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News Research

UN rejection of Taiwan bid lauded

[2007-09-21 07:04 ]

Beijing praised the latest decision by the UN General Assembly to reject a vote on Taiwan's attempt to join the world body Thursday, saying it demonstrates that no one can change the fact that "Taiwan is an inalienable part of Chinese territories".

Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu made the remarks after the General Committee of the 62nd session of the UN General Assembly decided not to include the so-called issue of "Taiwan's participation in the United Nations" on the agenda of the General Assembly on Wednesday.

"This again shows that... any act that is against the UN Charter and Resolution 2758 will gain no support of the vast majority of the UN member states, and any attempt to challenge the one-China policy and split China will doom to fail," said Jiang.

It was the 15th consecutive year the General Assembly thwarted Taiwan authorities' attempt to join the UN.

In New York, China's Permanent Representative to the United Nations Wang Guangya said on Wednesday that no matter what plots the Taiwan authorities hatch, their attempts to seek "Taiwan independence" through secessionist activities in the United Nations will never win international support.

Wang noted that the Chen Shui-bian administration, for personal and party interests, is provoking confrontation across the Taiwan Straits with intensified secessionist activities.

"Instead of offering blessings to the Taiwan compatriots, these activities can only cause disastrous consequences," he said.

"We hope and believe that the Taiwan compatriots can clearly see Chen's ulterior motives," Wang said.

Jiang on Thursday also lashed out at a US report criticizing China's religious situation, saying "China is strongly resentful of, and resolutely opposed to, the report which runs counter to the fundamental principles of international relations and openly interferes in China's internal affairs".

She was commenting on the International Religious Freedom Report 2007 released by the US State Department last Friday.

Jiang said that all ethnic groups and people across China enjoy the freedom of belief fully as entitled by law, and it is the Chinese government's long-term policy to respect and protect religious freedom of its citizens.

"This is an undeniable fact that does not allow any distortion," she said.

She said China demands Washington stop using issues such as religion to intervene in China's internal affairs, and do more to promote mutual understanding and trust between the two countries instead.

On the Dalai Lama's ongoing visit to Germany, Jiang said: "the Dalai Lama is not simply a religious figure but a political one who has long engaged in separatist activities aimed at undermining national unity under the guise of religion."

She added that China resolutely opposes any official contact between the Dalai Lama and foreign governments in whatever form.

International News

Russian defence minister resigns

2007-09-19 09:39

MOSCOW - Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov has resigned, Russia's new prime minister said on Tuesday as President Vladimir Putin considered his proposed cabinet lineup.

"I spoke with Serdyukov and we came to a decision that considering our close family ties he should submit his resignation," Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov, who is related to Serdyukov, was shown saying on Russian television.

After meeting Putin at his Bocharov Ruchei residence in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, Zubkov said he had submitted the proposed cabinet lineup to Putin for consideration and that the government's new structure would be announced by Friday.

"The structure (of the government) will be decided within the period which is defined by the law -- within seven days after my appointment," Zubkov said.

Zubkov said Serdyukov, who is married to his daughter, had informed Putin about his wish not to be in the next cabinet.

Zubkov, previously head of a money-laundering watchdog, was appointed by Putin to replace Mikhail Fradkov on Friday after being confirmed in his post by the lower house of parliament.

One of a tight circle of colleagues who worked alongside Putin in St Petersburg City Hall in the early 1990s, Zubkov has pledged changes to the government's structure.

Kremlin watchers seeking clues about the direction of Russian policy during the election year - and after - are waiting to see which ministers will be dropped from the cabinet.

Russian newspapers have speculated that reformers such as Economy Minister German Gref, who has presided over the longest Russian boom for a generation, could leave the cabinet.

Putin's appointment of Zubkov, 66, is seen by investors as the start of a process that will culminate in a hand-picked successor being elected president in March 2008.

After two four-year terms in office, Putin must relinquish the presidency in 2008, though he has hinted he will try to preserve influence. Some observers expect him to use his wide popularity to return to power at a later date.

Serdyukov, a former tax official, was appointed by Putin in February to replace Sergei Ivanov, who was then promoted to first deputy prime minister.

Since his appointment, Serdyukov, 45, has dismissed key military figures who were appointed under Ivanov, seen as one of the leading candidates for the presidency.

Industry News

Bin Laden urges Pakistanis to rebel

2007-09-20 22:56

CAIRO, Egypt - Al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden is calling on Pakistanis to rebel against President Pervez Musharraf in a new audiotape.

An undated file photo of Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden. [File]

The announcement of the upcoming message came as al-Qaida released a new video in which bin Laden's deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, boasted that the United States was being defeated in Afghanistan, Iraq and other fronts.

Speakers in the video promised more fighting in Afghanistan, North Africa and Sudan's Darfur region.

The messages are part of a stepped-up propaganda campaign by al-Qaida around the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Earlier this month, bin Laden released two messages - including his first new appearance in a video in nearly three years.

A banner posted on an Islamic militant Web site on Thursday advertised that another message would be released, though it did not say whether bin Laden would appear in video or speak in an audiotape.

"Soon, God willing: 'Come to Jihad (holy war)', from sheik Osama bin Laden, God protect him" the banner read.

"Urgent, al-Qaida declares war on the tyrant Pervez Musharraf and his apostate army, in the words of Osama bin Laden," it read.

Such advertisements usually precede the release of the video by one to three days, according to IntelCenter, a US counterterrorism group that monitors militant messages.

The sophisticated 80-minute video released Thursday on the same Web site was in the style of a documentary, intersplicing the speech by al-Zawahri with footage from the Sept. 11 attacks, interviews with experts and officials taken from Western and Arab television stations, and old footage and audiotapes of bin Laden.

Al-Zawahri began by condemning the Pakistani military's July assault on Islamic militants who took over the Red Mosque in Islamabad, and he paid tribute to one of the militants' leaders, Abdul Rashid Ghazi, who was killed in the fighting.

The siege "revealed the extent of the despicableness, lowliness and treason of Musharraf and his forces, who don't deserve the honor of defending Pakistan, because Pakistan is a Muslim land, whereas the forces of Musharraf are hunting dogs under (President) Bush's crucifix," al-Zawahri said.

"Let the Pakistani army know that the killing of Abdul Rashid Ghazi and his male and female students ... has soaked the history of the Pakistan army in shame and despicableness which can only washed away by retaliation," he said.

Bin Laden and al-Zawahri are thought to be hiding in the lawless Pakistan-Afghanistan border region, where many analysts believe they have rebuilt al-Qaida's core leadership.

Al-Zawahri called for attacks on French and Spanish interests in North Africa and on UN and African peacekeepers expected to deploy in Sudan's wartorn Darfur region.

"What they claim to be the strongest power in the history of mankind is today being defeated in front of the Muslim vanguards of jihad six years after the two raids on New York and Washington," al-Zawahri said, speaking in what appeared to be an office, with shelves of religious books and an automatic rifle leaning against them.

"The Crusaders themselves have testified to their defeat in Afghanistan at the hands of the lions of the Taliban," he said. "The Crusaders have testified to their own defeat in Iraq at the hands of the mujahideen, who have taken the battle of Islam to the heart of the Islam world."

The video included footage of al-Qaida's leader in Afghanistan, Mustafa Abu al-Yazeed, meeting with a senior Taliban commander. In contrast to past videos that showed al-Qaida and Taliban fighters in rough desert terrain, Abu al-Yazeed and the commander were shown sitting in a verdant field surrounded by trees as a jihad anthem played, extolling the virgins that will meet martyrs in paradise.

Abu al-Yazeed said al-Qaida's ties with the Taliban were strengthening. The Taliban commander, Dadullah Mansoor, said: "We shall target the infidels in Afghanistan and outside Afghanistan: inside all the infidel countries oppressing the Muslims. And we shall focus our attacks, Allah willing, on the coalition forces in Afghanistan."

Another clip in the video showed Abu Musab Abdulwadood, the leader of Algeria's main Islamic insurgency movement, addressing bin Laden and vowing that "our swords are unsheathed."

Al-Zawahri called on supporters in North Africa to "cleanse the Maghrib (western region) of Islam of the children of France and Spain ... Stand with your sons the mujahideen against the Crusaders and their children."

The video also included what IntelCenter said appeared to be old, but previously unreleased footage of bin Laden. The images show the terror leader, with a beard streaked with gray and a a white cloth draped over his head, in front of a map showing the Middle East and South and Central Asia. He points to the map with a stick and addresses an unseen audience.

He condemns Arab Gulf governments that have allied themselves with the United States, saying they have "sold the Islamic nation, colluded with the enemies of Islam and backed the infidels. And this is the greater form of being an infidel ... But Allah permitting, they shall leave the Gulf under the blows of the mujahideen," bin Laden said.

Domestic News
Tycoon to return US$8.9m horse head to China

2007-09-20 21:14

A bronze horse head, stolen from an old imperial summer palace 147 years ago by invading British and French troops, is to return to China after Macao gambling tycoon Stanley Ho bought it for HK$69.1 million(US$8.9 million) and announced his intention to donate it to China.

The head, dating back to the Qing Dynasty, is one of 12 bronze animal heads representing the 12 signs of the Chinese zodiac, which were situated on the water clock fountain in Yuanmingyuan Park, or the Old Summer Palace, situated in northwest Beijing and burned down in 1860.

Ho bought the sculpture from a collector in Taiwan in a deal brokered by Sotheby's auction house before it was due to be put up for auction in October.

"I feel honored to play a role in helping save lost cultural relics from overseas," Ho said.

"We are very happy to see the horse head sculpture return home after being away for nearly 150 years," said Song Xinchao, director of the museum department of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage.

In 2000, the ox, tiger and monkey heads were bought by Chinese collectors and returned home, and Stanley Ho, who is also a member of the Standing Committee of the National Committee of Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), bought the boar head with HK$6 million and returned it to Beijing in 2003.

The four head sculptures are currently all on display in the Poly Art Museum in Beijing.

A source with China's Lost Cultural Relics Recovery Program said sculptures of the mouse head and rabbit head are kept in Paris. However, the dragon head, snake head, rooster head, dog head and sheep head are still untraceable.

Statistics show 1.67 million Chinese cultural relics are housed in over 2,000 museums in 47 countries, accounting for 10 percent of all lost Chinese cultural treasures. Most of the lost treasures are owned by private collectors.