Émissions Ondes Courtes de Tamsui, Taiwan, en Français

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^{Le retour du service français de Radio Taiwan International aux ondes courtes, printemps 2020 QSL}

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Radio Taiwan International’s direct programs from Tamsui

Émissions directes de Radio Taiwan Internationale de Tamsui

Shortwave is gaining ground: Radio Taiwan International’s French service will broadcast from its shortwave transmission site in Tamsui this month – every weekend (Fridays through Sundays) from 17:00 to 18:00 UTC on 11995 kHz and from 19:00 to 20:00 UTC on 9545 kHz. August 05 – 07 August 12 – 14 August 19 – 21 August 26 – 28.

Pour la première fois, il y aura des émissions françaises de Tamsui, Taiwan, pour les regions européennes et nord-africaines. Selon Radio Taiwan Internationale, Le programme de cette activité radiophonique en français sera diffusé en Ondes Courtes tous les vendredis, samedis et dimanches du mois d’août. Fréquence 11995 kHz, 17h00-18h00, temps universel (19 h à Paris), Fréquence 9545 kHz, 19h00-20h00, temps universel (21 h à Paris), tous les week-ends.

^{Bonjour le Monde – les émissions réguliers de Radio Taiwan Internationale – source: RTI}

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Tests were carried out in July in a range of 308 to 325° reportedly, which suggests that both northern Africa and Europe should be good places to listen to the transmissions from Tamsui, northwestern Taiwan.

Des émissions testes ont été effectués en juillet, dans un azimut de 308 à 325°.

RTI’s French service usually broadcasts for Europe on 6005 kHz, from 19:00 to 19:30 UTC, via Kostinbrod relay, Bulgaria. Listeners who don’t usually listen to the station’s internet programs (one hour of programming per day) will have a great opportunity to get to listen to programs they wouldn’t usually hear on shortwave.

Normalement, il y a une émission par jour de Kostinbrod, la Bulgarie, chaque jour de 19:00 à 19:30 temps universel (21 – 21:30 h à Paris) sur 6005 kHz, pour l’Europe et l’Afrique du nord. En outre, il y a une transmission pour l’Afrique ouest tous les dimanches, en 13835 kHz (apparemment à partir d’Issoudun, Centre-Val de Loire, en France). Si vous n’écoutez, d’habitude, les programmes français en ligne (il y en a une demie-heure sur les ondes courtes, mais des 30 minutes additionnels en ligne), les émissions de Tamsui vous donneront une belle occasion d’écouter des programmes rares sur les ondes courtes en août, car il y en aura 60 minutes par émission de Tamsui.

Xi Jinping’s Reply Letter to “Global Young Leaders Dialogue”

An organization named “Global Young Leaders Dialogue” has made it into the number-one headline¹⁾ of China People’s Broadcasting Station‘s morning news on Thursday.²⁾ The “Global Young Leaders Dialogue” is, by self-description, a “unique communication, education, and professional development platform for young achievers under the age of 45 with diverse regional, cultural, disciplinary, sectorial, and professional backgrounds across the globe”, “jointly initiated by the Center for China and Globalization (CCG) and the Academy of Contemporary China and World Studies (ACCWS)”.

The “Center for China and Globalization”, in turn, is a “think tank” devoted to the development of “a new narrative system” in track-II diplomacy (possibly not exactly the same, but similar to, “people-to-people diplomacy”.

The project appears to have formed a “partner” organization in Europe, too, the “Europe-Asia Center”, whose colors come across as somewhat EU-China-centered:

“Europe Asia Center” logo

Fittingly, former President of the European Council Herman Van Rompuy sent them a “congratulatory letter”, too, dated August 5.

The project is probably some kind of “must-have”, not only among “people-to-people diplomacy” advocates, but in the view of the party leadership, too: cooptation stuff like this forms part of the imperial regalia. After all, the World Economic Forum runs a “Young Global  Leaders” project, too. German Green Party chancellor candidate, Annalena Baerbock, is among them.

But back to the Chinese copy of it.

The following is a translation from a letter reportedly sent by Xi Jinping, to the “Global Young Leaders Dialogue”.

Reply letter
回信

Delegates of the “Global Young Leaders’ Dialogue Project”:
“国际青年领袖对话”项目外籍青年代表：

Hello! I have received your letter. You all study, work, and live in China, and I am very glad that you now have the opportunity to deepen your knowledge and understanding of China through thorough travels and visits.
你们好！来信收悉。你们都在中国学习、工作、生活，这次有机会到各地深入走访，加深了对中国的认识和了解，我感到很高兴。

Just as you wrote in your letter, the Chinese people rely on their own wisdom and sweat to build a fertile and beautiful homeland on the earth of China, to create a civilization of many forms and colors, and to achieve the life of modest prosperity it has long yearned for. Happiness demands struggle. The most important thing is to be based on the national condition and to take one’s own road. Practice shows that the new Chinese-style road of modernization becomes ever broader and will help to develop better ourselves and thus benefit the world.
正如你们在来信中谈到的，中国人民依靠自己的智慧和汗水，在中华大地上建设富饶美丽的家园，创造多姿多彩的文化，实现了梦寐以求的小康生活。要幸福就要奋斗。中国幅员辽阔、人口众多，要想发展振兴，最重要的就是立足国情、走自己的路。实践表明，中国式现代化新道路越走越宽广，将更好发展自身、造福世界。

Youth is always accompanied by dreams. The Communist Party of China has passed the 100-years’ milestone, but our original intentions have only grown stronger as time has passed. After 100 years, you are just in your prime time. On our new journey, we will continue to make the Chinese dream of great rejuvenation happen in an indefatigable struggle, and indefatigably struggle to promote the progress of mankind’s development. We welcome more international young people to come to China for exchange, and hopefully, Chinese and foreign young people, as they learn from each other and set examples for each other, will improve understanding, earn friendship, grow together, and devote youthful power to contribute to the building of a community of common destiny for mankind.³⁾
青春总是同梦想相伴。中国共产党走过了百年奋斗历程，但我们的初心和梦想历久弥坚。百年恰是风华正茂。在新征程上，我们将继续为实现中华民族伟大复兴的中国梦而不懈奋斗，为促进人类发展进步而不懈奋斗。我们欢迎更多国际青年来华交流，希望中外青年在互学互鉴中增进了解、收获友谊、共同成长，为推动构建人类命运共同体贡献青春力量。

I wish you all the best in China!
祝愿你们在华一切顺利！

CPC Secretary General and State Chairman Xi Jinping, August 10, 2021 / Xinhua, August 11
中共中央总书记 国家主席 习近平 2021年8月10日 （新华社北京8月11日电）

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Notes

1) That’s no reason for the “young leaders” to get too exhilarated though. If Xi Jinping had opened a parrot-breeding station the day before, it might have been the number-one headline, too. In national news, it doesn’t matter what is done, but by who it is done.
²⁾ CPBS, August 11, 2021, 22:30 UTC
³⁾ More literally translated: a community of common destiny for mankind.
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Related

Center for China and Globalization’s New Narrative System, July 19, 2021
Enhancing Zhou Enlai’s Convivial Diplomacy, Febr 20, 2012 (re Oct 9, 2009)
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Updates / Related

Xi Jinping schrieb zurück, CRI, Aug 11, 2021
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Huanqiu Shibao on “Ulterior Motives” in Southern Weekly Conflict

Main Link: Global Times: Lay Off Supporting Southern Weekend, Or Else

There’s a blog – kind of a bridge blog, if you like – which deserves a lot more attention. In November 2011, China Copyright and Media translated the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party’s Decision on Deepening Cultural Structural Reform (I could have saved myself a lot of time if I had come across their translation earlier).

Fortunately, I did save myself the time to translate a Huanqiu Shibao editorial on the Southern Weekly / Southern Weekend standoffs with the local propaganda department. They’ve got a translation or rendition of that, too – been online since January 8 this year – including the original commentary in Chinese.  China Copyright and Media  includes posts about Chinese legislation, as well, but obviously, I can’t judge their quality. It’s not my department.

Soft power: the land where the Bananas bloom

So, if you want translations from the real Chinese press – beyond the English-language mouthpieces from China Daily to the “Global Times” which are stuff from a parallel universe, made by the CCP propaganda department for foreigners -, read JR’s China Blog, for example.

But read there, too. There are updates every few days, and sometimes several times a day.

The translator finds a lot of rotten points in the Huanqiu article. But this may not be what matters to Huanqiu, to the China-Daily Group, or to the propaganda department. They can’t overlook many domestic online comments in their threads which are highly critical of their approach.

Song Luzheng, an overseas Chinese journalist or official in Paris, follows the same line as does Huanqiu Shibao, in many of his articles, particularly about the freedom of the press. Some of the readers he – probably – hopes to reach are Chinese readers who are disillusioned former admirerers of “Western” values. There seems to have been a trend since 2008, the botched “Sacred-torch” ralleye in the run-up to the Beijing Olympics which has changed the atmosphere in favor of Song Luzheng, Huanqiu Shibao, et al.

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Related

» Readers’ Reactions: I will Endure, May 3, 2012
» Oh Rule of Law, April 11, 2012

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The BoZhu Interviews: Germany’s and Japan’s post-war image –

Tai De about war crimes, popular narratives, foreignness, and soft power

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« Previous Interview: MKL, July 13, 2012

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The following is a spontaneous, unplanned BoZhu interview with Tai De, a civil servant from Verden. It’s actually the second interview with him, after a more general one about his blog, about a year ago.

Tai De studied history. His pattern of thought is that of a historian – but he wants me to write a word of warning in advance: he is no particular “expert” on Japan or on the Far East.

Our interview – originally rather a discussion – came up this afternoon after I listened to the memories of William Shawcross, son of the British chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials, on Radio Australia‘s shortwave service this afternoon.

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Q: When listening to Anglo-American media, I’m getting the impression that we (Germans) get away with a much more positive image despite the Nazi crimes and WW2, than them (the Japanese). What’s your impression?

A: Quite so.

Q: Do you have an explanation for that?

A: I don’t think there’s that one explanation which can say it all.

Q: To start with something: do the Americans or British see Germans as part of the family? Sort of distant relatives? Like: “Yes, they committed heinous crimes, but …”

A: The outset after the war was the same after VE day and VA day, in terms of geostrategic interest – America needed West Germany, and America needed Japan. Britain didn’t mind an anti-Soviet bulwark in central or Europe either. I can’t generalize Anglo-American perceptions of either Germans or Japanese people. But as far as my favourite trash history novelist is concerned, …

Q: … Alexander Kent, …

A: … you can sense his attitude towards the Japanese – I think I can, anyway. I may be wrong, of course.

Q: German gentleman criminals, Japanese low-class criminals?

A: Oh, he definitely doesn’t get trapped in that kind of concept. But there’s that Japanese foreignness. And there’s that incredible Japanese brutality against allied prisoners of war – and the brutality of their warfare.

Q: German crimes were no smaller, were they?

A: No, they weren’t smaller. The German war was a war of extermination.  The industrialized annihilation of millions of people. But when it comes to our international image, a lot of that brutal German energy was directed against Germans, not Americans or British people.  The annihilation of Jews in particular, but other minorities, too. And communists, social democrats, also very blanketly.  As far as Alexander Kent is concerned, you also see a clear division of roles, in Germany’s case. The basically good – and very brave – Wehrmacht or navy officer on the one hand, and the coward, brutal, lower-class Gestapo policeman or SS man on the other. You don’t have that difference when it comes to the depiction of Japan. There’s no “Samurai”, no gentleman warrior. And if there was a “Samurai” depiction, it would have to be the kind of perpetrator who’d behead American or British POW from the platform of a truck, just by holding his sword out while passing rows of POWs on their death march.
Mind you, that’s not necessarily an accurate depiction of a Japanese soldier – but it’s become a picture of symbolic power. There were British and American pilots murdered by Germans, too, but not that systematically. And not that – how can I put this? – the war in Europe didn’t become that personal. Not between unoccupied countries and Germans, anyway.

Q: Were Allied prisoners of war traumatized? Did they face more brutality than what they would have expected from the Japanese?

A: Maybe not before the first atrocities – against non-Asians, I should add – became known. But initially, yes. I can’t tell how familiar they were with the way the Japanese forces treated Asians – but they probably didn’t expect that their service people would be treated similarly – that civilians with their forces would be forced into prostitution, for example.

Q: Japanese brutality spelled foreignness?

A: That’s one side of it, I think. And the other is the decades after the war. I mentioned the Samurai. But there was no such positive Japanese symbol, at least not in the Western narrative. Very different from the way Germany was depicted. And that’s a matter of symbolic gestures. Maybe Japan did make gestures, but not of the kind America, Australia, or Britain would easily understand. Emperor Hirohito looks quite good in some of their narratives, as a man who assumes “responsibility” for Japan’s crimes. But that was immediately after the end of the hostilities. The Japanese were under huge objective pressure then. But later on, after the pressure had eased, they never managed to do something highly symbolic – not in a Western sense, anyway.

Q: Like Willy Brandt dropping to his knees before the Warsaw Ghetto Monument?

A: Exactly. I’m not saying that Willy Brandt changed everything – but he had a huge effect on our national image abroad. For one, he hadn’t been involved – he had actually been underground in Norway during the war. But he was a German. “A symbol for a different Germany”, as they say.
He didn’t do because of his personal record. I don’t know what exactly made him kneel – all I know is that he made an allusion later, when reacting to criticism from the BILD-Zeitung, stuff like “one must only kneel before God”. He only reacted in private, and one of his ministers recalled it in 1992, after Brandt’s death. Brandt said that those journalists had no idea before whom he had kneeled.
But when it comes to Japan…  if there was resistance among the Japanese during the war – and I suppose there was – we may never know about these people.

Talking about Willy Brandt – there was his Neue Ostpolitik, too, for the obvious reason that Germany was divided. The Ostpolitik was a symbol of hope – not only for Germans, by the way, but for all of Europe – and it was really powerful. With really honest intentions – and skills – the social democrats and the liberals in Germany made the best of it. They turned our calamities into moral strength. You write a lot about soft power, don’t you? That was soft power. Brandt was about soft power. Olof Palme, too, in his own way, from Sweden. German partition was a price Germany had to pay – that division of our country. Territorial losses, too. In Asia, it was – and still is – Korea who has to live with partition. Not Japan. That could matter, too.

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Related

» Nanking Massacre, Wikipedia, acc. Dec 14, 2012
» Lev Kopelev: No Easy Solution, April 11, 2009
» All BoZhu Interviews

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China’s Car Exports Falling

That said, the major issue in China’s foreign relations isn’t love and understanding (which doesn’t mean that losing face wouldn’t hurt). So long as official boycotts of Chinese goods aren’t on the cards – and the only Turkish minister who called for one had only expressed his personal view – there may be Chinese hurt feelings, but the oil keeps will keep coming in – and China, contrary to most countries, does keep importing lots of it. Iran’s, Oman’s, and Kuwait’s crude oil exports to China all rose per May this year, according to steelguru.com – and they will all try to keep their business. Chinese exports to Muslim countries may be a different story, but the current declines can hardly be attributed to 7-5. Let’s take a look at the Chinese car industry and its exports, for example. According to globalautoindustry.com, China exported only 61,000 vehicles in the first quarter of 2009, a decline of 62% from the previous year.

Chinese Car, Syrian Characteristics

Cars made in China may go almost unnoticed in most of Europe (and North America, I guess), but you do see a lot of them in Syria, which was among the four countries visited by Wu Sike (吴思科), China’s special representative for the Middle East, late in July and earlier this month. In 2006, the major export markets for the Chinese car industry were Russia, Iran, Belgium, Syria, Algeria, Kazakhstan, Angola, Vietnam, Ukraine, and Iraq (the countries written in bold letters are among the four visited by special representative Wu). The 2006 numbers in detail, according to wtojob.com, were as follows:

Rank	Country	Vehicles	in 1,000 USD
1.	Russia	38,051	350,030
2.	Iran	10,606	237,710
3.	Belgium	18,147	197,730
4.	Syria	51,662	191,560
5.	Algeria	20,201	156,950
6.	Kazakhstan	5,703	135,520
7.	Angola	6,966	131,540
8.	Vietnam	14,491	99,650
9.	Ukraine	10,119	82,800
10.	Iraq	13,618	77,920

The average price paid per car varies strongly from country to country.

According to the same source, exports to Syria showed a small decline in 2007, while exports to Russia rose to 106,000 vehicles – that would be 17.3 per cent of China’s total automobile exports. Major markets in 2007, besides Russia, were Syria, Ukraine, South Africa, Algeria, Vietnam, Iran, and Venezuela.

Exports to Russia went down in 2008, with only 77,000 vehicles. Especially in the fourth quarter, there were hardly any exports to Russia. Exports to Africa, Latin America and ASEAN countries kept rising, but the trend in Russian exports is pointing downward this year, too.

Statistics for the first half of 2009 are rather fragmentary on the internet, but Changan Global Sales Company‘s general manager is quoted as saying that he sees problems on all of the industry’s (or Changan’s) existing markets. The China Automobile Industry Association reportedly recorded automotive exports dropping by 62 per cent during the first quarter this year, compared to the same period [last year]. As far as Zhejiang province’s carmakers [the source seems to refer to the first four months of this year] are concerned, their exports to Syria fell by more than half, according to this source which claims to quote the Zhejiang Ministry of Commerce.

China’s automotive companies may not abandon the roads for the skies yet, but if China’s propaganda has it right, industry insiders expect China to become the pacemaker of a new-energy automobile industry in the future thanks to strong policies from the government and a full industrial chain.

That said, it probably depends on which industry insiders you ask. The globalautoindustry.com website is less euphoric than the Global Times.

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Related:
在叙利亚看中国车：东方之子售3.7万美元, sina.com, March 20, 2005

Codfish on the Rocks

Every day has been cold here so far this year. It’s either crisp, sunny and cold with minus 10 degrees Celsius – sometimes probably closer to minus 20 degrees in some places at night when the skies are clear -, or it’s overcast and foggy, some minus three degrees or somewhat above the freezing point, but windy and humid which feels much colder. I think wind makes the biggest difference, and humidity is the second factor which makes moderate frost feel cold. Last night was one of the milder ones, with some snowfall.

A cartoonist at De Standaard (Belgium) seems to have second thoughts about Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth.

Then again, maybe the Arctic meltdown is cooling down the North Sea? Codfish on the rocks?

Time Blog Info on Henan-Beijing relations

The relationship between the provinces and Beijing is one of the most complex and difficult to fathom in China. Usually however, the central government can use it undoubted muscle in situations where it deems it politically necessary. […]

Henan denies Attack on Belgian TV crew

The following is from Pu Cheng Jincheng City’s (晋城市, Shanxi Province) municipal party committee’s website of today, concerning VRT journalist Tom van de Weghe’s trip to Shangqiu, Henan Province on November 27.

Henan Province denied yesterday that three Belgian journalists had recently been violently attacked when interviewing AIDS victims.

Xinhua quotes Henan Province Foreign Affairs Office Deputy Director of Information Services Wang Yuejin (王跃进) saying that the preliminary investigations by the departments in charge differed substantially with foreign reports. He said that Belgian VRT television reporter Tom Van de Weghe, a Belgian assistant and an interpreter were stopped twice while doing interviews in two places in Zhoukou and Shangqiu on November 27.

The first stop took place around 2:00 p.m. at the Shangqiu-Zhoukou highway junction (商周高速公路路口). Van de Weghe’s video was taken away by several men, but there had been no violent confrontation.

The second stop happened in the evening of the same day at the riverbank of Suixian (睢县) township. There were claims that four AIDS victims who didn’t want their condition to be publicized to the outside world demanded the video from Van den Weghe. There was a scuffle and Van den Weghe handed over the video and a memory card, but [the VRT team] came out of their car by themselves, and had not been dragged out of the car as said in foreign reports, and there had been no violent assault etc.

Wang Yuejin said that the reporter’s video and memory card had been taken to Zhengzhou [Henan Province capital] by the investigation team.