ZGBriefs June 16, 2011
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FEATURED ARTICLE
It's barely the middle of June, and this is shaping up to be an especially long, hot summer in China. There was rioting in another Chinese city last week, unrest in Inner Mongolia, and-rare for China-bomb attacks in two other cities. |
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GOVERNMENT / POLITICS / FOREIGN AFFAIRS
China says no expiry date on Communist Party rule (June 9, 2011, Reuters) China's Communist Party sees no reason why it cannot stay in power indefinitely, having made the nation into the envy of the world with its economic success, one of the Party's top official historians said on Thursday. Li Zhongjie, a deputy head of the Party's History Research Center, made it clear that China will use the impending 90th anniversary of the Party's founding as a time for rousing pride, rather than reflection on a history that has spanned war, revolution, mass famine and deadly purges. Under the Party's rule, China had made leapfrog developments, Li told a news conference, and he said it was foolish to expect any party to want to give up power. "Over the last 90 years, especially the last 30 years of reform and opening up, we have made major achievements. This is something the world basically recognizes," Li said, ahead of the Party's anniversary of its 1921 founding on July 1.
Zengcheng riot: China forces quell migrant unrest (June 14, 2011, BBC News) Chinese security forces have moved into the southern city of Zengcheng, restoring calm after days of rioting by migrant workers. Witnesses say security personnel are manning roadblocks and patrolling the streets, and have ordered people to stay in their homes overnight. No violent incidents were reported on Monday night. Hundreds of workers rioted at the weekend after a pregnant woman was allegedly assaulted by security guards. Reports said the woman was shoved to the ground when she refused to move her market stall. The protesters set fire to cars and damaged government buildings in Zengcheng, near the wealthy southern city of Guangzhou. Police reportedly fired tear gas and deployed armoured vehicles.
China dispatches large patrol ship amid tensions (June 16, 2011, AP) China has dispatched one of its largest maritime patrol ships on a first-ever visit to the Southeast Asian city-state of Singapore amid a spike in tensions over disputed territory in the South China Sea. The Haixun-31 left Wednesday and will stay in Singapore for two weeks of exchanges on search and rescue, anti-piracy and port management operations, Chinese state media reported Thursday. Similar ships have been accused of harassing foreign shipping in the South China Sea, including U.S. Navy surveillance vessels.
China closes Tibet to foreigners until July 26 (June 16, 2011, AP) Travel agents say China has closed Tibet to foreigners until July 26 in an apparent move to head off trouble surrounding sensitive political anniversaries. Agents say official written notice of the closure was received June 1 and cited last month's 60th anniversary of communist rule over Tibet as the cause. However, with the May 23 anniversary already passed, the closure seems more likely targeted at the 90th anniversary of ruling Communist Party's founding, which is July 1.
China military paper urges steps against U.S. cyber war threat (June 16, 2011, Reuters) China must boost its cyber-warfare strength to counter a Pentagon push, the country's top military newspaper said on Thursday after weeks of friction over accusations that Beijing may have launched a string of Internet hacking attacks. The accusations against China have centered on an intrusion into the security networks of Lockheed Martin Corp and other U.S. military contractors, and deceptions intended to gain access to the Google e-mail accounts of U.S. officials and Chinese human rights advocates. But the official newspaper of the People's Liberation Army said it was Beijing that was vulnerable to attack, in a news report that surveyed the Pentagon's efforts in cyber security.
China pledges aid to Mongolia (June 16, 2011, AFP) China pledged on Thursday to help resource-rich Mongolia develop its economy, offering visiting Prime Minister Sukhbaatar Batbold a $500 million loan and support for the key mining and energy sectors. On a three-day visit to Beijing, Batbold met with Premier Wen Jiabao and also discussed joint infrastructure projects while overseeing the signing of a raft of agreements, including the loan. "China is willing to unify planning and coordination with Mongolia on pushing forward mining, energy, infrastructure and other big projects," China Central Television quoted Wen as telling Batbold in talks. "China is willing to provide assistance within its means to help Mongolia raise its energy and environmental protection capacity and push forward the development of its national industry." Wen further urged Batbold to work with China to fight terrorism, separatism and cross-border crime and that the two nations should jointly cooperate to maintain stability along their long common border.
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HEALTH
China in lead poisoning 'cover-up' - Human Rights Watch (June 15, 2011, BBC News) China has been accused of trying to cover up the extent of lead poisoning among children, and of blocking effective testing and treatment. A report by Human Rights Watch says local authorities in heavily-polluted industrial areas have been sending sick children back to contaminated homes. It says that in these areas - Henan, Yunnan, Shaanxi and Hunan provinces - anyone who complains is being harassed. China has promised to clean up chronic pollution from heavy metals.
10 arrested in tainted pork scandal in E China (June 16, 2011, China Daily) Authorities in east China's Jiangsu Province said Wednesday that they have arrested ten people, including four government staff and six butchers, in a case involving pork tainted with a toxic chemical. The government staff, including three officials, were from the trade bureau, health inspection station and veterinary station of Jianye District in the provincial capital city of Nanjing, said a spokesman with the city's procuratorate. They were accused of neglect of duty, according to the spokesman. Six butchers, all from the Xingwang Slaughterhouse, were accused of selling poisonous food as they knew the pigs had been fed with the chemical and sold the pork. |
RELIGION
China plans to help Nepal develop Buddha's birthplace at Lumbini (June 16, 2011, Reuters) A Chinese-backed foundation and Nepal's government plan to transform Lord Buddha's birthplace in southern Nepal into a magnet for Buddhists in the same way as Mecca is to Muslims and the Vatican for Catholics. The Asia Pacific Exchange and Cooperation Foundation plans to raise $3 billion at home and abroad to build temples, an airport, a highway, hotels, convention centres and a Buddhist university in the town of Lumbini, about 171 km (107 miles) southwest of Nepal's capital Kathmandu. The foundation, blessed by the Chinese government, signed a memorandum of understanding with the Nepalese government last month to jointly develop and operate Lumbini, where Buddha was born Prince Gautama Siddhartha about 2,600 years ago. The foundation also pledged to bring communications, water and electricity to Lumbini. |
SOCIETY / LIFE
Over 70,000 Chinese got US green cards in 2010 (June 10, 2011, China Daily) Over 70,000 Chinese applicants obtained a US green card in 2010, according to statistics released by the US Department of Homeland Security, reported China News Service Friday. The data shows that 70,863 Chinese citizens received a US green card in 2010, 6,625 more than 2009 but 9,408 less than 2008. In 2010, more than 1 million US green cards were issued by the US, among which 6.8 percent were obtained by Chinese applicants, ranking the second-highest following the 13.3 percent of Mexican applicants.
Report: 2 wounded by bomb in north China city (June 11, 2011, AP) China's state news service says two people were wounded by a bomb outside government headquarters in the northeastern city of Tianjin. It said the attacker sought revenge over personal problems. The official Xinhua News Agency said Saturday that one man was arrested on suspicion of setting off the explosion just before 10 a.m. (0200 GMT) Friday. It said the suspect, a Tianjin resident identified only by the surname Liu, had been having problems with gambling and family members and wanted "revenge against society."
China to allow individual travel to Taiwan (June 12, 2011, AFP) China will relax a decades-old ban on travel to Taiwan by individuals under a pilot scheme starting June 28, the government said Sunday, responding to growing demand amid a thaw between the two sides. Initially, the programme will apply to residents of the Chinese capital Beijing, the eastern business hub Shanghai and the coastal city of Xiamen on the Taiwan Strait, said Wang Yi, director of China's Taiwan Affairs Office. Mainland Chinese residents of the coastal province of Fujian, where Xiamen is located, also will be allowed to travel individually to the Taiwanese-controlled islands of Kinmen, Matsu and Penghu off the Fujian coast.
Security tight in riot-torn southern Chinese city (June 13, 2011, AP) Security forces patrolled the streets and manned roadblocks Tuesday in a southern Chinese city where rioting factory workers attacked police stations and torched vehicles over the weekend, residents said. No major incidents have been reported since Sunday in Xintang in the southern manufacturing hub of Guangdong province, where tens of thousands of migrant workers enraged by the reported beating of a street vendor turned on authorities. Xintang residents contacted by phone Tuesday said security forces were a constant presence on city streets and shops and restaurants had been ordered to close early. They said they had been told not to go out at night or transmit photos of the unrest online. That demand reflects authorities' fears of unrest spreading via the Internet amid scattered calls for migrants to converge on Xintang for a new round of protests to demand the release of 25 people reportedly arrested over the violence.
Chinese share bribe stories on web (June 14, 2011, AFP) Several Chinese websites have sprung up in the past week on which citizens confess to buying out officials, inspired by an Indian anti-corruption site called "I Paid A Bribe", state media said Tuesday. At least eight similar Chinese sites have been launched since Friday, the state-run China Daily reported. The sites, which aim to highlight the daily toll of corruption, invite Internet users to describe the bribes they paid and the circumstances but asks them to refrain from identifying the officials involved. "We reveal bribery but object to infringement of privacy," Zhang Zhongguo, an employee with a Beijing-based Internet company that set up a site called "I made a bribe", was quoted as telling the China Daily. The site attracted 60,000 visitors in its first three days.
China pledges to improve lives in Inner Mongolia (June 15, 2011, AP) China's central government pledged Wednesday to improve living conditions for farmers and herders in Inner Mongolia while continuing to promote the development of the border region that recently saw its biggest demonstrations in two decades. Last month's protests followed the killings of two Mongols who were trying to block coal-mining and coal-hauling operations that locals complain damage grasslands and cause pollution. On Wednesday, Premier Wen Jiabao presided over an executive meeting of the State Council, China's Cabinet, that called for the incomes of Inner Mongolia's urban and rural residents to surpass the national average by 2020, an official statement said.
Air Force spares more space (June 15, 2011, China Daily) New measures to ease delayed departures for civil aviation may soon take flight, an airspace regulation expert said. The People's Liberation Army Air Force, the country's airspace regulator, will work with local authorities to shift flights to less busy hours, shorten the interval between flights and extend the time airspace is open, an unnamed airspace official told Xinhua News Agency on Monday.
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BUSINESS / ECONOMICS / TRADE
Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway set to open (June 13, 2011, AP) Chinese railway authorities say all is ready for the opening of a showcase high-speed railway between Beijing and Shanghai later this month. Railways Ministry Vice Minister Hu Yadong told reporters in Beijing on Monday that tickets for the rail link between the China's top two cities would range from 410 yuan to 1,750 yuan ($63 to $270), depending on speed and class of train seat. The fastest travel time on the 1,318-kilometer (813 mile) line will be five hours, or about half the current time, and the longest to just under eight hours, he said in a transcript posted on the ministry's website. Trial operations for the new rail line began May 11. Its formal inauguration coincides with the July 1st 90th anniversary of the founding of the ruling Communist Party.
China inflation at 34-month high on rising food prices (June 14, 2011, BBC News) Inflation in China hit its highest level in 34 months despite the government's efforts to rein in rising prices. Consumer prices in China rose by 5.5% in May, compared with the same month last year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. Food prices continued to be the biggest factor as they surged by 11.7% The rising cost of food and commodities have pushed up the cost of living and become a hot political issue in China. Analysts warned that prices are likely to rise even further. "For now, it seems certain that China's CPI will hit 6% in June," said Xu Biao of China Merchants Bank.
Google 'applying for China mapping license' (June 14, 2011, AFP) Google and its joint venture partner in China have applied for a licence to operate an online mapping service in the world's biggest web market, a news report said on Tuesday. The State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping was reviewing the application from Beijing Guxiang Information Technology Co., which operates Google's mapping service in China, Dow Jones Newswires said, citing an official. Google declined to confirm the report when contacted by AFP and calls to the government agency were not answered.
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ENVIRONMENT / TECHNOLOGY
Algae slick floating towards China's east coast (June 15, 2011, AFP) A large expanse of green algae is floating towards China's east coast, potentially threatening marine life and the region's tourism industry, an official and state media said Wednesday. The algae covers 130 square kilometres (50 square miles) off the eastern provinces of Shandong and Jiangsu, the Global Times said, citing a spokesman for the North China Sea Branch of the State Oceanic Administration. An official in the forecasting department of the agency told AFP the size of the algae was "likely to turn out to be larger than that" reported by the newspaper, but "should be similar to regular years".
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LINKS TO DETAILED ARTICLES AND ANALYSIS
While ethnic tensions in Inner Mongolia and a spate of anti-government bombings are a more immediate challenge to Beijing's campaign to resuscitate authoritarian norms, attempts by "public intellectuals" to seek election at grassroots-level legislatures could eventually prove more dangerous. Another affront to the party-state apparatus' lurch toward conservatism is liberal claims that "criticizing authorities is a kind of patriotism".
But the ethnic Mongolian protests that have swept a number of cities in recent weeks are a sobering reminder that government largess, assimilation or an iron fist cannot entirely extinguish the yearnings of some of China's 55 ethnic minorities, who account for 8 percent of the country's population.
The Three Gorges Dam was once an untouchable symbol of China's determination to pursue economic growth over political reform. As criticism gets louder and the State Council pours in more cash to address festering shortcomings, the gigantic investment is now a harbinger of mounting political problems for China's authoritarian model of national development.
As the Chinese government and the fast-modernizing naval branch of the People's Liberation Army extend the nation's maritime reach, uneasy neighbors are tracking Chinese vessels, including military and surveillance boats, fisheries law enforcement ships and fishing skiffs, and pushing back hard over anything deemed aggressive.
In the past two and a half years, thousands of workers, villagers and children in at least 9 of mainland China's 31 province-level regions have been found to be suffering from toxic levels of lead exposure, mostly caused by pollution from battery factories and metal smelters. The cases underscore a pattern of government neglect seen in industry after industry as China strives for headlong growth with only embryonic safeguards.
The first to build and occupy European-style stone villas atop this bamboo-cloaked mountain were the foreign missionaries. Then came Big-Ear Du and other Shanghai gangsters looking for a getaway (or maybe hideaway). Later still, the big guns rolled in: Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong.
The party celebrates its 90th birthday on July 1, outwardly confident that it deserves to rule for "the next 90 years," as Li Zhongjie, deputy head of the Party History Research Center, told Beijing News. Inwardly, however, it is haunted by a sense that it is not truly loved, said Kerry Brown, one of six overseas academics who attended three days of meetings last week with officials of the major party organs.
China has vowed to improve food safety laws following a series of scandals involving contaminated milk and pork. More than 2,000 people across the country have been arrested for failing to meet safety standards. Al Jazeera's Melissa Chan reports from Beijing.
Recent Vietnamese naval exercises in the potentially resource rich South China Sea have raised tensions between Hanoi and Beijing. In addition to that a number of other Asian nations have laid claim to some of the sea islands. China editor of the BBC World Service Shirong Chen explains the background to the tensions.
Giving birth to a child abroad is not a privilege reserved to the stars and the very wealthy. An increasing number of expectant middle-class parents also fancy giving their children passports that they can feel proud of. "The return on investment is higher than robbing a bank," the consultancy agent tells women such as Liu. When Chinese children are born in America, they automatically become U.S. citizens. Once they reach 21, their parents will be able to apply for green cards and emigrate.
Borderland explores China's 14,000 mile border, the world's longest.
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LINKS TO BLOGS
Anyone who has set foot in one of China's larger cities over the past five years has undoubtedly noticed the growing presence of Starbucks, which has exploded from its first mainland China location in 1999 to 450 today.
How big is the Chinese economy? Answering that question is not as straightforward as looking up the number on the National Bureau of Statistics website. China's GDP data is haunted by controversy, with widespread doubts about its accuracy.
Review of Greater China in an Era of Globalization, edited by Sujian Guo and Baogang Guo. New York: Lexington Books, a division of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2010.
JW: Water is figuring centrally right now in a lot of reporting on China. Do you see this as due to a change in the situation or just increased awareness of the kinds of dilemmas and issues you flagged more than two years ago in the "China's Water Woes" post you did for this blog?
A few years ago, while visiting a small, prosperous city a few hours from Changsha, in China's Hunan Province, I paused outside of a primary school to snap a photo of grandparents eagerly awaiting the afternoon bell and the grandchildren who would emerge from the school gate. A few minutes later, when that bell rang, a flood of boys emerged, enough to convince me and several other companions that we had happened upon a boy's school. It was only later, over lunch, that we were told that, in fact, the school was co-ed.
While Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg analyzes his options in China, where the social networking giant is blocked, LinkedIn's Chinese membership has grown to more than one million users - an illustration of how global websites might be able to compete in the China market, if given a fighting chance.
Now this is annoying. You just spent hours memorizing a phrase and when you try to use it with a Chinese person they answer, "I don't understand English." "But I'm speaking Chinese!" You shriek, "Ah! Why can't you understand my pronunciation?!" One or two more failed attempts and your I-am-going-to-be-a-Chinese-expert ego shrinks into despair. The more discouraged you get the less likely you are to pick up that textbook again. So follow this advice.
The 90th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party is just a little over two weeks away, and the time has come for pomp and circumstance. That is the message China's propaganda czar, Li Changchun (李长春), conveys to the domestic media today in a speech being energetically promoted - presumably because no one has any real choice - across major internet news portals and in daily newspapers. |
RESOURCES FOR RESEARCHERS
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RESOURCES
China Briefing has just released the third edition of its technical guide "Setting Up Wholly Foreign Owned Enterprises in China" - offering an up-to-date reference source for all issues concerning the establishment, administration, and utilization of a wholly foreign owned enterprise (WFOE) in China.
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| Contributions to support the production of ZGBriefs are always welcome and can be made at our secure online giving page for ZGBriefs. Click here to give online. Thank you. |
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