Must-read China news by Danwei

Wong couldn't move on. He had always been fascinated with his childhood in 1960s Shanghai and Hong Kong, and his post-2000 work has been an extension of Days of Being Wild—replicating its cinematography, sets, costume design, and characters. His latest, My Blueberry Nights, is set in contemporary America and should have been a new direction. But it comes off as desperate, playing like a greatest-hits version of his '90s filmography performed by an all-white cover band. His visual motifs of clocks and countertops, no longer carrying the shock of the new, feel as empty and shopworn as fashion advertisements.

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Given his retirement–and a handy staff of ghost writers–Comrade Fidel casts his thoughts to Chinese history with a few digs thrown in on separatism of the Taiwanese and Tibetan varieties. No real shockers here, pretty much boiler-plate Party line/Marxist theoretical reductionism, though for obvious reasons Fidel focuses particular attention on US support for Chiang Kai-shek and the American involvement in Tibetan independence movements of the 1950s. (Apparently the ex-El Presidente and I have the same nightstand reading list as well as taste in cigars–I read Kenneth Conboy’s The CIA’s Secret War in Tibet last spring.)

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Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao has pledged that his government will extend further support to poor areas inhabited by ethnic minority people...

...Wen told farmers in Dai, Jingpo and De'ang villages that his new cabinet has decided to increase rural spending by 25 billion yuan (3.5 billion U.S. dollars)

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Now the security presence in town was steadily mounting. Still, eight foreign reporters together at one Tongren hotel was far too many to bother hiding. So after breakfast we all decided to take a cab over to the monastery, if we still could get in. It turned out we could, though it was obvious we were being watched. Under a photo of the Dalai Lama, a plump acolyte in the central prayer sanctuary did not stop lighting candles and tidying altars as he spoke, swiveling his gaze to and fro over our shoulders. He described to me and another journalist a cresting wave of tensions and controls. "Too many things to explain just like that," he said. "It just gets to the point where you just can't control yourself anymore."

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But the story purports to reveal some of the darker secrets of how Tencent keeps its users buying QQ coins — especially if the company doesn’t look like it’ll hit its quarterly numbers....As promised, this time around the meat of the story centers on allegations that Tencent is manipulating its virtual currency so as to impact not the RMB, but rather its stock price.

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Fu Chao, an official with the Hotan Regional Administrative Office, said the protest had nothing to do with the head scarf ban.

"The rioters were mainly Uighurs. The riot was nothing to do with the ban on head scarves, but about responding to the riots in Tibet. We will announce further information shortly," Fu said.

The Hotan government report said a small number of people — including "terrorists," "separatists" and "religious extremists" — "stirred" things up but were stopped by police.

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On the upstream side is Beijing, an economic behemoth committed to shrinking its growing wealth gap by developing the country's interior. The plan, sometimes known as the Go West policy, hinges in part on access to water for drinking, energy generation, agriculture and industry, especially in arid areas such as Xinjiang.

Downstream are Kazakhstan and Siberian Russia, developing in their own right but a far cry from China's breakneck growth. Rivers that originate in China – mainly the Irtysh, which crosses the Kazakh northeast before entering Russia, and the Ili, which ends in Kazakhstan – are essential to the two states, for the same reasons that Beijing needs them.

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I was interested in the direct and democratic election of the Taiwanese regional leadership this year for two reasons. Firstly, I wanted to get a real picture of the Taiwanese popular election and its political manifestations. Secondly, I felt that the direction of Taiwan’s future depended on which party leader was elected president. Therefore, on the day of March 22, 2008 I paid very close attention to news stories concerning Taiwan’s presidential election. On some websites there were play-by-play updates and pictures depicting the Taiwanese voters at the polls. On portal websites and main media outlets, however, the content and analysis concerning the election were markedly dull. The reporting of the election was watered down and even trivialized.

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So, it started me thinking... unrest in Tibet, a tiny flame carrying the hopes of all China stored at secret base camp high in the mountains, tight security, and government secrecy. Hrmm. Throw in a glass of holy water from some glacial Tibetan lake, Bruce Willis, and a bad-ass monk or two trying to extinguish the flame and you've got an awesome action movie plot.

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Deer penis, turtle blood and angelica root potions have joined steroids and amphetamines on the list of banned drugs for Chinese Olympians...

...While China's top athletes have long sought a competitive edge by ingesting traditional concoctions, those customs are fading amid stricter doping rules...

...Traditional Chinese medicines may contain banned substances such as the stimulant ephedrine or interact with each other to trigger positive doping tests, said Ai Hua, a doctor for China's gymnastics and weightlifting teams during the 2004 games...

...In the 1990s, Chinese track coach Ma Junren credited a series of world records by unknown runners to high-altitude training and a cocktail of turtle blood and caterpillar fungus. Current head coach Feng Shuyong was skeptical, especially after Ma and six of his athletes were pulled from the 2000 Olympic squad for suspected doping.

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To sum up, the morning was full of "Qu bu liao!" and "Zou! Zou! Zou!" which I liberally translate as "You can’t get there from here," and "Keep moving." I finally gave up in my search for Olympic goodwill, shared dreams and unified world. I headed down into the subway. AP reported later that one subway station was closed. They got it wrong. Two stations were closed: Tian'anmen East and West. And that "noticeable boost in security in downtown Beijing" that they reported was a lot more noticeable if you didn’t have an invitation or a press pass.

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Rising international rice prices are not a cause for major concern in China, Premier Wen Jiabao said Monday.

'Please set your mind at rest because China has abundant supply of rice,' Wen said, adding that the country has stockpiled about 40-50 million tons of rice.

He made the remarks on the sidelines of the Greater Mekong River Subregion Summit.

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The site is regarded as too expensive and the housing the leaders have built themselves too luxurious. Some houses are valued at over ¥740000 and have an area of 340 m2. This exceeds the figure of 90 - 100 m2 stipulated in the regulations set by national and provincial governments and is generally felt to be verging on corruption and something the city certainly cannot afford.

In a rare development, the national authorities seem to be taking the people's side. Beijing has been highly critical and a scathing article in the party's mouthpiece, The People's Daily, has been picked up and reprinted by regional newspapers all over China (and abroad). The article criticises the local leadership and compares Liuzhou's government to that of the Soviet Union and points out that it was abuse of privilege such as this which led to the downfall of the communist party there.

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The Dalaı Lama critiques are of course highly entertaining for the readers, who marvel at how little has changed since the Cultural Revolution. For the journalist writing/translating, it must be a bizarre experience being told to shut down the part of the brain that houses rational thinking and then sign your name to the article. I once asked a colleague how he felt about putting his name to a State Council rant about the Dalaı Lama. "I know I’m brainwashed but I still believe 80 percent of it," was the reply.

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Workers at the factories in Fuzhou accuse the management of cheating on pay, discriminating against young men and stifling a pioneering attempt to set up a trade union....

After a strike in 2006 led by young male workers, the Taiwanese management took a decisive step. "They were all kicked out," said an administration clerk.

Now the factory appears to discriminate illegally against men.The evidence was a prominent notice outside the gate. It said any men applying for jobs must produce a certificate from the public security bureau in their home towns proving they did not have a criminal record. No such rule applied to women.

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