China Reform Monitor: No. 951

February 11:

In the run-up to Russia’s presidential election, the internet has been awash with political video clips. The latest hit video entitled “Russia With No Putin? Apocalypse Tomorrow!” posted on YouTube by Vladimir Putin supporters claims that with Putin gone by 2013, China will take over the Russian far east and “establish administrations in Irkutsk, Chita, Blagoveshchensk and Khabarovsk.” About two minutes and fifty seconds into the video is footage of a simulated Chinese military invasion including a map with Chinese flags planted in Amur Oblast, the Jewish Autonomous Oblast, and Khabarovsk Krai regions. The film plays heavily on the fears of outside invasion and western interference in Russia’s internal affairs.

February 12:

Two Chinese patrol vessels were spotted in the East China Sea sailing near the Japan-controlled Senkaku or Diaoyu Islands, which China also claims, Japan’s Kyodo News Agency reports. The ships left about 30 minutes after entering the zone, though they never broached Japan's territorial waters. When Japan’s Coast Guard radioed the ships to inquire about their intentions, the Chinese responded that they were engaging in ordinary patrol activities. Last year, nine Chinese vessels entered the waters near the Diaoyu Islands; this was the second time this year that Chinese patrol ships have been spotted there, the first being on January 14.

President Hu Jintao has cancelled a meeting in Beijing with representatives of seven Japanese groups that promote friendship with China because he is unhappy with Tokyo’s plan to name uninhabited isles near the disputed Senkaku Islands. The meeting was set to kick off a series of events to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the normalization of bilateral relations. The Japan Times reports that Hu decided to cancel the planned meeting because “the military is against the Japanese government’s plan to name uninhabited islands.” An opinion piece published last month in the official People’s Daily said Japan’s naming the islands “is a blatant move to damage China's core interests.” Relations between Japan and China have deteriorated to their lowest point in years after Japan arrested the captain of a Chinese trawler following a collision with Japanese patrol vessels near the Senkaku Islands in September 2010.

February 14:

China’s State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) has announced that foreign TV shows will no longer be aired from 7:30 to 10:00pm. Foreign TV series also cannot run longer than 50 episodes and should comprise “no more than 25% of programming each day,” according to the decree. Local TV channels are not allowed to show too many programs from one particular region, the regulator said, without further explanation. All foreign shows must be approved and cannot have violent or vulgar content. Stations that violate the new rules face “severe punishments,” the BBC reports. The rules are part of a series of new regulations on TV programming.

February 16:

Heilongjiang’s 2011 trade with Russia was $18.99 billion, a 154 percent increase over 2010 levels, the official China Daily reports. Heilongjiang-Russia trade represented 24 percent of total bilateral trade between the two countries. In January the province’s foreign trade reached $2.45 billion, with Russia making up 67 percent of that total. Heilongjiang shares a 3,000km border with Russia, that includes 25 trade ports. China and Russia aim to increase their bilateral trade to $100 billion by 2015, and to $200 billion by 2020.

February 17:

Chinese police have cracked two major drug trafficking cases in Yunnan and seized 12 suspects, including two from Myanmar. Six suspects were caught with 27 kg of methamphetamine and a gun in Fengqing, Yunnan. In a second case, another six suspects, five in Dali, Yunnan and another in Lanzhou, Gansu were apprehended with 20 kg of heroin. China has a zero-tolerance approach to drugs. Smugglers, dealers, transporters and manufacturers caught with more than 1 kg of opium or more than 50 grams of heroin or methamphetamine can be sentenced to 15 years in jail, life imprisonment, or death.