Taiwan readies its army to counter military exercises by China

China completed its largest-ever military exercises around Taiwan. It is now the turn of Taiwan to conduct its live-fire drill. Beijing repeated threats to bring the self-ruled democracy of Taiwan under its control. Recently, US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan. That did not go down well with Beijing, they staged air, and sea drills in the region. Such an exercise increased tension to their highest level in years. Taiwan accused China of using the visit as an excuse to carry out military drills. That could be a rehearsal for an invasion. Taiwan, on its part, fired howitzers and target flares as part of the defensive drill. It took place in the country’s southernmost county and lasted about an hour. Taiwan holds military drill after China says war preps will continue. The military said its exercises were already scheduled and there was no link to China's war games.

Taiwan explained that these were annual affairs. The main purpose was primarily to ascertain proper condition of the artillery and their maintenance condition. The second was to confirm the results of previous year. China had said it had "successfully completed various tasks" in the Taiwan Strait and vowed to continue patrolling its waters and be prepared for war. China last issued a white paper on Taiwan in 2000. It had proposed the "one country, two systems" model similar to Hong Kong and Macau that were promised a degree of autonomy under Chinese rule. However, this is not acceptable to Taiwan. It has created a separate identity for itself and transformed from an autocracy into a vibrant democracy.

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Wing flap that washed ashore in Tanzania confirmed to belong to MH370

The Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 had in mid-air with 239 people on board during a regular flight from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Beijing on March 8, 2014. A wing flap that had washed ashore on an island off Tanzania has now been identified as belonging to the missing Being 777.
This has been reported in thehindu.com dated 15 September 2016.

The flap was found in June by residents on Pemba Island off the coast of Tanzania, and an analysis by experts at the Australian Transport Safety Bureau, which is heading up the search for the plane, has confirmed that it was indeed from the aircraft.
This was the fifth piece of wreckage from the plane that have washed ashore on coastlines around the Indian Ocean since the aircraft vanished in mid-air in 2014.
Apart from the latest discovery of a wing flap, another piece of wing was found a year ago on La Reunion Island, near Madagascar and it was positively identified by French officials.
Search officials expect some more wreckage to wash up in the coming months but, none of the debris recovered so far has helped to narrow down the precise location of the main underwater wreckage.


Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org


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Tiger devours a middle-aged woman in a safari park in China

It was a tragedy when a woman was eaten alive and another was seriously injured after they jumped out of a car in a tiger enclosure at a Chinese safari park. The incident happened at Badaling Wildlife World, near the Great Wall of China and the middle-aged woman was killed instantly after she followed the younger woman out of the car. Both of them had ignored repeated warnings to remain inside the vehicle.
This has been reported in dailymail.co.uk dated 24 July 2016.

There was one older woman, a younger woman, a child and a man in the park located just over an hour journey north-west of Beijing. It seems the younger woman and the man had an argument after which she stormed out of the car. The older woman followed her out and was instantly attacked by the Siberian tiger.
The huge 6,000 acre park permits people to either drive themselves or join a tour and cautions the people not to leave their vehicles at any point. Entry fee for the park is £5, and visitors can feed the animals - but, they are not allowed to get close to the larger residents.


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Beijing is sinking by 11cm per year due to over consumption of ground water

Beijing is one of the world's most important and vibrant city and is home to 20 million people, but it is literally collapsing because of over consumption of ground water. Research has revealed that some parts of the city are sinking at an alarming rate - by as much as 11cm per year.
Groundwater has been there since time immemorial but it is increasingly being used for domestic consumption, industrial use and agriculture. As a result, there is depletion of groundwater which, in turn, causes underlying soil to compact, creating a phenomenon called subsidence. This process is accelerated by the increasing weight of buildings as more and more buildings continue to be constructed.
This has been reported in nzherald.co.nz dated 30 June 2016.

Beijing is the fifth most water-stressed city in the world and the demand for water far exceeds the supply. The region has been experiencing subsidence since 1935 but never at such a high rate. The findings of the research, in short, is that the rate of sinking threatens "the safety of the public and urban infrastructure".
Moreover, uneven sinking could prove catastrophic for the city's train network, buildings and other major structures.
The study was conducted by specialists from China, Spain and Germany. They worked with the National Natural Science Foundation of China to analyze data from thousands of satellite images and global positioning sensors, tracking changes in the ground level from 2003 to 2011. They found that the city's Chaoyang district in the business heart of Beijing, is the worst affected, sinking at an annual rate of 11cm. Other districts slowly being swallowed up by the earth include Changping, Shunyi and Tongzhou. Some areas sank more than 75cm during the study period.


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Powerful tornado hits eastern China killing at least 51 people

Eastern China was hit by a powerful tornado and hail storms in which at least 51 people have been killed. The tornado struck homes, farms and factories near the city of Yancheng with a population of more than eight million people The city is situated about 500 miles south of Beijing and the tornado was accompanied by winds of up to 78mph.
This has been reported in news.sky.com dated 24 June 2016.

Apart from the loss of lives, dozens of people were injured and large numbers of buildings have been destroyed. The recent extreme weather conditions included torrential downpours that added to the chaos and carnage in Jiangsu province, located north of Shanghai. The southern and eastern parts have been experiencing weeks of heavy rainfall and storms that have caused widespread severe flooding, resulting in a number of fatalities and leaving 20 people missing.
Incidentally, the south is hit every year during the monsoon months of May, June and July. But, this year, the water levels in some major rivers have exceeded those of 1998, when vast flooding had affected nearly 180 million people.


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Explosion in Tianjin leaves at least 50 dead, more than 700 injured

The blasts, at a warehouse storing toxic chemicals in Tianjin, a city in north China, and has left at least 50 dead with another 700 injured. The explosion has also destroyed tower blocks and burned out thousands of cars.
This has been reported in bbc.com dated 13 August 2015.

The dead include twelve firefighters while 36 of their colleagues are still missing.
Tianjin is one of China's most important industrial centers, and one of the busiest ports in the world and President Xi Jinping has promised a thorough investigation into the events and agreed to make the disclosures public The explosions occurred in Tianjin's Binhai New Area which is a vast industrial zone and houses car factories, aircraft assembly lines and other manufacturing and research firms. There were a number of blasts and broken and buckled shipping containers lay all around the area.
The intensity of the blast was such that windows had blown out and office blocks were destroyed for a radius of 2-Km. The impact of the blasts was felt several kilometres away, and was detected by a US Geological Survey monitoring unit in Beijing 160-Km distant.
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Chinese research finds that spicy food is the secret to a long life

#spicyfood #health #cancer #heartdisease #beijing A research, led by Peking University Health Science Center in Beijing, has concluded that those who go in for spicy foods, such as curry, have lower risk of death from cancer and heart diseases. This has been reported in news.sky.com dated 5 August 2015.

The research is in line with previous evidence on the health benefits of spicy foods. In the opinion of the study authors, capsaicin is the main active component of chilli pepper. Its qualities have been extensively reported and it is good in respect of anti-obesity, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer, and anti-hypertensive effects.
Moreover, the antimicrobial function of spices, including chilli pepper, has long been recognized by experts.
The study had gone to extreme lengths to analyze the food habits and health details of nearly half a million Chinese people and concluded that those who ate spicy food six or seven days a week had a 14% reduced risk of death as compared to people who ate it less than once a week.
Another finding was that eating spicy food was associated with a lower risk of death from cancer, heart diseases and respiratory illnesses. And, in the case of women, it corresponded with a reduced risk of death from infections.
Incidentally, spices have long been used for flavoring, coloring and preserving food and, they also possess medicinal properties which needs to be exploited.
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Did debris of the ill-fated Malyasia Airlines MH370 reach Reunion Island

#MalayasiaAirlines #MH370 #reunionisland Malayasia Airlines flight MH370 had vanished on March 8, 2014 with 239 passengers and crew onboard as it was on a scheduled flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. There was no trace of the wreckage of any debris till some items have washed up on a beach of the Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean.
Among the debris found is a bottle of laundry detergent from Jakarta, Indonesia – this lends credence to the theory that these could be from missing Flight MH370.
This has been reported in foxnews.com dated 31 July 2015.

Earlier, a sea-encrusted section of a plane wing had been found to have washed up on Reunion and it is believed to most certainly be a part of the Boeing 777. This is felt to be a potentially major breakthrough in the search for the missing jet.
Items that have been found on the Saint Andre beach on the western coast of the French island east of Madagascar will be examined by a team of experts who are looking to determine if they came from the plane that has been missing since March 8, 2014 with 239 passengers and crew onboard.
Malaysian investigators will be sending the debris to a French military laboratory near Toulouse -- the hub of Europe's aerospace industry --for examination. The wing part will also be analyzed in special defense facilities that are used for airplane testing and analysis.
(Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org)

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#PrinceWilliam #wildlifetrade #ivorytrade #China #JapaneseTsunami Prince William is on a tour of Japan and China and, after conclusion of the Japanese leg, he is now in China where he would be attending a few events as representative of the Queen and in others as an ambassador of Britain. This has been reported in news.sky.com dated 1 March 2015.
The visit of Prince William to Beijing would be the first visit to China of a senior British royal in three decades. As per the itinerary, the Duke of Cambridge, would spend three days in visiting Beijing, Shanghai and an elephant sanctuary in Yunnan Province.
The trip after his four-day tour of Japan, would test his diplomatic skills because UK is actively seeking to expand economic and cultural opportunities with China. Therefore, while trade would be one area of focus, Prince William is also expected to take up the issue of China's role in ending the illegal wildlife trade.
In Japan, he had spent the last day of his tour listening to the pathetic stories from the survivors of the 2011 Japanese tsunami. He had toured the coastal town of Ishinomaki which was hit by an estimated 28 foot wave in which 3,275 people died. It seems 430 people are still missing. Moreover, nearly 22,000 residents lost their homes and 53,000 homes were damaged in the Tsunami.
In China, Prince William would meet President Xi Jinping and tour the Beijing's iconic Forbidden City before flying to Shanghai where he would officially declare open the Great Festival of Creativity in Shanghai. This is a British initiative to set the ball rolling for what is billed as a "flagship year of cultural exchange between the two countries".
In the last leg of his tour in China, he would focus on his favorite cause of combating the illegal wildlife trade. As per plans, he will visit China's only elephant sanctuary on the border with Laos and Myanmar. And, on this occasion, he would get the opportunity to call for a ban on illegal wildlife trade in China, especially the ivory trade.

Beijing migrants or Rat Tribes live in underground bunkers built by Mao

#undergroundbunkers #beijing #bombshelter The migrants in Beijing are known as Rat Tribe and they had moved into the city with dreams of making it big but, for these countryside-bred people, life in Beijing is not cheap. Hence, they have literally gone underground. They number nearly one million and have set up home in the underground bunkers that had been built by Mao as revealed in dailymail.co.uk dated 2 February 2015.
The bunkers had been built in 1969 under Chairman Mao's rule during the Cold War because there were fears of an imminent Soviet attack. Cities were accordingly ordered to prepare safety measures and that led to approximately 20,000 bomb shelters being dug.
Subsequently, after the death of Mao, and taking over by Deng Xiaoping, the defensive tactics were sidelined and resulted in the creation of innumerable underground bunkers. It turned out to be a labyrinth of caves.
These bunkers are located near the deserts of the north east and is a welcome environment for all seasons: cool in summer, warm in winter. Of course, while most of the people who live there want to move on to bigger and better things above the ground, the vast majority appears to be content as well as grateful.