Beijing | November 6

Al Jazeera - China has described as protectionist new US anti-dumping duties on steel pipes and demanded Washington's recognition that it is a market economy.

The reaction came a day after the US imposed preliminary anti-dumping duties ranging up to 99 per cent on $2.63bn in Chinese-made pipes used in the oil and gas industry.

Nov 6

BBC -
China is planning to hold a robot Olympics in 2010.

The international event will be held in the city of Harbin and will see robots take part in 16 different events.

Robots will be able to compete in familiar Olympic sports such as athletics as well as those more suited to machines such as cleaning.

Entry to the competition will be restricted to robots resembling humans. They must possess two arms and legs. Wheels are banned.

The organisers of the games expect from more than 100 universities from around the world to send competitors to the event.

Washington | Oct 27

AFP - A top Chinese general on Monday defended Beijing's rapid military modernisation, including the development of advanced weapons that threaten US forces in the Pacific, as aimed at meeting its minimum defence requirements.

General Xu Caihou, vice chairman of China's military commission, sought to allay US suspicions over the growing might of the Asian superpower by insisting that Beijing harboured no expansionist ambitions and wanted collaborative international relations.

"We will never seek hegemony, military expansion or an arms race," he told an audience of foreign policy experts at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.

But when asked about its development of missiles designed to target US warships in the Pacific, Xu said Western suspicions about China's aims were unfounded.

"It is a limited capability, and limited weapons and equipment for the minimum requirement of its national security," he said, speaking through an interpreter.

Xu, whose position is the rough equivalent to a defence minister, also defended China's double-digit annual increases in defence spending as "quite low" both in real terms and as a percentage of its gross domestic product.

Whereas US defence spending amounts to 4.8 percent of GDP, China's was only 1.4 percent, he said.

The United States has repeatedly urged China to be more transparent about its military spending, warning of a shifting balance of power in the region that could arouse misunderstanding and miscalculation.

Oct 20

Asia Times - China, by issuing residents from Indian-administered Kashmir visas different from those given to Indians from other parts of the country, is treating the disputed area as a sovereign entity. This is a surprising departure from Beijing's traditional policy of leaving the Kashmir issue to India and Pakistan to resolve. Delhi suspects a hidden agenda.

New York Times, By David W. Dunlap & James Estrin, October 14

Any effort to describe the photography of Lu Guang by reference to the work of other artists would almost certainly invoke the name of W. Eugene Smith. (It is, for instance, just about impossible to look at Slide 4 without thinking of “Tomoko Uemura in Her Bath.”)

So it seems especially fitting that Mr. Lu, a Chinese freelancer, is the recipient of this year’s $30,000 W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography for his project, “Pollution in China.” The announcement was made Wednesday evening in New York by the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund on the occasion of its 30th anniversary.

Oct 15

Asia Times -

ADRIFT ON A RUSSIAN ISLAND, Part 1
Koreans left high and dry

When Sakhalin Island, off Russia's east coast, became a Japanese colony in 1905, thousands of Koreans were brought in to work in the fishery and timber industries. When the Soviet Union regained the island 45 years later, the Koreans became virtual prisoners, and a stormy coexistence began that lasts to this day.

This is the first article in a two-part report.

Quite the history lesson~ tina

Daniel Howden | Oct 15

The Independent - From Liberia to Ethiopia, Beijing is constructing a 21st century empire thousands of miles from home

This afternoon more than a dozen Liberians are expected at the Samuel Doe sports stadium in the capital, Monrovia. In a makeshift classroom with some plastic chairs and a whiteboard their teacher, Li Peng, is waiting to finish the group's second week of instruction in Mandarin Chinese. Early attendances at the free daily lessons provided by the Chinese embassy have been poor, but officials are blaming heavy rain rather than light interest. The class is still struggling with the basics and few Chinese listeners apart from their teacher would recognise the strange "hellos" and "goodbyes" being called out.

"Learning Chinese may prove difficult," Mr Li admitted. "But if they work hard they will make it."

The West African country set up to settle freed American slaves in 1843 is English-speaking and the going is hard.

"Traditionally, we Liberians are closer to the Americans than we are to the Chinese," he says. "But the irony is that the Chinese are more open to us than the Americans are."

Liberia's government has no Mandarin speakers, and China's ambassador, Zhou Yuxiao, admits that he's uncomfortable that multibillion-dollar accords between the two countries are signed with one side unable to read the documents.

Tokyo | Oct 9

AFP - China has detected deadly nerve gas at its border with North Korea and suspects an accidental release inside the secretive state, a Japanese news report said Friday.

The Chinese military is strengthening its surveillance activities after detecting the highly virulent sarin gas in November last year and in February in Liaoning province, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper reported, citing anonymous sources from the Chinese military.

Sarin gas, which was developed in Germany before World War I, was used in the deadly 1995 nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subway by a doomsday cult.

The Chinese special operations forces found 0.015-0.03 microgrammes of the gas per cubic metre when they were conducting regular surveys while there were winds from the direction of North Korea, the report said.

China suspects that there were some experiments or accidents in its neighbouring country, it said.

Seoul | Oct 5

AFP - China and North Korea vowed Monday to strengthen a friendship which they said preserved regional peace, as Premier Wen Jiabao pressed on with a mission to bring Pyongyang back to nuclear disarmament talks.

"History has proven that developing China-North Korea relations is in line with the fundamental interests and common aspirations of the two peoples and conducive to safeguarding regional peace and stability," said a Chinese foreign ministry statement quoting its President Hu Jintao and Wen.

"We are willing to work together with North Korea to... constantly push forward friendly and cooperative relations."

The statement, issued to mark the 60th anniversary of diplomatic relations, came on the second day of Wen's high-profile visit to Pyongyang. It made no mention of the North's nuclear programmes.

In the same statement, the North's leader Kim Jong-Il was quoted as calling the bilateral relationship "a common treasure".

Steven Morris | Bristol, England | September 24

The Guardian - New discovery unearthed in rock formations in north-eastern China confirms birds evolved from dinosaurs, scientists claim

The discovery of five remarkable new fossils has confirmed that birds evolved from dinosaurs, Chinese scientists claimed tonight.

Because the fossils - unearthed in rock formations in north-eastern China - are older than previous discoveries of similar creatures, the find adds weight to the theory that birds descended from predatory dinosaurs.

The fossils all have feathers or feather-like structures. The clearest and most striking of the specimens can be seen to have four wings, extensive plumage and profusely feathered feet.

Daniel Allen | Bangkok | Sept 20

Asia Times - China's role in the development of northern Laos has grown significantly in recent years, but with several unfortunate side effects. Rare wildlife is being poached for Chinese consumption, while land grabs for rubber plantations are destroying not only the environment, but also the livelihoods of the local people.

Harry Wu | Sept 20

The Independent - Harry Wu was incarcerated for 19 years, a victim of Chairman Mao's Cultural Revolution. Now a human rights campaigner, he recalls how the horror began

Harry Wu, was condemned to life imprisonment when aged just 21. He was sent to a laogai, a Chinese labour camp for being a "rightist counter-revolutionary". He was incarcerated for 19 years, survived, went to the United States, and founded the Laogai Research Foundation, which reports and campaigns on labour camps and other human rights abuses in China.

He has described his experiences in a remarkable new book, Nine Lives, which tells the stories of individuals who, operating outside the normal channels, have made the world a better, fairer place. They include Sompop Jantraka, who has rescued thousands of girls from the Thai sex trade, Bassam Aramin, a Palestinian peace campaigner whose daughter was shot by Israeli border police, Rami Elhanan, an Israeli peace campaigners whose 14-year-old daughter was killed by a suicide bomber, Youk Chhang, who has dedicated his life to exposing the atrocities of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge, and Chaeli Mycroft, a teenage girl with cerebral palsy who is transforming disability rights in South Africa.

Mr Wu was born in 1937, the son of a banker father who prospered until the 1949 Communist takeover. Thereafter, the family suffered a descent into not-so-genteel poverty. Harry went to university in 1955, and in 1957 came the events which defined his life. This, extracted from Nine Lives, is his story in his own words.

Benjamin A Shobert | Sept 18

Asia Times - An emotive new television advertisement in the United States aimed at awakening people to the long-term perils of rising national debt has an unflattering, none-too-subtle nod to China. The commercial infers that tomorrow's generation of Americans will be beholden to Beijing due to its large holdings of US debt, and that the debt problem is somehow China's fault.

Sudha Ramachandran | Bangalore | Sept 18

Asia Times - A proposed trip by the Dalai Lama in November to the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, part of which China claims as its territory, has ruffled feathers in Beijing. The visit by the Tibetan spiritual leader could lead Sino-Indian relations, already tense over alleged Chinese incursions into Indian territory, to deteriorate even further in the coming months.

"We firmly oppose Dalai visiting the so-called 'Arunachal Pradesh'," Jiang Yu, the spokesperson for China's Foreign Ministry, told Reuters this week. China claims around 90,000 square kilometers of territory in India's northeast, roughly approximating Arunachal Pradesh. It regards the area as "disputed territory" and refers to it as "Southern Tibet".

With India indicating that it will not buckle to Chinese pressure on the issue as it has in the past, a war of words and heightened tension along the nation's frontiers is on the cards. "Arunachal Pradesh is a part of India and the Dalai Lama is free to go anywhere in India," India's Minister of External Affairs S M Krishna said on Wednesday.

Arunachal Pradesh is India's eastern-most state. During the 1962 Sino-Indian border war, China advanced deep into the state, and after briefly occupying it, withdrew. It has continued to lay claim to the area, expressing this in increasingly strident language and alleged intrusions in the last couple of years. It objects to any Indian assertion of sovereignty over Arunachal Pradesh.

Rex Nutting | Washington | September 11

MarketWatch - The Obama administration will impose stiff tariffs on imports of Chinese-made tires after finding that a surge of imports has disrupted the U.S. domestic market.

President Barack Obama signed an order on Friday to impose the special punitive tariffs for three years, the White House announced.

media round up after the jump

Clifford Coonan | Sept 8

The Independent - As China prepares to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the People's Republic, a new blockbuster tells the story of its founding. Naturally, the nation's biggest movie stars took part, as Clifford Coonan reports from Beijing

There has never been a movie quite like Jiangguo Daye. The blockbuster features nearly 200 of China's top movie stars, including action heroes Jackie Chan and Jet Li plus a host of directors, comedy stars and even journalists. There is Zhang Ziyi of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stephen Chow of Kung Fu Hustle, and Hong Kong heartthrob Andy Lau. Imagine a Hollywood film featuring the entire celebrity audience at the Oscars and you get the idea.

But The Founding of a Republic – the title in English – is not just an A-list extravaganza. It is a stirring propaganda epic, a tale of how 60 years ago, when Chairman Mao's scruffy band of revolutionary warriors overcame Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist Kuomintang in the civil war to establish the world's most enduring Communist revolution.

The film is a key component in celebrations to mark six decades since the foundation of the People's Republic of China on 1 October 1949. It is also tipped to be one of the biggest hits in China in years. Younger Chinese cinema-goers typically give a wide berth to state-sponsored propaganda. As an example of the genre, this one is up alongside Sergei Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin, Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will or Roland Emmerich's Independence Day. But by peppering the picture with stars, its producers hoped to update patriotic cinema for a new generation. If the audience at a preview screening yesterday were anything to go by, they succeeded. They cheered loudly and chuckled when their favourite actors or pop stars appeared on screen.

Lots of sources reporting on China's derivative threat today. So where do I come for enlightenment? :-)

In short, the reports are that the Chinese have threatened to unilaterally terminate commodities contracts in an attempt to cut losses on derivatives. Lots of speculation amid a general selloff, but could this be the beginning of the next wave?

Nansan, Yunnan, China | August 27

Al Jazeera - Thousands of people have crossed the border from northeastern Myanmar into China after tensions flared between government troops and ethnic minority groups in the region, activists, state media and witnesses have said.

Officials and local residents said large groups of refugees have been streaming over the border into the town of Nansan in southern Yunnan province this month.

Here's another example of what Ian would use to say, "the future doesn't happen here anymore." And he would be right: those darned Chinese and all those benighted poor people there who are managing to get ahead of the US in solar power and green technology imports. Isn't America 'sposed to be the best at everything? The uber-innovator? The be-all-end-all of the world technology wise?

Syed Fazl-e-Haider | Quetta | Aug 24

Asia Times - Energy-deficient Pakistan is seeking help from the United States and China to help it overcome its energy crisis through a long-term upgrade and diversification of the antiquated power sector as larger cities suffer power cuts on a daily basis.

Last week, US President Barack Obama's special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, Richard Holbrooke, said that recent gains by the Pakistani army against militants gave Washington "breathing room" to focus more attention on the country's economic woes.

A team of American experts arrived on Sunday (August 23) in Islamabad to assess the ailing energy sector and help the government overcome electricity loadshedding and outages. US trade promotion agencies are expected to provide financial backing for some of the projects in the power sector.

At the same time, President Asif Ali Zardari, who is on a five-day visit to China, has sought Chinese assistance in hydro, thermal and solar power generation to overcome the power crisis and has invited Chinese firms to carry out a feasibility study. The two countries on Saturday signed a memorandum of understanding for construction of the Bunji dam in the northern area, which would have a capacity of generating 4,000 megawatts of electricity.

Syed Fazl-e-Haider | Quetta | Aug 13

Asia Times - Cash-strapped Pakistan, which has had to accept more than US$11 billion from the International Monetary Fund, is threatened with the loss of a huge foreign investment after China said it had shelved its multi-billion dollar coastal oil refinery project at Gwadar, in southwest Balochistan province.

China has formally informed the Pakistani authorities that the refinery project has been deleted from the list of financial development plans agreed with Islamabad for the financial year ending next June as there has been no progress on the project, according to a Business Recorder report.

The decision, which follows suspension in January by the United Arab Emirates state-run International Petroleum Investment Company (IPIC) of work on the $5 billion Khalifa Coastal Refinery (KCR) project at Hub, also in Balochistan, creates uncertainty about the future of the planned $12.5 billion mega oil city project in Gwadar, of which the refinery there was to be a key element.

It also casts doubt over plans for a corridor carrying energy pipelines and refinery products the length of Pakistan from Gwadar onto western China.

The global recession was a factor in forcing the Chinese and UAE governments to shelve their refinery projects, the Business Recorder report said, citing sources in Pakistan's Petroleum Ministry. Local analysts, however, believe that security concerns were also an important factor.

Tania Branigan/Beijing & Justin McCurry/Tokyo | Aug 10

The Guardian - • Up to 600 people feared buried as record rainfall hits island
• China evacuates 1 million from east coast provinces
• Deadly tropical storm Etau triggers floods in Japan

Hundreds of people are missing in a village in Taiwan after it was buried by a mudslide when typhoon Morakot struck the island yesterday morning, a police official has reported.

At least 34 people have died and millions of others been affected across east Asia after Morakot and a separate tropical storm battered China, Taiwan, the Philippines and Japan.

Southern Taiwan suffered its worst flooding for half a century as the typhoon dumped up to 2.5 metres (8.2ft) of rain.

The official, surnamed Wang, said around 100 people from Hsiao-lin village, in Kaohsiung county, had been rescued by military helicopter or other means, according to Associated Press.

Lin Chien-chung, a rescued resident, told the Taipei-based United Evening News he believed 600 people were buried in the mudslide and that it covered "a large part" of the village. Hsiaolin is thought to have around 1,000 inhabitants.

AUgust 5

BBC News - A Chinese teenager sent to an internet addiction rehabilitation camp has allegedly been beaten to death by his counsellors, according to reports.

A number of employees of the Qihang Salvation Training Camp in Nanning have been arrested over the death, his father Deng Fei told the Global Times.

The camp had promised to put Deng Senshan, 15, under 24-hour supervision.

China is increasingly taking action against what it sees as a pandemic of web addiction.

Tania Branigan | Beijing | Aug 3

The Guardian - China stepped up pressure on the exiled Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer , saying two of her children and her brother had written letters condemning her for orchestrating last month's riots in Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang region.

Five of Kadeer's 11 children still live in the north-western province, and human rights groups say ,they have experienced repeated harassment because of their mother's campaigning.

According to the state news agency, Xinhua, 12 relatives, including Kadeer's son Khahar, daughter Roxingul and younger brother Memet, told her: "Because of you, many innocent people of all ethnic groups lost their lives in Urumqi on 5 July, with huge damage of properties, shops and vehicles."

They allegedly added: "We want a stable and safe life … Please think about the happiness of us and your grandchildren. Don't destroy our happy life here. Don't follow the provocation from some people in other countries."

Xinhua reported that, in another letter to the victims of the 5 July riots, they had written: "Evidence proved the riot was organised by the World Uighur Congress, led by Rebiya Kadeer, and implemented by a group of separatists within the Chinese borders."

Luke Harding | Aug 3

The Observer - It was an unashamed display of military force, involving tanks, fighter jets and more than 3,000 soldiers. Last week China and Russia held their biggest joint military exercises ever - their battalions streaking across the plateaus and shimmering plains of Shenyang province.

The exercises come as Moscow and Beijing prepare to celebrate an important moment in history: 60 years of diplomatic relations. After long periods of frigidity during the cold war, the two countries now claim to be enjoying an unprecedented strategic partnership.

But the military manoeuvres - named Peace Operation 2009 - were not just about showing off, unleashing rockets at imaginary terrorist enemies or threatening the US. Instead their aim was to send an unambiguous message to the internal Muslim populations of China and Russia: no dissent will be tolerated.