Telegraph – The head of China’s central bank has given the strongest signal yet that the country will move away from pegging its currency to the dollar, but he said any changes would be gradual. At the annual session of the legislative National People’s Congress in Beijing, Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of the People’s Bank of China, said that the days of the “special yuan” policy were numbered. He described the dollar peg as a “temporary” response to the global financial crisis, but gave no timescale for any change in policy. The currency has been pegged at about 6.83 yuan per dollar since July 2008. Read Article
CTV News – NEW DELHI- India has officially agreed to sign on the nonbinding Copenhagen climate accord. Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh told parliament the decision implies that India stands by the accord. India, along with Brazil, China, South Africa, the EU and the U.S., forged the compromise at the Danish summit in December. But there was some concern earlier this year after several countries missed an initial deadline to express support for the accord that even the weak agreement would fall apart. Read Article
Yahoo! (AFP) – Asia is “missing” about 96 million women — the vast majority in China and India — who died from discriminatory health care and neglect or who were never born at all, the UN estimated on Monday. Female infanticide and sex-selective abortion have caused a severe gender imbalance in Asia, and the problem is worsening despite rapid economic growth in the region, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) report said. Read Article
Financial Times – China Daily reports that the country’s Weather Modification Office says there is ‘rising demand’ for ways to control the weather: As drought and hailstorms pose severe threats to rural income and food supply, there is a rising demand for technology to cushion the impact, Zheng Guoguang told China Daily. What is weather modification, you ask? Well, it’s mostly cloud-seeding, and, in China at least, precipitating snowfall and preventing hail. Read Article
BBC – Human rights organisations in Cambodia have called for the government to tackle the rising incidence of rape. A report by Amnesty International says victims have limited access to justice, medical services and counselling. It claims that rape cases are often settled by cash payments to the victim – or bribes to the authorities. Read article
International Business Times – War-torn Afghanistan will set up an Internet filter to block Internet sites with sexual or violent content, a minister said. But the government denied that it was another attempt at censorship or would include the Taliban’s website. Read Article
Ottawa Citizen – The West’s bullying approach to developing nations won’t work anymore — global power is shifting to Asia. This is the first in a four-part series of articles examining how the world will manage a shift in power and influence from west to east. From 1000-1800 AD, Asia, Africa and Latin America — today’s developing world — accounted for 65 to 75 per cent of global population and income. Europe rode to world dominance through the industrial revolution, innovations in transport and communication, and colonialism, during which the developing countries suffered dramatic relative losses. Read article
BBC – Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao has said China must reverse its widening income gap between rich and poor. He said benefits of a growing economy – expected to expand by 8% this year – should be distributed more fairly. Read Article
Times Online – China has unveiled a 7.5 per cent increase in its military spending for this year, the first time in nearly two decades that the budget has grown by less than double-digit figures. The slowdown in defence expenditure growth surprised international experts who had expected a slight decrease from last year but were forecasting a rise in the region of 14.5 per cent. Read article
AP – A powerful 6.4 magnitude earthquake rocked southern Taiwan on Thursday morning causing buildings to sway hundreds of miles to the north. Local news reports said at least one person was injured.The quake was centered in the county of Kaohsiung, and struck at a depth of about 3.1 miles. Kaohsiung is about 249 miles south of the capital, Taipei. Read Article
Reuters – China stood its ground that diplomacy was the best way to resolve the standoff over Iran’s nuclear program, as U.S. diplomats arrived in Beijing on Tuesday for talks on Tehran and North Korea’s atomic ambitions. U.S. Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg will be the most senior U.S. diplomat to visit Beijing since a flurry of disputes over Internet censorship, trade, arms sales to Taiwan and Tibet unsettled ties with China. Read article
BBC – China has tightened controls on internet use, requiring anyone who wants to set up a website to meet regulators and produce ID documents. The technology ministry said the measures were designed to tackle online pornography, but internet activists see it as increased government censorship. A number of websites are now being registered overseas in an attempt to avoid controls. Read Article
Times of India – Opposition leader Manohar Parrikar has lambasted the state government, alleging that it is abetting deforestation even as rampant illegal mining continues. “For the past three years alone, 1,500 hectares of forest land has been converted to mining land. The forest department should be renamed as the de-forestation department,” Parrikar told the media at a press conference here on Thursday. “From statistics made available to me, about 18 to 22 per cent of iron ore exported from the state is being extracted from illegal mines. Goa is currently exporting 43 million tonnes of iron ore, which is double to the quantity of exports in 2005. The government is unable to give an account of the source of ore for more than 33 million tonnes,” Parrikar said. He also said that chief minister Digambar Kamat should be made accountable for growing illegalities in the mining sector. Read Article
VOANews – Child poverty in Japan is increasing at a surprising rate. That is the assessment from a senior government researcher studying the country’s economic decline. Aya Abe says 15 percent of Japanese children live in poverty and the government is not doing enough to help them. Read article
Sydney Morning Herald – China’s top expert on social unrest has warned that hardline security policies are taking the country to the brink of ”revolutionary turmoil”. In contrast with the powerful, assertive and united China that is being projected to the outside world, Yu Jianrong said his prediction of looming internal disaster reflected on-the-ground surveys and also the views of Chinese government ministers. Read article
Washington Post – After a morning of rushed evacuations, the tsunami that reached Hawaii midday Saturday was smaller than officials had feared, causing no reported damage and never rising more than about three feet above sea levels, authorities said. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center lifted its warning for Hawaii about two hours after the series of waves hit Hawaiian shores, and later for most of the rest of the Pacific. Read Article
Washington Post – Thousands of people are going online to share information about the massive 8.8-magnitude earthquake that struck central Chile early this morning. Note that much of it is in Spanish, but can be converted to English through Google’s translation tool. Read more
Washington Post — Wide swaths of the south Pacific, Asia and Australia braced for a tsunami after a devastating earthquake hit the coast of Chile on Saturday. Officials in Japan and Australia warned a tsunami from the earthquake was likely to hit Asian shorelines within 24 hours. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii issued a tsunami caution for areas across the region. Read article
Washington Post — A devastating earthquake struck Chile early Saturday, toppling homes, collapsing bridges and plunging trucks into the fractured earth. A tsunami set off by the magnitude-8.8 quake threatened every nation around the Pacific Ocean – roughly a quarter of the globe. President-elect Sebastian Pinera said more than 120 people died, but the death toll was rising quickly. Read article
Reuters – China’s military warned the United States on Thursday to “speak and act cautiously” to avoid reigniting tensions between the two powers, denying the People’s Liberation Army played a part in Internet hacking. Huang Xueping, spokesman for the Chinese Ministry of Defense, said his government would not reverse its decision to suspend “bilateral military plans” with Washington after it said in late January that it would sell $6.4 billion of arms to Taiwan, the self-ruled island Beijing claims as its own. Read article
Telegraph – India and Pakistan’s first talks since the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks ended in acrimony as each accused the other of harbouring terrorists and tolerating human rights abuses. The meeting in New Delhi was regarded as the first step in rebuilding trust between the long-standing enemies, but their foreign secretaries revealed significant differences continued. India’s foreign secretary Nirupama Rao said dialogue “holds tremendous potential” but progress had been repeatedly “thwarted” by acts of terrorism. She went into the talks “conscious of the large trust deficit between the two countries,” she said. Read article
China Daily – Contrary to much speculation China may not buy the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) remaining 191.3 tons of gold which is up for sale as it does not want to upset the market, a top industry official told China Daily yesterday. “It is not feasible for China to buy the IMF bullion, as any purchase or even intent to do so would trigger market speculation and volatility,” said the official from the China Gold Association, on condition of anonymity. He said China would continue to shore up its gold reserves by acquiring gold mines abroad rather than purchases on the international market. Some analysts had earlier said China would purchase the IMF gold in an effort to diversify its dollar asset-dominated foreign exchange reserves. According to estimates, over 70 percent of China’s $2.4 trillion foreign exchange reserves are in dollar assets. Read Article
Ed – Preparations are well at hand for the final destruction of the US dollar and economy. Out of the ashes will arise a North American Union and a single currency, the Amero. All exactly to plan
Daily Telegraph – Evidence is mounting that Chinese sales of US Treasury bonds over recent months are intended as a warning shot to Washington over escalating political disputes rather than being part of a routine portfolio shift as thought at first. Read Article
BBC – A senior Maoist rebel leader in India has offered a ceasefire ahead of possible talks with the government. Koteswara Rao – also known as Kishenji – told the BBC that the truce, apparently without conditions, could start later this week. Read article
Reuters – North Korea has proposed holding military talks with the South next week after it raised tension on the troubled peninsula last week by warning it would hold live-fire drills near the border with its rival. North Korea is apparently using military threats against U.S. ally South Korea to strengthen its hand to win concessions from regional powers as it appears ready to return to international talks on ending its nuclear arms program, analysts said. Read article
