News: August 2005 Archives
By JIM YARDLEY (The New York Times)
BEIJING, Aug. 30 - For the more than 11 months that he has been incarcerated, Zhao Yan has been held in one of the darkest corners of China's legal system because of the accusation against him: that he leaked state secrets to his employer, The New York Times.
The accusation, which Mr. Zhao and The Times deny, deprives a defendant in China of almost all rights. Mr. Zhao still has not had a court hearing. No public explanation has been given for his arrest. He is forbidden to see his family. His lawyer's efforts to post bail were denied not by a judge but by the Ministry of State Security, the agency that arrested him.
Mr. Zhao, 43, who worked as a researcher for the newspaper's bureau in Beijing, was no stranger to State Security when it picked him up last Sept. 17 at a Pizza Hut in Shanghai. His previous work as a muckraking journalist and rural activist earned him regular visits from agents and invited speculation that his past life was the reason for his arrest.
from BBC News
China is suspending production at a third of its coal mines, in an effort to reduce the huge number of fatal accidents that blight the industry.
The 7,000 mines affected will need to meet national safety standards before they can reopen, state media report.
More than 3,000 miners have been killed this year alone, in fires, floods and other work-related accidents.
Analysts say the closures may be hard to enforce, as jobs and energy needs can take precedence over safety.
HONG KONG - Authorities in the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang succeeded in preventing any first-hand media coverage of an environmental protest in which thousands of villagers clashed with riot police, local residents said.
As villagers began their sit-in last week outside the Tian Neng Battery Factory in Meishan township, many local residents began calling local media hotlines to try to publicize concerns about high levels of lead in their children’s blood.
"This is a very difficult situation. The police have arrested a lot of people, and local residents are very angry. If you came here to interview local people, they would all tell you what’s going on here," one woman resident of Meishan told RFA’s Mandarin service.
"We were constantly in touch with media organizations about this issue, but not one of them came here to cover the story," she said.
No journalists allowed
"There were no reports about this in the local news. It was a huge story, and there were no journalists present."
Another Meishan resident confirmed that protesters had tried to get in touch with journalists.
A US businessman is under arrest in China, accused of spying for Taiwan, according to the US embassy in Beijing.
Xie Chunren, who was born in China, has been kept under house arrest without charge for nearly three months, after his arrest in Sichuan province in May.
Mr Xie's detention is the latest in a series of such cases.
The embassy said it was informed of his detention shortly after his arrest on 31 May, but he had only now agreed to have his case made public.
By Chris Buckley - International Herald Tribune
BEIJING China disclosed on Wednesday (August 3rd) that it had frozen approvals for foreign satellite broadcasters entering its market and would strengthen restrictions on foreign television programs, books, newspapers and performances in an effort to exercise tighter control over the country's cultural life.
"Import of cultural products contrary to regulations will be punished according to the circumstances, and in serious cases the import license will be revoked," the rules, which were issued on Tuesday, stated. "In the near future, there will be no more approvals for setting up cultural import agencies."
Viacom, the U.S. television and entertainment conglomerate that owns MTV China, is one of three foreign broadcasters that have secured rights to broadcast to selected Chinese audiences. The other two are Star TV, owned by News Corp., and Phoenix Satellite Television, based in Hong Kong.
Other broadcasters, like CNN and BBC World, can broadcast into hotels and residential compounds used by foreigners or have joint ventures with Chinese state-run television stations.
Many multinational companies, including Time Warner and Sony, have sought deals in China.
The new rules were announced by the Propaganda Department, the Ministry of Culture and four other regulators and appeared in the Chinese press on Wednesday. They will make it more difficult for foreign companies to bring in foreign books, Internet and video games and performing acts at a time when many multinational companies are turning to China's burgeoning market for growth.
Co-productions by Chinese and foreign film and television companies will face stricter censorship, foreign magazines and newspapers can be sold only through state-controlled agencies, and imported Internet games face strengthened censorship.
By Nick Mackie
BBC News, eastern Sichuan
Once through the toll booths on the main highway, the first roadside billboard in Sichuan is somewhat surprising.
It tells incoming drivers they are entering a "disease free zone", a model for the nation.
But far from being disease free, this area has become a death zone.
A disease caused by the pig-borne bacterium streptococcus suis has now killed more than 35 people, with nearly 200 others infected.
NDTV Correspondent
Saturday, August 6, 2005 (London):
The 2008 Olympics in Beijing offer an opportunity for China to improve human rights conditions, including abolishing the death penalty and releasing political prisoners, Amnesty International said today.
The London-based human rights group also urged the International Olympic Committee to express concern to Beijing over rights abuses allegedly perpetrated by authorities in preparation for the games.
In the past, senior Chinese officials have said hosting the games would help improve human rights conditions in the country.
IOC officials have said they share those hopes, but will not act as human rights monitors.
Chinese authorities must adopt "a set of realistic, practical, steps" to improve the human rights situation in the run-up to the Olympics, Amnesty said in a statement.
These include abolishing the death penalty, reforming the judicial system, allowing citizens freedom of expression and association, releasing all prisoners of conscience and providing justice for the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown. (AP)
Original source: NDTV
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
BEIJING (AP) -- Though it's missing some paragraphs and gets a couple of facts wrong, an unauthorized Chinese version of ''Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince'' was on sale Sunday in Beijing, just two weeks after the book appeared in English and almost three months ahead of the planned October launch of the official Chinese-language edition.
Impatient Chinese fans also have begun posting their own translations online. One reader was so upset about the ending he wrote his own and posted it on a university Web site.
The fantasy series by J.K. Rowling is wildly popular in China, where the hero is known as ''Ha-li Bo-te'' and authorized translations of five earlier books have sold millions of copies. In 2002, an unknown Chinese author produced an entire fake adventure, ''Harry Potter and Leopard-Walk-Up-To-Dragon.''
Chinese leaders, under pressure from the United States and the country's other trading partners, have promised repeatedly to stamp out the country's rampant piracy of goods ranging from books and movies to drugs and designer clothes.
But such fakes are still widely available, and foreign companies say they are losing billions of dollars in potential sales.
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