From: gaojeng@durras.anu.edu.au (J. Gao)
Subject: CND-Global, Fri, August 28, 1992
Summary: CND
Keywords: CND
Organization: Computer Services Centre, Australian National University
Date: 28 Aug 92 06:18:27 GMT

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

                              (News Global)

                        Friday, August 28, 1992

Table of Contents                                                # of Lines
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1. News Brief (4 Items) ................................................ 40
2. PRC Announces Further Loosened Policies on Overseas Students ........ 56
3. Poll Says Chinese Concerned Over Economy ............................ 51
4. Qigong- Health Fad Delights Miami but Troubles Beijing .............. 67
5. What's in Today's Hua Xia Wen Zhai #74 (cm9208d) .................... 29
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1. News Brief (4 Items) ................................................ 40
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[AP 8/26/92] BANGKOK, Thailand -- Vietnam's state airline has resumed
flights to China after a 13-year suspension, the official Voice of Vietnam
radio reported Wednesday.  A Vietnam Airlines flight from Hanoi arrived
Tuesday in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, formerly known as
Canton. The radio station said there will be monthly flights until October,
then two or three flights a week.  Earlier this year, China resumed flights
from Guangzhou to Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh City and from Beijing to Hanoi.
(From: <izzyhc1@ucla.edu>)
                        ____  ____  ____  ____

[KYODO 8/27/92] Hong Kong's economy will grow 5.5% this year, outpacing
last year's 4.2% rise in inflation-adjusted gross domestic product, Hong
Kong & Shanghai Banking Corp. said, in raising its 5% growth forecast made
at the end of last year.  Growth could exceed 5.5% if the U.S. renews
China's preferential trade status and industrialized economies continue to
recover, the report said.  It estimated 19% export growth, up from 16% in
1991, aided by the Hong Kong dollar's weakness, and a 21% rise for imports.
It predicted 9.8% inflation this year, down from 12% last year, as
productivity improvements offset higher wages. (From: Charles P. Mok)
                         ____  ____  ____  ____

[AP 8/27/92] Mary Grace Knapp Burtt, who opened the first school for blind
girls in China in 1917, died Tuesday. She was 102.  Burtt, blinded herself
by spinal meningitis at the age of 2, attended the Perkins School for the
Blind in Boston and graduated with honors from Wellesley College in 1915.
Burtt, a college classmate of Mei-ling Soong, opened her school in the town
of Shiu-Hing. She returned to the United States in 1949, then went to Hong
Kong in 1958 and set up programs for the blind and sighted refugees. (From:
<izzyhc1@ucla.edu>)
                        ____  ____  ____  ____

[Ap 8/26/92] Ethnic Chinese who live abroad can return to their roots after
death by buying a burial space in an imperial cemetery, the Xinhua News
Agency said Wednesday. Xinhua said a 9-square-foot plot in the Qing dynasty
cemetery in Zunhua, about 170 miles south of Beijing, will cost $100 to
$500. Many Chinese cities offer incentives to ethnic Chinese to come to the
"motherland" with investments or high-technology ideas. Zunhua is one of
only a few places trying to lure them back in death. (From: <izzyhc1@ucla>)

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2. PRC Announces Further Loosened Policies on Overseas Students ........ 56
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Source: People's Daily Overseas Edition, August 21, 1992
Summarized and Translated by Bo Xiong

According to People's Daily Overseas Edition (08/21/92), on August 12, the
General Office of the State Council of PRC issued its (1992) No.44 Document
regarding the new policies towards overseas students and scholars, it
contains nine articles, the following is a summary of the document.

1) The government welcomes overseas students and scholars to come back to
   work, visit, conduct academic exchange and etc..  The government will
   not investigate their wrong doings in the past, even if some overseas
   CSS had joined overseas counterrevolutionary organizations and/or done
   something harmful to the country, they will not be looked into as long
   as they obey PRC laws and are not involved in anti-government activities
   after they return.

2) The CSS, who bear expired public-affair passport or good-for-one-trip-
   only passport, may have their passport renewed or be issued new passport;
   They are also allowed to change their passport to private-affair
   passport; For those who have acquired foreign citizenship, they should
   renounce their PRC citizenship per the PRC Citizenship Code, and will be
   treated as foreign Chinese.

3) The applications by overseas CSS for renewal and change of passport, and
   for renouncement of PRC citizenship, should be processed/handled.  If
   there are unsolved money matters with their original domestic unit, they
   should settle the matters with their domestic unit, however, the
   unsettled matters should not affected the handling/processing of their
   application.

4) Overseas CSS may use valid foreign reentry visa along with valid PRC
   passport to re-exit PRC after their brief visit to China at any time,
   no additional application and approval for exit permit is necessary.

5) The domestic units of overseas CSS should enhance their communication
   with the CSS and care their well-being.  Returned CSS may look for job
   on their own, job-hunting and hiring procedure should be "choice of both
   sides".  With approval of their employer, they may take concurrent
   overseas post.

6) Family members of overseas CSS may apply to visit the CSS and their
   applications should be approved by Public Security Bureaus per PRC
   Citizen Exit and Entry Code.

7) All local authorities and administrations should follow the guidelines
   in the No.44 document and should simplify their procedures for
   exit/entry for the CSS, and should help returned CSS to handle the
   matters in their daily life and work.

8) In the places that there are large numbers of returned CSS, local
   government or social groups may establish organizations for returned
   CSS and service center to help those returned CSS.

9) PRC overseas embassies and consulates are in charge of overseas CSS
   affairs and represent their interests on behalf of the country, they
   shall protect CSS's interests and provide assistance to overseas CSS.

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3. Poll Says Chinese Concerned Over Economy ............................ 51
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~From: A CND Reader
Source: UPI 8/26/92

BEIJING -- Nearly one in four Chinese is unhappy over the country's
economic situation and fewer than two-thirds are satisfied with the current
political climate, a new public opinion poll said Thursday.

The survey on social relationships, described by the official Xinhua news
agency as the first of its kind, also found that some of the key
beneficiaries of China's economic reforms were singled out for disdain by
the respondents.

The poll was conducted by the Public Opinion Research Institute of the
People's University in Beijing. Researchers compiled the data from 3,158
respondents, from factory workers and government workers to farmers,
surveyed during the past few months nationwide.

Opinion surveys are a relatively new phenomenon in China. After decades of
communist political repression, most people are still reluctant to express
their true feelings in public or to any form of authority.

Although the official spin on the new poll stressed the happy majority, the
survey noted that 23.4 percent of respondents -- nearly one in four -- were
"not satisfied" with China's current economic situation. It said 60.3
percent were satisfied.

The report did not say whether the remainder fell in between or did not
offer an opinion.

The poll said 64.8 percent of respondents were generally optimistic about
China's economic future, while "only 12.1 percent expressed doubts." The
opinions of the rest were not detailed.

But the poll also said only 59.4 percent were generally satisfied with
China's current political situation, while 15.2 percent admitted they were
dissatisfied, in contrast to official claims of overwhelming support for
the political leadership.

Without giving figures the survey said private businessmen, pop singers and
medical doctors, as well as tax collectors, were generally described as
"bad" or "not very good" by respondents in a public image category.
Teachers enjoyed the highest rating.

The poll did not discuss the results, but business people, entertainers and
others have all been beneficiaries of the country's free-market economic
reforms, which along with prosperity have spawned corruption and a class of
nouveau-riche.

The Xinhua dispatch quoted the research institute's director, Gan Xifen, as
saying the researchers hoped the poll "will be useful to the current
economic and political reform and opening to the outside world."

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4. Qigong- Health Fad Delights Miami but Troubles Beijing .............. 67
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~From: XU Ming Yang
Source: The Sydney Morning Herald 8/28/92
By: Yvonne Preston

Mostly over 60 and overweight, the class of 30 Americans listened
attentively as the qigong doctor got into his stride with an elementary
lesson in relaxation and relieving mental stress.

Qigong exercises are a Chinese fad the curative powers of which have now
spread to the elderly in Florida and California, with promises of long life,
health and an entry to eastern mysticism.

The seaside resort of Beidaihe, where China's aging leaders come every
summer to discuss affairs of party and State, is also home to the country's
biggest qigong hospital.

Tourists, looking for something different, follow three day's sightseeing in
Beijing with a train ride 300 kilometres north and 10 days of indoctrination
in basic qigong techniques.  They also dabble in taiqijuan exercises and
calligraphy.  The therapy costs less than US$11 a day.

Qigong is said to be 3,000 years old, beating Indian yoga by a full thousand
years.

Not everyone is impressed by its claims. The China Daily newspaper described
it as a medical hot potato. Some call it a magic cure, others mere
self-suggestion. In a country where medical breakthrough claims - a cancer
cure, a potion to kill the AIDS virus - are commonplace, quackery is never
far away.

An American nurse doing the course said bottled water claiming to cure
cancer was on sale at the Beidaihe Qigong Rehabilitation Hospital.

Others were fascinated and deeply impressed. An elderly Florida woman -
confirming the common love affair many Americans have with China - praised
the therapy and adored the taiqi, the culture and the painting.

The qigong fad sweeping China was condemned as feudal superstition in the
cultural revolution. When it was revived in the mid-1980s it was suppressed
again as a social movement threatening the party.

The clampdown began in 1989 but it was never fully blooded because many
Communist Party members believed its claims. Since the Beidaihe hospital
opened in 1956, it has treated, among other leaders, Liu Shaoqi, a former
President of the State.

Qigong covers a bewildering array of activities. Hard qigong is a martial
art. Grand master Yuan Xiyin is famous for surviving a lorry laden with 10
people driving over his body.

Accounts of abuse are numerous. At mass meetings pseudo-religious
charismatic qigong cults reduce audiences to mass hysteria and frenzy,
whimpering, sobbing, grunting and convulsing. Some masters enjoy a cult of
personality immensely worrying to party bosses. An internal party document
in 1990 said there were 50 million qigong devotees across the country, as
many as are members of the party.

There are hundreds of qigong clinics across China, researching, treating
patients or existing as fronts for personality cults.

But despite the charlatans, belief is widespread. All over China parks at
dawn are full of people doing soft qigong exercises. Diplomatic wives employ
their own qigong masters.

None of its medical claims has been scientifically authenticated, but there
is no shortage of run-of-the-mill qigong charlatans, offering the gullible a
mixed bag of superstition, occult, mysticism and faith healing.

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5. What's in Today's Hua Xia Wen Zhai #74 (cm9208d) .................... 29
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~From: CND Hua Xia Wen Zhai Editorial Board < cnd-cm@library.uta.edu >


                 Hua Xia Wen Zhai  (CND Chinese Magazine)
                        (CND Chinese Magazine)
                              Issue #74
                            August 28, 1992

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                      Table of Contents (cm9208d)
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1. Prose: Wedding and Father ...............................Wu Guanzhong
2. Story of a Musician: Tchaikovsky--Mme Von Meck--
   Symphonie Pathetique .......................Henry and Dana Lee Thomas
3. Inside China: Mao Zedong Fever  .............................Wei Qing
4. Biography:
   Yuan Hongbin and His THE TIDE OF HISTORY (Part 2 of 2) .....Shi Liuzi
5. Humors: A Funny Thing Happened to Me
6. "We" (Wo Men): Joining the Youth League ........................Yu He
7. Recipe: Ma Po Dou Fu
8. Information Exchange:
   The Regulation of Reexit China Simplified Again
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      Executive Editor:  Bao, MinQi < cnd-cm@library.uta.edu >
- ------------------------------------------------------------------------
Please send contributions to cnd-cm@library.uta.edu, including your
name and E-address in the  GB  file  unless  you wish to be anonymous.
Also please avoid printing HXWZ in peak hours on a multi-user printer.
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