Information About China (February)

Information About China (February) 

The test poses a major foreign policy challenge to Mr. Xi Xiping the Chinese president the new head of the Communist Party, who has said he wants the United States and China to develop a “new type of relationship between two great powers.” 

How Mr. Xi deals with North Korea in the coming period could tell the United States what kind of leader he will be, and what kind of relationship he envisions with Washington.

• Already he has shown himself to be more of a nationalist than his predecessor, Hu Jintao, displaying China’s determination to prevail in the East China Sea crisis in which China is trying to wrest control of islands administered by Japan. 
• He has also displayed considerably more interest in China’s military, visiting bases and troops in the last two months with blandishments to soldiers to be combat ready.

source NYT

China expressed its "firm opposition" to North Korea's latest nuclear test Tuesday and called for new denuclearization talks, a relatively mild response from Pyongyang's most important ally.

 The statement from the Foreign Ministry reflects Beijing's growing frustration with its communist neighbor's provocative behavior, as well as its reluctance to impose more severe measures that could destabilize the North's hardline regime.

In China, where official relations with the Vatican are a “never-ending crisis,” as the Vatican Insider put it recently, the news of the resignation of Pope Benedict has been slow to spread. The Chinese state doesn’t recognize the Pope as the leader of China’s Catholics and has had its own “patriotic” church since the Communist Revolution in 1949. source

But by noon Tuesday the news that rocked the world was arriving here, too. One priest’s reaction was accepting – even approving.“I’m open-minded. You can retire as Pope,” said Father Yan, in a telephone interview from a Chinese province. (H