News » Society » Impact of train coupling hurts 24 passengers
News » Society » Impact of train coupling hurts 24 passengers |
- Impact of train coupling hurts 24 passengers
- 3 killed, 5 injured after trucks plunge off collapsed bridge in NE China
- 3 killed, 5 injured after trucks plunge off collapsed bridge in NE China
- The Gu Kailai body double debate
- EU group sees red as wine wars intensify
- A business group has criticized mainland calls to probe European Union wine imports as "protectionist," as a dispute between the major trading partners threatens to escalate.
- Syrian refugees to get 30m yuan aid
- Taiwan evacuates 3,000 as Tembin nears
- Universe is 'dark' in 100b years
- HIV infection rate soars among men in their 50s, 60s
- High-rise building under construction catches fire in Dalian
- Team set up to probe cop-prostitute nexus
- Cash woes put Monkey King project in a limbo
- Low-altitude airspace ban set to be relaxed
- Amusement parks boost real estate market
- Website of People’s Daily Doubles Profit
- China escalates U.S. trade dispute, requests WTO decision
- U.S. Plans New Asia Missile Defenses
- China Q2 bank earnings to signal end of easy profits
- Have You Heard…
| Impact of train coupling hurts 24 passengers Posted: 23 Aug 2012 08:14 PM PDT AT least 24 passengers were injured when two trains were hooking up carriages yesterday afternoon in Jiamusi, a city in northeast Heilongjiang Province. The Harbin Railway Bureau said five passengers are still being treated for bruises at a hospital while other passengers with minor injuries have been sent home by the bureau. The cause of the accident is still under investigation, the bureau said, adding that people responsible for mishandling the trains will be punished. |
| 3 killed, 5 injured after trucks plunge off collapsed bridge in NE China Posted: 23 Aug 2012 06:56 PM PDT THREE people were killed and five others injured early this morning after four trucks they were travelling aboard plunged off a collapsed bridge in a northeast China city, police sources said. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| 3 killed, 5 injured after trucks plunge off collapsed bridge in NE China Posted: 23 Aug 2012 05:51 PM PDT
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| The Gu Kailai body double debate Posted: 23 Aug 2012 04:34 PM PDT What Gu 'body double' story says about China |
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| Taiwan evacuates 3,000 as Tembin nears Posted: 23 Aug 2012 10:10 AM PDT TAIWAN authorities evacuated more than 3,000 residents from mountainous areas yesterday as a powerful typhoon approached the island and threatened to dump torrential rains that could unleash deadly landslides. By late evening, Taiwan's weather bureau said Typhoon Tembin was packing winds of 155 kilometers per hour off the the island's southeast. It said the slow-moving storm would probably make landfall around noon today and predicted up to 1 meter of rain in several eastern counties. Mindful of a devastating typhoon three years ago that took 700 lives, authorities say thousands of resucers equipped with rubber boats and amphibious vehicles have been put on alert to help with relief efforts in areas impacted by Tembin's fury. Authorities closed schools and ordered workers home in the eastern city of Hualien, where all flights were canceled. Schools were closed in Taitung and in parts of Kaohsiung county in the south. Farmers were urgently harvesting crops ahead of the storm's arrival, and many homes and businesses in eastern Taiwan boarded up their windows to try to minimize damage. Outdoor events to mark a special Qixi Festival were also canceled. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Universe is 'dark' in 100b years Posted: 23 Aug 2012 10:09 AM PDT Astronomers should feel lucky they have a space full of stars, galaxies and other objects to study after Nobel Prize laureate Brian P. Schmidt suggested that the universe would eventually fade away. "Human beings will look to an empty universe in 100 billion years, as all the galaxies will fade away except the Milky Way we live in," said Schmidt during the 28th General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union held in Beijing from August 20 to 31. Schmidt shared the 2011 Nobel Prize in physics with Saul Perlmutter and Adam Riess for providing evidence that the expansion of the universe is accelerating. Before their discoveries, it was commonly thought that the expansion of the universe was slowing down. Schmidt and his partners discovered that billion-year-old exploding stars and their galaxies are accelerating away from their reference frame. Their discoveries led to research on dark energy, a hypothetical form of energy that permeates all of space and tends to accelerate the expansion of the universe. "Unless dark energy suddenly disappears, that will surprise us as we can't really think of a reason why - the universe will continue to expand more and more quickly and eventually fade away," Schmidt said. Eagerly searching for life signals in the universe, human beings - if we still exist - will feel lonelier in a dark universe in 100 billion years. "Our Milky Way will still be here and merge with some nearby galaxies," Schmidt said, "but other things we see today will not be able to reach us in the future. Every galaxy beyond the Milky Way will disappear." At that time, astronomers will all be unemployed because there will be nothing to work at, he said. "The universe does what it does and I'm here to measure, not to judge," he added. |
| HIV infection rate soars among men in their 50s, 60s Posted: 23 Aug 2012 09:57 AM PDT UNSAFE sex outside marriage and less watchfulness about infection has sent the number of men in their 50s and 60s with HIV or AIDS skyrocketing in the past decade in China, where the HIV/AIDS population reached about 780,000 as of last year. Men aged 50 to 64 accounted for 13.6 percent of the country's total HIV-positive cases reported last year, a sharp increase from 1.6 percent in 2000, according to a report by the National Center for AIDS/STD Control and Prevention, of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Men above 65 accounted for 7 percent of the total HIV-positive cases reported in 2011, rising from 0.34 percent in 2000, the report said. Among new HIV-positive cases reported nationwide, those over the age of 60 accounted for 8.9 percent in 2010, a sharp rise from 2.2 percent back to 2005, Wu Zunyou, an official with the center, told the Beijing Times. Experts told the newspaper that the dramatic rise in older men in China infected with HIV is because many are retired and less busy but still have sexual desires, while their spouses' level of desire may be dampened after age of 60. Many older HIV carriers or AIDS patients paid for sex without using protection, and some don't worry about the damage of AIDS because they believe the virus takes 10 years to incubate, experts told the newspaper. The country had 48,000 new HIV-positive cases last year and a total of 28,000 people died of diseases related to AIDS, the report said. The number of people who died of AIDS-related diseases is on the rise. In 2010 the death toll was 26,000, up from 20,000 in 2009. Wu said deaths are rising because many patients are diagnosed with AIDS too late. Among the total 780,000 HIV carriers and AIDS patients by the end of last year, women accounted for 28.6 percent. The number of AIDS patients was 154,000, report shows. Sexual transmission is now the major cause of HIV infection as 76.3 percent of the total HIV-positive population is infected due to sexual activities, a sharp rise from 33.1 percent in 2006, Wu told the newspaper. By the end of September, about 75.8 percent of HIV-positive cases were reported from Yunnan, Henan, Sichuan and Guangdong provinces, the Guangxi Zhuang and Xinjiang Uygur autonomous regions, according to the report. College students The report also shows a sharp increase in people aged 20 to 24, mainly college students, who were infected by HIV as they accounted for 49 percent of the total of HIV-positive cases last year, compared with 20.3 percent in 2006. Students account for 1.64 percent among HIV-positive cases in 2011, rising from 0.96 percent in 2006, report shows. The country is still facing great challenges in AIDS prevention. About 25 percent of drug abusers share syringes, 32 percent of prostitutes don't use condoms every time they are with a client, and 87 percent of gays in sexual relationships had sexual activities with two or more partners within six months, the report said. China will strengthen AIDS-prevention measures to reduce new infections by 25 percent and reduce the death rate from AIDS by 30 percent by the end of 2015, Wu told the newspaper. |
| High-rise building under construction catches fire in Dalian Posted: 23 Aug 2012 09:54 AM PDT A high-rise building under construction catches fire in the high-tech zone of Dalian City, northeast China's Liaoning Province, yesterday. A fire broke out at the high-rise building in Dalian yesterday afternoon, with casualties not clear yet and the cause of the fire under investigation. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Team set up to probe cop-prostitute nexus Posted: 23 Aug 2012 09:16 AM PDT An investigation team has been established by the Xi'an City Public Security Bureau in northwest China's Shaanxi Province to look into a case where policemen are accused of working with prostitutes to catch and fine their clients, the bureau announced yesterday. The team was set up after a program by the Shaanxi Broadcast and Television Station stirred public anger. The program showed how policemen caught "Johns" and took them to a nearby police station from a shady massage parlor and then sent back the prostitutes to the parlor. According to the TV program broadcast on Tuesday, a migrant worker surnamed Zhang told reporters that a masseuse of the massage parlor offered her services for a low price late one night. But as they walked out of the parlor for their rendezvous, a plainclothes policeman caught him and fined him 3,000 yuan for engaging in illegal sexual activities, Zhang revealed. "I felt like I was being scammed. I was just walking with that young woman on the street and we hadn't started anything yet, so how come the police knew that she was a prostitute and I was buying sex from her?" Zhang asked. He said he was asked to pay the money and leave the station, but didn't receive any receipt for the fine. He paid another visit to the parlor some days later and, to his surprise, found that it was still open. The police had not taken any action. Reporters of the TV station hid near the massage parlor for several days and a young woman working there told one of the undercover reporters that they offered all kinds of sexual services. In the program, an unlicensed van carrying two policemen, one dressed in uniform and the other in plainclothes, would visit the parlor late at night. The two cops would catch a prostitute and her client, take them to the vehicle which then headed to a nearby police station. But strangely, after the van took a young woman and her client away at about 10pm on August 10, the woman was sent back to the massage parlor just 15 minutes later. With the van parked near the police station, a man was recorded handing a wad of cash to another man in a police uniform. The program was broadcast over 1 million times online with angry netizens asking: "Are cops working with prostitutes to make money from the Johns?" In response, Zhao Xiaoqi, vice director of the Xi'an City Public Security Bureau, told media that an investigation team has been set up to look into the case. "We have asked all police stations to identify the policemen caught in the program and to punish them." |
| Cash woes put Monkey King project in a limbo Posted: 23 Aug 2012 09:15 AM PDT A county in north China's Shanxi Province is struggling to complete a sightseeing project at a site associated with the Monkey King, the main hero of the Chinese literary classic, Journey to the West. The project developer has spent more than 60 million yuan (US$9.4 million) creating scenes based on descriptions in the novel, but only managed to complete a four-story tourist reception center and plant trees on some barren hillsides, Xinhua news agency reported yesterday. Qiang Junkui, an official in charge of the project, said hundreds of millions of yuan are still needed to complete the project. Loufan County Tourism Bureau director Liang Junjie said local government didn't support the project because it believes the tourist resort may not be as lucrative as previously assumed. "The Monkey King is just a mythical figure and Loufan County and its surrounding areas don't have any scenic spots. It is hard to put Loufan on the tourist map," he said. Xinhua said Ru'nan County in central Henan Province had also suspended construction of a park dedicated to Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai, the Chinese Romeo and Juliet described in ancient folklore. County officials said the park investor has pulled out of the project, leaving a mess for local authorities to clean up. In recent years it has become common for rural areas to try every effort to prove their links to celebrities and popular figures, thereby hoping to earn big bucks from the sightseeing projects. However, some projects have been forced to stop due to lack of funds while others failed to garner much attention, Xinhua said. |
| Low-altitude airspace ban set to be relaxed Posted: 23 Aug 2012 09:15 AM PDT CHINA will relax the ban on the use of low-altitude airspace across the country starting in 2013, national air traffic authorities said yesterday. A series of reforms will be implemented in five to 10 years, creating an independent airspace market under some government guidance, said Zhu Shicai, an official with the state air traffic control commission. Zhu made the remarks at the two-day 2012 China Low-altitude Economy Summit, which began yesterday in Shenyang, capital of northeast China's Liaoning Province. "The new policy suggests that the biggest obstacle facing the opening up of China's low-altitude airspace has been cleared," Zhu said. China has launched pilot projects in its northeastern, southern and central regions, as well as seven pilot cities, to open airspace below 1,000 meters to general aviation flights. The seven pilot cities are Tangshan, Xi'an, Qingdao, Hangzhou, Ningbo, Kunming and Chongqing. New regulations on airspace planning and operation as well as applications for general aviation flights will be issued this year, simplifying the use of low-altitude airspace, Zhu said. Further opening up of the airspace is expected to promote the general aviation industry, including the purchase and use of private planes. China's low-altitude airspace is controlled by the Air Force and the Civil Aviation Administration of China. Private flights currently need to go through time-consuming and complicated procedures to fly in low-altitude airspace. |
| Amusement parks boost real estate market Posted: 23 Aug 2012 11:43 AM PDT  Source: China Daily When visiting a theme park in China, listen for the shrieks as the roller coasters whiz past and the bumper cars collide. Amusement parks are a booming business in China. But although attractions are springing up nationwide, industry insiders say the trend has less to do with tapping the thrill-seeker market and more to do with securing prime real estate. Theme parks in Asia sold a combined 103.3 million tickets last year, one-third of the total in the world and second only to those sold in North America (127 million), according to AECOM, a consultancy firm in Hong Kong. And unlike the US, East Asia is seeing a growing number of new attractions. Chris Yoshii, an analyst for AECOM, told USA Today recently that almost a third of China's 2,500-plus theme parks have opened within the past two years, with the total number expected to surpass that of the US by 2020. However, a 2010 study by the firm found that at least 70 percent of these attractions are actually losing money, with the real profits coming from adjacent projects. Feng Yuguo, secretary-general of the China Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions, said that fact doesn't worry investors. "Many investors don't mind losing money operating theme parks, since the sales of tickets and food make up only a very small percentage of their profits," Feng said. "The major part comes from the adjacent commercial and residential developments, including apartments, villas and hotels." Profit model Victory Kingdom in Tianjin, which borders Beijing, has made 20 million yuan ($3.14 million) since opening its doors on July 7. Yu Gui Garden Investment Group, a real estate developer from Guangdong province, invested 3 billion yuan in the project. Yet an insider who did not want to be identified said the villas and hotels now under construction nearby are expected to turn a bigger profit, and faster. "Many foreign-funded enterprises have settled in the area in recent years, as it was made an economic and technological development zone in 1991," said Wang Zhen, the park's publicity officer.  The zone has led to 90 billion yuan being invested in the past two decades and an influx of 1,200 enterprises from 50 countries and regions, creating about 125,000 jobs. "As transportation gets more convenient, we believe we will get more visitors in the future than the 150,000 we received in the first month," Wang said. He added that the second phase of the park, which is twice the size of the part already open to the public, is scheduled to open next year. As Victory Kingdom brings an influx of people ready to part with their hard-earned money, industry analyst Shao Gang predicted the zone will enjoy boom times over the next five years, with hotels, shopping malls and restaurants soon arriving to get a piece of the action. "Many (developers) are trying the same model," the deputy director of EntGroup Consultants in Beijing said. "They buy land at a relatively low price to build a theme park and then erect adjoining apartments and hotels." Unlike residential developments, the restrictions imposed by the State Council to cool the "hot" property market do not apply to projects classified as cultural or for entertainment purposes. As this is the case, theme parks have become attractive investments to major real estate companies. Roundabout course Traditionally, funding for adventure parks has come from established industry players, such as Overseas Chinese Town Group and Shenzhen Huaqiang Holdings, or multinational entertainment groups, such as Walt Disney Co, which is set to open its first theme park on the Chinese mainland, in Shanghai, in 2015. However, largely due to the nation's housing market restrictions, about one-third of China's top 100 property developers have now entered the tourism real estate sector, including industry giants Vanke and Wanda, according to China Venture Group, a research and consulting company. According to 5u588.com, a Chinese tourism-industry information website, 70 tourism real estate projects have already been signed this year, with a total investment of 260 billion yuan. That figure is expected to surpass 1 trillion yuan by December. To prevent companies getting around the restrictions, however, Beijing city authorities in August last year banned the construction of new theme parks over a certain size. The move prompted the cancellation of many projects in the capital, Shao added. Making profits from commercial and residential developments "is something that everyone in this industry knows", said an employee of an amusement park in Tianjin who spoke on condition of anonymity. "Parks require a lot of funding and have high operating costs, so it can take a long time for investors to recoup their money," he said. And not all of them do. According to Shao, many theme parks built in the early 2000s have gone bankrupt, with the properties failing to sell at dozens of auctions over the past seven years. "The development of the theme parks in China has taken a roundabout course, especially in the early years," said Feng from the China Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions. "Although some theme parks are operating well and making some money, like Happy Valley, many are still in debt." An increase in theme parks is good news for thrill-seekers, but Feng said investors need to be prudent, to avoid finding themselves on a financial roller coaster. |
| Website of People’s Daily Doubles Profit Posted: 23 Aug 2012 11:49 AM PDT  Source: Wall Street Journal By Shen Hong SHANGHAI—Apparently, touting the Communist Party line can be good for business. The performance at People.cn came as many Chinese companies are reporting, or are expected to report, disappointing midyear results. It offers a reminder that favorable policies and an industry blueprint set by Beijing can generate corporate success, even against the backdrop of a slowing economy. In a stock-exchange filing Wednesday, the news portal—which is nearly 80%-owned by the People's Daily—said its first-half net profit rose to 64.9 million yuan ($10.2 million) from 32.3 million yuan a year earlier. The company, which raised 1.4 billion yuan in an initial public offering of stock in April, recorded revenue of 291.6 million yuan, up 38%. People.cn attributed the robust earnings growth to strong performances in three core areas: news content for mobile devices; its business selling political and economic analyses; and advertising sales. But it also stressed the "pivotal impact" of the Chinese government's support for what officials in China call the "cultural industry," as well as related efforts to nurture a group of dominant state-run enterprises. "The launch of various regulations and policies has promoted the orderly development of the Internet sector," People.cn said in the filing. As part of its 12th five-year plan, a blueprint for social and economic development for 2011-2015, Beijing has been aggressively promoting the cultural industry, which includes news-media, publishing and education-related businesses. China's leaders are seeking fresh growth engines for the world's No. 2 economy as it shifts to more consumption-driven development and away from export-led growth. People.cn's listing in Shanghai in late April also came as China's state-linked media companies restructure to better compete with popular commercial website operators such as Sina Corp. and Sohu.com Inc. In spite of government backing, both politically and financially, most state-run news portals often don't draw the same traffic as private-sector outlets. Noting Beijing's support, investors embraced People.cn on its debut and sent the stock up 74% from its IPO price. Shares in People.cn fell 1.2% to 38.93 yuan on Wednesday amid a weak broader market. The news portal also counts state-owned telecommunications companies including China Mobile Ltd., China Unicom (Hong Kong) Ltd. and China Telecom Corp. CHA +0.98%as minority shareholders. Such affiliations have started to pay off. "Thanks to the deepening cooperation with telecom operators, all kinds of mobile value-added services have continued to advance and brought about income growth areas," People.cn said in its filing. In the first half of this year, People.cn's mobile value-added services contributed revenue of 45.1 million yuan, up 80% from a year earlier. Revenue from the company's information services rose 64% to 84.4 million yuan, while advertisement sales increased 18% to 154.1 million yuan. |
| China escalates U.S. trade dispute, requests WTO decision Posted: 23 Aug 2012 11:52 AM PDT  Source: Reuters By Tom Miles (Reuters) – In a move that escalates a trade row with the United States, China said it would ask the World Trade Organization (WTO) to adjudicate a dispute over U.S. punitive import duties on 22 Chinese exports, including solar panels and steel products. WTO rules entitle China to demand adjudication after a 60 day period of consultations. China will make the demand for adjudication at a meeting of the WTO's Dispute Settlement Body on Aug 31, China said in a statement circulated to WTO members this week. The office of the U.S. Trade Representative said in May that China's decision to bring the dispute to the WTO was "premature and not an appropriate use of dispute settlement system resources", because the U.S. Department of Commerce was already working to address the issues raised by China. But China's statement said two subsequent rounds of talks, on June 25 and July 18, had failed to resolve the dispute, which includes wind towers, as well as certain types of steel pipe, wire, cylinders and wheels, aluminum extrusions, wood flooring, magnesia bricks, thermal and coated paper and citric acid. China is by far the world's biggest producer of steel and is also a leading maker of clean energy equipment such as solar panels and wind towers, helped by Beijing's ambition of tackling carbon emissions without slowing China's growth. Foreign competitors complain that its oversupply is the result of a market that is driven by forces such as government edicts and subsidies rather than fundamental supply and demand, and China has created surpluses that distort the global market. China decided to bring the latest WTO complaint, which it says affects exports worth $7.3 billion, after winning a previous WTO dispute last year over U.S. duties on imports of Chinese steel pipes, off-road tires and woven sacks. Many of China's grievances might have been dealt with by a U.S. court decision last year, which struck down the Commerce Department's ability to impose anti-subsidy duties on "non-market economies" like China. But the U.S. Congress voted to restore it in March, ensuring U.S. duties on about two dozen Chinese goods stayed in place. The case is one of several currently "live" disputes between the United States and China at the WTO. The United States is challenging Chinese export restrictions on rare earths, tungsten and molybdenum and Chinese duties on certain U.S. car exports and U.S. chicken exports. Last month China also lost an adjudication decision against a U.S. claim that it was discriminating against U.S. bank card suppliers. It could decide to appeal the decision but has not yet said whether it will do so. |
| U.S. Plans New Asia Missile Defenses Posted: 23 Aug 2012 12:00 PM PDT  Source: Wall Street Journal By Adam Entous and Julian E. Barnes The U.S. is planning a major expansion of missile defenses in Asia, a move American officials say is designed to contain threats from North Korea, but one that could also be used to counter China's military. It is part of the Obama administration's new defense strategy to shift resources to an Asian-Pacific region critical to the U.S. economy after a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. The expansion comes at a time when the U.S. and its allies in the region voice growing alarm about a North Korean missile threat. They are also increasingly worried about China's aggressive stance in disputed waters such the South China Sea, where Asian rivals are vying for control of oil and mineral rights. U.S. defense planners are particularly concerned about China's development of antiship ballistic missiles that could threaten the Navy's fleet of aircraft carriers, critical to the U.S. projection of power in Asia. "The focus of our rhetoric is North Korea," said Steven Hildreth, a missile-defense expert with the Congressional Research Service, an advisory arm of Congress. "The reality is that we're also looking longer term at the elephant in the room, which is China." China's Ministry of National Defense didn't comment directly on the anti-missile plans, but sounded a cautious note. "China has always believed that anti-missile issues should be handled with great discretion, from the perspective of protecting global strategic stability and promoting strategic mutual trust among all countries," it said in a statement on Thursday. "We advocate that all parties fully respect and be mindful of the security concerns of one another and try to realize overall safety through mutual benefit and win-win efforts, while avoiding the situation in which one country tries to let its own state security take priority over other countries' national security." In a separate statement, China's Foreign Ministry said it hopes the U.S. "will carefully handle this problem out of concern for maintaining the global and regional strategic balance and stability, and promoting the strategic mutual trust among all countries."  A centerpiece of the new effort would be the deployment of a powerful early-warning radar, known as an X-Band, on an undisclosed southern Japanese island, said U.S. defense officials. The Pentagon is discussing that prospect with Japan, one of Washington's closest regional allies. The radar could be installed within months of Japan's agreement, American officials said, and would supplement an X-Band the U.S. positioned in Aomori Prefecture in northern Japan in 2006. A Japanese Ministry of Defense spokesman said the government wouldn't comment. The U.S. and Japan have ruled out deploying the new radar to Okinawa, a southern island whose residents have long chafed at the U.S. military forces' presence there. Officials with the U.S. military's Pacific Command and Missile Defense Agency have also been evaluating sites in Southeast Asia for a third X-Band radar to create an arc that would allow the U.S. and its regional allies to more accurately track any ballistic missiles launched from North Korea, as well as from parts of China. Some U.S. defense officials have focused on the Philippines as the potential site for the third X-Band, which is manufactured by Raytheon Co. Pentagon officials said a location has yet to be determined and that discussions are at an early stage. The beefed-up U.S. presence will likely raise tensions with the Chinese, who have been sharp critics of U.S. ballistic missile defenses in the past. Beijing fears such a system, similar to one the U.S. is deploying in the Middle East and Europe to counter Iran, could diminish China's strategic deterrent. Beijing objected to the U.S.'s first X-Band deployment in Japan in 2006. Moscow has voiced similar concerns about the system in Europe and the Middle East. Without commenting on specific plans, Pentagon Press Secretary George Little said: "North Korea is the immediate threat that is driving our missile defense decision making." In April, North Korea launched a multistage rocket that blew up less than two minutes into its flight. It conducted previous launches in August 1998, July 2006 and April 2009. The Pentagon sent a sea-based X-Band, normally docked in Pearl Harbor, to the Pacific to monitor the most recent North Korean launch as a precaution. The Pentagon is particularly concerned about the growing imbalance of power across the Taiwan Strait. China has been developing advanced ballistic missiles and antiship ballistic missiles that could target U.S. naval forces in the region. China has between 1,000 and 1,200 short-range ballistic missiles aimed at Taiwan, and has been developing longer range cruise and ballistic missiles, including one designed to hit a moving ship more than 930 miles away, says the Pentagon's latest annual report on China's military. The proposed X-Band arc would allow the U.S. to not only cover all of North Korea, but to peer deeper into China, say current and former U.S. officials. "Physics is physics," a senior U.S. official said. "You're either blocking North Korea and China or you're not blocking either of them." Beijing has said it poses no threat to its neighbors. One goal of the Pentagon is to reassure its anxious regional allies, which are walking a fine line. Many want the U.S.'s backing but also don't want to provoke China, and they aren't sure Washington can counter Beijing's rapid military modernization because of America's fiscal constraints. U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said during a visit Wednesday to the USS John C. Stennis warship in Washington state that the U.S. would "focus and project our force into the Pacific." The U.S. presence on the ground in Asia, especially the Marine bases in Okinawa, has been a source of constant tension, and a more determined presence could spark similar problems. In addition to the new X-Band site in southern Japan, the U.S. plans to increase the number of Marines in Okinawa in the near term before relocating them to Guam. As the Marines are pulled out of Afghanistan, going from 21,000 to less than 7,000, the number of forces on Okinawa will rise, from about 15,000 to 19,000, officials said. Analysts say it is unclear how effective U.S. missile defenses would be against China. A 2010 Pentagon report on ballistic missile defenses said the system can't cope with large-scale Russian or Chinese missile attacks and isn't intended to affect the strategic balance with those countries. The senior U.S. official said the new missile defense deployments would be able to track and repulse at least a limited strike from China, potentially enough to deter Beijing from attempting an attack. Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia nonproliferation program at the Monterey Institute of International Studies in California, said any missile-defense deployments in the Asian theater will alarm the Chinese, particular if they believe the systems are designed to cover Taiwan. "If you're putting one in southern Japan and one in the Philippines, you're sort of bracketing Taiwan," Mr. Lewis said. "So it does look like you're making sure that you can put a missile defense cap over the Taiwanese." Mr. Hildreth of the Congressional Research Service said the U.S. was "laying the foundations" for a regionwide missile defense system that would combine U.S. ballistic missile defenses with those of regional powers, particularly Japan, South Korea and Australia. U.S. officials say some of these allies have, until now, resisted sharing real-time intelligence, complicating U.S. efforts. Territorial disputes between South Korea and Japan have flared anew in recent weeks, underlining the challenge of creating unified command and control systems that would be used to shoot down incoming missiles. The U.S. has faced a similar problem building an integrated missile-defense system in the Persian Gulf. Once an X-Band identifies a missile's trajectory, the U.S. can deploy ship-or-land-based missile interceptors or antimissile systems. The Navy has drawn up plans to expand its fleet of ballistic missile-defense-capable warships from 26 ships today to 36 by 2018, according to Navy officials and the Congressional Research Service. Officials said as many as 60% of those are likely to be deployed to Asia and the Pacific. In addition, the U.S. Army is considering acquiring additional Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD, antimissile systems, said a senior defense official. Under current plans, the Army is building six THAADs. |
| China Q2 bank earnings to signal end of easy profits Posted: 23 Aug 2012 11:54 AM PDT  Source: Reuters By Kelvin Soh (Reuters) – China's big banks are set to report possibly their last set of bumper profits in coming weeks as weak economic expansion, shrinking deposits and a more competitive interest rate market point to more modest earnings growth in the future. "The last solid results, with a bumpy road ahead," said Deutsche analyst Tracy Yu. "We remain cautious on the Chinese banks, although solid first-half results might be supporting of the share price in the short term." Profit growth is already slowing down. ICBC (601398.SS), the world's biggest bank by market capitalization, is expected to say first-half net profit rose 15 percent from a year earlier, a Reuters survey of nine analysts shows. But that would be almost half the pace it reported for the first half of 2011. The slowdown became even more pronounced in the second-quarter, when analysts estimate net profit growth slowed down to 9.5 percent, or 60.98 billion yuan. CCB (601939.SS) and AgBank (601288.SS) are expected to report second-quarter net profit growth of 11 percent and 19 percent, respectively. Fourth-ranked Bank of China (601988.SS) is likely to post a 4 percent rise in quarterly profit. A seemingly endless flow of deposits insulated China's major banks from poor lending decisions in recent years. They could rely on government-set fixed net interest margins and a steady economic growth rate of at least 10 percent. But the banking landscape is changing. Deposit growth has slowed down, partly because of outflows to investment products that offer higher returns. Since the start of 2011, banks have suffered net monthly declines in yuan deposits five times, compared with just once between 2002 and 2010. This year the central bank raised the competitive stakes by giving banks more leeway to set their own deposit and lending rates. Commercial banks can now set deposit rates at up to 1.2 times the benchmark central bank rate. "Margins will likely fall more in the second half of this year, partly because of the interest rate liberalization we're seeing," said Tan Yuansheng, president of Chongqing Rural Commercial Bank (3618.HK), which reported a 25 percent jump in its first-half earnings on August 17. The net interest spread has tightened to just 0.9 percent, based on the lowest permissible lending rates and highest permissible deposit rates, from more than 3 percent as recently as June. Economic growth is seen sliding this year to around 8 percent, its worst showing since 1999, feeding expectations of a rise in bad loans, currently running at less than 1 percent. Some sectors are already feeling the pinch. More than 20 steel traders have been taken to court by lenders such as China Minsheng Bank (1988.HK) over debt defaults in the past two months. Such court action has been rare in China. The hangover from the lending spree sparked by China's 4 trillion stimulus package during the global financial crisis in 2008-2009 is also now weighing. Bad loans are now likely to rise to about 3-5 percent as some of those loans come due, said Gigi Chan, who manages the China Opportunities Fund at Threadneedle. "You just don't see so many roads to nowhere anymore," she said. |
| Posted: 23 Aug 2012 11:28 AM PDT Have You Heard…   |
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