Author: joyce

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China

In Shift, Chinese Are Spending More Money Overseas

All over the world, Chinese companies are sending home fewer of the billions of dollars they earn from exports, parking them in overseas bank and brokerage accounts instead reports the New York Times. And in Hong Kong, wealthy mainlanders are turning up at jewelry stores in growing numbers seeking diamonds, big ones.

Total outflows in the fourth quarter were as much as $240 billion, but this is using the broadest possible definition and includes everything from capital flight to a slowdown in repatriation of overseas profits by Chinese companies. There is no good data assessing the motives of those moving money out of China.

Most troubling for China would be if a sizable portion of these disparate streams represented capital flight — people taking their money out because they worry about the stability of the country.

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Cambodia & Laos Culture & History

Efforts to Limit Khmer Rouge Trials Decried

The Cambodian government, critics say, is trying to limit the scope of the trials for its own political reasons, a limit that the critics say would compromise justice and could discredit the entire process.

A Cambodian prosecutor said additional indictments could be destabilizing. She said they would cost too much, take too long and violate the spirit of the tribunal, which she said envisioned “only a small number of trials.”

The Cambodian Prime Minister who bargained hard with the United Nations over the shape and scope of the tribunal, has said that trying “four or five people” would be enough, although there is no formal limit on the number.

Categories
Culture & History North Korea

Pyongyang scraps all agreements with Seoul

“First, all the agreed points concerning the issue of putting an end to the political and military confrontation between the DPRK and the ROK will be nullified,” said a statement issued by the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea, the Pyongyang organization in charge of ties with Seoul.

“Second, the Agreement on Reconciliation, Non-aggression, Cooperation and Exchange between the DPRK and the ROK and the points on the military boundary line in the West Sea stipulated in its appendix will be nullified.”

“There is neither a way to improve (relations) nor hope to bring them back on track,” DPRK’s KCNA news agency. “The confrontation between the DPRK and the ROK in the political and military fields has been put to such extremes that the inter-Korean relations have reached the brink of a war.”quoted the committee as having said.

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Cambodia & Laos

Laos set to build new airport and Mekong bridge

The Lao government has planned to build a new airport and a Mekong River bridge in Khong district, Champassack province, local media reported.

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China

China tourism revenue hits $170 bln in 2008

The revenue includes RMB874.9 billion earned from local travelers and RMB283.9 billion from overseas tourists. The data showed that domestic tourism still held up while inbound tourism declined as the global economic slowdown cut travel demand reports Xinhua.

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China Russia

Trade between NE China, Russia exceeds US$11 bln in 2008

Northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province, which borders Russia, saw 11.06 billion U.S. dollars in foreign trade with its northern neighbor in 2008, representing a growth of 3.1 percent year-on-year, according to the provincial commerce department.

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Uncategorized

No Signs of Eased Control in North Korea

Don Oberdorfer, a leading expert on North and South Korea in an interview with nytimes, says there are no clear signs that North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il is too ill to run the country.

“We would know if he were in such a state that he could not function and he couldn’t give any instructions,” Oberdorfer said. “Things like that trickle out of the North. That’s not been the case.” He said he believes the Obama administration will step up diplomacy on North Korea but doubts there will be major initiatives in the short term.

“The administration has got lots of things on its plate” and this “is not an issue where you can get any early returns. I remain skeptical it’s going to be a major item.”

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Central Asia Russia

Russia, Uzbekistan to Expanding Central Asia Central Asia Gas Corridor

Agreements on expanding gas cooperation have been reached at Russian-Uzbek talks in Tashkent.”We agreed that we will do a technical feasibility study of creating a new gas transportation system with Russia in addition to the existing Central Asia-Center gas transportation corridor,” head of Gazprom, Alexei Miller told media.

Categories
Culture & History Vietnam

Vietnamese media awards outrage Catholic activists

Lay Catholic activists in Hanoi are expressing outrage that the government has honored two media outlets for their coverage of property disputes with the Church. The awards to the New Hanoi newspaper and VTV1 television station came after the two outlets flagrantly distorted their coverage of the December trial of several Catholic activists on charges of destroying state property.

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China Uncategorized

Stock market cooperation hint at HK’s growing strategic importance

The relationship between the Hong Kong and mainland stock markets is warming up after more than two years of frigid relations. More importantly, behind the warming ties is perhaps the elevation of the status of the Hong Kong stock market in the eyes of Beijing from the political to the strategic.