Theory that Coronavirus Escaped from a Lab Lacks Evidence

The pathogen appears to have come from wild animals, virologists say, and there are no signs of genetic manipulation in the SARS-CoV-2 genome.

The Scientist, Emily Makowski, Mar 5, 2020

Since the early days of the COVID-19 epidemic, theories have circulated about the origin of the novel coronavirus causing the disease, SARS-CoV-2. One prominent rumor is that it first escaped from a lab in Wuhan studying bat coronaviruses and then spread to the public. This theory has also evolved into claims that the virus was genetically engineered to be a bioweapon. But scientists say that while there’s not enough information to pinpoint where the virus came from, there is no evidence that it was created in a lab.

The lab-escape theory had been circulating on social media and various blogs for weeks, but gained considerable visibility in a New York Post article in late February. In it, Steven Mosher, a social scientist and the president of the Population Research Institute in Front Royal, Virginia, summarizes why he believes SARS-CoV-2 may have been accidentally spread by China’s National Biosafety Laboratory at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where researchers have studied bat coronaviruses.

In the article, Mosher describes several lines of reasoning, namely, that the lab is less than 10 miles away from the seafood market where a cluster of COVID-19 cases was first discovered, and that after the 2003 SARS outbreak, the SARS-CoV virus escaped from virology labs multiple times in China. He also describes how Chinese virologist and bioweapons expert Major General Chen Wei went to the Wuhan Institute of Virology with military scientists in January to study thenew virus, which Mosher sees as a form of damage control.

“The circumstantial evidence surrounding it is pretty compelling. . . . The idea that the epicenter of this epidemic would be just a few miles from the Institute of Virology in Wuhan, which is where we know that dangerous pathogens are being kept and looked at as potential bioweapons, I think the odds against that are just astronomical,” Mosher tells The Scientist.

Dimitrios Paraskevis, an epidemiologist at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens in Greece, tells The Scientist that while it’s not possible to rule out the idea of lab escape, he believes that it is unlikely. “Any person who works in a lab must follow very strict safety regulations. It sounds to me very extraordinary that something happened and nobody took care about such an accident,” he says. The World Health Organization updated SARS surveillance guidelines in 2004 after the lab-based outbreaks, urging labs to follow proper biosafety procedures, and China replaced the director of its Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

One problem leading to a lot of apprehension and speculation about the new coronavirus is that scientists “don’t know what the actual source of the virus was,” Anthony Fehr, a coronavirus researcher at the University of Kansas, tells The Scientist. Additionally, researchers don’t know if SARS-CoV-2 immediately started to spread in humans after a single transmission from an animal, or if it took multiple zoonotic events between an infected animal population and humans.

Despite the question mark around the exact source of the disease, it does appear to have originally come from wildlife, according to a team of international public health scientists who wrote a statement published in The Lancet. An analysis of SARS-CoV-2 by scientists at the Wuhan Institute of Virology suggests that the virus’s genome is 96 percent similar to a coronavirus found in bats.

Mosher agrees that animals were the likely origin. “That doesn’t mean [the virus] wasn’t collected, brought to the lab, and was being tested on in various ways, and escaped from the lab,” he says. Mosher also does not claim that China genetically engineered the virus. “I’m not saying this has been genetically engineered to be a bioweapon that’s escaped from the lab. . . . I’m just saying that [China is] collecting dangerous pathogens, [and] they have a history of letting them escape from the lab,” he says.

Transmission from an animal, with no lab experiment or genetic manipulation involved, fits best with what scientists know about how other coronaviruses have made the jump to humans. In the past, these viruses have spread through wild bats that infect another type of animal—an intermediate host—that then spreads it to humans. SARS-CoV, for example, was transmitted from bats to civets to humans, while camels were an intermediate host in MERS, according to Quanta. The civet version of SARS-CoV was 99.8 percent similar to the one found in humans—much more closely related than the bat and human varieties of SARS-CoV-2—so researchers believe the new coronavirus also infected another type of animal on its way from bats to humans. But they have not found a candidate so far, according to Nature.

This ability to move in between different animal hosts is a characteristic feature of coronaviruses, according to Paul McCray, a pulmonologist at the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine whose lab studies coronaviruses. “It’s exactly what we’ve learned in studies of SARS in 2002 and 2003, and MERS in 2012. . . . So the concept that this is happening again should come as no surprise,” he says. “For people that work with these viruses, this is completely unsurprising. We don’t need to come up with farfetched theories when the genome sequences and the characteristics of these viruses support what we’re seeing.”

No signs of engineering in SARS-CoV-2 genome

In addition to the claim that a naturally evolved virus escaped from a lab by mistake, some conspiracy theories have posited that SARS-CoV-2 was genetically engineered. In fact, researchers throughout the world, including in the US and China, have conducted research involving the creation of experimentally engineered hybrid coronaviruses. But there is no evidence that SARS-CoV-2 was genetically engineered, says Paraskevis, whose genomic analysis of the new virus was reported as a preprint in January.

RNA viruses, which include coronaviruses, “accumulate mutations at a rate one million times faster than human DNA [does]. . . . It gives them the ability to survive against an immune response,” Paraskevis says. While the new coronavirus does have some genetic differences to other known viruses due to mutations, “there’s no evidence that this is the result of a human experiment,” he says, adding that if the virus were engineered, scientists would expect to see additional genetic material in its genome. For example, an early bioRxiv preprint on SARS-CoV-2 found HIV-like genetic sequences, but online commenters pointed out that “the findings were at most a coincidence” and that research has since been retracted, reports STAT.

As there are still many unknowns about SARS-CoV-2, researchers worldwide are trying to uncover as much as they can about the virus. Chinese researchers “released the genomic sequence incredibly rapidly online. . . . They were very public in sharing the most important first piece of information” about it, McCray tells The Scientist. “The fact that scientists all over the world had access to that genomic sequence” made a lot of early research possible, he says.

Emily Makowski is a freelance writer based in Boston. Find her on Twitter @EmilyRMakowski.

"China is seeking to deflect criticism for its role in starting a global pandemic and not telling the world" by spreading "dangerous and ridiculous" conspiracy theories, a US State Department official said https://t.co/wBxj3p3Sjl pic.twitter.com/myx3OcoixS

— AFP news agency (@AFP) March 13, 2020

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Myanmar judge says policeman's 'entrapment' testimony stands

Yahoo – AFP, May 2, 2018

Detained Myanmar journalist Kyaw Soe Oo (C) is escorted by police to court
(AFP Photo/Myo Kyaw SOE)

Yangon (AFP) - A Myanmar court ruled Wednesday that crucial testimony from a whistleblowing policeman in the case against two Reuters journalists is credible, a decision seen as a "ray of light" by the defence.

Reporters Wa Lone, 32 and Kyaw Soe Oo, 28, have been in custody since December.

They are accused of violating the country's Official Secrets Act for possessing material linked to security operations in conflict-hit Rakhine state.

The charge carries up to 14 years in prison.

Over months of pre-trial hearings, their defence team has insisted they were set up -- lured to dinner by a police source who handed them documents for which they were subsequently arrested.

Court testimony last month by Deputy Police Major Moe Yan Naing backed up that version of events, even though he had been called as a prosecution witness.

He said a superior ordered his men to set up the sting which resulted in sensitive documents being passed to the reporters.

In response prosecutors asked the court to declare Moe Yan Naing a hostile witness.

But the court found no problems with the police officer's account.

"The court rejects the proposal claiming the law officer to be a hostile witness," Judge Ye Lwin told the hearing Wednesday.

A lawyer for the journalists welcomed the decision.

"I am elated. The court has proved itself as a court of justice," Khin Maung Zaw said. "We have seen a ray of light. It strengthens our case."

The two journalists were also buoyed by the court ruling.

"We are happy about today’s decision. This shows that the truth will come out and proves that we have been treated unfairly," Wa Lone told reporters before they were taken back to prison.

On April 30 the police officer was jailed for breaching a police disciplinary act, a charge he had faced since December for previous communications with Wa Lone.

Police sources said he was sentenced before he gave his shock testimony to court -- an extremely rare instance of a security official openly challenging superiors in the formerly junta-run country.

In addition, the family of Moe Yan Naing was evicted from their police housing a day after he gave evidence. Police denied the two events were connected.

At the time of their arrest, the reporters were investigating the extrajudicial killing of 10 Rohingya men in the village of Inn Din in the north of Rakhine state.

The military has denied allegations of widespread atrocities against the Muslim minority.

But it did concede that security officers took part in the killings at Inn Din which were later reported by Reuters.

Some 700,000 Rohingya have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh since the army-led campaign was launched last August, ostensibly to combat Rohingya insurgents.

The stateless group has faced decades of systematic discrimination and persecution in mainly Buddhist Myanmar.

Social media encouraging corruption whistleblowing in China

Want China Times, Xinhua 2015-05-09

Smartphone users in Taiyuan, Shanxi province. (File photo/CNS)

China's use of social media to encourage public tip-offs about corrupt or unprofessional official practices is gaining steam.

In Qinhangdao city of north China's Hebei province, more than 20,000 citizens have used an app launched in August which enables them to report officials' "undesirable work styles" such as bureaucracy and extravagance to the city's discipline watchdog.

Discipline staff have received more than 300 complaints via the app, said an official with the Qinhuangdao Municipal Discipline Inspection Commission of the Communist Party of China (CPC).

Authorities have handled over 200 of the cases, punishing 30 officials for offences ranging from driving government cars for personal affairs to organizing extravagant banquets for family weddings or funerals.

"A small mobile phone can help solve a big problem. Every mobile phone is a tool for inquiry and everyone is a supervisor," said Hao Zhanmin, secretary of the commission.

Since late 2012, the new Chinese leadership has launched campaigns against corruption and misconduct among officials. More than 100,000 officials have been punished.

With an increasing number of smartphone users, WeChat and Weibo, both instant messaging services popular in China, have made it easier for the public to expose violators to authorities.

The CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection launched its own mobile application in January.

Whistleblowing channels like apps and WeChat or Weibo platforms have also been adopted among discipline inspection bodies in Beijing as well as Shandong and Zhejiang provinces.

Beijing's discipline inspection watchdog recently opened a WeChat account, publicizing the contact details for six inspection teams.

Social media is not the only technology being used to ensure professionalism among officials. Some judicial bodies have adopted face recognition machines to monitor employees' attendance, in order to curb laziness at the workplace.

"After using the system for some time, the phenomena of arriving at work late and leaving early has been reduced a lot," said Wang Guorui, an official with the Changchun Intermediate People's Court in northeast China's Jilin Province.

The CPC is keeping pace with the times to explore new technological means to help fight corruption or bureaucracy, said Zhu Lijia, a professor with the Chinese Academy of Governance.

ABN Amro fires six at Dubai office for irregularities

DutchNews.nl, March 11, 2015

Dutch state-owned bank ABN Amro fired six employees at its Dubai private banking desk after an internal probe showed they were involved in serious irregularities, the Financieele Dagblad says on Wednesday. 

The bankers had failed to comply with internal codes of conduct by enabling clients to use their personal accounts for illicit business transactions. The FD said this enabled the clients to use private banking accounts to carry out transactions which should have fallen under a much stricter compliance regime.

‘We offer private banking, and feel that using our services this way is improper,’ a spokeswoman told the Wall Street Journal. ‘We maintain a high standard world-wide for client acceptance.’ 

ABN Amro has a workforce of around 100 in Dubai. The office trades in commodities such as oil and in diamonds as well as offering private banking services to wealthy clients. 

The FD says the bank kept the irregularities and the redundancies quiet and described the sudden departure of the responsible chief executive officer as ‘retirement’.

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Stuart Gulliver in Hong Kong in 2012: leaked files show that the
HSBC chief executive was a client of the bank’s Swiss subsidiary at
the centre of the scandal. Photograph: Bloomberg via Getty Images

"The Recalibration of Awareness – Apr 20/21, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Old Energy,Recalibration Lectures, God / Creator, Religions/Spiritual systems (Catholic Church, Priests/Nun’s, Worship, John Paul Pope, Women in the Church otherwise church will go, Current Pope won’t do it), Middle East, Jews, Governments will change (Internet, Media, Democracies, Dictators, North Korea, Nations voted at once), Integrity (Businesses, Tobacco Companies, Bankers/ Financial Institutes, Pharmaceutical company to collapse), Illuminati (Started in Greece, with Shipping, Financial markets, Stock markets, Pharmaceutical money (fund to build Africa, to develop)), Shift of Human Consciousness, (Old) Souls, Women, Masters to/already come back, Global Unity.... etc.) -(Text version)

“… The Shift in Human Nature

You're starting to see integrity change. Awareness recalibrates integrity, and the Human Being who would sit there and take advantage of another Human Being in an old energy would never do it in a new energy. The reason? It will become intuitive, so this is a shift in Human Nature as well, for in the past you have assumed that people take advantage of people first and integrity comes later. That's just ordinary Human nature.

In the past, Human nature expressed within governments worked like this: If you were stronger than the other one, you simply conquered them. If you were strong, it was an invitation to conquer. If you were weak, it was an invitation to be conquered. No one even thought about it. It was the way of things. The bigger you could have your armies, the better they would do when you sent them out to conquer. That's not how you think today. Did you notice?

Any country that thinks this way today will not survive, for humanity has discovered that the world goes far better by putting things together instead of tearing them apart. The new energy puts the weak and strong together in ways that make sense and that have integrity. Take a look at what happened to some of the businesses in this great land (USA). Up to 30 years ago, when you started realizing some of them didn't have integrity, you eliminated them. What happened to the tobacco companies when you realized they were knowingly addicting your children? Today, they still sell their products to less-aware countries, but that will also change.

What did you do a few years ago when you realized that your bankers were actually selling you homes that they knew you couldn't pay for later? They were walking away, smiling greedily, not thinking about the heartbreak that was to follow when a life's dream would be lost. Dear American, you are in a recession. However, this is like when you prune a tree and cut back the branches. When the tree grows back, you've got control and the branches will grow bigger and stronger than they were before, without the greed factor. Then, if you don't like the way it grows back, you'll prune it again! I tell you this because awareness is now in control of big money. It's right before your eyes, what you're doing. But fear often rules. …”

Malaysia military court sacks election whistleblower

BBC News, 12 January 2015

The ink was used at polling stations to identify who had voted

The Malaysian Air Force officer who told the media that indelible ink used in the 2013 general election was ineffective has been sacked.

The judge said officer Zaidi Ahmad breached military protocol by making the media statement.

The opposition coalition claim the use of faulty ink combined with fraud cost them victory over Malaysia's governing coalition in May 2013.

The coalition has been in power for more than five decades.

Malaysia's Rakyat Post newspaper reports that Major Zaidi Ahmad was dismissed with immediate effect under Section 89 of the Armed Forces Act.

The military court's five member panel dropped other charges against the officer but found him guilty of not going through military channels to voice his grievances and leaking a document on the indelible ink to the media without obtaining approval from the Armed Forces. Major Zaidi said the charges against him were politically motivated.

Following the election there were several reports claiming the ink used at polling stations to identify who had voted could be easily washed off.

Malaysia's ruling coalition led by Prime Minister Najib Razak's United Malays National Organisation (UNMO) won nine out of 12 states in the 2013 election, but with a share of the popular vote below that of the opposition coalition under Anwar Ibrahim.

It was the governing coalition's poorest showing since 1969.

GSK China bribery probe should sound alarm for foreign firms

Want China Times, Xinhua 2014-05-17

GSK's offices in Tianjin, July 25, 2013. (Photo/XIinhua)

The latest development in the GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) China bribery saga is teaching foreign firms in China a fresh lesson on business integrity.

After more than 10 months of investigation, the case is ready to be handed over to prosecutors, authorities said Wednesday.

Police investigating the case have stated that the British drugmaker offered bribes to boost sales and inflated drug prices to allow for bribery expenses and high profits.

The probe not only revealed why some imported drugs in China are disproportionately expensive, but illustrated what happens when a company chooses to focus solely on profits instead of taking their corporate responsibility and their customers seriously.

Drugs are more than just commodities. They epitomize the social responsibility of manufacturers who work to cure diseases and relieve pain through research and development.

GSK's practices in China tainted both the company's reputation and its credibility worldwide. Mark Reilly, former head of GSK China, is believed to have pressed his sales teams to bribe hospitals, doctors and other medical institutions and organizations through various means, gaining billions in illegal revenue.

The company manipulated prices to disguise real costs. The actual cost of a box of Heptodin is 15.70 yuan (US$2.55). It is declared as 73 yuan (US$11.70) at customs and priced at 142 yuan (US$22.78) as factory price. In contrast, the drug sells at about US$2.89 in South Korea, US$4.17 in Canada and US$4.81 in the United Kingdom, according to a document acquired by Xinhua.

No matter how a company tries to disguise its practices, the truth will come out eventually.

Patients and the government had to foot the bill for these expensive drugs. The health of patients might also be at stake as some doctors had the incentive to prescribe excessive amounts to get more kickbacks.

GSK's practices eroded its corporate integrity and could cause irreparable damage to the company in China and elsewhere. The case is a warning to other multinationals in China that ethics matter. Increasingly attractive to foreign investors, more and more companies see China as their most important market.

These investors should learn to respect the Chinese market, at the very least by providing quality products at reasonable prices, abandoning discrimination and honoring their due corporate responsibilities.

For those profiteers, the market will eventually make its own choice.

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"THE BRIDGE OF SWORDS" – Sep 29, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) - (Text Version)

“…I'm in Canada and I know it, but I will tell those listening and reading in the American audience the following: Get ready! Because there are some institutions that are yet to fall, ones that don't have integrity and that could never be helped with a bail out. Again, we tell you the biggest one is big pharma, and we told you that before. It's inevitable. If not now, then in a decade. It's inevitable and they will fight to stay alive and they will not be crossing the bridge. For on the other side of the bridge is a new way, not just for medicine but for care. Paradigms that have not yet been thought of, which don't represent any system that currently exists, will be created and developed by young minds who have concepts that the seniors don't know about. Things that don't have integrity today will fall over tomorrow. Just get ready. It's all part of what's on the other side of the bridge. And the old energy won't like it, and they will object. …”

Internet shaping China for the better: Xinhua

Want China Times, Xinhua 2014-04-21

People log on to the internet with smartphones at a store in Taiyuan,
Shanxi province. (Photo/CNS)

Twenty years after the world's most populous country gained access to the internet, China has been fundamentally and irreversibly changed, but not in the way some observers in the West had expected.

Instead of bringing collapse, the internet in China is becoming more commercially robust and innovative despite the unique Chinese way of management.

As the internet reshapes China, the country is also changing the online landscape through its rising internet firms, brand-new products and the world's largest web population of 618 million.

CHINA REMOLDED

On April 20, 1994, a pilot network to serve education and scientific research was linked to the internet via a special line in Beijing's Zhongguancun, now China's technology hub, marking the country's first fully functional internet access.

At the time, the only way for most Chinese to learn of South Africa's newly elected black president and the construction of China's massive Three Gorges hydraulic project was by reading the next day's state-run newspaper.

Recalling his first days online, Liu Ren, a Beijing-based journalist, said few Chinese were in cyberspace in the late 1990s.

"I would be overjoyed to receive an email, even if it was a spam mail at that time," said the reporter renowned for his keen observation of China's IT industry. "But today, the internet has been changing everyone's lives, sometimes even against their will."

Meanwhile, cab drivers are now consulting their children to learn how to use taxi apps for additional tips from potential customers.

"Never did I think that one day my work would have anything to do with the internet," said Lao Liu, a 54-year-old taxi driver in central China's Wuhan city. "The apps bring me an additional income of 50 yuan (US$8) every day."

Mobile Internet is changing the entrenched habits of Chinese people like Lao Liu, including how they read, buy things, and manage money.

Yu'ebao, a popular online wealth management product, has raised around 500 billion yuan (US$80.2 billion) in less than a year, helping boost the funds available for China's real economy, instead of raising financing costs.

In March, Beijing vowed to promote the healthy development of the burgeoning internet finance, giving products like Yu'ebao promising prospects.

The growing population of internet users has also made online opinions too important to be ignored by officials.

The transformative power of the internet has challenged top-down communication patterns in China by supporting multi-level and multi-directional flows of communication, changing the country's political landscape.

Several Chinese officials have been probed after online whistleblowers accused them of corruption, the latest being Song Lin, chairman of state corporation China Resources (Holdings).

The country's internet has become an accessible yet decentralized platform for the public to discuss public affairs and breaking events, said Wang Sixin, professor of law with the Communication University of China in Beijing.

INNOVATION

The rising prominence of China is one of the most important developments shaping the internet.

Behind the internet boom is Beijing's unique way of management. China has long been dedicated to developing the internet, but it has also underscored the rule of law to ensure internet security, which President Xi Jinping said is a concern for the country's security and development.

Xi became head of China's central internet security and informatization leading group in February, revealing the country's resolve to build itself into a strong cyber power.

This way of internet management, itself a Chinese innovation, has not stifled the creativity of the internet as some had predicted. Innovative products and services are significantly changing the landscape of the internet.

At least six of the world's 10 largest social networks in 2013 were developed by Chinese internet firms, according to a report from US business and technology news website Business Insider. China-based social networking apps such as WeChat and Sina Weibo have also achieved significant scale.

Sina Weibo, China's answer to Twitter, debuted this month on the Nasdaq exchange with a 19.1% jump, bringing the company US$287 million.

The success of the microblogging service, which official figures say over 500 million are using, highlighted the innovation-driven development of China's internet companies.

Sina Weibo may have imitated Twitter at first, but it adapted and improved by constantly introducing new functions to maintain a high number of active users.

"More Chinese internet companies will be going abroad like Sina Weibo did," said Fang Xingdong, founder of Blogchina.com and an IT columnist. "The year of 2014 will mark the beginning of the global strategy of China's internet."

Last year, China's online retail market expanded to over 1.8 trillion yuan (US$288.8 billion), almost the size of Malaysia's GDP that year.

"We have built up the Chinese people's trust in online transactions," said Jack Ma, founder of China's e-commerce giant Alibaba.

China will become "more open, more transparent, more willing to share" in the next two decades because of the internet, he said.

NSA spy units in mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan: report

Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2013-10-31

A rally in Washington DC on Oct. 26, 2013 to protest the National Security
Agency's spying activities. (Photo/Xinhua)

A classified document leaked to German news magazine Der Spiegel has indicated that the US government's spying activities extend to major cities in the Greater China region including Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Hong Kong and Taipei.

According to the "top secret" 2010 document, the CIA and the National Security Agency operate a black budget program known as the Special Collection Service (SCS), which is responsible for inserting surveillance equipment in foreign embassies, communications centers and other foreign government installations. The SCS teams are said to work predominantly undercover in shielded areas of the American embassy and consulate where they are granted certain immunities as foreign diplomats.

The document reveals the existence of more than 80 SCS branches around the world specializing in spying on communications between government departments of foreign countries, including in major European cities such as Paris, Rome, Frankfurt and Geneva, as well as key locations in Asia such as Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Hong Kong and Taipei. American allies Japan and South Korea are not on the list.

Among the accusations leveled against the US government by Der Spiegel is that the NSA has an SCS branch in Berlin, which has been monitoring the mobile phone of Chancellor Angela Merkel since 2002. The NSA allegedly said in the document that the exposure of the "not legally registered spying branch" lead to "grave damage for the relations of the United States to another government."

President Obama apologized to Merkel when she called him on Wednesday seeking clarification on the matter and said he would have stopped it had he known it was happening, Der Spiegel reported.

The White House indicated on Tuesday that it would at least support some of the congressional efforts to rein in the NSA's surveillance programs and was already in the process of amending US intelligence gathering activities following an internal review stemming from the Snowden scandal.

NSA director Keith Alexander, however, launched a stern defense of the agency's current programs at a congressional hearing, saying that the NSA would prefer to "take the beatings" from the public and media "than to give up a program that would result in this nation being attacked."

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China Media Regulator Speaks Out Over Reporter Arrest

Google – AFP, Agence France-Presse, October 24, 2013

A chinese man walks by a newspapers stall in Beijing, China on October 24.
(EPA Photo/Rolex Dela Pena)

Beijing. China’s media regulator has vowed to protect “lawful reporting rights,” state media said, in a rare official intervention over press freedom after a journalist was detained by police.

Chen Yongzhou, a journalist with the New Express tabloid based in the southern city of Guangzhou, was held on Friday by police on “suspicion of damaging business reputation” after he wrote 15 articles on “financial problems” at Zoomlion, a partly state-owned construction machinery manufacturer.

The New Express on Wednesday ran a full-page editorial on its front page to call for Chen’s release, in a rare example of media defying authorities that drew an outpouring of sympathy and support online and among its press peers.

China’s General Administration of Press and Publication, Radio, Film and Television (GAPPRFT) said it was “highly concerned” by Chen’s detention, the China Press and Publishing Journal, which is run by the agency, reported late Wednesday.

The agency has “coordinated with relevant authorities” to ensure the case was handled “in a just and appropriate manner,” the report said, citing an unnamed GAPPRFT official.

GAPPRFT is a key part of the Chinese government’s control mechanisms over the media, and issues the credentials all Chinese journalists need to be able to work.

“The GAPPRFT firmly supports the media to carry out normal reporting activities and firmly protects the justified and lawful reporting rights of journalists,” the report quoted the official as saying.

But the official added it opposed any “abuse of reporting rights” and hoped all media outlets would cover the incident in an “objective and rational way,” according to the newspaper.

In the published reports Chen accused Zoomlion of providing fraudulent accounting figures such as inflated profit data.

Zoomlion is about 20 percent owned by the state, and is listed on the Hong Kong and Shenzhen stock exchanges with a total market capitalisation of more than $8 billion.

It is one of China’s biggest manufacturers of construction machinery, such as bulldozers.

Agence France-Presse

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Australia central bank subsidiary in Saddam link

Google – AFP, 30 Sep 2013

Iraqi President Saddam Hussein delivers a televised speech in 1998 -- the year

 a company owned by the Reserve Bank of Australia attempted to strike a

business deal with him (IRNA/IRNA/AFP)

Sydney — The Reserve Bank of Australia on Monday admitted staff from a subsidiary visited Iraq at the height of UN sanctions after it was accused of attempting to strike an illegal deal with Saddam Hussein.

A joint investigation by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and Fairfax Media said secret files showed officials from the central bank's scandal-hit Note Printing Australia (NPA) went to Iraq to discuss a contract to turn the country's paper currency into polymer notes.

During the 1998 trip, codenamed Delta Project, they met a middleman -- former dictator Hussein's brother-in-law and bodyguard Arshad Yassin, the reports said.

"Indications from Arshad Yassin's office are that Saddam Hussein's office has already allocated $US65 million for the total project," RBA officials said in one document, the media groups reported.

A man walks past the Reserve Bank of

 Australia on May 7, 2013 (AFP/File,

William West)

"He has confirmed that Saddam Hussein has seen the polymer notes samples and is keen to adopt our product."

Reserve officials working for NPA said the funds could potentially be accessed by funnelling them through a Jordanian bank "with the green light of SH (Saddam Hussein)," it was alleged.

The operation was called off six months later after Australian diplomats uncovered the secret dealings with the brutal regime, according to the ABC.

The RBA admitted officials made the trip, as calls mounted for a full inquiry.

"The visit in 1998 was, in the opinion of the bank, ill-advised," it said in a statement.

"No banknotes were ultimately supplied to Iraq. On the records available to the bank, the project went into abeyance after concerns were raised by DFAT (Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade) with the then-CEO of NPA."

David Chaikin, a legal expert at the University of Sydney who reviewed the confidential bank documents, said the negotiations were a violation of international law and alarm bells should have been sounded "to the highest levels of the bank".

"What was happening is not only in violation of law, but could potentially destroy and undermine the reputation of Note Printing Australia and its owner, the Reserve Bank," he told the broadcaster.

He added to Fairfax that the files contained a "very strong prima facie" case that officials involved in the trip had breached a UN sanction that banned Australians from promoting the sale or supply of goods to Iraq.

NPA has been plagued by allegations of corruption in recent years, with claims it and another RBA subsidiary Securency paid bribes to win plastic bank note contracts in Asia.

Executives from both companies have been charged over the alleged racket, which involved contracts in Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam and Nepal, following an investigation by Fairfax in 2009.

The RBA has previously denied it attempted to hide information related to the Asian contracts, with bank chief Glenn Stevens telling an inquiry last year that he knew nothing about the scandal before it was exposed.

Whistleblower Brian Hood, a former NPA executive, told the ABC and Fairfax that Stevens' testimony "wasn't the truth" and the RBA knew of the allegations in 2007, claims the bank rejected Monday.

"The governor has always answered questions in parliamentary proceedings fully and truthfully," it said.

Australian Greens Party deputy leader Adam Bandt said the latest revelations were disturbing.

"Most Australians would be shocked to know their central bank was using their money to line up dirty deals with Saddam Hussein," he said.

"The stench surrounding the Reserve Bank gets worse and a full inquiry is needed to clear the air."

Whistleblowers welcome as China's anti-graft watchdog launches website

Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2013-09-20

The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, China's anti-corruption watchdog, is introducing a new centralized website as part of the Communist Party's current campaign against graft, reports the Guangzhou-based Southern Weekly.

The newly created website, which combines resources from five former anti-graft government websites, includes an "I want to report" function to allow members of the public to report allegations of corruption.

Commission chief Wang Qishan, who took over the role last November, has called for a more impartial and independent disciplinary watchdog. The typically mysterious commission appears to be taking steps to become more transparent, with increased news coverage of its activities detailed on national broadcaster CCTV.

Wang issued an order in June for all commission staffers to ditch their special VIP and membership cards, which had become prone to being used as a mechanism for corruption. For this year's Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, in addition to the usual warnings against officials receiving gifts and wining and dining on state funds, punishments will also be handed down to those in breach of the prohibitions.

Wang has so far received positive reviews for his efforts, with Renmin University of China professor Zhou Shuzhen saying that Wang is a hard worker dedicated to real work rather than showmanship. After listening to people speak, Wang would often ask them what the source of the problem is and what ideas they would recommend to solve the problem, Zhou added.

The commission said that in addition to the new website it will also be opening an official microblog account and take advantage of other social networking platforms such as messaging service Weixin, known as WeChat outside China.

Wang said he personally has no time to microblog, but he has a special team that specifically searches for and collects information about potential corruption cases regarding officials on the internet. This information is not only shared with him but also with other party leaders, Wang added.

During a commission forum in March and April this year, participants told reporters that the party is very focused on the next step in its anti-corruption campaign and believes that the internet can offer the breakthrough party leaders are looking for.

The commission currently has 27 functional departments, with the number of impartial discipline inspection offices increased from eight to 10 this year, including four in charge of monitoring state-owned enterprises and central government departments.

The goal of the commission in its widening anti-corruption campaign is to increase the number of reported cases, increase the number of cases investigated, and ensure that the punishment issued acts as an effective deterrent. Staffers said, however, that the core purpose of the campaign is not necessarily just to take down corrupt officials but to improve the overall atmosphere inside the party.

Since Xi Jinping became head of the party last November, the commission has taken down nine officials at vice-ministerial level or above: Sichuan deputy party chief Li Chuncheng, former Guangdong United Front Work Department chief Zhou Zhenhong, former energy chief Liu Tienan, former Anhui vice governor Ni Fake, former Sichuan Federation of Literary and Art Circles chairman Guo Yongxiang, Inner Mongolia United Front Work Department chief Wang Suyi, Guangxi Federation of Trade Unions chairman Li Daqiu, China National Petroleum Corp deputy general manager Wang Yongchun and its former chairman Jiang Jiemin.

The Central Commission for Discipline
Inspection website. (Internet photo)

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CPC anti-graft watchdog launches official website