Beijing - A giant panda at Beijing Zoo has mauled a third intruder who climbed into its enclosure, state media said on Thursday.

The 110-kilogram panda, Gugu, bit the legs of a man surnamed Zhang who climbed into the pen to retrieve a toy dropped by his young son on Wednesday, the Beijing Morning Post said.

The animal's attack on Zhang, a tourist from the eastern province of Anhui, was its third reported in the last three years.

Beijing - Executives of the Chinese lorry manufacturer Beiqi Foton said Wednesday they expected an envisaged joint venture with German concern Daimler to be launched in August, a year after the two sides signed a letter of intent on the project.

After a board meeting Foton said that they expect that within three years' time the joint venture compnay would be producing 100,000 medium-sized and heavy-duty lorries.

The 50-50 joint venture plans foresee Daimler investments of around 2.8 billion yuan (410 million dollars) in the project, half of the joint venture's registered capitalisation of
5.6 billion yuan.

Beijing - Ailing Bank of America Corp sold a 2.8-billion-dollar share of China Construction Bank Corp, the Chinese bank confirmed Wednesday, expressing understanding for the move, owing to the US lender's difficult financial situation.

China Construction Bank said Bank of America's sale of 5.62 billion shares, or 12-per-cent stake, of its holdings in China's second-largest bank after Industrial & Commerical Bank of China was "normal market behaviour."

The US lender now holds 16.6 per cent of China Construction Bank, whose shares plunged almost 6 per cent at the Hong Kong stock exchange.

Beijing - China's authorities on Wednesday issued licences for third-generation (3G) mobile phone services to three operators.

The three operators, China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom, now granted access to the world's largest mobile phone market with 600 billion users will all pursue individual technologies, the official Xinhua news agency said.

Beijing, Jan. 5 : British luxury saloon maker Jaguar will recall 87 sedans in China after receiving complaints of warning system flaws.

China''s quality supervisor claimed on Sunday that speakers on the Jaguar XF units often fail to voice warnings like signals indicating turns and seat belt conditions.

According to a report in Xinhua, the company has decided to recall a total of 3,754 XF units worldwide for the same problem.

The recall in China will start from today and involve vehicles produced between October 2007 and March 2008, said the GAQSIQ.

It said Jaguar dealers would check the car speakers'' function and make reconfiguration.

Beijing  - China's estimated foreign trade surplus rose to a record 290 billion dollars last year despite a global slowdown hitting exports in the second half of the year, state media said on Sunday.

Foreign trade for 2008 totalled about 2.55 trillion dollars, up 18 per cent from 2007, the official Xinhua news agency quoted a report by China's customs administration as saying.

The estimated trade growth was marginally below the rate for 2007, "because of the worsening financial crisis and ensuing global recession" towards the end of last year, the agency quoted the report as saying.

Monthly foreign trade fell by 9 per cent year-on-year in November, the first monthly drop since since October 2001.