From Asia Times: A new crisis is at work in China. Its fracture lines are barely apparent; still, they run deep, reaching the very structure of power of the Communist Party: the bureaucracy. It was thanks to the efficient chain of command and control of the bureaucracy that the Tiananmen crisis was quickly brought under […]
Read MoreFrom Financial Times: Local governments in China are investing heavily in trophy construction projects while neglecting a basic need for environmental infrastructure such as wastewater treatment systems, a senior Chinese official said on Thursday. Qiu Baoxing, vice-minister for construction, reported that some 230 of the 600 or so Chinese cities surveyed by the government did […]
Read MoreFrom Reuters, via Three Gorges Probe: A massive hydro-electric scheme in western China has left locals poor and discontented, a researcher at an official think-tank said, casting doubt on official promises that the country’s dams bring prosperity. Residents in western China’s Qinghai province have become poorer despite a project to build 13 hydro-power dams along […]
Read MoreFrom Times Online: CHINA IS IN the grip of a new “cultural revolution”. This revolution differs from Mao Zedong’s calculated mobilisation of Red Guards against the hierarchy in two vitally important respects. It is welling up from below as a culture of outspokenness takes hold; and, although the spread of this revolution, in chat rooms, […]
Read MoreA 71 year old housing eviction protester in Shanghai displays photos and documents related to her case, by Monkeyking.
Read MoreFrom the South China Morning Post, via Asia Media: Foreign internet companies are facing a critical choice between giving in to Beijing’s media censorship or risking the loss of Net users, according to a prominent mainland blogger. Zhao Jing whose popular blog was shut down by Microsoft last month under central government pressure, said international […]
Read MoreFrom the Globe and Mail: More than fifteen years after the Berlin Wall was shattered with hammers and bulldozers, a Canadian-designed computer program is preparing to break through what activists call the great firewall of China. The program, in the late stages of development in a University of Toronto office, is designed to help those […]
Read MoreFrom Bloomberg: World Trade Organization chief Pascal Lamy lashed out against rising protectionism in the U.S., saying Congress is stirring election-year fears about China’s growing economic strength. Increasing congressional opposition to free trade is “a worrying development,” Lamy said in an interview today at his office overlooking Lake Geneva. China’s soaring wealth is “good news […]
Read MoreFrom Maclean’s: Today, China employs approximately 30,000 cyber-police to monitor Web traffic and postings from the country’s roughly 111 million Internet users. Writing articles “incompatible with the mainstream ideology” is prohibited. Posting messages that “damage the reputation of the state” can get you arrested. And publishing anything deemed to be a state secret can carry […]
Read MoreFrom the Financial Times: After a meeting with farmers disgruntled over the confiscation of their land in a small village near Beijing, the middleman who engineered the encounter asked if the journalists were satisfied with their interview. If not, he had other stories to offer. “How about underground churches? Or there’s been some big fighting […]
Read MoreFrom the New York Times: A dozen former Communist Party officials and senior scholars, including a onetime secretary to Mao, a party propaganda chief and the retired bosses of some of the country’s most powerful newspapers, have denounced the recent closing of a prominent news journal, helping to fuel a growing backlash against censorship. A […]
Read MoreFrom Xinhua: China to close down 70 percent of small-sized coal mines by 2010 and shut all down by 2015, the Ministry of Land and Resources said here Wednesday. China now has about 24,000 small coal mines with an annual production output ranging from 10,000 tons to 30,000 tons each, accounting for 70 percent of […]
Read MoreFrom the AP, via the International Herald Tribune: China announced a plan Wednesday to combat widespread pollution and leave a better environment for future generations. The plan, approved by the State Council, or cabinet, focuses on pollution controls and calls for the country to clean up heavily polluted regions and reverse degradation of water, air […]
Read MoreFrom the San Francisco Chronicle: Criticism of China’s limits on free speech online escalated Tuesday with the State Department and members of Congress taking steps to counter Internet censorship by repressive nations. The State Department weighed in on the hotly debated issue by announcing the creation of a task force that will study the use […]
Read MoreFrom a Washington Post editorial: SINCE JOINING the World Trade Organization in 2001, China has proved serious about honoring its commitments. It has rewritten laws and regulations to comply with WTO rules, so much so that the United States and the European Union, which bring high-profile cases against each other before WTO tribunals, have a […]
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