Innholdsfortegnelse for Vol. 60/No. 13 i Beijing Review

The adoption of the General Provisions of the Civil Law at the Fifth Session of the 12th National People’s Congress, China’s top legislature, on March 15 marked a milestone in the rule of law in the country. China urgently needs a civil code which incorporates laws on property, contract, tort liability, marriage and inheritance to suit its contemporary society. The General Provisions, the opening chapter of the long-awaited civil code, contain provisions on a wide range of issues from ecological conservation to property protection and the guardianship system. It outlines the basic principles and general rules of the civil law. The new law is based on the General Principles of the Civil Law adopted in 1986, which were partly revised in 2009. The General Provisions deleted outdated provisions of the…

Comments to zhouxiaoyan@bjreview.com Cao Dewang, President of China’s autoglass titan Fuyao Group, increased investment in the United States in 2016 and later made remarks about China’s manufacturing industry being overtaxed, sparking a month-long controversy on China’s tax system. In recent years, the media has often reported on foreign businesses that have withdrawn from or reduced their investment in China. Rumor has it that China’s investment environment is deteriorating. A detailed analysis of the statistics in this year’s Government Work Report will show us whether China’s investment environment has really deteriorated or not. Let the figures speak To start with, China’s global rank in foreign investment and its business environment has soared. Statistics show that China has been second only to the U.S. in terms of inbound and outbound investments for…

The General Provisions of the Civil Law were adopted at the Fifth Session of the 12th National People’s Congress on March 15. It will take effect on October 1. The civil law regulates personal and property relationships between civil subjects with equal status, that is, between natural persons, legal persons and unincorporated organizations. The decision to compile a civil code by 2020 was made by the central leadership in 2014. The civil code was planned to be developed in two steps: 1 Adopting the basic principles for regulating civil activities 2 Compiling five individual books, respectively on: Highlights: 1 The interests of fetuses are protected. Article 16: A fetus is deemed to have capacity for civil conduct in cases involving inheritance, acceptance of gift and the protection of its interests.…

Comments to liuyunyun@bjreview.com In 2003, China and the European Union (EU) established a comprehensive strategic partnership based on their consensus on a multipolar world. A window of opportunity that accords with this vision has recently emerged. With Donald Trump becoming U.S. president, many nations are concerned about the direction the world seems to be taking, while China and the EU are finding they have more in common than they thought. Recently, Chinese and European leaders have met on several occasions and exchanged views over current world affairs. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke by phone in January, and French Prime Minister Bernard Cazeneuve and Italian President Sergio Mattarella paid official visits to China in February. Free trade, multilateralism and global governance became key words in top…

Comments to zanjifang@bjreview.com When she was 12, Cai Qun and her elder sister were sent out by their impoverished family from their village in southwest China’s Guizhou Province to earn a living. The two girls walked for more than 100 km on tortuous mountains routes to reach provincial capital Guiyang, where they became scavengers to survive. They lived in a rotting wooden shack, becoming drenched to the skin whenever it rained. They ate whatever they could salvage from garbage bins. However, the hardship steeled her and ignited an aspiration for a happy life. During the Fifth Session of the 12th National People’s Congress (NPC) in Beijing in March, Cai, now a NPC deputy, talked to the media about those days of hardship and how she managed to build a new…

Comments to zhouxiaoyan@bjreview.com The U.S. Federal Reserve raised the target overnight interest rate by 25 basis points to a range of 0.75 to 1 percent on March 15. The widely expected move marks the third rate rise in almost a decade and the first one since Donald Trump took office. The rate increase implies an optimistic outlook for the U.S. economy. Although how many more rate hikes will come this year remains unknown, one thing is for sure—the Fed will accelerate the pace of rate hikes, compared with the once-ayear frequency in 2015 and 2016. The decision was made on the basis of major U.S. economic indicators. The consumer price index (CPI), a main gauge of inflation, registered above 2 percent in the past two months, and the core CPI…

Weibo user Ling Rui: It’s funny how some people are okay with a love affair betwene a human and a beast yet find homosexuality intolerable. Li Xiaoshui Xiangrikui: The earlier Disney princesses were too weak and hardly had any skills. Snow White’s job was to lie in bed and wait for a prinec’s kiss. Cinderella’s job was to find one of her missing shoes. But Belle is an intellectual. Dingshendeng: Belle invents the “washing machine,” which frees her from tedious chores and allows her more time to read. Emma Watson suggested changing Belle’s blue dress into a pair of trousers. She also refused to wear corsets. To avoidv iewers criticizing “Stockholm syndrome” [where the captive begins to empathize with the capotr], the film emphasizes the equal status of Beauty and…

Comments to yanwei@bjreview.com Moving house is traumatic at the best of times. I recently decided to look for a new apartment on the eastern side of Beijing and seek greener pastures compared with my present abode in the back of beyond. Previously, colleagues had always helped me to hunt down that elusive place to hang my hat. With little time at my disposal to physically hunt down apartments on my own, I searched for that most persuasive of creatures—the real estate agent. Browsing through the endless expat website adverts chock-full of agents ready to move heaven and earth to get people settled, I made contact. My requirements were simple—a one-bedroom apartment, with an enclosed shower, close to a subway line and within my specified price range. How hard could that…

NAVAL COMMANDER MAKES MEDIA DEBUT Rear Admiral Chen Yueqi, Commander of China’s first aircraft carrier formation, recently appeared in an interview with state broadcaster China Central Teelvision and spoke on the flotilla’s latest cross-sea training and tests. From December 20, 2016 to January 13, the formation—consisting of aircraft carrier Liaoning, a number of destroyers, J-15 carrier-based fighter jets and helicopters—sailed through the Bohai Sea, the Yellow Sea, the East China Sea and the South China Sea. Along the way, the vessels passed through the Miyako, Bashi and Taiwan straits, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy said. Drills simulated real combat as much as possible and achieved expected results, Chen said. He is the second commander of the fleet, taking over the post from his predecessor Wang Hai in July 2015.…

During the annual sessions of the national advisory body and legislature, National People’s Congress (NPC) deputies and Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) National Committee members discussed the draft General Provisions of the Civil Law. This is what some of them said: Chen Yueliang, NPC deputy and Ministry of Civil Affairs official: The General Provisions strengthen legal civil rights protection significantly. For example, personal information and virtual assets have been brought under legal protection. Li Mingrong, Deputy Procurator General of the People’s Procuratorate of Fujian Province and CPPCC National Committee member: The General Provisions reflect China’s achievements in civil law in the past decades and are suited to our national conditions. Wang Xuecheng, CPPCC National Committee member and legal expert: The civil law lays a legal cornerstone to support economic…

Beijing Review: Sansha is one of the youngest cities in China. It has been only five years since it was established in July 2012. How is the city’s development faring? What are the main pillars of its economic development? Xiao Jie: There have been tremendous changes to Sansha’s facilities in recent years. There is one inbound or outbound flight at Yongxing Airport every day; a ferry runs twice a week; and telecommunications services have improved remarkably. Residents can make phone calls anywhere, surf the Internet with Wi-Fi or 4G networks and watch TV programs on highdefinition screens. Desalination facilities and power supplies have been available on all islands and reefs where conditions allow. Basic needs, including education and health care as well as cultural and sports activities, have been met.…

Comments to yanwei@bjreview.com Liu Zhitong and Yu Qingliang had no idea that watching a movie with their 10-yearold daughter could be akin to walking into a minefield. The family had gone to see Disney’s new fantasy film Beauty and the Beast, which had been released globally since March 17. The film was shrouded in controversy after director Bill Condon talked of an “exclusively gay moment” in the film, a “confused” relationship between two male characters and a “payoff” at the end. Voices from fans Yu, a 40-year-old working mom, was unaware that the film was not showing in Malaysia as the censors had wanted some scenes cut or that an Alabama theater owner had refused to screen it, saying, “If we cannot take our 11-yearold granddaughter and 8-year-old grandson to…

Dear Readers, Forum is a column that provides a space for varying perspectives on contemporary Chinese society. We invite you to submit personal viewpoints on past and current topics (in either English or Chinese). yanwei@bjreview.com Please provide your name and address along with your comments Two children fell from the fourth floor in a shopping mall and died in late February in the northern city of Tianjin. One of them was 5 years old and the other was 2; they were sister and brother. At the time of the incident, their father was holding one in each arm beside a glass fence. Suddenly, one child fell, and as the father tried to catch him, the other child also slipped from his grasp. This accident has brought an old topic back…