By Ben Blanchard - REUTERS | via (UNCENSORED) yahoo!news
May 08, 2008
China will not guarantee it won't censor the Internet over this summer's Beijing Olympics, nor can it guarantee to stamp out piracy of Olympic-branded goods, officials said on Thursday.
Wang Wei, executive vice president of the Beijing Olympic organizers, had promised media would have "complete freedom" to report over the event, but rights groups have regularly criticized China's commitment to that pledge.
China maintains a tight grip over the Internet, whose use is exploding in the world's most populous nation, preventing access to sites it considers anti-government, such as those of the banned spiritual group Falun Gong or Tibet independence groups.
"China has always been very cautious when it comes to the Internet," Technology Minister Wan Gang told a news conference as the Olympic torch was being paraded atop Mount Everest.
"I've not got any clear information about which sites will be shut or screened. But to protect the youth there are controls on some unhealthy websites.
"We will guarantee as much as possible" that sites will not be blocked over the Olympics, he added. "Every country limits access to some websites. Even in developed countries not every site can be accessed."
As part of China's plan to hold a "high-tech Olympics," broadband wireless Internet services will be widely available, according to a handbook issued at the same news conference, to ensure "convenience for journalists (and) promptness of news."
Last week, the United States said again it was concerned about Internet controls in China.
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By The Epoch Times
May 04, 2008
After the French protest at the Beijing Olympic Torch relay, official Chinese media have been highly critical of France. Since then, a retaliatory boycott on French goods has been advocated, resulting in a Chinese protest and boycott of the France-invested retailer Carrefour. Yet the escalating boycott has begun to unintentionally hurt Chinese suppliers of Carrefour as well.
On April 24, a food supplier in Beijing received a fax from Carrefour requesting a goods return. "If the boycott continues, we will certainly suffer greater loss in the future," said the helpless supplier who mentioned that other food suppliers also received goods return notice from Carrefour.
A Beijing supplier was told to go to Carrefour and process 70 boxes of returned goods, or their order would be null and void. "Seventy boxes equates to about a 10 day sales amount in Carrefour," explained the supplier.
According to a China Business Journal report, from the over 100 Carrefour outlets, 95 percent of the goods come from over 1,000 local suppliers in China. Based on Carrefour's unconditional goods return contract, the loss from returned goods will eventually be borne by the suppliers.
"The protests in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Suzhou are relatively restrained," said a Carrefour manager, whose name was withheld by request, "The protests outside our stores in Hefei, Xuzhou, Kunming, Changsha, Wuhan, and Qingdao are very intense." Carrefour stores in Wuhan and Hefei have had to suspend operations due to the protests.
"Because of the boycott, our total sales declined almost 20 percent in the past few days. We are gradually receiving goods return notices from various Carrefour stores," said the manager.
Yang, a General Manager from the Shanghai Chengxie Logistics Distribution Ltd. is very concerned as his company supplies between 70 to 80 percent of the goods for Carrefour Shanghai. In his opinion, many goods have to wait two months before one can see the true impact of the goods return on them.
Yang said that for Carrefour, the incident is merely a sales loss in the short term, and subsequently a partial profit loss. But the real victims are the over 1,000 Chinese suppliers, he said.
Yang explained that Carrefour normally operates on a three-month accounting cycle and returns goods unsold in two months. "Now the goods return rate for Carrefour is about eight percent," said Yang. "If the rate reaches over 20 percent after one or two months, it will hurt the suppliers greatly, especially the food suppliers."
A fresh produce supplier verified that with fewer Carrefour customers, the fresh produce may be affected the most. "Our product sales will decrease at least 30 percent on the whole, and the returned products that cannot be sold will all be borne by the suppliers."
By Agence France Presse | via UNCENSORED Yahoo! News
May 01, 2008
US actress and activist Mia Farrow accused China on Friday of "underwriting the atrocities in Darfur" as she tried to put pressure on Beijing to end years of bloodshed in the Sudanese region.
Farrow, speaking in Hong Kong as the Olympic torch relay was borne through the southern Chinese city, is using the high profile of this summer's Beijing Games to highlight China's support of the Sudanese government.
"It isn't a pretty way to say this, but China is underwriting the atrocities in Darfur through the oil revenues which now top 4 billion US dollars a year," she told AFP in an interview.
"Some 70 percent of that money has been used to attack the population of Darfur."
By SAM HANANEL, Associated Press Writer | via uncensored Yahoo! News
May 01, 2008
A U.S. senator accused the Chinese government on Thursday of ordering U.S.-owned hotels in China to install Internet filters that can spy on international visitors coming to see the summer Olympic games.
Sen. Sam Brownback, a Kansas Republican, made the charge at a Capitol Hill news conference where he and other lawmakers denounced China's record of human rights abuses and urged President Bush not to attend the Olympic's opening ceremonies in Beijing.
"This is wrong, it's against international conventions, it's certainly against the Olympic spirit," Brownback said. "The Chinese government should remove that request and that order."
Brownback said he has seen the language of memos received by at least two U.S.-owned hotels. He declined to name them, and said he obtained the information from two "reliable but confidential sources" in the hope that public pressure would persuade the Chinese government to back off the demand.
The filters could enable the government to monitor Web sites viewed by hotel guests and restrict Internet information coming in and out of China, Brownback said.
The senator called China "the foremost enabler of human rights abuses around the world" and said the Chinese government is turning the summer games into "an Olympics of oppression."
A call Thursday to the Chinese embassy in Washington was not immediately returned.
By REUTERS | The New York Times
April 29, 2008
China's lawyers face official harassment, meddling, even jail for defending suspects and sensitive causes, a rights group said in a new report, adding to criticism of the nation's rights record before the Olympics.
Human Rights Watch says the ruling Chinese Communist Party's avowed commitment to rights and rule of law has not been matched by its treatment of lawyers seeking to defend those principles.
"Chinese lawyers continue to face huge obstacles in defending citizens whose rights have been violated and ordinary criminal suspects," the New York-based monitoring group said in the report. "China has a long way to go to lift arbitrary restrictions on lawyers and establish genuine rule of law."
The criticisms and demands for better protection for lawyers will add to a long list of human rights complaints about China ahead of the Beijing Olympic Games in August.
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