China :: Commentaries

Flash Chilean demonstrators gather as they clash with riot police during a protest against the government and the public state education system at Santiago city September 29, 2011. Chilean police and students clash on education reform again. Chilean students are demanding for free and better state education, as well as for an end to profit-making in the public state education system.

China will publish a second action plan on human rights, Minister of the State Council Information Office (SCIO) said on Wednesday. At a conference convened by the SCIO to discuss the formulation of the second action plan on human rights, Wang Chen, minister of the SCIO, said that the new National Human Rights Action Plan of China will guide China's human rights work in the next four years from 2012 to 2015. Wang added that the new plan will attach more importance to improving people's livelihoods. The new plan will cover economic, social and culture rights as well as civil and political rights. It will also make commitments to improving the rights of ethnic groups, women, children, senior citizens and disabled people, Wang said. China published the first Action Plan in April 2009, the first of its kind that the country has made, and an action which made China one of the 26 countries that have responded to the United Nations' call to establish a national human rights plan s...

THE toddler who was saved from a 10-floor fall on July 2 was discharged from hospital today and her savior was discharged a day earlier. The two-year-old Niu Niu fell off her apartment window in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province after her grandmother went downstairs to pick up the laundry. Her fall was cushioned by the outstretched arms of a woman named Wu Juping. Wu's arms were fractured and Niu Niu suffered damages to her organs, brain and limbs. The girl was in a coma for 10 days. After surgery and healing therapy, Niu Niu has recovered well; her vision has returned to normal and she can walk unaided although nerves in her left leg remain impaired, according to the No. 2 Hospital of Zhejiang University's School of Medicine. "Niu Niu's treatment has achieved the ideal result," said Wang Jian'an, the hospital president. "It's a miracle that Wu saved Niu Niu and it is also a miracle that Niu Niu recovered so well." "But she still has a long way t...

A fugitive who went on the run 17 years ago after killing someone "because of a dream" has been apprehended. Zhang Hualin, from Pengzhou in Sichuan province, woke from a nap on Aug 22, 1992, after having dreamed that he was running away from someone who wanted to harm him. He then became aware that the son of his divorced girlfriend, Zheng Bin, was standing over him and demanding that he get out of the room. The situation quickly developed into a fight. Fueled by the fear of his dream, Zhang got a knife from the kitchen and stabbed Zheng to death. To escape punishment, he fled to the city of Linzhou in Central China's Henan province and worked as a litter collector. "If it were not for my dream, I might not have been so impulsive," the killer told police during his confession.

Flash The expected blowout in the tourism market is unlikely in the upcoming National Day holidays, dashing hopes of domestic travel agencies in the Golden Week. The number of tourists who have applied to join overseas tourism groups in the week-long holidays is only about 60 to 70 per cent of that in the same period last year with most routes witnessing declines, according to a report in the Beijing Times. The tourism sector, which suffered heavy losses because of the SARS outbreak, had pinned high hopes on the holidays to get back into the black. Many travel agencies started preparations and promotions in August. In the previous several years, the two week-long holidays, the May Day holidays from May 1 to May 7 and the National Day holidays from October 1 to October 7, were the hottest tourism seasons in the mainland. "But the applications this year are far from our expectations," said Dun Jidong of the China Travel Service's overseas ...

Nepalese police recover the body of a passenger who died when a Buddha Air Beechcraft 1900D aircraft crashed at Kot Danda in Lalitpur, on the outskirts of Kathmandu, on September 25. (Prakesh Mathema/AFP/Getty Images) A small tourist plane crashed while heading to Mount Everest on Sunday, killing all 19 people on board, according to media reports. The plane was carrying 16 tourists on a trip to view Everest and other Himalayan mountain peaks, but went down as it was returning to Kathmandu, the capital city, according to The Himalayan Times. Two Americans, 10 Indian nationals, 6 Nepalis, and one Japanese tourist, were on board the aircraft, according to the newspaper. The three crew members were also killed. The airplane's black box was found at the site and Nepalese authorities said they would do an investigation into the crash, according to the Times. Police spokesman Binod Singh told AFP, The rescue efforts have been hampered by heavy rain and confirmed the nationalities of thos...

Flash Germany is celebrating this year the birth of the automobile, with a patent applied for by Carl Benz 125 years ago for a motorized tricycle, in hopes of drawing tourists smitten by cars. Historical cars are displayed at the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart, southern Germany. [CNTV] The national tourism office has made the auto industry a highlight of its annual programme for the first time and the southwestern region of Baden-Wuerttemburg alone has organised 200 events from May through September. Anyone travelling to the regional capital Stuttgart will not miss the Mercedes star that sits above the main train station or the posters that advertise the local auto museum. Built at the base of a hill that dominates the city, the museum inaugurated in 2006 boasts a striking glass facade that covers a double spiral of steel meant to represent the automobile's DNA. Historical cars are displayed at the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart, southern Germany. [CNTV] An elevator that em...

Water calligraphy is a poetic activity that you can observe in many Chinese parks: Artists use a large brush to write Chinese characters using ink instead of water. Minutes after the characters are written, they disappear. Media Artist Nicholas Hanna built a tricycle that writes Chinese characters on the ground as it moves. His tricycle is part of an exhibition for Beijing Design Week: You can see itat the Northern Electric Relay Factory in Dashilanr, south of Qianmen gate. The exhibition opens 6pm on Saturday September 24, 2011, and runs until October 3. The video below was shot ands edited by Jonah Kesssel . You can also watch it on Vimeo (Tudou coming soon if youre in China without a VPN).

A demonstrator pauses while calling for Georgia state officials to halt the scheduled execution of convicted cop killer Troy Davis. Davis was eventually executed on Wednesday night. (Erik S. Lesser/AFP/Getty Images) The state of Georgia executed Troy Davis in Jackson, Ga. at 11:08 p.m. on Sept. 21. He was 42 years old and had spent 20 years on death row. The Supreme Court denied his lawyers request for a stay of execution, after the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles and the Georgia Supreme Court denied it earlier in the week. Doubts remained about his guilt, and protestors demonstrated in multiple cities, including Atlanta, Paris, and Washington D.C. The NAACP, which had collected hundreds of thousands of signatures asking for clemency for Davis, posted his last words. They were: I'd like to address the MacPhail family. Let you know, despite the situation you are in, I'm not the one who personally killed your son, your father, your brother. I am innocent. The incident that...

From nddaily Afraid of being killed by gangsters, 9 people consist of 3 barbershop owners and their employees lie down in line on a zebra line in order to call for protection from the government.I dare not to go back there, or they will chop me into pieces.Said Chen Mingxing, one of the barbershop owners who claimed that they couldnt take the extortion and threatening from gangsters anymore. Protestors lied in the middle of a busy road of Dongguan City for 2 hours and only left after the police on spot guaranteed their safety. Last July, Chen Mingxing opened a barbershop in Hengli Town, Dongguan City. With his excellent practice his shop was looking at a very good prosperity had it not for a gang who came now and then black mailing him. These people would came in hordes sometimes, finding unnecessary charges such as bad shaving or giving them fake money in change so as to ask for 4400 or 4600 yuan compensation, otherwise they would beat up their employees or smash the shop. We have no ...

Damselfish in a sea fan at Sangalaki in Kalimantan, Indonesia. (Matthew Oldfield) Damselfish mostly inhabit tropical coral reefs around the world and are almost all marine fish, except a few species that are found in freshwater in the lower parts of some rivers. They are typically brightly colored and can reach to 14 inches (36 centimeters) in length. Both sexes look the same. The males make nests and protect the developing eggs from predators. During this time, some species exhibit nuptial color patterns. Damselfish may perform a variety of specialized ecological roles, such as as territorial algal farming, or planktivory. Some species in the Indo-Pacific live commensally with sea anemones, and are known as clownfishes or anemonefishes. Related Articles SCIENCE IN PICS: Crustacean Got Your Tongue? Clownfish are immune to their host's toxins, thus gaining protection from predators as well as feeding on leftover food from the anemone. The anemone also benefits from the rela...

A child in local Metro stations who passengers feared may have been abducted from his family was in fact begging with his father, police said yesterday. A photograph posted on a microblog of the three-year-old boy with a long-haired man on a Metro service has been retweeted almost 1,000 times since Monday. The picture was uploaded by local office worker Zhao Shuai who photographed the exhausted-looking boy holding a plastic cup at 10pm on a Line 2 service. He said the child was being scolded by the man accompanying him. Zhao said the boy kept looking at his hand, as the cup seemed to be stuck to his palm to make him keep begging. "I thought, 'surely that man cannot be his relative,'" Zhao said. Metro police located the pair on Tuesday night at the Xujiahui Station on Line 1 and discovered they were father and son. The 24-year-old father, surnamed Hou, from northwest China, showed police the boy's birth certificate, which was confirmed as authentic. The boy had bee...

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At least seven people have been confirmed dead and 22 others injured in a southern county of China's Tibet Autonomous Region, impacted by a strong earthquake centered in the state of Sikkim in northern Indian on Sunday evening. Astrong earthquake hit the northern Indian state of Sikkim on Sunday evening, said local TV reports. At least five people were confirmed dead. In neighboring Nepal, at least five people were killed in the quake, including three at the British embassy in Kathmandu where a building reportedly collapsed. More information is being awaited after the primary reports of casualties from the strong earthquake measuring 6.9 on the Richter scale which struck at 6:11 p.m. local time (12:41 GMT) with its epicenter in the India-Nepal border area or 68 km northwest of Sikkim's capital Gangtok. Mudslides are reportedly blocking roads between India and Nepal in western Sikkim, making rescue efforts difficult, said the local authorities. While telephone communications hav...

Flash Deep in the mountains of Guizhou Province in southwest China, there live a group of people who plow and paint. Sharply contrasting today's fashionable pop art, pieces created by the Miao ethnic group realistically depicts their everyday life, farming, cooking, embroidering, singing and dancing. With bright colors and delicate brushwork, art returns to its very original and simple form. With verdant mountains seen in all directions, life is simple here in Pingpo village. The locals are ethnic Miao people, a minority with over 5000 years' of history. Till today, the villagers seem to maintain their simple way of life. Getting close to nature inspires their artistic talent in various fields. Miao people's cross-stitching, embroidery, and batik are all internationally known. However in here, the villagers find painting a freer way to express their inner world. 50-year-old Lan Dezhen is meeting her friend to discuss their painting. They...

From Netease : A set of photos showed a class of primary school students studying in a classroom with a coffin in the front has shocked Chinese netizens and sparked heated discussion. Two years ago, a primary school in a small village in Shaanxi province was certified as a "dilapidated house". With no funding to build up a new school, the school rented a room from residence as the classroom. Since then, the students have been studying with the coffin. Comments from Netease : [] 2011-09-17 13:58:21 I dont know what Lu Meimei and her father has in mind after reading this news. China-Africa Hope Project, is a projected China hope to have in its own country. wod178 [] 2011-09-17 13:59:51 The local country governor should fit the coffin well. 2011-09-17 14:05:12 2080 The governors of Hubei P! rovince who spent 800 thousands yuan in 20 days show their contempt. * 2011-09-17 14:07:21 Red Cross has lots of money, but it wont give a penny to your ordinary people. ip111.121.*.* 2...

China's Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) will set up a national online database of convicted bribers by the end of this year, in a bid to prevent possible corruptions. The database will serve as an admittance control mechanism in the bidding and government procurement procedures, said a statement from the SPP on Sunday. China has put online lists of convicted bribers, making such information available for public inquiry from 2006 and the blacklists have effectively deterred some cases of corruption as well as commercial bribery, the SPP's statement said. The SPP also called on procuratorial organs in the country to improve their crime reporting systems for the reference of policy makers.

Nation Brief Former active duty Marine Corps Corporal and Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer (C) walks with Kentucky law enforcement officers. (Luke Sharrett/Getty Images) A small town in Kentucky celebrated one of its own this weekend. Former active duty Marine Corps Cpl. and Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer led the Cow Days Festival parade down Main Street in his hometown on Sept. 17 in Greensburg, Ky. Meyer was awarded the Medal of Honor after saving the lives of 36 American and Afghan soldiers while serving with Marine Embedded Training Team 2-8, Regional Corps Advisory Command 3-7, Sept. 8, 2009, during a firefight in Kunar Province, Afghanistan. Meyer is the first living Marine to receive the Medal of Honor since the Vietnam War. Related Articles Veterans Groups Reach Out to Todays Vets

The logo of German industrial group Siemens is pictured during the company's annual press conference in Munich in 2010. (Christof Stache/AFP/Getty Images) Siemens, the Germany-based industrial and engineering giant, said it is getting out of the nuclear power business after the German government decided to stop using nuclear as an energy source, according to media reports. This chapter is closed for us," CEO Peter Loscher told Germanys Der Spiegel publication in an interview on Sunday, Sept. 18. He said the company will not be involved in managing or building nuclear power plants. Two years ago, the firm struck a deal with Russias Rosatom, but Loscher said that deal will not go through in the end, adding that the two firms will work together in other fields. In the aftermath of the massive earthquake and tsunami that crippled Japans Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, the German government turned off several of its power plants and passed a bill to completely ph...

A flag-raising ceremony is held at a museum featuring the "9/18 Incident" in Shenyang, Liaoning Province, yesterday. On September 18, 1931, Japanese forces attacked the barracks of Chinese troops in Shenyang, marking the beginning of the Japanese invasion and an occupation that lasted 14 years. Sirens sounded yesterday morning in Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces in China's northeast, the first areas that fell victim to the Japanese invaders, to observe the 80th anniversary. In Shenyang, the sirens began at 9:18am and lasted for three minutes, while more than 1,000 people from the central and local governments, the People's Liberation Army and all walks of life gathered to commemorate the anniversary.

U2 band member Bono (Jason Merritt/ Getty Images) U2s Achtung Baby Turns 20 Nov. 1 marks the 20th anniversary of U2s Achtung Baby, and in honor of the event there are five different remastered editions available as well as a forthcoming tribute album, according to Rolling Stone. The tribute, announced by U2 frontman Bono during opening night for this years Toronto International Film Festival, features Jack White, Damien Rice, Patti Smith, and Depeche Mode covering tracks from the coveted album. If you opt for U2s version, you can upscale the experience with the Uber Deluxe Edition, with six discs including Achtung Baby, Zooropa, B-sides, outtakes, and rarities, four DVDs, vinyl, art prints, an 84-page hard-bound book, an issue of their fanzine, stickers, badges, and a replica of Bonos The Fly sunglasses. The other four remastered sets offer scaled-down versions of the above. The original Achtung Baby had five hit singles and has sold over 18 million copies to date. Tony Be...

Related reading: China's annual output of early-season rice, which is mainly planted for reserves and industrial use, registered slight growth this year, a hard-won result thanks to improved yields amid drought, the statistics agency said on Tuesday. Output hit 32.76 million tonnes, an increase of 4.5 percent from a year ago, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said in a statement on its website. The rise in output is the result of an improvement in yield per unit, although the planting area shrank 45,000 hectares, or 0.8 percent of the total from a year earlier, to 5.75 million hectares, the statement said. More than 96 percent of China's early-season rice is planted in eastern Zhejiang Province, the central provinces of Anhui, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, and the sout...

Sunday, Sept. 18, 2011 Troops from N. Vietnam infiltrate the South on Sept. 18 of what year? THEN September 18, 1964, communist North Vietnam orders its troops to infiltrate noncommunist South Vietnam resulting in a battle in Quang Tri Province. The North is defeated in the battle and suffers massive casualties, but the confrontation marks a serious escalation in the conflict between the North and the South. In March 1965, then U.S. President Lyndon Johnson commits the first U.S combat troops to support South Vietnam. The 1975 invasion of Saigon by the North marks the end of the Vietnam War and brings about the unification of Vietnam under communist rule. NOW Today, Vietnamstill a communist regimeis categorized as Not Free in the 2011 Freedom House Country Report. In the report, Freedom House details its findings by listing some of the Vietnamese governments abuses of power in 2010 including: continued restrictions on civil liberties and religious freedom, and crackdowns on disse...

GOING GREEN: A US Navy FA-18 Super Hornet approaches an air refuelling tanker.The U.S. Air Force has nearly completed certifying its fleet to use carbon-intensive coal-to-liquid fuels. (Toshifumi Kitamura/AFP/Getty Images) There has been much talk of late of the military's efforts to go green. This characterization is accurate in a sense, but misleading if interpreted too broadly. The military recognizes that its dependence on massive quantities of fossil fuels imposes substantial risks, and to reduce these risks it must reduce its energy requirements. Although the military cites dependence on foreign oil and the dangers posed by continued climate change as a component of these risks, the more important issue is the logistics and costs involved in delivering fuel to distant operational centers around the world. The most obvious example of this danger is the staggering number of casualties suffered by servicemen and women during fuel shipments. In response, the military has not only...