China

The vast majority of Chinese schoolchildren chose to stay home and surf the internet during the summer holidays rather than play outside, state media said on Tuesday. The poll of 103 children aged four to 14 found that just 4% chose to do outdoor activities during the holidays and only 9% took part in summer educational camps

China’s Premier Wen Jiabao on Monday expressed ”grave concern” over reports that Chinese army hackers had penetrated German government computers systems and he vowed to crack down on such activity. ”We in the government took [the reports] as a matter of grave concern,” Wen said after meeting visiting German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Polluters along two of China’s main rivers have defied a decade-old clean-up effort, leaving much of the water unfit to touch, let alone drink, and a risk to a sixth of the population, state media said on Monday. Half the check points along the Huai River and its tributaries in central and eastern China showed pollution of ”grade five” or worse — the top of the dial in key toxins.

There is ”no hope” of finding survivors from a flood in a Chinese coal mine, which has trapped 181 workers, a senior official said on Thursday, adding those responsible for the disaster will be handed over to the law. The miners have been trapped since last Friday, when a river dyke burst during torrential rain.

Desperate efforts to save 181 Chinese coal miners from two shafts flooded with water and mud faced near impossible odds on Wednesday, as a safety official said mine owners had failed to anticipate the threat of disaster. The miners have been trapped since Friday, when a river dyke burst in torrential rain, sending water surging into the shafts.

Typhoon Sepat swept China’s southern coast on Sunday, forcing almost a million people from their homes and spawning a tornado that smashed buildings and killed at least nine people. The tornado cut a corridor of destruction 800m wide, wrecked 156 houses and injured more than 60 residents in Zhejiang province.

More than 180 coal miners were trapped underground in eastern China on Saturday after heavy rain caused a river to flood and inundate two separate pits, the latest accident to hit the world’s deadliest mining industry. The official Xinhua news agency said 584 miners were rescued after Friday’s incident.

There might be millions of characters in the Chinese language, but English letters and even symbols are increasingly being used as names in China. In one of the strangest names, parents tried to call their son "@", while other people have used transliterated English names to make their own sound more Western, the <i>First</i> newspaper reported.

The death toll from the collapse of a bridge under construction in central China rose to 36 on Wednesday, with 23 others still missing, officials said. The 328m bridge over the Tuo River in Hunan province crumbled on Monday as workers were removing steel scaffolding erected during the building work, the State Administration of Work Safety said.

A road bridge under construction across a river in southern China collapsed, killing 22 people and injuring 22, state media reported on Tuesday, but witnesses expected the death toll to rise substantially. At least 39 people were missing after the 320m concrete arc bridge spanning the Tuo river in Fenghuang county, Hunan province, collapsed on Monday during the evening rush hour.

At least 35 people were killed after violent rainstorms triggered floods and landslides in various parts of China, state media reported on Saturday. At least 25 people were killed and 37 went missing in north-west China after continuous downpours began to hit cities and counties in Shaanxi province on Tuesday, Xinhua news agency reported.

Chinese police have arrested hundreds of people in western China after residents there called for the return of exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, reports Friday. Soldiers and police were dispatched to Lithang after locals gathered on Wednesday to celebrate a traditional horse festival.

All 69 Chinese coal miners trapped underground by flood waters for more than three days emerged in broad daylight blindfolded, soaked but safe on Wednesday, state media said. The miners had been trapped in the Zhijian colliery in Shan county since Sunday morning when a flash flood surged through an old shaft.

More than 1,2-million people in the central Chinese province of Hunan are facing a ”water crisis” after four weeks of drought and high temperatures, which are also straining power-generating capacity, state media said on Tuesday. Hunan has received 25% less rain than normal and about half of its two million water-storage facilities are half-empty.

A correspondent for China’s international radio station who has not been seen since apparently abandoning his post in Zimbabwe was officially warned on Thursday to return to work. China Radio International posted a notice in the <i>China Daily</i> newspaper saying that Cheng Qinghua "left his post without authorisation" on April 20.

Hundreds of sections of embankments along China’s third-longest river have become loose, threatening the homes of millions of people after three weeks of floods across the country. Rain has wrought havoc across large parts of China this summer, killing more than 500 people and causing billions of dollars in damage.

More than 100 people have died in floods and landslides in China where dykes protecting a swollen river in the east, which has already prompted tens of thousands to flee their homes, are in danger of being breached. Severe flooding has hit about half of China since the start of the summer, killing hundreds in what has become the deadliest rainy season in years.