From Spiegel Online: Looking from the imposing Potala Palace into the Lhasa River Valley, one glimpses a white bridge far in the distance. For the moment, it is empty. But soon, trains will be rolling across and into the brand new train station now under construction on the opposite bank. A whole new quarter of […]
Read MoreFrom the New York Times: And that’s why I came here. Because Shangri-La County is a microcosm of the biggest challenge facing China. Put simply: if development doesn’t come to Shangri-La and other rural areas, the divide between haves and have-nots will widen and destabilize China. But if the wrong development comes here, it will […]
Read MoreFrom In These Times: Everyone I meet is afraid. The chief executive of one of China’s largest hotel groups is afraid to complain to the police about the hustlers who sell fake watches outside the lobbies of his hotels. A Buddhist who runs a network of factories is afraid to speak openly about the Chinese […]
Read MoreFrom AOA News: Environmental group Greenpeace says global warming is threatening the main source of China’s Yellow River and causing serious damage to the environment and people’s livelihoods. The group says carbon-dioxide emissions must be reduced or the river and the livelihoods of people who rely on it will be at risk. A study commissioned […]
Read MoreFrom The Guardian: By 2050, China and India will make up half of the global economy. Tracing a route through the folds of the eastern Himalayas, Motilall Lakhotia is explaining how Indian trade caravans used to ply the scenic Chumbi valley into Tibet.”It was a big trade even then. The Tibetans sold us Indians silver, […]
Read MoreFrom Guardian Weekly “Aren’t we Chinese great? They said it couldn’t be done. And yet we’ve not only done it, we’ve done it ahead of plan.” We are two hours, several beers and half a roasted duck into a journey on the overnight express from Xining, the capital of Qinghai province, travelling along the completed […]
Read MoreChelala writes in Tokyo Times that “During a recent visit to Beijing, U.N. rights envoy Louise Arbour called attention to the serious human-rights situation in China and the need for improvements according to international human-rights standards. An important step in that regard would be for China to ratify the International Covenant on Civil and Political […]
Read MoreFrom Asia Times: Road construction has become ubiquitous throughout the west, from steamy tropics to snow-capped mountains to arid deserts. It seems as if everywhere one goes, there is a bypass, a road under construction, and workers in orange waistcoats pitching their tents by the roadside. Some of the results are impressive. The Erlanshan tunnel, […]
Read MoreFrom AP, via Washingtonpost.com: A rail link being built between Tibet and several major Chinese cities could lead to “cultural genocide” by luring more Chinese workers to the region, the Dalai Lama said. Tibet’s spiritual leader said following a speech in Idaho Sunday that more pressure will be placed on native Tibetans by the rail […]
Read MoreFrom the International Herald Tribune: By the time the great railroad reaches this town from the east, it has already traversed more than half of China, past the high desert of Qinghai, around one of the world’s great salt lakes, through the arid fastness of Gansu, and then over and around mountain ranges arrayed like […]
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