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China wrote history this week after gaining approval for oil exploration in the Amu Darya Basin in Afghanistan, making it the first international oil deal made by Afghanistan with a foreign country in several decades. more ›

PetroChina's Xinjiang branch is currently embroiled in a so-called "Luxury Car Gate" scandal over their fleet of imported luxury SUVs. Netizens reacted angrily to the news of PetroChina Xinjiang's fleet of Audis, Range Rovers and VW Touregs, but when PetroChina attempted to smooth things over, their half-assed explanation only made things much, much worse. more ›

Li Xiang, a reporter for Luoyang TV in Henan province, was found dead early Monday morning after having been stabbed 10 times on his way home from a KTV sessions with his friends. His laptop had been stolen, and police are treating the case as a robbery-murder. But AFP reports that he had been investigating swill oil in Henan, and had even been at odds with the food safety commission: "The last post on Li's micro-blog on September 15 said web users "had complained that Luanchuan county (in Henan) has dens manufacturing gutter cooking oil, but the food safety commission replied that they didn't find any". Bloggers said they suspected Li's death was related to his previous reports on the "gutter" cooking oil cases." While this link between his inquiries and his murder is pretty weak, recently the heat has been turned up on illegally reprocessed cooking oil (called 'gutter' or 'swill' oil) and it's not unreasonable to assume that there are some very nervous manufacturers out there. more ›

Will this make eating out safer, will it? "THE Shanghai Food and Drug Administration yesterday issued a rule requiring local eateries not to use cooking oil for more than three days if they can't control the oil quality. Officials said they have developed an instant oil checking method to test oil quality, and those using oil too frequently will face punishment. A testing method for eateries using kitchen waste oil is expected to be launched in August." [Shanghai Daily] more ›

On Wednesday, four Chinese employees working for a Sinochem affiliate in Caqueta, Columbia were kidnapped by what the Chinese embassy in Bogata has confirmed were Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) members. Likely kidnapped for extortion, local media reported that the four were forced out of their car at gunpoint and into the jungle. Their driver was then released to report the kidnapping. The Columbian military has dispatched air and ground forces in search and rescue efforts, but there have been few developments so far. more ›

Via The Calgary Herald: "China and Alberta. On the surface, they don't appear to be natural partners. One is a Communist country that sits on the far left of the political spectrum; the other is an entrepreneurial Conservative bastion halfway around the world. But if you think China and Alberta don't have a lot in common, think again." more ›

As violence continues to escalate across Libya (read one of the first dispatches to come out of the capital Tripoli here), thousands have begun fleeing the country. Reports have surfaced of repeated attacks on Chinese construction and oil sites, some confirmed, but news coming out of the country is sporadic at best. Over 30,000 Chinese citizens work and live in Libya, where China's estimated bilateral trade is over $6.6 billion. Here are the latest updates from the China side: more ›

Suspect your local factory of producing swill oil - that nasty, cancer-causing reprocessed cooking oil that shocked Shanghainese when it was discovered here? Then report it at the special Swill Oil hotline set up by the Shanghai government: 5290-1111. Cash payouts (of an unspecified amount) will be made for tip-offs about the unlicensed processing and sale of the product, the Sanitation Bureau said. Currently, only two plants in the city are authorized to dispose of waste oil and 23 firms are legally allowed to collect it. more ›

Tragedy struck already water-parched northern China when a diesel oil pipeline owned by China National Petroleum spilled into the Yellow River yesterday. The compromised pipeline was sealed Wednesday after 150,000 liters of oil spilled into the nearby Wei river, an upstream tributary of China's second longest river in Shaanxi province. Attempts to contain the leak through diversion channels and floating damns ultimately failed: as a result, the spillage that finally leaked into the Yellow river has made the main source of water for millions of people undrinkable. With Beijing already sapping nearby water reserves, the spill could be devastating for much of the northern populace. more ›

• China's 8.9% Growth? No Way [Forbes]"On Oct. 22, Beijing announced that gross domestic product grew by 8.9% in the third quarter of 2009 compared with the corresponding period last year. The National Bureau of Statistics also reported that growth for the first three quarters was up 7.7%. How could it not have been? Since last November, Beijing has spent perhaps as much as $900 billion-from its own funds as well as those of the larger state banks-to jump start its $4.3 trillion economy. No government can disburse that amount of cash without creating some economic activity."
• China's push for oil in Gulf of Mexico puts U.S. in awkward spot [LA Times]"China's push to enter U.S. turf comes four years after CNOOC's $18.5-billion bid to buy Unocal Corp. was scuttled by Congress on national security grounds. The El Segundo oil firm eventually merged with Chevron Corp. of San Ramon. Whether CNOOC's second attempt to lock up U.S. petroleum assets will trigger a similar political backlash remains to be seen. The sour U.S. economy and the need for Washington and Beijing to cooperate on potentially larger issues could mute any outcry."
• The story of China Incorporated [China Daily] "Twenty-five years ago, Megatrends was a must-read for any Chinese who was keen to know about the world - not just the world as it was, but the world that would be. And that included higher officials who were unaccustomed to foreign theorizing other than that by Marx and Lenin. By some estimate, the book sold some 20 million copies in China. The original English version was published two years earlier, in 1982, and stayed on the New York Times bestseller list for two years. Last month, John Naisbitt, the author of Megatrends, came out with China's Megatrends. This time, the Chinese edition debuted before the English original."
• Voices of Power Transcript: Chris Lu [Washington Post] "Chris Lu has known President Obama since they attended Harvard Law School together, but they cemented their friendship when Obama hired him in 2004 for his Senate staff. He's the Cabinet secretary — a title that belies an intense assignment as chief intermediary between the White House and the federal agencies. On a daily basis, his job is not only to convey the president's views and expectations to all the department heads and keep them on message, but also to help them resolve their issues with the White House. The son of Chinese immigrants, Lu is one of the highest-ranking Asian Americans in the administration. "
• A special report on China and America: : The price of cleanliness [The Economist] "The Beijing authorities built Taiyanggong to impress the world in the run-up to the Olympic games which opened in the city in August 2008—on the same day that America opened a new embassy in Beijing (heated, American officials say proudly, by Taiyanggong). Some 5,000 workers toiled night and day to deliver on the Chinese government’s promise to provide an environmentally friendly power source for the games. Taiyanggong was connected to the grid with nearly eight months to spare…Now the power station’s owners, led by a municipal state-owned company, are struggling to make it work financially. "
• Mandarin Eclipses Cantonese, Changing the Sound of Chinatown [NYTimes] "He grew up playing in the narrow, crowded streets of Manhattan’s Chinatown. He has lived and worked there for all his 61 years. But as Wee Wong walks the neighborhood these days, he cannot understand half the Chinese conversations he hears. Cantonese, a dialect from southern China that has dominated the Chinatowns of North America for decades, is being rapidly swept aside by Mandarin, the national language of China and the lingua franca of most of the latest Chinese immigrants." more ›

What's black, crude, and older than even China? Oil! Everyone's favorite spoil of war has a glitzy new pavilion inspired by Beijing's water cube, and funded by China National Petroleum Corp, China Petrochemical Corp and China National Offshore Oil Corp. Highlighting the history, functions, and even odors of the natural resource, the "Oil Cube" is sure to be a major attraction for tourists from oil rich and poor countries alike. more ›

• Chavez says world 'center of gravity' now Beijing [AP] "The world's center of gravity has moved to Beijing, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez told his Chinese counterpart Wednesday during a visit focused on boosting Chinese oil purchases. The frequent U.S. critic also praised China's response to the global financial meltdown that has sent prices of his South American nation's key export, oil, down sharply."
• Auto Makers Flock to Web to Woo Chinese Buyers [WSJ] "Global auto makers think the Internet is the way into the hearts of a new generation of Chinese car enthusiasts. Both foreign and domestic auto makers here are pouring ad money into online ventures, even as their overall spending remains flat. Market-tracking firm iResearch expects outlays for online auto marketing to reach 1.75 billion yuan, or roughly $256 million, this year, up from 1.38 billion yuan in 2008."
• Professor beaten ahead of Tiananmen anniversary [ABC] "The approaching 20th anniversary of China's Tiananmen Square crackdown has brought tensions to a head, with a 75-year-old, retired professor brutally beaten for trying to honour the memory of a Chinese leader who supported the students in 1989."

Effective today, China will raise gasoline and diesel fuel prices 16 percent and 18 percent, respectively, news that sent global oil prices down nearly US$5 a barrel. Electricity prices are also expected to rise sharply. Reuters offers a poorly displayed chart that shows China's domestic gasoline prices, fixed since November 1, have climbed 95 percent and diesel prices have more than doubled since 2003. Retail fuel prices in China are expected to increase to $3.05 per gallon for gas and $3.31 for diesel. Says the New York Times, "Costlier fuel and electricity could prompt businesses and individuals across China to use less of it, slowing somewhat China’s voracious increase in oil consumption in recent years as well as its steep rise in emissions of global warming gases." [Sources: AP, Reuters, LAT, NYT, CNN] more ›

In a surprise move that if enforced will lead to an undoubtedly cleaner Shanghai and China in general. The powers that be have decided that as of June 1st those ultra thin plastic bags (.025mm) that accompany virtually every purchase in China will be banned. The regular thickness plastic bags will still be allowed, but grocery stores and other vendors will be forced to charge for those bags and prices will need to be clearly marked. more ›

And in a class all by itself, the US$1 trillion(1,000,000,000,000) club. On Monday, the 4 billion A-share offering, priced at 16.7 yuan per share, finished its first day of trading on the Shanghai Stock Exchange at 43.96 yuan, rising as high as 48 yuan intraday. At US$1.005 trillion, PetroChina’s market cap is more than twice that of its US peer, Exxon Mobil (USD $486 billion), even though Exxon Mobil generated four times as much revenue... more ›