SHANGHAI, CHINA: New PuLi hotel blends classy with subtle natural elements

Hotel lobby

2010-2-7 

By Yang Di  

LOCATED in the hub of the commercial district adjacent to Jing'an Park, The PuLi Hotel and Spa is an epitome of class with a twist of nature, a place to find peace and tranquility in the middle of the hyper-active urban jungle.

With its resort-type environment, the complex sets a new benchmark for a unique yet pleasant experience. It is not just another business hotel but an urban resort.

Patrons are greeted by two rows of bamboo trees flanking the right and left of the driveway on approach to the hotel, immediately transporting them to another world.

Enter the hotel and sink into the ultra calming atmosphere imbued with contemporary elements and accents of traditional Asian charm, meet the reception staff or have a drink at the Long Bar in the lobby, and overlook a candle-lit reflection pond through the glass walls.

Impeccable attention to detail is evident from the consistent, warm "honey glow" custom designed light fittings, locally sourced Chinese materials such as dark local timbers, cast bronze and grey Shanghai brick, to the use of distinctly resort style elements. It exudes a sense of understated luxury and elegance.

"As we were interested in developing a residential feel to the hotel we did not want to waste much space on conventional hotel facilities such as the reception desk and concierge," said Johannes Hartfuss, owner and principal designer of Layan Design Group.   "We consolidated all of these services together in one substantial bar called the Long Bar located parallel to the main lobby."

Another distinct feature in the lobby is a very cozy library with a massive fire place, comfortably decorated to make guests feel at home. It is a 5-meter-high space filled with bookshelves all around, offering a variety of publications in English and Chinese.

Open the door to each room or suite and a distinct Chinese feel dominates, without being overtly ethnic and traditional. A visual splendor spreads before you with a mixture of modern shapes combined with traditional local materials.

The carved timber screens, textured local grey brick walls, dark and grainy timber in combination with lightly honed sandstone and sand-colored wall-coverings create a sense of harmony. All finishes and materials are warm and soft, with the use of textures and matt finishes throughout.

"As for the rooms, we tried to maximize available space while opening the bathroom to the individual guestroom. There are very large-scale sliding panels in the rooms that allow them to be separated if needed. Otherwise it is open and spacious," Hartfuss said.

A nest of warmth and comfort, the rooms have their own character, featuring a dining table that also functions as a desk. The bathtub is located along the window, together with a huge daybed. Also, each room has separate "rainforest" shower and toilet cubicles, as well as cast bronze basins.

"The rooms feel somewhat 'furnished' rather than 'planned' which again enforces the idea of being in a home rather than in a hotel," Hartfuss said.

The facility has 209 rooms and 20 suites, with sizes ranging from 45 to 130 square meters, offering 24-hour dining as well as 24-hour concierge, laundry and valet services. Club floors from levels 20 to 26 comprise 61 rooms and suites, all of which will have a personalized butler service and are scheduled to open in the second quarter of the year.

As fine cuisine is an integral part of The PuLi experience, the second level is dedicated to Jing'An restaurant with three distinctive areas, a formal restaurant, central library and bistro lounge.

The third level has a state of the art gymnasium, 25-meter infinity lap pool and the first Anantara Spa in Shanghai.

"The hotel is a kaleidoscope of sights and senses waiting to be discovered, with a seamless blend of Eastern and Western elements," said The PuLi's general manager Martijn van der Valk.

The PuLi's unique concept is the brainchild of Urban Resort Concepts, founded by seasoned veterans in the hospitality industry, who believe that the running of a luxury hotel is as much artisan craft as it is a business.

• Address: 1 Changde Rd
• Tel: 3203-9999

The Deluxe Suite features a dining area where all finishes and materials are warm and soft, with the use of textures and matte finishes throughout

View Article in the Shanghai Daily

DALIAN, CHINA: Port Arthur (Lushun)

FROMMER’S:

Lushun -- Known to war historians as Port Arthur, Lushun has been the most important, and most sensitive, naval base in northern China for roughly 100 years. Little used during the Qing dynasty, it became a formidable installation under Russia, was captured and expanded by Japan after the Russo-Japanese War, and was finally returned to Chinese control after World War II. Warning: Most of the area is a military zone and officially off-limits to the public; do not cross the railroad tracks, which mark off the restricted area. For more information, contact the PSB (tel. 0411/8661-3411).

Only two historical sights fall north of Lushun Bei Lu, both of which will appeal primarily to military history buffs. The express air-conditioned coaches to Lushun (1 1/2 hr.; ¥11/$1.45/70p) leave from the square's west side every hour. To reach there by taxi, it costs ¥250-¥300 ($33-$39/£16-£20) round-trip. Some travel agencies, and even the Dalian Tourism Bureau, will claim that you can see other sights, but the only believable authority here is the PSB.

CHINA AT THE OLYMPICS: Chinese world champions eye gold

Posted: Feb 9, 9:42a ET | Updated: Feb 10, 2:51p ET

Vancouver (AFP) - China's women's curling captain Wang Bingyu , or "Betty," is eyeing Olympic gold to add to an already impressive list of achievements by the reigning world champions.

China, who only took up the sport about 15 years ago, won the 2009 world women's championship in Gangneung, South Korea -- just four years after the first Chinese facility dedicated exclusively to curling opened.

The victory came on top of their second-placed finish at the world championship in Canada the previous year, taking their cumulative record in those tournaments to an impressive 22-4.

Wang, who answers to the name "Betty," was introduced to curling by her ice hockey-playing father in her hometown of Harbin, taking up the sport about nine years ago.

Chinese women's national team coach Dan Rafael, from Canada, puts China's success down to a single-minded focus on technique.

"When I first met them, in 2007, their practice schedule was three hours a day of throwing and throwing and throwing. It wasn't even game-situation shots. It was just sliding rocks, working on their releases."

"What they asked me about most was strategy. They were convinced I had a magical curling book."

The Chinese, also including Zhou Yang , Yue Qingshuang and Liu Yin, play their first game in Vancouver against Great Britain on Wednesday.

View Article on NBC Olympics

My Tentative Scholarship @ Sea Lecture Schedule on the Ocean Princess (Feb – Mar, 2010)

Heather Hopkins Clement, MA/MBA, developed an appreciation for Japanese culture at a young age and has passionately pursued the study of Japan and East Asia ever since. Her extensive experience living and travelling in Japan gives her a wealth of valuable insights into this complex country. She delights in sharing her academic knowledge of the cultural history of East Asia and sharing her practical experience of visiting the numerous sights of the region to enhance other's travels to the area. You can read more about Heather and her travels on her blog: http://heatherineastasia.blogspot.com/.

(Schedule object to change at the discretion of the Cruise Director)

Saturday, February 20 – Shanghai, China

Sunday, February 21 – SEA DAY 1

· “Exploring the Cultural, Historical and Natural World Heritage Sites of NE Asia” – Learn about UNESCO’s World Heritage Site program and the amazing sites you can access from our upcoming ports of call in China, S. Korea, Russia and Japan.

Monday, February 22 – Dalian, China

Tuesday, February 23 – Beijing (Xingang), China

Wednesday, February 24 – SEA DAY 2

· “The Koreas Today” – After a brief historical overview of modern Korean history, this talk will explore the recent events on the Korean Peninsula through the headlines and look ahead to future challenges and opportunities for the North and the South.

Thursday, February 25 – Incheon, S. Korea

Friday, February 26 – SEA DAY 3

· “The Path of Buddhism in NE Asia” – Learn about the historical origins of Buddhism and its basic tenets, and then follow its transmission along the Silk Road to see how the civilizations of China, Korea and Japan integrate it with their own traditions to make this religious philosophy uniquely their own.

Saturday, February 27 – SEA DAY 4

· “Russia Today” – After a brief historical overview of modern Russia history, we will talk about contemporary Russia by exploring the top news stories of the past year and learn why the Russian Far East is positioned to be a major player in the “Asian Century”.

Sunday, February 28 – Vladivostok, Russia

Monday, March 1 – SEA DAY 5

· “Japan Today” – Learn about contemporary Japan through the top news stories of the past year and explore how geography and demographics are key factors in many of the challenges Japanese society faces today.

Tuesday, March 2 – Fukuoka (Hakata), Japan

Wednesday, March 3 – Hiroshima, Japan

Thursday, March 4 – Osaka, Japan

Friday, March 5 - SEA DAY 6

· “Heather on the Hotseat” – Join Heather for a casual post-Japan Q&A session as we discuss all that you experienced while ashore in Japan.

Saturday, March 6 – Tokyo, Japan

Sunday, March 7 – SEA DAY 7

· “Exploring the Cultural, Historical and Natural World Heritage Sites of NE Asia” – Learn about UNESCO’s World Heritage Site program and the wonderful sights you can access from our upcoming ports of call in Japan, Russia, S. Korea and China.

Monday, March 8 – Osaka, Japan

Tuesday, March 9 – Hiroshima, Japan

Wednesday, March 10 – Fukuoka (Hakata), Japan

Thursday, March 11 – SEA DAY 8

· “Russia Today” – After a brief historical overview of modern Russia history, we will talk about contemporary Russia by exploring the top news stories of the past year and learn why the Russian Far East is positioned to be a major player in the “Asian Century”.

Friday, March 12 – Vladivostok, Russia

Saturday, March 13 – SEA DAY 9

· “Heather on the Hotseat” – Join Heather and her special guest for a casual post-Japan Q&A session as we discuss all that you experienced while ashore in Japan.*

Sunday, March 14 – SEA DAY 10

· “The Koreas Today” – After a brief historical overview of modern Korean history, this talk will explore the recent events on the Korean Peninsula through the headlines and look ahead to future challenges and opportunities for the North and the South.

Monday, March 15 – Incheon, S. Korea

Tuesday, March 16 – SEA DAY 11

· “China Today” – Explore modern China through the top news stories of the past year and learn how China has become the world’s second largest economy and some of the downsides of rapid modernization.

Wednesday, March 17 – Beijing (Xingang), China

Thursday, March 18 – Dalian, China

Friday, March 19 – SEA DAY 12

· “Fun with Chinese Characters” - This interactive lecture will begin with an explanation of the historical origins of the Chinese writing system and its influence on neighboring countries. We will then learn the meaning of some basic characters and give you a chance to test your knowledge reading signs and dates.

Saturday, March 20 – Shanghai, China

Lecture Topic Summary:

· “Exploring the Cultural, Historical and Natural World Heritage Sites of NE Asia” – Learn about UNESCO’s World Heritage Site program and the amazing sites you can access from our upcoming ports of call in China, S. Korea, Russia and Japan.

· “Russia Today” – After a brief historical overview of modern Russia history, we will talk about contemporary Russia by exploring the top news stories of the past year and learn why the Russian Far East is positioned to be a major player in the “Asian Century”.

· “The Koreas Today” – After a brief historical overview of modern Korean history, this talk will explore the recent events on the Korean Peninsula through the headlines and look ahead to future challenges and opportunities for the North and the South.

· “The Path of Buddhism in NE Asia” – Learn about the historical origins of Buddhism and its basic tenets, and then follow its transmission along the Silk Road to see how the civilizations of China, Korea and Japan integrate it with their own traditions to make this religious philosophy uniquely their own.

· “Japan Today” – Learn about contemporary Japan through the top news stories of the past year and explore how geography and demographics are key factors in many of the challenges Japanese society faces today.

· “China Today” – Explore modern China through the top news stories of the past year and learn how China became the world’s second largest economy and some of the downsides of rapid modernization.

· “Fun with Chinese Characters” - This interactive lecture will begin with an explanation of the historical origins of the Chinese writing system and its influence on neighboring countries. We will then learn the meaning of some basic characters and give you a chance to test your knowledge reading signs and dates.

· “Heather on the Hotseat” – Join Heather for a casual post-Japan Q&A session as we discuss all that you experienced while ashore in Japan.

*My travelling companion, Ms. Janabeth Benjamin Reitter, a former teacher who also has a master’s degree in Japanese Studies from the University of Michigan, has kindly agreed to join me on stage to field questions.

CHINA: Quake questioner

Tan was investigating why so many school collapsed in Sichuan

Page last updated at 17:12 GMT, Tuesday, 9 February 2010

Activist Tan Zuoren, who has been sentenced to five years in prison for "inciting subversion of state power", was a well-known critic of the Chinese government.

Profile of Tan Zuoren:

The 56-year-old was tried over comments he made on the internet in which he criticised the government for its handling of the bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square in June 1989.

But Tan's supporters believe that the real reason for the trial was to silence him.

Tan had been a vocal critic of the government in the wake of the massive Sichuan earthquake in 2008, in which nearly 90,000 people died.

In particular, he had questioned why so many schools collapsed in the quake - in many cases when other buildings around them remained standing.

The government admitted that nearly 14,000 schools were damaged in the quake, and there was widespread anger in China that so many children died.

Many said the poor construction of the schools was a result of corruption.

In the months after the quake, bereaved parents complained that they were being prevented from publicly mourning their children, in an attempt, critics said, to keep the issue quiet.

'Ridiculous'

Tan asked internet users and people who had lost their children in the quake to help compile a detailed database of the victims.

“All he did was to publish his personal diary and an investigative report into the deaths of students”

- Ai Weiwei

He also asked volunteers to help him detail any evidence of poor construction at the schools.

He was in the process of compiling his independent report into the schools when he was arrested in March last year.

Tan's lawyer, Pu Zhiqiang, believes that by exposing the extent of the destruction, he would have embarrassed the government.

"They took out any mention of the earthquake from the verdict because they are afraid of referring to it," said Mr Pu.

Tan's wife, who was not allowed to attend court, described the trial as "ridiculous" and lacking justice.

Artist and fellow activist Ai Weiwei said Tan's crime was "entirely one of speech, of conscience".

"All he did was to publish his personal diary and an investigative report into the deaths of students," he said.

"If he is sentenced to five years in prison for doing that, then nobody is safe in China."

View Article on BBC

For elderly Russian, man accused as camp guard is vivid memory

Alexei Vaitsen, in his home in the Russian city of Ryazan, holds a newspaper with an article about John Demjanjuk, accused in deaths at Sobibor. (Sergei L. Loiko, Los Angeles Times / January 27, 2010)

Alexei Vaitsen, 88, escaped from the Nazi death camp of Sobibor during a prisoner revolt. He says he recognizes John Demjanjuk, 89, now on trial in Germany, as having been a guard.

February 6, 2010

By Megan K. Stack, Reporting from Ryazan, Russia

The witness has grown old and sick. He sits propped on pillows while the snow piles up outside. Recovering from a stroke, he languishes in a cramped apartment because his legs are too frail to negotiate five flights of stairs.

His name is Alexei Vaitsen. He is one of the few Jews to survive the torments of the Nazis' Sobibor death camp and the only member of his family who lived to see the end of World War II.

His thoughts these days are hundreds of miles away, in a distant courtroom where the fate of another sick old man is being weighed. John Demjanjuk, who is accused of being a guard at Sobibor, lay on a bed before a judge in Germany last week because, he said, he was not well enough to sit upright.

In Munich, where Demjanjuk is on trial, other aged prisoners have climbed into the witness box. They described the sadism of the guards, detailed the terrors of gas chambers and talked about Jews being led obliviously to their deaths. None of them could remember Demjanjuk.

Vaitsen says he can. He doesn't recognize the more recent photographs of the elderly man with white hair. But he swears he remembers the fresh-faced guard in an old snapshot. And after decades of silence, he seems eager to tell anybody who will listen.

"It's him. I know him," Vaitsen, 88, says vehemently. "I'm 100% sure."

After all, he says, there were only a few hundred guards, and he spent more than a year living in terror of their whims.

Are his memories as solid as he thinks? If so, does his evidence help anybody? He wants to know whether, in this trial of frail bodies and dying embers of memory, his story is relevant.

Reports of Vaitsen's account filtered out in Europe this week, and German investigators say it is up to the court to decide whether to call him as a witness. The chief investigator, Kurt Schrimm, said he could be brought in at any time. But retired investigator Thomas Walther, who led the effort that resulted in Germany prosecuting Demjanjuk, expressed skepticism that after so many years and so much publicity, Vaitsen could suddenly provide anything new.

Vaitsen and his family say he has lived with his secrets for decades.  "Everything is hidden inside him," said his grandson, 38-year-old Alexander Vaitsen. "He wakes himself up screaming."

There was a time when Nazi hunting carried a sense of glamour and immediacy. For decades, survivors, Israeli agents and man hunters tracked down the former tormentors. They stripped away false names, plucked criminals from balmy exiles and pushed for justice.

Now it is theater of the half-dead. The victims are old and dying; so are the perpetrators. Demjanjuk is 89 and so sick he can stand trial for only 90 minutes at a time.

As for Vaitsen, whose name is also transliterated from Russian as Weizen, he's hardly enjoying a luxurious retirement. Almost immobilized by the recent stroke, he lives on a slim pension; his grandson is a woodworker who collects disability payments. His friend asks visitors from Moscow to bring a food packet -- sausages, cheese and fruit.

Vaitsen can barely move, but he has one specific memory of a particular young guard, a man he is certain was Demjanjuk, leading a group of prisoners into the forest. Were they going to chop wood, to be punished, to undertake some other task? He doesn't know, but that flash of memory is there.

Demjanjuk is old, he says, but so what? Vaitsen is old too. The years have flown. Demjanjuk had a family and earned a living as an autoworker in Ohio. He was sentenced to death in Israel in 1988 after being identified as the camp guard known as "Ivan the Terrible" in the Treblinka death camp. But the Israeli Supreme Court overturned the conviction five years later on the basis of new evidence.

As for Vaitsen, even his family was unaware of his past.
He was born in Poland to a Jewish family that moved to a town now in western Ukraine.

As a young man, Vaitsen was a sprinter who also played soccer and worked in the local prosecutor's office. After Soviet forces moved in, he was drafted as a border guard for the Red Army.

Vaitsen said his parents and sister were killed in pogroms sparked by the advance of German troops into Ukraine. German soldiers captured him and put him on a train to Sobibor in occupied Poland. Two of his brothers were also imprisoned in the extermination camp.

Most of the prisoners in the camp were Jewish, and almost all were slaughtered in chambers poisoned with tank exhaust. Tens, perhaps hundreds, of thousands are believed to have been killed.
Demjanjuk has been charged as an accessory to 27,900 deaths at Sobibor.

Vaitsen was among the luckier ones. He was given a job in the arrival hall, where prisoners turned over their clothes, had their hair sheared off and were told they were being sent to bathhouses. From 7 in the morning until 7 at night, he sorted through clothes stripped from prisoners, repairing and refashioning them for reuse.

"All I was thinking about was how to get as far away from this hell as possible," Vaitsen said. "My dream was just to kill all the Germans and get away. Every day started with the thought, 'They'll kill me today.' "

Vaitsen had been scraping out survival for a little more than a year when prisoners hatched a plan to kill the top officers and escape. On an October morning in 1943, they made their move. They killed nearly a dozen German officers and a smattering of Ukrainian guards; hundreds of prisoners escaped into the forest.

"For us prisoners, it was a great pleasure to kill the guards," Vaitsen said of the uprising, almost dreamily.

"We never thought we would survive," Vaitsen said. "God chose us and gave us life. For many years after the war, those who survived were asking ourselves how we managed to survive."

After his escape, Vaitsen says, he joined the partisans and fought in the forests of western Ukraine. He eventually made his way to Russia, where he rejoined the Soviet army.

One of his brothers was put to death in Sobibor before the uprising. The other brother in the camp escaped during the uprising, only to be captured by Poles and tortured to death, Vaitsen said.

For decades, he kept his torments private. The Soviet Union was a place where onetime prisoners of war were often sent to the gulag, suspected of treachery.

Vaitsen married what his family calls "an ordinary Russian woman" -- meaning a non-Jew. He stayed in the military until the 1960s and then took a job as supply manager at a local energy company.

Only 20 years ago, and then just bit by bit, did he begin to tell his family the truth. The Soviet Union was slumping toward extinction, and Vaitsen grew bolder.

The anniversary of his birth was not his real birthday, he told his family. It was Oct. 14, he said, the date he escaped from a death camp.

Today, both his wife and son are dead. Vaitsen is entombed in a Soviet-era apartment complex that could be any other, anywhere in Russia: bricks the color of old sand, aged cars calcifying in the cold, chilled staircases haunted by vague smells of garbage and cigarettes.

He had his first stroke three years ago, when he was describing his Holocaust experiences at a conference.

Still, he is thinking about that trial.

"There was so much dirt and so much death," Vaitsen said. "And he was a horrible man."

View Article in the LA Times

OLYMPICS: Russia plans to win at least seven Olympic golds

Published 05 February, 2010, 17:16; Edited 08 February, 2010, 01:46

Russia are planning to win from 7 to 11 golds and from 27 to 31 medals overall at the upcoming Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Izvestia newspaper claims they have gained access to a document called the “Task Integrated Program”, meant only for internal viewing by the country’s sporting officials.

According to the document, the Russian biathletes will be able to win three golds (in sprint, pursuit and relay races), and cross-country skiers will bring two more victories (in men's sprint, relay and mass start).

Figure skaters are also expected to show an excellent performance as golds are expected from Evgeny Pluschenko and from one of the pairs in dancing.

Stakes have also been put on speed skaters (two golds), the bobsled team, and the men's hockey squad.

A medal plan was common ahead of every big sporting event and the careers of athletes and coaches largely depended on its fulfillment. However, in recent years, sporting bosses said they gave the tradition up, so the data revealed by the newspaper shows it has not been abandoned.

The 2010 Winter Olympic Games kick off in Vancouver, Canada, on February 12.

 

View Article in RT

JAPAN: Toyota in global recall of Prius

Toyota is recalling 436,000 hybrid cars worldwide

Page last updated at 15:10 GMT, Tuesday, 9 February 2010

Toyota has announced the recall of about 436,000 hybrid vehicles worldwide, including its latest Prius model, to fix brake problems.

Akio Toyoda: "Let me assure everyone we will redouble our commitment to quality"

The total includes more than 200,000 Prius cars sold in Japan and 8,500 cars in the UK.

"We have decided to recall as we regard safety for our customers as our foremost priority," the firm said.

The company has already recalled eight million vehicles because of accelerator and floormat problems.

Company president Akio Toyoda made the latest recall announcement at a news conference in Tokyo on Tuesday afternoon.

TOYOTA RECALLS: STORY SO FAR:

September 2007, US: 55,000 Camry and Lexus cars in floormat recall

October 2009, US: 3.8m Toyota and Lexus vehicles recalled due to floormat problem

November 2009, US: floormat recall increased to 4.2m vehicles

January 2010, US: 2.3m Toyota vehicles recalled due to accelerator pedal problems (of those, 2.1m already involved in floormat recall)

January 2010, US: 1.1m Toyotas in floormat recall

February 2010, Europe: 1.8m Toyota's in pedal recall

February 2010, Japan, US: 200 reports of brake faults in new Prius. Cars recalled

February 2010, worldwide: 436,000 hybrid vehicles in brake recall. Also, 7,300 Camry vehicles recalled in the US over potential brake tube problems

Q&A: Toyota recalls

Reputation could suffer for years

Toyota fights back as problems escalate

"We will do everything in our power to regain the confidence of our customers," he said.

After the conference, he told reporters that he might go to the United States next week to explain details about the recall.

The Prius was Japan's top-selling car in 2009 and the world's most popular hybrid model.

Peter De Lorenzo, author of the book The United States of Toyota, told the BBC that the latest recall would be particularly painful for the company.

"The Prius is their shining example of their vision of what we should all be driving and it is everything the new Toyota represents. So for them to have to acknowledge a recall of hundreds of thousands of them is a tremendous blow to their image," he said.

Credit rating agency Moody's said it had put Toyota's credit rating on review for a possible downgrade, following the latest recall.

"This action is prompted by Moody's concern that the growing scale of Toyota's product problems and associated recalls may have longer term impacts on its brand equity, pricing power and market share in key markets," it said.

Toyota's president has come under criticism from Japan's transport minister Seiji Maehara for not reacting quickly enough to recall faulty vehicles.

"I wish you had taken measures earlier rather than simply saying it was not a major technical problem," Mr Maehara told Mr Toyoda in a meeting.

Mr Maehara said he would meet US ambassador John Roos on Wednesday to discuss the situation.

"Recalling defective products is important, but each country needs to consider how to prevent this from becoming a diplomatic problem," he said.

Software update

There would also be recalls of Hybrid Sai, sold only in Japan, and Lexus HS250h, sold globally, the company said on Tuesday.

Johnny Goldstone, greentomatocars.com: "If we were concerned... we would take all the cars off the road without hesitation"

The latest recall refers to third-generation Prius models built before 27 January 2010.

There have been complaints in Japan and the US that the brakes momentarily fail when driven on rough or slippery road surfaces.

Toyota blames a software glitch and says it has already fixed vehicles sold this year.

In a statement, Toyota said it was keen to reassure Prius owners that the cars were safe to drive.

"At no time are drivers without brakes," the firm said.

Toyota said that it would be writing to vehicle owners affected and the procedure - to upgrade the anti-lock braking system - would be carried out free of charge.

In the UK, no other Toyota or Lexus models are affected by the latest recall.

In addition to recalling 133,000 2010 Prius models in the US, Toyota said it will also recall 14,550 Lexus Division HS250h 2010 models to update software in the vehicle's anti-lock braking system.

Separately, Toyota has announced a safety recall on about 7,300 2010 Camry vehicles in the US over problems that could lead to a hole in the brake tube, causing a brake fluid leak. Owners of the Camry models involved will be contacted by post in the middle of February.

Investigation

The US Transportation Department said last week that it was investigating the braking problems with Prius.

The US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration received 124 reports from drivers about it, including four of crashes.

There have been no reports of any such accidents in the UK.

The US investigation will look into allegations of momentary loss of braking power while travelling over uneven road surfaces.

Mr Toyoda wrote that he had been in contact with US Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and assured him that communication would be kept open, would be more frequent, and that Toyota would be "more vigilant in responding" to officials.

Before it announced the Prius recall in Japan, Toyota estimated that its losses would reach $2bn (£1.23bn) in costs and lost sales from its worldwide recall of vehicles that might have faulty accelerator pedals.

The Prius recall is expected to send this figure even higher.

View Article & Video on BBC News

BEIJING: After Summer Olympics, Empty Shells in Beijing

BEIJING MINUS ATHLETES On Olympic Boulevard, a year after it was thronged with tourists, a lone guard patrolled last July.  Susetta Bozzi/OnAsia.com

February 5, 2010

By MICHAEL WINES

BEIJING  — If you build it, he will come,” Ray Kinsella, the farmer in the 1989 film “Field of Dreams,” hears, mystically, as he walks through his cornfield. So at seemingly ruinous cost, he razes the cornfield and builds a ball field, and is rewarded with an endless stream of ticket buyers stretching to the rural Iowa horizon.

In 2008, the Chinese built a ball field — boy, what a ball field — known worldwide for its lattice-like architecture as the Bird’s Nest. Alas, after the 2008 Olympics, the ticket buyers haven’t come. Right now, the Bird’s Nest serves as a winter amusement park known as the Happy Ice and Snow Season. In April, a promoter may stage a celebrity rock concert to “establish China as a world leader for global peace and a healthier planet.” Or not.

After that, the government says it may build a shopping center there.

The accompanying photographs, shot at locales for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, succinctly depict the loneliness of where the long-distance runner once strode. In a week when the United States contemplates how long its future will be spent deep in debt, they also hint at how much its greatest creditor is pinning its own hopes of building wealth on dreams.

Two summers ago, China’s Olympic extravaganza was recognized worldwide, and especially here, as a barely disguised metaphor for this nation’s rise to worldwide importance. Eighteen months later, China is more important than its leaders could have imagined.

But Beijing’s famous Water Cube has hoofed its way from Olympic stadium to light-show concert hall to stage for a Russian performance of “Swan Lake.” Its latest incarnation is as an indoor water park.

In the year after the Olympics, the iconic 91,000-seat Bird’s Nest hosted a Jackie Chan concert, an Italian soccer match, an opera and a presentation of Chinese singing standards. But the local soccer team declined a deal to make it their home field, and the only tenants now are tourists who pay $7 to visit the souvenir shop.

By most accounts, the vendors hawking trinkets outside the stadium outnumber the foreigners who go there to gawk.

Outsiders may find this wasteful. After all, Atlanta’s Olympic stadium became a baseball park, and Calgary’s Saddledome a civic fixture.

Then again, the Olympics seem to bring out profligacy in even buttoned-down governments. Consider Athens, where 21 of the 22 stadiums erected for the 2004 Olympics were reported last year to be unoccupied. The $14.4 billion cost of that party is being cited by some as a source of Greece’s potentially destabilizing fiscal troubles.

If China is different — and China is — it is because fiscal worries on the diminutive scale of Athens hardly register on Beijing’s blotter. Overbuilding is not a prime concern. Indeed, some might call it an economic strategy.

This is a nation of spanking new office towers and hotels and luxury apartment complexes, many built on spec, many financed with state-subsidized loans, or on state-subsidized property, or with low-cost steel from mills built with state subsidies. Many are more empty than full.

According to Colliers International, a real estate firm, Beijing’s central business district offices will stand roughly 38 percent vacant this year. That’s 12 points higher than the figure for San Bernardino, Calif., which the advisory firm REIS says was the worst major office market in America in the last quarter of 2009.

Yet what seems awful in San Bernardino is the norm in effervescent Beijing. Real estate speculation here is rampant, many experts agree that housing and finance are riding bubbles, and everyone expects a big reckoning somewhere — a year? two? — down the line. But there was a reckoning after the Asia panic in 1999, and another reckoning in 2004, and both times the government bailed out the big state-owned banks, and the boom went on.

Indeed, the government forgave the Agricultural Bank of China $120 billion in sour loans just last October without a peep of public protest.

If you build it, the feeling is, they will come. Eventually, in a nation this large, someone will fill the convention center and the water park. And if not, well, build it anyway. Building creates jobs, and feeds prestige, and pumps up the GDP. Here in the nation that is too big to fail, as long as the bad loans don’t overwhelm the good, the waste is tolerable.

“That, to me, is the essence of the Chinese strategy,” Eswar Prasad, a Cornell University professor and a former head of the International Monetary Fund’s China division, said in a recent telephone interview. “Just keep the machine going fast enough.”

View Article in the New York Times

RUSSIA: On this day: 9 February

On February 9, 1983, the Soviet Union left the World Psychiatric Association because of accusations of using psychiatry for political and punitive purposes.

In January 1921, Maria Spiridonova, leader of the anti-Bolshevik party, became the first victim of Soviet punitive psychiatry. She was arrested for terrorism, and Felix Dzerzhinsky, the head of Cheka, the special Soviet security service, ordered to put her not in prison, but in the “psychiatric sanatorium.” According to Spiridonova’s medical record, she was diagnosed with “hysterical psychosis” and was in awful condition when came to the clinic. Spiridonova had been transferred from one prison to another for 20 years, and was executed in 1941.

In 1935, a new special branch of the mental hospital in Kazan, Tatarstan, opened for criminals diagnosed with a mental illness, and the first party of mentally handicapped offenders, mixed with mentally healthy political criminals, was admitted for compulsory medical treatment. In 1939, the government placed the whole hospital under the control of the People's Commissariat for the Interior, and criminals became the only patients. Military men, instead of doctors, headed the hospital. Between 1940 and 1970, about 2,000 patients died there. Among them were people charged with having relatives abroad, spreading panic rumors during World War II, anti-Soviet agitation and other not clearly defined crimes. The Kazan Prison Mental Hospital was the most infamous of all the psychiatric clinics in the Soviet Union.

One of the documents necessary for sending someone to the psychiatric hospital was the mental examination report. The majority of such examinations were carried out in the Serbsky Institute of the Forensic Psychiatry in Moscow. Initially after its foundation in 1923 the institute was a rather normal scientific organization, but in the 1930s it became a tool of the government. The staff members of the institute often participated in investigative actions – they gave criminal and political suspects drugs to make them talk at the interrogations. The special laboratory of the institute studied such drugs and searched for the best ways to numb one's consciousness and to force one to speak. Lawyers for the suspects had no right to be present at the examinations.

After Stalin’s death in 1953, Nikita Khrushchev came to power. He started the campaign against “the cult of personality” and let people openly speak about Stalin’s repressions. People embraced the freedom, and started to speak openly not only about Stalin, but also about the situation in the country and the drawbacks of Khrushchev’s reality as well.

Khrushchev was not ready for this stream of freethinking, and decided to get rid of the dissidents. He could not use the Siberian concentration camps for it – the camps were part of Stalin’s regime, which he criticized. Khrushchev needed other ways to prevent the upcoming disturbance, and so he proclaimed that only crazy people dislike socialism, thereby giving a green light to punitive psychiatry.

In 1961, new instructions for dealing with a mentally ill offender were developed. According to those instructions, anti-Soviet agitation, slanderous talk about the government and sacrilege against the hymn and the flag of the Soviet Union were considered socially dangerous acts. Mentally ill people guilty of such actions could be hospitalized against their will.

In the beginning of 1960s, psychiatrist Andrey Snezhinsky described a new type of schizophrenia – so-called continuous sluggish schizophrenia. All the symptoms of this disease were described as “light” or “ill-defined.” Unsociability and reticence were named among the basic symptoms, so almost everyone could be diagnosed with this illness.

Hundreds of people were hospitalized with this new diagnosis. The new prison hospitals were founded in different districts of the country. In 1963, a dissident and prisoner in one such hospital, the translator and literary critic Valery Tarsis, published in Germany a novel about this system, “The Ward 7.” Two other dissidents, Vladimir Bukovsky and Semyon Gluzman, wrote “The Dissidents’ Guide to Psychiatry,” where they gave recommendations for the arrested, taught them how to speak with doctors and police investigators, and what to write in documents. “Do not give way to despair! In spite of all the psychopharmacological remedies and shock therapy, contemporary science still is not able to destroy the human personality” advised this book to those who were, in spite of the entire struggle, sent to a hospital.

In 1964 Josef Brodsky, the famous Russian poet and recipient of the Nobel Prize, spent two weeks in a psychiatric clinic in Saint Petersburg, and later described those weeks as the most awful time of his life in the Soviet Union. The doctors injected him with tranquilizers, though he was considered healthy, and applied a method of the “wet pack” to him. This method of treatment was very simple – the nurses wrapped a patient tightly into a wet sheet and left him in this condition for several hours.

Only in 1988 were the psychiatric hospitals returned from the control of the Security Service to the Department of Health. 776,000 patients were considered healthy and taken off the books in psychiatric clinics. The doctors who participated in carrying out executions were not punished.

JAPAN: Nissan reports return to profit

Nissan has benefited from the success of car scrappage schemes

Page last updated at 08:53 GMT, Tuesday, 9 February 2010

Japanese carmaker Nissan has reported a return to profit for the last three months of 2009.

The company made a profit of 45bn yen ($500m, £320m) in the October to December period, compared with a loss of 83bn yen a year earlier.

It now says it expects to make a full-year profit of about 35bn yen, instead of the loss it previously predicted.

Nissan said scrappage schemes in major markets and sales growth in China had provided a boost to sales volumes.

The company sold 882,000 vehicles worldwide in the three-month period, a 20.6% increase on the previous year.

View Article on BBC News

N. KOREA: China and UN visits intensify North Korea diplomacy

North Korea walked away from talks on its nuclear programme last year

Page last updated at 08:05 GMT, Tuesday, 9 February 2010

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has told China he is committed to ridding the Korean peninsula of nuclear weapons, Chinese state media has said.

His comments came during a visit to the North by senior Beijing envoy Wang Jiarui and prior to the arrival of senior UN envoy, Lynn Pascoe.

The diplomats are thought to be trying to restart multi-nation talks with the North on ending its nuclear programme.

Pyongyang pulled out of talks after the UN condemned its testing of missiles.

The BBC's John Sudworth in Seoul says Mr Kim's statement is broad aspiration, containing no details about how and when the transformation would occur.

But coming amid the flurry of diplomatic activity, it has led to speculation that North Korea may be preparing to return to the talks, our correspondent adds.

Promises

Xinhua said Mr Kim had reiterated North Korea's "persistent stance to realise the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula" in the talks with Mr Wang, head of the Communist Party's international department.

"The sincerity of relevant parties to resume the six-party talks is very important," Xinhua quoted Mr Kim as saying.

He said North Korea was willing to strengthen communication and coordination with China.

Mr Wang delivered to Mr Kim a letter from Chinese President Hu Jintao, in which he said Beijing was ready to work with North Korea to maintain peace and stability on the peninsula and invited Mr Kim to visit China, Xinhua added.

Mr Wang was accompanied back to Beijing by the North's nuclear envoy, Kim Kye-gwan, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported.

Citing unidentified diplomatic sources in Beijing, Yonhap said the North Korean envoy's trip was believed to be aimed at discussing the six-party talks.

Treaty

The visit by Mr Pascoe, the top advisor to UN Secretary General Ban K-moon, marks the most senior UN trip to the North since 2004.

He will urge North Korea to rejoin the nuclear talks and discuss the country's relationship with the world body, the Associated Press news agency quoted a UN official in New York as saying.

Talks involving North Korea have a tortured history of stops and starts - formerly held under the six-party format which includes the two Koreas, the US, Russia, China and Japan.

Last weekend, the North released an American missionary detained since Christmas for illegal entry, and on Monday officials from the two Koreas met in a North Korean border town to discuss restarting joint tourist trips suspended in 2008.

North Korea has made clear it wants sanctions lifted and a peace treaty to formally end the 1950-1953 Korean War before returning to the disarmament talks.

Washington has responded that Pyongyang must come back to the talks first before any talk about political and economic concessions.

View Article in the BBC News

OLYMPICS: Japan targets 10 Olympic medals

Tuesday, Feb. 9, 2010

VANCOUVER (Kyodo) Seiko Hashimoto, Japan's Chef de Mission for the upcoming Vancouver Olympics, said Sunday she has set the country's athletes a target of 10 medals.

"As a medal target, I aim at the number we won in Nagano," Hashimoto said after arriving in Vancouver from Japan.

At the 1998 Nagano Games, Japan secured the most medals it has ever won in a Winter Olympics with 10, including five golds.

"I want to do whatever I can so that the Japanese athletes will reflect back on the Vancouver Olympics as their best Olympics," said the 45-year-old, a seven-time Olympian who will be the first woman ever to head the Japanese team at a Summer Games or Winter Olympics.

View Article in the Japan Times