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/ 24 February 2004
Two-thirds of the Great Wall of China has been destroyed by sightseers, developers and erosion, Beijing’s state-run media has reported in a warning that the world heritage site is crumbling out of existence. Survey teams are said to have found large new breaches in the ramparts, which are believed to have once stretched almost 6 400km.
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/ 13 February 2004
When finance ministers from the G7 rich nations dine in the Florida seaside resort of Boca Raton this week, the spectre at the feast will be China, whose turbo-charged trade and rigidly pegged currency are increasingly a topic of global significance. Stubborn Beijing could cave in to growing calls for a currency revaluation.
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/ 12 December 2003
Shanghai’s population has soared beyond the 20-million mark in the past year as more than three million new job seekers have flocked to the city in the vanguard of China’s spectacular economic surge.
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/ 8 December 2003
There is a capitalist pig in Ri Dok-sun’s garden. There are also two capitalist dogs and a brood of capitalist chicks. But even though Ri, a 72-year-old North Korean, lives in the world’s last Orwellian state, this is no animal farm. The beasts are the product of the growing free market pressure on a government that claims to be the world’s last truly socialist country — Korea.
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/ 5 September 2003
The United States was accused of seeking to ”smash the rice bowls of the workers”’ as Treasury Secretary John Snow flew into China this week with the issue of cheap exports top of his agenda.
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/ 3 September 2003
The affordable family saloon is replacing the tank and the rocket launcher in China’s new cultural revolution. Once considered a privilege only for senior government officials, now 60% of new cars are bought by individuals, observes Jonathan Watts in Beijing.
A senior Chinese minister warned recently that the world’s fastest growing economy is in danger of overheating as expansion outstrips power supplies, threatens production quality and raises the risk of oversupply.
”Never forget your original intention.” The four-character saying was inked with elegant brushstrokes, marked with the seal of a calligraphy master and set in a black lacquer frame. I picked it up on a rubbish dump during my first week in Japan.
Its economy is growing at a staggering rate and its people are beginning to enjoy a better diet. But the head of the UN’s environment programme has warned that China’s growth — and ambitious plans for the future — are unsustainable.
If David Beckham had peered down from the 38th-floor window of his swanky Tokyo hotel last week, he might have wondered why the vast green park opposite was flecked with blue tarpaulins.