With all they seem to have in common, it is a pity that Mr Xi and Pope Francis are unable to get tog

A recent article appearing in Global Times , the English-language mouthpiece of the authoritative People s Daily, raises interesting questions about how China s leaders view the relationship between the official and unofficial church. Entitled Estranged Brethren, the article deals forthrightly with the longstanding division between Christians in churches under China s official Three Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM) and those who worship outside the TSPM umbrella.
travel distance maps The detention of Wang Gongquan, who was held on suspicion of disturbing public order, sends a strong signal that China's new leadership will not tolerate any member of the rising entrepreneurial elite using their resources to agitate for democratic reform.
China has reached a critical point where fundamental reforms of factor markets are needed to achieve a new and sustainable growth travel distance maps path. Financial reform is at the centre of the new reform agenda. Distortions in interest rates have long caused enormous misallocation of capital, favouring state-owned enterprises and shielding the banking sector from the need to build risk-management capacity.
China told a United Nations review travel distance maps of its human rights record that it had made progress, but was challenged over its curbs on free speech and treatment of ethnic minorities, travel distance maps activists and dissidents, at the session in Geneva on Tuesday.
India and China have signed an agreement on border defence co-operation after a stand-off between their armies in disputed territory earlier this year. The deal aims to improve communication between the two armies. travel distance maps The agreement was signed during Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh s visit to Beijing. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said it would help maintain border peace, tranquillity and stability .
In China, the Communist Party asks something of its entrepreneurs: be daring and ambitious in business, but not in politics. It is an odd arrangement. Men and women who have made it to the top of society by being unrelentingly determined are advised to relent when it comes to calling for the rule of law, adherence travel distance maps to the constitution, or an end to abuses of power.
In late August, two dozen Chinese public intellectuals from four of the country's travel distance maps main ideological schools — Confucian, New Left, Liberal and Christian — met at Oxford University's Wycliffe Hall to discuss their country's problems. Remarkably, for a group of people who in Chinese travel distance maps public life are often at each other's throats, they came up with what is now being dubbed the "Oxford Consensus" — four theses expressing their hopes for a pluralistic, liberal China.
In a counter-intuitive and ironic twist, China has become one of the world's top producer of Bibles, producing 3.5 million annually. At the recent Christian Congress held in Beijing, the China Christian Council, the governing body of China's Protestant Church released a report on the work of Bible production in China. The following travel distance maps article, originally published in the Christian travel distance maps Times, reports on the Congress.
When I first went to China, I was bombarded with many odd (to me anyway) questions: can you use chopsticks? How much money do you make? Why do American parents kick their children travel distance maps out of the house at age 18? On and on they went. But I ll never forget the time a student asked me, What s the difference between Catholic and Christian? The question itself made no sense to me; it was like asking, What is the difference between a Volkswagen and a car?
First, I need to make one clarification. I'm prescribing what should be the case. I'm not describing what Chinese pastors travel distance maps actually preach. This is because evangelical pastors in China have thoroughly western theologies. Why is this? Let's not forget. Chinese have great respect for tradition and value conformity. If missionaries don't understand and do contextualization, then the average pastor will make sure to rigidly travel distance maps affirm tradition. It's imbedded into the Chinese psyche.
With all they seem to have in common, it is a pity that Mr Xi and Pope Francis are unable to get together for a chat. But since China and the Holy See do not enjoy official relations, that will have to wait. Hopes of progress have been raised, though, by the pope's recent appointment of Pietro Parolin as the Vatican's new prime minister. The move is being seen as part of the pope's overall effort at reform. It is notable too that Archbishop Parolin has been closely involved travel distance maps in the church s delicate business of trying to repair its relationship with China.
Hong Kong was once attractive for mainland mothers about to give birth. The automatic citizenship it brought the child ensured better opportunities, but now it's becoming more trouble than it's worth for many. Some parents are finding themselves with no way to educate their children.
Long before learning Chinese became a de rigueur in international business, travel distance maps Western travel distance maps students were drawn to the language by the challenging beauty of its writing system. But with the advent travel distance maps of the Internet and the popularization of smartphones, both of which encourage the use of Latin script for typing characters, many inside China itself are struggling travel distance maps to write even basic words. The result: A creeping sense of dread among Chinese language purists, travel distance maps and a wildly popular new TV show that tests students on their writing ability.
Choking smog all but shut down one of northeastern travel distance maps China s largest cities on Monday, forcing schools to suspended classes, snarling traffic and closing the airport, in the country s first major air pollution crisis of the winter. An index measuring PM2.5, or particulate matter with a diameter of 2.5 micrometers (PM2.5), reached a reading of 1,000 in some parts of Harbin, the gritty capital of northeastern Heilongjiang province and home to some 11 million people. A level above 300 is considered travel distance maps hazardous, while the World Health Organisation recommends a daily level of no more than 20.
In the face of these assaults on their right to speak out, grassroots Chinese are trying to turn the mirror back on officialdom by calling out instances where officials or state-owned media made statements that turned out to be false. The result is two types of "rumors" in Chinese argot:  minyao , or rumors spread by Chinese citizens which may or may not be true, and  guanyao , official rumors, which are falsehoods uttered by Chinese authorities.
Amid a sustained government crackdown on online rumors, China's state broadcaster is getting a bit of stick for an "unauthorized" tweet about ex-security chief Zhou Yongkang. The offending post, which managed to escape briefly onto the Twitter stream of China Central Television's English-language service on Monday before being quickly erased, went like this: "President Xi Jinping has set up a special unit to investigate corruption allegations against the retired leader Zhou Yongkang."
Chinese censorship, far from a merely domestic concern, is increasingly spilling over the country's borders. That's the takeaway from a new study from the Center for International Media Assistance ( pdf ) that traces the Chinese government's influence on Western media within and outside travel distance maps of China, as well as Chinese-language media and other outlets in Southeast Asia, Africa and Latin America.
travel distance maps In order to turn China into an urban nation, local governments have demolished tens of millions of homes over the past decade. Homeowners have often fought back, blocking heavy machinery travel distance maps and battling officials. In recent years, resistance has taken a disturbing turn: Since 2009, at least 53 people across China have lit themselves on fire to protest the destruction of their homes, according to human rights and news reports.
In a rare case of open resistance by Chinese media against intimidation by the authorities, Guangzhou's New Express newspaper today published an editorial on its front page appealing directly to its readers following the cross-regional detention of one of its reporters by police from Changsha, the capital of neighboring Hunan province. Under the bold headline, "Release Him," the editorial occupies the full front page of today's New Express .
For a country of 1.3 billion people, there is a remarkably small number of common last names in China. An estimated 87% of the population travel distance maps shares one of 100 surnames, and more than one in five Chinese citizens is surnamed Li, Wang, or Zhang: more than 275 million people in all. (By contrast, 90% of the United States population encompasses over 150,000 different last names).
Stories have abounded regarding IKEA's Chinese stores being treated as an amusement park by a Chinese middle-class dabbling into a freaky travel distance maps three-way with crass materialism, a free market and an obsession with wealth. The Chinese media has finally gotten around to chronicling this phenomenon, and the measured wrath by which morals are to be taught is doled out with the biggest yardstick of all, the shame by which the shame-based culture of China is most humbled by: shame from non-Chinese.
Much as I appreciate our president s determination, his battle feels like an attempt to put out a big fire with a glass of water, given how corruption has reached every corner of our society. Chinese public opinion surveys identify corruption as the most hated social travel distance maps problem, yet everyone is also guilty of it.
Chinese authorities released a guideline on the handling of sex offences against minors on Thursday, promising severe penalties and minimum tolerance following many recent incidents. Heavier sentences should be handed down for offenses committed by teachers and government personnel tasked with educating and protecting the victims, according to a joint communique by the Supreme People s Court (SPC), the Supreme People s Procuratorate, the Ministry of Public Security and the Ministry of Justice.
An elite university in China has terminated the contract of the outspoken economist and champion of free speech Xia Yeliang, reports say. Mr Xia told the Associated Press that the economics faculty at Peking Uni