Chinanews, Beijing, Nov. 30 ¨C According to Beijing Evening News, China Scholarship Council plans to send 6,000 graduate students for further study abroad next year, most of them to be recommended by prestigious universities.

These students will study and do research in natural resources, environment, agriculture and high-tech fields. China Scholarship Council announced that all those candidates would come from the national supported research areas, and their age should be under 35.

These students will be sent abroad before June 2008.

(Source: CRIENGLISH.com)
Former diver Tian Liang (R) and Ye Yiqian propose a toast at their wedding ceremony in the northwestern Chinese city of Xi’an on Thursday, November 29, 2007. [Photo: star.sport.cn]
Former diver Tian Liang (R) and Ye Yiqian light heart-shaped candles at their wedding ceremony in the northwestern Chinese city of Xi’an on Thursday, November 29, 2007. [Photo: star.sport.cn]Nov. 30 - Olympic diving champion-turned entertainer Tian Liang, on Thursday married Ye Yiqian, a contestant of the “American Idol”-like singing show “Super Girl.”

The high-profile wedding was held at the five-star Shangri-La Hotel in Xi’an, northwestern Shaanxi province.

Because of rampant rumors, the hotel experienced an influx of paparazzi from across the country.

Tian Liang, 28, is the gold medal winner of the 10-meter platform event at the 2000 Sydney Olympics. The celebrated diver announced his retirement earlier this year, making a good headway towards the showbiz industry.

Twenty-three-year-old Ye Yiqian is known as a finalist of the 2005 Super Girl competition.

The couple were first spotted together in March, 2006. A report says they registered their marriage in Beijing last month.

(Source: China Daily)Nov. 30 - Chang’e I will experience a lunar eclipse around February 21. This may lead to a power shortage because of the lack of sunlight on its solar panels that generate electricity, experts have said.

The lunar eclipse will be the first of two that are expected, with the second likely to occur in August, Ye Peijian, lead designer of Chang’e I, said.

“The orbiter will be operating without a solar power supply for five-and-a-half hours,” he said Thursday in an online interview.

The temperature on the lunar orbiter will subsequently drop to nearly minus 130 C.

“The eclipses will be a real challenge for the proper function of various pieces of equipment on Chang’e I,” he said.

Rao Wei, a designer at the Academy for Space Technology Research, said repeated testing and preparation beforehand should be able to solve the “blackout” problem.

The storage battery will be put to use during the blackout to power the normal operation of the lunar probe, he said.

Non-essential equipment on the orbiter is also designed to pause, allowing the limited power of the battery to work key parts during the blackout, Rao told the Xinhua News Agency.

Enhancing the performance of the storage battery and cold-resistant devices on the satellite will keep warming the probe, he said. In normal conditions the solar battery is recharged every 127 minutes.

Eclipses occur when the Earth is positioned on a straight line with the Sun and the moon. In a lunar eclipse, the Earth’s shadow falls on the moon, darkening it, and can be seen from wherever on Earth the moon is above the horizon.

    BEIJING, Nov. 29 (Xinhua) — The Chinese government on Thursday released a coal industry policy document, putting a ban on new coal mines with an annual capacity below 300,000 tons.

    The document comes in the wake of a nationwide campaign to close down small coal mines, which account for one third of China’s total production but two thirds of the deaths resulting from colliery accidents.

    But as existing small mines were being shut down, new ones were being opened, Li Yizhong, head of the State Administration of Work Safety, admitted earlier this year.

    The top work safety official said that the work safety situation remained grave because colliery accidents were still prominent.

    Last year, China produced 2.4 billion tons of coal but production of its 80,000 coal companies averaged only 30,000 tons. Meanwhile, accidents in small coal mines claimed 3,431 lives.

    To better protect the environment, the document said that environmental appraisal must be carried out in coal mines and that coal mines must not be built in such “vulnerable areas” as nature reserves, water sources and geological hazard zones.

    A total of 13 large coal production bases would be formed in Shanxi, Shaanxi, Shandong, Henan, Yunnan, Guizhou, Ningxia and Inner Mongolia to ensure stable supply of coal in the country, it said.

    The document also aims to protect the interests of coal mine workers, saying they should work in four shifts per day and be covered by work injury insurance.

    BEIJING, Nov. 29 (Xinhua) — A Chinese personnel official on Thursday reiterated opposition to discrimination, especially against Hepatitis B carriers, in the upcoming civil servant test.

    Vice Minister of Personnel Yang Shiqiu reassured an applicant of the national civil servant examination in December that “Hepatitis B carriers who are ruled out after medical examination to be Hepatitis B patients would be considered eligible candidates.”

    The Chinese government issued a week ago rules to ensure fair, transparent enrollment of civil servants. The rules ban employers of civil servants from setting “requirements that are unrelated to the nature of posts”.

    In 2005, the government issued a health standard that included Hepatitis B carriers among eligible candidates for the civil service and dropped out weight and height requirements.

    The standard said Hepatitis B carriers were eligible to work for the government so long as the infection did not progress to the disease stage.

    Despite this, Chinese job hunters, including those seeking government posts, have long complained of discrimination on the grounds of sex, age, religion, race or physical disability.

    Since China began organizing civil servant recruitment examinations in 1994, civil service has become one of the most popular professions of the country’s job seekers because it offers a stable income, high social status and good welfare insurance.

    In 2007, more than 530,000 applicants competed for 12,700 government jobs — 42 people competing for each job on average.

    This year, more than 800,000 applicants will sit for the civil service examination in December, according to a statement on the ministry’s website.

    HAIKOU, Nov. 29 (Xinhua) — Three of the 12 Chinese fisherman who went missing in the Nansha Islands in the wake of Typhoon Hagibis have been rescued, according to the Hainan search and rescue center, but official reluctance to impart information has left details hazy.

    The three fishermen were rescued by a foreign ship heading to Singapore, an official surnamed Zhong told Xinhua by phone.

    He claimed not to know which country the rescue ship was registered to, the condition of the rescued fishermen or where they were found.

    Meanwhile, 806 fishermen trapped in the Nansha and Xisha Islands are safe after they received food and water from rescue ships.

    The number of fishermen, earlier reported to be about 760, is likely to rise due to previous miscounting, said Zhou Wanli, head of the media office with the salvage bureau of the South China Sea.

    Rescue ships delivered 1,185 kilograms of rice, three tons of fuel, 250 kilograms of noodles and 80 kilograms of vegetables to 241 fishermen in the Meijiu and Meiji Reefs, Zhou said.

    Among the 806 trapped fishermen, seven Vietnamese and three Chinese were sent to Sanya of Hainan Province, while many others were set to return with their own boats or continue fishing as soon as weather permits, said the rescue official Zhong. He did not explain why the Vietnamese fishermen were sent to Sanya.

    Hagibis disappeared on Tuesday, according to the website of the China Meteorological Station in Beijing.