Archive for ‘China alert’

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21/12/2018

China, Russia to boost military cooperation

BEIJING, Dec. 20 (Xinhua) — Chinese State Councilor and Minister of National Defense Wei Fenghe met with Deputy Defense Minister of the Russian Federation and Chief of Main Directorate for Political-Military Affairs of the Russian Armed Forces Andrey Kartapolov in Beijing Thursday.

Wei spoke highly of recent exchanges and cooperation between the two militaries.

“China is willing to work jointly with Russia, taking the opportunity of the 70th anniversary of diplomatic ties between the two countries next year to resolutely implement the consensus reached by the two heads of states and promote the two sides’ military cooperation to continuously score new achievements,” Wei said.

Kartapolov said Russia would strengthen cooperation with China in the military and other fields, and keep pushing the relationship between the two countries and their militaries to a new level.

Posted in China alert, cooperation, Military, Russia, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

21/12/2018

China, Germany should jointly safeguard free trade: FM spokesperson

BEIJING, Dec. 20 (Xinhua) — A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson said Thursday that China and Germany have the responsibility to jointly safeguard free trade and multilateralism and avoid sending a negative signal that could affect investment environment and market confidence.

Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hua Chunying made the remarks after Germany tightened rules on foreign investment in some sectors on Wednesday, adjusting the threshold for starting state security reviews of share purchases by non-EU investors to 10 percent of company shares in sectors such as critical infrastructures as well as defense-relevant and high-tech companies.

“While it is understandable to conduct necessary security scrutiny, it should not become a tool for advancing protectionism and creating new invisible barriers,” Hua said at a daily press briefing, also expressing opposition to discriminatory practices.

She called on the two countries to expand two-way opening-up so as to inject positive energy into bilateral high-level cooperation of mutual benefits and safeguard an open world economy.

Posted in China alert, FM, free trade, Germany, safeguard, spokesperson, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

20/12/2018

China says ‘resolutely opposes’ new U.S. law on Tibet

BEIJING (Reuters) – China denounced the United States on Thursday for passing a new law on restive Tibet, saying it was “resolutely opposed” to the U.S. legislation on what China considers an internal affair, and it risked causing “serious harm” to their

relations.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed into law the Reciprocal Access to Tibet Act.

The law seeks to promote access to Tibet for U.S. diplomats and other officials, journalists and other citizens by denying U.S. entry for Chinese officials deemed responsible for restricting access to Tibet.

Beijing sent troops into remote, mountainous Tibet in 1950 in what it officially terms a peaceful liberation and has ruled there with an iron fist ever since.

Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a daily briefing that the law “sent seriously wrong signals to Tibetan separatist elements”, as well as threatening to worsen bilateral ties strained by trade tension and other issues.

“If the United States implements this law, it will cause serious harm to China-U.S. relations and to the cooperation in important areas between the two countries,” Hua said.

The United States should be fully aware of the high sensitivity of the Tibet issue and should stop its interference, otherwise the United States would have to accept responsibility for the consequences, she added, without elaborating.

Rights groups say the situation for ethnic Tibetans inside what China calls the Tibet Autonomous Region remains extremely difficult. The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights said in June conditions were “fast deteriorating” in Tibet.

All foreigners need special permission to enter Tibet, which is generally granted to tourists, who are allowed to go on often tightly monitored tours, but very infrequently to foreign diplomats and journalists.

Hua said Tibet was open to foreign visitors, as shown by the 40,000 American visitors to the region since 2015.

At the same time, she said it was “absolutely necessary and understandable” that the government administered controls on the entry of foreigners given “local geographic and climate reasons”.

Tibetan rights groups have welcomed the U.S. legislation.

The International Campaign for Tibet said the “impactful and innovative” law marked a “new era of American support” and was a challenge to China’s policies in Tibet.

Third Canadian detained in China amid Huawei dispute

“The U.S. let Beijing know that its officials will face real consequences for discriminating against Americans and Tibetans and has blazed a path for other countries to follow,” the group’s president, Matteo Mecacci, said in a statement.

Next year marks the sensitive 60th anniversary of the flight into exile in India of the Dalai Lama, the highest figure in Tibetan Buddhism, after a failed uprising against Chinese rule.

China routinely denounces him as a dangerous separatist, although the Dalai Lama says he merely wants genuine autonomy for his homeland.

Posted in China alert, opposes, Tibet, Uncategorized, USA | Leave a Comment »

20/12/2018

Looking for China’s spies

The US has launched a crackdown on Chinese attempts to steal secrets.

American officials say the Chinese state is boosting its own companies.

But in the UK there’s no equivalent crackdown.

Posted in China alert, spies, Uncategorized, USA | Leave a Comment »

20/12/2018

Chinese Chamber of Commerce launched in Croatia

ZAGREB, Dec. 19 (Xinhua) — The Chinese chamber of Commerce in Croatia was launched here on Wednesday aiming to help Chinese companies doing business in Croatia and assist Croatian counterparts seek business opportunities in China.

The chamber was initiated by Norinco International, Huawei and China Road and Bridge Corporation which currently work on some of the largest projects in the country.

“This is the first time that Chinese companies have their own organization in Croatia,” said Chinese Ambassador to Croatia Hu Zhaoming at the launch ceremony.

According to Hu, only a few years ago there were only one or two Chinese companies in Croatia. In the last two years, however, the number has tripled, while Chinese investment in the country witnessed remarkable growth.

In 2017, Chinese investments in the country increased more than 100 times over the year before. Nearly 90 percent of Croats view China as a friendly country, while Chinese enterprises have positive views on the investment environment in the country and its future economy.

“Some Chinese companies are considering to set up regional offices or even European offices in Croatia,” said the ambassador.

In 2018, China Road and Bridge Corporation won the bid to construct the Peljesac bridge connecting the Croatian peninsula Peljesac with the mainland, while bypassing a short strip of the neighboring Bosnian coast that interrupts the continuity of the Croatian territory. It is the largest infrastructure project in the country in recent years, to the tune of over 400 million euros (485 million U.S. dollars).

Also this year, Norinco International signed a deal to construct a wind farm near the city of Senj, with an investment of almost 180 million euros (around 200 million U.S. dollars).

Posted in Chamber of Commerce, China alert, Croatia, launched, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

19/12/2018

Google China: Has search firm put Project Dragonfly on hold?

China, Google, Project Dragonfly
Image captionGoogle’s plans for a Chinese search engine have reportedly halted

Google has reportedly “effectively ended” plans for a censored search engine in China.

The Intercept, which revealed the existence of Project Dragonfly in August, says Google has been “forced to shut down a data analysis system it was using” to feed the project.

And access to data “integral to Dragonfly… has been suspended for now, which has stopped progress”.

Google said it had no immediate plans to launch a Chinese search engine.

A Chinese woman's face appears behind a Google logoImage copyrightGETTY IMAGES
Image captionGoogle has faced protests about the search engine it was working on for China

What is The Intercept reporting?

Citing internal Google documents and inside sources, the Intercept says Project Dragonfly began in the spring of 2017 and accelerated in December after Google’s chief executive, Sundar Pichai, met a Chinese government official,

An Android app with versions called Maotai and Longfei were developed and could be launched within nine months if Chinese government approved, it says.

Using a tool called BeaconTower to check if users’ search queries on Beijing-based website 265.com would fall foul of China’s censors, Google engineers came up with a list of thousands of banned websites, including the BBC and Wikipedia, which could then be purged from the Dragonfly search engine.

But members of Google’s privacy team confronted the Dragonfly project managers, saying the system had “been kept secret from them”.

And after several discussions, “Google engineers were told that they were no longer permitted to continue using the 265.com data to help develop Dragonfly, which has since had severe consequences for the project”.

China, Google, Project DragonflyImage copyrightREUTERS
Image captionGoogle’s Project Dragonfly is reportedly on hold in China

What are the issues with launching a search engine in China?

The so-called great firewall of China is notorious for not allowing its citizens free access to all the content available on the internet.

China has in the past two years imposed increasingly strict rules on foreign companies, including new censorship restrictions.

Some Western sites are blocked outright, including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Certain topics such as the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 are also completely blocked.

References to political opposition, dissidents and anti-Communist activity are also banned as are those to free speech and sex.

Any search engine in China would have to comply with the Chinese government’s strict rules on censorship.

Presentational grey line

Analysis

by Dave Lee, BBC North America technology reporter

Even with this news today, I don’t think Google’s ambitions in China are over – just stalled.

Sundar Pichai has clearly decided that China is too important (and lucrative) a market to pass up and so, while Dragonfly has met a significant bump in the road – thanks to its own privacy team, the company will almost certainly find a new approach to serving the Chinese market.

But in doing so it might do serious harm to its brand.

Now more than ever, US technology companies are under pressure to act in the interests of both America and Americans.

Bowing to Beijing’s demands with whatever Project Dragonfly morphs into will be a stain on Google’s principles and its reputation.

Presentational grey line

How advanced were the plans?

We learned from Mr Pichai’s recent appearance on Capitol Hill that more than 100 engineers had been working on the project at one point in time.

When quizzed by lawmakers on the plans, he said: “Right now, we have no plans to launch in China.”

He said all efforts were “internal” and did not currently involve discussions with the Chinese government.

In response to further questions, Mr Pichai said the company would be “fully transparent” with politicians if it released a search service in China.

The BBC understands Project Dragonfly never reached the point of having a full and final privacy review by Google.

A letter from more than 300 Google employees in November, co-signed by Amnesty International, asked the company to halt the project entirely.

China, Google, Project Dragonfly
Image captionGoogle’s Project Dragonfly is reportedly on hold in China

Why does Google want to get back into China?

Quite simply, China is the biggest internet market in the world.

Google launched a search engine in the authoritarian state in 2006, google.cn.

Google was compliant with the Chinese government’s censorship requirements at the time but the search company pulled the plug in 2010, citing increasing concerns about cyber-attacks on activists.

Despite its main search engine and YouTube video platform being blocked, Google still has more than 700 employees and three offices in China and has been developing alternative projects.

Its Google Translate app for smartphones was approved in China last year.

It also invested in Chinese live-stream game platform Chushou in January and has launched an artificial intelligence game on the social media app WeChat.

Posted in China alert, Google, on hold, Project Dragonfly, search firm, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

19/12/2018

China’s staggering 40 years of change in pictures

Forty years ago, China introduced major economic reforms – lifting hundreds of millions of people out of poverty and leading to it becoming the second-largest economy in the world.

Here’s the story of how China changed – in pictures.

1. Wheels and more wheels

This is what Chang’an Avenue – a major street in the capital Beijing – looked like in 1978.

Four decades on, the street looks pretty different.

Car ownership in China has soared – there are now over 300 million registered vehicles in the country – while bike ownership has dropped.

It’s a result of China’s urbanisation and economic growth – but has also come at a price.

Frequent traffic jams in many cities have led to licence plate quotas being imposed.

And the World Health Organization says more than a million people in China die every year due to air pollution.

2. Money money money

Compare a 1978 shop window…

… with one from this decade.

As China’s gross domestic product (GDP) has skyrocketed, its shopping habits have changed too.

Chinese shoppers are among the world’s highest consumers of luxury goods.

President Xi Jinping emphasised China’s economy – and how it had transformed people’s lives – during a long speech on Tuesday marking the anniversary of the economic reforms.

“Grain coupons, cloth coupons, meat coupons, fish coupons, oil coupons, tofu coupons, food ticket books, product coupons and other documents people once could not be without have now been consigned to the museum of history,” he said.

“The torments of hunger, lack of food and clothing, and the hardships which have plagued our people for thousands of years have generally gone and won’t come back.”

Image captionApple is a popular brand in China – though not as popular as Huawei

There’s even a political element to this. As Chinese consumers have grown richer, they’ve become increasingly influential.

Several companies have been forced to apologise after offending Chinese sensibilities, and while foreign brands are generally coveted in China, more and more shoppers are starting to say they prefer local brands.

It’s a sentiment that Mr Xi also touched on in his speech, when he said: “China is increasingly approaching the centre of the world stage.”

“No-one is in a position to dictate to the Chinese people what should or should not be done.”

3. Families and children

Life has changed significantly for children of the 2010s, compared to children of the 1970s.

Image captionA family enjoy tea in a park in Guangzhou, 1978

For starters, they are likely to live longer – China’s life expectancy was 66 back in 1978, and is now about 76.

They’re also more likely to have a better education – literacy rates increased from 66% in the early 1980s to 95% in 2010.

For most Chinese children in the 1970s, going on an overseas holiday would have been almost unthinkable. Today China has the world’s largest number of outbound tourists – who spend billions of dollars while abroad.

Image captionA girl celebrates the golden week national holiday with her dad in October 2018

Chinese students are now also more likely to end up studying abroad.

According to Chinese government figures, China is currently the world’s largest source of international students.

One thing hasn’t changed as much as the government would like though – the birth rate.

In 1979 – a year after starting economic reforms – the government imposed a one-child policy to try and curb population growth.

Birth rates were declining anyway – but the controversial policy was harshly enforced in some cases.

Couples who violated the policy could face punishments ranging from fines and the loss of employment to forced abortions and sterilisation.

China’s population, like those of many other developed countries, is now ageing.

In 2015, the government decided to end the one-child policy and allow couples to have two children.

There is even speculation that the policy may be relaxed further – to allow three or more children – in the near future.

But many Chinese millennials see having more children as too expensive – or a burden on their careers.

4. To market, to market

As economies change, so do people’s diets, and what they want to spend their money on.

Here’s a marketplace in the central city of Xi’an, back in 1978.

And here’s what some of Xi’an’s street markets look like now.

Many of the signs are advertising meat dishes – and statistics show meat consumption in China has risen significantly over the past few decades.

Pork, for example, used to be considered a luxury food reserved for special occasions – now, figures suggest the average Chinese person will consume about 40kg of pork per year.

Posted in Change, China alert, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

19/12/2018

How Greenland could become China’s Arctic base

A town in typical Greenland style is pictured - brightly-painted wooden walls and triangular roofs covered in snow are the main features of these sparsely dotted homes
Image captionGreenland’s capital, Nuuk, needs investment – but could it come from China?

China is flexing its muscles. As the second richest economy in the world, its businessmen and politicians are involved just about everywhere in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

Now, though, China is taking a big interest in a very different part of the world: the Arctic.

It has started calling itself a “near-Arctic” power, even though Beijing is almost 3,000km (1,800 miles) from the Arctic Circle. It has bought or commissioned several ice-breakers – including nuclear-powered ones – to carve out new routes for its goods through the Arctic ice.

And it is eyeing Greenland as a particularly useful way-station on its polar silk road.

A map is seen on a curved globe surface of the earth -Greenland is marked on the top, just a short distance from the North Pole, also marked - and China's location has two extremely large nations of Mongolia and Russia between it and the pole

Greenland is self-governing, though still nominally controlled by Denmark.

It is important strategically for the United States, which maintains a vast military base at Thule, in the far north. Both the Danes and the Americans are deeply worried that China should be showing such an interest in Greenland.

Least densely populated place on Earth

You’ve got to go there to get an idea of how enormous Greenland is.

It’s the 12th-largest territory in the world, 10 times bigger than the United Kingdom: two million square kilometres of rock and ice.

A vast frozen swathe of Greenland is seen in this aerial shot
Image captionMost of Greenland is covered in permanent ice – a vast frozen wilderness

Yet its population is minuscule at 56,000 – roughly the size of a town in England.

As a result, Greenland is the least densely populated territory on Earth. About 88% of the people are Inuit; most of the rest are ethnically Danish.

In terms of investment neither the Americans nor the Danes have put all that much money into Greenland over the years, and Nuuk, the capital, feels pretty poor. Denmark does hand over an annual subsidy to help Greenland meet its needs.

Every day, small numbers of people gather in the centre to sell things that will generate a bit of cash: cast-off clothes, children’s schoolbooks, cakes they’ve made, dried fish, reindeer-horn carvings. Some people also sell the bloody carcases of the big King Eider ducks, which Inuits are allowed to hunt but aren’t supposed to sell for profit.

China’s air power

At present you can only fly to Nuuk in small propeller-driven planes. In four years, though, that will change spectacularly.

The Greenlandic government has decided to build three big international airports capable of taking large passenger jets.

China is bidding for the contracts.

Media captionAirport officials say the planned work is a huge project – but an important one

There’ll be pressure from the Danes and Americans to ensure the Chinese bid doesn’t succeed, but that won’t stop China’s involvement in Greenland.

Interestingly, I found that opinion about the Chinese tended to divide along ethnic lines.

Danish people were worried about it, while Inuits thought it was a good idea.

The Greenlandic prime minister and foreign minister refused to speak to us about their government’s attitude to China, but a former prime minister, Kuupik Kleist, told us he thought it would be good for Greenland.

But the foreign affairs spokesman of the main Venstre party in the Danish coalition government, Michael Aastrup Jensen, was forthright about Chinese involvement in Greenland.

“We don’t want a communist dictatorship in our own backyard,” he said.

Much-needed wealth

China’s sales technique in other countries where its companies operate is to offer the kind of infrastructure they badly need: airports, roads, clean water.

The Western powers that once colonised many of them haven’t usually stepped in to help, and most of these governments are only too grateful for Chinese aid.

But it comes at a price.

Media captionThe former prime minister says someone – anyone – has to invest in Greenland

China gets access to each country’s raw materials – minerals, metals, wood, fuel, foodstuffs. Still, this doesn’t usually mean long-term jobs for local people. Large numbers of Chinese are usually brought in to do the work.

Country after country has discovered that Chinese investment helps China’s economy a great deal more than it helps them. And in some places – South Africa is one of them – there are complaints that China’s involvement tends to bring greater corruption.

But in Nuuk it’s hard to get people to focus on arguments like these.

What counts in this vast, empty, impoverished territory is the thought that big money could be on its way. Kuupik Kleist put the argument at its simplest.

“We need it, you see,” he said.

Posted in Arctic, base, China alert, Greenland, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

19/12/2018

Senior CPC official meets Turkish Justice and Development Party delegation

CHINA-BEIJING-YANG JIECHI-TURKISH DELEGATION-MEETING (CN)

Yang Jiechi(R), a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the CPC Central Committee, meets with a delegation of the Turkish ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which is led by its deputy chairman Cevdet Yilmaz, in Beijing, capital of China, on Dec. 18, 2018. (Xinhua/Ding Lin)

BEIJING, Dec. 18 (Xinhua) — Yang Jiechi, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, on Tuesday met with a delegation of the Turkish ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which was led by its deputy chairman Cevdet Yilmaz.

Yang, also director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the CPC Central Committee, said China is willing to work with the Turkish side to implement the consensus reached by the two heads of state during their sideline meeting at the G20 summit in Buenos Aires.

He said the CPC is willing to make joint efforts with the AKP to deepen the exchange on the experiences of managing the party and the country so as to promote bilateral ties.

Hailing China’s achievements since reform and opening-up 40 years ago, Yilmaz said the AKP is ready to enhance communication and exchange with the CPC to promote bilateral cooperation in fields including the economy, trade, tourism, and anti-terrorism.

Posted in China alert, CPC, delegation, Justice and Development Party, Turkey, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

19/12/2018

World experts hail China’s miracle-like achievements over 40 years

BEIJING, Dec. 18 (Xinhua) — As China celebrated the 40th anniversary of its reform and opening-up policy on Tuesday, the achievements it has made over the last four decades were hailed as a miracle.

Experts said that China’s reform and opening-up not only is a milestone in the country’s history but also holds global significance.

RIGHT PATH

Addressing a grand gathering Tuesday to celebrate the 40th anniversary, Chinese President Xi Jinping said that the past 40 years eloquently prove the correctness of the path, theory, system and culture of socialism with Chinese characteristics.

Robert Lawrence Kuhn, a leading American expert on China who was honored with China Reform Friendship Medal on Tuesday, said China’s direction is clear, that is, socialism with Chinese characteristics, the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in all areas, putting people and their well-being and happiness first, and the need to further implement and deepen reforms.

Russian Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov said the reform and opening-up policy enacted by the CPC at the third plenary session of the 11th CPC Central Committee in 1978 planned China’s development and raised China to heights unimaginable at that time.

“All the achievements that China has made is inseparable from the country’s adherence to the leadership of the CPC and taking the socialist path,” he told Xinhua in a recent interview.

Manoranjan Mohanty, former chairperson of the Institute of Chinese Studies in Delhi, said the reform and opening-up was a great revolution.

At one time it was called a “New Long March,” which has two things in common with the Long March of the Red Army – one is the determination to unite maximum popular forces and the other is to innovate a strategy of revolution, he said.

QUANTUM LEAP

Describing the reform and opening-up as “a great revolution in the history of the Chinese people and the Chinese nation,” Xi said a quantum leap has been made in the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics.

Stephen Perry, chairman of Britain’s business networking organization 48 Group Club, said China has undergone incredible transformation since its reform and opening-up in 1978 and the country is sure to achieve its long-term target.

Perry, also recipient of the China Reform Friendship Medal, said that he had seen China turning from a backward country where most of the population lived in countryside into a country where nearly 60 percent of the population now dwell in towns and cities.

During the period, China’s grain output has doubled to over 600 million tons and modern technology is being developed in various industries, Perry noted.

William Jones, Washington bureau chief of the U.S. publication Executive Intelligence Review, told Xinhua in an interview that the 40th anniversary of the reform and opening-up is extremely important and is a pivotal moment.

China has moved from a relatively impoverished country to one of the most important economic powers in the world today, Jones said.

What is done has shown that the policy that was laid out in terms of the reform and opening-up has been a resounding success, he added.

China’s reform and opening-up over the past 40 years has proven to be the “golden key” to reviving its society, said Jin Jianmin, a senior fellow at the Fujitsu Research Institute in Tokyo, believing that the ongoing process will never stop.

Shadrack Gutto, a political analyst at the University of South Africa, recalled that when talking about China 40 years ago, people would think of the “kingdom of bicycle.”

But now automobiles made by China have been exported to the world market, said Gutto, adding that both in material and spiritual terms, Chinese people’s standard of living has been significantly improved.

PROPELLING GLOBAL PROSPERITY

The 40 years of reform and opening-up has benefited both China and the world, said Jin, emphasizing that the great demand created by China’s rapid economic growth has offered opportunities to the international community.

Farooq Sobhan, president of Bangladesh Enterprise Institute, said the China International Development Cooperation Agency, along with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the New Silk Road Fund, represents the country’s “firm commitment to promote and support economic growth, both globally and regionally.”

These institutions will “benefit Bangladesh and other developing countries to meet their growing development and infrastructure requirements,” said Sobhan.

Appreciating the China-proposed concept of a community with a shared future for mankind, Mohanty believed that “people all over the world wish the people of China even greater successes in pursuing the path of equitable and sustainable development.”

(Xinhua reporters Hu Xiaoguang, Zhang Jianhua, Zhao Xu, Wang Huihui, Jin Jing, Gui Tao, Zhu Dongyang, Hu Yousong, Liu Chen, Jiang Qiaomei, Yang Ting, Jing Jing, Liu Chuntao, Yang Shilong contributed to the story)

Posted in achievement, China alert, experts, hail, miracle-like, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

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