Roller disco lives on in China

I just discovered roller disco in China! The oh so 1980s disco craze is still rolling on in China due to a huge following from the country’s masses of migrant workers.

On a regular weeknight, the Xinxiang roller skating rink in one of Shanghai’s less fancy districts is teeming with crowds of young migrant workers, mostly in their 20s.

from Pakistan: Now or Never?:

Brzezinski on U.S.-India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and China

The Real News had an interview last week with former National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski who talks about how U.S. policy is playing out across Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and China. The second part of the interview covers his support for the mujahideen fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan, but here is what he has to say about Pakistan and the regional dynamics: 

"We are in Afghanistan because we have been there for 8 years, now getting out is easy to say, but by now if we get out, quickly, the question arises, what follows? Is there going to be again a very sort of militant regime in Afghanistan which might tolerate al Qaeda's presence and beyond that is now a new issue, namely the conflict in Afghanistan has come to be connected with the conflict in Pakistan. Pakistan is an important country of 170 million people which has nuclear weapons, nuclear weapons, and delivery systems, delivery systems to the entire region around so we have to think much more responsibly on how to deal with this problem ... "

"We have to find a way of helping Pakistan cope with its problem in Pakistan but also help us cope with our problem in Afghanistan and that raises an extraordinarily complicated question, namely how do we give the Pakistanis the reassurance they want that if we leave Afghanistan there is not a regime in Afghanistan other than the Taliban which is more friendly to India than to Pakistan."

Asked about whether the linchpin of U.S. strategy in the region was based on an alliance between the United States and India:

How to Make an Ice Sculpture

Reuters Television recently visited the ice sculpture competition at the International Ice and Snow Festival in Harbin, capital of China’s frozen Heilongjiang province.

If you would like to make your own ice sculpture, please follow the simple instructions in the video below.

Note: for those wishing to replicate the gargantuan castles and temples in the Ice and Snow World , we suggest you seek professional advice at the festival itself.

from Global News Journal:

Interview with North Korea border crosser Robert Park

 (Photographs by Lee Jae-won)

North Korea said on Tuesday it had  detained a U.S. citizen who entered its territory, apparently confirming a report that an American activist crossed into the state to raise awareness about Pyongyang's human rights abuses.   Robert Park, 28, walked over the frozen Tumen river from China and into the North last Friday, other activists said. The Korean-American told Reuters ahead of the crossing that it was his duty as a Christian to make the journey and that he was carrying a letter calling on North Korean leader Kim Jong-il to step down.

Park had an exclusive interview with Reuters last week before starting on his journey. The following are excerpts from the conversation. He requested that the comments be held until he was in North Korea.  

Why Taiwan mentioned China’s missiles

Taiwan and China, once bitter political rivals, jubilantly exchanged gifts after upbeat trade talks this week. But the festive atmosphere faded when Taiwan’s top policymaker Lai Shin-yuan reminded visiting Chinese negotiator Chen Yunlin of an ominous, obvious fact: Taiwan’s public feels “uncomfortable” with China aiming missiles at it. Taiwan accuses China of pointing 1,000 to 1,500 short-range or mid-range missiles in its direction to deter any move toward de jure independence. Taiwan is self-ruled today but China claims it. Missiles, however, weren’t on this week’s can-do agenda. Taiwan’s Beijing-friendly President Ma Ying-jeou has said China-Taiwan talks for now should avoid political issues until more mutual trust accumulates through discussion of lighter topics such as trade.

And Lai’s statement did little good on the surface. Taiwan’s Chinese-language China Times newspaper said the Chinese negotiator replied that Beijing is in no hurry to discuss political issues. Another Taiwan paper, the United Daily News, reported that negotiator told Lai the missile issue would take time to solve.

Snowboarding the Bird’s Nest

Beijing’s “Bird’s Nest” stadium, the tangled steel structure that starred as the focal point of the 2008 Summer Games, has been dressed up for winter in hopes of drawing post-Olympics visitors — and their cash.

Transformed into a winter-themed sports park, the stadium — which in its glory days packed some 80,000 cheering spectators into row after row of seats — now includes snowboard and ski slopes inside the inner ring, as well as a short toboggan tube, all covered in man-made snow.

But judging by the turnout on the opening weekend, when media representatives outnumbered paying visitors, this white Christmas wonderland faces a tough challenge to escape the stadium’s legacy as a big, white elephant.

The 180 yuan entrance fee (about $26) is one barrier to making the snowy playground a financial success. A young mother who brought her son said she reluctantly paid the fee only because the stadium has a special status among China’s famous cultural sites. Other visitors said they were taken aback by extra fees charged inside the venue.

from Pakistan: Now or Never?:

Can China help stabilise Pakistan?

When President Barack Obama suggested in Beijing last month that China and the United States could cooperate on bringing stability to Afghanistan and Pakistan, and indeed to "all of South Asia", much of the attention was diverted to India, where the media saw it as inviting unwarranted Chinese interference in the region.

But what about asking a different question? Can China help stabilise the region?

As I wrote in this analysis, China -- Islamabad's most loyal partner -- is an obvious country for the United States to turn to for help in working out how to deal with Pakistan.

It already has substantial economic stakes in the region, including in the Aynak copper mine in Afghanistan and Gwadar port in Pakistan. Its economy would be the first to gain from any peace settlement which opened up trade routes and improved its access to oil, gas and mineral resources in Central Asia and beyond. It also shares some of Washington's concerns about Islamist militancy, particularly if this were to spread unrest in its Muslim Xinjiang region.

North Korea, through a shopwindow darkly

When people want to know what’s happening in North Korea, their first stop is often the Chinese border city of Dandong. It’s one of the few places where North Koreans interact with the outside world. There are truck drivers and traders, and also spies, missionaries and refugees, not to mention reporters.

 We went to Dandong this week to see if we could find out about the impact of North Korea’s currency change. The government has capped the amount of old currency that could be traded for new, effectively lopping off the savings of many small traders and a new merchant class.

from Global Investing:

What worries the BRICs

Some fascinating data about the growing power of emerging markets, particularly the BRICs, was on display at the OECD's annual investment conference in Paris this week. Not the least of it came from MIGA, the World Bank's Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, which tries to help protect foreign direct investors from various forms of political risk.

MIGA has mainly focused on encouraging investment into developing countries, but a lot of its latest work is about investment from emerging economies.

This has been exploding over the past decade. Net outward investment from developing countries reached $198 billion in 2008 from around $20 billion in 2000. The 2008 figure was only 10.8 percent of global FDI, but it was just 1.4 percent in 2000.

Not surprisingly, the lion's share comes from the BRICS -- Brazil, Russia, India and China -- which together made up 73 percent of outflows last year. BRIC outward investment jumped to $144.3 billion in 2008 from $29.6 billion three years earlier.

Factories in front of me, factories behind me…(video).

Monk Qing Fuming is no stranger to hardship.

He and two other monks live high up in the mountains in Inner Mongolia in Lasengmiao’s Lama Temple.

Alongside an unforgiving climate and few amenities, Qing now lives in a growing cloud of smog as, down in the plains, factories wreathe his tiny monastery in clouds of choking smoke.