TOP NEWSCHINA DAILY Friday, December 30, 2016

3

of intellectual property rightsfor investors is also covered.

Thegovernmentwillwork tomake it easier for foreign inves­tors and experts to live andwork in China. Foreign invest­ment in the “encouraged cate­gories” in central and westernareas will receive financing,land and taxation incentives.

Li has reiterated the impor­tance of foreign investmentthis year. When addressing theUN General Assembly in NewYork in September, he vowedthat China will carry out a new

FROM PAGE 1 round of opening­up.Foreign investment is vital

for China’s economic transfor­mation and structural adjust­ment, said Chen Fengying, aresearcheringlobaleconomyatthe China Institute of Contem­porary International Relations.

“Multinational companiesare facing competition fromChinese rival enterprises andrising costs of labor, but themarket potential of Chineseconsumers and China’s advan­tage in educated talent stillattract overseas investors,”Chen said.

China, which now is encour­

aging foreign investments tomove into high­end, low car­bon and sustainable indus­tries, can improve thebusiness environment andlower market access barriersby introducing negative listsand granting multinationalcompanies national treat­ment, which may maintain itsattractiveness, Chen added.Negative lists include onlythoseactivities thatareoff lim­its in a sector, and all otheractivities are considered open.

Contact the writer at zhang­yue@chinadaily.com.cn

Open: Foreign investment vital

for taking bribes of about 20million yuan.

From 2002 to 2014, Xuabused his official positionsto grant favors to enterprisesand individuals in businessoperations and job promo­

FROM PAGE 1 tions, the verdict said.The announcements about

the three cases came ahead ofnext week’s plenary session ofthe Central Commission forDiscipline Inspection, China’stop discipline watchdog.

Members of the commis­sion will meet in Beijing

from Jan 6 to 8 to report ontheir work in 2016 and dis­cuss tasks for the comingyear.

Yang Weidong, a law pro­fessor at the Chinese Acad­emy of Governance, said:“The news on the threecases on Thursday shows

that pressure against grafthas not been weakenedand will remain high nextyear.”

Xinhua contributed to thisstory. Contact the writer atzhangzhihao@chinadai­ly.com.cn

Officials: Top discipline watchdog to meet

WHITE PAPER

$500b to boost high­speed rail planGoals include ‘rejuvenating’ western China andcountry’s economy, transportation official says

By SU ZHOU andLUO WANGSHU

In the next five years, Chinawill invest 3.5 trillion yuan($503 billion) to acceleraterailway construction, includ­ing expansion of the country’shigh­speed rail network to30,000 kilometers, a seniorofficial said on Thursday.

“By 2020, more than 80 per­cent of China’s major cities willbe connected by high­speedrailways,” said Yang Yudong,vice­minister of transportation.

China released a white papertitled “Development of China’sTransport” on Thursday, whichHu Kaihong, director of theState Council InformationOffice’sPressBureau, said is thefirst white paper to review thesector’s tremendous changes inrecent decades and to set goalsfor its future.

In thepast fewyears,China’srailway network, especiallyhigh­speedrail, hasundergonedramatic change. From 2011 to2015, China invested 3.58 tril­lion yuan to build 30,000 kmof railway. By the end of thisyear, the nation’s total railwaylength will reach 124,000 km,including 20,000 km of high­speed railway, accounting for65 percent of the world’s totalhigh­speed rail.

InJuly, theNationalDevelop­

ment and Reform Commissionissuedanupdatednational rail­way development plan envi­sioning a 175,000­km railnetwork by the end of 2025,with 38,000 km of high­speedrail.

However, the high­speed rail­way network still faces challen­ges, especially in the less­developed western part ofChina. Yang, the vice­ministeroftransportation,saidheiscon­fident that lines in western Chi­na will eventually becomeprofitable.

“Plus, building high­speedrailway in less­developedregions is not only aboutrecoupinginvestment. It ispartof the big project of rejuvenat­ing the whole region and thecountry’s economy,” said Yang.

The high­speed rail linkingBeijing and Shanghai showeda profit last year, Xinhua NewsAgency reported in July, quot­ing Tianjin Railway Construc­tion Co, a shareholder ofBeijing­Shanghai High­SpeedRailway Co.

Yang Hao, a professor of railtransportation at Beijing Jiao­tong University, said the eco­nomic returns of a high­speedrailway network shouldn’t bejudged solely on whether linesare profitable, since these rail­ways can leverage the develop­ment of such industries astourism, logisticsandrealestate.

According to China RailwayCorp, construction began onThursday on a high­speed railline linking Guiyang, Guizhouprovince — a transportationhub connecting members ofthe Association of SoutheastAsian Nations — and Nan­

ning, the capital of the Guang­xi Zhuang autonomousregion.

The 482­km line will con­nect the Shanghai­Kunmingrailway and the Chengdu­Gui­yang railway to the north andwill also link to southern coast­al areas including Hainanprovince and Guangzhou,Guangdong province.

The new railway will acceler­ate communication betweenChina and ASEAN countriesand play an important role inthe Belt and Road Initiative.

Contact the writers atsuzhou@chinadaily.com.cn

WILDLIFE

Report onZimbabweelephants‘nonsense’By MO JINGXImojingxi@chinadaily.com.cn

China rebutted a recentreport that Zimbabwe hadsent wild animals, including35 elephant calves, to China topay for a military debt, sayingit is “sheer nonsense with anulterior motive”.

The Times newspaper inLondon reported on Mondaythat Grace Mugabe, wife ofZimbabwean President Rob­ert Mugabe, had sent safarianimals to a Chinese wildlifepark to pay for military uni­forms for the DemocraticRepublic of Congo.

“Iwanttoemphasizethatthisis a normal commercial activity,which is in line with relevantinternational conventions andlaws in both countries” ForeignMinistry spokeswoman HuaChunyingtoldadailynewscon­ference on Thursday.

HuasaidthatwildlifeparksinShanghai, Beijing andHangzhou recently imported atotal of 35 African elephantsfromZimbabwe.Paymentshavebeen received by Zimbabweanauthorities, and the money willbeusedfor theAfricancountry’swildlifeprotection,Huasaid.

“It is an international prac­tice for zoos to import foreignsafari animals. The technicalconditions of Chinese animalparks have met internationaldemands and the parks cantake care of the African ele­phants,” she added.

An anonymous Chinesestaff member directly involvedin the transaction told ChinaRadio International that “allthe payments have beenbrought into the accounts ofthe Zimbabwe Parks andWildlife Management Author­ity and national parks”.

He also said Zimbabwe’senvironmental protectionminister inspected the wildlifeparks in Shanghai andHangzhou in January andassessed the conditions of ele­phants that had been import­ed earlier to Guangzhou.

Li Wentao, an expert on Afri­can studies at the China Insti­tutes of ContemporaryInternational Relations, saidthe report unfairly speculatedaboutnormalChina­Zimbabwetrade ties when Zimbabwe issuffering economic difficulties.

“The two countries are goodpartners with close coopera­tion, and China has been pro­viding economic assistance tothe African country. However,this is no reason to make suchspeculation,” he said.

He Wenping, a researcher atthe Institute of West­Asianand African Studies of the Chi­nese Academy of Social Scien­ces, said the misleading reportshows the Western media’slongtime prejudice againstChina­Africa cooperation.

“Anyonewithcommonsensewill knowsuchareport is ridic­ulous. Every country couldhave ups and downs, and Chi­na and African countries havea consensus on overcomingdifficulties together,” she said.

SPACE

Teens’ mini­satellitenow sending signalsBy ZHAO LEIzhaolei@chinadaily.com.cn

Students at Beijing’s BayiSchool, President Xi Jinping’salma mater, have a new rea­son to boast: They workedwith space scientists to devel­op and launch Chinese teen­agers’ first satellite, which isnow orbiting hundreds ofkilometers above Earth.

The 2.4­kg mini­satellite,Bayi Youngsters’ Expedition,was launched atop a LongMarch 2D carrier rocket onWednesdaymorningfromtheTaiyuan Satellite Launch Cen­ter in Shanxi province. Themajor task of the launch wasto lift two commercial Earth­observation satellites that aremuch larger and heavier.

The mini­spacecraft has adesigned life span of 180 daysin a sun­synchronous orbitand then will be controlled tofly back into the atmosphereto burn out so it won’tbecome space debris, saidZhou Xiubin, a seniorresearcher at the China Aero­space Science and Technolo­gy Corp who oversees theproject.

He said the satellite hasequipment to take pictures ofthegroundandtoconductradiocommunication and audiotransmissionexperiments.

The spacecraft and instru­ments were designed andassembled by about 40 Bayistudents instructed by morethan 20 experts at the ChinaCenter for Aerospace Scienceand Technology Internation­al Communications, whereZhou is a deputy director, aswell as the China Academy ofSpace Technology and Nan­jing University of Scienceand Technology.

“Students who were at aground tracking and controlstation in Kashgar (in the

Xinjiang Uygur autonomousregion) received signals sentfrom the satellite as soon as itstarted to orbit Earth yester­day,” he said on Thursday. “Itis working well. Now we cancall the project a success.”

Zhu Kai, vice­dean of BayiSchool, said his students planto use the spacecraft toobserve Earth and to transmitChinese songs back to Earth.He said the school will takeadvantage of the satellite topopularize space knowledge.

Bayi School has built aground tracking and controlstation on its campus and istraining its students to usethe facility, according to Zhu.

Before Wednesday’slaunch,PresidentXisenta let­ter to students at Bayi Schoolwho are taking part in theproject, saying he was pleasedwith their passion and brav­ery in the exploration of sci­ence and technology.

Xi also said he hopes thestudentswill remian interest­ed in exploring new things.

Yang Shangwen, a satellitedesigner who mentored stu­dents in the satellite’s devel­opment, said that the UnitedStates, Russia and Israel areamong other countries thathave launched satellitesdesigned by teenagers. Hesaid the Chinese studentswere selected from appli­cants according to their aca­demic performance inscience and innovation.

Xu Yifei, a Bayi studentand member of the develop­ment team, said she helpeddesign the satellite’s powersystem. She also has appliedto take part in the trackingwork because “I have beencharmed by the beauty ofspace exploration and wantvery much to continue to bepart of the satellite’s opera­tions”.

124,000kilometers

The nation’s total railwaylength by the end of this year The world’s highest bridge, at 565 meters, opened on Thursday at the border of Southwest China’s Guizhou and Yunnan provinces. By

the end of last year, China’s highways totaled 4.58 million km. HE JUNYI / FOR CHINA DAILY

Development ofChina’s transportationnetwork

• RailwayBy the end of 2015,

China’s railway net­work totaled 121,000km, ranking second inthe world. It has theworld’s longest high­speed railway net­work, totaling 19,000

km. By 2020, Chinawill expand its high­speed railway networkto 30,000 km, con­necting more than 80percent of its big cit­ies.

• HighwaysBy the end of last

year, China’s highwaystotaled 4.58 millionkm, and the country

ranked No 1 in theworld in expresswayconstruction.

• Civil aviationChina had 210 civ­

il airports by 2015,among which 26handle more than10 million passen­gers annually, and 51handle over 10,000metric tons of cargo

and mail each year.

• PortsAt the end of last

year, China’s portshad more than31,000 quay berthsfor production use,and the number ofberths for 10,000tons or abovereached 2,221.

­XINHUA

fact box

On the move

Chongqing Health Center for Women and Children staff mem­bers transfer newborns from the center’s old campus to a newone on Wednesday. The 22 infants were moved from the inten­sive care unit with the help of 24 doctors and 60 assistantsusing five cars. RAN WEN / FOR CHINA DAILY

COOPERATION

Loans to aid three Pakistan road projectsBy ZHANG ZHIHAOzhangzhihao@chinadaily.com.cn

China will provide about$1 billion in soft loans forthree new road projectsalong the western route ofthe China­Pakistan Econom­ic Corridor, connecting the“shortest route from Gwadarto China”, a senior Pakistaniofficial said.

Syed Murad Ali Shah, chiefminister of Pakistan’s south­eastern Sindh province, saidChina will invest in new roadsand factories to help smaller

Pakistani provin­ces integrate intothe project.

The easternand westernroutes of the Chi­na­PakistanEco­nomic Corridor“should operatelike two legs of abody”, said Shah.However, moreinvestment andopportunitieshave gone intothe eastern route, where mostof the country’s industrial andfinancial sectors are located,

he said.“The economically smaller

provinces feel deprived andleft out of the project,” he said.“CPEC is a national project,after all, and should improvethe economy throughout thecountry.”

Shah was in Beijing for thesixth China­Pakistan JointCooperation Committeemeeting on Thursday in Bei­jing.

It was the first time thatthe chief ministers from all ofPakistan’s provinces wereinvited to discuss industrialcooperation, he said.

Tang Mengsheng, directorof the Pakistan Studies Centerof Peking University, also saidChinaandPakistanbothneeda top­level government bodyto run the CPEC and “facili­tate interconnectivity in poli­cy, infrastructure, trade,currency and people”.

Sun Shihai, director of theChinese Association forSouth Asian Studies, said thatdeveloping the western routenot only will help local econo­mies flourish, but also willensure a robust and conve­nient trade network as thebedrock of CPEC’s success.

Syed MuradAli Shah,chief ministerof Pakistan’sSindhprovince

Inside

See more >p10, 11