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Danish queen visits Nanjing memorial hall

Queen of Denmark Margrethe II became the first sitting head of state to visit the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Hall on April 27.

Observers said the visit also underscored support from Denmark, one of the victims of World War II.

She said the hall recorded the darkest history of the city, and although history cannot be changed, lessons can be learned to face the future.

The hall commemorates more than 300,000 Chinese killed by Japanese soldiers after they occupied the city, then the Chinese capital, on Dec 13, 1937.

Inside the memorial hall, the queen and her husband, Prince Consort Henrik of Denmark, visited the corridor adorned with photographs depicting Bernhard Sindberg, a Dane who helped save up to 20,000 Chinese during the massacre that lasted for 107 days.

Sindberg, along with German colleague Karl Gunther, established a camp for Chinese inside the Jiangnan Cement Factory, run by a Danish firm. They also set up a small field hospital for the wounded and tried to provide food and other supplies to the refugees.

Xi calls for anti-terror tools in Xinjiang

President Xi Jinping has urged police officers in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region to devise "effective ways" to deal with terrorists.

"I care very much about your equipment and training. It is necessary that you have effective methods to handle violent and terrorist criminals," Xi was quoted by Xinhua News Agency as telling officers at a police station on April 28 in the westernmost border region of Kashgar, home to more than 4.3 million people from 47 ethnic groups.

"The training must simulate real combat. Sweat more in peacetime to bleed less in wartime," he added. "The Kashgar region is the front line in antiterrorist efforts and maintaining social stability, the situation is grim and complicated. Grassroots police stations are 'fists and daggers' so you must spare no efforts in serving the people and safeguarding public security."

Xi began an inspection tour of Xinjiang on Sunday, his first visit to the region since becoming the top leader in November 2012.

Li urges China, US to tread with care

Premier Li Keqiang urged China and the US on April 29 to handle disagreements and friction carefully for mutual benefit and regional peace and stability.

He made the remarks during a meeting with former US treasury secretary Timothy Geithner, a close adviser to US President Barack Obama.

Obama arrived in the Philippines on April 28, the final stop on his four-country Asian visit. Hours before his visit, the two countries signed a defense agreement, giving US forces temporary access to selected bases and allowing the US to base fighter jets and ships in the Philippines.

Li told Geithner that China and the US should stick to a vision of "no conflict, no confrontation, mutual respect, and win-win cooperation" that their leaders had agreed to in The Hague.

Answering questions about the relationship between reform and economic expansion, Li said China's deepened reform and opening-up will broaden bilateral trade and economic cooperation.

Public-car misuse tops violations

Misuse of government vehicles was the top violation out of 174 cases of corrupt officials who were punished in the previous week, the country's top anti-graft agency announced on April 28.

Disciplinary authorities nationwide found that government vehicles had been misused in 33 cases, according to the Communist Party of China Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.

Also, 244 officials were punished for various misbehavior, including violating the frugality rules, sightseeing at public expense and drinking alcohol during lunch breaks on workdays, according to the anti-graft agency.

Of those cases, 23 involved officials giving illegal subsidies to civil servants, 20 related to officials playing mahjong or shopping online during work time, and 10 showed officials were late for work.

The officials' names and titles were publicized on the commission's website. So far, 719 cases have been exposed on the website since April 8.

Violators were given penalties that included warnings, administrative demerits and even removal from posts.

'Roof of the world' connected with power

The base camp of Qomolangma, at an altitude of 5,200 meters on the world's highest mountain, has had access to reliable electricity supply since early April, according to the Tibet Branch of the State Grid.

More than 1,000 households in 21 towns near the camp now have electricity thanks to a two-year project.

The project ran 85 km of power lines at an average altitude of more than 5,000 meters, where the oxygen level is less than half that in lower areas.

The move is expected to end electricity shortages and a reliance on intermittent solar power and generators at the base camp of Qomolangma, known as Mount Everest in the West, and tourists and climbers will enjoy more convenient services.

"With access to stable electricity, it is more convenient for climbers to use computers, the Internet and recharge cell phones," said Tsering Wangmo, a mountaineer on the Tibet Mountaineering Team.

Located on the "roof of the world" with a history that goes back more than a century, the Rongbo Monastery is the world's highest.

Joint college to offer international courses

The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, received approval from the Guangdong provincial government on April 28 to open its doors to students.

The new university is a joint venture between the Chinese University of Hong Kong and Shenzhen University and is located in Shenzhen, Guangdong province.

The Ministry of Education gave its stamp of approval on March 21, a year and a half after preparatory work for the university began.

It will be one of the few universities in China to adopt an international-based curriculum in the mold of New York University Shanghai, a joint program between the New York-based institution and East China Normal University, located in Shanghai.

Peng Peng, a senior researcher at the Guangzhou Academy of Social Sciences, said CUHK Shenzhen would combine the resources from the two universities.

Tweaks to policy to tackle slowdown

Policy fine-tuning was proposed on April 25 to prevent the economy from slowing further after top decision-makers reviewed economic performance in the first quarter.

There is no need to change current fiscal and monetary policies, because growth is still within the targeted range, according to a meeting of China's core leadership chaired by President Xi Jinping.

Despite a slowdown, economic performance in the first three months also featured a relatively good job market, low inflation and balanced trade. There were also positive structural changes, according to a communique from the meeting.

New tasks were proposed in five broad areas to help the economy avoid uncertainties and downward pressure on growth, it said.

China's GDP rose by 7.4 percent year-on-year in the first quarter, compared with the government's annual target of 7.5 percent. Some economists predict that growth in the second quarter could be lower still.

Among the new tasks, the top leadership pledged "greater support to the real economy", including good procurement prices for farm products, a rational increase in money supply, and fewer restrictions on small and micro-sized enterprises.

Search for MH370 to enter new phase

The search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 is commencing a new phase and will transit to an intensified undersea search over the coming weeks, the Joint Agency Coordination Center said on April 30.

The submarine drone Bluefin-21, which has completed a total of 16 search missions scouring the 314-square-kilometer area around the detections made by the Towed Pinger Locator, will continue to search adjacent areas, the Perth-based search coordination center said.

"Mission 17 will commence when weather conditions improve allowing Bluefin-21 to be safely launched from Australian Defence Vessel Ocean Shield," the center said.

The statement said Ocean Shield would remain on station supporting Bluefin-21 search activity and a Royal Australian Air Force AP-3C Orion also remains on standby in Perth.

It said other vessels and aircraft that have been engaged in the surface and aerial search will transit to their respective national tasking in the coming days.

As to a report which says an Australian exploration company GeoResonance has found something in the Bay of Bengal that may related to the missing plane, the center responded that the Australian-led search is relying on information from satellite and other data to determine the missing aircraft's location. The location specified by the GeoResonance report is not within the search arc derived from this data.

Economic belt to drive development westward

Premier Li Keqiang promised on April 28 to help a group of 11 provincial-level entities into the largest development network in China, an economic belt along the 1,800-kilometer "golden waterway" of the Yangtze River.

It was a logical step to use the Yangtze to connect relatively developed East China with Central and West China, Li said.

From the coastal financial center of Shanghai to the central China business center of Wuhan and to the nation's largest municipality of Chongqing in western China, the proposed Yangtze economic belt would cover one-fifth of China's territory and have a population of about 580 million.

Li discussed the plan with leaders from the 11 municipalities and provinces in Chongqing on April 28, and he believes it will generate a powerful driving force for the nation's next round of economic development.

The 11 provincial level entities in the proposed economic belt are Shanghai and Chongqing municipalities, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou provinces.

Another recently proposed cross-region integration plan covers Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei province in North China.

Patent mechanism needs to be upgraded

Patent mechanisms in China need to be upgraded with foreign expertise, amid a growing demand for international intellectual property services from domestic enterprises, experts said.

The number of patent applications, the demand for legal support, and intellectual property consultation in various sectors has soared in recent years, inspired by the central government's call to develop intellectual property strategies.

But the development also poses challenges to the country's immature patent services, they said.

The State Intellectual Property Office said China has 1,001 patent agencies and 8,861 professional practicing agents registered under the office. The entire patent agency industry generated income of more than 8.7 billion yuan ($1.4 billion), including application and managing fees last year.

There is still room for the industry to thrive, as lots of IP-related services have not yet been fully developed in China, said He Hua, the deputy director of the office.

China received 825,000 invention patent applications last year, a 26.3 percent increase year-on-year. The 2.38 million patent applications filed were the highest in the world for the third consecutive year, the office said earlier this month.

Industrial profits rebound in March

Thanks to robust profit growth in information technology and the automotive industry, China's industrial profits in March rebounded, though many industries are still in the doldrums.

Profit generated from major industrial enterprises with annual revenue of more than 20 million yuan ($3.2 million, 2.3 million euros) reported a 10.7 percent year-on-year growth in March, according to the National Bureau of Statistics on April 27, a strong rebound from the 9.4 percent growth in January and February.

March's figure pulled first-quarter industrial profits up to 1.29 trillion yuan, up 10.1 percent from a year earlier.

However, the profit was concentrated in a few industries, while most industries' profit grew little or even declined.

Five industries - automotive, power generation and supply, electrical and mechanical machinery, nonferrous metals and information technology products - contributed nearly 80 percent of the 41 industrial sectors' total profit, the NBS said.

For example, the information technology product sector's profit surged strongly from the first two months' 14.1 percent year-on-year loss to 63.42 percent growth in March, pulling overall industries across all sectors up by 3.3 percentage points.

In absolute terms, the automotive and power industries contributed the most profit.

The automotive industry's strong profit was driven by robust demand, as car sales in the first quarter grew 9.2 percent over a year ago, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers.

Harsher air pollution penalties sought

Lawmakers are seeking harsher punishment for air polluters in China, amid increasing demand from the public for cleaner air.

Lawmakers should speed up efforts to expand the punishment of those who illegally discharge air pollutants, said Shen Yueyue, vice-chairwoman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, on April 26.

Shen made the remarks during a seminar on the revision of the law on air pollution prevention and control. Lawmakers from provincial people's congresses attended the seminar, organized by the Environment and Resources Protection Committee of the NPC.

The NPC Standing Committee plans to revise the air pollution law later this year. The law, adopted in 1987, has been revised twice, in 1995 and 2000.

Ji Zhenhai, a lawmaker in the Hebei Provincial People's Congress, said that the current law is too lenient with air polluters and the revision should focus on increasing punishment.

"Only when businesses pay a heavy price for polluting the air will they become more self-driven to abide by the law," Ji said, adding that the revised law should further specify punitive measures to accelerate law enforcement.

Foreign experts honored for education

Ten foreign workers were named on April 27 as Foreign Experts with Exceptional Contributions to China's education.

One of those, Pedro Nueno, president of China Europe International Business School, said he was glad that China was so welcoming to people who come to implement their ideas and dreams.

"I feel a lot of gratitude to China for being so generous to me," he said. "It's fantastic to receive the award."

The 10 foreign experts were selected by International Talent Exchange magazine and the China Society for Research on International Professional Personnel Exchange and Development from among 60 foreign experts in culture and education.

The judging panel recognized Spanish expert Nueno for his exceptional contribution to management education in China, especially for his efforts to improve the international level and academic standards of CEIBS, a world-renowned Asian business school co-founded by Nueno in 1994.

China Daily-Xinhua

(China Daily European Weekly 05/02/2014 page2)