May 2006 Archives
BBC News
May 29, 2006
Officially China does not censor the internet. According to the Chinese government, its internet regulation is no different from that in America, Britain, or anywhere else in the world.
China says it only blocks internet sites that are damaging, such as pornographic sites, or ones promoting things like terrorism.
The reality of China's internet is very different.
Just try logging on to the BBC News website from an internet cafe in China. You can't. The same goes for websites for The New York Times, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and a host of others which could hardly be described as pornographic or "dangerous".
China probably has the most sophisticated internet monitoring and censorship system in the world. In the last few years it has spent tens of millions of dollars building what has come to be known as the "Great Firewall of China". In the past, whole websites were blocked. Today the system can block out individual parts of websites.
The Epoch Times
May 28, 2006
Fearful of public gatherings, officials ban dragon boat festival
The Dragon Boat Festival (May 31) has a long history in Yingtan City, Jiangxi Province, China. The boat race commemorates the great patriotic poet, Qu Yuan (about BC 340-277) in China. However, the local communist authorities worried that the activity might attract too many people in one place. Allegedly fearful that such a large group of people might cause accidents or conflicts, the local communist regime banned the race by cutting in half about 1,000 dragon boats.
The action was revealed by a government official who participated in the plan but wanted to remain anonymous. The destruction caused many complaints from villagers.
According to Tengxun News Net and Apple Daily, Yuehu Security sub-bureau in Yingtan City, Jiangxi Province recently made this statement: "In order to build a new rural village under socialism, the authorities prohibited people from making or buying any materials relating to dragon boats through collecting money or donations."
The authorities also said that because "the location does not conform to security conditions," and the dragon boat racing activity may seriously affect social order, the authorities decided to completely ban the celebration.
By Thom Shanker | The New York Times
May 23, 2006
WASHINGTON, May 23 — China's leadership has not satisfactorily explained its military expansion and goals, even as it modernizes its forces to be able to challenge foreign armed forces operating in the region, the Defense Department said in a report released Tuesday.
"China's leaders have yet to adequately explain the purposes or desired end-states of their military expansion," according to the 2006 report, "Military Power of the People's Republic of China." "Estimates place Chinese defense expenditure at two to three times officially disclosed figures."
The 50-page report, delivered annually to Congress, is at www.defenselink.mil/pubs
Reporters Without Borders
May 22, 2006
The Public Security Bureau’s formal refusal on 17 May to allow detained blogger and documentary filmmaker Hao Wu access to a lawyer on national security grounds is “absurd,” Reporters Without Borders said today, as Hao began his fourth month in detention.
“Hao’s case is emblematic of the PSB’s methods,” the press freedom organisation said. “It is farcical to treat this blogger as a threat to national security. Is there any serious possibility that letting a prisoner of conscience have a lawyer might destabilise the Chinese government?”
A formal request for Hao to be defended by a lawyer was filed with the PSB by his sister, Na Wu, who has reported on her blog (http://spaces.msn.com/wuhaofamily): “It appears that all efforts to seek legal help have reached a dead end.”
According to the authorities, Hao is currently under “house arrest.” He cannot receive visits or telephone his family. The PSB is also still refusing to tell him why he has been arrested. But it has reportedly undertaken to make a statement to the family by August, which would be six months after his arrest.
Hao had a blog called Beijing or Bust in which he wrote under the pseudonym of Beijing Loafer. He was also the North-East Asia editor of the website Global Voices, to which he contributed under the name of Tian Yi. He was arrested on 22 February while preparing a report on China’s underground protestant churches.
Global Voices has set up a Hao support site: http://ethanzuckerman.com/haowu
International Herald Tribune | The New York Times
May 21, 2006
Before President Hu Jintao of China visited the United States earlier this spring, there was hope that his government would free Zhao Yan, a longtime journalist who is now a researcher for The New York Times. Zhao was being held on political charges, the prosecution's attempt to make him the scapegoat for a Times article that had apparently outraged Chinese leaders. And when those charges were dropped shortly before Hu met with President Bush, it raised the possibility that Zhao would be released immediately.
Now, that hope seems lost. Last week, prosecutors reinstated the old charges against Zhao word for word, charge for charge. The reinstatement is doubly distressing. Zhao was not in fact a source for a Times exclusive two years ago on the announcement of a change of leadership. And Chinese laws forbid double jeopardy, so this second charge on the same offense runs directly counter to the country's own code.
The Bush administration has helped make Zhao's case a priority and that emphasis can only help. But some China experts worry that this legal step backward is one reaction to Hu's treatment when he was in Washington. The White House refused to elevate the trip to a state visit, which apparently rankled some of the Chinese. An announcer called China by the official name of Taiwan and a woman who had received press credentials disrupted one event to protest treatment of the Falun Gong.
Agence France Presse | Yahoo
May 19, 2006
China's film censor criticized the director of a movie set around the 1989 Tiananmen democracy protests for showing it at the Cannes Film Festival without government approval.
"Summer Palace", directed by 40-year-old Lou Ye, is a love story that follows the open and sexually free lives of Chinese students before the protests and how they deal with the bloody quelling of the demonstrations and its aftermath.
"This amounts to participation in a competition against regulations," Zhang Hongwei, deputy director of the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television's film bureau, told AFP.
"The film has not passed screening from the administration. This violates our country's regulations on films."
By Verna Yu | Agence France Presse
China's state-controlled media have been silent over the 40th anniversary of the start of the tumultuous Cultural Revolution, still seen as a taboo subject that haunts the country.
All mainstream media -- newspapers, television and radio stations -- stayed mum on the subject as did popular websites, whose chatrooms are normally filled with lively discussions on topical issues.
Searches on Tuesday for "Cultural Revolution" under the news section on China's most popular search engine, Baidu, yielded no results while specific websites focused on the period were not accessible.
Apart from several regional or academic magazines with limited circulation that have published articles on the troubled decade during the past two months, there has been a virtual media black-out on the issue.
The Communist Party's propaganda department controls the nation's media, giving the authorities powerful leverage to decide what gets reported.
By Luis Ramirez | Voice of America
This week marks 40 years since Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong launched a 10-year movement known as the "Cultural Revolution." The movement was meant to do away with most elements of China's past and push the country to a new, purer socialist, egalitarian state. The result for China was devastating, as historical and cultural artifacts were destroyed. Millions of people suffered persecution - sometimes from their own neighbors, colleagues and friends. Many Chinese view the period as a stain on their country's history and a time many would rather not remember.
REUTERS
Dozens of Shanghai residents protested on Wednesday over their forced relocation to a remote corner of China in the 1960s, defying the official silence on the 40th anniversary of the chaotic Cultural Revolution.
The 150 or so protesters, many carrying signs reading "there's nothing wrong with petitioning," gathered outside the Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau, which includes a petitions office where citizens can bring complaints to the government.
Most were sent to Xinjiang, China's most northwesterly province, as part of a Maoist "learn from the masses" campaign where they were forced into hard physical labor.
When able to return to Shanghai years or decades later, they often found their old houses in new hands. And the official silence over the Cultural Revolution, a decade-long period of social upheaval, has left victims without compensation.
By Jim Yardley | The New York Times
May 17, 2006
Chinese prosecutors have indicted a researcher for The New York Times on accusations of fraud and disclosing state secrets, a reinstatement of the same case that authorities dropped two months ago.
The reintroduction of charges against Zhao Yan, 44, who worked in The Times's Beijing bureau, means that legal proceedings against him are at a new starting point, even though he has spent almost 21 months in prison without a hearing or an appearance before a judge.
Mo Shaoping, the lead defense lawyer for Mr. Zhao, said Chinese law requires that a trial be held within six weeks, though prosecutors can seek at least two postponements. Mr. Zhao, who has denied the charges, faces at least 10 years in prison if convicted. His case has been marked by delays and legal irregularities.
"We're deeply, deeply disappointed," said Bill Keller, executive editor of The Times. "We've never seen any proof that Zhao Yan was guilty of anything but journalism. Over the past year, we've been writing about Chinese efforts to modernize their legal system, and a case like this certainly casts doubt on their progress."
BBC News
May 15, 2006
China has revived a legal case against a detained New York Times researcher two months after dropping charges against him, his lawyer said.
Zhao Yan was arrested in September 2004 and was facing charges of leaking state secrets and fraud.
But the charges were dropped in March one month before a US visit by Chinese President Hu Jintao.
Lawyer Mo Shaoping said there was a new indictment against his client, but he did not know what the charges were.
"The prosecutors notified me last Friday that they had re-transferred the case to the Beijing Second Intermediate Court one or two days earlier," he told Reuters news agency.
He said prosecutors had told him they were "resuming criminal investigation and prosecution", but he said there was no legal basis for this under Chinese law.
"It is definitely a prolonged and illegal detention now," he said.
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS | The New York Times
May 15, 2006
SHANGHAI, China (AP) -- A Chinese man who tried to set up an independent environmental group went on trial Monday on charges of stealing state secrets, an overseas human rights group and court official said.
Computer technician Tan Kai has been in custody since police in the eastern city of Hangzhou summoned him on Oct. 19, New York-based Human Rights in China reported.
Tan was detained after he opened a bank account as part of efforts to register an environmental group, ''Green Watch.''
His trial at Hangzhou's Xihu District People's Court was closed to the public because it involved state secrets, said a court official reached by telephone. The official refused to give his name because he was not authorized to speak to media.
Agence France Presse | The Philippine Daily Inquirer
May 15, 2006 (05:56 am Manila time)
Tragedy of Cultural Revolution recalled
BEIJING -- Forty years ago on Tuesday, Chairman Mao Zedong unleashed China’s infamous Cultural Revolution -- a decade of terror and violence that continues to haunt both the country and its people.
The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, now officially referred to as “10 years of catastrophe,” was to unravel in a disaster that claimed millions of lives and pushed China to the brink of economic and social collapse.
The movement officially began on May 16, 1966, with a directive from Chinese Communist Party (CCP) chief Mao charging that “representatives of the bourgeoisie” had infiltrated all levels of the party and intended to establish a “dictatorship.”
The motives for the Cultural Revolution’s launch are complex, although Mao’s intention to eliminate people who threatened him politically is now seen as a stronger reason than his apparent desire to create social equality through eradication of a new class of exploitative bureaucratic rulers.
“Mao told people that he wanted to realize a fair and equal society. He deceived people by saying that (inequality) was due to his enemies,” Xu Youyu, a philosophy professor at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told Agence France-Presse recently.
Rahul Tandon
BBC religious affairs reporter
May 14, 2006
Tension between China and the Vatican looks set to escalate after the state-controlled Catholic church appointed another bishop without approval of the Holy See.
Bishop Zhan Silu, 45, was installed as head of Mindong Diocese in eastern China's Fujian province during a ceremony held by the Chinese Patriotic Church on Sunday.
But the appointment was made without the blessing of Pope Benedict XVI.
Earlier this month, the Vatican reacted angrily to the appointment of two other bishops by the state-controlled Patriotic Church.
China has both a state-run Catholic association and an underground church which is loyal to the Vatican.
Lui Xinhong and Ma Yinglin may not be household names outside China but their consecration has cast a shadow over fragile talks to re-establish links between the Vatican and China which were severed over half a century ago.
By JIM YARDLEY and KEITH BRADSHER | The New York Times
May 13, 2006
SHENYANG, China, May 9 — From the moment in 1978 when China reopened itself, conditionally, to the outside world, the Roman Catholic Church has been painstakingly working to get back in. Hopes have been raised, then dashed, but this year Rome and Beijing finally seemed close to a historic deal to normalize relations.
Then, unexpectedly, a public spat last week over China's installation of two bishops without the Vatican's approval changed everything. Now, the debate is over how much damage has been done, and why efforts to end 55 years of diplomatic isolation have again gone wrong.
"It is potentially a huge problem," said the Rev. Jeroom Heyndrickx, a Belgian priest who has acted as an emissary between the sides. "It's a confrontation. There was an informal dialogue going on. This has been cut off now. The question is, can we go on from here?"
The Communist Party and the Catholic Church, whose last missionaries were ordered out of China in the early 1950's, make formidable adversaries, each reluctant to give up authority
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS | The New York Times
11 May 2006
WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush welcomed to the White House three human rights activists from China, including one whose Internet blog was blocked by Chinese authorities after it was nominated for two top international awards.
The three -- author Yu Jie, law professor and blogger Wang Yi and legal scholar Li Baiguang -- are active in China's underground Protestant churches, which have been hit for months by a government crackdown in which many movement leaders have been arrested.
Such underground Chinese churches, both Protestant and Roman Catholic, are known as house churches, a reference to their use of private homes for services instead of government-monitored churches.
Bush raised the fate of the house movement with Chinese President Hu Jintao when he visited Beijing in November. He said afterward, ''A society which recognizes religious freedom is a society which will recognize political freedom as well.''
Radio Free Asia
11 May 2006
美国总统布什5月11号会见了来自中国大陆的三位基督徒，表达美国政府对中国宗教信仰自由的高度关注。下面是自由亚洲电台记者含青的采访报道。
美国总统布什5月11号上午在白宫会见了来自中国大陆的家庭教会成员余杰、王怡和李柏光。余杰在接受本台记者采访时表示，原定是半小时的会面持续了近一个小时，会见非常愉快。余杰说，他们首先向布什总统介绍了最近几年中国国内发生的一些新的变化：（录音）
余杰说，布什总统听到这样的信息后非常高兴，布什总统表示，美国政府将会持续地对他们表示支持，并继续关注中国的宗教信仰自由、以及中国人民对人权的追求。
余杰说，这次会面是安排在布什总统的起居室，而不是他的椭圆形办公室，这表明，这是一位美国基督徒与中国基督徒之间的会面。余杰说：（录音）
余杰说，他们三人还与布什总统分享了他们成为基督徒的个人经历，余杰接着说：（录音）
By REUTERS - The New York Times
11 May 2006
Yahoo Inc. said on Thursday it was seeking the U.S. government's help in urging China to allow more media freedom, after reports linking information it gave to Chinese authorities with the jailing of a dissident.
Last month, the Internet media company was cited in a Chinese court decision to jail an Internet writer for 10 years for subversion in 2003 -- the fourth such case to surface implicating Yahoo.
Yahoo Chairman and Chief Executive Terry Semel said it had no choice but to comply with local laws and did not have the power to change Chinese policy.
``We tried, and we are going to continue to try as an industry to have our government help us,'' he told New York media executives at a Newhouse School event.
He said that closing down Yahoo's operations in China would not help boost free speech.
``In my mind one of the equalizers to lack of information happens to be the Internet,'' he said.
BBC News
11 May 2006
China's leading web search company has launched an online, user-generated encyclopedia modelled on the US-based Wikipedia, which is blocked by Beijing.
The new service from Baidu.com, Baidupedia, is heavily self-censored to avoid offending the Chinese government.
Wikipedia had become increasingly popular in China until blocked in 2005.
China has strict laws on internet use and blocks content it deems a threat, including references to the Tiananmen Square massacre and notable dissidents.
The Epoch Times
10 May 2006
The International Society for Human Rights (IGFM) honored the German edition of The Epoch Times—Die Neue Epoche —with a special media prize for its "extensive and regular reporting" about violations of human rights in China. The presentation took place last week-end during the annual general meeting of the IGFM in Königstein am Taunus.
The first prize went to Bernd Ziesemer, the editor-in-chief of the Handelsblatt, for his editorial "Ugly China."
Ziesemer stressed in his speech that economic success did not automatically go along with progress in the area of human rights and that businessmen should not become allies of human rights violators.
Die Neue Epoche online (Germany)
09 May 2006
Die internationale Gesellschaft für Menschrechte (IGFM) hat Die Neue Epoche für ihre „umfangreiche und regelmäßige Berichterstattung“ über Menschenrechtsverletzungen in China mit einem Medien-Sonderpreis ausgezeichnet. Die Preisverleihung fand am vergangenen Wochenende im Rahmen der Jahreshauptversammlung der IGFM in Königstein am Taunus statt.
Der erste Preis ging an Bernd Ziesemer, den Chefredakteur des Handelsblattes, für seinen Leitartikel „Das hässliche China“.
Ziesemer betonte in seiner Rede, dass wirtschaftlicher Erfolg nicht automatisch mit Fortschritten im Bereich der Menschenrechte einhergingen und dass sich Unternehmer nicht zu Erfüllungsgehilfen von Menschenrechtsverletzern machen dürften.
By REUTERS | The New York Times
10 May 2006
BEIJING (Reuters) - At least four Chinese journalists and Internet writers are expected to stand trial this month just weeks after President Hu Jintao presented a softer line on human rights during a trip to the United States.
Early this year China, which sometimes frees political prisoners to build goodwill and bargaining power ahead of major diplomatic visits, released two jailed journalists and let a Tibetan nun imprisoned for 15 years travel to the United States.
But with Hu's April trip to Washington over, so are the diplomatic niceties, analysts believe.
By Howard W. French | The New York Times
09 May 2006
SHANGHAI, May 8 — To her fellow students, Hu Yingying appears to be a typical undergraduate, plain of dress, quick with a smile and perhaps possessed with a little extra spring in her step, but otherwise decidedly ordinary.
And for Ms. Hu, a sophomore at Shanghai Normal University, coming across as ordinary is just fine, given the parallel life she leads. For several hours each week she repairs to a little-known on-campus office crammed with computers, where she logs in unsuspected by other students to help police her school's Internet forums.
Once online, following suggestions from professors or older students, she introduces politically correct or innocuous themes for discussion. Recently, she says, she started a discussion of what celebrities make the best role models, a topic suggested by a professor as appropriate.
Politics, even school politics, is banned on university bulletin boards like these. Ms. Hu says she and her fellow moderators try to steer what they consider negative conversations in a positive direction with well-placed comments of their own. Anything they deem offensive, she says, they report to the school's Web master for deletion.
FACTS ONLINE | Switzerland
03 May 2006
110 Millionen Chinesen haben Zugang zum Internet. In fast allen Städten gibt es Internetbars, die rund um die Uhr geöffnet haben und kaum etwas kosten. Vor allem Junge nutzen das Internet zum Chatten, Mailen und Telefonieren. Wie in Südkorea und Japan sind Onlinespiele sehr populär. Politische Inhalte, vor allem in chinesischer Sprache, werden dagegen streng zensiert: Die Website der BBC und der chinesische Dienst der Deutschen Welle sind in China ebenso blockiert wie Tausende andere Websites.
Besucher von Internetcafés müssen sich ausweisen und die Betreiber ein elektronisches Logbuch der aufgerufenen Websites speichern. Die Zensurbehörden können so jederzeit zurückverfolgen, wer welche Site besucht hat. Nach Angaben von Menschenrechtsorganisationen sitzen mindestens 49 Chinesen im Gefängnis, weil sie im Internet eine Meinung geäussert haben, die der Partei nicht genehm war.
http://www.facts.ch
FINANCIAL TIMES
06 May 2006
By Mure Dickie in Beijing
In a 1958 encyclical, Pope Pius XII assured Chinese Roman Catholics they could rely on intervention from a powerful source: "Mary, the Virgin Mother of God, Queen of China."
Describing Mary as the nation's sovereign may have reassured a Chinese flock thrown into turmoil by the Communist revolution. But for the country's leaders, it was a reminder of Catholic claims to authority that could only be anathema to fiercely nationalist and atheist revolutionaries.
Half a century later, questions of power and loyalty still bedevil ties between the Vatican and Beijing. Just this week, hopes for a rapprochement have been dashed by the government-controlled Chinese church's appointment of two new bishops without papal approval.
"This is a grave wound to the unity of the Church," a Vatican spokesman said, adding that Pope Benedict XVI had learned of the appointment of the two bishops with "great displeasure".
DIE WELT (Deutschland | Germany)
by Paul Badde
05 May 2006
Es ist ein wahrer Kulturkampf. Das kommunistische China ernennt auf eigene Faust Kandidaten der staatsnahen "patriotischen" Kirche zu "katholischen" Bischöfen. Gerade das Prinzip der "Sukzession" gehört aber unverzichtbar zum Wesen der katholischen Kirche, die sich immer auch schon als "apostolisch" verstanden hat. Es ist dies das Prinzip der unmittelbaren und ununterbrochenen Nachfolge aller Bischöfe seit den Tagen der Apostel. Seit 2000 Jahren kann deshalb jeder katholische Bischof genau die Linie der Herkunft aller Hände bestimmen, die all seinen Vorgängern schon seit den Tagen der Urgemeinde in Jerusalem die Hände aufgelegt haben, bis die Weihe durch die Hände seiner unmittelbaren Vorgänger ihn selbst erreichte. "Diese Dienstkette dauert bis heute an", unterstrich Papst Benedikt XVI. gerade bei seiner Generalaudienz auf dem Petersplatz, "und sie wird bis zum Ende der Welt andauern."
************REPORTERS************
WITHOUT BORDERS | SANS FRONTIERES
05 May 2006
Faced with growing social unrest, the government has chosen to impose a news blackout. The press has been forced into self-censorship, the Internet purged and foreign media kept at a distance.
Arrests of journalists, particularly Chinese contributors to foreign media, continued in 2005. Ching Cheong, a Hong Kong reporter with a Singapore daily was imprisoned for “espionage”. While Zhao Yan, contributor to the New York Times, winner of a 2005 Reporters Without Borders - Fondation de France press freedom award, is to be tried for “disclosing state secrets”. In Tibet, five monks were arresting for working on an underground publication, while in Muslim Xinjiang, the editor of a literary magazine was sentenced to three years in prison. As of 1st January 2006, at least 32 journalists were in prison throughout the country.
Every day, Chinese editors receive a list of banned subjects from the Propaganda Department, renamed the Publicity Department. These include demonstrations by peasants, the unemployed or Tibetans - nothing escapes the censors who stoke up a climate of fear within editorial offices. When the army opened fire on villagers in December, draconian measures were put in place: The press was banned from carrying anything but reports from the official Xinhua news agency, foreign reporters were persona non grata in the region and every reference to the village was erased from the Internet.
In the same way, the announcement of the death of former prime minister Zhao Ziyang, ousted in 1989, was banned by the government, his name missing from television, discussion forums and search engines. In December the press was banned from publishing a single word on the death in exile of journalist Liu Binyan, dubbed the “conscience of China”.
At least 16 foreign journalists were arrested by police in 2005 while investigating sensitive issues. China has given no promises to guarantee their freedom to work ahead of the 2008 Olympic Games.
por favor lea en el español
>> Read the complete article
lisez s'il vous plaît en français
>> Read the complete article
By Associated Press | via CNN
04 May 2006
The Vatican has excommunicated two bishops ordained by China's state-approved Catholic church, as well as the two bishops who presided over the ceremony without Vatican consent.
In a statement, Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said on Thursday the Roman Catholic Church's canon law states that in such a case excommunication is automatic.
Earlier the Vatican strongly criticized the ordination of the bishops, saying they represented a "grave violation of religious freedom" and hindered dialogue between the Vatican and Beijing.
A statement Thursday from the Vatican spokesman said Pope Benedict XVI was deeply saddened at the news of the ordinations, which took place without Vatican approval. It called on Chinese authorities to prevent any such moves in the future -- noting they lead to excommunication.
"The Holy Father learned of the news with great sadness," Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said in the statement. "It is a great wound to the unity of the Church."
Corriere Della Sera
04 May 2006
La Santa Sede: «Grave violazione della libertà religiosa»
Pechino nomina due nuovi alti prelati in tre giorni senza l'avallo del Papa che esprime il suo «profondo dispiacere»
ROMA - Sale la tensione tra Cina e Santa Sede. Pechino ha nominato un vescovo per la seconda volta in pochi giorni senza l'assenso del Papa, una decisione che suscita amarezza e preoccupazione in Vaticano. Le ordinazioni illegali dei due vescovi «una grave violazione della libertà religiosa», ha detto il portavoce Joaquin Navarro Valls in una dichiarazione diffusa in mattinata. La Santa Sede ribadisce la necessità del rispetto della «libertà» della Chiesa e dell'autonomia «delle sue istituzioni da qualsiasi ingerenza esterna».
ROMA - Sale la tensione tra Cina e Santa Sede. Pechino ha nominato un vescovo per la seconda volta in pochi giorni senza l'assenso del Papa, una decisione che suscita amarezza e preoccupazione in Vaticano. Le ordinazioni illegali dei due vescovi «una grave violazione della libertà religiosa», ha detto il portavoce Joaquin Navarro Valls in una dichiarazione diffusa in mattinata. La Santa Sede ribadisce la necessità del rispetto della «libertà» della Chiesa e dell'autonomia «delle sue istituzioni da qualsiasi ingerenza esterna».
BBC News
04 May 2006
The Vatican has expressed "deep displeasure" over China's appointment of two Roman Catholic bishops.
The appointment of the bishops without the Vatican's approval represented a "grave violation of religious freedom", a statement said.
China's Catholic Church announced on Wednesday it had installed another bishop - the second in three days.
The Chinese Church does not recognise the Vatican's power to appoint bishops, causing tensions between the two sides.
China has a state-sanctioned Roman Catholic Church, but also a bigger, unofficial Church that is loyal to the Pope.
On Wednesday, Liu Xinhong was consecrated at a church in Anhui province in eastern China, while on Sunday the state church ordained Ma Yinglin as a bishop in the south-western province of Yunnan.
The statement was unusually strong in tone, says the BBC's David Willey in Rome.
"The Holy Father learned the news with deep displeasure," said the statement.
"We are faced with a great violation of religious freedom."
The Epoch Times
02 May 2006
On April 28, a Sound of Hope journalist made contact with one kidney transplant surgeon in Beijing. The surgeon said, because there were more organ donors in Sichuan province, China, he had been temporarily transferred to Sichuan local military hospital to help out. The doctors in the Air Force Hospital admitted they had young and healthy Falun Gong practitioner donors.
[Download telephone recording from Sound of Hope. ]
Tsinghua University Yuquan Hospital, also known as No. 2 Affiliated Hospital of Tsinghua University, is a noted kidney transplant centre. Kidney Transplant Department Chief Li Honghui said that every year the centre performed over 100 transplants but recently, the donor pool in Beijing was a shrinking, so two months ago, he was transferred to a military hospital in Chengdu City, Sichuan Province to assist with the overload; that region had plenty of donors.
Li Honghui: "We were in the military district!"
Journalist: "Is it because there were more kidney donors, that you went there to perform surgeries?"
Li Honghui: "Yes"
Li said that it was several years ago that organs mostly came from Falun Gong practitioner; when the journalist asked whether they could provide Falun Gong practitioner donor organs, he answered, "Yes."
Li Honghui: "It happened that for the past several years that donor organs were from Falun Gong practitioners."
Journalist: "Do you mean that this type of donor was quite easy to get several years ago."
Li Honghui: "That's true."
Journalist: "Can you supply young and healthy donors, such as people who practice Falun Gong?"
Li Honghui: "This request can be considered, I will tell you when the time comes"
Li Honghui said there would be a batch of kidneys on April 30.
【大纪元5月1日讯】（希望之声记者李思思 唐梅采访报导）记者4月28日联系北京肾移植的主刀医生，他表示，由于四川成都的供体来源多所以被调派到当地部队医院支援，连续三日空军医院的医生都坦承，有年轻健康、炼法轮功的供体。
MP3：在綫收听 下载收听
Realplayer：下载收听
北京清华大学附属第二医院玉泉医院是肾移植中心，李主任(宏辉)说他们每年做一百多例。而最近由于北京供体比较紧张，所以一两个月前，他被调派到肾源多的地区四川成都，协助当地的部队医院----空军医院进行肾移植。
By REUTERS | The New York Times
02 May 2006
BEIJING (Reuters) - China is poised to appoint another bishop to its state-run Catholic Church despite Vatican disapproval, escalating tensions with the Holy See as the two sides vie for influence over Chinese church affairs.
A priest in the Communist Party-approved church in the central province of Anhui is to be consecrated bishop of the province, a vice chairman of the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, Liu Bainian, told Reuters on Tuesday.
Liu Xinhong's appointment is opposed by the Vatican, Hong Kong's South China Morning Post reported on Tuesday.
It comes just days after a senior official in the government-approved church, Ma Yingling, was appointed bishop of Yunnan province in the face of objections from Hong Kong Cardinal Joseph Zen and reported disapproval from the Holy See.
Zen told the Hong Kong newspaper that the string of bishops promoted without Vatican approval suggested the state-run Patriotic Association was attempting to derail expanding dialogue between Beijing and the Vatican.
The two sides severed ties after 1949, when the victorious Communist Party cracked down on religion. The Vatican switched official recognition to Taiwan, where the anti-Communist Chinese Nationalists fled.
BBC News
May 2, 2006
The head of Hong Kong's Roman Catholic Church says the Vatican must halt talks with China because of its appointment of bishops without Vatican consent.
Cardinal Joseph Zen, who has been at the forefront of the move to improve ties, said Beijing had imposed a "fait accompli" and had been "very disloyal".
His comments come just days after state-sanctioned clerics in the Chinese city of Kunming ordained a new bishop.
The Vatican had asked for the ceremony to be delayed, to assess the candidate.
But Beijing said the Vatican should not to interfere in its internal affairs.
Another bishop is set to be appointed in central Anhui province without Vatican approval on Wednesday.
By David Barboza | The New York Times
April 30, 2006
SHANGHAI, April 30 — In the early 1990's, when Chinese contemporary art was just beginning to take off, a young painter here named Zhou Tiehai came up with an ambitious plan to make himself famous.
He would succeed by beating the art market at its own game, exposing its commercialism while exploiting it to the hilt. He would produce paintings that he hoped would be acclaimed by the same Western collectors and journalists who, in his mind, had advanced the careers of too many mediocre Chinese artists.
And he would do all this without lifting a brush: he would delegate that work to hirelings.
Somehow, he pulled it off. Mr. Zhou is now one of China's hottest artists. His meteoric rise from marginalized rebel to mainstream superstar culminated in a solo exhibition of his works at the Shanghai Art Museum in March.
Many of the biggest names in Chinese contemporary art were on hand for the opening. Mr. Zhou choked up with tears, seemingly awed by the lofty stage he had ascended.
For more than a decade, his work has mocked the art scene. In an era when every leading Chinese artist seems to have a recognizable brand, a series of obvious signature pieces, Mr. Zhou slyly appropriated Joe Camel from the American cigarette ads and transformed it into his own improbable brand. (Many people here refer to Mr. Zhou — pronounced Joe — as the Joe Camel guy.) Now important collectors boast of owning his paintings. His works, which command prices as high as $100,000, have been shown in New York, London and at the Venice Biennale.
That he doesn't paint them himself seems to make little difference, even, or perhaps especially, to those clued in to his game. Karen Smith, a Beijing-based art critic, calls him "the child who dares to suggest the emperor is indeed naked." Others hail him as a marketing genius.
Search
The purpose of the website is to publish articles by journalists about a variety of topics concerning the People’s Republic of China. All journalists and the publications that publish their writings are clearly identified. All copyrights belong exclusively to the identified sources of these articles. | Powered by
Information + More