Innholdsfortegnelse for Vol. 61/No. 30 i Beijing Review

FRANCE Fireworks light up the sky in front of the Eiffel Tower during Bastille Day celebrations in Paris on July 14 SOUTH AFRICA The leaders of media organizations from BRICS nations meet to discuss cooperation at the BRICS Media Forum in Cape Town on July 18 PAKISTAN An injured man is transferred to hospital in the Mastung area of Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan Province on July 13, after a suicide bomb killed 128 people at a campaign rally TANZANIA President John Magufuli speaks in Kibaha on July 16 at a ground-breaking ceremony for the Julius Nyerere Leadership Sch ol, co-founded by six political parties from six African nations BELARUS The closing ceremony of the Slavonic Bazaar is held in Vitebsk on July 17. The international music event attracted more than 5,000…

Leaders of the European Union (EU) must have been shocked to hear that they topped U.S. President Donald Trump’s hit list after he was asked during a CBS News interview to name his “biggest foe globally right now.” Following Trump’s recent trip to Europe, where he suggested British Prime Minister Theresa May sue the EU rather than go into negotiations with it, the naming of the EU as his number one foe should be another wake-up call for the once close ally. This comes on the heels of U.S.-imposed aluminum and steel tariffs earlier this year. The question now is: After a series of body blows, is it time for the EU to turn away from the United States? While it may be too early to give an affirmative answer,…

On July 8, the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) announced that the State Council had, in principle, approved increased access for foreign investors to the Chinese mainland stock market by allowing foreign individuals to trade yuan-denominated A-shares. “The move is significant in increasing the financing sources for the stock market, optimizing the structure and lifting the level of opening up and internationalization of the capital market,” the CSRC said in a statement. The easing of A-share investment restrictions is part of China’s efforts to further open up its financial sector to foreign investment and gear up the real economy. The new policy’s beneficiaries mainly consist of foreign nationals working in the Chinese mainland and foreigners working overseas for A-share listed companies and participating in equity incentive programs. A cooperation mechanism…

The Taocheng District Court of Hebei Province’s Hengshui City recently issued judicial advice to private middle schools under its jurisdiction, ordering them not to recruit the children of those on the list of dishonest persons subject to enforcement (dishonest debtors). As a result, the children of these people may face rejection by these schools or be forced to leave them. The judicial advice aims to remind dishonest debtors to fulfill their legal obligations so as to avoid dragging down their children. It quickly sparked heated debate among the public. Some see it as an effective method of forcing dishonest debtors to fulfill their legal obligations while others believe such a move is unfair and unreasonable. Fair and effective Zhu Dan (www.xatvs.com): The Taocheng District Court’s judicial advice is not only…

Day of Celebration Women of the Yao ethnic group present traditional clothing in Longji Township in Guilin, south China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, on July 18, celebrating the Clothes Drying Festival. The annual event falls on the sixth day of the sixth month of the Chinese lunar calendar. Online Copyright A campaign against Internet platform copyright infringement was launched on July 16. The campaign, jointly launched by the National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC), the Cyberspace Administration of China, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Ministry of Public Security, is to last for more than four months. It will target key areas including the unauthorized republication of news as well as plagiarism on social media, unauthorized broadcasting of copyrighted content on short video sharing apps, and copyright…

Not far from the administrative center of Guiyang, capital of southwest China’s Guizhou Province, sits a vast complex, the Guiyang International Eco-Conference Center. Forty percent of its main building is covered by greenery, while the roof supports more than 100 solar panels, which not only power the building but also provide all of its hot water. The building is the venue for the Eco-Forum Global Annual Conference. The topics on the agenda of the three-day event range from forest cities to poverty alleviation, green finance innovation, ocean conservation, bio-diversity in economic development, mitigating climate change, environment and health, and wilderness restoration. The first annual conference of the forum took place in 2009 under the name Eco-Forum Guiyang, but was upgraded in 2013 to Eco-Forum Global as a national and international…

Wang Shouwen, Chinese Vice Minister of Commerce and Deputy China International Trade Representative, was the focus of attention at the headquarters of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Geneva, Switzerland, during the institution’s seventh trade policy review of China since the country’s accession in 2001. As head of the Chinese delegation to the review, Wang gave an extensive introduction to China’s pursuit of opening up for cooperation and mutual benefit with other countries. The review, conducted on July 11 and 13, looked back at China’s trade and economic policies over the past two years. “In their interventions, members highlighted the importance of China’s contribution to global growth over recent years,” said Eloi Laourou, Chairperson of the WTO Trade Policy Review Body, in his concluding remarks. Members participating in the review…

Mall Resurgence The performance of China’s shopping centers improved in 2017 amid fierce competition from online shopping platforms, a new index showed. The China Shopping Center Development Index rose 1.3 points to 68.5 in 2017, showing market recovery and sound momentum in the sector, according to a report issued by the Ministry of Commerce. A reading above 50 indicates expansion, while a reading below 50 shows contraction. Thanks to their larger markets, first-tier cities saw higher development indexes than smaller cities. More than 70 percent of business owners expressed optimism over the continued growth of rent, sales and profits, the report said, forecasting that the sound momentum of the sector will continue this year due to steady economic growth and the country’s consumption upgrading. Stable Home Prices House prices in…

As the escalating trade war between China and the United States casts a shadow over the world’s two largest economies and the global economy at large, the much-anticipated Chinese economic figures for the first half of the year have offered some certainty of China’s economic resilience and sustainability amid mounting instability worldwide. The Chinese economy expanded 6.8 percent year on year in the first half of 2018, beating market expectations. The rate was 6.7 percent for the second quarter, edging down 0.1 of a percentage point from the first, with the growth rate within the 6.7-6.9-percent range for 12 consecutive quarters, according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on July 16. NBS spokesperson Mao Shengyong said at a press briefing that the data showed the country’s…

The United States is bent on pulling the plug on China’s ascent since the world’s only superpower can’t tolerate China’s peaceful resurgence. But President Donald Trump’s tariffs on foreign goods do not only affect exporting countries such as China and Germany, they also undermine the entire global economy. This is why the rest of the world must move closer together to defend free trade against an unpredictable U.S. leader. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang visited Germany in early July for the fifth China-Germany government consultations, meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and signing several joint treaties. The most important topic during these consultations was the United States’ trade frictions with other major world economies including China and Germany. Both the Chinese and German economies are strong export-oriented success models, and are…

Situated within the Wuling Mountain Range and covering an area of 40,300 hectares, Fanjingshan (Fanjing Mountain) in southwest China’s Guizhou Province was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List on July 2. The addition of the site has brought China’s total number of World Natural Heritage Sites to 13, the most of any single country in the world. Fanjing Mountain, located in Tongren City in the eastern part of the province, is the fourth world natural heritage site in Guizhou and the only natural site proposed by China to the UNESCO 42nd World Heritage Committee for 2018. Guizhou now boasts the largest number of world natural heritage sites in China. Fanjing Mountain is the first site in the province to apply for world natural heritage site status as an independent…