From: gaojeng@durras.anu.edu.au (J. Gao)
Newsgroups: aus.culture.china
Subject: China News Digest (U.S.), Fri, 11/6/1992
Date: 7 Nov 92 03:03:28 GMT
Organization: Australian National University
NNTP-Posting-Host: 150.203.22.8
Summary: CND
Keywords: CND

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

                                (US Regional)
                           Friday, November 6, 1992

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| CND-US, normally 1 or 2 issues a week, is a supplement to CND-Global and |
| has  basically no overlap with the daily news.  CND-US provides in-depth |
| information concerning Chinese students/scholars in the United States.   |
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Table of Contents                                                 # of Lines
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1. News Brief (5 Items) ................................................. 57
2. IFCSS-Humanitarian Aid Committee Calls for Helping June 4 Victims .... 18
3. Dai Qing: China's Most-Favored-Nation Trade Status Necessary ......... 60
4. Wang Ruowang Optimistic on China's Democracy ......................... 61
5. Tiger and Monkey: Chinese Puppet Master Brings Them to U.S. .......... 73
============================================================================

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1. News Brief (5 Items) ................................................. 57
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The Alliance of Hong Kong Chinese in the U.S. has issued a statement on Hong
Kong Governer Christopher Patten's proposed political reforms for Hong Kong.
The statement called the reform measures "small steps in the right
direction" and "in no way contravene the letter or spirit of the
Sino-British Joint Declaration or the Hong Kong Basic Law." While
recognizing that the proposals fall far short of the wish of the Hong Kong
people, AHKCUS appeals to the Hong Kong Legislative Council to shoulder
their responsibility and speedily pass the package of constitutional
revisions proposed by Governor Patten, and urges all people of good will to
support the further democratization of Hong Kong. (From: Charles Mok)
			       ___  ___  ___

IFCSS is trying to develop a mass-mailing list of potential contributors. It
is understood that there are tens of thousands Americans as well as Chinese
who support IFCSS in its pursuit of democracy and freedom. The IFCSS asks
for volunteers in collecting names and addresses of potential donors; typing
labels or stuff envelopes; distributing IFCSS brochures, which contains
information on what IFCSS has done and will do as well as a request for
donation; and, most importantly, collecting information on human rights
violations and victims of political persecution, particularly families that
are experiencing difficulties as a result of the "June 4th Massacre." It is
one of our foremost tasks to provide aid to them. For more information,
contact the IFCSS HQ at <ifcss@wam.umd.edu>.
(From: IFCSS HQ <ifcss@WAM.UMD.EDU> )
			       ___  ___  ___

The Association of Chinese Professionals have proposed to establish a
special interest group (SIG) on environment protection. Activities of
SIG-ENV will include technology information exchange and act as a conaulting
center and help developing business in environment protection area between
U.S. or other developed countires and China. More information on SIG-ENV can
be obtained from Ching Wu at <yw5@prism.gatch.edu>.  ACP's east regional
office is helping set up a Greater D.C.  Area local chapter.  A preparatory
group has been set up, headed by Yuan Peng, a Ph.D candidate of U. Maryland,
and the owner of NOVA Systems.  Currently, the group is gathering more
members and concerned people in the greater D.C. area (including D.C., and
its neighboring MD, VA and WV areas). Contact Yuan Peng at
<ypeng@astro.umd.edu> for more information. (From: <daili@eng.ufl.edu>)
			       ___  ___  ___

A group of Chinese geologists currently in the United States of America have
formed the North American Chinese Geoscientist Association (NACGA).  The
purposes of this organization are: A) To promote internal communication and
cooperation among Chinese geological and geophysical scientists; and B) To
promote communication and cooperation with China.  The organization is in
preparation stage. All Chinese geologists and geophysists are welcome to
join it.  The organization will publish a monthly electronic newsletter for
members.  Currently membership is free. For more information please contact
Wanbing Li. (From: Wanbing Li <wanbing@FIREFLY.GEOLOGY.UIUC.EDU>)
			       ___  ___  ___

An effort is being made to work out an alumni directory for the people who
ever studied or worked in Chengdu College of Geology (Chengdu Di-Yuan) and
are staying in this country. Enrollment in the directory can be done by
sending a breif message containing the applicant'sname, class, current
address, phone number and major to Weixing Guo at <wxg101@psuvm.psu.edu>.
(From: Weixing Guo <WXG101@psuvm.psu.edu>)

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2. IFCSS-Humanitarian Aid Committee Calls for Helping June 4 Victims .... 18
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>From: Yalai Zhang, Jinhua Guan <ALIAS@VX.CIS.UMN.EDU>
Source: China-Net, 10/20/92

The IFCSS-HUMANITARIAN Committee is committed to provide humanitarian aid to
victims in China who suffer from physical damages as a result of either
natural or unnatural causes.  At the present time, the committee is
concentrating on aiding the June 4th victims.

The committee calls for information concerning people who were victimized
during the June 4th massacre. Information needed include the victim's name,
age, danwei, a brief description of the incident, the date and time of the
incident, his/her current situation in medical treatment, work, and everyday
life, etc. The committee will look into the case and see to it that
necessary help be delivered to the victim.

Information is also solicited concerning the existence of foundations that
are willing to provide humanitarian aid to the June 4th victims.

For more information, or providing the committee with the above information,
please send a E-mail to <ALIAS@VX.CIS.UMN.EDU> or call Yalai Zhang at
(612)-623-0170, or Jinhua Guan at (612)644-0547.

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3. Dai Qing: China's Most-Favored-Nation Trade Status Necessary ......... 60
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By: George Zhu
Source: CND, 11/3/92

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- Dai Qing, a leading Chinese journalist and writer, said
in an interview on Oct. 28 that the United States should continue its
most-favored-nation trade status to China "for the sake of ordinary Chinese
people to change their social status."

Dai, now visiting Harvard University under a fellowship from Nieman
Foundation, was detained by police in Beijing for as long as ten months
following the June 4 massacre in 1989.  She was then expelled from the
communist party because of her role in the democracy movement.

In last ten years, Dai said, while the U.S. has been extending China's
preferable tariff status, the foreign enterprises, joint enterprises
and private enterprises in China have been flourishing, and the central
planning economy is being weakened.

As a result, China's economic structure has been changed significantly,
millions of unemployed people have been able to find a job in companies
over which the communist government has less direct control, according to
Dai.

"The impact of the most-favored-nation status on China is that it has in
fact helped to solve a most urgent and most populous human rights problem
there," said Dai.

Dai thanked the international community for its concern and support during
her detention in Beijing two years ago.  After Secretary of State
James Baker personally raised her case to the Chinese leaders during his
visit late last year, the government finally allowed Dai to leave China
for the United States.

However, Dai said she disagrees with the U.S. Congress in imposing various
conditions on China in order to renew its most-favored-nation trade status.

"Undoubtedly I was one of the beneficiaries as a result of the international
pressure in pushing China to improve its human rights record," Dai said.
"Nevertheless, the worst human rights violation committed by the communist
regime is to set a permanent status for each individual based on ideology."

Dai said, in China, "if you are put on the bottom of the society, you have
no status right, no education right, no marriage right and no relocation
right, you don't even have the most fundamental human rights."

"I was once asked: If for the millions of people to have their rights to
live and change their status, still put you in jail. Do you accept that?"
Dai said. "I replied: Yes, I accept it."

Because, Dai explained, while her imprisonment was certainly in part due to
the fact that "the Chinese law has many flaws and the government often
fails to implement it", it was also the result of her own activities.

"Since I did what I did, I should bear its consequences," Dai emphasized.

A renowned reporter for the official Guangming Daily, Dai was recently
awarded the Golden Pen for Freedom by the International Newspaper Publisher
Association for her excellence in advocating freedom of expression and
human dignity in China.

Dai's late foster-father was Jianying Ye, one of the founders of the
People's Republic of China and one of the 10 marshals commissioned by
Chairman Mao in 1950's.

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4. Wang Ruowang Optimistic on China's Democracy ......................... 61
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Forwarded by: Yuan Liu
Source: The Gazette (MTL), 11/2/92

China's hard-line Communist leadership is on its last legs and a single,
dramatic event could spark its downfall at any moment, a leading Chinese
dissident says.

Wang Ruo-wang, 74, a writer and former longtime member of the Chinese
Communist Party expelled twice from the party for his liberal views, said
many key segments of modern Chinese society deeply oppose the rigid social
control imposed by the Beijing regime.

One single, major incident -- perhaps the death of Deng Xiaoping, 88,
China's paramount leader -- could easily galvanize those groups into
bringing down the government, Wang said.

"Any incident in China could ignite the fire just like a spark ignite
a fire in the prairie," he said in a Montreal interview Friday.

"It could come at any moment."

The day Deng "goes to see Marx will probably be the day of the explosion,"
Wang added, speaking through a translator.

Wang, who was imprisoned in 1989 for 14 months for his role in the pro-
democracy movement, was allowed to leave China for the first time in
August.

He said four key forces in Chinese society oppose the regime:

* Owners of businesses that have sprung up in southern and coastal China
as a result of market-orientated emonomic reforms.
* An additional one million enterpreneurs who now run small businesses
in rural China.
* Open-minded party members and leaders who are unsatisfied with communism
and who sympathize with the people.
* The vast majority of Chinese intellectuals.

Many of these groups are growing, he said, because of Deng's attemps to
build a socialist China with a Communist dictatorship and a capitalist
economy.  Such attempts are bound to fail because of their irrevocable
contradictions, Wang said.

In the meantime, he added, overseas pro-democracy activists and the
Taiwanese government, which he said has begun democratic reforms,
provide support for the internal opposition.

He describe changes in party leadership at last month's party congress
as superficial.

All the same, he said, "there has been some loosening up" in censorship
by authorities since they crushed the pro-reform demonstrations in
Tiananmen Square in 1989 -- even though at least 300 participants remain
in jail.

He cited the permission granted by authorities to students who circulated
a petition demanding reparations for World War II abuses during a recent
visit by the Japanese emperor, and the publication of a book this year by
a Beijing univerisity in which leading dissidents harshly criticized
party hard-linders.

Wang, now a visiting scholar at Columbia University in New York, said
he was visiting pro-democracy activists in Montreal "so I can compensate
for what I lost while I was isolated in China."

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5. Tiger and Monkey: Chinese Puppet Master Brings Them to U.S. .......... 73
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Forwarded by: Zhao Hua
Source: AP, 10/26/92

Five generations ago, Yang Wuxian delighted crowds in China by bringing
puppets to life with small gestures like a ritual flip of a sleeve, the
flaring of a tiger's nostrils, a monkkey cleaning his glasses on his robe.

His descendant, Yang Feng, continues the puppeteering tradition unbroken in
the family since the beginning of the 19th century. The 41-year-old Yang, a
political refugee who lives in Denver, travels around the United States
giving shows with the same kinds of puppets and techniques his ancestors
did.

"Things are OK. Nobody is controlling me and I don't have to control
others," he said, adding that he wishes his 18-year-old daughter, who also
learned puppetry, could get a passport to leave China.  Yang's recent New
York performances included participation in the New York International
Festival of Puppet Theater, which featured 17 puppet companies, including
Jusaburo Tsujimura of Japan, Theatre Drak of Czechoslovakia, Diablomundo of
Argentina and Philippe Gentry of France.

The festival was meant to showcase new directions in the art form and show
how puppetry has been revived as serious adult entertainment in many places.

The 10-inch hand puppets he uses are made of wood and dressed in silky
robes. Some have hinged hands that allow them to raise an umbrella or lift a
tiny cup. Others can arch an eyebrow, or hunch the shoulders, or bend the
knees for an exaggerated, marching walk.

The children who watched Yang perform got to ask questions afterward. And
they especially wanted to know how a monkey who almost drowns when trying to
catch a fish can spit water (a concealed syringe), how a tiger swallows a
monk (a quick substitution of a thinner puppet dressed like the monk that
slips into the tiger's mouth), and how an acrobat throws and catches a
silver pole ("lots of practice").  Yang started learning puppetry from his
father at age 6. At 20 he was taking students; and in his 30s he was
regarded as a leading exponent of Chinese hand puppetry and directing a
troupe of some 60 people that toured the world.

Yang said he never used veiled political criticism in his puppet stories, as
some puppeteers in China did. As the leader of a government-sponsored
troupe, much of his work was in schools, where Communist Party approval of
the plays was required.

But he did speak at demonstrations in his home province, Fujian, in support
of the student-led democracy movement in Beijing in 1989.

"I was well-known there. The local government was unhappy with me," he
said in an interview.

He was prohibited from performing and got word he would be arrested.

Yang left China and went to Bolivia. Then in 1991 he flew to Alaska and
presented himself to immigration authorities. He said it took two months in
detention before he got political asylum.

In that time, Yang built a new stage and carved new puppets.  Taped music
replaced the ensemble that played with the troupe in China.

In China, puppets are losing popularity as people get wrapped up in modern
forms of entertainment, Yang conceded.

His kind of puppetry "zhangzhongxi," or theater of the palm of the hand
originated in Fujian and Taiwan, and still draws audiences who like the
historical stories, the jokes it can carry off, and the language and music
of the performances, he said.

"I have no fear traditional puppetry will die," he said through an
interpreter at a conference on puppetry.

Other speakers at the conference, however, all but wrote off traditional
forms and focused on a Western search for new meaning in puppetry that's
informed by modern art and contemporary consciousness.

"In China puppetry has already survived 1,000 years and numerous wars,"
Yang said. "In a more stable society, why worry it will die?"

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