Vacant affordable housing shames local leaders

THE NATIONAL AUDIT Office recently disclosed that over 30,000 affordable houses in Guiyang, Southwest China's Guizhou province, have been uninhabited for two years because there is no water or electricity supply or road link. The local officials responsible for this waste of resources should be held accountable, says Beijing News:

Primary school teachers should get higher pay

DUE TO A GENDER imbalance among local primary school teachers, the educational authorities in Southeast China's Fujian province offered 500 male high school graduates free college education to become teachers. This is not a good solution to the gender imbalance among primary school teachers, says Southern Metropolis Daily:

Hot words

Greater say in global governance

Cartoon

Path to carbon pricing for a green world

World leaders will meet in Paris to negotiate a new climate change agreement. To date, 150 countries have submitted plans detailing how they will move their economies along a more resilient low-carbon trajectory. These plans represent the first generation of investments to be made in order to build a competitive future without the dangerous levels of carbon dioxide emissions that are now driving global warming.

Use a site's real strengths to draw tourists

After premiering in mid-September, TV series Nirvana in Fire, or Langya Bang in Chinese, has become very popular among Chinese viewers. But this is not surprising because Langya Bang could also mean "The Rankings of Langya", for which Anhui, Jiangsu and Shandong provinces had been competing with each other. The competition has temporarily ended with Chuzhou city in Anhui renaming the "Huifeng Pavilion" in the Mount Langya scenic area "Langya Pavilion".

'Dual-track' approach for better ASEAN ties

Just a few days after President Xi Jinping returned from the APEC economic leaders' meeting in Manila, Premier Li Keqiang attended the 18th China-ASEAN (10+1) Summit, the 18th ASEAN Plus Three (10+3) Summit and the 10th East Asia Summit in Kuala Lumpur.

A hard question to answer in the Belgian capital

Last Wednesday, after I had returned from covering the G20 summit in Antalya, Turkey, I was sitting at the table eating break fast with my son, aged 11, when he told me that the uncle of one of his classmates had been killed in the Paris attacks on Nov 13.

Robotics to get 5-year push

China is close to complete a five-year development plan for home-made robots industry, multiple sources said on Friday. The ambitious plan aims to more than double the market share of made-in-China robots to 50 percent by 2020.

Tencent to expand WeChat's reach

Tencent Holdings Ltd is expanding its WeChat mobile payment system to stores in more than 20 countries to tap into the growing purchasing power of Chinese outbound tourists.

IN BRIEF (Page 8)

Healthy surge in M&A deals

'Shadow stocks' surge in anticipation of floats

Stocks related in some manner to the forthcoming initial public offerings surged in Chinese stock markets on Friday, some by the 10 percent daily trading limit.