From: jxg601@huxley.anu.edu.au (J. Gao)
Newsgroups: aus.culture.china
Subject: China News Digest (Global), Thu, 10/8/1992
Date: 9 Oct 92 06:40:28 GMT
Organization: Australian National University
NNTP-Posting-Host: huxley.anu.edu.au
Summary: CND
Keywords: CND

              * * *  C h i n a   N e w s   D i g e s t  * * *

                              (News Global)

                        Thursday, October 8, 1992


Table of Contents                                                # of Lines
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1. News Brief (2 Items) .................................................18
2. The Communist Party Congress to Show Deng's Success and Failure ......90
3. Chinese Government Gambles on Japanese Emperor's Visit ...............81
4. Japan Extends 137 Billion Yen Instalment of ODA Loan to China ........30
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1. News Brief (2 Items) .................................................18
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[Japan Economic Newswire, 10/7/92] TOKYO -- North Korean President Kim Il
Sung is likely to visit China at the end of the month, diplomatic sources
said Wednesday. If realized, the visit will be the first by the North
Korean leader since the establishment of full diplomatic relations between
China and South Korea on August 24. The sources said Kim strongly hopes to
meet with senior Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping to discuss relations between
the two countries. (From: Liu Jian)
                               ___  ___  ___

[Japan Economic Newswire, 10/7/92] TOKYO -- The Export-Import Bank of
Japan will provide a loan amounting to about 20 billion yen to China to
finance joint Sino-Japanese high technology ventures, bank officials said
Wednesday. They said a formal agreement on the loan will be signed in
Tokyo on Tuesday. The fund will be used to finance two large-scale
integrated circuit and telephone exchange ventures launched in China by
major Japanese electronics firm NEC Corp., the officials said.
(From: Liu Jian)

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2. The Communist Party Congress to Show Deng's Success and Failure ......90
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From: A CND Reader
Source: UPI, 10/7/92

BEIJING -- When the Communist Party of China opens its national congress
Monday as a testimonial to the reform era of Deng Xiaoping, the
preordained outcome will signal more about the senior leader's lasting
failures than his greatest triumphs.

The 14th national congress, convened five turbulent years after the last
such meeting, is being billed as a consecration of the political will of
the 88-year-old Deng who, technically retired and in uneven health, may
not even show up.

After 14 years as China's most powerful man, Deng has managed to take his
vast, backward country into the 20th century, flinging open its doors and
bringing unprecedented prosperity to much of the world's most populous
nation.

Yet he also has failed to find a credible successor, fumbled attempts to
modernize China's imperial power structure and been unable to change with
the new times his own reforms have spawned, leaving the nation with no
clear vision of its future.

With the party holding a congress only about every five years, this
meeting may be Deng's last. And with the sweeping changes already
unleashed in Chinese society, it is likely to be less of a landmark than a
postscript.

Speculation has been intense on how the party will codify the Deng program
and the new cast of characters in the ruling Politburo and Central
Committee. But while the emphasis is on reform, the bigger question of
direction will remain unanswered.

China's leaders have issued vague pledges of 100 years of reform and
economic development. Yet their vision of the future remains a freer
economic system grafted onto a totalitarian political structure already
declared obsolete in most of the world.

"Without basic change, they can turn back the clock," noted a Chinese
academic.  "The most important thing for the old men is to hold onto
power."

The Deng legacy, in fact, has become a victim of his power. To remain at
the top, he has sacrificed two heirs apparent -- party leaders Hu Yaobang
in 1987 and Zhao Ziyang in 1989 -- and left his third, current party
leader Jiang Zemin, as a straw man.

By retaining the deciding vote, he also has assured a continuing struggle
for power. Even President Yang Shangkun, a key Deng ally likely to assume
the emperor's mantle after Deng's death, may not be able to wield such
personal clout.

At the last party congress in 1987, Deng won strong endorsement of
reforms, retired his hard-line rivals in the party elite and set up bold
reformist Zhao Ziyang as his heir, purportedly achieving his lifelong
goals.

Then came an economic downturn in 1988 and the pro-democracy protests in
1989, ending in the military crackdown at Tiananmen Square and Zhao's
ouster. Deng and the elderly hard-liners re-emerged, along with a dose of
old-time communist religion.

Last winter, seeing stagnation in China, change in the world and perhaps a
last chance, Deng used a classic bold tactic with what was effectively a
campaign tour of south China, reviving reforms and setting the country in
a market frenzy.

But he has been unwilling or unable to couple economic change with any
meaningful political reform or increase in the rule of law, leaving a
Mafia-like power structure of rival factions complete with aging
godfathers and young political button men.

"The lesson they drew from the Soviet Union is that political reforms are
risky," observed a Western diplomat. "They still lack confidence that any
rocking of the political boat can be controlled."

The government nonetheless has set in motion dizzying changes -- from
stock markets and foreign investment to the loosening of social and
economic controls. Many Chinese are flush with cash and living the good
life.

But along with cellular telephones, video recorders and private cars have
come crime, drugs and other social ills, along with a spiritual vacuum
that can no longer be filled by Marxism's greatest hits or quotations from
Chairman Mao.

"There is no more ideological leadership, no idea of where we are actually
going," said a middle-aged Chinese intellectual. "They just say push ahead
and when they need to they fall back on all the old slogans."

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3. Chinese Government Gambles on Japanese Emperor's Visit ...............81
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From: Liu Jian
Source: Japan Economic Newswire, 10/7/92

BEIJING -- When Japan's Emperor Akihito arrives in Beijing on October 23,
he will fulfill a longstanding Chinese government wish, but many citizens
say no amount of official pomp can obscure the emotional scars still
haunting Sino-Japanese ties.

While few people in China expect anti-Japanese demonstrations to mar the
emperor's trip, his presence will undoubtedly evoke bitter memories far
removed from the official celebrations marking 20 years of normalized
diplomatic ties.

In the view of many Chinese people, the time has come for Japan to settle
its World War II account with a full imperial apology for its invasion of
China and handsome reparations. For China's government, the emperor's
visit is a fitting climax to a year of diplomatic triumphs.

A recent Xinhua News Agency commentary captured the official mood to a
tee, lauding the "momentum of China's all-round diplomacy" as the country
reaches out to all corners of the world in its diplomatic quest.

China's recent diplomatic coups include a series of first-time visits by
foreign leaders, and Beijing is proud now to point out that Emperor
Akihito will be the first Japanese monarch to visit China in a bilateral
relationship stretching back two millennia.

The deluge of self-congratulation has even prompted some observers to draw
comparisons with "chaogong" or tribute paying, the traditional custom of
dispatching foreign emissaries to pay homage to the Chinese imperial court.

And having an emperor pay tribute is clearly the highest honor of all, a
fact not lost on several Japanese opponents of the visit who oppose his
coming for that very reason.

The emperor's visit also carries ample symbolism by affixing the imperial
seal on China's diplomatic revival in the wake of its bloody suppression
of student-led democracy protesters in June 1989.

Symbolism aside, analysts say Beijing also foresees golden economic gains
on the emperor's coattails.

Japan is providing China with an 810 billion yen loan package for
1990-1995, but foreign diplomats say Beijing's ambitious reform program
could certainly use billions more.

With this in mind, the Chinese government has prepared a strong bargaining
hand in advance of the emperor's arrival, they say.

For a start, Beijing has declined to explicitly criticize Tokyo's decision
to send peacekeeping troops to Cambodia, a move other Asian countries,
including Indonesia and North Korea, have condemned. In addition, China
has not publicly opposed Japan's desire to become a permanent member of
the United Nations Security Council.

But the Chinese government's strongest bargaining chip lies in its
apparent decision not to endorse civilian demands for Japanese war
reparations and an imperial apology.

In the past three months, war victim groups have amassed 300,000
signatures from citizens demanding compensation from Japan.

Although many outside observers suspect the government has had a
clandestine hand in the campaign, Beijing's official position has been to
distance itself from civilian demands. Officials, however, have let drop
several hints that attitudes might change if no progress on the war issues
is achieved.

Compensation seekers also have support from Chinese intellectuals who have
issued similar calls for some kind of gesture from the emperor.

With anti-Japanese sentiment sure to be heightened by the emperor's
arrival, some analysts question the wisdom of having invited him before
all outstanding bilateral differences are resolved. They say the last
thing the Chinese government can afford is an incident beyond its control.

With that in mind, the authorities have begun to quietly discourage overt
protests.  Short-term detentions of potential demonstrators have already
been reported in Beijing and Shanghai, two stops on the emperor's six-day
tour.

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4. Japan Extends 137 Billion Yen Instalment of ODA Loan to China ........30
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From: Liu Jian
Source: AP-DJ 10/6/92

TOKYO -- Japan is extending 137.33 billion yen to China for an
Official Development Assistance (ODA) loan for 21 projects this fiscal
year to contribute to China's economic stability and modernization, the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced Tuesday.

The loan is made available by the Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund to the
Government of China at interest of 2.6% per annum. Repayment will be over
30 years including a 10-year grace period, and procurement method is
general untied.

The loan will be used to procure goods and services needed for 16 existing
infrastructure projects and five new projects.

The loan is the third portion of Japan's third yen loan to China, which was
announced in 1988 to total 810 billion yen. Japan had suspended its
lending to China after the June 1989 Tiananmen Square incident, but it was
resumed again November 1990.Japan provided 122.5 billion yen in 1990 and
129.6 billion yen in 1991.

New projects for which the loan will be used are Hubei Ezhou Thermal Power
Plant Project (I), up to 4.0 billion yen; Lianyungang Port Xugou Area First
Phase Construction Project, up to 5.9 billion yen; Qinhuangdao Port E and F
Berths Construction Project (I), up to 3.42 billion yen; Qiqihar Nenjiang
River Highway Bridge Construction Project, up to 2.1 billion yen; and
Beijing-Shenyang-Harbin Telecommunication Systems Project (I), up to 3.15
billion yen.

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