State Councilor and Minister of Public Security Meng  ianzhu inspects security preparations within the Expo site.

    BEIJING, April 6 — China’s Minister Public Security Meng Jianzhu yesterday inspected Shanghai’s preparation for Expo 2010 and visited security guards and volunteers at the Expo site. He came to Shanghai after visiting Expo-related security works in Shanghai’s neighboring cities, including Suzhou.

    Meng, who is also a state councilor, stressed that the city should work out more detailed and strict measures to ensure the security of the World Expo as there was only 27 days left before the event starts.

    Yesterday morning, he looked over security check points at the Expo site and inquired about police force deployment and emergency plans. He pointed out that the success of the security work lies in details. Security work within the Expo site was the vital part of the event, which includes license check, transport and logistic security, fire safety and emergency plans, he added.

    At the Nanmatou police station of Pudong New Area, Meng asked about the work to issue vehicle passes for automobiles entering Shanghai. He said that the application process should be as conveniently as possible for the public, and reduce impact on people’s daily life.

    Meng also visited Shanghai’s Hongqiao Transportation Hub. He inspected the information service centre, bus hubs, Metro entrance, the terminal of the Hongqiao Airport and the security check points in the airport. He said that the security work was a complicated task, involving various aspects of Shanghai’s management. The city had to fully integrate its resources to implement .

(Source: www.en.expo2010.cn)

 Beijing Pavilion is transformed into the Bird’s Nest.

    BEIJING, April 6 — Eighty large LED panels will transform the Beijing Pavilion structure into four iconic city buildings - the Temple of Heaven, the National Aquatics Center, better known as the Water Cube, the Bird’s Nest, and National Grand Theater.     

    Each transformation takes about 10 seconds, designers revealed yesterday.     

    Chinese director Zhang Yimou has finished filming a five-minute movie to be played in the Beijing Pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo, a senior official of the Expo organizer said yesterday as construction and outfitting finished in the pavilion.     

    The film, about a foreign tourist’s one-day visit to Beijing, is in its final edit and will be sent to a 50-seat theater in the pavilion for testing early next week, said Xu Yuwei, vice chairman of China Council for the Promotion of International Trade Beijing Sub-Council.     

    The movie will highlight many different sounds that the traveler hears in the city, including Beijing accents and Peking Opera. It will be played every 12 minutes.     

    The 600-square-meter pavilion in the joint-provincial building will showcase the city’s hosting of 2008 Beijing Olympics and the ceremony at the 60th anniversary of People’s Republic of China last October through videos and exhibits with the theme “Charming Capital.”

(Source: www.en.expo2010.cn)

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    BEIJING, April 2 (Xinhua) — A senior official of the Communist Party of China (CPC) met Friday with Saeed Jalili, visiting Iranian chief nuclear negotiator and Secretary of Supreme National Security Council.

    Wang Jiarui, head of the International Department of the CPC Central Committee, said that China supported maintaining the validity of the international nuclear nonproliferation system and believed that the Iran nuclear issue should be addressed through dialogue and negotiation, so as to safeguard peace and stability in the Middle East.

    Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo met with Jalili in Beijing Thursday. The two had frank and in-depth exchanges on China-Iran relations and issues of mutual concern. Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi held talks with Jalili on the same day.

    BEIJING, Feb. 19 (Xinhua) — Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai Friday summoned the U.S. Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman and lodged solemn representations over U.S. President Barack Obama’s meeting with the Dalai Lama.

    ”The U.S. act grossly interfered in China’s internal affairs, gravely hurt the Chinese people’s national sentiments and seriously damaged the Sino-U.S. ties, ” said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu in a further statement Friday.

    In spite of China’s strong opposition, U.S. President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met respectively with the Dalai Lama in Washington on Thursday.

    ”Tibet is an inalienable part of the inviolable territory of China, and the issues concerning Tibet are purely internal affairs of China,” Ma said.

    China firmly opposes leaders or government officials of any country meeting the Dalai Lama in any form, and also firmly opposes any country or anyone using the Dalai Lama issue to interfere in its internal affairs, he added.

    ”The Dalai Lama’s words and deeds have shown that he is not a pure religious figure, but a political exile who has all along been engaged in separatist activities under the pretext of religion,” the spokesman said.

    The U.S. side allowed the Dalai Lama to visit the United States and arranged its president and other political leader to meet with him, which grossly violated the basic norms governing the international relations, and ran counter to the principles set forth in the three China-U.S. joint communiques and the China-U.S. joint statement, Ma said.

    ”It also went against the repeated commitments by the U.S. government that the U.S. recognizes Tibet as part of China and gives no support to ‘Tibet independence’”, he said, stressing China expressed strong dissatisfaction and resolute opposition against such a move.

    The determination of the Chinese government and the Chinese people to safeguard national sovereignty and territorial integrity is firm and unshakable, and anyone who attempts to use the Dalai Lama issue to interfere in China’s internal affairs is doomed to failure, said Ma.

    He demanded the U.S. seriously consider China’s stance, immediately adopt measures to wipe out the baneful impact and stop conniving and supporting anti-China separatist forces that seek “Tibet independence.”

    The U.S. should stop interfering in China’s internal affairs and make concrete actions to maintain healthy and steady growth of China-U.S. relations, he said.

    Originally named Lhamo Thondup, the Dalai Lama was conferred the title of the 14th Dalai Lama in 1940.

    After launching and having failed an armed rebellion in March 1950, he fled to India and formed a so-called “Tibet government in exile.”

    In the guise of religion, the Dalai Lama has since then been involved in activities aimed to separate China and to undermine Tibet’s social stability.

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Wu Bangguo (C), chairman of the Standing Committee of China’s National People’s Congress (NPC) visits a high and new tech enterprise park in Shanghai, east China, Jan. 29, 2010. Wu visited Shanghai from Jan. 28 to Feb. 1. (Xinhua/Yao Dawei)

    SHANGHAI, Feb. 1 (Xinhua) — Top Chinese legislator Wu Bangguo has urged Shanghai to take the opportunity of hosting the World Expo to pioneer the country’s transformation of economic development mode.

    Wu, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, China’s top legislature, made the remarks during his visit to the country’s economic and financial hub from Jan. 28 to Feb. 1.

    Accompanied by Yu Zhengsheng, secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, Wu visited the Expo Site as well as some high and new tech enterprises in the city.

    Shanghai must spare no effort in hosting the Expo and seize the opportunity to promote economic restructuring and industrial structural upgrading, to boost the development of modern service industry, and to speed up fostering emerging strategic industries, Wu said.

    ”Wu must make technological breakthroughs, speed up industrialization process, and develop emerging industries such as smart grid, low-carbon technology and biomedicine, so as to make sure the country can have the initiative in the new round of international economic competition,” Wu said.

    The 2010 World Expo was scheduled to be held from May 1 to Oct. 31 in Shanghai, expected to attract a record total of 70 million visitors from home and abroad.

Wu Bangguo (C), chairman of the Standing Committee of China’s National People’s Congress (NPC) visits the 2010 World Expo site in Shanghai, east China, Jan. 29, 2010. (Xinhua/Yao Dawei)

Special Report:  Expo 2010 Shanghai China  

    UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 21 (Xinhua) — A senior Chinese diplomat announced here on Thursday that China has decided to contribute an additional 2.6 million U.S. dollars in cash to quake-hit Haiti and send a 40-member medical care and epidemic prevention team to the Caribbean country.

    The announcement came as Liu Zhenmin, China’s deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, was taking the floor at the second briefing/pledging conference of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) for Earthquake in Haiti, which opened here on Thursday afternoon.

    A strong earthquake on Jan. 12 has left many people dead, including 61 UN staff members working in the island country, and a lot of buildings damaged or destroyed.

    ”At today’s meeting, I am honored to announce that the Chinese government has decided to contribute an additional 2.6 million U.S. dollars in cash to Haiti, send a 40-member medical care and epidemic prevention team to Haiti and provide additional medicine and medical equipment to the country,” Liu said.

    ”We support the United Nations in playing an important coordinating role in disaster relief and reconstruction in Haiti,” he said. “We hope that the Haitian people, with the help of the international community, will overcome the difficulties, rebuild their homes and achieve self-reliance at an early date.”

    The new Chinese contribution follows a Jan. 13 decision of the Red Society of China to donate one million U.S. dollars in cash to Haiti, he said. “On Jan. 15, the Chinese government announced its decision to provide 30 million yuan (about 4.4 million U.S. dollars) worth of humanitarian emergency supplies to Haiti.”

    The first charter plane loaded with these supplies arrived in Haiti on Jan. 17, bringing to the local people medicine, tents, portable emergency lights, water purification equipment, food, drinking water and clothes, he said. “The second plane, which was delayed due to limited capacity of the Haitian airport, will arrive on Jan. 26.”

    Since Jan. 13, the 60-member emergency rescue team sent by the Chinese government has fully engaged in disaster relief in the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince, he said. “The team has carried out effective search and rescue operations at the headquarters of MINUSTAH (the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti), the prime minister’s palace and other places, with a number of bodies found, including those of Special Representative Hedi Annabi of MINUSTAH and other UN staff.”

    ”The medical team of the Chinese rescue team are providing medical support for several hundred local people everyday,” he said. “At this very moment, the Chinese international rescue team is still working at this forefront of disaster relief in Haiti and doing its utmost to help more people affected by the earthquake.”

    Since the earthquake struck Haiti on Jan. 12, the international community has worked in solidarity to offer a helping hand to the Haitian people and government, he said. “At present, disaster relief in Haiti is in full swing.”

    ”The Chinese government highly commends the timely and effective assistance provided to Haiti by the United Nations, which has won the wide acclaim of the international community and laid a good foundation for the next phase of reconstruction efforts,” he said.

 Special Report: Strong Quake Rocks Haiti