china confidential
Monday, April 27, 2009
China Fears Mexican Swine Flu Could Mutate
While the United States moves painfully slowly to stop the spread of Mexican swine flu--out of fear of offending a failing neighboring state's corrupt and inefficient government--China is moving swiftly and decisively to combat the deadly disease.
China has warned its citizens visiting or already in Mexico to take precautions.
Beijing has also banned all direct or indirect imports of swine or pork products from Mexico and from Texas, California and Kansas, the country’s General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said.
Chinese officials fear that the swine flu virus that has killed dozens in Mexico could mutate into a "more dangerous" strain, as a senior World Health Organization official said on Sunday. The WHO official said the United Nations agency will decide on Tuesday if it should raise its alert rating.
"Yes, it's quite possible for this virus to evolve," Keiji Fukuda, acting WHO assistant-general for health, security and the environment told journalists.
"When viruses evolve, clearly they can become more dangerous to people," he said.
China and other Asian countries are ahead of the United States in dealing with the outbreak, which is on the verge of becoming a pandemic.
Airports in South Korea, Singapore, Thailand, Japan, Indonesia, and the Philippines have installed special thermal scanners. The devices, which the U.S. does not have, were last used in the SARS scare.
The Philippines has also temporarily banned pork from the U.S. and Mexico. Russia, China, and Thailand also banned pork imports from Mexico and parts of the U.S. But the BBC reported that a World Health Organization (WHO) official said “there was no evidence to link exposure to pork with infection."
Japanese scientists are also racing to find a vaccine.
In contrast with the rest of the world, the U.S. is moving incrementally. Under pressure, it finally advised against "nonessential" travel to Mexico; but the border remains wide open.Exxon Looks at China's Energy Future
Today the United States has the world’s highest power generation fuel demand, followed closely by China. But by 2030, China’s economic and population growth will drive power generation demand up by more than 100 percent, to almost 28 MBDOE, 40 percent higher than the U.S.’s projected usage of approximately 20 MBDOE. Like that in the U.S., demand in the European Union will grow slowly, up about 10 percent to 16 MBDOE.
By 2030, we expect overall power generation demand in China to more than double, despite efficiency gains. Although coal loses share in China over the outlook period, it will still grow rapidly at 2.3 percent per year, reaching more than 20 MBDOE.
By 2030, coal will still dominate Chinese power generation and account for almost 75 percent. Considering the vast coal resources that give China security of supply – and assuming no significant direct cost of carbon or tax on greenhouse-gas emissions – it is likely that China will continue to favor coal as a fuel source for power generation for the foreseeable future.
Natural gas use also will grow rapidly and reach 4 percent of the market at 1.1 MBDOE, helping meet peak-demand requirements while also reducing environmental impacts in urban areas. Nuclear is expected to have continued strong growth, reaching a 13 percent share by 2030, up from 2 percent in 2005. Hydroelectric power is the most prominent renewable energy source for Chinese power generation, and it will continue to increase significantly.
Overall, China will account for more than one-third of the worldwide increase in power generation demand from 2005 to 2030. This rapid expansion contrasts dramatically with that of the U.S., where demand is expected to grow slowly. Although total U.S. power generation demand in 2030 will be higher (20.2 MBDOE vs. 18.6 MBDOE in 2005), it will have declined to approximately 16 percent of global power generation, down from 23 percent in 2005.
- ExxonMobilObama's Plane Panics Manhattan
Now, this calls for an apology.
AFP reports:New Yorkers evacuated offices in panic Monday when an unexpected overflight by one of President Barack Obama's Boeing 747s triggered fears of a new 9/11.
The jumbo, escorted by low-flying fighter jets, roared over southern Manhattan and the Hudson River for about 30 minutes on what officials later described as a photo op.
Office workers who failed to spot the presidential markings feared a repeat of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in which two hijacked airliners smashed into the World Trade Center, killing almost 3,000 people.
EDITOR'S NOTE: The above AP image was taken with a cellphone by Jason McLane.China Arms Imports Drop Amid Rising Concerns Beijing Building Up Domestic Weapons Industry
By Stephanie Ho
A newly released report says China has been importing a smaller volume of conventional arms in recent years. The trend comes as concerns grow that Beijing is working on further developing its own indigenous weapons industry and capabilities.
The information is included in a new Stockholm International Peace Research Institute report that looks at arms transfers around the world.
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute analyzed data over a five-year period, to give an average that it considers more reliable than only looking at an individual year.
In the findings for the most recent period, from 2004 to 2008, China remained the top global recipient of conventional weapons, with 11-percent of the world's total.
SIPRI researcher Paul Holtom says the high point for Chinese weapons deliveries was 2006.
Big Ticket Items
"That was when big ticket items such as combat aircraft, naval vessels, submarines, were being delivered and the last of the orders placed around the beginning of the millennium, 2001 to 2003," he said.
At the same time, Holtom points to what he describes as a "significant drop" in arms deliveries to China in 2007 and 2008.
He says one reason is that China has needed time to absorb the high volume of equipment it has already received from Russia, which he calls a near-monopoly supplier. He says another reason may be China's desire to rely more on making and developing its own arms and military technology.
China does not buy weapons from the United States and the European Union because of arms embargoes imposed following Beijing's bloody crackdown on protesters in Tiananmen Square in 1989.
Wariness in Russia
Holtom says China's efforts to develop its own weapons is causing wariness in Russia, which has so far been unwilling to sell China just a small number of combat aircraft that can be used on an aircraft carrier.
"Playing into that is concerns in Russia that when they deliver a small number of items, China is sort of reverse-engineering and seeking to use that as a means to develop its own copies," Holtom said.
Increasing sales of Chinese arms worldwide could be another reason Beijing is looking to build up its own weapons industry.
SIPRI's data from the 1980's showed China ranked as the fifth largest arms supplier in the world. Holtom says despite anticipation that China would emerge as a major global arms supplier, the country dropped to twelfth in the latest period.
"At present, what China is offering is not going to be attractive to most of the big buyers," he said. "If you look at its markets - and it's Bangladesh, they are other poorer nations in Asia or Africa."
Holtom says China's customers include oil-rich countries like Sudan and Burma, which are shunned by a large part of the international community. He also points to another highly-publicized case last year, in which Chinese arms and ammunition were headed for Zimbabwe, shortly after a disputed election there.
Tuesday, 28 April 2009
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