SinoEye

Cowardly Australians, says the U.S.

2005-06-29T16:20:00.000+12:00

The U.S. is suggesting that the Australian Government is being too timid on the issue of human rights with China. All because Australia refused to attend a summit, the subject of which is how to deal with a "rising China".

The summit will be attended by the U.S., Canada, Japan, and New Zealand. Australia will instead be briefed on the meeting afterwards. Interestingly, New Zealand is also taking a pragmatic approach when dealing with China, that is while voicing human rights "concerns" they are still willing to pursue closer ties with China. I wonder if NZ would think of backing out of this summit too?

Of course, there is the whole political asylum seeking issue in Australia. The Aussies won't want to offend China too much by then basically attending a "how to contain China" (at least that is how the Chinese would see it, I assume) meeting?

Here is a transcript of the ABC report.

Ideology is quite dead in international politics nowadays. Since countries like Zimbabwe are probably not so important economically, we can be decent international citizens and boycott them in everything, including cricket. Of course, no country today would dare boycott China unless they want to suffocate themselves economically... no one would suggest we stop playing ping pong or badminton with them. No, never.

I just wonder how long the U.S. can hold up the arms embargo on China.

Anyway, here is what the Australian Foreign Minister has to say about it (from ABC again):

ALEXANDER DOWNER: Well, this is - look, let me answer the question this way: we obviously talk about China and the rise of China with the United States and with just about every country in the world because we're an important part of the Asia Pacific region, and why wouldn't we? I mean, we've just established or are establishing at the ministerial level a trilateral security dialogue with the United States and Japan to talk about a whole range of things, and obviously China will come up in that. So this proposition that somehow, because we didn't go to a particular meeting, we don't want to talk about China is, if I may say so, as politely as I can put it, rather pitiful. I mean, we're quite happy to talk about China with anybody, but in terms of one particular meeting, we didn't participate in that meeting. My recollection of what this was was just an officials-level discussion, and I don't have any particular view about it one way or the other. I don't have a problem with it, but we didn't participate at that particular time, and if it were to happen again in the future, we might or might not. I mean, I'm quite relaxed about it.

Apparently this is a "secret forum"?

TONY JONES: Mr Downer, evidently this was an annual forum, a secret one at that, and it was convened by the Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage. That's pretty senior, isn't it? Why was that invitation turned down?

ALEXANDER DOWNER: Richard Armitage didn't participate in such a forum. We have constant discussions - or did have, when he has the Deputy Secretary of State - with Richard Armitage and Colin Powell, and those discussions from time to time were about China. You know, it's one of many, many forums we get invited to participate in. We don't necessarily participate in all of them. I don't want to, you know, be rude about it. I'm sure the discussions they had over a day or so were useful, but I mean, we have thousands of discussions in a year about China with any number of countries, and to extrapolate from the fact that we didn't attend some particular forum, an officials-level forum, that somehow we feel cowered by China is just breathtaking in its ignorance. I mean, of course we would be happy to talk about China with anybody who wants to talk to us about China.

TONY JONES: Was the problem in this case that it was a secret forum, as has been reported, this so-called Halibutt Group - a name apparently chosen because it couldn't be said in Mandarin?

ALEXANDER DOWNER: (Laughs) I don't know about that; I don't speak Mandarin.

TONY JONES: Sadly!

ALEXANDER DOWNER: Yeah. If it was secret, I would have thought it would be less of a problem in terms of your relations with China than if it was public, actually, so I don't really follow the logic of that. But I can assure you, it's nothing to do with it being secret or not secret. I mean, it was just a forum we chose not to participate in. We have thousands of other ways of communicating on these issues, and this is one of the more breathtaking storms in a teacup that I've seen. But I’m happy to talk about China with anybody, including on the Lateline program.

You can read more in the second ABC report about Australia's stance on other issues in terms of China-U.S. relations. As has been reported some time ago, Australia has made it clear that they would not simply jump into a war against China with the U.S. simply because of ANZUS.

Now, the bit I found interesting is where Mr Downer highlights the different approaches in dealing with China's human rights issues:

ALEXANDER DOWNER: Well, I don't know the numbers. I do know this about China: that China is not a democracy. I know that. I know that in China there are problems with repression, and that's why we have a human rights dialogue with China. We don't have a human rights dialogue with Great Britain, but we do have one with China. We have one with China 'cause we're concerned about human rights issues in China. We have been having this human rights dialogue with China, though, since, I think, 1997 – ‘97 or ‘98. I think it was 1997. Plenty of countries nowadays have human rights dialogues with China - the European Union, some of the individual members within the European Union, Canada and so on. The United States has a different…

TONY JONES: But Mr Downer…

ALEXANDER DOWNER: No, just let me explain this because I think your viewers would be interested, because it's just worth knowing this, 'cause this comes about because of two different approaches. Countries like Australia and Canada and so on, we have a human rights dialogue with China 'cause we think that's the best way to engage them on this issue. The United States has an approach where, every year, they introduce into the Human Rights Commission in the United Nations a resolution condemning China on human rights. Now, our view is that that’s not going to achieve anything. The resolution has never been passed. It's much better to talk to the Chinese face to face about our human rights concerns. It's the best thing we can do in a constructive and practical way.

Obviously, the Chinese don't react well to U.S's annual condemnation of China's human rights. They see this as simply an attempt to internationally humiliate them, and each year they retaliate by issuing their own human rights report on the U.S. But who really takes either of the two seriously when it comes to human rights accusations? Seems like childish bickering to me.

On the other hand, how effective are these "dialogues" that Canada, Australia, and New Zealand has with China on the issue of human rights? We don't know exactly what these leaders talk about behind closed doors...

TONY JONES: Okay, we sort of understand the basic principles involved there. These discussions, however, happen behind closed doors, so help us out. Did your dialogue team raise the number of Chinese people - which the US State Department puts at 250,000, a quarter of a million - that are being held in re-education through labour camps or gulags right now?

ALEXANDER DOWNER: Well, we don't - we're not the United States. I mean, we don't always raise everything the United States raise, but we raise a raft of...

TONY JONES: Do you accept their figure?

ALEXANDER DOWNER: Just a second.

TONY JONES: Do you accept their figure? That’s the question I asked you before.

ALEXANDER DOWNER: I don't know the figure. I don't know even if they know the figure's right, but I certainly don't know whether that figure is accurate. I do know that in China there is repression. I do know in China that there are concerns about human rights. I do know China isn't a democracy.

Hmm, OK. So the Aussie-Canadian-Kiwi approach isn't evidentally too effective either. But at least it doesn't really agitate China as much as U.S. way at least.

The interviewer then presses Mr Downer about the gulags (forced labour camps for political dissents) and the statistics etc. He responds:

ALEXANDER DOWNER: I mean, half the time you run the line that the United States can't be relied on for information, and now I'm being told we have to accept everything the United States says. I don't know how many people are held in what you call gulags. I don't know how many people are in so-called re-education camps. I do know that people in China who dissent from the government, who are regarded by the government as a threat to society because of the views they hold - and some of these people are Falun Gong practitioners - have been detained as a result of that, and we don't support that, and we raise our concerns with the Chinese through our human rights dialogue, and obviously from time to time we raise these issues in other meetings with the Chinese.

So here, it's made quite clear that the Australians are not prepared to follow the U.S. blindly. I think this is in line with most other countries at the moment, who were traditionally U.S. allies, including Canada and New Zealand.

And, it seems Australia will look at following NZ's lead in banning Zimbabwe cricket...

TONY JONES: Mr Downer, I need to move on, if I can, to Zimbabwe. The New Zealand Foreign Minister, Phil Gough, has said tonight that what's going on in Zimbabwe right now is something we haven't seen since the days of Pol Pot. Do you agree with him, and what will Australia do to increase or change its measures against the Mugabe Government?

ALEXANDER DOWNER: Well, look, I'm not going to make comparisons with other parts of the world or history, excepting to say that I think the human rights abuses that we've seen in Zimbabwe more generally have been appalling, and what we've seen in recent days - and it's being shown on the ABC and in other Australian media - I think it's quite egregious. I've had discussions with Phil Gough. I have also during the course of today been talking about this issue with Jack Straw, who’s the British Foreign Minister. I have made it very clear to both of them we have to think about other measures that we might be able to take. Now, that's quite an easy thing to say; it's quite hard to think about what effective measures you can take, particularly bearing in mind we eventually got Zimbabwe out of the Commonwealth. Well, that was fine, but that doesn't seem to have had any impact on the human rights situation there. I'm going along with Phil Gough's idea that we should approach the International Cricket Council and see if it was prepared to consider banning Zimbabwe from international cricket, but I’m advised that it's unlikely the International Cricket Council will do that. So Jack Straw and I have had a discussion today about this, and we are going to have our officials sit down and try and work out what other types of measures we can come up with, but that's not much of an answer. I mean, we want to find the measures. We haven't got them yet.

...but nothing about Chinese ping pong.

So the Japanese aren't that sophisticated after all

2005-06-25T00:02:00.000+12:00

Just found a couple of blogs quoting me on the Asian dishes topic. It looks like I was wrong, the Japanese aren't too sophisticated for whale burgers after all. Thanks to Simonworld for that.

I realise there are a lot of soybean substitutes for shark fin and whatnot, again this will give the consumer more choices. My emphasis is that Asian culture, I feel, is somewhat being vilified in western media because of their taste for these things. I know of Asian people who, after watching documentaries on how they de-fin sharks, have chosen to not eat shark fin soup anymore.

Personally, I am not an adventurous when it comes to food. Actually, I'm rather squeemish. I'm not really into trying exotic new species or anything like that, I much prefer the soya bean version of them.

I'm not here to promote shark fin soup nor McDonalds.

After you watch the whaling documentary, remember to watch the McLibel one too. I think they showed chickens lining up to be decapitated, so that's a warning to other squeemish people out there.

UPDATED: Here's a more balanced article covering the issue of shark finning and ecology.

Some interesting bits from the article:

Shark-fin soup -- who eats it?

Shark-fin soup was just a regional delicacy in Canton, south China, until the late 1980s. The Beijing government had derided shark-fin soup as a symbol of elitism, but it ended this stance in 1987. Increased East Asian affluence quickly made shark-fin soup popular at wedding banquets, birthdays, feasts and business dinners, as a way of honoring guests. The demand has escalated astronomically in the last 15 years, and now it's a standard dish.

Hong Kong has roughly 50 percent of the global trade in shark fins. I've seen entire streets there lined with shark-fin shops; huge burlap bags brimming with shark fins are stacked into warehouses. Its safe to assume that most of the shark fins in Chinatown are from Hong Kong.

Wow! Is it delicious? How's it prepared? Is it healthy?

It's cooked for a very long time until the shark fin separates into needles of cartilage that look like clear noodles. The fin itself has no taste, but it's served with a broth of chicken, ham and shiitake that it absorbs. The final texture is supposed to be interesting.

Shark-fin soup is traditionally regarded in Chinese medicine as a tonic. [It's good at strengthening the waist, supplementing vital energy, nourishing blood, invigorating kidney and lung and improving digestion, according to the Compendium of Materia Medica] Modern nutritionists find it rich in protein, and the large amount of gelatin contained can help the growth of cartilage. But scientifically speaking, shark fin has little nutritional value--and, in fact, it may even be harmful to health over the long term, as shark fins have been found to contain high levels of mercury.

Does WildAid want shark fishing to become illegal?

No. Sharks are an important source of protein in certain parts of the world, like India and West Africa. It's primarily the huge value for fins that endangers sharks--its like a global gold rush. What WildAid wants is an international ban on finning.

What exactly is finning? "Finning" refers to the practice of cutting off only the shark fins and discarding the body. Sometimes sharks are dead when they're pulled into the boats, but often, they're still alive as their four fins are cut off with a knife. When they're thrown back into the ocean the sharks either bleed to death, or they drown, because sharks can't swim without fins, and they need to go forward to get oxygen. Divers have discovered hundreds of dead finned sharks at the bottom of the ocean in huge shark graveyards.

Fifty percent of sharks are bycatch -- they're accidentally caught by boats that are looking for tuna, swordfish or other fish. Many of the boats don't want to keep the entire shark, so they just fin them. This greatly increases the amount of sharks killed, because a fishing boat can hold an enormous amount of fins.

A few points drawn from the article. Firstly, shark fin soup was a very localised cultural thing for Cantonese people (since they tend to live near the sea...), until the 1980s when Beijing decided that it should become a symbol of elitism. This corresponds with China's opening up reforms, where the CCP states "to get rich is a good thing" and shark fin soup equates to being rich.

And secondly, the article focusses on advocating against the process of obtaining these shark fins, not fishing for shark itself. As I stated in my previous article, I am annoyed that western media portrays Chinese culture as inately cruel because it eats those poor sharks' fins. The problem is an ecological one, not really a cultural one. The problem here is that by only taking the fin, and not the whole shark (instead leaving it to die a cruel death, drowning) means more sharks are killed.

The media, I feel, should focus more on the dealers and finners, as opposed to in effect saying the Chinese are a distasteful culture, they eat shark fins. Really, some Chinese don't feel comfortable with the way the information is sometimes being presented by westerners: YOU SHARK KILLER, YOU MAKE ME SICK.

Ok, I think I'm done beefing on this topic. No more shark fin posts for awhile I hope.

Even China is more well-liked than America abroad

2005-06-24T20:58:00.000+12:00

Not sure what they're implying when they say even China's better in terms of image abroad. I suppose this is due to the inbalance in media, which has probably portrayed China as the bigger ogre compared to the U.S.

The People's Daily no doubt pounced on this story. However, they didn't mention this (from IHT):

Strong majorities in several countries said they would like to see another military power emerge to balance the United States - but most, especially in the West, did not want this to be China.

"There's really strong opposition to the idea of China rivaling American military power," Kohut said, "even though most of the world doesn't like the fact the U.S. is a military hegemon."

Seven in 10 of those surveyed in Britain, France and Russia opposed a rising Chinese superpower, as did approximately 8 in 10 Germans and Americans. But the idea was much more popular in developing countries: Majorities in Indonesia, Jordan, Pakistan and Turkey were in favor.

Could it be that China's grooming of the "vanguard of the developing world" is paying off in terms of international relations?

No doubt, China hasn't quelled worries of China rising as a military power because of their human rights record. It seems that finger pointing at the U.S or saying that the world should not "interfere with its internal affairs" just isn't acceptable to the rest of the developed world just yet.

Since world politics is run by the developed, industrialised countries, China would want to improve their human rights records in their books. Difficult to balance this with their desire to maintain monopoly on power. It's not simply the issue of western democracy or multi-party votes, it's probably more to do with the fact that China has undergone rapid economic reforms since the 80's, yet political reforms nowhere matches this pace. Corruption is a rampant problem, and they lack the transparent institutions to deal with the dark aspects of capitalism. Hence, they continue to rely on instilling fear through the death penalty to curb the problem. Evidently, this has not been so effective.

Hong Kong, listen to your nanny

2005-06-24T18:42:00.000+12:00

I just came across an amusing article in the Taipei Times mocking the Hong Kong's government tendancies to issue out "social guidance" messages.

The latest message popping up on RTHK (Hong Kong's state-owned radio station):

"Show your parents how much you care," the cheery voice says. "Take them to the dentist."

No surpirse, this caused some mixed reactions:

Instead of encouraging a flood of elderlies to the dentist, it caused widespread hilarity.
"I guess the days of a good old bunch of flowers have gone," quipped radio DJ Phil Whelan, one of the station's presenters required by law to play such announcements of public interest each hour.

Humour aside, the article is rather critical of Hong Kong's emergence as a nanny state:

The dentist spot is among a multitude of announcements and notices stating what can seem blindingly obvious that have flourished in Hong Kong in recent years, baffling visitors and earning the city a reputation as a nannying state.

For a territory that claims to have the world's freest economy, Hong Kong's 6.9 million people live under a tyranny of petty rules and regulations, critics say.
"They are on the rise, undoubtedly," Chinese University sociologist Chan Kim-man says. "Residents tend to tune them out, but visitors certainly notice them."

I remember being in Hong Kong in 04/05 over Christmas and seeing this TV commercial telling children to be filial. The ad shows some kid helping an elderly person pick up some stuff they had dropped. As a visitor I certainly noticed and thought quite strange to see government make ads such as this.

From codes preventing schoolboys from having curly hair to TV ads telling them how to carry textbooks; from "no sitting" signs in malls to "no spitting" notices on ferries; and from warnings on entering manholes to laws against loud music at concerts, almost every aspect of life is covered by a regulation. Among RTHK's incongruous spots are those that offered advice on buying a license for your pet whale shark and donating blood to make you look younger.

I am not so sure about the scientific backing of the blood donation tip. I would have thought people donated blood out of good will. While in HK, I was amazed at how many advertisements on TV and on those bus LCD TVs showed "look young, look fairer, and look slimmer" products.

As a bit of an aside, I also need to beef about Hong Kong malls. As flash as they may be, my one and only grudge is that there are seriously no benches or seats whatsoever for you to take a breather in between your frantic shopping. This is a bit of concern for visitors who have been shopping for 2-3 hours straight. I suppose this is how they get you into Starbucks or Delifrance, which is clever. Better to have you spending during your break from shopping, than sitting down being unprofitable. Still, it's rather cruel.

So, what else should HKers be mindful of?

Another hygiene-promotional ads simultaneously said "Wash vegetables under running water," and "Don't let taps run: save water."

Well, the hygiene messages aren't so strange. Sydney has those "don't waste our precious water" ads as well, mainly because they actually have water shortage problems with lack of rain.

The need for stringent social guidelines is contrary to the Confucian philosophy prevalent in China. Confucius taught that civilizations maintained order through understanding and education, not through laws and regulations.

True, today Hong Kong could probably care less about Confucious. But somehow, I think running ads telling people to take their eldery to the dentist or help the elderly cross the road aren't all that effective. After all, the youths of Hong Kong society seem to idolise "Twins" (are they still "in"?) more than Confucious, Zheng He, Zeng Guofan, or Sun Yat-sen.

However, according to Chan, Hong Kong's obsession with rules has little to do with Chinese cultural beliefs and more to do with the territory's British colonial past.

"It is partly a hangover from the days of British rule and British bureaucracy," Chan says. "Our legal system and bureaucratic system was handed to us by the British."
"Those signs are there to inform the foreigners -- the immigrants," Chan adds. "This is a city of outsiders and the feeling has always been that they need to be educated in our ways of behavior."

I'm guessing the "no spitting" thing is to target mainland visitors/immigrants. Shanghai was a really exciting city, and I really enjoyed my visit there. But the spitting was a major put off. Even the people who dressed really sophistically spat, with the "hwuuik, tooh!" sound.

United front against Asian dishes

2005-06-23T17:30:00.000+12:00

There has been a lot of bashing of Chinese and Japanese taste for "delicacies". Lately, the whaling issue has been covered in the media. Now, they're ranting about Hong Kong Disneyworld (opening on September 12, 2005) serving shark fin soup in their restaurants.

"They say it's cultural. Does that mean Disneyland in Japan is now going to be having whale burgers?" asked Paul Watson, the founder and president of the U.S.-based conservation society, in Friday Harbor, Washington State.

Um, firstly the Japanese are too sophisticated to waste whale meant on burgers. I bet Mr Watson had lamb for tea last night, and bacon this morning for breakfast. I wonder what his mates will think of him if he held a barbeque with no pork ribs.

Another group, the Hong Kong-based Animals Asia Foundation, has seized on the issue as a way to underline its concerns over how China's growing wealth has led to a growing appetite for rare species. Eating leopard cats, exotic snakes and scaly anteaters known as pangolins, both for status and for the supposed health benefits, has become so popular that animal advocates fear entire species could be threatened.

Well, frankly I would never touch any of that stuff listed above. I acknowledge that it is certainly irresponsible to allow uncontrolled hunting of these species, or rather allowing limitations to go unenforced.

However, I am feeling that the media is actually bashing the taste for these foods. They highlight the cruelty of cutting off the shark's fin, sometimes a baby shark's fin, and then throwing it back into the ocean.

However cruel, this is not the only cruelty committed against other species of our planet. Just because beef, lamb, or chicken isn't rare, doesn't mean the processing of it is any less gruelsome.

Take McDonalds, an obvious example of American culture. You may have read about the McLibel case, which highlighted some cruel things they do to animals. And no doubt you have seen on TV documentaries how they cage up those chickens, that they have probably never been able to spread its wings, let alone take a step throughought their entire lives before being butchered. Leaving aside for a moment that breeding animals just so they can be slaughtered, as opposed to hunting them in the wild where they would have lived a free life before landing on our plates, is cruel enough in itself.

People certainly aren't eating less McDonalds today. Well, even if they are, for most people it's for self-serving reasons of "staying healthy", as opposed to a reaction against the way McDonalds process their meat.

When the media portrays those chicken cages, we might decide to eat only free-range chickens or eggs from now on, or if you have enough will power become a vegetarian. Many people shrug it off, and continue to eat their chicken nuggets. But when they talk about shark fin and whales, they vilify Asian culture and tradition, as if their eating habits are inately cruel.

Killing is an ugly thing. Animals kill and eat each other. Humans unnecessarily kill and eat animals, this happens all over the world. More attention should be paid as to how these foods are processed, and enforcing control to prevent extinction of any species. Chinese and Japanese people have seen the documentaries too - more and more they are becoming aware of the issue. Just like how western people see their McLibel documentaries, some many decide not to eat this stuff anymore, or at least make more informed choices.

Whaling and shark-finning may be an environmental and animal rights issue, but it should not be used to vilify Asian culture.

My two cents.

More bickering in the UN

2005-06-23T14:58:00.000+12:00

China has announced that it will vote against plans to expand the UNSC. Reported in ChinaDaily, Wang Guanya (China's UN Ambassador) says:

"The enlargement of the Security Council must give priority to increasing the representation and participation of developing countries, especially African nations," he said. "

Any expansion formula must make sure that small and medium countries have more opportunities to take turns to participate in the work of the Security Council, uphold the principle of geographical balance and ensure the representation of different cultures and civilizations."

Ok, China doesn't really participate in the UN much, except for blocking stuff it doesn't like. The UN isn't exactly the most useful thing in the world, and China's right about it already being divisive. It's just another forum to play power politics.

If we look behind the noble talk of sticking up for developing nations, China doesn't want the G-4 proposal to succeed because Japan is in that proposal. There has been reporting that China would support India's bid (although Pakistan wouldn't of course), but I have only read this from Indian newspapers and not Chinese ones.

I think the Chinese will have to make it look like they reject the whole G-4 plan, as opposed to outright saying "we oppose Japan full stop". That will make it quite obvious that this isn't an issue of sticking up for the developing nations but a regional hegemony issue. But it also wouldn't want to annoy other nations that China actually wants good relations with, e.g. India and Germany, and probably Brazil too.

China needs friends, but also needs an enemy to unite the population against every now and then.

According to the ambassador, council reform should follow the gradual process of democratic discussion with a view to reaching consensus and should not only represent the concerns of a few countries.

What is more "democratic" than the General Assembly voting? I think the votes of the General Assembly are a more "democratic" indication of what the world wants than the elites bickering amongst themselves, cutting deals, blocking bids even if it get 2/3 of the votes cos they don't think it should be so.

When China wants to take things slowly with "democratic discussions" I think this means permanent stalling.

Same thing with their own "democratic reforms", they want to say "let's not be too hasty, let us sort out our poor people first," which means never, because their poor people are getting poorer by the day.

Unfortunately, it seems the world has not evolved into a civil international community. It's still very much anarchic, based on power politics.

Nicole Kidman in The Interpreter. IMDB rating 6.6/10.

On a similar note, I can't believe they made that Nicole Kidman movie The Interpreter which I saw last week. They made it look like the UN can actually save the world. Well, it couldn't stop the Rwanda genocide, or stop the U.S. going to war in Iraq... it can't actually stop anything unless the countries would have done it themselves anyway regardless of whether the UN was there or not. So I guess Hollywood either likes to paint naive pictures of the world or pack them with sex and violence. Either sells quite nicely.

Microsoft partners with China on censorship

2005-06-20T20:27:00.000+12:00

Microsoft joins the bandwagon of MNCs co-operating with China on internet censorship. Others already part of the internet propaganda system include Google and Yahoo!.

Apparently Altavista has been blocked by China because it has yet to join, but the article I got that from was written in 2002 so who knows, they would be missing out on a big market if they don't sign up on China's terms.

Taipei Times reports:

Users of the MSN Spaces section of Microsoft Corp's new China-based Web portal get a scolding each time they input words deemed taboo by the communist authorities -- such as "democracy," "freedom" and "human rights."

"Prohibited language in text, please delete," the message says. However, the restrictions appear to apply only to the subject line of such entries. Writing them into the text, with a more innocuous subject heading, seems not to be a problem.

Hmm, talk about big brother.

Ok, so if people are sitting at their computers trying to type the word "freedom" - not even in the political sense... e.g. "my folks aren't letting me go out with my friends tonight, I wish I had more freedom!" and they'll get a popup saying they're not allowed to use the word freedom. Then even the apolitical teenager may wonder why the hell I can't enter the word "freedom" without bloody Microsoft scolding me off as if they were my parents?

Also, what if you wrote "d e m o c r a c y" or "D3M0CR4CY"?

Noting that this little slap on the hand message only applies to the subject line.

Seriously though, this is one of the more stupid internet filtering techniques I have come across.

The other ones have been quite clever though, having thousands of employees sitting at computers deleting "unacceptable" posts on the ChinaDaily forum, filtering out searches on Tibet, Taiwan, democracy, freedom, Falun Gong, pornography...

EastSouthWestNorth has an entertaining and educational list of filtered searches in China.

It's really quite amusing, I urge you to go through them. I noticed they blocked the word "condom" as well, but that seems to be counter-productive to the whole campaign against AIDS... how are people suppose to find information on safe sex? Does the CCP provide sex-education?

Anyway, back to the Microsoft article:

The Chinese government encourages Internet use for business and education but tries to ban access to material or Web sites deemed subversive.

A search on Google for such topics as Taiwan or Tibetan independence, the banned group Falun Gong, the Dalai Lama or the China Democracy Party inevitably leads to a "site cannot be found" message.

The consequences of defying government limits can be severe: At least 54 people have been jailed for posting essays or other content deemed subversive.

Internet-related companies are obliged to accept such limitations as a condition of doing business in China. And government-installed filtering tools, registration requirements and other surveillance are in place to ensure the rules are enforced.

The government has recently demanded that owners of Web sites register with authorities by June 30 or face fines.

So it seems recently the CCP have been paranoid about internet and blogs, which have become rather high profile ever since the 2004 U.S elections. They're probably realising that they can try their hardest to filter out stuff they don't like, but there will always be bits leaking in... they have left out heaps of words which could be used in searches to defy their purposes. However, the CCP have proven to catch on fast. Government run websites and forums such as ChinaDaily and People's Daily shows just how savvy they are at using technology to push their propaganda. It probably doesn't matter too much then if a few stray websites manage to leak through the system.

SinoEye... blocked from the mainland already?

2005-06-20T16:38:00.000+12:00

Sinosplice has just listed us (thanks!), but on their list they have indicated that we're actually blocked in China (but can possibly be accessed via anonymous).

I don't know the technical details of how the Great Firewall works in China, but we're only a few days old!

It's probably because we have the keyword "democracy" or "freedom" in the meta tags. Not that I think the word "democracy" and "freedom" should be thrown around as if it were the solution to everything. They are loaded terms, but more on that later.

Drop me a line if you're from the mainland and have managed to access this blog. Or if you're visiting the mainland and find you can't actually access this blog at all.

UPDATED: I just figured out it's not because my site has been specifically blacklisted or anything (good to know) - it's just because they block all sites hosted on blogspot. Hmmm, well maybe one day if I'm passionate enough about this little project I may set up my own hosting and domain, but for now... I guess there will be no mainlanders in my audience. Sorry guys.

Donald to lead beyond 2007?

2005-06-20T13:33:00.000+12:00

Donald Tsang will be officially appointed to his CE position on the 1 July. However, "pro-leftist" Tsang Hin-Chi reckons he will win again in 2007.

So does that mean Don will "reign" until 2012? And will his 05-07 term count as a full term? If it is a full term then Don can't run again in 2012, but if it's a half term... well if Don runs again he will end up having 2.5 terms... so my bet is that Beijing will just cut Don after 1.5 terms.

Article 46 of the Basicl Law:

The term of office of the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall be five years. He or she may serve for not more than two consecutive terms.

I think the whole point of interpreting the Basic Law was for Don to only serve the remaining two years of Tung's term is to appease the business elites who had aspired to run in the CE election after Tung's two terms. The business elites being those who push for closer economic ties with the mainland so that the latter can slowly usurp Hong Kong's independence while everyone else is too busy fussing over Taiwan and the Middle East.

But was it really worth making such a messy interpretation just so that these people will not have to wait another three years? I guess three years is a long time when HKSAR is only eight years young.

Did Ching step over the line?

2005-06-20T13:05:00.000+12:00

It's pretty well-known now that Ching was not just doing old-fashioned journalism when he tried to smuggle out some of Zhao Ziyang's memoirs.

Zhao Ziyang, who's fate was sealed when the CCP ordered the crackdown on Tiananmen square.

A career as a journalist is a complicated one in the People's Republic of China. We are all well aware that the CCP is determined to tightly control the country's media. The media is the key to power, the ultimate propaganda machine.

Where does this leave the role of journalists then? The Party knows how to make good use of them. It is known that they often get journalists to write for them, to give them a favourable view or use them to villianise a particular someone who they want out of power.

According to Ching's wife, he had done some "research" work for Chinese officials, including monitoring the "political mood" of the Hong Kong people during Tung's era and at the time of the half million people protest.

The Standard reports:

"We want the Chinese government to understand press freedom and the work of a journalist,'' said Cheung Ping Ling, president of the Hong Kong Journalist Association.

I'm pretty sure the Chinese government knows and understands what press freedom is, but have chosen not to allow it because they understand it so well. The CCP has an ideology vacuum that they have replaced with nationalism and capitalism to pacify and unite the population with. They cannot afford to have their bubble burst by the media, especially when that media is part of their propaganda system which gives them power.

"We think that the journalists get journalistic materials, not state secrets,'' but their job is made more difficult by the fact that the Party chooses to be the only source of ideas.

Even if Zhao Ziyang's memoirs is not a "state secret" it is certainly a Party secret... but wait, the Party is the state, so I guess it is a state secret after all. The CCP is so concerned with the country's image, it is certainly puzzling with so many members in its organisation why they cannot think up of any new phrases aside from the "stealing state secrets". Same thing goes with phrase "stop interfering with our internal affairs". As much reform as China has undertaken in the past few decades, when it comes to sensitive issues like this they are too quick to fall back into the habit of clinging to Stalinist notions of state sovereignty, which really doesn't go down well when they are trying to project themselves as an international leader.

What did we learn from the past?

2005-06-20T12:36:00.000+12:00

Yesterday, Japan's PM visited a WWII memorial on Iwo Jima, a tiny island where many U.S and Japanese forces died during fierce battle.

In a speech, Koizumi said:

"Our country has never taken part or been involved in war after the end of the [World] war and has maintained peace"

"We will never let the lessons from the war fade away"

Learning from the past, a true Confucian way.

China has been reviving Confucianism lately. No doubt, the CCP have learnt from their past as well. They learnt that class struggles and mass campaigns against their own people end up counter-productive and would eventually undermine their own power. They learnt that creating a cult of personality such as Mao is a very, very dangerous thing and would eventually distabilise the Party. They learnt from USSR that too much and too swift democratic reforms will destroy themselves. They learnt from June 4, 1989 that allowing gradual democratic change would probably break them too.

So, if they can't use these things to control the population anymore, what's there left to do? The American thing of course: popular culture, fast cars, celebrities, cellphones, TV, computers, karaoke, clubs, playstations, nikes, capitalism, nationalism. Easy. All with Chinese characteristics of course.

Bloody village riots

2005-06-18T23:15:00.000+12:00

Two days ago, BBC reported another peasant riot in the northern village of Shenyou, of which video footage had been obtained (footage available on the BBC report). Reuters has a good report on this also.

This kind of thing goes on in China every week, because the state (in most cases, corrupt officials wanting to make a few bucks) kicks peasants off land as China industrialises to make way for factories.

How ironic is it that the peasantry is actually the source of most of CCP's legitimacy problems today. Was it that long ago that the peasantry formed the root of CCP legitimacy ever since the legendary Yan'an era? Was it that long ago that the "red elements" launched their campaigns against the "black elements"? Perhaps it has been a long time, but certainly the CCP makes it difficult for themselves to break with the past when Mao's portrait still towers over Tiananmen Square today.

Nonetheless, it seems the peasants have served their purpose already.

As evidence of just how problematic these peasants are to the CCP, they even set up village elections during the reform era. It's all very "democratic"... votes are cast in a secret ballot, universal suffrage, the number of candidates exceeds the number of positions available.

Too bad that between the leaders who get elected and the actual National People's Congress there are about a million layers, so that really these elected village leaders have no real power whatsoever. Also, candidates need to be "approved" by the CCP, so basically you can pick and choose anyone you want, so long as they are CCP loyal. So really, as a local leader, you don't get to where you are because you're popular with the crowd, you're there because the CCP put you there.*

And when you screw up by allowing a riot to take place, "the authorities" will sack you.

*That was pretty much a crude and skewed summary of Political Participation in Beijing by Shi Tianjian, but of course Shi Tianjian is a professor in political science at Duke University whilst I am not. To be fair, the election system has undergone some positive reforms since its establishment, but not nearly enough. The book does emphasise the point that villagers are actually quite a politically savvy bunch and know how to work the system to some extent to their advantage. An interesting read.

It's no cushy job

2005-06-18T20:02:00.000+12:00

Already, Tsang is being bombarded with calls for democracy. Many HK democrat lawmakers have been calling for Tsang to clarify his position on issues like universal suffrage (for CE elections) and his stance on detained HK reporter Ching Cheong.

The Standard quoted Ronny Tong, a barrister-lawmaker:

"The full democracy we are talking about is universal suffrage so that all people can participate in the government.

"Merely adding some people to an advisory body will never be the same, nor can be it called Hong Kong-style democracy,'' he said. His Article 45 colleague Margaret Ng said Hong Kong-style democracy should be of no different from other modes of democracy in the world.

The reality is, however, that the CE in the current HKSAR system is not really accountable to LEGCO (which to date remains to be dominated by business elites anyway), let alone the Hong Kong people. Donald Tsang cannot afford to lose Beijing's trust if he were to remain CE for a second term, something he needs to aim for seeing his first term would only be 2 years.

Clearly then, Tsang will not be initiating any universal suffrage unless Beijing approves of it. What do people expect him to do? He can't change the Basic Law himself, only the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress in Beijing can.

So, does Beijing want universal suffrage in Hong Kong?

On the one hand, stalling for too long might agitate the Hong Kong public and make The CPG look bad internationally - despite being stereotyped as an apolitical population, the half million people protest showed Hong Kong people are politically savvy. Clearly, the whole "stability" argument doesn't go down as well in Hong Kong as in the mainland. HKers aren't that gullible.

On the other hand, if they allow universal suffrage and it works out alright, then what is their excuse for not adapting a similar system for other parts of China? Even worse, what if they elected someone like Martin Lee to be CE? I doubt the latter would happen, I think the majority of Hong Kongers are sensible enough not to be so confrontational with Beijing, as this would be bad for both sides. The former would be of concern to Beijing though.

Optimists argue that Beijing is only stalling democratic processes because 70% of China's population are peasants and poor, so once the riches from the South East trickle to the rest of China, democracy will grow.

Now that's a fine and dandy theory. The problem is, the CCP are no longer the vanguard of the proletariat or peasants. They're fond of the new middle class now, which shows as the gap between rich and poor widens more and more. Why? Because it is the educated middle class who would ever challenge the CCP's monopoly on power. Hence, if this trend continues, then democratic processes can be permanently stalled.

Ah, I have gone off topic. Conclusion: I am pessimistic about Hong Kong's democratic progress.

Koizumi says NO to Yasukuni Shrine substitute

2005-06-18T12:44:00.000+12:00

Japan Today reports that there is growing support for the idea of creating a secular war memorial that can replace the controversal visits by Japanese leaders to Yasukuni Shrine, where Japanese soldiers, including class-A war criminals, are "paid respects".

Koizumi is meeting up with S. Korean president Roh Moo Hyun on Monday, who will also be encouraging this idea.

However, PM Koizumi says:

"I think it may be all right to consider setting up a facility at which people can mourn without feeling uncomfortable, but no facility will substitute for Yasukuni Shrine,"

CIR online even has a report saying a Taiwanese has taken the PM's shrine visits to the High Court, challenging it as "unconstitutional":

The case was filed by mostly Taiwan aboriginals, who are also seeking 10,000 yen, about 90 US Dollars for each plaintiff in compensation for the psychological suffering provoked by the Prime Minister's annual visit to the shrine, where 14 Class-A war criminals are honored.

Plaintiff's representative May Chin criticized Japan's ignorance to the history crime, and demanded a public apology.

"I don't think that Yasukuni shrine respects us and the government of Japan doesn't respect our human rights. So, I want that the court to do us justice for our human rights."

The group also wants to see the names of their relatives removed from memorial plaques at the Yasukuni Shrine.

Some 28,000 names of people from Taiwan are listed on the shrine, with half them Taiwan aboriginals who were forced to join the Japanese military during World War Two.

I haven't managed to find this reported in other sources, so I can't be certain of its validity. Anyhow, I think the idea of a new war memorial is wise in light of the tension.

Some have posted opinions on the Japan Today website saying that the new memorial would simply become another theme park. Also, some were concerned that to go through with this would be allowing China to dictate to Japanese what they can and can't believe in history.

Alright, valid concerns. But, trivial nonetheless when compared to the bigger issues for Japan. Firstly, the shrine visits don't seem to be doing any good to Japan's interests. A poll in May showed that half of Japanese oppose the shrine visits, which is pretty significant since Japan is suppose to be a democracy. All of Japan's neighbours, not just China, are all annoyed with this - not good when Japan's bidding for a international leadership position in the UNSC.

Secondly, it seems somewhat ridiculous to argue that this is simply a Japanese cultural/religious thing without implying somehow that the right-wing politicians of Japan are culturally superior, seeing that half the Japanese population oppose it. The world pretty much agrees that there was a Nanjing Massacre and the Japanese soldiers who participated in it are war criminals, just like the world agrees that there was a Holocaust. The same uproar would happen if German leaders were to start "paying respects" to Nazis. Referring to the poll again, do these shrine visits even contribute to Japanese nationalism?

In saying that, it's annoying how China's propaganda system is so damn good.

UPDATED: Regarding the CIR article above, the People's Daily also mention it:

China deems that the demand by a group of Taiwan indigenous people related to the Yasukuni shrine is reasonable and deserves due respect, and it is China's hope that Japan can properly handle the related issue left over from history, said Liu Jianchao, spokesman of Chinese Foreign Ministry at a regular press conference on June 14.

A group of Taiwan natives went to the Yasukuni shrine on June 14, demanding their ancestors' names be removed from the shrine's enshrinement list, yet were obstructed by the Japanese side.

Um, yes. I wonder if Liu Jianchao would deem the request made several weeks ago for an apology by mothers of Tiananmen Massacre victims "reasonable". No wait, that is an "internal affair" so the FM does not need to comment. By the way, I don't recall finding any reports on that in the PRC papers... maybe I didn't look hard enough.

Power changes people

2005-06-17T20:54:00.000+12:00

The Taipei Times has posted a critical piece on the recent rise of Donald Tsang as the undisputed winner of the CE race. I haven't gone through all the major Hong Kong papers, but apparently most of them compare the elections to those held on the mainland (where you'd know who's the winner before the actual election for obvious reasons).

In an editorial in the Ming Pao:

"Hong Kong's public had high hopes for Donald Tsang. That's why in the past two weeks, when everyone saw him show his arrogant and stubborn side, they felt disappointed."

The South China Morning Post thought the election was a "dissapointment", while the Hong Kong Economic Journal said the election was a "small circle" elitist thing that doesn't involve the public.

Their main message to Tsang: don't get cocky.

Well, it wasn't like we weren't expecting all these things anyway. Deng Xiaoping's aim was never to "democratise" Hong Kong with "one country, two systems", rather it was just a good excuse to allow Hong Kong to remain capitalist, allow its fruits to flow into the mainland. So, since Deng was more of a "reformist" than any subsequent leader, we can only expect Beijing and their appointed guardians of Hong Kong to stall on the whole universal suffrage issue.

I guess Taipei Times was just taking another jab at the HKSAR system, it's definitely not what they want for Taiwan.

Playboy Lama?

2005-06-17T17:15:00.000+12:00

For those of you that can't be bothered reading long posts on serious subjects, here's some light reading from BBC. Apparently the sixth Dalai Lama was a bit of a wild thing...

Tsangyang Gyatso, who became the sixth Dalai Lama in 1697, often went against the principles of the Gelug Sect of Tibetan Buddhism, of which he was the spiritual leader.

He dressed as a layman and often took the name Norsang Wangpo at night, getting drunk and visiting brothels.

However he was also a poet and wrote moving pieces about the pains and pleasures of the human heart, and a new English version of his works has been completed by British linguist Paul Williams.

and somehow there is a link between that and modern Tibetan politics...

Tsangyang's lifestyle meant there were many who believed they could not govern effectively in his name, creating a power vacuum in Tibet.

This led to two successive invasions from different parts of Mongolia - after which the Chinese army entered the area to sort out the situation.

"It is really from this time that China had been able to enforce their claim - which they still have - that Tibet is an integral part of China," Mr Williams added.

"So the impact of the Sixth Dalai Lama could be said to still being felt by the modern Tibetans, in terms of the Chinese claim," he said.

It's all about timing

2005-06-16T18:48:00.000+12:00

So I was just surfing on ChinaDaily and saw they have a special coverage on Japanese War crimes. An interesting read if you have the time.

Japan and China are both pretty savvy players in international relations. They know timing is everything. They also know when to push and when to pull.

Remember when Japan's PM Junichiro Koizumi apologised for Japan's atrocities during WWII? And of course Japan's also increasing its foreign aid. It emphasises its current status in the world as an economic powerhouse, humanitarian, and democratic.

China on the other hand, emphasises Japan's history. The Nanjing Massacre, the white-washing Nanjing Massacre textbooks, the Nanjing Massacre again. China was very adept at letting the wrath out, but only so much that it could pull it back when it had served its purpose.

Certainly, the brutality of Japan in WWII should never be looked at lightly. It was truly a crime to humanity.

What interests me, however, is what if the Japanese right-wing government finally gets down from its high horse and truly apologises, like how Germany did? What would the Chinese government have to say then? Would they really back off blocking Japan's bid to the UNSC? Somehow, I doubt it.

The problem here is that we don't know how much Japan needs to apologise before the Chinese population to forgive Japan. But I think of Japan makes more of an effort, it will be harder for the Chinese government to continue fuelling hatred in the population.

By the way, Mao actually worked with the Japanese during WWII. He would have viewed the Japanese invasion as a good thing because it got the KMT off their backs during the civil war (CCP was hopelessly outpowered compared to the KMT, until the Japanese came). Also, Japan only managed to control the big cities, so the leftovers around the countryside all went to CCP control. So, the Chinese people not only deserve an apology from Japan, but from the CCP (no doubt this part of Chinese history has been left from Chinese textbooks). See Jung Chang & Jon Halliday's new book - Mao: the unknown story.

There was an article on CNN in March on Chinese textbooks:

CNN: What Chinese textbooks don't say

SHANGHAI, China (AP) -- Some things you won't find in Chinese history textbooks: the 1989 democracy movement, the millions who died in a famine caused by misguided communist policies or China's military attacks on India and Vietnam. As China criticizes Japan for new textbooks that critics say minimize wartime abuses like the Japanese military forcing Asian women into sexual slavery, Beijing's own schoolbooks have significant omissions about the communist system's own history and relations with its neighbors.

"With rising Chinese nationalism, the efforts to rewrite history, to reinterpret history according to the demands of nationalism have become a major national pastime," said Maochun Yu, a history professor at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland.

Experts say China's textbooks are written to heighten a sense of national victimhood and glorify the Communist Party that seized power in a 1949 revolution and lashes out at any threat to its rule.

The books describe those who died fighting Japan and other outsiders as having "gloriously sacrificed" themselves for China.

Propaganda paintings reproduced in schoolbooks show Chinese struggling against foreign invaders -- poses imitated by protesters who threw rocks at the Japanese Embassy in Beijing over the weekend during violent anti-Japanese demonstrations in several Chinese cities.

An eighth-grade history book used in Shanghai, China's most cosmopolitan city, repeatedly refers to Japanese by an insulting phrase that roughly translates as "Jap bandits."

The book focuses on Japanese atrocities and repeats China's claim that 35 million Chinese died or were injured during their 1937-45 war.

"Wherever the Japanese army went, they burned, killed, stole and plundered," the book says. "There was no wickedness they didn't commit."

Omissions of major events appear aimed at shoring up China's image of itself as a non-aggressor, especially since the 1949 revolution.

The books don't mention the brief but bloody 1962 border war with India that broke out when Chinese troops attacked Indian positions to enforce territorial claims.

There is nothing on the 1979 war when Chinese troops attacked Vietnam. The assault was ordered to punish Hanoi for ousting the murderous Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia, which was an ally of Beijing.

Also missing:

The 1989 crackdown on democracy demonstrations, when Chinese troops killed hundreds and possibly thousands of unarmed protesters.

The estimated 30 million Chinese who starved to death during the 1958-61 "Great Leap Forward," revolutionary leader Mao Zedong's attempt to speed up China's farm and factory output through mass collectivization.

Textbooks gloss over ally North Korea's invasion of South Korea at the start of the 1950-53 Korean War, a conflict that drew in troops from the United States and other countries on the side of the South and China's army in support of the North.

The texts say only that "civil war broke out," without mentioning how it started. America is portrayed as an invader that forced Beijing to intervene by threatening Chinese territory.

A seventh-grade text also accuses the U.S. military of using biological weapons during the Korean War, repeating a claim made by China, North Korea and the former Soviet Union during the Cold War but never proven.

While Japan's distortions of its history appear driven by a reluctance to accept shame, China's are aimed at preserving communist rule, said Sin-ming Shaw, a China scholar at Oxford University in England. "Not owning up is a calculated political policy," Shaw said.

Not saying that the Chinese people do not have a right to protest about the Japanese textbooks, they surely do. I only wish they could see what wrongs committed by the CCP to the Chinese people have been kept out of their textbooks.

So, it's Chief Executive Donald Tsang... again

2005-06-16T10:21:00.000+12:00

Well, it's been highly speculated since Tung Chee-Hwa stood down anyway, but it seems Donald Tsang has won the Hong Kong Chief Executive position by a landslide. Not that there has been any official confirmation, but he just handed in his nomination form - with the support of 710 of the 800 members of the Election Committee.

I say again, because currently it's still Henry Tang filling in after Tsang resigned (who sat in after Tung resigned) so he could be eligable for this by-election race. Wow.

Donald Tsang: Who's the chief?

Of course, we saw the headlines around the world already, and if you don't know much about Hong Kong you'd think this was something like a presidential election where people line up at the polling booth to vote, and after you've voted you'd run home and check the election progress on TV...

Well, that may have been the case for 2004 LEGCO elections, but certainly not for the Chief Exec ones.

Firstly, this isn't an universal suffrage election (you're probably wondering why 710 votes is so significant in a region of 6.8 million people). Beijing has set up an Election Committee to handpick Hong Kong's leader. Initially it comprised of 400 members, but it has since been expanded to 800 members, who are elected from particular sectors and appointed by the Central People's Government (CPG).

Secondly, it wasn't like any of the other candidates had a chance. They only had a few dozen votes to share between themselves.

Thirdly, the final decision needs to be "approved" by the CPG. That is, you ain't the chief until Beijing says you are.

Hm, not nearly as exciting as the Bush-Gore race.

Because of the hiccup with Tung Chee-Hwa resigning earlier this year, we probably won't hear anything about a universal suffrage election for the Chief Executive position any time soon. Article 45 of the Basic Law states that universal suffrage is an eventual goal for the Chief Executive position.

It's not likely Donald Tsang will be the new bastion of political reform or anything like that. He is very much pro-Beijing and seeing his position relies their support, he wouldn't want to agitate or mock Beijing too much. Don't worry Martin Lee, your job is safe.

But for now, we can be happy for Hong Kong. Certainly, the colourful bow-tie look makes Tsang more appealing than the worn-out look of Tung. Also, with 70% of support from the public according to recent polls, Donald Tsang seems less of tyrant. Then again, Tung was more of the tyrant's pet on a leash.

UPDATED: Now it's official, they won't bother voting on July 10 (even if they did, it would only be a show "election"). In the article by Cannix Yau in The Standard, it hints Tsang calling for a more open election process on the path to universal suffrage. He also said that if it was one person, one vote, then the election process would be so much easier. Of course the CE position is accountable to Beijing... so even if Tsang personally would like to see a more open process, we still have to see what Beijing says.

An Introduction

2005-06-16T09:46:00.000+12:00

你好 and welcome to SinoEye. Basically, this is another political commentary and current events blog focussing on China. That is all I shall say for now, seeing this blog is still in its infancy.

Why SinoEye?
Um, basically the other names that I could think of this early in the morning, such as "SinoWatch" and "ChinaWatch", were taken on blogspot. Mind you, those blogs haven't been updated since 2003-2004. SinoEye ain't so bad, it was certainly way easier to come up with a logo for that.

Who are you?
For now, let's just say I have an avid fascination for China and its political development in the past few decades. My interests, in the topic of China, include government, censorship, political and economic reform, media, and foreign relations (probably more to add as this blog continues). I also have a particular interest in Hong Kong, which will probably show in my posts.

Are you anti-China?
I just need to openly state that I am in no way "anti-China". Really, it pisses me off when the CCP labels you "anti-China" just because you criticise the government (constructively, I might add). I know the CCP has managed to brainwash many Chinese that if you are not loyal to the Chinese government (in other words, the CCP) then you are a traitor to your country. China, as a country, does not equate to the CCP. China is the Chinese people. Think about it, over two millenia of history and only 50 years of these were under the CCP rule, and the CCP today is completely different from the CCP of 1949.