The Sinocism China Newsletter

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If you can only read one article I recommend Bo Xilai Said to Have Spied on Top China Officials – NYTimes. The reporters confirm a story that hit the overseas Chinese sites like Boxun a couple of weeks ago, and mention the possible role played by Fang Binxing, the father of China’s Great Firewall who is rumored to be in trouble and possibly detained.

• China’s sports authority commits to go deep in soccer corruption crackdown – Xinhua | English.news.cn
  this mean some who may have been protected by bo xilai, aka the “soccer mayor” from his time in dalian, may know be in trouble?
• Photos of latest sea trial of China’s aircraft carrier – Xinhua | English.news.cn
• Bo Xilai’s family in spotlight over website bought for $100,000 | World news | guardian.co.uk
  $100,000 to buy guagua.com. his mom must have had a lot of savings…
• How Effective Will China’s Carrier-Based Fighters Be? | Defense Tech
  will be a useflu tool for China to project power in its neigborhood and possibly intimitade neighbors with less sophisticated militaries but the jets won’t be the key to major carrier operations around the world. At the end of the day, China is going to have to develop bigger carriers capable of launching a variety of heavy aircraft using catapults instead of smaller carriers that can only launch fighters using a skip jump ramp if it wants to conduct truly effective carrier operations.
• Ambassador Locke’s China Green Hospital & Senior Living Trade Mission | Asia Healthcare Blog
  This week, the U.S. Department of Commerce together with Ambassador Locke, led one of five trade delegations that the Ambassador has committed to conducting in 2012.  This one, focused on China’s burgeoning need to build green hospitals and senior care facilities, conducted meetings in Xian and Beijing
• “鬼城”鄂尔多斯康巴什调查：停顿的工地 撤离的人群 – 市场 – 21世纪网
• BlackRock Said to Plan Asia Investment Fund With CIC – Bloomberg
• China Helps First-Home Buyers as Market Cools: Mortgages – Bloomberg
• Chinese Writers Seek $17 Million Censorship Suit Default – Bloomberg
  The writers sued China and Baidu.com Inc., (BIDU) the owner of China’s most popular Internet search engine, in May 2011, seeking $16 million in damages. They claimed that their pro- democracy writings about China were censored or banned from the search engine.
• U.S. charges ex-Morgan Stanley executive with fraud | Reuters
  Garth Peterson, who was a managing director in Morgan Stanley’s real estate investment and fund advisory business, secretly acquired millions of dollars worth of real estate investments for himself and an influential Chinese official, the SEC said.Peterson had a plea hearing before a federal judge in Brooklyn slated for later on Wednesday in the criminal case, however details were not immediately available.Peterson had a personal friendship with the former chairman of a Chinese state-owned entity, Yongye Enterprise (Group) Co, which had influence over the success of Morgan Stanley’s real estate business in Shanghai, the SEC said.Peterson secretly arranged to have some $1.8 million paid to himself and the chairman, and disguised the money as finder’s fees that Morgan Stanley’s funds owed to third parties
• Bo Xilai Said to Have Spied on Top China Officials – NYTimes.com
  BEIJING — When Hu Jintao, China’s top leader, picked up the telephone last August to talk to a senior anticorruption official visiting Chongqing, special devices detected that he was being wiretapped — by local officials in that southwestern metropolis.
  The discovery of that and other wiretapping led to an official investigation that helped topple Chongqing’s charismatic leader, Bo Xilai, in a political cataclysm that has yet to reach a conclusion.
  ly a dozen sources with party ties, speaking anonymously for fear of retribution, confirmed the wiretapping, as well as a widespread program of bugging across Chongqing. But the party’s public version of Mr. Bo’s fall omits it.
• Taiwanese Nationals Charged in Military Technology Plot – Bloomberg
  Two Taiwanese nationals already accused of trying to smuggle drugs through a New Jersey port were charged today with plotting to export sensitive U.S. military technology to benefit the Chinese government.
  Hui Sheng Shen, 45, and Huan Ling Chang, 41, who were arrested in February and are being held without bail, appeared before a judge today in Newark, New Jersey. They are accused of conspiring to buy unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, as well as E-2C Hawkeye surveillance airplanes and stealth technology related to F-22 fighter planes.
• Ex-Morgan Stanley Manager Appeals Insider Trading Convict – Bloomberg
  Former Morgan Stanley Managing Director Du Jun yesterday appealed a Hong Kong insider trading conviction for which he was sentenced to seven years in prison, saying prosecutors didn’t prove he committed the crime.
• Bo’s Brother Resigns as Vice Chairman of China Everbright – Bloomberg
  Li Xueming, the brother of ousted Politburo member Bo Xilai, stood down as a director and vice chairman of China Everbright International Ltd. (257), after media reports that highlighted his personal background.
• China Auto Scraps IPO After Struggling to Lure Investors – Bloomberg
  maybe the bankers should stop bringing premature deals to market?
• 专家称渤海污染至今无人问责 垄断集团无人能管_新闻_腾讯网
  no one really held responsible for the bohai oil spill
• Fraud Heightens Jeopardy of Investing in Chinese Companies – NYTimes.com
  Two of the universities owned by ChinaCast appear to have been transferred to ChinaCast’s former chief investment officer and president of its Chinese operations. And last week, according to the board, about a dozen people broke into the company’s Shanghai office and stole a number of documents and computers.ChinaCast has a revolt on its hands that it is finding difficult to quell.One reason that ChinaCast is having a problem is that shareholders did not actually buy an interest in its operations. Instead, to avoid Chinese restrictions on foreign investment, ChinaCast’s shareholders invested in a United States company that has contractual arrangements with a Chinese company. But the Chinese company remains in the ownership of Chinese citizens.
• 香港与薄熙来有关书籍传被下架_多维新闻网
  【多维新闻】薄熙来事件后，有媒体报道援引北京消息称，中央要求“严防境外反动出版物流入境内”，而香港中资书店亦怀疑受到压力，“和谐”相关书籍，与薄熙来有关的书籍几乎全部下架。
• Beijing auto show: a global shambles | beyondbrics | News and views on emerging markets from the Financial Times – FT.com
  ince the 2008 Olympic games, non-China residents could be forgiven for thinking that the Middle Kingdom was now a place capable of pulling off world class events with relative ease. It has the trains, the highways, the airports, the staff, and the money to compete with anyone, anywhere. Doesn’t it?Visitors to the Beijing auto show this week would have been quickly disabused.
• China’s world view: a long way to go | beyondbrics | News and views on emerging markets from the Financial Times – FT.com
  to hear it from China’s foreign policy officials, things haven’t changed much at all: China is still just a developing country, minding its own business.
• Huabao Suspends Trading After Falling on Short-Seller Report – Businessweek
  auditor is PWC//
  Huabao International Holdings Ltd. (336), a maker of flavors and fragrances used in cigarettes, suspended trading in Hong Kong after the stock plunged on a short-seller report that questioned its finances.Huabao fell 8.1 percent to HK$3.98 at the close in Hong Kong yesterday after short seller Anonymous Analytics said the company “reports absurdly high margins, which industry sources say should not be possible.”
• Gan Lulu’s boobs biggest draw at the Beijing Auto Show: Shanghaiist
• China’s social-media boom | McKinsey China
  This report reviews the survey findings and offers a perspective on how companies can use Chinese social media to create meaningful value for their businesses. First, we will review China’s digital-development stage and its social-media landscape. Next, we will look more closely at how the Chinese are using social media and how behavior and preferences differ by user segments. Finally, we will discuss the hurdles that companies face in addressing consumers who use social media and the ways to overcome them.
• Unilever tea bags China’s latest food scare – Companies & Industries – businesswatch
  he latest scandal popped up on Tuesday, when Greenpeace, an environmental protection organization, said three types of Unilever NV’s Lipton-branded tea bags were found to contain banned pesticide residue that could be harmful to the human endocrine system or male reproduction.Greenpeace said it had tested four types of Lipton tea bags bought randomly from supermarkets in Beijing, and sent samples to a third-party certified laboratory for tests.The test results found that Lipton-branded jasmine, green and oolong tea samples contained methomyl, a pesticide banned from use in tea planting.
• CCTV anchor disappears from screen after leaking gelatin scandal – Chinese Twitter – businesswatch
  Zhao Pu, an anchor at China’s official TV station CCTV, has disappeared from his routine program after the furor over a message on his microblog on April 9 in which he warned people not to eat solid yogurt because of contamination concerns. His message is now considered the first warning exposing the gelatin scandal in which Chinese companies used industrial gelatin in “solid yogurt”, jello and even in capsules.He has reportedly been suspended from his position and has accepted CCTV’s internal punishmen
• Chongqing Scoop Master Yang Haipeng Latest Victim of China Internet Crackdown – China Real Time Report – WSJ
  Yang Haipeng, a Shanghai-based journalist who has been a prolific source of information about developments in the saga surrounding former Chongqing Communist Party boss Bo Xilai’s, said he received a call from a friend at 8 a.m. on Wednesday informing him that his Sina Weibo account had been closed. He said he didn’t receive an explanation from Sina, and isn’t going to argue the closure of his site “because it won’t be any use.”Formerly a reporter for the boundary-pushing financial news magazine Caijing, Mr. Yang, who isn’t working at any publication at the moment, said he had more than 247,000 followers on Sina Weibo
• In the midst of control, where can change be found? – China Media Project
  and another C, cognitive dissonance//Yes, we repeat here, yet again, our emphasis on Qian Gang‘s Three C’s, control, change and chaos, to describe China’s confusing (there’s a fourth “C”) information landscape.
• 管理网格化 服务更贴心（走基层・一线见闻） — media.people.com.cn — Readability
  2011年，内蒙古自治区通辽市科尔沁区科尔沁街道率先在全自治区建成了数字网格管理工程，标志着科尔沁区社会管理创新的手段向科学化、现代化、信息化管理迈出了坚实一步。
• 这一次，变化真的发生了
  导语：峰回路转。一度令有关方面陷入困境的乌坎事件，在经历了一个具有历史意义的转折点之后，步入了良性的轨道。
  经济观察报 孙立平/文
• Why Wukan Will Remain a One-off – Economic Observer News- China business, politics, law, and social issues
  By Sun Liping (孙立平), Professor of Sociology at Tsinghua University
• The Hindu : News / National : Vested interests in India playing up military threat: Chinese daily
  Following the launch of Agni-V, India and China must guard against “vested interests” that were playing up the “China threat” and promoting an arms race between the neighbours, the Communist Party-run The Global Times newspaper said on Sunday.
• 同鼎轩电话,地址(图)-北京-大众点评网
  nice restaurant in the old Poly Plaza building in Beijing
• 祛寒娇耳汤_百度百科
  the origin of chinese dumplings
• Wal-Mart took part in lobbying campaign to amend anti-bribery law – The Washington Post
  Wal-Mart, the giant retailer now under fire over allegations of foreign bribery in Mexico, has participated in an aggressive and high-priced lobbying campaign to amend the long-standing U.S. anti-bribery law that the company might have violated.The push to revisit how federal authorities enforce the statute has been centered at a little-known but well-funded arm of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce where a top executive of Wal-Mart has sat on the board of directors for nearly a decade.
• Bo Xilai’s Son Issues Statement Defending Himself – WSJ.com
  Mr. Bo also said he had never driven a Ferrari or visited the U.S. Ambassador’s residence in Beijing, and hadn’t been to the U.S. Embassy there since 1998.The Wall Street Journal reported in November that he had arrived at the U.S. Ambassador’s residence in a red Ferrari to pick up a daughter of Jon Huntsman, then the Ambassador, for a dinner appointment, according to people familiar with the episode.
• Exclusive: China firm boasts about missile-linked North Korea sale: envoys – Chicago Tribune
  UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – A Chinese firm that intelligence agencies believe provided North Korea with the body of an off-road transport vehicle used to carry missiles appears to have a press release on its website that boasts about the sale, U.N. diplomats told Reuters.Washington suspects that the Chinese firm, Hubei Sanjiang Space Wanshan Special Vehicle Co., did not sell North Korea an entire vehicle, but a chassis, and may have believed it was for civilian purposes, suggesting the company did not intentionally flout U.N. sanctions, a U.S. official said.
• China Escalates Crackdown on Internet Amid Scandal – WSJ.com
  On March 24, Chinese journalist Yang Haipeng drew a connection on his Sina Weibo account between a British national and the Bo family, including Mr. Bo’s son, Guagua. “Deceased: Guagua’s nanny. Nationality: British. Place: Chongqing. Handled by: Wang Lijun. Cause of death: Wang was not allowed to investigate. The body was not preserved and instead directly cremated,” said the post, which was forwarded widely before it was deleted.”The most important effect of weibo is decentralization,” said Qiao Mu, director of the Center for International Communication Studies at Beijing Foreign Studies University, using the Chinese term for microblog. “Before, what the story is, who gets famous, everything was decided by the government. It was a centralized process. Now anyone can become famous. They don’t need the government’s permission. And anyone can put out news.”Social media has given legs to alternative news sources that formerly had loyal but limited readership, such as Boxun, a Durham, N.C.-based website run by what founder Watson Meng calls citizen journalists.
• Amazon.com: Midnight in Peking: How the Murder of a Young Englishwoman Haunted the Last Days of Old China eBook: Paul French: Kindle Store
  just bought, have only heard great things about it
• Altercation Over Parking Spot Ends in Death by Testicular Asphyxiation
  A shopkeeper in China was fatally injured last week after a woman with whom he was clashing clutched his testicles, and squeezed them until he blacked out.
• Mad-Cow Case Confirmed in Central California, USDA Says – Bloomberg
  so much for exports to china?
• Apple’s Chinese iPhone Sales “Mind-Boggling,” Bring China Revenues To $7.9B | TechCrunch
  imagine what they wold be if they launch a low cost iphone4 when the iphone5 launches. as long as iphone5 looks different they could keep the cache while massively growing handset and iOS share here.
• Why Jon Huntsman is leaving the GOP (not because they’re Communists) – Yahoo! News
  For what it’s worth, I don’t think Huntsman was painting with a brush so broad as to compare the Republican Party with Communist China. For one thing, Huntsman is not yet under house arrest with his Internet access forbidden.But here’s what the dust-up missed. If you take all of what he said to me over some 90 minutes, it is all but certain that Jon Huntsman is not going to be a Republican much longer.
• 中央高层频赴天津考察会见张高丽_多维新闻网
  【多维新闻】继4月12日政、军、警三个高规则团体同一日高调赴天津考察后，4月23日，中组部副部长李智勇一行赴天津考察，称中组部支持天津创新人才发展体制机制。近期，天津被中共各部门高层频频亲临考察，其密集程度少见，其中或折射出某些政治含义，引起媒体注意。
• 重庆公益广告牌“卸红” 将回归商业轨道_多维新闻网

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