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News » Society » China media: Ningbo protest |
- China media: Ningbo protest
- Week in China: Rural life 'never better'
- China's Sinopec in profit decline
- Apple Siri 'too smart,' helps users find hookers
- Chemical factory expansion stops after thousands march in protest
- Sounds of ancient bronze drums die out in modern age
- Temples barred from selling market shares
- Sinopec Third-Quarter Profit Falls 9.4 Percent, Beats Estimates
- China Unicom ditches Cisco hardware in move seen as retaliation
- China Construction Bank Profit Growth Slows on Weaker Fee Income
- Have You Heard…
- Wen family rejects NY Times claim
- China halts project amid protests
- VIDEO: China halts project amid protests
- Typhoon Son-Tinh hits S China
- Typhoon Son-Tinh brings gales, rains to S China
- Cold snap to sweep through China
| Posted: 28 Oct 2012 09:09 PM PDT Morning newspaper round-up: Newspapers comment on protests in Ningbo against a plan to expand a petrochemical plant. |
| Week in China: Rural life 'never better' Posted: 28 Oct 2012 07:56 PM PDT As China prepares for a new generation of leaders to take power, the BBC spends a week on the road looking at the challenges ahead for the world's most populous nation and the advances it has made. |
| China's Sinopec in profit decline Posted: 28 Oct 2012 08:51 PM PDT China Petroleum & Chemical Corp, Asia's largest refiner, posts a 9.4% drop in profit in three months to 30 September. |
| Apple Siri 'too smart,' helps users find hookers Posted: 28 Oct 2012 10:14 AM PDT APPLE'S Siri, a popular voice-activated personal assistant app for iPhones, is now accused in China of being "too smart" as it may help users find illegal venues offering prostitution, Chinese media reported. According to Xinhua news agency, some iPhone users with Apple's latest IOS 6 operating system and Chinese-language Siri said when they asked the assistant app "Where to find prostitutes," Siri showed 15 places with detailed locations. While many netizens were shocked by the app's powerful search feature, some suggested it could help police crack down on houses of prostitution. A reporter with Xinhua tried using Siri to search for prostitutes in Baoshan District in Shanghai and the app provided 12 locations in the search result, mostly entertainment venues. The reporter picked one on Shuangcheng Road and went there in the middle of the night to see young women wearing sexy clothes at the venue's entrance. A staff worker told the reporter that the venue offers prostitutes in KTV or karaoke rooms, while customers may pay additional fees to take prostitutes out of the venue. Not all offer sex services The reporter said he checked another venue provided by Siri and it was also offering such services. But apparently not all the locations were offering sexual services. The reporter checked a third on Shuichan Road W. only to find that it is a hairdressing salon that closes before 10pm. According to Xinhua, Shanghai police said they are investigating the venues suspected of offering sexual services in the search list by Siri. Police told the news agency that so far they haven't received any reports or complaints about the app involving sexual content. Police said that they regard the app as only a platform to collect and exchange information. They encourage residents who have misgivings about search results on the app to report the locations so they can be investigated, according to Xinhua. The Xinhua reporter said Apple hasn't replied to the agency on the Siri issue. However, a worker surnamed Lin with Apple's customer service hotline told the reporter that Siri could help users find prostitutes because so far the app has not been set to filter sensitive words. She suggested users turn off the app or set passwords for it to block children from accessing inappropriate material. |
| Chemical factory expansion stops after thousands march in protest Posted: 28 Oct 2012 10:13 AM PDT THOUSANDS of protesters who marched through the eastern Ningbo City yesterday against the expansion of a petrochemical factory won a pledge from the local government that the project would be halted. The Ningbo government said in a statement yesterday evening that the city and the project's investor had "resolutely" agreed not to go ahead with the expansion. The city's Zhenhai District, where the chemical plant locates, said Ningbo's Communist Party chief Wang Huizhong and Mayor Liu Qi held discussions with residents on Saturday night. The Ningbo government said in a short statement on its website yesterday evening that the project wouldn't go ahead and that refining at the factory would stop for the time being while a scientific review is conducted. The demonstration is the latest this year over fears of health risks from industrial projects, as Chinese who have seen their living standards improve become more outspoken against environmentally risky projects in their areas. Hundreds of residents headed from a city square toward the offices of the Ningbo government early yesterday. They were stopped by police at the gate. Tensions rose after about 200 riot police walked out of the gate, tore down banners that people had hung in trees. Hundreds roamed along nearby shopping streets. Police diverted traffic to allow them to pass down a main road. The protests began a few days earlier in the coastal district of Zhenhai. On Saturday they swelled and spread to the center of Ningbo. Residents reported that Saturday's protests involved thousands of people. Authorities said "a few" people disrupted public order by staging sit-ins, unfurling banners, distributing fliers and obstructing roads. Marchers included the elderly and children, as well as some pet poodles. Some protesters wore face masks and shouted slogans like "Protect Ningbo" and "Return my health." "We have to do this for our future and our family's future," a 40-year-old protester surnamed Jing said yesterday, as she pointed to the smoggy air. "The sky was so clear when I was a child. Look at it now." Another protester, Yu Yibing, said he wanted the factory to be closed, not expanded, and his 7-year-old son to grow up in a clean environment. "As the common people, we need to live in a green environment. This is a reasonable request," Yu said. The planned expansion project was designed to produce 15 million tons of refined oil and 1.2 million tons of ethylene per year and belongs to Sinopec Zhenhai Refining & Chemical Co, which has invested 55.87 billion yuan (US$8.9 billion). This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Sounds of ancient bronze drums die out in modern age Posted: 28 Oct 2012 09:22 AM PDT WEI Zhenli has just finished teaching children how to play bronze drums. After they have gone he feels lonely, disappointed and worries about the inheritance of the thousand-year-old instrument. "Television, cell phones and the Internet have changed the lives of villagers, and traditional culture cannot attract people's eyes anymore, the young people in particular," said Wei, a Lanyang villager of Hechi City in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. "People who can master the skills of beating bronze drums are few, and many of them are in their 40s or 50s," said Wei, who is one of the successors of the bronze drum, which is a cultural relic of ethnic groups living in south China. Wei said the young people of his village migrate to cities for work, so people in their 40s or 50s take up the task in teaching the children to play the drums. Culture needs protection Dating from 200 BC, bronze drums used to be an important instrument for a family, and it has been a tradition of local people to play drums to pray for rain and a good harvest. Only 2,400 of the bronze drums are estimated to remain, more than 1,400 of which are in Hechi. Wei still missed the days when every family in his village carried the drums onto a nearby mountain and played day and night. "Things are no longer the same now, and few people can play the instrument," Wei said. Wei's father, Wei Wanyi, who has collected more than 40 of the instruments, has been considered the "king of the bronze drum." As his father grows older, Wei Zhenli takes up the duty to pass on the bronze drum culture and teach people skills to play the instrument. He has also led the drum team of Donglan County to perform in Beijing, Shanghai and Nanning to promote drum culture. "During the Great Leap Forward campaign from 1958 to 1960, almost all metal things, including the bronze drums, were melted down producing steel. Hundred-year-old bronze drums were destroyed at that time," said Liang Fulin, the former director of the cultural heritage management station of Hechi. Liang said entrepreneurs had rushed to his village to purchase ancient drums from local people for profit, which also led to the loss of the original drums. "A single bronze drum is a story, and also an irreplaceable cultural symbol for this area," said Li Gang, director with Folk Opera Department of the Public Art Museum in Hechi. He added that they staged bronze drum performances last year calling on people and local government to protect and inherit the custom. |
| Temples barred from selling market shares Posted: 28 Oct 2012 09:21 AM PDT CHINA is telling Buddhist temples popular with tourists: Don't let money be your mantra. Authorities announced a ban last week on temples selling shares to investors after leaders of several popular temples planned to pursue stock market listings for them as commercial entities. Even the Shaolin Temple of kung fu movie fame was once rumored to be planning a stock market debut - leading critics to slam such plans as a step too far in China's already unrestrained commercial culture. "Everywhere in China now is about developing the economy," complained Beijing resident Fu Runxing, a 40-year-old accountant who said he recently went to a temple where incense was priced at 300 yuan (US$50) a stick. "It's too excessive. It's looting," she said. Centuries-old Buddhist pilgrimage sites such as Wutai Mountain in Shanxi Province, Putuo Mountain in Zhejiang and Jiuhua Mountain in Anhui all were moving toward listings on stock markets in recent months to finance expansion, according to state media. The government's religious affairs office called on local authorities to ban profiteering related to religious activity and told them not to allow religious venues to be run as business ventures or listed as corporate assets. Companies that manage temple sites may be able to bypass the prohibition on listing shares simply by excluding the temples themselves from their lists of assets. A Buddhist site at Emei Mountain in Sichuan already has been on the Shenzhen stock exchange since 1997 but its listed assets include a hotel, cable car company and ticket booths - not the temples, which date back several hundred years. Shanghai lawyer Wang Yun said the new prohibition wouldn't likely affect Emei, but might make additional companies think twice before listing. The ban on profiteering from religious activity is "just a reflection of the terrible reality of the over-commercialization in recent years of temples and other places," the Southern Metropolis Daily said in a recent editorial. "People who have been to famous religious places should be familiar with expensive ticket prices and donations for all kinds of things." Chinese entities from nature parks to religious sites are increasingly turning to commercial activities to pay expenses as government support dwindles in a society with little charitable giving. Temples face heavy costs to maintain centuries-old buildings and gardens. |
| Sinopec Third-Quarter Profit Falls 9.4 Percent, Beats Estimates Posted: 28 Oct 2012 09:56 AM PDT  Source: Bloomberg News By Aibing Guo China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. (600028), Asia's biggest refiner, posted a 9.4 percent decline in third- quarter profit, beating estimates, as two increases in retail fuel prices in the period helped margins. China, which controls retail fuel prices to contain inflation, raised prices twice in August and September after inflation dropped to 1.9 percent in September from as high as 4.5 percent in January. Sinopec, forced to sell fuel below cost under the pricing system, posted its lowest half-yearly profit since 2008 in the six months ended June 30. "Operations in the third quarter improved thanks to our active adjustments in production and sales," the company said in the statement. "Prices of chemical products also rebounded in the third quarter after a big decline in the second quarter." Crude production rose 2.3 percent in the first nine months to 245 million barrels and natural gas output increased 15 percent to 438 billion cubic feet, according to the statement. Realized crude prices rose 2.5 percent to 100.69 a barrel, while realized natural gas prices rose 5.5 percent to $5.77 per thousand cubic feet, it said. Brent crude, the benchmark for more than half of the world's oil, averaged $112.20 a barrel in the first nine months, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Capital spending reached 83.4 billion yuan in the first nine months, with 35 billion yuan going toward exploration and production, the statement showed.   |
| China Unicom ditches Cisco hardware in move seen as retaliation Posted: 28 Oct 2012 09:53 AM PDT  Source: Want China Times China Unicom, one of China's three main state-owned telecoms, is replacing hardware supplied by Cisco Systems, a move seen as retaliation after the US government branded Chinese companies Huawei and ZTE as security threats, reports our sister newspaper China Times. About 80% of the internet in China is operated by two backbone networks: "China 163″ from China Telecom and "China 169″ from China Unicom. China Unicom usays it will no longer use Cisco's products in the future. Cisco has been a major provider of China's principal internet equipment, accounting for 70% of the hardware in the China 163 network and 80% of the China 169 network, as well as other related network devices widely used by the finance, government, railway, civil aviation and medical sectors as well as the police and the military. China is an important market for Cisco, which had global revenue of US$40 billion last year. China accounted for only a 4% share of its revenue but created profit returns of 30%. A committee set up by the US House of Representatives released a report on Oct. 8 after months of investigation which recommended Washington view with suspicion the penetration of the US telecom market by Chinese companies, referring to Huawei and ZTE. Earlier rumors said Cisco Systems, the world's largest maker of networking equipment, had been promoting suspicions about its Chinese rivals behind the scenes. Experts said the latest move by China Unicom suggests trade tensions between China and the US are spreading and may escalate further.   |
| China Construction Bank Profit Growth Slows on Weaker Fee Income Posted: 28 Oct 2012 09:59 AM PDT  Source: Bloomberg News China Construction Bank Corp. (939), the nation's second-largest lender, posted profit growth that decelerated to 12.4 percent as the weakest economic expansion in three years crimped demand for financial services and led to more defaults. Construction Bank, the world's second-largest by market value, posted slower profit growth than Agricultural Bank of China Ltd. and Bank of China Ltd. as it struggles to curb rising defaults and maintain margins amid the faltering economy. Banks face further challenges in the next six months, according to Deutsche Bank AG, which said third-quarter results won't fully reflect challenges including interest-rate cuts. "The third-quarter growth rates of Chinese banks cannot mask their deteriorating operating trends," said Xie Jiyong, a Shanghai-based analyst at Capital Securities Corp. (6005) "Even though big banks are still holding onto their loan pricing power, interest-rate deregulations will eventually hurt everybody's margins." China's economy expanded 7.4 percent from a year earlier in the third quarter, compared with 7.6 percent in the April-June period. The International Monetary Fund this month cut its forecast for 2012 global growth to 3.3 percent from a previous estimate of 3.5 percent. Bank Shares Shares of Hong Kong-traded Chinese banks have gained an average 1 percent this year, with Construction Bank up 5.9 percent. Banking stocks have rallied since mid-September as the U.S. announced a third round of quantitative easing and China's sovereign wealth fund said it increased its stakes in the country's four biggest lenders. Agricultural Bank of China Ltd. (601288), the country's third- largest lender by assets, on Oct. 26 posted third-quarter net income of 39.6 billion yuan, beating the 37.8 billion-yuan average estimate in a Bloomberg survey. Profit growth at Bank of China, the fourth-biggest lender, accelerated to 17 percent, the fastest pace in more than a year, taking net income to 34.8 billion yuan compared with a consensus estimate of 32.7 billion yuan. Overseas Operations Bank of China's overseas operations reduced the effect of a narrower interest rate spread in China, analysts including Mike Werner of Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. said. Foreign operations accounted for about 24 percent of total assets at the end of June. "We do not think the shares are trading on the operating or financial fundamentals of the banks," Jim Antos, a Hong Kong-based analyst at Mizuho Securities Asia Ltd., wrote in a note on Oct. 24. Many banks "will correct 5 percent to 10 percent after earnings announcements, due to the continuing credit quality overhang." Banks' profits may grow by an average 10 percent in the third quarter, slowing from 15 percent in the second quarter and 17 percent in the first three months, Antos predicted. Construction Bank extended 769.6 billion yuan of new loans in the first nine months, taking the outstanding amount to 7.3 trillion yuan. Non-performing loans rose to 72.9 billion yuan as of Sept. 30 from 70.4 billion yuan three months earlier, according to the statement. The bank set aside 8.4 billion yuan against soured debt in the third quarter, compared with 6.9 billion yuan a year earlier. Margin Widens Construction Bank's net interest margin, a measure of lending profitability, widened to 2.74 percent, up 6 basis points from a year earlier. The central bank in June allowed lenders to widen the discount on borrowing costs to 20 percent, and then broadened the limit to 30 percent the following month, accelerating the liberalization of interest rates. Banks were also permitted to offer deposit rates at 10 percent above the benchmark, the first time a premium has been allowed. While the four biggest state-owned lenders are limiting discounts on loans to 10 percent of the benchmark borrowing rate, even for their best corporate clients, they are paying out more to savers as competition for deposits intensifies. China's official one-year lending rate is 6 percent, while the deposit rate is 3 percent after two cuts since June. Construction Bank and its three largest rivals are offering 3.25 percent on one-year deposits. Construction Bank's net interest income rose 18 percent to 91.3 billion yuan in the third quarter, while fee income, from businesses such as credit cards, trade finance and custodian services, fell 2 percent to 20.7 billion yuan.   |
| Posted: 28 Oct 2012 09:51 AM PDT Have You Heard…   |
| Wen family rejects NY Times claim Posted: 28 Oct 2012 02:48 AM PDT Lawyers for Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's family reject New York Times claims that it has amassed "hidden riches" since he entered high office. |
| China halts project amid protests Posted: 28 Oct 2012 08:02 AM PDT Days of protests against the expansion of a petrochemical plant in eastern China force authorities to shelve the project. |
| VIDEO: China halts project amid protests Posted: 28 Oct 2012 04:26 PM PDT Days of protests against the expansion of a petrochemical plant in eastern China force authorities to shelve the project. |
| Posted: 27 Oct 2012 11:07 PM PDT More than 80,000 people in south China's Hainan Province have been relocated following the arrival of Typhoon Son-Tinh, which has brought gales and downpours to the region since yesterday. |
| Typhoon Son-Tinh brings gales, rains to S China Posted: 27 Oct 2012 11:07 PM PDT MORE than 80,000 people in south China's Hainan Province have been relocated following the arrival of Typhoon Son-Tinh, which has brought gales and downpours to the region since yesterday. |
| Cold snap to sweep through China Posted: 27 Oct 2012 09:30 PM PDT CHINA'S central and eastern regions will experience temperature drops in coming days, while the southern parts will receive moderate to heavy rain, the national meteorological watchdog forecast today. |
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