IV.
International (02-01-06)
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The Buddha is pictured
with six postures, usually represented in religious
postures. It is known as the “Vitarka Mudra”—seated
with thumb & forefinger of right hand touching; seated
in the lotus with one hand on top of the other in his
lap; seated with one hand on his lap, the other on his
knee; seated with right hand touching the earth;
standing with palms up facing outward; standing with
palms up facing outward; standing with one palm up, the
other pointing to the earth, known as restraining the
waters.
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When the great families of the prewar period, e.g.,
Madame Chiang Kai-shek, Edda Ciano (Mussolini’s
daughter), Edwina Mountbatten (mother of the Queen of
England), Henry Pu Yi (last Emperor of China) came out
of the war and the various communist revolutions
relatively poor, perhaps even destitute, they thought
about selling their jade. They are all dead now, or too
old to care about jade, but jade was their passion.
There’s an old Chinese proverb: Better to invest than
work, better to hoard than invest.
. China’s
economy grew 9.8% in 2005, state media reported, an
upward revision of the previous growth forecast of 9.4%
by the state planning agency.
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Yellow Roadway
plans to operate its own trucks in China later this year
as part of a global expansion and will change its name
to YRC Worldwide.
. Chinese
regulators approved the first batch of foreign and local
banks to act as yuan market makers, in another
step toward greater currency flexibility.
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China’s
Communist rulers faced a rare display of media
independence as
Beijing News journalists
walked out to resist toeing the line.
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Pres. Chen of
Taiwan
pledged to push for a new constitution during his last 2
years in office, despite warnings from China and growing
domestic opposition.
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Taiwan’s top officials for Chinese Affairs tried
to soothe concerns that the president’s New Year’s
speech signaled tighter limits on mainland investing.
. A Taiwanese
academic has discovered that ammonia density in a river
in central Taiwan rose between 20x and 40x higher than
normal in the immediate period prior to massive
earthquake that hit the area on 9/21/99.
. Japan’s
Mitsubishi Heavy is the front-runner to buy
nuclear energy concern Westinghouse for more than
$2.5 billion.
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In TV sets, Sony’s
traditional stronghold, Samsung now jockeys with
Sony and a handful of top players for the #1 share of
sales globally.
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Behind the Sony-Samsung rivalry, an unlikely alliance
develops between Sony’s Murayama and Samsung’s Insik.
The 2 engineers symbolize their increasing dependence on
each other since 2003.
. North Korea
said it cannot return to international nuclear
disarmament talks unless the US lifts sanctions imposed
for its alleged currency counterfeiting and other
illegal activities.
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A North Korea
expert at Seoul’s Dongguk U. suggests steps at boosting
the country’s negotiating power, such as test-firing a
missile or increasing its nuclear arsenal. The nuclear
test is unlikely as it would provoke China and other
neighboring countries.
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North Korea
claims the US is seeking to overthrow its regime behind
a smoke screen of dialogue. It says the sanctions and
emphasis by the US
on the North’s human rights abuses are signs of
Washington’s hostility.
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Former Philippine
Pres. Fidel Ramos gave Pres. GMA until 9/30/07 to resign
and decide whether she would run for Parliament under an
amended constitution
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Judge Henrik Gingayon of
Pasay City Regional Trial Court Branch 117 was
assassinated by 2 motorcycle-riding assailants over the
Ninoy Aquino Intl Airport Terminal 3 between the
government and a Filipino-German consortium. Seven other
lawyers met the same gruesome fate this past year.
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Revenues from electronic exports in 2005 likely grew
around 2% from the previous year, with an expected
rebound in December after 3 straight months of decline
beginning September, said the Semiconductor &
Electronics Industries in the Philippines Inc (SEIPI)
said.
. Thailand
is the world capital of GRS (gender reassignment
surgery for sex change). They have microsurgery and some
of the best surgeons in the field.
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The sex industry’s current turnover is nearly double the
Thai government’s annual budget. Only an estimated 2.5%
of all Thai sex workers work in bars and 1.3% in massage
parlors. Where in the world one sees a bar so vulgarly
named to underscore the sex industry in the “Cock and
Pussy” Bar?
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The remaining 96.2% work in cafes, barbershops and
brothels only rarely patronized by non-Thai clients.
Most of the country’s
sex industry is invisible to the visiting foreigner.
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American companies made
a commitment to invest more in
Indonesia
provided the government can guarantee legal certainty
and security
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Landslides triggered by
heavy rains swept down Central Java, burying houses and
leaving dozens of people missing and feared dead,
officials said.
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Islamic groups staged 2 separate demonstrations outside
US and Australian embassies in
Jakarta
and warned US not to attack Afghanistan & other
countries and condemning recent attacks on mosques in
Queensland.
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More than 300 people,
overcome by ammonia fumes caused by a chemical reaction
at a nearby illegal dumpsite, fled their homes near
Sungai Gatom in
Malaysia.
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The strengthening
manufacturing sub-sector, comprising mainly of
production of electronics, is poised to record a growth
of 10% or higher in December, economists said, and will
play a key role in economic expansion.
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Malaysian cell phone
firm Maxis and an Indian partner, the Reddy
family, will take over India’s regional cellular
operator Aircel in a $1.08 billion deal.
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The best nephrite and
jadeite in the world came from an area in the Kachin
Mountains in
Burma
and have for thousands of years. During every one of
these thousands of years, the political situation has
been volatile, the human cost of mining the jade
appalling, the greed of Chinese middlemen outrageous.
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The case today is no different than it was in the
warring states period. At present, a corrupt and
probably insane military junta, desperate for hard
currency, sells the jade in parallel with opium and
methadone.
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The miners are encouraged to shot up on heroin to help
them endure the disgusting conditions. There is a high
incidence of HIV, often developing in full-blown AIDS.
The mortality rate among the miners is extremely high,
which suits the junta who don’t want the miners
returning to Rangoon to gossip.
. India’s
consumers are helping to propel sales in a burgeoning
market that increasingly draws the attention of foreign
companies.
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Indian police arrested a suspected member of the
Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-i-Taiba in
connection with recent shooting at a prestigious science
university in the technology hub of Bangalore killing
one person.
. India
aborted 10 million female babies in 20 years through
prenatal sex selection which has reached an alarming
proportion, said a new study of 6 million people in 11
million households.
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The government has offered a package of 10% shares of
Pakistan Steel Mills Corp (PSMC) to its
workers, besides extending them an assurance that they
would have job security after its sell-off.
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A coalition of thousands
of Islamic schools vowed to resist a Pakistani
government plan to deport foreign students, calling the
proposal immoral.
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Winter storms grounded helicopters and thwarted
Pakistani quake relief as refugees struggled against the
cold.
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The government invited
foreign & local investors to set up a modern oil
refinery along the coast to meet both domestic needs and
export requirements.
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Police and soldiers
cordoned off 5 districts in Colombo,
Sri Lanka
and detained more than 900 people during the
door-to-door searches to track down Tamil Tiger rebels,
threatening to plunge the country into civil war.
. The Red
Cross Movement has pledged to construct 15k homes
for tsunami-affected families and the reconstruction is
ongoing in districts destroyed by the natural disaster
in the island.
. Media
associations held a demonstration in front of the
Fort Railway Station in Colombo against the security
forces for harassing Tamil media persons & media
institutions using the Emergency Regulations,
sources said.
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Supporters of 2
Bangladeshi opposition parties fought in the streets
of Dhaka leaving 1 person dead. The clash began when a
procession of the Jatya Party reached an
area where the Communist Party was holding a
rally.
. Since
neither the central bank nor the nationalized
commercial banks (NCBs) are able to meet the energy
ministry’s demand for foreign currencies to import oil,
the ministry is resorting to borrowing up to $800
million from foreign banks.
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Most participants in the
11th
Dhaka Intl Trade Fair
(DITF) said
they failed their sales target as the month-long fair
concluded last month.
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Two bomb blasts hit the
tourist town of Pokhara following a series of overnight
explosions in
Nepal that
came just hours after Maoist rebels called off a 4-month
truce.
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The Ministry of
Culture, Tourism & Civil Aviation has, for the time
being, ruled out the possibility of allowing the private
airline operators to hike air ticket prices.
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After seeing the threat of vertical split for the second
time in less than a year, the Rastriya Prajantantra
Party (RPP) has expelled 10 central members,
including the Home Minister (Kamal Thapa) from
the part’s central working committee.
