Asia Times
Dec 15, 2009
By Benjamin A Shobert

Several years ago, while attending a conference on United States-China business relations, I heard a well-respected leader in the field finish his presentation and take questions from the audience. Perhaps the most interesting question was also the simplest: “What could happen in the United States that would shift our relationship with China?” With only the slightest of pauses, his answer was “a long and protracted recession in the US”.

The exchange was certainly interesting that particular moment, when the idea of such an event seemed distant and easy to trivialize. Today, in the midst of precisely that situation, his comments are difficult to ignore.

The recent release of the annual 2009 congressional report from
the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC), the product of a congressional committee long known for its suspicious view of China’s modernization and military growth, reinforces the idea that US-China relations are vulnerable to any number of things, but the state of the US economy remains the predominant threat. Many of the committee’s comments are not surprising, especially for those who have followed the growth of its role in policymaking over the past several years. Ongoing concerns over Taiwan echo throughout the report, while at the same time acknowledging the small gains that have transpired in 2009 regarding travel restrictions between China and Taiwan.

Similarly, the committee continues to push for greater transparency from the Chinese government regarding its objectives for the burgeoning military budgets coming from Beijing. Perhaps because 2009 was a year with its share of economic conflict, the most recent USCC report does a remarkably good job at casting a more balanced light on the growth of the Chinese military, and its potential to contribute to military conflict. The report goes so far as to say that ” … the expansion of China’s military and security activities abroad are more evolutionary than revolutionary in nature. Although the PLA [People's Liberation Army] is operating more frequently abroad, it should not yet be considered a global military or a military with global reach.”

Even more surprising was the report’s contention that “The Chinese military’s more international orientation is not a fundamentally negative development. A more activist PLA could in some circumstances provide a ‘public good’ by contributing more to global stability.” Given the many criticisms the report usually has for China, these points suggest that even the most hawkish forces in Washington are being forced to recognize that they will have to co-exist with Chinese power, and that doing so need not be detrimental to peace or prosperity.    more ….

Reuters
Dec 5, 2009
Ralph Jennings

TAIPEI (Reuters) – Taiwan’s China-friendly ruling party lost a county vote to the opposition on Saturday in elections seen as a first test for President Ma Ying-jeou’s policy of engagement with Beijing.

The Nationalist Party (KMT) lost the magistrate job in Ilan county to the main opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which supports Taiwan’s formal independence from China and upset Beijing when it controlled the presidency from 2000 to 2008.

Although the KMT kept its large overall lead as expected, holding the opposition to four of the 17 cities and counties that voted, the ruling party was muted in its reaction.

Ma, also the KMT chief, conceded at a news conference that election results “did not measure up to ideals.”

Polling followed 174 arrests covering more than 2,400 cases of vote buying and election-related violence, the Taiwan justice ministry said on Saturday after an aggressive crackdown during the campaign.

The elections, involving 38 percent of the electorate, were to select county magistrates and city mayors, county and city councillors and township chiefs.

“I think the KMT will try to inform the DPP that this is a local election that will not affect China policy, but of course there will be other voices,” said Alexander Huang, strategic studies professor at Tamkang University in Taipei.

“Beijing might raise some concern on whether (relations with China) play into the election result,” Huang said.

China has claimed sovereignty over self-ruled Taiwan since 1949, when Mao Zedong’s forces won the Chinese civil war and Chiang Kai-shek’s KMT fled to the island. Beijing has vowed to bring Taiwan under its rule, by force if necessary.    more …

Associated Press
2009-11-02

China’s legislature has removed the country’s unpopular education minister amid a corruption scandal in a city he used to oversee and widespread public dissatisfaction with the education system.

The executive committee of the national legislature dismissed Zhou Ji on Saturday at the end of a routine meeting and promoted a deputy education minister to replace him. In announcing the change late Saturday, the official Xinhua News Agency gave no reason but said Zhou “will get a new appointment.”

At 63, the American-educated Zhou was two years short of retirement and thus an unlikely candidate for a job change.

The surprise move was the latest shift to roil a public education system that Chinese traditionally idealize as a fair pathway to advancement but that has been filled with problems ?from chronic underfunding at primary and secondary levels to poor quality higher education.

Though many of the ills predate Zhou’s rise to education minister six years ago, he has come to be associated with them. When the legislature, the National People’s Congress, met last year to vote in a new Cabinet for a five-year term, Zhou received the highest number of negative votes of any minister.

Zhou’s removal comes just weeks after two senior administrators were arrested for bribery at Wuhan University. While Zhou has not been publicly linked with the scandal, he spent much of his career in Wuhan city working in the education system and served as mayor for two years before being elevated to education minister.   more …

Asia Times
Oct 17, 2009
By M K Bhadrakumar

The surprise element was almost completely lacking. The expectation in Delhi for a while has been that sooner or later Beijing would hit out. Verbal affronts from India were becoming a daily occurrence and a nuisance for Being. Not a single day has passed for the past several months when either influential sections of the Indian strategic community or the English-language media, tied by the umbilical cord of financial patronage to the Indian establishment, failed to indulge in some vituperative attack on Chinese policies and conduct towards India.

Yet, when it finally came on Wednesday, the timing of the cumulative Chinese reaction was most curious. Beijing chose a very special day on its diplomatic calendar to make its point. The prime ministers of Russia and Pakistan, Vladimir Putin and Yousuf Raza Gilani, and the United States Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell, were on official visits to Beijing. Indeed, Campbell had come on an important mission to prepare for the visit by US President Barack Obama to China next month.

Beijing made a big point that its current ruckus with Delhi was less bilateral and more geopolitical. Indeed, Wednesday’s People’s Daily commentary on India resorted to a colloquium that hasn’t been heard in the dialogue across the Himalayas for very many years.

On the previous day, in two statements the Chinese Foreign Ministry provided the “curtain raiser” for the People’s Daily commentary. The first statement focused attention on the recent Indian media campaign against China and asked Delhi to be “conducive toward promoting mutual understanding”, rather than publishing false reports on border tensions.

The second statement was substantive and it conveyed that Beijing was “seriously dissatisfied” by the visit of the Indian prime minister 10 days ago to the state of Arunachal Pradesh (which China claims as its territory). The Chinese spokesman said, “China and India have not reached any formal agreement on the border issue. We demand that the Indian side pay attention to the serious and just concerns of the Chinese side and not to provoke incidents in the disputed region, in order to facilitate the healthy development of China-India relations.”   more …

guardian.co.uk
Tuesday 6 October 2009 22.00 BST
By: Jeremy Goldkorn

On 3 July Chinese government censors blocked access to Danwei.org, the website I have edited from my home in Beijing since 2003. It is hosted outside China, so it’s easy for zealous regulators to flip an electronic switch and restrict access. Most of our content is translated from the Chinese media and internet, which gave us a certain amount of protection: most Chinese people who write or publish in China self-censor; this is why we had escaped the censor’s wrath. Until July.

This year – after a period of relatively relaxed controls – the bodies who censor information and culture have come back with a vengeance. There are several reasons: 2009 has seen a number of “sensitive” anniversaries, including the 4 May student uprisings of 1919, the 1959 Tibetan uprising, and Tiananmen Square in 1989. Although Tibet has been relatively calm this year, the riots in Urumqi in July added greatly to the tense atmosphere in Beijing. Government nervousness about the internet was exacerbated by hype in the western press about Twitter bringing democracy to Iran. Another factor is the financial crisis, which has made mass unrest more likely.   more ….

BBC News
15 October 2009 10:29 UK

A Chinese court has sentenced a further six people to death over ethnic unrest in the far-western region of Xinjiang in July, state-run media report.  Nearly 200 people were killed during riots between ethnic Uighurs and members of China’s dominant Han group.  The six were among 21 people who have been tried this week on charges including murder, robbery and arson.  Twelve people have been sentenced to death over the riots while another nine got life sentences or lesser terms.

The six were sentenced to death at a court in Urumqi, the regional capital of Xinjiang, Xinhua news agency said.  Three of the sentences were suspended for two years, meaning they could be later commuted to life sentences.

Another three life sentences were handed down while five other people received lesser sentences, Xinhua said.   more …