April 14, 2008
Top headline: ATM smashing in Lhasa caused dispute between Dalai Lama and Bank of China
According to the article, 13 financial institutions were damaged during the Lhasa ‘March 14 Incident’; 18 ATM machines were burned or smashed.
The article says that the Dalai Lama accused local banks of being responsible because they had appropriated Central Government money which should have been spent for the development of Tibet. The article quotes the vice director of the Lhasa branch of Bank of China, Nie Xunqing (聂勋庆), who denied the charge, saying
It is the Dalai clique that does not want to see financial services function well in Tibet. Besides, they want to sabotage the Beijing Olympic Games. Bank of China is the only bank partner of the Beijing Olympic Games, and every branch of Bank of China here bears a sign of the Olympic symbol. [Sabotaging the Olympic Games] is their real purpose.
Also on the front page:
- On April 12, a gas explosion in a coal mine in Huludao (葫芦岛), Liaoning Province, killed 14 miners, and left two missing. The big photo shows a team of rescuers at the scene of the accident.
- Two girls were stabbed by a neighbor in an apartment complex in Beijing. A pet dog was allegedly the cause of the bloody conflict.
- Like Xu Ting (许霆), the security guard who got a life sentence for taking away money from a faulty ATM, a police academy student named He Peng (何鹏) was also given a life sentence for taking money given to him by a malfunctioning ATM machine. That was seven years ago. After hearing that Xu Ting’s original life sentence has been reduced to five years (see this Danwei post), He told reporters that he wished he had done his crime today instead of seven years ago.
- Taiwan to open to Mainland investors, hopefully: Xiao Wanchang (萧万常), the election-winning candidate who is going to be the vice president of Taiwan after May, said in the Boao Forum that he was going to make good of his election promise to promote the cross-strait economic cooperation and reform Taiwan’s economy policies.
Xiao’s official title in the forum is the chairman of the Cross-Strait Common Market Foundation. - University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) celebrated the 30th anniversary of its “prodigy program”, a special program for gifted children. China’s first such program, it has drawn both enthusiastic attention and vehement argument. According to the report, China’s education facilities for gifted children are still “embarrassing”.
- Jet Li (李连杰) won the 27th Hong Kong Film Awards yesterday for his performance in the The Warlords. (投名状).
Cultural Revolution monuments to be protected
The State Administration of Culture Heritage of China issued a statement which promised to put more efforts to protect Chinese cultural heritages, especially revolutionary sites. Buildings and constructions of the Commune Movement, Big Leap Forward Movement, and Cultural Revolution will be preserved.
In 2006, More than 40 people’s representatives proposed to NPC to build a national museum of Cultural Revolution. Their proposal was turned down.
Other stories
- China raised the poverty line from annual income of 1,067 yuan to 1,300. The change caused an immediate two-fold growth of people that the Chinese government classifies as poor: from 40 million to 80 million.
- Zong Qinghou (宗庆后), chairman of the board of the biggest Chinese beverage maker, Wahaha, was accused of “tax evasion”. Zong allegedly dodged taxation by concealing his undeclared overseas income. The amount involved in the case was as high as 300 million RMB. But the article said Zong paid most of the sum shortly before the investigation began last year, which complicated the case.
Most of Zong’s overseas income was paid by Danone, Wahaha’s one-time partner, which ended the partnership and sued Wahaha last year. The dispute has not yet been finally resolved. - Song Xiaoqi (宋晓琪), a disfigured Master’s degree holder came to Beijing for a cosmetic surgery on the burn wounds on her face. Song said she once thought that an advanced degree would offset the adverse effect of having a burnt face, which turned out not the case－none of the employers who originally showed a strong interest in her offered her a job after meeting her.