hongkong // Current

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4 months ago

China grows faster 7.9% this quarter amid world economic worries

China's economy grew at an annual rate of 7.9% between April and June, up from 6.1% in the first quarter, thanks to the... more

conservativelyliberal
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2 years old child smokes and curses in Sichuan - China

The innocent and angelic child is blameless. With the exception of a small number of people that take this as a form of... more

mundosanto
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Sustainable palm oil gets boost in China

Major China-based producers and users of palm oil have announced they intend to provide more support for sustainable palm oil, an important boost for efforts to halt tropical deforestation.

The public statement, made at the 2nd International Oil and Fats Summit in Beijing on July 9, committed the companies to “support the promotion, procurement and use of sustainable palm oil in China,” as well as “support the production of sustainable palm oil through any investments in producing countries.”

China is currently the world’s largest importer of palm oil, accounting for one third of all global trade. Increasing demand for palm oil, which is used in everything from soap to chocolate bars, is causing considerable damage to fragile rainforest environments, threatening endangered species like tigers, and contributing to global climate change.

Palm oil producers and buyers making the statement included Wilmar International, IOI Corperation, KLK Berhad, Kulim Malaysia Berhad, Asia Agri., Premier Foods PLC and Unilever PLC. Oxfam International, TransAsia Lawyers, and Solidaridad China were signatories.

“Given the massive of volumes of palm oil now being purchased, any move China makes towards using sustainable palm oil will have a big influence on protecting tropical forest resources in South East Asia and other areas,” said WWF-China Country Representative Dermot O’Gorman.

WWF helped set up the international Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) in 2004, with the aim of establishing global standards for sustainable palm oil production and promoting the use of products containing sustainable palm oil.

WWF-China first introduced sustainable palm oil to Chinese companies in 2004, and continues to encourage the country’s buyers, producers, and traders to participate in RSPO.

Sustainable palm oil received a massive boost in November 2008 when Dr. Huo Jiangguo, President of China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Foodstuffs and Native Produce, attended the RSPO annual conference in Indonesia and announced that China supported the drive for more sustainable palm oil products.Major China-based producers and users of palm oil have announced they intend to provide more support for sustainable palm oil, an... more

JanforGore
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4 months ago

China learns from Iran: shuts down Cell Phone service & Twitter

China just delivered a stunning, real-world demonstration of the changes rocking -- and transforming -- modern journalism. When... more

asherp
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18 comments

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5 months ago

China riots: Twitter and YouTube frustrate 'censorship attempts'

The communist authorities who built the so-called Great Firewall of China raced to stamp out video, images and words posted by... more

Apocalipstick
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27 comments

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5 months ago

140+ Killed in Ethnic Unrest in China

CNN - Ethnic Uyghur residents in Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang, took to the streets Sunday afternoon in a rare public protest that prompted a police lock-down of the city.

By Monday, police had arrested several hundred participants, the Xinjiang Public Security Department said, according to Xinhua. Police were searching for about 90 other key figures.

State-run media reported that protesters attacked passersby, burned public buses and blocked traffic on Sunday. The report did not say how many people took part in the protest or what their grievances were.

But a witness in Urumqi told CNN that, soon after the protest started at about 5 p.m., hundreds of protesters "grew into easily over 1,000 -- men, women and children, all ethnic Uyghurs -- screaming and chanting."

Xinjiang is home to many Uyghurs. China's constitution guarantees ethnic minorities equal rights and limited autonomy. However, ethnic tensions run deep. Minority groups such as the Uyghurs complain that they are treated as second-class citizens and are subjected to discrimination by the majority Han nationalities.

"What was clear was, the Uyghur protesters were not happy," the witness in Urumqi said. "They broke windows of public buses, threw bottles and rocks at the police, and harassed what looked like Chinese of Han or Hui nationalities. I saw a Uyghur man kick a Han woman in the behind as she tried to get away from the crowds."

A spokesman for the World Uyghur Congress, a dissident Uyghur group based in Munich, Germany, told CNN that Uyghur people in Urumqi and Xinjiang had told him by telephone that they had seen bodies thrown into military vehicles.

Dilxat Raxit added that tens of thousands of demonstrators had gathered in every Uyghur neighborhood in Urumqi to protest peacefully against what he described as the government's ethnic cleansing in Guangdong's Shaoguan City.

After about 40 minutes -- during which the crowd shouted slogans, calling the incident in Guangdong's Shaoguan City a planned ethnic cleansing -- the Chinese military began to crack down by sending more than 50 military vehicles, including tanks, carrying troops into Urumqi.CNN - Ethnic Uyghur residents in Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang, took to the streets Sunday afternoon in a rare public protest that... more

larkjl86
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5 months ago

At least 129 people dead amidst Rioting in Chinas West.

BEIJING - At least 129 people were killed in in rioting by a Muslim ethnic group in China's far west, state media said... more

Hurtsville
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8 comments

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5 months ago

China Ratchets Up Pressure on the Dollar

China has been supporting rhetoric with action ahead of this week's G8 summit in Italy, as it aims to promote the use of its... more

zoloftkid
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5 months ago

Han Chinese launch revenge attacks on Uighur property

Tania Branigan and Dan Chung report from Urumqi, where armed gangs of Chinese Han vigilantes have taken to the streets in revenge... more

zoloftkid
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5 months ago

Did China's nuclear tests kill thousands and doom future generations?

"Enver Tohti remembers the week that it rained dust. That summer of 1973 he was in elementary school in Xinjiang Province,... more

DeliaTheArtist
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33 comments

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5 months ago

Xinjiang Riots Explode in China

Ethnic protests have spread to a second city in China's western Xinjiang province after riots rocked the region's... more

afitzgerald
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12 comments

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5 months ago

China president hurries home from G8 after rioting

China's president cut short a G8 summit trip to rush home Wednesday after ethnic tensions soared in Xinjiang territory, and the government flooded the area with security forces in a bid to quell emotions in the wake of a massive riot that left 156 dead.

Two helicopters dropped leaflets appealing for calm among the Xinjiang capital's 2.3 million residents a day after running battles in the streets involving Han Chinese and minority Muslim Uighurs waving bricks, steel pipes and cleavers.

A Foreign Ministry statement said "given the current situation in Xinjiang," President Hu Jintao cut short a trip to Italy for a Group of Eight meeting later Wednesday to return home. It was not known if he would travel to Urumqi, about four hours by air west of Beijing.

After an overnight curfew, streets were calmer Wednesday, but residents showed cell phone and video camera footage of the earlier chaos, reporting neighbor-on-neighbor violence and pointing out bloodstains.

Uighurs say the riots that started Sunday — put down by volleys of tear gas and a massive show of force — were triggered by the June 25 deaths of Uighur factory workers killed in a brawl in the southern Chinese city of Shaoguan. State-run media have said two workers died, but many Uighurs believe more were killed and said the incident was an example of how little the government cared about them.

Many of the Turkic-speaking group believe the Han Chinese, who have flooded into the rugged, rapidly developing western region in recent years, are trying to crowd them out. The Han Chinese say the Uighurs are backward and ungrateful for all the economic development and modernization.

They also complain that the Uighurs' religion — a moderate form of Sunni Islam — keeps them from blending into Chinese society, which is officially communist and largely secular.

In one of the biggest Uighur neighborhoods Wednesday, residents crowded around reporters to complain about how mobs of Han Chinese men stormed into their neighborhoods and assaulted them.China's president cut short a G8 summit trip to rush home Wednesday after ethnic tensions soared in Xinjiang territory, and... more