Books
06.25.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/books/system/rowena-he-tiananmen-exiles.jpg?itok=vLDWoDGW)
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Tiananmen Exiles
In the spring of 1989, millions of citizens across China took to the streets in a nationwide uprising against government corruption and authoritarian rule. What began with widespread hope for political reform ended with the People's Liberation Army firing on unarmed citizens in the capital city of Beijing, and those leaders who survived the crackdown became wanted criminals overnight. Among the witnesses to this unprecedented popular movement was Rowena Xiaoqing He, who would later join former student leaders and other exiles in North America, where she has worked tirelessly for over a decade to keep the memory of the Tiananmen Movement alive. This moving oral history interweaves He's own experiences with the accounts of three student leaders exiled from China. Here, in their own words, they describe their childhoods during Mao's Cultural Revolution, their political activism, the bitter disappointments of 1989, and the profound contradictions and challenges they face as exiles. Variously labeled as heroes, victims, and traitors in the years after Tiananmen, these individuals tell difficult stories of thwarted ideals and disconnection that nonetheless embody the hope for a freer China and a more just world. —Palgrave Macmillan {chop}
Caixin Media
06.24.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/77320564.jpg?itok=5L3HAd-X)
Top Political Advisor Investigated for Graft
A vice chairman of the country's top political advisory body is being investigated for "serious violations of discipline," the Communist Party's anti-graft fighter says.The Central Discipline Inspection Commission (CDIC) did not...
Media
06.24.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/the_attorney_sm.png?itok=PRVnblEL)
The President China Never Had
An activist lawyer heroically risks everything for his beliefs. Although he fails, his brave stand against authoritarianism wins him lasting admiration and changes the fate of his East Asian nation forever. The plot may sound seditious in mainland...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.24.14Australia Says China Free Trade Deal Likely by End of Year
Reuters
China and Australia, which have been trying to set up a bilateral free trade agreement for years, are determined to sign a deal by the end of this year, Australia's trade chief said on Tuesday after talks with Chinese leaders.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.24.14China's Legendary ‘Crazy Yang’ Oil Trader Dies
Reuters
Legendary Chinese oil trader “Crazy Yang” Qinglong, who started China's oil business with Iran in the 1990s and was renowned as a hard-drinker who bear-hugged Iranian officials, has died, said company officials and former acquaintances.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.24.14Vietnam Vows Stand Against China as Sea Collisions Continue
Bloomberg
Vietnam accused Chinese ships of ramming one of its fishing boats yesterday, saying relations between the two countries have been “deeply damaged” by the their standoff over a disputed oil rig in the South China Sea.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.24.14China Confirms Deadly Xinjiang Attack, Shows Graphic Footage of October Violence
Globe and Mail
Chinese authorities have confirmed an attack on security personal at a checkpoint in the restive far western region of Xinjiang, which a U.S.-backed radio service said left five dead.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.23.14China’s Economic Power Buys British Silence on Human Rights
South China Morning Post
For Prime Minister David Cameron and the British government, Premier Li Keqiang’s recent visit could not have gone better. Diplomatic relations, which turned frosty following Cameron's meeting with the Dalai Lama in 2012, are back on track.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.23.14Bangladesh Woos China in Snub to West
Al Jazeera
India is likely to be watching closely as Sheikh Hasina bolsters ties with Beijing to repair dented legitimacy.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.23.14Bangladesh Woos China in Snub to West
Al Jazeera
India is likely to be watching closely as Sheikh Hasina bolsters ties with Beijing to repair dented legitimacy.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.23.14China Threat: Air-Sea Battle vs. Offshore Control?
Defense News
There are doubts in Washington that a US president would ever approve the bombing of China. This notion demonstrates that the Pentagon’s Air-Sea Battle operational concept is seriously flawed, said T.X. Hammes, a senior researcher at the department’...
Conversation
06.23.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/77074056.jpg?itok=YSP1EE5U)
The Debate Over Confucius Institutes
Last week, the American Association of University Professors joined a growing chorus of voices calling on North American universities to rethink their relationship with Confucius Institutes, the state-sponsored Chinese-language programs...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.23.1432 Terrorist Groups Smashed in Xinjiang, China Says
New York Times
Officials in the western Chinese region of Xinjiang said an antiterrorism crackdown that began in late May had resulted in the smashing of 32 terrorist groups and the sentencing of 315 people to prison.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.23.14China Charges Former Senior Official with Graft
Reuters
China formally charged Liu Tienan, former deputy head of its top planning agency with corruption, paving the way for his trial as the government pursues a high-profile campaign to root out graft.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.23.14Paramount Rushes for Beijing ‘Transformers’ Premiere Amid Dispute
Los Angeles Times
The studio was hit by claims of a product-placement deal gone sour.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.23.14Yang Lan, the ‘Oprah of China,’ Expands Her Reach
Time
Yang Lan is partnering with MAKERS to bring the women's-stories platform to China.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.23.14China’s Henan Province Creating Jobs in US Hinterlands
Associated Press
Henan's Golden Dragon Precise Copper Tube Group opened a plant that will employ more than 300 in a county known less for job opportunities than for lakes filled with bass, pine forests rich with wild turkey and boar.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.21.1413 ‘Thugs’ Die in Attack on China Police Station
USA Today
Chinese police shot dead 13 people who attacked a police station in the restive northwest region of Xinjiang Saturday morning, according to a report on the local government website and the state-run Xinhua news agency.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.21.14A Showdown Looms
Economist
Hong Kong, China’s most prosperous city, is becoming dangerously polarized.
Sinica Podcast
06.20.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/img_3738.jpg?itok=CEX97azh)
Isolda Morillo: Una Vida en China
from Sinica Podcast
This week on Sinica, Kaiser and Jeremy are delighted to be joined by Isolda Morillo, a Peruvian journalist for the Associated Press whose life story is as interesting as they come. Growing up in Beijing in the 1980s, where she attended local schools...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.18.14China Bans Unauthorized Critical Coverage by Journalists
Reuters
Reporters in China are forbidden from publishing critical reports without the approval of their employer, one of China’s top media regulators said on Wednesday.
Caixin Media
06.18.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/75458395.jpg?itok=43jWhejk)
China’s Retiring Migrant Workers Have No Place to Call Home
A generation of Chinese people from rural areas who moved to the big cities to find work is reaching retirement age, but many are finding they have been left outside the country's urban pension system despite extensive reforms in recent years...
Media
06.18.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/corrupt_aunties_small_node5996.jpg?itok=hofShf61)
Leaning In ... to Corruption
It's no secret that graft is an essential part of climbing the Chinese Communist Party ranks. Now, according to Chinese state media, ambitious female cadres are increasingly being caught taking bribes and trading favors. On June 16, the state-...
Books
06.18.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/books/system/louisa-lim-amnesia.jpg?itok=iNV0NL20)
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The People’s Republic of Amnesia
On June 4, 1989, People's Liberation Army soldiers opened fire on unarmed civilians in Beijing, killing untold hundreds of people. A quarter-century later, this defining event remains buried in China's modern history, successfully expunged from collective memory. In The People's Republic of Amnesia, NPR correspondent Louisa Lim charts how the events of June 4th changed China, and how China changed the events of June 4th by rewriting its own history.{node, 5555}Lim reveals new details about those fateful days, including how one of the country's most senior politicians lost a family member to an army bullet, as well as the inside story of the young soldiers sent to clear Tiananmen Square. She also introduces us to individuals whose lives were transformed by the events of Tiananmen Square, such as a founder of the Tiananmen Mothers, whose son was shot by martial law troops; and one of the most important government officials in the country, who post-Tiananmen became one of its most prominent dissidents. And she examines how June 4th shaped China's national identity, fostering a generation of young nationalists, who know little and care less about 1989. For the first time, Lim uncovers the details of a brutal crackdown in a second Chinese city that until now has been a near-perfect case study in the state's ability to rewrite history, excising the most painful episodes. By tracking down eyewitnesses, discovering U.S. diplomatic cables, and combing through official Chinese records, Lim offers the first account of a story that has remained untold for a quarter of a century. The People's Republic of Amnesia is an original, powerfully gripping, and ultimately unforgettable book about a national tragedy and an unhealed wound. —Oxford University Press {chop}
ChinaFile Recommends
06.17.14China's Clampdown on ‘Evil Cults’
New York Times
The government’s anti-religion campaign is not borne of concern for public security stemming from a horrific murder. This is a concerted effort to bring independent churches and their followers into line.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.17.14As China’s Leader Fights Graft, His Relatives Shed Assets
New York Times
As President Xi Jinping prepares to tackle what may be the biggest cases of official corruption in more than six decades of Communist Party rule, new evidence suggests that he has been pushing his own family to sell hundreds of millions of dollars...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.17.14To Bolster Its Claims, China Plants Islands in Disputed Waters
New York Times
China has been moving sand onto reefs and shoals to add several new islands to the Spratly archipelago, in what foreign officials say is a new effort to expand the Chinese footprint in the South China Sea.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.17.14Foreign Direct Investment in China Declines
Wall Street Journal
Foreign firms worry over arbitrary law enforcement, rising labor costs.
Sinica Podcast
06.16.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/495413331.jpg?itok=aFrsl78A)
The Resurgence of Gender Inequality in China
from Sinica Podcast
This week on Sinica, Kaiser and Jeremy are joined by David Moser and Leta Hong Fincher, newly-minted Ph.D. and author of Leftover Women, a book which gazes into the state of women’s rights in China, and documents the way state-sanctioned propaganda...
Viewpoint
06.13.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/490319335.jpg?itok=pxAC_Dyn)
Arrested Chinese Lawyer Pu Zhiqiang Speaks from Prison
“They bring me in for questioning practically every day. Sometimes the sessions last as long as ten hours. My legs are getting swollen, probably from sitting on a bench without moving for so long.” He said of these grueling interrogation sessions, “...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.13.14ISU Student Tried to Smuggle Technology to China
Iowa City Press Citizen
An Iowa State University graduate student has apparently been held in a New Mexico jail without bond since February, and a television station reported that he is suspected of trying to illegally transfer specialized equipment to China.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.13.14Rigged: Comradely Relations Go From Bad to Worse
Economist
Vietnam and China share a long history of enmity—and of managing to patch things up when they go wrong. But their latest dispute is not running true to form.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.13.14China Arrests Rights Lawyer Who Fought Labor Camps
ABC
The dramatic turnaround of Pu Zhiqiang highlights the thin line that activist lawyers often find themselves having to walk if they seek to drum up public support for causes that embarrass the ruling Communist Party: success can come at great...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.13.14Data Show Mixed Picture of China’s Economy
Wall Street Journal
China’s economy is struggling to find equilibrium, data released Friday shows, with government stimulus measures gaining traction last month while the vital housing market continues its swoon.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.13.14Is That Leg Loaded? Ai Weiwei Starts Web Craze With Mysterious ‘Leg-Gun’ Pose
Guardian
The Chinese artist has sparked an internet meme by posting pictures of people with their legs raised and pointing like rifles. Is it his latest revolutionary act? A new dance craze? Or the next Angelina Jolie's thigh? We weigh up the options.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.12.14China’s Top Taiwan Official to Make First Visit to Island
Reuters
China’s top official in charge of relations with Taiwan will make his first visit to the island later this month, state media said, following large-scale protests there against a controversial trade pact.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.12.14China, Japan Blame Each Other for Jet Encounter
Washington Post
The Chinese government released video that purports to show Japanese fighter planes flying dangerously close to a Chinese fighter planes over the disputed waters of the East China Sea.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.12.14U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern Introduces New Bill on Tibet
Office of Congressman Jim McGovern
Mr. McGovern (MA-02) announced today that he has introduced HR 4851, The Reciprocal Access to Tibet Act, in the House of Representatives.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.12.14Angelina Jolie Angers China With Taiwan Comments
Guardian
The star, promoting Maleficent in Shanghai, said that her favorite Chinese director is Ang Lee – who is from Taiwan, a country still seen by many Chinese as a rogue state.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.12.14Capital Mobilizes Anti-Terrorism Volunteer Force
China Daily
Beijing has deployed an anti-terrorism force of about 850,000 urban volunteers to patrol its streets following recent terrorist attacks across the country.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.12.14Anson Chan on Beijing’s Pressure Tactics in Hong Kong
New York Times
In an interview, Anson Chan talked about what she sees as increasing control from Beijing, which had guaranteed Hong Kong a high degree of autonomy until 2047 under the “One Country, Two Systems” formula.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.11.14Instagram Grows in China, Despite Ban on Parent Facebook
CNET
While Facebook itself is blocked by the Chinese government, Facebook-owned Instagram is growing fast in that country.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.11.14China Cultivates India Amid Tension With Neighbors
ABC
Amid fierce disputes with Japan, Vietnam and the Philippines, China is reaching out to India in a warming trend that could help ramp up economic exchanges and dissipate decades of distrust between the two giant neighbors.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.11.14Hong Kong Media Worries Over China’s Reach as Ads Disappear
New York Times
In what may be a major escalation of pressure by mainland China on Hong Kong’s independent-minded news media, two major British banks have stopped advertising with one of the city’s biggest newspapers, a top media executive said.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.11.14China Media: White Paper on Hong Kong
BBC
Media in China give full support to an official document reaffirming total control over Hong Kong, while papers in the special administrative region express pessimism over the future.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.11.14Ten Questions Cambridge University Must Now Answer Over the Chong Hua Donation
Telegraph
The news that one of China's most powerful political families has endowed a professorial chair at Cambridge University raises profound and disturbing questions, both about the integrity of British academia and the reach of China's soft-...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.11.14Japan Slams China Over Close Encounter of Jets
Washington Post
Japan lodged a diplomatic protest with Beijing on Wednesday after Chinese military jets flew near Japanese military aircraft over the East China Sea, an official said.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.11.14Crackdown on Fringe Sects in China Has Mainstream Churches Worried
New York Times
Although their voices are muted by the censors, human rights advocates and some mainstream religious leaders in China say that the latest anti-cult campaign is misguided and that it frequently violates Chinese law.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.11.14Vietnam Says China Moving Rig; China Denies Sending Warships
Reuters
Vietnam said on Wednesday a Chinese oil rig at the centre of an increasingly bitter territorial dispute appeared to be on the move again, as China denied Vietnamese accusations that it had sent warships to the scene.
Conversation
06.11.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/495413703.jpg?itok=NVCoUQ33)
Is a Declining U.S. Good for China?
Zha Daojiong:Talk of a U.S. decline is back in vogue. This time, China features more (if not most) prominently in a natural follow-up question: Which country is going to benefit? My answer: certainly not China.Arguably, the first round of “U.S.-in-...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.10.14China’s Anti-Graft Drive “A Testament of Xi’s Power”
Deutsche Welle
Over 1,000 people have been marked as "naked officials" in China, suspected of funneling illicit gains to overseas relatives. Analyst Rebecca Liao says Beijing is resolved to block any escape route for corrupt officials.
Caixin Media
06.10.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/article/system/caixin.jpg?itok=-v6IRXNK)
A Jesuit Astronomer in a Qing Emperor’s Court
Of the 920 Jesuits who served in the China mission between 1552 and 1800, only the Italian Matteo Ricci (Li Madou) remains well known. This is understandable—it was Ricci who first gained permission for the Jesuits to live in Beijing and who...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.10.14Despite Critics, China Asserts Democratic Progress in Hong Kong
New York Times
A week after roughly 100,000 people turned out in Hong Kong in a protest directed at China’s Communist leadership, Beijing has issued a ringing of defence of its oversight of the territory.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.10.14How “Rogue” Is China's Aid?
Washington Post
Moisés Naím has called Chinese development assistance “rogue aid,” claiming that it is nondemocratic and harmful to progress and to average citizens.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.09.14Young Chinese Twitter User Arrested for Proposing Method to Spread Truth About June 4th Massacre
China Change
On Monday China’s state-run media outlet China News (中新网) reported that Beijing police had arrested a 22-year-old female for posting an article on Twitter that teaches how to use a pseudo base station “to send illegal information.”
ChinaFile Recommends
06.09.14State Firms Barred from Vietnam Contract Bids
South China Morning Post
Vietnamese and Chinese ships have been clashing since China set up an oil rig near disputed island in the South China Sea last month. Tensions over the move caused anti-China riots in Vietnam.
Books
06.09.14![](https://www.chinafile.com/sites/default/files/styles/system/public/assets/images/books/system/barnett-law_voicesfrom-tibet.still001.jpg?itok=bTZ5m9yJ)
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Voices from Tibet
Tsering Woeser and Wang Lixiong are widely regarded as the most eloquent, insightful writers on contemporary Tibet. Their reportage on the economic exploitation, environmental degradation, cultural destruction, and political subjugation that plague the increasingly Han Chinese-dominated Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) is as powerful as it is profound, ardent, and analytical in equal measure, and not in the least bit ideological. Voices from Tibet is a collection of essays and reportage in translation that captures the many facets of an unprecedented sea change wreaked by a rising China upon a scared land and its defenseless people. With the TAR in a virtual lockdown after the 2008 unrest, this book sheds important light on the simmering frustrations that touched off the unrest and Beijing’s stability über alles control tactics in its wake. The authors also interrogate longstanding assumptions about Tibetans’ political future. Woeser’s and Wang’s writings represent a rare Chinese view sympathetic to Tibetan causes, one that should resonate in many places confronting threats of cultural subjugation and economic domination by a non-indigenous power. —Hong Kong University Press {chop}
ChinaFile Recommends
06.08.14From China with Pragmatism
New York Times
Americans see patronage as corruption, but Chinese recognize that giving money in a red envelope is good manners and important social grooming, and unrelated to graft.
ChinaFile Recommends
06.08.14Beijing, Vatican Prepare to Resume Talks for the First Time Since 2010
South China Morning Post
Meeting said to be in the works, but recent anti-church actions could complicate dialogue.