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Hoang Anh Gia Lai (HAGL) Group has released an announcement to reject the information of the London-based environmental watchdog Global Witness on its occupation of land in Laos and Cambodia. See original article: Hoang Anh Gia Lai denies information of Global Witness

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The rest is here: Tubbataha Reefs More Intact Than Feared

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A photographer takes pictures of the hostesses, who serve delegates, pose on Tiananmen Square ahead of Congress. Pic: AP. BEIJING (AP) — China’s government promised its people Tuesday deficit-fueled spending to fight corruption, to improve the despoiled environment and address other quality-of-life issues that a growing number of Chinese are demanding. In a speech outlining [...]

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Growing numbers of Chinese go online, unafraid to say they deserve better leadership BEIJING: A recent Chinese internet meme – a catchphrase gone viral – lacerated what’s widely seen as a lame excuse for why China’s leaders have been so slow to enact political reform.

The ever-sharp social media blog Tea Leaf Nation says it all started when Professor Gong Fangbing, at China’s National Defense University, wrote an essay for a People’s Daily website, arguing that the reason the Communist Party hasn’t yet embraced democracy is “largely because of insufficient preparation of theoretical backing.” He posited that the Party, despite being in power for 63 years, hadn’t developed theories to move it from a revolutionary party to a ruling party that could, maybe, eventually, share power.   The responses, gathered by Tea Leaf Nation from Weibo, China’s version of Twitter, were scathing: “Now I get it.

The Chinese soccer team didn’t win the World Cup because of insufficient theory,” scoffed one user. “Lunch is delayed due to insufficient theory,” tweeted another. “Due to insufficient theory, constipation continues,” wrote a third.  And attorney Yuan Yulai added, “It’s only natural to conduct democratic reforms and return power to the people. If you steal something, you return it to the owner. Why does that need theoretical proof?” It’s a question that’s getting harder for the Communist Party to answer. And as the party prepares for the Nov. 8 opening of a Party Congress that will announce a new generation of leaders, a growing chorus of voices from unexpected quarters is saying political reform is long overdue.    As the party prepares for a new generation of leaders, a growing chorus of voices says that political reform is long overdue. Deng Yuwen, deputy editor a newspaper put out by the Central Party School, The Study Times, has criticized President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao for having “created more problems than achievements” – by having failed to reform the system. And that was even before The New York Times came out with its exhaustively researched investigative report about the $2.7 billion it said Wen’s family has amassed in the time he’s been a senior leader. Deng, in an essay published on the website of the business magazine Caijing and promptly taken down by censors, suggested that the Chinese people and the party seem to have increasingly divergent ideas about what reform is. Deng offered his own view. “The essence of democracy is how to restrict government power; that’s the most important reason why China needs democracy so badly,” he wrote. “Over-concentration of government power without checks and balances is the root cause of so many social problems.” Among those problems, he said, is China’s growing wealth gap, with many of the wealthiest being Communist Party officials, their relatives and close friends. The 70 wealthiest members of the National People’s Congress were found by Bloomberg News Agency last year to have an average net worth of $1.2 billion. Each.  The party’s response to growing resentment of such inequality, not to mention snide online commentary about it? Party cadres – and their families – have been ordered to reduce conspicuous consumption of luxury goods, especially in the run-up to the Party Congress.   Among those problems is China’s growing wealth gap, with many of the wealthiest being Communist Party officials, their relatives and close friends. But that’s barely a beginning, in a year when reports are coming out about the families of top leaders amassing fortunes, when one of the Communist Party’s former stars, Bo Xilai, had his spectacular fall from grace, when the son of Hu Jintao’s effective chief of staff crashed a black Ferrari in the wee hours of a March night, killing himself and badly injuring the two young women – one Tibetan, one Uighur – who were in the car with him, in various states of undress, according to the South China Morning Post. Ironically, it was just a couple of weeks before that crash that Xi Jinping, the likely next head of the party and president of China, gave a speech at the Party School, about the importance of “maintaining the purity of the Party.” “The Party’s capacity to govern, steer reform and opening up, develop the market economy and respond to the external environment will all be challenged, and we will be faced with the growing danger of losing our drive, underperforming, becoming alienated from the people, lacking in initiative, and corruption,” Xi said. Xi is still an enigma when it comes to how he really feels about political reform – how much, how fast, and what kind. He’s played the game to rise as far as he has in the party. But his father, Xi Zhongxun, has been an ally of China’s reformist leader Hu Yaobang in the 1980s, and was the only senior leader to protest when Hu was ousted by senior leader Deng Xiaoping for moving too fast with reforms.  A well-informed public, fed-up with corruption, inequality and injustice, is increasingly demanding a better deal from its government. Interestingly, Xi is said to have paid a visit over the summer to Hu’s son, Hu Deping. A Reuters report quoted sources who knew of a written summary of Xi’s remarks to Hu, circulated among some retired officials. In it, Xi was quoted as saying “the problems that China has accumulated are unprecedented” and “we must seek progress and change while remaining steady,” according to Reuters, quoting sources who knew of a written summary of Xi’s remarks circulated among some retired officials.  Even if Xi proves more open to allowing political reform than the outgoing leadership – not a high bar — there’s still the question of whether he’ll have the clout and persuasive power to push such reforms through a system whose elites have proven adept at protecting their privilege. And while an increasingly well-informed public, fed-up with corruption, inequality and injustice, is increasingly demanding a better deal from its government – the party is still trying desperately to control the conversation.

That was true even as state-run media were trumpeting the news that Chinese novelist Mo Yan had won the Nobel Prize for Literature. The Propaganda Department put out the following directive, says the US-based website China Digital Time. It gathers such leaked circulars from disgruntled Chinese journalists and publishes them online in a section called Directives from the Ministry of Truth: “To all websites nationwide: In light of Mo Yan winning the Nobel prize for literature, monitoring of microblogs, forums, blogs and similar key points must be strengthened. Be firm in removing all comments which disgrace the party and the government, defame cultural work, mention Nobel laureates Liu Xiaobo (serving an 11-year prison sentence for calling for a multi-party democracy in China) and Gao Xingjian (a Chinese novelist in exile), and associated harmful material. Kind of annoying for the censors, then, that Mo Yan himself had barely taken the time to bask in the party’s congratulations for his award, when he turned around and called for Liu Xiaobo to be released as soon as possible.  The party continues to scramble to keep up. The popularly acerbic blogger Han Han, in his book, This Generation, sums up the growing tension in China this way: “The main contradiction in China today is that between the growing intelligence of the population at large and the rapidly waning morality of our officials.” A growing number of Chinese people aren’t afraid to say they deserve better. Some are impatient to see if their new leaders have the vision and courage to lead the change that’s needed rather than be unwillingly pushed forward by it. Few are holding their breath.  

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See original article: New Naval app secretly recreates environments from your phone

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Read more: Can Thailand’s Flood Defenses Fail Again? With a well-developed infrastructure, a free-enterprise economy, generally pro-investment policies, and strong export industries, Thailand enjoyed solid growth from 2000 to 2008 – averaging more than 4% per year – as it recovered from the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98. Thai exports – mostly machinery and electronic [...]

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China is the biggest market for illegal ivory from Africa. In an effort to stop the slaughter of elephants by poachers, celebrities like basketball player Yao Ming and environmental groups are teaming up to educate the Chinese public about the costs of poaching, with the hope that reducing demand could reduce the supply. Internet and tourism campaigns target Chinese citizens and visitors to African countries like Kenya. Many Chinese surveyed by the International Fund for Animal Welfare, for example, reported not knowing that elephants were killed for their tusks, and 80 percent of those surveyed said such facts would prevent them from buying ivory in the future. Postal workers in China are trained to recognize suspect packages, and penalties for smuggling are being strengthened.

Through star power and education, animal rights advocates hope to stem the demand for ivory once and for all. – YaleGlobal Celebrities lend support to endangered elephants Mike PflanzThe Christian Science Monitor, 5 September 2012Rights:© The Christian Science Monitor. All Rights Reserved.

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Weibo is just 3 years old, but its posters are fierce in tackling China’s challenges BEIJING: It was the last straw for Shanghai graduate student Wu Heng, when he heard that restaurants near him were using toxic chemicals to make pork taste like beef. He started a food-safety blog out of his dorm room in January. In April, he got 10,000 hits. In May, he got 5 million. “Word spread on Weibo,” he says with a grin.  Weibo – China’s version of Twitter – has created a vigorous virtual public square since it was launched by the Chinese internet company Sina three years ago this month.

The site, which allows users to post photos, videos, comments and messages, has since expanded with scorching speed. It now boasts some 350 million users. “These days, a lot of people use Weibo as their main source of information, and information on Weibo can pass very fast,” says Wu. “So I update my Weibo account every day, with the latest news on food safety.” Food safety is but one of the hot-button issues that have raised a public outcry on Weibo, providing a new source of public pressure on the government. A similar outcry came last summer after a high-speed train crash killed 40 people, just days after the expensive and high-profile project was rushed into service.  Weibo comments mocked official excuses and attempts to cover up bad management. Weibo is now driving, in many ways, the entire national dialogue in China. “This is unprecedented in Chinese history,” says Kaiser Kuo, the director of Corporate Communications at Baidu.com, the leading Chinese search engine. “There’s never been a time when there’s been a comparably large and impactful public sphere. It’s now driving, in many ways, the entire national dialogue.” So far, China’s leaders are ambivalent. On the one hand, Weibo gives them a window into public opinion they never really had before, letting at least some people blow off steam online rather than on the street. On the other hand, China’s leaders are neither used to nor comfortable with public scrutiny, much less public ridicule.   Wang Chen, who heads China’s State Internet Information Office, has said that Weibo and other microblogs should “serve society,” and not threaten public security. Exactly what does threaten public security is open to interpretation, and Sina and other microblog providers are expected to interpret broadly as they exercise censorship on behalf of the government. Critical comments are wiped away; entire Weibo accounts are sometimes deleted. Popular blogger Isaac Mao had 30,000 followers when his account was closed in June. He’d written a comment criticizing China’s space program as a waste of money.   A couple of months earlier, Chinese microbloggers woke up on a Saturday morning to find the message: “Recently, comments left by microbloggers have started to contain much illegal and detrimental information, including rumors.” To clean up these rumors, the message continued, Weibo would suspend its comments section – the function that allows lively, often irreverent discussion – for three days. If Weibo is a battlefield between authorities and civil society, the government seeks to occupy it. “People who didn’t say something before, they start to realize there’s something wrong with this system,” Mao said at the time. “I think they censors fear if they shut down Weibo totally, it will backfire. But they’re testing to see how people respond to more restrictions. Because Weibo is now a battleground between the official voices and the voices of civil society.” Not necessarily, says Chinese blogger and journalist Michael Anti. He says Weibo has its uses for official circles, too. “Now, when someone in the central governments wants to take action against a local government or some princelings children of senior party leaders, they put the news directly on Weibo or Twitter,” he says. “Microblogging is really changing the pattern of how we follow news, and how news is leaked.” If Weibo is a battlefield, he says, the government seeks to occupy it, not destroy it. And lest ordinary citizens think they can get creative in their own political uses of Weibo – Anti has his doubts. “You can’t use Weibo to organize a social movement,” he says. “Because as soon as you use the word ‘gather,’ the keyword would get picked up, and the warning would be sent to the local police station. So even before you gather at the restaurant, you’ll already have the police there. I call it Censorship 2.0.” The government’s current squeeze on Weibo includes requiring users to use real names when they register –inconsistently enforced – and, especially in the run-up to this autumn’s leadership transition, to keep comments “harmonious.” A Harvard study released in June, led by social science professor Gary King, found that about 13 percent of China’s social media content is deleted by censors, though, curiously, many negative comments are allowed to stay. Weibo is transforming the relationship between Chinese citizens and their government. “Posts with negative, even vitriolic criticism of the state, its leaders and its policies are not more likely to be censored,” said the study report, adding that China’s online censorship program focuses on “curtailing collective action by silencing comments that represent, reinforce or spur social mobilization.” Not surprising, then, that news of Hong Kong’s mass demonstrations in recent weeks, against increasing Mainland Chinese government control, made only the most fleeting of appearances on Weibo. Still, Chinese Weibo users are using what Baidu’s Kaiser Kuo calls “delightful creativity” in using homonyms, puns and wordplay to get messages across.  Those who want to post longer, edgier messages often post them as photos, to get around both censors and the word limit.  Kuo says social media companies are left to balance between following the law and letting the virtual public square that’s their customer base thrive.  “Internet companies in China serve two masters,” he says. “They need to keep users happy, and none of them labor under the illusion that people prefer censored search results…. We are obliged to obey the law in China. And we are also compelled to explore the elasticity of our boundaries.” Many a Chinese Weibo user is doing exactly that, transforming the relationship between Chinese citizens and their government. “Before, it was very much one-way communication; the government disseminated information to the public” says environmentalist Ma Jun, whose Beijing-based Institute of Public & Environmental Affairs runs a popular website that maps, names and shames polluting factories around China. “But Weibo is different. It’s created, for the first time, a sort of equal two-way communication.” Ma says Weibo has been a godsend for his website, both in spreading the word  and collecting information about polluters, with people who see pollution sending details and photos to add to his map. He says the central government has been fairly supportive, even when local government officials have come to his office to try convincing him to remove embarrassing data.

That doesn’t mean democracy is about to break out. Ma says, for all the heady change Weibo has brought in its first three years, civil society in China is still in its infancy. “For thousands of years, this country was ruled top down, and it doesn’t have a long tradition of transparency or public participation in decision making,” he says. “Now, it’s quite a critical moment, because the country is facing all these challenges.

The environmental challenge is just one of them.

There are many other social challenges. If we want to go through these smoothly, there’s an increasing understanding that the government alone cannot fully micromanage all these challenges. It needs the society to help.” An increasingly vocal and growing Chinese middle-class is proving itself willing, even insistent, on playing that role – and a 3-year-old called Weibo is making it ever harder for the government to ignore those voices.   

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