| Home page To receive this publication via e-mail, click here. The Week�s Links: Feature and Opinion Pieces on Communist China April 24, 2003 �China�s Chernobyl� That�s what the Times of London called severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in this editorial. The Washington Post took the phrase for this editorial, which concludes, �The damage caused by secrecy in the SARS case shows why it is right to continue pressing China in every way possible to become more open.� Meanwhile, Willy Wo-Lap Lam, CNN, finds the Communist secrecy on SARS simply part of a disturbing, but not surprising, tradition that includes silence on the Tiananmen Square massacre, �many blunders and disasters of the recent decades,� and even the bloody 1950�s �anti-rightist campaign.� More On Communist China and SARS Hannah Beech, Time Asia, has an installment on how SARS is beginning to devastate the rural interior, including Shanxi, Inner Mongolia, and Sichuan provinces. Matthew Forney, also in Time Asia, looks at the damage done to Communist credibility, and the PRC economy. Agence France Presse has this quote from Ray Yip on SARS, �If they use the same dedication they used to eradicate Falungong, they'll get it done.� Ouch! AFP Link courtesy Susan Prager, Member since 2003 Francis Markus, BBC, has another installment on Communist secrecy and SARS, in his case Shanghai, where the city told its officials, including airport security, not to wear protective masks: �it would give the city a bad image.� Barbara Carroll, Newsmax, looks at the worldwide economic fallout from the disease. Steve Friess has a terrific piece in the Baltimore Sun ripping the PRC on SARS, and reminding the world just how much the Communists can still damage the rest of the world, charm offensive and all (Link courtesy Susan Prager, Member since 2003). Gwynne Dyer, in the Washington Times, says this of SARS: �the urgent lesson to be learned from this episode is that China must clean up its act.� John Pomfret, Washington Post, examines what SARS could do to the Communists� political credibility within the PRC. The editors of the Washington Times see the disease as a test of PRC President Hu Jintao. Holly Williams, BBC, looks at the effect of SARS on Beijing. On Katrina Leung Rene Sanchez, Washington Post, hears from friends of J.J. Smith, one of Katrina Leung�s FBI lovers, and finds �unusual episodes involving the pair over the years,� among other things. On the North Korea Talks The editors of the Washington Post call on the Stalinist regime to open up their regime, Communist China to �be more willing . . . to help force change� on its ally, and for the U.S. to �at least test whether Pyongyang might choose a path of cooperation� � an �iffy� piece at best. Sign up now for the next North Korea Report, sent out every Monday. Tell Gay Hartwell Sills of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. to kill the Global Crossing sale to Hutchison Whampoa. Check out the latest on the Communist China and the Terrorist War page. Miss an Update, Weekly Links, or a North Korea Report? Find it on our home page. Sign the Boycott Petition: In reaction to the decision of the International Olympic Committee awarding Beijing the 2008 Olympic Games, the China e-Lobby has begun a petition for an American boycott of those games. Feel free to forward this to anyone you think might be interested in receiving it. Anyone who wishes to join can send his/her name and e-mail address to [email protected]. Please feel free to send any news on Communist China or North Korea that you happen to find to the same address. |