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China’s Reaction to Trump’s Election Win

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Xinhua Commentary Series: Spotlight on the U.S. Presidential Election

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Wu Guoguang: Xi Jinping’s Reversal of the Course, Will China’s Transition be Peaceful or Marked with Bloodshed?

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Cheng Xiaonong: U.S.-China Strategic Relations Have Crystallized

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Huanqiu Editorial: How Shall We View Staring a War after Nearly 30 years Peace?

On January 15, 2013, , Huanqiu (the Chinese edition of Global Times) published an editorial titled, “How Shall We View ‘Staring a War’ after Nearly 30 years Peace?" According to the article, discussions about “starting a war” have appeared on Chinese media due to the tense situation in the Diaoyu Islands and the South China Sea. The article stated that the United States is everywhere behind the hot spots around China.

It concluded, “China should continue to build up the power of its national defense so as to form a strategic deterrent against the United States, which is behind all of the above thinking. The stronger China’s economic strength is, the greater China’s influence will be in the world order. China must have sufficient military power to suppress the ambitions behind any attempt to use non-economic means to change the rules of competition .”

Source: Huanqiu, January 15, 2013
http://opinion.huanqiu.com/editorial/2013-01/3494346.html

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend

Xinhua: Stay Alert for U.S. Offline Network Attacks

Xinhua recently published an article analyzing strategic changes in U.S. network-based warfare. According to the article, the key focus should be offline attack technologies that can implant data, via wireless signals, into enemy systems that are not connected to the Internet. It was reported that the U.S. Army obtained this strategic technology five years ago. There are three other strategic changes mentioned in the article: (1) New network warfare rules; (2) Distribution of offensive network attack weapons instead of defensive ones; (3) An upgrade of the network warfare command center to the top level in the Army’s ranking system.
Source: Xinhua, January 7, 2013
http://news.xinhuanet.com/globe/2013-01/07/c_132074516.htm
Briefings | | |   Defense/Military

RFA: 100 Times More Chinese Middle School Students Head for the US

Radio Free Asia (RFA) recently reported that, compared to the year 2006, 100 times more Chinese students attended U.S. middle schools in 2011. Many of these students studied at costly elite schools. The numbers are based on data released by the U.S. Department of Education. From 2005 to 2006, around sixty Chinese middle school students studied in the U.S. In 2011, the headcount reached seven thousand. The number of Chinese students that came to the United States in 2011 totaled 160,000, which made China number one in the number of international students coming to the U.S. Most of the Chinese middle school students attended private schools with costs higher than the average college. Many Chinese parents interviewed by RFA suggested that the primary reasons for sending their kids to the States were: first, nothing useful can be learned in Chinese schools; and second, the U.S. is safer than China.
 
Source: Radio Free Asia, January 11, 2013
http://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/xql-01112013161340.html
Briefings | | |   US-China Relations

CRN: China’s Central Bank Printed More Currency than the U.S.

China Review News (CRN) recently reported that, based on information officially released by China’s central bank, China’s currency supply (M2, a broad indicator to quantify the amount of money in circulation) reached RMB 97.42 trillion yuan (around US$15.53 trillion) by the end of 2012. This number represents an annual increase of 13.8 percent and is two times the Chinese GDP. Based on the current exchange rate, China’s GDP is one third of the U.S. scale, but the Chinese currency’s circulation level has already surpassed the U.S. Experts warned that the extra printed money may introduce potential systemic risks. Last year’s data for China shows that the government was loosening up the currency policies in order to “stabilize growth.” It is expected that China will maintain the current policies for the first half of 2013 and may tighten up in the second half, which typically faces higher inflation pressure.
Source: China Review News, January 11, 2013
http://www.zhgpl.com/doc/1023/9/7/7/102397732.html?coluid=10&kindid=253&docid=102397732&mdate=0111093828
Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

A Clash of Values, Part I

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Introduction

There can be no greater difference between forms of government than between the United States of America and the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Their foundations and goals and the means they use to achieve them lie in stark contrast. The United States came about as the result of a revolution that resulted in the promulgation of its Founding Principles to ensure the freedom and guarantee the rights of the governed. The PRC is a Communist government that came about as a result of violent revolution. Its leaders then “transformed its revolutionary idealism into a conservative reactionary autocracy.” They believed “that they themselves were the embodiment of ‘the people’ or ‘the general will’ and thus had full legitimacy to use all means possible, including dictatorship and terrorist killings to achieve this goal.” [1]

This series of articles explores the contrast between the two from the perspective of the United States’ founding principles as an example of the greatness that a government can achieve as compared to a regime based on a usurpation of power and its continuance at the barrel of a gun. Part I describes America’s Founding and the principles on which it is based.

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Analyses | | |   Opinion

Youth.cn Defends the Party’s Role in Media Control

As the recent incident of the Chinese regime’s censorship of the Guangzhou based Southern Weekend‘s New Year’s editorial continued to develop, Youth.cn, the official website of Central Committee of the Chinese Youth League, also joined the public debate.
In its editorial on Tuesday January 8, 2013, the website said, “Southern Weekend is part of the newspaper business of the CCP’s Guangdong Provincial Party Committee; it is part of the Party Committee’s propaganda work. During the specific implementation of the Party’s propaganda work, internal disagreements and even conflicts and disputes are normal. This has nothing to do with constitutional government or freedom of the press.”
“In socialist China, the newspaper is a propaganda tool of the Party. The Party controls the media. This is an iron principle. One can confidently tell the world about that. A newspaper’s role is to convey the Party’s principles and policies and unify the mass’s understanding. … A newspaper is the Party’s eyes, ears, and mouth. Southern Weekend is too, whether in the past, now, or in the future. Over the years, a large number of outstanding editors and reporters have emerged in Southern Weekend. They are carefully selected and hired by the Southern Newspaper Group, under the guidance of the Party. They are also the Party’s journalists.”
Source: Radio Free Asia, January 8, 2013
http://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/jz-01082013150812.html
Briefings | | |   Information/Technology

Radio Free Asia: Half of World’s Black Dollars Are from China; Capital Flight Is Accelerating

Radio Free Asia quoted a report from the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, which said that, in the past 10 years, through different means and various channels, the illegal funds fleeing from China reached a staggering US$3 trillion. Out of every two "black dollars" in the world, one is from China. It was estimated that, after the 18th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, when the authorities considered implementing the exposure of the personal assets of government officials, the capital flight accelerated to US$41.2 billion in November alone. Süddeutsche Zeitung reported that the second largest group responsible for the flight of capital was government officials.
Li Xinde, who runs a website that monitors Chinese public opinion, believed that the cause of the problem was the current policies and laws that involve anti-corruption, exposure of personal assets, and supervision of power.
A Beijing economist Zhong Dajun attributed the rampant capital flight to the current social political system, where a person can become rich quickly but develop a strong sense of insecurity after becoming rich. A 2011 report from China’s central bank revealed eight major means that corrupt officials use to transfer their property: cash smuggling, remittance fraud, current account fraud, overseas investment, credit card spending, creating an offshore financial center, foreign direct receipt, and transfer through offshore special relationships.
Although China has strict foreign exchange regulations, more and more rich people continue to transfer their money overseas. Hexun, a Chinese financial news portal, reported that China’s capital flight using even the most simple and primitive method–hiding bundles of cash in ones luggage–has accelerated.
Source: Radio Free Asia, January 10, 2013
http://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/xl2-01102013123334.html
Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources

Air Quality Deteriorates in Large Areas in China; Public Advised to Stay Inside

Recently misty weather has covered large areas of China with a serious deterioration in air quality. The air quality in multiple metropolitan areas has been coded as “serious pollution.”
The Beijing Environmental Monitoring Center released data showing that, since Thursday night (January 10), the pm2.5 concentration has been sustained at above 300 micrograms and reached level six, which is “serious pollution.” In the most polluted area the pm2.5 index reached 456.
In nine out of 11 cities in Hebei Province, the measure of air quality has been labeled "serious pollution.” In Shijiazhuang, Handan, Xingtai, and Hengshui, the quality index even exceeded 500. Air in Wuhan City in central China was also "heavily polluted" for several days.
On Saturday January 12, China’s Central Meteorological Station issued a blue fog warning. Nine provinces, including Hebei, Tianjin, Shandong, Henan, Jiangsu, Anhui, Zhejiang, Hubei and Sichuan Basin, had heavy fog with visibility of less than 1000 meters. Environmental experts warned that heavy fog prevents the dispersion of air pollutants. Local governments have issued air quality warnings to the public and advised people to stay indoors. Schools have suspended outdoor physical activities.
Source: BBC Chinese, January 12, 2013
http://www.bbc.co.uk/zhongwen/simp/chinese_news/2013/01/130112_china_air.shtml
Briefings | | |   Economy/Resources