China News: 2005 July | China Digital Times (CDT)

Date archive for July 2005

Warning over unrest after violent protests
From The South China Morning Post, via A Glimpse of the World:
The authorities issued a stern warning yesterday after a series of violent protests across the country, emphasising the Communist Party’s leadership and the need to abide by the law.
The People’s Daily vowed in a front-page commentary that no illegal attempts to disrupt social stability would be tolerated as the country went through a critical stage of reform.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 6:14 PM
Blogs Under Its Thumb – Bruce Einhorn and Heather Green
From BusinessWeek Online:
Still, it’s unclear whether anyone will actually make money from China’s bloggers. Without the politically charged blogs that are popular in the West, China’s blogging entrepreneurs may find it tough to keep readers from drifting away once the novelty wears off, says Analysys’ researcher Sun Lilin. He thinks growth will slow next year, increasing from 6 million bloggers at yearend to 7 million by the end of 2007. “Just doing blogs is not enough, because of the restrictions,” he says. Maybe so, but with so many Chinese taking to the Internet, there’s no shortage of entrepreneurs betting that even a censored blogosphere is a pretty good place to make a profit.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 5:13 PM
China’s ‘Google’ grows – AP
From AP, via Finance24.com:
Little known abroad, 5-year-old Baidu.com says it already is the world’s sixth most-visited internet site, thanks to a strong following from China’s 100 million-plus web surfers.
Now the startup founded by two Chinese veterans of American tech firms is preparing to follow Google’s example with an initial public offering in the United States, hoping to raise $45m.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 9:22 AM
E-mail From Shanghai: Return of the Bourgeois Dogs – Hannah K. Beech
From Time.com:
The idea of keeping pets ” naughty or otherwise ” had long been taboo in the People’s Republic of China. During the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, Chairman Mao’s Red Guards killed pet dogs by the tens of thousands, seeing them as symbols of the pampered bourgeoisie his Communist regime was out to eradicate. Even dogs being bred for their meat in southern China were exterminated, and gourmets dissuaded from tasting the rich flesh lest they become infected by class depravity.
But China’s booming free market experiment has brought the bewhiskered icons of capitalist decadence back to the nation’s cities, tails held high.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 9:19 AM
Economists predict China’s economy may fall into deflation – Xinhua
From The Xinhua – English:
A hot debate on whether China’s economy is turning cold is underway around the country’s economic circle since this spring. At the second China economic observation forum, some economists predict that China’s economy may fall into a deflation characterized by persistent consumer price decrease.
Lin Yifu, Director of China Center for Economic Research (CCER)of Beijing University, said at the forum held quarterly by CCER that owing to the overproduction in most manufacturing sectors since 1998 and the to-be-overcapacity from over-investment in some sectors in 2003 and 2004, China is expected to see deflation caused by overcapacity in the latter half of 2005.
Wang Jian, Deputy Secretary General for the Economic Research Institute under State Development and Reform Commission, said thatdecreasing growth of Consumer Price Index (CPI), dropping enterprise profits, as well as losses in downstream industries areall signals that China’s economy has taken a cooling trend.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 9:14 AM
China rushes vaccines to combat swine flu spread – Reuters
From The Reuters AlertNet:
China on Sunday rushed the first batch of swine flu vaccine to the southwestern province of Sichuan, where an outbreak of the disease has killed 34 people and left 28 in critical condition.
Vaccines for 350,000 pigs were flown to Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan, where the infection has swept through about 100 villages, Xinhua news agency reported.
It said vaccines for a total of 10 million pigs were being produced to combat the disease, which is contracted from slaughtering, handling or eating infected pigs.
This topic on the Web, via Google News.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 9:10 AM
China rolls out proposal on North Korea – Edward Cody
From The Washington Post, via SFgate:
China circulated a proposed agreement on broad principles for ending North Korea’s nuclear weapons program Saturday, seeking to push forward long- stalled six-party talks aimed at guaranteeing a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula.
The Chinese draft, which diplomats discussed without reaching a conclusion, was seen as an attempt to pull together the lowest common denominator of views that have been laid out during five days of intense but so far fruitless negotiations here, including an unprecedented half-dozen bilateral meetings between U.S. and North Korean diplomats.
This topic on the Web, via Google News.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 9:06 AM
Advantage, China -James McGregor
From The Washington Post:
We’re losing the intelligence war against China.
No, not the one with spy satellites, human operatives and electronic eavesdropping. I’m talking about intelligence : having an intelligent understanding of and intelligent discussions about China — where it’s heading, why it’s bidding to buy major U.S. companies and whether we should worry. Above all, I’m talking about formulating and pursuing intelligent policies for dealing with China.
The Chinese government today understands America much better than our government understands China. Consequently, the Chinese government is much better at pulling our strings than we are at pulling theirs. China’s top leaders, diplomats and bureaucrats have a clear framework from which they view the United States, and they are focused and unified in formulating and implementing their policies toward us.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 9:00 AM
Uzbeks Order U.S. From Base in Refugee Rift – Steven R. Weisman
From The New York Times:
Uzbekistan formally ordered the United States to leave an air base that has been a hub for operations in Afghanistan in protest over a predawn United Nations operation on Friday to spirit out refugees who had fled an uprising in Uzbekistan in May, senior State Department officials said Saturday.
The officials said Uzbekistan had given the United States 180 days to close the base, which has played a central role in rooting out fighters of the Taliban and Al Qaeda and in carrying out relief operations.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 8:59 AM
Better use of the Internet – Xinhua
From Xinhua – English:
The Internet has, in many ways, outperformed newspapers and television to become the world’s most powerful media. For example, it boasts a vast audience; is rich with information; and people can use it anonymously.
All these merits have brought positive changes to people’s traditional lifestyles the way they access information, entertain and moreover, do business. The Internet is also a super highway of information and an open forum in which people can be free with their opinions.
» Read more
- July 31, 2005 8:01 AM
Photo: Irony Lives In China: A Photo Album, via EastSouthWestNorth blog.

» Read more
- July 30, 2005 11:00 AM
Public Criticisms in China -ESWN
From EastSouthWestNorth:
The first photo above collected in Irony Lives In China: A Photo Album triggered some memories from the very interesting book, Rhetoric of The Chinese Cultural Revolution by Lu Xing.
(p. 121) In traditional operas, loyalty to the emperor and obedience to authority were highly praised. The Mandate of Heaven mythology of ancient China was naturally extended to adoration for Mao Zedong in modern times. When revolutionary songs equated Mao with the gold sun and his teachings with sunshine, the Chinese embraced such exaltation and took it in stride. Loyalty to the emperor was transferred to Mao and the party. Obedience to authority became obedience to Mao’s teachings. Similarly, traditional Chinese values emphasized sacrifice for the community and state. The new revolutionary art forms celebrated sacrifice for the proletarian cause.
In Chinese language the two characters guo Âúã (state) and jia ÂÆ∂ (family) are always used together, implying that the head of the county is also the head of the family. As China has had three thousand years of practicing filial piety in relation to the family, it was not difficult to extend the practice and apply it to the head of state. Though Mao presented himself as a radical reformer of Chinese society and was critical of traditional Chinese attitudes concerning filial piety and loyalty, he allowed the masses to worship him as another Chinese emperor. The only difference was that no Chinese emperor before him had ever been elevated to such a grand scale of deification.
» Read more
- July 30, 2005 10:46 AM
Wasted energy – Amy Myers Jaffe
From The New York Times, via A Glimpse of the World:
Lately there has been much grandstanding about the dangers of the bid by a government-backed Chinese oil company, Cnooc, for Unocal. But American protectionists are focusing on the wrong target.
It’s true that China could be a threat to American energy security some day, but not because it wants to buy an American company already on the block. Before American politicians intervene to make sure that Unocal’s Indonesian gas and oil fields remain in the hands of a U.S. corporation, they would do well to recall some history.
» Read more
- July 30, 2005 10:24 AM
Mugabe sells bankrupt Zimbabwe’s assets to China – Rochelle Mutton
From theage.com.au:
“We will never be a colony again!” This has been the catch-cry of Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe throughout his 25-year reign.
But while he rails against perceived imperialist, colonial agendas and denounces anything white-skinned or Western, Mr Mugabe has spent this week in China signing over his bankrupt country’s resources to the Asian economic superpower.
» Read more
- July 30, 2005 10:04 AM
The Letter of Dread in China – ESWN
From EastSouthWestNorth:
If you think it is all fun and joy being a corrupt Chinese official with all the money to spend on women, food and wine, think again! One day, you may just receive a letter like this one out of the blue:
Elder Brother:
How are you? This unexpected letter will probably surprise you. I thought about calling you, but that might be inconvenient. I used to work at a hotel in your town and my real name is XX. You must remember me. Since we parted the last time, I have worked in several other places. During this time, I worked at a certain hotel in Hebei. But they were cracking down on the 3P girls, so I got laid off and I had no recourse. Several days ago, there were some family problems, so I need money urgently. I thought it over for several nights, and I decided to contact you. You said that you would help me if I ever encountered any hardship.
» Read more
- July 30, 2005 10:02 AM