Rana Mitter proves that you don’t have to trudge through hundreds of pages to gain a nuanced view of China’s place in the current global milieu. His Modern China: A Very Short Introduction, is 140 pages (not including the index and other material) but packs more information and insight than many grander volumes. Mitter sets […]
Category: Politics & Society
Categories
Cool heads in a crisis
The Sichuan earthquake represents a stiff test for China’s leaders
US authorities are investigating whether the content of Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez’s laptop computer was secretly copied during his visit to Beijing last December, AP reported. The copying is believed to have occured when Gutierrez left the computer unattended, according to anonymous sources. It is not clear what information on the machine might have […]
Parents of children killed when a school in Dujiangyan collapsed during the May 12 earthquake may pursue legal action against local officials they believe are responsible for the school’s sub-standard construction, the Financial Times reported. Parents at Juyuan Middle School on the outskirts of Dujiangyan, where 289 students and teachers died, have pooled money to […]
President Hu Jintao and Kuomintang chairman Wu Poh-hsiung said that semi-official talks between Taiwan and mainland should be revived as soon as possible, the Financial Times reported. During a live televised meeting in Beijing Wednesday, the two leaders agreed to work to resume dialogue between the Straits Exchange Foundation and the Association for Relations Across […]