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Vancouver (AFP) - Apolo Anton Ohno said Tuesday he will count on his experience and a "hometown advantage" to become the most decorated Olympic short-track speed skater in what could be his third and last Games. The 27-year-old American said he had "skated all around" in Vancouver when his father took him there from their home in the US city of Seattle just south of the border and used the sport to discipline him as a child.
Since his 1,500-metre triumph on his debut in 2002 at Salt Lake City, Ohno has won two gold, one silver and two bronze Olympic medals. Five other short-trackers have picked up five Olympic medals each but are already retired. He can also replace long-track legend Bonnie Blair as the most medalled US winter Olympian if he skates away with two more in Vancouver.
With his pop-star status following his media-hyped Olympic debut, he won the 500m gold in Torino four years ago. He also has nine world titles to his credit and is a bona-fide celebrity. In 2007, he won television's Dancing with the Stars title with Julianne Hough and was voted one of the US People magazine's 50 most beautiful people the same year.
He weighed 165 pounds (75kg) in 2002, 155 (70) in 2006 and 145 (66) now with body fat down to 2.5 percent. Ohno, who won the Olympic titles against South Korean rivals, said he expected South Korea to remain dominant. "These Games will be no different." Asked if Vancouver could be his last Olympics, he replied: "Possibly." But he added: "I'm just taking it year-by-year. This is the Games I'm just focused in now. I can tell you I will definitely take a small break after these Games." |
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
OLYMPICS: Short Track Speed Skating: Ohno on track for history books
CHINA AT THE OLYMPICS: Curling: China's 'Betty' eyes Olympic gold
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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 Yan, Yue Qingshuang and Liu Yin, play their first game in Vancouver against Great Britain on Wednesday. |
JAPAN: At Toyota's home base, townspeople are worried
Toyota City, Japan; Kimimasa Mayama / Bloomberg / Getty
Wednesday, Feb. 10, 2010
At Toyota's Home Base, Townspeople Are Worried
By Michael Schuman / Toyota City
For bespectacled Sirou Hirayama, times have never been so bad. He and his wife Kiyomi, standing behind the counter at the Toyomi pharmacy in downtown Toyota City, home to Japanese car giant Toyota Motor, complain that the global recession has so punished the local economy that his sales are down 20% from 18 months ago.
Now, with Toyota facing a crisis over the safety of its cars, Hirayama fears more hard times down the road. "Toyota was known for quality cars. Now that's changed 180 degrees," he says. "I'm fearful of the impact. The whole area is dependent on Toyota."
That gloom is enveloping Toyota City. The town of 420,000 in eastern Japan has been synonymous with Japanese manufacturing prowess for decades. The residents were so proud of Toyota that in 1959 they changed the city's then name, Koromo, to match its most important citizen. But the town's fortunes rise and fall with Toyota's. The firm's sprawling factory complexes lie only a short distance from the town center, and, as in any company town, the paychecks of Toyota employees are the main source of support for its restaurants and shops. According to city statistics, 77,000 people in the town work in auto-related industries. The entire region is connected to Toyota, with independent suppliers of parts spread through the surrounding countryside and nearby cities. "Toyota is the biggest company in this area," says Masahiko Hosokawa, a business professor at Chubu University in Nagoya, the closest major metropolis to Toyota City. If Toyota's crisis depresses its global sales, "it will have an impact here," he says. (See the 50 worst cars of all time.)
The timing is terrible. In recent months, Toyota City — which boasts Detroit as a sister city — has shared some of the pain felt by its American counterpart. The region is still suffering from what locals call the Toyota shock. After the Lehman bankruptcy, when the worst of the financial crisis bit and the U.S. car market collapsed, Toyota reduced production and shed temporary workers, sending a damaging ripple through the region. The scars are clearly visible on the town's streets, riddled with closed shops and restaurants. Ryuichi Watanabe, an agent at the local branch of the Able property brokerage, says rents are down some 20% from two years ago, with many apartments lying empty. He worries the worst may be yet to come.
"The myth of Japanese quality has crumbled," he says. "That means less markets and a negative impact on the entire economy."
Toyota City already gives an impression of a town under siege. Toyota's giant headquarters building is inaccessible — like a fortress at war. A spokesman for the city wouldn't grant TIME an interview with officials, saying the government won't comment on the issues of one company. Toyota employees are keeping their lips tightly sealed as well. Those approached on the streets, their Toyota company IDs clearly visible, politely bow their heads and say they are unable to comment. Only one young employee, who wouldn't give his name, mutters, "We're not sure what is going to happen." (See pictures of Detroit's decline.)
Yasuteru Kamiya has no doubt though. The proprietor of the Happy End café in Toyota City's center sees Toyota's current crisis as yet another stop in the town's 30-year decline. Toyota City, he says, has never regained the bustle it enjoyed back in the 1980s, during the go-go years when Japan was the rising force of the global economy. Since the Toyota shock, Kamiya's sales are down 50%. "We're very worried that we can't continue," he says. And that all depends on Toyota.
— With reporting by Terrence Terashima / Toyota City
JAPAN AT THE OLYMPICS: Japan vow to match record medal haul
| Vancouver (AFP) - Japan, which managed just one Winter Olympic medal in 2006, vowed on Monday to restore their pride with a record-matching performance at the Vancouver Games.
Japan collected a record 10 medals, including five golds, on home ice and snow in Nagano in 1998. But their medal haul slipped to one silver and one bronze in 2002 and to only one at the Torino Games through the gold captured by Shizuka Arakawa who became Asia's first Olympic champion in figure skating. The 2006 heartbreak was made more acute by the performances of their great Asian rivals as South Korea won 11 medals, including six golds, while China also claimed 11 medals, two of which were gold. "I think our athletes seem relaxed," said Hashimoto who met Japanese moguls competitors earlier in the day, including world double women's champion Aiko Uemura and 1998 Olympic gold medalist Tae Satoya. "I believe they will live up to our expectations." Uemura, who has finished second twice but failed to win a race so far in the season's World Cup series, is keen to make the podium for the first time in her four Olympic outings. Uemura is due to compete in women's moguls on Saturday, the first full day of competition at these Games. "It will be great if she (Uemura) feels it has turned out to be her best Olympics. It will give a momentum to the whole delegation," said Hashimoto, now a senator, who won a 1,500-metre speed skating bronze in 1992. In Vancouver, Japan's medal hopes are once again pinned on figure skaters as two former world champions, Mao Asada (2008) and Miki Ando (2007) take on reigning title-holder Kim Yu-Na of South Korea in the women's event. The men's figure skating team is led by 2007 world silver medallist Daisuke Takahashi, who is joined by Nobunari Oda, the runner-up to world champion Evan Lysacek of the United States at the Grand Prix Final. Japan are also looking forward to the Nordic Combined event after winning the world team title last year for the first time in 14 years. Keiichiro Nagashima hopes to lift Japan back from a Speed Skating medal drought in Torino. |
Hiroyuki Sanada joins the cast of “Lost”
February 11th, 2010 by James
Japanese actor Hiroyuki Sanada, who is probably best remembered by international audiences for his role as the badass guy who beat up Tom Cruise in the “Last Samurai,” is now appearing in the American TV drama “Lost”:
You can read an interview with Sanada about his new role over at IGN TV.
RUSSIA AT THE OLYMPICS: Figure skating: Russians 'ditch Aboriginal costumes'
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Moscow (AFP) - A top Russian skating pair whose 'Aboriginal' ice dance routine hurt feelings in Australia have decided to ditch their costumes for the Vancouver Olympic Winter Games, a newspaper reported on Monday. Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin, Russian world champion ice dancers considered favourites at next week's battle on ice in Vancouver, caused an uproar in Tallinn, Estonia last month with their 'Aboriginal' act. Their routine included costumes of dark, skin-toned bodysuits punctuated by bright red loin cloths, white body paint and eucalyptus leaves. A stunned Australia said, however, that the music, movement and body decorations worn by the champion pair have nothing in common with Australia's 60,000-year-old Aboriginal culture.
Domnina and Shabalin had earlier defended their routine, which proved a hit with the crowds in Estonia. "Our coach offered us this music and we decided to try it. We researched it on the internet and got a lot of information," 27-year-old Shabalin said at the time. "It's wasn't our purpose that it be especially Australian, just a dance from many thousands of years ago." Last month, reports of the duo's dance number unleashed a torrent of anti-Russian vitriol on the internet, with some commentators claiming the faux pas was not surprising because most Russians are rude and insensitive. |
OLYMPICS: Curling: Scots aim to push Simpsons out of spotlight
| Vancouver (AFP) - David Murdoch and teenager Eve Muirhead are aiming for double British curling gold at the Vancouver Olympic Games and push TV cartoon stars The Simpsons off the radar. Murdoch, who leads the British challenge in Canada, is the reigning world champion and is tipped to edge out the home team's Kevin Martin, who took silver in Salt Lake City in 2002. The Scot has enjoyed four consecutive wins over Martin, nicknamed 'K-Mart', including a skins tournament recently in Ontario where he collected 75,000 dollars prize money. "It's nice to beat another Olympian," said Murdoch. "In that respect I suppose it's a psychological boost for us." Britain's women were surprise Olympic champions in 2002 with the matronly Rhona Martin sending her 'stone of destiny' to capture gold. Eight years on, the skipper is 19-year-old Muirhead, a striking blonde who boasts a tattoo of the Olympic rings on her back. Muirhead and her team face stiff opposition from defending champions Sweden, who will again be led by Anette Norberg and also top-ranked Canada. However, China's women, skippered by Bingyu Wang, affectionately known as 'Betty', are the reigning world champions. In the run-up to the competition, all curling hopefuls will face unexpected competition in the roly-poly shape of TV's doughnut-chomping Homer Simpson and his dysfunctional family from hell. The hugely-popular American TV cartoon series is celebrating its 20th anniversary with an episode to air during the February 12-28 Games in which Homer and long-suffering wife Marge represent the US in Olympic curling. Far from being embarrassed by seeing their 500-year-old sport lampooned by Springfield's most notorious residents, curling's top officials believe the unlikely partnership can only benefit its long-term future. "We're ecstatic about the exposure," Rick Patzke, chief executive of USA Curling, told reporters recently. "The show's writers took genuine interest. We're pleased with the opportunity to share more information about our sport with a grander audience." |
OLYMPICS: United Nations Chief calls for Olympic Truce to be honoured
| Vancouver (AFP) - United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday called for the world to respect the Olympic Truce and urged all warring countries to cease hostilities for the duration of the Winter Games in Vancouver.
The idea of the Olympic Truce dates back to an ancient Hellenic tradition from around 776 BC, and in keeping with this all wars would stop during the Olympic Games. It was fully respected for twelve centuries and in 1992 the International Olympic Committee urged the world to observe it once again.
Ban was joined in his call for an end to hostilities by UN General Assembly president Ali Abdussalam Treki, who said the Olympic Games was about spreading peace through sport.
The Olympic Winter Games start on Friday and run until February 28. |
RUSSIA AT THE OLYMPICS: Ovechkin not talking trash -- yet
VANCOUVER (AP) -- Russia's Alexander Ovechkin says he's not thinking about it yet. Nor has he begun talking trash with his Swedish, Czech, Canadian or American teammates on the Washington Capitals.
"No, not yet," Ovechkin said Wednesday in Montreal before the Capitals played the Canadiens.
But Ovechkin's friend, linemate and Olympic rival Nicklas Backstrom of Sweden tells a different story.
"There's a bit of trash talk going on," Backstrom said. "But nothing that big."
Ovechkin will be joined on the Russian team in Vancouver by Capitals teammates Alexander Semin and Semyon Varlamov , with Backstrom and Tomas Fleischmann of the Czech Republic rounding out Washington's list of five Olympians.
When asked about the 14-game win streak the Capitals were riding into Montreal and whether he had ever been on a similar run at any other level of hockey, Ovechkin didn't have to think long to come up with a snarky answer.
"World championships, probably, when we beat Canada," he said, referring to the 2008 tournament with a big, gap-toothed smile, before adding "in the final."
BUSAN, FUKUOKA & OSAKA: Air Busan Opens Booking for New Japanese Destinations
Air Busan is conducting a promotional event through its Web site at airbusan.com to encourage flights to its new Japanese destinations of Fukuoka and Osaka. / Courtesy of Air Busan
01-28-2010 22:03
By Do Je-hae
Staff Reporter
Air Busan, Asiana's low-cost air carrier will take reservations for flights from Busan with two Japanese cities starting this week before the launch of services the airline's first international routes.
Air Busan will make two round trips daily between Busan and Fukuoka starting Mar. 29 and Busan and Osaka from Apr. 26 on a code-sharing basis with Asiana.
Code sharing allows one carrier to sell its tickets on the other's flights in order to boost revenue by increasing passenger numbers and destinations.
The airline will operate a Busan-Fukuoka flight daily departing from Busan at 9:40 a.m. and returning from Fukuoka at 11:20 a.m., while Asiana's flight will depart from Busan at 5 p.m. and return from the Japanese city at 6:50 p.m.
Air Busan's Busan-Osaka flight will depart from Busan at 4 p.m. and return from Osaka at 6:10 p.m., while that of Asiana will depart from the port city at 9:30 a.m., returning from the Japanese city at 11:50 a.m.
Ahead of the March opening of services to Japanese cities, Air Busan recently introduced upgraded reservation services through its new Web site, airbusan.com.
The selection of the two Japanese cities demonstrates the Busan-based carrier's dedication to facilitate travel between the two countries with cheaper and faster access, according to CEO Kim Soo-cheon.
In particular, a supranational project to join the economies of Busan and its 20-year sister city of Fukuoka will spur additional passenger demand, Kim stressed in a press conference in October 2009.
"Busan and Fukuoka already share a long history of economic and cultural cooperation. The common economic zone project has created an urgency to increase flight connections," Kim said.
It takes about 50 minutes by air to cover the 208 kilometers between the two cities. Fares will cost from 150,000 to 170,000 won, 30 percent lower than major air carriers. On-board duty-free shopping will be available.
Going international is one of the airline's main strategies to lift itself out of the red and start seeing profits in 2011. It is expecting around 1 billion won (US$857,000) in annual revenue from the new routes.
The airline is also opening a new call center at 1666-3050.
TIANJIN, CHINA: Tianjin Becomes Homeport For International Cruise Liners
February 10, 2010 19:25 PM
TIANJIN, Feb 10 (Bernama) -- Tianjin Port in north China will open to international cruise ships for refueling and maintenance in June this year, Xinhua reported, citing the port operator as saying here on Wednesday.
China currently has three homeports namely Shanghai, Xiamen in Fujian Province and Sanya in Hainan Province, which are all in the south. All these three homeports has the same function as Tianjin Port.
According to the spokesman of the Tiankin Port Group Co.Ltd, the world's leading cruise companies Costa Cruises and Royal Caribbean International Cruises will make Tianjing its homeport for their cruises on the Asia itinerary from this year.
"The homeport will have two berths in use for Costa's ship Costa Romantica and Royal Caribbean's ship Legend of the Seas in June," he said.
He said as the homeport, Tianjin will offer comprehensive services for the ships, including loading supply, maintenance and disposing garbages.
Both Costa Romantica and Legend of the Seas will start and finish their cruises in Tianjin on their journeys between China, Japan and Korea in summer.
The former will make 10 cruises on the route from June 26 to August 19, and the latter will have 8 trips on the route from July 31 to October 7.
The Tianjin homeport can dock the world's largest cruise liners and has a designed passenger handling capacity of 500,000 persons per year, said Ou.
He said the company would build another four berths in the homeport if the cruise business went well.
According to statistics from the China Communications and Transportation Association, Chinese tourists have shown an increasing interest in cruise sailing.
In 2009, more than 200,000 tourists from China's mainland took international cruises from mainland ports, compared with 10,000 recorded in 2005.
View Article in Bernama
SHANGHAI, CHINA: Shanghai's residents live life to the fullest
By Cai Wenjun
SHANGHAINESE people are living longer, with an average life span of 81.73 years in 2009, eclipsing the record of 81.28 set in 2008.
The longevity figures were part of a comprehensive set of statistics released yesterday by the Shanghai Health Bureau.
The average life span for the registered male population of the city was 79.42 years, up from the previous year's 79.06, while females had a mean figure of 84.06 years from 83.5.
The maternal mortality rate last year was 9.61 in every 100,000, close to the average in developed countries for the first time. The death rate of infants was 6.58 in every 1,000.
Life span and maternal and infant mortality rates are the three major data reflecting a country or a region's medical-service standards and people's general wellbeing.
"All the three data in Shanghai are in line with developed countries," said Xu Jianguang, director of the health bureau. Xu said this was a direct result of health-care development and increased medical capabilities.
In addition to routine health care, he said Shanghai had made great achievements in health reform and in combating swine flu and other major infectious diseases last year.
The incidence of severe infectious diseases last year was 195.37 in every 100,000, the lowest level in Shanghai since record-keeping began.
Last year, the city's hospitals offered 171 million outpatient and emergency services, 13.81 percent higher than in 2008.
Medical staff performed 807,700 operations last year, 14.5 percent up from 2008.
Ambulances offered 430,200 services and transported 396,100 patients last year, with both figures city records and No. 1 in the nation.
According to health officials, pre-hospital first aid is the key for the survival of patients, especially those in critical conditions.
To meet the growing demand, city health authorities slated 81 ambulances for day-time shifts, 24 percent more than 2008.
Because of this, 70 percent of ambulances reached their destinations within 15 minutes of receiving calls and 95 percent of residents expressed satisfaction with the service.
Shanghai last year kicked off a project to build five big hospitals in rural districts of the Pudong New Area and districts of Minhang, Baoshan and Jiading, upgrade three district-level hospitals in Chongming County and the districts of Qingpu and Fengxian and relocate a hospital to Jinshan's new town.
The ambitious project is expected to be completed in 2013, when the city will have up to 6,000 new beds for people living in rural areas who will receive state-of-the-art medical services.
"It is the largest project with the biggest investment in recent years," Xu said.
CHINA: Bundles of joy: Beijing-style dumplings for Chinese New Year
A handmade shrimp dumpling is dipped in black vinegar seasoned with soy sauce. (Kirk McKoy / Los Angeles Times)
In China, family and tradition are wrapped up in the warm New Year's treat.
February 11, 2010
By Lillian Chou, Reporting from Beijing
On Saturday, amid the cacophony of firecrackers and other pyro-noise, most of China will be up all night to welcome in the Year of the Tiger. Here in the north, that will mean televisions blaring, watermelon seeds cracking, mah-jongg tiles clacking and, most important, people wrapping and eating dumplings. Northern Chinese eat dumplings on New Year's the way Americans eat turkey on Thanksgiving (southerners have a whole different set of New Year eating traditions, relying more on sticky rice things).
Dumplings resemble the ingots that once were China's currency, so eating them brings hope of an auspicious and fortunate year. Some cooks even stuff a lump of sugar in a dumpling to ensure sweetness, and sometimes, a coin is hidden inside. If you don't break a tooth, you're considered lucky for the year.
Dumplings seem to have been around forever -- visitors can see fossilized dumplings found in an ancient tomb at the Turpan Museum in Xinjiang province. However, their origins remain shrouded in folk tales. During the Han dynasty, it is said that Zhang Zhongjing, one of China's most revered doctors, treated patients with frostbitten ears with a tonic of medicinal herbs and lamb wrapped in dough. He also fed his patients a soup containing two dumplings that were said to resemble a pair of ears. If you've ever seen a boiled dumpling with all its funny folds and wrinkles, just add some imagination, and the story takes on multiple meanings, like so many things Chinese.
Though a lot of delicious tradition gave way to modernization and construction for the 2008 Olympics, small eateries serving dumplings remain plentiful in Beijing. Here, boiled jiaozi are called shui jiao (water dumpling) and are served with black vinegar, sometimes spiked with chile, sesame oil or soy sauce.
Just about every restaurant in Beijing makes its dumplings to order and at ridiculously low prices, $1 or less for a full plate. Dumplings are sometimes sold by the half-dozen, other times by weight and with a dizzying array of fillings such as lamb and pumpkin, or pork and fennel, tomato and egg and the Beijing classic: pork and cabbage. Why would anyone make his own?
Customized filling
To find out, I go to Wang Ming Jun's apartment in Haidan, the western part of Beijing. She is nicknamed Lao Yi, which means "Old Aunt," but she is the youngest old aunt anyone might meet. She's 50 with the energy of a 20-year-old and has made dumplings since she was a little girl. Lao Yi tells me with her sharp R-studded Beijing accent that the reason you make dumplings yourself is so you can customize your xianr (filling).
Choosing her own stuffing is important to Lao Yi. Unlike many Chinese, her husband and son eschew pork, preferring beef instead. And because local beef -- raised on the grasslands of Inner Mongolia -- tends to be so lean from grazing and moving around, she adds oil to the filling mix to ensure it isn't dry. A splash of rice wine counters any gaminess, and a considerable amount of water or broth keeps the meat juicy and moist.
Lao Yi whips the meat in one direction with chopsticks, essentially emulsifying it, the way you'd make mayonnaise. All the ingredients, including liquid and fats, are suspended with no binders. Some recipes call for starch or egg, but there's really no need. The filling becomes very wet and soft. The final addition of chopped leeks and ginger or other vegetables gives texture, flavor and more moisture.
When it comes to wrapping, the pretty pleated folds that I grew up with go out the window at Lao Yi's house. Her boiled dumplings are not pretty things; they are all about the texture of the dough and the flavor of the filling. Although steamed dim sum can be works of sculpted art, a plate full of boiled dumplings in Beijing is like a plain girl with a wonderful personality.
In China, the flour for making dumplings and noodles is a special blend that's fine as talc, softer than American flour. I find the Chinese flour makes a whiter, smoother dough, but in the end, both will work well. Using bleached American flour, my dumplings remain a grayish color, but that's nothing more than vanity, like whitened teeth. Both have great chew and flavor -- the things that really matter.
Not like home
While growing up in my household in southern China, we drizzled soy sauce on our dumplings, sometimes a dusting of white pepper and maybe some chile paste, but Beijingers dip theirs in black rice vinegar, often by itself. I personally like a little heat and I also find soy sauce tones down the sharpness, which I'm still not used to.
What I don't find in Beijing is my mother's dumplings. She came from the seafood-abundant south, and her pork and shrimp filling was all I knew as a child. But her dumplings were actually huntun, sometimes called yuntun and better known as wontons. Over the years, I've graduated toward an all-shrimp filling laced with crunchy fresh water chestnuts.
And that's the reason to make your own dumplings -- so you get what you want. That and getting the perfect dumpling skin. In the U.S., most store-bought wrappers are too thick for wontons, but too thin for dumplings. Worst of all, they're devoid of all the characteristics of a great homemade wrapper, something worth making at least once in your life.
Food has a greater meaning than just sustenance, and that's particularly true in China. It's one of the few ways to express love and sincerity in a society where emotion and affection are rarely displayed. And in a country where parents are often separated from their children for better work opportunities, the New Year's reunion takes on an even deeper meaning.
For many, the humble act of wrapping and eating dumplings for the start of a new year is much more than a meal, it's a family celebration that shares joy, love and togetherness.
CHINA: Editor Appeals Sentence in China
By EDWARD WONG
A literary editor sentenced by a Chinese court to five years in prison gave a defiant handwritten appeal to the court on Wednesday. The editor, Tan Zuoren, was sentenced by the court on Tuesday for subversion. The court said Mr. Tan faced the charges because of recent writings and a rally criticizing the government’s deadly suppression of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 were the reasons, but his supporters said the central government wanted to stop his investigation of fatal school collapses during the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. At least 5,300 children died in the earthquake, according to the government.
Mr. Tan wrote his appeal in 12 Chinese words, simply saying: “I am innocent, I protest, I defy, I appeal.”
TAIWAN & CHINA: Taiwan to hold biggest war games in over a year
Taiwan plans its biggest war games in over a year, the defence ministry has said
TAIPEI — Taiwan plans its biggest war games in over a year, the defence ministry said Wednesday, amid simmering tensions over US arms sales to the island which China claims as its own.
The military exercises, codenamed "Han Kuang No 26", will take place in April and involve units from the army, the navy and the air force, a defence ministry official told AFP.
"Among the scenarios, we'll test what would happen if the enemy were to invade Taiwan and how we would seek to nip it in the bud," he said, on condition of anonymity.
He said special emphasis would be placed on "asymmetrical warfare", in which a small force seeks to use special advantages to overcome a larger opponent, but he declined to give specific details.
The announcement of the exercise comes shortly after renewed tension between China and the United States over a US decision to sell 6.4 billion dollars worth of arms to Taiwan.
The island last held similar military manoeuvres in December 2008, but only computerised "Han Kuang" war games were held last year.
Ties between Taiwan and China have improved markedly since President Ma Ying-jeou of the Beijing friendly Kuomintang came to power in 2008 on a platform of boosting trade links and allowing in more Chinese tourists.
But Beijing still refuses to renounce the use of force against the island which it has considered part of its territory awaiting reunification since the two sides split in 1949 at the end of a civil war.
JAPAN: Toyota faces a massive marketing challenge
A couple greet a salesman in a Toyota commercial aimed at restoring consumers' trust. The ad is airing frequently on TV and appears on YouTube and Toyota's website. (Toyota / February 8, 2010)
To win back confidence in its vehicles' safety as worries grow of further bad news, the automaker must embrace a rapidly evolving strategy and reach out boldly to consumers, crisis experts say.
By Sharon Bernstein
5:23 PM PST, February 9, 2010
Toyota has begun the painful and difficult task of trying to convince consumers that they should buy the beleaguered company's cars -- even as worries mount that more bad news may be ahead.
Capping a week of by-the-book crisis management, including television appearances by top executives, the world's largest automobile maker has begun to air a commercial aimed at restoring confidence in its vehicles.
Opening with a 1960s-era photograph of what is now Toyota of Hollywood, the ad is airing frequently on network and cable television stations along with YouTube and the company's website.
"In recent days our company hasn't been living up to the standards that you expect from us, or that we expect from ourselves," the narrator says. "We're working around the clock to make sure we build vehicles of the highest quality -- to restore your faith in our company."
The spot is just one of Toyota's efforts to reach consumers. The company has bought banner ads on 400 websites and is running radio commercials in the style of public service announcements to direct people to its website for information on the recalls.
The moves come amid indications that some customers may be steering clear of Toyota Motor Corp. vehicles. New-car sales were down in January, and the automotive website Kelley Blue Book reports that the number of people seeking to buy Toyotas has dropped by a third since the most recent recall was announced last month.
Kelley Blue Book allows people looking for a new car to search the site and contact dealers to request a quote. But since Jan. 20, the day before Toyota announced its latest recall, such requests have dropped significantly, analyst James Bell said.
Before the recall, about 18% of Kelley Blue Book users requested quotes for new cars from Toyota dealers, Bell said. Since then just 11% to 12% did so, he said.
Kelley Blue Book says that values of used Toyotas -- already down 3% -- will decline further this week by about 1.5%. The Prius hybrid, which typically sells for close to its entry-level sticker price of about $23,000, is likely to see its retail value drop by $1,000 to $1,500, Bell said.
The company says it has not tracked values for Toyota's upscale Lexus line, which has had to recall fewer vehicles.
Toyota reported a drop in new-car sales last month, but it is not clear whether that was because of lessened demand because dealers had been ordered not to sell several models for part of the month. The company is already offering a $1,000 incentive to buy a new Prius, and it is expected to put discounts in place for other vehicles.
Most experts believe that Toyota will eventually win customers back. But they say that to do that, the company will need to reach out -- with direct marketing, more TV commercials and a message that it has solved its safety problems and made its vehicles better than ever.
At Toyota right now, that means embracing a marketing strategy that is evolving rapidly -- a departure for a company that is careful to chart most of its major moves well in advance. As of Tuesday, executives were still reviewing whether the television portion of a campaign for the Sienna minivan would begin as scheduled Friday.
"We are analyzing our options on a day-to-day basis," said spokeswoman Celeste Migliore. "We're talking consistently with our customers and measuring their response to us."
In addition to TV, radio and newspaper outreach, Toyota is buying advertising on Internet search engines in hopes that its message will pop up at the top of the list of sponsored links when people look for auto-related information online, Migliore said. On Monday, Jim Lentz, chief executive of Toyota Motor Sales USA Inc., answered questions from Internet users on the popular site Digg.
The company has also hired additional lobbyists and public relations specialists in its Washington offices, public affairs manager Cindy Knight said. Toyota is not releasing information on how much it is spending on its stepped-up advertising, public relations and lobbying campaigns.
Since fall, Toyota has issued 10 million recalls for problems related to unintended acceleration, with about 2 million vehicles subject to more than one recall. The company temporarily halted sales and production of the eight models affected but these have resumed.
Late Monday, the company recalled 437,000 more vehicles, including 133,000 Prius and 14,500 Lexus models in the U.S.
Rebuilding customer loyalty will be key for a company that for decades has traded on an almost religious adherence on the part of Toyota owners to the idea that the vehicles were reliable and safe, said Jim Stengel, a former marketing chief for Procter & Gamble Co. who teaches at UCLA's Anderson School of Business.
"They need a massive one-on-one campaign," Stengel said, in which the company digs into its gigantic customer database and contacts Toyota owners by mail and through electronic means such as e-mail.
The company also must continue to advertise, said Chris Gidez, U.S. director of risk management and crisis communications for public relations firm Hill & Knowlton. But to work, the ads must convince consumers that the company knows what went wrong and is fixing its problems.
"It's not enough to do the best advertising and the most creative marketing and really smart social-media engagement," Gidez said. "They first need the compelling story, which is that they've got the fix, they have the means to maintain or rebuild that bond of trust."
After that, experts said, the company can start to rebuild its brand, perhaps embarking on a campaign to highlight new products or technical innovations.
Toyota owner Jonathan Braun said he was skeptical of the ad's claim that more than 172,000 employees were working to fix the safety problems.
"They didn't show anything they had actually done to fix the problems," Braun said. "That's what made it seem more like a fluffy PR ad."
Most analysts said they expected the company to eventually recover its image. But few -- including Toyota -- are predicting how long that might take.
"We do believe they will recover to a strong degree, but these are the dark days," said Bell of Kelley Blue Book. "And it just keeps stacking up on them."
OLYMPICS: Benshoof plans to smash speed world record
Tony Benshoof attends the United States Olympic Committee luge press conference at the Whistler Media Centre on Feb. 9 in Vancouver.
Posted: Feb 10, 12:45a ET | Updated: Feb 10, 1:13p ET
Tony Benshoof attends the United States Olympic Committee luge press conference at the Whistler Media Centre on Feb. 9 in Vancouver.
WHISTLER (AFP) - U.S. slider Tony Benshoof has held the Guinness World Record for the fastest luge speed for almost a decade, but he thinks he can go quicker at the Winter Olympics.
Benshoof is America's top hope in a sport not for the faint-hearted, with athletes hurling themselves down icy, twisting, banked tracks in gravity-powered sleds.
He booked the fastest time of 86.6 mph (139 kph) in 2001 and no-one has gone faster since.
"Absolutely," he said when asked if he could go better here.
"I have the Guinness record, but to break it they have to go through this whole process. We go faster than that routinely. It's a technicality, but I'll take it."
Asked whether there was a speed ceiling lugers can reach, he said he was close to it.
"We're really close. The tracks are getting faster and faster," he said.
"It's getting pretty crazy. There's that word 'dangerous', it's like that word 'fear'. It's getting down to that. I mean, a 100 miles an hour is pretty quick."
"I don't know how much faster we can go."
While Benshoof is the current speed king, he is not a favorite to win gold. That honor goes to Italian Armin Zoeggeler , who is going for his third straight Olympic title in Vancouver this month. Russian World Cup challenger Albert Demtschenko and German world champ Felix Loch are expected to run him close.
Benshoof finished fourth at the last Games in Torino and said he was approaching the 2010 event relaxed, treating it as just another race.
"In '06 I had a great race. I really did. There was not a whole lot I could have done differently," he said.
"I'm not going to treat this one differently. You can't pull a rabbit out of the hat. You just have to do what you do best."
CRUISING: Frugal Traveler: Q&A with the Editor in Chief of CruiseCritic.com
February 9, 2010, 11:00 pm
Q&A with Carolyn Spencer Brown, editor in chief of CruiseCritic.com
By MATT GROSSBack in 1996, if you were going to pick someone to cover the cruise industry, you might not immediately have thought of Carolyn Spencer Brown. A cruise virgin, Ms. Brown got easily seasick and was dumfounded by things like preset dining times. She described her attitude back then as, “Frankly, it’s not my style of travel.”
But that didn’t stop an editor at The Washington Post from assigning her the cruise beat, and after her first trip, on Celebrity’s Zenith ship, she got hooked. Thirteen years and 150 cruises later, the 47-year-old is now an aficionado (she even met her husband on a cruise), and has since moved on from The Post to become editor in chief of CruiseCritic.com, an online magazine and discussion board devoted to all things seaworthy (and not so seaworthy). I recently spoke with her by phone about a business that, all too often, seems out of reach of frugal travelers.
Q. My trips rarely top $100 a day, including airfare. Is that possible for a cruise?
A. Oh god, yes. In 2009, deals were falling out of the sky and hitting you on the head, they were so cheap. Norwegian Sky was doing $25 a day on its three- and four-day Bahamas cruises, and it was a decent ship—it wasn’t a tub. Once you get there, you don’t have to spend another penny beyond gratuity.
Today they’ve gone up. But you can get in about 50 bucks, 75 bucks a day very, very easily.
Q. How do you do that?
A. First of all, you cruise from someplace relatively close to home, so you don’t have to take a flight. Home-port cruising is completely resurging. You can now cruise year-round from Baltimore, New York; seasonally from Boston, Seattle; San Diego, L.A. all year, Galveston all year and New Orleans all year and Tampa all year.
Q. Are there lines that cater to budget travelers?
A. There’s no such thing anymore — there’s no Big Red Boat or Premier Cruise line. What happens now is, with the cruise lines, as the ships get older, the cheaper it’s going to be. And that’s because it doesn’t have all the same bells and whistles. Royal Caribbean’s Majesty of the Seas is going to have a whole different experience from its Oasis of the Seas, almost as if you weren’t even on the same cruise line.
Q. What does Oasis of the Seas have that Majesty of the Seas doesn’t?
A. Rock-climbing walls, zip-lining, surf parks, ice-skating rinks, 25 places to eat.
Q. So what does Majesty have?
A. It has a big dining room that you’ve already paid for in your cruise fare, and it has some bars. It has some pools. It has a casino. A small spa. But not all the extras that I think are where you start to get into trouble, money-wise.
Q. What are those troublesome extras?
A. Extras are alcohol, cocktails. You know how on the airlines it used to be four bucks for a beer and now it’s seven? They’re going up on the cruise ships as well. So cocktails are huge — and spa treatments, casino gambling, alternative restaurant fees — and some lines are now moving into the European mode where they have restaurants that are priced à la carte. So you don’t go in and pay a $20 fee to eat dinner, but you go in and you pay for your food. And then you pay a gratuity later on.
You’ve got to be really careful. Cruise lines like to say that they’re very inclusive, price-wise, but they’re never remotely anything close to all-inclusive. You can go on and not spend anything, but it’s pretty hard.
Q. Do any lines let you bring your own alcohol?
A. No. I took a bottle of wine in a suitcase on a Royal Caribbean ship last April. It was an eight-day cruise, and I thought it would be nice to have a bottle in my cabin, and they actually went through my luggage and took it out.
Q. Does time of year make a difference when you’re booking?
A. You want to go for shoulder season or off-season. So if you want the cheapest, cheapest, cheapest fares to the Caribbean, you should go during hurricane season. You might have a little bit of a rock-and-roll experience, but that’s when nobody wants to go, so it’s fantastic. I would say between mid-August and October are just the perfect times.
Q. Is that safe? What do ships do during hurricanes?
A. They just change itineraries. You can’t be too wedded to where you want to go. I mean, you’ll be somewhere in the Caribbean — the Caribbean’s huge! — but if you’re in the western Caribbean and there’s a storm in the Gulf, you may find yourself spending time in St. Thomas.
Q. If you’re going to fly, is there a region of the world that’s cheapest?
A. The most popular places to cruise are the places where you’re going to get the best deals. So, for example, we were looking at the western Mediterranean, which is, next to the Caribbean, the most popular region of the world for cruising, and in June alone, 37 different cruise ships were offering itineraries. That’s the western Med —we’re not talking Greece or Turkey, we’re talking France, Italy, Spain. That’s a lot of ships in one area. So you’re going to see a lot of deals because with so many ships, there’s a lot of capacity and they need to fill it.
Q. Is it true that you don’t have to tip on a European cruise?
A. Yup, that’s true. Well, you have to tip a little bit.
Q. But not as much as you would on an American cruise?
A. No, absolutely not. One of the things people don’t know that haven’t cruised before is that you’re supposed to tip. It’s considered tacky if you don’t. The new thing is automatic tipping — auto-gratuity — where they just tack on 10 bucks a day per person. If you decide you don’t want to tip that way, you can have your name removed and do it the old-fashioned way, or you can just be skint and slip out and not do it. Well, Carnival had a situation where somebody actually posted in the crew quarters the names of people who decided they didn’t want to auto-tip. One of our members took a picture of it, and it was a scandal! But look, if you can afford to go on a cruise that’s $100 a day, you can afford to tip.
We also see a lot of deals lately where the big bonus is $100 onboard credit for your gratuity.
Q. How do you avoid the dreaded single supplement?
A. There seems to be a very small resurgence in solo-traveler trends, and the biggest movement in the past 10 years is the fact that Norwegian Cruise Lines, with its new Epic coming out in June had created this area on the ship of inside cabins, with windows that look into the hallway, and they were aiming them at the hipster, like the budget traveler who wants to be a Britney Spears wannabe. And they couldn’t sell them! So they refocused and re-marketed them as solo cabins. You can get on for $799 for a week. And they’re tiny! But it’s the first effort I’ve seen to really market to these travelers. Just understand: these cabins are minuscule.
Q. Are there cheap strategies to improve life in a minuscule cabin?
A. Don’t bring 45 pairs of shoes. Certainly don’t bring things like candles, because you can’t use them. My problem is books. I tend to bring books, and then I have to pay extra air.
Q. Are there lines with better libraries?
A. The library is one of these dinosaur traditions that’s disappearing a bit, but N.C.L. has decent libraries. Cunard has a fantastic library. But if you go on Carnival or Royal Caribbean, bring your own books. The lines going for the younger passenger typically don’t do much with the library.
Q. I loved easyCruise when I did it in the Caribbean in 2006. But it’s doing badly. What happened?
A. They couldn’t make any money on it. They went from two ships to one, and they went from it being a real hostel experience to ramping it up to make it more cruiselike. The one ship still does more intense days in port, and you’re in Mykonos till one o’clock in the morning. But clearly, it’s not growing. I mean, it’s a great idea, but people didn’t respond to it.
Q. Any affordable ways to improve boring food?
A. I’d smuggle in some hot sauce. Look at it this way: If you don’t want to do the alternative restaurants — which aren’t a bad deal if you really like food — keep it simple. This is banquet-hall dining. Just know that going in. Know that, for the most part, this is going to be okay food.
Q. Are shore excursions worth the expense?
A. No. The only time you should even bother with a shore excursion is if it’s a very complicated day trip. Let’s say you go to Naples and you want to go up to the Amalfi Coast; I’ve heard more stories about people who’ve missed the ship because they don’t get back on time because of traffic or they get lost. Generally, you can do whatever it is the cruise line is doing cheaper and, in most cases, getting a better experience, on your own.
Q. What about Internet access?
A. Oy. Don’t. Do it in port. It’s come down a lot since they introduced the Internet on cruise ships, and it is faster than it used to be, but it’s still going to be 50 cents a minute. We have port profiles on our site and we actually list the nearest Internet cafe.
Q. Is there a frugal remedy for seasickness?
A. You could hang out by the bathroom! I’ve had very good luck with Bonine, which is a chewable thing. I buy a box every couple of months. It costs $5 and it’s worth its weight in gold. If you really want to be frugal, go down to the purser’s desk and they have a free stash.
JAPAN: Rep. Henry Waxman casts further doubt on Toyota
Service technician Tungyio Saelee repairs an accelerator pedal on a new Corolla at City Toyota in Daly City, Calif. The automaker has said the pedal can become stuck in a partially depressed position, causing sudden acceleration. (Justin Sullivan / Getty Images / February 5, 2010)
February 10, 2010
By Ralph Vartabedian and Jerry Hirsch, Reporting from Los Angeles and Washington
The chairman of the House committee investigating the automaker says it may not really know why some of its cars accelerate suddenly.
Despite announcing two recalls to address sudden-acceleration problems, Toyota Motor Corp.'s conflicting statements are raising doubts about whether the company knows the exact cause of the defects, the chairman of the House committee investigating the automaker said Tuesday.
Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Beverly Hills) said that although Toyota was reassuring the public in the last two weeks that it had identified the cause, it was telling House investigators that getting to the bottom of the issue was very difficult. That leaves open the possibility that it had not identified all of the potential root causes of the condition that has been blamed on 19 deaths and more than 300 crashes over the last eight years, he said.
The contradictory statements "raise questions and doubts about Toyota's understanding of the risks and the condition," Waxman said in an interview Tuesday.
Waxman has previously pointed out Toyota's contradictory statements, but his comments Tuesday go further by suggesting that Toyota may simply not know what is causing its cars to accelerate out of control.
Toyota officials could not be reached for comment.
Toyota has said that floor mats can jam accelerator pedals in 12 of its models and that certain accelerator pedals in eight of its models can become stuck in a partially depressed position after drivers pull their foot off the pedal. It has assured the public that those are the only causes of sudden acceleration.
"They told our staff that the causes are very hard to identify and refused to state that the two recalls had totally resolved the problem," Waxman added.
Waxman, who chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has asked Toyota to explain the contradiction. The committee has scheduled a hearing Feb. 25.
The congressional inquiry into the Toyota recalls also intensified Tuesday as a third committee scheduled a hearing. The Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation committee will hold a hearing March 2 and has requested briefings by Toyota and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The stepped-up scrutiny of Toyota problems came as American Honda Motor Co. said Tuesday that it was expanding a recall to fix the driver's air bag inflater in 2001 and 2002 Accord, Civic, Odyssey, CR-V models and some 2002 Acura TL cars.
Honda said it knew of 12 incidents, including one death, in which the air bag did not deploy properly. In some instances it can send shrapnel-like metal fragments through the air bag, injuring or killing the driver. The automaker said it did not know of any events after July 2009.
Honda originally recalled a small number of vehicles in November 2008. After seeing more incidents, it increased the number to 440,000 autos. This adds 378,758 U.S. and Canadian vehicles to the recall.
The automaker said it notified NHTSA of the recall Tuesday and planned to also give the Japanese Transport Ministry similar notice. Honda said it would contact owners by mail.
"There is a heightened sensitivity right now with anything having to do with recalls," said John Mendel, a Honda senior vice president, but the timing of the announcement was based upon the automaker's need to notify regulators in the U.S. and Japan.
Meanwhile, State Farm Insurance said Tuesday that it had received numerous inquiries about alleged unwanted acceleration problems in Toyota and Lexus vehicles in recent years and notified federal officials of the problem three years ago.
"We routinely track claim trend information and periodically communicate with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. In this case, State Farm notified NHTSA in late 2007 about an uptick in situations involving alleged unwanted acceleration in Toyotas," said Kip Diggs, the insurer's spokesman.
Diggs cautioned that his company sold insurance and was "not equipped to draw general conclusions about the safety of a product."
However, State Farm voluntarily passes on information to federal regulators when it sees trends from its product-related insurance claims, Diggs said. The inquiries from State Farm policyholders were first reported by USA Today.
Since fall, Toyota has issued 10 million recalls worldwide for problems related to unintended acceleration, with about 2 million vehicles subject to more than one recall.
Late Monday, Toyota said it was recalling an additional 437,000 vehicles, including 133,000 Prius and 14,500 Lexus models in the U.S., because of a braking problem. Owners will receive letters starting next week instructing them to bring the vehicles to a dealership to update software in the anti-lock brake system.
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said Tuesday that U.S. officials would continue to press the Japanese automaker to address safety concerns.
"Last Thursday, NHTSA opened a formal investigation of 2010 Toyota Prius hybrid vehicles in response to consumer complaints about braking difficulties, and today, Toyota has acknowledged a safety defect," LaHood said. "When I spoke with Toyota President Akio Toyoda last week, he assured me that his company takes U.S. safety concerns very seriously."
U.S. transportation officials have come under fire, along with Toyota, for not reacting more quickly to concerns about sudden-acceleration problems in Toyota vehicles. A congressional committee had been scheduled to grill Toyota and U.S. officials this week about the safety problems. But that hearing by the House Government Oversight and Reform committee has been postponed because of the snowstorm that hit Washington last week and another storm expected to begin Tuesday night, according to a spokesman for Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista), the top Republican on the panel. The hearing has been rescheduled for Feb. 24, the spokesman said.
On Tuesday, corporate credit rating agency Moody's Investors Service placed Toyota's unsecured long-term-debt rating under review. Moody's said it was concerned "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."
Toyota says it knows it has disappointed customers and is taking steps to review its operations.
When he announced the recall in Japan, Akio Toyoda, Toyota's president and the grandson of the automaker's founder, said the company planned to establish as many as six quality centers in the U.S. to analyze its problems.
"As we say, Genchi genbutsu ['Go and see for yourself'], we have to find out what is really happening. And a team that can do such an analysis needs to be structured," Toyoda said.
Times staff writer Jim Puzzanghera contributed to this report.
RUSSIA, CHINA & US: Russia, U.S. harshly condemn Iran's nuclear move; China's response more muted.
February 10, 2010
By Borzou Daragahi, Reporting from Beirut
Tehran says it will enrich some of its uranium to a higher purity for medical purposes, but other nations fear the process could eventually be used for weapons. China's response is more muted.
Iran's move on Tuesday to produce higher-grade uranium for a medical reactor prompted widespread international condemnation and an uncharacteristically harsh response from Russia, whose support is key to U.S.-led efforts to impose tough new sanctions against the Islamic Republic.
But the response from China, which like Russia wields a U.N. Security Council veto and maintains robust economic ties with Iran, was far more muted, suggesting a tough road ahead for the Obama administration and Western allies seeking to put pressure on Tehran.
Iranians in lab coats at the Natanz facility cried "God is great!" as they transferred uranium from one capsule to another, presumably to begin the enrichment process, state television showed.
But it was unclear from its statements whether Iran had actually started producing higher-grade uranium or had only begun testing the process.
Tehran has said it will turn some of its uranium, currently enriched to 3.5% purity and suitable for generating electricity, into material of 20% purity necessary to power an ailing Tehran medical reactor. The West fears that Iran's goal is to eventually produce high-grade uranium for weapons.
The Obama administration quickly condemned Iran's move.
"It's provocative, and it deepens our concerns about what the Iran leadership's intentions are," said Philip J. Crowley, the chief State Department spokesman.
President Obama said the administration and five other world powers are "moving along fairly quickly" to develop new sanctions on Iran to persuade it to abandon its nuclear ambitions.
The U.S. criticism of Iran's latest move was echoed by Russian lawmakers, commentators and ranking officials.
"Iran says it doesn't want to have nuclear weapons. But its actions, including its decision to enrich uranium to 20%, have raised doubts among other nations, and these doubts are quite well founded," Nikolai Patrushev, the nation's security chief, told Russian news agencies.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko was quoted on the department website as declaring: "Iran's decision . . . increases doubts in the sincerity of Iran's intentions to ease, through joint efforts, the existing concerns of the international community with regard to the Iranian nuclear program."
But Beijing, which has balked at even harshly rebuking Iran, continued to call for more diplomacy.
"China hopes all relevant parties will step up diplomatic efforts and make progress in dialogue and negotiations," Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu said Tuesday during a regular briefing, the official New China News Agency reported.
Low-enriched uranium, which Iran already has, can power electricity-producing reactors, whereas uranium enriched at levels of 60% or higher can be used to make a nuclear weapon.
Iran's nuclear chief, Ali Akbar Salehi, told state-run news media that inspectors from the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency will observe the process of further refining the fuel, while Iranian diplomats continue to negotiate with the West over a U.N.-backed proposal for Iran to send its low-grade material to Russia in exchange for fuel plates made in France.
"The enrichment of uranium up to 20% does not mean the doors are closed to interaction and negotiations for fuel exchange," Salehi said, according to the official Islamic Republic News Agency. "In case our adversary parties in the negotiations show wisdom and stop killing time, the Islamic Republic will be ready to go ahead with interaction."
Salehi told the semiofficial Iranian Students News Agency that Iran plans to devote 164 centrifuges to further refining some of its 4,000-pound supply of low-enriched uranium into fuel for the medical reactor and produce as much as 11 pounds of 20% enriched uranium a month, which is more than the 4 pounds a month needed to produce isotopes for cancer treatment and diagnosis at the medical reactor.
Salehi said a uranium conversion plant in Esfahan can convert the 20% enriched uranium into fuel plates for the reactor, which is due to run out of fuel this year.
"In the past seven months, any time Iran mentioned it could meet its fuel needs, Western nuclear experts and politicians questioned Iran's capability to produce fuel plates," state television quoted Salehi as saying. "But we have mastered the sophisticated technology of producing fuel plates."
Times staff writers Paul Richter in Washington and Megan K. Stack in Moscow contributed to this report.
OLYMPICS: Consider yourself warned, IOC's Rogge tells Russia
Mon Feb 8, 2010 8:07pm EST
By Karolos Grohmann
VANCOUVER (Reuters) - Russia has been warned to get its anti-doping act together days before the start of the Vancouver Olympics after several of their athletes have been busted for taking banned drugs in the past months.
"I understand that people are worried by the numbers," International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge told reporters on Monday.
"We have indeed been alerted by the number of positive cases. It is legitimate to be worried. I was puzzled by the numbers, yes indeed..."
Rogge said he had raised the issue in meetings with Russian sports officials and the country's president, Dmitry Medvedev, recently.
"We have alerted Russian authorities and we now expect them to comply," he said.
"I insisted (in talks with president Medvedev) on the need to have a strong action on doping and he promised that he would launch that and he was very explicit in public declarations," Rogge said.
Russia has seen a spate of positive tests prior to these winter Games with the country's anti-doping agency under mounting pressure to crack down on athletes taking performance-enhancing drugs.
She sat out a two-year ban before returning to competition.
Rogge defended her participation saying she had paid the price for her doping offence.
Medvedtseva is fortunate to compete though because under a new rule brought in two years after she was caught, athletes who are banned for six months or more for a doping offence are automatically excluded from the next Olympics.
(Editing by Miles Evans)
CHINA & US: After Buying Spree, China Owns Stakes in Top U.S. Firms
Prime Minister Wen Jiabao has expressed concern about China's holdings of United States debt. Feng Li/Getty Images
Published: February 8, 2010
By DAVID BARBOZA and KEITH BRADSHER
SHANGHAI — Flush with cash despite the global economic downturn, China’s sovereign wealth fund quietly bought more than $9 billion worth of shares last year in some of the biggest American corporations, including Morgan Stanley, Bank of America and Citigroup.
Related
List of China’s U.S. Stock Holdings (sec.gov)
Although most of the stakes were small, the China Investment Corporation, the government’s $300 billion investment fund, now owns stock in some of the best-known American brands, including Apple, Coca-Cola, Johnson & Johnson, Motorola and Visa.
The detailed list, which contained holdings totaling $9.6 billion as of Dec. 31, was disclosed Friday in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission; it lists stakes only in companies traded in the United States.
The filing offers a glimpse of how China is trying to diversify its more than $2 trillion in foreign currency holdings with stock, rather than investing almost entirely in United States Treasury bonds and other debt securities issued by governments and by government-sponsored enterprises like Fannie Mae.
Prime Minister Wen Jiabao of China and other officials have repeatedly expressed worry about how the country’s holdings of Treasury securities could be hurt by inflation or by mounting United States debt. By buying the securities of international companies, China is trying to spread its fast-growing wealth more widely. It is also seeking to acquire strategic stakes in companies that could feed its hungry economy with a range of commodities.
The China Investment Corporation, already one of the world’s largest sovereign funds, was formed in 2007 with about $200 billion. It now has assets of nearly $300 billion and, according to state-run news media, is expecting another large injection of funds.
A spokeswoman for the corporation, which is based in Beijing, did not return e-mail messages or phone calls seeking comment. But analysts said the filing showed that the fund had invested only a small portion of its $300 billion in American stocks, and the fund seemed to be following a cautious strategy to diversify globally after initially having put its biggest investments into shoring up the capital of Chinese banks.
“This is still a relatively small amount compared to the total size of the fund,” said Chang Chun, a professor of finance at the China Europe International Business School in Shanghai.
The sovereign wealth fund got off to a rocky start in 2007 and early 2008 by acquiring a $3 billion nonvoting stake in the American private equity firm Blackstone and paying $5 billion more for a 9.9 percent stake in Morgan Stanley.
Shares of both companies plummeted in 2008 during the financial crisis, leading to a storm of criticism directed at the wealth fund. But analysts say the fund performed well in 2009, particularly because it was buying aggressively as the market recovered.
Exactly when the investment corporation bought the shares of various companies was not disclosed in the filing. Its acquisition of nonvoting units of Blackstone and its early stake of preferred shares in Morgan Stanley are not listed in the filing, apparently because they are not traded equities.
The filing indicates that the corporation owns about $19 million worth of Bank of America stock, close to $30 million worth of Citigroup shares and about $333 million worth of shares in Visa, as well as holdings in various index funds.
The fund’s largest listed holdings were $1.7 billion worth of shares in Morgan Stanley and nearly $650 million worth of shares in BlackRock, the New York money management fund.
The Morgan Stanley stake was acquired last June, when the investment bank issued about $2.2 billion worth of common shares to help repay the United States government under the Troubled Asset Relief Program. The Chinese fund acquired about $1.2 billion worth of shares at that time.
Some United States politicians in both parties have been nervous about China’s growing financial reach, and have been particularly wary that China might seek political influence in the West commensurate with its corporate stakes. Four years ago, Congress discouraged Cnooc, a state-owned Chinese oil company, from buying the oil company Unocal, which instead merged with Chevron.
Most sovereign wealth funds, with the exception of Norway’s, disclose few details about their holdings. But the Chinese fund made its list available for the first time on the S.E.C.’s form 13F, which is filed quarterly by institutional investors and mutual funds in the United States.
Ben Simpfendorfer, an economist at the Royal Bank of Scotland, said the Chinese sovereign wealth fund’s decision to disclose its holdings could limit concerns about secrecy in government holdings.
“This should help reassure politicians that Chinese sovereign wealth funds can take minority positions responsibly,” he said.
The Chinese fund’s holdings outside the United States are substantial and growing. In Canada, it owns a $3.5 billion stake in Teck Resources, a mining and resources company listed in the United States, and a $1 million stake in Research In Motion, the maker of BlackBerry mobile phones.
The sovereign wealth fund has also been buying small stakes in Australia’s biggest banks and paid $646 million last autumn for a stake in the Noble Group, a diversified commodities company based in Hong Kong with operations around the world in industries like iron ore mining and sugar mills.
Executives whose companies have accepted investments from the Chinese fund tend to defend it as apolitical.
Richard S. Elman, the founder and chairman of Noble, said last month that executives of the Chinese fund had been businesslike in their approach to the investment.
“They are hugely commercial, and they want results,” he said. “They do not interfere in the day-to-day operations.”
David Barboza reported from Shanghai and Keith Bradsher from Hong Kong.
A version of this article appeared in print on February 9, 2010, on page B4 of the New York edition.
JAPAN: Ozawa Says He’ll Keep Job
Published: February 9, 2010
Japan’s most influential political leader, Ichiro Ozawa, said Monday that he would keep his formal job as the No. 2 leader of the governing Democratic Party after prosecutors decided not to charge him in a financing scandal.
Mr. Ozawa, who was the architect of his party’s election victory last summer, said that the prosecutors’ decision proved his innocence. But recent polls show that about three-quarters of Japanese think he should resign.
A version of this article appeared in print on February 9, 2010, on page A11 of the New York edition.
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