China is changing the rule book for business, forcing multinational companies to figure out how to play a new game or risk losing out on the world’s second-largest economy. When China joined the World Trade Organization 13 years ago, the government welcomed foreign companies, eager for their factories and technology. Now China is using its growing economic and financial muscle to dictate new terms, as dozens of American, European and Japanese businesses face…
Posts published in November 2014
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has left for China on a two-day visit to attend the annual meeting of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) being held in Beijing. There, he is likely to sign 27 MoUs and agreements – 21 related to energy production – amounting to an estimated total of $33 billion. Much of this would have already been done had the Chinese President not cancelled his visit to Pakistan last month owing to the sit-ins…
BEIJING: Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif was accorded a warm welcome when he arrived here on Friday on a three-day visit to China. Besides holding talks with Chinese President Xi Jingping and Prime Minister Li Keqiang, he will represent Pakistan at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) meeting being held here. In a statement before leaving for the visit, the prime minister said he was going to China to save the people from extra…
BEIJING/ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif was accorded a warm welcome when he arrived in Beijing on Friday on a three-day visit to China. He was greeted by a smartly turned-out contingent of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Sources said that the visit would help in ushering in an era of development, prosperity and generating employment opportunities to over one million youth of the country. During his visit to China, the…
GWADAR: A vehicle of the Frontier Works Organisation (FWO) was damaged in a bomb blast in Panjgur town on Friday. According to official sources, the powerful explosion occurred near Rakhshan river when an FWO convoy was passing through the place. One of the vehicles in the convoy was damaged. “ It was a time device that was detonated by remote control to hit the FWO convoy,” police said. Security forces launched…
By Shabbir Mir in The Express Tribune, November 8th, 2014. GILGIT: Though fuel prices have been slashed by the government, the benefit is yet to trickle down to the people in Gilgit-Baltistan (G-B). “The prices of grocery and other daily commodities are still soaring,” said Imtiaz Khan, a resident of Gilgit, on Friday. “We were expecting a considerable decrease in prices of daily items transported to Gilgit but that has not happened,” he complained.…
GILGIT: At 8.30 in the morning on Thursday, Masroor Wali makes a beeline to a firewood vendor with hopes of stockpiling firewood, his family’s only line of defence against the biting cold of Gilgit. This is the third consecutive day Wali has gone in search for wood before he goes to work for the government. But he returns empty-handed as there is no firewood left in the market. Firewood is what winter in Gilgit-Baltistan…
By Simon Denyer in The Washington Post, November 6 at 5:11 PM BEIJING — When Chinese President Xi Jinping took a large government and business delegation to Tanzania on his inaugural trip abroad in March 2013, he took pains to emphasize that his country’s growing ties with Africa would benefit the people of the continent. But even as he spoke in glowing terms about unity and cooperation, his entourage was busy buying up thousands…
By EDWARD WONG in the NY Times, Nov 7, 2014 BEIJING — As a winter chill settled across China’s far northwest, 489 people boarded a chartered train in the city of Urumqi for the 50-hour ride to the country’s opposite corner, in semitropical Guangdong Province, to take up new factory jobs. “If I can adapt to life in Guangdong, I would consider opening a restaurant and settling down there,” said one passenger, Tahir Turghun,…
The author has been a Central Information Secretary of PML, remained associated in MRD formation and then as Member Central Coordination Committee of PDA. Regardless of history, if the senate committee is finally able to provide provincial status and local self-government to Gilgit-Baltistan, this would not only be a tremendous service to these people but it would also finally include the Gilgit-Baltistan territory into Pakistan. PHOTO: AFP One of the main and often…
ISLAMABAD: As Pakistan eagerly awaits the investment of US$35 billion from China, the Transparency International’s headquarter in Germany gave the lowest rating to the Chinese corporate sector for being the worst performers on transparency and anti-corruption. In its report “Transparency Incorporate Reporting 2014” released from Berlin on Wednesday afternoon, the TI declared Chinese companies operating outside China as the most non-transparent to prevent corruption. Similarly, the Bank of China has been assessed the…