The China Bomb
 

 

NEWS: (scroll to end for latest news)

 

From NYT, June 14, 1998:

"On 2/28, Beijing joined 28 other Chinese cities that have started to issue weekly air
quality reports in the last year...
 
"Chinese citizens for the first time have hard information on the air they breathe...
 
"The data has confirmed that the air in China's cities is among the most polluted
in the world...
 
"The severity of the pollution has propelled environmental issues onto the agenda
of the current Chinese-American summit meetings...
 
"According to the World Bank, 5 of the world's 10 most polluted cities are in China...
 
"The most serious pollutant in Chinese cities is tiny airborne particles, measured as
total suspended particles, produced primarily by the burning of coal and, increasingly,
car exhausts...
 
"There are 1.3 million cars registered in Beijing today, compared with 200,000 a decade ago.
And the average Chinese car produces 10 to 15 times the exhaust of its American counterpart...
 
"As of January 1, Beijing has banned the sale of leaded gas, and as of next year all new cars
must have catalytic converters."
 
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ENVIRONMENT ON THE AGENDA FOR CLINTON'S CHINA TRIP
WASHINGTON, DC, June 23, 1998 (ENS) - President Bill Clinton's upcoming
visit to China will have an environmental focus, Assistant Secretary of
State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Stanley Roth told reporters.
 
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U.S. & CHINA SIGN NUCLEAR POWER & ENVIRONMENT PACTS
BEIJING, China, June 29, 1998 (ENS) - Agreements for
government-to-government environmental cooperation between the United
States and China and a number of commercial energy contracts were signed
today in ceremonies at the Great Hall of the People.
 
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* President Clinton today announced that the U.S.-backed Export-
Import Bank will loan China $50 million to pursue clean
energy projects.
- Clinton made the announcement during a visit to Guilin, China.
from INTELLIGENT NETWORK CONCEPTS, INC.
THURSDAY, JULY 2, 1998
 
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* U.N. Environment Program director Klaus Topfer says Chinese officials
have acknowledged that the severe flooding in that nation recently
is largely the result of man-made environmental degradation.
INTELLIGENT NETWORK CONCEPTS, INC.
TUESDAY, AUGUST 25, 1998
 
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STUDENT ORGANIZES ONE-DAY INTERNET STRIKE IN CHINA
Nanjing University economics student Huang Zhenqiang is organizing a one-day
Internet strike to protest the access rates charged by government monopoly
China Telecom. China Telecom charges about $30 to $40 for 20 hours of
Internet use, or about one-fourth of the average monthly salary in that
country. (AP/San Jose Mercury News 25 Nov 98)
 
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CHINA MAINTAINS TIGHT CONTROL OF INTERNET
In a continuing effort to restrict Internet use in China, the Chinese
government is charging 30-year-old Shanghai computer software businessman
Lin Hai with "inciting the overthrow of state power" by providing 30,000
e-mail addresses to a U.S. Internet magazine called "Big Reference"
published by Chinese dissidents. (AP 25 Nov 98)
 
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CHINA: NET USE TRIPLED IN '98
for full story see Wired News
 
A China Daily survey puts the total number of users at 2.1
million. The official news agency Zinhua says 1.5 million.
Either way, the Net is making inroads, especially
in Beijing.

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Y2K IN CHINA: CAUGHT IN MIDAIR
for full story see Wired News

China orders its airline executives to fly on New Year's Day,
2000. You can bet those execs are taking the Y2K problem
seriously now.

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January 20, 1999 from Financial Times:

China has ordered all internet cafes and bars to register
with local authorities and provides lists of customers, in a
move that highlights official unease over the explosion of
internet use.

The official media said yesterday that the move was
intended to stop the spread of pornography and
gambling, which were "poisng a threat to the hearts and
minds of our youth".

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SHANGHAI MAN GETS RELATIVELY LIGHT SENTENCE IN INTERNET CASE
A Chinese court has given a two-year jail sentence to Lin Hai, the
30-year-old owner of a computer software company in Shanghai, for selling
30,000 e-mail addresses to the Washington, D.C.-based electronic publication
VIP Reference, which is critical of the Chinese government. Although the
charge on which Lin Hai was judged guilty was "inciting the subversion of
state sovereignty," his wife insisted that he had sold the addresses without
knowing that they were being used for anti-government purposes. The
sentence is part of a renewed government crackdown against dissidents, but
it is significantly lighter that other recent sentences for similar
offenses. (Washington Post 20 Jan 99)
 
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CHINA HUNTS "COUNTER-REVOLUTIONARIES" ON THE INTERNET
The Hong Kong-based Information Center of Human Rights and Democratic
Movement says that China's national police ministry has created special
computer task forces to monitor Internet bulletin board services 24 hours a
day to hunt down people posting anti-government remarks and shut down any
bulletin boards that sponsor "seditious" talk. (AP/Washington Post 29 Jan 99)
 
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CHINA SETS UP ITS OWN WEB SITE TO LURE U.S. CONCERNS' BUSINESS
The Chinese government is establishing its first electronic
commerce-oriented Web site, www.meetchina.com, where Chinese
companies will be allowed to post company, product, and service
information for the benefit of American corporations. Chinese
companies will also be able to provide their e-mail addresses and
other contact information. U.S. Business Network is operating
the site for China, and CEO Ken Leonard says the site will help
Chinese companies develop contacts with American companies.
Leonard says the site represents the first time Chinese companies
have been allowed to make direct contact with international
companies. Michael Borrus of the Berkeley Roundtable on the
International Economy says the site is part of the Chinese
government's efforts at privatizing its industries.
(New York Times 04/12/99)
 
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Spies tell China embassy attack was no accident
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
China's intelligence service reported to Beijing earlier this month that the bombing
of Beijing's embassy in Belgrade was a deliberate attack aimed at dragging
China into the Balkans conflict, according to Pentagon intelligence officials.
A classified report based on National Security Agency (NSA) intelligence data
was sent to senior Pentagon officials last week and revealed that Chinese
intelligence viewed the attack as part of a NATO "conspiracy" to involve China in the
war.
The Chinese spy agency based its judgment on the damage caused by the bombs.
The three U.S. Joint Direct Attack Munitions, satellite-guided bombs known as JDA
Ms, caused the most damage to the embassy's security communications room and the
defense attache's office, said officials familiar with the NSA report.
"They are convinced it was intentional," one official said of the Chinese.
According to U.S. defense and intelligence officials, the NATO bombing May 7 by
U.S. bombers was a mistake based on faulty intelligence. The embassy was
misidentified as a Serbian military building based on map and satellite photographs.
Several military and intelligence agencies that reviewed plans for the attack
caught the error.
 
Officials said intelligence reports on the internal Chinese reaction to the
bombing help explain why Beijing has not accepted U.S. explanations that the bombing
was a tragic error. Three Chinese nationals died in the attack and 20 others
were wounded.
President Clinton has apologized to the Chinese government and leaders on several
occasions and recently discussed restitution for the damages caused by the
errant bombing strike, said Pentagon officials.
Asked about the Chinese view of the embassy bombing, Pentagon spokesman Kenneth
Bacon declined to comment.
China has reacted to the bombing by canceling all military exchanges with the
United States and by organizing anti-American activities against the United States,
the officials said.
Beijing also has demanded an official investigation into the attack and threate
ned publicly that China could retaliate in unspecified ways.
According to the Pentagon officials, China instructed embassy people to search
the bombed-out building for fragments of the missiles that hit the building. The
JDAM is one of the most advanced U.S. munitions that is guided to its target
by data fed from the constellation of Global Positioning System navigational
satellites.
China is known to be developing advanced long-range cruise missiles that will u
se the GPS satellite data for targeting and midcourse correction of the missiles.

The Chinese embassy personnel were to send any JDAM fragments to Beijing as soo
n as possible, the officials said.
Meanwhile, separate Pentagon intelligence reports have revealed that China's go
vernment has directed its state-run media to single out the United States for
blame. Other NATO countries have not come under fire from the Chinese government
over the errant attack because of growing anti-American sentiment among Chinese
leaders, the officials said.
Officials said a Chinese government news organization instructed all Chinese me
dia and reporters around the country not to report that NATO's bombing was the
result of an accident.
In addition, Beijing ordered news organizations to focus their criticism on the
U.S. government, American citizens and U.S. corporations and investors in China,
the officials said.
Chinese reporters were prohibited by the Beijing government from reporting on
protest demonstrations in China directed at any NATO countries other than the
United States, the officials said.
The bombing triggered days of protests outside the U.S. Embassy in Beijing that
were approved and supported by the Chinese government. Protesters hurled rocks
and chanted slogans and prevented outgoing U.S. Ambassador James Sasser from
leaving the compound.
A survey conducted by China's Beijing Youth Daily found that 40 percent of the
Chinese people believed the embassy bombing was intentional and designed to test
China's reaction. Another 16 percent stated that the bombing was intended to
silence China's criticism of the NATO bombing campaign, according to findings
of the poll reported by China's official Xinhua news agency on Thursday.
The nighttime bombing raid was carried out by a single B-2 stealth bomber that
fired three JDAMs at the Belgrade embassy. The 2,000-pound high-explosive bombs
are "near-precision" weapons that are less accurate than the laser-guided bomb
s used in a large portion of the bombing strikes in Yugoslavia.
The laser-guided bombs require pointing and holding a laser beam "designator"
from an aircraft or soldier on the ground that is used by the bombing's guidance
package to home in on the target.
By contrast, the JDAM is a "standoff" weapon that is fired miles from the targe
t and guided to the target by use of a GPS guidance system.
State Department spokesman James P. Rubin said on Friday that the U.S. government's
investigation of the bombing that China had requested is nearly complete.
"We will be presenting the findings of our investigation into the accidental
bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade to the People's Republic of China," he
said.
 
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