News in Chinese Media

Xinhua News Agency

    All the track-laying work on the new 13.5-kilometer-long section of Beijing's subway system has been completed as of today.

     The newly completed line, which runs from Fuxingmen to Bawangfen, has 11 stations along the way, and passes through Tian' anmen Square. It is also the main underground line along the city' s major thoroughfare, Chang'an Avenue.

     This project, constructed jointly by the Beijing City Construction Co., the Beijing Municipal Construction Engineering Corporation, and the No.16 Engineering Bureau under the Ministry of Railways, was built at a cost of 7.57 billion yuan (908.4 million US dollars). The original deadline for this new section was 1996, however, the lack of funds delayed the completion of the project, which was begun in June 1992, until this year.

     The new line will begin operations on September 28, and will be able to run thirty pairs of trains an hour, with the capacity to transport as many as 60,000 passengers per hour during peak hours.

     Beijing's existing subway system consists of a 42-kilometer- long line.

Xinhua News Agency

    Chinese surgeons were able to perform a craniotomy, the surgical opening of the skull, which is difficult even in modern times, as early as 4,000 years ago.

     This is contrary to archaeologists' previous belief that the craniotomy was introduced to China by Arabs after the Tang Dynasty (618-907).

     In the latest issue of the journal Archaeology, Han Kangxin and Chen Xingcan, of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' Institute of Archaeology, say that several ancient skulls with holes on them were discovered at sites in Qinghai, Henan, Heilongjiang provinces.

     Carbon dating indicates that the skull, which was found in a tomb in Minhe County in Qinghai, is the oldest to have had this operation in China and was from the later New Stone Age, about 4, 000 years ago.

     A large triangular cut can be found at the top of the skull with traces of scraping around it. There are also two sunken traces on the skull, which Han says might have been left by a strike from a certain instrument, causing a fracture and inflammation of the skull.

     There were some bony growths around the hole and the scraped traces are indistinct, he says, meaning that the patient survived for a period of time after the operation.

    Skulls from the Shang Dynasty (1600-1100 BC), Western Zhou Dynasty (1100-771 BC), Eastern Zhou Dynasty (770-256 BC), and Han Dynasty (206 BC-220 AD) with holes in them were also discovered at Anyang in Henan, Datong in Qinghai, and Tailai in Heilongjiang.

     The skull of a middle-aged man from more than 3,000 years ago unearthed in a tomb in Datong County has caught the attention of archaeologists. It has an arc-shaped hole 115 millimeters long and 30 mm. wide. This large-scale craniotomy is very rare, Han says, and it is interesting to find that different areas around the hole grew back differently.

     So, they concluded that the patient had had a skull opening operation more than once.

     Chen Xingcan, another archaeologist at the institute, says that ancient surgeons used flint pieces or metal knives for the operation and points to how marvelous it is that these people had mastered this technique when the instruments were so simple and crude.

     Evidence of early craniotomies has also been found in Europe, Africa, America, and other parts of Asia.

Xinhua News Agency

    China began a cybermarketing project recently to help companies with marketing on websites, the China Information Industry Association (CIIA) reports.

     The project is sponsored by CIIA, China Telecom's Data Communication Bureau, and the China Financial Net Information Technology Co. Ltd, according to Gao Xinmin, vice-director of CIIA.

     It helps companies with market research and analysis and product development via the Internet.

     The project has 2 parts: training and Internet service. In the first, managers will receive training on cybermarketing and basic Internet use; in the second, Internet Service Providers and Internet Platform Providers will provide services.

     Gao says that it is still difficult to do e-commerce in China, but that cybermarketing, which does not have website costs, will help develop e-commerce.

     A survey by the China Entrepreneur System this year showed that although 20 percent of Chinese companies have a homepage, the addition of information on the homepage is very slow, and 85 percent didn't even add to the homepage in half a year.

Xinhua News Agency

    In Wuhan, the capital of China's Hubei Province, bridges are bringing good profits.

     The Wuhan Bridge, China's first bridge across the Yangtze River, is an important connection between the north and south on the Beijing-Guangzhou Railway Line. It has generated nearly 10 billion yuan in economic benefits since it opened in 1957.

     Wuhan Bridge No.2, which drew 100,000 visitors at its inauguration in 1995, has made a reality of the city's ring road. Wuhan is separated by the Yangtze and the Hanjiang rivers into Wuchang, where government institutions and colleges are located, Hankou, where business is done, and Hanyang, which is the cultural center.

     Thanks to the ring road, drivers can travel around the city a lot faster, a far cry from the ferryboats that used to be the only way to cross the Yangtze. Work is going on on two other new bridges across the Yangtze.

     On the Hanjiang, 3 more new bridges are being built in addition to the four operational ones. Wuhan is China's largest bridge industry center for design, construction, special steel, and bridge engineering equipment.

     The Railways Ministry's Bridge Engineering Bureau has made its headquarters in Wuhan. It has been involved in more than 300 bridges.

     To show their devotion to the bridges, for which the word in Chinese is "qiao", many local people have given their newborn children names with "qiao" in them.

     Since 1957, China has built 16 bridges across the Yangtze.

Xinhua News Agency

    A year-old project designed to help young people in China find jobs has been successful.

     Of China's army of the unemployed, a third are below the age of 30. To deal with the problem, the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League of China (CYLC) and the Ministry of Labor and Social Security began the project early last year.

     So far, more than a million young people have received re- employment training and some 100 job fairs have been held to introduce them to possible jobs. As a result, over 200,000 people have found new jobs, and some 3,500 small and medium-sized businesses have been created, according to the Central Committee of the CYLC.

     The CYLC is asking its subordinates across the country to place more importance on the project and to do more for the country's economic readjustment.

Xinhua News Agency

    China's leading gearbox manufacturer, the Shanghai Automobile Gearworks, has become the first Chinese factory to get the VDA 6.1 certification for automobile quality of the German Automobile Industry Association ( VDA).

     VDA 6.1 is considered to be one of the two top automobile quality standards in the world, along with the QS 9000 of the three big US automobile manufacturers, Chrysler, Ford, and General Motors.

     The two standards both have more stringent requirements than the standard ISO 9000.

     Shanghai Automobile Gearworks has been a supplier of Germany's Volkswagen and has exported 45,000 gearboxes. It was given the ISO 9000 and QS 9000 certification a few years ago.

Xinhua News Agency

    Tourists now have a new way to see the Chinese capital -- by boat.

     The first boat tour started on Wednesday on a major canal that runs through the downtown area. Beijing has 336 km. of rivers and canals. In ancient times, grain, foodstuff, and commodities from the south were transported to the capital on them.

     However, in this century, most of them have silted up or have had their water polluted and navigation has come to a halt.

     The Beijing government has spent a billion yuan and used 10,000 workers to dredge them since 1998 and sources say that all of them will be open to navigation in two years and they will be used for various forms of entertainment.

Xinhua News Agency

    The Ministry of Construction has issued new regulations governing secondary housing market clarifying housing property rights of owners of public and government-subsidized housing.

     As a part of the ministry's housing reform program, the new regulations will enable state officials and employees to go to the secondary housing market if they want to sell their home or exchange them for more spacious ones.

     They have gained housing property rights "upon buying public housing at cost price," the ministry officials were quoted by today's China Daily as saying.

     However, home sellers must have housing property right certificates before they can sell their homes on the secondary market.

     For decades, China operated a welfare housing system under which the government allocated houses as welfare to State officials and employees. Residents had no housing property rights to such welfare houses, which were owned by their work units.

     Ministry officials said that the new policies will go a long way towards creating an active housing market, stimulating housing purchases and eventually boosting growth in gross domestic product.

     Xie Jiajin, director of the ministry's Department of Housing and Real Estate Industry, was quoted by the English newspaper as saying that China will continue to look to the housing sector as a new economic growth engine by speeding up housing reform and encouraging more people to purchase housing this year.

     Last year, the housing sector contributed about one percent out of the 7.8 percent GDP growth.

     "By clarifying the housing property issue, we are building up confidence among more and more people that the government is trying its best to shape a healthy and active secondary housing market," Xie said.

     An active market also generates tens of thousands of job opportunities and gives a boost to the consumption of furniture, decorations and construction, she added.

Xinhua News Agency

    China's drug administration plans to impose tight control over production and the use of a medicinal material which can be processed into the drug "ice", according to today's China Daily.

     The State Drug Administration (SDA) has drawn up a regulation to restrict the supply and use of ephedrine, asking that ephedrine and its products may only be produced by SDA-designated enterprises.

     The report described the action as "part of the global drive to control the abuse of narcotics", and anti-narcotics specialists from many countries have predicted that the abuse of such substances as deoxyephedrine will gradually replace heroin and be used widely in the next century.

     China is one of the world's biggest producers of ephedrine, which is often clinically used in the country to treat illnesses like the common cold.

     However, several drug trafficking cases have been disclosed in which ephedrine was abstracted to be processed into drugs.

     The SDA regulations ordered designated enterprises not to increase production, transfer their technology or establish branches in other places without permission from the SDA.

     Ephedrine products can only be marketed in state-designated commercial units. Researchers, hospitals and pharmaceutical plants must apply for permission before they are allowed to purchase such products from designated suppliers, according to the regulations.

China Daily
Author:  Wang Rong

    GUANGZHOU _ Police in South China's Guangdong Province said yesterday they have cracked down on the country's largest "ice"-making operation in Huizhou in Guangdong this month.

    Police confiscated 1,584 kilograms of methyl amphetamine, also known as the drug ice. The amount was nearly the same as the total seized in China last year.

    Twelve suspects were arrested for their involvement in the illegal manufacturing of ice, including five residents from Huizhou and seven from Sichuan Province.

    Also seized were lots of raw material, manufacturing equipment, transportation and telecommunication tools.

    "This battle proves China's determination and its strengthening ability to fight drug crime, especially the production and marketing of narcotics," said Yang Fusheng, general director of Huizhou Public Security Bureau.

    After nearly a year's investigation, he said, police finally closed in on July 4 when officers arrested all 12 suspects within 30 minutes.

    According to suspects, they were asked this April by a man, who claimed to be a Hong Kong resident, to produce the drug. After purchasing the raw materials, they processed it primarily at one site and then created the finished product at another production site.

    "All the ice they produced was seized, with zero flowing into the market," Yang said.

    The Anti-Drug Bureau under the Ministry of Public Security sent a congratulatory telegram on Tuesday to praise Guangdong for its achievements in cracking down on drug criminals.

    An official from Guangdong Public Security Bureau pointed out that the key to stopping ice production is to tighten up management of ephedrine _ a medicinal material that can be processed into "ice."

    

    

China Daily
Author:  Jiang Jingen

    CHINA is taking a series of essential measures aimed at easing the glut in vacant properties, according to sources from the Ministry of Construction.

    A report released by the ministry early this week indicated that there were more than 80 million square metres of vacant housing nationwide at the end of last year, half of which had remained empty for at least one year.

    Shanghai Municipality and Guangdong, Jiangsu, Hainan, Zhejiang and Liaoning provinces each had at least 4 million square metres of vacant housing, accounting for about 60 per cent of the total.

    The report said the central government is very concerned that this empty housing has tied up large quantities of bank funds, restricted economic development and affected the normal operation of banks.

    In Hainan alone, about 5.9 million square metres of completed property remain empty. This property had absorbed more than 47 billion yuan (US$5.6 billion) of investment by the end of last year.

    The central government has ordered governments at various levels to map out "effective ways" to fill the vacant property and free up the bank loans, ministry officials said.

    Major measures include proposals that governments lowertaxes or miscellaneous fees for housing programmes, while banks reduce bank interest for real estate developers, who in turn, should reduce their profits to promote the occupation of completed properties.

    Localities with large amounts of empty property should put strict controls on approving land use to avoid the appearance of more vacant property.

    Meanwhile, the government intends to adopt preferential policies such as exemption from some taxes, fees or bank interest to encourage real estate developers to turn vacant commercial housing into affordable or low-rent housing. Medium- and low-income families would thus be able to purchase their own homes.

    The ministry, together with the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Land and Resources and the People's Bank of China, are supervising and monitoring occupancy of vacant property in regions with a large amount of empty housing, according to the report.

    The government has launched a nationwide investigation as to the extent bank loans and other funds have been siphoned off by the vacant property market, it said.

    Ministry sources said that, though the exact amount of money involved is unknown, hundreds of billions of yuan are tied up in empty properties.

    

    

Dalian Daily

    Sponsored by the News Information Center of Xinhua News Agency and undertaken by Xinhua News Agency Dalian Branch, a special information line in Japanese, the first of its kind in China, was formally put through yesterday here in Dalian.

    The information line will spread information in Japanese through Xinhua News Agency Online to the whole world. The line is an aggregate of information on state policies in macro respect, practical information in micro respect and information on various trades, besides, it will supply certain information at the request of customers.

    It is introduced that the opening of the information line will play a very active role in helping Japanese enterprises and organizations to know more about China¡¯s economic situation and to facilitate their investment in and cooperation with China.

    Wang Huiquan, director of the city¡¯s publicity department expressed his congratulations on the opening of the line on behalf of Dalian municipal government. He said the opening of the line in Dalian will surely stimulate the economic development of Dalian.

    Dalian has exchanges with Japan in extensive fields, there are a lot of Japanese enterprises and financial organs in Dalian. He hoped the opening of the information line will further advance the economic and cultural exchanges between Dalian and Japan.

    

    

Dalian Daily

    Approved by the Ministry of Communications, the third far ocean sea route of Dalian port, Dalian-Middle East sea route was formally opened on July 26.

    The route is jointly run by a Taiwan and a Hong Kong shipping company.

    A celebrating gathering marking the maiden trip on the route was held yesterday evening at Dalian Shangri-la Hotel.

    Dalian-Middle East sea route chains a dozen of ports including Dalian, Tianjin, Qingdao, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Singapore, with one sail a week.

    The route will play a very important role in advancing trade between Northeastern China and Middle East, Southern Asia and Southeastern Asia Area and in facilitating transshipment between Dalian port and ports around Bohai-rim.