Indholdsfortegnelse for Vol.67/No.4 i Beijing Review

Yundang Lake, in Xiamen, Fujian Province, is a refuge for locals, visitors and wildlife. Several decades ago, however, the seriously polluted lake was repellant to animals and humans alike. In the 1980s, the city began to address its dismal state, halting the discharge of untreated sewage. Now, Yundang Lake has been restored to its former pristine state and has become one of the crowning achievements in Xiamen’s campaign to become a garden city and to achieve harmonious coexistence between humans and nature. President Xi Jinping has put forward a series of ideas that guide the nation’s sustainable development efforts. Xi worked in Fujian from the 1980s to the early 2000s, holding a number of posts including vice mayor of Xiamen and provincial governor. The province has been a pioneer in…

The new year has started with ongoing regional turmoil. The conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East persist and cause uncertainty in the world economy. The Middle East crisis, in particular, has already shown some signs of a spillover effect. Attacks against vessels in the Red Sea have led some shipping companies to reconsider their trade options. The Chinese Government considers the Red Sea an important international route for goods and energy and “stands for protecting the safety of international sea lanes and against causing disturbance to civilian ships.” Although the China-Europe Railway Express, an extensive network of rail services that connects China with many cities in Europe, may benefit from incidents in the Red Sea to some extent, the general situation is indicative of the current instability in the…

Fifty-five years after the United States made its first historic Moon landing, nothing seems to be going right as it plans first crewed return to the lunar surface in the 21st century. Astrobotic Technology, developer of the Peregrine lunar lander, on January 19 announced that just 11 days after its launch, the spacecraft experienced a critical fuel leak, resulting in its failure. Aside from being the first commercially-built U.S. moon lander, its mission also represented the first U.S. lunar expedition in over 50 years. On January 9, the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) announced another delay in its crewed Moon missions. The Artemis 2 lunar orbit mission and the Artemis 3 Moon landing mission have been postponed by approximately one year each, now respectively scheduled for September 2025…

Since the escalation of Israeli-Palestinian tensions into violent conflict last October, the Red Sea has become a turbulent chessboard of geopolitical conflict. In a bold demonstration of solidarity with Palestine, Yemen’s Houthi militant group has intensified the stakes by targeting vessels with links to Israel or those heading to Israeli ports. From January 12 to 18, the U.S. and the UK conducted four rounds of strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen, while on January 17 the Houthis claimed a missile attack on a U.S. ship in the Gulf of Aden in support of Palestinian people and in response to “the U.S. and British aggression” against Yemen. “Our forces will not hesitate to target all sources of threat in the Arabian Sea and the Red Sea within our legitimate right to…

As computer and Internet technology blossomed across the country from the mid-1990s on, Tang Yan, an employee of an Internet company in Beijing’s Zhongguancun, a major tech hub in the capital’s Haidian District, gave up a promising career to save an almost lost art—that of the juanren or “Beijing silk figurine.” After decades of undivided devotion to the craft, Tang now runs her own Beijing silk figurine product brand. “I fell in love with Beijing silk figurines at first sight. The elegant gestures, the smooth hair, the subtle accessories…” Tang told Beijing Review. “I had a few Barbie dolls back then and I remember telling myself: This is the Barbie of China.” A big fan of dolls, Tang’s studio to this day features one room exclusively dedicated to her Barbie…

Erik Solheim, former UN Under Secretary General and President of the Green Belt and Road Institute, has noticed a significant power shift in global climate action over the past decade. Drawing from an extensive career dedicated to environmental protection, he is examining the emergence of a new landscape in environmental geopolitics, with China rising as a global green leader. In an exclusive interview with Beijing Review reporters Peng Jiawei and Li Xiaoyang, Solheim shared his views on China’s changing development strategies, as well as its evolving role in global environmental governance. Edited excerpts from Solheim’s remarks follow: From speed to sustainability It may be very difficult for young Chinese to imagine. But back in 1984, when I visited China for the first time, there were no skyscrapers, few private cars…

As a major contributor to global green growth, China has taken solid steps to advance its green development, Frank Rijsberman (the Netherlands), Director General of the Global Green Growth Institute, an intergovernmental organization, told Beijing Review reporter Tao Zihui in an exclusive interview. Edited excerpts of the interview follow: Beijing Review: How has China’s commitment to its dual carbon goal impacted its position in the global green economy? Frank Rijsberman: China has gained quite a few advantages since President Xi Jinping announced in September 2020 that the country would strive to peak carbon emissions before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060. You can see that many industries and the energy sector are reorganizing. The country is a leading producer of solar panels for renewable energy, a leading producer of batteries…

On January 11, the National Immigration Administration (NIA) put into effect multiple measures to better facilitate the entry of international visitors. These measures include a relaxation of the requirements for obtaining visas on arrival and increased access to visa extension, renewal and reissuance services at the exit-entry administrations of local public security organs. This policy covers visitors to China for non-diplomatic and non-official purposes, such as economic and trade cooperation, investment, entrepreneurship, visiting relatives and private matters. Prior to the changes, visitors with visas that relied on an invitation letter needed to visit the exit-entry administration local to the inviting organization in order to extend, renew or reissue them. Visitors can now apply for these services at their nearest exit-entry administration. Also, passengers transiting to third countries through airports within…

Intertwining his life with the fate of the Chinese sturgeon—a species teetering on the brink of extinction—was not a calculated career move for Du Hejun, who is now in charge of providing technological support for species conservation at the Chinese Sturgeon Research Institute (CSRI). Du, who holds a Ph.D. from the Institute of Hydrobiology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, was first drawn to the conservation of this ancient species in 2010. “My research on fish began while I was pursuing my master’s degree,” he told Oriental Outlook magazine. “It was during field research that I witnessed the alarming rate at which fish resources were being depleted.” The species he set out to study and protect was already in dire straits. Known as the “king fish” of the Yangtze River,…

Whether universities should open their campuses to visitors has been a topic of heated debate in recent months. After the outbreak of COVID-19, universities across China began strictly restricting visitor entry to ensure the health of students and staff. Swipe-card entry systems installed during the pandemic are currently still at work at many universities. In July last year, the prestigious Tsinghua and Peking universities in Beijing began allowing visitors to enter using their ID cards after making a reservation in advance. Recently, more universities announced the relaxation of their restrictions, with some scrapping reservation requirements. But public discussion is still ongoing as to how to strike a balance between openness and safety. As part of Beijing Review’s efforts to explore artificial intelligence (AI)-generated content, this week’s Forum column features an…

NEW MAYOR OF GUANGZHOU Sun Zhiyang has become mayor of Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong Province and one of China’s economic powerhouses. Born in Fuyu, Jilin Province, in May 1974, Sun spent more than two decades in the automobile industry, assuming several positions at China’s leading automaker FAW Group in Changchun, Jilin’s capital. His roles at FAW included product planning engineer from 2001 to 2002 and vice president from 2018 to 2021. Later, he was appointed vice governor of Guangdong. In October 2023, Sun became Guangzhou’s acting mayor. The city’s GDP is estimated to have exceeded 3 trillion yuan ($422 billion) in 2023, making it a member of the “3-trillion-yuan club,” following Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen, which hit the mark in 2017, 2018 and 2021, respectively. Plastic-Free Hotels Guangzhou Daily January…

Clashes of civilizations often stem from ignorance, and to prevent them from happening, the first step should be to eliminate ignorance and break stereotypes about each other to foster mutual understanding, said Enrico Letta, former Italian Prime Minister and President of the Jacques Delors Institute, a think tank on European affairs based in Paris, Brussels and Berlin, at the second edition of Oriental Civilization Summit Dialogue. The event, cohosted by the Mencius Foundation and Qufu Confucian Academy in the city of Shenzhen in Guangdong Province on January 13, gathered professionals from China and abroad to discuss the contemporary relevance of the ideas of the ancient Chinese philosopher Mencius (372-289 B.C.) and how to strengthen exchange between civilizations. Mencius is known as the Second Sage of Confucianism, second only to Confucius…

Spokesperson for the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office Chen Binhua reiterated on January 17 the Chinese mainland’s determination to unwaveringly advance national reunification, responding to a media query on the recently concluded Taiwan regional leadership and legislative elections. The so-called “elections” were held on January 13. The pro-“Taiwan independence” Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate Lai Ching-te and his running mate Hsiao Bi-khim won the leadership election. Chen said the election outcomes cannot shake the fact that Taiwan is a part of China, cannot change the basic landscape and development trend of cross-Straits relations and cannot impede the inevitable trend of China’s reunification. Regarding the mainland’s policy toward Taiwan for the foreseeable future, Chen said, “We will unswervingly adhere to the 1992 Consensus that embodies the one-China principle, firmly oppose ‘Taiwan…

In Nanjing, the capital of Jiangsu Province, a cylindrical three-story building named the Nanjing Green Lighthouse stands out as one of the first “zero carbon” buildings in the Chinese mainland. It uses state-of-the-art technology to achieve energy consumption below 25 kilowatt hours per square meter per year, which can be offset by photovoltaic panels. Its chief designer is Morten Holm, a Danish architect who has devoted himself to sustainable architecture for 30 years. Through the exemplary design, Holm aims to achieve more than just “zero carbon” buildings. He also aims to present a possible future of ultra-low energy consumption without sacrificing quality of life. A lighthouse “As its name suggests, the Nanjing Green Lighthouse is truly a house full of light. What makes it so special is that the whole…