News » Society » China granted Iran oil reprieve

---

• China granted Iran oil reprieve
• Oldest pottery cooking pot found
• Bird flu `epidemic' sparks chicken cull
• Combat-ready patrols bring Spratlys to boil
• The military has begun combat-ready patrols in the waters around the disputed Spratly Islands, the defense ministry said, in the latest escalation in tensions over the potentially resource-rich area in the South China Sea.
• Recall hits battered dairy sector
• FLASH: RETURN CAPSULE OF SHENZHOU-9 TOUCHES DOWN
• China spacecraft returns to Earth
• Actress Dies At 94
• 'Deplorable' conditions at Apple's Chinese suppliers
• Chinese cities up in competitive rankings
• China in 'combat-ready' warning
• Concern over Panetta remarks
• Shenzhou-9's crew return about 10am
• Liuzhou submerged in flood
• Red Cross donations decline
• Man gnaws woman's face
• High-rise near airport to have top dismantled
• Education deal signed
• Shenzhen’s "mini-Hong Kong" to test China’s financial ambitions

China granted Iran oil reprieve Posted: 28 Jun 2012 08:24 PM PDT The United States grants China a six-month reprieve from financial sanctions for buying Iranian oil.

Oldest pottery cooking pot found Posted: 28 Jun 2012 11:12 AM PDT US archaeologists working in southern China find the oldest known sample of pottery, used to cook food or maybe to brew alcohol.

Bird flu `epidemic' sparks chicken cull Posted: 28 Jun 2012 07:38 PM PDT

Combat-ready patrols bring Spratlys to boil Posted: 28 Jun 2012 07:38 PM PDT

The military has begun combat-ready patrols in the waters around the disputed Spratly Islands, the defense ministry said, in the latest escalation in tensions over the potentially resource-rich area in the South China Sea. Posted: 28 Jun 2012 07:38 PM PDT

Recall hits battered dairy sector Posted: 28 Jun 2012 07:38 PM PDT

FLASH: RETURN CAPSULE OF SHENZHOU-9 TOUCHES DOWN Posted: 28 Jun 2012 07:06 PM PDT FLASH: RETURN CAPSULE OF SHENZHOU-9 TOUCHES DOWN

China spacecraft returns to Earth Posted: 28 Jun 2012 07:50 PM PDT A Chinese space capsule carrying three crew members returns to Earth after a 13-day mission which saw China's first manual docking procedure.

Actress Dies At 94 Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:33 AM PDT Renowned Chinese actress Zhang Ruifang died of an unspecified illness in Shanghai last night. She was 94. She joined the Shanghai Film Studio after New China was founded in 1949. She won the China's Best Actress Award for her role in "Li Shuangshuang" in 1963.

'Deplorable' conditions at Apple's Chinese suppliers Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:05 AM PDT A LABOR rights group found "deplorable" conditions at Apple suppliers in China following an investigation into several firms that make the US technology giant's hugely popular products. New York-based China Labor Watch said yesterday that a four-month investigation of 10 Apple suppliers in southern and eastern China uncovered violations of workers' rights, including excessive overtime and hazardous working conditions. "This investigation of 10 different Apple factories in China finds that harmful, damaging work environments characterized by illegally long hours for low levels of pay are widespread in Apple's supply," it said. The report was based on surveys and interviews of 620 workers, as well as first-hand observations by a team of six, including some who entered the factories undercover. The lengthy report followed findings announced in March by the Fair Labor Association, which toured three Chinese suppliers with Apple's consent and also reported on forced overtime and other problems. China Labor Watch Director Li Qiang urged the California-based company's chief executive Tim Cook to make good on repeated pledges to improve conditions. "Apple should take the responsibility to change the poor working conditions of those workers," Li said. Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the latest report, but Cook said in February that the company took ensuring good working conditions at its suppliers seriously and was constantly fixing problems. Following the FLA report, Apple?s largest supplier, Taiwan-based?s Foxconn, also pledged to end workplace abuses at its factories on China?s mainland, including overtime above the amount permitted by Chinese law. Foxconn has come under scrutiny since 2010, following a number of suicides and incidents of labor unrest at its Chinese plants. At least 13 of its employees died in apparent suicides in 2010, with several more deaths last year. China Labor Watch said other Apple suppliers had treated their staff worse than Foxconn, which has received the most attention. òThe labor rights violations at Foxconn also exist in virtually all other Apple supplier factories and in many cases are actually significantly more dire than Foxconn,ó the report said. 130 hours overtime The labor group found employees worked an average of between 100 and 130 hours of overtime a month at the 10 factories, well above China?s legal limit of 36 hours. Low wages compelled workers to accept overtime and some factories did not properly compensate them for the hours, it said. Working conditions in factories that produce cases for Apple products were especially poor, including exposure to loud noise and toxic chemicals, the report said. Workers had little ability to push for better conditions because they did not know how independent unions functioned, it said. Foxconn responded to the report yesterday by saying it was committed to making changes following the FLA audit in March. òThe process of change in our company continues, and competitive wages, improved living conditions and the abolition of the use of dispatched workers by our company are some examples of this,ó it said in a statement. Another company named in the report, a unit of US-headquartered Jabil Circuit in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, denied some of the accusations, including no limits on overtime for some workers. òSome of the things said by employees do not conform with the company?s situation. We abide by state regulations,ó a personnel official, who declined to be named, said. Apple products are wildly popular in China, where the iPhone and iPad are particularly coveted by wealthy consumers. China Labor Watch said more than 70 percent of the workers it surveyed did not own Apple products but would like to have at least one.

Chinese cities up in competitive rankings Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:04 AM PDT SIX Chinese cities are among the 100 most competitive in the world and Shanghai ranks the highest of all those on the Chinese mainland, according to a Chinese Academy of Social Sciences survey. New York is the world's most competitive of 500 cities around the globe, the academy said. Shanghai ranks 36th, following Hong Kong (9) and Taipei (32). Beijing (55), Shenzhen (67) and Macau (79) are the other Chinese cities in the top 100. The economic slowdown and European debt crisis has dragged down overall competing power in the North American and European regions, according to the survey, which covers the period from 2011 to the early months of this year. Despite the obvious impact of a sluggish global economy, such as a shrinking demand for exports, the overall competitive abilities of Chinese cities had improved from the same period a year earlier, according to the study. Shanghai rose one place compared to the previous year. Beijing went up five places. Hong Kong, the only Chinese city in the top 10, rose two places from a year earlier. The top 10 most competitive cities were New York, London, Tokyo, Paris, San Francisco, Chicago, Los Angles, Singapore, Hong Kong and Seoul. Researchers mainly took into account the cities' economic output, technology development levels and their international influence to determine the rankings.

China in 'combat-ready' warning Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:04 AM PDT China has begun "combat-ready patrols" in the South China Sea, the Defense Ministry said yesterday, the latest escalation in tensions over the potentially resource-rich area. Asked what China would do in response to Vietnamese air patrols over the Nansha Islands, ministry spokesman Geng Yansheng said China would "resolutely oppose any militarily provocative behavior." "In order to protect national sovereignty and our security and development interests, the Chinese military has already set up a normal, combat-ready patrol system in seas under our control," he said. "The Chinese military's resolve and will to defend territorial sovereignty and protect our maritime rights and interests is firm and unshakeable," Geng added, according to a transcript on the ministry's website (www.mod.gov.cn). Geng said China's armed forces shoulder the responsibility of safeguarding the country's territorial sovereignty, sea rights and interests, adding that this fact is not directly related to the establishment of the city of Sansha. China may set up local military command organs in the city according to relevant regulations, he said. The State Council, or China's Cabinet, has approved the establishment of the prefectural-level city of Sansha to administer the Xisha, Zhongsha and Nansha island groups and their surrounding waters, while the government seat will be stationed on Yongxing Island, part of the Xisha Islands, according to a statement from the Ministry of Civil Affairs. The council has abolished a county-level administrative office for the island groups that was also stationed on Yongxing Island, the statement said. Last week China said it "vehemently opposed" a Vietnamese law asserting sovereignty over the Xisha and Nansha islands, which straddle key shipping lanes thought to contain rich energy reserves. CNOOC, China's offshore oil specialist, said earlier this week that it would invite foreign partners to jointly explore and develop nine blocks in the western part of the South China Sea this year. On Tuesday, Vietnam said CNOOC's plan was "illegal" and the blocks encroached on Vietnamese territorial waters. At a regular briefing on Wednesday, China's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Hong Lei, insisted that the tenders were in accord with Chinese and international law and urged Vietnam not to escalate the dispute.

Concern over Panetta remarks Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:01 AM PDT THE United States' reinforcement of military deployment in the Asia-Pacific is not conducive to security and mutual trust in the region, a Chinese Defense Ministry spokesman said yesterday. Geng Yansheng was responding to US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's remarks at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore earlier this month when he said Washington was seeking to increase the US military presence in the Asia-Pacific by shifting 60 percent of its navy ships to the region by 2020. Deliberately highlighting the military and security agenda, and deploying more forces in the Asia-Pacific, goes against the world's pursuit of peace, development and cooperation, Geng said.

Shenzhou-9's crew return about 10am Posted: 28 Jun 2012 10:00 AM PDT CHINA'S Shenzhou-9 spacecraft and its crew of three will land in Inner Mongolia at around 10am today. It separated from the orbiting Tiangong-1 lab module around 7am yesterday, the first time such a disconnection had been carried out manually. Liu Wang conducted the operation and continued manually steering the spacecraft to a safe distance from the lab module, the Beijing Aerospace Control Center said. The spacecraft was then ready to begin its flight back to Earth. A return module with the three astronauts on board - Liu Wang, Jing Haipeng and Liu Yang, China's first woman in space - will separate from the spacecraft before it enters Earth's atmosphere. Parachutes will help reduce the speed of the module as it falls and a rocket will fire to further slow it shortly before landing. Seven helicopters are on standby in the vicinity of landing area on grassland of Inner Mongolia's Siziwang Banner ready to look for the module after it comes down. "The helicopters have been equipped with China's Beidou navigation satellite system to send back the position of the module to the Beijing control center," said Cui Xiaojun, deputy commander for the landing mission. The return module will be sending signals to the helicopters during landing, so they will be able to gauge its position while it is still in the air, Cui said. Wu Ping, a spokeswoman for China's manned space program, said an upgraded video monitoring system had been installed around the landing zone to transmit details to the control center in Beijing. China Central Television will broadcast the landing process. A medical helicopter will pick the astronauts up and carry out health checks. A separate cabin with two female medical workers has been prepared for Liu Yang, Cui said. All of the previous eight Shenzhou spacecraft have landed in the sparsely populated area. All nearby mobile phone towers and high voltage cables will stop working for a day to avoid disturbing transmissions from the return module. Traffic will also be restricted. A hospital has been placed on standby for any emergency. Wu said it was possible the astronauts would suffer some ill effects from being weightless in space and they would need time to readapt to Earth?s gravity. Weather conditions in north China will be favorable for the landing, forecasters in the area said. The sky will be clear and temperatures will be around 17 to 21 degrees Celsius. It had been raining with some thunder in the landing zone from Wednesday to yesterday, but conditions were improving and would meet the requirements of the landing. The astronauts on Shenzhou-9 successfully carried out the country?s first manual space docking procedure on Sunday with Tiangong-1. All experiments and tests had been completed on schedule and produced valuable data, Chen Shanguang, chief commander of the mission?s astronaut system, said. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Liuzhou submerged in flood Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:28 AM PDT A man rides a bike through floodwater in Liuzhou, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in southwest China. Torrential rains pounded the city for several days, raising the water level of local Liujiang River to 79.71 meters by 10:55am today, the highest so far this year. Many roads are under water. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Red Cross donations decline Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:28 AM PDT DONATIONS to the Red Cross Society of China dropped 59.4 percent in 2011, according to an annual report on public donations published yesterday. The China Charity Information Center said in its report that the Red Cross received about 2.87 billion yuan (US$451 million), accounting for 3.4 percent of total public donations last year. In June 2011, a young woman identifying herself as Guo Meimei claimed to work for an organization affiliated with the Red Cross. The woman posted photos depicting her lavish lifestyle on the Internet, prompting speculation she had embezzled money to fund her extravagances. The Red Cross Society of China denied employing her. However, the incident resulted in persistent public calls for the organization to boost its transparency. The scandal negatively affected the public's willingness to donate to charity, according to Liu Youping, deputy director of the charity center. Public donations dropped to 84.5 billion yuan in 2011, down 18.1 percent year on year. Liu cited fewer major natural disasters as one of the reasons for the drop, adding that donations directed toward disaster relief dropped by 20 billion yuan. Public donations totaled 100 billion yuan in 2008 after a massive earthquake devastated Sichuan Province. Donations topped 100 billion yuan again in 2010, when another large earthquake hit Yushu County in Qinghai Province. More than 60 percent of public donations were made through social organizations.

Man gnaws woman's face Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:28 AM PDT AN intoxicated bus driver has been detained after he gnawed on a female driver's face after blocking her car on a road in Wenzhou City of Zhejiang Province, local media reported yesterday. Police said the incident occurred near a bus station in Ouhai District at 2pm on Tuesday when a man surnamed Dong rushed onto the road and blocked the vehicle of a female driver surnamed Du, Wenzhou City News reported. The man then climbed on the car's hood and started hitting the windshield while Du screamed inside, police said. Several minutes later, Du got out of the car to flee, but the man jumped on her and started gnawing on her face once they were on the ground, police said. Passers-by said Du's face was covered in blood. They said they tried to pull Dong off the woman, but he seemed so "crazy" that they couldn't stop him. Police stopped the man. Doctors at a nearby hospital said Du will need plastic surgery to repair the damage from the bites on her nose and lips. Police said Dong had been drinking heavily with his friends at lunch that day.

High-rise near airport to have top dismantled Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:27 AM PDT WANDA Group has been ordered to dismantle the top 10 floors of a 32-story mall built close to an airport in Sichuan Province after night flights were suspended due to the building?s excessive height, a report said. The high-rise is 2.4 kilometers from the airport in Mianyang City, making it difficult for pilots to see the runway at night. The cancellation caused the airport to lose up to 200,000 yuan (US$31,460) per day while the building?s proximity to the runway endangered all flights, Time Weekly reported yesterday. The high-rise violated height restrictions and the developer should bear responsibility for the suspension of night flights, a department director with the Sichuan Civil Aviation Administration, surnamed Ni, told the newspaper. A pilot, who declined to be named, said Wanda has been ordered to remove 10 stories from the top of the building. An anonymous government official verified this, according to the report. Rebuilding would cost at least 200 million yuan, but the developer believes the Mianyang government should pay for it, the report said. An unnamed Wanda employee was cited as saying the project had been approved by the Mianyang government. An employee from the mall?s sales office was confident the building would remain untouched. The employee was quoted as saying: òThe mall will not be knocked down at the top. Wanda is so powerful in the industry.ó Mianyang authorities refused to comment and have tried to prevent the news from spreading, the paper said. The airport neither published notice nor gave an explanation after night flights were canceled. The danger was discovered on April 22 when a night flight twice failed to land at Mianyang Airport because the high-rise was a huge obstacle in front of the runway. The plane was rerouted to land at another airport. The Sichuan Civil Aviation Administration suspended night flights at the airport beginning on April 24.

Education deal signed Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:27 AM PDT THIRTY-FOUR higher education institutions in Hong Kong and the Chinese mainland signed a letter of intent yesterday to further strengthen exchange programs. The agreement involves 17 schools from both the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong. Exchange activities include visiting mainland and Hong Kong universities to pursue studies and research. The central government will set up a dedicated fund to support teachers and students in Hong Kong to participate in exchange programs on the mainland. Hao Ping, Vice Minister of Education, and Michael Suen, Secretary of Education in Hong Kong, and other representatives attended the signing ceremony.

Shenzhen’s "mini-Hong Kong" to test China’s financial ambitions Posted: 28 Jun 2012 09:04 AM PDT Source: Reuters By Alison Leung and James Pomfret (Reuters) – China's southern boomtown of Shenzhen, a pioneer of economic reforms but long in the shadow of Hong Kong, is plotting another bold ploy: a $45 billion 'mini-Hong Kong' to return it to the limelight and aid China's rise as a financial power. On a barren stretch of reclaimed land in western Shenzhen and near the Hong Kong border, China wants to build another financial services hub from scratch in the Qianhai Bay economic zone, offering the low taxes, rigorous legal regime and anticorruption vigilance enjoyed by its affluent neighbor. For the former British colony, which this weekend will mark the 15th anniversary of its return to China, the project could bring fresh business opportunities and bolster its position as China's financial window on the global markets. But Shenzhen's ambitions are running into the brick wall of Beijing's caution over reform, as China's grand hopes of becoming a global financial powerhouse struggle to overcome its fear of freeing markets from government control. Local officials have given up, for example, on the idea of an independent antigraft body similar to Hong Kong's, settling for a hybrid that mixes features of the Hong Kong and mainland systems, said Cao Hailei, head of the Qianhai Authority overseeing the project. "The structure of the two governments is different," Cao told Reuters in an interview at a Shenzhen municipal government office. Chinese President Hu Jintao is expected to announce preferential tax rates and other incentives for the Qianhai Bay zone when he visits Hong Kong this week to fete the anniversary of the city's return and swear in a new administration. China has been steadily expanding the role Hong Kong plays in internationalizing the yuan, which it hopes one day will be a global currency like the dollar, and in building up the Chinese financial markets. Beijing announced a series of new measures on Wednesday for Hong Kong, including allowing joint ventures among the stock exchanges of Shanghai, Shenzhen and Hong Kong, and letting Hong Kong financial firms set up consumer arms in Guangdong province, which includes Shenzhen. BUCOLIC BACKWATER Now a bustling metropolis of 10 million crammed with ports and skyscrapers and home to Chinese corporate goliaths such as carmaker BYD Co (1211.HK) and telecommunications firm Huawei Technologies 002502.SZ, Shenzhen was no more than a bucolic backwater of 30,000 villagers living off paddy fields and the sea in 1980. Shenzhen's stock market, while smaller than its Shanghai counterpart, has become the most active global IPO center on a wave of domestic listings, eclipsing London and Hong Kong. China has also laid out plans to build up Shanghai, which already boasts the world's fourth-largest stock market by value of shares traded, into a bona fide global financial center by 2020, but it still has far to go to compete broadly with established centers such as New York and London. Despite giant economic strides in the past two decades, China's still difficult and fickle business environment needs to mature into one of greater openness and legal rigor, foreign investors say, and those are elements that have long been part of Hong Kong's institutional and commercial fabric. Qianhai, which will focus on financial, logistics and IT services and is set for completion in 2020, would allow the mainland to leverage Hong Kong's expertise. Through close cooperation with Hong Kong, Qianhai would forge an "innovative financial reform program", Zhang Jianmin, an official with China's top economic planning agency, the National Development and Reform Commission, said this month. The Qianhai Authority's Cao said he hoped to establish a new arbitration court with juries partly comprised of Hong Kong residents to settle commercial disputes, addressing common concerns among Hong Kong and foreign investors toward the vagaries of Chinese law. "We expect the policies will be approved before the end of June," he said. Hong Kong officials have publicly backed the Qianhai project, offering expertise on financial markets and legal systems. They see it as a key part of the rapidly expanding conglomeration of cities in the Pearl River Delta, which comprises much of Guangdong province and is often called the world's workshop for its concentration of export-oriented manufacturers. The region, along with Hong Kong and Macau, has a combined GDP exceeding the Netherlands and nearly the size of Australia. "Hong Kong is suffering from limited land supply," said Thomas Chan, head of the China Business Centre at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. "With the help of Qianhai, (Hong Kong) could expand some of its financial business across the border. In fact, this is what the mainland planners have in mind. The 15 square-kilometer area is twelve times the size of Hong Kong's central district." Qianhai will be largely self-financed by bank loans, bonds and revenue from land-use rights of the area, as well as co-development projects, Cao said, with infrastructure development costs estimated at 285 billion yuan ($44.8 billion). Analysts say the project's endorsement at the highest levels in Beijing should reduce the risk of any financing difficulties even as China's credit environment tightens.

You are subscribed to email updates from Update » News » Society To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now.	Email delivery powered by Google
Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610