Torbjørn Færøvik's Blog, page 1365

US-China climate pact puts pressure on India to act

This week's China-U.S. climate agreement between the world's top two polluting countries puts pressure on India, No. 3 on the list, to become more energy efficient and should encourage investment in renewable energy. Read more

Hong Kong’s ‘Umbrella Square’ one month on: how are protesters living?

Almost as soon as I arrived at the Hong Kong pro-democracy protesters’ main encampment earlier this month, a young man in a black T-shirt tapped me on the shoulder, smiled, and handed me a bottle of water. “If you’re thirsty,” he said, and walked away. Read more

Hong Kong protest leaders prevented from travelling to Beijing

China has stopped three leaders of Hong Kong’s democracy protests from travelling to Beijing, where they had planned to voice their call for free elections to Chinese authorities. Read more

Beijing Smog: The Day After ‘APEC Blue’

“APEC Blue,” a term that emerged this week to describe the ephemeral skies above Beijing just before the APEC summit, vividly depicts the façade that China wanted to present to the world while it hosted the 21 heads of the Asia-Pacific economies. Read more

The Beijing APEC Summit in Review

An interview with professor David Shambaugh. Video

Why China needs the U.S.

For the Chinese leaders the US in the one indispensable nation. Read more

Sex Trafficking and China’s One Child Policy

Despite all of its good intentions, China continues to have a severe sex trafficking problem. This is due, in no small part, to China’s notorious one child policy. China’s gender imbalance has grown increasingly wide since 1979, when the policy was implemented — estimates indicate that by 2020 there will be 30 million men unable to find wives in China. Read more

China’s Climate Change Plan Raises Questions

Many scientists have said that 2030 may be too long to wait for China’s greenhouse gas emissions to stop growing, if the world is to keep the average global temperature from rising more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius) above the preindustrial average. Read more

Obama Seeks to Push Myanmar Back on the Path Toward Democracy

Faced with signs of regression in a country whose democratic transition he has claimed as a diplomatic coup, President Obama on Thursday prodded Myanmar’s president to keep on track its transformation from a reclusive military dictatorship to a fledgling democracy. Read more

Day of the Imprisoned Writer: Gao Yu

We urge the Chinese government to protect you from ill-treatment and to grant you access to your family and a lawyer of your own choice. We are greatly concerned about your well-being; we will be following your case closely and we will stand up for you. Read more