News & Reports 2011-07-30

 Hello and Welcome to News and Reports on China Radio International.

 
In This Edition
 
Death toll 1 from the bullet train crash in Zhejiang rises to 40; victims' families express disappointment at the government's handling of the tragedy.
 
Norwegian police say they will interrogate 2 the suspect of last week's twin attacks for the second time since he was arrested.
 
More than 75,000 people have been evacuated 3 before tropical storm Nock-Ten made landfall over Hainan.
 
Power shortages continue in China as temperatures go higher in the summer.
 
 
Hot Issue Reports
 
China train crash death toll rises to 40, with mourning for victims
The death toll from the high-speed train crash in east China's Zhejiang Province has risen to 40 after a critically injured passenger died in hospital.
The train crash happened near the city of Wenzhou six days ago, which has also injured almost 200 people.
 
Some relatives of the victims have gathered at the site of the accident to mourn their deceased loved ones.
 
The mourners placed flowers at the site and took turns kneeling and whispering messages to the deceased.
 
Meanwhile, some people have gathered at a local morgue for cremation 4 rites 5 to pay the last respects to their loved ones.
 
Forty-three year-old Zhang Mei-lan, who lost her niece, was at the morgue with the girl's family for her last rites.
 
Zhang says they are disappointed at the government's handling of the accident.
 
"The main thing for us is the response from the railway department and how they will help the families of the victims deal with this problem. The district office told us that if we do not sign on the compensation agreement, they are going to leave. They said if we want to wait, we can wait but they would not care about us. What kind of reasoning is this?"
 
The government has just decided 7 to almost double the amount of compensation to 915,000 yuan per death.
 
The Ministry 8 of Railways will provide the compensation.
 
Officials handling the aftermath of the accident say the raise of the compensation amount is intended to stick to the principle of "putting people first."
 
But the families of the victims have repeatedly urged the government to release more information about the cause of the accident and the rescue efforts that followed it.
 
Chinese Premier 9 Wen Jiabao has promised a thorough and transparent 10 investigation 11 into the accident during a visit to the train crash site.
 
Norway police to question gunman for the second time
Norwegian police say they will interrogate the suspect of last week's twin attacks for the second time since he was arrested.
 
Police Lawyer Paal-Frederik Hjort Kraby says the second round of investigation focuses on two things.
 
"Our two priorities are to find out are there any more danger and did he cooperate with anyone. That's our main questions."
 
Thirty-two year old Anders Behring Breivik is charged with killing 12 a total of 76 people in a bomb attack in Oslo and a subsequent shooting rampage on the Utoeya Island.
 
Meanwhile, Norwegians are slowly coming to terms with the attacks, reflecting on what they might mean for the future.
 
Oslo resident Alex Soloie says he thinks there will be changes.
 
"I think they will tear down the building, and they have constituted this commission for the 22nd of July commission, so they will make some changes for the police authorities, their procedures. I think everybody is going to think twice before they send their kids off on summer camp again."
 
For more on the aftermath of Norway's twin attacks, Liu Yan earlier talked with Chen Xuefei, our north Europe correspondent.
 
More than 75,000 people evacuated before Nock-Ten made landfall
More than 75,000 people were evacuated before tropical storm Nock-Ten made landfall over the southern island province of Hainan late Friday afternoon.
 
Nock-Ten was recorded as packing winds of up to 28 meters per second when landing at Longlou Township in the city of Wenchang at 5:40 p.m.
 
173 flights were canceled.
 
Zhu Yong is a CRI reporter who is stationed in Hainan.
 
"The downpours have stopped all shipping 13 services across the Qiongzhou Strait, which separates Guangdong Province from the island, as well as stopping some of the railway services. The Haikou maritime 14 affairs office has already sent warning messages to all shipping and harbor companies to return all of their boats and staff to port and to stay alert due to Nock-ten. Some areas have also halted tourism activities. Ten districts in Hainan have issued yellow alerts for the tropical storm."
 
Nock-Ten, the eighth storm and the most powerful one to hit China so far this year, is moving northwest at 15 to 20 kilometers an hour and is forecast to enter Beibu Bay Saturday morning. At least 31 people in the Philippines died as a result of the storm.
 
Fujian travelers visit small Taiwan islands alone
Residents of China's Fujian Province started visiting the islands of Kinmen, Matsu and Penghu near Taiwan as individual tourists starting Friday.
 
Ceremonies to mark the start of the tours were carried out in Fuzhou, Quanzhou, and Xiamen simultaneously 15 this morning. Later, 385 tourists began their individual trips by ship, marking the successful efforts to boost tourism exchanges between the mainland and Taiwan.
 
Traveling by "Jinlong" ship, tourists said it's the first time they have been able to travel to Matsu, adding that they plan to make the most of their opportunity and take a good look at the scenery the island has to offer.
 
"We are excited to be part of the first independent tour group to visit Taiwan. It's a precious opportunity."
 
Local resident of Matsu, Ye Yan-gong was returning home on the same ship. He said excitedly that local residents will welcome visitors from Fujian during their tour of Taiwan.
 
"The open policy will benefit both cultural and academic exchanges and will close the Cross-Strait relationship."
 
Guo Heng-ming, director of the Fujian Tourism Bureau, says Fujian residents being able to visit the islands near Taiwan as individual tourists lays a good foundation for the construction of a Taiwan Straits traveling circle.
 
"Cooperation with the three outlying islets of Taiwan, as well as with Taiwan's main island, has real significance for promoting understand between the two sides".
 
Power supply is stable
Power shortages continue in China as temperatures go higher in the summer. To deal with the situation, the government has coordinated 16 sources across the country to balance supply and demand. He Fei has more.
 
The National Development and Reform Commission says to ensure the power supply this summer, the country has increased the supply of coal for power generating and encouraged the country to produce more hydropower.
 
Jia Fusheng is with the NDRC.
 
"All major coal producing provinces and related state-owned enterprises have increased the productions of power generating coal. Transportation departments list the coal transmission as their priority."
 
The national power capacity has reached 2,200 billion kilowatt-hours in the first half of the year, about 13 percent of increase compared to the same period last year. The total electricity supply has also increased 12 percent.
 
Since June, increasing rainfall and adequate water supply in the eastern part of the country have brought new hopes. In June alone, the national hydropower capacity per day reached more than 2 billion kilowatt-hours, which is 30 percent more than the number in May. On top of that, the country has paid more attention on coordinating 17 power resources across the country.
 
Jia Fusheng again.
 
"As the central and eastern parts of the country are short of power supply, the NDRC and the National Energy Administration have helped to expand the power delivery from southwestern Sichuan Province. In June, inter-district power transmission across the country was nearly 16 billion kilowatt-hours, 20 percent more than the same period last year."
 
Jia says the NDRC has also urged local governments to improve their regulations on proper power utilization 18. Power for living is the priority. High energy consumption and heavy pollutant 19 enterprises are still strictly 20 limited.
 
The NDRC has stated the country's power supply is generally stable and people's daily lives have been guaranteed.
 
For CRI, I'm He Fei.
 
Pork prices drop for first time in three months
The Ministry of Commerce says China's pork prices dropped by 0.2 percent for the week ending July 24, compared to figures from the previous week.
This represents the first time that the price of pork has dropped within the past 3 months.
 
High pork prices have become a major concern for the nation as the consumer price index, the main gauge 21 of inflation, rose to a three-year high of 6.4 percent last month, driven by surging food prices.
 
Data from the National Bureau of Statistics show pork prices in June surged 57.1 percent year-on-year.
 
For more insight into pork prices and China's CPI, Liu Yan earlier talked with Mark Hughes, executive business editor with China Daily.
 
Adoption 22
China has always been a popular destination for couples from other countries such as America and the UK seeking to adopt a baby abroad. Since 2000, US citizens have adopted more babies from China than from any other country.
 
"My name is A Mei, I was born in the year of rabbit. I love the Chinese language."
 
A Mei is a Chinese girl who was adopted by an American couple years ago. Recently, her adoptive parents brought her back to China for a tour. Her adoptive mother says she hopes A Mei can get a better understanding of Chinese culture during the trip.
 
"She is our Baobei (sweetheart), she is beautiful, we love her, and she is very bright, does well at school and sports and music. She is exceptional."
 
In recent years, China has been a popular destination for couples from other countries seeking to adopt a baby abroad. The Chinese government has been very serious about selecting families for these children and has implemented 23 strict measures to protect the children.
 
It was in 1992 that intercountry adoption was specified 24 for the first time in China's adoptive law. And in 1993, China joined the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption, which is an international convention dealing 25 with international adoption, child laundering 26, and child trafficking.
 
The China Center for adoption affairs, which was established in 1996, is a nonprofit organization committed to transcountry adoption and to seeking opportunities for orphans 27 to find placements with families. So far, it has established partnerships 28 with many adoptive organizations in 17 countries, including the US, the UK and Spain.
 
Zhang Shifeng, the director of the China Center for Children's Welfare and Adoption explains:
 
"The document provided by adoptive family includes many details. We see if the family is capable of adopting a child. This includes information on the couple's marital 29 status, their health status, their jobs and income, as well as if they have any criminal record. Measuring these aspects aims to ensure that the orphans from China will have a good family looking after them."
 
According to a report by the People's Daily online, it is becoming increasingly difficult for American couples to adopt a Chinese baby because the number of available children is diminishing despite soaring interest.
 
For CRI, I am Zhang Wan 6.
 
Films set for Venice Film Festival
Organizers of Venice Film Festival have announced the movies that are competing for the Golden Lion this year.
 
American filmmakers seem to dominate the lineup of the event, where George Clooney and four others will be competing for the Golden Lion, while Madonna, Al Pacino and Steven Soderbergh will premiere their latest directorial efforts.
 
According to the organizer, Clooney's political drama "The Ides of March" has been selected as the festival's opening night film.
 
Madonna's film about King Edward VIII's romance with American divorcee Wallis Simpson will have its world premiere at the festival.
 
Marco Mueller is the director of Venice film festival.
 
"Rock-stars also can become movie artists and can have the attitude and the intelligence that many important film-maker have. Madonna's movie, you will see it as you will watch it, distributed by Archibald, is not the movie you expect. It is a movie that begins from a very sad finding: Wally Simpson writes to a friend saying ' Mine became the love-story of the century, this means that I am sentenced to live the rest of my life until my death this and only this love-story. This does not seem to me an obvious approach, but I don't know what does it mean to have a rock-star's approach to a movie."
 
So far, 21 films for the competition have been announced with another one to be unveiled during the festival.
 
Meanwhile, three Chinese-language films have made it to the list, namely Hong Kong director Ann Hui's film "Tao Jie", "Seediq Bale" of Taiwan director Wei De Sheng and action star Jet Li's new film "The Sorcerer and the White Snake."
 
The 68th Venice Film Festival will be held from August 31 to September 10.
 
Newspaper Picks
 
Global Times: After a series of food safety scandals across the country, Beijing plans to build a computer tracking system to fully 30 guarantee food from source to consumer by 2015.
 
The new system will particularly emphasize the safety of domestic brands of baby milk powder.
 
However, many consumers believe it will take a lot longer to rebuild customer confidence than it will to construct the software system.
 
Trust in China's dairy industry is at an all time low, following massive failures in the supply chain.
 
After the melamine-contaminated "plastic milk" scandal in 2008, this February saw the "leather milk" episode, in which another additive 31, leather-hydrolyzed protein, was found.
 
A survey conducted by China Central Television in April showed that 70 percent of Beijing consumers will not buy domestic milk powder.
 
In a five-year action plan laid out and released by Beijing Food Safety Administration (BFSA) in a meeting Wednesday, the city will set up a rigorous food tracking and monitoring system to fully guarantee food safety.
 
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Shanghai Daily: A local scholar is looking for a car driver who threw litter at him and ignored his advice.
 
Wang Pinxian, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and a Tongji University professor, was leaving campus for home last Sunday when a man tossed some trash out of his car window in front of Wang.
 
Wang picked up the waste and asked the driver to take it back, but the driver turned a deaf ear to him.
 
Wang then moved to the front of his car to get his attention, but the driver backed his car and drove away.
 
Wang posted a letter on the campus website seeking clues to the driver. He said he would visit the driver and discuss with him about his behavior whether he is a Tongji member or not.
 
The university issued a "wanted notice" on the campus website to help Wang find the driver. The website editor said the letter is a good reminder 32 to students and faculties 33 about their public behavior.
 
City legislators are revising the public sanitation 34 administration law to include a specific punishment against people who throw trash out of a car window.
 
Fines could be several hundred yuan but the exact amount is still under discussion, according to the legislators.
 
Market Update
 
US stocks ended the worst week in a year Friday as time runs out on Washington to reach agreement before the government loses its ability to borrow money.
 
The Dow Jones industrial average was down 0.8 percent to 12,143. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index was down 0.7 percent to 1,292. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down 0.4 percent to 2,756.
 
European market also closed low. London's FTSE 100 dipped 1 perent to 5815, Frankfurt's DAX index lost 0.4 percent to 7159, and the CAC 40 in Paris went down 1 percent to 3671.