.10 and the S&P 500 closed up 7.48 points or 0.6 percent at 1,322.70. Despite the gains, the major averages all posted notable losses for the first quarter, adding to the losses seen in the previous quarter. For the first three months of the year, the Dow lost 7.6 percent, the Nasdaq fell 14.1 percent and the S&P 500 closed down 9.9 percent.

China receives Olympic Torch amid protests

2008-03-30T16:08:00.000-05:00

Chinese citizens felt pride Chinese spectators cheered Sunday as Greece handed off the Olympic flame for its long journey to Beijing as the relay will travel through 20 countries. But protesters brandishing Tibetan flags tried to steal the limelight. Some two dozen activists chanted "Save Tibet!" and unfurled a banner reading "Stop Genocide in Tibet" before police intervened, detaining 21 protesters outside the Panathenian Stadium. Most were later freed.

A police cordon prevented the demonstrators from disrupting the final leg of Greece's relay from the Acropolis to the marble stadium, the venue of the first modern Olympics in 1896. About 7,000 Greek and Chinese spectators cheered as Greek triple jumper Hrysopigi Devetzi carried the torch into the stadium, lined with the flags of both countries. Greek presidential guards and actresses dressed as ancient priestesses looked on.

"It was an emotional experience for me," Devetzi said. "I hope the flame will bring light to all athletes, especially those from Greece and that everything with the Games goes well."

The president of the Hellenic Olympic Committee, Minos Kyriakou, delivered the flame to chief Beijing organizer Liu Qi. The torch later left Athens on a specially equipped Air China flight expected to arrive in Beijing on Monday. Qi promised a "grand welcoming ceremony" in Tiananmen Square, where the government has increased security. The torch will then travel through 20 countries before returning to mainland China, covering 85,100 miles.

Kyriakou appealed for respect for a "timeless symbol which stirs admiration, pride and faith" in the Olympics. "I hope the world community welcomes the flame and honors it," he said. The relay has become a magnet for Tibetan protesters and human rights activists, who disrupted the March 26 flame-lighting ceremony in Athens and dogged the weeklong Greek leg of the relay.

"We just wanted to show our support for Tibet, peacefully, and when we displayed the flags we were taken away by police," said Klara Vrhova, a Czech member of the Students for a Free Tibet group.

Marina Staroyianni, a Greek member of the group, said protesters wanted "to let the whole world know that China is violating human rights" in Tibet. "A lot of people are now talking about the problem, throughout the world," she added.

The flame goes Tuesday to Almaty, Kazakhstan, and then on to Istanbul, Turkey, and St. Petersburg, Russia. Those stops are not expected to bring problems, but the following three could: London, Paris and San Francisco. London's route on April 6 is sure to be lined by thousands of demonstrators, who are expected to have a wreath-laying ceremony to commemorate those killed in Tibet's recent unrest. Tibetan exiles say almost 140 people have died, while the Beijing government puts the number at 22.

Pro-Tibet demonstrators are expected to be just as numerous in Paris on April 7. French President Nicolas Sarkozy is the first European leader to suggest a boycott of the opening ceremony as a possibility to protest China's handling of the unrest in Tibet. In San Francisco, the only North American city hosting the torch, officials shortened the April 9 route through the city and have abbreviated the ceremonies. Mayor Gavin Newsom has said no one will be prevented from expressing his views, but permits are required to gather near the torch.

Another difficult stop comes April 17 in New Delhi. India is home to Tibet's government-in-exile and many Tibet rights groups are located in the country. Activists want Chinese authorities to cancel plans to carry the flame through Tibet on its way to Mount Everest for the first time. China has dismissed the demand.

"The torch will for the first time ascend the summit of the world, thereby testifying to the great strength of the Olympic movement in marking the progress of human civilization," Liu said after receiving the flame.

China allows foreign press to visit Tibet as hundreds surrender

2008-03-26T17:05:00.000-05:00

China acted Wednesday to show it had the situation in Tibet under control, saying more than six hundred people had surrendered over deadly unrest and escorting foreign journalists on a tour of the region. The media trip came as Chinese state-run press and online forums ramped up criticism over Western reporting about the unrest, and French President Nicolas Sarkozy warned he might boycott the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics.

The White House later said US President George W. Bush had called his opposite number to express his concern over the situation in the region, while urging him to talk to the Tibetans. The small delegation of selected foreign journalists landed in Lhasa on Wednesday for a three-day trip expected to be tightly controlled and slanted toward China's version of events in the vast Himalayan region.

China has indicated the journalists, the first allowed into Tibet since the unrest, will be permitted to speak with victims of the violence and shown property damaged by rioters, but gave no assurances on reporting freedom. The group did not include AFP and some other major global news agencies. Tibet's spiritual leader the Dalai Lama reacted positively to news of the trip, but urged visiting journalists to do their homework before reporting on the situation.

"It's very good," the Dalai Lama said, "but it should be with complete freedom. Only then can you assess the real situation," he told reporters in New Delhi. "In the meantime, I think the correspondents should also know the background of the events taking place there. Otherwise, there is always the possibility of artificial publicity," the 72-year-old Buddhist monk said.

Foreign reporters have been barred from visiting Tibet and neighbouring Chinese provinces with large Tibetan populations affected by the unrest, making it nearly impossible to independently verify the number of dead and arrested. Protests against Beijing's rule of Tibet began in Lhasa on March 10 -- the anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule of the region.

The demonstrations turned bloody four days later and spilled over into other parts of the country, with the Chinese authorities accused of heavy-handedness in putting down the demonstrations. Tibet's government-in-exile has said 140 people were killed in the unrest, while China has reported a total of 20 deaths, 19 of them in Lhasa.

China has accused the Dalai Lama of masterminding the protests -- a charge the Tibetan spiritual leader, who fled his homeland after the 1959 uprising, denies. The Dalai Lama, who has said he is open to dialogue with Beijing, on Tuesday reiterated a pledge to resign as spokesman for the Tibetan people if there were more violent anti-Chinese protests.

Beijing has sought to highlight attacks by Tibetans on ethnic Chinese, and on Wednesday trumpeted the number of people who had turned themselves in to face punishment over their involvement in the unrest. More than 280 people had surrendered in Lhasa, while 381 others had turned themselves in Ngawa county, in southwest Sichuan province, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

"Most of those who have come forward are ordinary people and monks who were deceived or coerced," said Shu Tao, a local Communist Party chief, according to the state-run China Daily.

Lhasa prosecutors have also issued arrest warrants for 29 people allegedly involved in a protest that broke out in the Tibetan capital on March 14, while police have put 53 suspects on a "most-wanted" list, Xinhua said. The unrest comes at a delicate time for the Chinese authorities as the world watches Beijing ahead of the Summer Games, due to begin in less than five months. Sarkozy said Tuesday that "all options are open" regarding an Olympics boycott, as he appealed to China's leaders to show a "sense of responsibility" over the unrest.

Increasing the pressure on Beijing, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, in an interview published Wednesday, recommended that Sarkozy meet with the Dalai Lama during a planned trip to France in August. China reacted Wednesday, with foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang issuing a statement saying the government "resolutely opposes official contact of any kind between any country and the Dalai Lama". But the White House later said Bush had called China's President Hu Jintao to express his concern over the issue and urge him to talk to the Dalai Lama.

"The (US) president raised his concerns about the situation in Tibet and encouraged the Chinese government to engage in substantive dialogue with the Dalai Lama's representatives and to allow access for journalists and diplomats," the White House said in a statement.

China accuses Dalai Lama of taking Olympics "hostage"

2008-03-23T11:55:00.000-05:00

China accused the Dalai Lama on Sunday of using unrest in Tibet to back demands for Tibetan independence ahead of the August Olympic Games in Beijing. The verbal attack on the exiled Tibetan leader, accused on Saturday of colluding with Muslim Uighur separatists in China's western Xinjiang region, was part of an intense propaganda and security drive to stifle anti-Chinese unrest before the Games. Unrest in Tibet began when Buddhist monks demonstrated in the capital, Lhasa, on March 10, the 49th anniversary of a failed uprising against Chinese rule, and on subsequent days.

Five days later anti-Chinese rioting shook the city. Chinese authorities said one policeman and 18 civilians were killed. Anti-government protests then flared in nearby provinces with large ethnic Tibetan populations, leading to violence in which several people were killed and many injured. In Sichuan, Gansu and other troubled provinces troops continued conspicuously patrolling the streets of Tibetan towns, and kept schools and Buddhist monasteries under tight guard.

The official Xinhua news agency reported on Sunday that 94 people had been injured in Tibetan areas in Gansu, almost all of them police. The Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, has in recent days criticized the violence and said he wants talks with China to negotiate autonomy, but not independence, for his homeland.

But the government is intensifying propaganda telling its citizens and the rest of the world that the Dalai Lama, not failings in government policy, caused the trouble in Tibet and accusing him of wanting to ruin the Beijing Olympic Games.

"We must ... win the final victory in all respects against the secessionist forces to help ensure a successful Olympic Games with a stable social situation in the Tibet Autonomous Region," Xinhua quoted Tibet's governor, Qiangba Puncog, as saying.

The ruling Chinese Communist Party's official newspaper, the People's Daily, said on Sunday that the Dalai Lama, winner of the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize, had never abandoned violence after fleeing China in 1959 following a failed revolt against Beijing.

"The so-called 'peaceful non-violence' of the Dalai clique is an outright lie from start to end," the paper said. "... The Dalai Lama is scheming to take the Beijing Olympics hostage to force the Chinese government to make concessions to Tibet independence."

Beijing's efforts to isolate the Dalai Lama could become a sticking point with Taiwan's President-elect Ma Ying-jeou, who said the exiled leader would be welcome on the disputed island, and that an Olympic boycott was possible. China calls Taiwan a breakaway province that must accept reunification.

"The Dalai Lama, if he wants to visit Taiwan, he'd be more than welcome," Ma told a news conference in Taipei on Sunday, a day after his landslide election win. "If the situation in Tibet worsens, we would consider the possibility of not sending athletes to the Games," said Ma -- who wants closer economic ties and political dialogue with China.On Saturday the Peoples Daily accused the Dalai Lama of planning attacks with the aid of violent Uighur separatist groups seeking an independent East Turkestan for their largely Muslim people in Xinjiang.

Up to now, most of the ferocious criticism of the Dalai Lama came from the official press in Tibet but others are joining in.

"Tibet is an inseparable part of China. In the history of the world there has never been a country or a government that has ever recognized Tibetan independence," Ngapoi Ngawang Jigme was quoted by Xinhua as saying on Sunday. The 86-year-old is a vice chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the top advisory body to parliament. He represented Tibet in 1951, signing the surrender agreement with Beijing a year after Chinese troops took control of Tibet for the Communist winners of China's civil war.

China's denunciations of the Dalai Lama have drawn applause from many Han Chinese citizens, who have said Western critics fail to appreciate their government's efforts to develop Tibet. But the campaign has begun to draw some domestic critics. On Saturday, a group of 29 Chinese dissidents urged Beijing to end the bitter propaganda, allow United Nations investigators into Tibet, and open direct dialogue with the Dalai Lama. Troops have choked off much travel in Tibetan areas and blocked access by foreign reporters, and officials have said they are also guarding against unrest in Xinjiang.

China's pollution becoming everyone's problem

2008-03-19T11:51:00.000-05:00

The emergence of China as a dominant economic power is an epochal event, occasioning the most massive and rapid redistribution of the earth's resources in human history. The country has also become a ravenous consumer. Its appetite for raw materials drives up international commodity prices and shipping rates while its middle class, projected to jump to 700 million by 2020, is learning the gratifications of consumerism. The catch is that China has become not just the world's manufacturer but its despoiler, on a scale as monumental as its economic expansion. A fourth of the country is now desert. More than three-fourths of its forests have disappeared. Each year, uncontrollable underground fires, sometimes triggered by lightning or mining accidents, consume 200 million tons of coal, contributing massively to global warming. A miasma of lead, mercury, sulfur dioxide, and other elements of coal-burning and car exhaust hovers over most Chinese cities.

Meanwhile, roughly 70 percent of the world's discarded computers and electronic equipment ends up in China, where it is scavenged for usable parts and then abandoned, polluting soil and groundwater with toxic metals. If unchecked, such devastation will not just put an abrupt end to China's economic growth, but, in concert with other environmentally heedless nations (in particular, the US, India, and Brazil), will cause mortal havoc in societies and ecosystems throughout the world.

The fallout
The process is already under way. Acid rain caused by China's sulfur-dioxide emissions severely damages forests and watersheds in Korea and Japan and impairs air quality in the US. Every major river system flowing out of China is threatened with one sort of cataclysm or another. The surge in untreated waste and agricultural runoff pouring into the Yellow and China Seas has caused frequent fish die-offs, and overfishing is endangering many ocean species. The growing Chinese taste for furs and exotic foods and pets is devastating neighboring countries' populations of everything from gazelles to wolves, and turtles to parrots, while its appetite for shark fin soup is causing drastic declines in shark populations throughout the oceans. According to a study published in Science in March 2007, the absence of the oceans' top predators is causing a resurgence of skates and rays, which are in turn destroying scallop fisheries along America's Eastern Seaboard. Enthusiasm for traditional Chinese medicine is causing huge declines in populations of hundreds of animals – including tigers, pangolins, and sea horses. Seeking oil, timber, and other natural resources, China is building massive roads, bridges, and dams throughout Africa, often disregarding international environmental and social standards.

China has also depended on imports of illegally cut wood in becoming the world's wood workshop, supplying oblivious consumers in the US and Europe with furniture, flooring, and plywood. Chinese wood manufacturers have already consumed the natural forests of Thailand, Cambodia, and the Philippines, and at current rates will swallow the forests of Indonesia, Burma, Papua New Guinea, and the vast Russian Far East within two decades. Most of these forests are formally protected by law or regulation, but corruption and ineffectual enforcement have fostered a flourishing illegal trade. China has probably already overtaken the US as the world's leading emitter of CO2, and the country's ecosystems are displaying climate change's consequences: Arid northern China is drying out, the wet south is seeing more and more flooding, and, according to a June 2007 Greenpeace report, 80 percent of the Himalayan glaciers that feed Asia's mightiest rivers could disappear by 2035. Such a development would jeopardize hundreds of millions of people who depend on the rivers for their livelihood.

Nevertheless, China has maintained that the developed countries bear primary responsibility for global warming and must be the first to counter it. The argument has some merit: After all, the US alone is responsible for a quarter of the man-made greenhouse gases pumped into the earth's atmosphere over time, while China's cumulative contribution is still less than a third as much. And even today, China's per capita carbon-dioxide emissions are less than a fifth of America's. Yet China's refusal to curb emissions soon could single-handedly wipe out reductions made elsewhere, crippling the international effort. All this is common knowledge among those who follow Chinese environmental trends. Still, the news has not shaken China out of its money-induced euphoria. One likely reason is that China's growth rate takes no account of the environmental devastation the boom has caused. In 2006, an official at China's State Council said environmental damage (everything from crop loss to the price of healthcare) cost 10 percent of its gross domestic product – all of the economy's celebrated growth. Vaclav Smil, a highly respected China scholar at the University of Manitoba, pegs both the environmental-damage rate and the growth rate closer to 7 percent, "so basically every year environmental damage wipes out the GDP growth," Mr. Smil says.

China performs balancing act ahead of Olympics

2008-03-16T09:52:00.000-05:00

The Beijing Olympics were supposed to mark China's debut as a modern nation that commands respect, even admiration, but instead of that dream, the country's leaders face a PR nightmare. A crackdown on unrest in Tibet has added to mounting pressure on China over human rights and other issues that threaten to tarnish the coming-out party, pushing its Communist leaders into an uncomfortable corner, analysts said.

"This is the worst thing that could have happened for China," China scholar Jean Philippe Beja said of deadly unrest in the Tibetan capital Lhasa that has forced an army lock down of the city. The Chinese and Tibetan leaders are facing a no-win situation," said Beja, of the Centre for International Research in Paris.

With five months to go before the world's athletes begin competing here, China's communist government finds itself teetering on a political balance beam, observers and dissidents said. Aside from Tibet, China is under fire for its tough rule in the Muslim-dominated Xinjiang region, for restricting press and religious freedoms, and its support of Sudan, which is blamed for the massive bloodshed in Darfur. It has also drawn condemnation for what rights activists call a crackdown on critics, including the arrest in December of prominent human rights campaigner Hu Jia.

Former factory worker Yang Chunlin has also been tried and is awaiting a verdict after he organised a petition -- entitled "We want human rights, not the Olympics" -- that gathered 10,000 signatures. The Tibet issue embodies the pitfalls China faces on these challenges, experts say. A strong response on critics could trigger worldwide condemnation, while not being tough enough could embolden further dissent.

"Beijing will have to find a middle way, between not doing anything -- with the risk that the situation could worsen -- and with reacting violently, arresting everybody and firing on crowds," Valerie Niquet, director of the French Institute of International Relations in Paris, told AFP. "What's interesting is that we see strong tension on a regime that does not like tension."

Any misstep in Tibet, in particular, will likely have serious repercussions on China's image and the success of the Games, said Beijing-based dissident Liu Xiaobo.

"If the Tibet situation spawns large-scale bloodshed, the impact on the Olympics will be great and will lead to even greater world condemnation," he said.

China could easily defuse the tensions by offering to hear the grievances of Tibetans, opening talks with exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama and loosening its grip on critics, observers said. But the long-term risks of such actions would far outweigh a tarnished Games, said Kate Saunders of the International Campaign for Tibet.

"While there is an historic moment for China to address the concerns of the Tibetan people, the hardest thing for the Chinese leadership to do would be to really engage," said Saunders, adding that she expected the familiar pattern of harsh suppression.

China's quandary would likely be even worse if world governments and the International Olympic Committee applied strong pressure. But the responses have been tepid out of a fear that economically powerful China could hold a grudge against anyone seeking to spoil its moment in the sun, say observers.

"Unfortunately, I think China can afford even more repression in Tibet, because the world's leaders are in an awkward position," said Claude Levenson, a Switzerland-based author and specialist in Tibetan issues.

China faces another test next week when it is expected to put the high-profile dissident Hu on trial. But dissident Liu said he expected China to cynically score some points in the weeks ahead with an expected light sentence for Hu, who he said was being used as a bargaining chip.

Check out Joyland Casino for online casino play

2008-03-16T09:41:00.000-05:00

Take a look at Joylandcasino.com for one of the best online casino play available on the net. The site is quite user friendly and offers casino games ranging from video poker and video slots to blackjack and roulette. Joyland Casino also offers incredible bonuses and promotions beginning with a $808 Welcome Bonus for all new players! So if you love the challenge and fun of a casino then check out Joylan Casino for a great virtual casino and take advantage of the many games they have to offer.

Chinese forces swarm Tibet enforcing curfues

2008-03-15T16:34:00.000-05:00

Chinese soldiers swarmed Tibet's capital in armored carriers Saturday, enforcing a strict curfew a day after protesters burned shops and cars to vent their anger against the Chinese rule. In another western city, police clashed with hundreds of Buddhist monks leading a sympathy demonstration. The violence erupted just two weeks before China's Summer Olympic celebrations kick off with the start of the torch relay, which passes through Tibet. China is gambling that its crackdown will not draw an international outcry over human rights violations that could lead to multiple boycotts of the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

This latest round of unrest began Monday on the anniversary of a 1959 uprising against Chinese rule. Tibet was effectively independent for decades before communist troops entered in 1950. Initially, the protests were led by Buddhist monks demanding the release of other detained monks. Their demands spiraled to include cries for Tibet's independence and turned violent Friday when police tried to stop a group of protesting monks. Pent-up grievances against Chinese rule came to the fore, as Tibetans directed their anger against Chinese and their shops, hotels and other businesses.

It was the fiercest challenge to Beijing's authority in nearly two decades. China's official Xinhua News Agency reported at least 10 civilians were burned to death on Friday. The Dalai Lama's exiled Tibetan government in India said Chinese authorities killed at least 30 Tibetans and possibly as many as 100. The figures could not be independently verified.

In the Tibetan capital Lhasa on Saturday, police manned checkpoints and armored personnel carriers rattled on mostly empty streets as people stayed indoors under a curfew, witnesses said. The show of force imposed a tense quiet. Several witnesses reported hearing occasional bursts of gunfire. One Westerner who went to a rooftop in Lhasa's old city said he saw troops with automatic rifles moving through the streets firing, though did not see anyone shot. Foreign tourists in Lhasa were told to leave, a hotel manager and travel guide said, with the guide adding that some were turned back at the airport.

"There are military blockades blocking off whole portions of the city, and the entire city is basically closed down," said a 23-year-old Canadian student who arrived in Lhasa on Saturday and who was making plans to leave. "All the restaurants are closed, all the hotels are closed."

Even as Chinese forces appeared to reassert control in Lhasa, a second day of sympathy protests erupted in an important Tibetan town 750 miles away. Police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of Buddhist monks and other Tibetans after they marched from the historic Labrang monastery and smashed windows in the county police headquarters in Xiahe, witnesses said. Also Saturday, fresh demonstrations by Tibetan exiles and their supporters sprouted up in New York, neighboring Nepal, Switzerland and Australia.

The Chinese government is hoping a successful Olympics will boost its popularity at home as well as its image abroad. But Beijing's hosting of the Olympics has already attracted scrutiny of China's human rights record and its pollution problems. So far, international criticism of the crackdown in Tibet has been mild. The U.S. and European Union called for Chinese restraint without any threats of an Olympic boycott or other sanctions.

"What is happening in Tibet and Beijing's responses to it will not affect the games very much unless the issue really gets out of control," said Xu Guoqi, a China-born historian at Kalamazoo College in Michigan.

International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said Saturday he opposed an Olympic boycott over Tibet.

"We believe that the boycott doesn't solve anything," Rogge told reporters on the Caribbean island of St. Kitts. "On the contrary, it is penalizing innocent athletes and it is stopping the organization from something that definitely is worthwhile organizing."

China restricts access to Tibet for foreign media, making it difficult to independently verify the casualties and the scale of protests and suppression. Yet the details emerging from witness accounts and government statements suggested Beijing was preparing a methodical campaign — one that if carefully modulated would minimize bloodshed and avoid wrecking Beijing's grand plans for the Aug. 8-24 Olympics.

The China-installed governor of Tibet vowed to deal harshly with the protesters in Lhasa, but said no shots had been fired and promised that "calm will be restored very soon."

"Beating, smashing, looting and burning — we absolutely condemn this sort of behavior," Champa Phuntsok, an ethnic Tibetan, told reporters in Beijing.

In Lhasa, law-enforcement agencies issued a notice offering leniency for demonstrators who surrender before the end of Monday and threatening severe punishment for those who do not. Neighborhood committees went door-to-door handing out the notices, telling locals defiance would be treated as a criminal act and hinting of rewards if they turned protesters in, said Robbie Barnett, a Tibet specialist at Columbia University, who talked with Lhasa residents by phone.

The calculated mix of threats and inducements underscored the difficulties the communist leadership faces in trying to quell a serious challenge to its 57-year rule in Tibet while saving the Olympics. Preparing the public for tough measures, state-run television on the evening newscast showed footage of red-robed monks battering bus signs and Tibetans in street clothes hurling rocks and smashing shop windows as smoke billowed across Lhasa.

"The plot by an extremely small number of people to damage Tibet's stability and harmony is unpopular and doomed to failure," a narrator said as the footage played.

Chinese newspapers and Internet sites, all state-controlled, ran no reports on the violence except a brief Xinhua statement vowing to reassert order.

China overtakes US in webtraffic

2008-03-13T23:05:00.000-05:00

China has surpassed the United States to become the world's largest Internet market by number of users, a research firm said on Thursday. The estimate by Beijing-based BDA was based on data from China Internet Network Information Center which indicated that the country's Internet users totaled 210 million at end of 2007.

Nielsen/NetRatings put the United States Web population at 216 million for the same period, BDA said.

"Based on these sources and the assumption that these markets have continued to grow in 2008 to date at the same rates that they grew in 2007, we can conclude that China has by now comfortably surpassed the United States as the world's largest Internet population," analyst Bin Liu said in a statement. BDA added that it expected e-commerce to become the next boom sector in China, as businesses take advantage of the mass market of consumers already online.

China assures Olympics will be safe

2008-03-11T09:53:00.000-05:00

China assured that they plan to spare no effort to ensure a safe Olympics, the foreign ministry said, after officials said two alleged terrorist plots from its Muslim-majority northwest had been thwarted. "I'd like to stress that China is relatively safe, but we will not be careless," foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters. We will spare no efforts and continue to do a good job in ensuring security during the Olympics. We are confident and competent to ensure that."

Wang Lequan, Communist Party chief in the northwestern Xinjiang region, said Sunday that a January raid on "terrorists," which resulted in the deaths of two militants and 15 arrests, had foiled a planned attack on the August Games. It was believed to be the first specific threat against this summer's Beijing Olympics to be reported by authorities, although Chinese officials had previously warned that terrorism was the biggest threat to the event.

The alleged plot was the second foiled attack linked to Xinjiang, which has a large Muslim population, to be announced over the weekend. Passengers on a China Southern Airlines flight attempted to crash a Chinese airliner on Friday flying to Beijing from Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang, an official from the region said on Sunday. As in the first case, few details have emerged except for a brief statement on Monday from the national aviation authority that passengers on the flight had been carrying "suspicious liquids." The exiled head of the Uyghur American Association, Rebiya Kadeer, said that China fabricated the alleged plots.

"It's completely untrue. All these allegations are falsified," Kadeer, who joined her US-based husband in 2005 after six years in a Chinese jail, told AFP through an interpreter.

The Xinjiang region of 20 million people is largely populated by ethnic Uighurs and other Muslim minorities, who have traditionally opposed Beijing's rule and clamoured for greater autonomy, which the central government has strongly opposed.

Chinese thwart potential Olympic attack

2008-03-09T08:44:00.000-05:00

A group of suspected "terrorists" that were eliminated in a raid in northwest China's Muslim-dominated Xinjiang region earlier this year had been planning an attack on the Olympics, said a top official Sunday. Separately, the Xinhua news agency quoted a high-level Xinjiang official as saying authorities Friday foiled a planned "terrorist attack" on a passenger plane flying from the regional capital Urumqi to Beijing.

Both officials were speaking on the sidelines of the national parliamentary session. Two militants were killed and 15 arrested in the January 27 raid in Urumqi, capital of the vast Xinjiang region bordering several Central Asian republics. Five police officers were wounded in the raid when three homemade grenades were thrown at them.

"Obviously, the gang had planned an attack targeting the Olympics," Wang Lequan, Xinjiang's Communist Party chief, told reporters.

The group had collaborated with the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), an obscure grouping that is listed by the United Nations as an international terrorist group, according to Xinhua.

"The Olympic Games slated for this August is a big event, but there are always a few people who conspire to commit sabotage. It is no longer a secret now," said Wang. "Those terrorists, saboteurs and secessionists are to be battered resolutely, no matter what ethnic group they are from," said Wang, who is a member of the Communist Party's politburo.

Meanwhile Nur Bekri, chairman of the Xinjiang regional government, told reporters about what appeared to be a planned hijacking Friday. The China Southern Airlines plane was forced to land in Lanzhou, capital of neighbouring Gansu province, because "some people were attempting to create an air disaster," he said. The crew stopped the would-be attackers and all passengers and crew were safe, he added.

Nur did not elaborate, saying only that authorities were investigating "who the attackers are, where they are from and what's their background," Xinhua reported.

"But we can be sure that this was a case intending to create an air crash," he said, also on the sidelines of the National People's Congress.

The Xinjiang region of 20 million people is largely populated by ethnic Uighurs and other Muslim minorities, who have traditionally opposed Beijing's rule and clamoured for greater autonomy. Delegates to the ongoing parliamentary session have promised to step up a crackdown on ethnic unrest, separatism and religious extremism in Xinjiang. Eighteen alleged terrorists were killed and 17 captured in an army raid in January 2007 on what Beijing said was an ETIM training camp. East Turkestan often refers to two short-lived republics established in Xinjiang by the Muslim Uighur minority, one in the early 1930s, the other in the second half of the 1940s.

Advertise with TheChinamogul

2008-03-06T18:14:00.000-06:00

Thank you for considering advertising with Thechinamogul.com
Thechinamogul.com is a young site but it continues to grow each and every day. In only 3 months our traffic has increased 430%! February alone showed our traffic double again! Advertising here is fairly cheap so I would act now because as we continue to grow, I'm sure these prices will not last!

Currently, I have a couple of different options to choose from:

150 x 150 Ad Spot - $20.00 USD/month (As of March 1st, 2008)

Availability: 3/3 open

I have three spots available on the site. Please email me the 150 x 150 image to shane.barrow@gmail.com.

Text Links - $5.00 USD/month

I will have a "Sponsored Text" section on the right of the page.

All ads will be published on the site (on every page) for a 30 day period from when the ad is approved. Currently, I only accept paypal as the form of payment. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to email me at shane.barrow@gmail.com.
Thank you.

China's rising military a concern

2008-03-04T11:50:00.000-06:00

The yearly Pentagon report on China said Beijing's lack of transparency posed risks to stability and voiced concern over how it would use its expanding military power. China is developing cruise and ballistic missiles capable of striking aircraft carriers and other warships at sea, tested an anti-satellite weapon last year and fielded new intercontinental ballistic missiles.

"I think the biggest thing for people to be concerned about, really, is the fact that we don't have that kind of strategic understanding of the Chinese intentions," said David Sedney, deputy assistant defense secretary for East Asian affairs. "And that leads to uncertainty. That leads to a readiness to hedge against the possibility that China's development will go in ways that the Chinese right now say it won't," he said.

The assessment comes despite some progress in US-Chinese military relations, including an agreement last week to open a telephone hotline between their defense establishments and to engage in dialogue on nuclear strategy.

The Pentagon estimated China's total military spending in 2007 at between 97 and 139 billion dollars, more than double China's declared budget of 45 billion dollars, which rose by 17.8 percent in 2007 over the previous year. The report said China's military modernization was being driven in the near-term by preparations for contingencies in the Taiwan Strait, including the possibility of US intervention in a crisis.

"However, analysis of China's military acquisitions and strategic thinking suggests Beijing is also developing capabilities for use in other contingencies such as conflict over resources or disputed territories," it said.

Foreign weapons, high rates of investment in defense and science and technology industries, and far-reaching reforms of its military have stepped up the pace and scope of China's military modernization, the report said.

"China's expanding and improving military capabilities are changing East Asian military balances; improvements in China's strategic capabilities have implications beyond the Asia-Pacific region," the report said.

Among other things, the report said China is developing "counterspace" capabilities to prevent potential adversaries from using space-based assets in a crisis. As examples, it cited China's use of a ballistic missile to destroy a low orbiting weather satellite in a January 2007 test, as well as civilian space programs with military applications.

The report said China has the most active cruise and ballistic missile program in the world. It is acquiring large numbers of highly accurate ground- and sea-launched cruise missiles and deploying short-range ballistic missiles opposite Taiwan at a rate of 100 missiles a year, according to the report.

China is also developing a variant of the CSS-5 medium range ballistic missile with a range of 1,500 kilometers (930 miles) to give the military the capability to strike ships "from great distances," the report said. Although the situation in the Taiwan Strait remains stable, the balance of military power continues to shift in China's favor, the report warned. As of November, China had between 990 and 1,070 short range ballistic missiles deployed to garrisons opposite Taiwan, and it has 490 combat aircraft within un-refueled operational range of the island, the report said.

Southern China's gems - Guangzhou and Shenzhen

2008-03-01T09:43:00.000-06:00

Guangzhou, better known to English speakers as Canton, and neighbouring Shenzhen have been China's "windows to capitalism" for almost three decades. The two cities, particularly Shenzhen which is classified as a Special Economic Zone (SEZ), were among the early “free market laboratories” of China’s then Senior Leader Deng Xiaoping in the late 1970s, when the largest Communist nation chose to relax rigid command economics for greater prosperity. The Beijing government’s efforts have paid off and today, both cities are among China’s most modern and their residents enjoy some of the vast country’s highest living standards.

Guangzhou and Shenzhen are located in China’s southern province of Guangdong, the ancestral home of the Cantonese who make up close to 20 per cent of Malaysian Chinese. Like Hong Kong, which shares a land border with Shenzhen, they are hustling and bustling with private enterprise. They are also increasingly popular as tourist getaways, especially for Malaysians and Singaporeans. Popular TV3 documentary Majalah 3 and New Straits Times recently paid a visit to both cities, in a seven-day trip arranged by AirAsia.

The low-cost airline has had a daily flight to Guangzhou’s Baiyun International Airport and two daily flights to Shenzhen’s Baoan International Airport since January and last December respectively. AirAsia organises travel packages to both cities in partnership with Century Holidays, one of the leading travel companies in Guangdong. Guangzhou is the capital of Guangdong and is a port on the Pearl River, navigable to the South China Sea, and is located about 120km northwest of Hong Kong.

It has a population of 10 million and is China’s third largest city after Shanghai and Beijing. Originally called Panyu, Guangzhou was once the capital of the ancient Vietnamese kingdom of Nanyue. The Chinese Empire conquered Nanyue in 111 BC, and created the province of Guangdong with Guangzhou as its provincial capital. Since then, Guangzhou emerged as one of China’s most important ports. It was here that China first encountered Muslim traders and missionaries in the seventh century and one of them, Saad Abi Waqqas, has a mausoleum in the city.

China’s first encounters with Europeans, from the 16th to 19th centuries, also occurred in Guangzhou. Manufacturers from Hong Kong have opened factories in Guangzhou to take advantage of mainland China’s low labour costs. Many Malaysian and Singaporean businesses have followed suit, too. An environmentally-friendly city with no shortage of well-landscaped parks, Guangzhou has since January last year seen a ban on motorcycles plying its commercial centre. The Beijing government is also introducing LPG fuel for all taxis and buses in the city, and public transport is expected to be fully “green” by 2010.

Muslim restaurants are also aplenty in Guangzhou as the city’s population is five per cent Muslim. The city has more than 20 of them and they are mostly run by China’s large Uighur minority from the northwestern Xinjiang province that shares historical links with Kazakhstan. These halal restaurants serve a mix of Han Chinese and Uighur fare, and one of the latter’s trademark dishes is a crispy, yet tender fried fish which is prepared without cooking oil.

Guangzhou also has more than 10 mosques, including Saad Abi Waqqas mosque which was built in 651 and is China’s oldest. The Chen Family Academy in Zhongshanqi Road, built during the Qing Dynasty in the 19th century, is one of Guangzhou’s major tourist attractions. An “ancestral temple” for Chinese who bear the Chen (alternatively known as Tan, Chan, Chin or Ting) surname, it covers 15,000 square metres and has 19 traditional buildings. The academy contains intricate stone and wood carvings as well as traditional paintings and antique furniture. It also houses Guangdong Folk Arts Museum, established by Beijing in 1959 for the study and display of folk arts throughout the country.

Another tourist attraction is Panyu Baomo Garden which is a stylish, Chinese cultural village covering 100,000 square metres complete with traditional pavilions, about 30 curving stone bridges, lily and lotus-covered lakes and actors who portray village fishermen and duck breeders. Situated in Shawan, a suburb of Guangzhou, it was built in the late 19th century as a retreat for government officials. The cultural village contains several replicas of famous Chinese works of art, and chief among them is a lengthy porcelain sculpture of China’s most expensive painting “Riverside Scene Of Qingming Festival”.

Chimelong Paradise is Guangzhou’s answer to Genting Highlands. Containing a theme park complete with adrenaline-rush roller coaster rides and explosive stuntman shows, Chimelong also houses a Singapore-style safari park and zoo, and a safari-themed hotel with a unique restaurant built around a den of Siberian white tigers and pink flamingoes. Guangzhou has two popular shopping districts, namely, Shangxiajiu Street and Beijing Street.

Resembling Kuala Lumpur’s Bukit Bintang and Singapore’s Bugis Street, both shopping havens come alive in the evenings and offer lots of branded and home-grown goods at affordable prices. The brightly lit shops in both streets are housed in heritage buildings nicely preserved by the local authorities. Beijing Street also contains a historical underground road dating back to ancient times, and part of this pathway has been dug up and covered by a lighted glass panel for public viewing.

Shenzhen, with a population of eight million, has grown by leaps and bounds in the last three decades. Almost indistinguishable from neighbouring Hong Kong as a result of its many skyscrapers, its growth has largely been fuelled by investment from the former British colony.

More than 7,000 Hong Kongers work in Shenzhen and more than 2,000 Shenzhen natives study in Hong Kong. Shenzhen counts as its sister cities Houston in Texas, the United States, Jamaica’s capital of Kingston and Malaysia’s Johor Baru. Not unlike Guangzhou and Hong Kong, it is also a major industrial centre of Greater China. A shopper’s paradise, Shenzhen has several major shopping malls or districts, the most famous of which is Lo Wu (also called Luo Hu) Commercial City, just across from the Hong Kong border. Spread over several floors, its many small stores sell watches, handbags, textiles, fashion and jewellery, and shop owners are accustomed to bargaining.

The Dong Men Pedestrian Street is the place to go for Western-sized clothes at affordable prices. It is also the “home” of many international restaurant franchises such as Starbucks Coffee and McDonald’s.

The Window Of The World in the western part of the city is its most famous theme park. With about 130 reproductions of world famous tourist spots squeezed into 480,000 square metres, it includes a 108-metre tall “Eiffel Tower”, “Pyramids of Egypt” and the “Taj Mahal” in close proximity.

China hopes for Yao Ming's return for Beijing Olympics

2008-02-27T11:17:00.001-06:00

Yao Ming's season-ending injury has China thinking the once-unthinkable: The host nation's biggest and glitziest star might miss the Beijing Olympics. News of the NBA All-Star center's injured foot hit China heavily on Wednesday, highlighting Yao's role as a face of the games and a symbol of the nation's quest for global competitiveness and international acceptance. Yao, the world's most recognizable Chinese athlete, is far and away China's most popular sporting star. While doctors say he should still make the Games, healing is expected to take until around June -- close to the Olympics' Aug. 8 opening ceremony.

"When we heard about Yao's injury, we felt shocked and concerned just like all the basketball fans in China," Bai Ximin, manager of the national men's team told a packed news conference. "We can totally understand how he feels right now and we hope he'll remain positive and optimistic while receiving treatment," Bai said.

The 7-foot-6 Yao, who was averaging 22 points and 10.8 rebounds, was ruled out for the season on Tuesday with a stress fracture in his left foot, a stunning blow to the surging Houston Rockets. Bai and the Chinese Basketball Association's deputy director, Hu Jiashi, said officials discussed Yao's condition with China's Lithuanian-born coach Jonas Kazlauskas at a morning meeting. They said contingency plans were being worked out in case he is ruled out of the Games.

China willing to resume human rights talks

2008-02-26T08:53:00.000-06:00

China told the United States on Tuesday it is willing to resume a human rights dialogue with Washington, a move that could be aimed at defusing criticism surrounding its hosting of the 2008 Olympics. China broke off the dialogue in 2004 after Washington urged a U.N. watchdog to condemn what it called China's backsliding on rights.

"We are ready to resume the human rights dialogue," Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi told reporters at a news conference with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who was in Beijing on a 24-hour visit. We are willing to have exchanges and interactions with the U.S. and other countries on human rights on a basis of mutual respect, equality and non-interference in each others' internal affairs," he said.

Rights groups have been using the Beijing Games to put pressure on China, which they say is the world's leading jailer of journalists and which lacks an independent judiciary as it cracks down on political dissent and strictly controls the media. Rice said she had raised the issues generally, as well as three specific cases, with Yang.

"I have expressed to the minister our continuing concerns about human rights and religious freedom in China (and) the importance of resuming a human rights dialogue between the United States and China," she said. "We do this in a spirit of respect but these issues are very near and dear to America."

Rice said no date had yet been set for the dialogue to resume but the two countries would work to set one. During the meeting with Yang, Rice raised the case of activist Hu Jia, who was detained for inciting subversion after supporting campaigns for democratic reform. She also brought up Jude Shao, a U.S. citizen sentenced to 16 years for tax evasion. Shao's supporters say the charge was trumped up after he refused to pay a bribe.

The third case involves more than one person, targeted by the Chinese government after Yahoo Inc helped identify them. Dissident Shi Tao, a reporter accused of leaking state secrets, was sentenced to 10 years in prison. New York-based Human Rights Watch had urged Rice to speak publicly about press freedom and dissent on her trip. The group mentioned several cases, including that of Hu, and Yang Chunlin, a factory worker on trial after calling for rights to take precedence over the Olympics.

The Temple of Heaven in Beijing

2008-02-25T08:45:00.000-06:00

The Temple of Heaven was constructed between 1406 and 1420 during the reign of Ming Emperor YongLe (1403-1424) , who also oversaw the creation of the Forbidden City during the same period. The Temple of Heaven was originally established as the Temple of Heaven and Earth, but was given its current name during the reign of Ming Emperor JiaJing (1522-1567) , who built separate complexes for the earth, sun and moon. The Temple of Earth (DiTan) can be found in north Beijing. The temples of the sun and moon are in the east and west of Beijing.

The Temple of Heaven was renovated again during the reign of Qing Emperor QianLong (1736-1795). In 1998, the Temple of Heaven was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List. In early 2005, the Temple of Heaven underwent a 47 million yuan (6 million USD) renovation that was completed on May 1st, 2006.

Temple of Heaven
Located just south of Tiananmen Square, the Temple of Heaven (located within Temple of Heaven Park) is China’s largest temple complex, built in the 15th century and used for prayer by the emperor to ask for good harvests. The architecture of the temple is exquisite and the roofs are covered with blue glazed tiles. The grounds of this UNESCO World Heritage Site also contain the Echo Wall, which carries the merest whisper.

Tian Tan Lu (north gate entrance)
Tel: (10) 6702 8866.
Opening hours: Daily 0830-1800; daily 0600-2000 (park).
Admission charge.

Inflation soaring in China

2008-02-24T16:31:00.000-06:00

As China's factory floors feel the pressure from spiralling costs, there is growing nervousness in the rest of the world that the Asian giant's next big export could be inflation. From air-conditioned US shopping malls to bustling African street markets and remote Asian villages, shoppers have become accustomed over recent years to the vast array of ultra-cheap Chinese goods on offer. China's trade surplus last year reached 262.2 billion dollars, a more than 10-fold rise from 2003. But now a confluence of factors, led by soaring domestic inflation that hit an 11-year high of 7.1 percent in January, is ramping up the costs of doing business in China, with potential knock-on effects for the rest of the world. As China's currency has strengthened sharply against the dollar, the government has scrapped export tax rebates, while more stringent labor laws and even the ice and snow storms in southern and central China have further driven up costs.

"China's inflation is having a domino effect on worldwide inflation, especially in the United States," Li Huiyong, an analyst from Shanghai-based SYWG Research and Consulting, told AFP.

"In the past, (outside) inflation pressures in the US mainly came from oil prices because the US economy is highly dependent on crude oil. Cheap products from China and other developing countries helped to alleviate that pressure. Now Chinese goods are no longer as cheap it adds to the inflation pressure in the United States."

Nevertheless, while it is clear that doing business in China is getting more expensive, there is no consensus among economists about how much that will
translate into higher price tags for Chinese-made products overseas. Wang Qing, chief China economist at Morgan Stanley, stressed that Chinese competitiveness was not about to disappear and goods from Asia's most populous nation would remain cheap for years. This would be the case as products moved up the value chain from toys and clothes to cars and high-tech machinery, according to Wang.

"I don't think the days of cheap Chinese goods are over. The inflation that China is experiencing now has a cyclical component. By that I mean the high inflation won't be sustainable," he said. What's more important is that you should not just focus on nominal wage growth, you also need to pay attention to labor productivity growth. That's why I think we shouldn't be too alarmed about this."

And given the long and complex business chain between suppliers in China and overseas consumers, a rise in manufacturing costs does not mean that shoppers will immediately have to pay more for Chinese products. Aside from cutting their own margins, factories and traders can first look to their clients, many of whom charge huge mark-ups on the wholesale price, to take on more of the financial burden. For instance, the price of making a branded T-shirt in China may be just a few dollars, but they are typically sold in US malls for 10 or more times that price. Companies intent on paying bottom dollar for their products could move operations to nations with cheaper overhead costs, such as Vietnam, Sri Lanka or Cambodia. Alarm bells are definitely ringing in boardrooms across China. Eating into exporters' profit margins, producer prices jumped 6.1 percent last month to a three-year high. Meanwhile, labor wages last year rose 20 percent and the yuan has appreciated more than nine percent against the US dollar in the past 14 months.

This has meant that more exporters face bankruptcy unless they lift prices to salvage their disappearing margins, which is just what most plan to do. According to a survey by brokerage and research firm CLSA, 80 percent of Chinese exporters intend to raise prices this year in response to higher raw material costs.

"The appreciation of the renminbi (yuan) against the US dollar is a secondary factor driving these price hikes," Shanghai-based CLSA economist Andy Rothman said in the survey.

Yatta Mao, a trade manager at Shanghai-based chemical trading firm Hanren, told AFP the tighter business conditions that have emerged over the past year were making it difficult to survive.

"The yuan appreciation has a huge impact on our business. It costs us much more in the production and delivery costs. What's worse, the export tax rebates of 13 percent were cancelled so our total costs are up 20 percent," she said.

And in China's southern province of Guangdong, which borders Hong Kong and is one of the nation's main export hubs, there are deep feelings of pessimism. Thousands of Hong Kong- and Taiwan-owned factories based in Guangdong are likely to close soon as they seek cheaper overheads elsewhere, said Alexandra Poon, director of policy research at the Federation of Hong Kong Industries.

China not happy with US Olympic food plans

2008-02-21T11:36:00.000-06:00

The United States Olympic Committee's plan to bring its own food to China has disappointed the head of food services for the Beijing Olympics. Wary of food quality in China following recent incidents of tainted products and reports of the heavy use of drugs and insecticides in food production, the USOC is planning to transport tons of meats and other foods to a training camp at Beijing Normal University.

"I feel it's a pity that they (Americans) decided to take their own food," Kang Yi, the head of the Food Division for the Beijing organizing committee, said Thursday. She added the U.S. had not officially notified her department of the plan.

The U.S. delegation will number more than 600, and many will eat their daily meals at the training camp, rather than the Athletes Village. The Village will house about 17,000 athletes and officials during the Aug. 8-24 Games and will be capable of serving 6,000 meals simultaneously.The New York Times reported earlier that the U.S. will ship 25,000 pounds of lean meat to China.

"We have made lots of preparations to ensure that they (athletes) can get together at the Olympic Games," Kang added, speaking at a news conference Thursday on food safety. "If the American delegation is not at that gathering, it's a pity."

The safety of food in China has become a major issue for the Olympics, where athletes will face extensive drug testing. Security officials are aware that a positive drug test triggered by contaminated food could ruin an athlete's career and generate a public-relations disaster for China, which is intent on showing itself as a modern, sophisticated country. Other countries are also reported to be considering plans to cater their own food. In a related issue, dozens of teams have announced plans to arrive in China as late as possible, choosing to train elsewhere and avoid Beijing and the city's noxious air pollution.

Tang Yunhua, a spokeswoman for the Beijing Municipal Office for Food Safety, repeated claims Thursday of extensive monitoring from the pasture to the plate — using bar codes, satellite tracking devices and labor-intensive operations — for food served at the Olympic Village.

"We can guarantee the food safety during the Olympic Games," Tang said. "We have a safety plan during the Olympics Games to guarantee our venues will be safe," she added. "And the standards for Olympic food safety are much more strict than international standards. So all the delegations can enjoy the food provided during the Olympic Games."

Another official said there was no evidence that drugs and growth stimulants used in meat production could trigger positive doping tests. "As far as we know we haven't found any scientific report on this," said Lu Yong, director of the Beijing Municipal Food Safety Monitoring Center.

China responds to Spielberg resignation

2008-02-20T09:36:00.000-06:00

Beijing has gone on the offensive following the resignation of Steven Spielberg as an artistic director to the Olympic Games. State-run media has criticised the Hollywood director, saying his actions were naive and defied common sense. At the same time, China has been playing up its own role in bringing peace to Sudan's Darfur region, the issue over which Mr Spielberg resigned. The director cut his links with the Olympics last week. He said China was not doing enough to resolve the humanitarian crisis in Darfur. A front-page editorial in the overseas edition of the People's Daily newspaper on Wednesday lambasted a "certain Western director".

"The Darfur problem was not created by China and is not in any way related to China's policies in Africa," said the editorial. Linking the Darfur problem to the Beijing Olympics is unfair."

It went on to say that childish vanity lies behind the West's criticism of China's policy on Darfur.

"The Western media has also shown naivety over the Beijing Olympics, and that is childish and ridiculous," it said.

Other newspapers have also carried commentaries laying out China's position with regard to Mr Spielberg's resignation.

China is doing its utmost to convince the West that it is playing a beneficial role in Darfur, where at least 200,000 people have died in fighting since 2003. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao spoke to British Prime Minister Gordon Brown about the issue in a telephone call this week.

"China hopes for a quick realisation of peace, stability and development for the Sudanese region and has worked constructively to this end," Premier Wen apparently told Mr Brown.

Liu Guijin, China's special envoy on Darfur, is also due to give a keynote speech in London later this week about his country's role in the region. He will then travel on to Sudan. China has strong trade and military links with Sudan, which is accused of backing militias that have raped and murdered in Darfur. Critics say Beijing should use these links to pressure Khartoum on this issue. China says it is already doing all it can. It points out that it backs a United Nations mechanism to resolve the crisis and has already sent peacekeepers to Darfur. China's current publicity offensive stands in sharp contrast to its slow response in reacting to the initial news of Mr Spielberg's resignation. It took Beijing about a day and a half before it gave its first official comment.

China planning over 10 space missions in 2008

2008-02-19T05:45:00.000-06:00

China will launch a record number of spacecraft this year, state media reported Tuesday, amid a rise in tensions among world powers over the militarisation of space. China plans to send up more than 10 missions this year, said Yang Baohua, head of the China Academy of Space Technology, according to the China Daily.

"China's space technology has entered a new stage. The design and manufacture of satellites takes less time, and homemade satellites are more reliable and have a longer lifespan," Yang said.

China has launched an average of eight spacecraft in the past two years, according to the report. The missions this year will include two Shenzhou VII spaceships -- one of which will feature the country's first spacewalk -- two environmental satellites and a communications satellite for Venezuela.

The news comes amid rising tensions between Russia, China and the United States over the militarisation of space. China and Russia have expressed concerns about a US plan to shoot down what officials in Washington say is a crippled spy satellite, with that event to take place potentially as early as this week.

Russia's defence ministry has said it fears the US plan is a veiled weapons test and represents an "attempt to move the arms race into space", while Washington has insisted it is merely trying to prevent it hitting Earth. The United States, meanwhile, remains concerned over China's own satellite destruction effort in January last year.

China used a ballistic missile to intercept and destroy one of its own ageing weather satellites in low Earth orbit, becoming only the third nation after the United States and the former Soviet Union to do so. Adding to the tensions, Russia and China last week unveiled plans for a new treaty banning the deployment of any weapons in space, but the United States rejected the move as "impossible".

Washington is currently negotiating with Warsaw and Prague on the possible installation of 10 interceptor missile sites in Poland by 2012 and associated radar stations in the Czech Republic, as part of a missile shield.

China set to face wave of bad pr heading into Olympics

2008-02-17T13:26:00.000-06:00

China's public relations woes over the Olympics are just beginning, activists have warned, after a torrid stretch of headlines highlighted by Steven Spielberg ending his links to the Games. The international leg of the torch relay during April is set to be a target for protests over the many complaints about the Chinese government, while Beijing itself will likely be a magnet for critics during the August Games.

Jill Savitt, director of Olympic Dream for Darfur, an organisation set up to pressure China into helping end the bloodshed in the western Sudanese region, told AFP protests were already being planned for the torch relay.

"We will be targeting the various stages of the torch relay for demonstrations and we plan to be in Beijing during the Games for a demonstration," US-based Savitt said.

China, which is one the closest allies of the Sudanese government and its main arms supplier, has come under intense and sustained international criticism for not doing more to stop the years of civil conflict in Darfur. Beijing insists it is playing a positive role in Sudan, and that activists like Savitt are simply politicising the Olympics and seeking to ruin the event.

But American speed skater Joey Cheek, a gold medallist at the Turin Winter Games two years ago and a self-described "huge" fan of the Olympics, disagreed that Darfur and sport should be mutually exclusive. Cheek is a founding member of Team Darfur, a group of around 250 past Olympians athletes and future Olympic hopefuls from 42 countries who plan to use the Beijing Games to speak out on Darfur.

He said that, when host nations stage the Olympic for political reasons, people such as himself should not be accused of politicising the Games.

"Countries stage the Games not just because they like sport but because they want to showcase their country, people, culture and political systems. It makes no sense to say it is not political," Cheek told AFP.

Indeed, China's ruling Communist Party has made no secret of the fact it sees sees the Games as a chance to trumpet the nation's rise as a peaceful world power. Meanwhile, the athletes from Team Darfur train in red, green and black sweatbands, and Chinese officials will undoubtedly be looking nervously for this sign of protest when Olympians train and compete in Beijing. Other individuals and groups are hoping to shine the spotlight on issues such as China's controversial rule of Tibet, its record on human rights and religious freedoms, and its suppression of the Falungong spiritual movement. Pro-Tibet independence groups and press freedom groups have already staged protests in China and are believed to be planning more.

"The Beijing Games are now, rightly, destined to become known as the Games of Shame," Free Tibet Campaign spokesman Matt Whitticase said after US film-maker Spielberg last week withdrew his services as an advisor for the Olympics opening and closing ceremonies.

US actress and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Mia Farrow, who branded the Beijing Olympics the "Genocide Games" last year in a reference to Darfur, said activists could take heart from Spielberg's decision to quit.

"This is the time to increase pressure on Beijing, host of the Olympics, and tragically, the underwriter of the Darfur genocide," she said.

Among the other recent bad headlines for the Chinese, an aide to Britain's Prince Charles last month said the heir to the British throne would not attend the Olympic opening ceremony, apparently because of opposition to China's handling of Tibet. And the British Olympic Association unwittingly caused a PR storm for China when it sought to have its athletes agree to a gag order preventing them from speaking out against Chinese policies. The association backed down last week after an uproar in the British press, but not before the story served to again cast world attention on the alleged human rights abuses and other controversial policies of the Chinese government.

The Chinese government has admitted the pressure from protest groups are souring Olympic preparations. China was "facing accusations from all over the world" that could cause "problems for the organisation and planning" of the Olympics, the People's Daily, mouthpiece of the Communist Party, said recently.

China market stumbles, is run over?

2008-02-15T10:48:00.000-06:00

Just a few short months ago, China was one the hottest areas of growth. Then came the slowdown. Is the gong sounding for an end to China's growth? Looking at the Chinese exchange traded funds as of Feb. 1, you might say yes. Last week, iShares FTSE/Xinhua China 25 Index Fund (NYSEArca:FXI.TO - News) was 35% off its high.

The ETF tracks the performance of the largest Hong Kong-listed companies that do most of their business in the People's Republic of China. It hit its all-time high of $219.56 Oct. 31. The reason for the pullback is twofold: snow and the U.S. economy. Chinese industry came to a near standstill last month after being hit by the most severe snowstorms in 50 years. Factories closed, transportation came to a standstill and power was cut off for days.

Millions of crops were lost, and hundreds of thousands of homes were flattened by ice and snow. The U.S. economic slowdown has meant fewer U.S. orders for goods and a slowing of production. The two factors combined to help push the Shanghai Composite Index down 9.3% on Feb. 1. That's the index's sharpest one-week loss since 1997.

The fund's biggest holdings really suffered. China Mobile (NYSE:CHL - News), the world's largest mobile phone operator, is the fund's most heavily weighted stock. China Life Insurance (NYSE:LFC - News) and PetroChina (NYSE:PTR - News) are also among the fund's top holdings. All slid more than 4% last week.

Business also halted last week because of the Lunar New Year, when just about everything in Asia shuts down. Some believe China's run is over and point 15 the fact that a short China fund and levered short China funds were launched last week.

Some analysts say don't give up on China yet. Launching short funds when everything's closed by storms and the Lunar New Year doesn't give an accurate picture of performance. Those same companies that showed poorly for Xinhua last week are in recovery this week.

Despite the recent problems, China still shows growth potential. Its Q4 2007 GDP climbed 11.2% from the previous year. The country's National Statistics Bureau says tax revenues hit $691 billion last year and its foreign reserves are $1.53 trillion.

Other Chinese ETFs also are bouncing. For example, PowerShares Golden Dragon Halter USX China (AMEX:PGJ - News) perked up this week, rising 11%. The Golden Dragon fund tracks U.S.-listed stocks of companies that get most of their revenue from China and have market caps as low as $500 million. That U.S. listing can make a difference to investors when a sometimes-corrupt government grabs a big stake in major companies.

Steven Spielberg to boycott China Olympics

2008-02-13T09:39:00.000-06:00

US film-maker Steven Spielberg has abandoned his role in the Beijing Olympics, as a host of prominent figures accused China of not doing enough to press its ally Sudan to end devastating violence in Darfur.

“Sudan's government bears the bulk of the responsibility for these ongoing crimes but the international community, and particularly China, should be doing more to end the continuing human suffering,” Spielberg said in a statement. “I have decided to formally announce the end of my involvement as one of the overseas artistic advisors to the opening and closing ceremonies of the Beijing Olympic Games.”

In a separate move, Nobel Prize winners and Olympic athletes urged China's President Hu Jintao to pressure Sudan to end atrocities in Darfur, as attention turns to this summer's Games.

“As the primary economic, military and political partner of the government of Sudan, and as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, China has both the opportunity and the responsibility to contribute to a just peace in Darfur,” they said in a joint letter.

The signatories included Hollywood actresses Mia Farrow and Emma Thompson, and African music legend Hugh Masekela.

“Ongoing failure to rise to this responsibility amounts, in our view, to support for a government that continues to carry out atrocities against its own people,” the letter read.

The 25 signatories included South Africa's Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Iranian lawyer Shirin Ebadi - both Nobel Peace Prize winners - along with Olympic athletes, writers, actors and political figures from around the world. The UN estimates some 200,000 people have died in the western Sudanese region from the combined effects of war, famine and disease since 2003, when a civil conflict erupted pitting government-backed Arab militias against non-Arab ethnic groups.

Pro-government Janjaweed militia began fierce retaliation after rebels took up arms to fight for a bigger share of the country's resources. China's ties with Khartoum have been regarded as a sticking point in international efforts to pressure the Sudanese government to ease the crisis.

“Rape and sexual violence have been and continue to be used as weapons of war against untold numbers of girls and women” in Darfur, said the letter to Hu, released by the Save Darfur Coalition campaign group. “The government of Sudan has also been involved in the forced relocation of people from refugee and internally displaced peoples camps. Without homes to return to, those displaced are left vulnerable to further attack.”

It urged China to support the deployment of an approved joint UN-African Union force to secure the region, which Khartoum is accused of blocking. The coalition said it was holding protests in 16 cities across the world today, including a protest at the Chinese embassy in Washington. Spielberg's statement said: “I have made repeated efforts to encourage the Chinese government to use its unique influence to bring safety and stability to the Darfur region.” As an artistic adviser, Spielberg said he had been working with artists including the Chinese director Zhang Yimou.

“My conscience will not allow me to continue with business as usual,” he said, however. At this point, my time and energy must be spent not on Olympic ceremonies, but on doing all I can to help bring an end to the unspeakable crimes against humanity that continue to be committed in Darfur.”

Spielberg had come under criticism last year from Farrow, a UNICEF Goodwill ambassador, who accuses China of lending financial support to Sudan as it backs militia attacks in Darfur.

Health tips for those travelling to China

2008-02-07T15:36:00.000-06:00

Information on health precautions for travelers can be obtained in the United States from local health departments, the U.S. Public Health Service, private doctors, and travel clinics. For China, immunizations are recommended for diphtheria, tetanus, and polio. A gamma globulin shot may offer protection against hepatitis A. In addition, immunization for Japanese B encephalitis (JE) is recommended during the epidemic summer months for visitors planning to stay longer than 2 or 3 weeks. At present, no vaccine for JE is available in the United States, but it can be obtained in Japan or Hong Kong. Malaria occurs in China, particularly in rural areas and in southern China. Depending on the season and your destination, you may need to take antimalarial drugs, use insect repellant, and take other measures to reduce contact with mosquitoes.

Few cities in China have Western-style pharmacies stocked with drugs common in the United States. Therefore, carry medications in your hand luggage to avoid emergencies should your checked luggage go astray.

Foreign visitors who become ill in China are provided with the best medical care available in the country. Generally speaking, the doctors and nurses are qualified and competent, but hospital accommodations are spartan, and medical technology is not up-to-date.

Hospital costs for non-Chinese visitors are similar to those charged for similar services in the United States. Prospective travelers should review their health insurance policies. If your policy does not provide coverage overseas, consider buying coverage that does. In addition, insurance covering medical evacuation is highly recommended. Although several private companies offer evacuation service in the P.R.C., the cost can be extremely high. For example, the estimated cost of evacuation, using a stretcher and with a medical escort, from Beijing to San Francisco is between $16,000 and $22,000.

Tourist travel in China can be extremely strenuous and may be especially debilitating to someone in poor health. Tours often involve walking long distances and up steep hills. All visitors, especially those with a history of coronary/pulmonary problems, should have a complete medical checkup before making final travel plans. Plans should include rest time and avoiding overly full schedules that could lead to exhaustion or illness. China discourages travel by persons who are ill, pregnant, or of advanced age. Visa applicants over 60 usually are required to complete a health questionnaire. If medical problems exist, a letter from your physician in the United States explaining treatment and, if relevant, copies of your most recent electrocardiograms would be helpful in case a medical emergency occurs in China.

Air pollution in the large cities is often severe, particularly in winter when soft coal is burned in the northern cities. It is common for tourists to become afflicted with respiratory ailments.

Visitors are advised not to drink the tapwater in China. Hotels almost always supply boiled water that is safe to drink. Bottled water and carbonated drinks are sold in stores. Carry water purification tablets to use when neither boiled water nor bottled drinks are available.

China continues to battle worst winter in 100 years

2008-02-05T12:29:00.000-06:00

Millions remained stranded in China on Monday ahead of the biggest holiday of the year as parts of the country suffered their coldest winter in a century. Freezing weather has killed scores of people and left travelers stranded before the Lunar New Year, or Spring Festival -- the only opportunity many people have for a holiday all year. It has also brought China unwanted negative publicity six months before the Summer Olympics in Beijing.
President Hu Jintao chaired an emergency Politburo meeting on Sunday for the second time in a week to discuss rescue efforts.

"We have to be clear-minded that the inclement weather and severe disaster will continue to plague certain regions in the south," said a statement issued after Sunday's meeting. "Relief work will continue to face challenges, posing a tough task."

The China Meteorological Administration said the weather was the coldest in 100 years in central Hubei and Hunan provinces, going by the total number of consecutive days of average temperature less than 1 degree Celsius (33.8 degrees Fahrenheit). But it expected brighter weather ahead, though fog could become a problem and temperatures at night would likely still be below freezing, slowing the thaw.

"It is still necessary to remain alert for possible low temperatures, frozen rain, snow, freezing and heavy fog," said administration head Zheng Guoguang.

He added the cold snap had caught the country off guard, in an area unprepared for such heavy snow. But climate change could see more extremes in weather in China, Zheng warned. Four people died after a snow-laden roof collapsed at a fuel station in the eastern city of Nanjing on Sunday, Xinhua news agency said. One person was killed in a stampede at Guangzhou railway station in the south as people rushed to board trains.

Roads and railways, some of which have been blocked for days, have started to move again, and fewer flights were being cancelled, state media said, offering a glimmer of hope. The United States and Singapore pledged emergency aid of $150,000 and $500,000 respectively, Xinhua said, as several other countries sent condolence messages.

China faces weather chaos with stoicism

2008-02-02T11:14:00.000-06:00

Emergency crews struggled on Saturday to restore power to parts of southern China blacked out for a week by heavy snow as forecasters warned of no quick end to the worst winter weather in 50 years. Mobilizing the might of the state, China has deployed more than 300,000 troops and nearly 1.1 million militia and army reservists to get traffic moving and ensure power supplies, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

The freak weather, which has killed at least 60 people in parts of the country unused to heavy snow, could last another week, the Central Meteorological Station said. In Chenzhou, a city of 4 million in the southern province of Hunan, which has been without electricity for eight days, shopkeepers huddled under blankets while cooks warmed their hands over their woks. At least the snow had stopped falling by late Saturday afternoon.

"At night there is nothing you can do but just pile on extra blankets. If you have an electric heater you can't use it," said Hu Jun, 20, pacing up and down to keep warm as he charged his mobile phone at an outside stall.

About 5,000 workers have been mending frozen power lines leading to Chenzhou, with some soldiers firing submachine guns to shatter ice cloaking the cables, according to Xinhua.

Premier Wen Jiabao arrived in Chenzhou by train on Saturday to oversee relief efforts. Officials said earlier they hoped to partially restore electricity to the city by the end of the day.

"These are small problems for us Chinese people. We're not afraid of difficulties here," said a woman working in a convenience store, half-burned candles on the counter.

"Things are all pretty normal," said the woman, who gave only her family name, Liu.

But a taxi driver struck a different note. "Ninety percent of people are complaining and nobody thinks the government has handled this well at all," the man, who would not give his name, said.

Huge winter storm could cost China as much as 5 billion

2008-01-31T12:26:00.000-06:00

China's worst winter in more than half a century showed no signs of abating Wednesday as forecasters warned of three more days of snow and sleet. The weather has paralyzed transportation, frozen the power grid and delivered a $4.5 billion hit to the economy, according to figures released Wednesday by the Civil Affairs Ministry. The situation is compounding economic problems for China. Destroyed crops have resulted in increased food prices, while the inability to transport goods has further inflated prices and led to shortages at stores.

China's railways and roads are the lifeblood for its manufacturing sector, one of the fastest growing in the world.

"Being a manufacturer, we are so worried," said marketing manager Calvina Chan, who works for a Hong Kong-based firm that relies on a factory in mainland China to produce luggage for brands such as Samsonite. Because of the snowstorm, the transportation isn't very good and so there might be a late delivery."

Automakers Toyota and Ford halted their China-based production this week. The transportation stoppage has had a domino effect, preventing the delivery of coal, which is vital to China's power plants. That is amplifying China's energy problems.

"Most of the coal is produced in the north and northeast, (while) the users are along the coast," said economist Nicholas Kwan. "This time the snowstorm's problem is not so much freezing the production but freezing the transportation line which makes transportation of coal to those power plants more difficult."

Kwan said some of the power plants have already depleted their coal reserves. All this comes during the Lunar New Year holiday, the country's busiest shopping season. In Guangzhou, hundreds of factory workers who had saved money all year to visit their families during China's Lunar New Year filled the city's train station, waiting for trains that were not expected to arrive for days.

Up to half a million people have camped out in the southern city for nearly a week, hoping to get home for the holiday. Factories in the province of Guangzhou shut down Wednesday ahead of the February 7 holiday with workers joining the masses around the train station -- hoping the government would deliver on its promise of quick action and immediate relief for those trying to make it home.

"I have been sleeping out here for six days. I have spent all my money. I don't know how I will get home," one man said.

Another man told CNN's Hugh Riminton he had tried to get out of Guangzhou every way possible -- by airplane, bus and his own car -- but could not make it because of the weather conditions.

"Now he's in the queue with everyone else trying to get on a train," Riminton said. "And the trains simply aren't going at the moment and it's unlikely they'll be going really in sufficient numbers for days to come"

Security is tight at the railway station as people occasionally stampeded the barricade in an attempt to get closer to the train platforms, to no avail. Armed riot police entered the station on Wednesday to regain control of the situation.

So far, Chinese authorities have managed to persuade nearly 470,000 people to abandon their travel plans and accept a refund for their train tickets. Prime Minister Wen Jiabao apologized Tuesday to the hundreds of thousands of people stranded in train stations across his country -- a rare move by a Chinese politician.

"First we'll fix the electric grid. After that, the trains will run again. ... Then all of you can go home for the Chinese New Year," the premier said.

China dealing with worst winter in over 50 years

2008-01-30T10:01:00.000-06:00

China's worst winter in more than half a century showed no signs of abating Wednesday as forecasters told citizens to brace for three more days of snow and sleet. "The heavy snow and sleet has paralyzed transport and coal shipments, and led to travelers cramming railways stations and airports and power supply reductions in almost half of the 31 provinces and regions on the Chinese mainland," China's Xinhua news agency reported.

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Wen Jiabao apologized to the hundreds of thousands of people stranded in train stations across his country -- a rare move by a Chinese politician.

"I apologize to you all," said Wen, using a bullhorn to address stranded travelers at a train station in Hunan province. "We are currently trying our best to repair the system. First we'll fix the electric grid. After that, the trains will run again. ... Then all of you can go home for the Chinese New Year," the premier said, bringing applause from the crowd.

Chinese media replayed the apology several times. The unusual gesture is likely to go a long way in pacifying the anger and frustrations of the thousands stranded across the country, CNN's Jaime Florcruz said.

Chinese President Hu Jintao called an emergency meeting of the policy-making politburo and promised quick action and immediate relief for those trying to make it home.

The moves are intended to show that the government is in control and taking responsibility for the situation, Florcruz said. The weather could not have come at a worse time: Millions of Chinese workers were trying to leave the cities where they work to travel home to their families for the Lunar New Year holiday, the Xinhua news agency reported, putting intense pressure on the country's transportation network. The holiday, also known as the Spring Festival, falls on February 7.

More than 177 million Chinese are expected to travel by train, and 22 million more by plane, for the holiday. The transit meltdown saw Brian Blackwell of Chicago stranded for two days at Shanghai's Hongqiao International Airport, where tempers were short and several fist fights nearly broke out.

"There were thousands of people there and they were pushing toward the counter," Blackwell told CNN in a phone interview. "You had no idea what the status of your flight was."

On Wednesday, Blackwell drove to Shanghai's Pudong International Airport to catch a United Airlines flight to Chicago. He said the mood was much calmer at Pudong, which handles more international flights. Brutal winter weather has pounded China's central, eastern and southern sections. In its 10-day forecast, the China Meteorological Administration said Wednesday that southwestern, eastern and southern China can expect more snow and sleet with freezing temperatures, while northern China will stay clear but windy.

More than 300,000 passengers who wanted to board trains at the Guangzhou station were stranded in the city as heavy snowfall knocked out power and greatly slowed rail operations in Hunan province, along a line serving Beijing and Guangzhou, Chinese media reported. Armed riot police were deployed to keep order.

Wild Weather pummels China

2008-01-28T22:55:00.000-06:00

Chaotic winter weather besieged China's business and farming heartland on Tuesday amid the country's worst power crisis, with one mountain-road accident blamed on snow killing 25 people ahead of a major holiday. Icy temperatures, snow and sleet blanketing much of central, eastern and southern China have crippled thousands of trucks and trains loaded with coal, food and passengers in the most severe winter weather seen there in 50 years.

A bus plunged more than 40 meters (130 ft) from a snowy mountain road in the southwest province of Guizhou, Xinhua news agency said, the first known major accident caused by the freak weather. Elsewhere, about 24 people have died in recent weather-caused accidents, including three workers killed while trying to fix iced-up power lines. Premier Wen Jiabao visited stricken Hunan province in the south, Xinhua said. Wen first flew to neighboring Hubei province, because Hunan's main airport was iced-in.

The snow and biting cold across regions that usually have fairly temperate, snow-free winters were likely to stretch beyond Tuesday, the national forecaster said on its Web site (www.nmc.gov.cn). Beijing remained cold but clear. China warned residents of Shanghai and neighboring Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces -- the country's commercial engine room -- to stay indoors if possible. In Shanghai, some food shelves in shops emptied as people stocked up.

Analysts said the brutal weather was a short-term blow to the economy and would stoke inflation -- it hit an 11-year high of 4.8 percent last year -- that already has the government worried.

"The short-term impact on the economy is big, with transport being disrupted, prices of agricultural products, in particular vegetables, rising," said Jin Dehuan of the Shanghai Securities and Futures Institute with stock prices appearing to stabilize after huge losses on Monday.

ENERGY FEARS

Jin said the weather chaos could jolt inflation higher in January but the broader impact would be limited. Blocked roads and railways have also choked coal shipments, magnifying energy shortages that have brought electricity brownouts to 17 of China's 31 provinces and province-status cities.

The country's worst power crisis has forced major industrial users like metal smelters to shut down and Beijing is urging small coal mines closed in a safety drive to restart production if they have been "rectified." Fuel stockpiles at many plants have plunged to levels that cover just a few days of generation, but analysts say the power problem is caused as much by policy as weather.

Coal prices are rising but Beijing keeps a tight cap on power tariffs to fight inflation, so some plants unable to turn a profit have seized on the weather as an excuse to cut production and limit their losses. Adding to energy woes, blocked roads and railways have disrupted fuel shipments so diesel is running out in some areas.

NOODLE RATIONS

Paralyzed roads and railways also threaten to make this year's Lunar New Year celebrations a miserable one away from families hometowns. On the main highway between Guangdong, the manufacturing powerhouse of the south, and neighboring Hunan province, more than 20,000 trucks and other vehicles were stranded, Xinhua said. Among them was a man taking 10 children by bus to Guangdong to visit their migrant-worker parents.

"Today is our fifth day on the bus," Tan Wenming told Xinhua. "Every day, we each get two packs of instant noodles to eat."

Railway stations and airports remained choked with stranded passengers trying to return to families to celebrate the Lunar New Year, or Spring Festival, which starts on February 7. In the south, more than 150,000 people crammed around the main station in Guangzhou, hoping for word of restored services -- which seems unlikely soon, reported the Guangzhou Daily. At the main Shanghai railway station, over 70,000people were stranded by Monday night, local radio reported.

Up to 19 airports are completely shut and flights from many others are badly delayed. The government has mobilized troops and officials to help citizens by sending food, clearing ice and speeding supplies of coal to starved power plants. But newspapers said the disaster has also exposed bureaucratic confusion and obfuscation. The Beijing News complained that some railway officials refused to share information about severed services.

China preparing effort to dominate Olympics

2008-01-25T13:30:00.000-06:00

China has the Great Wall, Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square and many other wonders. But come August, Beijing Olympics organisers are planning to at least equal them in one of the greatest sporting events the world has seen. On the evidence of a flying visit before Christmas, the thousands of athletes and visitors who will crowd into an already bulging Beijing for the Games will not be disappointed.

Opening day, August 8 is an auspicious date according to Chinese astrology and likely to bring luck. But organisers are leaving very little to chance in their first crack at the world's biggest and most prestigious sporting event.

This year is the year of the rat, considered in Chinese folklore to be a harbinger and protector of prosperity. Everywhere in Beijing, which has been virtually a building site since the city got the hosting rights for the Games, that prosperity is there for the world to see. The bamboo curtain has been yanked back to reveal a city undergoing a revolution but still steadfastly clinging to its culture steeped in its many dynasties. Most of the cranes are gone now, replaced by modern skyscrapers in projects so large they caused a five-year world-wide steel shortage as much of the rebuilding of the city, its infrastructure and games stadiums took shape.

And while the city planners, engineers and hundreds of thousands of workers have been toiling with picks and shovels in extreme summer heat and sub-zero conditions in winter to meet completion targets or even better them, the Chinese sports machine has been quietly gearing up behind the scenes. Many tip China to top the medal count. It would not surprise if they do. You get the feeling the country's leaders expect it, nay demand it.

Already we've seen Chinese rowers at the forefront last year in a sport they traditionally have not excelled in. Expect more of the same in Beijing, not just from rowing but across all sports. At the Athens Olympics four years ago, superpower the United States won 103 medals, 35 of them gold. China pushed them all the way to finish just three medals behind in the gold tally. Their total of 63 may have been way behind Russia's 91 but the Russians could manage only 27 golds.

Just as the Chinese economy has been growing exponentially, so are its medal ambitions for Beijing. And long-term, such is the commitment for sporting excellence that success in Beijing is likely to set the stage for dominance in London in 2012. This drive began in the schools with huge programmes supported by the Government involving 400 million children throughout China. The centrepiece of this audacious bid for world glory will be the National Stadium, or the Bird's Nest as it is commonly known.

Sited in the Olympic Green, the 91,000 seat stadium, which will be the venue for the opening and closing ceremonies, track and field and the soccer final, is a writhing mass of steel interwoven in the shape of a bird's nest - a delicacy in Chinese cuisine. Organisers expect the unusual stadium to become an iconic feature of the games. After the Olympics, the seating will be scaled back to around 80,000 and it will be used for sporting and cultural events.

The other unusual stadium in the Olympic Park is the US$100 million ($130 million) national aquatics centre. Shaped like a cube, it takes on the appearance of being filled with water and was paid for by donations from Chinese living abroad. Other facilities in the Olympic Green include the national indoor stadium, the venue for gymnastics, trampolining and hand ball and the biggest indoor stadium in China, the hockey field, archery field, tennis centre and Olympic village, all within walking distance of each other.

After the games, like most of the facilities, the courts will be turned over for public use. Some stadiums have been sited at universities so their on-going use will be guaranteed. The new table tennis facility at Peking University, which will seat up to 8000 people, is a good example.

Is the China stock market boom over?

2008-01-22T12:56:00.000-06:00

A dramatic sell-off that has sent share prices here plummeting more than 10 percent over the past two days is raising fears that China’s spectacular stock market boom may be coming to an end. Many analysts worry that the sharp downturn so far this week could unleash an even greater wave of selling in the weeks to come, and possibly create social instability ahead of the Olympic Games, which are scheduled to take place in Beijing this summer.

This country’s young stock market, which only came into being in 1990, has been prone to frenzied and hysterical buying and selling. Big price swings are closely watched, not just by economists but by political analysts as well. And the latest evidence is not good. Investors sold furiously on Tuesday, compounding losses from a huge sell-off in Asia and Europe on Monday, while markets were closed in the United States for the Martin Luther King Day holiday.

The Shanghai composite index dropped 7.2 percent Tuesday to close at 4,559.75; the Shenzhen composite fell 7.7 percent; and the Hang Seng index, the bellwether of the much longer-established stock market in Hong Kong, plunged 8.7 percent to close at 21,757.63, down by nearly one-third from its high of about 31,600.

The sell-offs, which are believed to be tied to global fears about a recession in the United States, came after two years of spectacular stock gains for Chinese investors. The major indexes all reached record highs in recent months.

“This is significant,” Jing Ulrich, an analyst at JPMorgan, said after Tuesday’s selloff. “Looking back, it must have been 10 years since I saw this kind of thing happen, during the Asian financial crisis.”

Mr. Ulrich and other analysts are not yet saying this is the end of the bull market in China, but they certainly sound gloomy about the prospect of stock gains in a weakening global economy which could dampen growth prospects in China.

Indeed, some analysts are already hinting that the Chinese government may be forced to step in and restore confidence in a market that is susceptible to wild mood swings. But officials in Beijing issued no major statements on Tuesday about the plunge in stock prices. Officials repeatedly warned investors last year that prices could fall sharply. A huge sell-off in the 1990s led to a nearly decade-long bear market, one that persisted even after 2002, when China’s economy turned red hot and new investment poured into the country.

Many angry investors even picketed government offices, saying they were cheated out of their retirement or life savings. That situation only began to change in 2006, after a series of partial privatizations and other government measures helped reignite the stock market, fueling another mad rush to buy stocks, particularly hot initial public stock offerings, or IPO’s. Before long, retirees were camping out at brokerage houses, college students were quitting school to play the market and maids were calling themselves day traders.

Insider trading and stock scams multiplied, and many analysts began referring to the Chinese equity markets as the nation’s biggest gambling den. The euphoria could be seen in popular mobile-phone messages that friends sent to one another, encouraging them to dive in and buy stocks. A line from China’s national anthem, “Arise ye who refuse to be slaves,” was soon replaced in phone messages with, “Arise! Ye who haven’t opened an account! Pour your gold and silver into the hot market!” Now, the investing herds are selling.

Of course, whether a huge stock downturn will lead to social instability is unclear. But economists and analysts in China frequently discuss the possibility. They also say many investors are operating on the belief that the government will not allow a stock market crash before the Olympic games get underway this summer, out of fear that a social crisis would spoil the country’s highly anticipated coming-out party. And so, analysts say, everyone is trying to time exactly when to get out with their huge winnings intact.

“One big risk in the future is the rumors that say that before the Olympics, in June and July, some big investors will probably run away, pulling all their money out,” said Zhao Xinge, an associate professor of finance at the China Europe International Business School in Shanghai. “This fear lurks around, badly influencing the psychology of investors.”

The worries are exacerbated by the widespread feeling among investors and analysts that Chinese stock prices have risen too sharply, making a mockery of stock-price valuations seen in other countries.

“At these kinds of levels, it doesn’t take much to unhinge things,” said Stephen Green, an Shanghai based economist at Standard Chartered Bank, referring to the recent sell-off.

China’s economy, experts say, is not the problem; it may slow this year, but growth prospects remain robust. There are signs of trouble, such as rising food and energy prices and a credit tightening that could crimp growth in some sectors, like real estate. But few analysts are alarmed. They say the Chinese economy, and perhaps the stock market, can withstand the challenges.

“I think this is just short-term turbulence,” said Qian Qimin, an analyst at Shenyin & Wanguo Securities in Shanghai. “The macroeconomy for China goes well, so the stock market won’t be so bad in 2008.”

The biggest challenge, though, may be investor sentiment. After two years of phenomenal stock gains and new riches, many investors may worry that the party is ending, and sell their stocks. China does not yet have a culture of long-term investment; its markets are driven mainly by speculators. Many of the investors are people like Zhang Liying, a 55-year-old retired hotel worker who put her life savings into the stock market. And now she is bitter.

“The stock market is terrible these days,” Zhang said seated before a terminal at a Shanghai brokerage house on Tuesday afternoon, looking at a screen of losing stocks. “I’m quite worried — not just worried, but angry. I think most other small investors are angry too, because we are always the losers. The big investors and the government are smart enough to know when to pull out and when to invest more. This is a totally unfair game for us.”

US Women defeat China to win Four Nations

2008-01-20T12:21:00.000-06:00

Shannon Boxx scored on a looping header in the 77th minute Sunday and the United States beat China 1-0 to win the Four Nations Tournament. The Chinese held off the Americans with a conservative, low-pressure game, as their players sagged back in their own half of the field most of the time. But the Americans -- undefeated in the three-game tournament -- kept attacking and eventually Boxx headed the ball over the goalkeeper from 11 yards out.

Hope Solo, briefly dismissed from the U.S. team for criticizing the former coach's decision to drop her during the World Cup, started in goal for the second time in the tournament and had one save.

"At the end of the day, it was speed," said new U.S. coach Pia Sundhage. "You get tired after a while and the header Boxx put in the goal, that was just excellent -- a good finish for us in this tournament."

Sundhage, hired two months ago, was pleased with the overall performance of her team, which had 12 players from last year's squad that finished third in the World Cup.

"The Chinese team forced us to change the system in the first half to the second half," said Sundhage, an assistant coach for China last year. "The defending of the Chinese team challenged us a little bit, which was good because this is what it's all about. The next game, we'll make sure we can attack in different ways."

China coach Elisabeth Loisel was impressed with the Americans' speed and strength, but thought her players could improve.

"I'm very happy with our team's defense," said Loisel, China's seventh head coach in four years. "I believe through different training and competition, we'll get good results."

Canada finished third after a long-range goal by Jodi-Ann Robinson in the fourth minute of stoppage time for a 1-1 draw with Finland. The Finns scored in the first half.

Get your shots before heading to the 2008 China Olympics

2008-01-18T12:31:00.000-06:00

If you plan on attending the 2008 Summer Olympic games in China this summer, you might want to start getting your vaccinations.

"There are a lot of diseases that pose a potential risk in this part of the world," said Debra Amos, a travel nurse with The Methodist Hospital Wellness Services in Houston. "There are no required immunizations to enter China, but there are many that are recommended."

The Twinrix vaccination, which covers Hepatitis A and B, is a series of three shots. If you get one today, the second one would be administered in a month, and third in six months. Hepatitis A, a liver disease that can last anywhere from six to nine months, is the only vaccination recommended for all travelers. Good hand hygiene is a good way to avoid spreading this disease, but vaccination is the best defense. Other recommended vaccinations include:

Typhoid For people with adventurous dietary habits, and for those who plan to travel outside of tourist areas of China. Hepatitis B Mainly for people with high potential for seeking medical care while in the country. Japanese and tick-borne encephalitis Mainly for people who will be hiking, camping or doing similar outdoor activities. Rabies for people with young children who plan to stay for an extended period of time.

It's also important to be up-to-date on routine vaccinations such as tetanus/diphtheria, measles, pneumococcal, polio, and varicella.

"People spend a lot of money to have a good time when they go to they Olympic games," Amos said. "Taking a few minutes to make sure you have the proper vaccinations will give a better chance of avoiding any dangerous medical problems when you're far from home."

The 2008 Summer Olympics take place in China from Aug. 8 through Aug. 24.

China History - The Five Dynasties

2008-01-16T22:21:00.000-06:00

The time from 907-960 A.D. is called The Five Dynasties . However, numerous small kingdoms also existed. The Five Dynasties are the officially recognized dynasties of the north, while the south had ten kingdoms. The north was continually ravaged by warfare during this time as they were attacked time and again by the Khitans and the Turks. Conversely, the south enjoyed a time of peace, economic prosperity, and cultural growth. The leaders of the southern kingdoms were often the military governors of the T'ang dynasty.

Despite the political division of China, four important advances occurred. In the south, trade became increasingly important, especially the tea trade. Efforts at state monopolization occurred in an attempt to control the revenue of the tea trade. Salt monopolies were developed and the salt tax was the top budget item during this period. The second development was translucent porcelain. This also happened in the south and was used both within China and as an export item. The next important development was in the field of printing. In about 940 A.D., the first printing of the Classics occurred. Attempts at movable type began in about 1045 A.D. Printing had far reaching effects on the Chinese people. As would occur later in Europe, printing allowed more people to become educated as books became more readily available. The availability of books also allowed for private libraries. Finally, in northern China, paper money was introduced. This introduction was due in part to the fact that metal is scarce in China. Also, the existing copper money was very heavy and difficult to transport. The beginnings of paper money were deposit certificates that merchants used in provinces that prohibited the export of copper coins. Eventually, the government would accept copper and then issue certificates, thus creating a banking system. This money system greatly increased trade.

The practice of binding women's feet also began during this time. The first evidence of this practice shows up in about 950 A.D. Scholars are not sure why this practice began, however, it was widely practiced among both the rich and poor of China. Only a few groups did not participate in this custom. They were the boat women of Kuang-tung and the aboriginal people of the southwest. None of the non-Chinese groups surrounding China participated in this custom.

Buddhism experienced a sharp decline during this period. In northern China, Buddhism was heavily persecuted beginning in 955 A.D. This persecution seemed to be aimed at stopping men from becoming monks to avoid joining the armies. Many regulations were put in place. 30,336 temples and monasteries were secularized, and many monks were forced to leave the monasteries and take up secular lives. The construction of temples and monasteries was limited, as private people could no longer build them and each district was limited to a certain number of temples. Monks were also required to carry six identification cards.

China banning paper bag use

2008-01-10T15:46:00.000-06:00

Love it! Here's to hoping cities in the US pick up the trend.

China is banning free plastic bags common at shops and supermarkets and ordering customers to be charged for any they use, the government said Wednesday. The rules, which take effect June 1, come as the country tries to tackle a significant source of litter, a statement on the government's Web site said.

The bags also are banned from all public transportation, including buses, trains and planes and from airports and scenic locations, the government said. Companies caught breaking the new rules face fines and possible forfeiture of goods, the government said. Shops have been instructed to mark the price of the plastic bags clearly and not fold them into the cost of other items.

Environmental organizations, including Greenpeace, praised China's move, and Christopher Flavin, president of Worldwatch Institute, an independent research organization in Washington, said "China is ahead of the U.S. with this policy," AP reported. The Chinese use up to 3 billion plastic shopping bags a day.

Often, the flimsy bags are used once and discarded, adding to waste in a country grappling with air and water pollution as a result of rapid economic transformation, officials said.

"Our country consumes a large amount of plastic bags. While convenient for consumers, the bags also lead to a severe waste of resources and environmental pollution because of their excessive use and low rate of recycling," the statement at the Web site Gov.cn said. "The ultra-thin bags are the main source of 'white' pollution as they can easily get broken and end up as litter."

The government statement added, "We should encourage people to return to carrying cloth bags, using baskets for their vegetables." More durable plastic bags still will be allowed for sale by markets and shops, The Associated Press reported.

When the ban goes into effect, China will join countries such as Uganda and South Africa, the statement said. Bangladesh banned plastic bags four years ago when officials realized they blocked drains and led to flooding. Since then, customers have taken to using bags made of jute or cloth for shopping. Last year, San Francisco, California, became the first U.S. city to outlaw plastic checkout bags at supermarket.

How will a US Recession Impact China?

2008-01-08T22:37:00.000-06:00

A US recession will dampen China's surging exports but the impact on the world's most populous nation, which is taking steps to cool down a red-hot economy, may be limited, experts say. But they also cautioned that Beijing must be prepared to face protectionist trade policies from Washington as a result of a recession, with the sub-prime mortgage crisis and the credit rout showing little sign of easing.

Many experts believe there is a greater than a 50 percent likelihood of the United States, a huge absorber of Chinese exports, plunging into at least a short, shallow recession over the next 18 months or so. Fred Hu, managing director of Goldman Sachs (Asia), said a modest US downturn could not take a heavy toll on China, which was stepping up efforts to cool inflation to prevent the world's fastest growing major economy from overheating.

"If the US economy really does enter into recession, there could be an impact on China in a direct way, but the timing however is not all that bad," he said on the sidelines of a Washington conference on China's economic growth and its implications for the world. If there is a mild recession, not a protracted, deep recession, that may provide some welcome cooling agent to the Chinese economy, whose rapid growth is largely export-driven," he said.

Daniel Rosen, a China expert at the Washington-based Peterson Institute for International Economics, said a US recession could take a toll on industries in China most dependent on US exports, especially those producing goods for the American household sector. But he hastened to add that China's ongoing moves to boost domestic consumption in a bid to be less reliant on exports could be a critical cushion.

"At the same time though, as China shifts more to domestic consumption itself, then it relies less on US consumers and more on the Chinese consumer. So I don't expect there to be a heavy hit on China from a moderate recession," he said.

The World Bank said Tuesday that US economic growth likely slowed to 2.2 percent in 2007. The bank forecast a 1.9 percent expansion in 2008, then a rise to 2.3 percent in 2009.

"External demand for the products of developing countries could weaken much more sharply and commodity prices could decline if the faltering US housing market or further financial turmoil were to push the United States into a recession," a bank report warned. US economic data through the third quarter of 2007 remained robust, but more recent reports suggest softer conditions.

With the housing sector slowing sharply, oil prices hovering near 100 dollars a barrel and the US dollar slumping, Beijing appears to be bracing also for financial market turbulence.

"China's financial system is thus gradually improving its knowledge to deal with instability or turbulence of varying degrees," said Chinese central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan in a report circulated at the conference. While it's difficult to avoid mistakes completely, the key is to learn the right lessons, make improvements, and achieve substantial progress," he said.

As campaigning for the November US presidential elections heats up amid the weakening economy, Wing Thye Woo, a China expert with Washington-based Brookings Institution, warned about the prospect of protectionism that could take a heavier toll on the Chinese economy.

"With recession, China's direct exports to the US will fall but the protectionism will lead to further decrease in exports and I think then the outcome in China will be slowdown in economic growth," he said.

But he still believed the Chinese could offset any deflationary effects by increasing domestic infrastructure investments to help lay the groundwork for greater economic expansion in the future.

Healthcare struggling to keep pace in China

2008-01-07T12:36:00.000-06:00

China's health care system is struggling to keep pace with the country's economic growth and faces a major challenge in looking after its 1.3 billion people, the health minister said on Monday. China embarked on massive economic reforms three decades ago and has since abandoned a cradle-to-grave welfare system, causing hardships for millions left behind by rapid development.

Health Minister Chen Zhu, speaking at a forum in Beijing, said: "There is still a significant gap between the Party and State Council's requirements and people's new expectations."

Many hospitals have resorted to charging premiums for medical care and prescriptions and deregulation of the health industry has brought a rash of scandals involving overcharging, bogus drugs and malpractice. The costs of seeing a doctor or staying in hospital are out of reach for many in the world's fourth-largest economy and this lack of access combined with corruption has made the issue a source of social unrest. But Chen said the Olympic Games, which Beijing hosts in August, would spur the expansion of public health.

"The 2008 Beijing Olympic Games provides a great opportunity for the country's public health development," he said. "Beijing will join hands with co-host cities and its neighboring provinces to strengthen disease-related information monitoring and make risk evaluations on the possible public health accidents."

Rehearsals would be staged to prepare officials for such accidents, the report said. China has been pouring money into the health sector in an effort to save the failing system. Chen, in comments carried on the government Web site, noted health expenditure last year increased to 63.1 billion yuan ($8.7 billion), up 277 percent from 2006.

The Xinhua news agency said the average life expectancy in China rose to 73 years in 2005 from 71.4 in 2000. It also cited a Health Ministry report saying the infant mortality rate fell to 15.3 per 1,000 babies in 2007 from 25.5 per 1,000 in 2003. But Chen added many infectious and chronic diseases were still a threat.

"Public medical and health agencies' operating mechanisms are not adapted to the needs of the public, the improvement of health personnel's ability is still weak and the development of the health insurance system is lagging," Chen said.

Chen said last week that market forces must not come to dominate China's health service, as they lead only to inequality and cause the vast and poor countryside to be ignored. Instead, the government must spend more money on health and take the lead in guiding reform, Chen and ministry Communist Party boss Gao Qiang wrote in the ideological journal "Qiu Shi," which means "Seeking Truth."

Jim Rogers on Investing in China

2008-01-03T23:26:00.000-06:00

You invested in China some time ago. But the market is up 300% over the past three years - why should other investors jump in now?

In the book I specifically make the point two or three times that people need to be careful because there may be a bubble developing in China. Obviously if a bubble develops you don't want to buy anything. But you need to understand that there are gigantic opportunities in China and gigantic changes taking place there. So the book is designed to help people understand in simple language what's happening and where there may be opportunities for one who does his homework. It's not a catalog of hot tips. I'm not yet convinced that there is a bubble, by the way. The Chinese government is doing its best to prevent a bubble. They've raised interest rates five or six times in the past year. But even if a bubble develops and it pops, it's not the end of the Chinese story. China is still going to continue to develop.

Why has the Chinese stock market taken off?

The Chinese have done a very good job [with the economy] over the past 20 years. But the one mistake they've made is they have continued to block the currency and made it nonconvertible. That's causing huge liquidity to develop in the country, and that's causing trouble. It has really intensified in the past two or three years. They've got all this money sloshing around that's been flowing into China and can't get out. It's going into the mainland stock market and driving up prices. It's going into commodities. And it's going into real estate.

How are you investing in China now? Are you buying shares of companies? Indexes? Real estate?

I own the currency. I own commodities. I do not own real estate. I have not bought any indexes. Rightly or wrongly, I think I can pick shares better than the index. All the studies show that most people can't do that. I haven't bought any new shares lately, but if I did, I would buy them in Hong Kong or Singapore or London or New York, because they're cheaper than on the mainland.

Why move to Singapore and not Shanghai or Beijing?

Well, we would like to move to China, but the air is so terrible, the pollution is so bad, that we can't bring ourselves to do it. Everything works in Singapore. It's an astonishing place. It's got the best education system in the world. It's got the best health care in the world. And it's Chinese-speaking. Our 4-year-old daughter, Happy, goes to a school where they only speak Chinese. One of our motivations was that she continue to speak Chinese. It may not be as exciting as Shanghai or New York, but it's exciting enough for me.

You mention the terrible pollution in China. Do environmental and political issues give you pause as you call this the Chinese century?

First of all, the environmental problems are a huge opportunity. Somebody's going to make a fortune on that. I talk about that in the book and mention some of the companies that will be trying to address the problems. Can they solve their problems? There are going to be horrible setbacks along the way. There certainly were in America as we grew and boomed. In 1907 our whole system collapsed and went bankrupt. Turns out that was a good time to buy. That's going to happen in China too. They will probably have political setbacks, environmental setbacks. I don't know when they're going to be, but take advantage of them.

Beijing Air Pollution off the charts

2007-12-28T09:13:00.000-06:00

Beijingers were warned to stay indoors on Thursday as pollution levels across the capital hit the top of the scale, despite repeated assurances by the government that air quality was improving. "This is as bad as it can get," a spokeswoman for the Beijing Environmental Protection Bureau told AFP.

"Level five is the worst level of air pollution. This is as bad as it has been all year."

According to the bureau's website, 15 out of the 16 pollution monitoring stations in urban Beijing registered a "five" for air quality rating. The main pollutant was suspended particulate matter, which is usually attributed to coal burning and automotive exhaust.

"Old people and young children should reduce outdoor activities and protect their health," the spokeswoman said.

The Beijing Evening News warned residents not to do their morning exercises on Friday as pollution levels were likely to linger over the capital until a cold front moved in and blew some of the bad air away later in the day. A lack of wind in the capital over recent days has led to a heavy cover of smog trapping in the pollutants, the paper said.

By nightfall, the pollution was still horrendously thick. In the run up to the 2008 Olympic Games, Beijing has vowed to clean up its air and this year set a goal of 245 "blue sky days," or days with only light pollution. As of Thursday, the city needed one more day to reach the annual goal, the bureau said. But official "blue sky days" are often hazy affairs with heavy pollution.

Beijing's air quality is routinely rated among the worst in the world by international agencies such as the United Nations and the World Bank, with rampant coal burning, regular dust storms and a growing number of cars cited as the main reasons.

The head of the government's information office, Cai Wu, told reporters on Thursday that Beijing's environment was improving and they should have "full confidence" that the Olympics would be pollution free.

Review: From Wall Street to the Great Wall

2007-12-23T23:09:00.000-06:00

China: one country, 1.3 billion people, seemingly infinite growth potential. In short: perfect conditions for those hoping to get rich. "China is consuming more, creating more, graduating more, and — with increasing economic clout — buying more," according to Burton Malkiel's new book, From Wall Street to the Great Wall .

Consider China's acquisitions since the millennium — Italian motorcycle manufacturer Benelli, German toolmaker Schiess, IBM's personal computer business and Britain's MG. No question, China is a major investment opportunity. But it's fraught with risk, misinformation and mystery.

Big investment houses and multinationals have been navigating China for decades, although slowly at first. Now, individual investors want to jump and reap rewards — such as the rumored "$1 billion paper profit" Goldman Sachs made in one day during the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China's initial public offering.

That is where Malkiel, and his new book, comes in. Malkiel is emeritus dean of the Yale School of Management, author of the famed A Random Walk Down Wall Street, and current Chemical Bank Professor of Economics at Princeton University.

And now, writing with Patricia Taylor, Jianping Mei and Rui Yang, Malkiel attempts to give a primer on China's economic extravaganza. The biggest risk? Not investing at all, they say.

Just how to invest is not easy to explain and comes late in the book. First, an introduction to historical and cultural China. It's a fascinating read about the influence of Confucian and Maoist ideology on contemporary Chinese economy. (The future of China is covered, as well.) Readers are in for a heavy slog next: a dense explanation of efficiency in stock markets in general, and Chinese markets in particular.

If you've read A Random Walk Down Wall Street, this will be familiar territory. If not, this part is intimidating. Even the authors say it can be "eye-closing prose" and suggest skipping it if you have "absolute faith in our judgment."

A very simplified version goes like this: Inefficient markets of a certain type (like some in China) are those where corruption and unethical dealings are rampant. In these markets, if you have what amounts to inside information (or can spot the trends of a stock's price being manipulated), you should be able to reliably beat the market with your stock picks. For this reason, the authors suggest investing in funds run by local Chinese managers who have access to this sort of information.

Which brings us to three strategies:
•Homegrown. Invest in funds with a China focus or Chinese stocks listed on U.S. stock exchanges.

•Offshore. Invest in businesses and industries that will indirectly benefit from a growing China.

•Go for broke. Invest directly in Chinese stocks listed on Chinese stock exchanges.

So much of the book talks about Chinese stock markets, and gives advice on how to look at Chinese stocks, but — reader beware — you won't find much about how to do this kind of investing.

"We called a number of major, widely respected brokerage firms," they write. "Some frankly admitted they had no idea how to purchase Hong Kong stocks. Others said they would only do so with a minimum order of $20,000. Still others said they would check with their international desk and try to get back to us within the week."

The other two strategies (offshore and homegrown) are more accessible for individual U.S. investors, and the authors provide dozens of stock and fund picks for the adventurous reader. Of course, as the authors note, the picks were made in February 2007, so while they might still be good, they might also be worthless now.

"One of the paradoxes of investment advice," they write, "is that when people act on a recommendation, they tend to diminish its value."

In an effort to combat this paradox, the authors do a good job explaining why they chose the picks they did, and how individual investors might evaluate their own picks. Also, the authors provide basic investing strategy where needed, such as how to assess one's capacity for risk.

From Wall Street to the Great Wall is interesting. But the problem is that, for most individual investors, direct investment in stocks is not much of a viable option yet.

China forecasts strong growth for 2008

2007-12-21T15:53:00.000-06:00

China's economic growth is expected to slow slightly next year to a still robust 10.9 percent, with inflation at 4.5 percent, the central bank's research bureau said in a forecast reported Friday by a government newspaper. The country's global trade surplus is expected to rise 20 percent next year to US$300 billion (euro209 billion), said the forecast, reported in the China Securities Journal.

China's economy is expected to expand by more than 11 percent this year, up from annual growth of 10.7 percent in 2006 — the highest since 1995. Consumer inflation has picked up and hit a decade-high monthly rate of 6.9 percent in November, far above the official 2007 target of 3 percent.

What is Club China?

2007-12-17T17:11:00.000-06:00

What is Club China?

KLM Club China is an exclusive network for people doing business with or in China. Becoming a member of KLM Club China gives you an instant network of useful contacts. A network with clever features allows you to select those contacts and find the ones you need to successfully do business in China. KLM Club China is a service for members of Flying Blue, the frequent flyer program of Air France and KLM, and BlueBiz.

Within the community experiences and tips can be exchanged. Do you have a story to share with other members? Have a question about Guanxi? Want to inform other members about a good and reliable business partner? Via contributing, reading and commenting on experiences and tips, members can help each other with their questions and opportunities.

Club China is a valuable social networking tool for those doing business in China or looking for information on all things China.

China evicting 13,000 a month for Olympics

2007-12-05T13:37:00.000-06:00

China continues to evict 13,000 people each month in preparation for the Beijing Olympics, despite worldwide attention and increased scrutiny, a housing rights group said today. The Center on Housing Rights and Evictions said a recent trip to the Chinese capital confirmed an estimate it made earlier this year that 1.5 million people would be displaced by the time the 2008 Games are held.

Beijing says the group is grossly inflating the number of people being relocated as a result of the Olympic preparations, and that residents are content with the compensation they have received.

"Despite courageous protests inside China, and condemnation by many international human rights organizations, the Beijing municipality and Beijing Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games have persisted with these evictions and displacements," said Jean du Plessis, the Geneva-based COHRE's deputy director.

The group – which claimed in June that 1.25 million had already been displaced – said it returned to Beijing in August and found that forced evictions were continuing unabated. In September, the Beijing municipality demolished several buildings in a run-down neighbourhood called the "petitioners' village" in Fengtai District, which provided housing for thousands from all over China who came to complain to the central government about land seizures, forced evictions and corruption, COHRE said.

"Evictions in Beijing often involve the complete demolition of poor peoples' houses," the group said. "The inhabitants are then forced to relocate far from their communities and workplaces, with higher transportation costs driving them further into poverty.

"In Beijing, and in China more generally, the process of demolition and eviction is characterized by arbitrariness and lack of due process. In many cases, tenants are given little or no notice of their eviction and do not receive the promised compensation."

The group said it was pleased the International Olympic Committee is taking housing rights more seriously, including guaranteed commitments that local people would not be displaced in its deal with Russia for the 2014 Winter Games, which will be hosted by the Black Sea resort of Sochi. In August, the director of Beijing's construction committee said only about 40,000 people were being relocated yearly, and about 2,000 were moved to build new venues for the games. Sui Zhenjiang also said residents were adequately compensated, adding that 16,000-17,000 "affordable" houses had been built in the city of 15 million.

"The 1.5 million figure is definitely wrong," Sui said of COHRE's estimation.

COHRE also criticized Myanmar and Slovakia on Thursday for ``pervasive housing rights violations" in 2007. It said Myanmar, also known as Burma, was responsible for the ``mass displacement of more than one million civilians from their lands and homes." Slovakia was cited because "municipalities deliberately neglect to improve – or indeed actively strive to worsen – the housing conditions of Roma," also known as Gypsies, said Claude Cahn, COHRE's advocacy chief.

China to act to limit Three Gorges Dam impact

2007-11-25T07:49:00.000-06:00

China will act to limit ecological damage from the Three Gorges Dam project amid growing alarm over the negative impact of the world's biggest hydroelectric facility, state media said Wednesday. The announcement comes after Chinese experts warned recently of an environmental "catastrophe" from the massive project and the news last month that an additional four million people would need to be relocated.

The government would strengthen protection of water sources and guarantee water supplies for the 1.4 million people relocated by the project so far, Xinhua news agency reported, citing a statement from the Three Gorges Project Committee. It would also launch plans for the sustainable use of the dam on the Yangtze River and improve the environment of the submerged areas, Xinhua said.

The state-run office also pledged to take measures to prevent dumping of pollutants in the Yangtze, improve bio-diversity, and set up environmental monitoring and response systems, the report said, without giving further details of the plans.

"We want to build a first-class hydropower facility... but we also aim for a good environment," Xinhua quoted the statement as saying.

The 22-billion-dollar project has long been touted by the government as a symbol of national strength and went ahead despite myriad warnings about its social and environmental impact.

Chinese experts warned in September the dam was a potential "catastrophe" and was creating environmental problems including landslides, soil erosion, deteriorating water quality, and threats to indigenous wildlife since beginning operations last year.

The head of the project committee, Wang Xiaofeng, said last week those problems were "less severe than predicted," a view echoed in the government statement issued Tuesday. "No major geological disasters or related casualties have happened in the reservoir area since water level was raised to 156 metres (515 feet) last year," it said.

However, experts have said landslides, caused by the growing water pressure on the steep Yangtze shoreline, had created large landslides which in turn triggered huge waves.

China - Olympics then Space

2007-11-20T23:06:00.000-06:00

China will launch its third manned space mission on the heels of next year's Beijing Summer Olympics, newspapers reported Tuesday. The Shenzhou 7 launch is on track for October 2008, about one month after the Olympic Games end, the China Daily newspaper said on its website, citing Pang Zhihao, a researcher with the China Academy of Space Technology. The trip is to carry three astronauts into space and will feature China's first ever spacewalk.

Also Tuesday, official media reported that China's first moon probe, called Chang'e 1 after a mythical Chinese moon goddess, had positioned its directional antenna toward Earth to allow data to be transmitted home later this month.

State broadcaster CCTV and the official Xinhua News Agency said the probe had orbited the moon 158 times by mid-Tuesday at a stable altitude of 200 kilometers (124 miles) above the lunar surface. Launched in late October, the probe is due to have surveyed the entire surface of the moon at least once by early next year. China has denied any link between the manned mission and its staging of the Olympics, although both events are a source of huge national pride.

In 2003, China became only the third country in the world after the United States and Russia to send a human into orbit, following that up with a two-man mission in 2005. Its moon probe was launched about one month after rival Japan blasted its own lunar orbiter into space.

China has announced longer term plans for a permanent presence in space and China Daily said in a separate report that the new generation Long March 5 rocket capable of launching 25 ton components for a space station into near earth orbit could be ready for use by 2013.

The rocket is being developed at a 4.5 billion yuan ($529 million;euro357.8 million) research and manufacturing center in Tianjin, just southeast of the capital Beijing, the paper said, citing Zhang Yanhe, deputy director of the Tianjin Office of Science Technology and Industry for Space.

China Law Blog - Check out the Award Winning blog

2007-11-16T12:26:00.000-06:00

Check out one of the best sources for information about business law in China at the China Law Blog . This award winning blog is considered one of the top blogs on China. Dan Harris and Steve Dickinson, the China lawyers behind the China Law Blog , have been writing the blog for over two years and provide a multitude of useful information regarding business law within China.

I found the China Law Blog to be informative and fascinating reading on an area of the world moving into the forefront as a world power. The three part series Foreign Investment in China focuses on recent changes to China's foreign investment laws and Beijing's trend to restrict foreign investment in Chinese real estate. It was particularly interesting.

So if you are interested in Chinese Law or need information from a top source in China Law hop over to the China Law Blog . I promise you will be impressed.

China Olympic construction unearthing artifacts

2007-11-13T10:52:00.000-06:00

China's multi-billion-dollar building boom ahead of the Beijing Olympics has unearthed hundreds of ancient relics -- some 2,000 years old -- leaving archaeologists to pick up pieces behind construction crews. The director of the State Administration and Cultural Heritage, Shan Jixiang, has urged local officials to conduct archaeological investigations of sites before construction, the China Daily reported on Tuesday. But in the rush to finish projects ahead of the August 2008 opening of the Games, the earth movers are driving on.

"Archaeologists in Beijing are following bulldozers," an archaeologist with the Beijing municipal cultural heritage administration, who requested anonymity, told the newspaper.

More than 1,500 gold, ceramic, jade and other artifacts have been recovered from Beijing's Olympic stadium sites, and more than 700 ancient tombs have been found on the sites during the past two years, the newspaper reported. The archaeologist said some of the relics dated back to the Han Dynasty (206 B.C.-220 A.D.). Breakneck economic development also has claimed many historic "hutong" alleyways and architectural icons in the capital. But Beijing's problem is not unique in the fast-growing country.

"China's cities have undergone huge changes, with many of their older quarters being reshaped, often to the detriment of their cultural heritage," Shan told the newspaper.

Shan said the government will spend more money to help preserve 100 of the country's famous historical sites, including the Great Wall and some sections of the Silk Street shopping area.

"The next few years will be a critical time for these sites because of the ongoing urbanization," he said.

China to become worlds leading energy user by 2010

2007-11-07T15:19:00.000-06:00

China is set to dislodge the United States as the world's top energy consumer soon after 2010, as scorching growth there and in India reshape the global energy order, the International Energy Agency said on Wednesday. The IEA, energy adviser to the world's industrialized nations, said that global energy demand was likely to rise more than 50 percent between now and 2030, with China and India accounting for 45 percent of this increase.

Its annual World Energy Outlook said strong demand from rapidly-industrializing China and India had forced it to raise its previous global energy demand projection for 2030 by 4 percent. That could increase to 6 percent if growth rates are higher than assumed. The two Asian neighbors, both with more than a billion people each, are easily the world's fastest growing major economies. China's GDP has grown at double-digit rates for some years, while India's growth is just shy of 10 percent.

"As they become richer, the citizens of China and India are using more energy to run their offices and factories, and buying more electrical appliances and cars," the IEA said, adding that energy use in both countries was set to more than double between 2005 and 2030.

The redrawn world energy map could create severe strains, the IEA said and its chief economist Fatih Birol put the responsibility on developed countries to find ways to ease oil demand growth or risk nasty surprises.

"We are experiencing high oil prices today and if actions are not taken in years to come, we can see a supply crunch which is not good news for anybody and it may end up with very high prices," Birol told Reuters in an interview.

Oil has surged to new record highs in recent weeks, and is poised to test the $100 a barrel mark.

Dining tips for when in China

2007-11-06T16:42:00.000-06:00

Here are some (un)common courtesies to consider when dining in China.

In contrast to western rules, slurping is considered an acceptable way to cool down hot soup. Also, since rice is difficult to eat with chopsticks, it's perfectly normal to lift the bowl from the table and scoop it into your mouth.

Before refilling your teacup, extend the courtesy of refilling the cups of fellow guests at the table, even if they are not empty.

Many Americans were told as children to clean their plates when eating. But in China, eating the last piece of food on the table is an insult-signifying that he or she did not serve enough food for the guests.

If placed incorrectly, chopsticks can be omens of bad luck. Standing them in your bowl after dinner replicates a sign of death-incense sticks standing in a bowl of ashes.

China has 20 of the 30 most polluted cities in the world

2007-11-05T00:52:00.000-06:00

China is home to 20 of the world's 30 most polluted cities, according to a World Bank report.

Health costs related to air pollution total $68 billion a year, nearly 4 percent of the country's economic output, the report said. And acid rain has contaminated a third of the country, Sheng Huaren, a senior Chinese parliamentary official, said last year. It is said to destroy some $4 billion worth of crops every year.

"What we are facing in China is enormous economic growth, and ... China is paying a price for it," said Henk Bekedam, the country representative for the World Health Organization. "Their growth is not sustainable from an environmental perspective. The good news is that they realize it. The bad news is they're dependent on coal as an energy source."

But the costs go far beyond China. The soot from power plants boosts global warming because coal emits almost twice as much carbon dioxide as natural gas. And researchers from Texas A&M University found that air pollution from China and India has increased in cloud cover and major Pacific Ocean storms by 20 percent to 50 percent over the past 20 years.

"We know dust from factories in China, India, Mexico and Africa does not simply disappear; the wind brings it here," said the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Bill Kovacs.

Kovacs said overseas dust is adding to the number of counties that do not qualify for federal transportation funds because they are out of compliance with ozone standards. More than 100 counties do not meet the limit of 84 parts per billion. China alone contributes 3 to 5 parts per billion, estimates Daniel J. Jacob, professor of atmospheric chemistry and environmental engineering at Harvard University. Mercury, a byproduct of some coal-mining, is another major concern. The potent toxin falls into waterways and shows up in fish. Asia's contribution to U.S. mercury levels has shot up over the past 20 years. Jacob estimated half of the mercury in the United States comes from overseas, especially China.

"It's a global problem and right now China is a source on the rise," he said. "If we want to bring down mercury levels in fish, then we have to go after emissions in East Asia."

A fifth of the mercury in the Willamette River came from China and other foreign sources, said Bruce K. Hope of the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. Pregnant or nursing women who eat the fish put their babies at risk of neurological damage.

"It's frustrating to realize that part of your problem is someone else's behavior and you can't really go to them and say, 'Can you do something different?'" Hope said.

China has closed some polluting factories and says it will retire 50 gigawatts of inefficient power plants, or 8 percent of the total power grid, by 2010, according to the Pew Center for Global Climate Change. The government has also mandated that solar, wind, hydroelectric and other forms of renewable energy provide 10 percent of the nation's power by 2010, and ordered key industries to reduce energy consumption by 20 percent. President Hu Jintao, in a speech to a key party congress last month, promised a cleanup. But China has fallen short of its national targets for using energy more efficiently, and coal remains a major energy source.

"Everyone knows coal is dirty, but there is no way that China can get rid of coal," the World Bank's Zhao Jianping said in Beijing. "It must rely on it for years to come, until humans can find a new magic solution."

Robert N. Schock, the director of studies for the World Energy Council, agreed that coal, cheap and abundant, will remain a crucial source of energy for many years and be crucial to improving living standards in developing countries.

"Twenty-five percent of the world's electric power is now generated by coal, and those plants are not likely to disappear overnight," Schock said.

In Shanxi province, authorities have pledged to close 900 coal mines and dozens of makeshift factories that process coal for the steel industry, according to the official Xinhua News Agency. The Asian Development Bank is providing more than $200 million in loans to improve air quality in the province, through programs to shift to cleaner-burning natural gas for household heating and a demonstration project to capture methane, a greenhouse gas released in coal mining.

Taiyuan, dubbed the world's most polluted city in the 1990s, is no longer thought to be the worst, thanks to various efforts including phasing out coal-burning boilers. But the level of pollutants in the air remains five to 10 times higher than levels in New York or London. Residents say they see blue skies fewer than 120 days a year.

Australians Paul and Helen Douglas, who work for Evergreen in Taiyuan, an American social service agency, said their 21-month-old daughter Rose has been found in tests to have elevated lead levels. She has developed a chronic cough, Paul Douglas said, and the family will likely return to Australia before their contract ends if their daughter's toxin levels rise further.

"People say we are irresponsible and that we are making decisions that are injuring our children," he said of coming under fire from relatives and church members for staying in Taiyuan.

Taiyuan residents, though, shrug wearily when the talk turns to pollution, fearful that speaking out could get them in trouble. But when pressed, the complaints tumble forth and expose a community held hostage by the soot. Residents seal their windows to keep out the dirty air. Parents are warned not to let their toddlers play outside, for fear of being covered in coal dust. Fruits and vegetables must be washed in detergent.

"I'm worried about my children," said a woman who lives in the shadow of a power plant and fertilizer factory. She would only give her surname, Zhang. "We worry about everything. If you get sick seriously, you will die."

Many complain of chronic sore throats, bronchitis, lung cancer and pulmonary fibrosis. One study, by researchers at Norway's Center for International Climate and Environmental Research, found Taiyuan's pollution increased death rates by 15 percent and chronic respiratory ailments by 40 to 50 percent.

"I feel terrible and I'm coughing all the time," said William Li, a retired engineer from Taiyuan. His father died of lung cancer and his son has tracheitis, an upper respiratory condition. "The coal, it produces electric power that we send to other provinces. But we are left with the pollution."

China raises gas prices to curb demand

2007-11-02T13:40:00.000-05:00

China raised gasoline and diesel prices by nearly 10 percent Thursday, reversing anti-inflation controls in hopes of cooling demand amid fuel shortages that have left trucks backed up at filling stations in the booming south. Consumers and some Chinese media accused suppliers of creating a phony crisis to get the government to raise prices at the pump. But fuel supplies have long been tight across China, a problem that oil companies blamed on a lack of investment in refineries because of government controls preventing them from passing along increases in world crude prices to consumers.

The companies say the surge in petroleum prices to new highs led some Chinese refiners to suspend production to avoid losses, resulting in a drop in deliveries that workers at filling stations said began early last week. Supplies are particularly short in southern China, which is home to many of China's manufacturing areas. Some filling stations imposed informal rationing, limiting the amount of fuel that individual drivers can buy. The National Development and Reform Commission, the country's main planning agency, said China's first fuel price hike in 18 months was ordered to narrow the gap between crude costs and pump prices.

It said prices would rise by 9.1 percent for gasoline and 9.9 percent for diesel, but added that prices at some retailers could increase nearly twice that much. "To ensure the supply of domestic oil products and the promotion of energy conservation, the state decided to properly increase the prices of oil products," the agency said. It said the rise also applied to aviation fuel. The announcement was a break with price controls imposed in September on gasoline and other basic goods in an effort to control China's worsening inflation, which hit an 11-year high in August of a 6.5 percent rise in prices over the preceding 12 months.

Higher fuel prices should add less than a tenth of a percentage point to the monthly inflation rate, the commission said. The recent inflation spike has been blamed on a shortage of pork and some other food items, with annual inflation for other goods only about 1 percent. Economists say inflation should cool in coming months as government efforts to increase food supplies take effect. Trucking companies said the diesel shortage has slowed deliveries in Shanghai and areas along China's southeast coast that export manufactured goods to the United States and other foreign markets. After Thursday's increase, drivers will pay the equivalent of up to $3.20 a gallon for gasoline and $2.69 for diesel. The government had resisted appeals by oil companies to boost retail prices, saying it wanted to avoid hurting China's poor, who are struggling with the sharp rise in food costs. The planning commission said it would try to shield the public from some of the increases.

"Prices of railway tickets, natural gas for civilian use and public transportation will not be raised, to reduce the impact of the price hikes on the public, and the government will provide subsidies for taxi drivers," it said. The agency added, however, that it also planned to raise natural gas prices at some point, but did not say by how much. China is the world's No. 2 user of oil after the United States, propelled by economic growth that is expected to top 10 percent this year for a fifth straight year.

China yuan surges

2007-10-29T16:24:00.000-05:00

The yuan rose the most in two years after China's central bank signaled it will allow the currency to appreciate faster to help narrow a record trade surplus and slow inflation.

The currency climbed 0.3 percent after the People's Bank of China set the highest daily reference rate since it ended a fixed link to the dollar in July 2005. Deputy Governor Liu Shiyu said on Oct. 26 that foreign exchange markets have ``a role to play in correcting'' trade imbalances, reacting to calls for more rapid gains by the Group of Seven nations.

``Strong credit growth, investment and inflationary pressures are still apparent,'' said Craig Chan, a currency strategist in Singapore at Lehman Brothers Asia Ltd. ``Authorities will use the exchange rate in its monetary tightening bias.''

The yuan rose to 7.4745 versus the dollar at the 5:30 p.m. close in Shanghai, the biggest gain since the peg ended in July 2005, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. It will strengthen to 7.4 by the end of the year, according to the median forecast of 28 economists.

The yuan, a unit of China's currency, the renminbi, fluctuates within a 0.5 percent range against the dollar from a level set daily by the central bank. The currency was little changed compared with the record reference rate today.

``They need to have the renminbi appreciate more quickly so it reflects economic fundamentals,'' said U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson at a conference in Mumbai today. He'll visit Beijing in December for the third round of the Strategic Economic Dialogue talks.

Weakening Dollar
The dollar is down 8 percent so far this year on a trade- weighted basis against six currencies including the euro and the yen. Over the same period, the U.S. currency is down 4.2 percent against China's yuan, while the euro is up 4.6 percent.

China's record $185.7 billion trade surplus in the first nine months has flooded banks with cash, and the economy grew at an 11.9 percent annual pace in the second quarter. The central bank has raised interest rates five times this year after inflation accelerated to a 10-year high.

Smog chokes Beijing amid Games delay fears

2007-10-28T18:15:00.000-05:00

Children and the elderly in Beijing were advised to stay indoors as thick smog choked the city on Friday, a day after the top Olympic official warned pollution could disrupt next year's Games. Beijing's top weather official, Sun Jisong, said old and young risked contracting respiratory diseases if they went outside.

"Wear a face mask if you have to go out today," the official Xinhua news agency quoted Sun as telling all Beijingers.

Xinhua blamed a heavy fog that had enveloped Beijing for trapping the pollution, and the smog caused havoc across the city on Friday. Major highways leading into the Chinese capital, one of the world's most polluted cities, were closed, with visibility reduced to 50 metres (yards) in some areas, state press reported. Thousands of passengers were also stranded at Beijing's Capital International Airport in the northeast as the thick grey haze shrouded the runways and forced flight delays, witnesses said.

The spike in Beijing's environmental problems came a day after International Olympic Committee (IOC) chief Jacques Rogge said that events at next year's Olympics could be delayed because of pollution. Rogge, addressing a major environmental forum here, said Beijing had worked hard to improve its pollution woes but could still fall short of ensuring clean air for athletes, especially those competing in endurance events.

"For this reason, we may have to reschedule some events so that the health of athletes is scrupulously protected," he said.

China launches lunar probe

2007-10-24T22:10:00.000-05:00

With a regional space race heating up in Asia, China launched its first lunar probe into space Wednesday as the Communist Party moved a step closer to fulfilling its ambitions of one day reaching the moon. The Chang'e-1 satellite, named after a mythical Chinese goddess who flew to the moon, lifted off at 6:05 p.m. Officials and tourists watched the launching at a site in Sichuan Province, while state television provided coverage to the rest of the nation. The probe is expected to remain in orbit for a year, providing lunar satellite images and other information as China prepares to launch a space vehicle to the moon by 2012 and then send an astronaut in 2020. Within an hour of blastoff the probe's solar panels had been activated, and space officials declared the launch a success.

"The launch was very successful, and everything is proceeding just as planned," Wu Ji, director of the Space Science and Applied Research Center, told Xinhua, China's state-run news service.

In recent years, China's space program has attracted international attention for its ambitions and fast-rising technological prowess. In 2003, China became only the third nation after the United States and the former Soviet Union to send a man into orbit — a feat it has since replicated. However, the United States and other nations reacted with alarm when China successfully blasted one of its own aging weather satellites out of orbit in a military test. China is not the only emerging space power in Asia. Last month, Japan stole a bit of China's thunder by launching its own lunar probe, and India plans its own lunar orbiter next year. Technological development is a motivator for all three countries, but so is nationalistic pride and regional rivalry.

"As lunar exploration embodies our overall national strength, it is very significant for raising our international prestige and our national unity," Ouyang Ziyang, a top scientist with China's space program, told People's Daily, the Communist Party's most authoritative newspaper.

China doesn't want political 2008 Olympics

2007-10-22T22:26:00.000-05:00

China is warning critics not to link the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games to political issues or boycotts, saying that any attempt to do so would be "inappropriate and unpopular". Rights groups have seized upon the Olympics as a chance to exert pressure on China for everything from the conflict in Darfur, Beijing's support of Burma's ruling military junta and the rights of migrant workers.

"We believe that any political issue that has nothing to do with the Olympics should not be linked to the Beijing Games," Liu Jingmin, executive vice president of the Beijing Organising Committee for the 2008 Olympic Games, told a news conference on the sidelines of a Communist Party Congress.

This week, Human Rights Watch urged China to use its UN Security Council membership to help end state repression in Burma after last month's crackdown on street protests. The New York-based rights group noted that the auspicious date, August 8, 2008, chosen as the opening day of the Beijing Olympics, marked the 20th anniversary of the 1988 pro-democracy protests in Burma, crushed by the military a month later.

"The Chinese government has been playing a constructive and responsible part in the Myanmar (Burma) issue and the constructive role has been recognised by all," said Liu, who is also a Beijing deputy mayor. "We believe that an attempt to use this issue as an excuse to boycott the Olympics will be both inappropriate and unpopular."

Liu also defended China's own human rights record, which has been called into question by forced evictions of people moved to make way for Olympic venues and a crackdown on dissidents who the government fears may negatively affect social stability.

"I believe that the preparations for the Olympics have tremendously boosted the development of human rights in China," he said.

In case anyone should try to organise protests at the Games or otherwise try to disrupt them, Liu warned that security forces would be on high alert.

"Security has always been the top priority during our preparations," he said. "We can absolutely ensure the 2008 Games will be a safe Olympics."

China's surplus of sons a geopolitical time bomb

2007-10-20T11:17:00.000-05:00

I found this article very interesting:

The Olympics are around the corner. Just as qualifying athletes are training hard for the big event, China seeks to put its best foot forward in response to critics at home and abroad. Among the criticisms is a quiet but serious challenge: the artificially high number of Chinese men compared with Chinese women. China should act expeditiously to correct the social and legal pressures that have converged to create this problem.

"Son preference" is a deep-seated, widespread problem in many cultures. In many parts of the world, having a son is integral to one's future financial and social wellbeing. Recent articles have tried to shed light on the problem in India – putting much blame on the ultrasound machines women use to determine the sex of their unborn children in order to decide whether they should abort a female fetus.

In China, however, the problem takes on a frightfully larger scope when "son preference" meets the notorious One Child policy. When the government only allows one child, it puts immense pressure on Chinese parents to determine the sex of their child in the womb, and terminate the pregnancy if it is a girl.

The unintended consequences of this government policy are staggering. The proportion of male births to female births (the "sex ratio") is not merely unusual, but alarming. Worldwide, there are already 100 million girls "missing" due to sex-selective abortion and female infanticide, according to the English medical journal The Lancet. Fifty million of these girls are thought to be from China. In many provinces, the sex ratio at birth is between 120 to 130 boys for every 100 girls; the natural number is about 104. What will happen in future decades when these boys grow up and look for wives?

Among other things, such a situation would exacerbate the growing problem of sexual trafficking, which will surely have its hardest effect on the most vulnerable in the developing world as China grows richer. Another serious threat is to regional stability and, by extension, international security. As Valerie Hudson and Andrea den Boer recently wrote in their prize-winning work on demography and security, "Bare Branches," surplus male populations in a region often result in violence – through banditry, rioting, or militarization. The 6 to 5 male-female ratio in China means there are a lot of men who will not be able to start families. If history is any guide, they will either find less savory things to occupy their time, or find women through equally unsavory means.

China should work to prevent sex-selective abortions and fix the gender balance, not only to avoid social and political instability, but also because women and men are equal. The fundamental right to life exists regardless of one's gender. The means to correct China's gender imbalance will hopefully prove as peaceable and wholesome as those being undertaken by Korea, whose government, religious, and cultural leaders have worked together for years to increase the value of girls in their culture and erase "son preference." While China is engaged in the early stages of similar efforts, it can bolster them through changes in policy. An excellent step would be to enact and enforce laws that ban sex-selective abortion by targeting prenatal ultrasound use. Likewise, certain perceived economic causes for China's tradition of son preference could be undercut by changes in China's social-welfare networks. Most effective in balancing the sex ratio and affirming the rights of Chinese girls would be to abandon the odious one-child norm.

A tale from antiquity illustrates the potential tragedy of gender imbalance. Ancient Rome began as a refuge for fugitives, full of young, high-spirited men but utterly lacking in women. So Romulus held an athletic festival and encouraged guests to bring their wives and daughters. At a set time, able-bodied Romans seized the assembled women in an event now known as the Rape of the Sabine Women. As China hosts the world, the world should make clear to the Chinese government how abhorrent its one-child policy is, as are its resultant sex-selective abortions. Let us take advantage of this opportunity and help the Chinese learn from the past to avoid demographic catastrophe and geopolitical instability in their future.

China's goal to put man on moon

2007-10-18T08:51:00.000-05:00

China launches its first lunar orbiter next week as it counts down to putting a man on the moon within 15 years, state media said on Wednesday. Advanced cameras and x-ray "spectrometers" have been installed on the orbiter, the Chang'e One, for mapping 3D images of the moon's surface and analyzing moon dust, Xinhua news agency said.
The next step in the program is to launch a moon vehicle, and bring it back to Earth, and to put a man on the moon "within 15 years," the China Daily said.

"We have taken hundreds of preventative measures directed towards a successful launch," Zhang Qingwei, minister in charge of the Commission of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense, told reporters. Zhang said the probe had already been transported to the launch site in Xichang in the southwestern province of Sichuan.

"Although the risks are great, we have confidence it will be a success." The launch is set for next Wednesday, a date chosen "with the consideration of weather and celestial conditions," Zhang said.

China's space exploration program has come far since late leader Mao Zedong lamented that China could not even launch a potato into space. In 2003, it became only the third country after the former Soviet Union and the United States to launch a man into space aboard its own rocket. In October 2005, it sent two men into orbit and plans a space walk by 2008.

But China's space plans have faced increasing international scrutiny. Fears of a potential space arms race with the United States and other powers have mounted since it blew up one of its own weather satellites using a ground-based missile in January. Japan plans to launch its first mission to land a spacecraft on the moon in the next decade -- a feat so far achieved only by the former Soviet Union and the United States.

China angered by US honor of Dalai Lama

2007-10-17T07:35:00.000-05:00

China has offered harsh criticism of U.S. plans to honor the Dalai Lama with a Congressional medal on Wednesday in a Washington ceremony. "U.S. leaders meeting the Dalai (Lama) seriously violate the basic principles of international relations," Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said in a statement. Lui called Tibet "an inalienable part of China" and a matter for the country's internal affairs.

According to White House Press Secretary Dana Perino, U.S. President George W. Bush will deliver "brief" remarks and bestow the Congressional Gold Medal -- the nation's highest civilian honor -- upon Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th and current Dalai Lama, during a ceremony in the Capitol Rotunda.

The medal, one of four awarded by Congress, is presented for singular acts of exceptional service and for lifetime achievement. The Dalai Lama is also a Nobel Peace Prize laureate. Wednesday's ceremony comes a day after Bush met privately with the exiled spiritual leader in the White House residence. It was his fourth meeting with him, Perino said.

The visit -- which the administration has worked to downplay -- has nevertheless drawn the ire of Chinese leaders, who call it an interference into internal state matters. Watch why he's considered a threat to China »

In an earlier statement, Perino told reporters she predicted that the events would not seriously affect U.S.-Sino relations. "We in no way want to stir the pot and make China feel that we are poking a stick in their eyes," she said.

The Dalai Lama also dismissed China's anger. "That always happens," he told reporters with a laugh outside his Washington hotel, according to The Associated Press.

Anticipating the negative reaction, Bush told Chinese President Hu Jintao of his plans last month at the Asia-Pacific Economic Conference meeting in Sydney, Perino said. The People's Republic of China claims to be the rightful and legitimate government of Tibet after China's 1951 invasion. However, ongoing sovereignty disputes have called into question the legitimacy of that claim based on international law.

"As I understand it," Perino said, the Dalai Lama is not calling for independence from China but for Tibetans to have the freedom to practice their religion. Lui on Wednesday said the Dalai Lama's work was part of "separatist activities."

"The words and deeds of the Dalai Lama in the past decades show he is a political refugee engaging in secessionist activities under the cloak of religion," he said. Zhang Quingli, the Communist Party secretary of Tibet, was more forceful in his criticism of the Dalai Lama, who has been based in India since fleeing his homeland in 1959. "He is a person who has tried to split the motherland, who lacks love for his home country," he told reporters in Beijing.

The Dalai Lama, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, has said he advocates autonomy for Tibet, and is not calling for it to be a separate country.

Last month, the chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, met the Dalai Lama, in Berlin. Last week, China announced that, for technical reasons, it was canceling a planned meeting on human rights with German officials.

China's market can continue to rally

2007-10-14T19:35:00.000-05:00

While investor Warren Buffett may have taken profits, many fund managers think China's market can continue to rally for a while longer, according to a report in Barron's. The report said Chinese companies today have some of the world's largest market caps. It said Warren Buffett sold his position last week, but PetroChina is up 50 percent for the year, giving it a market value of $383 billion. Rival BP's (BP.L) market cap is $238 billion, the article said.

The article said that while China's central bank raised rates trying to curb growth, the market has continued surging, and the U.S. Federal Reserve's recent interest rate cut was taken as a green light for more speculation.

The article said fund managers are still buying Chinese shares, including China Mobile, Huaneng Power and Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical.

Chinese oil appetite increasing

2007-10-09T09:49:00.000-05:00

China's net imports of crude oil rose 18.1 percent in the first eight months of the year as the booming country's voracious energy demands continued to grow, state media reported Sunday. Net imports reached 108.2 million tonnes from January to August, Xinhua news agency said, quoting figures from the General Administration of Customs (GAC).

The world's second-largest oil importer, China has seen its demand for energy rocket as a result of its explosive economic growth, which has been in double digits for four consecutive years.
It has been a net importer of oil since 1993 and imported 138.8 million tonnes of crude in 2006, up 16.9 percent from the previous year.

Imports last year accounted for 47 percent of the country's overall consumption, and industry observers have warned imports might make up more than 50 percent of China's petroleum needs in a year or two. Chinese demand has been identified as at least partly responsible for currently high oil prices.

Guide to Tiananmen Square

2007-10-08T09:48:00.000-05:00

Tiananmen is the largest public square in the world, covering over 44 hectares and is always filled with tourists from all over China. In the middle of the Square is the Monument to the People's Heroes. Directly north is Chang'an Avenue, Beijing's main street.Across the street is Tiananmen Gate, which is recognizable by the huge portrait of Mao Zedong. Tiananmen Gate is the gate which leads to the Forbidden City. To the west is the Great Hall of the People which houses the National People's Congress, but when the Congress is not in session the Hall is the venue for concerts and cultural events.

The Great Hall is occasionally rented out for other purposes as well. Off to the east is the National History Museum, on which is displayed a large digital countdown clock, ticking off the days and seconds until the return of Macao to Chinese sovereignty on December 20, 1999. Before July 1, 1997, the same clock was used to count down the days until the return of Hong Kong. Back to the south is the Chairman Mao Memorial Hall, where you can wait in line and be quickly ushered past the crystal coffin where "Mao" now lies. A specially-trained battalion of PLA troops marches out each morning and raises the flag exactly at sunrise. Then, at sunset the flag is taken down again. Every day many tourists gather in the Square to watch this solemn ceremony. On holidays and special occasions the Square is filled with flower arrangements and fountains.

Between the Memorial Hall stands the Memorial to China's Fallen Soldiers.

The 1989 protest in Beijing, was the culmination of a series of student-led prodemocracy demonstrations in China. The events leading up to the Tiananmen Square protest began with the death of Hu Yaobang, a former general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, in April 1989. Hu had become a hero to Chinese liberals after he refused to halt unrest in January 1987. Following Hu’s death, students began peaceful memorial demonstrations in Shanghai, Beijing, and other cities. The memorial escalated into a prodemocracy movement, with protesters demanding the removal of China’s paramount leader Deng Xiaoping and other Communist officials. The government’s order to end the demonstrations on April 20 was ignored. On May 4, approximately 100,000 students and workers marched in Beijing demanding democratic reforms. On May 20 the government declared martial law, however the demonstrations continued while the government wavered between the leadership of Premier Li Peng and CCP General Secretary Zhao Ziyang. Eventually choosing the hard-line approach of Li Peng, with the support of Deng, the government ordered troops to Tian’an Men Square. On June 3 and 4, 1989, the People’s Liberation Army crushed prodemocracy supporters, killing hundreds of supporters, injuring another 10,000, and arresting hundreds of students and workers. Following the violence, the government conducted widespread arrests, summary trials, and executions; banned the foreign press; and strictly controlled the Chinese press.

India and China stock market bubbles now real

2007-10-06T19:57:00.000-05:00

An aggressive buying by international funds in blue-chip stocks has created the stock market bubble in India. A new intra-day peak of 17,953 points in Sensex shows how far the bubble gas gone. China is a similar story. Stock market doubles in price in China within months. Chinese Government has stopped the international funds to participate and create bubble like in India. But their bubble has come from local small investors who cannot gain much from traditional savings.

Indian Finance Minister P Chidambaram cautioned retail investors in India for the first time. He is worried about the consequence. The international funds bring in mega funds and create the bubble. They can leave in moments notice creating a deep depression in Indian economy. Chidambaram worries about inflation, liquidity and growth. A catastrophic collapse (like that in 1929 in US) will cause a massive depression in India. Unlike US in 1929, India is very heavily populated. The economic catastrophe can easily translate into riots, hunger and even civil war.

China faces the same grim outlook. The food prices in China and India are increasing close to 3% per quarter while official inflation is registered at one fifth of that. The crude oil price is building a massive trouble spots in both the economies.

China Olympics face Terrorism Threat

2007-10-04T12:26:00.000-05:00

China's top cop said terrorism is the biggest threat at its Olympic Games, and a leading terror expert warned Tuesday that Beijing faces a long-term threat from an Islamic separatist group in its far west. In remarks appearing on the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, Public Security Minister Zhou Yongkang said China would seek closer cooperation with other nations in dealing with the threat.

"Although the general security situation for the Beijing Olympics remains stable, we still face the challenges of terrorism, separatism and extremism," Zhou was quoted by the state-run China Daily newspaper as saying. "Terrorism in particular poses the biggest threat," Zhou told a security conference in Beijing on Monday, the paper said.

Safeguarding the Olympics has been one of the biggest costs and concerns for cities hosting the games in recent years. Greek officials spent a record $1.4 billion on security for the 2004 Athens Olympics. Experts say the terrorist threat to the Aug. 8-24, 2008, Olympics is relatively low, but they warn that Beijing faces a growing threat from Islamic separatists among the Uighur population in the western region of Xinjiang.

However, only one or two terrorist groups are capable of attacks in northeast Asia, and their ability to operate within China's tightly controlled society is very limited, said Rohan Gunaratna, author of "Inside al-Qaida — Global Network of Terror."

"The threat (to the Beijing Olympics) is medium to low. The threat from the outside is very low," said Gunaratna, who is based in Singapore. He warned, however, that China's counterterrorism capabilities remain relatively weak, especially in its understanding of groups based outside its borders. "I expect they'll improve a lot before the Olympics," he said.

China has not joined military operations in Iraq or Afghanistan, and has not so far been a target of al-Qaida or other Islamic terror groups. It recently appointed a special envoy to focus on Middle Eastern conflicts, but Beijing's involvement in the region has mainly been limited to economic contacts and calls for a negotiated settlement to the Palestinian question. Although Uighur separatists have launched occasional bombings and assassinations, the last serious incidents were a decade ago.

In a rare publicized action earlier this year, China said it raided a terror camp in Xinjiang run by the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, or ETIM, killing 18 militants it says had links to al-Qaida and the Taliban. The Sept. 11 attacks helped dilute U.S. and other foreign criticisms of China's heavy-handed tactics toward ethnic separatists it accuses of terrorism.

However, Gunaratna said the ETIM remained dangerous and was developing stronger links with al-Qaida, changing it from an essentially Uighur nationalist group to one espousing a pan-Islamic ideology. ETIM trains in Pakistan's remote tribal areas and has been spreading its message on the Internet.

Gunaratna estimated the group represents the views of less than 1 percent of China's approximately 50 million Muslims. But he warned that China needed to avoid alienating mainstream Uighurs by improving education and job options and showing more sensitivity to their ethnic concerns.

Interpol said Monday it would help China with security by sending a "major events support team" to the Olympics that will have quick access to Interpol files on fingerprints, images and "wanted persons notices." Interpol will also provide "threat assessments" on issues relating to Olympic security and international crime, the organization said.

Liu Jing, a vice minister for public security, told the meeting in Beijing that China hopes all 135 cities on the Olympic torch relay route will also help safeguard that event, the China Daily said. Liu was quoted as saying that some organizations and individuals were trying to politicize the games and planned to disrupt the relay.

In one indication of discord, Taiwanese media reported that China has insisted Taiwan's national flag and official emblem do not show up along a proposed 15-mile torch route in Taipei. China claims Taiwan as its territory, and objects to all symbols of sovereignty by the democratic, self-ruling island.

Water Scarcity a Problem in China

2007-09-28T05:08:00.000-05:00

Hundreds of feet below ground, the primary water source for this provincial capital of more than two million people is steadily running dry. The underground water table is sinking about four feet a year. Municipal wells have already drained two-thirds of the local groundwater.

Above ground, this city in the North China Plain is having a party. Economic growth topped 11 percent last year. Population is rising. A new upscale housing development is advertising waterfront property on lakes filled with pumped groundwater. Another half-built complex, the Arc de Royal, is rising above one of the lowest points in the city’s water table. “People who are buying apartments aren’t thinking about whether there will be water in the future,” said Zhang Zhongmin, who has tried for 20 years to raise public awareness about the city’s dire water situation.

For three decades, water has been indispensable in sustaining the rollicking economic expansion that has made China a world power. Now, China’s galloping, often wasteful style of economic growth is pushing the country toward a water crisis. Water pollution is rampant nationwide, while water scarcity has worsened severely in north China — even as demand keeps rising everywhere.

China is scouring the world for oil, natural gas and minerals to keep its economic machine humming. But trade deals cannot solve water problems. Water usage in China has quintupled since 1949, and leaders will increasingly face tough political choices as cities, industry and farming compete for a finite and unbalanced water supply.

Cities like Beijing and Tianjin have shown progress on water conservation, but China’s economy continues to emphasize growth. Industry in China uses 3 to 10 times more water, depending on the product, than industries in developed nations. “We have to now focus on conservation,” said Ma Jun, a prominent environmentalist. “We don’t have much extra water resources. We have the same resources and much bigger pressures from growth.”

The North China Plain undoubtedly needs any water it can get. An economic powerhouse with more than 200 million people, it has limited rainfall and depends on groundwater for 60 percent of its supply. Other countries, like Yemen, India, Mexico and the United States, have aquifers that are being drained to dangerously low levels. But scientists say those below the North China Plain may be drained within 30 years.

“There’s no uncertainty,” said Richard Evans, a hydrologist who has worked in China for two decades and has served as a consultant to the World Bank and China’s Ministry of Water Resources. “The rate of decline is very clear, very well documented. They will run out of groundwater if the current rate continues.”

Marriott to quadruple hotels in China

2007-09-27T04:06:00.000-05:00

Hotel operator Marriott International Inc (MAR.N) said it planned to quadruple its hotels in China to 100 in the next five to six years to tap growing demand for tourism and business. The U.S.-based company aims to expand to 48 hotels in China by 2010 from 25 now, chairman J.W. Marriott told reporters in Shanghai on Thursday. In addition, 32 hotels are under development.

"In five to six years, we plan to have over 100 hotels in China," he said.

Demand for hotels is very strong because of inbound tourism and increasing travel by China's middle class, said Geoff Garside, vice president in charge of the Asia-Pacific region. Marriott is expanding from China's biggest cities such as Beijing and Shanghai to smaller, second-tier cities such as Wuxi and Wuhan to meet rising demand there, Garside said.

China is a focus for international players such as InterContinental Hotels (IHG.L), Hilton Hotels (HLT.N), Shangri-La (0069.HK) and Accor (ACCP.PA). They are competing for travelers in a market that is expected to become the world's second biggest in 10 years, from the sixth biggest at present, according to estimates by the World Travel & Tourism Council.

Last week Accor, Europe's largest hotelier, said it had raised its hotel expansion plans for China, aiming to open or start developing more than 180 hotels by 2010. Accor currently owns 50 hotels in China, including high-end Sofitel and Novotel hotels as well as its Ibis budget chain. Shangri-La, Asia's biggest listed hotel chain controlled by billionaire Robert Kuok, said in July it planned to raise at least HK$5.17 billion (US$662 million) via a rights issue to fund expansion in China, where it runs 19 hotels

Chairman Marriott, who helped develop the company from a family business to a listed hotelier with 3,000 properties worldwide, said he was not worried about the risk of oversupply in China.
"The economy in China continues to grow and people all over the world travel to China," said Marriott, who was in Shanghai to announce the opening of a Renaissance-branded hotel.

Apart from the Renaissance brand, Marriott runs six other brands in China, including the high-end Ritz-Carlton and JW Marriott Hotels & Resorts, as well as Courtyard by Marriott for mid-income travelers. To help accommodate an estimated 2 million visitors during the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Marriott plans to double its number of hotels in the Chinese capital to 11 next year from five now, Marriott said. The company aims to boost its number of hotels in the Asia-Pacific region to 125 by 2010 from 78 now, and to triple its hotel portfolio in India by that time.

China to tighten Everest access for Olympic torch relay

2007-09-25T22:07:00.000-05:00

China has put in place tougher rules on access to the Tibetan side of Mount Everest next year as part of preparations to take the Olympic torch to the summit of the world's highest mountain. The new regulations, which include stricter background checks on foreign climbers, follow threats by Tibetan independence activists to step up protests against China's presence in the Himalayan region during the 2008 Summer Games.

Chinese officials "will not limit expeditions, but they will strictly vet the expedition teams," the head of the Nepal Mountaineering Association, Ang Tsering Sherpa, told AFP. He said China plans limit the number of different nationalities represented in each climbing team, demand climbers' documents two-and-a-half months before the trip and prohibit substitutions or last-minute additions to an expedition.

"The main purpose is to run the Olympic expedition smoothly without problems. That is their main concern," said Sherpa, who was informed of the new rules during a recent meeting with Chinese representatives on planning for the 2008 Everest climbing season.

He said the restrictions did not apply to the Nepali side of the mountain.
The organisers of the Beijing Olympics plan to bring the Olympic torch to the top of the 8,848-metre (29,198-foot) peak as part of a relay that will also take in the Tibetan capital Lhasa.
The torch summit bid by a team of hardened Chinese climbers is expected to take place in early May, slightly earlier than the traditional window when lines of mountaineers often queue for access to the summit, Sherpa said.

China asserts Tibet, a vast Himalayan plateau which it has ruled since sending troops in to "liberate" the region in 1951, is an "inseparable part" of its territory.
Beijing has been targeted by "Free Tibet" protests involving foreign mountaineers over the past year.

In April, five Americans were expelled from China after staging an illegal "Free Tibet" protest at Everest base camp. The demonstration prompted Beijing to lodge a formal protest with Washington.

In 2006, China also came in for international criticism after foreign climbers witnessed, filmed and photographed the shooting of Tibetan refugees by Chinese border guards who killed a Buddhist nun.

Tibetan independence campaigners say the new Everest regulations are clearly aimed at them.
"In taking the torch to the summit, China wants to convey a message of ownership over this most potent symbol of Tibetan land," said Kate Saunders, spokeswoman for the Washington-based International Campaign for Tibet.

"The new restrictions represent a more systematic attempt to control and manage the presence of international expedition teams on Everest at a crucial time for China," she added. "Chinese officials are acutely aware that mountaineers carry the latest communications technologies and are therefore capable of transmitting information directly to the outside world."

The head of the New York-based Students for a Free Tibet claimed China was displaying a "paranoia that something will go wrong that will show they don't legitimately rule" Tibet.
"The closer the time draws for the ascent (of the Olympic torch), the tighter the Chinese are going to get," said Lhadon Tethong, vowing that activists "will do whatever we can during the time of the torch relay."

'Survivor' Goes To China

2007-09-21T00:13:00.000-05:00

"Survivor" has taken its audience to almost every corner of the world -- from Thailand to Africa and Guatemala to Panama -- but this season is sure be different. Not just for the viewers, but for the record books. The 15th season of the hit reality show will be the first American TV series to be filmed entirely in China, its host, Jeff Probst, told The Early Show co-anchor Harry Smith. After years of rejecting the CBS program's efforts to film inside the country, China officials at long last said yes, though Probst does not know why the country changed its mind. "We've been trying to get in there," Probst said. "I don't know why they finally said yes. I don't know if it's because the Olympics are coming up and they want to open their arms or if they've watched 'Survivor' and thought we've always treated other countries well."

More surprisingly, China officials did not hang over the show's shoulder during production, Probst said, aside from one minor incident involving a cultural difference. "They had a rule that any representative at any time could look at any tape they wanted to make sure we were portraying China in a positive light," Probst said. "We did a gross food-eating challenge and they heard it and thought gross food-eating? This is not gross, this is our normal everyday lunch (China said). We had to explain that it's a cultural thing we (Americans) don't eat." The difficulties that the cast confronts in the upcoming season, including fishing for food, moldy rice and extreme heat, has generated positive reviews from critics, Probst said.
He also had a few things to say about some members of the cast, which has also been praised by critics:
On Jean-Robert Bellande, a profession poker player: "He thinks just because he was a poker player, he can read anybody. That guy is gold. He's the guy you go to tribal council every time because he'll give you something."

On Todd Herzog, a flight attendant: "(He) is a 'Survivor' fanatic. He was like 13 when the show started. He knows everything about 'Survivor' and it comes into play. He can tell you, merges always happen on this day and this always happens here."

On Frosti Zernow, a Parkour student-athlete: "He's hardcore … He jumps over things and he's very aerobatic."

On provocatively-clad Ashley Massaro, a professional WWE wrestler: "She was the girl in with the knee-high boots, fishnet stockings. This is 'Survivor' and you won't forget her."

On waitress Courtney Yates: "From New York City, a girl after my own heart."

China prepares for what is predicted to be most powerful typhoon in years

2007-09-18T12:12:00.000-05:00

China is preparing for what forecasters say will be the most powerful typhoon to hit Shanghai in a decade. The typhoon is churning waves up to 36 feet high. It's expected to make landfall south of Shanghai early tomorrow.

The typhoon's outer edges have begun to lash northern Taiwan, where officials have ordered schools, businesses, and the stock market to close. The storm's winds knocked down scaffolding, killing a construction worker.

Shanghai authorities also closed schools. China's state-run news agency says officials are evacuating nearly 200,000 people living in coastal or low-lying rural areas. Shanghai and two provinces to the south have issued typhoon warnings requiring all vessels to return to shore or change course to avoid the storm.

About 30,000 fishing boats reportedly have taken shelter in port and ferry service with outlying islands is suspended.