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The city's wealth has given it a degree of independence not enjoyed by other Chinese cities. But that may now be under threat, as Beijing increases its scrutiny of the financial capital.

Shanghai's stock market dropped by only 0.2% in reaction to the news.

But property stocks dropped by 5%, with some investors worried that there would be a tighter regulatory environment imposed from Beijing.

He is believed to have clashed with Prime Minster Wen Jiabao over Beijing's attempts to cool the overheating Chinese economy.

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quote:

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Mr Wen, in an article published by state media, said China was "still far from walking out of the primary stage of socialism and remains a developing country".

He said China must encourage reform and innovation to help it develop, but must not allow that to be at the expense of fairness and social justice.

China is one of the world's fastest-growing major economies, but there is also a growing gap between rich and poor.

The gulf has been felt particularly by people in the countryside who are not seeing the benefits that those in the cities are experiencing.

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Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, is expanding its presence in China after agreeing to buy a 35% stake in discount store chain Trust-Mart:

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The terms of the deal, giving Wal-Mart an interest in 100 stores in 34 Chinese cities, were not revealed but analysts have said the business is worth $1bn.

Should Wal-Mart ultimately buy out the group, it would make it China's largest foreign retailer in terms of stores.

Foreign sales currently account for about 20% of the firm's turnover.

Based in Taiwan, Trust-Mart was set up in the mid-1990s and has more than 30,000 staff.

Along with other leading global retailers like Carrefour and Tesco, Wal-Mart is looking to build its interests in China's fast-growing retail sector.

The firm already operates 68 stores there and said last year that it was prepared to hire an extra 150,000 staff in the next five years.

Wal-Mart said the latest deal was an "important step" for the business.

"Through this investment in Trust-Mart we have the opportunity to expand our presence in China, one of the world's fastest growing markets," said Michael Duke, Wal-Mart's vice-chairman.

Wal-Mart said the two companies would, for the time being, operate independently but that if "certain conditions" were met, it could buy out the remainder of the business by 2010.

Carrefour is currently the leading foreign retailer in China, with 90 hypermarkets.

Tesco opened its first own-brand store in China last month, and has interests in another 45 outlets through a joint venture with a domestic retailer.

China's retail sector was worth nearly $850bn in 2005 and is forecast to grow to more than $2 trillion by 2020.

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Communist protesters were briefly arrested after they marched on government buildings in Delhi, waving placards saying "Save small retailers".

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The protestors burned an effigy representing Wal-Mart near the office of Kamal Nath, the Indian commerce and trade minister.

India's retail industry is worth about $300bn (£150bn) a year and has attracted the interest of international retailers such as Metro, Carrefour and Tesco.

A spokesman for India FDI Watch, which tries to limit the growth of foreign retailers in India, says Wal-Mart's entry threatens large numbers of jobs.

"Around 40 million people depend on the retail sector and these people's livelihoods will be ruined if Wal-Mart is permitted to enter India's retail market," he said.

Indian law currently allows foreign multi-brand retailers to run only cash-and-carry or franchise businesses.

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[ 27 February 2007: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]

So what's stopping El Salvador or Philippines or African nations from becoming another China ?.
Who's protesting anything in those countries ?.
Communists in those countries get given more than a bit of police trouble if they protest. trade union and human rights activists in Burma get life imprisonment or worse.

Let's observe two of Uncle Sam's closest trading partners trading freely with the largest economy in the world: Haiti and El Salvador, two democratic capitalist third world nations. And we'll see if either one of those countries becomes another Singapore in even the next ten to fifteen years. We won't be holding our breath in the meantime.

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Party members can be sentenced to death for corruption, although senior figures often have their sentences commuted to life imprisonment or shorter sentences.

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That must scare hell out of our own crony capitalists and their high-ranking friends in government. People like Mulroney and the Libranos don't even get slaps on the wrist. They just resign or call an election before it's even time.

[ 27 February 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]

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A recurrent theme in anti-Palestinian propaganda (usually misnamed "pro-Israel") is "Don't Single Out." The idea is that evil should be addressed everywhere; the greater the evil, the greater the protest against it should be; and since there are worse cases of evil than Israel's, Israel should not be criticized. Not now, at least: perhaps after all other evils have been eradicated.

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[ 27 February 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

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Originally posted by Jacob Two-Two:
Listing the regimes that are worse than China doesn't make China hunky-dory.

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Who said anything about Hunky or Dory?.

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You do know that they lead the world in state-sponsored executions, right? There's no need to make apologies for these pricks. China needs democracy. China needs enshrined human rights.

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Originally posted by Cueball:
Precisely, this is the "don't single out" falacy as demolished by Ran Hacohen in this article: [URL=http://antiwar.com/hacohen/?articleid=10219]The Embarrassment of the Wretched [/UR]

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But if we started a thread bashing any of the dozens of real third world capitalist nations trading freely and in gross violation of human rights, nobody would be show up. I can say with some certainty that there would be zero interest, well, aside from the usual few babblers, in chiding Haiti, El Salvador, Guatemala, Pakistan, Phillippines, Dominican Republic or even democratic capitalist India for allowing 350 million people to go to bed every night with hunger pangs while that country exports cash crops to "the market" on time every time.

[ 27 February 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]

Interestingly Wilf is exceptional here, as he prefers to talk about Pakistan in threads about Israel.

[ 27 February 2007: Message edited by: Cueball ]

The Chinese and Singaporeans are aware that corruption is part and parcel of a market economy. It's either dealt with or it isn't.

[ 27 February 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]

We were talking about it here, but it's closed for length, so I figured this would be as good a place as any to post it.

Seems like a pretty short time between the sentencing and execution. I guess there isn't much of an appeals process.

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China executed the former head of its food and drug watchdog on Tuesday for approving untested medicine in exchange for cash, the strongest signal yet from Beijing that it is serious about tackling its product safety crisis.

The execution of former State Food and Drug Administration director Zheng Xiaoyu was confirmed by state television and the official Xinhua News Agency.

During Zheng's tenure from 1998 to 2005, his agency approved six medicines that turned out to be fake, and the drug-makers used falsified documents to apply for approvals, according to previous state media reports. One antibiotic caused the deaths of at least 10 people.

''The few corrupt officials of the SFDA are the shame of the whole system and their scandals have revealed some very serious problems,'' agency spokeswoman Yan Jiangying said at a news conference held to highlight efforts to improve China's track record on food and drug safety.

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I suppose you could argue that this guy is responsible for the deaths of 10 people, and our neighbours to the south execute people for less than that. On the other hand, were these premeditated murders? I don't think so. On the third hand (hmm!) I suppose holding a bureacrat responsible for the deaths that result from his corruption isn't completely bad.

In many cases, their high powered lawyers don't have to prove innocence just reasonable doubt. Or our politicians can avoid prison sentences by resigning or calling an early election after taxpayers have handed millions of dollars to even more lawyers and politicians for an inquiry. There is no transparency wrt Canadian government dealings. A guy like Steve Harper can run the country with less than 24 percent of eligible voter support, and he can flout democracy by aiding and abetting known war criminals with their imperialist agenda in Afghanistan. Something's amiss wrt democracy in general here.

I think the two old line parties in these N.American countries have been on the take for many years - it's just the odd time they are caught taking voters for granted. And the U.S. system is one large conflict of interest with the same hands in the public cookie jar year after year.

[ 10 July 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]