World Bank helps out China
The World Bank said last week it would lend China US$87 million to help expand the supply of renewable electricity in Asia's economic powerhouse and giant energy consumer. "China's abundant undeveloped resources of small hydropower, wind, biomass, geothermal and solar energy ... could help the country reduce some of the environmental damage from its overwhelming dependence on coal for large-scale, grid-based power generation," the global lender said.
Africans flood to cities
Sub-Saharan Africa's traditionally rural-based society is fast disappearing, with more than half its roughly 700 million people seen living in urban areas by 2030, the United Nations said Friday. The head of the UN housing project Habitat said Africa's "chaotic urbanization" was -- together with the HIV/AIDS pandemic -- the biggest threat to the world's poorest continent.
More tsunamis predicted
Scientists are convinced another giant tsunami will one day sweep across the Indian Ocean -- what they are not sure about is when. Almost six months after the deadly Dec. 26 tsunami, triggered by a magnitude 9.15 earthquake, scientists are keeping a close eye on aftershocks and the increased earthquake activity around Indonesia as they try to work out when the next big one will hit.
Blair caught in climate dilemma
British Prime Minister Tony Blair is trapped in a dilemma of his own creation over saving the planet from global warming, analysts say. Blair has put climate change at the heart of his year-long presidency of the Group of Eight industrial nations, but his efforts to get action agreed at next month's G8 summit in Scotland are being repeatedly torpedoed by the US.
Desertification a global threat
Desertification threatens to drive millions of people from their homes in coming decades while vast dust storms will damage the health of people continents away, an international report said last week. "Desertification has emerged as a global problem affecting everyone," said Zafar Adeel, assistant director of the UN University's water academy and a lead author of a report drawing on the work of 1,360 scientists in 95 nations.
Brazilians uncover `Michelangelo code'
Two Brazilian doctors and amateur art lovers believe they have uncovered a secret lesson on human anatomy hidden by Renaissance artist Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel's ceiling. Completed nearly 500 years ago, the brightly colored frescoes painted on the Vatican's famous sanctuary are considered some of the world's greatest works of art. They depict Biblical scenes such as the Creation of Adam in which God reaches out to touch Adam's finger.
Scientists look for new blood
Australian scientists say they have found a way to make blood cells in volume out of human master cells, which could eventually lead to production of safe blood cells for transfusions and organ transplants. Synthetically produced red blood cells would, in theory, overcome the concerns about dangerous infections that can be transmitted from blood donors to patients worldwide.
By global standards, the traffic congestion that afflicts Taiwan’s urban areas isn’t horrific. But nor is it something the country can be proud of. According to TomTom, a Dutch developer of location and navigation technologies, last year Taiwan was the sixth most congested country in Asia. Of the 492 towns and cities included in its rankings last year, Taipei was the 74th most congested. Taoyuan ranked 105th, while Hsinchu County (121st), Taichung (142nd), Tainan (173rd), New Taipei City (227th), Kaohsiung (241st) and Keelung (302nd) also featured on the list. Four Japanese cities have slower traffic than Taipei. (Seoul, which has some
Michael slides a sequin glove over the pop star’s tarnished legacy, shrouding Michael Jackson’s complications with a conventional biopic that, if you cover your ears, sounds great. Antoine Fuqua’s movie is sanctioned by Jackson’s estate and its producers include the estate’s executors. So it is, by its nature, a narrow, authorized perspective on Jackson. The film ends before the flood of allegations of sexual abuse of children, or Jackson’s own acknowledgment of sleeping alongside kids. Jackson and his estate have long maintained his innocence. In his only criminal trial, in 2005, Jackson was acquitted. Michael doesn’t even subtly nod to these facts.
Writing of the finds at the ancient iron-working site of Shihsanhang (十 三行) in New Taipei City’s Bali District (八里), archaeologist Tsang Cheng-hwa (臧振華) of the Academia Sinica’s Institute of History and Philology observes: “One bronze bowl gilded with gold, together with copper coins and fragments of Tang and Song ceramics, were also found. These provide evidence for early contact between Taiwan aborigines and Chinese.” The Shihsanhang Web site from the Ministry of Culture says of the finds: “They were evidence that the residents of the area had a close trading relation with Chinese civilians, as the coins can be
The March/April volume of Foreign Affairs, long a purveyor of pro-China pablum, offered up another irksome Beijing-speak on the issues and solutions for the problems vexing the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the US: “America and China at the Edge of Ruin: A Last Chance to Step Back From the Brink” rang the provocative title, by David M. Lampton and Wang Jisi (王緝思). If one ever wants to describe what went wrong with US-PRC relations, the career of Wang Jisi is a good place to start. Wang has extensive experience in the US and the West. He was a visiting
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