21st July 2010

The Lion Awakes 

News at a Glance

今天的中国新闻

A compilation of Headlines + Brief Summary from Chinese & International Publications relating to China.

Just 5 Minutes each day to be up-to-date on the News of China

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China News Archive

From 2008

China Daily

Based on China's energy policies and way of life, the Chinese  will never consume energy as lavishly as the Americans do. The West should not only look at the country's total energy consumption, but also the per capita data, which is only one-fifth of that of the United States.

Three Gorges Dam withstands its biggest test

The Three Gorges Dam in Yichang of Central China's Hubei province opens its nine deep drainage outlets to discharge floodwater with a flow of 40,000 cubic meters per second on July 20, 2010. The Three Gorges Dam on China's Yangtze River went through its first major flood-control test Tuesday. The flow on the river's upper reaches topped 70,000 cubic meters per second - 20,000 cubic meters more than the flow during the 1998 floods that killed 4,150 people and the highest level since the dam was completed last year. All ferry services were halted at the Three Gorges Dam on Monday, and the 30-km exclusive road along the river was opened to vehicles carrying shipping cargo. [Photo China Daily]

China Daily

US-ROK drill in Sea of Japan

BEIJING - Washington and Seoul will launch a military drill on Sunday targeting Pyongyang in the Sea of Japan, delaying a similar move in the Yellow Sea after opposition from Beijing over the joint exercise.

US-S.Korean maritime war games needlessly provocative  (Global Times)

When the US ponders the idea of deploying its nuclear aircraft carrier in the Yellow Sea, very close to China, shouldn't China have the same feeling as the US did when the Soviet Union deployed missiles in Cuba?

China's reliance on coal to drop 7 pct by 2015

BEIJING -- China's coal consumption is likely to drop to 63 percent of total energy consumption by 2015, down from 70 percent last year, said an official with the National Energy Administration (NEA) Tuesday.

Google pulls plug on two Chinese Web services

BEIJING - Google Inc said on Tuesday it will shut down two unpopular Chinese online services and end technical support for a Chinese-language forum website.

Environmental officials held in toxic waste spill

SHANGHANG, Fujian - Two more local environmental officials have been detained for their inadequate supervision in the recent toxic wastewater leakage at a copper mine in Shanghang county of East China's Fujian province, local prosecutors said on Tuesday.

Grim picture for exports this year, says ministry

BEIJING - Despite the high growth in exports during June, the overall prospects for 2010 still look bleak as the European debt woes and the monetary tightening policies will crimp demand for the nation's goods, the Ministry of Commerce said on Tuesday.

China may spend $738b on clean energy projects

China may spend about 5 trillion yuan ($738 billion) in the next decade developing cleaner sources of energy to reduce emissions from burning oil and coal, a government official said.

The government will submit plans to develop cleaner energy, including nuclear power and gas from unconventional sources, in 2011 to 2020 to the State Council, or Cabinet, for approval, Jiang Bing, head of the National Energy Administration's planning and development department, said in Beijing

'Wrong' to hit at outbound investment

BEIJING - Countries including the United States and India should not politicize outbound investment by Chinese enterprises or abuse investment protection tools to shield their own industries and jobs from the financial crisis, the Ministry of Commerce said on Tuesday

China good trade partner, says Cable

FARNBOROUGH, UK - British Business Secretary Vince Cable on Monday reiterated that China is a "good trade partner", and he looks forward to visiting the nation soon.

Cable's endorsement comes days after a group of German industrialists, who accompanied Chancellor Angela Merkel during her recent China visit, had criticized Beijing's business and investment climate.

VIDEO - Guozhuang bonfire dance in Tibet

Guozhuang village is in Qamdo Prefecture, in the east part of Tibet autonomous region. Guozhuang's bonfire dance is the most famous folk dance in Tibet.

In the old days, when traveling merchants took their rest for the night, they built a bonfire for cooking teas. After dinner they danced around the bonfire, to relax after a long day of traveling.

Now Guozhuang bonfire dance is performed for festivals, ceremonies or weddings. Both men and women get into a circle, hand in hand. The song begins slowly, then gradually speeds up. Men always take the first lines of lyrics, and women reply. They repeat, until they get into the same happy rhythm.

Guozhuang bonfire dance was cataloged into the first set of national intangible cultural heritage in 2006.

Global Times

Editorial - How much energy is too much?

China has overtaken the United States to become the largest energy consumer in the world.

No one is excited about this news, including China itself.

Foreign countries get more nervous about the rising power's industrial expansion and increasing thirst for more energy and resources around the globe.

China fears outside worries may fuel the "China threat" theory and turn the world hostile against the country.

That may explain why Beijing's energy authority hastily announced yesterday that the International Energy Agency (IEA) has overestimated China's appetite.

China disputes energy-use rank

China is challenging the credibility of an International Energy Agency (IEA) report that branded the country the world's top energy consumer, surpassing the United States, claiming that the estimation is inaccurate.

Money alone doesn't make a middle class

The nature of China's middle class still remains a mystery. The 2010 Beijing Social Construction Analysis was jointly conducted by the Beijing University of Technology and Social Science Academic Press. According to the report, Beijing has around 5.4 million members of the middle class, making up roughly 40 percent of the total.

The number provokes a fierce social discussion as soon as it was released. Apart from the current numbers of the middle class, people argued over whether the criteria is too low. The report said that the average monthly income of middle class individuals was 5923.18 yuan ($874.91).

Shifting seas leave Chinese interests awash

The changes in China over the last 30 years have altered it from being a land-orientated, agricultural nation into one increasingly dependent on maritime traffic for its exports and imports.

But China isn't yet prepared to cope with this change into being a maritime nation, and so has encountered many unprecedented difficulties.

China is like a man trying to do business in an unfamiliar town full of robbers.

International News Sources on China

The Wall Street Journal  China RealTime Report

We’re Not No. 1 (In Energy)!

It’s believed by some that China is headed for world dominance, but the country’s leadership can be awfully uncomfortable about being top dog.

China as Co-Shaper of Global Standards

Could future technological standards be driven by the Chinese Communist Party Politburo, as well as Steve Jobs?

A Quarter-Century for a Beijing Home

Beijing’s traffic may now be the worst in the world, but natives have long known the capital’s streets aren’t as hard to navigate as its housing.

The average Beijing home sells at an extraordinary 25 times the average annual wage.

Russell Leigh Moses: In Floods, Party’s Default Mode May Not Wash

Russell Leigh Moses is a Beijing-based analyst and professor who writes on Chinese politics. He is writing a book on the changing role of power in the Chinese political system.

In the current floods in southern China, it might be a mistake for China's Communist Party to resort to the same old approaches that worked before.

A Rare Sight in Hong Kong: Blue Skies

Blue skies are a welcome sight most anywhere, but in smoggy Hong Kong, they’re exceedingly rare.

Photo Courtesy of The Wall Street Journal

China Reapplies to WTO Procurement Group

BEIJING—China offered to increase foreign companies' access to its government purchases as it seeks to overcome international complaints that it discriminates against foreign vendors, but analysts said the move still may not go far enough toward easing their concerns.

Kaixin – China is learning that for the ‘west’ on capitulation would be far enough to ease their concerns.

Chinese Firm Accepts Blame for Poisoning River

SHANGHAI—A major Chinese mining company offered a rare public apology for its role in polluting a local river, while fishing vessels helped clean up a large oil slick off the major port city of Dalian, as China continues to grapple with a spate of industrial accidents.

China Land Price Growth Slows

SHANGHAI—Land prices in China continued to rise in the second quarter from the preceding quarter, albeit at a slower pace, highlighting the challenges that Beijing faces in its efforts to lower persistently high property prices.

The New York Times

Business News Outlet Rises to Focus on China, in English

Cai Business Indepth, known as CBID, is aiming to become a major provider of reliable financial news and analysis, in English, about one of the world’s largest and most complex economies: China. (“Cai” means finance in Mandarin.)

Asia Times Online    

SUN WUKONG
Another convenient scapegoat
By Wu Zhong, China Editor

HONG KONG - In an authoritarian society like China, it is always easy and convenient for the authorities to find a scapegoat for the failure of a policy.

First it was prostitutes, now real estate agents - accused by a government agency of fueling rental prices to line their pockets - are taking the heat for China's hot property market. Until government policies succeed in bringing soaring prices within reach of average buyers, another convenient scapegoat will inevitably be found.

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