Chinese authorities moved quickly and with force to quash a pro-democracy ‘Jasmine Revolution’, believed to have been inspired by the recent uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa.
More police than usual were scrambled to line the streets today, and there were a number of activists detained after online sites had organised staged protests in Beijing, Shanghai and 11 other major cities.
Citizens were urged to shout: ‘We want food, we want work, we want housing, we want fairness’ – a slogan that highlights common complaints among ordinary Chinese.
Many activists said they didn’t know who was behind the campaign and weren’t sure what to make of the call to protest, which was first posted on U.S.-based, Chinese-language website Boxun.com.
Showing posts with label BEIJING. Show all posts
Showing posts with label BEIJING. Show all posts
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Friday, January 14, 2011
WILL CHINA REPLACE THE UNITED STATES ?
China does not want to "replace" the United States from its dominant role in the world, and the world should not fear China's rise, the country's top diplomat wrote in an essay.
State Councilor Dai Bingguo said that China would not engage in an arms race, as the country's resources were better spent on development and ensuring its people had enough to eat.
"The notion that China wants to replace the United States and dominate the world is a myth," Dai wrote in the essay carried on the Foreign Ministry's website (www.mfa.gov.cn) late on Monday.
"Politically, we ... respect the social systems and development path of the different peoples of the world," he added.
"Economically, we wholeheartedly want to continue to develop," Dai wrote. "Militarily, we are not engaged in an arms race."
China's growing military clout and rising defense spending have raised concern in Asia, especially in Japan and Taiwan, as well as in Washington. China says its military expenditure is purely for defensive purposes.
Dai said the world had no reason to fear China.
"The international community should welcome and not fear China's peaceful development, help it and not hinder it, support it and not hold it back," he wrote.
But the world also needed to "understand and respect China's reasonable interests and concerns."
Such issues included China's territorial integrity and foreign arms sales to Taiwan, the self-ruled island China claims as its own, Dai said.
China will also be "actively involved" in global issues relating to the North Korean and Iranian nuclear programs, the Arab-Israeli conflict and Sudan's Darfur, and "a responsible participant in the international system," Dai said.
The United States, Japan and South Korea have pressed China to bring its old ally North Korea to heel following renewed tension on the Korean peninsula, though Beijing has refrained from doing so, calling instead for multilateral talks.
State Councilor Dai Bingguo said that China would not engage in an arms race, as the country's resources were better spent on development and ensuring its people had enough to eat.
"The notion that China wants to replace the United States and dominate the world is a myth," Dai wrote in the essay carried on the Foreign Ministry's website (www.mfa.gov.cn) late on Monday.
"Politically, we ... respect the social systems and development path of the different peoples of the world," he added.
"Economically, we wholeheartedly want to continue to develop," Dai wrote. "Militarily, we are not engaged in an arms race."
China's growing military clout and rising defense spending have raised concern in Asia, especially in Japan and Taiwan, as well as in Washington. China says its military expenditure is purely for defensive purposes.
Dai said the world had no reason to fear China.
"The international community should welcome and not fear China's peaceful development, help it and not hinder it, support it and not hold it back," he wrote.
But the world also needed to "understand and respect China's reasonable interests and concerns."
Such issues included China's territorial integrity and foreign arms sales to Taiwan, the self-ruled island China claims as its own, Dai said.
China will also be "actively involved" in global issues relating to the North Korean and Iranian nuclear programs, the Arab-Israeli conflict and Sudan's Darfur, and "a responsible participant in the international system," Dai said.
The United States, Japan and South Korea have pressed China to bring its old ally North Korea to heel following renewed tension on the Korean peninsula, though Beijing has refrained from doing so, calling instead for multilateral talks.
Saturday, March 27, 2010
CHINA HAS THE MOST DIABETES CASES IN THE WORLD.
After working overtime to catch up to life in the West, China now faces a whole new problem: the world's biggest diabetes epidemic.
One in 10 Chinese adults already have the disease and another 16 per cent are on the verge of developing it, according to a new study.
The finding nearly equals the US rate of 11 per cent and surpasses other Western nations, including Germany and Canada.
The survey results, published on Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine, found much higher rates of diabetes than previous studies, largely due to more rigorous testing measures.
With 92 million diabetics, China is now home to the most cases worldwide, overtaking India.
"The change is happening very rapidly both in terms of their economy and in terms of their health effects," said David Whiting, an epidemiologist at the International Diabetes Federation, who was not involved in the study.
"The rate of increase is much faster than we've seen in Europe and in the US."
Chronic ailments, such as high blood pressure and heart disease, have been steadily climbing in rapidly developing countries like China, where many people are moving out of farms and into cities where they have more sedentary lifestyles.
Greater wealth has led to sweeping diet changes, including eating heavily salted foods, fatty meats and sugary snacks - boosting obesity rates, a major risk factor for type two diabetes, which accounts for 90 per cent to 95 per cent of all diabetes cases among adults.
"As people eat more high-calorie and processed foods combined with less exercise, we see an increase of diabetes patients," said Huang Jun, a cardiovascular professor at the Jiangsu People's Hospital in Nanjing, capital of northern China's Jiangsu province, who did not participate in the study.
Previous studies over three decades have shown a gradual climb in China's diabetes rates.
The sharp rise in the latest study, conducted from 2007-2008, is largely explained by more rigorous testing methods, said lead author Dr Wenying Yang from the China-Japan Friendship Hospital in Beijing.
Earlier nationwide studies relied only on one blood sugar tolerance test, while this survey of nearly 50,000 people caught many more cases by checking levels again two hours later, an approach recommended by the World Health Organization. More than half of the people with diabetes didn't know they had it, the study found.
The Asia-Pacific, the world's most populous region, was highlighted in another study last year estimating that by 2025, it would be home to more than 60 per cent of the 380 million diabetes cases globally.
And while the world's giants, China and India, already have the highest number of cases worldwide, the per capita rate is higher in several other countries - up to 30 per cent of all people living on the tiny Pacific Island of Nauru have the disease, according to estimates from the International Diabetes Federation.
It revealed that men were slightly more affected and there were more diabetes cases in cities than in the countryside - one in 11 city dwellers were diabetics, compared with one in eight in rural areas.
One in 10 Chinese adults already have the disease and another 16 per cent are on the verge of developing it, according to a new study.
The finding nearly equals the US rate of 11 per cent and surpasses other Western nations, including Germany and Canada.
The survey results, published on Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine, found much higher rates of diabetes than previous studies, largely due to more rigorous testing measures.
With 92 million diabetics, China is now home to the most cases worldwide, overtaking India.
"The change is happening very rapidly both in terms of their economy and in terms of their health effects," said David Whiting, an epidemiologist at the International Diabetes Federation, who was not involved in the study.
"The rate of increase is much faster than we've seen in Europe and in the US."
Chronic ailments, such as high blood pressure and heart disease, have been steadily climbing in rapidly developing countries like China, where many people are moving out of farms and into cities where they have more sedentary lifestyles.
Greater wealth has led to sweeping diet changes, including eating heavily salted foods, fatty meats and sugary snacks - boosting obesity rates, a major risk factor for type two diabetes, which accounts for 90 per cent to 95 per cent of all diabetes cases among adults.
"As people eat more high-calorie and processed foods combined with less exercise, we see an increase of diabetes patients," said Huang Jun, a cardiovascular professor at the Jiangsu People's Hospital in Nanjing, capital of northern China's Jiangsu province, who did not participate in the study.
Previous studies over three decades have shown a gradual climb in China's diabetes rates.
The sharp rise in the latest study, conducted from 2007-2008, is largely explained by more rigorous testing methods, said lead author Dr Wenying Yang from the China-Japan Friendship Hospital in Beijing.
Earlier nationwide studies relied only on one blood sugar tolerance test, while this survey of nearly 50,000 people caught many more cases by checking levels again two hours later, an approach recommended by the World Health Organization. More than half of the people with diabetes didn't know they had it, the study found.
The Asia-Pacific, the world's most populous region, was highlighted in another study last year estimating that by 2025, it would be home to more than 60 per cent of the 380 million diabetes cases globally.
And while the world's giants, China and India, already have the highest number of cases worldwide, the per capita rate is higher in several other countries - up to 30 per cent of all people living on the tiny Pacific Island of Nauru have the disease, according to estimates from the International Diabetes Federation.
It revealed that men were slightly more affected and there were more diabetes cases in cities than in the countryside - one in 11 city dwellers were diabetics, compared with one in eight in rural areas.
Friday, March 12, 2010
ELEVEN SIBERIAN TIGERS STARVE TO DEATH IN A CHINA ZOO
Eleven Siberian tigers have starved to death over the past three months at a zoo in northeast China, after the cash-strapped animal park fed them cheap chicken bones, state media reported.
Liu Xiaoqiang, the vice head of the wild animal protection office in Shenyang, the capital of Liaoning province, said the 11 tigers had died due to malnutrition, Xinhua news agency said.
Two hungry tigers at the same zoo in Shenyang severely mauled a zoo worker in November, in an attack officials said was due to the predators' lack of food. The man survived, but the tigers were shot during the rescue.
After the incident, work safety officials asked the zoo's owners to confine the remaining tigers to their cages, which added to their health problems, the report said Thursday.
China has more than 200 zoos, according to the Chinese Association of Zoological Gardens. But only large zoos in major cities such as Beijing and Shanghai receive government funding and attention, state media say.
"Many privately-owned zoos are under financial pressure, and most of them fail to feed the animals well," said Liu.
China said last month it had nearly 6,000 tigers in captivity, but just 50-60 left roaming in the wild, including about 20 wild Siberian tigers.
There are in theory four varieties of wild tigers in China, but one of them -- the South China tiger -- has not been spotted in the wild since the late 1970s. In the 1950s, there were around 4,000 of the subspecies.
Degradation of the animal's habitat and poaching of the tiger and its prey are blamed for the rapid disappearance of the endangered species.
In the 1980s, China set up tiger farms to try to preserve the big cats, intending to release some into the wild.
But those farms have come under the international spotlight, with some conservation groups saying they use the great cats for their parts.
China banned the international trade in tiger bones and related products in 1993, and is a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), which also bars such trade.
The global wild tiger population is estimated to be at an all-time low of 3,200, down from an estimated 20,000 in the 1980s and 100,000 a century ago.
Liu Xiaoqiang, the vice head of the wild animal protection office in Shenyang, the capital of Liaoning province, said the 11 tigers had died due to malnutrition, Xinhua news agency said.
Two hungry tigers at the same zoo in Shenyang severely mauled a zoo worker in November, in an attack officials said was due to the predators' lack of food. The man survived, but the tigers were shot during the rescue.
After the incident, work safety officials asked the zoo's owners to confine the remaining tigers to their cages, which added to their health problems, the report said Thursday.
China has more than 200 zoos, according to the Chinese Association of Zoological Gardens. But only large zoos in major cities such as Beijing and Shanghai receive government funding and attention, state media say.
"Many privately-owned zoos are under financial pressure, and most of them fail to feed the animals well," said Liu.
China said last month it had nearly 6,000 tigers in captivity, but just 50-60 left roaming in the wild, including about 20 wild Siberian tigers.
There are in theory four varieties of wild tigers in China, but one of them -- the South China tiger -- has not been spotted in the wild since the late 1970s. In the 1950s, there were around 4,000 of the subspecies.
Degradation of the animal's habitat and poaching of the tiger and its prey are blamed for the rapid disappearance of the endangered species.
In the 1980s, China set up tiger farms to try to preserve the big cats, intending to release some into the wild.
But those farms have come under the international spotlight, with some conservation groups saying they use the great cats for their parts.
China banned the international trade in tiger bones and related products in 1993, and is a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), which also bars such trade.
The global wild tiger population is estimated to be at an all-time low of 3,200, down from an estimated 20,000 in the 1980s and 100,000 a century ago.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
OBAMA TO MEET WITH DALI LAMA AT THE WHITE HOUSE
The White House Thursday said President Barack Obama would meet the Dalai Lama next week, sparking an immediate demand from Beijing for the withdrawal of the diplomatically explosive invitation.
Obama's meeting with the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader is sure to further strain increasingly testy US-China relations, as the president seeks to overcome Beijing's reluctance to place a choke hold of sanctions on Iran.
In one step apparently meant to mollify China, the February 18 talks will take place in the White House Map Room, not the symbolic surroundings of the Oval Office, where Obama normally meets foreign leaders and VIP guests.
Next week's meeting comes at a time when Sino-US relations have soured over the sale of a 6.4-billion-dollar package of US weapons to Taiwan, which Beijing regards as a Chinese territory to be reunified by force if necessary. Related article: China says it has 'no dissidents'
Obama also knows Chinese support is vital if he is to succeed in winning unanimous backing at the UN Security Council for the tough regime of sanctions he wants to impose on Iran for stepping up its suspect nuclear work.
The Dalai Lama, 74, fled his Tibet homeland to exile in India in 1959, after a failed uprising against Chinese rule. That came nine years after Chinese troops were sent to take control of the region.
Since the 2008 round of talks, China has maintained a tough crackdown in Tibet it launched following a wave of anti-Chinese unrest that erupted in March of that year and which Beijing blamed on the Dalai Lama.
Obama's meeting with the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader is sure to further strain increasingly testy US-China relations, as the president seeks to overcome Beijing's reluctance to place a choke hold of sanctions on Iran.
In one step apparently meant to mollify China, the February 18 talks will take place in the White House Map Room, not the symbolic surroundings of the Oval Office, where Obama normally meets foreign leaders and VIP guests.
Next week's meeting comes at a time when Sino-US relations have soured over the sale of a 6.4-billion-dollar package of US weapons to Taiwan, which Beijing regards as a Chinese territory to be reunified by force if necessary. Related article: China says it has 'no dissidents'
Obama also knows Chinese support is vital if he is to succeed in winning unanimous backing at the UN Security Council for the tough regime of sanctions he wants to impose on Iran for stepping up its suspect nuclear work.
The Dalai Lama, 74, fled his Tibet homeland to exile in India in 1959, after a failed uprising against Chinese rule. That came nine years after Chinese troops were sent to take control of the region.
Since the 2008 round of talks, China has maintained a tough crackdown in Tibet it launched following a wave of anti-Chinese unrest that erupted in March of that year and which Beijing blamed on the Dalai Lama.
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