Malaysia's growth forecasts raised after the actual 5.4% in Q2, 2012

 Malaysia's economy up 5.4% in Q2, manufacturing, demand support growth 

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's economic growth, as measured by gross domestic product (GDP), for the second quarter ended June 30 rose by an unexpected 5.4% year-on-year, underpinned by an expansion in manufacturing and robust domestic demand.

GDP growth for the first quarter was revised to 4.9% from 4.7%, while growth for the first half of the year stood at 5.1% compared with the same period a year ago. Compared with the first quarter, GDP expanded by 3%.

In the supply side of the economy, only the agricultural sector saw a contraction due to lower crude palm oil production. Manufacturing, services, construction and mining all posted growth. Domestic demand jumped 13.8% for the quarter and rose 11.8% for the first-half.

The country's second-quarter GDP numbers came as a surprise to many economists, whose median forecast was for a 4.6% expansion. Growth for the quarter even exceeded the most optimistic forecast of 5.2%.

Zeti (far right) attending the briefing. With her are other Bank Negara officials

Bank Negara governor Tan Sri Dr Zeti Akhtar Aziz said at a briefing following the release of the GDP data that the surge in private investment was the most encouraging aspect of the economy.

“Private investment has made a strong return because the investment climate has improved tremendously, with Malaysia moving up the rankings of various surveys in terms of competitiveness, costs and ease of doing business,” she said.

Zeti said the improvement was underscored by the higher implementation of investments by domestic and foreign investors. She added that civil engineering projects in the oil and gas, transport, utilities and services industries had helped spur growth in the construction sector.

By numbers, investments from the public and private sectors jumped 26.1% year-on-year for the quarter under review, with the first half rising 21.3%.


By sector, private investments rose 24.6% while public investments surged 28.9%. For the first half, private sector investments grew 22.4% while public sector investments expanded 19.5%.

Consumption rose 8.9% for the quarter and 11.8% in the first half. By sector, private consumption increased 8.8% for the quarter and 8.1% for the first half while public consumption expanded 9.4% for the quarter and 8.4% in the first half.

Zeti said monetary policy continued to be supportive of growth and that for the rest of the year, risks weighed on growth rather than on inflation with external headwinds still overshadowing the outlook.

She said it would take time for the global economy to recover and this would need action from various stakeholders.

“At this point, we're maintaining our forecast of 4% to 5% GDP growth for the year but this may change when the budget is announced (on Sept 28). This will come in at the upper range of the forecast if growth is robust,” Zeti added.

Alliance Investment Bank Bhd chief economist Manokaran Mottain has revised GDP growth for the year to 4.7% from 4.5% previously, with the second half to record growth of 4.5%.

He told StarBiz the third quarter would see expansion at its slowest.

Manokaran said despite the surprising growth figures, the global and domestic economy's outlook for the rest of the year would still be dampened by the eurozone debt crisis, slower expansion in China and tepid growth in the United States.

“We believe the eurozone crisis will continue to have an impact on trade and this will show itself in slower exports growth,” he said.

He added that with a drop in manufacturing activity, sentiments would be affected, leading to slower growth in the domestic-oriented services sector as consumption slowed.

Manokaran said Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) for July indicated that exports would slow as demand dropped in developed markets.

CIMB Investment Bank Bhd economic research head Lee Heng Guie said in a report that the leading index for June suggested that the economy could weaken in the second half.

“We caution that a sharply high base in the second half of last year poses a hurdle to year-on-year growth,” he said.

He pointed out that the global Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development composite leading together with regional high-frequency indicators, including trade and PMI, were still under external pressures.

Meanwhile, the Statistics Department released data showing that July prices as measured by the Consumer Price Index gained 1.4% year-on-year to 104.8 and remained unchanged compared with the previous month.

By FINTAN NG fintan@thestar.com.my The Star/Asia News Network

Economists turn bullish following better-than-expected growth in Q2

 
PETALING JAYA: Several economists have raised their gross domestic product (GDP) forecasts for Malaysia following better-than-expected growth for the second quarter ended June 30.

Malaysia's economic growth for the second quarter rose by an unexpected 5.4% year-on-year underpinned by an expansion in manufacturing and robust domestic demand.

GDP growth for the first quarter was revised to 4.9% from 4.7%, while growth for the first half of the year stood at 5.1% compared with the same period a year ago.

Compared with the first quarter, GDP expanded by 3%.

Hong Leong Investment Bank's (HLIB) research unit said that following the strong-than-expected second quarter data, it had raised its full-year 2012 GDP forecast to 5% (previously: 4.5%).

For the second half of 2012, HLIB Research expected GDP growth to dip to 4.5% year-on-year in the third quarter (dragged by subdued trade and manufacturing and higher base in the third quarter of 2011) before improving to 5.1% year-on-year in the fourth quarter, yielding an average of 4.8% year-on-year (first half: 5.1% year-on-year).

“We are still positive that line-up of the Economic Transformation Programme projects for the second-half and 2013 could still provide a strong support to GDP growth despite external uncertainty,” said HLIB Research.

According to Bloomberg, Goldman Sachs also raised Malaysia's GDP growth predictions to 4.6% from 3.8% for 2012, and to 5.3% from 5.2% for 2013.

Meanwhile, CIMB Investment Bank Bhd economic research head Lee Heng Guie said given the steady performance in the first half, he had raised the 2012 growth estimate to 5%, from 3.8% previously.

“However, this still implies a slower growth of 4.5% to 5% in the second half versus 5.1% in the first half,” said Lee in a report.

Lee warned that external headwinds still warranted caution as they remained hurdles to Malaysia's export growth.

Meanwhile, Maybank Investment Bank (IB) Research said its 2012 and 2013 growth forecasts of 4.4% and 5.1% respectively were under review.

“Provisionally, we expect 2012 growth to be around 5%, which implies a slightly slower growth of 4.8% in the second half as the global purchasing managers index in July signals that the global economy hence external demand will remain soft in the third quarter.”

Maybank IB Research said domestic demand would continue to be well supported by initiatives to sustain consumer spending, policies and measures to spur investments, and the roll-out and progress of big ticket infrastructure projects and capital expenditures in industries like oil, gas and energy.

By THOMAS HUONG huong@thestar.com.my The Star/Asia News Network

Dangerous Older Drivers: A Car is a Lethal Weapon

“She only drives to the store”.

“He doesn’t drive at night, he just drives to the doctor and to church”.

Imagine the justifications people can invent to allow dangerous aging parents to stay behind the wheel. These are statements from family members whose elder is no longer safe to drive, but they’re still driving.  No one has the guts to ask Dad or Mom to stop.   Since most accidents happen within 3 miles of home, the “only to church” or “only to the store” is not safer than anywhere else.

The National Safety Council publishes a journal called Family Safety and Health, and in its Fall, 2012 issue, an article, “Time to Hand Over the Keys” appears.  I was interviewed for the article.  As a former personal injury lawyer, I represented hundreds of victims of car accidents, some caused by older drivers who never should have been on the road.  That dangerous driver could be your dad, your grandma or your aunt.  The next generation needs to see the problem and face the fear about confronting it.

Research indicates that most people, when approached respectfully, will voluntarily give up driving.  However, “ most people” does not include the very stubborn, those in denial, and those elders with the kind of cognitive impairment that prevents them from actually understanding how impaired they are.  With those folks, their families desperately need a strategy.

Here’s a sampling of parts from the strategy I advocate that you use.

First, recognize the problem.  A car is a lethal weapon whether your elder is driving it a block from home or across the city.  It is not a safer weapon because your elder is closer to home.  That’s a fanatasy. Give it up. I met an 84 year old who was behind the wheel when he accidentally hit and killed his best friend in the driveway of his own apartment building.

Next, be honest and respectful and talk to your aging loved one about his or her driving. If you’ve see grandma careen across the street cutting off other cars, unaware of their presence, it’s time to gently ask her to give up the keys.  Try a one-on -one conversation first.

Next, add allies to your approach if the one-on-one is not successful.  Bring in a trusted friend, other family, or anyone Dad likes best.  Bring up the subject kindly and with acknowledgement that giving up driving is huge and that it means losing independence.  Use an outside professional if this doesn’t work.

Make alternative transportation arrangements.  If your elder lives in an urban area, many resources may be available for elders, from community vans to carpools from senior centers.  Beware of putting cognitively impaired elders on buses. They may be confused and get lost.  Rural dwellers must usually rely on family and friends to transport them.  The burden on adult children may stop them from facing the issue of a parent’s dangerous driving.

If the elder is too dangerous to continue driving, get rid of the car if you can.  Sometimes a caregiver can do the driving and the aging person keeps the car. If there is no caregiver or someone else’s car is used to transport, the elder’s car is a sad reminder and a temptation you don’t want kept in the driveway.  It’s too easy for Dad to get a duplicate set of keys made.

Use the law as a last resort.  The primary care doctor may be of help if willing to report the danger or need for retesting to the department of motor vehicles.  Some states allow you to report a dangerous driver and ask for license retesting anonymously.  The courts can be used to protect elders who are a danger to themselves or others. Guardianship can be used in extreme cases to give family permission to take the car away.

Some older drivers are fine, like my mother in law, Alice, 90.  She limits her driving to daytime. She is still quite sharp, has a great memory and sense of direction and pays attention to what is on the road.  I wouldn’t classify her as dangerous, but she’s in the minority at her age.

Asking an aging loved one to give up driving takes courage. It can draw extreme resistance, anger and refusal.  Facing that possibility requires a plan and perhaps a family conference before approaching a particularly difficult elder.  I urge you to find your courage if your elder is scaring you when he or she gets behind the wheel.  Sometimes elders know it’s time and will give up driving willingly when asked.  You might be lucky.  In any event, it’s time to take your chances if this article reminds you of anyone close to you.


By Carolyn Rosenblatt, Forbes Contributor

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America’s deadly love affair with guns

BARELY a month after the deadly shooting in Colorado which killed 12 people, six more lives were lost to another maniac with a gun, this time at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin.

Yet, like the earlier shootings, the whole episode is destined to quickly recede into the background.

For all its greatness, America is a nation that is easily distracted by the trivial at the expense of the critical, a nation that can barely hold its collective attention much beyond the 30 second sound bytes of its newscasters.

It is one of the many paradoxes of America.

Consider, for example, that the death of 3,000 people on 9/11 became the jumping-off point for more than a decade of war that cost thousands of lives and billions of dollars, whereas the 140,000 or so lives lost to gun violence since then has elicited no corresponding outrage or demand for action.

I suppose it’s always much harder to confront the enemy within than the enemy without, easier to go after strange men in far away places than face an ugly truth closer to home.

Besides, the gun culture is so much a part of the American fabric that to confront it is to challenge the way America thinks about itself.

Almost all of America’s great heroes were gunslingers or men who cut their teeth in war.

Guns are so much a part of society that pastors preach about the right to bear arms while banks give them away to good customers.

Even the courts have let stand the so called “Stand Your Ground Law” which basically gives citizens the right to use deadly force when confronted by an assailant even when such force is unnecessary.

Talk about a licence to kill.

Perhaps, there is a certain fatalism as well; a resignation that such senseless killings are the necessary price Americans must pay for their cherished right to bear arms.

What is incomprehensible, though, is the frequently used argument that a well-armed population is the best protection against government encroachment of individual freedom. It might have been an appropriate response in the aftermath of their war of independence 236 years ago, but it makes no sense today.

The gun culture is largely sustained and promoted by the all powerful gun lobby and the arms manufacturers who fund them.

Guns are a US$31bil (RM96bil) industry that brooks no interference.

Their power to destroy anyone who challenges them is legendary. Even simple calls for more stringent background checks on prospective gun buyers are enough to send them on the offensive.

Unsurprisingly, most politicians go out of their way to avoid offending the gun lobby, especially in an election year.

President Obama, for example, has offered communities affected by recent gun violence the sympathy of his heart but not the power of his office.

Even his prospective Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, one of whose signature achievements as governor of Massachusetts was a ban on assault weapons, has been cowered into silence.

And so they talk endlessly about the need for better mental healthcare for troubled young men or promise to begin a “conversation” about guns in America instead of actually taking the bull by the horns.

It is escapism and denial on a staggering scale.

The gun lobby, meanwhile, continues to push the asinine argument that it is not guns but people who kill.

Society has long recognised that cars, for example, can kill and maim if not used properly and have come up with stringent regulations replete with a licencing system to control and regulate its use.

No such rules apply to guns which can be bought legally by just about anyone and carried just about anywhere. And not just handguns but assault rifles and other military-type weapons.

There’s also no limit to how much weaponry a citizen can amass.

It is estimated that there are more than 300 million privately owned guns in the US (population 314 million), making it the most heavily armed civilian population in the world. Most Americans, however, do not own guns; the numbers are skewered because most gun owners tend to stockpile them.

And perversely, every time there is another mass shooting, gun sales actually explode, as people rush out to buy yet more guns. Indeed, gun sales rose 40% in the aftermath of the recent Colorado shooting.

The other thing about such shootings is that it shines a spotlight on the deep alienation of a rootless and disconnected generation brought up on video games, movies and music that glorify gratuitous violence and anti-social behaviour. When unstable young men, to whom killing is probably just another video game, have unlimited access to the most lethal weapons, can there be any doubt that carnage is inevitable?

We shouldn’t be surprised, therefore, to see more and more heavily armed gunmen emerge from the shadows of their dark and dreary lives to carry out mass murder as the ultimate thrill, the final expression of their banal existence.

Until Americans are willing to confront the power of the gun lobby and demand that their leaders show some political courage on the issue, America will remain a killing field.

DIPLOMATICALLY SPEAKING 

By DENNIS IGNATIUS

China, S.Korea demand Japan own up to its wars criminal past

China and South Korea on Wednesday pressed Japan to face up to its wartime past, as festering territorial disputes flared and Asia marked the anniversary of Tokyo's World War II surrender.

Both countries demanded Japan do more to atone for the brutal expansionism of the 20th century, while in Tokyo cabinet ministers paid tribute to fallen Japanese, including top war criminals, at a controversial shrine.

Beijing said the key issue was "whether Japan can really look in the mirror of history, heeding its lessons, holding hands with Asian people to face the future".

"The power is in the hands of Japan itself," it added. "We hope Japan can keep its promise to deal with and reflect on its invasion history and take concrete measures to safeguard China-Japan relations."

In Seoul, President Lee Myung-Bak, whose visit to disputed islands last week sent relations with Tokyo into virtual freefall, said Japan had to make amends for the sexual slavery it forced on women in its former colony.

"It was a breach of women's rights committed during wartime as well as a violation of universal human rights and historic justice. We urge the Japanese government to take responsible measures in this regard", Lee said.

War veterans and others wearing uniforms of the Imperial Navy march at the Yasukuni shrine to honour the dead on the 67th anniversary of Japan's surrender from World War II in Tokyo. China and South Korea have pressed Japan to face up to its wartime past, as festering territorial disputes flared and Asia marked the anniversary of Tokyo's World War II surrender.

"Chain links tangled in the history of Korea-Japan relations are hampering the common march toward a better tomorrow in the Northeast Asian region, as well as bilateral ties", Lee said.

The demands came as Japanese police arrested five pro-China activists who had landed on an island claimed by both Beijing and Tokyo.

The five were part of a group of activists from Hong Kong and Macau who had sailed to the archipelago, known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China, with the intention of planting a Chinese flag.

Japan summoned the Chinese ambassador in response.

Their action came just days after South Korea's Lee landed on another set of disputed islands, kicking back into life a long-slumbering row with Japan, which this week morphed into a warning that Japan's emperor must apologise if he ever wanted to visit.

Tokyo rounded on Lee, who had previously been viewed as a pragmatist with whom it could deal.

Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba said his comments on the emperor -- a respected figurehead in Japan -- were "extremely regrettable" and "difficult to comprehend".

As Seoul celebrated Liberation Day, around 500 South Koreans, including two former comfort women, rallied outside the Japanese embassy in Seoul.

It was their 1,035th weekly protest over the issue, which Tokyo insists was settled in a 1965 accord normalising relations.

The demonstration was echoed in Taiwan, which Japan occupied from 1985 until the war's end, where about 200 Taiwanese chanted slogans and tore up Japanese military flags.

Japan marked the 67th anniversary of its surrender with an official ceremony in which Emperor Akihito and Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda led 6,000 people in prayer.

Their speeches used tried and tested formulae for regret, but avoided an explicit apology.

Two Japanese cabinet ministers visit a war shrine on the anniversary of Tokyo's World War II surrender, a move sets to inflame regional tensions amid increasingly bitter territorial disputes. Duration: 01:02

"During the war, (Japan) inflicted significant damage and pain on many countries, especially on people in Asian countries," Noda told the annual ceremony. "We deeply regret that."

Akihito said: "Recalling history, I profoundly hope that the suffering of war will never be repeated. I sincerely express mourning for those who lost their lives on the battlefields, and wish world peace and our country's further development."

Less diplomatically palatable were the pilgrimages by two of Noda's cabinet to Yasukuni Shrine in central Tokyo, which honours 2.5 million war dead -- including 14 leading war criminals from World War II.

Those enshrined at Yasukuni include General Hideki Tojo, the Japanese prime minister who ordered the attack on Pearl Harbor and was convicted of war crimes and hanged by a US-led tribunal.

Jin Matsubara, one of the ministers, told reporters he was there "in a personal capacity" and had used his visit to "remember ancestors who established the foundations of the prosperity of present-day Japan".

Japanese Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko offer a silent prayer during an annual memorial service to honour the dead on the 67th anniversary of Japan's surrender from World War II in Tokyo. China and South Korea have pressed Japan to face up to its wartime past, as festering territorial disputes flared and Asia marked the anniversary of Tokyo's World War II surrender.

The pilgrimages were the first on the sensitive anniversary by any government minister since the centre-left Democratic Party of Japan came to power in 2009.

All three prime ministers since then have asked their cabinets to stay away, but Noda's crumbling support seemingly left him without sufficient power to prevent the visits.

North Korean state media said the ministers' actions were an "intolerable insult and mockery of the Asian people who suffered a lot due to the atrocities of Japan".

TOKYO (AFP)

Related posts:

Japan, the deputy sheriff in Asia?

China demands Japan release activists over Diaoyu Islands landing  

China demands Japan release Chinese activists landed on the Chinese-owned Diaoyu Islands

By James Pomfret and Linda Sieg
HONG KONG/TOKYO | Wed Aug 15, 2012 11:52am EDT

(Reuters) - China demanded Japan immediately and unconditionally free 14 Chinese activists held over a protest landing on disputed islands on Wednesday, as tensions between Tokyo and its neighbors flared on the anniversary of the end of World War Two.



 Video:Review: Diaoyu Islands dispute CCTV News - CNTV English
Video: Japan arrests 14 Chinese activists on Diaoyu Islands issue CCTV News - CNTV English

The landing by the activists on an island chain in the East China Sea and their detention by Japan's coastguard came on a day of regional diplomatic jousting, underscoring how history dogs Japan's ties with China and South Korea.

In a meeting with Japan's ambassador to Beijing and a phone call with a Japanese official, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Fu Ying lodged "solemn representations" over the latest territorial quarrel between Asia's two biggest economies.

Fu "demanded that Japan ensure the safety of 14 Chinese nationals and immediately and unconditionally release them", the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on its website.

Japan arrested five members of a group of activists from China, Hong Kong and Macau who landed on the island, Japan's coastguard said. China's Xinhua news agency said Japan's coastguard later detained nine activists on their boat. Japanese media also said that in all, 14 activists had been detained.

Earlier, South Korea prompted an official protest from Japan after comments by South Korean President Lee Myung-bak which some saw as going too far by insulting Japanese Emperor Akihito.

And in a move likely to add to the anger of Japan's neighbors, two Japanese cabinet ministers paid homage at a controversial Tokyo shrine for the war dead.

Memories of Japan's wartime occupation of much of China and colonization of South Korea run deep despite close economic ties in one of the world's wealthiest regions.

Japan protested to China's ambassador over the landing and Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said Tokyo would deal with the matter strictly in accordance with the law.

Xinhua said Japan had pushed tension "to a new high".

"The tensions are fully due to irresponsible clamoring and attempts by some Japanese politicians and activists to claim the islands, which ... indisputably belong to China," it said.

Friction over the uninhabited isles, near potentially rich gas deposits, had been heating up already.

Several of the activists, who set out from Hong Kong, jumped into the sea, swam and waded ashore. The group said its boat had been rammed by the coastguard and hit with water cannon. A Japanese official denied that any serious damage had been done to the boat.

Media published photographs of the activists planting a Chinese flag on a rocky shore.

"We've waited 10 years for this... We finally managed to get ashore," the captain of the protest ship was quoted as saying on Hong Kong television.

A separate row over rival claims by South Korea and Japan to other islands has also intensified, signaling how the region has failed to resolve differences nearly seven decades after Japan's defeat at the end of World War Two.

WARTIME MEMORIES LINGER

The friction in part reflect skepticism over the sincerity of Japan's apologies for wartime and colonial excesses.

On Tuesday, South Korea's Lee told a group of teachers that Emperor Akihito should apologize sincerely if he wants to visit South Korea, saying a repeat of his 1990 expression of "deepest regrets" would not suffice.

Japan, noting that it had never broached the idea of a visit by the emperor to South Korea, lodged a protest with Seoul over the remarks. Akihito has spent much of the past two decades trying to heal the wounds of a war waged in his father's name.

Lee, whose Friday visit to the islands claimed by South Korea and Japan frayed ties between the two U.S. allies, called Japan an "important partner that we should work with to open the future".

But in remarks commemorating Korea's liberation from Japan's 1910-1945 rule, he also said the countries' tangled history was "hampering the common march toward a better tomorrow".

He urged Japan to do more to resolve a dispute over compensation for Korean women abducted to serve as sex slaves for wartime Japanese soldiers, known by the euphemism "comfort women" in Japan and long a source of friction.

"It was a breach of women's rights committed during wartime as well as a violation of universal human rights and historic justice. We urge the Japanese government to take responsible measures in this regard," Lee said.

Japan says the matter was closed under a 1965 treaty establishing diplomatic ties. In 1993, Tokyo issued a statement in the name of its then-chief cabinet secretary apologizing to the women and two years later set up a fund to make payments to the women. South Korea says those moves were not official and so not enough.

Speaking at a ceremony marking the war's end on Wednesday, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda acknowledged the "enormous damage and suffering" caused by Japan to other countries, especially in Asia.

"We deeply reflect upon (that) and express our deepest condolences to the victims and their families," he said, vowing that Japan would never go to war again.

Tapping into anti-Japanese sentiment remains a way to seek public support in South Korea and China, which face leadership changes in coming months. And some experts say a new strain of nationalism is surfacing in Japan amid gloom about the future.

In a sign of the domestic pressures in Japan, National Public Safety Commission Chairman Jin Matsubara and Transport Minister Yuichiro Hata visited the Yasukuni shrine for war dead, defying Noda's urgings to stay away.

Many see the shrine as a symbol of Japan's past militarism because 14 Japanese wartime leaders convicted as war criminals by an Allied tribunal are honored there with Japan's war dead.

(Additional reporting by Kaori Kaneko and Stanley White in Tokyo, and Ben Blanchard and Chris Buckley in Beijing; Editing by Louise Ireland and Robert Birsel)

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Backgrounder: History proves Diaoyu Islands are China's territory

Xinhua | 2012-8-17 19:02:23

The Japanese government on Friday decided to release the 14 Chinese illegally detained Wednesday by Japanese authorities at the Diaoyu Islands after the Chinese government repeatedly demanded their "immediate and unconditional" release.

The 14 Chinese, despite obstruction by Japan Coast Guard patrol ships, arrived at the Diaoyu Islands by a Hong Kong fishing vessel to assert China's territorial claim to the islands.

Japanese police arrested them on suspicion of "illegal entry."

After their detention, China's Vice Foreign Minister Fu Ying reiterated China's sovereignty over the Diaoyu Islands and the affiliated islets, and demanded that the Japanese guarantee the safety of the citizens and free them immediately and unconditionally. On Thursday, China once again urged Japan to "immediately and unconditionally" release its nationals.

Demonstrators across China staged protests Thursday demanding the release of the 14 Chinese nationals.

The Diaoyu islands, in the East China Sea between China and Japan, have belonged to China since ancient times.

The islands are 120 nautical miles northeast of China's Taiwan province, 200 nautical miles east of China's mainland and 200 nautical miles west to Japan's southernmost island Okinawa.

Geologically the islands are attached to Taiwan. The waters around the islands are 100 to 150 meters deep and there is a 2,000-meter-deep oceanic trench between the islands and Japan's Okinawa islands.

Fishermen from China's Taiwan and Fujian and other provinces conducted activities such as fishing and collecting herbs in this area since ancient times.

The islands appeared on China's map since the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).

There are records about the islands in a book published during the rule of Yong Le (1403 to 1424) in the Ming Dynasty, more than 400 years before Japan claimed discovery of the Diaoyu islands in 1884.

After the Ming Dynasty, the islands were recorded in many historical documents.

On a map published by Japan between 1783 and 1785, marking the boundary of the Ryukyu Kingdom, the Diaoyu islands were shown as belonging to China.

Japan never questioned China's sovereignty over the islands before the Sino-Japanese war of 1894-1895.

In April 1895, the government of the Qing Dynasty was forced to sign the Treaty of Shimonoseki, under which China ceded the whole island of Taiwan and its surrounding islands including the Penghu Islands to Japan.

Only since then has Japan had its own name for the area where the Diaoyu islands are located. Before that, Japanese maps marked the islands by their Chinese names.

Japan was occupied by the United Sates after it was defeated in the Second World War.

In 1951, Japan and the United States illegally signed a treaty in San Francisco without the presence of China, which was one of the victor countries in the Second World War.

Although article two of the treaty said that Japan surrendered its claim over Taiwan and the Penghu islands, article three wrongly assigned the Diaoyu islands, which Japan had stolen from China, and other islands, to the Ryukyu zone which was under US control.

The then Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai lodged a strong protest and said the Chinese government would never recognize the San Francisco Treaty.

In a statement on territorial waters in 1958, the Chinese government said that Japan should return all the territory of the People's Republic of China including Taiwan and the islands around it to China.

Consequently, there is no room for argument that the Diaoyu islands have historically been a part of China's territory.

Related:
Japan, the deputy sheriff in Asia?
China, S.Korea demand Japan own up to its wars criminal past

Japan, the deputy sheriff in Asia?

Since the United States declared to move its strategic focus towards the east, it keeps strengthening its alliance with Japan and emphasizing that this ally should play a "footstone" role in guaranteeing the security of the Asia-Pacific Region. Japan is cooperating greatly and its role in the regional security area is changing into the "deputy sheriff" of Asia for the United States. It is mainly reflected in five areas.

First, Japan is wantonly meddling in South China Sea affairs. Japan has declared many times its stand of emphasizing the “navigation freedom” of the South China Sea. Japan and the Philippines have signed a defensive cooperation agreement and will carry out joint maritime trainings and share maritime security intelligence. Japan and Vietnam have signed the “Maritime Strategic Security Agreement.” In addition, Japan has also decided to hold a special summit on the maritime security with the ASEAN.

Second, Japan is actively helping the United States weave the military partnership network in the Asia-Pacific Region. The military partnership network, which takes “the United States + Japan + one” (such as the United States + Japan + South Korea, the United States + Japan + Australia and the United States + Japan + India) as the framework, is extending from Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia to South Asia. They hold security consultation meetings and coordinate their stands periodically, or bring in advanced weapons in large scales to expand their armaments, or hold various military drills in turn. 

Third, Japan and the United States are promoting their diplomatic strategic cooperation actively and complementing and aiding each other tightly. After the United States removed its diplomatic obstacle with Myanmar, Japan immediately increased its investment, manpower and resources in Myanmar. Currently, the United States is trying to build the Mekong River area into a main foothold for its “return to the Asia-Pacific Region” and Japan already promised in a summit of Japan and five countries of the Mekong River valley held in April 2012 that it will offer 7.4 billion U.S. dollars of governmental development aids in next three years.

Fourth, Japan keeps breaking limits of the Peace Constitution to lay the foundation for serving as the “deputy sheriff” and realizing its dream of being a “normal great power.” After modifying the “Three Principles on Arms Export” and “Three Non-nuclear Principles,” Japan also wrote the words of “using the nuclear energy to make contributions for the national security” in its relevant laws. Currently, Japan is suggesting in public to lift the ban on the right of collective self-defense, showing a sign of recovering the militarism.

Fifth, Japan has given the performance of “buying the Diaoyu Islands” many times, significantly intensifying the Diaoyu Islands dispute. To certain extent, this action of Japan is also out of the consideration of serving as the vanguard for the United States to “return to the Asia-Pacific Region.”

The two anti-terrorism wars have consumed the United States a lot of energy, and therefore it has to assign a part of its “return” mission to Japan. And Japan also wants to seize this chance to improve its influence and status, build itself into a so-called “normal great power” and obtain the full political and military decision-making rights.

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Related

China, S.Korea demand Japan own up to its wars criminal past

China demands Japan release activists over landing Diaoyu Islands  

China's 'most dangerous man' shot dead near mum's home

After an eight-year manhunt across four provinces involving tens of thousands of police officers, China's most-wanted criminal was shot dead yesterday, 14 kilometres from his mother's home.

Zhou Kehua, 42, was cornered in an alley behind a shoe shop in the central city of Chongqing and opened fire. He was shot in the head at close range. At least one policeman was "lightly injured" in the gun battle.

After so many murders, he knew he would get the death penalty, so there was no moral struggle in his mind. 

Zhou had been on the run since 2004, evading capture despite being the target of one of the largest manhunts mounted in China.

Eight years on the run ... Zhou Kehua appears on a wanted poster. Photo: AFP

By the end, the combined value of all the rewards placed on his head had risen to 5.4 million yuan ($AU800,000) and wanted posters had been pinned up as far afield as Shanghai, more than 1600 kilometres from his home.

Gun crime is extremely rare in China, where firearms are strictly controlled, but Zhou had killed a total of nine people, including one policeman, in a series of armed robberies.

He went for bank customers withdrawing large sums of cash, following his victims and shooting them in the head before making a swift getaway.

"He remained very calm after the murders and would decide the quickest way to escape," said Pi Yijun, a criminologist at China University of Political Science and Law in Beijing. "He would do his homework by staying at a bank and observing its customers, working out the best place to strike. After so many murders, he knew he would get the death penalty, so there was no moral struggle in his mind."

Zhou would lie low for long periods, disappearing at one stage for more than four years, between 2005 and 2009.

He resurfaced last Friday for the first time since January, killing a woman outside a branch of the Bank of China in Shapingba, a district of Chongqing.

The local authorities quickly mounted an enormous manhunt, calling back all police on leave and mobilising the local army. However, after combing Gele Mountain, only a ragged green T-shirt and two cigarette cartons were found. China Central Television (CCTV) said it was thought that the manhunt, which was widely publicised in the media, had been a ruse to give Zhou a false sense of security.

In fact, he had been spotted in a department store in Chongqing on August 11, leading police to believe he had remained close to the scene of his last crime, rather than retreating to his mountain hideout.

Quietly, four-man teams of plain-clothes police moved through the city to track him down. Eventually a resident in Tongjiaqiao, near his mother's home, reported him to the police yesterday morning, collecting a 600,000 yuan reward. Zhou's father died last August, but his mother lives in a three-storey house and has been under constant surveillance since January.

His ex-wife lives in a neighbouring town with their 13-year-old son. Zhou is thought to have visited them at the beginning of the year after committing a murder and stealing 200,000 yuan in Nanjing.

Two Chinese newspapers disputed the account of Zhou's final moments.

The Chongqing Times said he had committed suicide and the police had merely found his body.

The Changsha Evening News, however, said that he had turned the gun on himself after being shot twice by police.

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Honey, I spoiled the kids!

We raise our children with the best of intentions but somehow end up mollycoddling them, to their detriment.

THE shortage of domestic servants in Malaysia gets worse every year, driving people urgently needing their services crazy with exasperation.”

That was the opening sentence in a report in The Star published on March 4, 1976. As the song goes, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” Uh huh.

Thirty-six years on, we are still facing a shortage, although “domestic servants” have morphed into “domestic workers” a.k.a. “maids” of foreign origin.

Let’s see, in 1976, I was in secondary school and sharing household and cooking chores with my sisters. We had long dispensed with the services of a servant/maid. When the last local woman who did our laundry became unreliable, my parents bought our first washing machine and that was it.

Going further back, we had a mother-and-daughter team who did the laundry and cleaned house as well. Actually the daughter, Bedah, was more our playmate. We had fun playing hide-and-seek and masak-masak in the wooden doll-house my dad built.

And when I was a very little girl living in Penang, my mum had a young live-in servant. Poor Ah Hong had a hard time managing my unruly brother, who slashed her arm with a butter knife after a nasty spat. After we moved to Kuala Lumpur, we lost touch with her.

For most of my growing years, my family was fortunate enough to have domestic help who did the heavy-duty stuff. But we kids still had our chores: washing our school shoes, taking out the garbage, weeding the garden and mowing the lawn. One chore which I really hated was peeling and cleaning prawns as I would always end up with bleeding fingers.

When we were in-between servants (we never called them maids in those days), we did the sweeping, mopping, windows, fans, bathrooms and, the most back-breaking of all, the laundry by hand.

I also learned how to hammer nails, saw wood, change light bulbs, use an electric drill, paint walls and fences, build chicken coops, dig wells and even mix cement from my extremely clever handyman dad.

So where did I go so wrong with my own kids?

Do I blame it on the fact that both my husband and I work and we had no time nor the energy to mend and clean on the weekends, leaving it all to the maid, thereby setting a poor example to my kids?

Do I excuse myself that middle class families mollycoddle their children in these prosperous times?

Whatever the reason, I stand guilty of raising children who are inadequately skilled in a lot of things my generation took for granted or were expected to know.

Mind you, they are great kids. They never did drugs nor partied excessively; never got me summoned to school over their grades or discipline problems. As adults, they are articulate and interesting individuals. They are respectful and caring towards their grandparents who live with us.

Yet, they have never toiled at anything in the house and won’t even wash their own cups simply because they grew up with maids who did everything for them.

But to be fair to them, the rot started earlier. By “rot”, I mean the diminishing ability to be self-reliant in keeping one’s house in order without external help.

Because Dad could build, mend and repair just about anything and Mum was an excellent cook and extremely house-proud, between them, my siblings and I were taught a lot of skills.

My husband, on the other hand, isn’t as handy. His answer to fixing anything is super glue. Despite my childhood training, I haven’t applied my skills much either. I quite happily gave up gardening when my lawn-mower broke down,

Fortunately, we can enlist the services of a gardener, plumber or electrician to fix whatever stuff that goes on the blink because they are affordable.

And for now, a maid.

With all these support services, our lives are really easy and comfortable. The downside is today’s convenient ways have made us soft, lazy and wasteful.

Yet, things are changing. If 36 years ago, we moaned the extinction of local servants, now we moan about the availability of foreign maids.

The news isn’t good. No matter how hard our Government is trying to re-establish the supply line from Indonesia, the fact remains that Malaysia is not the first choice for such workers.

What’s more, the countries that have long supplied us with cheap labour are enjoying economic growth and with it better job opportunities for their people.

For now, we can take pride that almost any middle class family can hire a maid. In the not-too-distant future, it may not be the case any more. Already, the agency fees and the salaries are getting painfully high.

Ironically, the richer and more developed a country, the more expensive hired help is. So in countries like Australia, the United States and Britain, DIY stores are huge business because there they don’t call in the plumber or electrician at the slightest trouble. Live-in maids are only for the wealthy.

In all likelihood, the time my daughters marry, they will have to figure out how to keep house and raise kids without a live-in maid.

My son? He sheepishly admitted he didn’t know how to sew a loose button or a tear in his pants. For the sake of my future daughter-in-law and grandchildren, I have decided he’s going to start becoming a bit more like grandpa.

It starts this Saturday when my Indonesian maid goes on home leave for Hari Raya. As they say, “Necessity is the mother of invention” so this mother who has been terribly remiss with her children’s basic life skills, is going to invent some necessity on the home front.

More importantly, better late than never, especially when we still have clever grandpa to teach the kids a handy tip or two. No super glue for them.

So Aunty, So What? By JUNE H.L. WONG

 > The writer, if she could turn back time, would certainly have done some things differently in the way she raised her kids. On a more cheerful note, Selamat Hari Raya Aidil Fitri!

Google+ launches vanity URLs, catching up to Facebook, Twitter

The tech giant starts rolling out custom URLs for certain brands and users, like +britneyspears and +toyota. Now, memorizing those long strings of numbers could be a thing of the past.

Both Twitter and Facebook have offered vanity URLs personalized to users' accounts for years -- something that has been glaringly vacant in Google Plus' URLs. But, that's about to change.

Google's social network announced today that vanity URLs for profiles and pages are on their way. It has even begun rolling out a few for celebrities, like soccer player David Beckham and pop singer Britney Spears, along with brands like Toyota, Delta, and Hugo Boss.

Here's what Google product manager Saurabh Sharma wrote in a blog post today:

Your Google+ profile is a place for you to share your passions with the millions of people who come to Google each day...Today we're introducing custom URLs to make it even easier for people to find your profile on Google+. A custom URL is a short, easy to remember web address that links directly to your profile or page on Google+. 

Sharma writes that at first just a few "verified profiles and pages" will get custom URLs, but eventually they will be offered to "many more" people and brands around the world. It's not clear how Google is choosing who is "verified" and who isn't and the timeframe for the greater inclusion of vanity URLs.

This is likely welcome news for most Google+ users since memorizing long strings of numbers isn't exactly easy. For example, CNET's Google+ URL is https://plus.google.com/105198124856956810263/posts. But wouldn't https://plus.google.com/+CNET be much more manageable?

In other Google+ news, the social network also announced today that it is launching a new audio setting for hangouts called "Studio Mode," which optimizes sound specifically for music. Beforehand, hangout sound was tweaked for conversations; but now by clicking settings and switching from "Voice" to "Studio Mode," music should sound more like a live concert than a video conference.

"Since we launched Google+ a little over a year ago, we've seen a thriving community of musicians connect with fans in really cool ways," Google product manager Matthew Leske wrote in a blog post today. "In particular: singer/songwriters like +Daria Musk, bands like +Suite 709, and many others are using Hangouts On Air to perform live for global audiences, and jam with fans face-to-face."

by Dara Kerr C/Net news

Dara Kerr, a freelance journalist based in the Bay Area, is fascinated by robots, supercomputers and Internet memes. When not writing about technology and modernity, she likes to travel to far-off countries.  

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Google gets the Baidu blues again after mapping losses

Chinese rival set to overtake Google Maps

Google looks like being beaten again in China, as Baidu leaps ahead in the mobile mapping space.

The text ads giant was still second in the Quarterly Survey of China's Mobile Map Client Market, but only just, according to Beijing-based Analysys International.

Chinese player Autonavi was the market leader by a long way, with 25.7 per cent, and Google Maps came in second with 17.5 per cent, but had Baidu breathing down its neck in third with a 17.3 per cent share.

The momentum is with the Chinese search firm too – Baidu Maps' market share rose from 13.6 per cent in Q1 to 17.3 per cent in Q2 while Google’s fell from 23.2 per cent. As a result, Baidu is predicted to supplant Google in the current quarter.

To add to Google’s woes, the analyst said local users were having problems updating their version of its mapping client, while Apple is set to drop Google Maps as a pre-install on the next version of iOS, with reports suggesting Cupertino is working with Autonavi now in the region.

“If the above problems are not solved quickly, it's hard for Google map to reverse the situation,” wrote Analysys International in a blog post.

Baidu and Google are of course old foes in the search space, where the home-grown firm routed its Californian rival after Google moved its search servers to Hong Kong in 2010 over censorship concerns.

Google's market share is now around 16 per cent while Baidu dominates with around 78 per cent.

The mobile map market in China is growing at a staggering pace, jumping 206 per cent year-on-year last quarter to 229 million accounts, according to Analysys International.

The analyst predicted it would be a key battle ground for the next phase of the mobile internet given that maps and associated apps are closely tied to up to a quarter of mobile advertising. ®

By Phil Muncaster 
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Olympic superpower

Olympics: China, Koreas are big winners in London

China may not have repeated their feats of Beijing 2008, but their presence in the top two was never in doubt. (AAP)

China proved they've arrived as a genuine Olympic super-power, and both Koreas impressed -- but Japan were top of the flops among Asian countries at the London Games.

China may not have repeated their feats of Beijing 2008, when they topped the medals table for the first time, but with 38 golds their presence in the top two, behind the United States, was never in doubt.
  
South Korea were the only other Asian team in the top 10. North Korea, finishing 20th, had their best Games in 20 years, Hong Kong celebrated cycling bronze and Singapore won their first individual medal in 52 years.
  
India couldn't follow Beijing by claiming their second individual gold, but they finished with two silver medals and four bronze -- their highest individual total.
  
Much as expected, China's divers and badminton and table tennis players missed just two gold medals between them, and their weightlifters hoisted five titles at London's ExCeL.
  
But China's shooters were off-target compared to Beijing, winning only two golds, and their gymnasts dropped from seven victories in 2008 to three on the London apparatus.
  
China's track hopes went up in smoke when 110m hurdler Liu Xiang, the 2004 champion, heart-breakingly limped out of the heats for the second Games running with a career-threatening Achilles tendon tear.
  
But his brave hop down the track to the finish line, symbolic kiss of the last hurdle, and embrace by his waiting competitors, was one of the Games' most memorable images.
  
Meanwhile Sun Yang and Ye Shiwen, 16, led China to their best performance in the pool, claiming two wins and a world record each as the team broke through with five titles in one of the Olympics' top-tier events.
  
Sun became China's first male Olympic swimming champion in the 400m freestyle, and then broke the 1500m world record for the second time in a year.
  
Ye set a new mark in the women's 400m medley and also won the 200m medley, while Jiao Liuyang won the women's 200m butterfly. Unproven doping speculation surrounding Ye was angrily dismissed by Sun.
  
"People think China has so many gold medals because of doping and other substances, but I can tell you it is because of hard work," said Sun.
  
"It is all down to training and hard work that we have results. Chinese are not weaker than those in other countries."
  
China, South Korea and Indonesia were also embroiled in one of the Games' worst scandals, when eight badminton players were disqualified for trying to lose group ties to secure easier quarter-finals.
  
South Korea's peerless archers, included the legally blind Im Dong-Hyun, hit the bull's-eye with three out of four gold medals, and their shooters added three more at the Royal Artillery Barracks.
  
They had two more in judo and two in fencing -- but none for Shin A-Lam, whose tearful, hour-long protest over her loss in the women's epee semis won sympathy and media coverage, but no Olympic medal.
  
North Korea's Games made an unpromising start when their women's footballers were pictured next to the South Korean flag on a stadium big screen, prompting a lengthy protest.
  
But tiny, 1.52m (five foot) weightlifter Om Yun-Chol put them on the gold trail when he lifted three times his bodyweight to win the 56kg category with a world record-equalling 293kg.
  
Kim Un-Guk and Rim Jong-Sim also lifted their way to gold at the ExCeL venue, while An Kum-Ae got judo gold on the opening weekend as North Korea matched their best ever haul of four titles at Barcelona 1992.
  
Japan, who are bidding to host the Games in 2020, had high hopes of emulating their record total of 16 gold medals. But after a near-wipeout in the judo, they ended with just seven.
  
South Korea rubbed salt into the wound when they beat Japan, their fiercest rivals, 2-0 for men's football bronze.
  
South Korea's Park Jong-Woo celebrated by waving a politically sensitive banner laying claim to an island group claimed by both countries. He was later barred from collecting his medal.
  
Sarah Lee Wai-Sze pedalled to Hong Kong's first cycling medal, bronze in the keirin, and China-born Feng Tianwei ended Singapore's half-century wait for an individual medal with bronze in the women's table tennis.
  
Malaysia got their first diving medal after Pandelela Rinong's bronze in the 10m platform, and there was a wave of sympathy for badminton star Lee Chong Wei, who fell just short of claiming the country's first gold.
  
Indonesia won two weightlifting medals, but nothing in badminton for the first time in 20 years, and Thailand had medals in boxing, taekwondo and weightlifting.

Source: AF

Related posts:
China to the world: Work harder to beat us
Chinese supremacy at Olympics

Malaysian leaders should learn from Deng Xiaoping?

It’s all about leadership

Recent Asian political history provides us with some useful examples of effective leadership. However, the list, sadly, is not long.

WITH a general election in the offing, Malaysians are quite naturally thinking a lot about “leadership”.

Recent Asian political history provides us with some useful examples of effective leadership.

However, the list, sadly, is not long. Many of the men (and women) who have led our countries have also been deeply flawed.

For example, in the case of Jawaharlal Nehru, his ideas and rhetoric may well have been brilliant but his performance in government was often disappointing, if not disastrous.

Deng Xiaoping, conversely, stands out among Asia’s leaders. He’s also the subject of a recently published biography by the academic Ezra Vogel, Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China.

First, Deng did more to alleviate global poverty than anyone else in the past century. According to Bloomberg, more than 250 million Chinese escaped poverty during his stewardship.

Described by Mao Zedong as a “needle inside a ball of cotton”, the Szechuan province-born Deng rose to the top of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its Politburo after a long, arduous process, including two periods in political wilderness, the first of which was the Cultural Revolution.

By 1978, when he was returned to the centre of power, China was at its lowest ebb. As Vogel wrote: “The average per capita income of Chinese peasants, who made up 80% of the population, was then only US$40 per year (RM124). The amount of grain produced per person had fallen below what it had been in 1957.”

But China was lucky to have Deng at this critical juncture. By the late 1970s, Deng had accumulated more than 50 years of experience at the heart of the CCP, the military, high-level diplomacy and governance.

Deng was experienced, wily, determined and above all, extremely pragmatic.

Moreover, his family’s personal tragedy during the Cultural Revolution – his son Deng Pufang was crippled after being beaten by the Red Guards – made his desire to stabilise and strengthen China all the more intense.

Deng was lucky enough to have met and worked with outstanding leaders. For example, while studying in France in the mid-1920s, he was to forge a critical friendship with Zhou Enlai, who – in turn – grew to respect the diminutive but rock-solid Deng.

Similarly, in the years when the Communists were battling the Nationalists, Deng assumed a vital military role – leading men into battle; motivating, coordinating and administering hundreds of thousands troops, their supplies and their relations with the local communities.

His most enduring success was the Huaihai Campaign of 1948, after which the Communists were able to cross the Yangtze River without resistance, dealing a fatal blow to the Kuomintang and endearing Deng to Mao himself.

So while Deng is better-known for his achievements in the economic sphere – especially his transformation of the coastal provinces in the late 1970s and early 1980s – there’s no denying that his military experience in the field equipped him mentally to lead under pressure.

Having endured the chaos of the Cultural Revolution, Deng was understandably wary of relaxing political controls. He was no democrat. Instead, he saw discipline and loyalty to the CCP as absolutely critical.

Indeed, Tiananmen Square was proof his unshakeable belief in both the primacy of the CCP as well as the need for political stability at all costs.

Whilst we may disagree with what he did, there’s no denying his steadfastness.

Deng was detailed and meticulous in all matters – managing China’s administration with a firm hand.

Fortunately, his international exposure at an early age meant Deng was open to foreign ideas and when it was time for him to lead China; he was ready to embrace the world beyond the Middle Kingdom.

So what can Deng teach us about leadership? I think the following lessons can be drawn:

> Lead decisively and with conviction. If you make a decision you believe is right, stick by it. People respect (and fear) determination;

> Deng believed in education. He rebuilt China’s shattered universities after the Cultural Revolution and shielded the centres of learning from political interference;

> Leaders must prioritise, dealing with only the most critical obstacles to development. On assuming power, Deng took a close personal interest in overcoming the infrastructural glitches and political resistance to reform at Xuzhou’s critical railway hub – thereby sending out a strong message to those who dared challenge his authority; and

> Deng laid the foundations for China’s current, albeit uneven rise to power. His legacy is something Malaysian leaders should not ignore.

Ceritalah By Karim Raslan