Six In The Morning

Close Army Ties of China’s New Leader Could Test the U.S.

By JANE PERLEZ

On one of his many visits abroad in recent years, Xi Jinping, the presumptive new leader of China, met in 2009 with local Chinese residents in Mexico City, where in a relaxed atmosphere he indirectly criticized the United States.

“There are a few foreigners, with full bellies, who have nothing better to do than try to point fingers at our country,” Mr. Xi said, according to a tape broadcast on Hong Kong television.  “China does not export revolution, hunger, poverty nor does China cause you any headaches. Just what else do you want?”

Mr. Xi is set to be elevated to the top post of the Chinese Communist Party at the 18th Party Congress scheduled to begin here on Nov. 8 – only two days after the American election. He will take the helm of a more confident China than the United States has ever known.

Fears grow over pace of reform as China ushers in new leaders

With social problems spreading, a younger generation may be ready to question Communist party policy
 

Tania Branigan, Beijing

The Observer, Sunday 4 November 2012

China’s incoming leaders face a growing clamour for reform as the days count down to the country’s once-a-decade power transition, with demands for changes across the policy spectrum: from reining in the vast state-owned enterprises to increasing the accountability of cadres.

“Economic and political reforms must go together,” urged an editorial in the influential magazine Caixin last week. “Too often, the heavy hand of government in the market and the dominance of state monopolies stifle competition, distort the market and allow rent-seeking and corruption to thrive.

“Abuses of power have wreaked havoc in society, causing political divisions, the income gap to widen and animosity between government and people.

Steering EU-Asian ties through the debt crisis

 EU and Asian leaders have two days to create trust in the midst of the eurozone crisis. At a summit in Laos, Brussels will try to reassure Asia that despite the crisis, the EU is still a major partner for the future.

DW-DE

When the 27 EU countries meet their Asian partners on November 5 and 6 for the Asia-Europe meeting (ASEM), they are going to have a long to-do list.

The issues on the agenda include economic cooperation, the fight against terror and weapons of mass destruction, and securing future food and energy supplies. The meeting’s motto is “Friends for peace, partners for prosperity,” but despite the broad spectrum of topics, it’s most likely the euro crisis that will dominate the summit.

For the EU, the partnership between Asia and Europe has mostly economic significance. In the first half of 2012, the 27 EU member states delivered some 31 percent of their exports to ASEM countries. The imports were even higher, with around 43 percent coming from ASEM nations.

Mediators to push Mali Islamists to cut al-Qaeda ties

Mediators in Mali will try to convince one of the Islamist groups controlling the country’s north to cut ties with al-Qaeda’s North Africa branch.

04 NOV 2012 07:30 – AFP

Burkina Faso Foreign Minister Djibrill Bassole, who is helping his country’s mediation efforts to end neighbouring Mali’s seven-month crisis, said he would meet representatives from Ansar Dine (Defenders of Faith) this weekend.

On Friday, Ansar Dine sent delegations to Algeria and Burkina Faso for peace talks.

Burkina Faso President Blaise Compaore, the main mediator in the crisis, to which the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) is trying to broker an end, would also meet the Ansar Dine delegation, Bassole said.

Zetas cartel occupies Mexico state of Coahuila

The aggressively expanding and gruesomely violent Zetas group dominates territory by controlling all aspects of local criminal businesses.

By Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times

Few outside Coahuila state noticed. Headlines were rare. But steadily, inexorably, Mexico’s third-largest state slipped under the control of its deadliest drug cartel, the Zetas.

The aggressively expanding Zetas took advantage of three things in this state right across the border from Texas: rampant political corruption, an intimidated and silent public, and, if new statements by the former governor are to be believed, a complicit and profiting segment of the business elite. It took scarcely three years.

How tourism cursed tomb of King Tut

Damage from breath of visitors forces closure of chamber

ALASTAIR BEACH  CAIRO  SUNDAY 04 NOVEMBER 2012

At around 10am on November 4, 1922, an unknown and slightly prickly archaeologist was working with his team to clear away some rubble close to the tomb of Ramses VI, the twentieth dynasty pharaoh who ruled Egypt during the twelfth century BC.

After five years of toil in the Valley of the Kings, the vast desert funerary complex close to modern day Luxor, Howard Carter had little to show for his relic-hunting efforts.