Archive for ‘Chindia Alert’

09/11/2013

China army says roots out ‘illicit’ apartments in graft fight | Reuters

Even the PLA is not immune to anti-corruption campaign.  This means Xi and Li have a stronger grip of power than some of their recent predecessors.

China\’s People\’s Liberation Army has discovered in a corruption probe that its troops \”illicitly kept\” more than 8,000 apartments and 25,000 vehicles, state media said on Tuesday.

But those who benefitted will apparently escape punishment and only have to give them up.

President Xi Jinping, who as chairman of the Central Military Commission is also China\’s top military official, has called corruption a threat to the Communist Party\’s very survival, and vowed pursue powerful \”tigers\” as well as lowly \”flies\”.

China intensified a crackdown on rampant corruption in the military in the late 1990s, banning the PLA from engaging in business. But graft has intensified in recent years due to a lack of transparency and checks and balances.

The PLA said its probe had \”uncovered more than 8,100 apartments and more than 25,000 vehicles kept illicitly by its personnel\”, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

There was, however, no mention of punishment.

\”Various PLA units have promised to return illegal housing and eliminate secretaries that were not allowed; they have also vowed to strictly regulate the use of military vehicles,\” Xinhua said.

\”PLA units have held criticism and self-criticism meetings and submitted reports to echo a Communist Party of China drive to clean up undesirable work styles such as … bureaucracy, hedonism and extravagance.\””

via China army says roots out ‘illicit’ apartments in graft fight | Reuters.

09/11/2013

China’s Coming Terrorism Wave | China Power | The Diplomat

Prediction time: China will experience unprecedented terrorism over the next few years.

China

On October 27, a carload of Xinjiang residents made headlines by crashing into a Tiananmen Square crowd, killing two people while injuring 38. Then, on Wednesday, a series of explosions rocked the provincial Communist Party headquarters in Shanxi province, killing one person while injuring 8.

This recent uptick in political violence is not an anomaly for China, but a harbinger of terrorist violence to come.

Several long-term trends put China at risk.

China’s footprint on the world stage is growing while the United States is retrenching internationally. The recent travel schedules of Xi Jinping and Barack Obama are telling. At a time when Barack was cancelling trips to attend the APEC Summit in Indonesia, the East Asia Summit in Brunei, and his planned visits to the Philippines and Malaysia, Xi was wrapping up tours of Indonesia, Malaysia, Russia, Tanzania, South Africa, the Congo, Mexico, Costa Rica, Trinidad and Tobago, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kurdistan, and Turkmenistan. Look for Xi and he’s probably overseas. Look for Obama and he’s probably at home, wrangling with Congress.

Historically, Americans have been the preferred target of international terrorism, while China has been virtually spared. Americans have been the most popular target because of their country’s hegemonic position around the globe, which inevitably breeds mistrust, resentment, and ultimately counterbalancing. Professor Robert Pape at the University of Chicago has found that foreign meddling is highly correlated with incurring suicide terrorist campaigns. With its comparatively insular foreign policy, China has understandably elicited less passion and violence among foreign terrorists.

But the trajectories of the U.S. and China are now inverting. Reeling from its botched counterinsurgency campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States is engulfed in an unmistakable wave of isolationism. Meanwhile, China is rapidly converting its rising economic power into ever greater international leverage. This newfound orientation makes sense geopolitically, but will not come without costs.

Moving forward, China will contend with not only international terrorism, but also the domestic variety. This is because China is likely to follow (albeit belatedly) the post-Cold War Zeitgeist towards democratization. China will neither become a Jeffersonian democracy nor continue to disenfranchise political dissidents. Instead, it will inch closer to a “mixed” regime, a weak democratic state. This regime type is precisely the kind that sparks domestic political unrest. Such governments are too undemocratic to satisfy citizens, but too democratic to snuff them out.

Add to this brew globalization and the government’s critics at home and abroad will be better informed about both Chinese policy and how to mobilize against it, including violently.

via China’s Coming Terrorism Wave | China Power | The Diplomat.

08/11/2013

Why banking mints the most women CEOs in India – Economic Times

As Arundhati Bhattacharya gets set to take charge as the chairperson of the country\’s largest bank State Bank of India (SBI), she looks likely to join the steadily expanding club of women currently holding the top job in Indian banks.

Bhattacharya will be the latest entrant, joining the likes of Chanda Kochhar, MD and CEO of ICICI Bank; Shikha Sharma, MD and CEO, Axis Bank; Naina Lal Kidwai, country head, HSBC; Kaku Nakhate, president and country head (India), Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Vijayalakshmi Iyer, CMD, Bank of India; Archana Bhargava, CMD, United Bank of India and Shubhalakshmi Panse, CMD of Allahabad Bank.

via Why banking mints the most women CEOs in India – Economic Times.

08/11/2013

Chinese Back to Buying Japanese Cars as Territorial Tensions Ease – Businessweek

A year ago, Honda Motor (HMC) salesman Liu Hao had one of China’s most hopeless jobs: persuading local consumers to purchase Japanese cars. After a territorial dispute over uninhabited islands in the East China Sea flared up in late summer of 2012, Chinese protesters took to the streets to denounce their Asian neighbor, overturning Japanese autos and attacking Japanese factories and restaurants. The unrest had a chilling effect on Japanese auto sales in China. Amid angry talk of boycotts, Honda sales fell more than 50 percent in October of last year and continued to drop well into 2013.

Burned cars at a Toyota dealership after they were set on fire by anti-Japan protesters in Qingdao, China, in November 2012

Today the two nations are still arguing about the islands, controlled by Japan and claimed by China, but tensions have eased, and customers are in the mood to buy Japanese products again. On a recent November afternoon, about 20 people crowded into a Honda showroom in central Beijing, checking out the new Jade sedan, launched in September for the Chinese market. Local buyers “trust the good reputation and engine of Honda,” says salesman Liu, 31. Besides, he says, fighting between China and Japan “would destroy the world, so there won’t actually be a war.”

Honda’s sales in China jumped 212 percent in October from the same period the year before, following a 118 percent increase in September. One potential customer is Mr. Song, a 28-year-old banker who won’t give his full name. He’s buying a Honda Civic and isn’t worried that a revival of anti-Japanese sentiment might endanger his vehicle. Given public revulsion at official corruption reported by the state media, he says, drivers of cars with government license tags “should be more worried about citizen anger and the danger of having cars smashed” than Honda drivers in Beijing.

via Chinese Back to Buying Japanese Cars as Territorial Tensions Ease – Businessweek.

08/11/2013

India negotiating to bring back stolen antiques: ASI – India Insight: Reuters

India plans to step up its efforts to bring back Indian artefacts from other countries after the recent repatriation of a 10th century “Yogini” stone sculpture from Paris.

Illegal trade in paintings, sculptures and other artefacts is one of the world’s most profitable criminal enterprises, estimated at $6 billion a year, according to Global Financial Integrity, a Washington-based advocacy group. India is one of the biggest targets for smugglers, who ship stolen antiques and other culturally important artefacts abroad to sell to art dealers and museums.

India Insight spoke to R.S. Fonia, Director (Antiquity) at the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), about the black market for Indian artefacts and what the ASI is doing to bring Indian antiques back home. This interview has been lightly edited.

Are you seeing an increase or decrease in smuggling of Indian artefacts?

Awareness has increased about the antiquities, so it has decreased. Certainly there is decline of smuggling.

How big is the market for smuggled Indian artefacts?

We don’t have figures.

What initiatives are you taking to bring back Indian artefacts from abroad?

We are trying hard. That’s why we have retrieved 16-17 artefacts from abroad. We are directly interacting with all concerned agencies, but it takes some time. There are so many processes involved.

via India Insight.

08/11/2013

China to loan Pacific island nations $1 billion | Reuters

Having woo-ed all the large countries, China is now wooing the smaller ones too.  See – https://chindia-alert.org/2012/12/31/question-who-did-china-woo-in-2012/ (We have been tracking China’s wooing in 2013 and will post the list in early 2014).

“China will provide a concessionary loan of up to $1 billion to Pacific island nations to support construction projects, state media on Friday cited Vice Premier Wang Yang as saying, a part of the world where Beijing and Taiwan compete for influence.

Political map of Oceania

Political map of Oceania (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Wang made the announcement at a forum with Pacific island nations in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, the official Xinhua news agency reported. It provided no other details on the loan.

China will also build medical facilities in the region and send medical teams as well as invest in green energy projects, Xinhua cited Wang as saying.

The meeting was attended by representatives from Micronesia, Samoa, Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, the Cook Islands, Tonga, Niue and Fiji, the news agency added.

The Pacific has traditionally been a site of competition for diplomatic recognition between China and Taiwan, the self-ruled island China claims as its own.

In the region, Taiwan maintains formal ties with Kiribati, Nauru, Palau, the Marshall Islands, the Solomon Islands and Tuvalu. Taiwan has also supported development projects and provided loans.

However, China and Taiwan have maintained an unofficial diplomatic truce and not tried to court each other\’s allies in the developing world since they signed a series of landmark trade and economic deals in 2008, ushering in improved ties.”

via China to loan Pacific island nations $1 billion | Reuters.

08/11/2013

China to build huge super nuclear bomber carrying over 200 nuclear bombs

Another innovation in military hardware. See:

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06/11/2013

Japan targets China as islands dispute threatens to boil over

Oh dear, brinkmanship often turns out to trigger real conflict. Hope this one doesn’t.

06/11/2013

Interview – Jairam Ramesh: Narendra Modi has marginalized his own party – India Insight – Reuters

Jairam Ramesh, the rural development minister in the Congress-led government, told Reuters on Tuesday that Narendra Modi’s career reminded him of the rise of the Third Reich, the strongest comments yet by a minister of his rank on the Bharatiya Janata Party leader.

(Click here for main story)

Here are the edited excerpts from the interview:

Where do you feel public sentiment is at the moment?

If you look at the social media, the sentiment is in one way. If you travel like the way I do to remote parts of the country where social media footprint is very very inconspicuous, the sentiment is some other way. We are going through the noise phase of the election campaign … Sentiments change, by the way; there is no such thing like a permanent sentiment.

The Modi campaign has got a lot of momentum and the perception is that the Congress campaign lacks that momentum.

Modi-entum, not momentum. The BJP is a master of hype. I have seen them now for 20 years closely and they are the world’s greatest experts at hype. And very soon they come down to earth because they begin to take their hype very seriously. When you start believing that hype, then you run into serious trouble. This is what happened to the BJP in the past. India Shining was a good example of that hype.

I think a time will come when Mr Modi will begin to get judged differently. But India right now in 2013, I would say, we are going through what Germany went through in 1932. The classic symptoms, I am beginning to read all my old books about how the Third Reich came into being, how fascism overtook parts of Europe. Because, look at Mr Modi’s — what are the three principles of his ideology? Political autocracy, social divisiveness and economic liberalism. This is sort of Mr Modi reduced to three dimensions, the 3D Mr Modi. This is exactly what created the autobahns and Volkswagens in the 30s but also created the disaster of Germany.

Don’t you think it’s a bit over-the-top to compare Modi to Hitler?

It’s not. It’s certainly not. I didn’t compare him to Hitler, by the way. I never took the word Hitler anywhere. Mr Modi has demonstrated in 12 years that he’s been in power. He runs a one-man show in Gujarat. It’s a one-man political party. He has marginalized not only us, he’s also marginalized his own party. Yes, he is industry friendly. But whether he is crony-friendly or market-friendly, I don’t know. Mr Modi has demonstrated a singular incapacity to abide by rules.

via India Insight.

06/11/2013

Blasts at China regional Communist Party office kill one – BBC News

A series of small blasts have killed at least one person outside a provincial office of the ruling Communist Party in northern China, state media report.

The blasts in Taiyuan in Shanxi province appeared to have been caused by home-made bombs, Xinhua reported.

It said eight people had been injured and two cars damaged.

Photos posted on social media showed smoke and several fire engines at the scene of the incident, which happened around 07:40 local time (23:40 GMT).

No immediate explanation has been given for the incident. There have been occasions in the past where disgruntled citizens have targeted local government institutions.

They do not often make the headlines but explosions in China\’s cities are not unheard of. Earlier this year, in another part of Shanxi Province, Chinese media reported that a bomb exploded outside the house of a local law official, killing his daughter. The culprit was a pensioner enraged by a court ruling against him.

Last year the BBC reported on a suicide bombing in Shandong, carried out by a disabled man upset by lack of compensation for an industrial accident. Every year there are examples of attacks with crude weapons or explosives, carried out by the desperate, the dispossessed and the disturbed, usually triggered by a dispute with some arm of local government or a local official.

It\’s too early to say whether the explosions on Wednesday follow the same pattern. But some details will worry the authorities: the ball bearings apparently placed inside the bombs, increasing their destructive power; the fact that witnesses reported several explosions over a period of time. And the bombs were placed outside the local Communist Party headquarters – was the party itself the target, or was this just the product of a local dispute?

The authorities will especially be nervous after last week\’s apparent suicide attack outside the gates of the Forbidden City, especially as the capital also prepares to host a meeting of China\’s Communist Party elite on Saturday.

Tensions are also high in the wake of last week\’s incident in Beijing. A car ploughed into a crowd in Tiananmen Square in what the authorities said was a terrorist attack incited by extremists from the western region of Xinjiang.

Later this week, the Communist Party\’s top officials will meet in Beijing to start a major economic planning meeting.

via BBC News – Blasts at China regional Communist Party office kill one.

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