May 3:
“The Kremlin fears China’s fast growing expansion in Siberia and the Far East, but does not know what to do with the Asian part of Russia and is gradually yielding,” according to an article entitled “Chinese Offensive” published by Russia’s Politcom.ru. Russia’s weakness in the region will sooner or later force “concessions” to China or “joint development of Far East and Siberian resources,” according to the report. “As the Chinese population and investment in the region increases it is becoming culturally and economically closer to China than it is to the rest of Russia. But China is not yet ready to present official claims to Russia for these territories.” The article calls for Moscow improve the region’s transportation and its attractiveness for Russians to resettle there. “Russia’s leadership must explain why land and riches are being farmed out to foreigners, and why this is being managed by Moscow, and not the local authorities.”
[Editor’s Note: On April 28 the China-Russia Trade and Economic Forum took place in Moscow and was led by Chinese Vice Premier Li Keqiang and Russian Vice Premier Igor Shuvalov. It resulted in the signing of 27 bilateral agreements on investments and cooperation worth about $15 billion. The agreements support increased Chinese investment in Siberia and the Far East.]
May 5:
After the latest health and safety inspection tour, six hundred school cafeterias have been fined and/or had their licenses revoked and more than 20,000 have been ordered to eliminate food safety hazards, according to statement issued by China’s State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA). To prevent food poisoning in the warmer months and ensure the implementation of a government order to ensure food safety, the SFDA and the Ministry of Education will conduct new inspections from May to the end of June, the official People’s Daily reports. Despite the overhaul of 130,000 school cafeterias since the end of March, schools reported a series of food poisoning cases last month raising fears among Chinese students and parents.
May 7:
Restrictions on foreign journalists in China have tightened over the last 18 months, the New York Times reports. The crackdown began in early 2011, when security officers detained foreign journalists covering the so- called Jasmine Spring protests, an online call for demonstrations sympathetic to the Arab Spring revolutions in the Middle East. One American journalist was beaten and hospitalized and others were warned by public security. Last week, Beijing security officials harassed foreign journalists reporting on Chen Guangcheng, the blind lawyer who fled house arrest to seek refuge in the U.S. Embassy. Officers temporarily confiscated the id cards of journalists who entered the Beijing hospital to see Mr. Chen. About a dozen others were called to the public security bureau and warned that their visas would be revoked if they did not ask permission before interviewing officials and others knowledgeable about Mr. Chen’s situation.
May 8:
After the downfall of Chongqing party chief Bo Xilai, the Communist Party of China (CPC) is considering putting off its 18th Party Congress until winter. Reuters reports that the congress, which is held every five years, may be delayed amid internal debate over the size and makeup of the the Politburo Standing Committee. President Hu Jintao’s allies want the party’s top decision-making body cut to seven members, of which they would likely hold a majority, and others want it expanded to 11 to accommodate rival factions. The delay would shorten the new leaders’ transition period to between two and four months before they take office in March 2013 – compared with up to six months if the congress convenes on schedule this fall. The new CPC leadership will likely be decided this summer when CPC leaders and elders hold their annual retreat at Beidaihe to discuss personnel and policy.
For the first time in 14 years China has forced a foreign news agency to shut its bureau. Al Jazeera, the satellite network based in Doha, Qatar, has closed its English-language channel after Beijing refused normally routine requests to renew the press credentials of Melissa Chan, the network’s Chinese-American correspondent or to allow another correspondent to replace her. “This is the most extreme example of a recent pattern of using journalist visas in an attempt to censor and intimidate foreign correspondents in China,” the Beijing-based Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China stated in comments carried by The Guardian. Officials were angered by a documentary on China’s forced labor camps that Al Jazeera broadcast in November that called the camps a form of slavery in which millions of prisoners produced goods sold worldwide. In March, Ms. Chan filmed the inside of one of China’s so-called ‘black jails,’ unofficial prisons where dissidents and petitioners are regularly held without due process.
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