Preceding NAPSNet Report

I. United States

1.   DPRK Nuclear Talks

New York Times (“6-NATION NORTH KOREAN NUCLEAR TALKS IN DOUBT”, 2004-09-26)  reported that in Northeast Asia, where the talks are to take place this weekend in Beijing, DPRK watchers are unsure when the next round will occur, or if they will occur at all. “At the earliest, the talks might be resumed at the end of the year, that is December, or early next year,” Aleksandr Losyukov, Russia’s ambassador to Japan and former delegate at the talks, said Friday at a seminar here. “All indications are that the six-party talks will not be held anytime soon, if at all ever again,” said C. Kenneth Quinones, the former director of the DPRK affairs office for the State Department, who has talked with DPRK diplomats in recent weeks.

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2.   ROK on DPRK Nuclear Talks

Agence France-Presse (“SOUTH KOREA CALLS FOR RESUMPTION OF NUCLEAR TALKS”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the ROK Foreign Minister Ban Ki-Moon called at the UN for a swift resumption of talks aimed at convincing the DPRK to shelve its nuclear weapons program. Ban told world leaders gathered at the UN General Assembly that a fourth round of the so-called “six-party talks” should be held “as soon as possible.” “It is our fervent wish that North Korea will make a strategic decision to forgo all its nuclear weapons programs, including uranium enrichment programs, in a thorough and transparent manner,” Ban said.

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3.   DPRK on DPRK Nuclear Talks

Xinhua News (“DPRK BLAMES US FOR SPOILING SIX-PARTY TALKS”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the DDPRK on Monday said that the US turning down the proposal of “reward for freeze” advanced by the DPRK and applying “double standards” make the fourth round of the six-party talks abortive. “The United States turned down the DPRK’s proposal for the ‘reward for freeze’ at the three rounds of the six-party talks and merely insisted on its old assertion that the DPRK must accept the complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantlement (CVID), thus deliberately laying an obstacle in the way of the negotiations,” said the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in a commentary. “The recent disclosure of a series of nuclear-related secret experiments in South Korea clearly proves that the double standards applied by the United States is a stumbling block in the way of solving the nuclear issue and a factor of nuclear proliferation,” said the KCNA.

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4.   DPRK Missile Program

Kyodo News (“N KOREA SOUGHT BILLIONS FROM US DURING MISSILE TALKS”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the DPRK sought “several billion dollars” in cash from the US during bilateral missile talks during former President Bill Clinton’s administration in exchange for halting its missile exports, the Kyodo news agency reported Sunday, citing US documents. The demand appears to reconfirm Pyongyang’s intent to gain economic tradeoffs from the US and other countries including Japan by using the development, testing and exportation of ballistic missiles as a negotiating card, Kyodo said. While the missile talks were under way, the DPRK was reported to have sought from the US $1 billion annually over a three-year period in return for the DPRK halting missile exports.

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5.   DPRK Missile Test

Chosun Ilbo/Arirang TV (“INDICATES INCREASED ACTIVITY AROUND MISSILE BASES IN NORTH KOREA INTELLIGENCE”, 2004-09-27)  reported that mystery persists about whether the DPRK is planning to test-fire a missile. Intelligence reports have indicated increased missile-related activity in the DPRK but the Pyongyang government calls the reports groundless. Military vehicles carrying liquid fuel needed to launch Rodong missiles have been sighted at the DPRK missile bases. According to Japan’s Yomiuri Shimbun, the new data comes from Japanese EP-3 electronic surveillance aircraft as well as US and Japanese reconnaissance satellites and wireless communications monitoring.

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6.   US on DPRK Missile Test

The Associated Press (“TOP U.S. MILITARY COMMANDER SAYS NORTH KOREAN MISSILE ACTIVITIES TROUBLING”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the DPRK is likely improving its missile technology, and recent signs that it may be preparing to test a ballistic missile are troubling, a top US military official said Sunday. US Pacific Air Forces Commander Gen. Paul V. Hester said the DPRK has posed a serious regional threat since 1998. That technology is expected to have improved and become a “greater concern,” Col. Victor L. Warzinski, spokesman for US Forces Japan, quoted Hester as saying. Hester said more precise DPRK missiles were among likely improvements.

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7.   Powell on DPRK Missile Test

Reuters (“POWELL EXPRESSES CONCERN OVER POSSIBLE N.KOREAN TEST”, 2004-09-27)  reported that Secretary of State Colin Powell on Thursday expressed concern after reports that the DPRK might carry out a new missile test. “I think it would be very unfortunate if the North Koreans were to do something like this and break out of the moratorium that they have been following for a number of years,” Powell told reporters. He said such a test would not change US policy or its commitment to six-party talks aimed at ending Pyongyang’s suspected nuclear weapons program. Powell said he had also seen the intelligence but was not sure whether the DPRK was indeed preparing a launch.

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8.   Japan on DPRK Missile Test

Agence France-Presse (“JAPAN EXPRESSES ‘SERIOUS CONCERN’ ABOUT NKOREAN MISSILES IN BEIJING TALKS”, 2004-09-27)  reported that Japanese negotiators told the DPRK they had “serious concern” about its missile program in talks that extended for a second day in Beijing, a Japanese diplomat said. “The Japanese side expressed serious concern about the missile issue,” said the Japanese diplomat, referring to Saturday’s negotiations. The Japanese delegates, headed by Akitaka Saiki, the foreign ministry’s deputy chief for Asian affairs, would see to it that the missile and nuclear issue was on Sunday’s agenda as well, he said. The talks were carried out against the backdrop of a Japanese press report that increased activity had been observed at about 10 missile bases in the DPRK that could be seen as preparation for a missile launch.

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9.   DPRK on Missile Test Reports

Associated Press  (“REPORT: N. KOREA DISMISSES MISSILE REPORTS “, 2004-09-27)  reported that a high DPRK official dismissed reports his government was preparing to test fire a long-range missile as “conjecture, rumor and speculation,” Japanese news media said Saturday. Choe Su Hon, the DPRK’s vice foreign minister, told Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi at a reception during the UN General Assembly meeting in New York that the reports were groundless, the newspaper Asahi and other Japanese media reported. Choe told Kawaguchi that the nuclear arms program was intended to counter what the DPRK charges are US plans to attack the DPRK, Kyodo said.

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10.   DPRK on US Missile Defense

Kyodo (“NORTH KOREA CALLS U.S. MISSILE DEFENSE IN SEA OF JAPAN A THREAT”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the DPRK on Monday called a US anti-ballistic missile defense system being deployed in the Sea of Japan an attempt to “isolate and crush” the DPRK. US Navy destroyers will soon patrol waters off the DPRK, laying the foundation for a system to detect and intercept ballistic missiles. The DPRK, which Washington suspects is upgrading its missile technology, said in a broadcast by state-run Korean Central Radio that the US program was an excuse to “militarily crush” the North’s regime. “These facts again show clearly that there is absolutely no change to the ambitions of the American war enthusiasts to isolate and crush the republic,” said the broadcast, monitored in Tokyo by Japan’s Radio Press.

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11.   US Troop Realignment

Donga Ilbo (“U.S. TO DEPLOY HIGH-TECH PRECISION-GUIDED DIRECT ATTACK MISSILES NEAR DMZ “, 2004-09-27)  reported that the US Forces Korea will introduce the precision-guidance kit known as JDAM (Joint Direct Attack Munition) in order to resolve the threat of North Korean long-range fire along the Armistice Line, announced General Richard Myers, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff. At a September 23 hearing of the US Senate Committee on Armed Services regarding the Global Defense Posture Review, Gen. Myers explained, “The JDAM is released from the air using a global positioning device,” and stated that it can debilitate the DPRK military’s tactic of attacking first with long-range guns, then charging at their enemy. Commander Leon LaPorte of the USFK, who also attended the hearing, added that when the USFK is relocated to the south of the Han River, it will be able to mobilize in any direction as required without being locked down by the DPRK’s long-range guns.

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12.   DPRK – Japanese Relations

Yonhap (“N. KOREA SAYS JAPAN INCREASING MILITARY MIGHT FOR INVASION”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the DPRK said Sunday that Japan is reviving its past military imperialism by loosening weapons regulations and boosting its troops abroad, all aimed at invading nations overseas, including the Korean Peninsula. The Minju Chosun, the newspaper of the DPRK Cabinet, said in a commentary, “It is sensed that Japan has been recently making very unusual military moves.” The commentary, carried by the (North) Korean Central News Agency, referred to Japan’s recent relaxation of rules restraining military reinforcement and weapons exports. Also, Japan is seeking to upgrade operations of its Self Defense Forces abroad to basic duties from supplementary ones, it said.

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13.   Japan on DPRK Sanctions

Associated Press  (“JAPAN FOREIGN MINISTER SUGGESTS ECONOMIC SANCTIONS TO DEAL WITH NORTH KOREA “, 2004-09-27)  reported that Japan could consider economic sanctions against impoverished the DPRK to force it to provide more details about Japanese citizens it kidnapped in the 1970s and 80s, Japan’s new foreign minister said Monday. The DPRK has admitted to kidnapping 13 Japanese citizens to teach its spies, and released five of them in 2002. Pyongyang says eight other victims have died, but has refused to respond to Tokyo’s demands for details of their fate to allay suspicions they are still alive. “I realize that economic sanctions are one policy tool,” Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura added, without mentioning specific actions or saying whether such punishments should be imposed.

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14.   Japan on Abductees

The Associated Press (“JAPAN DEMANDS RESULTS ON NORTH KOREA ABDUCTIONS “, 2004-09-27)  reported that Japan is demanding more detailed reports from the DPRK on the fate of Japanese citizens kidnapped by the DPRK in the 1970s and 80s, a top government official said Monday. The two sides met in Beijing on Saturday and Sunday for details of a DPRK investigation into the fate of eight Japanese abductees who allegedly died in the DPRK and two other suspected victims. Japanese officials said they were disappointed with the lack of information released by the DPRK.

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15.   DPRK on Abductees

United Press International (“PYONGYANG CHANGES ABDUCTEE STORY”, 2004-09-27)  reported that Pyongyang has changed its claim that a Japanese woman abducted to the DPRK in 1977 killed herself in 1993, though her real story remains unknown. At a second round of working-level talks between Japan and the DPRK in Beijing that ended Sunday, DPRK officials presented information effectively disproving their earlier claim that Megumi Yokota committed suicide in March 1993. This is the first time that the communist state has officially admitted its explanation was incorrect, apparently pressured by Japan’s insistence that Yokota had been seen in the DPRK in 1994.

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16.   DPRK Chemical Weapons Imports

Yonhap (“MORE CHEMICAL WEAPONS MATERIAL MAY HAVE BEEN SHIPPED TO N. KOREA”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the ROK may have exported more of a chemical substance that can be used to make chemical weapons to the DPRK via third countries than was initially known, according to a report released Saturday by the customs office. The ROK Customs Service said in the report submitted to Rep. Song Young-son, a member of the National Assembly’s defense committee, that the country exported more than 77,000 tons of sodium cyanide to the PRC and Malaysia over the past six years.

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17.   DPRK Food Supply

Yonhap (“N. KOREA’S RICE IMPORTS FROM THAILAND INCREASE THIS YEAR”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the DPRK’s rice imports from Thailand more than doubled this year from a year ago, a trade promotion agency said Monday. In the first seven months, the DPRK imported rice worth US$8.33 million, up 166.11 percent from 2003, according to a branch office of the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency here. Thailand’s overall exports to the DPRK increased by 20.78 percent.

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18.   DPRK Defectors

Chosun Ilbo (“NORTH KOREAN DEFECTORS ARRIVE IN SEOUL “, 2004-09-27)  reported that a government official said Friday that seven DPRK defectors who initially fled to Cambodia had arrived in the ROK on Thursday and are now under the protection of the government intelligence agency. The official confirmed that the DPRK defectors who arrived in Seoul are all defectors who reached Cambodia via the PRC and Vietnam earlier this month, hoping to be sent on to the ROK. Earlier, the foreign press reported that the DPRK had demanded the Cambodian government repatriate the seven defectors, coming after a similar incident where DPRK defectors who fled to a Southeast Asian country in July were sent to the ROK.

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19.   Inter – Korean Relations

Yonhap (“INTER-KOREAN TRAVEL DROPS DRASTICALLY IN 2003 “, 2004-09-27)  reported that the number of people traveling between the DPRK and the ROK decreased dramatically last year because of the chilled relationship between the DPRK and the US and a sluggish economy in the ROK, officials said Monday. According to the Ministry of Justice, which oversees legal visits to the DPRK, the number of those who came and went between the two Koreas was 191,749 in 2003, down by as much as 60 percent from the historic inter-Korean summit in 2000.

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20.   Kaesong Dedication

Yonhap (“DEDICATION OF KAESONG DEVELOPMENT OFFICE DELAYED TO OCT. 21”, 2004-09-27)  reported that a state-run land corporation will hold a ceremony on Oct. 21 to dedicate its development office at an industrial park in the DPRK, a government official said Sunday. The ceremony was originally scheduled to take place last Friday in Kaesong, a DPRK city near the inter-Korean border where a mammoth industrial complex is being built by the Korea Land Corp. (KLC) and Hyundai Asan, but it was put off at the request of Pyongyang.

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21.   DPRK Succession

Agence France-Presse (“MAN BELIEVED TO BE NORTH KOREAN LEADER’S SON ENCOUNTERS JAPANESE MEDIA”, 2004-09-27)  reported that a man believed to be the eldest son of DPRK leader Kim Jong-Il has run into a horde of Japanese reporters at Beijing airport, at a time when speculation is rife about the leadership succession in the DPRK. “Yes, I am,” the man replied in Korean when asked if he was Kim Jong-Nam after he was spotted at the international arrivals hall on Saturday, according to Japanese press reports from Beijing. A comparison of photographs showed that he had the same facial moles as the man who was deported from Narita. “I have been travelling in various countries,” the man told the reporters in Beijing, saying he would be staying at a hotel in the city.

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22.   IAEA in the ROK

Agence France-Presse (“IAEA TEAM LEAVES AFTER WEEK-LONG INSPECTION IN SOUTH KOREA”, 2004-09-27)  reported that United Nations inspectors left after a week-long investigation into the ROK’s past secret experiments with potential ingredients for nuclear bombs, officials said. A five-member team from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) launched the inspections Monday at the state-run Korean Atomic Energy Research Institute in Daejeon, 160 kilometers (100 miles) south of Seoul. Two of the five inspectors visited another nuclear research center in a northern part of Seoul Thursday while one of them toured an abandoned uranium mine at Goesan, 150 kilometers south of the capital, on Friday. The inspectors spent Saturday mostly in documenting what they had looked into or sampled from their field work.

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23.   ROK Terror Alert

Agence France-Presse (“US WARNS OF HEIGHTENED RISK OF TERROR ATTACKS IN SOUTH KOREA”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the US has warned of heightened risk of terror attacks and violent action on American government facilities and personnel in the ROK following Seoul’s dispatch of troops to Iraq. “The recent public announcement regarding the dispatch of Korean troops to Iraq raises the potential for demonstrations and violent actions against US government facilities and personnel in Korea,” an advisory issued by the US embassy in Seoul said. Moreover, it said, the embassy “remained concerned by indications that al-Qaeda and other terror groups continue to prepare to strike US interests both domestically and overseas. The advisory issued through the embassy’s warden system as a public service to all US citizens in the ROK said “terrorists do not distinguish between official and civilian targets.

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24.   ROK on Japan UNSC Bid

Chosun Ilbo (“KOREA OPPOSES ADDING PERMANENT MEMBERS OF U.N. SECURITY COUNCIL: FM BAN “, 2004-09-27)  reported that Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon expressed his viewpoint that he supported the augmentation of the seats of non-permanent Security Council members, and opposed increasing the numbers of permanent members, at the foreign minister talks held Friday between the ROK and Japan with Japanese Foreign Minister Kawaguchi Yoriko. Asked about the standpoint of the ROK to Japan’s becoming a member of permanent Security Council member as a single nation, Minister Ban said, “We haven’t decided anything about a specific country’s becoming a permanent Security Council member, and our standpoint is that we disagree with the augmentation of permanent member seats.”

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25.   US – ROK Relations

Donga Ilbo (“SUMMIT TALKS BETWEEN KOREA AND U.S. TO BE HELD IN NOVEMBER “, 2004-09-27)  reported that ROK president Roh Moon-hyun and his American counterpart, George W. Bush will discuss overall pending issues between the two nations at a summit meeting to be held during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit period in Chile this November. Kim Suk, the Foreign Ministry’s Director of North American Affairs, released that South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon met with US Secretary of State Colin Powell at a ROK-US ministerial-level meeting at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in Manhattan, New York City on Thursday on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meeting and reached an agreement to hold a summit meeting between the two nations.

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26.   Japanese Cabinet Reshuffle

Agence France-Presse (“JAPAN PM KOIZUMI RESHUFFLES CABINET IN POSTAL REFORM, FOREIGN POLICY PUSH”, 2004-09-27)  reported that Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi reshuffled his cabinet Monday, giving a key reformer the job of privatizing the postal system and replacing his foreign minister as the nation tackles thorny DPRK issues. The reshuffle, the third since Koizumi took power in April 2001, comes as public support for his cabinet improved slightly to 48 percent in a recent newspaper poll — still far below the 80 percent levels three years ago.

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27.   Japanese Energy Security

Yomiuri Shimbun (“OPERATIONS AT N-PLANTS MAY CEASE BY 2016”, 2004-09-27)  reported that operations at all nuclear power plants will be halted by fiscal 2016 if spent nuclear fuel from the plants cannot be reprocessed, as the plants’ storage capacities will have reached their limits, The Yomiuri Shimbun has learned. The Atomic Energy Commission of Japan issued this warning to a committee on long-term nuclear use, which considers the pros and cons of the nuclear fuel-cycle policy. While operations at the nuclear power plants continue, the amount of spent nuclear fuel will increase. As a result, the storage facilities will reach capacity by 2016, forcing the power plants to shut down the reactors.

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28.   ROK Energy Supply

South China Morning Post (“SEOUL SCORES IN THE FIGHT FOR ENERGY; DEALS WITH RUSSIA AND KAZAKHSTAN REDUCE DEPENDENCY ON MIDDLE EAST OIL SOURCES”, 2004-09-27)  reported that agreements signed during ROK President Roh Moo-hyun’s visits to Russia and Kazakhstan last week reflect the ROK’s bid to secure long-term sources of energy amid increasing demand from the PRC and high oil prices. A deal struck between the state-owned Korea National Oil Corporation and its Russian counterpart would allow the country to join oil exploration projects in Sakhalin and Kamchatka, which are said to have crude oil reserves of up to 1.7 billion barrels. According to Seoul, a similar protocol with Kazakhstan will allow the ROK access to around 850 million barrels of crude oil in the Teniz region and around the Caspian Sea.

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29.   PRC Energy Supply

Xinhua News  (“FEATURE: CHINA ACCELERATES NUCLEAR ENERGY DEVELOPMENT”, 2004-09-27)  reported that in terms of construction cost, fully imported nuclear power plants are over 30 percent higher than domestically designed and constructed ones. While targeting for independent construction, the PRC has always espoused international cooperation for nuclear power development and peaceful utilization of nuclear energy. Kang Rixin says the PRC has signed agreements with a host of countries on the peaceful utilization of atomic energy. Trade, personnel exchanges and cooperation in technological development and equipment manufacture form part of these agreements.

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30.   Cross Strait Relations

Associated Press  (“TAIWAN: WEAPONS PLAN WILL HELP IN DEFENSE “, 2004-09-27)  reported that Taiwan’s premier said Saturday that a government plan to spend billions of dollars on US weapons would help the island defend itself if rival the PRC attacked, as thousands of protesters marched in the capital to denounce the deal. The government wants to buy $18 billion worth of arms, including anti-missile systems, planes and diesel-electric submarines. On Saturday, thousands of protesters marched through pouring rain in the streets of Taipei, describing the deal as the start of a wasteful arms race. But Premier Yu Shyi-kun, Taiwan’s No. 3 leader, said the weapons were necessary to maintain the balance of power with the PRC, located across the 100-mile-wide Taiwan Strait.

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31.   PRC on Cross Strait Relations

Agence France-Presse (“TAIWAN TOO WEAK TO MATCH CHINESE MISSILE THREAT: ANALYSTS”, 2004-09-27)  reported that PRC analysts have shrugged off a warning by Taiwan of massive retaliation to any PRC missile attack, saying the island simply did not have the military capability. Responding to robust weekend comments by Taiwan Premier Yu Shyi-kun, in which he promised to engage the PRC in a “balance of terror”, the analysts described the threats as bluster. “Taiwan won’t be able to guarantee its security through an arms race or a balance of terror,” said Wu Nengyuan, head of Taiwan studies at the Fujian Academy of Social Sciences in southeast PRC. “We can’t even talk about a threat from Taiwan, since it simply doesn’t have the means to use military might,” he said.

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32.   Sino – Russian Relations

UPI (“CHINA AND RUSSIA REACH STRATEGIC ACCORD”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the PRC and Russia signed a communiqué on strategic economic cooperation, notably in oil and gas, during the PRC Premier Wen Jiabao’s visit to Moscow. The communiqué was signed in Moscow on Sept. 24 by Wen and Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov, and covered seven agreements on education, economy and trade, finance and insurance, Xinhua reported Monday. A key provision is that the PRC and Russia will implement cooperative projects in oil and natural gas, including the construction of pipelines between the two countries. Wen pledged that the PRC would invest $12 billion in Russia’s infrastructure construction, energy resources, manufacturing, and high-tech industries before the year 2020.

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33.   Sino – Japanese Relations

UPI (“CHINA ASKS JAPAN TO ACKNOWLEDGE HISTORY”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the PRC’s new ambassador to Japan says there are serious political barriers to improved relations between the two countries. Ambassador Wang Yi, who arrived in Tokyo earlier this month, said Japan must address historical issues and respect its 1972 commitment to recognize Taiwan as part of the PRC, the South China Morning Post reported Monday. Wang’s remarks were made in a speech to the Sino-Japanese Friendship Association, released Sunday. Wang said that to break the stalemate Japan must acknowledge its invasion of the PRC and stop hurting PRC victims of aggression through the shrine visits.

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34.   PRC Abandoned Chemical Weapons

Kyodo News  (“JAPAN FINDS 67 CHEMICAL WEAPONS IN NORTHEAST CHINA”, 2004-09-27)  reported that a three-week effort to unearth war-era Japanese chemical weapons from a site in northeast PRC ended Monday with a total haul of 2,000 weapons, including at least 67 chemical weapons, the Japanese government said Monday. Sixty-seven are chemical weapons, and another 22 might be chemical. They will remain at a local warehouse until the PRC decides how to dispose them. The Abandoned Chemical Weapons Office says chemical weapons in the area are mainly mustard gas and sneezing gas. The weapons, discovered in 1993, are known to come from Japan, which occupied northeast PRC from 1931 through the end of World War II in 1945.

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35.   PRC Media Freedom

Reuters (“CHINA DETAINS N.Y. TIMES RESEARCHER”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the PRC has detained a researcher working for the New York Times on suspicion that he helped break news that aging leader Jiang Zemin planned to retire from politics this month, sources familiar with the case said Thursday. Zhao Yan, a former reporter for the magazine China Reform, was arrested by state security agents on Sept. 17. Jiang stepped down from his post as head of the military on Sept. 19, during the annual meeting of the ruling Communist Party’s Central Committee. Zhao was taken into custody on suspicion of illegally providing state secrets to foreigners, according to a copy of an arrest document issued by the Beijing state security bureau and dated Sept. 21.

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36.   PRC Intellectual Property Rights

Agence France-Presse (“KUNG FU MONKS OF CHINA’S SHAOLIN TEMPLE IN HAND-TO-HAND COPYRIGHT BATTLE”, 2004-09-27)  reported that the monks of the PRC’s Shaolin temple are not just good at kung fu but also increasingly agile at using copyright rules to protect their name from rip-offs, state media reported. The 1,500 year-old temple, known as the cradle of China’s martial arts, recently set up the Henan Shaolin Temple Industrial Development Co., whose main purpose is to protect the temple’s intellectual property rights, Xinhua news agency said. More than 1,000 brands containing “Shaolin” have been registered without the approval of the temple in the US, Japan and Europe, Shi said. Since its start, the new company has been engaged in feverish activity, registering nearly 100 Shaolin-related brands in the PRC and has applied to register “Shaolin” brands in over 100 countries, Xinhua said.

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37.   PRC Anti-Corruption Movement

Associated Press  (“CHINA’S COMMUNISTS CALL FOR BETTER GOV’T “, 2004-09-27)  reported that the PRC’s Communist Party called on its members Sunday to improve their ability to run an increasingly complex nation, complaining in an unusually self-critical statement that some of its own leaders lack integrity and warning that the “life and death of the party” could hang in the balance. The appeal came in a report issued after a leadership meeting that concluded Sept. 19. The report by the party Central Committee called on its members to “develop a stronger sense of crisis” about reform, warning that communist rule “will not remain forever if the party does nothing to safeguard it,” the official Xinhua News Agency reported.

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38.   PRC Pro-Democracy Movement

Agence France-Presse (“BANNED HONG KONG DEMOCRAT GIVEN LONG-TERM ENTRY PERMIT TO CHINA”, 2004-09-27)  reported that an outspoken Hong Kong filmmaker banned from the PRC for 15 years for his pro-democracy views has been given a long-term entry permit for his homeland, local radio reports. John Shum told RTHK radio that he had been given a 10-year permit early this month following help from the city’s leader Tung Chee-hwa. “I was pretty surprised that I got a 10-year permit,” said Shum, who was given a single visa into the country in July. Shum said he would lobby for more permits to be given to other political activists. “I have mentioned to government officials that I hope they would give more entry permits to others who are willing to return to China and let them see the new development in the mainland,” he said.

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39.   PRC Emissions Controls

Agence France-Presse (“HONG KONG OFFICIALS ON MISSION TO CHINA TO CUT SMOG: REPORT”, 2004-09-27)  reported that Hong Kong environment officials will travel to the PRC to find ways of cutting smog that drifts into the city from mainland power plants and factories, media reports said. A team of specialists will go to the neighboring Guangdong province, the heart of the heavily industrialized Pearl River Delta region where 90 percent of Hong Kong’s pollution originates, the South China Morning Post reported. “We will send a team up (to Guangdong) to observe their power stations and other sources of the pollutants to hammer out measures to control the emissions of pollutants,” environment chief Keith Kwok was quoted as saying.

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40.   PRC Labor Relations

Washington Post  (“IN CHINA’S CITIES, A TURN FROM FACTORIES LABOR POOL SHIFTS AS URBAN WORKERS SEEK BETTER LIVES”, 2004-09-27)  reported that in a country with a supposedly bottomless supply of labor, the Daojiong Hequn Plastic Processing factory has somehow hit bottom. The plant in southern PRC can no longer find enough young women willing to spend their hours bending over machinery slicing artificial hair for toy dolls bound for the US. The $50 monthly pay is too little. The 14-hour days are too long. In the PRC’s burgeoning economy, there are better opportunities elsewhere. Throughout the southern province of Guangdong, whose factories produce nearly one-third of the PRC’s exports, and in other industrial areas along the PRC’s coast, labor is suddenly wanting — particularly the 18- to 24-year-old women who have become the staple workers of the PRC’s export trade. It is not so much a labor shortage — there are still tens of millions of peasants and former employees of the state-owned factories who need jobs — as a mismatch between the cutthroat wage demands of the export trade and the rising expectations of PRC workers.