TOP STORIES:
BEIJING, Dec. 24 (Xinhua) — China’s employment policies in the wake of the global financial crisis have so far generated positive results, Yin Weimin, minister of human resources and social security, said Thursday when delivering a report to the country’s top legislature.
BEIJING, Dec. 24 (Xinhua) — The cold snap that has brought freezing temperatures and snow to northwest China’s Xinjiang continued Thursday, spreading to north and central regions.
BEIJING, Dec. 24 (Xinhua) — China’s most senior official investigators Thursday revealed they had dealt with 88 cases of misspending of the government’s 4-trillion yuan stimulus package money a year after its introduction.
The cases involved 198 Party officials, said Wang Wei, Vice Minister of Supervision and a member of the Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), at a press conference held at the State Council Information Office.
BEIJING, Dec. 24 (Xinhua) — China’s 2009 public investment expenditure may go beyond its 908 billion yuan (62.02 billion U.S. dollars) budget, the Ministry of Finance said Thursday.
Increased spending on affordable housing, energy conservation and emissions cuts as well as technology innovation led to the possible over budget, said Zhang Shaochun, vice minister of finance, at a press conference.
CHONGQING, Dec. 24 (Xinhua) — A former lawmaker and business tycoon in southwest China’s Chongqing Municipality stood trial Thursday on charges of organizing a criminal gang, court authorities said.
Chen Mingliang, 52, was a deputy to the People’s Congress in Chongqing’s Yuzhong District, the local legislature, before he was arrested in June.
The former president of Chongqing Jiangzhou Industrial Group was accused of organizing a 34-member gang that ran a brothel at a downtown Chongqing hotel, trafficking at least 16,000 grams of narcotics and organizing illegal gambling tours to Macao, said an official with the Third Intermediate People’s Court of Chongqing.
BUSINESS & FINANCE
BEIJING, Dec. 24 (Xinhua) — The Ministry of Commerce said Thursday that it would impose anti-dumping duties on imports of 1,4-butanediol (BDO) from Saudi Arabia and Taiwan, starting Friday.
In a statement on its website, the ministry said Taiwan and Saudi Arabia had dumped BDO products on the Chinese mainland.
BEIJING, Dec. 24 (Xinhua) — China’s foreign trade is expected to decline 16 percent in 2009 from a year ago, to about 2.2 trillion U.S. dollars, the Minister of Commerce said on Thursday.
The annual retail sales is likely to rise more than 15 percent to 12.5 trillion yuan (1.84 trillion U.S. dollars), minister Chen Deming told a national meeting on commerce.
FEATURE:
by Xinhua Writers Jiang Tingting, Liu Min, Wang Hongjiang
BEIJING, Dec. 24 (Xinhua) — At the moment she unwrapped the parcel, Yang Ting who works for a foreign company in Beijing marveled at the set of delicate Christmas pompons, which was the third gift she had bought online within a month to decorate her house.
“With these pompons, a one-meter-plus high Christmas tree and some colored lights I bought on the net the other day, I can feel the excitement of Christmas even if I stay indoors,” Yang said.
Like Yang Ting, more Chinese consumers have turned to the internet for Christmas gifts and decorations this year.
Statistics from e-commerce companies show that on-line sales growth for the holiday season is much stronger than the year before, even though prices of Christmas gifts are generally higher.
