4th of October 2010
The Lion Awakes
Daily News, Culture & Current Affairs about China
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China Daily
My National Day holiday photos
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Send in the photos along with your contact information to China Daily editors at photos@chinadaily.com.cn.
This page will be updated continuoulsy during the 7-day National Day holiday as we receive photos.
Kaixin OpEd - A must, must see ...
Forbidden City overwhelmed by holiday visitors
Visitors crowd in front of the Forbidden City in Beijing, Oct 3, 2010. The number of visitors rushing to the Forbidden City reached up to 122,000 on Oct 2, more than twice of the palace's capacity, as people across the country are taking a break from work for the National Day holiday.
China backing euro, says Premier Wen
ATHENS - Premier Wen Jiabao said on Sunday that China will work closely with the European Union (EU) as well as directly with Greece to tide over the once-in-a-century financial crisis.
China's commitment to advancing China-EU relations "is not an expediency, but a long-term strategic policy", the premier said during a speech at the Greek parliament.
Wen also stated in clear terms that China will not reduce its holdings of euro bonds and said it supports a stable euro.
"We sent trade and investment promotion missions to Europe and signed a series of important trade and investment contracts," he said, noting that the initiatives were specific examples of China's efforts to help Europe overcome its financial difficulties.
When talking about the bilateral Sino-Greek relationship, Wen drew upon many famous names and old sayings, from both China and Greece, to illustrate how the two great ancient civilizations had experienced trials and tribulations throughout their history but had never been deterred nor defeated.
"The shining names of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Archimedes have left a permanent mark in the annals of human civilization," said the premier, who added that he had been fascinated and inspired by stories about ancient Greece ever since he was a boy.
Socrates once said that adversity is the best school to temper one's willpower, Wen noted. He said there was a similar saying in China: Out of hardship grows success.
Premier Wen: China firmly supports Greece
ATHENS - China is ready to intensify cooperation with Greece and help the country tide over its current difficulties at an early date, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said here Sunday.
"We applaud the efforts taken by the Greek government to tackle the international financial crisis and the debt crisis. And we support the measures taken by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund in this regard," Wen said during a speech at the parliament.
Kaixin OpEd - Cf the way China Daily reports this news with the western media below.
China's moon goal right on schedule
XICHANG, Sichuan - China moved closer to its goal of landing on the moon as its second lunar probe, Chang'e-2, blasted off seconds before 7:00 pm on Friday from the southwestern city of Xichang.
China-Africa trade to top $100b this year
BEIJING - The trade between China and African countries will rebound from a year ago and exceed $100 billion again this year, according to forecast by the Ministry of Commerce (MOC).
The MOC data showed trade between China and Africa jumped sharply by 65 percent year-on-year to $61.2 billion in the first half of this year.
China, Greece ink 13 deals
ATHENS - China and Greece clinched a series of deals on Oct 2, and agreed to further deepen their comprehensive strategic partnership as Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao is paying his three-day official visit to Greece.
Wen held talks with Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou after his arrival in Athens earlier Saturday.
The Greece visit, the first stop of Wen's four-nation tour, is the first by a Chinese premier in 24 years.
Wen and Papandreou attended the signing ceremony of 13 deals after their talks, which covered areas concerning cooperation in maritime transportation, loan, telecommunication, export and cultural exchanges.
The two countries also issued a joint statement on deepening their comprehensive strategic partnership.
Premier Wen also announced a package of measures that China will take to help the sovereign debt-ridden European country.
"China will try its best to support the eurozone countries, and support Greece to overcome the financial crisis and realize economic recovery and healthy development of fiscal policy," Wen told reporters after the talks.
Kaixin OpEd - An economically healthy world is an economically healthy market.
It is called diversification, and has been a focus of China's trade policy for several years now, in particular post GFC.
China urges Japan to maintain bilateral ties
BEIJING -- A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman on Friday called for concerted efforts from Japan to maintain relations between the two countries.
Guns to noodles - county's journey out of poverty
XINING - Police in the remote, west China county of Hualong are trained in a specific skill -- to detect and deter "treasure" hunters, and to arrest them if they get what they want.
Hualong, an impoverished county with a predominantly Hui population, a Muslim ethnic group in China, has no valuable relics in its arid, barren land. The "treasure" is illegal home-made firearms.
China's bear bile industry slowly dying
CHENGDU - In a tranquil patch of woods in Chengdu, Southwest China, 107 bears rest after a life of agony and incarceration.
The special cemetery of the Moon Bear Rescue Center, built by Animals Asia Foundation (AAF) in Sichuan province, is for bears once farmed for their bile.
Three freed bears from a Shandong bear-bile farm were recently buried here after their rehabilitation at the center failed.
"The bear bile industry is totally unnecessary, and its brutal side has defamed TCM and the image of our country," said Huang Xinyang, vice president of the Taoist Association of China, in a proposal to the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the country's top advisory body, this year.
Fortunately, 15 years after Jill Robinson, founder and CEO of AAF, first exposed the brutality of bear farms, the bear bile industry now has received more attention from the public and officials.
In 2000, government officials signed an agreement with the AAF on cooperation in bile bear rescues, the first of its kind signed between the Chinese government and international animal charities.
Couples untying the knot more frequently
Beijing - More than 848,000 couples registered for divorce at civil affair bureaus across the country in the first six months of the year, according to statistics published by the Ministry of Civil Affairs. This figure represents a rise of almost 10 percent year-on-year.
Lament of the lens
Chinese photo artists are increasingly engaged with contemporary realities, be it urban stress or fast-disappearing lifestyles, finds Raymond Zhou at the Pingyao photo festival
The grand prize in the 2010 Pingyao International Photography Festival that ran from Sept 19-25, goes to a set of photos about dilapidated industrial facilities and their equally haggard and soot-covered inhabitants. It is a fitting and subtle commentary on the former factory workshops where they were displayed and whose vibrancy can be detected only in a few pieces of machinery that now serve as interior decorations.
Tian'anmen in Pictures Now & Then - Slide Show
Pictures tell a generation of stories - Slide Show
A Teacher's Last Lesson - Slide Show
Expo gears up for China's National Day - Video
Beijing Blossoms for October 1st - Video
Part Two
Kaixin - A Must See!!
Global Times
Premier Wen makes five-point proposal on China-Greece ties
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Saturday made a five-point proposal on boosting ties with Greece during talks with his Greek counterpart George Papandreou, stressing that China is willing to work with the European country to combat the lingering financial crisis.
Wen arrived in Athens earlier in the day, starting a three-day official visit to the country, the first by a Chinese premier in 24 years.
Papandreou held a grand welcoming ceremony for Wen after the Chinese premier's arrival.
Wen said both countries were great civilizations in the history and the people of the two countries have always been amicable to each other. There have been consistent mutual support, mutual help and solid political mutual trust between the two nations for a long time.
"Currently, Greece is actively dealing with the impact inflicted by the sovereign debt crisis and has experienced the hardest time," Wen said during the talks with Papandreou.
"China will work with Greece to deal with various challenges and deepen the China-Greece comprehensive strategic partnership," he added.
China has bought and is now holding Greece's treasury bonds, and will continue to "take positive attitude to participate in the purchase of Greece's new treasury bonds," said Wen, adding that it served as one of China's measures to help the sovereign debt-ridden country.
Wen put forward a five-point proposal for the further development of China-Greece ties concerning cooperation in maritime transportation, trade and investment.
Dialogue - A 30 Minute Current Affairs Programme on CCTV - 9 (In English) where current issues are discussed by experts from China and Internationally:
American Empire and cold peace
CCTV - 9
News for Today
China Business Culture Science & Technology Travel
International News Sources
The Wall Street Journal China RealTime Report
Yuan Revaluation for China's Own Sake
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia—U.S. lawmakers have put China's currency policy high up on America's political agenda. Nouriel Roubini believes it ought to be even higher on China's economic agenda.
The famously gloomy economist, known in part for his prescient views ahead of the global financial crisis, says China needs to revalue its currency, the yuan, not because failure to do so hurts the U.S. Rather, keeping the yuan artificially low will lead China's own economy to hit a dangerous "growth wall" in the next two to three years ...
Stronger Yuan May Not Mean More U.S. Jobs
Suppose the Chinese, under intensifying pressure from the U.S. Congress and Obama administration, did let their currency, the yuan, climb 20% against the U.S. dollar. Then what?
The goal of U.S. politicians, of course, is jobs, which are in short supply these days with unemployment at 9.6% and projected to remain high for years.
Kaixin's 'Yuan Revaluation & Internationalisation'
China to Buy Greek Bonds, Support Shipping
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao offered Greece a major vote of confidence on a visit to the debt-ridden European nation, saying China will continue to buy Greek bonds and announcing the creation of a $5 billion fund to help Greek shipping companies buy Chinese ships.
Kaixin OpEd – A touch of irony there …
The birthplace of democracy going cap in hand to the bastion of totalitarianism (in the west’s eyes).
As Kaixin has opined before. Democracy as it is practised in the west bears little resemblance to the democracy that was practised in Athens.
The vote in Athens was highly restricted and certainly did not give the great un-washed a say in how the city-state was run. The elders of Athens knew full well that the great unwashed would simply vote themselves unlimited lolly until the city-state was bankrupt.
Which is precisely what has happened in Greece and many other western democracies.
Democracy can be a powerful force for equality. It can also be highjacked by powerful interests and turned against the people.
Like all things, it can be a force for good or for ill.
Climate Talks in Tianjin Put Spotlight on China
BEIJING—The first round of international climate talks hosted by China highlights the biggest energy consumer's struggle to expand its role in global-warming policy while shining a spotlight on the country's ambitions and shortcomings in clean energy.
Kaixin's 'Green China'
Xinjiang Goldwind to Raise $916 Million in IPO
HONG KONG—Chinese wind-turbine maker Xinjiang Goldwind Science & Technology Co. priced its Hong Kong initial public offering in a deal set to raise around US$916 million, said a person familiar to the situation.
Xinjiang Goldwind, which had earlier this year scrapped plans for a listing due to volatile markets, is selling 395.29 million shares, amounting to 15% of the listed company, in its Hong Kong IPO, according to a term sheet.
The company was ...
U.S. Investors Re-Embrace Chinese IPOs
After riding out a bumpier stretch this year, Chinese IPOs are beginning to feel the love again from U.S. investors.
After the 95% pop from Internet-services company ChinaCache International Holdings Ltd. on Friday—the best-performing initial public offering of stock in the U.S. since Athenahealth Inc.'s 97% gain in September 2007—it is clear that more new stocks from China will be landing on American shores in the weeks ahead.
Already lined up for this week are polysilicon manufacturer Daqo New Energy Corp. and foreign-language training school Global Education & Technology Group Ltd., which want to raise $100 million and $67 million, ...
The New York Times
Migrant ‘Walled Villages’ Ignite Debate
BEIJING — The community is walled and gated, an enclosure of rows of crowded low-rise homes and shops, where people exist in their own worlds, under the gaze of surveillance cameras and apart from the city.
The area, Shoubaozhuang, is not one of the affluent, gated residential compounds springing up around Beijing, but a poor village of rural migrants toiling at low-paid jobs.
Book Review - The Shadow Market - By Eric J. Weiner
A primer on the geopolitical clout of investment funds, oil nations and, most of all, China.
Getting Past the Politics of Climate Change
U.N. climate talks in Tianjin, China, could help prepare for more discussions in Mexico at the end of the year.
Russia’s Answer to Harvard Business School: A Break With Tradition
By SOPHIA KISHKOVSKY
A business school created by Russian oligarchs seeks a role as the Harvard Business School equivalent for students focused on the so-called BRIC countries of Brazil, Russia, India and China.
The Age
Inflation, corruption could hurt China: Wen
Premier Wen Jiabao has warned that corruption and inflation could have an "adverse impact" on the stability of power in China.
"I do have worry for the management of inflation expectations in China," Wen told Fareed Zakaria on CNN's GPS program on Sunday.
"And that is something that I have been trying very hard to manage appropriately and well, because I believe corruption and inflation will have an adverse impact on stability of power in our country.
Kaixin OpEd - Kaixin loves the breathless sensationalism of the western media when it comes to China.
Kaixin read the transcript. Premier Wen was voicing a concern and a recognition of a potential problem if the economy was not managed well. So far, China's economy has been managed exceptionally well.
Contrast that with the west and the GFC. Contrast that will the western economists and politicians who all looked the other way or were too dim to see it and chanted "bubble, what bubble, I see no bubble." Greenspan jumped around like a demented leprechaun throwing petrol on the fire and letting all the fire-bugs from Wall Street out of jail.
Contrast the two and mull it over for a while.
VIDEO of Leprechaun’s Dancing to Washington for the Great Bailout.
China-Africa trade to top $US100b in 2010
Beijing says its trade with Africa is on track to top $US100 billion ($A103.5 billion) this year as it benefits from investments in mines, farms and factories on the continent, state media reported on Sunday.
Inflation, corruption could impact China
Corruption and inflation could have an "adverse impact" on stability in China, Premier Wen Jiabao warned on Sunday, also acknowledging that the people's thirst for democracy was "irresistible."
Chinese premier pledges support for euro
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao has pledged to support a stable euro and ease trade ties with Europe as he moved to smooth over past tensions ahead of a key summit in Brussels.
"I am convinced that a strong Europe is irreplaceable....China wants to promote and strengthen strategic links with the European Union," Wen said on Sunday ...
Sinopec to pay $US7.1b for Repsol unit
China Petrochemical Corp will pay $US7.1 billion for a stake in Repsol YPF SA's Brazilian unit, the second-largest overseas acquisition by a Chinese company, as it moves to secure oil supplies.
Sinopec Group, as China's second-largest oil and gas producer is known, will buy new shares in the Brazilian unit to hold 40 per cent of the division ...
A Stretch of Old Shanghai
ON Duolun Lu, also known as Duolun Road Cultural Street, a short but history-studded pedestrian street in the Hongkou District of Shanghai, working-class residents mingle with tourists — mostly Chinese — seeking to commune with the progressive literary giants who lived and worked there in the 1920s and ’30s.
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