Innholdsfortegnelse for Vol. 61/No. 31 i Beijing Review

GREECE A house burns in the beach town of Kineta on July 23. The wildfires left at least 74 people dead, 187 injured and 20 missing. They were the worst to hit Greece since 2007 BELARUS People visit the Main Eastern Battlefield exhibition in Minsk on July 25. The exhibit, which commemorates China’s contribution to the WWII victory over fascism, offers more than 140 historical photos and other valuable relics CANADA Toronto police block a shooting scene in the Greektown neighborhood on July 23. The night before, a man killed two people and wounded 13 before dying after a gunfire exchange with police ARGENTINA Representatives attend the G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting in Buenos Aires on July 22, where they stressed that U.S. unilateral protectionist policies have…

Nothing, not even mountains, oceans or thousands of miles, can separate those with the same goal. The centuries of history shared between China and Middle East and Africa has formed the basis for deepening pragmatic cooperation across various fields in recent years, with bilateral and multilateral ties closer than ever in the new era. With profound changes taking place in the international situation, Chinese President Xi Jinping paid state visits to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Senegal, Rwanda and South Africa, attended the 10th BRICS Summit in Johannesburg, and visited Mauritius during a stopover from July 19 to 28. On the eve of the 2018 BRICS Summit and ahead of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) Beijing Summit in September, Xi’s visit to the five nations, also the first overseas…

Along the overlapping green mountains of the Hangzhou city suburbs lies a secluded, garden-like patch of land, where strips of limpid water converge into a spectacular sapphire fountain filled with koi carp swimming below lotus leaves. If the protruding cooling tower didn’t betray its true identity, one would think it was a holiday village or scenic resort. In fact, it is the site of a waste-to-energy plant. “Every day, roughly 3,000 tons of domestic garbage is transported by trucks to the factory for treatment, accounting for one third of the total volume generated in Hangzhou,” said Xiong Jianping, General Manager of the Hangzhou Jiufeng waste-to-energy project run by Everbright International. After some mental math, he calculated that if no treatment measures had been taken, garbage generated by the capital of…

Scorching Sun A farmer works on July 23 in a field in Zhangjiajie, central China’s Hunan Province. This year, Dashu, or great heat day, one of the 24 Solar Terms according to the Chinese lunar calendar, fell on July 23, signifying the hottest day of the summer. Flood Battles As rainfall continued to batter northern China, relevant departments have made necessary preparations for possible disasters caused by the rain. On July 22, China’s Ministry of Emergency Management (MEM) called for better efforts to mitigate disasters and reduce casualties during the flood season. MEM’s Vice Minister Huang Ming said that late July and early August is a critical period for fighting floods and providing relief. The Yellow River Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters issued a new alert for floods along…

Since the establishment of diplomatic ties in 1998, the relationship between China and South Africa has grown into a comprehensive strategic partnership. At the heart of this relationship lies technology and innovation, which both sides have placed at the top of their respective agendas. In celebration of the 20th anniversary of diplomatic relations, a photo exhibition showing China and South Africa’s respective technological achievements and the results of their cooperation was held in Pretoria during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit. The exhibition is expected to play a guiding role in furthering China-South Africa collaboration in this important field. Comments to yulintao@bjreview.com…

The Chinese Government has put forward specific requirements for the fiscal revenue and GDP of the cities that are applying for metro construction so as to further strengthen the management of urban rail transit, according to a guideline published by the State Council, China’s cabinet, on July 13. The guideline stipulates that the general public budget revenue of a city that applies for metro construction should be at least 30 billion yuan ($4.43 billion), or 15 billion yuan ($2.22 billion) for the construction of a light rail network. Gross regional domestic product should reach a minimum of 300 billion yuan ($44.68 billion) to qualify for the construction of a metro system, and 150 billion yuan ($22.34 billion) for light rail. In principle, the urban population should be larger than 3…

Bolstering the Real Economy China will better utilize its fiscal and financial policies to support the expansion of domestic demand and boost the development of the real economy, a State Council executive meeting decided on July 23. The meeting, chaired by Premier Li Keqiang, said that a more proactive fiscal policy will be pursued and the government will focus on tax and non-tax fee cuts. More companies will be eligible for preferential policies involving an additional deduction in research and development spending on taxable income, a policy expected to cut 65 billion yuan ($9.6 billion) of taxes this year. This comes on top of an initial goal of reducing taxes and fees by 1.1 trillion yuan ($162 billion) for the year. The country’s prudent monetary policy will neither be too…

‘After climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are many more hills to climb.” These famous words once spoken by late South African leader Nelson Mandela were quoted by Chinese President Xi Jinping at the BRICS Business Forum which took place during this year’s BRICS Summit held in Johannesburg, South Africa, from July 25 to 27. This year is the 10th since the BRICS summit mechanism took shape in 2009. There are plenty of examples that pay testament to the success of the group of five major emerging economies—Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa—in that time including the Contingent Reserve Arrangement, the New Development Bank (NDB) and the NDB Africa Regional Center. While the international situation has changed dramatically in recent years, with the world now threatened…

Beijing Review: What is the role of the NDB in the BRICS group? Leslie Maasdorp: The NDB was established to finance long-term infrastructure, especially sustainable infrastructure, in Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. There is a huge need to finance the building of ports, roads and railways, and power all kinds of big infrastructure so as to continue the process of industrialization and growth of these economies. All of the BRICS economies are emerging markets and in need of some new economic infrastructure. There is a huge financing gap in the building of this infrastructure. There are existing financial institutions that also finance infrastructure construction. We were started by these five countries to complement and be an additional resource to help them with infrastructure roll-out. What achievements has the…

In 2008, Qianmen Street, a traditional commercial center with hundreds of years of history in central Beijing, reopened after renovations. Ten years later, it has taken on a whole new look. Hutongs, or alleys, and buildings near the street preserve the traditional architectural style of old Beijing. The old-styled trams, known as Dangdang Che, drove onto the street again after decades of absence and many time-honored stores reopened on the street. In recent years, large creative and cultural shops have sprouted up in the area in perfect harmony with the residential area and its residents. Today, Qianmen Street and its surrounding area have become a new landmark in Beijing, something tourists shouldn’t miss.…

In a corner on the third floor of the Capitaland Shopping Mall in Beijing’s Xizhimen area, not far from the Forbidden City, sits the Chinese bookstore Sisyphe, which opened in February. The bookstore derives its name from Sisyphus, a cunning king of Ephyra (Corinth) in ancient Greek mythology who was punished for his deceitfulness by being forced to roll a huge boulder up a hill only to have it roll down again as soon as he had placed it on the summit, repeating this laborious task for eternity. According to its website, the bookstore chain is set to become the Sisyphus of the cultural industry, tenaciously promoting reading among the public. According to the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, 10,000 bookstores in China closed down from 2002 to 2012,…