Timeline China 2000-2004
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2000 Jan 4, In China the State Development Planning Commission announced that private enterprise should be put on "equal footing with state-owned enterprises."
(SFC, 1/5/00, p.A6)
2000 Jan 6, In China the state-controlled Catholic Church ordained 5 new bishops while the Pope elevated 12 prelates in St. Peter's Basilica.
(SFC, 1/7/00, p.A14)
2000 Jan 15, In China 5.9 and 6.5 earthquakes hit in Yunnan province and 4 people were killed.
(SFEC, 1/16/00, p.A25)
2000 Jan 18, In China the Intermediate People's Court in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, convicted 13 Uigher defendants of separatism, murder, robbery and illegally dealing in weapons. 5 of the convicted were sentenced to death.
(SFC, 1/25/00, p.A12)
2000 Jan 18, Steven Leung (52), a SF Bay Area entrepreneur, was found unconscious in a Beijing karaoke bar and transferred to a hospital where he was diagnosed with irreversible brain damage. Leung was flown home and died at Stanford Hosp. on Feb 3.
(SFEC, 1/30/00, p.D2)(SFC, 2/5/00, p.A16)
2000 Jan 20, It was reported that the number of Internet users in China had more than doubled over the last 6 months from 4 to 8.9 million, most of them young single men.
(SFC, 1/20/00, p.C16)
2000 Jan 21, In China it was reported that some 700 investigators had gathered over the last 2 months in Xiamen, formerly called Amoy, to investigate corruption and the smuggling of some $9.5 billion worth of goods.
(SFC, 1/21/00, p.A12)
2000 Jan 26, In China the State Bureau of Secrecy issued a 20-article circular that banned discussion of state secrets on the Internet, in e-mail, and in chat rooms or bulletin boards. Content and service providers were also required to undergo a "security certification" prior to operation.
(SFC, 1/27/00, p.A1)
2000 Jan 27, The US and China agreed to resume normal military ties.
(SFC, 1/28/00, p.D2)
2000 Jan, Li Jinhua, auditor general of China, reported that $15 billion in public funds destined for poverty relief and water conservation projects had been embezzled in 1999. It was also reported that 14 officials were being investigated for embezzling $57 million in funds intended to resettle people displaced by the Three Gorges Dam projects.
(SFEC, 1/30/00, p.A25)(SFC, 5/6/00, p.A12)
2000 Feb 10, Ji Pengfei, one of the last of China’s old guard, died at age 91. His 6 children included Gen. Ji Shengde.
(SFC, 7/18/00, p.A14)
2000 Feb 17, In China authorities detained Chen Zixiu (60) for heading to Beijing to protest for the Falun Gong. She was unable to pay a fine of $120 and was beaten and died on Feb 21. The government denied mistreatment.
(SFC, 2/29/00, p.A14)(SFC, 3/1/00, p.A13)
2000 Feb 21, China warned Taiwan that a prolonged lack of negotiations could provoke a military attack.
(SFC, 2/22/00, p.A1)
2000 Feb 25, The US sharply criticized China for a marked deterioration in human rights.
(SFC, 2/26/00, p.A10)
2000 Feb 27, In Louyang city Jin Xiangwu stabbed to death 3 children after they failed to pay 30 cents in his video arcade. Xiangwu was convicted and executed in April.
(SFC, 4/19/00, p.A12)
2000 Feb 27-2000 Feb 29, Some 20 thousand workers battled police and soldiers in Yangjiazhangzi due to loss of work and alleged corruption at a local molybdenum mine. The facility had closed last November and in Feb. workers received $68 for each year they had worked there.
(SFC, 4/5/00, p.A10,14)
2000 Feb, Rescue Bear 0001 arrived at the Animals Asia Foundation in Chengdu, China. He was named Andrew by the Hong Kong philanthropist who donated $1 million to create the animal sanctuary. Andrew (15) died in 2006 from a liver cancer likely related to years of being tapped for bile fluid.
(SFC, 2/16/06, p.A14)
2000 Mar 4, In Beijing 2,900 delegates from 32 provinces and regions gathered for the 10-11 day session of the Ninth National People's Congress. During the session Hu Changqing, a former official in Jiangxi province, was scheduled to be executed for taking bribes worth $658,000.
(SFC, 3/4/00, p.C1)(SFEC, 3/5/00, p.A22)
2000 Mar 6, China introduced a $111.1 billion budget that cut its deficit and added funds for military spending.
(WSJ, 3/7/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 8, In China Hu Changqing, former vice governor of Jiangxi province, was executed for corruption.
(SFC, 3/9/00, p.A10)
2000 Mar 10-2000 Mar 11, Public sentencing rallies took place in the Aksu region of Xinjiang and 11 Muslim Uighur members of a terrorist group were executed. The Uighurs of the region made up nearly half of Xinjiang’s 20 million population and had been struggling against Chinese rule for several years.
(SFC, 3/20/00, p.A14)(WSJ, 3/20/00, p.A1)(Econ, 9/6/08, p.54)
2000 Mar 14, In China an official was sentenced to death for embezzling $1.4 million that was meant to help relocate 1.3 million people displaced by the Three Gorges dam project.
(WSJ, 3/15/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar, Rebiya Kadeer (54) was convicted of revealing state information to "foreigners." She had sent official Chinese press reports to her husband in the US. Her appeal was later rejected and she was sentenced to 8 years in prison.
(SFC, 12/12/00, p.B3)
2000 Apr 1, Groundbreaking ceremonies for the Grand National Theater in Beijing were cancelled due to petitions against the design. Paul Andreu of France had won the design contest with a $361 million project in the shape of a "pearl" or "duck’s egg."
(WSJ, 9/6/00, p.A24)
2000 Apr 1, In Nanjing 4 unemployed youths broke into the home of Jurgen Hermann Pfrang (50), an executive for DaimlerChrysler, and stabbed him to death along with his wife and 2 children. The 4 were found guilty of murder and robbery on 7/14/00 and sentenced to death.
(SFC, 7/15/00, p.A13)
2000 Apr 12, China’s Pres. Jiang Zemin arrived in Israel to support commercial defense relations between the two countries.
(SFC, 4/13/00, p.A15)
2000 Apr 20, In China the Communist party announced that Cheng Kejie, a deputy chairman in the national legislature, was expelled and charged with amassing $4.5 million in bribes and kickbacks.
(SFC, 4/21/00, p.A20)
2000 Apr 23, In China Li Chenglong (48), deputy mayor of Guigang city, was executed. He had been convicted of corruption during his term as Communist Party secretary of Yulin city between 1991 and 1996.
(SFC, 4/24/00, p.A14)
2000 May 5, A human rights group reported that China had banned 9 books published by Zhong Gong, a school of the qi gong traditional slow-motion exercises.
(SFC, 5/6/00, p.C1)
2000 May 6, It was reported that Jin Wenchao, a former soldier and head of a Chinese construction firm involved in the Three Gorges dam project, had disappeared with over $120 million.
(SFC, 5/6/00, p.A12)
2000 May 6, The Chiang Mai Initiative (CMI) was set up to help East Asian cash strapped countries defend their currencies in times of trouble. The initiative came in response to the 1997 East Asian financial crises. ASEAN, China, Japan, and South Korea launched the multilateral arrangement of currency swaps (CMI).
(WSJ, 5/5/05, p.A12)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiang_Mai_Initiative)
2000 May 15, It was reported that Li Fuxiang (47), a top Chinese finance manager, leaped to his death from the top floor of a hospital a week earlier.
(WSJ, 5/15/00, p.A1)
2000 May 16, In China’s Liaoning province some 5,000 retired or laid-off workers in Liaoyang clashed with police following protests over non-payment of pensions and wages.
(SFC, 5/17/00, p.A18)
2000 May 19, China and the EU agreed to open markets.
(SFC, 5/20/00, p.A8)
2000 May 24, The US House voted 237 to 197 to grant China permanent normal trade status.
(SFC, 5/25/00, p.A1)
2000 May 29-2000 May 31, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il visited China and met with Pres. Jiang Zemin and the ruling Communist Party’s inner circle. He received promises of free food and other material assistance.
(SFC, 6/2/00, p.A16)
2000 May 30, Mou Qizhong, entrepreneur and former "reform hero," was sentenced to life in prison on charges that included defrauding a Chinese state bank of $75 million.
(SFC, 5/31/00, p.A14)
2000 Jun 9, At least 74 people were reported killed in Sichuan, China, from floods and mudslides following torrential rain and hail.
(SFC, 6/10/00, p.A24)
2000 Jun 15, Guo Chaoren, president of China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency, died at age 65. His books included "Sprint to the Summit," "Tibet in the Past Decade," and "African Diary."
(SFC, 6/16/00, p.A34)
2000 Jun 22, In China an overloaded ship capsized on the Yangtze River in Sichuan province and 59 people were either killed or missing. Separately a Yunshuji-7 turboprop was struck by lightning in Hubei province and all 42 people aboard were killed. 4 people were missing.
(SFC, 6/23/00, p.D3)
2000 Jun 28, China’s government announced a $48 million emergency plan to fight the drought in the northern provinces of Shanxi, Hebei, Gansu, and Ningxia.
(SFC, 6/29/00, p.C6)
2000 Jun 28, In Taiwan Pres. Chen Shui-bian told visiting Americans that he accepts that there is "one China."
(SFC, 6/29/00, p.A10)
2000 Jul 6, In Urumqi, China, 3 separatists were executed by firing squad immediately after a public sentencing.
(SFC, 7/13/00, p.C4)
2000 Jul 7, Chinese press reported that an investigation of Gen. Ji Shengde was concluded and that he would soon be indicted for corruption totaling $12.5 million.
(SFC, 7/18/00, p.A14)
2000 Jul 7, Three days of torrential rains over central China left at least 22 people dead in Sichuan. Thousands of buildings, 17 bridges and 7 hydroelectric power stations were damaged. In Guangxi Zhuang a bus fell into the Liujiang River in Liuzhou and at least 65 people were killed.
(SFC, 7/8/00, p.D8)(SFC, 7/10/00, p.A9)
2000 Jul 11, In China it was reported that 6 members of a Uighur separatist group were executed.
(WSJ, 7/12/00, p.A1)
2000 Jul 13, In China a mudslide following heavy rains killed at least 119 villagers in Ziyang county in Shaanxi province. The death toll was later raised to 213 with another 23 killed in the Liangshan area of Sichuan province.
(SFC, 7/17/00, p.A13)(SFC, 7/21/00, p.B7)
2000 Jul 15, It was reported that an attack force of 700,000 ducks and chickens, trained to hunt and eat insects at the sound of a whistle, were placed in the locust-plagued fields of China’s Xinjiang province.
(SFC, 7/15/00, p.A24)
2000 Jul 18, Chinese Pres. Jiang Zemin and Russia’s Pres. Putin denounced the US proposed missile defense program as a violation of the 1972 ABM treaty. They also vowed to strengthen a strategic partnership between their countries.
(SFC, 7/19/00, p.A10)
2000 Jul 22, In Beijing some 100 people were rounded up in a scattered protest marking the first anniversary of the banning of Falun Gong.
(SFEC, 7/23/00, p.B16)
2000 Jul 29, It was reported that the Songhua River had completely dried up under the drought that has ruined 35 million acres. 16.2 million Chinese were left short of water.
(SFC, 7/29/00, p.D8)
2000 Jul 31, A Beijing court sentenced Cheng Kejie (66) to death for corruption. He was a former deputy chairman of the national legislature and headed the southern region of Guangxi from 1990-1998. Over the last week 48 people were executed for drug trafficking. Kejie was executed in Sept.
(SFC, 8/1/00, p.A10)(SFC, 9/15/00, p.A14)
2000 Jul 31, It was reported that a number of large Chinese companies were on the verge of bankruptcy even as the government planned to bail out its money losing state sector by making more companies public.
(WSJ, 8/1/00, p.A8)
2000 Jul, Liu Yong, Chinese Communist Party member and head of the Jiayang Group, was arrested for corruption in Shenyang.
(SFC, 10/11/01, p.C2)
2000 Aug 17-2000 Aug 23, Farmers in Fengcheng, China, rioted in opposition to high taxes and other issues.
(SFC, 9/5/00, p.A12)
2000 Aug 21, In China’s Yunnan province an earthquake in Wuding county left 177,000 people homeless and 211 injured.
(SFC, 8/26/00, p.A9)
2000 Aug 28, Four Chinese students and a man whose sister was killed in the Tiananmen Square massacre filed a suit in NYC against Li Peng, head of the Chinese Parliament, for human rights abuses.
(SFC, 9/1/00, p.A16)
2000 Aug 30, In China’s Fujian province police arrested a Catholic priest, 20 nuns, 2 laymen and a seminarian in Luoyuan county. Rev. Liu Shaozhang (38) was reported to have been severely beaten and that parishioners bought the release of 2 nuns.
(SFC, 9/2/00, p.C16)
2000 Aug, Some 20,000 Chinese farmers attacked government offices and official’s homes in Jiangxi to protest high taxes.
(WSJ, 8/30/00, p.A1)
2000 Sep 1, Typhoon Maria struck 2 southern Chinese provinces between Huizhou and Shanwei and killed 47 people with $223 million in damages.
(WSJ, 9/6/00, p.A1)(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A22)
2000 Sep 5, Over 30 coal miners were killed in an explosion in Datong, China.
(SFC, 12/25/00, p.B6)
2000 Sep 8, The government of China’s Shaanxi province appropriated 123 Zhong Gong properties and land worth $36.5 million.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 8, A truck carrying explosives blew up in Urumqi, China. 100 casualties were reported.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 19, The US Senate voted 83-15 to end trade restrictions on China. The vote also removed a fiscal obstacle to Beijing’s 14-year drive to join the WTO.
(SFC, 9/20/00, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/20/00, p.A1)
2000 Sep 27, In China an explosion at the Muchonggou Coal Mine in Shuicheng, Guizhou province, killed 118 miners.
(SFC, 9/28/00, p.A1)
2000 Oct 1, Pope John Paul II on China’s national day, canonized as martyrs 87 Chinese believers and 33 European missionaries killed between 1648 and 1930. He also canonized Mother Katherine Drexel (d.1955), a Philadelphia heiress, who became a nun.
(SFC, 10/2/00, p.A12)(Econ, 12/18/10, p.78)
2000 Oct 1, In China Falun Dafa staged one to the biggest Tiananmen Square protests since it was banned 14 months earlier.
(WSJ, 10/2/00, p.A1)
2000 Oct 12, The Nobel Prize in literature was won by Gao Xingjian (60), an exiled Chinese writer living in Paris. His novels include "Soul Mountain," based on a 1986 walking tour along the Yangtze River.
(SFC, 10/13/00, p.A16)
2000 Oct 16, The Chinese press endorsed the building of a $12 billion river project to divert water from the Yangtze north to the Yellow River.
(SFC, 10/19/00, p.C3)
2000 Oct 18, A human rights group reported that 3 members of Falun Gong died after their arrest by Chinese police. 57 Falun Gong members have died under police custody during the 15-month crackdown.
(SFC, 10/19/00, p.C10)
2000 Oct 26, In Beijing at least 100 Falun Gong sect members were dragged from Tiananmen Square following a protest one the year anniversary of a government ban of the cult.
(SFC, 10/27/00, p.A21)
2000 Oct 27, China’s state media reported that auditors had found over $11 billion in mismanaged funds in government offices and businesses.
(SFC, 10/28/00, p.A14)
2000 Oct, In China some 6 million census takers began the 5th national census.
(SFC, 10/14/00, p.A12)
2000 Nov 8, Courts in southern China sentenced 11 people to death for their role in a giant smuggling ring, the Yuanhua Group, that moved some $6.4 billion in goods with the complicity of mayors, police and customs officers.
(SFC, 11/9/00, p.C2)
2000 Nov 20, China singed an agreement with the UN for cooperation and training on individual rights and the rule of law.
(SFC, 11/21/00, p.A13)
2000 Nov 21, Pres. Clinton agreed not to punish China for exporting missile components to Iran and Pakistan after China promised to end future technological cooperation with countries seeking to develop missile weaponry.
(SFC, 11/22/00, p.A20)
2000 Nov, Liu Dalin, a pioneering Shanghai sexologist, authored "Sexual culture of 20th Century China." He argued for an open-minded approach to sex.
(SFC, 12/31/00, p.B7)
2000 Dec 1, It was reported that Gao Changli, head of the Chinese bureaucracy that controls the legal system, was relieved of his duties, apparently as part of a crackdown on corruption.
(SFC, 12/2/00, p.A13)
2000 Dec 1, A shopping mall collapsed in Dongguan, China, and scores of people were killed.
(WSJ, 12/4/00, p.A1)
2000 Dec 12, China fired the boss of Fijian province amid an antigraft drive.
(WSJ, 12/13/00, p.A1)
2000 Dec 16, Brilliance China Automotive Holding introduced its new Zhonghua car. It boasted an Italian design, Japanese engine, and German electronics and suspension.
(SSFC, 12/24/00, p.A12)
2000 Dec 25, In China’s Louyang city as many as 309 young people were killed at a disco fire.
(SFC, 12/26/00, p.C6)
2000 Dec, Tan Guangguang, a Chinese scholar with recent visits to the US, was arrested on suspicion of spying.
(SFC, 4/10/01, p.A11)
2000 Martin Booth authored "The Dragon Syndicates," a history of the Chinese criminal societies known as the triads.
(WSJ, 8/4/00, p.W7)
2000 Bill Kong, Chinese film producer, released “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon." He had wooed Hollywood for a year to front half of the film’s $15 million budget.
(WSJ, 9/14/05, p.A1)
2000 China’s Premier Zhu Rongji said Beijing will no longer be livable in 35 years due to sand dunes 93 miles away and converging at an annual speed of 2 km.
(SSFC, 8/12/01, p.A21)
2000 China's Pres. Jiang Zemin launched the "Three Represents" program: the party must represent China's advanced productive forces, its advanced culture and the interests of the overwhelming majority of the people.
(Econ, 11/15/03, p.41)
2000 China launched its “great development of the west" program (often referred to as the “Go west" policy).
(Econ, 12/3/05, p.39)
2000 China banned the sale of video game consoles citing their adverse effect on the mental health of its youth. The ban was lifted in 2014 on a temporary basis.
(Reuters, 1/7/14)
2000 China planned to build 1,000 hotels for tourism growth for a total of 4,500. The government expected visitors to increase to 54 million from 46 million in 1995. The hotels were to be built in the poorer central and western China.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A10)
2000 In Ningbo, China, the Geely Group began producing cars. By 2006 the plant was producing 180,000 cars a year.
(WSJ, 11/7/06, p.A1)
2000 The WHO ranked China 4th from the bottom of 191 countries in terms of fairness of its medical coverage.
(WSJ, 12/5/05, p.A1)
2000 In China coal mine fatalities were estimated to be between 5,000 and 10,000 per year with an average of 13 miners killed per day. Miners earned about $50 per month.
(SFC, 12/25/00, p.B6)(NW, 10/28/02, p.44R)
2001 Jan 10, China sent rats into orbit aboard its "Sacred Ship" Shenzhou II, powered by a Long March rocket.
(SFC, 1/11/01, p.A16)
2001 Jan 11, China’s state media reported at least 27 people dead from a New years Day blizzard in inner Mongolia.
(SFC, 1/12/01, p.A18)
2001 Jan 16, China’s Shenzhou II unmanned space craft landed after 108 orbits.
(WSJ, 1/17/01, p.A1)
2001 Jan 23, Five people believed to members of Falun Gong set themselves on fire in Tiananmen Square. One woman and her daughter (12) died. In August 4 people were convicted of murder for organizing the self-immolation. A judge found that they had spread the notion that members could achieve nirvana through self-immolation.
(SFC, 1/24/01, p.A12)(SFC, 8/18/01, p.A11)
2001 Jan 24, The Chinese lunar calendar marked this as the new year, 4699.
(SSFC, 1/28/01, p.CN3)
2001 Feb 8, China’s cabinet approved a 700-mile rail line to link Lhasa, Tibet, and Qinghai province.
(WSJ, 2/9/01, p.A1)
2001 Feb 11, Gao Zhan, a US-based scholar, was detained at Beijing airport by Chinese authorities. She was formally charged as a spy on April 3. [see Mar 27]
(WSJ, 3/28/01, p.A1)(SFC, 4/4/01, p.D14)
2001 Feb 25, Chinese officials in Shenzhen detained Li Shaomin (44), an associate professor of marketing at Hong Kong’s City Univ.
(SFC, 3/31/01, p.A11)
2001 Feb 26, The US State Dept. issued its annual report on the status of human rights and cited "unconfirmed but credible" reports from China of continued use of torture by police to obtain coerced confessions.
(SFC, 2/27/01, p.A10)
2001 Feb 28, China gave a qualified endorsement for a UN-sponsored human rights treaty. It backed away from a guarantee of workers rights.
(SFC, 3/1/01, p.A8)
2001 Mar 1, China was reported to consume a little over 6% of the world’s total 75.5 million barrels per day of oil.
(WSJ, 3/1/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 2, In China 37 members of the banned Falun Gong were sentenced to prison terms of 3-10 years. Most had been convicted of "using a cult to obstruct the law."
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 5, China announced a 17.7% increase in defense spending.
(SFC, 3/6/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 6, It was reported that Chinese psychiatrists have decided to stop classifying homosexuality as a mental illness.
(SFC, 3/6/01, p.A11)
2001 Mar 6, In China an explosion at an elementary school in Jiangxi province left 37 students and 4 teachers dead. 42 people, mostly students, were killed in a schoolhouse explosion in southern China; parents said the students had been forced to make fireworks by school officials. Teachers, to enhance their meager salaries, had forced students to make firecrackers during their lunch breaks. Prime Minister Zhu Rongji said the blast was caused by a "deranged suicide bomber."
(WSJ, 3/7/01, p.A1)(SFC, 3/8/01, p.A1)(SFC, 3/9/01, p.A14)(AP, 3/5/02)
2001 Mar 13, In China four writers were detained a few months after they had formed the New Youth Study Group for discussing political change in China. In 2003 Xu Wei (28) and Jin Haike (26) were sentenced to 10 years in prison for subverting state power. Yang Zili (32) and Zhang Honghai (29) were sentenced to 8 years. Wei and Haike were released On March 12, 2011, after completing their jail terms.
(SFC, 5/30/03, p.A16)(AP, 3/13/11)
2001 Mar 16, Explosions rocked residential buildings in Shijiazhuang, a mill town in China’s Hebei province. At least 18 people were killed. The deaths soon mounted to 108 with 38 injured. Police later arrested Jin Ruchao (41), a deaf man, who reportedly confessed to the bombings.
(SFC, 3/17/01, p.A10)(SSFC, 3/18/01, p.D1)(SFC, 3/24/01, p.A11)
2001 Mar 21, The Taiwan United Daily News reported that a senior Chinese colonel had defected to the US.
(SFC, 3/23/01, p.D4)
2001 Mar 22, Pres. Bush met with Chinese Deputy Premier Qian Qichen and said the US would support Taiwan’s military needs.
(WSJ, 3/23/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 27, In its first specific accusation against a detained U.S.-based scholar, China said Gao Zhan had confessed to spying for foreign intelligence agencies. The US denied employing her as a spy. Gao, who had been detained on Feb. 11, was released the following July. In 2003 Gao Zhan admitted to illegal profits of over $539,000 from selling 80 microprocessors to the Chinese government. [see Feb 11]
(WSJ, 3/28/01, p.A1)(AP, 3/27/02)(SFC, 11/27/03, p.A3)
2001 Mar 27, China reported that its population stood at 1.26 billion, an 11.7% increase over the last decade.
(SFC, 3/28/01, p.D4)
2001 Mar 30, It was reported that the forests of China’s Yunnan province had dropped from 50% coverage in 1949 to less than 10% today.
(SFC, 3/30/01, p.A17)
2001 Apr 1, A US Navy EP-3 surveillance plane with 24 aboard collided with a Chinese fighter jet over the South China Sea and was forced to land on China's Hainan island. The fighter jet crashed. Chinese pilot Wang Wei parachuted out of his F-8 jet but had not been found. Zhao Yu, a 2nd pilot, later blamed the US plane banked and hit Wei’s plane. None of the 24 crew members was hurt, but they were held prisoner by the Chinese for a tense 11 days.
(SFC, 4/2/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/2/01, p.A1)(SFC, 4/4/01, p.A13)(SFC, 4/7/01, p.A13)(AP, 4/1/02)
2001 Apr 2, Pres. Bush demanded that the Chinese release the US Navy crew and spy plane that had made an emergency landing on China’s Hainan Island.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 4, US diplomats met with 24 US crew members held by the Chinese military on Hainan island. Colin Powell issued a statement of regret over the loss of the Chinese pilot involved in the incident. Powell also sent a letter to China’s chief foreign policy official outlining ways of settlement.
(SFC, 4/4/01, p.A1)(SFC, 4/5/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 5, Wang Zhizhi of China, 7 feet and 1 inch tall, made his NBA debut for the Dallas Mavericks. Wang Zhizhi became the first Chinese player to play in the NBA when he took the court for Dallas against Atlanta. He scored six points and grabbed three rebounds as the Mavericks beat the Hawks 108-to-94.
(SSFC, 4/15/01, p.A17)(AP, 4/5/02)
2001 Apr 5, Pres. Bush expressed regret over the loss of a Chinese pilot in the Apr 1 collision with a US spy plane.
(SFC, 4/6/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 6, US officials announced some progress toward the release of 24 military personnel in China and hoped to establish a joint US-China commission to examine the April 1 collision of a US spy plane and Chinese jet.
(SFC, 4/7/01, p.1)
2001 Apr 7, China rejected statements of regret and continued to demand a US apology for the April 1 collision between a US spy plane and Chinese jet.
(SSFC, 4/7/01, p.C1)
2001 Apr 8, Sec. of State Colin Powell expressed sorrow for the Chinese pilot lost on Apr 1, but the Chinese continued to demand that the US apologize reiterated a demand that the US stop all military surveillance off the Chinese coast. US officials said Pres. Bush was sending a letter to the wife of a missing Chinese fighter pilot as a humanitarian gesture. The pilot's plane had collided with a US spy plane, forcing the spy plane to make an emergency landing in China.
(SFC, 4/9/01, p.A1)(AP, 4/8/02)
2001 Apr 12, The 24 crew members of a US spy plane arrived in Hawaii after being held for 11 days in China. Pres. Bush blamed the Chinese for the midair collision of the US spy plane and a Chinese jet and rebuffed demands to end reconnaissance flights off the coast of China. In 2006 it was revealed that Prince Bandar bin Sultan, Saudi ambassador to the US, negotiated the release of the crew on behalf of Pres. Bush.
(SFC, 4/13/01, p.A1)(AP, 4/12/06)(WSJ, 10/11/06, p.D10)
2001 Apr 13, In China a 5.9 earthquake hit Yunnan province and at least 7 people were killed. 42,000 homes were destroyed in the Shidian area.
(SFC, 4/21/01, p.A24)
2001 Apr 15, Chinese police opened fire on villagers who opposed high local taxes and fees in Yuntang. 2 were killed and at least 18 wounded.
(SFC, 4/20/01, p.A16)
2001 Apr 17, US envoys arrived in China to resolved issues of the US spy plane collision with a Chinese jet.
(SFC, 4/18/01, p.A12)
2001 Apr 18, US negotiators said China agreed to discuss the return of the US spy plane following a day of unproductive talks.
(SFC, 4/19/01, p.A10)
2001 Apr 19, US and Chinese negotiators failed to reach any agreement over the US spy plane. The Chinese showed video images from flights last year and the US presented a written proposal for the return of the plane.
(SFC, 4/20/01, p.A14)
2001 Apr 25, In unusually blunt terms, President Bush warned China that an attack on Taiwan could provoke a U.S. military response.
(AP, 4/25/02)
2001 Apr 29, China offered to allow US officials to inspect the US Navy spy plane on Hainan Island.
(SFC, 4/30/01, p.A1)
2001 May 2, Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan returned to China from Russia with a draft accord for relations with Russia.
(SFC, 5/4/01, p.D2)
2001 May 2, US technical experts examined the US spy plane on China’s Hainan Island.
(WSJ, 5/3/01, p.A1)
2001 May 2, In China a landslide in Wulong County buried a 9-story building where 76 of 95 residents were home. 65 bodies were recovered.
(SFC, 5/4/01, p.D2)
2001 May 4, US experts, following 3 days of inspections, said the US spy plane on China’s Hainan Island could be repaired and flown home.
(SFC, 5/5/01, p.D1)
2001 May 8, China rejected a US plan to repair EP-3 the spy plane and fly it away.
(WSJ, 5/9/01, p.A1)
2001 May 19, It was reported that China’s "Strike Hard" anti-crime campaign had resulted in at least 801 executions in the last 3 weeks of April.
(SFC, 5/19/01, p.A8)
2001 May 20, In China 20 miners were feared dead in a gypsum mine in the Guangxi region and another 38-39 were trapped in a coal mine in Sichuan. The miners in Sichuan were working a prison-run mine.
(SFC, 5/21/01, p.A10)(SFC, 5/22/01, p.A11)
2001 May 20, In China 14 people were executed in 2 cities for robbery and murder.
(SFC, 5/21/01, p.A10)
2001 May 26, Wu Jianmin (46), a Chinese-born American writer, was arrested on charges of collecting information that endangered security. He was released and expelled Sep 28.
(SFC, 8/2/01, p.A7)(SFC, 9/29/01, p.B1)
2001 Jun 4, It was reported that US Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld had virtually cut off all Pentagon contacts with the Chinese armed forces in displeasure over the spy plane incident. Rumsfeld announced that he had given limited permission to resume military-to-military contacts with China due to the progress in the resolution of the spy plane incident.
(SFC, 6/4/01, p.A10)(SFC, 6/5/01, p.A12)
2001 Jun 5, It was reported that the ecstasy drug was a big hit in Chinese night clubs. It had begun filtering in from Hong Kong in 1998.
(SFC, 6/5/01, p.A12)
2001 Jun 5, In China 13 children were killed in a fire at a kindergarten dormitory in Nanchang.
(SFC, 6/6/01, p.C3)
2001 Jun 7, The US and China agreed on a final plan for the removal of the US spy plane from Hainan Island.
(SFC, 6/8/01, p.A16)
2001 Jun 7, China published new rules on genetic engineering. The government took broad oversight over the industry and required clear labeling on genetically altered foods.
(WSJ, 6/8/01, p.A13)
2001 Jun 14, A forum in China inducted Uzbekistan as the 6th member of a regional group (the Shanghai Five) that included China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. The 5-year-old group hoped to counterbalance US influence and fight Islamic separatism.
(SFC, 6/15/01, p.D6)(WSJ, 6/14/01, p.C11)
2001 Jun 15, The Shanghai Five member nations (China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Russia), having admitted Uzbekistan, signed the Declaration of Shanghai Cooperation Organization.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_Cooperation_Organisation)
2001 Jun 16, He Qinglian (44), Chinese economist, fled China after security agents broke into her office in Shenzhen.
(SFC, 7/3/01, p.A8)
2001 Jun 21, Jailed Falun Gong members attempted a group suicide in a Chinese northeast labor camp. 10-14 reportedly died by hanging.
(SFC, 7/4/01, p.A11)(WSJ, 7/5/01, p.A8)
2001 Jun 25, Typhoon Chebi killed 73 people in China’s Fujian province and left 83 missing. Damage was estimated at $425 million.
(WSJ, 6/26/01, p.A1)(SFC, 6/27/01, p.D3)
2001 Jun 26, In China 7 members of a North Korean family took refuge in the Beijing office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and claimed fear of deportation.
(SFC, 6/27/01, p.D3)
2001 Jun 27, It was reported that Wang Guoqi, a Chinese doctor seeking political asylum, had presented a written statement to US authorities that he had taken part in harvesting body parts from executed prisoners in China. China meanwhile observed UN anti-drug day by executing dozens of people for drug crimes. China denied the accusations.
(SFC, 6/27/01, p.A10)(SFC, 6/29/01, p.D4)
2001 Jun 29, A new $2.4 billion 700-mile railway project was begun to connect Lhasa, Tibet, to the Chinese interior.
(SSFC, 7/1/01, p.A18)
2001 Jul 1, China’s Pres. Jiang Zemin announced that the Communist Party will allow private businessmen to become members.
(SFC, 7/2/01, p.A8)
2001 Jul 1, Parts of the US spy plane were flown out from China’s Hainan Island.
(WSJ, 7/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Jul 7, It was reported that China had executed 1,781 people over the last 3 months.
(SFC, 7/7/01, p.A8)
2001 Jul 13, It was reported that record droughts persisted in Afghanistan northern China, North Korea, Mongolia and Tajikistan.
(SFC, 7/13/01, p.D4)
2001 Jul 13, The IOC awarded Beijing, China, the honor of hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics.
(SFC, 7/14/01, p.A1)
2001 Jul 14, China convicted Li Shaomin (44), a Chinese-born American business professor, of spying for Taiwan and ordered his expulsion.
(SSFC, 7/15/01, p.A12)
2001 Jul 15, China’s Pres. Zemin arrived in Russia for a state visit. A treaty of friendship and cooperation was planned.
(SFC, 7/16/01, p.A9)
2001 Jul 16, In northwest China an illegal cache of explosives blew up in Mafang and 41 people were killed.
(SFC, 7/17/01, p.A7)
2001 Jul 17, In Moscow Russia and China agreed to plan a $1.7 billion pipeline for oil from Siberia to northeastern China.
(SFC, 7/18/01, p.C4)
2001 Jul 17, In China’s Guangxi province the Lajiapo and Longshan mines flooded and 81 miners were killed. Immediate news was covered up. In Aug 20 company employees and 70 suspected gang members were arrested for the coverup. 11 mine officials and 4 county political leaders were arrested.
(SFC, 8/7/01, p.A7)(SFC, 8/15/01, p.A7)(SFC, 9/1/01, p.A10)(SFC, 9/1/01, p.A10)
2001 Jul 20, It was reported that China planned to buy 38 Russian Su-30 MKK ground attack jets worth $2 billion.
(SFC, 7/20/01, p.D4)
2001 Jul 24, A Chinese court sentenced two US residents to 10 years in prison on charges of spying for Taiwan. China released Gao Zhan and Qin Guangguang two days later.
(SFC, 7/25/01, p.A1)(AP, 7/24/02)
2001 Jul 28, US Sec. of State Colin Powell met with China’s Pres. Zemin and reached agreement to restart a formal dialogue with the US on human rights and weapons proliferation.
(SSFC, 7/29/01, p.A12)
2001 Aug 8, Four American Senators met with Pres. Jiang Zemin in China and warned him that the continued sales of sensitive missile technology would trigger an arms race and boost internal US support for a missile defense system.
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A10)
2001 Aug 9, It was reported that the US had decided to pay China $34,567 to cover the costs of the spy plane that was detained on Hainan island. China had asked for $1 million and rejected the offer.
(SFC, 8/10/01, p.A12)(SFC, 8/13/01, p.A12)
2001 Aug 10, China received its new $120 mil Boeing 767-300ER aircraft following retrofit in San Antonio, Tx. In Oct Chinese experts discovered high-tech listening devices hidden in the plane. Purchase of the plane was 1st announced in Aug 2000.
(SFC, 1/19/02, p.A4)
2001 Aug 14, In China Chen Qiulan, an arrested Falun Gong member, died of a heart attack at a detention center in Daqing, Hailongjiang.
(SFC, 9/1/01, p.A10)
2001 Aug 16, China said that it was spending $8.4 million to set aside forests in the southwest to help save some 1,000 remaining wild pandas.
(SFC, 8/17/01, p.A14)
2001 Aug 20, In China Wu Liangjie, an arrested Falun Gong member, died after falling from the window of a police office in Baicheng, Jilin province.
(SFC, 9/1/01, p.A10)
2001 Aug 21, It was reported that Chinese authorities had removed Khenpo Jigme Phuntsog (68), a Tibetan monk, from his Serthar religious academy in the Larung valley of Sichuan province. The move was seen as an effort to reduce the 6-7 thousand monks and nuns living in the area.
(SFC, 8/21/01, p.A7)
2001 Aug 23, It was reported that surveys had indicated that two-thirds of China’s 1.26 billion people were infected with hepatitis B.
(SFC, 8/23/01, p.A9)
2001 Aug 23, The Chinese government reported that some 600,000 people have been infected with AIDS with nearly as many from selling their blood as from sexual contact.
(SFC, 8/24/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 8/24/01, p.A1)
2001 Aug 23, Brian Regan (38), retired US Air Force master sergeant and cryptanalyst, was arrested by the FBI at Dulles Int’l. Airport on charges of spying. In 2002 Regan was accused of trying to spy for Iraq, Libya and China. On February 20, 2003, Regan was found guilty of three charges of attempted espionage including two counts of attempted espionage related to attempts to sell information to Iraq and China, and one count of gathering national defense information. He was acquitted of attempting to provide US secrets to Libya. On March 20, 2003, Regan was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
(http://cicentre.com/Documents/DOC_Regan_1.htm)(SFC, 8/29/01, p.A6)(WSJ, 2/15/02, p.A1)
2001 Sep 9, It was reported that some 3,000 people had been executed in China since Pres. Zemin announced a crackdown in April.
(SSFC, 9/9/01, p.A18)
2001 Sep 25, A Chinese captain went down with his freighter in the Taiwan Strait as Typhoon Lekima lashed the area.
(WSJ, 9/26/01, p.A1)
2001 Sep 28, In China Wu Jianmin, a Chinese-born American writer, was released from jail and expelled. The state media said he had confessed to his crimes of spying for Taiwan.
(SFC, 9/29/01, p.B1)
2001 Oct 10, In China a state court sentenced over a dozen key officials in Shenyang for corruption.
(SFC, 10/11/01, p.C2)
2001 Oct 12, China put limits on air travel to citizens of 19 countries, mainly in the Middle East.
(SFC, 10/13/01, p.A10)
2001 Oct 15, China executed 2 Muslim separatists in Yili, Xinjiang province.
(SFC, 10/18/01, p.C2)
2001 Oct 18, Pres. Bush arrived in China for the annual Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Shanghai. The agenda was economic development and trade liberalization.
(SFC, 10/18/01, p.A9)
2001 Nov 10, China officially joined the WTO after ministers in Qatar approved its membership.
(SSFC, 11/11/01, p.A14)
2001 Nov 11, Taiwan officially joined the WTO after ministers in Qatar approved its membership.
(SSFC, 11/11/01, p.A14)
2001 Nov 20, Chinese police on Tiananmen Square detained some 35 foreigners who protested the crackdown on the Falun Gong. The protesters were all expelled from the country.
(SFC, 11/21/01, p.A1)(SFC, 11/22/01, p.A21)
2001 Nov, China held its 1st national AIDS conference in Beijing.
(WSJ, 12/19/01, p.A12)
2001 Nov, China’s 4 largest producers of Vitamin C formed the Vitamin C Chapter of the China Chamber of Commerce of Medicines and Health Products.
(WSJ, 2/10/06, p.A16)
2001 Dec 13, The Beijing First Intermediate Court sentenced 6 people to prison for 3 to 12 years for downloading material from the Internet on the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement and passing it along.
(SFC, 12/24/01, p.A4)
2001 Dec 16, In China a weekend bombing killed 5 people.
(WSJ, 12/17/01, p.A1)
2001 Dec 27, Pres. Bush permanently normalized trade relations with China.
(WSJ, 12/28/01, p.A1)
2001 Ian Buruma authored "Bad Elements," a look at China’s dissidents, their convictions, and the country’s problems with self-identity.
(SFC, 11/26/01, p.A17)
2001 Gordon C. Chang authored "The Coming Collapse of China." He predicted that the People’s Republic would fall by the Olympic Games of 2008.
(WSJ, 8/8/01, p.A10)
2001 The ballet Raise the Red Lantern premiered in the spring. It was based on a 1991 film of the same name directed by Zhang Yimou.
(WSJ, 4/3/02, p.A16)
2001 A Chinese law prohibited medical institutions and personnel from performing gestational surrogacy services, in which an embryo created from a couple is implanted into another woman who carries the baby to term. In 2011 a couple spent nearly a million yuan ($160,000) and illegally enlisted two surrogate mothers to help have the four boys and four girls.
(AP, 12/30/11)
2001 In China Zhengzhou city in Henan province unveiled plans for a new city and hired Japanese architect Kisho Kurokawa to design Zhengdong New District and its main showcase buildings. Completion was scheduled for 2015 at a cost of $25 billion.
(Econ, 1/7/06, p.40)
2001 Amnesty Int’l. reported in 2002 that at least 3,048 people were executed in 31 countries in 2001. China accounted for at least 1,781. 90% of the executed were from China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the US.
(SFC, 4/10/02, p.A12)
2001 Shi Zhengrong, a Chinese solar engineer, started Suntech to manufacture solar cells. In 2005 it became the first Chinese solar firm to go public. By 2007 the company was the world’s 3rd largest in the field. In 2013 it went bankrupt.
(Econ, 6/2/07, SR p.16)(Econ, 3/30/13, p.68)
2001 There were some 720,000 passenger vehicles sold this year in China. Sales were expected to climb to 900,000 units in 2002.
(WSJ, 7/3/02, p.A9)
2001 Some 5,670 Chinese miners died in accidents in this year.
(SFC, 4/3/03, p.D1)
2002 Jan 3, Hu Jintao (59) was reported to be in line for the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party.
(WSJ, 1/3/02, p.A1)
2002 Jan 15, China reported that at least 50 miners were killed in 3 separate mine accidents.
(SFC, 1/16/02, p.A7)
2002 Jan 19, It was reported that China had imposed new Internet controls and required service providers to screen all e-mail messages for political content.
(SFC, 1/19/02, p.A4)
2002 Jan 23, It was reported that China was moving 17,000 settlers to a traditionally Tibetan region.
(WSJ, 1/23/02, p.A1)
2002 Jan 24, The US imposed sanctions on 3 Chinese entities accused of giving chemical and biological arms technology to Iran.
(WSJ, 1/25/02, p.A1)
2002 Jan 25, Chinese PM Zhu Rongji visited Bangalore and said: You are number one in software, and we are number one in hardware. If Indian software and Chinese hardware work together, we can create a force that will be number one in the world.
(SSFC, 1/27/02, p.A24)
2002 Jan 29, In China Xu Zerong (David Tsui), a Hong Kong-based historian, was sentenced to 13 years in prison for providing classified historical documents, pertaining to Chinese operations during the Korean war, to unspecified overseas parties. Zerong (57) was released on June 23, 2011, from Guangzhou Prison in southern Guangdong province's capital city.
(SSFC, 2/3/02, p.A17)(AP, 6/23/11)
2002 Feb 12-2002 Feb 13, The Chinese lunar calendar marked this as the new year, 4700, the Year of the Horse.
(SFC, 2/12/02, p.A14)
2002 Feb 14, In China 41 foreigners were arrested and later expelled following pro Falun Gong demonstrations on Tiananmen Square.
(SFC, 2/16/02, p.A14)
2002 Feb 20, President Bush, on the final leg of his Asian trip, arrived in China, where he urged President Jiang Zemin to respect religious freedoms.
(AP, 2/20/07)
2002 Feb 21, Pres. Bush met with Pres. Zemin in Beijing and both agreed to work on the reunification of North and South Korea. They disagreed over controls on exports of missile technology. Pres. Bush answered questions in a live broadcast and reaffirmed the US right to protect Taiwan.
(SFC, 2/21/02, p.A12)(SFC, 2/22/02, p.A12)(WSJ, 2/22/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 1, Laid-off workers of the Daqing Oilfield Co. began massive protests for re-negotiation of early retirement packages. Some 86,000 of 260,000 workers had been laid off since 1999. Daily protests hit as many as 50,000 workers.
(WSJ, 3/14/02, p.A1)(SFC, 3/20/02, p.A9)
2002 Mar 5, In China Falun Gong members cut into a cable network in Changchun and broadcast its messages for some 50 minutes.
(SFC, 3/8/02, p.A12)(WSJ, 3/8/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 6, China announced a 17.6% increase in defense spending.
(SFC, 3/7/02, p.A7)
2002 Mar 15, China allowed 25 North Korean asylum seekers to leave the Spanish Embassy in Beijing for South Korea by way of the Philippines.
(WSJ, 3/18/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 20, China deployed military police to at least 2 northeast cities to quell labor protests.
(WSJ, 3/21/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 30, It was reported that a massive dust storm spread from northwest China to South Korea. It was largest recorded since records began 130 years ago. Trans Pacific winds carried the dust clouds west.
(SFC, 3/30/02, p.A20)
2002 Apr 6, It was reported that China’s Jilin province was experiencing its worst drought in 20 years. Some 5 million acres were affected and dry soil reached a depth of 7 feet. Shandong province was also affected.
(SFC, 4/6/02, p.C10)
2002 Apr 11, China reported that some 850,000 people were infected with AIDS at the end of 2001.
(SFC, 4/12/02, p.A8)
2002 Apr 15, In South Korea an Air China jet Boeing 767, CA-129, with some 166 passengers crashed into a mountain near Kimhae. 122 people died in the crash.
(SFC, 4/15/02, p.A3)(SFC, 4/16/02, p.A7)(AP, 4/15/07)
2002 Apr 27, China’s VP Hu Jintao (59), heir apparent, stopped in Hawaii on his way to meet with Pres. Bush.
(WSJ, 4/29/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 28, China’s VP Hu Jintao (59), heir apparent, rang the bell at the NY Stock Exchange and viewed ground zero.
(WSJ, 4/30/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr, There was a bomb blast in Chengdu, China. Tibetan monks Lobsang Dhondup (28) and Tenzin Deleg Rinpoche were detained. Dhondup was executed Jan 27, 2003.
(SFC, 1/28/03, p.A6)
2002 May 1, China’s VP Hu Jintao met with Pres. Bush. Jintao said the Taiwan issue could hurt relations and defended China’s record on human rights.
(WSJ, 5/2/02, p.A1)
2002 May 2, China’s VP Hu Jintao met with Mayor Brown in SF and set a visit to Intel prior to his departure back to China.
(SFC, 5/3/02, p.A8)
2002 May 4, Two explosions killed at 34 miners in China’s Guizhou and Hunan provinces.
(SFC, 5/8/02, p.A13)
2002 May 7, A China Northern Airlines with 112 people crashed off the northeast coast. Flight 6136 was an MD-82 enroute from Beijing to Dalian. Xinhua news later reported that it was due to an act of sabotage by a passenger who lit a fire on board.
(SFC, 5/8/02, p.A15)(Reuters, 12/7/02)
2002 May 16, The state phone industry was divided into 2 competing parts: China Telecom and China Netcom.
(WSJ, 5/16/02, p.A12)
2002 May 30, It was reported that China was embarking on a program to inoculate its poorest people against hepatitis. Half of the population was reported to have had the disease with 120 million long term carriers.
(WSJ, 5/30/02, p.A1)
2002 Jun 12, In China more than 200 people have died in some of the worst flooding in years. Crops were destroyed and vast areas were under water.
(AP, 6/12/02)
2002 Jun 13, In China at least 223 were reported dead and 320,000 homeless from Xinjiang to Hubei provinces following weekend rains and flooding.
(SFC, 6/14/02, p.A16)
2002 Jun 16, In China at least 24 people were killed and 13 injured when a fire swept through the packed Lanjisu Cyber cafe in a university district of Beijing, in the city's worst fire since 1949. Windows were barred and the only door was locked. The unlicensed owner was arrested.
(Reuters, 6/16/02)(SFC, 6/17/02, p.A7)
2002 Jun 20, A gas explosion ripped through the Chengzihe coal mine in Jixi in northeast China and killed 111 miners.
(Reuters, 6/20/02)
2002 Jun 22, In China an explosion at a gold mine in Fanshi County, Shanxi, killed 46 miners. An initial cover-up was attempted.
(SFC, 6/29/02, p.A14)(SFC, 7/2/02, p.A8)
2002 Jun 26, Chinese basketball star Yao Ming was selected first overall by the Houston Rockets in the NBA draft.
(AP, 6/26/03)
2002 Jun 28, In China it was reported that at least 46 people were killed in the northern province of Shanxi when an electrical fire ignited explosives in a gold mine.
(Reuters, 6/28/02)
2002 Jul 3, Chinese police found Wang Bingzhang, a pro-democracy activist and US resident, in Guangxi Province. He had been recently kidnapped with 2 others in Vietnam.
(SFC, 12/21/02, p.A10)
2002 Jul 4, In China a blast in the Fuqiang mine in Songshu trapped 39 miners. There was little hope for survivors.
(SFC, 7/6/02, p.A14)
2002 Jul 7, In southern China 13 people were killed when a wall being demolished at a vegetable market crumbled after heavy rain, burying vendors and workers under a mound of rubble.
(Reuters, 7/7/02)
2002 Jul 8, In China a gas explosion at a coal mine killed 44 miners at the Dingsheng mine in northeastern Heilongjiang province.
(Reuters, 7/9/02)(SFC, 7/9/02, p.A10)
2002 Jul 12, Chinese officials reported that nearly 1,000 schoolchildren in northeast China were rushed to hospital after being vaccinated in late June for encephalitis and two senior officials were arrested and charged with negligence.
(Reuters, 7/12/02)
2002 Jul 19, In central China a downpour of giant hailstones, some the size of eggs, killed 15 people and left hospitals overflowing with head-wound victims.
(Reuters, 7/20/02)
2002 Jul 20, The number of Japanese who have died after taking diet pills imported from China has risen to four and 124 have fallen ill, Kyodo news agency reported quoting a Health Ministry report.
(Reuters, 7/20/02)
2002 Jul 25, Chinese police have formally arrested Liu Xiaoqing, one of the country's most famous film stars and 2-time winner of the prestigious Hundred Flowers Best Actress award, on suspicion of large-scale tax evasion. Liu was queen of Chinese cinema in the 1980s and is best remembered for playing Qing Dynasty Empress Dowager Cixi in the film "The Reign Behind the Curtain."
(Reuters, 7/25/02)
2002 Jul 26, It was reported that the regional Chinese governments of Tibet, Sichuan and Yunnan had agreed to develop an area to be called "The China Shangri-La Ecological Tourist Zone" across 50 counties next to Meili Snow Mountain.
(SFC, 7/26/02, p.A15)
2002 Aug 8, The Chinese government awarded an Australian consortium a 25-year natural gas supply contract in Australia's biggest-ever foreign trade deal.
(AP, 8/8/02)
2002 Aug 9, China reported 70 people dead from landslides and flooding in Hunan province.
(SFC, 8/10/02, p.A9)
2002 Aug 10, In China rescue crews pulled the bodies of 7 workers from a flooded mine in the central Chinese province of Henan. One more was recovered the next day.
(AP, 8/11/02)
2002 Aug 10, China’s Science and Technology Daily reported approval of a home-grown AIDS drug for the first time that will end the dependence of Chinese with the disease on imported medicine. Jiduo Fuding was developed by the Northeast General Pharmaceutical Factory.
(Reuters, 8/10/02)
2002 Aug 14, In southwest China a massive wall of mud and rock unleashed by heavy rains slammed into villages, burying 67 people in the second deadly landslide to strike the area this week.
(Reuters, 8/16/02)
2002 Aug 17, In China 3 days of floods and landslides caused by mountain torrents swept through southeastern Zhejiang province, killing at least 21 people.
(Reuters, 8/17/02)
2002 Aug 22, China evacuated some 600,000 people around the swollen Lake Dongting in Hunan province.
(WSJ, 8/23/02, p.A1)
2002 Sep 3, Russia and China gave their backing to the Kyoto Protocol on cutting greenhouse-gas emissions.
(AP, 9/3/02)(WSJ, 9/4/02, p.A1)
2002 Sep 4, China reported that flooding had killed 1,532 people this year.
(SFC, 9/5/02, p.A11)
2002 Sep 8, In southeast China typhoon Sinlaku was weakening as it churned inland after triggering fierce winds and heavy rain that killed 23 people, toppled homes and uprooted trees.
(Reuters, 9/8/02)
2002 Sep 14, In China 38 (49) people died and hundreds were hospitalized with food poisoning after eating breakfast snacks, sesame cakes, fried dough sticks and fried glutinous rice balls, in the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing. A man jealous of a business rival later confessed to spiking his competitor's breakfast snacks with rat poison. The man was convicted and sentenced to execution.
(Reuters, 9/14/02)(Reuters, 9/17/02)(WSJ, 9/17/02, p.A1)(WSJ, 10/1/02, p.A1)
2002 Sep 19, North Korea announced it had made the city of Sinuiju on its border with China a "special administrative region," a move South Korean media said was the first step towards creating a new economic zone. The project was soon mothballed after its first governor, Yang Bin, was jailed in China for tax evasion. Yang Bin was formally sentenced in July 2003 for 18 years, and was fined for 2.3 million renminbi.
(Reuters, 9/19/02)(Econ, 10/2/10, p.45)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yang_Bin)
2002 Sep 23, In Inner Mongolia, China, a staircase guardrail gave way at a school, killing 21 students.
(Reuters, 9/24/02)
2002 Sep 30, The National Intelligence Council said China, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria and Russia will have 50-75 million HIV-infected people by 2010, more than any other 5 countries.
(SFC, 10/1/02, p.A5)
2002 Oct 3, Wu-chi Liu (95), China-born scholar, died in Menlo Park, Ca. His books included "A Short History of Confucian Philosophy" and "An Introduction to Chinese Literature." He was also the senior editor of "Sunflower Splendor," an anthology that encompassed 3,000 years of Chinese poetry in translation.
(SFC, 10/18/02, p.A26)
2002 Oct 10, China sent Zhu Xiaohua (53), its most senior financial official nabbed for corruption, to jail for 15 years, but spared him the executioner's bullet after he confessed to taking bribes prosecutors knew nothing about.
(AP, 10/10/02)
2002 Oct 20, Yao Ming (22), a 7-foot-5 basketball player from China, arrived in Texas to join the Houston Rockets.
(WSJ, 10/22/02, p.A1)
2002 Oct 23, In China rescuers fought to save 29 miners trapped underground after a coal mine explosion in the northern province of Shanxi killed 21. China's death toll from mining accidents up to July this year was 3,620, up 4.8 percent from a year earlier
(AP, 10/25/02)(Reuters, 10/26/02)
2002 Oct 28, It was reported that 200 farms in China tap 7,000 live, caged bears for their bile in an excruciating process. Owners slice into the bears to milk bile from their gall bladder with a tube. Bear bile is viewed as a panacea in traditional Chinese medicine. Many bears do not survive the initial operation and few live longer than 10 years, less than half the average life expectancy.
(Reuters, 10/28/02)
2002 Oct 29, China and the United States have agreed to resume military-to-military ties with plans to hold talks at senior level in the near future.
(AP, 10/29/02)
2002 Nov 4, China signed a landmark agreement, “Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea," with ASEAN (Brunei, Malaysia, Philippines, Vietnam) on avoiding open conflict in the disputed South China Sea Spratly Islands. Indonesia objected and Taiwan was barred from signing.
(Reuters, 11/4/02)(Econ, 5/22/04, p.40)(www.aseansec.org/13163.htm)
2002 Nov 5, China finished blocking the Yangtze River at the Three Gorges Dam, paving the way for the world's biggest hydroelectricity and flood control project to come on stream next year.
(Reuters, 11/6/02)
2002 Nov 5, The ASEAN group (Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Brunei, Thailand and Myanmar) ended a 2-day conference in Cambodia that was also attended by representatives from China, Japan, and India and South Africa.
(AP, 11/5/02)
2002 Nov 8, China's President Jiang Zemin opened the Communist Party to businessmen to preserve its grip on power as he kicked off a congress at which his generation of leaders is due to retire.
(Reuters, 11/8/02)(Econ, 3/10/07, p.9)
2002 Nov 12, China's Communist Party congress held a preliminary vote for a new crop of leaders expected to replace President Jiang Zemin and other party chieftains this week.
(Reuters, 11/12/02)
2002 Nov 13, Delegates to China's Communist Party Congress confirmed that Jiang Zemin would step down as party chief and make way for a new generation of leaders this week.
(AP, 11/13/02)
2002 Nov 14, Chinese Communist Party chief Jiang Zemin ushered in a new generation of leaders under Hu Jintao in the first orderly succession since the party took power in 1949.
(Reuters, 11/14/02)
2002 Nov 15, Hu Jintao replaced Jiang Zemin as China's Communist Party leader.
(AP, 11/15/03)
2002 Nov 27, China arrested flamboyant flower magnate Yang Bin (39), a Dutch national, on charges of fraud and other commercial crimes, just two months after North Korea named him head of a new free-trade enclave.
(AP, 11/27/02)
2002 Dec 2, In Beijing Russia’s Pres. Putin and Jiang Zemin signed a 13-page declaration calling for a "multi-polar" world and peaceful solutions in Iraq and North Korea.
(SFC, 12/3/02, p.A8)
2002 Dec 3, Shanghai will host the 2010 World Exposition after bidding fiercely to organize an event expected to fuel millions of dollars of investment, Expo officials announced in Monaco.
(Reuters, 12/3/02)
2002 Dec 7, Entertainment giant Vivendi Universal signed an agreement to build a Universal Studios theme park in booming Shanghai, beating much-fancied Walt Disney Co to the punch.
(Reuters, 12/7/02)
2002 Dec 24, Chinese pro-democracy activist Xu Wenli was released from a prison in Beijing and flown to the United States.
(AP, 12/24/03)
2002 Dec 30, China launched its Shenzhou IV spacecraft in a test launch to prepare for manned space voyages.
(SFC, 12/30/02, p.A8)
2002 Dec 31, In China a German-designed magnetic-levitation train hit 260 mph on its maiden run between Shanghai and Pudong airport.
(SFC, 1/1/03, p.A10)
2002 Dec, China signed a preliminary agreement with Indonesia aimed at halting the trade in illegal logs.
(WSJ, 12/23/03, p.A12)
2002 Dec, In Guangdong province up to 26 people were killed and 100 injured following a tornado and severe hailstorm.
(SFC, 12/28/02, p.A24)
2002 China banned the novel "K: The Art of Love" by Chen Hongying following a lawsuit by a British woman who said the book insulted her late parents. The book was based on letters and journals of Julian Bell (d.1937), a nephew of Virginia Woolf, and his affair with poet named Lin.
(SFC, 12/13/02, p.K2)
2002 Chinese writer Jiang Benhu (b.1964), a former member of the intelligence services, authored “Jiemi" under the pseudonym Mai Jia. In 2014 it was translated into English under the title “Decoded."
(Econ, 3/22/14, p.84)
2002 Adeline Yen Mah authored "A Thousand Pieces of Gold: A Memoir of China’s Past Through Its Proverbs."
(SSFC, 11/3/02, p.M1)
2002 Andrew J. Nathan and Bruce Gilley authored "China's New Rulers." A 2nd edition was published in 2004.
(Econ, 3/27/04, p.82)
2002 David Sheff authored "China Dawn," a close-up look at the young men building Internet infrastructure in China.
(WSJ, 3/12/02, p.A24)
2002 Joe Studwell authored "The China Dream," the story of American business woes in China over the last 700 years.
(WSJ, 3/19/02, p.A20)
2002 China and ASEAN agreed to a China-ASEAN free-trade area to be implemented in stages up to 2015.
(Econ, 3/31/07, SR p.8)
2002 Apr 23, China’s state security bureau requested information from Yahoo! about the creator of an online forum. Yahoo! complied with the notice and another one and authorities soon detained democracy activist Wang Xiaoning. Mr. Wang (62) was released on Aug 31, 2012.
(Economist, 9/8/12, p.42)
2002 In China the International Trade City Mall opened in Zhejiang province. The giant 4-story mall had 30,000 stores across 18 million square feet, the equivalent of 350 football fields.
(SFC, 12/8/06, p.A31)
2002 China began constructing a $3.2 billion railroad to Tibet, to be completed in 2007.
(SFC, 11/5/03, p.A13)
2002 China announced a $5.25 billion East-West natural gas project. A Western consortium backed out in 2004.
(WSJ, 8/4/04, p.A11)
2002 Citigroup paid $70 million for a 4.6% stake in Shanghai Pudong Development, China’s 8th largest bank. In 2006 it pushed to raise the stake to 19.9%.
(Econ, 5/20/06, Survey p.21)
2002 Bankers looted some $483 million from the Bank of China in the southern Guangdong province and then fled the country.
(WSJ, 8/4/03, p.A1)
2002 China took over its whole portion of the Internet naming system as part of its program to control Internet access.
(WSJ, 2/13/06, p.A9)
2002 Tencent Holdings PLC, a Chinese Internet company, designed a virtual currency payment system for users in its virtual world. The system caught on and users began trading it at a discount to the yuan. In 2007 Chinese ministries and the central bank waged a crackdown on the QQ coin in order to prevent money laundering.
(WSJ, 3/30/07, p.B1)
2002 In Taiwan a language Romanization system known as tongyong pinyim was introduced. The Chinese favored the hanyu pinyim phonetic system developed in the 1950s.
(Econ, 6/7/14, p.46)
2002 China's exports totaled $325 billion.
(Econ, 12/20/03, p.98)
2002 China surpassed the US as Taiwan's top trading partner.
(WSJ, 4/20/04, p.A18)
2002 China surpassed the US to become the world's largest beer market by volume.
(WSJ, 3/10/04, p.A1)(WSJ, 3/904, p.A1)
2002 Nissan launched a joint effort in China with car manufacturer Dongfeng.
(Econ, 6/12/10, p.71)
2002 Official Chinese statistics said some 7,000 miners died in accidents in this year.
(SFC, 4/3/03, p.D1)
2002 A UN analysis of timber statistics for 2002 showed China's reported import of logs from Indonesia to be 200 times higher that the figures reported by Indonesian customs.
(WSJ, 12/23/03, p.A12)
2003 Jan 5, Chinese media reported that an unmanned Chinese space capsule had returned safely to Earth.
(AP, 1/5/04)
2003 Jan 11, In northern China an explosion ripped through a coal mine, leaving 34 people missing a day after a blast in a neighboring province killed 8 miners.
(AP, 1/11/03)
2003 Jan 20, In northeast China a gas explosion tore through a coal mine, killing 16 workers at a facility in the same city where another blast killed scores of miners last year.
(AP, 1/21/03)
2003 Jan 28, A Chinese company began distributing generic drugs for an anti-AIDS cocktail.
(SFC, 1/29/03, p.A5)
2003 Jan, China ended a "100-day campaign" to hunt down North Korean refugees. 3,200 were deported and another 1,300 awaited deportation. A Christian sponsored underground railroad reportedly helped some 300,000 North Koreans escape their homeland.
(SFC, 2/15/03, p.A14)
2003 Jan-2003 Dec, In China there were more than 58,000 protests, many of them over land rights disputes, across the country.
(Reuters, 6/29/05)
2003 Feb 1, The Lunar Chinese New Year 4701, the Year of the Ram, began.
(SFC, 1/31/03, p.A23)
2003 Feb 2, In northeastern China, fire tore through the Tiantan Hotel Harbin, killing 33 people at the start of Chinese New Year.
(AP, 2/2/03)
2003 Feb 9, In China Xinhua’s first SARS report was issued for leaders’ eyes only. By this time there were already some 300 cases and 5 deaths dating back to November 2002.
(Econ, 6/19/10, p.43)
2003 Feb 9, In China state media reported that scientists had discovered a massive underground lake, some 35 billion cubic feet, in the arid northwest beneath the Taklamakan desert.
(AP, 2/9/03)
2003 Feb 10, A Chinese court convicted U.S.-based dissident Wang Bingzhang on spying and terrorism charges and sentenced him to life in prison.
(AP, 2/10/04)
2003 Feb 11, From China it was reported that an unidentified illness, 1st noted in Nov., has killed at least five people in Guangdong province, left hundreds hospitalized and sent health officials scrambling to find its source.
(AP, 2/11/03)
2003 Feb 11, In China Ma Sanli (b.1914), a master performer of the traditional Chinese art of crosstalk, a rhythmic, often humorous mix of dialogue and storytelling, died.
(AP, 2/11/03)
2003 Feb 19, China outlined plans for an enormous, 30-50 year project to carry water from the country’s water-saturated south to its arid north. The project was 1st conceived by Mao Zedong in the 1950s.
(AP, 2/19/03)(SSFC, 9/5/04, p.A16)
2003 Feb 24, In China accidents in 3 coal mines killed at least 49 miners and left 10 others missing.
(AP, 2/25/03)
2003 Feb 24, A devastating earthquake shook western China, killing at least 268 people, injuring some 2,000 and flattening homes, schools and other buildings near the Silk Road oasis of Kashgar. The death toll soon rose to at least 266 people, with another 2,000 injured.
(SFC, 2/26/03, A8)(AP, 2/25/04)
2003 Feb 25, China issued its first group of long-term residency permits to 46 foreigners, letting them live in the country for up to five years.
(AP, 2/25/03)
2003 Mar 6, The Chinese government committed itself to helping its poorest citizens, unveiling a new budget aimed at helping the countryside and maintaining growth. Defense was budgeted a 9.3% rise, the lowest in 14 years, and plans were made to abolish the agency in charge of five-year plans.
(AP, 3/6/03)(SFC, 3/6/03, p.A14)(WSJ, 3/6/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 15, Hu Jintao was chosen to replace Jiang Zemin as the president of China.
(AP, 3/15/04)
2003 Mar 16, In China Wen Jiaboa (60) replaced Zhu Rongji as premier.
(SFC, 3/16/03, p.A16)
2003 Mar 17, Chinese police found 28 baby girls hidden in suitcases aboard a long-distance bus in southern Guangxi, apparently being smuggled for sale. Police later arrested 10 people involved in the scheme.
(AP, 3/22/03)(WSJ, 3/24/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 19, Doctors in Hong Kong reportedly identified the deadly pneumonia virus as belonging to the paramyxoviridae family. The severe acute respiratory illness (SARS) had killed at least 11 people and left hundreds ill. The outbreak is believed to have began in southern China in November. Later reports held that it could be a coronavirus, part of a group that cause the common cold. Many people treated with corticosteroids later developed an irreversible bone disease called avascular necrosis. By July 12, 2003, SARS killed 812 people worldwide.
(SFC, 3/15/03, p.A8)(SFC, 1/19/02, p.A4)(WSJ, 4/3/03, p.B1)(WSJ, 12/23/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 20, China demanded that military action against Iraq stop immediately and said the initial attack was "violating the norms of international behavior."
(AP, 3/20/03)
2003 Mar 22, A gas explosion killed 28 people and trapped 45 others in a coal mine in northern China.
(AP, 3/22/03)
2003 Mar 30, Students in China staged a rare state-sanctioned protest as hundreds of thousands around the world staged another day of rallies denouncing the US led war in Iraq.
(AP, 3/30/03)
2003 Apr 4, Chinese experts in hard-hit Guangdong province told the scientists they have found a rare form of airborne chlamydia in some of their SARS patients, raising the possibility that more than one germ may be involved. Other Chinese cases suggest the disease might be passed by touching something tainted by a sick person's mucous or saliva.
(AP, 4/5/03)
2003 Apr 6, In eastern China a fire roared through a food processing plant, killing 21 workers.
(AP, 4/6/03)
2003 Apr 9, China closed the People's Armed Police Hospital in Beijing due to SARS.
(SFC, 4/26/03, A3)
2003 Apr 11, Amnesty International said at least 1,526 people were executed worldwide last year, with 80 percent of all known executions carried out in China (1,060), Iran (113) and the United States (71).
(Reuters, 4/11/03)
2003 Apr 16, US, Chinese and North Korean officials announced talks in Beijing to try to resolve standoff over North's nuclear program.
(AP, 4/24/03)
2003 Apr 16, SARS deaths totaled some 154 with at least 3,412 affected in 22 countries. A World Health Organization team disclosed that there were unreported cases of the SARS virus in Beijing's military hospitals and that investigators have been barred from releasing details.
(SFC, 4/16/03, p.A3)(AP, 4/17/03)
2003 Apr 20, After reporting a nearly tenfold increase in SARS cases in the capital, China announced the sacking of its top health official and the capital's mayor from key Communist Party positions. The number of infections in Beijing soared from 37 to 346.
(AP, 4/20/03)
2003 Apr 21, China (13) and Hong Kong (6) reported 19 new deaths from SARS.
(SFC, 4/22/03, A3)
2003 Apr 23, Beijing closed all its primary and secondary schools until at least May 7 due to the SARS epidemic.
(SFC, 4/23/03, A16)
2003 Apr 23, A Chinese fuel tanker, "Daqing 767" carrying a 1000 tons of oil, sank and 3 crew members were missing after the vessel collided in heavy fog with another ship off China's southeastern coast.
(AP, 4/24/03)
2003 Apr 24, China shut down a major hospital in Beijing and put more than 2,000 employees under observation for severe acute respiratory syndrome. The global death toll from SARS surpassed 260
(AP, 4/24/04)
2003 Apr 25, Nuclear talks in Beijing ended after U.S. officials said North Korea claimed to have nuclear weapons and might test, export or use them.
(AP, 4/25/03)
2003 Apr 25, Beijing reported 180 new SARS infections and 5 deaths. Some 2,000 people at the People's and Ditan Hospitals were quarantined.
(SFC, 4/26/03, A3)
2003 Apr 26, Health ministers from across east Asia came up with a joint plan to fight SARS during a meeting, and hundreds of medical workers in Beijing were forced to sleep in their offices because of hospital-wide quarantines. The death toll climbed to 122 and a new 1,000-bed Beijing hospital was built in 5 days.
(AP, 4/26/03)(SSFC, 4/27/03, A1)
2003 Apr 27, In China's central Hunan province a wagon overturned and tumbled into a gully, killing 16 people and injuring seven others. In Beijing theaters, cafés and karaoke bars were closed as 126 new SARS cases were reported. Total confirmed cases in China rose to 2,914 with 131 deaths. 26 of China's 31 provinces were infected.
(AP, 4/27/03)(WSJ, 4/28/03, A1)(SFC, 4/28/03, A1)
2003 Aug 27, The US and North Korea held direct talks for the first time in months, meeting for a half-hour on the sidelines of a six-nation summit in Beijing designed to resolve the standoff over Pyongyang's nuclear program.
(AP, 8/27/03)
2003 Apr 29, China reported 9 more deaths and more than 200 new cases, most of them in the capital Beijing.
(AP, 4/29/03)
2003 May 2, China reported an accident on a diesel-powered submarine that killed all 70 sailors aboard.
(AP, 5/2/03)
2003 May 5, China said there were 160 new infections and 9 new deaths, similar to totals in the past several days. It has now recorded 4,280 cases, the bulk of the world's total. Beijing closed its schools for another 2 weeks.
(AP, 5/5/03)(WSJ, 5/5/03, p.A1)
2003 May 13, In eastern China a gas explosion ripped through a coal mine, killing at least 63 miners and leaving 23 others missing 1,500 feet underground.
(AP, 5/14/03)
2003 May 15, China threatened possible execution or jail sentences for people who cause death or injury by deliberately spreading SARS.
(WSJ, 5/16/03, p.A1)
2003 May 17, In southern China heavy rainstorms caused flooding killing 45 people and causing millions of dollars in damage to homes and crops.
(AP, 5/20/03)
2003 May 23, Researchers from China and Hong Kong identified a coronavirus in 3 wild mammals, palm civets, a raccoon dog and a ferret badger, sold in the live-animal food markets of South China.
(SFC, 5/24/03, p.A1)
2003 May 20, In northern China a powerful gas explosion at the Yongtai mine, an unlicensed coal mine, killed 25 miners.
(AP, 5/26/03)
2003 May 23, Flooding in a coal mine in central China trapped 15 miners,
(AP, 5/26/03)
2003 May 24, In China Chen Yongfeng (20), was arrested in Wenzhou on charges of killing and dismembering 10 people, who had made their living picking through garbage.
(AP, 5/30/03)
2003 May 26, China's Pres. Hu Jintao arrived in Moscow for talks with Pres. Putin.
(SFC, 5/27/03, p.A12)
2003 May 28, China’s President Hu Jintao called for a "multipolar world" and a strategic partnership with Russia to counter US dominance, and oil executives signed a preliminary deal for pipeline to carry Siberian oil to China.
(AP, 5/29/03)
2003 May 31, In St. Petersburg, Russia, Japanese PM Junichiro Koizumi and Hu Jintao, the new president of China, agreed in a summit to work at defusing tensions over North Korea.
(AP, 5/31/03)
2003 May 31, A Chinese freighter sank in the Baltic Sea. It carried 66,000 tons of fertilizer and leaked over 55,270 gallons of diesel oil. Some 38,000 gallons were recovered.
(SFC, 6/3/03, p.A3)
2003 May, In China’s Jingbian County, Shaanxi province, authorities moved to confiscate some 1,600 privately held oil wells following orders from the central government. Tens of thousands of investors had stakes in over 4,000 oil wells valued at about $850 million. A county-run company took over oil production and in 2005 struck a deal with Yanchang, a regional state-owned company to assume control.
(Econ, 8/4/12, p.39)
2003 May, Sun Dawu, owner of an agricultural conglomerate in China’s Xushui county, was arrested for illegally accepting deposits from local residents. Mr. Sun had recently accused rural state-owned banks of financial oppression and kickbacks. He was convicted in October and given a 3-year suspended sentence and a fine of $12,000.
(Econ, 1/3/04, p.26)
2003 Jun 1, China began filling the reservoir behind its gargantuan Three Gorges Dam, a major step toward completion of the world's largest hydroelectric project.
(AP, 6/1/03)
2003 Jun 6, In southern China a coach bus drove off a highway and plunged into a river, killing 12 people.
(AP, 6/6/03)
2003 Jun 7, In southern China 13 school children were reported missing after their ferry sank in rapids on the Qingshui River in Guizhou province.
(AP, 6/8/03)
2003 Jun 8, China began building one of the world's longest bridges. The 22-mile, $1.4 billion bridge across Hangzhou Bay, linking Shanghai to the port of Ningbo, was set for completion in 2009.
(AP, 6/9/03)(SFC, 7/9/03, p.A16)
2003 Jun 20, China said it will move 42,000 soldiers to civilian jobs this year as part of efforts to shrink the world's largest military.
(AP, 6/20/03)
2003 Jun 23, India's PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee, making the first visit to China by a leader of his nation in a decade, told his Premier Wen Jiabao that he hoped for friendship and trust between the nuclear-armed former rivals.
(AP, 6/23/03)
2003 Jun 24, The WHO lifted its warning against travel to Beijing due to SARS.
(SFC, 6/25/03, p.A7)
2003 Jun 29, Hong Kong and China signed a free-trade agreement, the Closer Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA).
(AP, 6/29/03)(Econ, 6/30/07, SR p.11)
2003 Jun, China began a new $15.7 billion investment fund as an alternative to its dilapidated pension system.
(WSJ, 8/26/03, p.C1)
2003 Jul 4, Landslides in central China caused by torrential rains killed 21 people as river waters ran at their highest level in more than a decade,
(AP, 7/6/03)
2003 Jul 4, A coal mine explosion in northeastern China killed 22 people and injured 6 others.
(AP, 7/6/03)
2003 Jul 11, In China a mudslide left 50 people missing in Sichuan province.
(AP, 7/13/03)
2003 Jul 14, In China Yang Bin (40), a Chinese-born Dutch citizen, was convicted of fraud and bribery and sentenced to 18 years in prison. The orchid-selling tycoon was once ranked by Forbes magazine as China's second-richest businessman.
(AP, 7/14/03)(SFC, 7/15/03, p.A11)
2003 Jul 14, In China a mountain on a tributary of the Three Gorges gave way killing 13 farmers. A large tongue of land was sheered into the water and a resulting wave crashed over 20 boats killing 11 fisherman.
(WSJ, 8/29/07, p.A12)
2003 Jul 19, In southern China a bus plunged more than 300 feet off a cliff, killing 23 people.
(AP, 7/21/03)
2003 Jul 21, In southwest China a magnitude-6.2 earthquake toppled thousands of mud-brick houses in a mountainous area, killing at least 16 people and injuring more than 300 others.
(AP, 7/22/03)
2003 Jul 28, In northern China a blast ripped through a fireworks factory in Wangkou, killing 29 people and injuring at least 141.
(AP, 7/29/03)
2003 Jul, China's foreign reserves reached a record $356 billion.
(Econ, 8/30/03, p.54)
2003 Jul, China said that newspapers run by county level governments and Communist Party committees would be axed by the end of September except for those with an advertising revenue of over 4m yuan ($480,000) annually.
(Econ, 10/4/03, p.42)
2003 Aug 4, In China’s Qiqihar city one person died and 43 people were injured after construction workers broke open several barrels of World War II mustard gas abandoned by Japanese troops. In 2010 a Tokyo court rejected compensation claims by a group of Chinese plaintiffs, who demanded the Japanese government pay 1.43 billion yen ($16 million) in damages.
(www.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2003-08/12/content_254104.htm)(AP, 5/24/10)
2003 Aug 11, In northern China a gas explosion ripped through a coal mine, killing at least 33 miners and leaving nine missing.
(AP, 8/12/03)
2003 Aug 13, Chinese researchers reported that they had created hybrid embryos of human and rabbit DNA as a source for stem cells.
(SFC, 8/14/03, p.A3)
2003 Aug 18, In Shanxi province, China, there was a gas explosion in a coal mine where 27 miners were working. At least 25 were killed.
(AP, 8/20/03)
2003 Aug 22, In northern China a bus swerving to avoid an oil truck ran off a highway and plunged into a ravine, killing 27 people.
(AP, 8/23/03)
2003 Aug 26, A hidden cache of fireworks exploded in a town in China's southeast, killing at least 20 people in the 2nd such disaster to strike the same county in one month.
(AP, 8/27/03)
2003 Sep 1, State media reported that China will cut an additional 200,000 soldiers as part of efforts to modernize its armed forces.
(AP, 9/1/03)
2003 Sep 2, Typhoon Dujuan slammed into the southern Chinese coastal city of Shenzhen, killing at least 20 people and causing extensive damage to parts of the country's showcase economic development zone.
(AP, 9/3/03)
2003 Sep 2, The official Xinhua News Agency reported that heavy flooding in northern China has killed 38 people with another 34 people missing since Aug 24.
(AP, 9/2/03)
2003 Sep 2, In Inner Mongolia a locust plague, Oedaleus decorus asiaticus, was reported to have affected some 47 million acres of grasslands.
(WSJ, 9/2/03, p.A1)
2003 Sep 2, Two South China tigers, the first ever to leave the country, arrived in South Africa as part of a project to save the endangered species.
(AP, 9/3/03)
2003 Sep 3, In China Typhoon Dujuan killed at least 32 people.
(WSJ, 9/4/03, p.A1)
2003 Sep 23, China signed agreements with Russia and four Central Asian neighbors (Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan) in an effort to strengthen a 7-year-old security alliance and encourage economic links across a largely undeveloped region.
(AP, 9/23/03)
2003 Sep, The Chinese government permitted US educators and a British prep school to operate a school for kindergarten and high school students. A ban on foreign-run elementary and middle schools remained in force.
(SFC, 12/26/03, p.D1)
2003 Sep, Wal-Mart opened a superstore in Namchang, China, and over 100,000 jammed the aisles. The company 1st entered China in 1996 through a joint-venture agreement.
(WSJ, 10/17/05, p.A1)(www.wal-martchina.com/english/walmart/history.htm)
2003 Oct 1, In China new rules took effect that eliminate a requirement for couples to get the permission of their employers before they tie the knot.
(AP, 10/1/03)
2003 Oct 8, China was reported to have taken the first step toward recognizing the Himalayan territory of Sikkim as a part of India, resolving a long-standing border dispute. Sikkim, located between Nepal and the kingdom of Bhutan, was an independent principality before it was annexed by India in 1975.
(AP, 10/8/03)
2003 Oct 9, In central China an underground flood in a coal mine trapped 18 miners.
(AP, 10/10/03)
2003 Oct 11, In China the 16th Communist Party Congress began in Beijing. The 4-day meeting included debates on reforms toward private property, a more stable legal system and measures to encourage private investments.
(SSFC, 10/11/03, p.A3)
2003 Oct 12, In China Ma Yong (43), was arrested and accused of robbing and killing 12 women in southern China over a five-month period, preying on job seekers in the boomtown of Shenzhen. Duan Zhiqun (20), his female partner, was arrested Oct 23.
(AP, 11/11/03)
2003 Oct 12, In southern China an explosion in a coal mine killed 7 miners, while the bodies of 4 miners killed in an underground flood were pulled from a shaft in a central province.
(AP, 10/12/03)
2003 Oct 14, China's ruling communists closed a secretive 4-day meeting aimed at pushing ahead with market reforms and said a revision to the country's constitution had been endorsed.
(AP, 10/14/03)
2003 Oct 15, In China Shenzhou 5 launched into orbit with air force Lt. Col. Yang Liwei (38) aboard, making China the third nation to put a human in space on its own, after the former Soviet Union and the United States. The launch was made from the space center at Jiuquan. His capsule landed in Mongolia the next day.
(AP, 10/15/03)(SFC, 10/16/03, p.A3)(SSFC, 7/15/07, p.D5)(Econ, 10/24/09, SR p.13)
2003 Oct 23, Chinese officials reported that accidents in China's mines and factories killed 11,449 people in the first nine months of this year despite a nationwide safety crackdown.
(AP, 10/23/03)
2003 Oct 23, Soong May-ling (b.1896), aka Madame Chiang Kai-shek, died in NYC. She became one of the world's most famous women as she helped her husband fight the Japanese during World War II and later the Chinese Communists. In 2009 Hannah Pakula authored “Madame Chiang Kai-shek and the Birth of Modern China."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soong_May-ling)(AP, 10/24/03)(SSFC, 12/27/09, Books, p.E3)
2003 Oct 24, Chinese President Hu Jintao became the first Asian leader to address Australia's parliament.
(AP, 10/24/03)
2003 Oct 25, In northwestern China powerful twin tremors, minutes apart, killed nine people and leveled houses in Gansu province.
(AP, 10/26/03)
2003 Nov 3, In China Yang Zhiya (Yang Xinhai, Yang Xinhua), an ex-convict dumped by his girlfriend, was arrested in northern Hebei province for the stabbing murders of 67 people and 23 rapes. Xinhai was sentenced to death on Feb 1, 2004. He was executed Feb 14.
(AP, 11/15/03)(AP, 2/1/04)(AP, 2/14/04)
2003 Nov 5, Chinese tycoon Aikelamu Aishayoufu was reported to be missing. His Xinjiang Hops Co. ran up liabilities totaling $100 million.
(WSJ, 11/5/03, p.A1)
2003 Nov 11, In Beijing former President Clinton called on China and the US to overcome their differences on trade, saying the two powers must learn to work together to conquer common threats like AIDS, terrorism and global warming.
(AP, 11/11/03)
2003 Nov 14, China and India began 1st ever joint naval exercises.
(SFC, 11/13/03, p.A7)
2003 Nov 22, In China a gas explosion at the Sundian coal mine in Hunan province killed 14 people, while 9 were still missing.
(AP, 11/24/03)
2003 Nov 24, The US Dept. of Commerce said it would impose tariffs on Chinese-made television sets that it ruled were being sold below fair market price in the US.
(SFC, 11/27/03, p.C3)
2003 Nov 29, China said it broke diplomatic relations with Kiribati after the tiny Pacific island nation opened ties with rival Taiwan.
(AP, 11/29/03)
2003 Nov, In China Jiang Lijun (39) was sentenced to four years in prison for posting Internet articles calling for the overthrow of the Communist Party. In 2006 it was reported that Yahoo's Hong Kong unit gave authorities a draft e-mail that had been saved on Jiang's account. Yahoo also provided information in the cases of Li Zhi and Shi Tao.
(AP, 4/19/06)
2003 Nov, Drought conditions in China's Hunan province forced Changsha, the provincial capital, to institute rolling blackouts.
(Econ, 3/27/04, p.43)
2003 Dec 1, A strong earthquake rumbled through a swath of western China's mountainous Xinjiang region, killing at least 11 people and collapsing hundreds of homes in Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture near the border with Kazakhstan.
(AP, 12/1/03)
2003 Dec 5, Shanghai's government reported that its population has surged to more than 20 million people, soaring by 3 million over the past year amid a flood of job seekers from other parts of China.
(AP, 12/5/03)
2003 Dec 6, In the beach resort of Sanya, China, Miss Ireland, 19-year-old Rosanna Davison, won the Miss World competition. Second place went to Miss Canada, Nazanin Afshin-Jam, while the host country's Miss China, Guan Qi, took third.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2003 Dec 9, Shanghai reported plans to ban bicycles from its major roads next year, banishing China's most popular form of transportation to make more room for cars.
(AP, 12/9/03)
2003 Dec 9, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao visited with Pres. Bush for talks on trade, Taiwan and other issues.
(WSJ, 12/9/03, p.A1)
2003 Dec 10, It was reported that China was forcibly repatriating some 100 North Korean refugees each week and the 852 were detained in camps awaiting deportation.
(SFC, 12/10/03, p.A16)
2003 Dec 11, In China's far northwest a coal mine fire in Urumqi killed nine miners, and rescue efforts were hampered by repeated gas explosions.
(AP, 12/13/03)
2003 Dec 12, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao arrived in Mexico in a bid to extend a string of recent diplomatic and economic successes in North America. In 2002 China shipped $6.3 billion in goods to Mexico, undercutting many local goods.
(SFC, 12/4/03, p.A22)(AP, 12/12/03)
2003 Dec 13, Chinese Premier Web Jiabao sought to assure Mexican leaders that their country's economy is not threatened by China's lower wages and cheaper goods, saying the two nations are partners, not rivals.
(AP, 12/13/03)
2003 Dec 15, From China it was reported that Liu Dalin (71), founder and curator of the Chinese Sexual Culture Museum, was moving his collection from Shanghai to Tongli. His 3,700 items covered 6,000 years of human sexuality in the world's most populous nation.
(AP, 12/15/03)
2003 Dec 17, China Life, China's biggest life insurer, debuted on the NY stock exchange.
(Econ, 12/20/03, p.104)
2003 Dec 19, China said it has issued rules restricting exports of missile, nuclear and biological technologies that can be used to make or deliver weapons of mass destruction.
(AP, 12/20/03)
2003 Dec 22, China put forth legislation to change its constitution to protect private property rights for the first time since the 1949 communist revolution, a key step in making capitalism its economy's driving force.
(AP, 12/22/03)
2003 Dec 23, A blowout occurred at a natural gas field near Chongqing in Kaixian County. Fumes from the gas well in China's southwest killed at least 233 people and forced some 41,000 to flee a 10-square-mile death zone. Technicians capped it Dec 27.
(AP, 12/25/03)(SFC, 12/27/03, p.A8)(SFC, 12/29/03, p.A3)
2003 Dec 25, China announced steps to reduce overexpansion.
(SFC, 12/26/03, p.A3)
2003 Dec 26, In northern China a fire raced through coal mine in Wu'an, a city in Hebei province, killing 26 miners.
(AP, 12/27/03)
2003 Dec 27, China announced its first suspected SARS case since July.
(AP, 12/27/03)
2003 Dec 29, China reported that the China State Shipbuilding Corp. has broken ground on what it says will be the world's biggest shipyard, a high-tech facility capable of producing cruise ships and natural gas tankers at the mouth of the Yangtze.
(AP, 12/29/03)
2003 Dec 30, In northeast China an explosion at a fireworks factory in Tieling, Liaoning province, killed at least 29 people. Authorities soon ordered more than 2,000 fireworks factories closed after a series of fatal explosions "sounded warning bells for the industry."
(AP, 12/30/03)(AP, 1/3/04)
2003 Dec 31, China offered to allow Taiwan to fly unlimited numbers of direct charter flights to the mainland in 2004, if the island's government agrees to allow Chinese airlines to do the same the following year.
(AP, 12/31/03)
2003 In China journalists Chen Guidi and Wu Chuntao authored “Will the Boat Sink the Water," a look at peasant life in southeast China. It sold some 250,000 copies before authorities took it off the shelves. Pirated copies continued to sell. In 2006 it was translated to English.
(WSJ, 7/6/06, p.D8)
2003 China’s President Hu Jintao launched his “Scientific Outlook on Development."
(Econ., 3/7/15, p.45)
2003 China moved to revitalize the old north-east industrial bases following rising unemployment and mass protests.
(Econ, 1/3/15, p.31)
2003 In China for the 1st time in over two decades people in Beijing got their names on ballot papers without official backing in elections to district people’s congresses.
(Econ, 11/11/06, p.48)
2003 China began building wire fences on major defection North Korean routes along the Tumen River. Since September 2006, China began building wire fences along the Yalu River.
(AP, 10/16/06)
2003 The Shanghai Tatler magazine was set up by owners of the Hong Kong Tatler, modeled on London’s Tatler.
(Econ, 1/3/04, p.27)
2003 The China Banking Regulatory Commission was carved out of the central bank.
(Econ, 10/29/05, p.72)
2003 In China Hony Capital, a private equity firm, was founded by John Zhao. By 2012 it was China’s leading private equity firm.
(Economist, 9/1/12, p.69)
2003 Chinese Internet users protested the beating to death in jail of a man arrested for failing to carry the right identity documents. This led to the scrapping of a decades old law giving police sweeping powers to detain anyone suspected of staying without a permit in a place other than his registered home town.
(Econ, 4/29/06, p.30)
2003 China executed 726 people, nearly two-thirds of the world's known court-ordered executions, and violated its own law by killing at least one man for a crime committed at age 16, according to a 2004 report by Amnesty Int'l. Publicly admitted executions in China soared to over 7,000 this year due to a “strike hard" crackdown on crime.
(AP, 4/7/04)(Econ, 4/28/07, p.69)
2003 Yang Xiuzhu, a senior Chinese official who oversaw construction projects in the booming eastern province of Zhejiang, got wind that anti-corruption investigators were looking into her affairs. She boarded a flight to Singapore. A few days later Yang changed her name and flew to New York. Local authorities said in 2004 she accepted kickbacks from property developers of more than 250 million yuan ($40.62 million) China filed an arrest warrant for her through Interpol and in 2005 she was detained in Amsterdam. As of 2014 she was still in the Netherlands.
(Reuters, 8/27/14)
2003 Coca-Cola test-marketed its “fruit pulp orange" drink in China and began rolling it out across the country with great success.
(Econ, 3/3/07, p.68)
2003 William C. Hsiao, senior professor of economics at Harvard, launched a program in Xinlian, China, to help residents monitor and publicize the quality of health care. Village doctors in China made most of their money selling drugs.
(WSJ, 2/13/07, p.A1)
2003 In China the local government of Hongwei acknowledged the seriousness of local pollution and called on Daqing Lianhua, a subsidiary of PetroChina, to relocate villagers.
(Econ, 9/29/07, p.47)
2003 In 2005 estimates of Chinese labor unrest for 2003 noted some 60,000 protests with a 17% annual increase over the past decade.
(WSJ, 4/18/05, p.A16)
2003 Chinese researchers at the State Key Laboratory of Agrobiotechnology of the China Agricultural University introduced human genetic coding into the DNA of Holstein dairy cow embryos, then transferred the embryos into cow surrogates. This followed years of testing on mice. By June, 2011, over 300 cloned cattle lived on an experimental farm in suburban Beijing, with new calves delivered every week.
(Reuters, 6/16/11)
2003 In 2006 China said its first confirmed human death from bird flu was in 2003, two years earlier than previously reported, showing that the virus was present on the mainland before the latest outbreak was first disclosed elsewhere in Asia.
(AFP, 8/8/06)
2003 China's growth rate for the year was measured at 9.1%.
(WSJ, 1/21/04, p.A1)
2003 India changed its verbiage on Tibet to say that the Tibet Autonomous Region is part of China as opposed to the previous description of Tibet as an autonomous region of China.
(Econ, 11/18/06, p.16)
2003 The Lao government signed a 30-year agreement with a Hong Kong-registered company to set up a 1,640-hectare special economic zone built with expertise from China. The population of the Golden City in Boten peaked at 10,000, but dwindled to 2,000 in 2011 after China’s foreign ministry warned citizens not to gamble there.
(Econ, 5/28/11, p.46)
2004 Jan 1, China began running the world's 1st commercially operated maglev train in Shanghai. The German-built system spanned 18 miles.
(SFC, 1/10/04, p.E4)
2004 Jan 1, Hong Kong began a de facto free-trade agreement with mainland China.
(SFC, 10/15/05, p.C1)
2004 Jan 3, In China a fire broke out on an overcrowded bus along an expressway that connects Shanghai with the eastern city of Nanjing, killing at least 12 people and injuring 14.
(AP, 1/3/04)
2004 Jan 3, In China a landslide crushed five houses, killing at least 14 people in northern Shanxi province.
(AP, 1/4/04)
2004 Jan 5, China confirmed its first SARS case since an outbreak of the disease was contained in July and authorities ordered the emergency slaughter of some 10,000 civet cats and related species after tests linked a virus found in the animals to the patient.
(AP, 1/5/04)
2004 Jan 6, China began a mass eradication of some 10,000 civet cats to stem a suspected link to SARS.
(SFC, 1/7/04, p.A14)
2004 Jan 8, Chinese state media reported that authorities had dismissed 44,701 police between August and November in 2003 for lacking job qualifications, corruption or other offenses in a campaign to raise policing standards.
(AP, 1/8/04)
2004 Jan 10, China reported a 3rd suspected SARS infection involved a 35-year-old man in Guangdong province.
(AP, 1/11/04)(WSJ, 1/13/04, p.D5)
2004 Jan 12, It was reported that China might inject $40 billion into its Industrial and Commercial Bank. 2 other state-run lenders, Bank of China and China Construction Bank, split $45 billion in transfers from foreign exchange reserves a week earlier.
(WSJ, 1/12/04, p.A1)
2004 Jan 17, The Chinese government confirmed two more SARS patients, bringing the total number this year to three.
(AP, 1/17/04)
2004 Jan 22, The Chinese New Year (Lunar Year 4702) ushered in the Year of the Monkey. In Korea the event is called Solnal and in Vietnam it is called Tet. The Chinese New Year marked a traditional time of settling debts. Migrant workers in the Chinese construction industry were reportedly owed over $40 billion in back pay.
(WSJ, 1/19/04, p.A1)(SFC, 1/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Jan 26, China's President Hu Jintao arrived in France, with European ministers considering Beijing's request that they lift an arms embargo imposed after the killing of Tiananmen Square protesters in 1989.
(AP, 1/26/04)
2004 Jan 30, The Chinese government said audits aimed at ferreting out corruption in China uncovered $8 billion in misused or embezzled funds and widespread irregularities that produced "serious losses" of state assets.
(AP, 1/30/04)
2004 Jan 31, China’s oil-refining boss signed a deal to buy crude oil from Gabon. Pres. Hu Jintao visited Gabon the next day.
(Econ, 2/7/04, p.45)
2004 Feb 1, China reported 5 more cases of the avian influenza virus.
(SFC, 2/2/04, p.A4)
2004 Feb 5, A lantern festival marking the end of China's Lunar New Year celebrations erupted into a stampede, killing at least 37 people and injuring 15.
(AP, 2/5/04)
2004 Feb 6, Chinese state-run media reported regulators have given preliminary approval for a private airline to be set up in the southwestern city of Chengdu.
(AP, 2/6/04)
2004 Feb 9, Culturecom Holdings Ltd. of Hong Kong unveiled a DVD player and word-processing device built with chips developed by Chinese computer scientist Chu Bong-foo. Chu found a way to put Asia characters in position to command binary code.
(WSJ, 2/9/04, p.A1)
2004 Feb 10, The US broke ground for a new U.S. Embassy compound in the Chinese capital, billed by the American government as the largest State Department project ever built on foreign soil.
(AP, 2/10/04)
2004 Feb 11, A gas explosion in a coal mine in southern China killed 24 miners.
(AP, 2/11/04)
2004 Feb 12, Wang Huaizhong (57), a former Chinese provincial vice governor, was executed in Shandong province for taking more than $600,000 in bribes.
(AP, 2/12/04)
2004 Feb 14, China executed Yang Xinhua (38), a man convicted of murdering 67 people, in what media said might be the country's longest killing spree in modern history. Yang was convicted of 67 killings and 23 rapes in Henan and three other provinces. His crime spree began in 2001 following release from a labor camp and ended with his capture in November.
(AP, 2/14/04)
2004 Feb 15, In northeastern China a fire swept through a shopping center, killing 51 people and injuring dozens more. Hours later, a fire in a temple in the country's southeast killed 39 people. The 2 blazes killed at least 93 people.
(AP, 2/15/04)(AP, 2/15/05)
2004 Feb 23, In northeastern China a coal mine explosion killed at least 24 miners as rescue workers scrambled to find 13 more trapped miners.
(AP, 2/24/04)
2004 Feb 23, Envoys from 6 nations gathered in Beijing for talks on the North Korean nuclear crisis.
(WSJ, 2/24/04, p.A1)
2003 Feb 28, It was reported that China’s foreign exchange reserves were $730 billion.
(Econ, 2/28/04, p.72)
2004 Feb 29, In central China a bus carrying migrant workers to faraway factory jobs plunged off a mountain road, killing 12 and injuring 35.
(AP, 2/29/04)
2004 Mar 1, An explosion in an unlicensed coal mine in northern China killed 28 miners.
(AP, 3/3/04)
2004 Mar 2, In China authorities shut down water supplies after a combination of synthetic ammonia and nitrogen from the Sichuan General Chemical Factory leaked into the Tuo River. Nearly 1 million people were left without water for drinking and bathing.
(AP, 3/5/04)
2004 Mar 5, China's Premier Wen Jiabao addressed the 2,904-member legislature and turned attention and resources to the hundreds of millions of citizens who work the land.
(AP, 3/5/04)(SFC, 3/06/04, p.A10)
2004 Mar 6, China handed its enormous military a double-digit spending increase in a show of support. According to China's 2004 budget, military spending for the PLA will rise 11.6 percent this year, an increase of $2.6 billion.
(AP, 3/6/04)
2004 Mar 7, in China's Muslim Xinjiang region the No. 2 Mine of the Hami Coal Co. flooded. 25 managed to escape while rescuers worked desperately to save survivors. Rescue workers saved 15 coal miners trapped in a flooded shaft, but seven miners were still missing.
(AP, 3/8/04)
2004 Mar 8, China's parliament began discussing a constitutional amendment that would protect private property for the first time since the 1949 communist revolution.
(AP, 3/8/04)
2004 Mar 9, China reported that it would scrap the 8% tax on farmers' crops over the next 5 years. The vestige of feudalism was established 4,000 years ago during the Bronze Age.
(AP, 3/9/04)
2004 Mar 12, Chinese state media reported that a 1,930-mile railway project to link China and Europe was announced by Kanat Zhangaskin, vice president of the Kazakhstan National Railway Co.
(AP, 3/12/04)
2004 Mar 14, China took symbolic steps toward a more capitalist society, amending its constitution to protect private property rights and formalizing a former president's once-unthinkable legacy, inviting entrepreneurs to join the Communist Party.
(AP, 3/14/04)
2004 Mar 16, China declared victory in its fight against bird flu, saying it had "stamped out" all of its known cases, while a factory worker in Thailand became Asia's 23rd victim of the virus.
(AP, 3/16/04)
2004 Mar 23, Chen Zhongwei (74), a Chinese surgeon credited with pioneering the process of reattaching severed limbs, died. Chen successfully reattached the severed right hand of an injured factory worker in 1963, in the first operation of its kind.
(AP, 3/27/04)
2004 Mar 25, China's Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing, arriving home from North Korea, saying his three-day trip yielded an agreement from that country's reclusive leader to "push forward" toward a third round of talks on its nuclear program.
(AP, 3/25/04)
2004 Apr 5, China promised $122 million to Pres. Skerritt in return for revoking Dominica’s recognition of Taiwan.
(Econ, 4/10/04, p.29)
2004 Apr 6, China issued a major ruling on how Hong Kong chooses its leaders, saying the territory must submit proposed political reforms to Beijing for approval.
(AP, 4/6/04)
2004 Apr 8, In China PM Wen Jiabao suspended plans for a huge dam system on the Nu River in western China due to environmental concerns.
(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A10)
2004 Apr 10, A coal mine explosion trapped five miners underground in a northeastern Chinese city where more than 150 miners have been killed in the past year.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 11, China’s People’s Bank, in an effort to slow the growth in money supply, raised bank reserve requirements from 7 to 7.5%, the 3rd increase in 8 months.
(Econ, 4/17/04, p.71)
2004 Apr 13, Authorities in Shanghai announced that divorced couples who remarry will be allowed to have a second child.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 14, China began offering free AIDS tests to anyone who wants one and free treatment for infected people who can't afford.
(AP, 4/14/04)
2004 Apr 16, Yu Zhendong, a fugitive Chinese banker accused of helping embezzle $485 million from his state-owned bank, was returned to China by U.S. authorities.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, A Chinese newspaper reported that China over the last few months had arrested nearly a dozen military officers — including at least four generals — on charges of spying for rival Taiwan.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, In Chongqing, China, leaking chlorine gas exploded at a chemical plant, killing at least 7 people and forcing 150,000 to flee their homes.
(AP, 4/17/04)(WSJ, 4/19/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 18, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il crossed into China in a special train for a summit to discuss the North's nuclear weapons program with the Chinese president.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 19, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il reportedly held talks with Chinese President Hu Jintao about the North's nuclear arms program and requests for economic aid.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 20, China urged North Korean leader Kim Jong Il to rethink his demands for a written U.S. pledge not to attack, saying only a softer line can ease the standoff over Pyongyang's nuclear program.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 20, Yang Xiuzhu, former vice-mayor of Wenzhou and vice-director of China’s Zhejiang Provincial Construction Bureau, fled abroad as investigations began on bribery charges. She was believed to have taken bribes of 253.2 million yuan (US$30 million).
(http://tinyurl.com/aza8m)(Econ, 6/4/05, p.42)
2004 Apr 20, Chinese state media reported that from April last year, about 50 to 60 infants died from malnutrition after being fed a milk formula with virtually no nutritional value.
(AP, 4/20/04)(SFC, 4/21/04, p.A8)
2004 Apr 23, China confirmed two cases of SARS and said the mother of one patient has died, apparently the first SARS fatality in the country since July.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 26, Mainland China dealt a crushing blow to Hong Kong's hopes for full democracy, when its most powerful legislative panel ruled the territory won't have direct elections for its next leader in 2007 or for all its lawmakers in 2008.
(AP, 4/26/04)
2004 Apr 27, The Chinese government said it had shut down a U.S. visa information center in Shanghai because of complaints of overcharging.
(AP, 4/28/04)
2004 Apr 27, It was reported that China planned to consolidate some 35,000 rural cooperatives over the next 3 years to about 3,000. The government estimated cooperative bad loans at 26% of the total loans.
(WSJ, 4/27/04, p.A16)
2004 Apr, China released Chen Gang, a factory worker who helped to organize a strike during China's 1989 pro-democracy protests.
(AP, 11/20/04)
2004 May 1, Shanghai Tobacco, maker of Panda and other cigarette brands, embarked on a campaign to extend Panda beyond the political and military elite. WHO statistics held that China accounts for 30% of the 5.5 trillion cigarettes consumed daily world-wide.
(WSJ, 5/26/04, p.A1)
2004 May 3, A car packed with explosives went off as a bus carried Chinese engineers to a port project in remote southwestern Pakistan, killing 3 of them and injuring 11 other people.
(AP, 5/3/04)
2004 May 4, Pakistan and China signed a deal for the construction of a nuclear power plant, the second such plant to be built in Pakistan with Beijing's help.
(AP, 5/4/04)
2004 May 5, In central China shelves stacked high with garlic collapsed and killed 15 workers at a cold-storage warehouse in Zhenghou.
(AP, 5/6/04)
2004 May 5, British-based SABMiller launched an unsolicited HK$4.3 billion ($550m) bid for Harbin Brewery, China’s 4th largest brewer.
(Econ, 5/8/04, p.61)
2004 May 9, The Chinese government warned that AIDS is continuing to spread and estimated that there were some 840,000 carriers of the disease.
(SFC, 5/10/04, p.A3)
2004 May 17, China and Kazakhstan agreed to build a 744-mile crude oil pipeline to send an initial 10 million tons of Kazakh oil to Xinjiang by 2006.
(WSJ, 6/17/04, p.A16)
2004 May 18, An explosion and a fire at two coal mines in northern China killed at least 22 workers and trapped 25.
(AP, 5/19/04)
2004 May 26, African and Latin American leaders meeting in China urged rich countries to fight terrorism by sharing wealth, not through military intervention.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 30, In southwest China a landslide triggered by torrential rains buried a village in Guizhou province, killing 8 people.
(AP, 6/1/04)
2004 May 31, Newbridge Capital, an American private equity firm, became the 1st foreign financial to gain control of a Chinese bank with an 18% stake in Shenzhen Development Bank and majority control of the board.
(Econ, 6/5/04, p.70)
2004 May, In Fujian province angry mobs in Fuan city gutted at least 3 villas of wealthy residents accused of defrauding investors in an informal network of unregistered credit associations known as biaohui.
(Econ, 7/17/04, p.46)
2004 May, A Japanese consulate worker in Shanghai committed suicide. Japanese newspapers later reported the official took his life because Chinese officials were pressuring him for secret information, using a "woman problem" as leverage. China accused Japan of deliberately smearing China's international image.
(AP, 1/1/06)
2004 Jun 1, Anheuser-Busch offered HK$5.58 per share for China’s Harbin Brewery Group Ltd. 2 days later SABMiller withdrew its HK$4.30 offer.
(WSJ, 6/4/04, p.A3)
2004 Jun 9, A Chinese state newspaper said 1 baby died and 20 were hospitalized with severe malnutrition in eastern China after drinking low-quality milk powder, two months after a nationwide crackdown on fake infant formula.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 15, It was reported that China had ordered water prices increased for the 1st time since the founding of the People’s Republic due to strains on supplies from development.
(WSJ, 6/15/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 26, In Beijing, China, 4 days of talks on North Korea’s nuclear program ended with a promise for further discussion.
(SSFC, 6/27/04, p.A24)
2004 Jun 28, The European Union denied China's request to be officially recognized as a market economy, saying that an assessment of the Chinese economy showed too much state interference and poor corporate governance.
(AP, 6/28/04)
2004 Jun, A pilot Confucius Institute program, designed to promote the study of Chinese abroad, was established in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. The first Confucius Institute was then established in Seoul on Nov 21, 2004. The 75th was established in Cracow, Poland, in 2006. By the end of 2013 there were 440 institutes in over 100 countries.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confucius_Institute)(Econ, 9/13/14, p.51)
2004 Jul 2, China began censoring telephone text messages to “block the dissemination of illicit news and information."
(SFC, 7/3/04, p.A2)
2004 Jul 2, Shanghai police raided the apartment of Randolph Hobson Guthrie III in a joint US-Chinese operation against pirated DVDs. They seized 210,000 pirated DVD copies.
(WSJ, 3/7/05, p.A1)
2004 Jul 13, It was reported that the bid price for a car license plate in Shanghai had surged to $4,133 in May.
(WSJ, 7/13/04, p.A1)
2004 Jul 27, The official Xinhua News Agency said Chinese authorities have shut down 700 pornographic Web sites in less than two weeks as part of a massive campaign to clean up the Internet.
(AP, 7/27/04)
2004 Aug 4, In China a school employee with a history of schizophrenia slashed 15 students and three teachers with a kitchen knife at a Beijing kindergarten, killing one child and leaving terrified classmates covered in blood.
(AP, 8/4/03)
2004 Aug 6-2004 Aug 8, Up to 100,000 rock and rollers crowded a remote desert venue in China's isolated Ningxia province over the weekend for a three-day festival featuring the nation's oldest and best bands.
(AP, 8/9/04)
2004 Aug 10, In southwest China a 5.6 earthquake killed four and injured nearly 600 in Yunnan province. More than 125,000 people were left homeless and cracked walls in reservoirs posed a threat to villages downstream.
(AP, 8/12/04)
2004 Aug 11, Huang Jingao, chief of Fujian’s Lianjiang County, posted on open letter on the Internet accusing colleagues of confiscating land from peasants and selling it a below-market prices to developers in exchange for bribes. In 2005 Jingao was sentenced to life in prison following a year-long campaign by party authorities to silence and discredit him.
(SFC, 11/11/05, p.A3)
2004 Aug 13, Typhoon Rananim weakened to a tropical storm. The death toll from Rananim rose to 115, after it slammed into the China's southeastern coast.
(AP, 8/13/04)
2004 Aug 16, General Motors said it will start making Cadillacs in China this year, joining a race by foreign luxury car brands to sell to the country's newly rich elite.
(AP, 8/16/04)
2004 Aug 16, In China villagers in an eastern province dug with farm tools to search for 24 people missing in massive landslides unleashed by Typhoon Rananim.
(AP, 8/16/04)
2004 Aug 17, A US research institute said India is projected to outpace China and become the world's most populous country by 2050, growing by 50 percent in the next 46 years to reach more than 1.6 billion people.
(AP, 8/17/04)
2004 Aug 20, China said it would offer 10-year residency permits to “high-level" foreigners, who bring in important investments or business skills.
(WSJ, 8/23/04, p.A1)
2004 Aug 23, It was reported that China recorded its 1st ever agricultural trade deficit, $3.73 billion, for the 1st half of this year.
(WSJ, 8/23/04, p.A1)
2004 Aug 24, China evacuated hundreds of thousands of people as Typhoon Aere lashed neighboring Taiwan, triggering landslides and disruption and leaving at least seven people feared dead and one missing.
(AFP, 8/24/04)
2004 Aug 26, Typhoon Aere crashed into mainland China prompting the evacuation of nearly a million people, as the death toll climbed to 35 after a mudslide killed 15 villagers in Taiwan.
(AP, 8/26/04)
2004 Aug 27, Liu Xiang (b.1983), Chinese hurdler, set a record and won Olympic gold in Athens in the 110 meter hurdles with a time of 12.91 seconds equaling the 1993 time of Colin Jackson.
(www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-08/28/content_369582.htm)
2004 Aug 27, It was reported that SABMiller was investing $82.2 million to build a brewery in Dongguan, Guangdong province, China.
(WSJ, 8/27/04, p.A10)
2004 Aug, The World Bank estimated that pollution is causing China and annual 8-12% of its $1.4 trillion GDP in direct damage.
(Econ, 8/21/04, p.56)
2004 Sep 2, The first Chinese tourists to visit Paris, French, on an official tour group were treated to a full taste of its charms.
(AP, 9/3/04)
2004 Sep 6, In southwest China at least 90 people were killed and 77 were missing after some of the worst rainstorms in recent years triggered landslides and flash floods.
(AP, 9/6/04)
2004 Sep 7, In southwestern China floods unleashed by torrential rains have killed at least 161 people and left dozens more missing, prompting authorities to put the massive Three Gorges hydroelectric project on alert.
(AP, 9/7/04)(WSJ, 9/7/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 10, Li Yuanjiang, the former editor-in-chief of one of China's biggest newspapers, the Guangzhou Daily, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for taking bribes. Guangzhou is the capital and the sub-provincial city of Guangdong Province in southern mainland China. The city was formerly known internationally as Canton, after a French language transliteration of the name of the province in Cantonese.
(AP, 9/11/04)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guangzhou)
2004 Sep 19, Former President Jiang Zemin turned over his last major post as chairman of the commission that runs China's military to his successor, Hu Jintao (61), completing the country's first peaceful leadership transition since its 1949 revolution.
(AP, 9/19/04)
2004 Sep 20, Russia's embattled Yukos oil giant raised the stakes in its bitter standoff with the Kremlin as the company slashed supplies to China in a move analysts said was designed to cause maximum embarrassment in Moscow.
(AP, 9/20/04)
2004 Sep 21, China's PM Wen Jiabao hailed a series of agreements with neighboring Kyrgyzstan including an agreement on the thorny issue of the countries' common border.
(AFP, 9/21/04)
2004 Sep 25, In southwest China a swollen river swept a bus off a bridge, and about 30 passengers were missing.
(AP, 9/25/04)
2004 Sep 25, Ma Chengyuan (77), former president of the renowned Shanghai Museum, died. He saved priceless artifacts from marauding Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution.
(AP, 10/10/04)
2004 Oct 1, G7 ministers met in Washington DC. Chinese officials were invited to attend for the 1st time.
(Econ, 10/2/04, p.11)
2004 Oct 7, US President George W. Bush told Chinese President Hu Jintao in a phone conversation that he supports reunifying Taiwan with the mainland but warned against "any unilateral attempt" to do so.
(AFP, 10/7/04)
2004 Oct 9, French President Jacques Chirac declared that France was a natural trade partner to China and, amid a flurry of air, rail and energy deals.
(AP, 10/9/04)
2004 Oct 13, In Shanghai, China, the Houston Rockets, featuring Yao Ming, played an exhibition basketball game against the Sacramento Kings. Advertisers paid some $10 million to sponsor the game and another in Beijing.
(WSJ, 10/15/04, p.B1)
2004 Oct 13, Russia and China settled a dispute over their 2,700-mile border during a visit by Pres. Putin.
(WSJ, 10/14/04, p.A1)
2004 Oct 20, China formally arrested Zhao Yan, a New York Times researcher, who was detained Sep 16 for allegedly leaking state secrets. The crime could be punishable by death.
(AFP, 10/21/04)
2004 Oct 20, In central China a gas explosion ripped through a coal shaft at the Daping Mine in Henan province killing at least 77 miners. Dozens miners were missing.
(AP, 10/21/04)(AP, 10/23/04)
2004 Oct 20, Senior Indian and Chinese officials met in New Delhi, India, to discuss a long-running border dispute between the two countries.
(AFP, 10/20/04)
2004 Oct 20, The EU revamped its trade rules. Nations with more than 15% of European market share of any goods were set to lose their discounted tariffs. China and India were expected to be the main losers.
(WSJ, 10/20/04, p.A15)
2004 Oct 21, China and Japan planned emergency talks over energy rights in the disputed waters between them.
(WSJ, 10/21/04, p.A17)
2004 Oct 21, Fu Hegong sneaked into a Beijing kindergarten to rob it. When he was discovered, he smothered a teacher with a quilt and killed a 5-year-old boy by hitting him with a fire extinguisher. In 2005 Hegong (31) was sentenced to death.
(AP, 9/10/05)
2004 Oct 24, In China the Golden Resources Shopping Mall, the largest in the world, opened in the Haidan district of Beijing.
(www.csmonitor.com/2004/1124/p01s03-woap.html)
2004 Oct 25, China’s state press reported that the population will grow to nearly 1.5 billion over the next 20 to 30 years.
(AFP, 10/25/04)
2004 Oct 27-2004 Oct 31, Violent clashes in a village in central China killed 7 people and injured 42. Police imposed martial law in Langchenggang, Zhongmou County, in Henan province after the fighting between hundreds of rioters that pitted Muslim Chinese against non-Muslims.
(AP, 11/1/04)(WSJ, 11/2/04, p.A1)
2004 Oct 28, China's central bank raised interest rates for the first time in 9 years in a surprise move that was aimed at guiding a heated economy onto a path of slower growth. The rate increase .25% to 5.6%.
(Reuters, 10/28/04)(Econ, 11/6/04, p.12)
2004 Oct 28, China and Iran signed a memorandum of understanding for an oil and gas agreement worth tens of billions of dollars.
(WSJ, 11/1/04, p.A1)
2004 Oct 30, A burst of poisonous gas in a coal mine in northeast China killed 15 miners at the Xilutian Mine in Fushun, a city in Liaoning province.
(AP, 10/31/04)
2004 Nov 6, China's central bank said it would take a "gradual and safe" approach to loosening the yuan-dollar peg.
(AP, 11/6/04)
2004 Nov 8, China’s state media reported that China will selectively reduce spending to help trim its ballooning fiscal deficit.
(AP, 11/8/04)
2004 Nov 10, Taiwan's leader, making a new appeal to China to hold talks, urged the communist giant to ban the development and use of weapons of mass destruction.
(AP, 11/10/04)
2004 Nov 10, Japan's navy went on alert when a submarine was detected in Japanese waters between the southern island of Okinawa and Taiwan. Japan soon determined that it was Chinese nuclear submarine and incident strained relations between two of Asia's biggest economic and military powers.
(AP, 11/13/04)
2004 Nov 11, It was reported that Beijing this month cancelled its bicycle registration requirements, a move viewed by the state press as highlighting the nation's full fledged entry into "car society" and the demise of the bicycle as a "transportation tool."
(AFP, 11/11/04)
2004 Nov 11, It was reported that large swathes of southern and eastern China are in the grip of their worst drought in more than 50 years, prompting calls from the countries top leaders for better management of water conservation.
(AP, 11/12/04)
2004 Nov 12, It was reported that Japan and China owned about a quarter of outstanding US Treasury debt. They held $723 and $172 billion respectively.
(WSJ, 11/12/04, p.C4)
2004 Nov 15, China’s state media reported that shortages of coal and electricity are expected this winter.
(AP, 11/15/04)
2004 Nov 17, In Maryland the first US small office of the Chinese Confucius Institute opened at the Univ. of Maryland. By 2009 there were over 60 such facilities across the country offering Chinese culture to the American public.
(http://english.people.com.cn/200411/19/eng20041119_164443.html)(Econ, 10/24/09, SR p.10)
2004 Nov 20, In China a fire at a complex of iron mines in Shahe, Hebei province, left 68 dead. Most of the miners were suffocated by smoke.
(AP, 11/26/04)
2004 Nov 21, In northern China a Bombardier CRJ-200 passenger plane crashed in an ice-covered lake seconds after takeoff, killing all 54 people aboard and one person on the ground after an apparent midair explosion.
(AP, 11/21/04)(WSJ, 11/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Nov 22, Chinese President Hu Jintao met with Fidel Castro in Havana for talks focusing on the broadening ties between Cuba and China.
(AP, 11/22/04)
2004 Nov 25, In China Yan Yanming (21) broke into a high school dormitory in Ruzhou with a knife and killed 8 students. A series of knife attacks have hit Chinese schools in recent months. Yanming was executed Jan 18, 2004.
(AP, 11/26/04)(AP, 1/20/05)
2004 Nov 28, In central China an explosion tore through a coal mine, sending smoke from air vents and trapping at least 166 miners in tunnels and shafts below without communications. The death toll was later confirmed at 166.
(AP, 12/1/04)(Econ, 12/4/04, p.43)
2004 Nov 29, Southeast Asian nations (ASEAN) and China signed an accord to create the world's biggest free trade area by removing tariffs for their 2 billion people by decade's end.
(AP, 11/29/04)(www.ey.com/global/content.nsf/Thailand/Home)
2004 Dec 2, It was reported that United Parcel Service Inc. (UPS) has forged a $100 million agreement with Sinotrans to take direct control of its international express operations in China's largest and most important cities by the end of 2005.
(www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/stories/2004/11/29/daily33.html)
2004 Dec 4, Miss Peru, Maria Julia Mantilla Garcia, an aspiring high school teacher, was crowned Miss World 2004 In Southern China.
(AP, 12/4/04)
2004 Dec 6, China and Germany signed contracts worth $2.1 billion for Airbus jets and other industrial goods. Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder called for an end to a 15-year-old European arms embargo on China.
(AP, 12/6/04)
2004 Dec 6, A Beijing newspaper reported that 9 out of 10 Chinese calling into a suicide-prevention hotline in the capital are getting the busy tone, adding that nationwide four people were killing themselves every minute.
(Reuters, 12/6/04)
2004 Dec 7, IBM and China’s Lenovo Group planned a joint PC venture. Lenovo was expected to pay some $2 billion for a majority share of IBM’s PC business. Lenovo announced a $1.75 billion cash and stock deal to acquire a majority interest in IBM’s PC business.
(WSJ, 12/7/04, p.A3)(SFC, 12/8/04, p.A1)
2004 Dec 7, DragonMart, a 1.2km dragon-shaped mall in Dubai featuring Chinese products, opened its doors to the public as the biggest Chinese shopping mall outside of China.
(www.dragonmart.ae/HelpFAQs.html)(Econ, 4/14/12, p.78)
2004 Dec 8, China’s Premier Wen Jiabao repeated that China will move gradually to a flexible exchange rate.
(WSJ, 12/9/04, p.A14)
2004 Dec 8, The European Union and China agreed to boost relations, but the EU made clear there can be no early lifting of its 15-year-old arms embargo until Beijing improves its human rights record.
(AP, 12/8/04)
2004 Dec 9, China reported that its monthly trade surplus widened in November for the fourth straight month, hitting $9.9 billion as exports surged at an annual rate of nearly 46 percent.
(AP, 12/9/04)
2004 Dec 10, A US trade panel gave final approval to anti-dumping duties of up to 198 percent on imports of about $1.2 billion worth of wooden bedroom furniture from China.
(AP, 12/10/04)
2004 Dec 11, China ended restrictions limiting foreign retailers to joint ventures.
(WSJ, 12/14/04, p.A13)
2004 Dec 12, In southern China a flood at a mine trapped 36 workers in Guizhou province.
(AP, 12/12/04)
2004 Dec 12, China dropped geographic restrictions against foreign insurers.
(WSJ, 12/13/04, p.A14)
2004 Dec 13, The Chinese government said China and Russia will hold their first joint military exercise next year.
(AP, 12/13/04)
2004 Dec 13, China said it will impose duties on its exports of textiles and apparel in an effort to alleviate the impact of eased restrictions effective Jan 1.
(SFC, 12/14/04, p.D3)
2004 Dec 17, It was reported that China paid out $15 billion per month to keep the yuan fixed at 8.277 to the US dollar.
(WSJ, 12/17/04, p.A14)
2004 Dec 17, It was reported that China’s growing power industry was causing global concern over mercury accumulation in the world’s water and food supply.
(WSJ, 12/17/04, p.A1)
2004 Dec 25, In southern China villagers of Da Lang battled police in a riot after security forces beat a resident to death.
(SFC, 12/27/04, p.A3)
2004 Dec 30, China accused the US of pressuring Israel not to return armed drone aircraft that were sent back for upgrades following their purchase in the 1990s.
(WSJ, 12/31/04, p.A1)
2004 In China Jiang Rong’s novel “The Wolf Totem" became a best seller. It was about the struggle for life on the Mongolian grasslands during the 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution. In 2005 the Penguin Group purchased rights for an English version.
(SFC, 9/7/05, p.E3)
2004 Mark Elvin authored “The Retreat of the Elephants: An Environmental History of China."
(Econ, 7/10/04, p.74)
2004 Bruce Gilley authored “China’s Democratic Future: How It Will Happen and Where It Will Lead."
(Econ, 6/26/04, p.83)
2004 Chinese President Hu Jintao visited Latin America and said that he hoped 2-way trade in the region would reach $100 billion by 2010.
(Econ, 8/15/09, p.20)
2004 China introduced new identity cards with embedded microchips. Software limited the use to standard characters. In 2006 a police official moved to ban problematic characters, thereby limiting people’s choices in names.
(Econ, 4/15/06, p.44)
2004 In China some 130 mainland securities companies lost 15 billion yuan (almost $2 billion) under a falling stock market, a dearth of new flotations and bad management. Losses for 2005 were later estimated to be even higher.
(Econ, 2/11/06, p.69)
2004 China experienced some 74,000 protests involving over 3.7 million people, up from 10,000 in 1994 and 58,000 in 2003.
(Econ, 10/1/05, p.38)
2004 In China Li Shiming, a corrupt and rapacious local Communist Party secretary in Shanxi province, beat up a farmer and cleared his land for a housing development [see Sep 23, 2008].
(Econ, 8/22/09, p.38)
2004 China’s national tax revenue of $318 billion came mostly from business taxes. The average Chinese paid $16 in income tax. Authorities in 90 Chinese cities turned some sales receipts into lottery tickets to encourage customers to demand trackable invoices.
(WSJ, 3/31/05, p.A1)
2004 China and Hong Kong entered into a Closer Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA). The phased agreement eliminated tariffs on Hong Kong exports and by 2005 created 29,000 jobs in Hong Kong.
(WSJ, 10/19/05, p.A11)
2004 China’s 2004 economic growth rate was revised up to 10.1 percent from 9.5 percent following the completion of an economic census in 2006.
(AP, 1/10/06)
2004 Chinese car sales reached 2.3 million making it the world’s 4th largest car market. It was expected to overtake Germany in 2005 and Japan by 2010.
(Econ, 4/23/05, p.61)
2004 In China Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba, set up an online payments system called Alipay.
(Econ, 1/1/11, p.55)
2004 A report by the World Health Organization (WHO) said some 600 people were killed daily in traffic accidents in China.
(SFC, 12/7/07, p.A25)
2004 Chinese made shoes accounted for 82% of all shoes sold in the US. US quotas had been abandoned in 1982.
(WSJ, 6/7/05, p.A13)
2004 China invested almost $150 million in Sudan this year.
(Econ, 10/28/06, p.54)
2004-2005 A Russian built nuclear reactor was scheduled to begin operating in Lianyungang, a coastal city northwest of Shanghai.
(SFC,12/30/97, p.B2)
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2000 Jan 4, In China the State Development Planning Commission announced that private enterprise should be put on "equal footing with state-owned enterprises."
(SFC, 1/5/00, p.A6)
2000 Jan 6, In China the state-controlled Catholic Church ordained 5 new bishops while the Pope elevated 12 prelates in St. Peter's Basilica.
(SFC, 1/7/00, p.A14)
2000 Jan 15, In China 5.9 and 6.5 earthquakes hit in Yunnan province and 4 people were killed.
(SFEC, 1/16/00, p.A25)
2000 Jan 18, In China the Intermediate People's Court in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, convicted 13 Uigher defendants of separatism, murder, robbery and illegally dealing in weapons. 5 of the convicted were sentenced to death.
(SFC, 1/25/00, p.A12)
2000 Jan 18, Steven Leung (52), a SF Bay Area entrepreneur, was found unconscious in a Beijing karaoke bar and transferred to a hospital where he was diagnosed with irreversible brain damage. Leung was flown home and died at Stanford Hosp. on Feb 3.
(SFEC, 1/30/00, p.D2)(SFC, 2/5/00, p.A16)
2000 Jan 20, It was reported that the number of Internet users in China had more than doubled over the last 6 months from 4 to 8.9 million, most of them young single men.
(SFC, 1/20/00, p.C16)
2000 Jan 21, In China it was reported that some 700 investigators had gathered over the last 2 months in Xiamen, formerly called Amoy, to investigate corruption and the smuggling of some $9.5 billion worth of goods.
(SFC, 1/21/00, p.A12)
2000 Jan 26, In China the State Bureau of Secrecy issued a 20-article circular that banned discussion of state secrets on the Internet, in e-mail, and in chat rooms or bulletin boards. Content and service providers were also required to undergo a "security certification" prior to operation.
(SFC, 1/27/00, p.A1)
2000 Jan 27, The US and China agreed to resume normal military ties.
(SFC, 1/28/00, p.D2)
2000 Jan, Li Jinhua, auditor general of China, reported that $15 billion in public funds destined for poverty relief and water conservation projects had been embezzled in 1999. It was also reported that 14 officials were being investigated for embezzling $57 million in funds intended to resettle people displaced by the Three Gorges Dam projects.
(SFEC, 1/30/00, p.A25)(SFC, 5/6/00, p.A12)
2000 Feb 10, Ji Pengfei, one of the last of China’s old guard, died at age 91. His 6 children included Gen. Ji Shengde.
(SFC, 7/18/00, p.A14)
2000 Feb 17, In China authorities detained Chen Zixiu (60) for heading to Beijing to protest for the Falun Gong. She was unable to pay a fine of $120 and was beaten and died on Feb 21. The government denied mistreatment.
(SFC, 2/29/00, p.A14)(SFC, 3/1/00, p.A13)
2000 Feb 21, China warned Taiwan that a prolonged lack of negotiations could provoke a military attack.
(SFC, 2/22/00, p.A1)
2000 Feb 25, The US sharply criticized China for a marked deterioration in human rights.
(SFC, 2/26/00, p.A10)
2000 Feb 27, In Louyang city Jin Xiangwu stabbed to death 3 children after they failed to pay 30 cents in his video arcade. Xiangwu was convicted and executed in April.
(SFC, 4/19/00, p.A12)
2000 Feb 27-2000 Feb 29, Some 20 thousand workers battled police and soldiers in Yangjiazhangzi due to loss of work and alleged corruption at a local molybdenum mine. The facility had closed last November and in Feb. workers received $68 for each year they had worked there.
(SFC, 4/5/00, p.A10,14)
2000 Feb, Rescue Bear 0001 arrived at the Animals Asia Foundation in Chengdu, China. He was named Andrew by the Hong Kong philanthropist who donated $1 million to create the animal sanctuary. Andrew (15) died in 2006 from a liver cancer likely related to years of being tapped for bile fluid.
(SFC, 2/16/06, p.A14)
2000 Mar 4, In Beijing 2,900 delegates from 32 provinces and regions gathered for the 10-11 day session of the Ninth National People's Congress. During the session Hu Changqing, a former official in Jiangxi province, was scheduled to be executed for taking bribes worth $658,000.
(SFC, 3/4/00, p.C1)(SFEC, 3/5/00, p.A22)
2000 Mar 6, China introduced a $111.1 billion budget that cut its deficit and added funds for military spending.
(WSJ, 3/7/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 8, In China Hu Changqing, former vice governor of Jiangxi province, was executed for corruption.
(SFC, 3/9/00, p.A10)
2000 Mar 10-2000 Mar 11, Public sentencing rallies took place in the Aksu region of Xinjiang and 11 Muslim Uighur members of a terrorist group were executed. The Uighurs of the region made up nearly half of Xinjiang’s 20 million population and had been struggling against Chinese rule for several years.
(SFC, 3/20/00, p.A14)(WSJ, 3/20/00, p.A1)(Econ, 9/6/08, p.54)
2000 Mar 14, In China an official was sentenced to death for embezzling $1.4 million that was meant to help relocate 1.3 million people displaced by the Three Gorges dam project.
(WSJ, 3/15/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar, Rebiya Kadeer (54) was convicted of revealing state information to "foreigners." She had sent official Chinese press reports to her husband in the US. Her appeal was later rejected and she was sentenced to 8 years in prison.
(SFC, 12/12/00, p.B3)
2000 Apr 1, Groundbreaking ceremonies for the Grand National Theater in Beijing were cancelled due to petitions against the design. Paul Andreu of France had won the design contest with a $361 million project in the shape of a "pearl" or "duck’s egg."
(WSJ, 9/6/00, p.A24)
2000 Apr 1, In Nanjing 4 unemployed youths broke into the home of Jurgen Hermann Pfrang (50), an executive for DaimlerChrysler, and stabbed him to death along with his wife and 2 children. The 4 were found guilty of murder and robbery on 7/14/00 and sentenced to death.
(SFC, 7/15/00, p.A13)
2000 Apr 12, China’s Pres. Jiang Zemin arrived in Israel to support commercial defense relations between the two countries.
(SFC, 4/13/00, p.A15)
2000 Apr 20, In China the Communist party announced that Cheng Kejie, a deputy chairman in the national legislature, was expelled and charged with amassing $4.5 million in bribes and kickbacks.
(SFC, 4/21/00, p.A20)
2000 Apr 23, In China Li Chenglong (48), deputy mayor of Guigang city, was executed. He had been convicted of corruption during his term as Communist Party secretary of Yulin city between 1991 and 1996.
(SFC, 4/24/00, p.A14)
2000 May 5, A human rights group reported that China had banned 9 books published by Zhong Gong, a school of the qi gong traditional slow-motion exercises.
(SFC, 5/6/00, p.C1)
2000 May 6, It was reported that Jin Wenchao, a former soldier and head of a Chinese construction firm involved in the Three Gorges dam project, had disappeared with over $120 million.
(SFC, 5/6/00, p.A12)
2000 May 6, The Chiang Mai Initiative (CMI) was set up to help East Asian cash strapped countries defend their currencies in times of trouble. The initiative came in response to the 1997 East Asian financial crises. ASEAN, China, Japan, and South Korea launched the multilateral arrangement of currency swaps (CMI).
(WSJ, 5/5/05, p.A12)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiang_Mai_Initiative)
2000 May 15, It was reported that Li Fuxiang (47), a top Chinese finance manager, leaped to his death from the top floor of a hospital a week earlier.
(WSJ, 5/15/00, p.A1)
2000 May 16, In China’s Liaoning province some 5,000 retired or laid-off workers in Liaoyang clashed with police following protests over non-payment of pensions and wages.
(SFC, 5/17/00, p.A18)
2000 May 19, China and the EU agreed to open markets.
(SFC, 5/20/00, p.A8)
2000 May 24, The US House voted 237 to 197 to grant China permanent normal trade status.
(SFC, 5/25/00, p.A1)
2000 May 29-2000 May 31, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il visited China and met with Pres. Jiang Zemin and the ruling Communist Party’s inner circle. He received promises of free food and other material assistance.
(SFC, 6/2/00, p.A16)
2000 May 30, Mou Qizhong, entrepreneur and former "reform hero," was sentenced to life in prison on charges that included defrauding a Chinese state bank of $75 million.
(SFC, 5/31/00, p.A14)
2000 Jun 9, At least 74 people were reported killed in Sichuan, China, from floods and mudslides following torrential rain and hail.
(SFC, 6/10/00, p.A24)
2000 Jun 15, Guo Chaoren, president of China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency, died at age 65. His books included "Sprint to the Summit," "Tibet in the Past Decade," and "African Diary."
(SFC, 6/16/00, p.A34)
2000 Jun 22, In China an overloaded ship capsized on the Yangtze River in Sichuan province and 59 people were either killed or missing. Separately a Yunshuji-7 turboprop was struck by lightning in Hubei province and all 42 people aboard were killed. 4 people were missing.
(SFC, 6/23/00, p.D3)
2000 Jun 28, China’s government announced a $48 million emergency plan to fight the drought in the northern provinces of Shanxi, Hebei, Gansu, and Ningxia.
(SFC, 6/29/00, p.C6)
2000 Jun 28, In Taiwan Pres. Chen Shui-bian told visiting Americans that he accepts that there is "one China."
(SFC, 6/29/00, p.A10)
2000 Jul 6, In Urumqi, China, 3 separatists were executed by firing squad immediately after a public sentencing.
(SFC, 7/13/00, p.C4)
2000 Jul 7, Chinese press reported that an investigation of Gen. Ji Shengde was concluded and that he would soon be indicted for corruption totaling $12.5 million.
(SFC, 7/18/00, p.A14)
2000 Jul 7, Three days of torrential rains over central China left at least 22 people dead in Sichuan. Thousands of buildings, 17 bridges and 7 hydroelectric power stations were damaged. In Guangxi Zhuang a bus fell into the Liujiang River in Liuzhou and at least 65 people were killed.
(SFC, 7/8/00, p.D8)(SFC, 7/10/00, p.A9)
2000 Jul 11, In China it was reported that 6 members of a Uighur separatist group were executed.
(WSJ, 7/12/00, p.A1)
2000 Jul 13, In China a mudslide following heavy rains killed at least 119 villagers in Ziyang county in Shaanxi province. The death toll was later raised to 213 with another 23 killed in the Liangshan area of Sichuan province.
(SFC, 7/17/00, p.A13)(SFC, 7/21/00, p.B7)
2000 Jul 15, It was reported that an attack force of 700,000 ducks and chickens, trained to hunt and eat insects at the sound of a whistle, were placed in the locust-plagued fields of China’s Xinjiang province.
(SFC, 7/15/00, p.A24)
2000 Jul 18, Chinese Pres. Jiang Zemin and Russia’s Pres. Putin denounced the US proposed missile defense program as a violation of the 1972 ABM treaty. They also vowed to strengthen a strategic partnership between their countries.
(SFC, 7/19/00, p.A10)
2000 Jul 22, In Beijing some 100 people were rounded up in a scattered protest marking the first anniversary of the banning of Falun Gong.
(SFEC, 7/23/00, p.B16)
2000 Jul 29, It was reported that the Songhua River had completely dried up under the drought that has ruined 35 million acres. 16.2 million Chinese were left short of water.
(SFC, 7/29/00, p.D8)
2000 Jul 31, A Beijing court sentenced Cheng Kejie (66) to death for corruption. He was a former deputy chairman of the national legislature and headed the southern region of Guangxi from 1990-1998. Over the last week 48 people were executed for drug trafficking. Kejie was executed in Sept.
(SFC, 8/1/00, p.A10)(SFC, 9/15/00, p.A14)
2000 Jul 31, It was reported that a number of large Chinese companies were on the verge of bankruptcy even as the government planned to bail out its money losing state sector by making more companies public.
(WSJ, 8/1/00, p.A8)
2000 Jul, Liu Yong, Chinese Communist Party member and head of the Jiayang Group, was arrested for corruption in Shenyang.
(SFC, 10/11/01, p.C2)
2000 Aug 17-2000 Aug 23, Farmers in Fengcheng, China, rioted in opposition to high taxes and other issues.
(SFC, 9/5/00, p.A12)
2000 Aug 21, In China’s Yunnan province an earthquake in Wuding county left 177,000 people homeless and 211 injured.
(SFC, 8/26/00, p.A9)
2000 Aug 28, Four Chinese students and a man whose sister was killed in the Tiananmen Square massacre filed a suit in NYC against Li Peng, head of the Chinese Parliament, for human rights abuses.
(SFC, 9/1/00, p.A16)
2000 Aug 30, In China’s Fujian province police arrested a Catholic priest, 20 nuns, 2 laymen and a seminarian in Luoyuan county. Rev. Liu Shaozhang (38) was reported to have been severely beaten and that parishioners bought the release of 2 nuns.
(SFC, 9/2/00, p.C16)
2000 Aug, Some 20,000 Chinese farmers attacked government offices and official’s homes in Jiangxi to protest high taxes.
(WSJ, 8/30/00, p.A1)
2000 Sep 1, Typhoon Maria struck 2 southern Chinese provinces between Huizhou and Shanwei and killed 47 people with $223 million in damages.
(WSJ, 9/6/00, p.A1)(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A22)
2000 Sep 5, Over 30 coal miners were killed in an explosion in Datong, China.
(SFC, 12/25/00, p.B6)
2000 Sep 8, The government of China’s Shaanxi province appropriated 123 Zhong Gong properties and land worth $36.5 million.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 8, A truck carrying explosives blew up in Urumqi, China. 100 casualties were reported.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 19, The US Senate voted 83-15 to end trade restrictions on China. The vote also removed a fiscal obstacle to Beijing’s 14-year drive to join the WTO.
(SFC, 9/20/00, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/20/00, p.A1)
2000 Sep 27, In China an explosion at the Muchonggou Coal Mine in Shuicheng, Guizhou province, killed 118 miners.
(SFC, 9/28/00, p.A1)
2000 Oct 1, Pope John Paul II on China’s national day, canonized as martyrs 87 Chinese believers and 33 European missionaries killed between 1648 and 1930. He also canonized Mother Katherine Drexel (d.1955), a Philadelphia heiress, who became a nun.
(SFC, 10/2/00, p.A12)(Econ, 12/18/10, p.78)
2000 Oct 1, In China Falun Dafa staged one to the biggest Tiananmen Square protests since it was banned 14 months earlier.
(WSJ, 10/2/00, p.A1)
2000 Oct 12, The Nobel Prize in literature was won by Gao Xingjian (60), an exiled Chinese writer living in Paris. His novels include "Soul Mountain," based on a 1986 walking tour along the Yangtze River.
(SFC, 10/13/00, p.A16)
2000 Oct 16, The Chinese press endorsed the building of a $12 billion river project to divert water from the Yangtze north to the Yellow River.
(SFC, 10/19/00, p.C3)
2000 Oct 18, A human rights group reported that 3 members of Falun Gong died after their arrest by Chinese police. 57 Falun Gong members have died under police custody during the 15-month crackdown.
(SFC, 10/19/00, p.C10)
2000 Oct 26, In Beijing at least 100 Falun Gong sect members were dragged from Tiananmen Square following a protest one the year anniversary of a government ban of the cult.
(SFC, 10/27/00, p.A21)
2000 Oct 27, China’s state media reported that auditors had found over $11 billion in mismanaged funds in government offices and businesses.
(SFC, 10/28/00, p.A14)
2000 Oct, In China some 6 million census takers began the 5th national census.
(SFC, 10/14/00, p.A12)
2000 Nov 8, Courts in southern China sentenced 11 people to death for their role in a giant smuggling ring, the Yuanhua Group, that moved some $6.4 billion in goods with the complicity of mayors, police and customs officers.
(SFC, 11/9/00, p.C2)
2000 Nov 20, China singed an agreement with the UN for cooperation and training on individual rights and the rule of law.
(SFC, 11/21/00, p.A13)
2000 Nov 21, Pres. Clinton agreed not to punish China for exporting missile components to Iran and Pakistan after China promised to end future technological cooperation with countries seeking to develop missile weaponry.
(SFC, 11/22/00, p.A20)
2000 Nov, Liu Dalin, a pioneering Shanghai sexologist, authored "Sexual culture of 20th Century China." He argued for an open-minded approach to sex.
(SFC, 12/31/00, p.B7)
2000 Dec 1, It was reported that Gao Changli, head of the Chinese bureaucracy that controls the legal system, was relieved of his duties, apparently as part of a crackdown on corruption.
(SFC, 12/2/00, p.A13)
2000 Dec 1, A shopping mall collapsed in Dongguan, China, and scores of people were killed.
(WSJ, 12/4/00, p.A1)
2000 Dec 12, China fired the boss of Fijian province amid an antigraft drive.
(WSJ, 12/13/00, p.A1)
2000 Dec 16, Brilliance China Automotive Holding introduced its new Zhonghua car. It boasted an Italian design, Japanese engine, and German electronics and suspension.
(SSFC, 12/24/00, p.A12)
2000 Dec 25, In China’s Louyang city as many as 309 young people were killed at a disco fire.
(SFC, 12/26/00, p.C6)
2000 Dec, Tan Guangguang, a Chinese scholar with recent visits to the US, was arrested on suspicion of spying.
(SFC, 4/10/01, p.A11)
2000 Martin Booth authored "The Dragon Syndicates," a history of the Chinese criminal societies known as the triads.
(WSJ, 8/4/00, p.W7)
2000 Bill Kong, Chinese film producer, released “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon." He had wooed Hollywood for a year to front half of the film’s $15 million budget.
(WSJ, 9/14/05, p.A1)
2000 China’s Premier Zhu Rongji said Beijing will no longer be livable in 35 years due to sand dunes 93 miles away and converging at an annual speed of 2 km.
(SSFC, 8/12/01, p.A21)
2000 China's Pres. Jiang Zemin launched the "Three Represents" program: the party must represent China's advanced productive forces, its advanced culture and the interests of the overwhelming majority of the people.
(Econ, 11/15/03, p.41)
2000 China launched its “great development of the west" program (often referred to as the “Go west" policy).
(Econ, 12/3/05, p.39)
2000 China banned the sale of video game consoles citing their adverse effect on the mental health of its youth. The ban was lifted in 2014 on a temporary basis.
(Reuters, 1/7/14)
2000 China planned to build 1,000 hotels for tourism growth for a total of 4,500. The government expected visitors to increase to 54 million from 46 million in 1995. The hotels were to be built in the poorer central and western China.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A10)
2000 In Ningbo, China, the Geely Group began producing cars. By 2006 the plant was producing 180,000 cars a year.
(WSJ, 11/7/06, p.A1)
2000 The WHO ranked China 4th from the bottom of 191 countries in terms of fairness of its medical coverage.
(WSJ, 12/5/05, p.A1)
2000 In China coal mine fatalities were estimated to be between 5,000 and 10,000 per year with an average of 13 miners killed per day. Miners earned about $50 per month.
(SFC, 12/25/00, p.B6)(NW, 10/28/02, p.44R)
2001 Jan 10, China sent rats into orbit aboard its "Sacred Ship" Shenzhou II, powered by a Long March rocket.
(SFC, 1/11/01, p.A16)
2001 Jan 11, China’s state media reported at least 27 people dead from a New years Day blizzard in inner Mongolia.
(SFC, 1/12/01, p.A18)
2001 Jan 16, China’s Shenzhou II unmanned space craft landed after 108 orbits.
(WSJ, 1/17/01, p.A1)
2001 Jan 23, Five people believed to members of Falun Gong set themselves on fire in Tiananmen Square. One woman and her daughter (12) died. In August 4 people were convicted of murder for organizing the self-immolation. A judge found that they had spread the notion that members could achieve nirvana through self-immolation.
(SFC, 1/24/01, p.A12)(SFC, 8/18/01, p.A11)
2001 Jan 24, The Chinese lunar calendar marked this as the new year, 4699.
(SSFC, 1/28/01, p.CN3)
2001 Feb 8, China’s cabinet approved a 700-mile rail line to link Lhasa, Tibet, and Qinghai province.
(WSJ, 2/9/01, p.A1)
2001 Feb 11, Gao Zhan, a US-based scholar, was detained at Beijing airport by Chinese authorities. She was formally charged as a spy on April 3. [see Mar 27]
(WSJ, 3/28/01, p.A1)(SFC, 4/4/01, p.D14)
2001 Feb 25, Chinese officials in Shenzhen detained Li Shaomin (44), an associate professor of marketing at Hong Kong’s City Univ.
(SFC, 3/31/01, p.A11)
2001 Feb 26, The US State Dept. issued its annual report on the status of human rights and cited "unconfirmed but credible" reports from China of continued use of torture by police to obtain coerced confessions.
(SFC, 2/27/01, p.A10)
2001 Feb 28, China gave a qualified endorsement for a UN-sponsored human rights treaty. It backed away from a guarantee of workers rights.
(SFC, 3/1/01, p.A8)
2001 Mar 1, China was reported to consume a little over 6% of the world’s total 75.5 million barrels per day of oil.
(WSJ, 3/1/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 2, In China 37 members of the banned Falun Gong were sentenced to prison terms of 3-10 years. Most had been convicted of "using a cult to obstruct the law."
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 5, China announced a 17.7% increase in defense spending.
(SFC, 3/6/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 6, It was reported that Chinese psychiatrists have decided to stop classifying homosexuality as a mental illness.
(SFC, 3/6/01, p.A11)
2001 Mar 6, In China an explosion at an elementary school in Jiangxi province left 37 students and 4 teachers dead. 42 people, mostly students, were killed in a schoolhouse explosion in southern China; parents said the students had been forced to make fireworks by school officials. Teachers, to enhance their meager salaries, had forced students to make firecrackers during their lunch breaks. Prime Minister Zhu Rongji said the blast was caused by a "deranged suicide bomber."
(WSJ, 3/7/01, p.A1)(SFC, 3/8/01, p.A1)(SFC, 3/9/01, p.A14)(AP, 3/5/02)
2001 Mar 13, In China four writers were detained a few months after they had formed the New Youth Study Group for discussing political change in China. In 2003 Xu Wei (28) and Jin Haike (26) were sentenced to 10 years in prison for subverting state power. Yang Zili (32) and Zhang Honghai (29) were sentenced to 8 years. Wei and Haike were released On March 12, 2011, after completing their jail terms.
(SFC, 5/30/03, p.A16)(AP, 3/13/11)
2001 Mar 16, Explosions rocked residential buildings in Shijiazhuang, a mill town in China’s Hebei province. At least 18 people were killed. The deaths soon mounted to 108 with 38 injured. Police later arrested Jin Ruchao (41), a deaf man, who reportedly confessed to the bombings.
(SFC, 3/17/01, p.A10)(SSFC, 3/18/01, p.D1)(SFC, 3/24/01, p.A11)
2001 Mar 21, The Taiwan United Daily News reported that a senior Chinese colonel had defected to the US.
(SFC, 3/23/01, p.D4)
2001 Mar 22, Pres. Bush met with Chinese Deputy Premier Qian Qichen and said the US would support Taiwan’s military needs.
(WSJ, 3/23/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 27, In its first specific accusation against a detained U.S.-based scholar, China said Gao Zhan had confessed to spying for foreign intelligence agencies. The US denied employing her as a spy. Gao, who had been detained on Feb. 11, was released the following July. In 2003 Gao Zhan admitted to illegal profits of over $539,000 from selling 80 microprocessors to the Chinese government. [see Feb 11]
(WSJ, 3/28/01, p.A1)(AP, 3/27/02)(SFC, 11/27/03, p.A3)
2001 Mar 27, China reported that its population stood at 1.26 billion, an 11.7% increase over the last decade.
(SFC, 3/28/01, p.D4)
2001 Mar 30, It was reported that the forests of China’s Yunnan province had dropped from 50% coverage in 1949 to less than 10% today.
(SFC, 3/30/01, p.A17)
2001 Apr 1, A US Navy EP-3 surveillance plane with 24 aboard collided with a Chinese fighter jet over the South China Sea and was forced to land on China's Hainan island. The fighter jet crashed. Chinese pilot Wang Wei parachuted out of his F-8 jet but had not been found. Zhao Yu, a 2nd pilot, later blamed the US plane banked and hit Wei’s plane. None of the 24 crew members was hurt, but they were held prisoner by the Chinese for a tense 11 days.
(SFC, 4/2/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/2/01, p.A1)(SFC, 4/4/01, p.A13)(SFC, 4/7/01, p.A13)(AP, 4/1/02)
2001 Apr 2, Pres. Bush demanded that the Chinese release the US Navy crew and spy plane that had made an emergency landing on China’s Hainan Island.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 4, US diplomats met with 24 US crew members held by the Chinese military on Hainan island. Colin Powell issued a statement of regret over the loss of the Chinese pilot involved in the incident. Powell also sent a letter to China’s chief foreign policy official outlining ways of settlement.
(SFC, 4/4/01, p.A1)(SFC, 4/5/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 5, Wang Zhizhi of China, 7 feet and 1 inch tall, made his NBA debut for the Dallas Mavericks. Wang Zhizhi became the first Chinese player to play in the NBA when he took the court for Dallas against Atlanta. He scored six points and grabbed three rebounds as the Mavericks beat the Hawks 108-to-94.
(SSFC, 4/15/01, p.A17)(AP, 4/5/02)
2001 Apr 5, Pres. Bush expressed regret over the loss of a Chinese pilot in the Apr 1 collision with a US spy plane.
(SFC, 4/6/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 6, US officials announced some progress toward the release of 24 military personnel in China and hoped to establish a joint US-China commission to examine the April 1 collision of a US spy plane and Chinese jet.
(SFC, 4/7/01, p.1)
2001 Apr 7, China rejected statements of regret and continued to demand a US apology for the April 1 collision between a US spy plane and Chinese jet.
(SSFC, 4/7/01, p.C1)
2001 Apr 8, Sec. of State Colin Powell expressed sorrow for the Chinese pilot lost on Apr 1, but the Chinese continued to demand that the US apologize reiterated a demand that the US stop all military surveillance off the Chinese coast. US officials said Pres. Bush was sending a letter to the wife of a missing Chinese fighter pilot as a humanitarian gesture. The pilot's plane had collided with a US spy plane, forcing the spy plane to make an emergency landing in China.
(SFC, 4/9/01, p.A1)(AP, 4/8/02)
2001 Apr 12, The 24 crew members of a US spy plane arrived in Hawaii after being held for 11 days in China. Pres. Bush blamed the Chinese for the midair collision of the US spy plane and a Chinese jet and rebuffed demands to end reconnaissance flights off the coast of China. In 2006 it was revealed that Prince Bandar bin Sultan, Saudi ambassador to the US, negotiated the release of the crew on behalf of Pres. Bush.
(SFC, 4/13/01, p.A1)(AP, 4/12/06)(WSJ, 10/11/06, p.D10)
2001 Apr 13, In China a 5.9 earthquake hit Yunnan province and at least 7 people were killed. 42,000 homes were destroyed in the Shidian area.
(SFC, 4/21/01, p.A24)
2001 Apr 15, Chinese police opened fire on villagers who opposed high local taxes and fees in Yuntang. 2 were killed and at least 18 wounded.
(SFC, 4/20/01, p.A16)
2001 Apr 17, US envoys arrived in China to resolved issues of the US spy plane collision with a Chinese jet.
(SFC, 4/18/01, p.A12)
2001 Apr 18, US negotiators said China agreed to discuss the return of the US spy plane following a day of unproductive talks.
(SFC, 4/19/01, p.A10)
2001 Apr 19, US and Chinese negotiators failed to reach any agreement over the US spy plane. The Chinese showed video images from flights last year and the US presented a written proposal for the return of the plane.
(SFC, 4/20/01, p.A14)
2001 Apr 25, In unusually blunt terms, President Bush warned China that an attack on Taiwan could provoke a U.S. military response.
(AP, 4/25/02)
2001 Apr 29, China offered to allow US officials to inspect the US Navy spy plane on Hainan Island.
(SFC, 4/30/01, p.A1)
2001 May 2, Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan returned to China from Russia with a draft accord for relations with Russia.
(SFC, 5/4/01, p.D2)
2001 May 2, US technical experts examined the US spy plane on China’s Hainan Island.
(WSJ, 5/3/01, p.A1)
2001 May 2, In China a landslide in Wulong County buried a 9-story building where 76 of 95 residents were home. 65 bodies were recovered.
(SFC, 5/4/01, p.D2)
2001 May 4, US experts, following 3 days of inspections, said the US spy plane on China’s Hainan Island could be repaired and flown home.
(SFC, 5/5/01, p.D1)
2001 May 8, China rejected a US plan to repair EP-3 the spy plane and fly it away.
(WSJ, 5/9/01, p.A1)
2001 May 19, It was reported that China’s "Strike Hard" anti-crime campaign had resulted in at least 801 executions in the last 3 weeks of April.
(SFC, 5/19/01, p.A8)
2001 May 20, In China 20 miners were feared dead in a gypsum mine in the Guangxi region and another 38-39 were trapped in a coal mine in Sichuan. The miners in Sichuan were working a prison-run mine.
(SFC, 5/21/01, p.A10)(SFC, 5/22/01, p.A11)
2001 May 20, In China 14 people were executed in 2 cities for robbery and murder.
(SFC, 5/21/01, p.A10)
2001 May 26, Wu Jianmin (46), a Chinese-born American writer, was arrested on charges of collecting information that endangered security. He was released and expelled Sep 28.
(SFC, 8/2/01, p.A7)(SFC, 9/29/01, p.B1)
2001 Jun 4, It was reported that US Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld had virtually cut off all Pentagon contacts with the Chinese armed forces in displeasure over the spy plane incident. Rumsfeld announced that he had given limited permission to resume military-to-military contacts with China due to the progress in the resolution of the spy plane incident.
(SFC, 6/4/01, p.A10)(SFC, 6/5/01, p.A12)
2001 Jun 5, It was reported that the ecstasy drug was a big hit in Chinese night clubs. It had begun filtering in from Hong Kong in 1998.
(SFC, 6/5/01, p.A12)
2001 Jun 5, In China 13 children were killed in a fire at a kindergarten dormitory in Nanchang.
(SFC, 6/6/01, p.C3)
2001 Jun 7, The US and China agreed on a final plan for the removal of the US spy plane from Hainan Island.
(SFC, 6/8/01, p.A16)
2001 Jun 7, China published new rules on genetic engineering. The government took broad oversight over the industry and required clear labeling on genetically altered foods.
(WSJ, 6/8/01, p.A13)
2001 Jun 14, A forum in China inducted Uzbekistan as the 6th member of a regional group (the Shanghai Five) that included China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. The 5-year-old group hoped to counterbalance US influence and fight Islamic separatism.
(SFC, 6/15/01, p.D6)(WSJ, 6/14/01, p.C11)
2001 Jun 15, The Shanghai Five member nations (China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Russia), having admitted Uzbekistan, signed the Declaration of Shanghai Cooperation Organization.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_Cooperation_Organisation)
2001 Jun 16, He Qinglian (44), Chinese economist, fled China after security agents broke into her office in Shenzhen.
(SFC, 7/3/01, p.A8)
2001 Jun 21, Jailed Falun Gong members attempted a group suicide in a Chinese northeast labor camp. 10-14 reportedly died by hanging.
(SFC, 7/4/01, p.A11)(WSJ, 7/5/01, p.A8)
2001 Jun 25, Typhoon Chebi killed 73 people in China’s Fujian province and left 83 missing. Damage was estimated at $425 million.
(WSJ, 6/26/01, p.A1)(SFC, 6/27/01, p.D3)
2001 Jun 26, In China 7 members of a North Korean family took refuge in the Beijing office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and claimed fear of deportation.
(SFC, 6/27/01, p.D3)
2001 Jun 27, It was reported that Wang Guoqi, a Chinese doctor seeking political asylum, had presented a written statement to US authorities that he had taken part in harvesting body parts from executed prisoners in China. China meanwhile observed UN anti-drug day by executing dozens of people for drug crimes. China denied the accusations.
(SFC, 6/27/01, p.A10)(SFC, 6/29/01, p.D4)
2001 Jun 29, A new $2.4 billion 700-mile railway project was begun to connect Lhasa, Tibet, to the Chinese interior.
(SSFC, 7/1/01, p.A18)
2001 Jul 1, China’s Pres. Jiang Zemin announced that the Communist Party will allow private businessmen to become members.
(SFC, 7/2/01, p.A8)
2001 Jul 1, Parts of the US spy plane were flown out from China’s Hainan Island.
(WSJ, 7/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Jul 7, It was reported that China had executed 1,781 people over the last 3 months.
(SFC, 7/7/01, p.A8)
2001 Jul 13, It was reported that record droughts persisted in Afghanistan northern China, North Korea, Mongolia and Tajikistan.
(SFC, 7/13/01, p.D4)
2001 Jul 13, The IOC awarded Beijing, China, the honor of hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics.
(SFC, 7/14/01, p.A1)
2001 Jul 14, China convicted Li Shaomin (44), a Chinese-born American business professor, of spying for Taiwan and ordered his expulsion.
(SSFC, 7/15/01, p.A12)
2001 Jul 15, China’s Pres. Zemin arrived in Russia for a state visit. A treaty of friendship and cooperation was planned.
(SFC, 7/16/01, p.A9)
2001 Jul 16, In northwest China an illegal cache of explosives blew up in Mafang and 41 people were killed.
(SFC, 7/17/01, p.A7)
2001 Jul 17, In Moscow Russia and China agreed to plan a $1.7 billion pipeline for oil from Siberia to northeastern China.
(SFC, 7/18/01, p.C4)
2001 Jul 17, In China’s Guangxi province the Lajiapo and Longshan mines flooded and 81 miners were killed. Immediate news was covered up. In Aug 20 company employees and 70 suspected gang members were arrested for the coverup. 11 mine officials and 4 county political leaders were arrested.
(SFC, 8/7/01, p.A7)(SFC, 8/15/01, p.A7)(SFC, 9/1/01, p.A10)(SFC, 9/1/01, p.A10)
2001 Jul 20, It was reported that China planned to buy 38 Russian Su-30 MKK ground attack jets worth $2 billion.
(SFC, 7/20/01, p.D4)
2001 Jul 24, A Chinese court sentenced two US residents to 10 years in prison on charges of spying for Taiwan. China released Gao Zhan and Qin Guangguang two days later.
(SFC, 7/25/01, p.A1)(AP, 7/24/02)
2001 Jul 28, US Sec. of State Colin Powell met with China’s Pres. Zemin and reached agreement to restart a formal dialogue with the US on human rights and weapons proliferation.
(SSFC, 7/29/01, p.A12)
2001 Aug 8, Four American Senators met with Pres. Jiang Zemin in China and warned him that the continued sales of sensitive missile technology would trigger an arms race and boost internal US support for a missile defense system.
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A10)
2001 Aug 9, It was reported that the US had decided to pay China $34,567 to cover the costs of the spy plane that was detained on Hainan island. China had asked for $1 million and rejected the offer.
(SFC, 8/10/01, p.A12)(SFC, 8/13/01, p.A12)
2001 Aug 10, China received its new $120 mil Boeing 767-300ER aircraft following retrofit in San Antonio, Tx. In Oct Chinese experts discovered high-tech listening devices hidden in the plane. Purchase of the plane was 1st announced in Aug 2000.
(SFC, 1/19/02, p.A4)
2001 Aug 14, In China Chen Qiulan, an arrested Falun Gong member, died of a heart attack at a detention center in Daqing, Hailongjiang.
(SFC, 9/1/01, p.A10)
2001 Aug 16, China said that it was spending $8.4 million to set aside forests in the southwest to help save some 1,000 remaining wild pandas.
(SFC, 8/17/01, p.A14)
2001 Aug 20, In China Wu Liangjie, an arrested Falun Gong member, died after falling from the window of a police office in Baicheng, Jilin province.
(SFC, 9/1/01, p.A10)
2001 Aug 21, It was reported that Chinese authorities had removed Khenpo Jigme Phuntsog (68), a Tibetan monk, from his Serthar religious academy in the Larung valley of Sichuan province. The move was seen as an effort to reduce the 6-7 thousand monks and nuns living in the area.
(SFC, 8/21/01, p.A7)
2001 Aug 23, It was reported that surveys had indicated that two-thirds of China’s 1.26 billion people were infected with hepatitis B.
(SFC, 8/23/01, p.A9)
2001 Aug 23, The Chinese government reported that some 600,000 people have been infected with AIDS with nearly as many from selling their blood as from sexual contact.
(SFC, 8/24/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 8/24/01, p.A1)
2001 Aug 23, Brian Regan (38), retired US Air Force master sergeant and cryptanalyst, was arrested by the FBI at Dulles Int’l. Airport on charges of spying. In 2002 Regan was accused of trying to spy for Iraq, Libya and China. On February 20, 2003, Regan was found guilty of three charges of attempted espionage including two counts of attempted espionage related to attempts to sell information to Iraq and China, and one count of gathering national defense information. He was acquitted of attempting to provide US secrets to Libya. On March 20, 2003, Regan was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
(http://cicentre.com/Documents/DOC_Regan_1.htm)(SFC, 8/29/01, p.A6)(WSJ, 2/15/02, p.A1)
2001 Sep 9, It was reported that some 3,000 people had been executed in China since Pres. Zemin announced a crackdown in April.
(SSFC, 9/9/01, p.A18)
2001 Sep 25, A Chinese captain went down with his freighter in the Taiwan Strait as Typhoon Lekima lashed the area.
(WSJ, 9/26/01, p.A1)
2001 Sep 28, In China Wu Jianmin, a Chinese-born American writer, was released from jail and expelled. The state media said he had confessed to his crimes of spying for Taiwan.
(SFC, 9/29/01, p.B1)
2001 Oct 10, In China a state court sentenced over a dozen key officials in Shenyang for corruption.
(SFC, 10/11/01, p.C2)
2001 Oct 12, China put limits on air travel to citizens of 19 countries, mainly in the Middle East.
(SFC, 10/13/01, p.A10)
2001 Oct 15, China executed 2 Muslim separatists in Yili, Xinjiang province.
(SFC, 10/18/01, p.C2)
2001 Oct 18, Pres. Bush arrived in China for the annual Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Shanghai. The agenda was economic development and trade liberalization.
(SFC, 10/18/01, p.A9)
2001 Nov 10, China officially joined the WTO after ministers in Qatar approved its membership.
(SSFC, 11/11/01, p.A14)
2001 Nov 11, Taiwan officially joined the WTO after ministers in Qatar approved its membership.
(SSFC, 11/11/01, p.A14)
2001 Nov 20, Chinese police on Tiananmen Square detained some 35 foreigners who protested the crackdown on the Falun Gong. The protesters were all expelled from the country.
(SFC, 11/21/01, p.A1)(SFC, 11/22/01, p.A21)
2001 Nov, China held its 1st national AIDS conference in Beijing.
(WSJ, 12/19/01, p.A12)
2001 Nov, China’s 4 largest producers of Vitamin C formed the Vitamin C Chapter of the China Chamber of Commerce of Medicines and Health Products.
(WSJ, 2/10/06, p.A16)
2001 Dec 13, The Beijing First Intermediate Court sentenced 6 people to prison for 3 to 12 years for downloading material from the Internet on the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement and passing it along.
(SFC, 12/24/01, p.A4)
2001 Dec 16, In China a weekend bombing killed 5 people.
(WSJ, 12/17/01, p.A1)
2001 Dec 27, Pres. Bush permanently normalized trade relations with China.
(WSJ, 12/28/01, p.A1)
2001 Ian Buruma authored "Bad Elements," a look at China’s dissidents, their convictions, and the country’s problems with self-identity.
(SFC, 11/26/01, p.A17)
2001 Gordon C. Chang authored "The Coming Collapse of China." He predicted that the People’s Republic would fall by the Olympic Games of 2008.
(WSJ, 8/8/01, p.A10)
2001 The ballet Raise the Red Lantern premiered in the spring. It was based on a 1991 film of the same name directed by Zhang Yimou.
(WSJ, 4/3/02, p.A16)
2001 A Chinese law prohibited medical institutions and personnel from performing gestational surrogacy services, in which an embryo created from a couple is implanted into another woman who carries the baby to term. In 2011 a couple spent nearly a million yuan ($160,000) and illegally enlisted two surrogate mothers to help have the four boys and four girls.
(AP, 12/30/11)
2001 In China Zhengzhou city in Henan province unveiled plans for a new city and hired Japanese architect Kisho Kurokawa to design Zhengdong New District and its main showcase buildings. Completion was scheduled for 2015 at a cost of $25 billion.
(Econ, 1/7/06, p.40)
2001 Amnesty Int’l. reported in 2002 that at least 3,048 people were executed in 31 countries in 2001. China accounted for at least 1,781. 90% of the executed were from China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the US.
(SFC, 4/10/02, p.A12)
2001 Shi Zhengrong, a Chinese solar engineer, started Suntech to manufacture solar cells. In 2005 it became the first Chinese solar firm to go public. By 2007 the company was the world’s 3rd largest in the field. In 2013 it went bankrupt.
(Econ, 6/2/07, SR p.16)(Econ, 3/30/13, p.68)
2001 There were some 720,000 passenger vehicles sold this year in China. Sales were expected to climb to 900,000 units in 2002.
(WSJ, 7/3/02, p.A9)
2001 Some 5,670 Chinese miners died in accidents in this year.
(SFC, 4/3/03, p.D1)
2002 Jan 3, Hu Jintao (59) was reported to be in line for the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party.
(WSJ, 1/3/02, p.A1)
2002 Jan 15, China reported that at least 50 miners were killed in 3 separate mine accidents.
(SFC, 1/16/02, p.A7)
2002 Jan 19, It was reported that China had imposed new Internet controls and required service providers to screen all e-mail messages for political content.
(SFC, 1/19/02, p.A4)
2002 Jan 23, It was reported that China was moving 17,000 settlers to a traditionally Tibetan region.
(WSJ, 1/23/02, p.A1)
2002 Jan 24, The US imposed sanctions on 3 Chinese entities accused of giving chemical and biological arms technology to Iran.
(WSJ, 1/25/02, p.A1)
2002 Jan 25, Chinese PM Zhu Rongji visited Bangalore and said: You are number one in software, and we are number one in hardware. If Indian software and Chinese hardware work together, we can create a force that will be number one in the world.
(SSFC, 1/27/02, p.A24)
2002 Jan 29, In China Xu Zerong (David Tsui), a Hong Kong-based historian, was sentenced to 13 years in prison for providing classified historical documents, pertaining to Chinese operations during the Korean war, to unspecified overseas parties. Zerong (57) was released on June 23, 2011, from Guangzhou Prison in southern Guangdong province's capital city.
(SSFC, 2/3/02, p.A17)(AP, 6/23/11)
2002 Feb 12-2002 Feb 13, The Chinese lunar calendar marked this as the new year, 4700, the Year of the Horse.
(SFC, 2/12/02, p.A14)
2002 Feb 14, In China 41 foreigners were arrested and later expelled following pro Falun Gong demonstrations on Tiananmen Square.
(SFC, 2/16/02, p.A14)
2002 Feb 20, President Bush, on the final leg of his Asian trip, arrived in China, where he urged President Jiang Zemin to respect religious freedoms.
(AP, 2/20/07)
2002 Feb 21, Pres. Bush met with Pres. Zemin in Beijing and both agreed to work on the reunification of North and South Korea. They disagreed over controls on exports of missile technology. Pres. Bush answered questions in a live broadcast and reaffirmed the US right to protect Taiwan.
(SFC, 2/21/02, p.A12)(SFC, 2/22/02, p.A12)(WSJ, 2/22/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 1, Laid-off workers of the Daqing Oilfield Co. began massive protests for re-negotiation of early retirement packages. Some 86,000 of 260,000 workers had been laid off since 1999. Daily protests hit as many as 50,000 workers.
(WSJ, 3/14/02, p.A1)(SFC, 3/20/02, p.A9)
2002 Mar 5, In China Falun Gong members cut into a cable network in Changchun and broadcast its messages for some 50 minutes.
(SFC, 3/8/02, p.A12)(WSJ, 3/8/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 6, China announced a 17.6% increase in defense spending.
(SFC, 3/7/02, p.A7)
2002 Mar 15, China allowed 25 North Korean asylum seekers to leave the Spanish Embassy in Beijing for South Korea by way of the Philippines.
(WSJ, 3/18/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 20, China deployed military police to at least 2 northeast cities to quell labor protests.
(WSJ, 3/21/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 30, It was reported that a massive dust storm spread from northwest China to South Korea. It was largest recorded since records began 130 years ago. Trans Pacific winds carried the dust clouds west.
(SFC, 3/30/02, p.A20)
2002 Apr 6, It was reported that China’s Jilin province was experiencing its worst drought in 20 years. Some 5 million acres were affected and dry soil reached a depth of 7 feet. Shandong province was also affected.
(SFC, 4/6/02, p.C10)
2002 Apr 11, China reported that some 850,000 people were infected with AIDS at the end of 2001.
(SFC, 4/12/02, p.A8)
2002 Apr 15, In South Korea an Air China jet Boeing 767, CA-129, with some 166 passengers crashed into a mountain near Kimhae. 122 people died in the crash.
(SFC, 4/15/02, p.A3)(SFC, 4/16/02, p.A7)(AP, 4/15/07)
2002 Apr 27, China’s VP Hu Jintao (59), heir apparent, stopped in Hawaii on his way to meet with Pres. Bush.
(WSJ, 4/29/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 28, China’s VP Hu Jintao (59), heir apparent, rang the bell at the NY Stock Exchange and viewed ground zero.
(WSJ, 4/30/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr, There was a bomb blast in Chengdu, China. Tibetan monks Lobsang Dhondup (28) and Tenzin Deleg Rinpoche were detained. Dhondup was executed Jan 27, 2003.
(SFC, 1/28/03, p.A6)
2002 May 1, China’s VP Hu Jintao met with Pres. Bush. Jintao said the Taiwan issue could hurt relations and defended China’s record on human rights.
(WSJ, 5/2/02, p.A1)
2002 May 2, China’s VP Hu Jintao met with Mayor Brown in SF and set a visit to Intel prior to his departure back to China.
(SFC, 5/3/02, p.A8)
2002 May 4, Two explosions killed at 34 miners in China’s Guizhou and Hunan provinces.
(SFC, 5/8/02, p.A13)
2002 May 7, A China Northern Airlines with 112 people crashed off the northeast coast. Flight 6136 was an MD-82 enroute from Beijing to Dalian. Xinhua news later reported that it was due to an act of sabotage by a passenger who lit a fire on board.
(SFC, 5/8/02, p.A15)(Reuters, 12/7/02)
2002 May 16, The state phone industry was divided into 2 competing parts: China Telecom and China Netcom.
(WSJ, 5/16/02, p.A12)
2002 May 30, It was reported that China was embarking on a program to inoculate its poorest people against hepatitis. Half of the population was reported to have had the disease with 120 million long term carriers.
(WSJ, 5/30/02, p.A1)
2002 Jun 12, In China more than 200 people have died in some of the worst flooding in years. Crops were destroyed and vast areas were under water.
(AP, 6/12/02)
2002 Jun 13, In China at least 223 were reported dead and 320,000 homeless from Xinjiang to Hubei provinces following weekend rains and flooding.
(SFC, 6/14/02, p.A16)
2002 Jun 16, In China at least 24 people were killed and 13 injured when a fire swept through the packed Lanjisu Cyber cafe in a university district of Beijing, in the city's worst fire since 1949. Windows were barred and the only door was locked. The unlicensed owner was arrested.
(Reuters, 6/16/02)(SFC, 6/17/02, p.A7)
2002 Jun 20, A gas explosion ripped through the Chengzihe coal mine in Jixi in northeast China and killed 111 miners.
(Reuters, 6/20/02)
2002 Jun 22, In China an explosion at a gold mine in Fanshi County, Shanxi, killed 46 miners. An initial cover-up was attempted.
(SFC, 6/29/02, p.A14)(SFC, 7/2/02, p.A8)
2002 Jun 26, Chinese basketball star Yao Ming was selected first overall by the Houston Rockets in the NBA draft.
(AP, 6/26/03)
2002 Jun 28, In China it was reported that at least 46 people were killed in the northern province of Shanxi when an electrical fire ignited explosives in a gold mine.
(Reuters, 6/28/02)
2002 Jul 3, Chinese police found Wang Bingzhang, a pro-democracy activist and US resident, in Guangxi Province. He had been recently kidnapped with 2 others in Vietnam.
(SFC, 12/21/02, p.A10)
2002 Jul 4, In China a blast in the Fuqiang mine in Songshu trapped 39 miners. There was little hope for survivors.
(SFC, 7/6/02, p.A14)
2002 Jul 7, In southern China 13 people were killed when a wall being demolished at a vegetable market crumbled after heavy rain, burying vendors and workers under a mound of rubble.
(Reuters, 7/7/02)
2002 Jul 8, In China a gas explosion at a coal mine killed 44 miners at the Dingsheng mine in northeastern Heilongjiang province.
(Reuters, 7/9/02)(SFC, 7/9/02, p.A10)
2002 Jul 12, Chinese officials reported that nearly 1,000 schoolchildren in northeast China were rushed to hospital after being vaccinated in late June for encephalitis and two senior officials were arrested and charged with negligence.
(Reuters, 7/12/02)
2002 Jul 19, In central China a downpour of giant hailstones, some the size of eggs, killed 15 people and left hospitals overflowing with head-wound victims.
(Reuters, 7/20/02)
2002 Jul 20, The number of Japanese who have died after taking diet pills imported from China has risen to four and 124 have fallen ill, Kyodo news agency reported quoting a Health Ministry report.
(Reuters, 7/20/02)
2002 Jul 25, Chinese police have formally arrested Liu Xiaoqing, one of the country's most famous film stars and 2-time winner of the prestigious Hundred Flowers Best Actress award, on suspicion of large-scale tax evasion. Liu was queen of Chinese cinema in the 1980s and is best remembered for playing Qing Dynasty Empress Dowager Cixi in the film "The Reign Behind the Curtain."
(Reuters, 7/25/02)
2002 Jul 26, It was reported that the regional Chinese governments of Tibet, Sichuan and Yunnan had agreed to develop an area to be called "The China Shangri-La Ecological Tourist Zone" across 50 counties next to Meili Snow Mountain.
(SFC, 7/26/02, p.A15)
2002 Aug 8, The Chinese government awarded an Australian consortium a 25-year natural gas supply contract in Australia's biggest-ever foreign trade deal.
(AP, 8/8/02)
2002 Aug 9, China reported 70 people dead from landslides and flooding in Hunan province.
(SFC, 8/10/02, p.A9)
2002 Aug 10, In China rescue crews pulled the bodies of 7 workers from a flooded mine in the central Chinese province of Henan. One more was recovered the next day.
(AP, 8/11/02)
2002 Aug 10, China’s Science and Technology Daily reported approval of a home-grown AIDS drug for the first time that will end the dependence of Chinese with the disease on imported medicine. Jiduo Fuding was developed by the Northeast General Pharmaceutical Factory.
(Reuters, 8/10/02)
2002 Aug 14, In southwest China a massive wall of mud and rock unleashed by heavy rains slammed into villages, burying 67 people in the second deadly landslide to strike the area this week.
(Reuters, 8/16/02)
2002 Aug 17, In China 3 days of floods and landslides caused by mountain torrents swept through southeastern Zhejiang province, killing at least 21 people.
(Reuters, 8/17/02)
2002 Aug 22, China evacuated some 600,000 people around the swollen Lake Dongting in Hunan province.
(WSJ, 8/23/02, p.A1)
2002 Sep 3, Russia and China gave their backing to the Kyoto Protocol on cutting greenhouse-gas emissions.
(AP, 9/3/02)(WSJ, 9/4/02, p.A1)
2002 Sep 4, China reported that flooding had killed 1,532 people this year.
(SFC, 9/5/02, p.A11)
2002 Sep 8, In southeast China typhoon Sinlaku was weakening as it churned inland after triggering fierce winds and heavy rain that killed 23 people, toppled homes and uprooted trees.
(Reuters, 9/8/02)
2002 Sep 14, In China 38 (49) people died and hundreds were hospitalized with food poisoning after eating breakfast snacks, sesame cakes, fried dough sticks and fried glutinous rice balls, in the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing. A man jealous of a business rival later confessed to spiking his competitor's breakfast snacks with rat poison. The man was convicted and sentenced to execution.
(Reuters, 9/14/02)(Reuters, 9/17/02)(WSJ, 9/17/02, p.A1)(WSJ, 10/1/02, p.A1)
2002 Sep 19, North Korea announced it had made the city of Sinuiju on its border with China a "special administrative region," a move South Korean media said was the first step towards creating a new economic zone. The project was soon mothballed after its first governor, Yang Bin, was jailed in China for tax evasion. Yang Bin was formally sentenced in July 2003 for 18 years, and was fined for 2.3 million renminbi.
(Reuters, 9/19/02)(Econ, 10/2/10, p.45)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yang_Bin)
2002 Sep 23, In Inner Mongolia, China, a staircase guardrail gave way at a school, killing 21 students.
(Reuters, 9/24/02)
2002 Sep 30, The National Intelligence Council said China, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria and Russia will have 50-75 million HIV-infected people by 2010, more than any other 5 countries.
(SFC, 10/1/02, p.A5)
2002 Oct 3, Wu-chi Liu (95), China-born scholar, died in Menlo Park, Ca. His books included "A Short History of Confucian Philosophy" and "An Introduction to Chinese Literature." He was also the senior editor of "Sunflower Splendor," an anthology that encompassed 3,000 years of Chinese poetry in translation.
(SFC, 10/18/02, p.A26)
2002 Oct 10, China sent Zhu Xiaohua (53), its most senior financial official nabbed for corruption, to jail for 15 years, but spared him the executioner's bullet after he confessed to taking bribes prosecutors knew nothing about.
(AP, 10/10/02)
2002 Oct 20, Yao Ming (22), a 7-foot-5 basketball player from China, arrived in Texas to join the Houston Rockets.
(WSJ, 10/22/02, p.A1)
2002 Oct 23, In China rescuers fought to save 29 miners trapped underground after a coal mine explosion in the northern province of Shanxi killed 21. China's death toll from mining accidents up to July this year was 3,620, up 4.8 percent from a year earlier
(AP, 10/25/02)(Reuters, 10/26/02)
2002 Oct 28, It was reported that 200 farms in China tap 7,000 live, caged bears for their bile in an excruciating process. Owners slice into the bears to milk bile from their gall bladder with a tube. Bear bile is viewed as a panacea in traditional Chinese medicine. Many bears do not survive the initial operation and few live longer than 10 years, less than half the average life expectancy.
(Reuters, 10/28/02)
2002 Oct 29, China and the United States have agreed to resume military-to-military ties with plans to hold talks at senior level in the near future.
(AP, 10/29/02)
2002 Nov 4, China signed a landmark agreement, “Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea," with ASEAN (Brunei, Malaysia, Philippines, Vietnam) on avoiding open conflict in the disputed South China Sea Spratly Islands. Indonesia objected and Taiwan was barred from signing.
(Reuters, 11/4/02)(Econ, 5/22/04, p.40)(www.aseansec.org/13163.htm)
2002 Nov 5, China finished blocking the Yangtze River at the Three Gorges Dam, paving the way for the world's biggest hydroelectricity and flood control project to come on stream next year.
(Reuters, 11/6/02)
2002 Nov 5, The ASEAN group (Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Brunei, Thailand and Myanmar) ended a 2-day conference in Cambodia that was also attended by representatives from China, Japan, and India and South Africa.
(AP, 11/5/02)
2002 Nov 8, China's President Jiang Zemin opened the Communist Party to businessmen to preserve its grip on power as he kicked off a congress at which his generation of leaders is due to retire.
(Reuters, 11/8/02)(Econ, 3/10/07, p.9)
2002 Nov 12, China's Communist Party congress held a preliminary vote for a new crop of leaders expected to replace President Jiang Zemin and other party chieftains this week.
(Reuters, 11/12/02)
2002 Nov 13, Delegates to China's Communist Party Congress confirmed that Jiang Zemin would step down as party chief and make way for a new generation of leaders this week.
(AP, 11/13/02)
2002 Nov 14, Chinese Communist Party chief Jiang Zemin ushered in a new generation of leaders under Hu Jintao in the first orderly succession since the party took power in 1949.
(Reuters, 11/14/02)
2002 Nov 15, Hu Jintao replaced Jiang Zemin as China's Communist Party leader.
(AP, 11/15/03)
2002 Nov 27, China arrested flamboyant flower magnate Yang Bin (39), a Dutch national, on charges of fraud and other commercial crimes, just two months after North Korea named him head of a new free-trade enclave.
(AP, 11/27/02)
2002 Dec 2, In Beijing Russia’s Pres. Putin and Jiang Zemin signed a 13-page declaration calling for a "multi-polar" world and peaceful solutions in Iraq and North Korea.
(SFC, 12/3/02, p.A8)
2002 Dec 3, Shanghai will host the 2010 World Exposition after bidding fiercely to organize an event expected to fuel millions of dollars of investment, Expo officials announced in Monaco.
(Reuters, 12/3/02)
2002 Dec 7, Entertainment giant Vivendi Universal signed an agreement to build a Universal Studios theme park in booming Shanghai, beating much-fancied Walt Disney Co to the punch.
(Reuters, 12/7/02)
2002 Dec 24, Chinese pro-democracy activist Xu Wenli was released from a prison in Beijing and flown to the United States.
(AP, 12/24/03)
2002 Dec 30, China launched its Shenzhou IV spacecraft in a test launch to prepare for manned space voyages.
(SFC, 12/30/02, p.A8)
2002 Dec 31, In China a German-designed magnetic-levitation train hit 260 mph on its maiden run between Shanghai and Pudong airport.
(SFC, 1/1/03, p.A10)
2002 Dec, China signed a preliminary agreement with Indonesia aimed at halting the trade in illegal logs.
(WSJ, 12/23/03, p.A12)
2002 Dec, In Guangdong province up to 26 people were killed and 100 injured following a tornado and severe hailstorm.
(SFC, 12/28/02, p.A24)
2002 China banned the novel "K: The Art of Love" by Chen Hongying following a lawsuit by a British woman who said the book insulted her late parents. The book was based on letters and journals of Julian Bell (d.1937), a nephew of Virginia Woolf, and his affair with poet named Lin.
(SFC, 12/13/02, p.K2)
2002 Chinese writer Jiang Benhu (b.1964), a former member of the intelligence services, authored “Jiemi" under the pseudonym Mai Jia. In 2014 it was translated into English under the title “Decoded."
(Econ, 3/22/14, p.84)
2002 Adeline Yen Mah authored "A Thousand Pieces of Gold: A Memoir of China’s Past Through Its Proverbs."
(SSFC, 11/3/02, p.M1)
2002 Andrew J. Nathan and Bruce Gilley authored "China's New Rulers." A 2nd edition was published in 2004.
(Econ, 3/27/04, p.82)
2002 David Sheff authored "China Dawn," a close-up look at the young men building Internet infrastructure in China.
(WSJ, 3/12/02, p.A24)
2002 Joe Studwell authored "The China Dream," the story of American business woes in China over the last 700 years.
(WSJ, 3/19/02, p.A20)
2002 China and ASEAN agreed to a China-ASEAN free-trade area to be implemented in stages up to 2015.
(Econ, 3/31/07, SR p.8)
2002 Apr 23, China’s state security bureau requested information from Yahoo! about the creator of an online forum. Yahoo! complied with the notice and another one and authorities soon detained democracy activist Wang Xiaoning. Mr. Wang (62) was released on Aug 31, 2012.
(Economist, 9/8/12, p.42)
2002 In China the International Trade City Mall opened in Zhejiang province. The giant 4-story mall had 30,000 stores across 18 million square feet, the equivalent of 350 football fields.
(SFC, 12/8/06, p.A31)
2002 China began constructing a $3.2 billion railroad to Tibet, to be completed in 2007.
(SFC, 11/5/03, p.A13)
2002 China announced a $5.25 billion East-West natural gas project. A Western consortium backed out in 2004.
(WSJ, 8/4/04, p.A11)
2002 Citigroup paid $70 million for a 4.6% stake in Shanghai Pudong Development, China’s 8th largest bank. In 2006 it pushed to raise the stake to 19.9%.
(Econ, 5/20/06, Survey p.21)
2002 Bankers looted some $483 million from the Bank of China in the southern Guangdong province and then fled the country.
(WSJ, 8/4/03, p.A1)
2002 China took over its whole portion of the Internet naming system as part of its program to control Internet access.
(WSJ, 2/13/06, p.A9)
2002 Tencent Holdings PLC, a Chinese Internet company, designed a virtual currency payment system for users in its virtual world. The system caught on and users began trading it at a discount to the yuan. In 2007 Chinese ministries and the central bank waged a crackdown on the QQ coin in order to prevent money laundering.
(WSJ, 3/30/07, p.B1)
2002 In Taiwan a language Romanization system known as tongyong pinyim was introduced. The Chinese favored the hanyu pinyim phonetic system developed in the 1950s.
(Econ, 6/7/14, p.46)
2002 China's exports totaled $325 billion.
(Econ, 12/20/03, p.98)
2002 China surpassed the US as Taiwan's top trading partner.
(WSJ, 4/20/04, p.A18)
2002 China surpassed the US to become the world's largest beer market by volume.
(WSJ, 3/10/04, p.A1)(WSJ, 3/904, p.A1)
2002 Nissan launched a joint effort in China with car manufacturer Dongfeng.
(Econ, 6/12/10, p.71)
2002 Official Chinese statistics said some 7,000 miners died in accidents in this year.
(SFC, 4/3/03, p.D1)
2002 A UN analysis of timber statistics for 2002 showed China's reported import of logs from Indonesia to be 200 times higher that the figures reported by Indonesian customs.
(WSJ, 12/23/03, p.A12)
2003 Jan 5, Chinese media reported that an unmanned Chinese space capsule had returned safely to Earth.
(AP, 1/5/04)
2003 Jan 11, In northern China an explosion ripped through a coal mine, leaving 34 people missing a day after a blast in a neighboring province killed 8 miners.
(AP, 1/11/03)
2003 Jan 20, In northeast China a gas explosion tore through a coal mine, killing 16 workers at a facility in the same city where another blast killed scores of miners last year.
(AP, 1/21/03)
2003 Jan 28, A Chinese company began distributing generic drugs for an anti-AIDS cocktail.
(SFC, 1/29/03, p.A5)
2003 Jan, China ended a "100-day campaign" to hunt down North Korean refugees. 3,200 were deported and another 1,300 awaited deportation. A Christian sponsored underground railroad reportedly helped some 300,000 North Koreans escape their homeland.
(SFC, 2/15/03, p.A14)
2003 Jan-2003 Dec, In China there were more than 58,000 protests, many of them over land rights disputes, across the country.
(Reuters, 6/29/05)
2003 Feb 1, The Lunar Chinese New Year 4701, the Year of the Ram, began.
(SFC, 1/31/03, p.A23)
2003 Feb 2, In northeastern China, fire tore through the Tiantan Hotel Harbin, killing 33 people at the start of Chinese New Year.
(AP, 2/2/03)
2003 Feb 9, In China Xinhua’s first SARS report was issued for leaders’ eyes only. By this time there were already some 300 cases and 5 deaths dating back to November 2002.
(Econ, 6/19/10, p.43)
2003 Feb 9, In China state media reported that scientists had discovered a massive underground lake, some 35 billion cubic feet, in the arid northwest beneath the Taklamakan desert.
(AP, 2/9/03)
2003 Feb 10, A Chinese court convicted U.S.-based dissident Wang Bingzhang on spying and terrorism charges and sentenced him to life in prison.
(AP, 2/10/04)
2003 Feb 11, From China it was reported that an unidentified illness, 1st noted in Nov., has killed at least five people in Guangdong province, left hundreds hospitalized and sent health officials scrambling to find its source.
(AP, 2/11/03)
2003 Feb 11, In China Ma Sanli (b.1914), a master performer of the traditional Chinese art of crosstalk, a rhythmic, often humorous mix of dialogue and storytelling, died.
(AP, 2/11/03)
2003 Feb 19, China outlined plans for an enormous, 30-50 year project to carry water from the country’s water-saturated south to its arid north. The project was 1st conceived by Mao Zedong in the 1950s.
(AP, 2/19/03)(SSFC, 9/5/04, p.A16)
2003 Feb 24, In China accidents in 3 coal mines killed at least 49 miners and left 10 others missing.
(AP, 2/25/03)
2003 Feb 24, A devastating earthquake shook western China, killing at least 268 people, injuring some 2,000 and flattening homes, schools and other buildings near the Silk Road oasis of Kashgar. The death toll soon rose to at least 266 people, with another 2,000 injured.
(SFC, 2/26/03, A8)(AP, 2/25/04)
2003 Feb 25, China issued its first group of long-term residency permits to 46 foreigners, letting them live in the country for up to five years.
(AP, 2/25/03)
2003 Mar 6, The Chinese government committed itself to helping its poorest citizens, unveiling a new budget aimed at helping the countryside and maintaining growth. Defense was budgeted a 9.3% rise, the lowest in 14 years, and plans were made to abolish the agency in charge of five-year plans.
(AP, 3/6/03)(SFC, 3/6/03, p.A14)(WSJ, 3/6/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 15, Hu Jintao was chosen to replace Jiang Zemin as the president of China.
(AP, 3/15/04)
2003 Mar 16, In China Wen Jiaboa (60) replaced Zhu Rongji as premier.
(SFC, 3/16/03, p.A16)
2003 Mar 17, Chinese police found 28 baby girls hidden in suitcases aboard a long-distance bus in southern Guangxi, apparently being smuggled for sale. Police later arrested 10 people involved in the scheme.
(AP, 3/22/03)(WSJ, 3/24/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 19, Doctors in Hong Kong reportedly identified the deadly pneumonia virus as belonging to the paramyxoviridae family. The severe acute respiratory illness (SARS) had killed at least 11 people and left hundreds ill. The outbreak is believed to have began in southern China in November. Later reports held that it could be a coronavirus, part of a group that cause the common cold. Many people treated with corticosteroids later developed an irreversible bone disease called avascular necrosis. By July 12, 2003, SARS killed 812 people worldwide.
(SFC, 3/15/03, p.A8)(SFC, 1/19/02, p.A4)(WSJ, 4/3/03, p.B1)(WSJ, 12/23/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 20, China demanded that military action against Iraq stop immediately and said the initial attack was "violating the norms of international behavior."
(AP, 3/20/03)
2003 Mar 22, A gas explosion killed 28 people and trapped 45 others in a coal mine in northern China.
(AP, 3/22/03)
2003 Mar 30, Students in China staged a rare state-sanctioned protest as hundreds of thousands around the world staged another day of rallies denouncing the US led war in Iraq.
(AP, 3/30/03)
2003 Apr 4, Chinese experts in hard-hit Guangdong province told the scientists they have found a rare form of airborne chlamydia in some of their SARS patients, raising the possibility that more than one germ may be involved. Other Chinese cases suggest the disease might be passed by touching something tainted by a sick person's mucous or saliva.
(AP, 4/5/03)
2003 Apr 6, In eastern China a fire roared through a food processing plant, killing 21 workers.
(AP, 4/6/03)
2003 Apr 9, China closed the People's Armed Police Hospital in Beijing due to SARS.
(SFC, 4/26/03, A3)
2003 Apr 11, Amnesty International said at least 1,526 people were executed worldwide last year, with 80 percent of all known executions carried out in China (1,060), Iran (113) and the United States (71).
(Reuters, 4/11/03)
2003 Apr 16, US, Chinese and North Korean officials announced talks in Beijing to try to resolve standoff over North's nuclear program.
(AP, 4/24/03)
2003 Apr 16, SARS deaths totaled some 154 with at least 3,412 affected in 22 countries. A World Health Organization team disclosed that there were unreported cases of the SARS virus in Beijing's military hospitals and that investigators have been barred from releasing details.
(SFC, 4/16/03, p.A3)(AP, 4/17/03)
2003 Apr 20, After reporting a nearly tenfold increase in SARS cases in the capital, China announced the sacking of its top health official and the capital's mayor from key Communist Party positions. The number of infections in Beijing soared from 37 to 346.
(AP, 4/20/03)
2003 Apr 21, China (13) and Hong Kong (6) reported 19 new deaths from SARS.
(SFC, 4/22/03, A3)
2003 Apr 23, Beijing closed all its primary and secondary schools until at least May 7 due to the SARS epidemic.
(SFC, 4/23/03, A16)
2003 Apr 23, A Chinese fuel tanker, "Daqing 767" carrying a 1000 tons of oil, sank and 3 crew members were missing after the vessel collided in heavy fog with another ship off China's southeastern coast.
(AP, 4/24/03)
2003 Apr 24, China shut down a major hospital in Beijing and put more than 2,000 employees under observation for severe acute respiratory syndrome. The global death toll from SARS surpassed 260
(AP, 4/24/04)
2003 Apr 25, Nuclear talks in Beijing ended after U.S. officials said North Korea claimed to have nuclear weapons and might test, export or use them.
(AP, 4/25/03)
2003 Apr 25, Beijing reported 180 new SARS infections and 5 deaths. Some 2,000 people at the People's and Ditan Hospitals were quarantined.
(SFC, 4/26/03, A3)
2003 Apr 26, Health ministers from across east Asia came up with a joint plan to fight SARS during a meeting, and hundreds of medical workers in Beijing were forced to sleep in their offices because of hospital-wide quarantines. The death toll climbed to 122 and a new 1,000-bed Beijing hospital was built in 5 days.
(AP, 4/26/03)(SSFC, 4/27/03, A1)
2003 Apr 27, In China's central Hunan province a wagon overturned and tumbled into a gully, killing 16 people and injuring seven others. In Beijing theaters, cafés and karaoke bars were closed as 126 new SARS cases were reported. Total confirmed cases in China rose to 2,914 with 131 deaths. 26 of China's 31 provinces were infected.
(AP, 4/27/03)(WSJ, 4/28/03, A1)(SFC, 4/28/03, A1)
2003 Aug 27, The US and North Korea held direct talks for the first time in months, meeting for a half-hour on the sidelines of a six-nation summit in Beijing designed to resolve the standoff over Pyongyang's nuclear program.
(AP, 8/27/03)
2003 Apr 29, China reported 9 more deaths and more than 200 new cases, most of them in the capital Beijing.
(AP, 4/29/03)
2003 May 2, China reported an accident on a diesel-powered submarine that killed all 70 sailors aboard.
(AP, 5/2/03)
2003 May 5, China said there were 160 new infections and 9 new deaths, similar to totals in the past several days. It has now recorded 4,280 cases, the bulk of the world's total. Beijing closed its schools for another 2 weeks.
(AP, 5/5/03)(WSJ, 5/5/03, p.A1)
2003 May 13, In eastern China a gas explosion ripped through a coal mine, killing at least 63 miners and leaving 23 others missing 1,500 feet underground.
(AP, 5/14/03)
2003 May 15, China threatened possible execution or jail sentences for people who cause death or injury by deliberately spreading SARS.
(WSJ, 5/16/03, p.A1)
2003 May 17, In southern China heavy rainstorms caused flooding killing 45 people and causing millions of dollars in damage to homes and crops.
(AP, 5/20/03)
2003 May 23, Researchers from China and Hong Kong identified a coronavirus in 3 wild mammals, palm civets, a raccoon dog and a ferret badger, sold in the live-animal food markets of South China.
(SFC, 5/24/03, p.A1)
2003 May 20, In northern China a powerful gas explosion at the Yongtai mine, an unlicensed coal mine, killed 25 miners.
(AP, 5/26/03)
2003 May 23, Flooding in a coal mine in central China trapped 15 miners,
(AP, 5/26/03)
2003 May 24, In China Chen Yongfeng (20), was arrested in Wenzhou on charges of killing and dismembering 10 people, who had made their living picking through garbage.
(AP, 5/30/03)
2003 May 26, China's Pres. Hu Jintao arrived in Moscow for talks with Pres. Putin.
(SFC, 5/27/03, p.A12)
2003 May 28, China’s President Hu Jintao called for a "multipolar world" and a strategic partnership with Russia to counter US dominance, and oil executives signed a preliminary deal for pipeline to carry Siberian oil to China.
(AP, 5/29/03)
2003 May 31, In St. Petersburg, Russia, Japanese PM Junichiro Koizumi and Hu Jintao, the new president of China, agreed in a summit to work at defusing tensions over North Korea.
(AP, 5/31/03)
2003 May 31, A Chinese freighter sank in the Baltic Sea. It carried 66,000 tons of fertilizer and leaked over 55,270 gallons of diesel oil. Some 38,000 gallons were recovered.
(SFC, 6/3/03, p.A3)
2003 May, In China’s Jingbian County, Shaanxi province, authorities moved to confiscate some 1,600 privately held oil wells following orders from the central government. Tens of thousands of investors had stakes in over 4,000 oil wells valued at about $850 million. A county-run company took over oil production and in 2005 struck a deal with Yanchang, a regional state-owned company to assume control.
(Econ, 8/4/12, p.39)
2003 May, Sun Dawu, owner of an agricultural conglomerate in China’s Xushui county, was arrested for illegally accepting deposits from local residents. Mr. Sun had recently accused rural state-owned banks of financial oppression and kickbacks. He was convicted in October and given a 3-year suspended sentence and a fine of $12,000.
(Econ, 1/3/04, p.26)
2003 Jun 1, China began filling the reservoir behind its gargantuan Three Gorges Dam, a major step toward completion of the world's largest hydroelectric project.
(AP, 6/1/03)
2003 Jun 6, In southern China a coach bus drove off a highway and plunged into a river, killing 12 people.
(AP, 6/6/03)
2003 Jun 7, In southern China 13 school children were reported missing after their ferry sank in rapids on the Qingshui River in Guizhou province.
(AP, 6/8/03)
2003 Jun 8, China began building one of the world's longest bridges. The 22-mile, $1.4 billion bridge across Hangzhou Bay, linking Shanghai to the port of Ningbo, was set for completion in 2009.
(AP, 6/9/03)(SFC, 7/9/03, p.A16)
2003 Jun 20, China said it will move 42,000 soldiers to civilian jobs this year as part of efforts to shrink the world's largest military.
(AP, 6/20/03)
2003 Jun 23, India's PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee, making the first visit to China by a leader of his nation in a decade, told his Premier Wen Jiabao that he hoped for friendship and trust between the nuclear-armed former rivals.
(AP, 6/23/03)
2003 Jun 24, The WHO lifted its warning against travel to Beijing due to SARS.
(SFC, 6/25/03, p.A7)
2003 Jun 29, Hong Kong and China signed a free-trade agreement, the Closer Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA).
(AP, 6/29/03)(Econ, 6/30/07, SR p.11)
2003 Jun, China began a new $15.7 billion investment fund as an alternative to its dilapidated pension system.
(WSJ, 8/26/03, p.C1)
2003 Jul 4, Landslides in central China caused by torrential rains killed 21 people as river waters ran at their highest level in more than a decade,
(AP, 7/6/03)
2003 Jul 4, A coal mine explosion in northeastern China killed 22 people and injured 6 others.
(AP, 7/6/03)
2003 Jul 11, In China a mudslide left 50 people missing in Sichuan province.
(AP, 7/13/03)
2003 Jul 14, In China Yang Bin (40), a Chinese-born Dutch citizen, was convicted of fraud and bribery and sentenced to 18 years in prison. The orchid-selling tycoon was once ranked by Forbes magazine as China's second-richest businessman.
(AP, 7/14/03)(SFC, 7/15/03, p.A11)
2003 Jul 14, In China a mountain on a tributary of the Three Gorges gave way killing 13 farmers. A large tongue of land was sheered into the water and a resulting wave crashed over 20 boats killing 11 fisherman.
(WSJ, 8/29/07, p.A12)
2003 Jul 19, In southern China a bus plunged more than 300 feet off a cliff, killing 23 people.
(AP, 7/21/03)
2003 Jul 21, In southwest China a magnitude-6.2 earthquake toppled thousands of mud-brick houses in a mountainous area, killing at least 16 people and injuring more than 300 others.
(AP, 7/22/03)
2003 Jul 28, In northern China a blast ripped through a fireworks factory in Wangkou, killing 29 people and injuring at least 141.
(AP, 7/29/03)
2003 Jul, China's foreign reserves reached a record $356 billion.
(Econ, 8/30/03, p.54)
2003 Jul, China said that newspapers run by county level governments and Communist Party committees would be axed by the end of September except for those with an advertising revenue of over 4m yuan ($480,000) annually.
(Econ, 10/4/03, p.42)
2003 Aug 4, In China’s Qiqihar city one person died and 43 people were injured after construction workers broke open several barrels of World War II mustard gas abandoned by Japanese troops. In 2010 a Tokyo court rejected compensation claims by a group of Chinese plaintiffs, who demanded the Japanese government pay 1.43 billion yen ($16 million) in damages.
(www.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2003-08/12/content_254104.htm)(AP, 5/24/10)
2003 Aug 11, In northern China a gas explosion ripped through a coal mine, killing at least 33 miners and leaving nine missing.
(AP, 8/12/03)
2003 Aug 13, Chinese researchers reported that they had created hybrid embryos of human and rabbit DNA as a source for stem cells.
(SFC, 8/14/03, p.A3)
2003 Aug 18, In Shanxi province, China, there was a gas explosion in a coal mine where 27 miners were working. At least 25 were killed.
(AP, 8/20/03)
2003 Aug 22, In northern China a bus swerving to avoid an oil truck ran off a highway and plunged into a ravine, killing 27 people.
(AP, 8/23/03)
2003 Aug 26, A hidden cache of fireworks exploded in a town in China's southeast, killing at least 20 people in the 2nd such disaster to strike the same county in one month.
(AP, 8/27/03)
2003 Sep 1, State media reported that China will cut an additional 200,000 soldiers as part of efforts to modernize its armed forces.
(AP, 9/1/03)
2003 Sep 2, Typhoon Dujuan slammed into the southern Chinese coastal city of Shenzhen, killing at least 20 people and causing extensive damage to parts of the country's showcase economic development zone.
(AP, 9/3/03)
2003 Sep 2, The official Xinhua News Agency reported that heavy flooding in northern China has killed 38 people with another 34 people missing since Aug 24.
(AP, 9/2/03)
2003 Sep 2, In Inner Mongolia a locust plague, Oedaleus decorus asiaticus, was reported to have affected some 47 million acres of grasslands.
(WSJ, 9/2/03, p.A1)
2003 Sep 2, Two South China tigers, the first ever to leave the country, arrived in South Africa as part of a project to save the endangered species.
(AP, 9/3/03)
2003 Sep 3, In China Typhoon Dujuan killed at least 32 people.
(WSJ, 9/4/03, p.A1)
2003 Sep 23, China signed agreements with Russia and four Central Asian neighbors (Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan) in an effort to strengthen a 7-year-old security alliance and encourage economic links across a largely undeveloped region.
(AP, 9/23/03)
2003 Sep, The Chinese government permitted US educators and a British prep school to operate a school for kindergarten and high school students. A ban on foreign-run elementary and middle schools remained in force.
(SFC, 12/26/03, p.D1)
2003 Sep, Wal-Mart opened a superstore in Namchang, China, and over 100,000 jammed the aisles. The company 1st entered China in 1996 through a joint-venture agreement.
(WSJ, 10/17/05, p.A1)(www.wal-martchina.com/english/walmart/history.htm)
2003 Oct 1, In China new rules took effect that eliminate a requirement for couples to get the permission of their employers before they tie the knot.
(AP, 10/1/03)
2003 Oct 8, China was reported to have taken the first step toward recognizing the Himalayan territory of Sikkim as a part of India, resolving a long-standing border dispute. Sikkim, located between Nepal and the kingdom of Bhutan, was an independent principality before it was annexed by India in 1975.
(AP, 10/8/03)
2003 Oct 9, In central China an underground flood in a coal mine trapped 18 miners.
(AP, 10/10/03)
2003 Oct 11, In China the 16th Communist Party Congress began in Beijing. The 4-day meeting included debates on reforms toward private property, a more stable legal system and measures to encourage private investments.
(SSFC, 10/11/03, p.A3)
2003 Oct 12, In China Ma Yong (43), was arrested and accused of robbing and killing 12 women in southern China over a five-month period, preying on job seekers in the boomtown of Shenzhen. Duan Zhiqun (20), his female partner, was arrested Oct 23.
(AP, 11/11/03)
2003 Oct 12, In southern China an explosion in a coal mine killed 7 miners, while the bodies of 4 miners killed in an underground flood were pulled from a shaft in a central province.
(AP, 10/12/03)
2003 Oct 14, China's ruling communists closed a secretive 4-day meeting aimed at pushing ahead with market reforms and said a revision to the country's constitution had been endorsed.
(AP, 10/14/03)
2003 Oct 15, In China Shenzhou 5 launched into orbit with air force Lt. Col. Yang Liwei (38) aboard, making China the third nation to put a human in space on its own, after the former Soviet Union and the United States. The launch was made from the space center at Jiuquan. His capsule landed in Mongolia the next day.
(AP, 10/15/03)(SFC, 10/16/03, p.A3)(SSFC, 7/15/07, p.D5)(Econ, 10/24/09, SR p.13)
2003 Oct 23, Chinese officials reported that accidents in China's mines and factories killed 11,449 people in the first nine months of this year despite a nationwide safety crackdown.
(AP, 10/23/03)
2003 Oct 23, Soong May-ling (b.1896), aka Madame Chiang Kai-shek, died in NYC. She became one of the world's most famous women as she helped her husband fight the Japanese during World War II and later the Chinese Communists. In 2009 Hannah Pakula authored “Madame Chiang Kai-shek and the Birth of Modern China."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soong_May-ling)(AP, 10/24/03)(SSFC, 12/27/09, Books, p.E3)
2003 Oct 24, Chinese President Hu Jintao became the first Asian leader to address Australia's parliament.
(AP, 10/24/03)
2003 Oct 25, In northwestern China powerful twin tremors, minutes apart, killed nine people and leveled houses in Gansu province.
(AP, 10/26/03)
2003 Nov 3, In China Yang Zhiya (Yang Xinhai, Yang Xinhua), an ex-convict dumped by his girlfriend, was arrested in northern Hebei province for the stabbing murders of 67 people and 23 rapes. Xinhai was sentenced to death on Feb 1, 2004. He was executed Feb 14.
(AP, 11/15/03)(AP, 2/1/04)(AP, 2/14/04)
2003 Nov 5, Chinese tycoon Aikelamu Aishayoufu was reported to be missing. His Xinjiang Hops Co. ran up liabilities totaling $100 million.
(WSJ, 11/5/03, p.A1)
2003 Nov 11, In Beijing former President Clinton called on China and the US to overcome their differences on trade, saying the two powers must learn to work together to conquer common threats like AIDS, terrorism and global warming.
(AP, 11/11/03)
2003 Nov 14, China and India began 1st ever joint naval exercises.
(SFC, 11/13/03, p.A7)
2003 Nov 22, In China a gas explosion at the Sundian coal mine in Hunan province killed 14 people, while 9 were still missing.
(AP, 11/24/03)
2003 Nov 24, The US Dept. of Commerce said it would impose tariffs on Chinese-made television sets that it ruled were being sold below fair market price in the US.
(SFC, 11/27/03, p.C3)
2003 Nov 29, China said it broke diplomatic relations with Kiribati after the tiny Pacific island nation opened ties with rival Taiwan.
(AP, 11/29/03)
2003 Nov, In China Jiang Lijun (39) was sentenced to four years in prison for posting Internet articles calling for the overthrow of the Communist Party. In 2006 it was reported that Yahoo's Hong Kong unit gave authorities a draft e-mail that had been saved on Jiang's account. Yahoo also provided information in the cases of Li Zhi and Shi Tao.
(AP, 4/19/06)
2003 Nov, Drought conditions in China's Hunan province forced Changsha, the provincial capital, to institute rolling blackouts.
(Econ, 3/27/04, p.43)
2003 Dec 1, A strong earthquake rumbled through a swath of western China's mountainous Xinjiang region, killing at least 11 people and collapsing hundreds of homes in Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture near the border with Kazakhstan.
(AP, 12/1/03)
2003 Dec 5, Shanghai's government reported that its population has surged to more than 20 million people, soaring by 3 million over the past year amid a flood of job seekers from other parts of China.
(AP, 12/5/03)
2003 Dec 6, In the beach resort of Sanya, China, Miss Ireland, 19-year-old Rosanna Davison, won the Miss World competition. Second place went to Miss Canada, Nazanin Afshin-Jam, while the host country's Miss China, Guan Qi, took third.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2003 Dec 9, Shanghai reported plans to ban bicycles from its major roads next year, banishing China's most popular form of transportation to make more room for cars.
(AP, 12/9/03)
2003 Dec 9, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao visited with Pres. Bush for talks on trade, Taiwan and other issues.
(WSJ, 12/9/03, p.A1)
2003 Dec 10, It was reported that China was forcibly repatriating some 100 North Korean refugees each week and the 852 were detained in camps awaiting deportation.
(SFC, 12/10/03, p.A16)
2003 Dec 11, In China's far northwest a coal mine fire in Urumqi killed nine miners, and rescue efforts were hampered by repeated gas explosions.
(AP, 12/13/03)
2003 Dec 12, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao arrived in Mexico in a bid to extend a string of recent diplomatic and economic successes in North America. In 2002 China shipped $6.3 billion in goods to Mexico, undercutting many local goods.
(SFC, 12/4/03, p.A22)(AP, 12/12/03)
2003 Dec 13, Chinese Premier Web Jiabao sought to assure Mexican leaders that their country's economy is not threatened by China's lower wages and cheaper goods, saying the two nations are partners, not rivals.
(AP, 12/13/03)
2003 Dec 15, From China it was reported that Liu Dalin (71), founder and curator of the Chinese Sexual Culture Museum, was moving his collection from Shanghai to Tongli. His 3,700 items covered 6,000 years of human sexuality in the world's most populous nation.
(AP, 12/15/03)
2003 Dec 17, China Life, China's biggest life insurer, debuted on the NY stock exchange.
(Econ, 12/20/03, p.104)
2003 Dec 19, China said it has issued rules restricting exports of missile, nuclear and biological technologies that can be used to make or deliver weapons of mass destruction.
(AP, 12/20/03)
2003 Dec 22, China put forth legislation to change its constitution to protect private property rights for the first time since the 1949 communist revolution, a key step in making capitalism its economy's driving force.
(AP, 12/22/03)
2003 Dec 23, A blowout occurred at a natural gas field near Chongqing in Kaixian County. Fumes from the gas well in China's southwest killed at least 233 people and forced some 41,000 to flee a 10-square-mile death zone. Technicians capped it Dec 27.
(AP, 12/25/03)(SFC, 12/27/03, p.A8)(SFC, 12/29/03, p.A3)
2003 Dec 25, China announced steps to reduce overexpansion.
(SFC, 12/26/03, p.A3)
2003 Dec 26, In northern China a fire raced through coal mine in Wu'an, a city in Hebei province, killing 26 miners.
(AP, 12/27/03)
2003 Dec 27, China announced its first suspected SARS case since July.
(AP, 12/27/03)
2003 Dec 29, China reported that the China State Shipbuilding Corp. has broken ground on what it says will be the world's biggest shipyard, a high-tech facility capable of producing cruise ships and natural gas tankers at the mouth of the Yangtze.
(AP, 12/29/03)
2003 Dec 30, In northeast China an explosion at a fireworks factory in Tieling, Liaoning province, killed at least 29 people. Authorities soon ordered more than 2,000 fireworks factories closed after a series of fatal explosions "sounded warning bells for the industry."
(AP, 12/30/03)(AP, 1/3/04)
2003 Dec 31, China offered to allow Taiwan to fly unlimited numbers of direct charter flights to the mainland in 2004, if the island's government agrees to allow Chinese airlines to do the same the following year.
(AP, 12/31/03)
2003 In China journalists Chen Guidi and Wu Chuntao authored “Will the Boat Sink the Water," a look at peasant life in southeast China. It sold some 250,000 copies before authorities took it off the shelves. Pirated copies continued to sell. In 2006 it was translated to English.
(WSJ, 7/6/06, p.D8)
2003 China’s President Hu Jintao launched his “Scientific Outlook on Development."
(Econ., 3/7/15, p.45)
2003 China moved to revitalize the old north-east industrial bases following rising unemployment and mass protests.
(Econ, 1/3/15, p.31)
2003 In China for the 1st time in over two decades people in Beijing got their names on ballot papers without official backing in elections to district people’s congresses.
(Econ, 11/11/06, p.48)
2003 China began building wire fences on major defection North Korean routes along the Tumen River. Since September 2006, China began building wire fences along the Yalu River.
(AP, 10/16/06)
2003 The Shanghai Tatler magazine was set up by owners of the Hong Kong Tatler, modeled on London’s Tatler.
(Econ, 1/3/04, p.27)
2003 The China Banking Regulatory Commission was carved out of the central bank.
(Econ, 10/29/05, p.72)
2003 In China Hony Capital, a private equity firm, was founded by John Zhao. By 2012 it was China’s leading private equity firm.
(Economist, 9/1/12, p.69)
2003 Chinese Internet users protested the beating to death in jail of a man arrested for failing to carry the right identity documents. This led to the scrapping of a decades old law giving police sweeping powers to detain anyone suspected of staying without a permit in a place other than his registered home town.
(Econ, 4/29/06, p.30)
2003 China executed 726 people, nearly two-thirds of the world's known court-ordered executions, and violated its own law by killing at least one man for a crime committed at age 16, according to a 2004 report by Amnesty Int'l. Publicly admitted executions in China soared to over 7,000 this year due to a “strike hard" crackdown on crime.
(AP, 4/7/04)(Econ, 4/28/07, p.69)
2003 Yang Xiuzhu, a senior Chinese official who oversaw construction projects in the booming eastern province of Zhejiang, got wind that anti-corruption investigators were looking into her affairs. She boarded a flight to Singapore. A few days later Yang changed her name and flew to New York. Local authorities said in 2004 she accepted kickbacks from property developers of more than 250 million yuan ($40.62 million) China filed an arrest warrant for her through Interpol and in 2005 she was detained in Amsterdam. As of 2014 she was still in the Netherlands.
(Reuters, 8/27/14)
2003 Coca-Cola test-marketed its “fruit pulp orange" drink in China and began rolling it out across the country with great success.
(Econ, 3/3/07, p.68)
2003 William C. Hsiao, senior professor of economics at Harvard, launched a program in Xinlian, China, to help residents monitor and publicize the quality of health care. Village doctors in China made most of their money selling drugs.
(WSJ, 2/13/07, p.A1)
2003 In China the local government of Hongwei acknowledged the seriousness of local pollution and called on Daqing Lianhua, a subsidiary of PetroChina, to relocate villagers.
(Econ, 9/29/07, p.47)
2003 In 2005 estimates of Chinese labor unrest for 2003 noted some 60,000 protests with a 17% annual increase over the past decade.
(WSJ, 4/18/05, p.A16)
2003 Chinese researchers at the State Key Laboratory of Agrobiotechnology of the China Agricultural University introduced human genetic coding into the DNA of Holstein dairy cow embryos, then transferred the embryos into cow surrogates. This followed years of testing on mice. By June, 2011, over 300 cloned cattle lived on an experimental farm in suburban Beijing, with new calves delivered every week.
(Reuters, 6/16/11)
2003 In 2006 China said its first confirmed human death from bird flu was in 2003, two years earlier than previously reported, showing that the virus was present on the mainland before the latest outbreak was first disclosed elsewhere in Asia.
(AFP, 8/8/06)
2003 China's growth rate for the year was measured at 9.1%.
(WSJ, 1/21/04, p.A1)
2003 India changed its verbiage on Tibet to say that the Tibet Autonomous Region is part of China as opposed to the previous description of Tibet as an autonomous region of China.
(Econ, 11/18/06, p.16)
2003 The Lao government signed a 30-year agreement with a Hong Kong-registered company to set up a 1,640-hectare special economic zone built with expertise from China. The population of the Golden City in Boten peaked at 10,000, but dwindled to 2,000 in 2011 after China’s foreign ministry warned citizens not to gamble there.
(Econ, 5/28/11, p.46)
2004 Jan 1, China began running the world's 1st commercially operated maglev train in Shanghai. The German-built system spanned 18 miles.
(SFC, 1/10/04, p.E4)
2004 Jan 1, Hong Kong began a de facto free-trade agreement with mainland China.
(SFC, 10/15/05, p.C1)
2004 Jan 3, In China a fire broke out on an overcrowded bus along an expressway that connects Shanghai with the eastern city of Nanjing, killing at least 12 people and injuring 14.
(AP, 1/3/04)
2004 Jan 3, In China a landslide crushed five houses, killing at least 14 people in northern Shanxi province.
(AP, 1/4/04)
2004 Jan 5, China confirmed its first SARS case since an outbreak of the disease was contained in July and authorities ordered the emergency slaughter of some 10,000 civet cats and related species after tests linked a virus found in the animals to the patient.
(AP, 1/5/04)
2004 Jan 6, China began a mass eradication of some 10,000 civet cats to stem a suspected link to SARS.
(SFC, 1/7/04, p.A14)
2004 Jan 8, Chinese state media reported that authorities had dismissed 44,701 police between August and November in 2003 for lacking job qualifications, corruption or other offenses in a campaign to raise policing standards.
(AP, 1/8/04)
2004 Jan 10, China reported a 3rd suspected SARS infection involved a 35-year-old man in Guangdong province.
(AP, 1/11/04)(WSJ, 1/13/04, p.D5)
2004 Jan 12, It was reported that China might inject $40 billion into its Industrial and Commercial Bank. 2 other state-run lenders, Bank of China and China Construction Bank, split $45 billion in transfers from foreign exchange reserves a week earlier.
(WSJ, 1/12/04, p.A1)
2004 Jan 17, The Chinese government confirmed two more SARS patients, bringing the total number this year to three.
(AP, 1/17/04)
2004 Jan 22, The Chinese New Year (Lunar Year 4702) ushered in the Year of the Monkey. In Korea the event is called Solnal and in Vietnam it is called Tet. The Chinese New Year marked a traditional time of settling debts. Migrant workers in the Chinese construction industry were reportedly owed over $40 billion in back pay.
(WSJ, 1/19/04, p.A1)(SFC, 1/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Jan 26, China's President Hu Jintao arrived in France, with European ministers considering Beijing's request that they lift an arms embargo imposed after the killing of Tiananmen Square protesters in 1989.
(AP, 1/26/04)
2004 Jan 30, The Chinese government said audits aimed at ferreting out corruption in China uncovered $8 billion in misused or embezzled funds and widespread irregularities that produced "serious losses" of state assets.
(AP, 1/30/04)
2004 Jan 31, China’s oil-refining boss signed a deal to buy crude oil from Gabon. Pres. Hu Jintao visited Gabon the next day.
(Econ, 2/7/04, p.45)
2004 Feb 1, China reported 5 more cases of the avian influenza virus.
(SFC, 2/2/04, p.A4)
2004 Feb 5, A lantern festival marking the end of China's Lunar New Year celebrations erupted into a stampede, killing at least 37 people and injuring 15.
(AP, 2/5/04)
2004 Feb 6, Chinese state-run media reported regulators have given preliminary approval for a private airline to be set up in the southwestern city of Chengdu.
(AP, 2/6/04)
2004 Feb 9, Culturecom Holdings Ltd. of Hong Kong unveiled a DVD player and word-processing device built with chips developed by Chinese computer scientist Chu Bong-foo. Chu found a way to put Asia characters in position to command binary code.
(WSJ, 2/9/04, p.A1)
2004 Feb 10, The US broke ground for a new U.S. Embassy compound in the Chinese capital, billed by the American government as the largest State Department project ever built on foreign soil.
(AP, 2/10/04)
2004 Feb 11, A gas explosion in a coal mine in southern China killed 24 miners.
(AP, 2/11/04)
2004 Feb 12, Wang Huaizhong (57), a former Chinese provincial vice governor, was executed in Shandong province for taking more than $600,000 in bribes.
(AP, 2/12/04)
2004 Feb 14, China executed Yang Xinhua (38), a man convicted of murdering 67 people, in what media said might be the country's longest killing spree in modern history. Yang was convicted of 67 killings and 23 rapes in Henan and three other provinces. His crime spree began in 2001 following release from a labor camp and ended with his capture in November.
(AP, 2/14/04)
2004 Feb 15, In northeastern China a fire swept through a shopping center, killing 51 people and injuring dozens more. Hours later, a fire in a temple in the country's southeast killed 39 people. The 2 blazes killed at least 93 people.
(AP, 2/15/04)(AP, 2/15/05)
2004 Feb 23, In northeastern China a coal mine explosion killed at least 24 miners as rescue workers scrambled to find 13 more trapped miners.
(AP, 2/24/04)
2004 Feb 23, Envoys from 6 nations gathered in Beijing for talks on the North Korean nuclear crisis.
(WSJ, 2/24/04, p.A1)
2003 Feb 28, It was reported that China’s foreign exchange reserves were $730 billion.
(Econ, 2/28/04, p.72)
2004 Feb 29, In central China a bus carrying migrant workers to faraway factory jobs plunged off a mountain road, killing 12 and injuring 35.
(AP, 2/29/04)
2004 Mar 1, An explosion in an unlicensed coal mine in northern China killed 28 miners.
(AP, 3/3/04)
2004 Mar 2, In China authorities shut down water supplies after a combination of synthetic ammonia and nitrogen from the Sichuan General Chemical Factory leaked into the Tuo River. Nearly 1 million people were left without water for drinking and bathing.
(AP, 3/5/04)
2004 Mar 5, China's Premier Wen Jiabao addressed the 2,904-member legislature and turned attention and resources to the hundreds of millions of citizens who work the land.
(AP, 3/5/04)(SFC, 3/06/04, p.A10)
2004 Mar 6, China handed its enormous military a double-digit spending increase in a show of support. According to China's 2004 budget, military spending for the PLA will rise 11.6 percent this year, an increase of $2.6 billion.
(AP, 3/6/04)
2004 Mar 7, in China's Muslim Xinjiang region the No. 2 Mine of the Hami Coal Co. flooded. 25 managed to escape while rescuers worked desperately to save survivors. Rescue workers saved 15 coal miners trapped in a flooded shaft, but seven miners were still missing.
(AP, 3/8/04)
2004 Mar 8, China's parliament began discussing a constitutional amendment that would protect private property for the first time since the 1949 communist revolution.
(AP, 3/8/04)
2004 Mar 9, China reported that it would scrap the 8% tax on farmers' crops over the next 5 years. The vestige of feudalism was established 4,000 years ago during the Bronze Age.
(AP, 3/9/04)
2004 Mar 12, Chinese state media reported that a 1,930-mile railway project to link China and Europe was announced by Kanat Zhangaskin, vice president of the Kazakhstan National Railway Co.
(AP, 3/12/04)
2004 Mar 14, China took symbolic steps toward a more capitalist society, amending its constitution to protect private property rights and formalizing a former president's once-unthinkable legacy, inviting entrepreneurs to join the Communist Party.
(AP, 3/14/04)
2004 Mar 16, China declared victory in its fight against bird flu, saying it had "stamped out" all of its known cases, while a factory worker in Thailand became Asia's 23rd victim of the virus.
(AP, 3/16/04)
2004 Mar 23, Chen Zhongwei (74), a Chinese surgeon credited with pioneering the process of reattaching severed limbs, died. Chen successfully reattached the severed right hand of an injured factory worker in 1963, in the first operation of its kind.
(AP, 3/27/04)
2004 Mar 25, China's Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing, arriving home from North Korea, saying his three-day trip yielded an agreement from that country's reclusive leader to "push forward" toward a third round of talks on its nuclear program.
(AP, 3/25/04)
2004 Apr 5, China promised $122 million to Pres. Skerritt in return for revoking Dominica’s recognition of Taiwan.
(Econ, 4/10/04, p.29)
2004 Apr 6, China issued a major ruling on how Hong Kong chooses its leaders, saying the territory must submit proposed political reforms to Beijing for approval.
(AP, 4/6/04)
2004 Apr 8, In China PM Wen Jiabao suspended plans for a huge dam system on the Nu River in western China due to environmental concerns.
(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A10)
2004 Apr 10, A coal mine explosion trapped five miners underground in a northeastern Chinese city where more than 150 miners have been killed in the past year.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 11, China’s People’s Bank, in an effort to slow the growth in money supply, raised bank reserve requirements from 7 to 7.5%, the 3rd increase in 8 months.
(Econ, 4/17/04, p.71)
2004 Apr 13, Authorities in Shanghai announced that divorced couples who remarry will be allowed to have a second child.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 14, China began offering free AIDS tests to anyone who wants one and free treatment for infected people who can't afford.
(AP, 4/14/04)
2004 Apr 16, Yu Zhendong, a fugitive Chinese banker accused of helping embezzle $485 million from his state-owned bank, was returned to China by U.S. authorities.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, A Chinese newspaper reported that China over the last few months had arrested nearly a dozen military officers — including at least four generals — on charges of spying for rival Taiwan.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, In Chongqing, China, leaking chlorine gas exploded at a chemical plant, killing at least 7 people and forcing 150,000 to flee their homes.
(AP, 4/17/04)(WSJ, 4/19/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 18, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il crossed into China in a special train for a summit to discuss the North's nuclear weapons program with the Chinese president.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 19, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il reportedly held talks with Chinese President Hu Jintao about the North's nuclear arms program and requests for economic aid.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 20, China urged North Korean leader Kim Jong Il to rethink his demands for a written U.S. pledge not to attack, saying only a softer line can ease the standoff over Pyongyang's nuclear program.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 20, Yang Xiuzhu, former vice-mayor of Wenzhou and vice-director of China’s Zhejiang Provincial Construction Bureau, fled abroad as investigations began on bribery charges. She was believed to have taken bribes of 253.2 million yuan (US$30 million).
(http://tinyurl.com/aza8m)(Econ, 6/4/05, p.42)
2004 Apr 20, Chinese state media reported that from April last year, about 50 to 60 infants died from malnutrition after being fed a milk formula with virtually no nutritional value.
(AP, 4/20/04)(SFC, 4/21/04, p.A8)
2004 Apr 23, China confirmed two cases of SARS and said the mother of one patient has died, apparently the first SARS fatality in the country since July.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 26, Mainland China dealt a crushing blow to Hong Kong's hopes for full democracy, when its most powerful legislative panel ruled the territory won't have direct elections for its next leader in 2007 or for all its lawmakers in 2008.
(AP, 4/26/04)
2004 Apr 27, The Chinese government said it had shut down a U.S. visa information center in Shanghai because of complaints of overcharging.
(AP, 4/28/04)
2004 Apr 27, It was reported that China planned to consolidate some 35,000 rural cooperatives over the next 3 years to about 3,000. The government estimated cooperative bad loans at 26% of the total loans.
(WSJ, 4/27/04, p.A16)
2004 Apr, China released Chen Gang, a factory worker who helped to organize a strike during China's 1989 pro-democracy protests.
(AP, 11/20/04)
2004 May 1, Shanghai Tobacco, maker of Panda and other cigarette brands, embarked on a campaign to extend Panda beyond the political and military elite. WHO statistics held that China accounts for 30% of the 5.5 trillion cigarettes consumed daily world-wide.
(WSJ, 5/26/04, p.A1)
2004 May 3, A car packed with explosives went off as a bus carried Chinese engineers to a port project in remote southwestern Pakistan, killing 3 of them and injuring 11 other people.
(AP, 5/3/04)
2004 May 4, Pakistan and China signed a deal for the construction of a nuclear power plant, the second such plant to be built in Pakistan with Beijing's help.
(AP, 5/4/04)
2004 May 5, In central China shelves stacked high with garlic collapsed and killed 15 workers at a cold-storage warehouse in Zhenghou.
(AP, 5/6/04)
2004 May 5, British-based SABMiller launched an unsolicited HK$4.3 billion ($550m) bid for Harbin Brewery, China’s 4th largest brewer.
(Econ, 5/8/04, p.61)
2004 May 9, The Chinese government warned that AIDS is continuing to spread and estimated that there were some 840,000 carriers of the disease.
(SFC, 5/10/04, p.A3)
2004 May 17, China and Kazakhstan agreed to build a 744-mile crude oil pipeline to send an initial 10 million tons of Kazakh oil to Xinjiang by 2006.
(WSJ, 6/17/04, p.A16)
2004 May 18, An explosion and a fire at two coal mines in northern China killed at least 22 workers and trapped 25.
(AP, 5/19/04)
2004 May 26, African and Latin American leaders meeting in China urged rich countries to fight terrorism by sharing wealth, not through military intervention.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 30, In southwest China a landslide triggered by torrential rains buried a village in Guizhou province, killing 8 people.
(AP, 6/1/04)
2004 May 31, Newbridge Capital, an American private equity firm, became the 1st foreign financial to gain control of a Chinese bank with an 18% stake in Shenzhen Development Bank and majority control of the board.
(Econ, 6/5/04, p.70)
2004 May, In Fujian province angry mobs in Fuan city gutted at least 3 villas of wealthy residents accused of defrauding investors in an informal network of unregistered credit associations known as biaohui.
(Econ, 7/17/04, p.46)
2004 May, A Japanese consulate worker in Shanghai committed suicide. Japanese newspapers later reported the official took his life because Chinese officials were pressuring him for secret information, using a "woman problem" as leverage. China accused Japan of deliberately smearing China's international image.
(AP, 1/1/06)
2004 Jun 1, Anheuser-Busch offered HK$5.58 per share for China’s Harbin Brewery Group Ltd. 2 days later SABMiller withdrew its HK$4.30 offer.
(WSJ, 6/4/04, p.A3)
2004 Jun 9, A Chinese state newspaper said 1 baby died and 20 were hospitalized with severe malnutrition in eastern China after drinking low-quality milk powder, two months after a nationwide crackdown on fake infant formula.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 15, It was reported that China had ordered water prices increased for the 1st time since the founding of the People’s Republic due to strains on supplies from development.
(WSJ, 6/15/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 26, In Beijing, China, 4 days of talks on North Korea’s nuclear program ended with a promise for further discussion.
(SSFC, 6/27/04, p.A24)
2004 Jun 28, The European Union denied China's request to be officially recognized as a market economy, saying that an assessment of the Chinese economy showed too much state interference and poor corporate governance.
(AP, 6/28/04)
2004 Jun, A pilot Confucius Institute program, designed to promote the study of Chinese abroad, was established in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. The first Confucius Institute was then established in Seoul on Nov 21, 2004. The 75th was established in Cracow, Poland, in 2006. By the end of 2013 there were 440 institutes in over 100 countries.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confucius_Institute)(Econ, 9/13/14, p.51)
2004 Jul 2, China began censoring telephone text messages to “block the dissemination of illicit news and information."
(SFC, 7/3/04, p.A2)
2004 Jul 2, Shanghai police raided the apartment of Randolph Hobson Guthrie III in a joint US-Chinese operation against pirated DVDs. They seized 210,000 pirated DVD copies.
(WSJ, 3/7/05, p.A1)
2004 Jul 13, It was reported that the bid price for a car license plate in Shanghai had surged to $4,133 in May.
(WSJ, 7/13/04, p.A1)
2004 Jul 27, The official Xinhua News Agency said Chinese authorities have shut down 700 pornographic Web sites in less than two weeks as part of a massive campaign to clean up the Internet.
(AP, 7/27/04)
2004 Aug 4, In China a school employee with a history of schizophrenia slashed 15 students and three teachers with a kitchen knife at a Beijing kindergarten, killing one child and leaving terrified classmates covered in blood.
(AP, 8/4/03)
2004 Aug 6-2004 Aug 8, Up to 100,000 rock and rollers crowded a remote desert venue in China's isolated Ningxia province over the weekend for a three-day festival featuring the nation's oldest and best bands.
(AP, 8/9/04)
2004 Aug 10, In southwest China a 5.6 earthquake killed four and injured nearly 600 in Yunnan province. More than 125,000 people were left homeless and cracked walls in reservoirs posed a threat to villages downstream.
(AP, 8/12/04)
2004 Aug 11, Huang Jingao, chief of Fujian’s Lianjiang County, posted on open letter on the Internet accusing colleagues of confiscating land from peasants and selling it a below-market prices to developers in exchange for bribes. In 2005 Jingao was sentenced to life in prison following a year-long campaign by party authorities to silence and discredit him.
(SFC, 11/11/05, p.A3)
2004 Aug 13, Typhoon Rananim weakened to a tropical storm. The death toll from Rananim rose to 115, after it slammed into the China's southeastern coast.
(AP, 8/13/04)
2004 Aug 16, General Motors said it will start making Cadillacs in China this year, joining a race by foreign luxury car brands to sell to the country's newly rich elite.
(AP, 8/16/04)
2004 Aug 16, In China villagers in an eastern province dug with farm tools to search for 24 people missing in massive landslides unleashed by Typhoon Rananim.
(AP, 8/16/04)
2004 Aug 17, A US research institute said India is projected to outpace China and become the world's most populous country by 2050, growing by 50 percent in the next 46 years to reach more than 1.6 billion people.
(AP, 8/17/04)
2004 Aug 20, China said it would offer 10-year residency permits to “high-level" foreigners, who bring in important investments or business skills.
(WSJ, 8/23/04, p.A1)
2004 Aug 23, It was reported that China recorded its 1st ever agricultural trade deficit, $3.73 billion, for the 1st half of this year.
(WSJ, 8/23/04, p.A1)
2004 Aug 24, China evacuated hundreds of thousands of people as Typhoon Aere lashed neighboring Taiwan, triggering landslides and disruption and leaving at least seven people feared dead and one missing.
(AFP, 8/24/04)
2004 Aug 26, Typhoon Aere crashed into mainland China prompting the evacuation of nearly a million people, as the death toll climbed to 35 after a mudslide killed 15 villagers in Taiwan.
(AP, 8/26/04)
2004 Aug 27, Liu Xiang (b.1983), Chinese hurdler, set a record and won Olympic gold in Athens in the 110 meter hurdles with a time of 12.91 seconds equaling the 1993 time of Colin Jackson.
(www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-08/28/content_369582.htm)
2004 Aug 27, It was reported that SABMiller was investing $82.2 million to build a brewery in Dongguan, Guangdong province, China.
(WSJ, 8/27/04, p.A10)
2004 Aug, The World Bank estimated that pollution is causing China and annual 8-12% of its $1.4 trillion GDP in direct damage.
(Econ, 8/21/04, p.56)
2004 Sep 2, The first Chinese tourists to visit Paris, French, on an official tour group were treated to a full taste of its charms.
(AP, 9/3/04)
2004 Sep 6, In southwest China at least 90 people were killed and 77 were missing after some of the worst rainstorms in recent years triggered landslides and flash floods.
(AP, 9/6/04)
2004 Sep 7, In southwestern China floods unleashed by torrential rains have killed at least 161 people and left dozens more missing, prompting authorities to put the massive Three Gorges hydroelectric project on alert.
(AP, 9/7/04)(WSJ, 9/7/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 10, Li Yuanjiang, the former editor-in-chief of one of China's biggest newspapers, the Guangzhou Daily, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for taking bribes. Guangzhou is the capital and the sub-provincial city of Guangdong Province in southern mainland China. The city was formerly known internationally as Canton, after a French language transliteration of the name of the province in Cantonese.
(AP, 9/11/04)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guangzhou)
2004 Sep 19, Former President Jiang Zemin turned over his last major post as chairman of the commission that runs China's military to his successor, Hu Jintao (61), completing the country's first peaceful leadership transition since its 1949 revolution.
(AP, 9/19/04)
2004 Sep 20, Russia's embattled Yukos oil giant raised the stakes in its bitter standoff with the Kremlin as the company slashed supplies to China in a move analysts said was designed to cause maximum embarrassment in Moscow.
(AP, 9/20/04)
2004 Sep 21, China's PM Wen Jiabao hailed a series of agreements with neighboring Kyrgyzstan including an agreement on the thorny issue of the countries' common border.
(AFP, 9/21/04)
2004 Sep 25, In southwest China a swollen river swept a bus off a bridge, and about 30 passengers were missing.
(AP, 9/25/04)
2004 Sep 25, Ma Chengyuan (77), former president of the renowned Shanghai Museum, died. He saved priceless artifacts from marauding Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution.
(AP, 10/10/04)
2004 Oct 1, G7 ministers met in Washington DC. Chinese officials were invited to attend for the 1st time.
(Econ, 10/2/04, p.11)
2004 Oct 7, US President George W. Bush told Chinese President Hu Jintao in a phone conversation that he supports reunifying Taiwan with the mainland but warned against "any unilateral attempt" to do so.
(AFP, 10/7/04)
2004 Oct 9, French President Jacques Chirac declared that France was a natural trade partner to China and, amid a flurry of air, rail and energy deals.
(AP, 10/9/04)
2004 Oct 13, In Shanghai, China, the Houston Rockets, featuring Yao Ming, played an exhibition basketball game against the Sacramento Kings. Advertisers paid some $10 million to sponsor the game and another in Beijing.
(WSJ, 10/15/04, p.B1)
2004 Oct 13, Russia and China settled a dispute over their 2,700-mile border during a visit by Pres. Putin.
(WSJ, 10/14/04, p.A1)
2004 Oct 20, China formally arrested Zhao Yan, a New York Times researcher, who was detained Sep 16 for allegedly leaking state secrets. The crime could be punishable by death.
(AFP, 10/21/04)
2004 Oct 20, In central China a gas explosion ripped through a coal shaft at the Daping Mine in Henan province killing at least 77 miners. Dozens miners were missing.
(AP, 10/21/04)(AP, 10/23/04)
2004 Oct 20, Senior Indian and Chinese officials met in New Delhi, India, to discuss a long-running border dispute between the two countries.
(AFP, 10/20/04)
2004 Oct 20, The EU revamped its trade rules. Nations with more than 15% of European market share of any goods were set to lose their discounted tariffs. China and India were expected to be the main losers.
(WSJ, 10/20/04, p.A15)
2004 Oct 21, China and Japan planned emergency talks over energy rights in the disputed waters between them.
(WSJ, 10/21/04, p.A17)
2004 Oct 21, Fu Hegong sneaked into a Beijing kindergarten to rob it. When he was discovered, he smothered a teacher with a quilt and killed a 5-year-old boy by hitting him with a fire extinguisher. In 2005 Hegong (31) was sentenced to death.
(AP, 9/10/05)
2004 Oct 24, In China the Golden Resources Shopping Mall, the largest in the world, opened in the Haidan district of Beijing.
(www.csmonitor.com/2004/1124/p01s03-woap.html)
2004 Oct 25, China’s state press reported that the population will grow to nearly 1.5 billion over the next 20 to 30 years.
(AFP, 10/25/04)
2004 Oct 27-2004 Oct 31, Violent clashes in a village in central China killed 7 people and injured 42. Police imposed martial law in Langchenggang, Zhongmou County, in Henan province after the fighting between hundreds of rioters that pitted Muslim Chinese against non-Muslims.
(AP, 11/1/04)(WSJ, 11/2/04, p.A1)
2004 Oct 28, China's central bank raised interest rates for the first time in 9 years in a surprise move that was aimed at guiding a heated economy onto a path of slower growth. The rate increase .25% to 5.6%.
(Reuters, 10/28/04)(Econ, 11/6/04, p.12)
2004 Oct 28, China and Iran signed a memorandum of understanding for an oil and gas agreement worth tens of billions of dollars.
(WSJ, 11/1/04, p.A1)
2004 Oct 30, A burst of poisonous gas in a coal mine in northeast China killed 15 miners at the Xilutian Mine in Fushun, a city in Liaoning province.
(AP, 10/31/04)
2004 Nov 6, China's central bank said it would take a "gradual and safe" approach to loosening the yuan-dollar peg.
(AP, 11/6/04)
2004 Nov 8, China’s state media reported that China will selectively reduce spending to help trim its ballooning fiscal deficit.
(AP, 11/8/04)
2004 Nov 10, Taiwan's leader, making a new appeal to China to hold talks, urged the communist giant to ban the development and use of weapons of mass destruction.
(AP, 11/10/04)
2004 Nov 10, Japan's navy went on alert when a submarine was detected in Japanese waters between the southern island of Okinawa and Taiwan. Japan soon determined that it was Chinese nuclear submarine and incident strained relations between two of Asia's biggest economic and military powers.
(AP, 11/13/04)
2004 Nov 11, It was reported that Beijing this month cancelled its bicycle registration requirements, a move viewed by the state press as highlighting the nation's full fledged entry into "car society" and the demise of the bicycle as a "transportation tool."
(AFP, 11/11/04)
2004 Nov 11, It was reported that large swathes of southern and eastern China are in the grip of their worst drought in more than 50 years, prompting calls from the countries top leaders for better management of water conservation.
(AP, 11/12/04)
2004 Nov 12, It was reported that Japan and China owned about a quarter of outstanding US Treasury debt. They held $723 and $172 billion respectively.
(WSJ, 11/12/04, p.C4)
2004 Nov 15, China’s state media reported that shortages of coal and electricity are expected this winter.
(AP, 11/15/04)
2004 Nov 17, In Maryland the first US small office of the Chinese Confucius Institute opened at the Univ. of Maryland. By 2009 there were over 60 such facilities across the country offering Chinese culture to the American public.
(http://english.people.com.cn/200411/19/eng20041119_164443.html)(Econ, 10/24/09, SR p.10)
2004 Nov 20, In China a fire at a complex of iron mines in Shahe, Hebei province, left 68 dead. Most of the miners were suffocated by smoke.
(AP, 11/26/04)
2004 Nov 21, In northern China a Bombardier CRJ-200 passenger plane crashed in an ice-covered lake seconds after takeoff, killing all 54 people aboard and one person on the ground after an apparent midair explosion.
(AP, 11/21/04)(WSJ, 11/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Nov 22, Chinese President Hu Jintao met with Fidel Castro in Havana for talks focusing on the broadening ties between Cuba and China.
(AP, 11/22/04)
2004 Nov 25, In China Yan Yanming (21) broke into a high school dormitory in Ruzhou with a knife and killed 8 students. A series of knife attacks have hit Chinese schools in recent months. Yanming was executed Jan 18, 2004.
(AP, 11/26/04)(AP, 1/20/05)
2004 Nov 28, In central China an explosion tore through a coal mine, sending smoke from air vents and trapping at least 166 miners in tunnels and shafts below without communications. The death toll was later confirmed at 166.
(AP, 12/1/04)(Econ, 12/4/04, p.43)
2004 Nov 29, Southeast Asian nations (ASEAN) and China signed an accord to create the world's biggest free trade area by removing tariffs for their 2 billion people by decade's end.
(AP, 11/29/04)(www.ey.com/global/content.nsf/Thailand/Home)
2004 Dec 2, It was reported that United Parcel Service Inc. (UPS) has forged a $100 million agreement with Sinotrans to take direct control of its international express operations in China's largest and most important cities by the end of 2005.
(www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/stories/2004/11/29/daily33.html)
2004 Dec 4, Miss Peru, Maria Julia Mantilla Garcia, an aspiring high school teacher, was crowned Miss World 2004 In Southern China.
(AP, 12/4/04)
2004 Dec 6, China and Germany signed contracts worth $2.1 billion for Airbus jets and other industrial goods. Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder called for an end to a 15-year-old European arms embargo on China.
(AP, 12/6/04)
2004 Dec 6, A Beijing newspaper reported that 9 out of 10 Chinese calling into a suicide-prevention hotline in the capital are getting the busy tone, adding that nationwide four people were killing themselves every minute.
(Reuters, 12/6/04)
2004 Dec 7, IBM and China’s Lenovo Group planned a joint PC venture. Lenovo was expected to pay some $2 billion for a majority share of IBM’s PC business. Lenovo announced a $1.75 billion cash and stock deal to acquire a majority interest in IBM’s PC business.
(WSJ, 12/7/04, p.A3)(SFC, 12/8/04, p.A1)
2004 Dec 7, DragonMart, a 1.2km dragon-shaped mall in Dubai featuring Chinese products, opened its doors to the public as the biggest Chinese shopping mall outside of China.
(www.dragonmart.ae/HelpFAQs.html)(Econ, 4/14/12, p.78)
2004 Dec 8, China’s Premier Wen Jiabao repeated that China will move gradually to a flexible exchange rate.
(WSJ, 12/9/04, p.A14)
2004 Dec 8, The European Union and China agreed to boost relations, but the EU made clear there can be no early lifting of its 15-year-old arms embargo until Beijing improves its human rights record.
(AP, 12/8/04)
2004 Dec 9, China reported that its monthly trade surplus widened in November for the fourth straight month, hitting $9.9 billion as exports surged at an annual rate of nearly 46 percent.
(AP, 12/9/04)
2004 Dec 10, A US trade panel gave final approval to anti-dumping duties of up to 198 percent on imports of about $1.2 billion worth of wooden bedroom furniture from China.
(AP, 12/10/04)
2004 Dec 11, China ended restrictions limiting foreign retailers to joint ventures.
(WSJ, 12/14/04, p.A13)
2004 Dec 12, In southern China a flood at a mine trapped 36 workers in Guizhou province.
(AP, 12/12/04)
2004 Dec 12, China dropped geographic restrictions against foreign insurers.
(WSJ, 12/13/04, p.A14)
2004 Dec 13, The Chinese government said China and Russia will hold their first joint military exercise next year.
(AP, 12/13/04)
2004 Dec 13, China said it will impose duties on its exports of textiles and apparel in an effort to alleviate the impact of eased restrictions effective Jan 1.
(SFC, 12/14/04, p.D3)
2004 Dec 17, It was reported that China paid out $15 billion per month to keep the yuan fixed at 8.277 to the US dollar.
(WSJ, 12/17/04, p.A14)
2004 Dec 17, It was reported that China’s growing power industry was causing global concern over mercury accumulation in the world’s water and food supply.
(WSJ, 12/17/04, p.A1)
2004 Dec 25, In southern China villagers of Da Lang battled police in a riot after security forces beat a resident to death.
(SFC, 12/27/04, p.A3)
2004 Dec 30, China accused the US of pressuring Israel not to return armed drone aircraft that were sent back for upgrades following their purchase in the 1990s.
(WSJ, 12/31/04, p.A1)
2004 In China Jiang Rong’s novel “The Wolf Totem" became a best seller. It was about the struggle for life on the Mongolian grasslands during the 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution. In 2005 the Penguin Group purchased rights for an English version.
(SFC, 9/7/05, p.E3)
2004 Mark Elvin authored “The Retreat of the Elephants: An Environmental History of China."
(Econ, 7/10/04, p.74)
2004 Bruce Gilley authored “China’s Democratic Future: How It Will Happen and Where It Will Lead."
(Econ, 6/26/04, p.83)
2004 Chinese President Hu Jintao visited Latin America and said that he hoped 2-way trade in the region would reach $100 billion by 2010.
(Econ, 8/15/09, p.20)
2004 China introduced new identity cards with embedded microchips. Software limited the use to standard characters. In 2006 a police official moved to ban problematic characters, thereby limiting people’s choices in names.
(Econ, 4/15/06, p.44)
2004 In China some 130 mainland securities companies lost 15 billion yuan (almost $2 billion) under a falling stock market, a dearth of new flotations and bad management. Losses for 2005 were later estimated to be even higher.
(Econ, 2/11/06, p.69)
2004 China experienced some 74,000 protests involving over 3.7 million people, up from 10,000 in 1994 and 58,000 in 2003.
(Econ, 10/1/05, p.38)
2004 In China Li Shiming, a corrupt and rapacious local Communist Party secretary in Shanxi province, beat up a farmer and cleared his land for a housing development [see Sep 23, 2008].
(Econ, 8/22/09, p.38)
2004 China’s national tax revenue of $318 billion came mostly from business taxes. The average Chinese paid $16 in income tax. Authorities in 90 Chinese cities turned some sales receipts into lottery tickets to encourage customers to demand trackable invoices.
(WSJ, 3/31/05, p.A1)
2004 China and Hong Kong entered into a Closer Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA). The phased agreement eliminated tariffs on Hong Kong exports and by 2005 created 29,000 jobs in Hong Kong.
(WSJ, 10/19/05, p.A11)
2004 China’s 2004 economic growth rate was revised up to 10.1 percent from 9.5 percent following the completion of an economic census in 2006.
(AP, 1/10/06)
2004 Chinese car sales reached 2.3 million making it the world’s 4th largest car market. It was expected to overtake Germany in 2005 and Japan by 2010.
(Econ, 4/23/05, p.61)
2004 In China Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba, set up an online payments system called Alipay.
(Econ, 1/1/11, p.55)
2004 A report by the World Health Organization (WHO) said some 600 people were killed daily in traffic accidents in China.
(SFC, 12/7/07, p.A25)
2004 Chinese made shoes accounted for 82% of all shoes sold in the US. US quotas had been abandoned in 1982.
(WSJ, 6/7/05, p.A13)
2004 China invested almost $150 million in Sudan this year.
(Econ, 10/28/06, p.54)
2004-2005 A Russian built nuclear reactor was scheduled to begin operating in Lianyungang, a coastal city northwest of Shanghai.
(SFC,12/30/97, p.B2)
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