China’s exports numbers in February painted a grim picture. (Roslan Rahman/AFP/Getty Images)
BEIJING (Financial Times, Geoff Dyer) -- China’s exporters succumbed on Wednesday to the full force of the global economic turmoil. Even after the horror show of economic statistics published around the globe in recent months, China’s exports numbers in February painted a grim picture.
Some analysts had been expecting a modest uptick, given that there were fewer working days in February last year because of new-year holidays. Instead, exports slumped by 25.7 per cent as the collapse in global demand caught up with the country’s exporters and overshadowed a sharp rise in domestic investment..
Mar 11—Short View: China and the markets
Financial Times -- Last week, world stock markets staged a brief rally on hopes from China. This week, they have rallied in spite of China.
The welter of new information from Beijing this week is hard to interpret; year-on-year comparisons are tricky thanks to the Chinese new year. But in essence, we have learnt that China now has deflation; that its stimulus package, announced in November, has prompted huge domestic investment; and that both imports and exports have fallen by a quarter over the last year, bringing down the trade deficit.
Mar 10—When China and Brazil Become A Better Investment Than the U.S.
Time Magazine (Douglas A. McIntyre) – China has obviously demonstrated that it has both the will and the capacity to exceed the growth of any other large nation in the world. But, what is rarely if ever mentioned by the government is that the nation's economic fate is not in its own hands.
Recently The Wall Street Journal reported that "Goldman Sachs estimates that China's economy grew 2.6% in the October-December period from the July-September quarter. The OECD puts the quarter-on-quarter growth for the same period at 0.3%." The numbers are telling in two ways. The first is that estimates of economic activity on the mainland are imprecise. The second is that China's growth rate may have already slowed considerably.
Mar 11—China to file WTO complaint on US poultry ban
BEIJING (AP) -- China said Wednesday it will file a World Trade Organization case challenging a U.S. ban on Chinese poultry imports, criticizing the measure as protectionist.
The United States and China banned imports of each other's poultry in 2004 following outbreaks of bird flu. China agreed in September to lift its controls and complained that the United States has failed to do the same.
The U.S. Embassy in Beijing did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Yao said China has created a quality control system for its poultry producers in line with international standards. He said China exports poultry to the European Union, Japan and Switzerland.
Mar 10—China adds deflation threat to economic woes
Chinese prices fall, fueling deflation fears as official says next few months `grim'
BEIJING (Associated Press, Joe Mcdonald) -- China's consumer prices fell in February, adding the threat of deflation to the nation's economic woes, and officials warned the next few months look grim as the global downturn worsens.
The 1.6 percent year-on-year fall in the consumer price index, announced by the government Tuesday, highlighted weakness in the world's third-largest economy as exports and consumer demand cool. Such a decline, if it continues, can drag down growth if consumers put off purchases in expectation of lower prices, forcing companies to cut wages and investment.
Mar 9—China pushes for consolidation of automakers
SHANGHAI (Reuters, Fang Yan) -- Chinese automakers, often touted as possible buyers of assets from desperate overseas carmakers, are instead heeding calls from Beijing to look to their fragmented and over-crowded home turf for deals.
China has more than 100 automakers that have hesitated for years to combine and forge large, globally competitive groups, largely because of resistance from regional governments that want to protect local jobs and the income received from taxes.
But with a push from the central government, they have developed a new sense of urgency as China's once-booming auto market slows sharply and losses pile up at many smaller companies.
Mar 11—Railway collapse in China leaves 9 dead, 4 missing
BEIJING (AP) – A dormitory for railway workers collapsed early Wednesday in eastern China, killing nine people and leaving four missing, a state news agency said. At least 21 were injured.
Phones in the Shanghai and Nanjing railway bureaus rang unanswered, and a receptionist in the Jiangsu office said no one was available to answer questions.
Mar 11—China to hike security budget: state media
BEIJING (AFP) – China will raise public security spending by nearly a third in 2009, state media reported on Wednesday, saying the boost was badly needed in poor central and western areas of the country.
The report by the China Youth Daily mentioned no specific security threats, but it comes amid growing fears of potential unrest amid rising joblessness and ongoing security crackdowns in Tibet and the Muslim western Xinjiang region.
It cited a budget plan submitted to the finance ministry as saying spending on police, courts and other legal organs would rise by 28.6 billion yuan (about 4.2 billion dollars).
Based on the growth rate of 32.6 percent, that would put spending for 2009 at around 87.7 billion yuan.
Mar 10—In China, Would-Be Protesters Pay a Price
ZHANGZHOU, China (Washington Post, Ariana Eunjung Cha) -- When Ji Sizun heard that the Chinese government had agreed to create three special zones in Beijing for peaceful public protests during the 2008 Summer Olympics, he celebrated. He said in an interview at the time that he believed the offer was sincere and represented the beginning of a new era for human rights in China.
Ji, 59, a self-taught legal advocate who had spent 10 years fighting against corrupt officials in his home province of Fujian on China's southeastern coast, immediately packed his bags and was one of the first in line in Beijing to file his application to protest.
It is now clear that his hope was misplaced.
In the end, official reports show, China never approved a single protest application -- despite its repeated pledges to improve its human rights record when it won the bid to host the Games. Some would-be applicants were taken away by force by security officials and held in hotels to prevent them from filing the paperwork. Others were scared away by warnings that they could face "difficulties" if they went through with their applications.
Ji has spent the past eight months in various states of arrest and detention. In January, he was sentenced to three years in prison, the maximum penalty allowed, on charges of faking official seals on documents he filed on behalf of his clients. Ji is appealing.
His relatives and human rights groups argue that the entire court case was a farce -- a punishment for Ji's refusal to back down during the Olympics....
Since the Games in August, the situation for the Chinese citizens who had tried to apply for the Olympics permits has worsened, and some of the more outspoken applicants, such as Ji, have been harassed or detained....
Mar 11—US, China play down tension as talks begin
WASHINGTON (AFP) – The United States and China played down tensions over Tibet and a US surveillance ship as they began high-level talks here Wednesday aimed at tackling the global financial crisis and other topics.
Reciprocating for her visit to Beijing late last month, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave a warm welcome to Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi who was also due to meet later with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.
The State Department is playing down the risk of damage to ties from a new US-Chinese row over human rights in Tibet and a standoff between a US Navy surveillance ship and Chinese patrol boats in the South China Sea.
Mar 11—Rising navy, assertiveness behind US-China flap
BEIJING (AP, Christopher Bodeen) – China's weekend scrap with a U.S. Navy surveillance ship is drawing attention to a new submarine base that Beijing is using to strengthen its presence on the strategically vital South China Sea, which it claims as a whole.
For the second day running, the Foreign Ministry in Beijing fired back Wednesday at U.S. complaints over what the Pentagon called harassment of the U.S. Navy mapping ship by Chinese boats in international waters about 75 miles (120 kilometers) off its southern island province of Hainan.
Defense Department officials say the Impeccable was on a mission to seek out threats such as submarines and was towing a sonar apparatus that scans and listens for subs, mines and torpedoes. With its numerous Chinese military installations, Hainan offers rich hunting for such surveillance.
Of particular interest is the new submarine base near the resort city of Sanya that is home to the Chinese navy's most sophisticated craft. Photographs of the base taken last year and posted on the Internet by the Federation of American Scientists show a submarine cave entrance and a pier, with a Chinese nuclear-powered Jin class sub docked there.
While little else is known, its location on the South China Sea offers the People's Liberation Army Navy access to crucial waterways through which much of the shipping bound for Japan and Northeast Asia must travel...
China's territorial claims are sharpened still more by Beijing's interpretation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. China sees the convention as giving it the right to ban a broad range of activities within its exclusive economic zone. That grates against the U.S. position that the Navy ships were in international waters and therefore have the right to conduct surveying...
March 11—Falun Gong Practitioners Call on the U.S. Government to Pay Close Attention to Persecution in China
WASHINGTON, DC (Clearwisdom.net / Falun Dafa Worldwide) -- On the occasion of Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi visiting the U.S., Falun Gong practitioners from the Washington DC area held a peaceful appeal on March 9 outside the U.S. State Department Building. They called on the U.S. government not to forget to address the brutal persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China, when they meet with the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) foreign minister.
At the same time, the Washington Area Falun Dafa Association wrote to President Obama and to Secretary of State Clinton regarding the ten year persecution of Falun Gong in China, especially the blatant arrests, detention and forced labor sentencing that the CCP has imposed upon practitioners before the Beijing Olympics last year.
The Association also delivered to the Secretary of State the 2008 annual report entitled, "Escalated Campaign Against Falun Gong in China Before and After the Olympics" compiled by the Falun Dafa Information Center (FDI), as well as lawyer Gao Zhisheng's letter to the U.S. Congress, and Mr. Gao's article entitled "Dark Night, Dark Hood and Kidnapping by Dark Mafia" which was published on the Radio Free Asia website on February 8.
An official from the State Department accepted the letter to Secretary of State Clinton.
Mar 10—Crowds protest around world for freedom in Tibet
NEW YORK (Associated Press, Jennifer Peltz) -- Hundreds of pro-Tibetan protesters marched in New York City on Tuesday, the 50th anniversary of the failed uprising that sent the Dalai Lama into exile.
The protest was mirrored by similar demonstrations in Europe and Asia as Tibetan exiles and their supporters urged an end to Chinese rule in the region.
Demonstrators marched to the United Nations wearing T-shirts saying "Tibet -- 50 years of resistance." They planned to move on to the Chinese Consulate and other locales.
Mar 11—China hits back at Tibet condemnation
BEIJING (AFP, Karl Malakunas) – China reacted angrily on Wednesday to a storm of international criticism over its rule of Tibet, telling the United States to stop interfering and calling the Dalai Lama a whingeing child.
As security forces kept a tight grip across the Himalayan region to ensure no anti-Chinese protests, China described Tibet as a paradise in response to the Dalai Lama's claim that his homeland had been made a "hell on earth".
There was no sign China had loosened its security stranglehold on Tibet and neighbouring areas with Tibetan populations
Foreign journalists, who are meant to be allowed to travel freely through western China, also continued to be stopped from visiting Tibetan areas.
Mar 11—U.S. Calls on China to Reconsider Its Tibet Policies (Update1)
Bloomberg (Viola Gienger) -- The U.S. urged China to reconsider its policies in Tibet, saying they have created tensions and had a “harmful impact” on religion and culture in the region.
In a statement marking the 50th anniversary of a Tibetan uprising yesterday, the State Department said it is “deeply concerned by the human rights situation in Tibetan areas.”
“The Tibetan issue is purely China’s internal affair,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu said today, according to a statement on the ministry’s Web site. “China’s government and people oppose any country using the Tibetan issue to interfere in our internal affairs.”
China’s “repressive and violent campaigns” have led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Tibetans, the Dalai Lama said yesterday in a speech in Dharamshala, while urging Tibetan and Chinese people to live as friends. “These 50 years have brought untold suffering and destruction to the people of Tibet,” he said, according to a text published on his Web site.
“The Dalai clique confuses right and wrong and spreads rumors,” Ma Zhaoxu, a spokesman for China’s Foreign Ministry, said at a regular press briefing in Beijing yesterday.
Mar 11—Tibetan wounds
Financial Times -- It is half a century since Beijing liberated the thankful serfs of Tibet. At least that's the official view of the Communist party. But few, if any, Tibetans see it that way. They regard the 50th anniversary of their unsuccessful uprising and the flight of the Dalai Lama as marking half a century under Beijing's boot.
Mar 11—China's Aegis ships keep eye on neighbors
HONG KONG (UPI, Andrei Chang) -- China's Sea Lion radar can search for more than 100 targets at once and track 50 of them at the same time. Its search range for combat aircraft appears to be around 500 to 550 kilometers (300 to 330 miles). The design requirements for both Russian and Japanese phased array radar systems are such that even if 10 percent of the elements are lost, the radar system can continue to function.
China has built only two 052C DDGs outfitted with this advanced radar system; its purpose is to test the effectiveness of the Sea Lion for future installation on Chinese aircraft carriers.
This radar system on the No. 171 DDG, currently deployed in the Gulf of Aden, makes it possible for the People's Liberation Army navy to monitor most of the airspace above Yemen, Oman and the Strait of Hormuz.
Tankers carrying crude oil from Saudi Arabia would have to go through this strait. In addition, the Fifth Fleet of the U.S. Pacific Fleet based in Bahrain, the forward headquarters of the U.S. Central Command located in Qatar, and the activities of the combat aircraft of the Saudi Arabian air force could all come under the surveillance of the Chinese Aegis radar system.
Of course, while en route to the Indian Ocean -- past the Philippines, Vietnam, Singapore, Brunei, Malaysia and through the Strait of Malacca -- the Chinese Aegis-equipped warships can conduct surveillance, including the airspace above southern India...
Mar 9—China group urges government to stick to green goals
BEIJING (Reuters, Chris Buckley) -- A Chinese environmental group on Monday urged the government not to backtrack on cleaning air and water despite the economic slowdown, asking parliament to ensure stimulus spending does not prop up pollution.
China's abrupt economic slowing has cut pollution, but environmental advocates worry the government's desire to bolster growth and jobs may encourage its 4 trillion yuan ($585 billion) stimulus plan into laxly regulated cement, steel and coke plants and deter effective environmental scrutiny of new projects.
Friends of Nature, a Chinese environmental group, issued a letter to the National People's Congress now meeting in Beijing urging delegates to ensure the stimulus spending announced late last year goes to clean projects.
Mar 11—Primatologist Goodall: China plundering Africa resources
WASHINGTON (AFP) – China's thirst for natural resources including wood and minerals is leading to massive deforestation in Africa and the destruction of crucial wildlife habitat, world-renowned primatologist Jane Goodall has said.
Mar 11—Tapped for Bile, China's 'Moon Bears' Languish
AFP / Discovery - One by one, 13 sick and traumatized Asian black bears squeezed into tiny cages are pulled from a truck, a lifetime of agonizing torture now over.
The bears, brought to a rescue center in southwestern China, suffer festering wounds and associated illnesses from having their gall bladders tapped for bile that is used in some Chinese medicines.
Yet these animals are the lucky ones. An estimated 7,000-10,000 moon bears, so-called for the pale crescent across their chests, still languish in bile farms across China. They are victims of a brutal trade that, despite some successes by activists, persists in a country where respect for animal welfare is low and a sizable market for the bile remains.
Mar 8—A new mantra for China's big thirst: Less is more
ZHANGYIGANG VILLAGE, China (AP) – It is China's latest grand attempt to tame nature. Three canals will bring water hundreds of miles to Beijing and other thirsty cities in the north. More than 350,000 people in the way will be forced to move...
Experts and environmentalists say it's time China took a different approach to its growth-related challenges, one based on conservation rather than engineering.
