New Delhi, Nov 2 : The China National Space Administration (CNSA) has categorically said that its first lunar probe program ’Chang'e-1’ has no military purposes.

"China has undertaken astronautical activities with the principle of 'peacefully utilizing space'," Pei Zhaoyu, the CNSA spokesman, said.

"The purpose of China's space program, including missions to probe lunar and outer space, is to explore the universe and benefit humanity," he said, adding that the country’s lunar probe is an open and transparent program.

New Delhi, Nov 2 : The shrinking of Glacier No 1 in China is severely threatening oases in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, scientists have warned.

Glacier No 1, which lies at the headwaters of the Urumqi River in the Tianshan Mountains, has shrunk by close to 14 percent in the past four decades, an unpublished survey conducted by the Chinese Academy of Sciences' (CAS) arid regions environment and engineering research institute revealed.

"Because of the continuous rise in temperature globally and in the western part of the country, the trend of glaciers retreating on a large scale will be irreversible," the China Daily quoted the report, as stating.

London, Nov 2 : Over eighty percent of toy factories in China's manufacturing hub are substandard, according to a survey.

In a survey conducted by the provincial authorities in Guangdong states, of the 1,726 factories inspected, 764 had their certificates revoked or suspended. A further 690 were ordered to renovate their facilities and improve product quality within a set period of time, The Telegraph reported.

In the wake of the findings of the survey, export quality certificates of one-third of factories have either being revoked or suspended.

200,000 inspectors scouring the province's industrial zones conducted the survey. The survey was a part of the wider inquiry into product safety.

Oct 31: Beijing has announced to build a new family of rocket launchers and a launch centre. According to the China Daily, the Long March 5 carrier rockets will be made in the northern coastal city of Tianjin, while the launch centre will be set up in the southernmost province of Hainan.

The new launchers will be able to carry up to 25 tons to near-Earth orbits, up from the current nine tons; and 14 tons to geosynchronous orbits, up from five tons. The diameter will be increased to five meters from 3.35 meters, the daily reported.

They are designed to launch space stations or heavyweight satellites, as the current Long March 3-A rockets cannot handle this.

The decision comes a week after the launch of the first lunar orbiter.

New Delhi, Oct 30 : According to the statistics from China’s birth deformity monitoring centre, the birth defects in babies have increased by nearly 40 percent since 2001.

Jiang Fan, deputy head of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, said that the rate of defects among all Chinese infants rose from 104.9 per 10,000 births in 2001 to 145.5 in 2006, affecting nearly one in every 10 Chinese households.

He said that of the 20 million babies born in China every year, 800,000 to 1.2 million of them are afflicted with defects.

As many as 300,000 are ‘visible deformities’, which means that birth deformities affect up to 6 percent of the children born every year on the Chinese mainland.

Beijing, Oct.26 : Chairperson of the UPA and Congress party President Sonia Gandhi was today told by Chinese President Hu Jintao that Beijing attaches great importance to its ties with New Delhi.

Interacting with Gandhi duriing a meeting in the Great Hall of the People here, Hu said:" You are the first foreign political leader to visit China after the conclusion of the 17th National Congress (on October 22), which is an indication of the importance both of us have attached to our relations."

Hu also said that he still retained fresh memories of recent visit to India (November 2006) and the warm reception accorded to him by the Indian Government and the country's people.

Harbin (China), Oct.26 : Harbin, the capital city of China’s most northeasterly Heilongjiang Province, is a more traditional city than the major cities of southern China, but this has not prevented its people from taking a liking to Munnabhai M.B.B.S, a new look Shahrukh Khan with his six- pack abs and Aishwariya Rai, the Bachchan bahu.

Though not as westernised or as noisy as other Chinese cities like Beijing and Shanghai, Harbin’s 10-million-strong population of which about four million live in the city, has taken a fancy to posters of Bollywood icons. It would not be wrong to say that the global phenomena of Bollywood mania has not even spared Harbin.

New Delhi, Oct.25 :  China will not embark on any lunar probe competition "in any form with any country" and will "share the results of its moon exploration with the whole world" in its pursuit of a policy of peaceful use of airspace, said a chief commander of the country's first lunar satellite project.

"The decision on the lunar probe was made completely in accordance with China's own conditions, which is not meant to be compared with others," Luan Enjie, chief commander of the lunar satellite project, told Xinhua.

Harbin, Oct 26 : India and China have decided to set up a working group to prepare the framework arrangement to resolve the longstanding border dispute, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said today.

He said that the 11th round of talks between the Special Representatives of India and China decided to set up the working group.

"We have discussed it at the 11th round of special representatives meeting that took place. It was successful and they have decided to set up a working group to prepare one framework arrangement. Let us wait for the recommendation of the working group," said Mukherjee after a 50-minute meeting with his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi.

New Delhi, Oct 25 : Congress President Sonia Gandhi along with her son and AICC General Secretary Rahul Gandhi arrived in Beijing today to boost bilateral relations between the two Asian giants.

Sonia is visiting China on the invitation of Chinese President Hu Jintao.

She is also accompanied by Minister of State for External Affairs Anand Sharma, Minister of State in PMO Prithviraj Chavan and Member of Parliament Dr. Karan Singh.

During her visit, UPA chairperson will meet Chinese President and other senior leaders of the Government and the Communist Party.

Harbin (China), Oct.24 : The troika dialogue between China, India and Russia witnessed a grandiose opening in the beautiful resort town of Harbin on Wednesday.

As leaders and officials raised a toast to each other in the huge ballroom of the plush Shangrilla Hotel, the mesmerizing sound of Chinese music, performed by a live orchestra, created an atmosphere of warmth and humility.

Chinese musicians were specially flown in from Beijing to perform at the event, which was complemented with sizzling and traditional Chinese delicacies, delighting the taste buds of participants.

New Delhi, Oct.23 : China's first moon orbiter is scheduled to blast off at around 6 p.m. on Wednesday from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Southwest China's Sichuan Province.

"It will be launched between October 24 and 26 and our first choice is around 6 pm on October 24," Li Guoping, spokesman for the China National Space Administration, was quoted by the China Daily as saying on Monday.

The launch window is about 35 minutes; and similar slots are available on Thursday and Friday, he added.

New Delhi, Oct.23 : Chinese workers in the country's Harbin area have spent the last three years building a huge earth dam to protect valuable dinosaur fossils, which are in danger of being washed away by the Heilongjiang River.

A horde of dinosaur bones lies buried in a mountain that sits right on the river that forms the boundary between China and Russia.

So far, thousands of dinosaur fossil bones have been unearthed from the mountain and assembled into 13 dinosaur skeletons, which are now exhibited in several museums nationwide, reports Xinhua.

New Delhi, Oct.22 : China is likely to become the world's second largest consumer market by 2015,  a Boston Consulting Group (BCG) report has claimed.

According to Xinhua, the report is based on a survey of 4,258 consumers in 13 Chinese cities from February to March 2007.

It says that Chinese consumers are experiencing an unprecedented wealth growth, which is three to five times faster than developed countries in the past 50 years, and adds that most Chinese consumers plan to spend more in the near future to fulfill their family dreams.

London, Oct.22 : Taiwan is developing a bomb designed to wipe out China's electrical system, according to the United Daily News.

The newspaper claims that Taiwan, which is still dubbed a "renegade province" by China, is working on a graphite bomb similar to one the U.S. reportedly used against Serbia in 1999.

The so-called "blackout bombs" would be carried by Hsiungfeng 2E cruise missiles to paralyze power systems of China's southeastern coastal cities, the United Daily News said.

The bombs work by sprinkling a cloud of chemically treated carbon fibers over power supplies, causing them to short-circuit, but without killing people.

New Delhi, Oct.19 :  Chinese taikonauts (astronauts) may start a branch of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in space, said the country's first taikonaut Yang Liwei.

China now has a 14-strong astronaut team. The team members, including Yang himself, are all CPC members.

"If China has its own space station, the taikonauts on mission will carry out the regular activities of a CPC branch in space in the way we do on earth, such as learning the Party's policies and exchanging opinions on the Party's decisions," the official Xinhua news agency quoted Yang, a delegate to the on-going CPC national congress in Beijing, as saying.

Beijing, October 18 : United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon has called upon the countries across the world to refocus attention and resources on the places and people that are being left behind in the efforts to reach the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) of poverty eradication.

Ban said that the global scorecard towards this goal is mixed.

New Delhi, Oct.17 : China wishes to join nations around the world in the peaceful exploration of outer space, a senior official said on Tuesday.

Li Xueyong, Vice-Minister of Science and Technology, said China is seeking to take part in the International Space Station program, which already includes the U.S., Russia, Japan, Canada, Brazil and 11 members of the European Space Agency.

"We hope to become the 17th partner of the global US-led project," Li told reporters on the sidelines of the 17th CPC Congress.

Shanghai, Oct.16 :  A senior International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) official has said that China and India will outpace other countries in the next two decades with the help of nuclear power.

"In China, in India, you have very definite plans for increasing the nuclear capacity six to 10 times for 20 years, this is really fast growth.The growth of the world is not so fast," said Yury Sokolov, IAEA's Deputy Director-General and the Head of the Department of Nuclear Energy.

New Delhi, Oct. 15 : China will not engage in arms race and will never seek hegemony over any region, President Hu Jintao told delegates at the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China on Monday.

Jintao, who is also the General Secretary of CPC Central Committee, pledged that China would follow "a national defence policy that is defensive in nature, and it does not engage in arms race or pose a military threat to any other country."

"China opposes all forms of hegemonism and power politics and will never seek hegemony or engage in expansion," The China Daily quoted him, as saying.