Society

If Naheed Nenshi thinks he has development headaches, he's just met a man with 20 times the challenges.

Calgary's top civic politician sat down in Beijing with his counterpart Guo Jinlong on Thursday for a brief chance to talk shop.

Amid formal greetings in an ornate hall near Tiananmen Square, Calgary's mayor came face-to-face with the daunting problems confronting a metropolis with almost 20 million people and five million vehicles.

The two mayors of one-time Olympic cities chatted briefly about issues such as expanding urban transportation, energy use and explosive population growth, although the sheer scale of Beijing's challenges came sharply into focus.

China and North Korea have agreed to open at least two special economic zones of shared development, where Beijing and Pyongyang plan to install next-generation factories to improve the quality of the North Korean economy. But the risk, several sources tell AsiaNews, is that these two areas will become "a sort of free port, where China can send its most unwelcome dissidents and North Korea can hide the weapons it does not want the international community to see".

The agreement was signed during Kim’s third trip to China in just over a year, a journey marked by issues such as North Korea's devastated economy, subject to heavy sanctions from the UN, and Pyongyang's nuclear disarmament, the delay of which inspires the rest of the world with fear. Rumours indicate the two dictators have chosen the island of Hwanggumpyong - in the southern part of the Duman River - as the first areas and the province of Rajin-Sonbong

China's senior military official said Wednesday that Beijing will never seek to challenge the US' armed strength, but vowed that further arms sales to Taiwan would negatively impact Sino-US military ties.

In the first official visit to the US in seven years by a Chinese military official of his rank, Chen Bingde, chief of the General Staff of the People's Liberation Army (PLA), said that "China does not have the capability to challenge the US," according to AFP.

Addressing concerns in the US over China's military growth, Chen delivered a speech at the National Defense University on Wednesday, saying "although China's defense and military development have come a long way in recent years, a wide gap remains between us."

Both US Defense Secretary Robert Gates and China agreed that two sides needed to strengthen dialogue and cooperation, the Xinhua News Agency reported Thursday.

China ordered a halt to construction of one of its high-speed rail lines due to violations of environmental rules, the latest sign of greater government scrutiny toward a high-profile project that has already been jolted by corruption and debt concerns.

China's Ministry of Environmental Protection said in a statement on its website Wednesday that project managers from eastern China's planned Tianjin-Qinhuangdao high-speed railway failed to submit to required environmental inspections after they made location changes.

A woman who answered the phone at the Tianjin-Qinhuangdao Passenger Dedicated Line Co., which is managing the project, said the company declined to comment. The environment ministry didn't respond to a written request for comment.