So I’ve decided to move on to another blog, with much more content, pictures, music, videos… Waaaay more fun in short !

It’s called {guerilaz}, check it out now by clicking on the screen capture below!

You might want to check the archive page instead.

]]> http://www.risk-strategies.org/business/back-to-life/feed/ 0 http://www.risk-strategies.org/censorship/blocked-in-china/ http://www.risk-strategies.org/censorship/blocked-in-china/#comments Wed, 03 Jun 2009 04:23:29 +0000 Olivier Falcoz http://www.risk-strategies.org/?p=468 As widely reported since a few days, Youtube, Blogspot, Tumblr, Livejournal, Xanga, WordPress, Friendfeed, Flickr, Microsoft’s Live.com, the new MS Bing.com and Twitter too, of course are blocked in China.

But you can still update Twitter, Facebook, Friendfeed and many other social networks at once with http://ping.fm (works from mobile too). It doesn’t mean you’ll have access to blocked sites from China but at least you can keep your lucky followers – who are out of China – updated with your stream.

Hope this helps… ;)

Valerie Niquet is Senior Research Fellow at The French Institute of International Relations (IFRI), Sinologist and Japanologist, Doctor in political science and writes about the evolution of regional balances and strategic issues in Asia since the end of the Cold War. Funded in in 1979 by Thierry de Montbrial, IFRI is France’s leading independent international relations center, dedicated to policy-oriented research and analysis of global political affairs.

This is how she describes her work:

Thirty years after the start of the policy of reform and opening up launched by Deng Xiaoping in 1978, the political system and Chinese society are considerably more open. However, there still are many gray areas, one of which is the question of decision-making: the way the decision-making process is concretely implemented remains opaque. Between statements of principle and apparent inconsistencies, an analysis of the decision-making process helps to shed light on the conflicts within the political apparatus, the debates on the evolution of the regime, the interests at work, and the power games that take place.

This is a very interesting piece of work if you are interested in how complex and opaque the decision-making process at the top political level in the Middle Kingdom is. Above all, she deserves all the credit for bringing to the mass – me (sic)- in less than 30 pages:

- The management of the Olympic Games

- How China is handling the international financial crisis and social challenges

- Environmental issues and the promotion of the “China” brand

- Last but not least, corruption and the power of influence networks

p/s. All the credit goes to Arnaud de la Grange who first spotted this article. You can download it here (PDF-122Kb).

Subject: Soya milk as substitute for milk and yogurt

Dear Parents,

It has always been our concern to look into our students’ health. We try our best to give them healthy and nutritious food/snacks to sustain all the nutrients that their growing body needs. In this regard we have decided to provide soya milk and fruits everyday instead of milk and yogurt. The reason is because of the continuous milk scare that goes around, being on the safe side, we will serve soya milk which is equally nutritious and healthy for the children.

I am very grateful to the school team for being such cautious but I can’t prevent myself from raising a couple of questions:

1. The word melamine is carefully not mentioned
2. Either these guys don’t read the news – everything’s possible in China… – and just discovered 6 months later the Sanlu affair, then just realized that feeding kinds with melamine was far from clever
3. Or they are very well informed and there is another scandal underway we are not aware of.

But the real question is then: What do I put in my morning flakes? Beer? Anyone has ever tried?

Britain-based Global Witness said that rights to exploit the resources have been allocated behind closed doors by a small number of power brokers around Prime Minister Hun Sen and other senior officials.

Over the past few years, Cambodia has been buzzing with excitement — and anxiety — about an oil discovery by U.S. energy giant Chevron Corp. off the southwestern coast. There have also been discoveries of other minerals including bauxite, iron ore, copper and chromium, while onshore oil reserves are also being explored.

Some estimate that in coming years Cambodia may reap some $1 billion in annual oil revenues, enough to cut its ties to foreign development aid if the funds are properly utilized.

More than 75 companies, including such internationals as Chevron Corp. and BHP Billiton, were already working in the mining and oil sectors and have paid upfront sums to the government, the report said.

“Companies need to come clean on what they have paid to the government to secure access to these natural resources, or risk becoming complicit in a corrupt system,” the report said.

Of the mine sites investigated in 2008, Global Witness said every one was controlled or owned by members of Cambodia’s political and military elite, including top military commanders and relatives of Hun Sen and cabinet ministers.

The full report is available for download here [PDF - 4.5 MB]

Johan gave an interview last week to Le Monde [in French] where he gets back to what happened.

Read the full article here or download it from there: Johan-Freckhaus-Otage-Des-Talibans [PDF]

Arnaud de La Grange from Le Figaro asks whether this is going to turn into the “New President Security Services’ Nightmare“, Aujourd’hui La Chine collects Chinese reactions in Beijing here and ChinaSmack has translated an impressive list of Chinese reactions there.

BTW, you noticed Wen is speaking in Chinese… at Cambridge !

It started all here on Dec. 26th by ChinaSmack, when Chinese Netizens noticed in pictures the Commissioner of the Nanjing Housing Administration Bureau was smoking very expensive cigarettes and wearing an expensive watch that a government official should not be able to afford [Read: on his salary]. ChinaSmack has translated in his post the numerous comments originally from Tanya. [Update: this link has been "harmonized"]

Yesterday, The Strait Times revealed this Government Official had been dismissed and that authorities in Jiangsu province where Internet users exposed an allegedly corrupt official’s taste for luxury have made posting information about private life illegal.

The ruling Communist Party’s parliament in eastern Jiangsu province approved a law making it illegal for people in the city of Xuzhou to publish ‘private information’ on the Internet, the China Daily reported.

But now, anyone in Xuzhou who posts ‘private information’ online will be fined up to 5,000 yuan and could be barred from using the Internet for six months.

Today the news has been reported by Shanghaiist and China Digital Times [Proxy required] as well.

Take a deep breath, here is some fresh air.

“This is spine-tingling and hair-raising stuff” says Shanghaiist.

Global Voices Online has sum up some Chinese comments as well.

I don’t remember having sung such song at school, seems that some Chinese pupils do. Here is an excerpt of the transliteration from the China Digital Times:

Lead: Earthquakes, shifting back and forth like the positions of Sarkozy, with his dirty tricks, trying to shake the great China

Lead: Did China retreat?

All: No. The Shenzhou-7 launched. We are victorious!

Lead: Pathetic Europe will never stop the insurmountable force of our great dynasty

All: Just the aftershocks from the earthquake would destroy France!

Watch the video. I am sure Sarkozy will love it !