"Sinocism is the Presidential Daily Brief for China hands"- Evan Osnos, New Yorker Correspondent and National Book Award Winner
Today’s Links:
THE ESSENTIAL EIGHT
Cultural reflection can improve modern governance: Xi – Xinhua at Politburo study session // Xi argued that ancient ideologies still have deep influence on people nowadays, and they should be scientifically analyzed so as to inherit and promote the good parts and discard the negative elements. “The absolutistic attitude of accepting or dismissing them completely is out of the question,” he told his audience. According to Xi, Chinese traditional cultures represent the country’s most profound soft power, and Chinese people should never forget their pasts or belittle themselves. “A country’s governing system and capacity are closely related to its heritage and traditional cultures, and the answers to China’s issues must be found in our own land,” Xi said, adding that the socialist path with Chinese characteristics is determined by cultural and historical factors.
Related: 习近平:
Related: 卜憲群_研究人員_中心概況_
LIVE: Hundreds of police use chainsaws to remove all barriers on Queensway | South China Morning Post Hundreds of police with power tools tore down protesters’ reinforcements on Queensway in Admiralty this morning, following a swiftly executed dawn operation to remove a number of barricades in Causeway Bay. In Tseung Kwan O, anti-Occupy protesters defied a court order and once again blocked the entrances to the Apple Daily newspaper headquarters, delaying the paper’s delivery for a second day.
Related: Hong Kong Protesters Reinforce Barriers After Rivals Try to Demolish Them – NYTimes.com Monday began with attempts to tear down the barriers around the Hong Kong protesters’ main camp. It ended with supporters of the protest movement swarming onto downtown streets and helping to erect stronger barriers. Bankers, builders, engineers and smartly dressed office workers were among the surge of people who gathered deep into the night to keep the police from squeezing the student-led protests out of the three major areas of the city they have clogged for two weeks.
Related: A battle for the streets: clashes between Occupy activists and opponents intensify | South China Morning Post Eddie Ng Yip-pui, director of the Taxi Drivers and Operators Association, admitted the association had mobilised about 200 taxi drivers and their relatives to disturb the Admiralty sit-in. Ng said they wanted to express their grievances about business losses caused by the occupation. He denied they were paid, contrary to a media report that accused the cabbies of receiving HK$2,000 each to protest.
Russia signs deals with China to help weather sanctions | Reuters The 38 deals, signed on a visit to Moscow by Premier Li Keqiang, allow for deeper cooperation on energy and a currency swap worth 150 billion yuan ($25 billion) intended partly to reduce the sway of the U.S. dollar.
Related: Chinese lenders grow wary of Russia – FT.com “If you expect us to rush in and do everything the European and American banks can’t do any more, you will be disappointed,” said an official at Bank of China in Moscow. “We want to develop our Russia business, but we have to consider the risks as well.” A western executive in the energy industry said: “There is strong anxiety on the Russian side: the Chinese are very reluctant to give them money at the moment.”
Related: Putin Deals China Winning Hand as Sanctions Power Rival – Bloomberg Isolated over Ukraine, Russia is relying on China for the investment it needs to avert a recession, three people involved in policy planning said, asking not to be identified discussing internal matters. This means caving in to pressure to grant China privileged access to the two things it wants most: raw materials and advanced weapons, two of the people said.
Party paper hits out at foreign firms, alleging widespread tax avoidance | South China Morning Post In almost a full page of coverage yesterday, including a report and a signed commentary, the newspaper said foreign corporations were funnelling away real profits. The commentary said tax-avoiding practices by some multinationals had deprived the nation of enormous revenue, even though they had taken advantage of its labour, land, resources, and huge market.
Maid in Hong Kong Fights for Justice Against Abuser – WSJ Hong Kong is home to hundreds of thousands of women from Indonesia and the Philippines who work as “helpers” in pursuit of meager wealth. They are an indispensable part of the city’s vibrant economy and society. But incidents of abuse often stay hidden from public view. Follow one woman’s tale as she seeks to put her life back together after a horrific crime.
集体何往_专题频道_财新网 Caixin cover story this week on future of collective ownership // 30多年来，改革渐入深水区，对集体所有制的改革也渐次突破。
Top Abe adviser dispatched for secret talks in China between Fukuda, Xi – AJW by The Asahi Shimbun but on Monday Chinese media were running reports citing Japanese media saying that Abe would not agree to China’s conditions for a summit–admission of a territorial dispute over the Diaoyu/Senkakus and a promise to not visit Yasukuni Shrine // A top national security adviser to the Abe administration joined in when former Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda met secretly with Chinese President Xi Jinping in China in July, according to diplomatic sources. This marks the first disclosure of the attendance of Shotaro Yachi, adviser to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and chief of the newly established National Security Secretariat, at the meeting. The revelation indicates that Japan and China have begun high-level talks to explore holding a summit to b
依法治国 全民共识（对话价值观（8）·法治篇）–时政–
BUSINESS, ECONOMY AND TRADE
China slaps resource tax on coal industry | Business Spectator The Ministry of Finance said on Saturday that the country would allow provincial authorities to set their own resources tax according to their local situation after considering the tax burden on companies and their level of reserves. “The coal resources tax range will be between 2 per cent and 10 per cent with the specific tax rates to be set by provincial level finance and tax departments,” the Ministry of Finance and the State Administration of Taxation said in statements posted on their websites, “provincial governments need to submit their proposed tax rates for final approval.”
Beijing Finds Agreement With IMF About Slowing China – Bloomberg The slowing momentum in the Chinese economy is being seen as positive rather than alarming. Moderating growth will make it more sustainable, which will benefit both China and Asia, Malaysia’s Central Bank Governor Zeti Akhtar Aziz said in an interview with Bloomberg News on the weekend. The balance between expansion and structural reforms that China is seeking is right so far, Markus Rodlauer, deputy director of IMF’s Asia Pacific Department, said at an Oct. 10 briefing. “China’s slowdown is a healthy correction, in many ways an engineered slowdown,” Jorge Mariscal, Chief Investment Officer for Emerging Markets at UBS AG, said in an interview in Washington on the weekend. “So far, this rate of decline of the economy isn’t so concerning to justify a very aggressive stimulus program, whether fiscal or monetary.”
Rationing of China ETFs Hits U.S. Market as Demand Soars – Bloomberg In the span of five days last month, the U.S.-based exchange-traded fund pulled in $130 million, sending assets surging by 33 percent to $515 million and nearly exhausting its Chinese government-imposed A-share purchasing quota. Managers were forced to get creative. They limited new creations and borrowed quota from another fund to avoid closing the year-old ETF to inflows and keep a potentially disruptive premium to underlying assets from developing. Their dilemma highlights what’s likely to become an increasingly common predicament as fund providers from BlackRock Inc. to CSOP Asset Management Ltd. look to follow suit and open up China’s more than $4 trillion A-shares market to U.S. ETF investors.
China Nickel Depletion Fuels LME Stockpile Growth, Norilsk Says – Bloomberg Record nickel stockpiles monitored by the London Metal Exchange mask a balanced market as supplies were shifted out of China after a financing scandal, according to OAO GMK Norilsk Nickel (MNOD), the world’s largest producer. As much as 100,000 metric tons of the industrial metal may have been shipped to LME warehouses after banks tightened rules on loan collateral, according to Anton Berlin, head of strategic marketing at Norilsk. Lenders stopped accepting warrants from China after Qingdao port warehouses issued documents backed by more metal than they held.
Default Risk Alert as Li Shakes Local Safety Net: China Credit – Bloomberg “These steps show the central government is really serious about handling the debt,” said Zhang Yingjie, Beijing-based deputy general manager of research at China Chengxin International Credit Rating Co., a Moody’s Investors Service joint venture. “Sovereign credit was overdrawn in an opaque financing system, but from now on, the responsible parties will be clearly stated.”
China closing in on affordable housing target – Xinhua By the end of September, the country had started construction on 7.2 million affordable housing units, slightly above the seven million target set for the whole year, while 4.7 million had been basically completed, accounting for 98 percent of the annual target, according to a statement from the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development. Altogether, 1.07 trillion yuan (174 billion U.S. dollars) has been invested in the program this year, the ministry said.
Alibaba targets rural expansion with major investment – Xinhua Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group plans to invest 10 billion yuan (1.6 billion U.S. dollars) within three to five years to build thousands of facilities in rural China to tap rising demand in these areas, it announced on Monday. The facilities will include 1,000 “county operational centers” and 100,000 “village service stations” and will see Alibaba’s network extend to one third of China’s counties and one sixth of its rural areas. The centers will focus on improving logistics services and cultivating more buyers and sellers in rural areas.
Fake Invoice Doubts Revived as China Trade Skyrockets – Bloomberg “Signs of distortion might have re-emerged in the trade data,” Xu Gao, chief economist at Everbright Securities, said in a note yesterday. “If policy makers overestimate external demand due to these fake trade figures and reduce the efforts to stabilize growth domestically, the outlook for the economy will be very worrying.” Xu, who formerly worked at the World Bank, pointed out the surge in exports included shipments of precious metals, which have been at the center of dodgy invoicing in the past. Government policies to support exports “seem to have stimulated fake exports instead,” he said.
China to scrap mortgage fees for some home loans: state media | Reuters The government will exempt notarial, guarantee and mortgage insurance fees as well as valuation charges for new and existing homes that are financed by the government housing provident fund, the state owned Xinhua news agency said on its official Weibo microblog.
China Sept vehicle sales growth slowest in 19 months | Reuters China’s September auto sales rose 2.5 percent from a year earlier, its slowest pace in 19 months, dragged down by sluggish sales of commercial vehicles such as trucks, an industry association said on Monday.
中金公司总裁朱云来离职|中金公司|朱云来_凤凰资讯 Levi
POLITICS AND LAW
Party Detains Two Senior Officials for Corruption – Caixin He did not complete the Ph.D. degree and went on to pursue a career in government after 1986. He had since worked with the central government’s former research office of political system reform, a state-owned enterprise (Huaxing Group) and the supervisory committee of strategic SOEs under the State Council, the country’s cabinet. He also briefly worked as the deputy mayor of Wuxi in the coastal province of Jiangsu. From September 1999 to January 2001, he was selected by the party’s personnel department to study at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. // can be the quite reunion in prison for these Amway-Kennedy fellows…
【山西贪官录】之一：令政策往事_政经频道_财新网
China Detains Legal Activist Guo Yushan – WSJ A dozen or so police and state security officers took Guo Yushan from his home in a Beijing suburb early Thursday morning, his wife Pan Haixia said Sunday. “They came in with a warrant and took a lot of things as evidence, his computer, his iPhone, iPad and some hard drives,” Ms. Pan said. The detention notice later given to the family said that he had been detained on suspicion of “picking quarrels” — a crime used in the prosecution of dozens of activists in recent years, according to a copy of the notice his lawyers posted online Saturday.
Even More Than Usual, China Clamps Down on Dissent – NYTimes.com It is not clear what prompted his detention, but Mr. Guo could simply be the latest victim of a wide-ranging crackdown on dissent that has picked up steam since pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong began a campaign of civil disobedience two weeks ago. More than 50 people have been detained across China this month, including 10 people in Beijing who last week attended a private poetry reading, disrupted by the police, that was billed as an expression of solidarity with the protesters in Hong Kong.
Book Ban Rumors Boost Authors in China – China Real Time Report – WSJ The General Administration of Press, Publications, Radio, Film and Television — China’s media regulator — didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment. Two major bookstores in Beijing, however, said they had received no orders relating to any of the authors and were continuing to sell the books they had in stock. Mr. Xu, one of the allegedly blacklisted authors, told China Real Time he had only seen the rumors online and didn’t know whether his books were banned. Regardless whether a ban was actually in force, some enterprising booksellers are already hoping to cash in. Chinese online retailer Dangdang.com set up a special promotional page on its website offering discounts on works by Messrs. Mao, Xu, Yu and Leung.
‘People’s democratic dictatorship’ wrongly targeted – Global Times The rule of law is the only path toward accomplishing China’s political reform and social construction, and it has won high support from all walks of life. However, some people are still calling for so-called constitutionalism with ulterior motives to replace the rule of law. Their advocacy is not accepted by mainstream ideology, and the ongoing debates over class struggle and people’s democratic dictatorship could probably be their sideline struggles for constitutionalism. The people’s democratic dictatorship is one of China’s conventional political concepts. As the key element that determines the nature of China’s state system, it is still applicable to Chinese society. But the heavy influx of new concepts and utterances has dramatically changed the public discourse, and these conventional concepts need to be interpreted in different ways so that the general public can better understand their meanings.
12 sentenced to death over Xinjiang violence – Global Times A court in Xinjiang’s Kashgar on Monday sentenced 12 people to death for organizing terrorist attacks that killed 37 civilians in Shache County on July 28. Those sentenced to death included Osman Ablet, Yuwup Ablet and Jume Qadir. According to the court, Osman Ablet joined the terrorist group led by Nur Memet, who police shot dead during the attack, and slashed at passing drivers with a knife, killing three. Yuwup Ablet also joined the group and killed five people while Jume Qadir smashed cars and killed two.
新疆和田女警被暴徒袭击身亡 已有2月身孕(图)_新闻_腾讯网 police officer in Hotan killed by two attackers, was two months pregant // 10月10日午时，
人民日报客户端：中央反腐对四类干部越查越严–时政–人民网
茅台酒大幅降价 酒瓶回收无人问津_产经_中证网 Moutai prices still dropping, demand has nearly dried up for use bottles and packaging (which are useful for creating counterfeit Moutai)
富家子为证明自己有能力赚钱贩毒品进京被拘_网易新闻中心-
中纪委网站刊文：官员退休等于平安着陆的美梦该醒了_凤凰资讯
FOREIGN AND DEFENSE AFFAIRS
China military training inadequate for winning a war: army paper | Reuters China’s military authority has sent a document to military units detailing 40 weaknesses in current training methods, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Daily said in a front-page story. “These problems reflect shortcomings and weak-points in the makeup of our military fighting force. If they are not promptly dealt with, then they will certainly affect and hinder our army’s ability to go to war,” the paper said, citing the PLA general staff headquarters
党指挥枪的真理不是天上掉下来的，是打出来的！ – 中国军网 党指挥枪，强军之魂在风雨中铸牢 ——新形势下坚持党对军队绝对领导的新闻调查
Germany calls arrest of news assistant in China ‘worrying’ | Top News | Reuters targeting news assistants a very effective way to limit reporting abilities of many Western journalists in China. Surprised there is not an outright, enforced ban on Chinese nationals working in these jobs // Germany expressed concern on Friday about the arrest in Beijing last week of a Chinese woman who was working as a news assistant for German weekly Die Zeit and had helped the publication report on protests in Hong Kong.
外交部回应德媒在华“雇员”被捕：依法依规_网易新闻中心 Di
Booming Chinese frontier town reveals growing Russian ties – and old divide | World news | The Guardian Manzhouli is thriving as China sucks in Russian raw materials and exports its consumer goods, but mutual distrust persists
HONG KONG, MACAO AND TAIWAN
中联办主任张晓明：占中是政治斗争_香港-多维新闻网
Triads infiltrated camps of Occupy supporters and detractors, say police | South China Morning Post Multiple sources blamed various factions of the Wo Shing Wo triad for the Mong Kok disorder. It was aided by the Sun Yee On triad, which sent its members to provoke trouble and lead the crowd to challenge police officers trying to maintain order. Of the October 3 chaos, one police source said: “They split into two groups, but most of them posed as supporters of Occupy students. This group wore yellow ribbons and mixed with protesters, while the other donned blue ribbons and mingled with Occupy opponents.
Hong Kong’s Pan Democrats Must Accept China’s Constitutional Powers – NYTimes.com This conflict stems from the unwillingness on the part of the Pan Democrats to accept the constitutional powers of the People’s Republic of China, which are enshrined in the Basic Law. Most of the people of Hong Kong, including those demonstrating in the streets at this moment, accept Chinese sovereignty, but not enough have read the Basic Law. Shiu Sin-por is head of the Central Policy Unit of the government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.
TECH AND MEDIA
Intel gains a new ally in China’s chip wars – Beijing | Reuters “We’ve entered an inflection point where government policy has started to work – it’s started to help the local semiconductor industry,” said Nomura analyst Leping Huang. The deal hashed out by Intel Corp Chief Executive Brian Krzanich over 24 hours in Beijing in early August extends Intel’s beachhead in China, the biggest battleground in the smartphone industry, and boosts the company’s years-long effort to catch up to leading mobile chipmaker Qualcomm Inc. A key visit during the trip was to Yang Xueshan, the deputy chief of China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), who gave his blessing for the deal.
Meet the Man Who Made ‘The Voice’ a Hit in China The third season of The Voice of China racked up more than 100 million downloads within the first 15 hours of its premiere in July on the Tencent online platform and has topped the ratings every Friday night this season, attracting up to 6.1 million viewers. “Star China is thrilled with the success of the third season of The Voice of China, our best season ever,” Star China CEO Ming Tian tells THR. That success is all Star’s to enjoy. At the start of the year, the investment fund China Media Capital bought out the remaining 47 percent of Star TV held by Rupert Murdoch’s Fox to become sole owner of the channel. The Voice isn’t Star’s only hit. The company’s other shows include China’s Got Talent and a local take on So You Think You Can Dance.
China Mobile to invest 10.4 bln yuan in new media arm China Mobile Ltd. (00941.HK) plans to inject 10.4 billion yuan (US$1.69 billion) into a new-media arm over the next three years, Tencent Tech news website reported Tuesday. Migu Culture & Technology Group Co. Ltd., expected to start operations in January 2015, will integrate China Mobile’s new media operations including music, video, reading, mobile games and cartoons into a single platform.
Tmall announces global free delivery promotion – Xinhua Tmall International, Alibaba’s platform that provides commodities produced or sold in overseas markets, announced on Monday that it will offer free delivery worldwide for products ordered on Nov. 11, an annual day of online shopping promotions in China.
SOCIETY, ART, SPORTS, CULTURE AND HISTORY
10月11日，贵州省黔东南苗族侗族自治州三穗县，农民、学生、
Study Finds Migrant Workers Excluded from Insurance Coverage – Caixin The majority of migrant workers do not receive social insurance provisions, said a report released by a joint team of researchers from Hong Kong Polytechnic University and Peking University published on October 11. China’s laws stipulate that employers must pay into five social insurance systems, which include pensions, unemployment, maternity leave and sickness and injury insurance. Around 96 percent of migrant workers had healthcare insurance, but only 30 percent of migrant workers were eligible for benefits, said the report. Researchers faulted limited training on social insurance among workers for the lack of access to benefits.
Experts point to poverty, illiteracy, injustice as keys to cults’ ongoing attraction – Global Times Phoenix Weekly // The popularity of homegrown pseudo-Christian cults in rural China is sparking discussions on why they are particularly attractive for farmers. Experts say that cults attract rural believers by promising them worldly benefits, deceptive practices, and taking advantage of the doomsday beliefs to let farmers vent their anger and frustration at modern society.
齐白石弟子许麟庐巨额遗产案今日宣判_新闻_腾讯网 stude
ENERGY, ENVIRONMENT, SCIENCE AND HEALTH
Inside a Chinese Military Hospital – Health Intel Asia When you hear “military hospital” you probably don’t think of a high-end hotel. But that’s exactly what some military hospitals in China look like. And their level of service is absolutely top-shelf.
Q. and A.: James E. Garvey on Chinese Solutions for America’s Carp Problem – NYTimes.com James E. Garvey, vice chancellor for research at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, recently visited China as part of a project researching the Yangtze and Mississippi rivers, including a look at the Asian carp present in both. In an interview, he discussed how Asian carp became such a headache in the United States, what can be learned from China’s long experience with the fish and whether there’s hope for eating away the problem:
Tencent Leads US$100M Investment in Chinese Medical Service Guahao – TechNode Guahao.com, an online medical service provider, today announced over US$100 million of funding, led by Tencent. Guahao’s Weiyi mobile apps, which connect patients and doctors,will be integrated into Tencent’s mobile apps, WeChat and Mobile QQ, according to the announcement.
河南淅川40万人因南水北调动迁 老人：不能渴北京_新闻_腾讯网 China Times looks at some of the 400,000 people in Henan moved to make way for the south-north Water Diversion Project
Skeptic Offers Huge Reward to Debunk Traditional Chinese Medicine | TheNanfang For all the claims traditional Chinese medicine makes, it’s said to have the practical ability of determining whether a woman is pregnant just by feeling the prospective mother’s pulse. This has become a point of contention for a popular Chinese doctor of Western medicine who has issued a RMB 50,000 reward to anyone who can prove he is wrong in saying “Chinese medicine is a fake science”.
环保部点名批评河北应对雾霾不力_国内_新京报网 Minist
AGRICULTURE
Once a Symbol of Power, Farming Now an Economic Drag in China – NYTimes.com More is at stake than the socialist credentials of the Communist Party, which came to power in a peasant revolution in 1949 and immediately collectivized farmland. State ownership of land is also a major source of government revenue. In areas near cities, local officials often rezone agricultural land and flip it to developers at a huge premium, sometimes setting off violent protests by residents who are left out. Others see the system of political control of the countryside at stake. “The rural system they’ve had since the 1950s is based on the state ownership of land,” said Fred Gale, who writes an influential blog on China’s agricultural sector called Dim Sums. “If this unravels, then the bureaucrats would be at a loss as to how to manage the countryside.”
BEIJING
China Approves $3.25 Billion Universal Theme Park in Beijing in Tongzhou // The overall investment in the theme park will be more than 20 billion yuan ($3.26 billion) after initial expectations of $2 billion. It will be built on a 300-acre site initially, before adding additional phases to expand to a 1,000-acre park over time, the company said at a launch ceremony in a Beijing hotel. There had been widespread local media speculation about the theme park, which will be the biggest park Universal has ever done. Local media has reported that it will open in 2019
追问北京地铁公交调价：如何购票？怎样收费？_国内_新京报网
JOBS AND EVENTS
CHINA Town Hall | NCUSCR–Webcast The eighth annual CHINA Town Hall will be held on October 16, 2014. The National Committee is pleased to present this program, which will feature a live webcast with Jimmy Carter, 39th president of the United States, as part of the Conversations at The Carter Center speaker series, followed by local presentations from on-site China specialists addressing topics of particular interest to the community