Biden conveys U.S. concern on air zone to China’s Xi

United States Vice President Joe Biden has conveyed to Chinese President Xi Jinping “deep concerns” about China’s decision to set up an Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ) over the disputed East China Sea, as he held more than five hours of discussions with the top-ranked Chinese leader.

Mr. Biden said he was “very direct about our firm position and our expectations in my conversations with President Xi”, in a speech to U.S. business leaders in Beijing on Thursday morning. The ADIZ move, he said, was a “recent and sudden" step that had "caused significant apprehension in the region".

Senior U.S. administration officials said Mr. Biden had indicated to the Chinese “deep concerns” on how the U.S. saw the ADIZ, and also “made clear” that the U.S. and other countries were looking at China “to take steps to lower tensions” and avoid “enforcement actions that could lead to a crisis”.

Mr. Biden had lengthy discussions with Mr. Xi stretching over more than five and a half hours on Wednesday evening, with two hours of restricted-level talks followed by a 90-minute formal, expanded meeting and a two-hour working dinner.

The senior administration officials, at a background briefing, expressed cautious optimism that all sides would take steps to tone down tensions, saying that Mr. Xi “listened carefully to the Vice President’s arguments about the need to create a more conducive environment too”. The Chinese side, they added, had "taken on board” what Mr. Biden said. “Now it’s a question of behaviour and action as we go forward,” the officials said.

It was, however, made clear that to them that China’s move was “part of a longstanding effort” and unlikely to be withdrawn, and was not a "knee-jerk" decision.

Chinese officials have stressed that they would not consider withdrawing the move, making the point that several countries had long established such zones. They have specifically pointed out that Japan’s ADIZ was set up in 1969, and covered the disputed Senkaku or Diaoyu islands in the East China Sea that are disputed by both countries - and now fall within both air defence zones.

In brief remarks to reporters in the middle of their talks on Wednesday, Mr. Xi admitted that “regional hotspot issues keep cropping up” and that “the world as a whole is not tranquil”. Mr. Biden praised Mr. Xi for being “candid” and “constructive”, saying that "candour generates trust".

China announced on November 23 that it would set up an ADIZ in the East China Sea, including the disputed islands and a submerged reef that is under South Korean control. The ADIZ is not a territorial claim, but a pre-defined area beyond a country’s territorial airspace within which it tracks or monitors aircraft.

China’s warning that it would take unspecified “defensive emergency” measures that may include interception of aircraft that had not notified authorities of their flight plans brought expressions of concern from the U.S., South Korea, Japan and Taiwan. China said last week it has scrambled fighter jets to tail 12 American and Japanese aircraft that had conducted patrols through the ADIZ without notifying China.

The Defence Ministry here on Tuesday released a lengthy statement in an attempt to address regional anxieties, saying the Chinese response would "generally" involve only radar identification, and that deploying fighter jets was "unnecessary" if there was no threat perception.

Speaking in Tokyo on Tuesday – the first stop of his three nation Asia tour – Mr. Biden spoke of the need for a “crisis management mechanism” to reduce tensions. He is expected to raise the idea in Seoul, the last stop of his tour, where he will arrive on Thursday and hold talks with President Park Geun-hye on Friday morning.

U.S. officials said Mr. Biden and Mr. Xi had discussed at length the situation in North Korea – an issue that actually took up more time than the ADIZ.

“I think the credibility of our argument about the impact of pressure on diplomatic solutions has been enhanced in the eyes of a number of countries, including China, by what’s happened with Iran,” the senior administration officials said referring to the recent Iran deal.

“That logic, which produced the interim deal in the Iran case, we are laying out as being what should apply in the North Korea case as well," they added, "and we’ve got a strong argument to make in that respect.”

More: http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/world/biden-conveys-us-concern-on-air-zone-to-chinas-xi/article5424574.ece

After Challenges, China Appears to Backpedal on Air Zone

China has permitted rare street protests and sent armadas of fishing boats to show its growing national interest in a small string of islands in the East China Sea. Earlier this year, the Chinese military locked its radar on a Japanese navy vessel.

Each step seemed like a measured escalation in the long-running territorial dispute, intended to press Japan to negotiate over jurisdiction of the islands. But they also seemed calibrated to avoid a sharp international backlash — or to raise expectations too high at home.

But by imposing a new air defense zone over the islands last weekend, Beijing may have miscalculated. It provoked a quick, pointed challenge from the United States, set off alarm bells among Asian neighbors and created a frenzy of nationalist expression inside China on hopes that the new leadership team in Beijing would push for a decisive resolution of the longstanding dispute.

On Wednesday, after the Pentagon sent two B-52 bombers defiantly cruising around China’s new air defense zone for more than two hours, Beijing appeared to backpedal. The overflights went unchallenged, and some civilian airlines ignored China’s new assertion of air rights.

“We will make corresponding responses according to different situations and how big the threat is,” the spokesman at the Foreign Ministry, Qin Gang, said when asked about China’s lack of enforcement against the American planes.

Under President Xi Jinping, China has suggested that it intends to make a more robust defense of its national interests, including in maritime disputes, to match its rising economic and military power. But even some Chinese analysts say they wonder if the new leadership team fully anticipated the response to the latest assertion of rights — or had in mind a clear Plan B if it met with strong resistance.

“I believe Xi Jinping and his associates must have predicted the substance of this reaction; whether they underestimated the details of the reaction, I’m not sure,” said Shi Yinhong, an occasional adviser to the government and a professor of international relations at Renmin University.

China does appear determined to escalate the issue of the uninhabited islands, known as Diaoyu in China and the Senkaku in Japan, as a way of forcing the Japanese to negotiate and give up control of territory that has symbolic and strategic value for both countries. In the long term, China has not tried to disguise its goal of weakening the alliance between the United States and Japan and supplanting the United States as the dominant naval power in the Western Pacific.

Beijing is especially frustrated that its previous, more cautious steps to convince Japan of the seriousness of its claim to the islands have not prompted Japan, which administers them, to negotiate in earnest.

“Japan always has the backing of the United States and shows unbelievable arrogance to the Chinese proposal to have talks on a bilateral basis,” said Zhu Feng, a professor of international relations at Beijing University and one of China’s more moderate voices on Japan. “Japan’s arrogance is unacceptable.”

But if China has been trying to drive a wedge between Washington and the Japanese government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, their strategy seems to have backfired, at least for now.

The United States had for months seemed reluctant to get involved or take sides in a dispute that carries so much emotional weight for China. American officials complained that some Japanese leaders had made nationalist gestures that antagonized China, worsening the tensions. And the Obama administration dodged requests by Japanese leaders to take a clearer stance in their favor.

That hesitation seems to have largely vanished since China pronounced it was expanding its hold on the region’s airspace.

With the flyover by the B-52s, the United States has shown it is more willing to work with Japan in opposing China’s efforts to unilaterally force a change in the status quo, even if the United States still takes a neutral stance in the islands dispute itself. Hours after China declared its new air zone, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel reaffirmed that the United States would stand by its security treaty obligations to aid Japan if it was attacked.

Since Saturday, Japanese leaders have publicly emphasized the close coordination with Washington — largely to reassure their own population, which has felt growing anxiety over China’s increasingly assertive stance.

On Wednesday in Tokyo, the defense minister, Itsunori Onodera, pledged in a phone call with Mr. Hagel to work closely with the United States military by sharing information and coordinating in the surveillance of Chinese activities in the East China Sea, Japan’s Defense Ministry said.

The new United States ambassador to Japan, Caroline Kennedy, said in her first speech since assuming her post, broadcast around the world on CNN, that China’s creation of the air defense zone “only serves to increase tensions in the region.”

The Chinese action also stirred the first official negative comments about China in South Korea since President Park Geun-hye took office this year and forged a closer relationship with Beijing. The coordinates of the air defense zone announced by China overlap with South Korea’s own air defense zone in some places and appear created to give China an edge in a separate maritime territorial dispute with South Korea.

“We see competition and conflict in the region deepening,” South Korea’s foreign minister, Yun Byung-se, said Wednesday. “Things can take a dramatic turn for the worse if territorial conflicts and historical issues are merged with nationalism.”

The announcement of the air defense zone may also have created problems at home for the leadership in China, where there are expectations among an increasingly nationalist population that the country can live up to its promise of standing up to Japan.

On Chinese social media, a barrage of commentary congratulated the government on the new air defense zone and warned that Beijing should make good on threats by the Defense Ministry that aircraft give notification or face military action.

“If the Chinese military doesn’t do anything about aircraft that don’t obey the commands to identify themselves in the zone, it will face international ridicule,” wrote Ni Fangliu, a historian and an investigative journalist, on his microblog, which has more than two million followers.

The Liberation Army Daily, the official newspaper of China’s military, said in a commentary published before the Chinese government acknowledged the B-52 flights that without strong enforcement, the zone would be just “armchair strategy.”

Despite the risks, Mr. Shi, the government adviser, said that proclaiming the air defense zone was important because it represented China’s first effort to expand its strategic space beyond offshore waters since the establishment of Communist China in 1949.

The response by the United States, he said, amounted to “a negative development for a strong great-power relationship” that China sought between the United States and China, but he added that the Chinese president was patient and strategic.

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/28/world/asia/china-explains-handling-of-b-52-flight-as-tensions-escalate.html?pagewanted=2&_r=0

China eases its one-child policy

China announced Friday that it would ease its deeply unpopular one-child policy, a high-profile move by new leaders to limit a program that has prevented millions of births but helped create an aging population that could constrict economic growth.


The decision to allow couples to have a second baby if either is an only child is part of a reform package that includes abolishing the much-criticized "re-education through labor" program, which allows people to be sent to labor camps for up to four years without trial.

The Communist Party also promised to respect property rights and reduce confiscation of land, a major grievance for farmers, who have largely missed out on the real estate boom that has made many urban Chinese rich.

The reforms were enacted at a four-day plenum of the Communist Party's Central Committee last week and announced on the evening news — China's most widely watched television program — an indication of the importance the leadership attaches to them.

The measures are among the first major policy moves by the new leadership under Xi Jinping, who became head of the Communist Party late last year and president in March. All of the reforms had been under discussion for years, but they were stalled during Hu Jintao's presidency, which many China watchers refer to as a decade of paralysis.

Xi has been eager to prove himself a more forceful and decisive president.

The change in the one-child policy is likely to have the most immediate effect on Chinese families. Demographers have estimated that such a change would allow about 10 million couples to have a second child. The current law allows only couples in which both are only children to have a second baby.

Since the one-child law was introduced in 1980, Communist Party officials have tweaked it repeatedly, allowing myriad exceptions — for minorities, for rural families without boys, for people with disabled children. But there have been few major amendments of this kind.

The party said it would adhere to the principle of limiting family size while promoting the "long-term balanced development of the population of China."

China's National Health and Family Planning Commission says the law has reined in the country's population growth, preventing 400 million births. China's population is 1.3 billion.

Demographers say the impact of the law on population growth has been exaggerated and that it instead has led to a gender imbalance, with more boys than girls born. Furthermore, they say, the low birthrate is beginning to impair China's economic growth, creating a population with too many old people and too few workers.

According to the 2010 census, China's fertility rate was 1.18 children per woman, far below the level needed for the population to replenish itself.

"In the 1980s, when the one-child policy was implemented, it was needed to stop the rapid population growth and increase per-capita income," said Zhou Haiwang, an expert in population studies at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences.

"Now, 30 years later, it has achieved that goal. Now it is time to increase the fertility rate to benefit our society in the long term," Zhou said.

The policy, a bedrock of the Communist Party's social engineering, has been deeply unpopular. In the 1980s, female factory workers had to show family planning officials their stained sanitary napkins to record their menstruation.

"We called them the 'period police.' They wanted to make sure you weren't pregnant," said Lijia Zhang, a Beijing-based writer and social commentator. "At the time, we didn't think it was intrusive. It was just the way things were in China."

Although enforcement has eased, family planning officials are still frequently accused of forcing women to undergo abortions, often late in pregnancy, or to be sterilized against their will.

Meanwhile, rich families have been able to skirt the one-child law by going abroad to give birth or paying large fines. Reports this year said film director Zhang Yimou had fathered seven children.

Another popular reform among human rights advocates is the abolition of the laojiao system, which allows petty offenders to be sent to labor camps without trial. It has often been used to punish whistle-blowers and people who file complaints against government officials.

The system, set up in the 1950s to punish counterrevolutionaries, has been the subject of much criticism in recent years. In 2009, a United Nations report estimated that 190,000 people were serving time in Chinese labor camps without having gone to trial.

In a disappointment to liberals, the plenum offered few other hints of political reform or a loosening of censorship. To the contrary, Xi pledged to step up monitoring of social media, a major source of news for many younger Chinese.

The leadership had hyped the meeting in advance as an opportunity for the most significant rethinking of China's model since Deng Xiaoping's reforms of the late 1970s. An announcement earlier this week disappointed economists and financial markets who were looking for indications China would loosen the grip of large state-owned enterprises.

The announcement Friday added to the financial reforms.

Among them are opening the banking sector by allowing "qualified private capital" to set up small and medum-size banks, and for state-owned enterprises to share more of their profits. It also calls for the protection of private property.

"One cannot be deprived of property," the document says.

As for U.S. concerns over exchange rates, the document refers to improving market mechanisms but doesn't give specifics.

"I think there is going to continue to be progress, but the question is how much and how quickly," U.S. Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew said Friday after meeting with Xi and Chinese finance officials during a visit to Beijing. "The direction is significant, but the character and the pace of change matters."

More: http://www.latimes.com/world/la-fg-china-one-child-20131116,0,2476432.story#axzz2kmQr6pK7

Granted 'decisive' role, Chinese markets decide to slide

Unimpressed by the promotion of markets to a "decisive" role in China's reform agenda for the next decade, investors sold off Chinese shares on Wednesday, disappointed by a lack of details in the reform plan and apparent reluctance to overhaul the state-owned sector.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew also bemoaned the lack of details and said he hoped to gather more information about specific policies in discussions with China.

"Frankly, there are a lot of questions still to be answered," he said on CNBC during a visit to Singapore. "The communique coming out of the plenum was at a very general level."

The ruling Communist Party said at the end of a four-day conclave of its 205-member Central Committee on Tuesday that it aimed to achieve "decisive results" by 2020, and gave markets a more prominent role.

By setting an unusually explicit self-imposed deadline and establishing a special working group, the new administration of President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang suggested a more decisive reform push than under the previous leadership.

But while the communique mentioned several reform areas Beijing aimed to tackle, its language was even more general than some had expected and it explicitly underscored the importance of the state sector for the economy.

"State-owned enterprise reform is a big disappointment," said Gary Liu, deputy director of the CEIBS Lujiazui International Finance Research Center in Shanghai.

"But the implementation will be even more important than the plan itself."

All major Chinese stock indexes opened down, lagging Asian shares.

By 0230 GMT, the CSI300 index .CSI300, which tracks China's largest listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen, was down 1.4 percent and the Shanghai Composite Index .SSECwas off 1.1 percent. The index of Chinese enterprises listed in Hong Kong .HSCE fell 1.8 percent.

All the indexes were dragged down primarily by financial stocks, in particular major state-owned banks, seen as the key levers through which Beijing controls the economy .SSEFN.

Other Chinese financial markets were flat, with the yuan trading steady and short-term money market still dormant at time of reporting.

Global markets also gave the outcome of the conclave little attention, focusing instead on when the U.S. Federal Reserve might start to rein in its economic stimulus measures.

Investors have been waiting for the official statements of the party meeting for signs of the government's intentions toward both financial markets and the companies that participate in them.

Explaining the new approach to reforms, official news agency Xinhua said in an editorial on Wednesday that rather than playing a role of markets in a system dominated by the state, the government would seek to accomplish its goals in conditions determined by markets.

"The state should exercise the government's role under the domination of the market, rather than exercising the market's role under the domination of the government," Xinhua said.

Lew said one test of the reform would be how the likes of the Shanghai free trade zone, launched in September, is developed.

"There have to be some details underneath it that open up markets in financial services and other things to competition," he said.

However, the communique did not commit to any radical move to weaken the role of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in the economy.

In the short term, some equities analysts argue leaving state industry reform off the table is not implicitly negative for equity indexes, dominated by state owned enterprises, in particular banks, which could see margins hurt by increased competition with private companies.

However, some economists believe that reforming market mechanisms without reforming market participants risks further distortions.

"As long as the government does not allow large SOEs to fail, they will be more credit worthy than private sector rivals," wrote Mark Williams and Qinwei Wang of Capital Economics in a research note.

"In these circumstances, the state sector could end up the major beneficiary if investment controls are relaxed and the financial sector further liberalized."

Domestic media, which must operate under guidance from the central government, reacted positively to the plenum, with many running long special sections on the reform accompanied by editorials.

However, an editorial in the Global Times, an influential tabloid published by the official People's Daily, warned of the risk entrenched interests still pose to market-based reform.

"With the advancing of reform, we should firmly oppose vested interest groups," the editorial read.

"If we don't seek a consolidation of group interests and whole social interests, reform will be an empty slogan."

More: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/13/us-china-reform-idUSBRE9AC04H20131113

8 killed in floods after typhoon hits China

Eight people were killed and over 1,000 students were trapped in floods after rainstorms in several areas in China triggered by Typhoon Haiyan.

Two people have died and four remain missing after a boat capsized in a reservoir in central China's Hunan Province early today.

The boat with ten people aboard capsized inSanlixi Reservoir in Taoyuan County.

Four people were rescued and four remain missing. The boat overturned during sudden strong gales, according to an initial investigation.

In another incident, rescuers continued searching for four people who went missing after their pedicab fell into a flooded river yesterday during heavy downpours triggered by Typhoon Haiyan in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

The four were among six people aboard the pedicab. The vehicle veered off a flooded road in Hengxian County and fell into the Daliao river. Two of the passengers managed to reach the bank.

Haiyan has been lashing Guangxi since Sunday, bringing heavy downpours and tidal waves that have led to at least six deaths in the region, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

Also more than 1,000 students and teaching staff of a middle school in southwest China were trapped by floods after rainstorms triggered by the typhoon swept the area, rescuers said today.

Torrents inundated the No 1 Middle School of Sanli Township in Guigang City, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region at 7:03 am today, with floodwaters 1.5 metres deep.

All of those trapped in the school buildings have been moved to the second floor or higher, and rescue operations are underway.

Downpours lashed Guangxi as Haiyan reached the region on yesterday morning.

The heavy rains have left one dead and affected nearly a million people in Guangxi.

Some 25,000 people were displaced and 249 houses collapsed, Xinhua reported.

More: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/china/8-killed-in-floods-after-typhoon-hits-China/articleshow/25631930.cms

China's leaders open key meeting to set reform agenda

Chinese leaders began a four-day secret meeting on Saturday to set a reform agenda for the next decade as they try to steer the giant economy towards more sustainable growth after three decades of breakneck expansion.

President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang must unleash new growth drivers as the world's second-largest economy loses steam, burdened by industrial overcapacity, piles of debt and soaring house prices.

The meeting will show just how committed the new leadership is to reform after formally taking power in March.

Economic reforms will dominate the meeting of the 205-member Central Committee of China's ruling Communist Party. Little if any news will be released during the secret gathering, although traditionally official news agency Xinhua releases a long dispatch on the last day.

State television's English-language news channel said the meeting had begun. It gave no other details.

Beijing has tightened security in the run-up to the meeting, and authorities have been more jittery than usual after a vehicle ploughed into a crowd last week on the northern end of Tiananmen Square, an event the government blamed on Islamist extremists.

While some social and political issues could be tackled, such as corruption and pollution, Western-style political reform is certainly not on the agenda.

Yu Zhengsheng, the fourth-ranked member in the elite Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party, said last month the meeting would deliver "unprecedented" economic and societal reforms.

Analysts have cautioned against high expectations as stability remains the watchword for the leadership, even amid media reports top policymakers could take bold steps to deal with entrenched vested interests, such as state monopolies.

The government has pledged to allow market forces to play a bigger role in setting the price of capital, energy and land, and to cut red-tape.

That suggests the biggest changes may be fresh measures to free up interest rates and fiscal changes to allow local governments to manage their debt better and move away from reliance on land sales for revenues.

The meeting may also decide to loosen the household registration system, which blocks migrant workers and their families from access to education and social welfare beyond their home villages.

The system is seen as an impediment to attracting more people to urban areas, a trend the government seeks to encourage to boost consumption.

The leaders may also push land reforms to allow farmers to sell land when they leave their villages. Currently, they cannot sell land freely and many do not leave their farms for fear local governments could grab them for development.

Historically, third plenums in China have served as a springboard for key economic reforms. New leaderships usually spend the first few months in office getting familiar with issues, building consensus before unveiling policy initiatives.

Former leader Deng Xiaoping launched historic reforms to open the economy to the outside world at a third plenum in 1978.

That was followed by a third plenum in 1993 that endorsed the "socialist" market economy, paving the way for sweeping reforms spearheaded by then Premier Zhu Rongji, which led to China's entry into the World Trade Organization.

But the third plenum, in 2003, under Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao - predecessors of Xi and Li - failed to yield key reforms. In 2008, they unveiled a 4 trillion yuan ($656 billion) stimulus package, which fuelled a property frenzy and saddled local governments with debt of more than 10 trillion yuan that the economy is still trying to absorb today.

More: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/09/us-china-reform-idUSBRE9A802E20131109

Why China's Third Plenum matters

At a busy open-air market in the centre of Beijing, shoppers are focused on finding the freshest, cheapest vegetables on offer.

Slices of pumpkin sold for 40 cents a pound were too expensive for one elderly woman. After berating the pumpkin stall owner, who barely shrugged in response, she shuffled off in search of a less expensive option.

Though it is likely to be held only few kilometres west, the upcoming big meeting of the Communist Party's top bosses, or the third session of the 18th Communist Party Central Committee, seems light years away.

The Third Plenum is simply the third time that Xi Jinping will meet with his top brass in his role as the party chairman. It is a closed door meeting attended by the ruling party's bigwigs. But it is important because the grand plans that come out of this meeting could affect everyone in China - and beyond.

President Xi Jinping is expected to unveil a new economic framework for the country after the summit. Hopes are high he will swoop in to remedy some the country's biggest headaches, from pollution to soaring property prices.

A growing wealth gap is one issue China's leaders need to tackle

But at the market, those asked about the big meeting nodded their heads to acknowledge they had heard of it, but their hopes for reform were focused on their daily lives.

"I want issues like housing prices to be discussed," explained one retiree as she bargained for a pound of cucumbers. "I hope that issue can be resolved for the families in need."

'Low efficiency'

In the past, the Third Plenum has done more than that; past leaders have seized on their third meeting with other party officials as a chance to announce dramatic changes to the Chinese economy.

Former Communist leader Deng Xiaoping was the first one to use a major party meeting in 1978 to announce China would open itself up to global trade.

Fifteen years later, Zhu Rongji, the country's vice-premier who then ascended to the role of prime minister, endorsed another round of restructuring combining private enterprise with strong support for state enterprises. That mixture spurred China to become the world's second-largest economy.

China's leaders want a more modern economy, shifting further from a centrally planned system, though experts all have differing opinions about where the government should start.

For some, the problems with China's cumbersome state-owned banks pose a huge bottleneck in economic growth.

"State-owned banks are more interested in lending to state-owned enterprises because this is politically safer. Leaders of state-owned banks are more interested in political promotions rather than profitability of the bank," explained Zhu Guozhong, professor at Peking University's Guanghua School of Management.

"So this leads to a very low efficiency in the allocation of funds. More funds go to less efficient state-owned enterprises and we have very active, very creative private firms. They need finance but they don't get it. I think this is a very urgent problem in China."

Others believe that government monopolies in sectors like oil and telecommunications are the real issue.

"State-owned companies, especially industrial state-owned companies, are generally in debt. This is unfair because they take up a lot of state resources, such as land and loans," explained Sheng Hong, director of the Unirule Institute of Economics, a private think tank based in Beijing.

"They haven't made profits in about two decades, but those officials receive unlimited salaries and bonuses. Chinese people hand resources to this group of people but they don't reward the people at all."

'No silver bullet'

Xi Jinping will have to negotiate between competing interests if he hopes to engineer ambitious reforms to the country's state-owned assets. Any new plans will be the product of months of closed door meetings between officials who represent competing interests.

More balanced development is needed to tackle severe pollution, observers say

A comprehensive plan will need to take many moving parts of the economy into account.

"It would be wrong to say there is one silver bullet that will solve all the problems," explained Axel Van Trotsenburg, World Bank Vice-President for East Asia and the Pacific. "All issues need to be put together, co-ordinated and a consensus towards implementation."

Even if Mr Xi shows willingness to steer China away from its centrally-planned past towards a more dynamic future, be sure to take his initial plans with a pinch of salt.

It is no secret in China that it is much easier for reforms to be announced, but that is just the start of a long process. It is very difficult for those reforms to be carried out, particularly if they threaten local interests.

Still, Xi Jinping is under pressure from many parts of Chinese society to unveil radical changes. If he doesn't, the big meeting might be an equally big disappointment.

More: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-24846815

India-China border agreement to reduce tension along LAC

The Border Defence Cooperation Agreement (BDCA) inked between India and China on Wednesday facilitates establishment of a hotline between the military headquarters of the two countries, besides border personnel meeting sites in all sectors receiving broad directive not to tail each others' patrols along the disputed borders.

The BDCA, the outcome of a series of talks following diplomatic tensions arising out of the Chinese troops pitching their tents at Depsang valley in Ladakh in April, says that the two sides may consider establishing a hotline between the military headquarters to facilitate communication at the highest level of the two militaries in times of crisis.

The two countries already have hotlines between the two prime ministers' offices.

The BDCA, signed after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh held talks with his Chinese counterpart Li Keqiang, also says the two sides have agreed not to follow or tail patrols of the other side where there is no common understanding of the line of actual control (LAC).

The aggressive patrolling often resulted in tension. It also says that in case a doubtful situation at the border arises either side has a right to seek a clarification from the other side.

It also stipulates that the two countries agree that if border defence forces of the two sides come to a face-to-face situation in areas of no common understanding, both sides exercise maximum self-restraint, refrain from any provocative action and not to use force or threaten to use force against either side, treat each other with courtesy and prevent exchange of fire or armed conflict.

The BDCA, which outlined a series of procedures to be followed by two countries along the about 4000 km long border, pending the settlement of the dispute facilitate exchange of information about military exercises, aircrafts, demolition operations and unmarked mines and take consequent measures conducive to the maintenance of peace, stability and tranquillity along theLAC.

Also the two sides agreed to jointly combat smuggling of arms, wildlife, wildlife articles and other contrabands besides assisting each other in locating personnel, livestock, means of transport and aerial vehicles that may have crossed or possibly in the process of crossing LAC.

More: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/India-China-border-agreement-to-reduce-tension-along-LAC/articleshow/24591297.cms

Key border agreement to be inked as Manmohan Singh, Li Keqiang hold talks

India and China are slated to ink a key border deal to prevent face-offs on their disputed border Wednesday as Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his Chinese counterpart Li Keqiang hold talks here Wednesday.

The stapled visa issue is also likely to prominently in talks, sources have indicated.

On Tuesday, sources had said that "all issues would be on the table". Besides the issuance of stapled visas by China to two archers from Arunachal Pradesh, India's northeastern state to which China lays claim, both sides would discuss the adverse trade balance and water sharing issues on the Brahmaputra river that runs from the Tibetan plateau to India.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Premier Li are to hold restricted talks and delegation level talks at the Great Hall of the People after which both sides are to ink the Border Defence Cooperation Agreement (BDCA) that is aimed to reduce tensions on the 4,000-km boundary that has seen several incidents of Chinese incursions laying claim to disputed territory.

The Indian cabinet approved the blueprint of the BDCA ahead of the prime minister's visit. The BDCA puts together existing mechanisms for maintaining peace on the border. It will not solve the border issue for which talks are going on for several years.

The source indicated India's unhappiness at the issuance of stapled visas. Several agreements are set to be inked, including on culture.

The adverse trade issue would figure in the talks. India is seeking market access to pharmaceuticals, IT among other items.

China and India are discussing setting up an industrial cluster in India and a Chinese team is scouting in India for possible sites to set up the special economic zone. The idea would be to sell the goods produced to China or third countries, which would also help in restoring the balance of trade which is heavily skewed in China's favour.

More: http://www.dnaindia.com/world/report-key-border-agreement-to-be-inked-as-manmohan-singh-li-keqiang-hold-talks-1907400

India, China to sign road pact during PM’s visit

Impressed with China’s highways infrastructure and superior standards for construction and maintenance, a bilateral pact on cooperation in the road transportation sector is set to be signed between the two countries during PM Manmohan Singh’s visit to China next week.

At 65,000 km China has world’s second largest network of expressways. So far, however, China has a limited presence in India’s highway sector. Only six Chinese companies, under joint ventures with Indian firms, are involved in building highways. All six companies have participated and won the bids for the projects.

The broad area where India wants to seek cooperation includes management of road infrastructure technology, standards for highway construction and maintenance, road safety intervention strategies aimed at reducing death and injuries resulting from road accidents, etc. India also wants to know more on how China has dealt with contractual issues and financing of highways build in public private partnership mode.

More: http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/NewDelhi/India-China-to-sign-road-pact-during-PM-s-visit/Article1-1137028.aspx

China, Brunei gaining momentum for further development of exemplary ties

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang starts an official visit to Brunei on Wednesday, opening up yet another opportunity for the two countries to further advance their relations.

During his stay, Li will hold talks with Bruneian Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah. The two sides are expected to sign a series of cooperation agreements, which will further materialize their newly upgraded strategic cooperative relationship.

In a sign of the broader significance of the bilateral interaction, Li will also attend a string of regional summits here to reaffirm Beijing's commitment to and table concrete proposals on promoting cooperation with Southeast Asia and in the wider East Asia.

Li's visit comes on top of two decades of steady development of China-Brunei relations. Since establishing diplomatic ties in 1991, the two countries have witnessed rapid expansion of bilateral interaction, with two-way trade increasing about 80-fold in two decades to 1.6 billion U.S. dollars last year.

Initiating a recent growth spurt of the relationship, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Hassanal announced in April in Beijing a historic move to lift bilateral ties to a strategic cooperative relationship. The sultan was the first foreign head of state Xi had hosted since assuming presidency in March.

The China-Brunei relationship, Xi said back then, features mutual respect and equality and serves as a paragon of harmonious coexistence and win-win cooperation between big and small nations in the region. He urged the two sides to give full play to their respective advantages and further deepen bilateral cooperation.

Brunei values very much the longstanding cooperation enjoyed by the two countries as "partners and close regional neighbors," and looks forward to further strengthening the friendship between the two peoples for mutual progress and prosperity, Hassanal said in a message to Xi at the advent of the 64th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China on Oct. 1.

While in Beijing, Hassanal also met with Li, and the two agreed to seize the opportunity of the upgrading to further boost bilateral practical cooperation. Li proposed that the two sides tap deeper into their cooperation potential so as to bring more benefits to their people.

In his message to Li on the occasion of China's National Day, the sultan said he looks forward to Li's visit and regards it as an important opportunity to strengthen the valuable and time-honored ties between the two countries.

During Li's forthcoming visit, China and Brunei will seek to expand cooperation in a variety of sectors, including agriculture, fishery and energy, Chinese Ambassador Zheng Xianglin told local media recently, adding that more Chinese companies are coming to Brunei for investment opportunities.

Looking at the regional picture, the two countries, with Brunei chairing the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) this year, have also pledged concerted efforts to promote the overall relations between China and the 10-member bloc.

Beijing, Xi said in his April meeting with Hassanal, is willing to work with the Bruneian side to champion peace and cooperation in the region and steer the development of the overall China-ASEAN ties forward in the right direction.

When Li meets with ASEAN leaders here, the Chinese premier is expected to expound more on his vision, articulated early September at the 10th China-ASEAN Expo, of ushering China-ASEAN cooperation from the past "golden decade" to a "diamond decade."

Priorities include upgrading the China-ASEAN free trade area, improving regional interconnectivity, and expanding maritime cooperation and people-to-people exchanges, said Zheng, the ambassador.

As for the South China Sea disputes, in which Bandar Seri Begawan is a claimant, China and Brunei have both reaffirmed their commitment to seeking peaceful settlements via dialogue and consultation and preventing the issue from undermining the China-ASEAN friendship and cooperation.

Li's trip, which will also take him to Thailand and Vietnam, comes a day after Xi returned home from a tour in the same region, in which the Chinese president visited Indonesia and Malaysia and attended the latest Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.

The intensive diplomacy in Southeast Asia, commented Ruan Zongze, vice-president of the China Institute of International Studies, once again demonstrates that Beijing is a trustworthy partner of ASEAN committed to win-win cooperation and common development in the region.

Credits: xinhuanet

Waves batter China as typhoon approaches

Waves more than 20m high have been battering the coast of China's Zhejiang province as Typhoon Fitow approaches.

Hundreds of thousands of people in the area have been told to leave their homes and more than 65,000 boats have been called back to shore.

The National Meteorological Centre has issued a red alert for the storm, saying it was expected to make landfall in China late Sunday or early Monday.

Credits: bbc