In Sydney, Australia yesterday, Chinese president Hu Jintao met with Korean president Roh Moo-hyun, Peruvian president Alan Garcia, Papua New Guinean prime minister Michael Somare, New Zeleand prime minister Helen Elizabeth Clark, and Australian Labor Party leader Kevin Rudd.
Such important news belongs nowhere else but on the front page, where the president appears above and below the fold, in four photos of him shaking hands with those national leaders (Kevin Rudd doesn’t get a photo; sorry Australia).
This marks the fifth day running that Hu has made the cover of People’s Daily (and Guangming Daily, Jiefang Daily, and so forth). In fact, he’s been in two front-page photos every day since Wednesday.
Identical front pages (and Hu’s frequent appearance on them) has been going on since mid-August; Xiao Qiang examined this phenomenon in a recent Washington Post opinion piece.
In papers that report real news, top headlines are much more varied. The Beijing News announces that China’s securites regulators are pushing for more transparency – listed companies must disclose to their stockholders any major decisions they make at the earliest moment possible. Beijing Youth Daily leads with the news that the public’s opinions will be solicited concerning reform of the medical system; its front-page photo is of the opening of Dou Wei’s arson trial. The rock star admits he set fire to a reporter’s car, but says it was unintentional. And Beijing Morning Post says that during the Olympics, Beijing’s roads will be lined with 40 million potted flowers, all of them grown in the city.
Thanks to the anonymous neighbor who shoved a Beijing Daily in my mailbox this morning.