Human Rights Blighting China's Future

Sick and tired of having do-gooders like Europe and America slamming the terrible human rights record in China, China has once again pointed out that only Chinese people can really attack the terrible human rights record in China.  If they're not already in jail for doing so that is.

Yesterday was, of course, International Human Rights Day, according to the UN General Assembly.  You'd think that with their recent appointment to the UN Human Rights Council, China would've at least started to pull their punches when it  come to be dishing out beatings to the poor folks that trek to Beijing to file petitions against corrupt officials, and other grievances they might have.  Not so, according to a retired army officer, Gao Hongyi, who went to Beijing's UN offices.

"After I got there, the place was packed with people and large numbers of police," Henan petitioner Shi Yuhong told RFA's Cantonese Service. "We were all put onto buses and taken to the holding centers," he said. "I was put on the 47th bus [to Jiujingzhuang detention center]," he said.

So everything's going well in that department, then.  Fearful that Chinese people would criticise the Chinese stance on human rights, the authorities went even further, making sure that no one at the train stations wouldn't get a chance to file their petitions, or make their opinions heard on what was supposed to be a day of building awareness about human rights violations.

They detained a few more people near the southern railway station in Beijing," said a petitioner surnamed Liu from the northeastern province of Jilin. "A lot of people are planning to head up to the UN at Liangmaqiao and the new premises of China Central Television to call for better human rights," Liu said.

"I saw a lot of police and their vehicles by the southern railway station," he added. "They treat petitioners as the enemy."

All of this is, of course, par for the course, when it comes to dealing with complaints made by the little people in China, it doesn't say much for a government which claims to have fought a revolution in the name of the rural poor.  Over the past year, censorship and suppression of protestors have increased, ranging from high profile arrests of troublemakers on Weibo to the quiet detentions of activists placed under house arrest.  Treatment of minorities in places like Xinjiang have gone from bad to worse, with arbitrary executions taking place without due process or supervision.

China treads a fine line between presenting itself as a modern, rising economy and superpower, but the actual mechanics underneath the shock and awe PR haven't changed since tanks were ordered to clear Tiananmen Square.  Despite the best efforts of the Chinese government, they just can't get away from the thuggish tactics that haven't worked in the past, and continue to blight China's future.

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Chinese Declare Internet Victory

If you've every wondered what your dad would sound like if he was put in charge of cleaning all the porn off the Interwebs then take a look at what Ren Xianliang had to say when his office issued forth a proclamation that the Internet is now like Disneyland, with barely a bad word to say about the CCP.

A study by an Internet opinion monitoring service under the party-owned People's Daily newspaper showed the number of posts by a sample of 100 opinion leaders declined by nearly 25 percent and were overtaken by posts from government microblog accounts.

Using his Jedi powers, Zhu Huaxin, general secretary of an Internet opinion monitoring service (such a thing does exist, apparently) weighed in, assuring us that positive energy (The Party) has regained control of the Intertubes, defeating negative powers (everyone else on planet Earth).

"The positive force on the Internet has preliminarily taken back the microphone, and the positive energy has overwhelmed the negative energy to uphold the online justice,"

The impressive statistics mean nothing, as was pointed out by a number of overseas analysts.  The mere fact that people aren't stupid enough to go public with their dissenting views means that they're being unpatriotic on more secure platforms, being driven underground and ultimately radicalised.  But then, the politicians in Beijing have already thought of that, right...?

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One Child Policy Reform Already Boosting Stock

In the opposite way that the dearth of copulating couples in Japan is having a crippling effect on the kiddie entertainment industry, a number of companies that cater for kids have seen their stock rise, giving the Hang Seng is biggest boost in two years.

One of the biggest problems has been that the retiring elderly don't have enough of the younger generation to take over their jobs.  The size of the retiring population prompted analysts to predict that there would be a drop of 3.25% of China's annual growth rate.  While the uneven population demographics have made China look like a developed country, China has little in the way of most developed countries social welfare, which, you can imagine isn't a good thing to have happen.

Writing on a blog post for China Gaze, Kirsten Korosec of Smart Planet also pointed out

The country’s one-child policy initially provided an economic boost. China’s working age population rose in the past 20 years, pushing up incomes and productivity as young people headed into cities to work in factories. But the share of working-age folks has since declined and is expected to fall between 2010 and 2030 nearly as fast as in Japan, the U.S. and other developed, rich nations.

Not awesome.  The good news is that as younger couples become wealthier, they are more inclined to have a second child should the reforms go through.  Of 26,000 Weibo users surveyed, the vast majority responded that they would have more children, law permitting, some of the responses to the proposed reform were pretty lukewarm, citing rising living costs and the raging property bubble as other worries to consider when thinking about becoming a parent.

 

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Sandra Bullock: Diplomat

Studio execs have been dribbling over the prospect that Gravity might just make everyone in Hollywoodland gajillionaires in China.  Projected revenues for the China release alone stand, at worst, at $60m, it stands to reason then that when the Chinese distributors wanted to have a chat with it's leading lady, on Ms. Sandra "there's a bomb on the bus" Bullock, the erstwhile producers didn't see much of a problem.

Ingratiating herself with the Chinese bean counters in Beijing, everything was going smoothly, until it came to an awkward moment when an invitation to visit China was extended to the starlet.  Gracefully declining as only she could, citing her demanding shooting schedule for the next couple of years, the short conversation proceeded quite cordially.  Until, that is, Ms. Bullock mistook a momentarily silent line to mean that the other party had hung up, whereupon she took the opportunity to confide to an aide that "at least now I don't have to visit fucking China.".

Hopefully the gaffe won't affect the box office performance, and the producers have a large fruit basket winging it's way to the offices at The Film Bureau.

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Chinese Press Control: You Can't Have Your Cake and Eat It.

The biggest mystery behind China's repeated attacks on foreign media has always been why do they bother?  It's understandable that the BBC's Chinese language news service would be blocked, as well as other overseas Chinese news sites, but to block an English language site seems pretty pointless.

Joshua Keating at Slate makes the point that state-controlled media in China vastly out-numbers foreign news sources, and that Chinese people aren't too bothered about reading news in English anyway.   Any trip down any street in Beijing will take you past a newspaper vendor who seems to have an unimaginably wide range of publications.  In spite of efforts to improve the levels of English literacy in the country, there's still a relatively small proportion of the Chinese population that is actually able to read English news site without the aid of a dictionary.

So what's the deal with wailing on foreign press?

Bloomberg Accused of Killing China Report

Making money in China ultimately means that at some point, you're going to have to kiss some serious ass.  If you're a news site you really have to knuckle under.  Get down on all fours and seriously lick boot.  The CCP are in charge around here, and they're used to getting all their own way.  Putting the frighteners on the foreign reporting community by administering a few sound beatings (back in the good old days) has given way to denied visa applications and the occasional website block as a surefire way of making sure that hacks think twice before following up a lead.

China rattles it's visa sabre just to remind all the foreign devils who write nasty stories about all those Mao-fearing politicians.  If you really piss someone off, your website gets blocked.  Pavlovian system of punishment and reward has meant that ISPs and websites do a lot of self-censorship to keep the Politburo happy.  Occasionally bulletins from the Ministry remind journos who exactly is in charge, but by and large, the censorship machine hums along quite nicely all by itself.

The problem is getting foreigners on board.  Foreign journalists have all sorts of righteous beliefs concerning the freedom of the press and serving the public interest, and other related nonsensica.  The New York Times and Bloomberg have paid the price for publishing non too flattering pieces about the upper echelons of Chinese government.

In an effort to get it's groove back in China, and prevent it's Beijing bureau from being forced to close, accusations have surfaced that senior editors at Bloomberg quashed a story that linked Wang Jianlin with the relatives of top government officials in Beijing.  Bloomberg have flat out denied that the story was dropped because of it's already precarious position in China.  Editor-in-Chief Matthew Winkler was adamant that there was no threat from the Chinese government that they would kick Bloomberg out of China if they ran the piece.  

“The reporting as presented to me was not ready for publication,” Mr Winkler told the Financial Times, adding that Laurie Hays, a senior editor, and other top editors agreed with that assessment.

The person familiar with the discussions dismissed Bloomberg’s comments that the story was not ready for publication, saying it had been approved and just needed a Chinese government response. “We had crossed the Rubicon,” the person said. “The story was fully edited, fact checked and vetted by the lawyers.”

Kowtowing through gritted teeth has become par for the course in Hollywood, who are more that happy to insert a couple of ingratiating yet completely irrelevant pro-China scenes in their movies.  If the allegations are true that the Bloomberg killed a report purely based purely on speculation that the Chinese wouldn't like it, they may as well just shut up shop anyway.

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Mainlanders are Locusts Even At Home

When a group of well meaning Hong Kongers took exception to the behaivour of certain mainland Chinese people acting like mainland Chinese people (i.e., doing whatever the hell they liked despite numerous public signs saying "don't do whatever the hell you like") they took out an ad in a newspaper that branded Mainlanders "locusts".

Whoever runs the official Beijing Subway Weibo account got pretty miffed at people leaving sunflower seed husks and endless flyers for real estate agents lying around the carriages, posting a particularly nasty message:

Beijing Subway V: #Civilization hand in hand with you# [Subway civilization discussion]  The Line 10 is scattered about in mess after “locusts” have left. The capital city of Beijing is well praised for its tolerance, but sometimes is also criticized for its over-tolerance. For those that intentionally destroy Capital Beijing with bad behaviors, what we can say is only that You are not welcome!

The ever touchy Chinese netizens descended on the tweet like....er....um....in their hundreds, taking exception to the word "locusts".

脱线的胖子：You are disqualified to choose the object of service as a public service provider.

Humpy：Locust, although used in a pair of quotation mark, is still an extreme insult to compatriots. You can not conduct personal attack at the passengers even if they behave badly. We ask Beijing subway authority to apologize to the public and punish those responsible.

张修茂：Beijing Subway is wrong if they refer locusts to strangers and migrants, but uncivilized behaviors should be condemned.

带上柳岩去日本：Is there any trash bin in the carriages?

 

As the writers of the original report at HugChina pointed out, there'll probably be nothing like the outrage that erupted after Jimmy Kimmel's "kill all the Chinese" skit.

Mosque Raid Linked to Tian'anmen Crash

Asia Times Online postulates on the credible connection between a police raid on a mosque in Xinjiang and the car crash in Beijing last week.

The driver of the car Usmen Hesen who was killed along with his wife and mother had quite vocally declared his intentions to seek revenge for the raid on his local mosque after police tore down the courtyard that Hesen had contributed a large portion of the funds to.  The police in  Yengi Aymaq village in Xinjiang's Akto county had declared the courtyard an illegal extension and tore it down when they raided the mosque exactly a year before the car attack in Tian'anmen.

Hesen made the speech as he told the mosque community to stand down after they argued with the armed police.
"At that time, Usmen Hesen jumped in and persuaded the community to disperse by saying, 'Today they have won and we have lost because they are carrying guns and we have nothing, but don't worry, one day we will do something ourselves'," Turdi said.

In a masterstroke of obfuscation, the local authorities had said that even though building permits had been successfully applied for and the 200,000rmb mosque, an amount that took three years to raise, the proper paperwork for the extension and courtyard (another 30,000 kuai) hadn't been completed properly and was therefore illegal.  Bloody red tape, eh? 

Hesen made the speech as he told the mosque community to stand down after they argued with the armed police.

"At that time, Usmen Hesen jumped in and persuaded the community to disperse by saying, 'Today they have won and we have lost because they are carrying guns and we have nothing, but don't worry, one day we will do something ourselves'," Turdi said.

"As Usmen Hesen finished his emotional speech, [his mother] Kuwanhan Reyim went to him crying, and hugged and kissed his forehead because of her pride in him. The crowd was also moved to tears and retreated."

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China's 8-Year-Old Lung Cancer Girl

With a 56% rise in lung cancer rates in a mere nine years, it can't be argued that the air quality in most of China is bad for you.  Horror stories have trickled out of the mainland, but none quite like the latest: an eight year girl being treated for lung cancer.  Proof, if proof were needed, that living next to a busy main road in Jiangsu and spending most of your time breathing in air that only slightly cleaner than an airport smoking lounge is actually not helping your lungs.

Politicians in the country have been adamant about blaming other things, from the Chinese "style" of cooking to the exhaust fumes of the millions of cars on the road - in fact anything that didn't include factories and coal fired electricity generators.

At the end of last month, Fang Li, deputy head of the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau said  "Beijing is an open city. All social forces will be mobilized and international advanced technologies and enterprises are welcome," when he announced that the city plans to invest 1 trillion RMB into cleaning up the air.  Whether those plans involve punishing factories that illegally pollute and routinely escape punishment because of the guanxi that their CEO has is another matter entirely.

 

Military Commander of Xinjiang Removed From Post

The terrorist attack in Beijing last week has left egg on the face of the Chinese security, and, predictably, it's time for some heads to roll.  First on the chopping block is General Peng Yong, who was appointed the military chief for Xinjiang, which presumably spearheaded the spate of shootings and executions of ethnic Uighurs in September.  The report in Chinese press didn't go into details, but Peng's dismissal is rather more than coincidental.

Despite waging his own terroristic war on terror, attackers were till able to load up on gallons of petrol and crash an SUV into a major tourist attraction.  Beijing has pointed the finger at Islamic extremists, further demonising Xinjiang Muslims in an effort to paint them not as downtrodden masses who get routinely shat upon by the Han Chinese.

The attack is a blessing when it comes to getting excuses to ramp up the persecution of otherwise innocent Uighurs, since the propaganda offensive that alleged that "terrorist elements" in the region were being fuelled by Syrian rebel Muslims.  The Syrian connection being that China is interested in brokering a oil deal with Assad, and hellbent on making sure that the Americans don't get anywhere near it.

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China Defends Human Rights Record: Eight Key Points

Points that the Chinese Special Envoy to the United Nations would like to make in relation to the human rights situation in the People's Republic of China.

1.  Anyone we've thrown in jailed on trumped up charges has never complained about their human rights being violated.  Even when we've threatened to break their legs.

2. We honestly didn't think you'd find out.

3.  Weren't the Olympics great?  The one that was in Beijing we mean.  We got sooooo many gold medals, do you remember?

4.  I mean seriously, Chinese human rights is still a thing?  You sandal-wearing UN hippies need to change the bloody record.

5.  It's all just a problem of you whities not understanding our culture.  In China, aborting babies at 8 months is an ancient practice that goes back tens of years (sometimes less than that), and is often performed out of sincere respect for the family by the local family planning officer/veterinarian.

6.  To prevent more Tibetan protestors setting themselves on fire, we've introduced several new revisions to the national "no smoking" initiative.

7.  No-one has been brutally shot down in their tracks or crushed under an M1 Tank since at least 1989.  If that's not progress, we don't know what is.

8.  Two monks were crossing a bridge one day.  The first monk said "The cherry blossoms have arrived early this year.".  The second monk said "yes, but I'm quite tall.".

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Administration of Foreign Experts Asks: Why Aren't You A Chinese Citizen?

Foreigners around the country were asked by the State-Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs to give their answers to a few questions as to why they would or wouldn't apply for permanent residence in China.

Despite the fact that Chinese passports rank fourth from bottom in a survey of 30 countries (just above Iran), the delightful folks at the administration failed to include questions related to "perceived crappiness of holding a Chinese passport", or indeed questions about Internet censorship, media censorship, the poor quality of the air, the dubious quality of almost everything you eat, etc, ad naseum.

Questions that were deemed important enough to warrant a mention included:

1、您是否愿意申请在中国永久居留(Would you like to apply for permanent residence in China)？

• A、是(Yes)


• B、否(No)


• C、没有考虑过(Have not considered)

2、您是否了解申请在中国永久居留的条件要求(Do you understand the conditions of foreigners to apply for permanent residence in China)？

• A、是(Yes)


• B、否(No)

3、哪些因素会对你申请在中国永久居留产生影响（可多选）(What factors will affect your application for permanent residence in China（could select multiply）)？

• A、出入境免签证更为便利(being more convenient for visa-free entry and exit)


• B、社会稳定、人民友善(social stability and friendly people)


• C、可以享受国民待遇(national treatment)


• D、工作、生活有归属感(a sense of identity in working and living in China)


• E、更好的事业发展机会(better career development opportunities)


• F、清晰明确的申请条件和流程(clear and specific application condition and procedures)


• 其他，请补充(others, please specify)

Full of Hot PM2.5

Worried that attending the APEC Summit in Beijing next year would warrant the use of face masks and Hazmat suits, Zhao Huimin was grilled over the plans to curb air pollution in the city at the end of this year's meet up.  Under pressure to clean up the air ahead of the 2014 summit, Zhao put his foot right in it when he suggested in a TV interview that Chinese cooking might be responsible for pushing levels of PM2.5 up to levels far too dangerous to even look at, let alone breathe.

Not wanting to give away how much money is being apportioned to the project to reduce air pollution, Zhao simply said that more money was being spent than during the Olympics (a mere five years ago).  Confident that Beijing's more "mature" guidelines concerning air pollution would be in place by 2014, a brief glance over Zhao's career suggests that he might not be the best person for the job.

Last summer, Zhao was the guest of honor at the much ballyhooed Foreign Language Festival, were plans were announced to remove signs and menus written in Chinglish in a an effort to make Beijing at least look like "a more international city".  A year later, not much has changed, despite Zhao's office publishing "local standards for English translation of public signs, menus, organization names and official positions".

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Party Official "Couldn't Stop" Three Day Wedding

An investigation has been launched into a deputy village chief from the Beijing suburb of Qingheying after it was reported that his son's wedding lasted for three days, and cost somewhere in the region of 1.6m RMB.

Stating that he was "well aware" of the Party's rules concerning lavish overspending on exactly this type of celebration, Ma Linxiang said that the bride's family paid for the epic wedding party, and that he couldn't stop them.  Ma admits that he spent 200,000 Yuan on a party that lasted two days in his village, but the one on Beijing was hosted at a convention centre at the Olympic village and included a couple of celebrities, and a troupe of performers.  When asked about the fleet of luxury cars involved, Ma said that they were just "borrowed" for the occasion.

The investigation continues.

Jiang Jiemin Removed From Post; Key Removals and Appointments

The State Council has announced that Jiang Jiemin will be removed from his post as the head of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission.

Jiang has been under investigation for serious "suspected serious disciplinary violation" the investigation was seen as the first move against old timer Zhou "The Bulldog" Yangkong,

"Jiang is considered the head of the 'oil faction' and a lead protege of former Communist Party Politburo Standing Committee member Zhou Yongkang in the oil system. His downfall adds further suspicion to rumours in the outside world about Zhou Yongkang being in trouble."

The investigation into Zhou that had been agreed by the Politburo earlier in the month, fell apart when it came out that ol' Zhou was merely helping the police with their enquiries, rather then target of an investigation.

In addition to axe falling on Jiang, a number of new token appointments have been made:

Wang Wenbin was appointed SASAC deputy director, replacing Shao Ning; Shi Yaobin was appointed vice minister of finance, replacing Li Yong; Chen Shixin was appointed World Bank executive director for China, replacing Yang Shaolin.

Ning Jizhe was appointed the head of the Research Office of the State Council; Wang Shouwen, Wang Bingnan and Zhang Xiangchen were appointed assistant commerce ministers; Fu Zhenghua, incumbent head of Beijing's Public Security Bureau, was appointed vice minister of public security.

 

 

 

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Charles Xue: Arrested for Prostitution, Confesses to Spreading Rumors Online

Charles Xue, the venture capitalist arrested earlier this month for prostitution, has appeared on Chinese TV confessing to the heinous crime of spreading rumors online.  While it hasn't been made especially clear why he's confessed to something that he never was arrested for, the state broadcaster is typically making an example of the unfortunate Xue, who is also known as Xue Manzi.

Commanding an online following of nearly 12 million on Weibo, Xue said that "My irresponsibility in spreading information online was a vent of negative mood, and was a neglect of the social mainstream," adding that "freedom of speech cannot override the law.".  Of course, when freedom of speech is technically written into the law, as it is in the Chinese constitution, it's become increasingly clear as the Big V crackdown continues unabated that there's no such thing in practice.

Under new legislation, if a rumor, say something like "Xi Jin Ping smokes the big one" gets viewed 5000 times, or reposted 500 times a potential maximum sentence of three years in jail can be bestowed upon the guilty party.  There's no word yet on what the punishment would be for anything, with, say 499 retweets, or 4999 visits.

Confessions made by arrested perps are a useful tool in reinforcing the idea that the Chinese police know what the hell they're doing.  The recent parading on TV of detained foreign businessmen confessing to what Chinese businessmen get away with before they've had their coffee in the morning is a relatively new development.  Along with the new laws regarding online behavior, legal experts have said that the confessions broadcast live to the nation make a mockery of the already pisspoor Chinese legal system.

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