From: gaojeng@durras.anu.edu.au (J. Gao)
Subject: China News Digest (Global), Wed, 10/7/1992
Summary: CND
Keywords: CND
Organization: Computer Services Centre, Australian National University
Date:  7 Oct 92 08:37:59 GMT

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

                              (News Global)

                        Wednesday, October 7, 1992


Table of Contents                                                # of Lines
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1. News Brief (2 Items) .................................................20
2. U.S. and China Face "Big Gap" in Trade Dispute .......................35
3. Chinese Government Agency Indicted in U.S. Import Fraud Probe ........65
4. Guangxi Cracks Down on Narcotics Trade ...............................40
5. Chinese Communist Party Membership Hits Record 51 Million ............27
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1. News Brief (2 Items) .................................................20
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[Dow Jones International News, 10/6/92] BEIJING -- China launched two 
satellites on Tuesday, one of them a Swedish scientific experiment 
satellite, official media reported. It was China's third foreign satellite 
launch and its second this year. A Chinese retrievable scientific surveying 
and technological experimental satellite was launched along with the 
Swedish satellite. Both were put into orbit by a single carrier rocket, an 
improved version of the Long March 2C, the official Xinhua News Agency said. 
The afternoon launch was from the Jiuquan satellite launching center in
northwest China's Gansu province. (From: Liu Jian)
                               ___  ___  ___

[Wall Street Journal, 10/6/92] NEW YORK -- American International Group 
said it plans to open an office in China under the first license awarded to 
a foreign insurance company in more than 40 years. The office will be in 
Shanghai, the city where AIG was formed in 1919. AIG will sell life 
insurance to Chinese citizens and foreign nationals through its American 
International Assurance Co. unit. It will also offer property and casualty 
insurance to joint ventures and other foreign businesses in Shanghai.
(From: Liu Jian) 

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2. U.S. and China Face "Big Gap" in Trade Dispute .......................35
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From: Liu Jian 
Source: Japan Economic Newswire, 10/6/92

WASHINGTON -- The United States and China still remain far apart in their 
trade dispute as negotiators from the two countries began a last round of 
efforts to avert a possible trade war, a senior U.S. trade official said
Tuesday.

"There still is a big gap," said Ira Wolf, assistant U.S. Trade
Representative for Japan and China.

Wolf made the remarks in a brief exchange with reporters shortly before he
and other senior U.S. trade officials sat down in Washington for the final
round of high-level talks to resolve their trade differences.

The United States has set an October 10 deadline for a settlement of their
disputes, threatening to impose punitive tariff on 3.9 billion dollars of
Chinese imports if no solution is found.

The Chinese have also proposed 4 billion dollar sanctions against U.S.
exports in retaliation.

Under U.S. trade law, U.S. Trade Representative Carla Hills will have to
make a determination before the deadline whether trade talks launched a year
ago have made sufficient progress to remove law-mandated retaliation against
China.

At stake are U.S. complaints that the Chinese are blocking U.S. exports
through tariff and nontariff barriers.

Wolf insisted that the U.S. demands that China opens up its market are
similar to the standards imposed under the General Agreement on Tariffs and
Trade (GATT), the world trade body China wants to join.

"The Chinese know what they have to do at this point," he said.

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3. Chinese Government Agency Indicted In U.S. Import Fraud Probe ........65
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From: Liu Jian
Source: Dow Jones International News, 10/5/92

NEW YORK -- A Chinese government agency and individuals in the U.S.
and China were accused in a federal criminal indictment Monday of evading
quotas set to protect the U.S. textile and clothing industries. 

Robert Van Etten, special agent in charge of U.S. Customs in New York, said
he could recall no similar instance of an indictment of a foreign 
government agency. 

"This is significant. I don't think it's been done before," he said. 

The indictment resulted from a 17-month investigation touched off in part 
by complaints from the U.S. textile and clothing industries about nations 
that ignore U.S. quotas which limit imports. 

The probe is continuing, and Van Etten said the practices of an unspecified
number of other nations were being looked at. 

Van Etten said China exports nearly 3.9 billion dollars in textiles to the 
U.S. annually. 

Federal officials believe 2 billion dollars worth more is imported 
illegally, including textiles made in China but shipped through other 
countries to avoid quotas. The most common way-stations are Pakistan, 
Malaysia, Taiwan, Panama and Honduras, prosecutors said. 

Accused in the indictment was the China National Textiles Import and Export
Corp. of Beijing. 

The company was described by the U.S. Attorney's Office as the Chinese
government agency that regulates and controls all imports and exports of
textiles and wearing apparel to and from the People's Republic of China. 

The agency reports directly to the Ministry of Foreign Economic Relations
and Trade, a release from the prosecutor's office said. If convicted, the
agency could be fined 2 million dollars. 

"They hold themselves out to be a separate corporate entity," said Milton 
L. Williams Jr., assistant U.S. attorney in charge of the probe. "Because 
of that, we took the position we could indict that corporate entity just 
like we can indict any corporate entity in the United States." 

Williams added that the company clearly "is controlled by the Chinese
government." 

Also indicted was China National's U.S. subsidiary, Chinatex America Inc. 
of Manhattan, as well as five individuals. If convicted, Chinatex faces a
2-million-dollar fine. 

A woman who answered the phone at Chinatex said everyone was out of the
office, and a message was not immediately returned. A man answering the 
phone at the Chinese Embassy said no one could immediately be reached for 
comment. 

Van Etten said the indictment sends the message that "the U.S. Customs 
and the Justice Department are serious about commercial fraud." 

Williams said the government will prove the defendants conspired to bring
more Chinese-made clothing into the United States than they were allowed. 

In some instances, they arranged for false documents to mislead Customs 
into believing the goods were made in one country when they actually were 
made in another, the indictment said. 

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4. Guangxi Cracks Down on Narcotics Trade ...............................40
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From: Liu Jian 
Source: Japan Economic Newswire, 10/6/92

HONG KONG -- Twenty-four people have been executed and nearly 3,700 been 
jailed this year for narcotics offenses in China's southwest Guangxi Zhuang 
Autonomous Region, the semi-official Hong Kong China News Agency (HKCNA) 
reported Tuesday.

An official in the province's new narcotics suppression commission said 
there had been 3,331 narcotics cases in the first eight months of 1992, 
seven times the number recorded last year, according to a HKCNA report from 
Nanning, the provincial capital.

The official said local authorities had eradicated narcotics trade and use
shortly after the Communists took power in 1949, but Nanning police began 
to find narcotics users in 1989, the HKCNA said.

Officials said two routes for international opium and heroin traffic from
Southeast Asia's notorious "Golden Triangle" now pass through Guangxi. As 
a result, police have found some narcotics use in nearly every area in 
Guangxi, the agency reported.

Economic losses from narcotics use exceed 450 million yuan annually,
according to an incomplete estimate by local officials.

A survey recently conducted by Nanning police indicated that 80% of drug
users had lost their life's savings, 45% had become separated from their
spouses, and 78% had become involved in criminal activity, said the HKCNA.

But officials admitted that, despite the risks, extraordinary profits had
tempted quite a few people to engage in trafficking.

Official efforts to stem the trade include the establishment of drug
rehabilitation centers in many localities, tighter patrolling of the borders
with Yunnan province to the west and Vietnam to the southwest, and more
frequent inspections at key transportation facilities.

In addition to arresting about 3,700 suspects in drug cases, police have
confiscated and destroyed more than 1,100 kilograms of opium or heroin,
according to the HKCNA report.

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5. Chinese Communist Party Membership Hits Record 51 Million ............27
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From: Liu Jian 
Source: Dow Jones International News, 10/6/92

BEIJING -- China's Communist Party has a record membership of more than 51 
million people, up 17% from five years ago, an official report said Tuesday. 

The Chinese Communist Party, the world's largest, has 7.51 million more
members now than in 1987, the Xinhua News Agency said, siting figures 
released by the party's Organization Department. With a population of 1.13 
billion, party members account for less than 5% of the population. 

The new membership figures don't reflect mounting dissatisfaction with the
party. It faces growing complaints over corruption within its ranks, and 
many members say privately that they joined because of the perks and 
advantages party membership brings. 

New members must swear to "fight my entire life for communism and be ready
at any time to sacrifice everything for the party and the people." But the
oath says nothing about believing in Marxism, and many people, including 
party members, say that few people do believe. 

The Xinhua report said one-third of China's 24 million professionals and
technicians are party members. 

In the past 14 years, the educational level of party members has improved.
Thirty-five percent of party members have at least a high school education, 
up from less than 13% in 1978, Xinhua said. 

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