BEIJING - The National Grid of China said power could be restored partially within the day in the worst-hit region in central China's Hunan Province, ending the eight-day blackout caused by snow.Local residents buy candies for the upcoming Spring Festival in Chenzhou, Central China's Hunan Province, February 1, 2008. Power supply in Chenzhou City has been cut off during the past eight days, leaving thousands of households in dark and coldness. [Xinhua] "Many power facilities in Hunan were damaged due to repeated extreme weather changes," said Yin Jijun, deputy director of the international liaison department of the National Grid. "As the weather deteriorated again, the regional power grid, in particular the southern grid in the province, is facing acute challenges."A new round of snow started to hit central, south and east China regions on Friday, adding to the woes caused by previous snowfalls.Hunan is one of the hardest-hit areas for the past three weeks. Power supply in Chenzhou City has been cut off during the past eight days, leaving thousands of households in dark and coldness. Hengyang and Yongzhou cities also experienced blackouts in some areas.To address the situation, Yin said the National Grid is working all out to ensure security of the main power network in southern Hunan, especially in Chenzhou."We will strive to partially restore electricity supply in Chenzhou on Saturday," Yin said.
China's press and publication watchdog yesterday announced a campaign to shut down pornography websites nationwide.As of last week, about 348 domestic websites were found to be posting and distributing porn novels and pictures Song Jianxin, director of the Internet supervision sector under the National Office of Anti-porn and Illegal Publications, said.Eight websites including 517z.com, xs4.xggirl.com and book.maobob.com were ordered to permanently shut down for the "extremely negative impact" they caused by posting 40 online porn novels."The contents were full of exaggerated and explicit description of sex. It harms and misleads the young who are still growing and lack reasonable judgment," Song said.Li Baozhong, director of the market supervision department of the national press watchdog said distributing porn novels violated laws, publication regulations and Internet information service regulations.All blacklisted websites are being put under close watch by press regulators and public security authorities at all levels."The violators will be heavily fined and punished," Li said.The watchdog also revealed a recent crackdown on pirated publications.The market enforcement team in Central China's Hunan province smashed a gang producing pirated books.About 627,000 pirated books worth of 20.3 million yuan (.67 millon) were seized.It included teaching materials of New Concept English and reference books for student tests, whose copyrights belong to about 21 domestic publishing houses.Four were arrested and one official from the Hunan press watchdog, accused of taking bribes and helping to facilitate the illegal practice, was removed from his post."We're facing unprecedented complexity in fighting for intellectual property rights protection," Li said."IPR infringement is becoming more complex as violators turn to more sophisticated ways to carry out their trade."
The first national-level association of Taiwan-funded enterprises held its inaugural ceremony in Beijing yesterday - a move which experts say will help boost cross-Straits economic integration and peace. "Taiwan business people are all over the mainland now," said Chang Han-wen, the newly-elected chairman of the Association of Taiwanese-invested Enterprises on the Mainland. According to conservative estimates, there are at least 1 million Taiwan business people on the mainland. The national-level association, comprising heads of Taiwan enterprise associations and representatives of Taiwan enterprises on the mainland, aims to serve the island's enterprises, protect their legal rights, boost relations with the ministries in Beijing and strengthen communication with mainland firms. Chen Yunlin, head of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, said the island has chalked up a huge trade surplus with the mainland and its trade with the mainland has become an indispensable driving force of Taiwan's economy. "The mainland market provides huge potential for the expansion and industrial upgrading of Taiwan enterprises," he said. Xu Shiquan, vice-chairman of the National Society of Taiwan Studies, said that the establishment of the association coincides with the mushrooming of Taiwan-funded enterprises on the mainland. "Besides their number and scale, more and more Taiwan enterprises are keen to upgrade their industrial structure into the hi-tech sector," he said. "Though they usually forge local associations, faster expansion and a larger scale require a higher level of coordination," he said. Feng Bangyan, director of the Institute of Taiwan Economy at Jinan University in Guangzhou, said the association, which brings together many business heavyweights, would definitely pressure Taiwan authorities to grant more freedom for economic growth. "The secessionists forces on the island can't hinder the ever-increasing economic bonds linking the two sides across the Straits," he said.
President Hu Jintao will "elaborate on China's position and propositions on climate change" at the upcoming summit of industrialized nations which features a session on global warming. Assistant Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai told a news briefing yesterday: "China's population is one-fifth of the global population, which means one out of five of the world's people affected by climate change will be in China. "That is why the Chinese government takes this issue very seriously... We need to base our development on energy that is secure and sustainable." Hu will attend an expanded summit of the Group of Eight (G8) in Germany from tomorrow to Friday. The meeting at the Baltic Sea resort of Heiligendamm will bring together leaders of the United States, Britain, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, Russia, and Japan. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is pushing for countries to commit to concrete reductions in the emissions of greenhouse gases believed to cause global warming, and for a 2 C limit on further increases in average temperature. Efforts to stop uranium enrichment by Iran, aid to Africa, currency exchange rates and global growth are also on the agenda. Apart from China, the other developing countries attending the dialogue are India, Brazil, South Africa and Mexico. It will be the fourth time Hu is attending the G8 outreach session since 2003. The earlier three were in France, Britain and Russia. Coinciding with Hu's visit, the Chinese government yesterday released its position paper for the G8 meetings, outlining Beijing's policy on climate change, energy, IPR protection, investment liberalization and African development. Cui reiterated China's long-time and traditional friendship with African countries. "China and African countries have had a very friendly, brotherly partnership since the establishment of New China, since the 1950s, and that has continued up to now," he said. "It can be said that this has been widely praised around the globe," he added. "In this world, there will always be people willing to criticise others. If they want to say something, then that's their business. Whether or not it's true, is another matter." He said China also wants the United Nations to be more involved in preventing conflict. "China maintains that the United Nations has a bigger role to play in conflict prevention and settlement and post-conflict reconstruction in Africa," the paper said. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Friday praised China's "helpful" role in Sudan. "The Chinese government has been exerting its utmost efforts (on Darfur), as I understand, and appreciate," he said. After Germany, Hu begins a three-day state visit to Sweden, the first by a Chinese head of state in 57 years since the two countries established diplomatic ties. Agencies contributed to the story
BEIJING - China's quality control watchdog has rejected a Hong Kong media report which alleged the mainland had exported hairy crabs containing carcinogens to Taiwan, confirming that the mainland had not exported any hairy crabs to Taiwan so far this year."The mainland's quarantine authorities have not approved the exports as the two sides are still in talks about quarantine standards," said a spokesman with the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (GAQSIQ ).Hairy crabs, mainly bred in East China's Jiangsu Province, have become a popular autumn delicacy in the mainland and have sold well in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan and the United States.But in August the Taiwan authorities published new standards requiring the crabs to contain no detectable drug residues, despite an agreement met with the mainland in July."The new standards are too picky and have no scientific grounds, nor do they comply with the WTO rules," said the GAQSIQ spokesman."We have noticed that a group in Taiwan is trying to discredit mainland food products. Such politically driven acts will harm normal trade across the Taiwan Strait," said Li Weiyi, spokesman for the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council earlier this week.Official figures show more than 99 percent of the Chinese foods exported to the United States, the European Union and Japan were up to standard in the first half of the year.China's number one hairy crab exporter, Wuzhong District of Suzhou City, Jiangsu Province, sold 1,800 tons of hairy crabs abroad over the last two years.
A regional pilot scheme designed to provide basic medical insurance for all urban citizens will go nationwide this year, a senior labor official said Tuesday.A further 229 cities will be added to the scheme this year, Wang Dongjin, former vice-minister of labor and social security and head of a team of experts involved with the pilot, said at a national teleconference.By the end of the year, the scheme will cover 317 cities, Wang said.Dubbed by the public as a lifesaving project, the scheme has been well received by residents in the 88 pilot cities and has brought financial and medical relief to all beneficiaries, he said.Launched in September, the program, as of December, covered 40.68 million people with 620,000 of them already benefiting from it, Wang said.With an average annual premium of 236 yuan () for adults and 97 yuan for children, the scheme will be extended to at least 240 million non-working urban residents, such as children, students, the elderly, the disabled and the unemployed.These groups have been given access to the insurance plan through agents at schools and neighborhood communities, Wang said.For the disabled, home visits will be offered to help them sign up, he said.The premiums are paid by households, instead of individuals, he said. And the government will give subsidies annually to each participant, with more going to families of low-income earners and the disabled.Wang cited a recent survey showing 68 percent of those insured giving it the thumbs up.The poll also found that, between October and December, the number of patients who refused medical treatment for fear of high costs decreased by 10 percent.While subsidized by both central and local governments, the insurance scheme presents both personal and governmental liabilities and cannot be considered a welfare program in its entirety, Vice-Premier Wu Yi said at the conference.Personal contributions to enroll in the scheme cannot be lowered, she said.With the new scheme, China now has a three-layer medicare system, including the health insurance plan for urban employees launched in 1998 and the New Rural Cooperative Medical Scheme launched in 2003.Among those already covered by the medical scheme are more than 10.8 million urban residents in Jiangsu province, almost 4.7 million people in Anhui province, and in excess of 2.2 million urban residents in Gansu province.
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NEW YORK - The overheating of the Chinese stock market is a structural problem that will be resolved by developing more financial products and cracking down on illegal activities, a Chinese securities regulatory official said Thursday. Hu Bing, deputy director-general of the market supervision department at the China Securities Regulatory Commission, said at a conference in New York that authorities are seeking to roll out more products to broaden investors' options, such as real estate investment trusts, or REITs, as well as listed infrastructure funds. Other eventual offerings will include derivatives products such as stock-index futures and warrants. These products will be launched "when conditions are ready," Hu said at a China Investment Forum sponsored by Merrill Lynch and Institutional Investor. He said he couldn't provide a clearer timeline for when those products would be ready. Hu acknowledged a "liquidity surplus problem" that is contributing to the overheating of the Chinese stock market and noted that hot-money inflows coming in through illegal channels are exacerbating the problem. Tackling the liquidity issue is a long-term project that "cannot be resolved just by (raising) the interest rate," Hu said. "So the structural problem has to be resolved using structural measures." Earlier this week, the Chinese government tripled its stamp tax on stock trades in an effort to rein in the equity market. The Shanghai Composite Index more than doubled in 2006 and is still up around 50 percent so far in 2007. Hu said China's capital markets are still young and face a "golden opportunity" to develop their depth and breadth. The majority of individual investors rely on rumors or inside information to make their decisions, leading to speculative gains in stocks, he said. Hu said authorities are stepping up efforts to crack down on insider trading, "but because this is a transitioning society in an emerging market, it will take a long time."
BEIJING - Chinese Defense Minister Cao Gangchuan will pay official good-will visits to Japan and the Philippines from August 29 to September 6, according to the Chinese Defense Ministry.He will visit the two countries at the invitations of Japanese Defense Minister Koike Yuriko and Philippine Secretary of Defence Gilbert Teodoro.Cao's upcoming visits aim to fulfill the consensus reached between leaders of China and the two countries and strengthen exchanges and trust in defense and security areas, the Defense Ministry said in a statement on Thursday.
KHARTOUM: Chinese peacekeepers were on Wednesday awarded certificates of merit for their excellent performance during their eight-month term in Sudan, a Chinese officer said Thursday.Lieutenant General Jasbir Singh Lidder, commander of the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS), presented Unit Citations to the engineering, transportation and medical contingents of Chinese peacekeeping troops, and Force Commander Commendations to 22 Chinese troops.The two certificates of merit are the highest honor awarded to peacekeepers from various contributing countries in Sudan, said the Chinese officer.The awards ceremony was held at the base of the Chinese peacekeeping troops in Wau, capital of West Bahr al-Ghazal state in southern Sudan, two weeks before their departure from Sudan to rotate with another batch of Chinese peacekeeping troops.Lidder said it was a great honor for him to serve with the Chinese peacekeepers as they were ending "their very successful term" in Sudan."During the past months, the three contingents of the Chinese peacekeeping troops have done a significant job to be a role model for professionalism, commitment and conduct," Lidder said.The Chinese peacekeepers had also maintained excellent relations with the contingents of other countries as well as the local population, the UNMIS commander said.Li Chengwen, the Chinese Ambassador to Sudan, congratulated all the three contingents, the 22 Chinese peacekeepers as well as the other officers and soldiers. He highly praised their performance in Sudan, especially in the extremely difficult and complicated conditions.The 435-strong Chinese peacekeeping troops, the second batch of Chinese peacekeepers deployed in southern Sudan since China started taking part in UN peacekeeping operation there in May last year and arrived in Wau in January this year.
XI'AN -- Lawmakers in Northwest China's Shaanxi Province enacted a law on Saturday that is intended to improve protection of the Qinling Mountains, a habitat of endangered giant pandas.The law, which will take effect on March 1, is aimed at preserving biodiversity, preventing soil erosion (which averages 84 million tons a year) and promoting harmony between man and nature in the mountain range, which is a divide between China's north and south.It requires all future development projects in the Qinling Mountains to be assessed for their possible impact on the ecology and bans real estate projects and polluting industries in nature reserves, where the ecology is more vulnerable.The law also bans mining and resource exploration in nature reserves and forest parks.Local governments must ensure immediate demolition of existing projects that are potentially harmful to the ecology, it says.The Qinling range, which largely spans Shaanxi Province, covers more than 50,000 square kilometers.The range is home to approximately 300 Qinling pandas, a sub-species of giant pandas on the verge of extinction, and many other rare animals under state protection, such as golden monkeys, the red ibis and antelopes.