Posts Tagged ‘China’
Written by admin on 12 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 12 (IANS) With prisoners in Beijing jails allowed to meet family members in reward for good behaviour, they can now even place orders online for meals they want to share with their loved ones.
Feng Jiancang, head of the Human Rights in Justice office at the Institute for Crime Prevention under the ministry of justice, said the system of ordering online meals frees up more time for the inmates to meet their families.
Inmates can also use the system to buy goods in prison supermarkets, now available in all prisons in the city, Xinhua reported.
Last year, the ministry lifted bans on homosexuality, dyed hair and other lifestyles and practices that were previously not allowed in prisons.
Tags: Beijing, , China
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Written by admin on 12 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 12 (IANS) Leaders of both China and India believe there is enough space in the world for the common development of both countries, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei said Wednesday.
Hong said at a regular press briefing that cooperative areas are also sufficient for the world’s two largest developing countries, Xinhua reported.
Hong made the remarks in response to India’s External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid’s recent comments on India-China relations.
According to media reports, Khurshid said earlier this week that as China and India convert their relationship into a meaningful partnership, India will have to accept the new reality of China’s presence in areas that India considers to be exclusive to India and its friends.
Khurshid said greater collaboration between India and China will define Asia’s role in the 21st century.
According to Hong, sustainable, stable and healthy China-India ties will not only benefit both peoples but will also help to maintain peace, stability and prosperity in Asia and the world at large.
He said China is willing to work with India so as to implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries and engage in developing a bilateral strategic and cooperative partnership featuring equality, mutual trust and cooperation.
Tags: Beijing, , China
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Written by admin on 12 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 12 (IANS) Chinese metropolis Guangzhou is now handing out 10,000 yuan in cash to car owners who purchase vehicles powered by new, alternative energy sources.
Out of 17,880 new licence plates approved by the government in the populated southern city, over 1,200 are earmarked for “green cars”, the People’s Daily reported.
However, car sellers said the cash incentive was still not enough to lure buyers.
“On an average, we sell two to three cars per month, but altogether we have only sold 10 green cars so far. Not that many,” said Yu Weitao, a sales consultant.
Some of the main challenges customers face are price and support facilities.
He, a Guangzhou resident, said new energy cars were “pretty expensive”, and refilling petrol and recharging electricity “are big problems now”.
In Shenzhen, a city down south from Guangzhou, a new green car is being sold at 170,000 yuan. Buyers are also entitled to 80,000 yuan worth of subsidy, putting the car price at only 90,000 yuan.
Tags: Beijing, , China
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Written by admin on 12 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 12 (IANS) Chinese authorities are investigating a kindergarten after the school launched its so-called “hug fee”, asking parents to cough up money for their children to get hugs from teachers.
Parents were being asked to pay the fee so that their children at the Jiangdu District Shangmao Kindergarten are hugged by teachers when they arrive in the morning and again when they leave, the Shanghai Daily reported.
The school in Yangzhou city charged 80 yuan ($12) per month per child for the hug.
News about the hug charges was posted online, and parents were told by teachers that hugging will put their children in a good mood.
The kindergarten explained that the service was part of a “quality education trial” to show that children feel loved and have their confidence raised when they receive hugs from teachers.
But local education authorities said such a practice violates rules and the kindergarten should return the money to parents.
Tags: Beijing, China
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Written by admin on 12 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 12 (IANS) A man in China has been sentenced to death for killing a provincial legislator with a poisonous herb dubbed “heartbreak grass” after stealing large amounts of money from the victim.
Huang Guang, a former deputy head of an agricultural office in Yangchun of Guangdong province, was convicted of both fraud and murder, the Shanghai Daily reported.
A court ruled that Huang decided to kill Long Liyuan, after swindling around 1.4 million yuan from Long, who headed a wood processing company.
Long went to lunch with Huang and a friend to a restaurant Dec 23, 2011, when Huang asked the owner of the restaurant to prepare cat meat soup and sneaked into the kitchen, where he put gelsemium elegan, a poisonous herb also known as “heartbreak grass” into the soup.
He soaked the toxic herbs for a few minutes and threw them away.
Long said the soup tasted bitter, but Huang persuaded him to eat it saying it might have been made with extra Chinese medicines or that the gallbladder of the cat was torn.
All three, including Huang himself, ate the cat meat soup and began to throw up.
Long, who ate more than the other two, died, and Huang and the other man survived after medical treatment.
Tags: Beijing, , China
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Written by admin on 12 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 12 (IANS) A woman in China hired hitmen to kill her multi-millionaire businessman husband after he allegedly subjected her to domestic abuse, a Chinese daily said Wednesday.
Police in central China’s Hubei province said the 44-year-old woman, surnamed Yang, promised to pay two men one million yuan ($160,000) to murder her husband, also 44, the Shanghai Daily reported.
The men were caught on surveillance cameras entering the husband’s art gallery in Yichang city Nov 25 and leaving just two minutes later.
A gallery employee found the businessman, surnamed Wang, the next morning dead. His throat was found slashed.
There were no signs of a robbery and none of the paintings in the gallery was touched.
Police found that Wang had asked his wife for a divorce but she refused as she suspected he had a mistress and was unwilling to divide the family assets despite the alleged domestic violence she claimed to have suffered.
Tags: Beijing, , China
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Written by admin on 12 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 12 (IANS) Ten people, including a woman, were arrested in China Wednesday for spreading rumours about the end of the world, and asking people to join a cult to survive the apocalypse.
Four people were held on charges of disturbing public order as they spread the doomsday rumours on the streets of Fuzhou, capital of Fujian province, the Shanghai Daily reported.
In Quanzhou city in the same province, six people were detained for cheating innocent people of money using the doomsday excuse.
The four in Fuzhou were accused of distributing pink leaflets, saying doomsday was near.
They also handed out red dates and walnuts, as their Chinese pronunciation sounds like “escape in time”, police said.
The accused also invited people to write down their names, phone numbers and addresses on a so-called “Life Book” to sign up as member of their cult.
Police said they were from an organisation that paid them to attract new members.
Around 34 middle-aged women were also held for spreading rumours in public.
Tags: Beijing, , China
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Written by admin on 12 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 12 (IANS) A Chinese man has been jailed after he was found guilty of kidnapping an official in a bid to demolish a public toilet built in front of his house.
The accused held the deputy head of a county captive for 10 hours, the China Daily reported Wednesday.
Zhang Xiaowei, who kidnapped Li Yibo, deputy head of Yunhe county in Zhejiang province, was also fined 30,000 yuan.
In May, Zhang held Li captive in a room at the compound of the Communist party’s county office, and demanded that the government demolish a toilet built in front of his house.
Police stormed the room and freed Li before subduing Zhang.
Zhang’s lawyer said the act did not constitute kidnapping but was rather an illegal detention for petitioning.
Two years ago, Zhang was sentenced to two years in prison after being found guilty of putting up posters on government buildings against the authorities.
Zhang was Tuesday sentenced to 11 years in prison, but said he will appeal to a higher court.
Tags: Beijing, China
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Written by admin on 10 December 2012
Hangzhou (China), Dec 10 (IANS) Top seed Xu Xin and defending champion Liu Shiwen won the men’s and women’s singles titles, respectively, at the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) World Tour Grand Finals here.
Xu, 22, won Sunday’s final against Wang Hao in four straight games 11-8, 11-7, 11-6, 11-7 avenging his defeat that he suffered a year ago at the hands of Wang at the quarter-finals stage in London, Xinhua reports.
It is Xu’s first major title of his career. He collected $104,000 for this milestone victory, and Wang earned $52,000.
Liu retained the women’s crown beating compatriot Ding Ning in the championship match.
Liu recovered from a two game deficit to record a 9-11, 7-11, 11-9, 11-1, 11-7 win at the Zhejiang Huanglong Sports Center.
In the women’s doubles final, Singapore’s Feng Tianwei and Yu Mengyu, who qualified for the year-ending tournament after Romanian pair Daniela Dodean and Elizabeta Samara pulled out, defeated second-seeded Cheng I-Ching and Huang Yi-Hua of Chinese Taipei 11-13, 11-13, 11-8, 11-4, 11-3, 5-11, 11-2.
Tags: China, Hangzhou
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Written by admin on 10 December 2012
Hangzhou (China), Dec 10 (IANS) Top seed Xu Xin won the men’s singles title at the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) World Tour Grand Finals here, beating Chinese teammate Wang Hao.
Xu, 22, won the Sunday’s final in four straight games (11-8, 11-7, 11-6, 11-7) and thus reversed the decision of one year ago when he had suffered defeat at the hands of Wang Hao at the quarter-final stage in London, Xinhua reports.
It is Xu’s first major title of his career. He collected $104,000 for this milestone victory, and Wang Hao earned $52,000.
In the women’s doubles final, Singapore’s Feng Tianwei and Yu Mengyu, who qualified for the year-ending tournament only after Romanian pair Daniela Dodean and Elizabeta Samara pulled out, defeated second-seeded Cheng I-Ching and Huang Yi-Hua of Chinese Taipei 11-13, 11-13, 11-8, 11-4, 11-3, 5-11, 11-2.
Tags: China, Hangzhou
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Written by admin on 10 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 10 (IANS) A Tibetan student died Sunday after she set herself on fire in northwest China’s Qinghai province, authorities said Monday.
The 16-year old girl who was studying at a minority school in Zekog county in the Huangnan Tibetan autonomous prefecture. She set herself ablaze around 6.50 p.m. in the village of Dageri, said authorities.
Teams have been sent to the village to investigate the incident, reported Xinhua.
The Tibetan autonomous prefecture of Huangnan has a population of 257,000 people, about 68 percent of whom are Tibetans.
Tags: Beijing, China
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Written by admin on 10 December 2012
Beijing, Dec 10 (IANS) It is unfair to force a literary idealist like Nobel Laureate Mo Yan to talk about China’s freedom of speech or human rights, a Chinese daily said Monday.
“The Nobel Prize for literature should not be a political device that the West uses to attack China,” the Global Times article said.
Mo Yan, winner of 2012 Nobel Prize laureate in Literature, attended the awards ceremony in Stockholm last week.
“However, discussion about him seems to focus on politics rather than literature.
“People should stop pressing Mo. He has already faced many questions he would have preferred to avoid,” said the daily.
The daily said that many expected Mo to talk about politics. “This is a sad day for literature. It seems that literature is worth nothing if it does not serve a political master”.
The daily said that Mo’s work represents a milestone, not only because he won the Nobel Prize for Literature, but also because his prize represents a breakthrough for tolerance and mutual respect between China’s reality and Western values.
“In the past, it was those opposed to China’s system who have won the Nobel Prize. The decisions made by the Nobel Committees often have political aspects. They seem to have become the bargaining chip that the West uses to confront China,” it added.
It went on to say that after Mo won the prize, “many forces wanted to use him as political leverage”.
“It is not that Mo’s victory has nothing to do with politics. An influential event must have embedded political meaning,” said the daily.
Mo’s behaviour after his victory shows that he would like to minimize the political influence of his prize.
“It is unfair to force a literary idealist to talk about China’s freedom of speech or human rights. The Nobel Prize for Literature should not be a political device that the West uses to attack China.
“Unexpectedly, Mo has become a window through which the world sees China,” said the article.
Tags: Beijing, China
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