China Chronicles May 29, 2012
- moo
- Heavy fog wreaks havoc on highway
Police and rescue workers clear up the wrekage of a traffic accident on a highway in central China's Henan Province where a total of 13 traffic accidents happened between 6:17 a.m. to 7:20 a.m on Monday, killing eight people and injuring 13 others in heavy fog on the Xinyang section of the Beijing-Zhuhai Highway, police said. Investigations have been underway into the cause of all the accidents.
- China condemns 'cruel killings' of civilians, backs UN efforts
CHINA yesterday condemned the cruel killings of civilians in Houla, while insisting Kofi Annan's efforts are the most viable way to end Syria's violence.
"China feels deeply shocked by the large number of civilian casualties in Houla, and condemns in the strongest terms the cruel killings of ordinary citizens, especially women and children," Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin said. "This incident again demonstrates that an immediate cessation of violence in Syria can brook no delay."
"We call on all sides concerned in Syria to implement the relevant UN Security Council resolutions and Annan's six-point proposal immediately."
- Ex-railway minister expelled from Party
CHINA'S former Railway Minister Liu Zhijun was expelled from the Communist Party of China after being found guilty of corruption, the CPC disciplinary watchdog announced yesterday.
The Party's Central Commission for discipline Inspection said Liu had taken massive bribes and abused his authority to help a private businessman make huge illegal profits.
It also accused him of fostering major corruption throughout the country's railway system and having "degenerate morals," a term that often refers to sexual liaisons and the keeping of mistresses.
"Liu should hold most of the responsibility for corruption in the railway system," according to the Party's discipline body.
Liu's case will now be handed over to prosecutors.
Liu had been under investigation since February 2011, when he was removed from his position on suspicion of "serious disciplinary violations."
In the investigation, it was shown Liu helped Ding Yuxin, who is also known as Ding Shumiao, the president of an investment management company, make huge illegal gains.
Liu took huge bribes and other valuables, according to the discipline watchdog. But the authorities did not disclose the amount of the bribes.
The country's rapid railway network development slowed down after the fall of Liu and the fatal bullet-train crash that killed 40 passengers in July last year in Wenzhou.
Liu, born in 1953 in central China's Hubei Province, began his career in 1972 as a railway worker and joined the CPC a year later. Liu took control of the railway ministry in 2003 and soon oversaw the railway system's leap into countrywide expansion of high-speed railways.
It was during the period that Ding's Boyou Investment Management Group Ltd benefited greatly from providing equipment to the nation's high-speed projects.
During Liu's tenure, fatal railway accidents frequently made headlines. A train collision killed 72 in 2008 in Shandong Province. Liu was criticized then but was not removed.
T! ogether with Liu, several high-ranking railway officials were removed and investigated in a series of graft probes.
Zhang Shuguang, the ministry's former deputy engineer, who was Liu's right-hand man, also faced corruption charges when he was found to own luxury homes in the United States.
China's bullet train system has been the subject of a series of scandals involving corruption, some of which are still under investigation.
The bidding process for high-speed railway projects was fraught with difficulties that gave business executives such as Ding with close ties to top rail officials priority in equipment contracts.
As a result, such equipment was found to have been bought at prices much higher than the market rate.
The July accident led to a public furor and accusations of reckless growth without proper attention to safety.
The current railway minister, Sheng Guangzu, ordered thorough checks of the railway network and slower speeds on high-speed railways.
- Rocket debris hits homes
THE debris of a carrier rocket hit some houses and high voltage wires in central China's Hunan Province on Sunday night, causing a blackout in a village.
The debris of the Long March-3B carrier rocket crashed on some houses and hit a 10kw high voltage wire in Wawutang Township and Shuikou Township in Suining County around midnight, local news portal Rednet.cn reported yesterday.
"After hearing a loud boom, a giant structure weighing 30 kilograms crashed on the wire and the whole village was plunged into darkness," according to a staff member of the power supply station of the Wawutang Township.
Some villagers felt electric shocks when they tried to pick up the debris. Local authorities said they will compensate the damages later.
The Long March-3B carrier rocket was used to launch a telecommunication satellite "ChinaSat 2A" into orbit on the evening of May 26. The satellite was successfully launched from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan Province.
- A Bite of China strikes a chord with food lovers
A DOCUMENTARY series combining human interest elements with foods from across China captured the country's hearts and stomachs for the entire first week that it aired.
On May 14, the series "A Bite of China," produced by China Central Television, debuted, kicking off a week-long surge in viewership for CCTV-1 during the 10:30pm time slot.
The series has stirred heated discussions both on- and offline, and episodes have been watched over 20 million times online and attracted an unexpectedly high TV audience.
"The food, cooked by the most ordinary people in the remote corners of China, reminds me of my hometown, my mum's cooking, and my childhood," said Wang Xin, 28, who hails from northwest China's Shaanxi Province but works for a bank in Beijing.
"No matter how far you go, no matter who you become, your stomach will still be your hometown stomach," said Chen Xiaoqing, the director of the documentary as well as a famous food writer in China.
The seven-episode series weaves together stories of ordinary Chinese and the diversity of their food and cooking methods, with each episode focusing on a particular food-related topic, including ingredients, staple foods, and how one ingredient could be used to make many different dishes.
The first in-house documentary broadcast on CCTV-1, the series attracted an audience 30 percent larger than that for the TV dramas that usually fill the station's 10:30pm time slot, said Liu Wen, the producer of the documentary.
Netizens have described the documentary as "a disaster for people who are trying to lose weight."
The program boosted online food orders around the time that it aired, and orders for previously unpopular local specialties peaked after these foods appeared on TV, said a spokesman for Taobao.com, China's largest consumer-to-consumer trade website.
During that week, more than 8.9 million people bought over 10 million local food items on the website, up 12.5 percent from previous months.
- Irate residents storm local office
ANGRY residents of Rui'an City in east China's Zhejiang Province vandalized cars and rushed in to a government office, smashing windows, yesterday morning to protest over the death of a resident, the city government said.
Video clips uploaded by witnesses on the microblog weibo.com show a group of youngsters smashing windows of cars at a parking lot near the government office and then turning them over one by one.
Hundreds of other residents came on to the street to watch them smashing the cars, some egging them on until police arrived, the videos show.
According to the city government, the protest was sparked by an incident on May 12 when a Hunan Province worker fought with a company official in a salary dispute. The worker, Yang Zhi, 20, was seriously injured in the head during the fight, while the company official, Xu Qiyin, 39, fled the scene.
Police launched an investigation into the incident and Xu turned himself in to police two days later. He was then detained by police on May 15.
In the meantime, Yang died in hospital on May 26 due to the severe head injury after surgeries failed to revive him.
The city's sub-district government officials tried to mediate with Yang's family over compensation for his death, but the family rejected the government's offer.
The family then gathered about 200 fellow villagers to protest at the government office this morning, demanding punishment for Xu and a better compensation offer.
But some of the protesters began vandalizing cars and then rushed into the government office, smashing windows.
- Prostitution gang busted
SIX people have been arrested for allegedly recruiting schoolgirls as prostitutes in Yongkang City, east China's Zhejiang Province, China News Agency reported yesterday.
Police detained a total of nine suspects, including three businessmen and a village officer, in the city. The officer, surnamed Hu, was also a member of the city's National People's Congress.
Apart from the six in custody, three others are under investigation and could be arrested, police said.
The crime was discovered in February following a public tip but local police declined to provide details, according to Qianjiang Evening News.
Early speculation indicates more than 20 girl students, including underage teens from three schools, were seduced into prostitution.
- Tibetans set themselves on fire
ONE man died and another was seriously injured after they set themselves on fire on a busy street in downtown Lhasa, capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region.
Dargye, from Aba in the Tibetan area of Sichuan Province, and Tobgye Tseten, from Xiahe County in a Tibetan community in Gansu Province, attempted self-immolation at 2:16pm on Sunday on Pargor Street in the heart of Lhasa, the publicity department of Tibet's regional committee of the Communist Party of China said yesterday.
It said police put out the flames within two minutes and sent the men to hospital. Dargye survived but Tobgye Tseten died. Dargye is stable and able to talk.
They were the first cases of self-immolation in Lhasa, though a spate of similar incidents have taken place in the Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Gansu and Qinghai provinces in the past year.
Downtown Lhasa is crowded these days as Tibetans celebrate Saga Dawa, falling on the 15th day of the fourth month in the Tibetan calendar and marking the anniversary of Buddha's birth, enlightenment and death.
Large crowds of pilgrims walk clockwise around Pargor Street in observance of Buddhist ritual.
A senior official in Tibet condemned the Lhasa self-immolations, saying they were separatist attempts.
"They were a continuation of the self-immolations in other Tibetan areas and these acts were all aimed at separating Tibet from China," said Hao Peng, secretary of the Commission for Political and Legal Affairs of the CPC Tibet Committee.
Police set up a special task force to investigate the case.
More than 20 Tibetans have died from self-immolations since March 2011. Most were lamas, nuns or former clergy members, said Qiangba Puncog, chairman of the Standing Committee of the People's Congress of the Tibet Autonomous Region.
Investigators found in many cases that photos of the designated self-immolators had been sent to separatist forces abroad, indicating that the self-immolations had been carefully planned. After the trag! edies, s eparatist forces would publish the photos alongside pictures of the self-immolation scenes to play up the situation.
Premier Wen Jiabao said at a press conference after the conclusion of the annual parliamentary session in mid-March that China opposes Tibetan clergy taking such radical moves of self-immolation to disturb and undermine social harmony.
"The young Tibetans are innocent and we feel deeply distressed by their behavior," Wen said, adding the so-called Tibetan government-in-exile in India is in nature a theocratic one, under the direct control of Dalai Lama or under his indirect influence.
"Its purpose is to separate Tibet and the Tibetan-inhabited areas from China. We have a firm position and principle on this matter," the premier said.
- Potala walls
- The Bund 2
Shanghai 2007 has added a photo to the pool:
- Better city Better life
Shanghai 2007 has added a photo to the pool:
- Our VentureAge
- Former railway minister expelled from Party for corruption
CHINA'S former railway minister, Liu Zhijun, has been expelled from the Communist Party of China (CPC) after being found guilty of corruption, the CPC disciplinary watchdog announced today.
Liu, also former Party chief of the Railway Ministry, had been under investigation since February 2011, when he was removed from his position on suspicion of "serious disciplinary violations."
Investigators found Liu used his position to seek huge illegal interests for Ding Yuxin, chairman of Beijing Boyou Investment Management Corporation, maneuvering which caused great economic losses and negative social influence, according to a statement issued by the CPC's Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.
The commission also discovered Liu, who the statement labeled "morally corrupted," had taken a huge amount of bribes and bore the major responsibility for severe corruption in the railways system.
Liu's behavior seriously violated the CPC's discipline, and the decision to expel him from the Party was made in accordance with the CPC's regulations and approved by the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, the statement explained.
It is suspected that some of Liu's discipline violations may have included criminal acts, so his case will also be turned over to judicial organs, it said, adding that Liu's illegal gains have been confiscated.
The public has long criticized China's railway system as being poorly managed, especially during peak times.
Liu's removal is also believed to be linked to the high-speed train collision last July that killed 40 passengers and injured 172 others, the tragedy having been blamed on improper management.- Protest over worker's death turns violent in Ruian City
ANGRY residents smashed windows and cars at a government office in Ruian City of Zhejiang Province this morning to protest the death of a villager, the city government announced.
On May 12, a Hunan Province native fought with a company official over a salary dispute. The worker, Yang Zhi, 20, was seriously injured in the head during the fight while the company official, Xu Qiyin, 39, fled the scene, the government reported.
Police started investigating the incident and Xu eventually surrendered to police. Police put him in detention on May 15. Yang died in hospital four days later.
The city's sub-district government tried to work out compensation with Yang's family but the family rejected the government's offer.
The family gathered about 200 fellow villagers to protest at the government office this morning. They demanded Xu be punished and a better compensation offer for Yang's family.
Some of the 200-plus people smashed windows and cars, the government reported.- FLASH: China's former Railways Minister Liu Zhijun expelled from the Communist Party of China (CPC).
China's former Railways Minister Liu Zhijun expelled from the Communist Party of China (CPC).
- Irate residents storm local office
Comments