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Edited by Hunter Davies $29.99
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Patrick Chappatte, Cagle Cartoons, The International Herald Tribune —
Posted on Jan 19, 2013
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 bbc.co.uk
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On Tuesday, Barack Obama played host to China’s Vice President Xi Jinping at the White House to discuss trade, human rights and other diplomatic topics. Why all the fuss over a VP? For one, Xi was returning a gesture that his American counterpart, Joe Biden, recently made.
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 Jonathan Kos-Read (CC-BY-ND)
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By Eugene Robinson — Even the briefest acquaintance with this smoggy, sprawling capital is basis enough to conclude that much of the campaign rhetoric we’re hearing about China is unrealistic, dishonest or just dumb.
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 Wikimedia Commons / Yancho Sabev
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The Chinese government has issued a warning to the White House that there will be consequences of a diplomatic nature if President Barack Obama goes ahead with a rumored plan to meet the Dalai Lama in Washington later this month. A representative from the Chinese Communist Party hinted vaguely at undesirable outcomes ... (continued)
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 AP / Ng Han Guan
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Chinese police dashed the hopes of eight contestants who would have vied for the title of Mr. Gay China in Beijing on Friday by shutting down the show right before it was set to start, claiming that event officials hadn’t followed the correct protocol in putting on the pageant.
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 AP
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With the U.S. economic slump and the seemingly never-ending boom in Chinese manufacturing, it comes as no surprise that China has become the world’s biggest car market, with 13.5 million vehicles sold in 2009—or 2.1 million more than the U.S.
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 fortressglobal.com
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The Chinese government has denied having any relationship with “a malware-based cyber espionage network” called GhostNet, an operation revealed Sunday by a Toronto-based research team. GhostNet is suspected of infiltrating a number of military and diplomatic computer systems, including the Dalai Lama’s, and is based in China.
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 cctv.com
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China’s cultural heritage agency has strongly condemned the auction of two bronze pieces it says were looted from the Summer Palace near Beijing some 150 years ago. Christie’s sold the bronzes, part of the late Yves Saint Laurent’s estate, for 31 million euros.
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 AP photo / Greg Baker, Pool
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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton this weekend made her first visit to China in her new role, but Amnesty International and other activist groups didn’t like her position when it came to addressing China’s treatment of dissidents—more specifically, she didn’t take a firm stand on the issue during her meetings with Chinese officials.
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 Flickr.com / PMorgan
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After reconfiguring its output figures, China has finally found itself on the medal podium for gross domestic product, ousting Germany from its role as third largest economy in the world. China’s economy has grown tenfold in the past 30 years, and its development, while marveled at, worries many environmental, human rights and labor activists.
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Simanca Osmani, Cagle Cartoons, Brazil —
Posted on Aug 25, 2008
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Satire by Andy Borowitz —
All that glitters is not gold, this tongue-in-cheek dispatch from the Beijing Olympics warns.
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Satire by Andy Borowitz —
A member of the U.S. Olympic diving team was disqualified from competition today when it was learned that he did not have a sufficiently compelling human story line to exploit on the NBC telecast of the worldwide sporting event.
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 White House / Eric Draper
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If you’ve been watching the Olympics this year, chances are you’ve had your share of George W. Bush sightings. The president isn’t exactly known for his worldliness, but he found the spirit of international understanding and friendship to be a pleasant surprise—a “very uplifting experience,” as he put it. Imagine that.
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Wow, there’ve really been some cheesy opening numbers in Summer Olympics past. Check out this amusing montage of clips from bygone ceremonies and see if you can tell, from the music, the outfits, and the cuts to shady-looking heads of state, when each awe-inspiring spectacle happened.
Posted on Aug 8, 2008
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 AP photo / Robert F. Bukaty
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With plenty of pomp and pageantry (not to mention some serious pyrotechnics)—and with auspicious figures like President Bush and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in attendance—the Olympic Summer Games kicked off in Beijing on Friday.
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 Wiki Commons/Andy Miah
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Naomi Klein points out that while repression in China is nothing new, Police State 2.0 has nothing to do with Communist ideological purity and everything to do with creating “the ultimate consumer cocoon for Visa cards, Adidas sneakers, China Mobile cell phones, McDonald’s happy meals, Tsingtao beer, and UPS delivery—to name just a few of the official Olympic sponsors. But the hottest new market of all is the surveillance itself ... an entirely for-profit affair that is the latest frontier for the global Disaster Capitalism Complex.”
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According to state media, a raid in China’s northwestern frontier region killed 16 policemen. Officials quickly tried to hush concerns about the Olympic Games, which are just a few days from opening thousands of miles away in Beijing, where the government has invested billions to clean up and secure the city.
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 AP photo / EyePress
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When Beijing was chosen to host the Olympics, the Chinese government pledged to make human rights improvements, but Amnesty International says the situation has actually gotten worse because of the coming games: “Specifically we’ve seen crackdowns on domestic human rights activists, media censorship and increased use of re-education through labor as a means to clean up Beijing and surrounding areas.”
Posted on Jul 28, 2008
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 Wiki Commons
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Sectarian battles for control of Iraq’s national team between Shiites and Sunnis have led the International Olympic Committee to block Iraq from participating in the Summer Games in Beijing. The ban was upheld Thursday after the Iraqis failed to meet a deadline to appeal the decision, thereby losing a chance to generate considerable PR and/or pride for the wounded country.
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 AP photo / Ng Han Guan
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Taking cues from past Olympic protests and the U.S.‘s notoriously ironic “free speech zones,” the Chinese government has declared its openness to dissidents criticizing the state—so long as dissent is contained in one of three areas, does not threaten vague notions of national unity, and is submitted five days beforehand to the local security bureau.
Posted on Jul 23, 2008
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 Flickr / maveric2003
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The United States has long enjoyed lecturing the communist government of China over the conduct of that nation’s economy. How times have changed. Chinese officials have recently criticized the United States’ “warped conception” of regulation, among other economic blunders.
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 cnn.com
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John Amaechi is not your typical basketball star. The former center for Utah, Orlando and Cleveland is the first NBA alumnus to openly declare that he’s gay, and now he’s combining sports and cultural politics in another sense by serving as Amnesty International’s sports ambassador to this summer’s Beijing Olympics.
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 Luca Galuzzi - www.galuzzi.it
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Despite disapproval from French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s party, which is working on improving relations with the Chinese government, Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe has championed the Dalai Lama by making the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader an honorary citizen of the City of Light.
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Satire by Andy Borowitz —
Fearful about the prospect of human-rights protesters ruining the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, China today announced a plan to move the summer games to a remote location where no one can find them.
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 cnn.com
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When CNN commentator Jack Cafferty called the Chinese “a bunch of goons and thugs” on the air April 9, Chinese-Americans were listening—and Saturday morning, thousands protested outside Hollywood’s CNN building, demanding that he be fired.
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 AP photo / Noah Berger
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Athletes participating in this summer’s Olympic Games in Beijing could be expelled if they fly the Tibetan flag or express political opinions that constitute “propaganda” in official ceremonies and spaces, according to International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge, but questions abound as to the precise definition of that term.
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 www.buddhismus.at
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Speaking from Japan, the Dalai Lama told reporters that he has supported the Beijing Olympics “right from the beginning,” but that protesters have a right to voice themselves. His government in exile, however, released a statement in opposition to the demonstrations that have followed the Olympic torch.
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 news.bbc.co.uk
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Representatives of the International Olympic Committee have warned China that the estimated 30,000 journalists who will cover the Games in Beijing must have unimpeded Internet access. Concerns were raised after the Chinese government blocked access to certain sites during the recent unrest in Tibet.
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 AP photo / Charles Dharapak
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Nancy Pelosi in recent weeks has been living up to her reputation as a critic of China. In an interview airing Tuesday, the House speaker tells “Good Morning America” that President Bush should consider skipping the opening ceremonies. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has already said “nein” to the affair.
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 chinadaily.cn
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China has accused international media outlets of showing bias in news reports of the riots in Tibet. However, the media, too, have a gripe: Beijing has prevented foreign media from entering Tibet and neighboring provinces and has limited domestic access to foreign media reports.
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 poptower.com
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Director Steven Spielberg was an artistic adviser to the 2008 Beijing Olympics but has resigned because of China’s unwillingness to put more pressure on the Sudanese government to bring an end to the humanitarian crisis in Darfur. As he put it, “I find that my conscience will not allow me to continue business as usual.”
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 iiichan.net
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China plans to stick with the economic and political reforms that have brought prestige, wealth and environmental catastrophe to the country, but don’t expect Beijing to turn its back on the Communist Party completely. As the official spokesman of the 17th party congress put it: “We will never copy the Western model of political system.”
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 Beijing Public Security Ministry
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Web users in Beijing will soon have to deal with a new annoyance as part of China’s endless effort to control the Internet. By the end of the year, all websites registered with the government will feature animated Internet cops that will warn users to avoid forbidden content and offer friendly (if obnoxious) Internet security tips.
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With the Red Star rising over Africa, locals and leaders across that vast continent are starting to wonder if Beijing’s forays represent a positive collaboration among developing nations—or just the latest incarnation of exploitative colonialism.
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