[Marxism] China's Wen Pitches Friendship as Japan Ties Thaw

[Walter Lippmann <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Where is this China Socialist Party based? What are its politics
on internetional questions? What would lead anyone to think that
China would consider military intervention on Taiwan? China has
active political relations with various political forces inside
Taiwan, even including the Kuomintang. You say Japan can behead
China? You've got to be kidding, right? 

China is today shaking the world again. Naturally, having chosen
the route of opening itself up to lots of foreign private capital,
deep contradictions and problems have developed. But can one say
that today China is worse off than during the Great Leap Forward
or the Cultural Revolution? That seems to be direction which our
comrade from the China Socialist Party is going with the posting
indicated below. Sino-phobia is a harmful disease.


Walter Lippmann
Havana, Cuba
"Un paraiso bajo el bloqueo"
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews/
==================================================================

Chinese Reserves Top 1.2 Trillion

Beijing, Apr 12 (Prensa Latina) Chinese foreign currency reserves
surpassed the fabulous figure of 1.2 trillion dollars at the end of
March, the Popular Bank of China said Thursday.

This monetary resource is 37.36 percent more than that existed of the
same month in 2006, and consolidates the Asian nation as the country
with most reserves in the world.

According to the bank, 135.7 billion dollars entered the coffers in
the first three months of the year - an increment of 79.5 billion
over that of last year.

The experts assure that the main factor in this rise is the growth of
the Asian giant's trade surplus.

The official data indicate that the commercial surplus between
January and March 2007 was 46.44 billion dollars, almost double that
registered the previous year.

In March, the surplus descended to 6.87 billion dollars, an apparent
reflection of the measures taken by the government to try to balance
its foreign exchanges.

Foreign trade already represents 70 percent of the Gross Domestic
Product, because the exchange has been growing globally by 20 percent
annually since 2002.

hr ccs tac jhb

PL-19


April 13, 2007
China's Wen Pitches Friendship as Japan Ties Thaw
By REUTERS

Filed at 4:09 a.m. ET

KYOTO, Japan (Reuters) - Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao chatted with a
farmer and sipped bitter tea in Japan's ancient capital of Kyoto on
Friday in a visit underscoring a thaw in ties, but he said time was
needed for all the ice to melt.

The trip to Kyoto came a day after Wen -- the first Chinese leader to
visit Japan since 2000 -- gave a milestone speech to Japan's
parliament, talking of friendship but warning not to forget the
wartime history that has long plagued relations.

Wen's three-day visit has combined summitry with a common touch in a
performance intended by both sides to appeal to ordinary citizens and
build on a fragile detente that began with Japanese Prime Minister
Shinzo Abe's October trip to Beijing.

The Chinese premier's effort to reach out was widely welcomed in
Japan, but on Friday he said the task of forging better relations
between the wary neighbors -- at odds over energy, territory and
regional influence -- was far from finished.

``Many people say my aim of the trip to 'melt the ice' has been
achieved,'' he told reporters before leaving Tokyo.

But he added: ``I cannot say all problems have been solved. We need
more time.''

Kicking off a busy schedule that was also to include a bit of
baseball, Wen took part in a Japanese tea ceremony at a guest house
on the grounds of the palace where the emperor resided when Kyoto was
the capital.

``People in Japan and China drink different types of tea, but we
share a custom of opening up our hearts through drinking it,'' grand
tea-master Soshitsu Sen said as he prepared the tea.

The room was adorned with a calligraphy scroll in the characters
shared by both countries and meaning ``mutual respect.''

``These words show the hope that there will be relaxation through a
person-to-person encounter,'' Sen said.

Wen replied: ``Understanding comes through getting to know each
other.''

In a sign that tensions remain, however, members of Japanese
right-wing groups cruised the streets in dozens of trucks with
loudspeakers blaring anti-China slogans, and security was tight.

``China is stealing Japan's resources,'' shouted one, referring to a
dispute over oil and gas reserves in the East China Sea.

IRREVERSIBLE TREND

Wen also laid flowers at a memorial to former Chinese Premier Zhou
Enlai, who studied in Tokyo and Kyoto from 1917 to 1919.

``Sino-Japanese relations will certainly brighten more in the future
and the flowers of friendly Sino-Japanese relations will increase
their beauty,'' he said.

Japanese media on Friday welcomed Wen's trip, which has been marked
more by symbolism than concrete breakthroughs.

China's official media were also cautiously optimistic.

``Although it takes more than one day to melt the thick ice, the
trend of improving bilateral ties is irreversible,'' said a
commentary in the overseas edition of the People's Daily.

Later, Wen exchanged his suit and tie for a windbreaker and running
shoes to visit a Japanese farm, where he planted two tomato plants
before drinking tea and eating a rice-and-red-bean sweet while
chatting with the farmer's family.

Wen has sought to use his human touch as a diplomatic tool, but some
ordinary Japanese watching from afar were skeptical.

``I saw him on TV and he seems to be nice,'' said housewife Yasuyo
Komori, 66, as she took her daily walk inside the palace grounds.
``But I don't have a good image of China,'' she said.

``The Chinese people seem to think Japan is bad. We've given them
money and their leaders should tell them that because there is a lot
of ill-will,'' she said.

Between his smiles and handshakes, Wen has issued pointed reminders
that China remains wary of Japan's handling of the legacies from its
military aggression in Asia up to 1945.

Still, his speech, the first by a Chinese leader to Japan's
parliament in 22 years, was a landmark in the thaw between the two
Asian giants, whose economies are deeply linked.

Tokyo and Beijing fell out during the five-year term of Abe's
predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, who paid his respects each year at
Tokyo's Yasukuni war shrine, seen across much of the region as a
symbol of past militarism.

Wen did not explicitly mention the shrine in his speech, but in an
interview before his visit he pressed Abe not to go. Abe has paid his
respects before at Yasukuni, but has declined to say if he will do so
as prime minister.



>From: lixiang@xxxxxxxxxxxx
>Sent: Apr 13, 2007 12:19 AM
Re: [Marxism] China's Wen buys over awful, hostile Japan.

>Remember what Nakagawa (chairman of the LDP Policy Research Council) 
aid a few months ago in a speech given in Nagoya: "If something goes 
wrong in Taiwan in the next 15 years, here (Japan) might also become 
just another Chinese province within about the next 20", a unclad 
clamour? But, the relative inferiority of BEIJING to JAPAN/TAIWAN is 
deteriorating, due to the officials and officers' inefficiency. JAPAN 
can behead BEIJING in minutes if the CCP takes a risk to attack Taiwan.
>
>Although the autocracy has no friends, Wen must smile to Japan, to 
deceive Chinese into thinking they have many friends. Furthermore, the 
CCP monopolize so much national wealth that they can be too generous 
to Japan. Wen just can lavish money to buy goods to please Japan. 
>
>
>Socialist Party China
>http://socialistchina.wetpaint.com




________________________________________________
YOU MUST clip all extraneous text before replying to a message.
Send list submissions to: Marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism