Last Christmas, Fion Ng had an unusual request from a mainland Chinese customer at the high-end cosmetics store she manages in Hong Kong’s Causeway Bay district, the most expensive place to rent a shop in Asia. “Is this really the most expensive cream?” the shopper from Shanghai asked, of a product that sells for...
NEW YORK — What does the death of the North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il tell us about the secretive, nuclear-armed prison state he ruled for 17 years? Unfortunately, not much we did not already know. US and allied Asian intelligence agencies (primarily Japan, Taiwan and South Korea) saw little or nothing amiss in...
BEIJING | Thu Dec 22, 2011 7:48am EST BEIJING (Reuters) – Chinese writer Chen Wei faces trial on Friday accused of “inciting subversion” for online essays advocating democracy, in the latest aftershock of a drive against dissent earlier this year, his wife and defense lawyer said. Chen will be tried in Suining, a city...
December 23, 2011, 2:45 AM EST By Belinda Cao Dec. 23 (Bloomberg) — Chinese stocks listed in New York rose, erasing the benchmark’s losses for the week, after surveys showed bankers expect the government to take further measures to increase loan growth in the Asian nation. The Bloomberg China-US 55 Index also climbed as...
BEIJING — A Chinese court sentenced a veteran democracy activist Friday to nine years’ imprisonment for inciting subversion, after he wrote four essays arguing for democracy. The sentence given to Chen Wei is thought to be the most severe punishment handed down in a crackdown on dissent this year. He was convicted of “inciting subversion...
When Japan’s Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda arrives in China on Sunday, a new blockbuster movie will ensure that the foremost image of the Japanese in many Chinese people’s minds will once again be of the country’s brutal wartime misdeeds. The story of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, around which Zhang Yimou’s “The Flowers of War”...
December 22, 2011, 5:42 PM EST By Bloomberg News Dec. 21 (Bloomberg) — China may overtake Germany as the world’s second-largest market for luxury cars behind the U.S. this year, fueled by demand for the two brands that are fighting for leadership in the category: BMW and Audi. The number of luxury cars sold...
By Kiyoshi Takenaka TOKYO | Fri Dec 23, 2011 6:04am IST TOKYO (Reuters) – Leaders from China and Japan will likely agree to work together to help maintain stability on the Korean peninsula following the death of North Korean ruler Kim Jong-il when they meet next week, but anything more than platitudes will be...
By Terril Yue Jones BEIJING | Thu Dec 22, 2011 5:14am EST BEIJING Dec 22 (Reuters) – China further tightened rules on microblogs on Thursday, requiring new authors on seven websites in southern Guangdong province to register their real names, state-run Xinhua news agency reported, in a move users decried as ineffective. Microblogs such...
December 22, 2011, 6:49 PM EST By Bloomberg News Dec. 22 (Bloomberg) — China’s stocks fell for a fourth day as investors speculated Europe’s debt crisis will worsen and lending to small companies may drop as banks hoard cash to meet year-end reserve-ratio requirements. China Cosco Holdings Co., the nation’s largest shipping Line, dropped...
