At THM:

As the mother of a victim, there is no way for me to forget these boys and girls and men and women, including my own son, who died in pools of blood. I want the people of the world to know that they once lived in this world, that this world once belonged to them, and why and how they disappeared from it.

As a family site, I won’t be linking to Mango Sauce often. The content is mostly related to bar-girl, prostitute and mail-order bride stories. But I’m glad the vacation is over.:

To convince a love-sick fool that his adorable Internet dream-girl is really a yo-yo knickered common prostitute, a big smoking gun needs to be rammed firmly up his arse and discharged several more times.

Fons is smart, Kroeber is smart, Myrick is smart. I was covering chemicals markets for about two years before I moved to Shanghai. Most of the big synthetic-fiber producers moved operations here before the end of the textile quota regime. I believe most of the natural-fiber producers did too, I have no immediate data or anecdotes to support that - but it would have been rational. The EU and US had 10 years to adjust for the end of quotas. They didn’t do it. Governments can’t be trusted to do anything right.

Arthur Kroeber of the China Economic Quarterly accuses in the Financial Times world leaders of lack of leadership.
"The recent surge in China’s textile exports to Europe and America, which threatens to spark a trade war, was an entirely predictable problem whose political impact could easily have been prevented by more intelligent economic leadership last year.

Look for detailed roundups elsewhere, but here are a few reactions to Schapelle Corby’s 20-year sentence for smuggling drugs into Indonesia, via faves Blair, Swanker, Jakartass and others from tecnorati (ap’s advice, some of you should take it down a few notches, much of the blog commentary on the Corby case is ugly.):

Oz uberblogger Tim Blair is impressed with her defense team.
Jakartass is not related to SillyAsses.
The Swanker asks: "Has Oz gone mad?"
Intellectual Poison says Corby got a "crappy" deal or "got off easy."
Drakk says she probably deserved it.
Shaneybaby severely overreacts: "I say we bomb them and leave them back at square one after the tsunami and walk away."
Alan Singer says he is not boycotting Indonesia but would not "contemplate travelling to that place whilst their legal system is
capable of the travesty of justice that is Schapelle Corby."
tauri is pissed, and will be active in freeing Corby, but won’t advocate a boycott of Bali.
‘Me’ says the Corby affair has "highlighted how much of Australia is made up of ignorant rednecks."

China is serious about cracking down on corruption. So much so, it is possibly inventing cases of corruption to target for prosecution (via Angry Chinese Blogger):

Yu (Huafeng), a former deputy editor for 南方都市报 (Southern Metropolitan News), was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment in January 2004 for corruption and embezzlement of fund. According to reports carried by Xinhua, China’s state media agency, Yu had embezzled $US70,000 in funds, which he used to make illegal payments to senior staff members while he was working with南方都市报. His sentence was reduced later reduced to 8 years in on June 7, 2004…
Reports obtained by the CPJ, a US based reporters’ rights group, suggest that money distributed by Yu had been obtained through legal channels, and that it was distributed, in line accepted Chinese corporate practices, as part of the news group’s bonus scheme.
Prior to his imprisonment, the 南方都市报 had begun a campaign to expose local corruption and to raise the prominence of socially important issues, including poverty and official abuses of power.

With three international media interviews this week, one of America’s favorite dictators is clearly trying to charm the Western press. His efforts probably didn’t impress the neighboring mullahs though, notes Nitin.

SPIEGEL: What would you suggest for keeping the Iranians from producing the bomb?
Musharraf: I can’t say. They are very keen on building the bomb.
SPIEGEL: As Pakistan was.
Musharraf: Yes, we were keen. Nobody can accept a threat to its existence. Therefore we are very proud to have nuclear weapons.
SPIEGEL: Did Pakistan help Iran and North Korea to go nuclear?
Musharraf: An individual from Pakistan did

The China Daily has been slipping lately. Once it was a source of state-approved commentary. It was crap reading (still is), but at least it allowed you to know what the State Council was thinking. The latest error isn’t on the scale of the ‘renminbi revaluation‘ screw-up. No one will lose millions - but someone will likely lose their job. (Via Danwei):

The China Daily website republished a story taken from USA Today last week, almost certainly without permission.
Titled China under spell of mighty ‘Super Voice Girl’ the article looks at the reality show / talent contests like American Idol that are becoming popular in China.
It seems that the editor-censors did not read the article very closely; the China Daily version still includes the following line:

Super Girl is surprisingly participatory. This remains a country where people can’t elect their leaders. But they can vote for their favorite singers.

Under the Talisay Tree writes, apropos of a plan to divide Cebu province, one of the most politically-influential provinces, into two or more new provinces:

Perhaps this move of dividing up Cebu can be a wake-up call to the leadership to be more attentive to the needs of the communities far from the seat of the provincial government. And by the way, there is another place where I used to live that is going to be dismembered soon too. I spend two years as young teacher in Dinagat Island. Another bill is pending in Congress that will detach Dinagat from Surigao del Norte and turn it into a province.

Dell is trying to steal sales from IBM/Lenovo by telling potential
customers that it doesn’t support the Chinese Communist Party (via the
(possibly firewalled?) Bingfeng):

04/28/2005 08:53 AM Subject: RE: PDA
　　Xxxxx，
　
　I was going to try for tomorrow but I may have a conflict (Wife’s
doctors appt. for our expecting baby). Are you in the office tomorrow
in case I can make it over to Belvoir?
　　Is there currently anything you are working on that we can provide some assistance with?
　
　From a IBM perspective, and please do not think I’m throwing stones.
As you know Lenovo is a Chinese government owned company that recently
purchased IBM’s desktop/notebook business. While the US government has
given its stamp of approval (no US secrets are in jeopardy) to continue
to purchase these units people must understand that every dollar they
spend on these IBM systems is directly supporting/funding the Chinese
government.
　　Just something to think about.
　　Chris 

China has jailed/detained a Singaporean journalist for violating state secrets. (via Diodati):

The Peking Duck reports
that Straits Times senior correspondent Ching Cheong was arrested in
Guangzhou on April 22, over alleged leakage of state secrets. Both the
Straits Times and the wife of the prominent Hong Kong journalist were
warned by the Chinese government to not reveal her husband’s
imprisonment, or else… Washington Post is first with the news.

This is especially odd given the favourable coverage the city-state’s media usually give the Communist Party.:      

Since late 1980s, it established a diplomatic relationship with China and has become closer and closer to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It now completely follows the CCP, seeks benefits from the CCP and conducts acts that are in the interest of the CCP. It is not hard to understand why the government of Singapore, disregarding its own image, has committed an evil deed by bringing two innocent Falun Gongpractitioners to court and heavily punishing them for letting tourists
and policemen know the truth of Falun Gong…
In addition, the media in Singapore is heavily influenced by the CCP. Accordingly, The Singapore United Times is the only overseas paper that is present in Mainland China. Even papers that are heavily influenced by the CCP, such as The Xing Pao Daily and The Ming Daily of Hong Kong and The World Daily of Taiwan, can not compare with it. In
this situation, The Singapore United has to completely conform to the CCP.