JAPAN: Hatoyama backpedals on Futenma timetable

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Kyodo News

Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama indicated Monday his administration won't be able to come up with a single proposal for the relocation of the Futenma U.S. military base by Wednesday, saying it is not legally bound to do so.

Hatoyama's remarks came shortly after Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada indicated prior to talks Monday with Defense Secretary Robert Gates in Washington that Japan doesn't have to narrow its proposals down to one before it begins negotiating with the United States in earnest.

"There is no legal basis on which we must come up with a government proposal within this month," Hatoyama said, backpedaling on an earlier promise to come up with a plan by the end of March.

The administration is mulling several alternatives to the existing plan to relocate the Futenma airfield within Okinawa Prefecture, with Hatoyama promising to resolve the issue by the end of May.

Hatoyama said the government will come up with one proposal soon because only about two months are left before the end of May.

"It may be natural for there to be several proposals at the beginning," he said. "But there can't be multiple ones as (the government) negotiates and puts together (a deal) over a government plan in the end."

The opposition was quick denounce Hatoyama's remarks, with Liberal Democratic Party Secretary General Tadamori Oshima demanding his resignation.

"The prime minister's words change every day," Oshima told reporters. "I suggest that he step down."

The U.S. has called on Japan to follow through on the existing plan, saying it is the best option. The plan is part of a broader agreement forged in 2006 on the realignment of U.S. forces in Japan.

The accord, which took years to hammer out, calls for transferring the aircraft operations of the Futenma base, now situated in the crowded city of Ginowan, to Camp Schwab's Henoko coast.

Once the replacement base is operational, 8,000 marines are to be relocated from Okinawa to Guam.

View Japan Times Article...

CHINA: China Sentences 4 Rio Tinto Employees To Jail

March 29, 2010

by Louisa Lim

A Chinese court sentenced four employees of mining giant Rio Tinto with jail terms of seven to 14 years on bribery and commercial secrets charges. The judge said the crimes committed by the four had caused major losses to the Chinese steel industry.

TRANSCRIPT

RENEE MONTAGNE, host:

NPR's business news starts with China sending a foreign executive to prison.

(Soundbite of music)

MONTAGNE: A court in Shanghai has sentenced four executives of an international mining company to jail. One was an Australian citizen. The men were working for the mining giant Rio Tinto. The case has riveted foreign business community in China.

NPR's Louisa Lim was in the courtroom, and has this report.

LOUISA LIM: Australian Stern Hu gave no visible reaction when his sentence of 10 years in prison was read out. Foreign journalists have been allowed to watch the verdict on closed circuit television. Hu and three Chinese Rio Tinto employees were found guilty of accepting bribes and violating commercial secrets. The longest sentence was 14 years, handed down to an employee found guilty of taking $9 million in bribes.

In the matter of commercial secrets, the court said the men had collected information about closed meetings held by the China Iron and Steel Association. It said the actions of the four Rio Tinto employees had caused losses of $150 million to China's steel industry and seriously damaged its competitiveness.

Louisa Lim, NPR News, Shanghai.

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SHANGHAI, CHINA: Excited crowds greet remade Bund

Tens of thousands of Shanghai residents and tourists swarm the Bund yesterday as the city's landmark site reopens after nearly three years' renovation work, just in time for visitors to the Shanghai World Expo. A vehicular tunnel beneath the promenade, designed to lighten traffic on the Bund itself, also opened yesterday.

2010-3-29

By Zha Minjie

ALONG the riverfront promenade that stretches along the west bank of Huangpu River, eight-year-old Shao Meirenyu gave out a yell.  "I can see it, I can see it."

Shao was just a pre-school girl three years ago when the Bund was closed for renovation. And the riverfront and the high-rises facing the river were just subjects on television or pictures for her.

Yesterday, she and her classmates and teacher joined the tens of thousands of people who poured onto the riverfront to view the renovations as the place made its long-awaited return on a Sunday that shone with sunshine after days of overcast weather in Shanghai.

The area, once a terminal for docks and a lane for lovers, was closed in 2007 as the city planned to make it "as charming as the Champs Elysee in Paris."

Three years, to locals, are not long enough to forget, but long enough to remember.

"It's worth being remembered by heart and documented by pen," said resident Tao Jun.

Tao, 81, said he used to stroll along the Bund at night. "I felt at peace as I watched the rolling river."

"Peace" seemed to be a thing that could be found nowhere yesterday, however.

Crowds leaned against riverfront barriers, where once stood concrete walls that had permitted a less-open view of the river. They walked along the broad new promenade that stretches over 2,000 meters.

Many stood on the 2,000 new benches to take photos.

"It's amazing to see so many people," said Smets Karel, a visitor from Holland.

During his last trip to the city in January, the area was still blocked to the public. He could only view the Bund from across the river in the Pudong New Area.

To Judy McKinney, a teacher from the United States, the trip meant a huge difference.  "When I came here 25 years ago, I could not see so many high buildings along the skyline," said McKinney.  "Are there still senior people doing tai chi in the early morning around here?" asked McKinney. She remembered the groups of people, exercising in morning light, who typically gathered along the Bund riverside.

Though some facilities have not been fully completed and shops not opened, curiosity was hard to resist.

The 500 parking spots in the area were filled by morning and some cars had to park on nearby streets.

About 400 bottles of water at two small stands selling soft drinks soon sold out.

In contrast to the hubbub above, the underground tunnel which also opened yesterday saw a quiet beginning.

No congestion was reported as it was not a workday, police said.
The tunnel, which runs beneath the promenade, aims to alleviate heavy Bund traffic.

Visitors generally gave high marks for the brand-new facilities, but some people, especially elderly ones, complained of too few places to get shade from the sun.

Authorities said they would make some improvements after soliciting people's suggestions.

The grand project formally opened at 9:30am, after a 30-minute ceremony attended by Shanghai's top government officials and local celebrities.

"Everything is under control," shouted a police officer to his walkie-talkie as the speeches ended and the crowds, which had been standing outside the ceremony site, swarmed in to catch places along the riverside.

View Shanghai Daily Article...

THE KOREAS: Broken ship found off North Korea

South Korea has not given up all hope of finding survivors

The South Korean military says it has located the stern of its warship that sank in mysterious circumstances on Friday following an explosion.

The authorities are hoping that some of the 46 crew members still missing may be alive but trapped in underwater air pockets in the wreckage.

Military diving teams were due to begin a search for survivors.

The vessel sank close to the sea border with North Korea; the South says it is open-minded on the cause of the blast.

Rescue officials said on the weekend that the explosion had broken the ship into two parts, which had sunk to the seabed.

Rescue race

The BBC's Korea correspondent, John Sudworth, said navy divers had been hampered by strong currents and murky waters, but had now located the stern, lying on the sea bed.

It is the part of ship that contains the sleeping compartments, so thought to be the most likely location in which survivors might be found.

But it is now a race against time, our correspondent says.

If any of the 46 missing crew members are still alive, calculations suggest that any oxygen in the trapped air will soon run out.

The 1,200-tonne Cheonan naval patrol vessel sank near the disputed maritime border with North Korea but military officials say there is no indication the North was involved.

Our correspondent says that although the two navies have exchanged fire along the sea border in recent years, no unusual military movements were detected on Friday night, leading to speculation that the sinking was due to some kind of accident.

Whatever the cause, as well as a disaster for the South Korean navy, it is moment of terrible, personal tragedy for the families of the missing, their trauma, and sometimes anger, played out on national television as the whole country waits for answers.

Tensions rise

At his latest emergency briefing on the rescue, the South Korean president has urged all available personnel and equipment to be mobilized to search the sunken ship as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, North Korea has accused the South of psychological warfare for allowing journalists to enter the two countries' demilitarised zone, and warned of "unpredictable incidents".

"If the US and the South Korean authorities persist in their wrong acts to misuse the DMZ for the inter-Korean confrontation despite our warnings, these will entail unpredictable incidents including the loss of human lives in this area for which the US side will be wholly to blame," the statement said.

Dramatic warnings from the North are not unusual - on Friday the North had threatened "unprecedented nuclear strikes".

However, they are dissected by Korea-watchers for hints of movement on the primary issue of importance to North Korea's neighbours - it's readiness to re-enter talks about how to end its nuclear programmes.

Separately, North Korea's Foreign Ministry issued a statement on Monday castigating the United Nations for its criticism of the North's human rights record.

South Korea recognises the Northern Limit Line, drawn unilaterally by the US-led United Nations Command to demarcate the sea border at the end of the Korean War. The line has never been accepted by North Korea.

View BBC News Article...

JAPAN: Japanese pair win world's top architectural prize

The duo were praised for the way their work blends into its surroundings

A duo of Japanese architects, Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa, have won the most coveted award in architecture, the Pritzker Prize, the has jury announced.

The 2010 winners were praised for using everyday building materials to create ethereal structures that shelter flowing, dreamlike spaces.

Their art museums, university buildings and designer-label fashion boutiques span Japan, the US and Europe.

The prize will be awarded formally in May in New York.

Sejima and Nishizawa, who are partners in the architectural firm Sanaa, said they did not see themselves as working within any sort of distinct Japanese architectural tradition.

But they acknowledged being influenced by the austere construction methods, lightweight materials and porous boundaries between inside and outside space that characterise traditional Japanese buildings.

"If you see Japanese temples made of wood, you can see how the architecture is made up," Nishizawa said.

"They have a clear construction and transparency and they are quite simple. I think this is one of the big things that we are influenced by."

Among the projects mentioned by the Pritzker jury were the Christian Dior Building in Tokyo's Omotesando shopping district and the Toledo Museum of Art's Glass Pavilion.

The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology's newly opened Rolex Learning Centre was also cited; it is a single-storey slab-like concrete and glass structure that undulates over a four-acre site, punctured in places to let light enter the massive open space that makes up its interior.

The duo's 2004 art museum in Kanazawa, Japan, was admired

View BBC News Article...

CHINA: China Court Due To Rule On Rio Tinto Workers

By ELAINE KURTENBACH , 03.28.10, 08:50 PM EDT, Associated Press

SHANGHAI -- A Shanghai court is due to rule Monday on bribery and commercial secrets charges against four employees of mining giant Rio Tinto - a case seen as a barometer of China's treatment of foreign business in a time of rising trade friction.

The verdict comes as multinational companies like Rio Tinto are facing increasingly strict oversight into their business dealings worldwide, as both developed and developing countries gradually tighten enforcement of anti-corruption rules.

Stern Hu, an Australian executive of Rio Tinto, and his three Chinese co-workers pleaded guilty to charges of taking bribes in a three-day trial held last week. Their pleas on commercial espionage charges were unknown as those hearings were closed and lawyers said they were barred from commenting.

"Please kindly understand that my colleagues and I are obliged to keep any and all of the secrecy matters in most strict confidence even after tomorrow, pursuant to professional regulations in China," said Jin Chunqing, a defense lawyer for Hu.

The court was due to issue a verdict and sentences Monday afternoon, Rio Tinto and the Australian government said. An Australian consular official was to attend the hearing.

Jin said he was wary of speculating on the likely sentence for the secrecy charges, which he described as "technically complicated and sophisticated."

"It is an unprecedented case for China, in its international business history and law enforcement," Jin said.

China warned against politicizing the case, while the Australian side lobbied for greater transparency and protested the court's decision to close sessions handling the commercial secrets charges.

But investigations aren't limited to just China or Rio Tinto.

German automaker Daimler AG, accused of paying tens of millions of dollars in bribes through subsidiaries to officials of at least 22 governments, including China, is among many companies snagged by the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which makes it unlawful to bribe foreign government officials or company executives to secure or retain business.

China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., Asia's biggest refiner, acknowledged Friday that Daimler AG had allegedly paid bribes to one of its employees. It urged the government to tighten oversight of lawbreaking foreign companies.

With most major economies still struggling to recover from the fallout from the global financial crisis, many Asian governments also have sharpened their scrutiny of multinational companies, says Robert Broadfoot, managing director of the Political and Economic Risk Consultancy in Hong Kong.

"There is nothing like a severe global recession to get people to focus on corruption," Broadfoot said. He noted, however, that graft cases also are used to advance the political agendas of those doing the accusing.

China ranks 10th among 16 countries the consultancy tracks in its political corruption survey of more than 2,000 executives working in Asia, the U.S. and Australia. Indonesia, Cambodia and Vietnam were the three worst.

In China, anti-corruption campaigns are a perennial political strategy of the Communist Party, which recognizes the damage to its image from widespread graft but enforces its crackdowns selectively.

Whistleblowers often run greater risks than the officials caught abusing their positions, especially if party leaders fear the accusations could threaten their hold on power.

In the Rio Tinto case, the government has said nothing official about the local businesspeople accused of giving the bribes.

"It's clearly a selective application of the law," Broadfoot said.

The arrests of the Rio Tinto employees last August were initially thought linked to Beijing's anger over high prices it paid for iron ore - a key commodity for China's booming economy. Rio Tinto, based in London and Melbourne, is one of the top suppliers of ore to China and a key industry negotiator in price talks with China's state-owned steel mills.

Few details of the allegations against Hu and the others have been released, and none has been allowed to make any public comment since they were detained.

Reports in the past week on the Web site of the Chinese financial magazine Caijing said one of the Rio Tinto employees, Wang Yong, was accused of receiving $9 million from Du Shuanghua, a steel tycoon whose company, Rizhao, has chafed at the state-dominated pricing arrangements, setting his own agreements with overseas suppliers.

The contrast between the Daimler case, which will be presented to a U.S. federal court next week, and Rio Tinto's highlights China's secretive way of handling such issues.

U.S. court documents available online outline in great detail the allegations against Daimler, reflecting the results of five years of investigations. No such materials on the Rio Tinto case are available in Shanghai; court officials refuse comment and defense lawyers said they were barred from commenting on the secrecy charges.

Australia's consul-general, the only outside official allowed to attend the bribery section of the trial, planned to attend Monday's hearing, and his government said it would comment after the verdict is announced.

Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed

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N. KOREA: North Koreans Use Cellphones to Bare Secrets

Mun Seong-hwi, a North Korean defector, speaking to someone in North Korea to gather information at his office in Seoul.  Jean Chung for The New York Times

March 28, 2010

By CHOE SANG-HUN

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea, one of the world’s most impenetrable nations, is facing a new threat: networks of its own citizens feeding information about life there to South Korea and its Western allies.

The networks are the creation of a handful of North Korean defectors and South Korean human rights activists using cellphones to pierce North Korea’s near-total news blackout. To build the networks, recruiters slip into China to woo the few North Koreans allowed to travel there, provide cellphones to smuggle across the border, then post informers’ phoned and texted reports on Web sites.

The work is risky. Recruiters spend months identifying and coaxing potential informants, all the while evading agents from the North and the Chinese police bent on stopping their work. The North Koreans face even greater danger; exposure could lead to imprisonment — or death.

The result has been a news free-for-all, a jumble of sometimes confirmed but often contradictory reports. Some have been important; the Web sites were the first to report the outrage among North Koreans over a drastic currency revaluation late last year. Other articles have been more prosaic, covering topics like whether North Koreans keep pets and their complaints about the price of rice.

But the fact that such news is leaking out at all is something of a revolution for a brutally efficient gulag state that has forcibly cloistered its people for decades even as other closed societies have reluctantly accepted at least some of the intrusions of a more wired world.

“In an information vacuum like North Korea, any additional tidbits — even in the swamp of rumors — is helpful,” said Nicholas Eberstadt, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute who has chronicled the country’s economic and population woes for decades.

“You didn’t used to be able to get that kind of information,” he said of the reports on the currency crisis. “It was fascinating to see the pushback from the lower levels” of North Korean society.

Taken together, the now-steady leak of “heard-in-Korea” news is factoring into ever swirling intelligence debates about whether there is a possibility of government collapse, something every American president since Harry S. Truman has wished for, and none have witnessed.

The news the informants are spiriting out is not likely to answer the questions about the North’s nuclear program or leadership succession that the United States cares about most. There is no evidence so far that these new sources have any access, or particular insight, into the North Korean leadership or military elite.

The informers themselves remain of limited use to American and South Korean spymasters, in part because the North has no broad cellphone network, making it easier for the authorities to eavesdrop on calls and harder for handlers to direct operatives in real time.

As one senior American intelligence official put it, “You’re not going to find the North Korean uranium project from these guys.”

So the traditional methods of intelligence collection — using satellite imagery, phone and computer intercepts, and informants and agents of South Korea’s intelligence service — remain the main sources of information.

Still, the Web sites appear to have inflicted damage. North Korea’s spy agencies, which almost never admit to weaknesses, recently warned that South Korea’s “plot to overthrow our system, employing all manners and means of spying, is spreading from the periphery of our territory and deeply inland.”

They vowed retaliation, especially against “human trash,” an apparent reference to the North Koreans who have betrayed their leaders’ code of silence out of principle or for pay to supplement their usually meager wages.

The informers’ networks are part of broader changes in intelligence gathering rooted in the North’s weaknesses. The first breakthrough came in the 1990s, when famine stoked by a breakdown in the socialist rationing system drove defectors out of the country and into the arms of South Korean and American intelligence agencies. The famine also led North Korea to allow traders to cross the border into China to bring home food, leaving them vulnerable to foreign agents, the news media and, most recently, the defectors and activists intent on forcing change in the North.

The first of their Web sites opened five years ago; there are now five. At least three of the sites receive some financing from the United States Congress through the National Endowment for Democracy.

The Web reports have been especially eye-opening for South Koreans, providing a rare glimpse of the aptly named Hermit Kingdom untainted by their own government’s biases, whether the anti-Communists who present the North in the worst light or liberals who gloss over bad news for fear of jeopardizing chances at détente.

“I take pride in my work,” said Mun Seong-hwi, a defector turned Web journalist with the site Daily NK, who works with the informers and uses an alias to protect relatives he left behind. “I help the outside world see North Korea as it is.”

Even in the days of the Iron Curtain, North Korea was one of the world’s most closed societies. There were few Western embassies where spies could pose as diplomats. And with citizens deputized to watch one another for suspicious activities, strangers could not escape notice for long.

Of the 8,400 agents South Korea sent over the border between the end of the Korean War in 1953 and 1994, just 2,200, or about 1 in 4, made it home. Some defected, according to former agents, but many were killed.

As recently as 2008, when the North’s leader, Kim Jong-il, reportedly had a stroke, it was long-distance sleuthing rather than on-the-ground spying that broke the news. South Korean agents intercepted a government e-mail message containing his brain scans, according to the Monthly Chosun magazine.

The Web sites have not uncovered news that delicate, although the implications of their reports on the currency crisis, later confirmed by South Korean government officials, were far-reaching. They said that the North was requiring people to exchange old banknotes for new ones at a rate of 100 to 1, as well as limiting the amount of old money that could be swapped. That suggested that officials in the North were cracking down on the few glimmers of private enterprise that they had tolerated, dashing hopes that the country might follow China’s lead of at least opening its economy anytime soon.

Still, the Web sites are plagued with challenges. The cellphones work on China’s cellular networks, so they operate only within several miles of the Chinese border. Because North Koreans cannot travel freely in their country, the Web sites are forced to depend mostly on people who live near China.

Beyond that, Ha Tae-keung, who runs one of the Web sites, says that some sources are prone to exaggerate, possibly in the hopes of earning the bonuses he offers for scoops. He and other Web site operators, meanwhile, are vulnerable to “information brokers” in the North who sell fake news.

But Mr. Ha said that the quality of the information was improving as Web sites hired more defectors who left government jobs and remained in touch with former colleagues, often by cellphone.

“These officials provide news because they feel uncertain about the future of their regime and want to have a link with the outside world,” he said, “or because of their friendship with the defectors working for us, or because of money.”

While such contacts would have been unimaginable 20 years ago, one thing has not changed: the danger.

Mr. Mun of Daily NK says his informers engage in a constant game of cat and mouse with the authorities. The North Korean government can monitor cellphone calls, but tracing them is harder, so the police rove the countryside in jeeps equipped with tracking devices.

The informants call him once a week; they never give their names, and they hide the phones far from their homes.

Despite those precautions, they are sometimes caught. This month, Mr. Ha’s Web site reported that an arms factory worker was found with a cellphone and confessed to feeding information to South Korea. A source said the informant was publicly executed by firing squad.

David E. Sanger contributed reporting from Washington.

An earlier version of this article was published in print in the International Herald Tribune on Jan. 25, 2010, and was published on nytimes.com on Jan. 24, 2010.

View New York Times Article...

S. KOREA: 46 South Korean sailors missing after naval ship sinks

The Cheonan, in background, sinks near South Korea's Baengnyeong Island as a coast guard vessel attempts to rescue its sailors. (Ha Sa-hun / Associated Press / March 27, 2010)

Fears of possible warfare with North Korea spread overnight, but officials later back away from claims that there was an attack on the vessel.

March 27, 2010

By John M. Glionna, Reporting from Seoul

Forty-six sailors were missing Saturday after a South Korean naval vessel sank along the country's disputed western sea border with North Korea, an incident that military officials here at first believed was caused by an attack by their northern enemies.

Fears of possible renewed warfare filled South Korea's capital with dread overnight. As naval ships rescued 58 crewmen from icy waters, President Lee Myung-bak and Defense Ministry officials convened an emergency meeting.

For hours, officials believed the ship had struck a mine or was hit by a torpedo late Friday, and Lee dispatched an armada of ships to investigate and search for imperiled crewmen.

The possibility of an outbreak of hostilities between the two Koreas caused the South Korean currency, the won, to slip against the U.S. dollar. Pentagon officials said the U.S. was monitoring developments.

But by dawn, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said they could not conclude that the reclusive North was behind the sinking of the 1,200-ton patrol boat Cheonan, which was on routine duty near Baengnyeong Island with 104 crew members when it began taking on water.

An official from the president's office said satellite pictures showed no sign of hostile military activity in the area. Other officials, noting that the area was known to be rocky, speculated that the ship may have had an accident.

An apparent explosion ripped a large hole in the ship's stern, the Yonhap news agency reported. The blast shut down the engine, and the ship swiftly sank as the crew jumped into the frigid waters of the Yellow Sea.

Half a dozen naval ships and two coast guard vessels, along with helicopters, converged on the site. At one point, skittish troops on alert for attacks opened fire on what officials later said was a flock of birds.

One Baengnyeong resident told Yonhap that he thought he heard sounds of a gun battle. "The loud firing sound remained for about 15 minutes, while I watched TV. I never heard such loud firing sound in my entire life . . . and the sound was definitely different from those heard from usual drills," he said.

The ship's foundering along the disputed Yellow Sea border occurred amid growing tensions between the two Koreas as the North refuses to accede to international pressure to return to six-party talks on dismantling its nuclear arsenal.

Only hours before the naval incident, North Korea had threatened "unpredictable strikes." In November, North and South Korea exchanged gunfire for the first time in years, damaging ships from both sides. In January, the North fired about 30 artillery rounds not far from Baengnyeong, and the South responded by firing about 100 rounds.

Ju-min Park of The Times' Seoul Bureau contributed to this report.

View Los Angeles Times Article

CHINA: China Now Leads World in Diabetes Cases

Published: March 25, 2010

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

HANOI — After working overtime to catch up to the West, China now faces a new problem: the world’s biggest diabetes epidemic.

One in 10 Chinese adults already have the disease and an additional 16 percent are on the verge of developing it, according to a new study. The finding nearly equals the U.S. rate of 11 percent and surpasses other Western nations, including Germany and Canada.

The survey results, published Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine, found much higher rates of diabetes than previous studies, largely because of more rigorous testing measures. With 92 million diabetics, China is now home to the most cases worldwide, overtaking India.

“The change is happening very rapidly both in terms of their economy and in terms of their health effects,” said David Whiting, an epidemiologist at the International Diabetes Federation, who was not involved in the study. “The rate of increase is much faster than we’ve seen in Europe and in the U.S.”

Chronic ailments like high blood pressure and heart disease have been steadily climbing in rapidly developing countries like China, where people are moving out of farms and into cities, where they have more sedentary lifestyles.

Greater wealth has led to sweeping diet changes and increasing obesity rates, a major risk factor for Type 2 diabetes, which accounts for 90 to 95 percent of all diabetes cases among adults.

“As people eat more high-calorie and processed foods combined with less exercise, we see an increase of diabetes patients,” said Huang Jun, a cardiovascular professor at the Jiangsu People’s Hospital in Nanjing, who did not participate in the study.

Previous studies over three decades have shown a gradual climb in China’s diabetes rates. The sharp rise in the latest study, conducted from 2007 to 2008, is largely explained by more rigorous testing methods, said the lead author, Dr. Wenying Yang from the China-Japan Friendship Hospital in Beijing.

Earlier nationwide studies relied only on one blood sugar tolerance test, while this survey of nearly 50,000 people caught many more cases by checking levels again two hours later, an approach recommended by the World Health Organization.

The study did have some limitations, sampling more women and city residents — 152 urban districts compared with 112 rural villages. Dr. Yang said she was alarmed by the findings, and the Chinese Ministry of Health has been alerted. She said there were plans to promote a national prevention strategy.

Diabetes occurs when the body is unable to regulate blood sugar. It is a major risk factor for heart disease, which is the biggest killer in China.

“I don’t think it’s unique to China, but it’s certainly a concern that the rates are high,” said Colin Bell, a chronic disease expert at the W.H.O.’s regional office in Manila. “It emphasizes the need for strong prevention and treatment programs.”

The Asia-Pacific region was highlighted in another study last year estimating that it would be home to more than 60 percent of the 380 million diabetes cases globally by 2025.

The Associated Press

View New York Times Article

RUSSIA & US: Ripple Effect Of U.S.-Russia Nuke Pact

S. KOREA: S. Korea Ship Sinks Near Maritime Border With North

March 26, 2010

By Mark Memmott

Update at 12:55 a.m. ET. The Associated Press now reports from Seoul that:

"Military officials say a South Korean navy ship has sunk off an island not far from North Korea. An official with the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Seoul said early Saturday (local time) that the ship sank some four hours after it began taking on water. The official spoke on condition of anonymity, in line with department policy."

Also from Seoul, Doualy Xaykaothao reports for NPR that South Korea's president held an emergency meeting at the Blue House (South Korea's equivalent of the White House) and that there is an investigation under way into whether the ship was hit by a North Korean torpedo. It's unclear, she adds, whether the reports about a shot being fired by a South Korean vessel refer to the ship that has been sunk or to another South Korean ship in the area.

Our original post:

"A South Korean Navy ship is sinking off the west coast near (the country's) maritime border with North Korea," according to South Korea's Yonhap News Agency, saying it gets that news from South Korean Government officials. It adds that "officials also said South Korea fired a shot at an unidentified vessel toward the North."

Reuters says other South Korean media are reporting that the ship was "possibly ... hit by a North Korean torpedo and (that) several sailors were killed."

The Associated Press reports the ship may already have sunk. Yonhap says it has a crew of 104, and that at least 58 have been rescued.

South Korea's Cabinet is holding an emergency meeting, the news agency also says.

View NPR Article

THE KOREAS: S. Korea Ship Sinks In Waters Off N. Korea

03.26.10, 01:34 PM EDT

By KWANG-TAE KIM, Associated Press 

SEOUL, South Korea -- A news report says a number of South Korean sailors died when their military ship sank off an island not far from North Korea.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency cited an unidentified naval official early Saturday as saying there were some deaths. The military says it cannot confirm the report but says 58 of the 104 crew members on board the ship that sank late Friday were safe.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - Military officials say a South Korean navy ship has sunk off an island not far from North Korea.

An official with the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Seoul said early Saturday that the ship sank some four hours after it began taking on water. The official spoke on condition of anonymity, in line with department policy.

The official said at least 58 of the 104 crew members have been rescued. There was no immediate confirmation of casualties. A rescue operation was still under way.

The cause of the sinking was not immediately clear.

View Forbes Article

THE KOREAS: Sunken Warship Raises Korea Tensions

The Korean Peninsula ranked high on most Davos participants' lists of the world's most dangerous flash spots. Reports today that a South Korean warship has sunk at night in part of the Yellow Sea disputed by the two Koreas is a significant raising of the risk level.

The vessel, possibly either a guided-missile-carrying frigate or a corvette (Update: it is a corvette, the Cheonan), with a crew of 104, went under following an explosion in the stern. The cause is unknown but the BBC is reporting that a torpedo was involved. South Korean media say authorities in Seoul are investigating whether it was a torpedo attack from North Korea. (Update: South Korean officials have played down early reports that the sinking may have been the result of North Korea attack, saying it is premature to ascribe a cause to the incident.)

Pyongyang has been building up its coastal defenses, particularly artillery and rocket launchers, since the end of last year. In January, it designated six zones on either side of the peninsula as naval firing zones and its guns shot hundreds of shells out to sea during military exercises, prompting South Korea to open fire on one occasion.

One interpretation of all this is that Pyongyang is trying to keep Seoul and Washington guessing over quite what level of security threat North Korea represents; this year's annual U.S.-South Korean joint military exercises earlier this month were scaled down. Pyongyang may also be looking for a bargaining chip to reestablish the six-nation nuclear talks that have stalled since North Korea pulled out, sensing that Beijing's currently tetchy relations with Washington open up an opportunity that it may be able to exploit with its unpredictability.

Another interpretation is that Pyongyang, in the throes of a long-term succession transition, needs an external distraction from the internal consequences of its disasterous currency reform last November that stoked inflation and caused supply shortages exacerbating the increasingly biting effects of U.N. sanctions imposed last June after missile and nuclear tests.

Deadly maritime exchanges between North and South Korea have occured on several occasions over the years. They are part of the tension of a game in which North Korea's leader Kim Jong-il repeatedly plays a high-risk hand. He looks now to be holding fewer cards than ever. At some point he will overplay his hand.

View Forbes Article

CHINA & US: Sino-US tensions show no sign of easing

Zhong Shan, vice-minister of commerce, visited Washington.[ZHANG JUN / XINHUA]

Updated: 2010-03-26 06:58

By Li Xiaokun and Ding Qingfen (China Daily)

BEIJING - There are no clear signals of an easing in trade and political tensions in Sino-US relations despite the hope generated by the visits of two Chinese vice-ministers to Washington.

Vice-Commerce Minister Zhong Shan said in the US capital on Wednesday that Beijing will reform its currency regime gradually and keep the exchange rate stable.

Rejecting mounting US calls to allow the yuan to rise more quickly, Zhong said changing the exchange rate was not the way to fix a huge bilateral trade gap, and that it could upset the global economy.

"Revaluing the renminbi is not a good recipe for resolving problems," he told the US Chamber of Commerce.

"It is in nobody's interest - China's, the US' or other countries' - to see big ups in the renminbi or big downs in the dollar," Zhong said.

He asked Washington not to blame others for its own problems, "otherwise, the outcome would just be the opposite".

Zhu Min, deputy governor of the People's Bank of China, the central bank, also said on Thursday that Beijing will refine its exchange rate regime but declined to set a timetable.

US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said it was critical for China to allow its currency to rise.

"We can't force them to make that change," he said in an interview with CNN. "But it is very important that they let it start to appreciate again. And I think many of them understand that," he said.

US Senators are crafting a law that would slap import duties on Chinese goods to offset what they believe is the low value of its currency.

The sponsors of the bill, Democratic Senator Charles Schumer and Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, also want the Barack Obama administration to formally label China a currency manipulator in a semi-annual Treasury Department report due on April 15.

Referring to Vice-Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai, who was on a transit visit in Washington earlier this week, the Foreign Ministry said on its website that he received promises from high-level US officials that Washington "attaches great importance to China's stance and concerns on issues related to Taiwan and Tibet" and would "cautiously handle the sensitive issues".

Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said on Thursday at a regular press briefing that the visits aimed to "clarify China's positions and policies and listen to opinions from all quarters in the US" to seek a solution to the current problems.

Shi Yinhong, an expert on American studies at the Renmin University of China, said the latest developments are not a clear signal of mending ties.

"Washington should take positive steps (to show its sincerity). For instance, whether it will go ahead with the move to label China a currency manipulator in April is crucial in defining bilateral relations."

Huo Jianguo, dean of the Trade Research Institute affiliated to the Ministry of Commerce, urged Washington to tread cautiously. "The US government should be sober-minded on the issue of labeling China a currency manipulator. It should not be carried away by domestic political pressure," he said.

This year, the two countries have had spats over issues related to Taiwan, trade and human rights. Adding to the tensions was Google's decision on Tuesday to exit the Chinese mainland market.

Two other US companies appeared to have joined Google on Wednesday.

The two Internet services providers said they would halt registration of Chinese domain names because the Chinese government has begun demanding pictures and other identification documents from their customers.

Shi said the exits are individual decisions.

"Maybe some are for political reasons while some are just for business purposes," he said. He added that as long as China's economic and investment conditions remain good, foreign firms would stay.

Derek Scissors, research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told China Daily that one or two Internet companies following Google's departure could not change the whole business environment.

"In determining whether this is an issue of Internet restrictions or a broader issue, it is much more important whether different kinds of American companies - in agriculture, banking, entertainment, and so on - are also reconsidering their China business.

"Thus far, that does not seem to be the case," he said.

Ai Yang and Cheng Guangjin in Beijing,Tan Yingzi in Washington contributed to the story

View China Daily Article

JAPAN: More than Cherry Trees Blossoming in Japan

04.02.10, 05:40 AM EDT

Tim W. Ferguson, Forbes Asia Magazine dated April 12, 2010

What to make of Japan now, as the business year there ends? The Nikkei index is back near its high since the Lehman Shock, retail sales perked up this winter, exporters have done well from China's latest spurt, and Japanese manufacturing technology remains, along with Germany's, the envy of the world.

All of this might seem a bracing contrast to the downbeat theme of the Japan story for years now. But then the other side of the coin comes up: continuing political miasma, enormous government debt, a stunning 8.4% peak-to-trough GDP decline in the Great Recession (one reason more recent igures look decent) and demographic decline (see "Friending the Elderly" for a positive note).

It's coincidental that Trouble has now come to Toyota, Japan's premier brand. Whatever the reasons behind the seeming spate of problems with the company's cars, they probably don't speak to Japan's predicament broadly--even the management practices allegedly to blame. But psychologically this is one more blow in a long string of them.

Japan Inc. is responding to limitations at home with bold moves abroad. The pharmaceutical sector continues on the diversification prowl. Autos and electronics are still a strength. Financial entities, especially Nomura, have seized on the recent crisis to push outward. The trading outfits, the soga shosha, have found new applications for their time-tested form of "enterprise resource planning"--look for the big three to figure prominently in our Global 2,000 companies list next month.

But overall the business record still pales of late, especially in comparison with the rest of hotly competitive North Asia. As the chairman of one of Japan's most established international players said to us at a lunch,

"The Koreans--they are supported by their government, but when they decide on a business move, they act."

There is nothing necessarily Asian about paralysis by consensus.

China is eclipsing Japan as Asia's economic leader, although the last chapters have not been written. Key economies like those of Australia, India and Taiwan still have toes in each camp. Some policy clarity might come from yet another Japanese election, in July for the upper house, but business cannot play a waiting game. The world is moving on.

Now is a strange calm after (or between?) economic storms. Interest rates that spiked on the fears in Dubai and then Greece have settled back, and debt remains cheap in most places. That is a precious respite for developing economies like Indonesia. Even troubled Pakistan's equities are at their highest in 18 months. But wild cards remain: a possible trade war, Iran, North Korea. We can hope conditions in 2010 will remain benign, but I'm still inclined to want my powder dry.

View Forbes Article...

DALIAN, CHINA: Friendship Square

LONELY PLANET:

• Address:  City Centre, W of Zhongshan Sq

West of Zhongshan Sq, Friendship Sqare is a traffic circle that surrounds a Dàlián landmark - a vast spheroid that's illuminated like a giant disco ball at night.

CHINA: Google Shuts China Site in Dispute Over Censorship

A Chinese flag flies next to the Google company logo outside the Google China headquarters in Beijing on Monday.  Liu Jin/Agence France-Presse - Getty Images

March 22, 2010

By MIGUEL HELFT and DAVID BARBOZA

SAN FRANCISCO — Just over two months after threatening to leave China because of censorship and intrusions by Chinese hackers, Google said Monday that it was closing its China-based Internet search service and instead directing Chinese users to a Hong Kong-based uncensored version of its search engine, which may get blocked in mainland China.

In a blog post, Google also said that it would retain much of its existing China operations, including its research and development team and its local sales force. The stunning move represents a powerful slap at Beijing regulators but also a risky ploy in which Google — one of the world’s technology powerhouses — will essentially turn its back on the world’s largest Internet market, with nearly 400 million Web users and growing quickly.

“Figuring out how to make good on our promise to stop censoring search on Google.cn has been hard,” David Drummond, Google’s chief legal officer, wrote in the blog post. “We want as many people in the world as possible to have access to our services, including users in mainland China, yet the Chinese government has been crystal clear throughout our discussions that self-censorship is a non-negotiable legal requirement.”

Mr. Drummond said that Google’s Hong Kong-based search engine would provide mainland China users results in simplified Chinese characters used on the mainland and was “entirely legal.”

“We very much hope that the Chinese government respects our decision,” Mr. Drummond said, “though we are well aware that it could at any time block access to our services.”

While the move may be an crafty attempt by Google to resolve its confrontation with the Communist regime, it appears to have angered officials in China, setting the stage for a possible escalation of the conflict.

The state-controlled Xinhua news agency quoted an unnamed official with the State Council Information Office describing Google's move as "totally wrong."

"Google has violated its written promise it made when entering the Chinese market by stopping filtering its searching service and blaming China in insinuation for alleged hacker attacks," the official said.

Google declined to comment on its discussions with Chinese authorities, but said that it was under the impression that its move would be seen as a viable compromise.

Google’s decision ends a nearly four-year bet by the company’s founders and top executives that Google’s search engine in China, even if censored, would help bring more information to Chinese citizens and loosen the government’s controls on the Internet.

Instead, specialists say, Chinese authorities have tightened their grip on the Internet in recent years. While other multinational companies are not expected to follow suit, some Western executives say Google’s decision is a symbol of a worsening business climate in China for foreign corporations and perhaps an indication that the Chinese government is favoring home-grown companies.

“It is certainly a historic moment,” said Xiao Qiang, director of the China Internet project at the University of California, Berkeley. “The Internet was seen as a catalyst for China being more integrated into the world. The fact that Google cannot exist in China, clearly indicates that China’s path as a rising power is going in a direction different from what the world expected and what many Chinese were hoping for.”

Despite its size and reputation for innovation, Google trails its main Chinese rival, Baidu.com, which was modeled on Google, with 33 percent market share to Baidu’s 63 percent.

The decision to shut down its China-based search engine will have a limited financial impact on Google, which is based in Mountain View, Calif. China accounted for a small fraction of Google’s $23.6 billion in global revenues last year. Still, abandoning a direct search engine presence in the largest Internet market in the world could have long-term repercussions and thwart Google’s ambitions to be a global superpower, analysts say.

Some Western analysts say Chinese regulators could retaliate against Google by blocking its Hong Kong or American search engines entirely, just as it blocks YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.

Supporters of Google have praised the company for taking a principled stand and effectively refusing to operate a censored Web site here, one that limits free speech and deletes information about democracy and human rights issues.

In a statement, Leslie Harris, chief executive of the Washington-based Center for Democracy and Technology, praised Google “for following through on its commitment to protect human rights and for its continued effort to enable China’s people with unfiltered access to robust sources of information from all over the world. Whether the Chinese people will be able to take advantage of Google search now rests squarely with the Chinese government.”

But other specialists said it was a foolish business decision that has unnecessarily embarrassed Beijing and one that could make it difficult for Google to continue operating other parts of its business in China.

In China, many students and professionals say they are extremely disappointed by Google’s decision to close its Chinese language Web site. They are about to lose access to the company’s vast resources, they say.

Last January, when Google initially threatened to leave China, many young people there placed wreaths at the company headquarters in Beijing as a sign of mourning.

At that time, Google said it had grown frustrated with complying with government censorship rules and that hackers based in China had stolen some of the company’s source code and even broken into the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights advocates.

The attacks were aimed at Google and more than 20 other American companies, the company said. While Google did not say the attacks were government sponsored, the company said it had enough information about the attacks to justify its threat to leave China.

People, inside and outside of Google, investigating the attacks have since put the number of companies that were targets at more than 30, and have traced the attacks to two universities in China: Shanghai Jiao Tong University and the Lanxiang Vocational School.

The universities and the Chinese government have denied any involvement in the attacks.

At the time of its announcement, Google said that its decision might well result in its having to shut down its China-based search engine, Google.cn, or leaving the country. In subsequent days, however, Google said that it hoped to preserve as much of its business in China as possible. In addition to its search engine, the company has a staff of about 600 that includes highly paid engineers and sales people, and a fledgling mobile phone business.

After serving Chinese users through its search engine based in the United States, Google decided to enter the Chinese market in 2006 with a local search engine under an arrangement with the government that required it to purge search results on banned topics.

But since then, Google has struggled to comply with Chinese censorship rules and failed to gain significant market share from Baidu.com, a Chinese site that was modeled on Google.

The decision to enter China, was also hotly debated in the company, and Google has come under criticism for cooperating with China’s censors. Not surprisingly, when the company said it would no longer abide by China’s censorship rules, human rights groups hailed the announcement, saying that Google’s stand should be a model for other American companies.

The decision to scale back its operations in China will have only a limited financial impact on Google in the short term. Google does not break down revenue by country, but people familiar with the company’s business in China said that its quarterly sales were in the vicinity of $150 million in the most recent quarter, which ended Dec. 31. Globally, it had $6.67 billion in revenue in the same period. Much of Google’s revenue in China comes from ads that Chinese companies place on Google’s sites in the United States and elsewhere. What’s more, ads that Google used to place on its China-based search engine will now be placed on the Hong Kong site, so as long as the site is unblocked in mainland China, Google will continue to earn revenue from them.

But the fallout from the decision could affect Google over the long term, as the Chinese Internet market continues to grow quickly.

Google is not the first American Internet company to stumble here. Nearly every major American brand has arrived with high hopes only to be stunted by government rules or fierce competition from Chinese rivals.

After struggling to compete in China, Yahoo sold its Chinese operations to Alibaba Group, a local company; Ebay and Amazon never got traction; and Microsoft’s MSN instant messaging service badly trails rival Tencent.

Google’s departure could present an opportunity for Baidu, whose stock has soared since the confrontation between Google and China began. It could also give a chance to Microsoft, a perennial underdog in Internet search, to make inroads into the Chinese market. Microsoft’s search engine, Bing, has a very small share of the market.

Many analysts say the government has favored and aided Chinese Internet start-ups, but that those businesses have also out maneuvered American companies.

Inside Google, the decision to pull out is widely believed to have been championed by Sergey Brin, a co-founder, who was born in the Soviet Union and is particularly sensitive to the issue of censorship. The decision by Google to enter China in 2006 was hotly debated internally, with Mr. Brin advising against it, while fellow co-founder, Larry Page, and chief executive, Eric E. Schmidt arguing for it.

Early this year, company executives acknowledged that their bet that Google could help open China had failed.

“We were looking at an environment that is more difficult than it was when we started,” David Drummond, Google’s chief legal officer said in January. “Far from our presence helping to open things up, it seems that things are getting tighter for open expression and freedom.”

David Barboza reported from Shanghai and Miguel Helft from San Francisco.

View New York Times Article

VLADIVOSTOK, RUSSIA: “Eagle's Nest Hill” (Orlinoye Gnezdo Hill)

You can get the best view of Vladivostok from the top of “Eagle's Nest” (Orlinoye Gnezdo) Hill.  It is the highest point in the city (214 m, or 702 feet). From this sweeping panoramic view, you can see Golden Horn, Amursky and Ussuriisky Bays, Russian Island, the commercial port, the fishing port, the docks, and the sea terminals.

The nickname “Eagle's Nest” comes from when the first settlers climbed to the top of the hill and found an eagle's nest with the younglings inside.

There are several ways to get to the top of the hill.   It’s about a 20 minute walk on foot through the city’s hilly terrain.  The easier way is to take the funicular railway from the Pushkinsky Theatre building.  The funicular railway was built in 1962 and spans downtown’s Sukhanov street.

Once at the top, the best viewpoint is located near the Far Eastern State Technical University building. The night view of the lights of Vladivostok is quite beautiful.

CHINA: Chinese shrug shoulders at possible Google pull-out

A man cycles past a Google logo in front of its China headquarters building in Beijing March 21, 2010. Credit: Reuters/Christina Hu

Mon Mar 22, 2010 7:02am EDT

Ben Blanchard and Melanie Lee

BEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) - With speculation swirling that Google Inc will soon announce the closure of its China-based Internet portal, the reaction from some Chinese has been hurry up and leave, or simply: so what?

On Friday, the China Business News reported Google may make an announcement as early as Monday on whether it will pull out of China.

The Financial Times, citing a person familiar with the situation, said the company could say on Monday that it will close its Chinese search engine.

Google has not formally unveiled any such plans.

Two months since Google said it would no longer agree to abide by Beijing's censorship rules even if that meant shutting down its Google.cn site, some Chinese Internet users and state newspapers are baying for the company to pull out.

The burst of angry Chinese comments suggested that, in spite of the widespread popularity of Google amongst educated Chinese, the government is steering state-run media and websites to lump the company together with other recent disputes with Washington that have stirred nationalist rancor in China.

"Get the hell out," wrote one user on the website of the nationalist tabloid the Global Times (www.huanqiu.com), in remarks echoed by other readers.

"Ha ha, I'm going to buy firecrackers to celebrate!" wrote another, in anticipation of the company confirming its departure from the online search market.

Joseph Cheng, a City University of Hong Kong politics professor, said China's ruling Communist Party was deploying nationalism to stifle debate about censorship.

"The criticism of cultural exports, or cultural imperialism, is a kind of defense to justify the Chinese authorities' censorship controls," said Cheng.

"In dealing with the American government, the Chinese authorities will try to emphasize that this is only a commercial dispute and has nothing to do with Sino-American relations," he added.

GOOD RIDDANCE?

A Global Times editorial cited online surveys as showing 80 percent of respondents said they could not care less if Google withdrew from China, the world's largest Internet market with an estimated 384 million users.

The saga was a reminder of the country's need to develop its own technology and not rely on foreigners, the editorial said.

"This is a high-tech competition, and also a competition to uphold the state's sovereignty," the editorial said.

Some bloggers went a step further and accused Google of being in cahoots with U.S. intelligence.

"It is understood that Google is very tight with the CIA," wrote "Xiaogui" on the popular portal sina.com.cn. "Take this opportunity to leave now, you spies."

Though Google has remained mum on the progress of talks, the firm's chief executive said earlier this month that an outcome is expected "soon."

The Google case has spread beyond censorship and hacking and has become a diplomatic knot in Sino-U.S. relations, already being challenged by spats over Taiwan, Tibet and the value of the Chinese currency.

The United States is studying whether it can legally challenge Chinese Internet restrictions, a top U.S. trade official said recently.

Over the weekend, a commentary by the official Xinhua news agency accused Google of pushing a political agenda by "groundlessly accusing the Chinese government" of supporting hacker attacks and by trying to export its own culture, values and ideas.

BLOW TO INNOVATION?

Analysts said if Google withdrew from China, the biggest losers would be its millions of Internet users.

With two research and development centres in China, hundreds of sales staff and engineers working on the Google Android platform and other initiatives, analysts said all may come to a halt if Google decides on a pull out.

"This is not a good thing for Chinese netizens because Google has been the leader in innovation in the search engine field," said Cao Junbo, chief analyst with iResearch, a Beijing-based research firm specializing in technology matters.

Currently, Google offers Google Maps, Gmail and free music downloads to Chinese users, all of which could be in jeopardy if the company walks.

Even Google's mobile platform Android is not safe, as Google products such as search which are embedded into the platform will stop working if Google withdraws, making the platform less desirable to consumers, analysts said.

Google's withdrawal will open up China's $1 billion search market to more local firms, Cao said.

The biggest beneficiary will be domestic search leader Baidu Inc, which already has a sophisticated search advertising display system and a robust sales and customer support team.

Others such as Tencent Holdings, China's most valuable Internet company, may also benefit as the firm runs the country's largest instant messaging platform that it could tap into to expand its search network.

"The biggest gainers of Google leaving will definitely be the local firms," Cao said.

(Additional reporting by Stefanie McIntyre in Hong Kong; Editing by Jerry Norton)

View Reuters Article

CHINA: Rio Tinto Employees Say They Took Bribes in China

Published: March 22, 2010

By DAVID BARBOZA

SHANGHAI — Three employees of Rio Tinto, the British-Australian mining giant, agreed to plead guilty Monday to taking bribes while working for the company in China, stunning confessions on the opening day of their three-day trial here.

The employees, including Stern Hu, an Australian national, admitted to receiving several million dollars of bribes, according to their lawyers. A fourth employee is expected to do the same.

The proceedings were largely closed to the public, but an Australian consular official said that Mr. Hu — the focus of the case — had admitted in court Monday to receiving some of the $1 million in bribes prosecutors accused him of taking while at Rio Tinto.

Mr. Hu and the three Chinese employees were detained last July in a high profile corruption case that at the time rocked the global steel industry and even strained diplomatic relations between China and Australia.

After a nine-month-long detention, Mr. Hu and his three Rio Tinto colleagues are on trial this week at the Shanghai No. 1 Intermediate Court, accused of accepting more than $12 million in bribes and also stealing commercial secrets from Chinese state-owned companies.

Now, according to several lawyers involved in the case, all four Rio employees may eventually plead guilty to accepting bribes.

In a statement after the opening day of the trial Monday, Tom Connor said Mr. Hu made “some admissions” and acknowledged taking some of that money.

Zhang Peihong, a lawyer for another Rio Tinto employee standing trial, Wang Yong, said his client has agreed to plead guilty to accepting about $1 million in bribes — much less than the $10 million he is accused of taking.

A spokesman for Rio Tinto declined comment on Monday.

The guilty pleas, which are expected to be formally entered Tuesday, are a dramatic turnabout in the case. Australian had pressed China for months, demanding a fair and transparent legal process, hinting that the employees may have been framed. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd even warned in recent days that “the world will be watching” the trial.

And for much of the past year, Rio Tinto, one of the world’s biggest producers of iron ore, has strongly defended its workers, saying the company has no evidence they engaged in wrongdoing.

The four Rio Tinto employees were initially accused of espionage, which would have fallen under the country’s tough state secrets law, and of causing China “enormous economic losses.” But in August, the four employees were formally charged with lesser offenses: bribery and stealing commercial secrets.

Monday’s portion of the trial focused only on the bribery issue. On Tuesday or Wednesday, the focus will switch to stealing commercial secrets.

Many Western executives doing business in China worry that the four Rio Tinto employees — Wang Yong, Ge Minqiang, Liu Caikui and Stern Hu — may have been unfairly detained because of business disputes with government-owned companies; and that other foreign executives could be targeted.

The timing of the case seemed ominous. Shortly before the July detentions, China’s steel industry association had complained about the skyrocketing price of iron ore and criticized Rio Tinto and other foreign suppliers for a breakdown in iron ore contract talks.

The detentions also came just after Rio Tinto scrapped plans to accept a $19.5 billion investment from Chinalco, one of China’s biggest state-owned mining groups.

Beijing has insisted this is a criminal case and has pressed Australian officials and others to avoid “politicizing” the case.

Yet because Australia is one of the leading suppliers of iron ore to China — iron ore worth billions of dollars and intended for this country’s booming steel industry — the case has become a concern for the top leaders of both countries.

Legal experts say the July detentions and initial allegations that the four Rio Tinto employees were stealing state secrets also suggested the government may have been using the case to punish Rio Tinto.

Western executives were alarmed because in the days after the detentions were announced last July, a spokesman for the foreign ministry dubbed the group spies, and China’s state-owned media published articles saying it was actually the Rio Tinto employees who were bribing government officials to get access to sensitive documents.

Yet in the nine months since the four were detained, the authorities here have announced no other arrests of steel industry officials for bribing Rio Tinto employees or trading in government secrets.

Indeed, prosecutors here reduced the charges to bribery and stealing commercial trade secrets after Australian and even American officials said they were concerned about the case and what it would mean for foreign executives working here.

Since then Australian officials and Rio Tinto executives have been more cautious in their remarks about the case.

Last week, Rio Tinto said that it had formed a joint venture with Chinalco, the Chinese state-owned company, to develop a huge iron ore project in Africa. And on Monday, Rio Tinto’s chief executive, Tom Albanese, spoke at the China Development Forum in Beijing, and pledged to work with China to find mineral resources in China and overseas.

Chen Xiaoduan contributed research.

View New York Times Article

RUSSIA: On this day: 22 March

 

Nadezhda Krupskaya

On March 22 1924, Nadezhda Krupskaya, Vladimir Lenin’s wife, released the notes of an address by Lenin to the Bolshevik party. The piece that Krupskaya presented was a part of the legendary “Lenin’s will”. This document still shrouded in mystery contained Lenin’s ideas about the future of the country and his private opinions about each member of the Politburo. This information could have undermined the position of the first people of the country, particularly Stalin, so it was deliberately kept secret and only made public after Stalin’s death.

After a series of strokes, starting in 1922, Lenin felt the end was drawing near, so, he rushed to put all his incomplete works on paper as a guideline for the rest of the party to follow after he was gone.

It was the political situation Lenin was most worried about. The fierce battles that raged between the Party and the opposition could one day lead to war, and Lenin urged the party members to seek compromise and to be wise while choosing his successor. His major concern was about Stalin and Trotsky*. Trotsky was very unpopular with the old Bolsheviks, and particularly Stalin, who strongly disapproved of his breakaway to the Menshevik wing (a milder and more liberal variation of socialists) and placed little confidence in him.

Stalin’s confrontation with Trotsky worried Lenin. In his notes, he described Stalin as rude and incapable of restoring peace in the party. These characteristics were later exploited in the process of Stalin’s “dethronement” by Nikita Khrushchev. According to him, Lenin never wanted to hand the steering wheel over to Stalin. It wasn’t personal dislike that drove Lenin to do so, but his desire for the party to function properly.

Some other measures that he proposed also speak in favor of this hypothesis. Lenin made a series of comments about a possible cabinet reshuffle and adding new blood to the party. His plan was to attract ordinary people, like workers or peasants with no political background, to the party’s administration, to clean it of corruption. Needless to say, this measure was never considered. Impossible to be implemented by the majority of the party members, the will was set aside and soon forgotten, until Khrushchev opened his Stalin dethronement campaign.

*Leo Trotsky – a leader of the international communist revolutionary movement, Marxism ideologist; one of the brewers of the October Socialist revolution in 1917, founder of the Red Army; People’s Commissar of Foreign Affairs and later People’s Commissar of Defense. In 1923 Trotsky became the head of the opposition; in 1927 he was removed from office and exiled. He was assassinated by a Soviet Secret Service agent in Mexico in 1940.

http://rt.com/Russia_Now/2010-03-22.html

DALIAN, CHINA: Map

SOURCE: FROMMER’S

RUSSIA: On this day: 21 March

On this day (21 March) in 1917, the Romanov imperial family was arrested. It would lead to their execution the following year and Nicholas II became ever-known as the last tsar to rule Russia.

Even though the Romanovs brought many changes and reforms to their country during their 300-year dynasty, making Russia a powerful empire, by the time Nicholas II came to the throne some considered him to be unfit for his post as tsar. Nicholas II was an autocratic ruler. The difference in lifestyles of the wealthy royals to that of the poor peasants was great. Mostly peasants criticized and demonstrated against him, but those who opposed were shot. With Russia’s defeat in World War One and a civil war uprising from the Bolsheviks under Vladimir Lenin, Nicholas was forced by the Provisioning Government to abdicate.

He and his family were soon placed under house arrest at the Alexander Palace. Later they were exiled, first to Tobolsk where they were still treated with respect and consideration. Many sympathized with the former tsar and still believed in his supremacy. But it was when they were moved to Yekaterinburg that conditions became harder. The house was fenced, large boards covered the windows and the Romanovs were constantly guarded by Bolshevik soldiers who humiliated and insulted them.

Maria, Nicholas’ daughter, writes in her diary during their captivity: “Everyone who comes into the house inspects our rooms . . . It's difficult to write about anything cheerful, because there's all too little cheerfulness here. On the other hand, God doesn't abandon us. The sun shines, the birds sing, and this morning we heard the bells sounding matins . . .”

About a month after moving there, the entire imperial family was executed by firing squad in the basement of the house they lived in.

View RT Article

RUSSIA: On this day: 21 March

On this day (21 March) in 1917, the Romanov imperial family was arrested. It would lead to their execution the following year and Nicholas II became ever-known as the last tsar to rule Russia.

Even though the Romanovs brought many changes and reforms to their country during their 300-year dynasty, making Russia a powerful empire, by the time Nicholas II came to the throne some considered him to be unfit for his post as tsar. Nicholas II was an autocratic ruler. The difference in lifestyles of the wealthy royals to that of the poor peasants was great. Mostly peasants criticized and demonstrated against him, but those who opposed were shot. With Russia’s defeat in World War One and a civil war uprising from the Bolsheviks under Vladimir Lenin, Nicholas was forced by the Provisioning Government to abdicate.

He and his family were soon placed under house arrest at the Alexander Palace. Later they were exiled, first to Tobolsk where they were still treated with respect and consideration. Many sympathized with the former tsar and still believed in his supremacy. But it was when they were moved to Yekaterinburg that conditions became harder. The house was fenced, large boards covered the windows and the Romanovs were constantly guarded by Bolshevik soldiers who humiliated and insulted them.

Maria, Nicholas’ daughter, writes in her diary during their captivity: “Everyone who comes into the house inspects our rooms . . . It's difficult to write about anything cheerful, because there's all too little cheerfulness here. On the other hand, God doesn't abandon us. The sun shines, the birds sing, and this morning we heard the bells sounding matins . . .”

About a month after moving there, the entire imperial family was executed by firing squad in the basement of the house they lived in.

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RUSSIA: On this day: 20 March

On March 20 1535, the first currency reform in Russia was held, giving birth to Russia’s smallest coin, the kopeck, the first all-Russia currency. The reform was carried out by Princess Elena Glinskaya, mother of Tsar Ivan IV (the Terrible). Since the Tsar was underage at the time, she ruled the country as his warden and implemented a number of very successful reforms until she was poisoned, allegedly by one of the contending aristocracy clans.

The urgency for this reform was called for by the increasing chaos in the country’s currency system. Before, many minting centres scattered all over the country issued currency that varied greatly in size and exterior. There was no fixed exchange rate. To make things worse, due to no security features, whole pieces of silver from the original coins were cut off, or, in the process of production, cheaper metals were blended into the alloy. The coins lost their value, which inevitably led to unhealthy commodity-money relations. The currency crisis reached such levels that “coin artists” were sentenced to death.

The reform unified the exterior and the weight of the coin. Lighter and cheaper coins were exchanged for the new ones at a fixed exchange rate to keep the new currency solid and reliable. However, the archaeologists still find secret stashes of old coins dating as far back as the 1530s. People were still suspicious of the new currency and didn’t get rid of their old savings in an attempt to secure their future.

The kopeck got its name from the word “spear” (“kopyo” in Russian), as Elena Glinskaya’s currency had the image of George the Victorious, piercing the serpent with a spear, engraved on it. Some sources argue that coins depicted the sovereign in power at the time the coins were minted.

The kopeck later survived a number of currency reforms. In 1704, under Peter the Great, the decimal system was introduced in Russia, equaling the kopeck to 1/100 of one ruble. To make them easily recognised by everyone, its value was written in words for the literate population and drawn as a combination of stripes and dots for illiterate people.

Inflation affected the value of the kopeck over the years. In its early days in the 16th century, three kopecks were worth a good country house, while in the mid-20th century one kopeck was only good to buy a pencil or a glass of soda pop.

Today there is talk about the complete elimination of the 1 and 10 kopeck coins, since they are practically no longer used, and their actual cost of production is about 18 times higher than their nominal value.

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DALIAN, CHINA: The Japanese Influence

FROMMER’S:

A stroll around the neighborhood surrounding Nanshan Riben Fengqing Jie will give you a glimpse of old Japanese housing, though the street itself is full of suspiciously modern homes.

RUSSIA: On this day: 19 March

Tsar Peter the Great

19 March 1697, the Grand Embassy, lead by Tsar Peter the Great, left Moscow to travel to Western Europe. He was the first tsar to leave his country in peacetime and ‘opened a window into Europe’. On his return Russia would never be the same and the west would become a model for changes to come.

The Embassy comprised of around 250 people and its first aim was to strengthen and expand the union between Russia and Europe in the fight against Turkey. Peter also intended to learn about the cultural and economic life of Europe. Officially the embassy was headed by the ‘grand ambassadors’ Frants Lefort, Fyodor Golovin and Pyotr Voznitsyn. Peter himself was incognito under the name of Peter Mikhaylov.

They traveled through Germany, Holland and Austria. Throughout this journey Peter collected knowledge of western technology and hired thousands of craftsmen, engineers, military personnel, architects and painters to take back to Russia. Peter met King William III of England and visited Oxford University and the Greenwich Observatory. As well as English royals at the Royal Mint, he met Isaac Newton. He attended sessions of the English parliament and talked with church bishops and politicians. Peter sought technological innovations and inventions, especially in shipbuilding. He observed and even worked in dockyards and visited cannon foundries, factories and medical practices. But his diplomatic mission was unsuccessful as Europe was too preoccupied with the Spanish and French wars to worry about problems further east and Turkey.

On his return to Moscow, Peter demanded western standards of appearance and that beards be shaved off at court and more European dresses be worn. Many were appalled by his actions but were harshly punished for any criticism. The tsar chose a more western way of development for his country and many reforms followed. One of them being a change from the old Russian calendar to the Julian calendar used in the West, where years were counted from the birth of Christ, rather than the creation of the world. Many later praised Peter for his reforms, but others felt he betrayed his country’s traditions.

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