Archive for ‘China alert’

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23/08/2013

In Bo Xilai Trial, Some See Positive Signs for Legal System

WSJ: “Many China watchers see the trial of Communist Party insider Bo Xilai as scripted and staged, unveiling flaws of a closed Chinese judicial system. Yet amid the criticism, some are seeing positive signs emerge from Jinan, the northeastern Chinese city in Shandong province where Mr. Bo is facing corruption charges, including allegations that he took bribes with the aid of his wife.

The following are opinions of legal experts who have been following the trial:

Many Western critics of the Bo trial are comparing it to the stage-managed show trials of China’s past, including Jiang Qing [the wife of Mao Zedong] and victims of the Cultural Revolution. But this criticism misses the point. The Bo trial is exactly 180 degrees different in nature. In the show trials of China’s past, the politics would drive the criminal prosecution. In other words, the target would fall out of favor politically and then be legally persecuted as a result. In this trial, we have the opposite: the criminal prosecution is driving the politics. A towering and influential figure is being prosecuted in spite of his political influence, and the trial is driven primarily by the criminal allegations against him. Instead of being accused of serious crimes because his political standing has collapsed, his political standing has collapsed because he has been accused of serious crimes. –Geoffrey Sant, adjunct professor at Fordham Law School and special counsel at Dorsey & Whitney LLP

Despite the degree of supervision provided for the trial, there are nevertheless grounds for opening up the administration of justice to the supervision of the people. We’ve seen that in China there are many cases and trials that are not open, that attendance is constrained. Yet leaders have shown that they are willing to open up this case—to a certain extent—to the media, creating the perception that they are moving toward creating a more accessible judicial system.

Leaders are going farther than they could have to make the trial available. It’s a show trial, but not all trials are for show in China. To the extent that openness reveals shortcomings of the judicial system and promotes civil liberties is a positive thing. –Lester Ross a Beijing-based attorney with U.S. law firm WilmerHale.”

via In Bo Xilai Trial, Some See Positive Signs for Legal System – China Real Time Report – WSJ.

Posted in China alert, Justice, Law suit, Openness, Politics, Rule of law | Leave a Comment »

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22/08/2013

Chinese forget how to write in digital age

The Times: “A televised contest that has become hugely popular in China has led to nationwide hand-wringing over the population’s increasing inability to write Chinese characters.

In 2003 Bijing earmarked $9m to improve Chinese language skills among teachers in Xinjiang region... they may have needed more

The rapid rise of computers and smartphones has left most young people barely able to write by hand, with many unable to recall the estimated 10,000 characters used in daily life without an electronic prompt.

The state broadcaster CCTV launched the Chinese Character Dictation Competition this month to improve the population’s handwriting amid fears that the country’s fiendishly complex writing system, a highly prized symbol of its ancient culture, is entering an inexorable decline.

While contestants on the show are school pupils, it was found that 70 per cent of adults in the audience were unable to recall how to portray the word for “toad”. Tests showed that fewer than half could write common Mandarin words such as “thick”.

Mastering the language’s estimated 50,000 pictograms takes children years of learning by rote. Yet the predictive text used on digital devices allows people to type characters simply by entering pinyin, the Romanised system of Chinese pronunciation, removing the necessity to remember how to write.“While the keyboard era has not affected other languages, relatively speaking, it has had a big impact on the handwriting of Chinese characters,” Guan Zhengwen, who designed and directs the show, said. “The impact of electronic technology on people’s writing habits is irreversible, there is nothing we can do about this trend.”

However, he added that he hoped to engage people with his mission to keep it alive as an art form, in line with centuries of the tradition of calligraphy.

Educated young Chinese freely admit forgetting how to write all but the most common Chinese words. “I usually write at a very slow pace,” Zang Xiaosong, 29, a newspaper journalist from Nanjing, said. “Most of the time, it seems the characters are somewhere in my head, it’s just that I can’t remember how to write them. Sometimes I use a computer to help me retrieve them.”

Hao Mingjian, the editor of a magazine devoted to Chinese characters, said: “The learning of Chinese characters is a lifelong process. If you stop using them for a long time, it is very likely you would forget them.””

via Chinese forget how to write in digital age | The Times.

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22/08/2013

China makes big show of Bo Xilai trial, but it’s still just theatre

SCMP: “With detailed online transcripts carried by China’s version of Twitter, Beijing is making an unprecedented effort to show its people that the trial of ousted politician Bo Xilai is fair and above board, but the court case is little more than theatre.

bxl_live.jpg

Never before has the stability and unity-obsessed ruling Communist Party allowed the gritty and colourful details of such a sensitive trial to be publicised almost real-time to the population at large.

None of this means, however, that China has turned a corner in efforts to push the rule of law and official transparency.

Making a microblog public is just their ruse, it’s meaningless ZHANG SIZHI, DEFENCE LAWYER

Bo, the 64-year-old former party chief of the southwestern city of Chongqing, has been charged with illegally taking almost 27 million yuan (HK$34 million), corruption and abuse of power and will almost certainly be found guilty in China’s most political trial in decades.

The party is almost certainly preventing any really embarrassing outbursts from Bo from appearing, has banned the world’s media from the courtroom and is certainly not broadcasting it live on national television.”

via China makes big show of Bo Xilai trial, but it’s still just theatre | South China Morning Post.

See also: https://chindia-alert.org/2012/08/12/bo-xilai-scandal-gu-admits-neil-heywood-murder/

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22/08/2013

China develops revolutionary submarine with high speed of 100 knots

The arm race between China, India and Japan gathers pace. What a shame.

Related articles

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21/08/2013

The economy: A bubble in pessimism

The Economist: ““JUST the other day we were afraid of the Chinese,” Paul Krugman recently wrote in the New York Times. “Now we’re afraid for them.” He is among a number of prominent commentators contemplating calamity in the world’s second-biggest economy. Three measures seem to encapsulate their fears. Economic growth has slowed to 7.5%, from its earlier double-digit pace. The investment rate remains unsustainably high, at over 48% of GDP. Meanwhile, the debt ratio—ie, what China’s firms, households and government owe—has risen alarmingly, to 200% of GDP, by some estimates.

Concerns about the first number were assuaged a little this month, when China reported strong figures for trade and industrial production (which rose by 9.7% in the year to July; see chart). Yet beneath the cyclical ups and downs, China has undoubtedly seen its momentum slowing.

It is the combined productive capacity of China’s workers, capital and know-how that sets a maximum speed for the economy, determining how fast it can grow without inflation. It also decides how fast it must grow to avoid spare capacity and a rise in the numbers without work. The latest figures suggest that the sustainable rate of growth is closer to China’s current pace of 7.5% than to the 10% rate the economy was sizzling along at.

For many economists, this structural slowdown is inevitable and welcome. It marks an evolution in China’s growth model, as it narrows the technological gap with leading economies and shifts more of its resources into services. For Mr Krugman, by contrast, the slowdown threatens China’s growth model with extinction.

China, he argues, has run out of “surplus peasants”. Chinese flooding from the countryside into the factories and cities have in the past kept wages low and returns on investment high. The flood has slowed and, in some cases, reversed. So China can no longer grow simply by allocating capital to the new labour arriving from the fields. “Capital widening” must now give way to “capital deepening” (adding more capital to each individual worker). As it does so, investment will suffer “sharply diminishing returns” and “drop drastically”. And since investment is such a big source of demand—accounting for almost half of it—such a drop will be impossible to offset. China will, in effect, hit a “Great Wall”. (The metaphor is so obvious you can see it from space.)”

via The economy: A bubble in pessimism | The Economist.

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21/08/2013

China, Japan, and India’s Asian Arms Race

BusinessWeek: “China and Japan managed to get past the Aug. 15 anniversary of the Japanese surrender in World War II without incident. For weeks leading up to the date, the question was, will he or won’t he? Will Shinzo Abe, the conservative prime minister who last year infuriated the Chinese by visiting the Yasukini Shrine in Tokyo, which commemorates Japan’s war dead—including war criminals from World War II—go to the shrine on the anniversary?

Japan's 19,500-ton Izumo helicopter carrier is launched in Yokohama on Aug. 6

Abe has enough on his agenda without provoking another crisis with China, so he decided to stay clear. Three members of his cabinet did go to Yasukini, part of a group of 100 members of Japan’s parliament who prayed at the shrine. While Abe wasn’t one of them, the prime minister did make a gesture to his nationalist supporters, sending a cash offering to the shrine.

Another day, another crisis in the ongoing saga of the dispute between the two Asian powers over uninhabited rocks in the East China Sea. Today, China’s official China Central Television reported the People’s Liberation Army had started 10 days of live-fire military exercises in the waters near the islands, which Japan calls the Senkaku and the Chinese call the Diaoyu. In a highly symbolic move, one ship taking part in the exercises is the Liaoning, China’s first aircraft carrier.

The Liaoning is part of a three-way arms race involving the naval forces of China, Japan, and the other big Asian power, India. With China embroiled in territorial disputes with both Japan and India, all three countries are coming out with bigger and better warships to make sure they hold their own in the region.

For Japan, the big news is a 19,500-ton helicopter carrier called the Izumo, which the government unveiled on Aug. 6. It’s the third such warship in Japan’s self-defense force and the biggest Japanese-made military vessel since the end of World War II. That’s big for Japan but still small compared with U.S. aircraft carriers, which displace 97,000 tons when fully loaded.

Still, the Chinese are not happy about the Izumo’s launch. The helicopter carrier is a “symbol of Japan’s strong wish to return to its time as a military power,” the Global Times wrote the next day.

India, meanwhile, has launched its first aircraft carrier, unveiled on Monday. That’s a challenge to China, the Global Times editorialized. “China should speed up its construction of domestic aircraft carriers,” it said. “The earlier China establishes its own aircraft carrier capabilities, the earlier it will gain the strategic initiative.”

India has tripled military spending over the past 10 years and in February announced more spending, with a 14 percent increase in defense outlays. The border dispute between India and China isn’t as hot as the one between Japan and China, but it involves much more land: India says China is occupying 38,000 square kilometers of Indian territory in Jummu and Kashmir (the much-disputed region in the north of India that is also claimed by Pakistan). China says India is occupying 90,000 square kilometers of Chinese territory in Arunachal Pradesh (a state in northeastern India near Bhutan and Tibet).””

via China, Japan, and India’s Asian Arms Race – Businessweek.

Posted in China alert, Chindia Alert, Diplomacy, Foreign invasion, GeoPolitics, History, India alert, Neighbour conflict, Politics | 2 Comments »

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21/08/2013

China’s Xi “Lurches” to the Left, Promotes Maoist Revival

Meadia: “In a move sure to dismay the people inside and outside China who hoped Xi Jinping would begin a new era of democratic reform, China’s president has “lurched” to the left, as the WSJ reports, promoting a revitalized version of nationalist Maoism across the country. ”Our red nation will never change color,” Xi said during a ceremony at Mao’s old lakeside mansion in Wuhan, declaring that the villa should become a center to educate young people about patriotism and revolution.

“It isn’t just Mr. Xi’s rhetoric that has taken on a Maoist tinge in recent months,” the Journal reports. “He has borrowed from Mao’s tactical playbook, launching a ‘rectification’ campaign to purify the Communist Party, while tightening limits on discussion of ideas such as democracy, rule of law and enforcement of the constitution.”

Xi appears to have capitalized on some uncertainty at the top levels of the Party after the fall of Bo Xilai, a charismatic and popular leader who also led a Maoist revival campaign and became a threat to the stability of the Party leadership. “Many of Mr. Bo’s former supporters and several powerful princelings have thrown their weight behind Mr. Xi’s efforts to establish himself as much a stronger leader than his predecessor,” party insiders told the WSJ.

Xi’s nationalist streak comes as the country prepares for Bo Xilai’s trial and amid an economic downturn that has caused worry among investors and analysts. At the same time, China and other Asian powers are engaged in a dangerous and accelerating game of military one-upmanship. New ships and maritime units are being unveiled from India to the Philippines to Japan and territorial disputes are growing more intense. Across the region, this trend is driven in part by a rising nationalism among citizens—in Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, India, elsewhere—who push their governments into increasingly aggressive and antagonistic positions against the neighbors. China is no exception.”

[Xi Jinping photo courtesy of Shutterstock]

via China’s Xi “Lurches” to the Left, Promotes Maoist Revival | Via Meadia.

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21/08/2013

Asia Needs ASEAN-ization Not Pakistanization of Its Continent: What China Wants in Asia 1975 or 1908?

Another offering from

Prof. (FH) Dr. Anis Bajrektarevic, Acting Deputy Director of Studies EXPORT EU–ASEAN–NAFTA

Professor and Chairperson

International Law and Global Political Studies

University of Applied Sciences IMC-Krems

Austria, EUROPE

http://www.4thmedia.org/2012/10/30/asia-needs-asean-ization-not-pakistanization-of-its-continent-what-china-wants-in-asia-1975-or-1908/

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20/08/2013

Critical similarities and differences in security structures of Asia and Europe

This post – http://www.europesworld.org/NewEnglish/Home_old/CommunityPosts/tabid/809/PostID/3535/CriticalsimilaritiesanddifferencesinsecuritystructuresofAsiaandEurope.aspx

is courtesy of:

Prof. (FH) Dr. Anis Bajrektarevic, Acting Deputy Director of Studies EXPORT EU–ASEAN–NAFTA

Professor and Chairperson

International Law and Global Political Studies

University of Applied Sciences IMC-Krems

Austria, EUROPE

 

Posted in China alert, Chindia Alert, Economics, India alert, Politics | Leave a Comment »

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19/08/2013

Japan’s Giant New Destroyer Sends A Clear Message To China, The World

Business Insider: “Sixty-eight years to the day of the Hiroshima bombing, Japan unveiled its new naval “destroyer” that happens to have a flat-top – dubbed “Izumo” — capable of carrying various rotary-wing aviation units, reports Eric Talmadge of ABC.

The Izumo has been in construction since 2009.

The new boat comes as Chinese officials say the country is in “no rush” to sign a code of conduct guiding military behaviour in the contested South China Sea.

From ABC:

[S]ome experts believe the new Japanese ship could potentially be used in the future to launch fighter jets or other aircraft that have the ability to take off vertically. That would be a departure for Japan, which has one of the best equipped and best trained naval forces in the Pacific but which has not sought to build aircraft carriers of its own because of constitutional restrictions that limit its military forces to a defensive role.

The “constitutional restrictions” refer to the American-written post-World War II Japanese Constitution which stipulated — among other things — a ban on the construction of certain military equipment. To this day, Japan euphemistically refers to its army as a Self-Defence Force.

Still, a restless Beijing patrolling more and more in the South China Sea, as well as an unpredictable North Korea, have caused alarm in some Japanese citizens. They’ve been pushing for more military spending, some say for fear that American sequester means a shorter reach for Washington in the island disputes.

Japan’s most recent defence white paper covered an increased budget and mentioned Chinese encroachment directly, “China has attempted to change the status quo by force based on its own assertion, which is incompatible with the existing order of international law.”

Two of the aims of Japan’s first increase in defence spending in 11 years were, according to the WSJ, “developing the ability to launch pre-emptive attacks on enemy bases abroad and the creation of an amphibious force similar to the U.S. Marine Corps.”

This even amid the widely touted U.S. “pacific pivot” and recent news of the Philippines sending a refurbished American Coast Guard cutter to join up with another used U.S. cutter in patrolling the contested seas.

China’s appetite for natural resources is growing though, so more Americans and cutters are unlikely to deter their claims. From Reuters:

Friction over the South China Sea, one of the world’s most important waterways, has surged as China uses its growing naval might to more forcefully assert its vast claims over the oil- and gas-rich sea, raising fears of a military clash.

Japan’s new flat-top doesn’t have slingshots for fixed wing aircraft — yet — but certainly the helicopters the boat carries will help patrol what Japan takes to be its sovereign territory.

Nonetheless, they say the boat is primarily for relief from natural disasters, something Japan has had no shortage of over the last few years.

In September, China will host the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) for talks on a maritime Code of Conduct regulating passage in the South China Sea.”

via Japan’s Giant New Destroyer Sends A Clear Message To China, The World | Business Insider Australia.

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