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Experts win reprieve for two out of three heritage houses but fear their success is only temporary
Authorities plan public cultural facilities for the site
The historic buildings on Shanghai’s Bund in the 1930s. One of the three structures has already been demolished but authorities have temporarily suspended plans to knock down the other two. Photo: Handout
Two historic buildings on Shanghai’s famous Bund have temporarily escaped demolition after a group of experts appealed to the government to conserve the heritage sites, but the intervention was too late to save a third.
About 15 architecture, history and culture experts based in Shanghai banded together to write an article on social media app WeChat last month, calling on the city’s government to “protect the city’s memories” by preserving three houses on Huangpu Road.
A few days after the article was published one of the buildings was demolished as part of a plan to build public cultural facilities on the site. But authorities suspended work on the other two and are considering removing only the interior structure while preserving the external walls, according to the group.
The houses, which date back to 1902, witnessed the city’s boom in the first half of the 20th century when it became one of the world’s most important, and famous, ports, the experts said.
The demolition project on The Bund, Shanghai has been suspended, but not before one of the three historic buildings was demolished. Photo: Urban China magazine
All three of the properties originally belonged to Japanese shipping company Nippon Yusen Kaisha Group and were later used as storage facilities for Japan’s military forces during the second world war, according to Yu Hai, a sociologist from Shanghai’s Fudan University.
“These buildings, along with the nearby Yangzijiang port on the Huangpu River, represented Shanghai’s wharf culture and port culture,” Yu said. “They are historically significant as they witnessed Shanghai grow prosperous through shipping and trade industries about a century ago.”
Although the two remaining buildings are safe for now, the experts argue their interiors are also worth preserving.
Liu Gang, an architecture professor at Shanghai’s Tongji University, said the properties featured big wooden beams supported by black iron pillars, which were prominent architectural features of industrial buildings dating back to the 19th century.
“We guess it was hard to move these giant beams with vehicles at the beginning of the 20th century. Quite possibly they were transported on the river. We guess that the wood was chopped down and processed in places across the Pacific [from North America] and shipped to Shanghai.”
In the WeChat article, Liu called for the protection of the interior structure of the buildings. “Without solid research, we cannot simply take them down to be replaced by new ones.”
Yu agreed, saying: “The building with a new inside structure would be a fake and this plan will destroy historical heritage.”
Experts say the interiors of the historic buildings are also worth preserving. Photo: Urban China magazine
Huangpu Road, where these houses sit, is rich with history. It features the Garden Bridge of Shanghai – the city’s first steel bridge, built in 1907 – and was once home to the consulates of the United States, Russia, Japan, Germany, Denmark and the Austro-Hungarian empire.
Other notable landmarks on the road include the Astor House Hotel, built in 1846, where Charlie Chaplin, Albert Einstein and George Bernard Shaw stayed in the 1920s and 1930s. The hotel is still there.
“History happened here,” Yu said. “But it’s a pity that most of the old buildings in this area no longer exist.”
Despite their success in winning a stay of execution for the two buildings, the experts are cautious in their expectations.
“The demolition work was suspended, but that does not mean they have accepted our proposals. We are not optimistic,” Yu said.
About two weeks ago as part of their effort to save the buildings, Yu and three other scholars approached officials from Shanghai’s Planning and Natural Resources Bureau, the government body behind the demolition project.
“Officials emphasised the difficulties of keeping the completeness of the old buildings and we just pointed out the damage to their historical values,” Yu said.
The Shanghai bureau did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
Shanghai nightclub king opens new art space – in disused oil tanks
Appeals by the public to conserve historical buildings have generally not been successful. Shenyuli, a typical Shanghai residential community built in the 1930s, was included in the city’s protected list of historical buildings in 2004.
The listing was not enough to prevent its demolition eight years later to make way for a public green land space.
Three years ago, the Shanghai government announced it was suspending the planned demolition of a former sex slavery station used by Japanese soldiers during the second world war, following media reports and a public outcry.
However, the building was later demolished, according to Su Zhiliang, history professor from Shanghai Normal University and a researcher on sex slavery, who predicts a similar outcome for this latest conservation effort.
“I think the government is just using the same tactic to postpone their plan. After the public’s attention is over, they will continue demolishing,” Su said.
BEIJING (Reuters) – Major European Union countries want to deal with China as a group rather than sign bilateral agreements as individual states, German Economy Minister Peter Altmaier said on Friday, attending a summit in Beijing on China’s Belt and Road plan.
European countries have generally signalled their willingness to participate in China’s programme to re-create the old Silk Road joining China with Asia and Europe.
But key states like France and Germany have said China must in turn improve access and fair competition for foreign firms.
Italy in March became the first major Western government to back China’s initiative, even as some EU leaders cautioned Rome against rushing into the arms of Beijing.
Nonetheless, Altmaier said Germany, France, Spain and the United Kingdom had shown at the Belt and Road Forum in Beijing on Friday that the EU was “in its great majority” united in its belief that “we can only implement our positions together.”
“In the big EU states we have agreed that we don’t want to sign any bilateral memorandums but together make necessary arrangements between the greater European Economic Area and the economic area of Greater China,” Altmaier said when asked if he could see Germany signing a similar bilateral agreement to Italy.
A spokesman for Altmaier’s office later said he was talking about general arrangements and not specifically the Belt and Road.
The minister said he was encouraged by Chinese President Xi Jinping’s pledge to pursue free trade, multilateralism and sustainability as part of Belt and Road.
“We will take this promise seriously” and make suggestions on how to achieve these goals in both Asia and Europe, he said.
China is a partner and a competitor at the same time and the EU must define its interests, Altmaier said.
“And for that we need an industry strategy. For that we need our own connectivity strategy,” he added.
When recycling businesses gravitated to Malaysia, a black economy went with them
Some countries treat China’s ban as an opportunity and have been quick to adapt
For years, China was the world’s leading destination for recyclable rubbish, but a ban on some imports has left nations scrambling to find dumping grounds for growing piles of waste. Photo: AFP
From grubby packaging that engulfs small Southeast Asian communities to waste that piles up in plants from the US to Australia, China’s ban on accepting the world’s used plastic has thrown recycling efforts into turmoil.
For many years, China took the bulk of scrap plastic from around the world, processing much of it into a higher quality material that could be used by manufacturers.
But, at the start of 2018, it closed its doors to almost all foreign plastic waste, as well as many other recyclables, in an effort to protect its environment and air quality, leaving developed nations struggling to find places to send their waste.
“It was like an earthquake,” Arnaud Brunet, director general of Brussels-based industry group The Bureau of International Recycling, said.
“China was the biggest market for recyclables. It created a major shock in the global market.”
Instead, plastic was redirected in huge quantities to Southeast Asia, where Chinese recyclers have shifted.
With a large Chinese-speaking minority, Malaysia was a top choice for Chinese recyclers looking to relocate, and official data showed plastic imports tripled from 2016 levels to 870,000 tonnes last year.
China to collect applications for scrap metal import licences from next month, trade group says
In the small town of Jenjarom, close to Kuala Lumpur, plastic processing plants appeared in large numbers, pumping out noxious fumes around the clock.
Huge mounds of plastic waste, dumped in the open, piled up as recyclers struggled to cope with the influx of packaging from everyday goods, such as foods and laundry detergents, from as far afield as Germany, the US, and Brazil.
Residents soon noticed the acrid stench over the town – the kind of odour that is usual in processing plastic, but environmental campaigners believed some of the fumes also came from the incineration of plastic waste that was too low quality to recycle.
“People were attacked by toxic fumes, waking them up at night. Many were coughing a lot,” resident Pua Lay Peng said.
“I could not sleep, I could not rest, I always felt fatigued,” the 47-year-old added.
Representatives of an environmentalist NGO inspect an abandoned plastic waste factory in Jenjarom, outside Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. Photo: AFP
Pua and other community members began investigating and, by mid-2018, had located about 40 processing plants, many of which appeared to be operating without proper permits.
Initial complaints to authorities went nowhere but they kept up pressure, and eventually the government took action. Authorities started closing down illegal factories in Jenjarom, and announced a nationwide temporary freeze on plastic import permits.
Thirty-three factories were closed down, although activists believed many had quietly moved elsewhere in the country. Residents said air quality had improved but some plastic dumps remained.
Chinese recycling expert breeds thousands of flies to turn kitchen waste into cash
In Australia, Europe and the US, many of those collecting plastic and other recyclables were left scrambling to find new places to send it.
They faced higher costs to have it processed by recyclers at home and in some cases resorted to sending it to landfill sites as the scrap piled up so quickly.
“Twelve months on, we are still feeling the effects but we have not moved to the solutions yet,” said Garth Lamb, president of industry body Waste Management and Resource Recovery Association of Australia.
Some have been quicker to adapt to the new environment, such as some local authority-run centres that collect recyclables in Adelaide, South Australia.
The centres used to send nearly everything – ranging from plastic to paper and glass – to China but now 80 per cent is processed by local companies, with most of the rest shipped to India.
Rubbish is sifted and sorted at Northern Adelaide Waste Management Authority’s recycling site at Edinburgh, a northern suburb of the city of Adelaide. Photo: AFP
“We moved quickly and looked to domestic markets,” Adam Faulkner, chief executive of the Northern Adelaide Waste Management Authority, said.
“We’ve found that by supporting local manufacturers, we’ve been able to get back to pre-China ban prices.”
In mainland China, imports of plastic waste dropped from 600,000 tonnes per month in 2016 to about 30,000 a month in 2018, according to data cited in a recent report from Greenpeace and environmental NGO Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives.
Once bustling centres of recycling were abandoned as firms shifted to Southeast Asia.
How China’s plastic waste ban has left Japan to deal with mountains of trash
On a visit to the southern town of Xingtan last year, Chen Liwen, founder of environmental NGO China Zero Waste Alliance, found the recycling industry had disappeared.
“The plastic recyclers were gone – there were ‘for rent’ signs plastered on factory doors and even recruitment signs calling for experienced recyclers to move to Vietnam,” she said.
Southeast Asian nations affected early by the China ban – as well as Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam were hit hard – have taken steps to limit plastic imports, but the waste has simply been redirected to other countries without restrictions, such as Indonesia and Turkey, the Greenpeace report said.
With only an estimated nine per cent of plastics ever produced recycled, campaigners said the only long-term solution to the plastic waste crisis was for companies to make less and consumers to use less.
Greenpeace campaigner Kate Lin said: “The only solution to plastic pollution is producing less plastic.”
In European countries outside the EU, investment also dropped in 2018.
What and where is China investing?
A large proportion of Chinese direct investment, both state and private, is concentrated in the major economies, such as the UK, France and Germany combined, according to the Rhodium Group and Mercator Institute.
Analysis by Bloomberg last year said that China now owned, or had a stake in, four airports, six maritime ports and 13 professional soccer teams in Europe.
It estimated there had been 45% more investment activity in 30 European countries from China than from the US, since 2008.
And it said this was underestimating the true extent of Chinese activity.
For example, China is financing the expansion of the port of Piraeus in Greece and is building roads and railways in Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia-Herzegovina and North Macedonia.
This could prove attractive to poorer Balkan and southern European countries, especially as demands for transparency and good governance can make EU funding appear less attractive.
Globally, China’s outward direct investment has slowed over the last year or two, after more than a decade of expansion.
“This is mainly the result of stricter controls on capital outflows from China, but also of a changing political environment globally concerning Chinese investment,” says Agatha Kratz of the Rhodium Group.
China’s global investment slows
The Trump administration is taking a tougher line towards China’s economic activities.
Governments elsewhere are more cautious – particularly when it comes to investment in sensitive areas of the economy, such as telecommunications and defence.
But there’s little doubt China is now a significant player in Europe, whether through direct investments or via the new Silk Road project.
China’s Ambassador to the UK Liu Xiaoming cites ‘rule-making’ as an area for bilateral cooperation with the UK
Chinese Ambassador to the UK Liu Xiaoming gives a keynote speech during the ‘Chinese Bridge’ Chinese Proficiency Competition for Foreign College Students UK Regional Final in London. Photo: Xinhua
China has asked Britain for help to offset claims its “Belt and Road Initiative” investments are opaque and justify its overseas spending to critics.
It made the move days before UK Chancellor Phillip Hammond was expected to head to the belt and road forum in Beijing.
In an article in London’s Evening Standard on Wednesday, China’s Ambassador to the UK Liu Xiaoming cited “rule-making” as an area for bilateral cooperation.
“Britain has played a leading role in the establishment and management of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank,” Liu said. “In [belt and road] development, Britain could have a big role to play in ensuring that the projects are of higher quality, at a higher standard, with higher return.”
Four years ago the UK defied the US and joined the AIIB.
Liu’s comments followed news the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) was asked to join a new initiative aimed at improving China’s international accounting and transparency standards.
China is thought to see DFID as a model for its new aid outfit, China International Development Cooperation Agency (CIDCA), which was established last year to oversee Beijing’s foreign aid.
Britain’s Chancellor of the Exchequer Phillip Hammond. Photo: EPA-EFE
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The DFID was the third most transparent donor in the world after the Asian Development Bank and UNDP, according to the aid data-crunching website Publish What You Find. China was the least.
Critics say part of the problem is Beijing prefers to deliver loans and other investments through local elites. There are also often several government departments involved, each directed by their own rules and priorities, making financial reporting more complex.
“I think the Chinese are instead playing by a different set of rules, not all of them in conflict with the West’s … but most definitely not fully aligned with what the West wants or expects”, said Eric Olander, managing editor of Shanghai-based The China Africa Project. “Therefore, I would not expect to see the kind of meaningful change in its accounting and financial standards in the near term.”
‘Cooperate or stop criticising’, China’s foreign minister Wang Yi says as belt and road summit nears
The MOU proposed by China is more a statement of intent than a plan of action but the UK welcomed it as a positive sign
“China’s proposal to set up a ‘Multilateral Cooperation Centre for Development Finance’ has real potential to ensure its huge investments in developing countries meet the key international standards that matter to all of us – on debt, transparency, environment and social safeguards,” UK International Development Secretary Penny Mordaunt said at the World Bank Spring Meeting recently.
A source at DFID told the SCMP that the UK has not signed the MOU yet but said while other countries are aware of the proposal, it is the only country so far to be formally invited to participate by China.
France and Germany were two possible future signatories, and MCCDF has been discussed in EU member state meetings in Beijing.
“[China] is clearly frustrated that it feels misunderstood by the international community,” said Olander.
“I have attended one seminar after another where African stakeholders ask the Chinese for more transparency and the Chinese respond with a sympathetic smile that says ‘I’d love to but I’m not sure how we can do that given our political culture and the current political realities’.”
With the Chinese economy slowing at home and the losses abroad in places like Venezuela starting to mount, there are indications that the Chinese policy banks are becoming far more risk-averse in places like Africa and the Americas.
Even so according to figures released on Thursday, the Export Import Bank of China provided more than a trillion yuan (US$149 billion) to more than 1,800 Belt and Road projects since 2013. China Development Bank (CDB) said in March it had provided US$190 billion in the same period.
“The UK is very concerned by rising debt levels, particularly in emerging market economies and in low-income countries,” Mordaut told the World Bank.
“Unsustainable debt levels are a real risk that can undermine or reverse development gains.”
The IMF said recently 24 out of 60 of the poorest countries are either in debt distress or at a high risk of falling into it.
China is also looking to the UK to help manage the BRI projects and organise part of the financing, something the City of London and the government are keen to do, Liu said.
Describing it as “third-party involvement in BRI development” he said: “The UK, with its unique strengths in professional services, project-management and financing, could tap into this potential.”
China is keen for the UK to sign a BRI MOU like Italy, and soon Switzerland, but so far it has resisted. A report released earlier this month by the parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee called for a rebranding of the “golden era” started by the former chancellor George Osborne, now the editor of the London Evening Standard.
Britain is keen to cement closer ties with Beijing as the world’s fifth largest economy looks to reinvent itself as a global trading nation if and when it leaves the European Union.
BEIJING, April 8 (Xinhua) — China on Monday voiced its support for multilateralism after France and Germany jointly proposed an “Alliance for Multilateralism” during a recent session at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC).
French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian and his German counterpart Heiko Maas intended to officially launch the Alliance during the 74th session of the UN General Assembly scheduled for September.
“China has always staunchly upheld, supported and practiced multilateralism,” spokesperson Lu Kang said at a press briefing while commenting on the proposed Alliance, adding that China supports the efforts of the international community including France and Germany in maintaining multilateralism.
Lu said China stands ready to work with all parties in preserving the international order and regime with the purposes and principles of the UN Charter at its core, and the rule-based multilateral trade regime with the World Trade Organization (WTO) at its core, with a commitment to multilateralism.
Against the backdrop of a surging trend toward economic globalization and multi-polarization as well as a constant increase in global challenges, the world needs multilateralism more than ever before, the spokesperson said.
Speaking of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s remarks at a forum on global governance attended by French, German and EU leaders during Xi’s recently-concluded European visit, Lu mentioned Xi’s advocacy for safeguarding multilateralism, enhancing international dialogue and cooperation, and jointly addressing the deficits in governance, trust, peace and development, so as to improve global governance.
“China is ready to work with all parties in facilitating a new type of international relations featuring mutual respect, fairness, justice and win-win cooperation, to jointly build a community of shared future for mankind,” Lu added.
BRUSSELS, April 6 (Xinhua) — China-European Union (EU) relations in tourism get a boost as the 2018 EU-China Tourism Year has scored a success, an official recently said.
During the tourism year, China and the EU held more than 100 promotional activities. It “has been extremely successful,” said Eduardo Santander, executive director of the European Travel Commission (ETC).
There was a 5.1-percent year-on-year increase in Chinese arrivals in EU destinations in 2018, and among the top ones in terms of the volume of Chinese arrivals were Britain, Germany and France, according to the latest figures from the ETC and the air travel analysis agency ForwardKeys.
“We continue to see the benefits in 2019,” Santander added. “The growth in Chinese travellers has been solid, and the near future, judging by current bookings, will see the EU continuing to increase its share of this valuable market, not just to traditional destinations, but lesser-known and emerging ones as well.”
Chinese bookings to the EU for the first four months of 2019 are 16.9 percent ahead of where they were at the end of 2017, said the ETC, adding that this compares very favorably to the global trend, which is 9.3 percent ahead.
According to a recent report by China Tourism Academy and China’s online travel agency Ctrip, 70 percent of Chinese tourists in 2018 chose “package tours” when traveling in Europe, due to language, visa, culture and other factors.
Nevertheless, the proportion of independent and customized travel continues to rise. In 2018, the demand for customized European tours booked by the travel website increased by 127 percent over the past year, far higher than the growth rate of the overall market, said the report.
In addition, a number of new routes were launched between China and Europe in 2018, including direct flights from Fuzhou to Moscow, Changsha to London, Jinan to Paris, and Shenzhen to Brussels. In 2018, there were more than 600 flights a week between China and Europe, according to the report.
Ctrip in 2018 forecast that consumption of each tourist in Europe will exceed 25,000 yuan (about 3,721 U.S. dollars) in two years, with the total annual consumption to reach 150 billion yuan (about 22.3 billion dollars).
“Our findings confirm what a concerted effort to boost tourism can achieve. It also appears to have lasting effects, as we can see in the forward booking figures,” said Olivier Jager, CEO of ForwardKeys.
China’s domestic travel agencies are also deepening the cooperation with Europe. For example, the SkyScanner, Ctrip’s online travel search platform, set up its first overseas calling service center in Edinburgh in April 2018.
Deputy prime minister Yannis Dragasakis hopes ‘logic will prevail’ ahead of EU-China summit
Affirms Greek support for Beijing’s belt and road plan for global trade
Greece’s deputy prime minister Yannis Dragasakis says the European Union’s suspicion about China is in danger of becoming a “self-fulfilling prophecy”. Photo: Alamy
The deputy prime minister of Greece has warned that European Union suspicion of China is in danger of becoming a “self-fulfilling prophecy” while reaffirming his country’s support for Beijing’s controversial “Belt and Road Initiative”.
In an exclusive interview with theSouth China Morning Post in Athens on Monday, Yannis Dragasakis said he hoped logic would prevail in the EU’s relationship with the world’s second-largest economy.
“We would like to see the EU having good relations with China,” he said.
“Seriously, we should start [the discussion about China] from the opposite end, which is, what are the needs and problems that we can work on with China?”
Dragasakis was speaking ahead of the annual summit between the EU and China in Brussels on Wednesday, which this year will take place against a backdrop of suspicion among some EU countries over Beijing’s political and commercial ambitions in the region.
Europe has been divided over whether to work with China’s enormous belt and road plan, which aims to link China by sea and land with southeast and central Asia, the Middle East, Europe and Africa, through an infrastructure network along the lines of the old Silk Road.
Italy becomes first G7 nation to sign up for China’s belt and road plan
Washington has criticised the scheme as a “vanity project”, and the EU looks set to refer to China as a “strategic rival”, with some European leaders fearing Beijing’s diplomatic manoeuvres could derail unity among member states.
Last month Italy, which is grappling with its third recession in a decade, became the first G7 nation to join the belt and road programme, in a bid to boost exports and upgrade its port facilities.
Last year Greece – ranked second lowest in economic competitiveness within the EU by the World Economic Forum in 2018 – signed up to the scheme, after years of relying on China to help it through its own financial crisis.
Chinese state-owned shipping company Cosco bought a 51 per cent stake in Pireaus Port, Greece’s most important infrastructure hub in 2016 with an option to buy another 16 per cent after five years.
China aims to make the port the “dragon head” of its belt and road programme, serving as a gateway for its cargo to Europe and North Africa.
Will Greece be China’s bridge to the rest of Europe?
With its warming relationship with Beijing, Athens has, at times, departed from EU positions on China.
In 2016, Greece helped stop the EU from issuing a unified statement against Chinese aggression in the South China Sea. The following year, Athens stopped the bloc from condemning China’s human rights record. Days later, it opposed tougher screening on China’s investments in Europe.
Dragasakis was clear that the EU should not devise any policies that may hinder Greece’s ability to revive its economy.
“Greece badly needs investment. We hope logic will prevail at the end of the day, which means we should take advantage of all opportunities and build on these prospects to further our collaboration,” he said.
“Greece will keep following a multidimensional policy, an inclusive policy, without excluding anyone.”
Dragasakis hit back at France and Germany for treating China as a geopolitical rival, while simultaneously signing up to trade agreements with Beijing.
Days before receiving Chinese President Xi Jinping in France last month, President Emmanuel Macron declared that the “time of European naivety” towards China was over – a remark the Greek deputy prime minister described as “interesting” during the interview.
“It’s so interesting, yes. Mr Macron, despite his statement, actually signed very large-scale agreements with China,” he said, adding: “Germany, the same”.
French President Emmanuel Macron welcomes Chinese President Xi Jinping to the Elysee Palace in Paris last month. Photo: AFP
Macron invited German Chancellor Angela Merkel and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker to his meeting in Paris with Xi, where the four sought to reassure each other over economic cooperation between the European trading bloc and China.
Dragasakis said Greece’s relations with China were based on “very solid ground” with the two countries sharing complementary interests, particularly through the belt and road plan.
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras is understood to be considering joining Foreign Minister George Katrougalos at the belt and road summit in Beijing, which will be hosted by Xi later this month.
More than 40 heads of state are expected to attend the summit, with China’s foreign ministry recently saying that Europe had started to see the value of the scheme.
If confirmed, Tsipras’ presence at the summit will be interpreted as an attempt by Greece to consolidate Chinese support in the wake of Italy’s joining of the scheme.
He will also need to mend ties with Beijing, following a recent decision by Greece’s archaeological body to block a plan by Cosco to upgrade facilities at the Piraeus port, throwing the future of the multimillion euro privatisation deal into uncertainty.
Portugal’s support for China’s belt and road plan ‘bad news’ for EU
Dragasakis said there were strong prospects for the future relationship between Greece and China because of the two countries’ reciprocal interest.
Relations with other Asian countries, while not yet as close as Greek ties with China, would continue to be developed, he said.
Dragasakis said Athens would not adopt discriminatory policies against any country as it looked to shore up foreign investments to boost its economy.
India, for instance, has set its sights on Greece as a potential business partner, with President Ram Nath Kovind becoming its first titular head of state to visit Greece last year.
“Relations with India are lagging behind – they are not at the same level as with China, but of course we are mulling further developments with India,” Dragasakis said, adding that Greece would also work more closely with Japan, South Korea and Vietnam.
EU leaders hold out olive branch to China over belt and road
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China’s Chang’e-4 lunar exploration mission was the first one to land on the far side of the moon – the side that’s not visible from earth – on January 3.
INDIAUpdated: Mar 11, 2019 13:47 IST
Sutirtho Patranobis
Hindustan Times, Beijing
The top space agencies – the China National Space Administration (CNSA) and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) – confirmed the information but did not share details why the cooperation failed to take off.(Corbis via Getty Images)
A rare opportunity for India and China to cooperate in a high-profile space mission fell through after the two countries disagreed on the nature of the Indian payload to be carried on the Chang’e-4 lunar mission, it has emerged.
China’s Chang’e-4 lunar exploration mission was the first one to land on the far side of the moon – the side that’s not visible from earth – on January 3. Since landing, the mission has sent back stunning first-time images from the moon’s surface. It has been carrying out a series of scientific research tasks involving multiple countries and organisations.
China’s lunar exploration chief Wu Weiren called the mission a “huge stride” for China.
It could have been a breakthrough stride for Sino-India cooperation in space – both countries have successful space programs – as well had Chang’e-4 carried the Indian payload.
The top space agencies – the China National Space Administration (CNSA) and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) – confirmed the information but did not share details why the cooperation failed to take off.
“In April 2015, Xu Dazhe, the incumbent administrator of CNSA wrote a letter to the heads of the world’s major space agencies, invited them to participate in the piggy-back cooperation of Chang’ e-4 mission, which received positive responses from more than a dozen national space agencies,” the Chinese agency told HT over email.
“China also received applications from India for the piggy-back cooperation. However, due to the different nature of the missions of the two sides, the Indian payload on Chang’ e-4 could not be carried through (after) the evaluation,” the agency said.
The payload in this context could have been a satellite or space probe equipment.
“No, we will not be able to comment on that … Yes, we will not comment on that,” an ISRO spokesperson said.
Several countries including Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, and Russia have cooperated in the ongoing mission.
India and China formally established the Sino-Indian Joint Committee on Space Cooperation in 2015. In the same year, the first meeting of the joint committee was held in Beijing, and the outline of Sino-Indian space cooperation was signed.
“The outline includes 19 projects in seven areas: Remote sensing satellites, space-based meteorology, space science and lunar and deep space exploration, education and training, piggy-back launch services, satellite navigation, and space components,” CNSA said.
“The MoUs signed have provided a platform (for the two countries) to work but there is nothing as of now; all at dialogue stage. There are international forums where they are there and we are there but nothing (bilateral),” ISRO’s spokesperson said.
Last year, the then Indian ambassador to China Gautam Bambawale visited CNSA twice in half a year and exchanged views with Zhang Kejian, the CNSA head, on promoting Sino-Indian space cooperation.
“The two sides reviewed the course of Sino-Indian space cooperation in recent years, agreed to further promote the process of Sino-Indian space cooperation with an active and open attitude of cooperation, and agreed to convene the second meeting of the Sino-Indian Space Joint Committee in 2019,” CNSA said.
The Chinese space agency said it is open to cooperating with India.
“CNSA is open to international cooperation in lunar and deep space exploration… and international cooperation for a series of deep space exploration activities, such as Chang’ e 6 sampling return, the Mars exploration, and asteroid exploration, Jupiter galaxy, and planetary crossing exploration,” it said.
“We are willing to work hand in hand with space agencies, space institutions, and foreign space exploration enthusiasts to explore the mysteries of the universe.”
The African Union headquarters in Addis Ababa is a shiny spaceship-like structure that glistens in the afternoon sun.
With its accompanying skyscraper, it stands out in the Ethiopian capital.
Greetings in Mandarin welcome visitors as they enter the lifts, and the plastic palm trees bear the logos of the China Development Bank.
African Union HQ, Addis Ababa
Everywhere, there are small indications that the building was made possible through Chinese financial aid.
In 2006, Beijing pledged $200m to build the headquarters. Completed in 2012, everything was custom-built by the Chinese – including a state-of-the-art computer system.
For several years, the building stood as a proud testament to ever-closer ties between China and Africa. Trade has rocketed over the past two decades, growing by about 20% a year, according to international consultancy McKinsey. China is Africa’s largest economic partner.
But in January 2018, French newspaper Le Monde Afrique dropped a bombshell.
It reported that the AU’s computer system had been compromised.
The newspaper, citing multiple sources, said that for five years, between the hours of midnight and 0200, data from the AU’s servers was transferred more than 8,000km away – to servers in Shanghai.
This had allegedly continued for 1,825 days in a row.
Le Monde Afrique reported that it had come to light in 2017, when a conscientious scientist working for the AU recorded an unusually high amount of computer activity on its servers during hours when the offices would have been deserted.
It was also reported that microphones and listening devices had been discovered in the walls and desks of the building, following a sweep for bugs.
The reaction was swift.
Both AU and Chinese officials publicly condemned the report as false and sensationalist – an attempt by the Western media to damage relations between a more assertive China and an increasingly independent Africa.
But Le Monde Afrique said that AU officials had privately expressed concerns about just how dependent they were on Chinese aid – and what the consequences of that could be.
In the midst of all of this, one fact remained largely unreported.
The main supplier of information and communication technology systems to the AU headquarters was China’s best-known telecoms equipment company – Huawei.
The company says it had “nothing” to do with any alleged breach.
Huawei “served as the key ICT provider inside the AU’s headquarters”, said Danielle Cave of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, in a review of the alleged incident.
Huawei headquarters in Shenzhen, China
“This doesn’t mean the company was complicit in any theft of data. But… it’s hard to see how – given Huawei’s role in providing equipment and key ICT services to the AU building and specifically to the AU’s data centre – the company could have remained completely unaware of the apparent theft of large amounts of data, every day, for five years.”
There is no evidence to indicate that Huawei’s telecoms network equipment was ever used by the Chinese government – or anyone else – to gain access to the data of their customers.
Indeed, no-one has ever gone on record to confirm that the AU system was compromised in the first place.
But these reports played into years of suspicions about Huawei – that a large Chinese company might find itself unduly influenced by the Chinese government.
Ren and the rise of Huawei
“When I first started out 30 years ago… we didn’t really have any telephones. The only phones we had were those hand-cranked phones that you see in old World War II films. We were pretty undeveloped then.”
Huawei’s founder and chairman Ren Zhengfei is reminiscing to the BBC about the origins of the world’s second-biggest smartphone firm, while sitting in the Huawei headquarters in Shenzhen – a symbol of the success that he’s worked his whole lifetime for.
A long marbled staircase, covered in plush red carpet, greets you as you first walk in.
At the top of the stairs, a giant painting depicts a traditional Chinese New Year scene.
Inside Huawei’s Shenzhen HQ
A few kilometres away in Dongguan, Huawei’s latest campus is even more eye-catching.
The site – designed to accommodate the company’s 25,000 R&D staff – comprises 12 “villages”, each of which recreates the architecture of a different European city, among them Paris, Bologna and Granada.
It’s as if Silicon Valley had been re-imagined by Walt Disney. Long corridors of Roman pillars and picturesque French cafes adorn the campus, with a train connecting the different areas, running through manicured gardens and past an artificial lake.
It’s a world away from the environment that Mr Ren found himself in when he first started the company in 1987. “I founded Huawei when China began to implement its reform and opening up policy,” he says. “At that time, China was shifting from a planned economy to a market economy. Not only people like myself, but even the most senior government officials, did not have the vaguest idea of what a market economy was. It seemed it was hard to survive.”
Ren was born in 1944 in Southern China – a tumultuous, chaotic place, one of the poorest regions in an already destitute country.
For a long time, hardship was all he ever knew.
He was from a family of seven children. “They were very poor,” says David De Cremer, who has co-written a book on Ren and Huawei.
“I think hardship is something that you can see throughout his life, and which he keeps emphasising himself.”
To escape that life of poverty and drudgery, Ren did what many young Chinese men of that era did. He joined the army.
Soldiers from the People’s Liberation Army, 1972
“I was a very low-ranking officer in the People’s Liberation Army,” he says. “I served in an ordinary construction project, not a field unit. At the time, I was a technician of a company in the military, and then I became an engineer.”
He left the military in 1983 when China began to downsize its forces, and went into the electronics business.
By his own admission, he wasn’t a great businessman at first.
“I was someone who had been in the military all my life at the time, used to doing what I was told,” he says. “Suddenly, I began to work in a market economy. I was at a total loss. So I too suffered losses, I too was deceived, and I was cheated.”
But he was quick to learn, and was a keen student of Western business practices and European history.
“I did research on what exactly a market economy was all about,” he says. “I read books on laws, including those about European and US laws. At that time, there were very few books on Chinese laws, and I had to read those on European and US laws.”
Five years later, he founded Huawei – the name can be translated as “splendid achievement” or “China is able” – to sell simple telecoms equipment to the rural Chinese market. Within a few years, Huawei was developing and producing the equipment itself.
Sometime in the early 90s, Huawei won a government contract to provide telecoms equipment for the People’s Liberation Army.
By 1995, the company was generating sales of around US$220,000, mainly from selling to the rural market.
The following year Huawei was given the status of a Chinese “national champion”. In practice, this meant the government closed the market to foreign competition.
At a time when China’s economy was growing by an average of 10% per year, this was no small advantage. But it was only when Huawei started to expand overseas in 2000, that it really saw its sales soar.
In 2002, Huawei made US$552m from its international market sales. By 2005 its international market contracts exceeded its domestic business for the first time.
Ren’s early days in business instilled in him a desire to protect his company from the whims and fancies of the stock market. Huawei is privately held and employee-owned. This gave Ren the power to plough more money back into research and development. Each year, Huawei spends US$20bn on R&D – one of the biggest such budgets in the world.
“Publicly listed companies have to pay a lot of attention to their balance sheets,” he says. “They can’t invest too much, otherwise profits will drop and so will their share prices. At Huawei, we fight for our ideals. We know that if we fertilise our ‘soil’ it will become more bountiful. That’s how we’ve managed to pull ahead and succeed.”
One story from the early days of the company tells how Ren was cooking for his staff (he loves to cook, or so the story goes). Suddenly he rushed out of the kitchen and announced to the room: “Huawei will be a top three player in the global communications market 20 years from now!”
And that’s exactly what happened. In fact, those ambitions were surpassed.
Today, Huawei is the world’s biggest seller of network telecommunications equipment.
From aspiring to be a company like Apple, it now sells more smartphones than Apple.
But shadows have continued to loom over Huawei’s international success.
Ren and Huawei’s links to the Chinese Communist Party have raised suspicions that the company owes its meteoric rise to its powerful political connections in China. The US has accused Huawei of being a tool of the Chinese government.
It’s an accusation which Ren denies. “Please don’t think that Huawei has become what it is today because we have special connections,” he says. “Even 100% state-owned companies have failed. Do good connections mean you will succeed then? Huawei’s success is still very much due to our hard work.”
The case against
It was 1 December 2018. US President Donald Trump and China’s President Xi Jinping were dining on grilled sirloin followed by caramel rolled pancakes at the G20 summit in Buenos Aires.
They had a lot to discuss. The US and China were in the middle of a trade war – imposing tariffs on each other’s goods – and growth forecasts for both countries had recently been cut as a result. This was adding to the fear of a slowing global economy.
In the event, the two leaders agreed a truce in the trade war, with Donald Trump tweeting that “Relations with China have taken a BIG leap forward!”
Xi Jinping and Donald Trump at dinner, December 2018
But thousands of kilometres north in Canada, an arrest was taking place that would throw doubt on this rapprochement.
Meng Wanzhou, Huawei’s chief financial officer and Ren Zhengfei’s eldest daughter, had been detained by Canadian officials while transferring between flights at Vancouver airport.
The arrest had come at the request of the US, who accused her of breaking sanctions against Iran.
“When she was detained, as her father, my heart broke,” says Ren, visibly emotional. “How could I watch my child suffer like this? But what happened, has happened. We can only depend on the law to solve this problem.”
Meng Wanzhou being driven to court in Canada
Huawei’s problems were just beginning. Nearly two months later, the US Department of Justice filed two indictments against Huawei and Ms Meng.
Under the first indictment, Huawei and Ms Meng were charged with misleading banks and the US government about their business in Iran.
The second indictment – against Huawei – involved criminal charges including obstruction of justice and the attempted theft of trade secrets.
Both Huawei and Ms Meng deny the charges.
January 2019: Acting US attorney general Matthew Whittaker announces charges against Huawei and Meng Wanzhou
The charge of stealing trade secrets centres on a robotic tool – developed by T-Mobile – known as Tappy.
According to legal documents, Huawei had tried to buy Tappy, a device which mimicked human fingers by tapping mobile phone screens rapidly to test responsiveness.
T-Mobile was in partnership with Huawei at the time, but it rebuffed the Chinese firm’s offers, fearing it would use the technology to make phones for T-Mobile’s competitors.
It’s alleged that one of Huawei’s US employees then smuggled Tappy’s robotic arm into his satchel so that he could send its details to colleagues in China.
After the alleged theft was discovered, the Huawei employee claimed that the arm had mistakenly fallen into his bag.
Huawei claimed that the employee had been acting alone, and the case was settled out of court in 2014. But the latest case is built on email trails between managers in China and the company’s US employees, linking Huawei management to the alleged theft.
The indictment also details evidence of a bonus scheme from 2013, offering Huawei employees financial rewards for stealing confidential information from competitors.
Huawei has denied any such scheme exists.
Meng Wanzhou, photographed in 2014
This is not the first time that Huawei has been accused of stealing trade secrets. Over the years companies like Cisco, Nortel and Motorola have all pointed the finger at the Chinese firm.
But US fears about Huawei are about much more than industrial espionage. For more than a decade, the US government has seen the company as little more than an arm of the Chinese Communist Party.
These concerns have been brought to the fore with the advent of “fifth generation” or 5G mobile internet, which promises download speeds 10 or 20 times faster than at present, and much greater connectivity between devices.
As the world’s biggest telecoms infrastructure provider, Huawei is one of the companies best placed to build new 5G networks. But the US has warned its intelligence partners that awarding contracts to Huawei would be tantamount to allowing the Chinese spy on them.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo recently cautioned against Huawei, saying, “If a country adopts this and puts it in some of their critical information systems, we won’t be able to share information with them.”
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
The UK, Germany and Canada are reviewing whether Huawei’s products pose a security threat.
Australia went a step further last year, and banned equipment suppliers “likely to be subject to extrajudicial directions from a foreign government”.
Huawei was not mentioned by name, but Danielle Cave of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute says the company posed a national security risk because of its government links.
She cites an article in Chinese law that makes it impossible for any company to refuse to help the Chinese Communist Party in intelligence gathering.
“Admittedly, what is missing from this debate is the smoking gun,” she says.
“For the average person who has a Huawei smartphone it’s not a big deal. But if you’re a Western government that has key national security to protect – why would you allow this access to a company that is in the political system that China is in?”
For his part, Ren says that Huawei’s resources have never and would never be used to spy for the Chinese government.
“The Chinese government has clearly said that it won’t ask companies to install backdoors,” he says. A “backdoor” is a term used to describe a secret entry point in software or a computer system that gives access to the person or entity who installed it to the inner workings of the system.
“Huawei will not do it either,” he continues. “Our sales revenues are now hundreds of billions of dollars. We are not going to risk the disgust of our country and our customers all over the world because of something like that. We will lose all our business. I’m not going to take that risk.”
Xi’s China
Zhou Daiqi is Huawei’s chief ethics and compliance officer.
He’s been with the company for nearly 25 years, in a number of different positions – chief engineer, director of the hardware department, head of the research centre in Xi’an, according to his biography on the company’s website. He is also understood to combine his high-ranking executive duties with another role – party secretary of Huawei’s Communist Party committee.
All companies in China are required by law to have a Communist Party committee.
Zhou Daiqi’s profile on Huawei’s website
The official line is that they exist to ensure that employees uphold the country’s moral and social values. Representatives of the committee are also often tasked with helping workers with financial problems.
But critics of China’s one-party system argue that they allow the state to exert control on corporate China. And they say the level of this control has increased in recent years.
“[President] Xi Jinping is exerting greater control over the business community in China,” says Elliott Zaagman, who regularly advises Chinese companies on their PR strategy. “As these companies gain power and influence overseas, the party doesn’t want to lose control over them.”
Ren, however, argues that the role of Huawei’s Communist Party committee is far less important than many in the West believe.
“[It] serves only to educate its employees,” he says. “It is not involved in any business decisions.”
In China, most chief executives are Communist Party members.
Every year, they dutifully turn up to the National People’s Congress along with local and national party chiefs, officials and chief executives.
It’s where the big economic decisions are voted on – although no proposal is put forward which hasn’t already been agreed upon.
Still, big CEOs come to show their commitment to the party, and to contribute to working papers that are meant to help the government understand the concerns of the business community.
Being a member of the party is very much a networking opportunity – in the way one would join a business association.
Elliott Zaagman argues that this is a system that demands loyalty.
“There is no separation from the party and the state,” he says.
“The system in China encourages the lack of transparency in companies like Huawei.”
The worry is that these close links mean that if the Communist Party asked a company to do something, they would have no choice but to comply.
And if that company is one that is involved in sensitive global telecoms infrastructure projects, it’s easy to see why Western observers would be worried.
There is no evidence to indicate that Huawei is in any way under the orders of the Chinese government, or that Beijing has any plans to dictate business plans and strategy at Huawei – particularly when it comes to spying.
But the way in which the Chinese Communist Party has robustly defended Huawei has raised questions about how independent the company is of its influence.
For example, Beijing stated that Ms Meng’s detention was a rights abuse .
And while her extradition case to the US was moving forward, China detained two Canadian citizens and accused them of stealing state secrets. Critics say the detentions are linked to Ms Meng’s arrest.
December 2018: Chinese police patrol outside Canada’s embassy in Beijing
While not commenting on the arrest of the Canadians, Ren says China’s defence of Huawei is understandable.
“It is the Chinese government’s duty to protect its people,” he says. “If the US attempts to gain competitive edge by undermining China’s most outstanding hi-tech talent, then it is understandable if the Chinese government, in turn, protects its hi-tech companies.”
Over the past few years, there have been signs of a bigger push by the government to get private companies, and in particular tech firms, to cooperate with party rules – even when they are firmly resistant.
A Didi Chuxing logo adorns a building in Hangzhou, China
China’s ride-hailing giant Didi Chuxing’s troubles are an example of the struggles Chinese firms face when they try to uphold their independence in the face of government pressure.
Chinese attitudes to data collection and data privacy are different to those in the West – many people don’t care if businesses have access to their data, arguing that it adds to the convenience of life and work.
Government access to data in China is not the free-for-all that many outside of China assume it to be
Samm Sacks, CSIS
So it wasn’t unusual when, after the murders of two of its passengers by Didi drivers, regulators used the scandal to force Didi to share more corporate data with the government. But Didi resisted – citing customer privacy. Under Chinese law, it had no choice but to comply.
When it did, it handed over “three boxes of data printed on paper, including 95 hard copies for authorities to review”.
According to Samm Sacks of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the case demonstrates that “government access to data in China is not the free-for-all that many outside China assume it to be”.
She says this indicates that there appears to be “a kind of tug of war between the government and companies over data”.
How this plays out will determine how Chinese companies are viewed by foreign governments when they do business overseas.
Companies like Huawei have grown up in a system where to survive and thrive they needed strong links to the Chinese government – there was and is no other choice. But these links could harm their reputation abroad.
“It’s two different systems,” says Zaagman. “Think of it like an electrical outlet. China’s plug doesn’t fit in to the outlets we have in the West.”
What’s at stake
“Basically you want to connect to everything that can be connected.”
Zhu Peiying, head of Huawei’s 5G wireless labs, is showing off devices that can connect to the new technology. From a smart toothbrush that collects data about how well you brush your teeth, to a smart cup that reminds you when you should drink some water, this is a world where everything you can think of is being measured and analysed.
At its most sophisticated, everything in entire cities would be connected – driverless cars, the temperature of buildings, the speed of public transport – the list is endless.
Huawei is thought to be a year ahead of its competitors in terms of its technological expertise and what it can offer customers, according to industry sources.
It’s also thought that the company can offer prices that are about 10% cheaper than its competitors, although critics claim this is because of state support.
Ren dismisses this, saying that Huawei doesn’t receive government subsidies.
He says the real reason behind the US resistance to Huawei is its superior technology.
“There’s no way the US can crush us,” he says. “The world needs Huawei because we are more advanced. Even if they persuade more countries not to use us temporarily we could just scale things down a bit.”
Many analysts say that Huawei’s exclusion from US networks could actually cause the US to fall behind in its 5G capabilities.
“It would mean we wouldn’t be able to participate in any blended network [using Huawei] in Europe or Asia,” says Samm Sacks of CSIS. “That would put us at a significant disadvantage.”
What this would mean in reality is a world of two internets – or what analysts are calling a “digital iron curtain” – dividing the world into parts that do business with Chinese companies like Huawei, and those that don’t.
Because of US pressure on its allies, Huawei has been on an aggressive public relations campaign to win over customers and government stakeholders.
In recent days, Vodafone’s boss Nick Read called on the US to share any evidence it has about Huawei, while Andrus Ansip, the European Commission’s vice president for the digital single market, said in a tweet that he had met with Huawei’s rotating CEO to discuss the importance of being open and transparent, as they explored ways of working together.
But suspicions about Huawei remain.
One security firm reports a sharp rise in inquiries by Asian government clients about Huawei.
“Some have asked us how much they should worry about whether Huawei is really a liability,” says an analyst who consults to Asian governments, on condition of anonymity.
Ren is sanguine about such concerns.
“For countries who believe in them [suspicions about Huawei] we will hold off,” he says. “For countries who feel Huawei is trustworthy, we may move a little faster. The world is so big. We can’t walk across every corner of it.”
But this is about more than just one company or one CEO and his family.
Increasingly, this is perceived as a battle between two world orders, and which one is the future.
In the early days of China opening up, US presidents like George HW Bush espoused the merits of engagement.
“No nation on Earth has discovered a way to import the world’s goods and services while stopping foreign ideas at the border,” he said in a 1991 speech. “Just as the democratic idea has transformed nations on every continent, so, too, change will inevitably come to China.”
1989: George HW Bush in Beijing – he encouraged economic engagement with China
Previous US administrations believed that economic engagement in China would lead to China following a freer, more “liberal” path.
There’s no denying China has made remarkable strides in the past 40 years. The economy grew by an annual average of 10% for three decades, helping to lift 800 million people out of poverty. It is now the second-largest economy in the world, only surpassed by the US.
Some estimates put China’s economy ahead of America’s by 2030.
It achieved this while maintaining one-party rule and the supremacy of the Communist Party.
But its success has raised concerns that it is only possible with a huge amount of government control over the country’s companies. The fear is that control could be used to achieve the Communist Party’s goals – which are at this point unclear.
“It’s a double-edged sword for China,” says Danielle Cave. “[Because of its laws] the Chinese Communist Party has made it virtually impossible for Chinese companies to expand without attracting understandable and legitimate suspicion.”
Added to this, China has become more authoritarian under Xi Jinping’s rule.
President Xi Jinping
“Xi is systematically undermining virtually every feature that made China so distinct and helped it work so well in the past,” writes Jonathan Tepperman, editor in chief of Foreign Policy.
“His efforts may boost his own power and prestige in the short term and reduce some forms of corruption. On balance, however, Xi’s campaign will have disastrous long-term consequences for his country and the world.”
But Ren dismisses this, insisting that China is more open than ever before.
“If this meeting took place 30 years ago,” he says of our interview, “it would have been very dangerous for me. Today, I can be straightforward when answering difficult questions. This shows that China has a more open political environment.”
Still, Ren is hopeful of the direction China will take in the future.
“China has more or less tried to close itself off from the outside world for 5,000 years,” he says. “Yet we had found ourselves poor, lagging behind other nations. It was only in the past 30 years since Deng Xiaoping opened China’s doors to the world that China has become more prosperous. Therefore, China must continue to move forward on the path of reform and opening-up.”
In one of Huawei’s vast campus sites across Shenzen, lies a man-made lake. Swimming in these serene waters are two black swans.
There is a story that Ren put the birds here to remind employees of “black swan” events – unpredictable and catastrophic financial eventualities that are impossible to prepare for. He dismisses this as an urban myth, but it’s hard not to read something into it.
For Huawei, and Ren, these are highly uncertain times with no way of telling what lies ahead.
CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon 