Asia

There has been a near unanimous global chorus of approval greeting Beijing’s announcement yesterday that it would resume talks with the Dalai Lama’s representatives. As I mention below, it’s definitely great news, given the alternative, which is more name-calling and stonewalling. But it’s hard to get any excitement up about prospects …

Xinhua story below. Seems like a pretty big breakthrough by Beijing to agree to talk again, even though that’s exactly what nearly everybody has been saying had to happen if there was to be any progress on the issue. We’ll see. There have after all been talks going on since 2002 with no result. More urgent now, obviously.

As has been …

In case anyone wants to see our latest take on what’s been happening in China, by the way, please see here.

Some interesting points from commenter Munir Ming:

Most Chinese, please note here I’m not saying all Chinese, want to hold a successful Olympics. They both personally and collectively think this is a huge opportunity to show the world that China has finally recovered from some two hundred years of national humiliation. You may

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Recently I spoke with Dai Qing, a Chinese writer and environmental activist, to get her thoughts on the current surge of nationalism in China. She said that it reminded her of 1966, the year that the Cultural Revolution started, which struck me as hyperbolic. Certainly there are parallels. Both are largely youth movements that emphasize …

Here’s a post from Vicky Y, who reproduces a ‘poem’ apparently written by Professor Emeritus of Physics University at Buffalo State University of New York, Duo-Liang Lin. (It has appeared around the web but I can find no trace of it on the Washington Post site, where it is alleged to have first been published) Regardless of its …

All the Chinese nationalists out there must just be pining for the day, absolutely aching with anticipation. Don’t worry. It’s coming soon. April 28, in fact. Yes, that is the day when the Holy Olympic Torch will arrive in….North Korea. No worries about protests there! China’s good friend Kim Jong Il and his vicious state …

Couldn’t resist posting this, a sign in the back of a taxi in Qingdao city in the coastal province of Shandong. It refers of course to the infamous sign that supposedly was posted during the 20s and 30s in a park in one of the foreign-administered areas of Shanghai that read: “No dogs or Chinese allowed” (狗與華人不得入內). As …

Rick Baum, a professor of political science at UCLA and one of America’s more knowledgeable China scholars, has apparently had enough of the preposterous US Presidential campaign—in this case, specifically, Hillary Clinton’s China fantasies. I hadn’t known Baum—who runs an informative on line forum for China hands called …

Wow, this film is everything that the Anna May Wong film (which I wrote about here) was not. San Francisco director Arthur Dong’s documentary Hollywood Chinese, which won the Golden Horse Award (the Chinese equivalent of the Oscars) in December, chronicles the contributions Chinese-Americans have …

Earlier this week the following message spread like wildfire via SMS in China. Some of China’s anger about the chaos the Torch relay is creating isn’t limited to the internet. It will be interesting to see how effective this boycott of Carrefour, the giant French retailer with mega stores all over China, will be.
Here is the SMS …

Just a friendly reminder to please keep comment within the bounds of civility. That means no swearing, racism, threats or threatening language. Obviously, we like to keep the debate as wide open as possible but there are limits, most of them plain common sense. Invective isn’t debate and insults don’t make arguments. These are heated …

Lawyers for jailed dissident Hu Jia (see many past references, most recently this on his sentence) went in on Monday to try and see their client and ask whether he wanted to appeal the three and a half year prison sentence he received April 2nd for inciting subversion of state power. But when they got there, the detention center told the …