Bo Chi <chi@vlsi> (02/11/91)
* C h i n a N e w s D i g e s t *
(News General)
February 10, 1991
Table of Contents # of Lines
News Brief ..............................................................6
1. Rebellion in North Korea Crushed ....................................26
2. Old shells unearthed from tourist site...............................39
3. U.S. Trying to Prevent East Asia Bloc, Mahathir Says ................39
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News Brief ..............................................................6
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From: chenh@ucs.indiana.edu
Source: AP NEWS 2/9/91
-- Shattering nearly a week of relative calm, an Iraqi Scud missile crashed
into a street in populous central Israel before dawn Saturday. At least 26
people were injured and a half-dozen apartments wrecked.
-- A senior aide to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein returned to Iran
Saturday, reportedly carrying a reply to a secret Iranian plan to end the Gulf
War.
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1. Rebellion in North Korea Crushed ....................................26
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From: Zuofeng Li < zuofeng@pollux.wustl.edu >
Source: UPI, Feb. 8, 1991
TOKYO -- North Korea has crushed a rebellion against its leadership and purged
counterrevolutionary elements within the ruling Workers Party, Kyodo News
Service reported Thursday.
Citing Radio Pyongyang, Kyodo said the plot was planned by ``anti-party, anti-
revolutionary elements and anti-party revisionists.''
The nature of the plot and names of officials involved were not disclosed.
The purge wiped out ``unorthodox ideological tendencies'' within the party and
has ``given complete assurance to the purity of its blood lineage,'' the
broadcast was quoted as saying.
The radio broadcast, monitored in Tokyo, said in a commentary that rebellious
elements within the party were all purged under the leadership of Kim Jong Il,
the eldest son and heir apparent of President Kim Il Sung, according to Kyodo.
It was the first reported plot against the Kims.
The elder Kim has ruled the communist-controlled northern half of the Korean
Peninsula since the end of World War II.
There was no confirmation of the report by the official (North) Korean Central
News Agency.
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2. Old Shells Unearthed From Tourist Site...............................39
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From: Zuofeng Li < zuofeng@pollux.wustl.edu >
Source: UPI, Feb. 7, 1991
BEIJING -- Bomb experts removed more than 200 World War II-era artillery
shells from the lake at Beijing's Summer Palace after they were unearthed
during renovations at the popular tourist site, the official press reported
Thursday.
The Guangming Daily, a state-run newspaper, said the ordnance had apparently
lain undisturbed for about 50 years at the bottom of Kunming Lake, which is
used for boating in the summer and ice skating in the winter.
Investigators said the shells were dumped into the lake in the late 1930s and
early 1940s by Nationalist Chinese troops as they withdrew under the Japanese
invasion.
The Summer Palace, one of Beijing's most popular tourist attractions, was
built in the late 1880s in northwest Beijing by the Empress Dowager Ci Xi. It
is now a public park.
Work crews drained the shallow lake late last fall and began a silt-clearing
operation, but dug up a World War II-era mortar shell in early December, the
Guangming Daily said.
Officials called in the Chinese army, which sent bomb disposal squads and
mine-detection teams that eventually unearthed 205 shells of varying sizes and
a number of other kinds of explosives.
The newspaper report did not say whether any of the shells was actually still
live, but said all the explosives were transported to a military field testing
site and destroyed.
The English-language China Daily published a photograph of soldiers sweeping
the dry lake bottom with mine detectors alongside five shells apparently stood
on end for the picture. It said officials determined the shells were
manufactured in 1927.
``The hidden trouble in the silt of Kunming Lake has been completely
eliminated,'' Zhang Zhixian, a bomb disposal expert, told the Guangming Daily.
``The people of the capital and domestic and foreign tourists can rest
assured.''
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3. U.S. Trying to Prevent East Asia Bloc, Mahathir Says ................39
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From: <chenh@ucs.indiana.edu>
Source: KYODO 02/06/91
Malaysia Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said the United States was trying to
scuttle the formation of a proposed East Asia economic grouping by trying to
influence certain countries against participating.
Malaysia will not protest the U.S. effort, Mahathir said, but will continue
to woo as many East Asian countries as possible.
''Certainly, they (U.S.) will not like cooperation among other countries as
it will prevent their control of the world's economy,'' Mahathir told
reporters.
Mahathir said that when the U.S. made its free trade agreement with Canada,
it did not seek Malaysia's opinion and Malaysia did not interfere.
Asked if the U.S. moves will seriously jeopardize the formation of the East
Asia group, he said Malaysia was prepared ''to face all
difficulties.''
U.S. diplomats denied that the U.S. was working against the formation of the
economic group, but some ASEAN diplomats said U.S. officials had approached
them on the matter, and pointed out how much the U.S. market was worth to the
ASEAN countries.
Faced with the collapse of the Uruguay Round of multilateral trade talks last
year, Mahathir suggested that the East Asian countries form a trade bloc to
counter possible future protectionist tendencies emerging in the West.
Mahathir envisaged a grouping of the dynamic economies of Japan, South Korea,
Taiwan, and ASEAN with the potentially important markets of China and
Indochina.
However, the proposal faced its first setback when Japan reacted negatively,
saying that it was against the formation of a trade bloc.
Mahathir then decided to push his proposal in ASEAN and later persuade the
other East Asian countries to join.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) groups Malaysia, Thailand,
Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei, and the Philippines and all have unofficially
agreed to endorse the proposed larger grouping at their summit later this
year.
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+------------------------------------------------------------------------+Bo Chi <chi@vlsi> (02/12/91)
* C h i n a N e w s D i g e s t *
(News General)
February 11, 1991
Table of Contents # of Lines
News Briefs ................................................................16
1. China Executes 18 More in Anti-crime Drive ..............................26
2. China Tells PLO Western Troops Should Leave Gulf After War ..............21
3. Chinese Construction Firms Eager to Return to Gulf ......................44
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News Briefs ................................................................16
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From: gl@gracie.Berkeley.EDU (G. Lin)
-- According to today(2/11)'s New York Time, Chen Zi-min is on hunger
strike in prison. He demands to postpone his trail for two weeks in order to
get enough time for him and his lawyer to prepare the defense.
From: chenh@ucs.indiana.edu
Source: DOW JONES INTERNATIONAL NEWS
-Key heads of state in the coalition against Iraq-not just President George
Bush-will decide when to go to a ground war in the Persian Gulf, France"s
defense minister says
-King Hussein of Jordan says he is hurt that the U.S. has misinterpreted
his recent comments on the Persian Gulf War as pro-Iraq, and denies claims his
country is a pipeline for weapons into Iraq
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1. China Executes 18 More in Anti-crime Drive ..............................26
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From: Wu, Fang < int3fwu@uclamvs >
Source: AP, Feb. 8, 1991
Authorities have executed 18 people in two cities as part of an anti-crime
campaign, including 10 train robbers who took passengers hostage in a getaway
attempt, official reports said today.
The human rights group Amnesty International has called the drive, which was
launched in May, the most severe anti-crime crackdown in China since 1983.
The earlier campaign is estimated to have resulted in 5,000 to 10,000
executions.
The 10 train robbers were sentenced at an open rally in Shanghai on Wednesday
and then executed, the China Youth News and two Shanghai newspapers reported.
Executions in China are by a single bullet to the back of the head.
The reports said 28 other train robbers also were given harsh sentences during
this week's proceedings, but the prison terms were not reported.
In the southwestern city of Kunming, authorities executed four drug
traffickers Thursday, official media reported. Nine other drug traffickers,
including a woman, were reportedly given suspended death sentences or life
imprisonment.
In addition, Shanghai newspapers said four people were executed this week
after being convicted of hooliganism for beating people, extorting money and
threatening people in public places in the city.
The state-run Xinhua News Agency has quoted the president of the Supreme
People's Court, Ren Jianxin, as saying more than 581,000 people were convicted
of crimes in 1990.
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2. China Tells PLO Western Troops Should Leave Gulf After War ..............21
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From: chenh@ucs.indiana.edu
Source: AP (via DJ News) 2/11/91
BEIJING -(AP-DJ)--China sent a deputy foreign minister on a special mission
to the Middle East on Monday to discuss ways of ending the Persian Gulf war.
Meanwhile, Chinese Foreign Minister Qian Qichen told an envoy from the
Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) that China believes foreign military
forces should be withdrawn from the Gulf region after the war is over, the
official Xinhua News Agency reported.
The Foreign Ministry said that in addition to his Middle East tour, Deputy
Foreign Minister Yang Fuchang also will travel to Yugoslavia. But the ministry
did not say if Yang will attend the meeting of non-aligned nations Tuesday in
Belgrade. The war is the main agenda item for the meeting.
The ministry said Qian sent a telegram to the gathering wishing it success.
Yang"s other stops are Syria, Turkey and Iran. The ministry said Yang will
carry messages from China"s leaders and discuss possibilities for an early end
to the war, but gave no specifics.
Xinhua said Qian told Farouk Kaddoumi, PLO chief Yasser Arafat"s top foreign
policy adviser, that post-war security in the gulf area "should be secured
through consultations between countries in the region."
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3. Chinese Construction Firms Eager to Return to Gulf ......................44
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From: chenh@ucs.indiana.edu
Source: AP via DJ 2/11/91
BEIJING -(AP-DJ)--China"s top four overseas construction companies have lost
more than 1 billion U.S. dollars in the Gulf crisis but are eager to return
to the region after the war, an official report said Sunday.
Before the outbreak of war, China had 10,000 citizens, mostly laborers, in
Kuwait and Iraq, and 2.7 billion dollars in labor service contracts in the
region.
The Gulf was a major market for the four construction companies, and the war
forced them to put negotiations and signing of new contracts on hold, the
China Daily"s Business Weekly reported.
China Metallurgical Construction Corp. planned to negotiate for several
projects in Iran and Jordan, and China International Water and Electricity
Corp. was on the verge of signing contracts for projects in Kuwait and the
United Arab Emirates, the paper said.
But work on some ongoing projects in the United Arab Emirates and Yemen was
continuing, the report said.
"If we did nothing in the Gulf region now, we would lose the chance to enter
the market after the war," said Zhai Guangjiang, an official for the China
State Construction Engineering Corp.
The four companies are maintaining contacts with Saudi Arabian firms. China
and Saudi Arabia established diplomatic relations last year, and the firms
were just beginning to discuss sending Chinese laborers to the kingdom.
The future of projects in Iraq remains in doubt, though no firm has ruled out
doing business there in the future, the report said.
The four companies have lost 1 billion dollars since the Iraqi invasion of
Kuwait last August. Their losses include non-payment by Kuwait and Iraq for
completed projects, deposits lost in local banks, equipment left in the Middle
East and the cost of evacuating workers, the report said.
China said before the outbreak of war last month that it had lost 2 billion
dollars in trade, transport and civil aviation. The figure did not include
debts owed by Iraq for trade and labor.
With the loss of their Middle East business, the construction companies are
turning their sights to Asia, Africa and the Soviet Union.
China Road and Bridge Engineering Co. recently sent delegations to Thailand,
Indonesia and Laos, the report said.
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| Editor of this issue: JD < B366JDX@UTARLVM1.BITNET > |
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| same address. US Readers: to receive CND-US/Visa News, send "SUB |
| CHINA-ND <Your Name>" to LISTSERV@KENTVM.BITNET. Canadian Readers: |
| send all requests to XLIAO@ccm.Umanitoba.CA. |
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| For technical assistance, contact: Tan Shi <tan@venus.ycc.yale.edu> |
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