South Korea moves to ease Chinese jitters over US-North Korea talks - March 12, 2018

March 12 , 2018

CNN：South Korea moves to ease Chinese jitters over US-North Korea talks
CNN reports: "South Korean officials met with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday, as part of an effort to bring jittery regional powers on board with US President Donald Trump's decision to accept a face-to-face meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Seoul's lead envoy, National Security Advisor Chung Eui-Yong, sat down with Xi in Beijing for 35 minutes on Monday, as a parallel delegation headed to Tokyo to brief Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on the attempts to open talks with Pyongyang on its nuclear and missile program."
TIME：'More Opposition in Mao's Time.' Why China's Xi Jinping May Have to Rule for Life
TIME reports: "In the end, dissent was negligible, just as Xi Jinping likes it. Sunday's vote to remove term limits from the Chinese presidency, thus allowing the incumbent Xi to rule beyond his erstwhile 2023 retirement date — and possibly for life — was passed by 2,958 votes in favor, with just two against and three abstentions. The final tally at China's National People's Congress annual parliament at Beijing's Great Hall of the People was hardly surprising. Xi has spent his first term purging the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) of any faction that challenged his omnipotence, while dialing up censorship, amassing more than a dozen separate leadership roles and assembling a budding cult of personality."
The New York Times：Four Years After Declaring War on Pollution, China Is Winning
The New York Times reports: "On March 4, 2014, the Chinese premier, Li Keqiang, told almost 3,000 delegates at the National People's Congress and many more watching live on state television, "We will resolutely declare war against pollution as we declared war against poverty." The statement broke from the country's longstanding policy of putting economic growth over environment, and many wondered whether China would really follow through. Four years after that declaration, the data is in: China is winning, at record pace. In particular, cities have cut concentrations of fine particulates in the air by 32 percent on average."

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