ConocoPhillips China (COPC), a subsidiary company under the U.S. energy giant ConocoPhillips, \”should take the blame\” for the oil leak near the Penglai 19-3 oilfield in Bohai Bay in north China, the State Oceanic Administration (SOA) said Tuesday.

The incident, which took place last month, has polluted an area of 840 sq-kms, causing \”a certain level\” of damage to the oceanic environment, said the administration.

The field is under the operation of COPC under a joint development agreement with the China National Offshore Oil Corporation, the country\’s largest offshore oil producer.

According to the administration, the leak from platform-B resulted from increased pressure of strata when workers injected water into the strata.

The leak from platform-C was due to a surge in the well coupled with leaks on the side, said the SOA, without giving details.

As of Monday, a total of 70 cubic meters of water-oil hybrid in the area had been cleaned up, but \”a small amount\” of oil film can still be seen on the sea surface, according to the SOA.

[i]Source: Xinhua[/i]

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One person has died and 28 others have been injured — two seriously — after an escalator accident Tuesday at a Beijing subway stop.

[img]http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/mediafile/201107/05/P201107051409061325827288.jpg[/img]

Photo shows the entrance of subway has been shut down. At 9:36 a.m. on July 5, the escalator at the Beijing Zoo station on Subway Line No. 4 suddenly crashed, causing one death and injuring nearly 28 people, two of which were badly injured. As of now, the cause of the accident is still under investigation. (Luo Xiaoguang/Xinhua)
The incident happened at 9:36 a.m. at the A exit of the Zoo Station on Line 4, said the information office of the Beijing municipal government.

The office said some people on the escalator fell down after \”an escalator malfunction,\” without elaborating the nature of the malfunction.

According to photos posted by witnesses on microblogs on weibo.com, several people were seen lying on the ground — apparently after falling down from the escalator — and were helped by others. Blood can be seen on the floor.

[img]http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/mediafile/201107/05/P201107051412512236717977.jpg[/img]

A man, injured in an escalator accident at the Beijing Zoo Station on Subway Line 4, receives medical treatment on July 5, 2011. (Luo Xiaoguang/Xinhua)
Beijing MTR Corporation, which operates the Line 4 subway, posted a brief statement about the accident on its website mtr.bj.cn, which provided an explanation as same as the government\’s press release.

The company said it has already launched an emergency response and all injured people have been sent to the hospital.

[img]http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/mediafile/201107/05/P201107051413049078506429.jpg[/img]

A man, injured in an escalator accident at the Beijing Zoo Station on Subway Line 4, receives medical treatment on July 5, 2011. (Luo Xiaoguang/Xinhua)
The government has demanded a probe into the accident while asking all subway operators to immediately launch checks of facilities to ensure the safety.

[i]Source: Xinhua[/i]

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An unidentified poisonous gas leak on Tuesday evening at a garment factory in Jiangjin district, Chongqing Municipality has left at least five people dead, local government said Wednesday.

The accident happened at about 10:20 p.m. at the Chongqing 3533 garment dyeing general factory. Eight people were affected, among them five were confirmed dead, two were seriously poisoned and one slightly poisoned. The three are being treated.

Investigation into the cause of the accident is underway.

[i]Source: Xinhua[/i]

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A leak from the Penglai 19-3 oilfield in Bohai Bay, operated by ConocoPhillips China (COPC), will have a \”long-term impact\” on the marine environment, China\’s top ocean watchdog warned on Tuesday.

[img]http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/mediafile/201107/06/P201107060820301434532737.jpg[/img]

Li Xiaoming, head of the department of marine environment protection under the State Oceanic Administration, speaks to reporters after a news conference in Beijing on Tuesday. (China Daily Photo)
The oil spill polluted an area of more than 840 square kilometers in Bohai Bay, Li Xiaoming, director of the department of marine environment protection at the State Oceanic Administration (SOA), said at a news conference.

\”There is still a small leak, but the spill is under control and the cleanup work is almost finished,\” Li said, adding that the area near the oilfield is the worst affected.

After an investigation that lasted just short of a month, the SOA has finished a preliminary assessment of the environmental impact.

\”But as the impact is long-term and complicated, further investigation and assessment are still ongoing,\” Wang Bin, deputy director of the SOA\’s marine environment protection department, said.

Penglai 19-3 is China\’s largest offshore oilfield, with daily production of 160,000 barrels.

It is operated by COPC under a joint development agreement with the State-owned China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), the country\’s largest offshore oil producer.

COPC holds a stake of 49 percent in the project while CNOOC has 51 percent.

On June 4, COPC reported to a branch of the SOA that an oil spill, from an unidentified source, had been detected. The source was confirmed as Platform B at Penglai 19-3 oilfield on June 12. On June 17, COPC reported another oil spill at Platform C to the SOA.

The leaks were brought under control by June 21 and the limited amount of oil on the sea surface, as of Monday, suggested no remaining significant leaks, Li said.

The leaks formed a slick 13 kilometers long and 100-500 meters wide, on June 17, according to Li.

The SOA said 3,000 meters of sea booms were deployed to help contain the spill.

Wang said that COPC faces a fine of 200,000 yuan ($29,850).

The first leak from Platform B occurred on the seabed and resulted from increased pressure when water was injected into the well. This is a common procedure to increase pressure on the oil. The later incident, at Platform C, was due to a surge in the well, the SOA said, without giving details.

The two companies remained silent about the oil leak until Southern Weekend reported the spills on June 30.

The news conference was the first formal one held after the oil leak on June 4, which was first made public on Sina Weibo, a popular micro blog site, on June 21.

Nearly 100 journalists attended the news conference.

The two companies will hold a joint news conference on Wednesday in Beijing to further brief the media about the incident, sources with COPC said.

Experts criticized the two companies for withholding the information from the public and called for stricter law enforcement on environmental protection.

Ma Jun, director of the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs, told China Daily that he was \”surprised\” that the oil leak and its \”serious\” impact could be hidden from the public for such a long time.

Zhong Yu, senior action coordinator at Greenpeace, told China Daily that the environment will take years to recover from the oil spill, no matter how small it was.

China\’s worst reported oil spill occurred nearly a year ago when a pipeline at Dalian, a busy northeastern port, exploded and oil poured into the sea, covering an area of more than 430 sq km.

Zhong, who joined the cleanup work after the Dalian spill, said she was disappointed because \”all the proposals, such as improving regulations and emergency responses, were not taken up\”.

\”Our law on marine environmental protection is outdated and an improvement is urgently needed,\” she said, adding that the 200,000-yuan fine is \”ridiculously\” small in terms of the damage caused.

The spill has raised concerns over the potential long-term impact to the area\’s active fishing industry.

\”There are many pollutants in oil, some decompose easily while others do not. If the content is high enough, it can affect people through the food chain,\” said Zheng Li, an expert at the SOA\’s First Institute of Oceanography, based in Qingdao, Shandong province.

[i]Zhou Yan, Zheng Jinran and AP contributed to this story.[/i]

[i]Source: China Daily[/i]

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[img]http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/mediafile/201107/05/P201107051326002334224383.jpg[/img]

Photo, taken on June 23, 2011, shows a heavy congestion near the Shawoqiao area of Beijing\’s Haidian District. Congested water from a strong thunderstorm on the morning of the same day disrupted some sections of urban roads. (Xinhua/Wan Xiang)

Following half a year of congestion control measures implemented by Beijing, including limiting new vehicle registrations, a survey conducted by the Beijing Municipal Commission of Transport website shows that more than 70 percent of residents surveyed said that Beijing\’s traffic congestion situation has not improved.

The Beijing Municipal Commission of Transport website initiated a public survey related to traffic congestion in the second half of June. In response to the question on whether or not Beijing\’s traffic congestion situation has improved, 16,000 out of 21,000 participants, or 76 percent, selected \”No.\” About 5,000 selected \”Yes,\” and 62 said that they knew nothing about it.

More than 17,200 people participated in the survey regarding the most effective traffic measures in relieving urban traffic congestion. More than 28 percent of respondents believe that \”advocating and practicing \’3-5-10 green travel,\’ which means travel three kilometers by foot, five kilometers by bicycle and 10 kilometers by subway and buses\” is the most effective traffic measure in relieving urban traffic congestion. Ranking last among six options was \”controlling the total number of motor vehicles by implementing passenger car index regulations and license-plate lotteries,\” with only 9 percent of respondents choosing this option.

The other four measures were \”adjusting parking prices and strengthening parking management,\” \”strengthening traffic information services and traffic management,\” \”accelerating the speed of public transportation\” and \”promoting urban micro-circulation to guarantee clear roads and better conditions,\” which obtained a support rate of 14.9 percent, 15.6 percent, 16 percent and 16.3 percent, respectively.

[i]By People\’s Daily Online[/i]

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[img]http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/mediafile/201107/06/P201107061604541445697236.jpg[/img]

Yangzom (2nd L) looks at the one-week-old baby of Gesang in the young mother\’s home tent during a return visit in Mamba Village of Maizhokunggar County, southwest China\’s Tibet Autonomous Region, July 1, 2011. (Xinhua/Li Ying)
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A former lawmaker in east China\’s Zhejiang Province was sentenced to 4 months in detention on Monday for drunk driving and fined 4,000 yuan (619 U.S. dollars).

Once a deputy to the Longwan District People\’s Congress in the city of Wenzhou, Huang Haichun, 39 years old, was convicted of dangerous driving by Longwan District People\’s Court.

According to the court\’s findings, Huang drove her car after drinking a bottle of wine while dining with friends on the night of June 11. She hit a pedestrian surnamed Wang but did not stop her car.

Wang got into his own vehicle and eventually pulled Huang over. Wang then called the police.

Huang refused to take a breath alcohol test and her blood test later showed her alcohol level at 215 milligrams of alcohol per 100 milliliters of blood, exceeding the legal threshold of 80 milligrams of alcohol per 100 milliliters of blood, according to the court.

She is the first lawmaker in Zhejiang Province to be convicted of drunk driving.

In recent years, fatal car accidents in Chinese cities such as Chengdu, Nanjing and Hangzhou have triggered public outcry, with many people calling for stricter penalties for drunk driving.

The newly amended Road Traffic Safety Law states that anyone caught drunk driving will have their driver\’s license revoked upon conviction, have to wait five years to apply for a new license and face detention for one to six months.

[i]Source: Xinhua[/i]

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China\’s northwestern Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region will be more open than ever before to accelerate its development, the regional government chairman Nur Bekri has said.

\”At present, we need to be more open than ever before, and in the future, we will, as always, further increase opening up,\” Nur Bekri told a symposium on Xinjiang\’s opening-up on Monday.

\”There has been a wide gap between Xinjiang\’s development and coastal provinces since the reform and opening up policy was introduced more than 30 years ago, the major reason of which is the level of Xinjiang\’s opening up is not enough yet,\” Nur Bekri said.

Xinjiang has become a frontier of China\’s westward opening and it has built up economic and trade relationships with 160 countries and regions, he said.

The regional government is drafting a development plan of westward opening up, he said.

The region now has 29 open ports to neighboring countries and 12 national industry zones. The Sino-Kazakhstan oil pipeline and the Turkmenistan-Uzbekistan-Kazakhstan-China gas pipeline have been completed and put into use.

Totally 308 enterprises which are among the world\’s top 500 companies and China\’s 500 leading enterprises had entered Xinjiang by the end of 2010, up by 113 from 2009.

[i]Source: Xinhua[/i]

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With millions of migrant workers pouring into China\’s cities every year from the countryside, social security experts are calling for a mechanism that will link the nation\’s urban and rural pension systems.

Currently, there are two strands to China\’s pension system – the new rural pension system that was introduced in October 2009 and one geared toward people living in cities.

The new rural pension system requires villagers to contribute for at least 15 years before they can qualify for a pension. Problems can arise when rural residents pay into that system from their home villages for several years before moving to a city as a migrant worker and participating in the urban pension system.

Li Chao, an official from the office of urban and rural residents\’ pensions in Qingdao city, Shandong province, cited the example of a farmer who had contributed to a rural pension system for 10 years before joining the urban one after moving to a city and signing a labor contract with his employer. Li said no one knew how to combine the two types of contributions because \”there is no calculation method\”.

\”The common practice now is to let workers start paying into the urban pension system and the social security office gives them back the money they had contributed to the rural pension system. That means the money the person has paid into the rural pension does not produce any gains,\” Li said.

Experts said the problem needs to be resolved because it affects the nation\’s 240 million migrant workers.

The fact that more and more rural residents are pouring into the cities each year only adds to the pressure to create a merged system, he said.

\”A large proportion of migrant workers work in the cities during the summer and winter but go back to their villages in the spring to plant crops and return again in the autumn for the harvest,\” said Bill Birmingham, a pension expert from the EU-China Social Security Reform Cooperation Project.

An integrated and transferable social security system that merges the two existing systems is the best way to resolve the problem, say economics experts.

\”This is a loophole in the newly implemented system but it is expected that the problem will be resolved in the near future through detailed rules in the Social Security Law,\” said Hu Xingdou, an economist at the Beijing Institute of Technology.

Endowment insurance experts also said rural people should take the issue of pensions more seriously because the rate of participation is low among people in the countryside compared to their urban counterparts.

Wang Xiangtao, a 42-year-old native of the rural area of Xingyang city in Henan province, told China Daily she and her husband do not participate in the rural pension system because they believe the returns are unattractive.

\”Few people around me take part in the pension program,\” Wang said.

Birmingham said the need to rationalize the pension systems is made more urgent by the changing face of China.

\”People used to believe that their offspring should provide for them in their twilight years but their children these days may be away from home working as migrant workers, which is different from the situation in past generations,\” he said.

[i]Source: China Daily[/i]

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\”Weibo succeeds in expanding Zippo\’s brand beyond the lighter, such as its series of outdoor products.\”

While many luxury brands have embraced the use of social media, not all of them use it as an advertising tool. Anne Wu told China Daily that different brands target different customers. \”The brands with younger customers who like to use social media have more online events and interaction,\” Wu said. \”Brands with customers from different age groups and a developed e-commerce website, such as Este Lauder, use micro blogs to share details of products rather than marketing.\”

Ogilvy China Group Director of Public Relations Autumn Guo also said that instead of advertising itself, Lamborghini has primarily used its Sina micro blog account to share videos and stories of car models.

\”Every luxury car brand sets out its own style, and the same goes for each respective micro blog,\” Guo told China Daily.

Yan Jun, director of the Peking University fashion and luxury management program, believes that micro blogs serve as the most direct and convenient platform for a luxury brand company to reach potential customers.

Furthermore, Yan believes that micro-blogging can strengthen a luxury brand\’s online presence. \”A micro blog can hype and reverberate customers\’ positive feedback to the brand\’s new products,\” Yan said. Once the micro blog successfully increases a brand\’s online visibility, it will also increase the brand\’s social capital.

Sina Weibo\’s increasing popularity serves as another indicator for micro-blogging\’s marketing potential in the luxury product sector. Sina has provided technical support for third parties to promote and sell their products through the micro blog interface. Sina facilitates a \”one-stop\” shopping service because the users are willing to pay.

Other forms of social media are rushing for a slice of the pie in the luxury market. Niche website P1.CN hosts an exclusive forum that targets stylish urban dwellers. Forum members not only receive email advertisements from luxury brands through P1.CN. The site also frequently provides access to exclusive offers and events from high-end international brands.

Other websites have also taken a step further to facilitate the online marketing of luxury brands. China\’s large e-commerce retailers such as Jingdong Mall and Taobao have ventured to create online luxury goods markets.

Liu Qiangdong, the president and executive officer of Jingdong Mall, said that his company\’s new online business-to-consumer website would primarily target the \”richest Chinese consumers\”.

Jingdong Mall will compete with China\’s largest retail website, Taobao, whose global section alone sold up to 3 billion yuan of luxury products in 2010.
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