Chine: La Démocratie et la Dynamique du Pendule

La population chinoise vit encore au rythme de la souffrance

Cette affaire du prix Nobel de la paix accordé vendredi depuis Oslo à un dissident chinois, Liu Xiaobo, est une opportunité pour le pouvoir chinois qui doucement, lentement, glisse vers la notion de démocratisation à la chinoise. Au sein même des opposants chinois, tous ne partagent pas le même enthousiasme que les membres du Comité du Nobel.

Wei Jinsgsheng qui a "séjourné" près de 20 ans en prison en Chine pour avoir demandé la 5e modernisation, "la Démocratie", ne s'est pas privé de traiter Liu de "collaborateur" du régime chinois. Pour Pékin, Liu et son Nobel est une mouche écrasée d'un revers de la main. Il n'y aura pas d'aventurisme avec ce Nobel de la Paix ignoré en Chine comme dans la plupart des pays asiatiques, mais le pouvoir répondra par une ligne politique droite comme une avenue pékinoise. Ce pouvoir vit des rivalités et il donne de la vie en Chine l'image souffrante d'une extrême difficulté d'être, en particulier chez la jeunesse.

Pourtant, à qui veut les lire, des signes évidents d'un remue ménage au plus haut niveau du pouvoir chinois sont peu à peu révélés par les médias chinois et les blogs qui perlent la toile de sursauts réconfortants malgré les censures et la férocité de la répression dans un pays qui n'a pas ré-inventé sa liberté depuis 1949.

Mais si Pékin n'a pas réagit avec force, c'est aussi parce que en Chine même, ce Nobel de la Paix répond fondamentalement à des exigences, à l'air du temps qui souffle sur l'empire du milieu. Lors du 30e anniversaire de l'ouverture de la zone économique spéciale de Shenzen, le 26 août dernier, Wen Jiabao, a prononcé un discours inattendu dans lequel il affirmait la nécessité pour le régime de poursuivre la réforme du système politique. Cette prise de position s'inscrivait dans la ligne de ce discours qu'il avait donné à l'université de Pékin en mai dernier, lors des célébrations du Mouvement du 4 mai, et d'un éloge très appuyé en avril de Hu Yaobang, ancien numéro 1 du Parti Communiste Chinois(1982 -1987).

Depuis, la presse chinoise ne laisse plus une journée sans que des allusions et commentaires apparaissent sur les vues réformatrices de Wen. Exemple dans le quotidien du sud de la Chine Xiaoxiang Zaobao: "... si le système politique n'est pas réformé, la modernisation ne pourra pas réussir, la poursuite de la croissance économique est alors conditionnée à la réforme politique, même si celle-ci demeure encore imprécise et fugace..." Pas commun de lire des phrases dont beaucoup ont rêvé dans ce grand pavillon rouge. La presse chinoise, protégée par de puissants personnages, se lâche de plus en plus fréquemment.

Wen Jiabao

Le fait est établi qu'au plus haut niveau de la politique chinoise, les signes d'une transformation de la vie politique sont avancés, sans pour autant en assurer les contours ou les recettes.

On se souvient du télégramme d'appel à la paix de l'Empereur du Japon HiroHito adressé aux Etats-Unis, information restée secrète durant des décennies, avant que les Soviétiques n'entrent en guerre avec le Japon. La réaction de Washington avait alors été de bombarder Hiroshima (Uranium) et de renouveler sur Nagasaki (Plutonium) devant un Japon exsangue, en guise d'avertissement au "père Joseph" [Staline]. Confirmation faite de sources autorisées d'Hiroshima.

Aujourd'hui les signes d'une modernisation nécessaire conduite en parallèle aux progrès miraculeux de l'économie chinoise requièrent quelques encouragements, et ce malgré les coups de mentons de la propagande chinoise vitupérante et menaçant à présent la Norvège de possible (répétons, "possible") représailles.

Rien de plus encourageant pour les modernisateurs chinois en lutte face aux conservateurs du régime! Un mouvement ininterrompu dans la continuité depuis la Chine du XXe siècle pas mécontente de nos jours qu'un geste aussi puissant accorde "très politiquement" un Nobel de la Paix à Liu Xiaobo.

Ce qui, symboliquement, revient à exprimer aux autorités et à l'opinion chinoise que le droit à la critique est un droit fondamental pour permettre au(x) pays et aux citoyens d'avancer sur la route du progrès politique, y compris en Chine (progrès jusqu'alors dicté mot à mot par les caciques du PCC), du progrès social, économique, culturel, artistique, numérique, de la lutte contre la corruption...

Un message attendu par ceux et celles en Chine soucieux d'exercer des droits politiques autres que ceux imposés par la seule volonté d'un parti unique, matrice des réformes et du "prêt a penser" modèle "Mao 49 réformé Deng 79."

Ainsi, un petit sondage, avec des sources chinoises occupant diverses fonctions à divers échelons de la grande nation chinoise, me laisse entendre qu'elles ne sont pas toutes mécontentées par cette "annonce surprise du Nobel de la Paix à un dissident chinois" car me disent-elles "c'est ainsi que la révolution chinoise s'est affirmée" en luttant contre les dynasties impériales corrompues et les invasions étrangères dont françaises, britanniques, japonaises, russes. Naturellement c'est la question de la réforme politique, moteur au décollage de la Chine comme la grande puissance économique du 21e siècle moins que politique, qui demeure aujourd'hui l'un des grands thèmes d'action en préparation du 12e Congres du PCC en 2012.

C'est ici que 3 "factions" s'opposent: les militaires, le parti, les financiers issues de l'appareil du parti auxquels il faut ajouter des éléments encore flous mais primordiaux, des provinciaux avec les grandes rivalités régionales et les école historiques, école de Shanghai de Jiang Zemin par exemple.

Wulingyuan, Hunan, 3 000 pics de grès à quartzite, torrents, gorges, étangs

Lorsque l'ingénieur Wen Jiabao a questionné le système et lancé son appel "Zhengzhi Tizhi Gaige", il a ouvert, lui, le premier-ministre, la voie aux réflexions d'une possible évolution, répétant ainsi des messages de prédécesseurs tel Hu Yaobang, Deng Xiaoping, Zhu Rongji. Un sentier qui ne souffre désormais aucune interruption mais des accommodements qui seront dictés impérieusement et exclusivement par la Chine, à son rythme et selon son bon plaisir. De quoi déplaire aux va-t-en-guerre de tous poils.

Un enjeu dont le Japon économique et politique en comprend aujourd'hui encore toutes les facettes. Preuve que le dialogue et la confiance continuelle demeurent entre les 2 géants asiatiques? En pleine crise d'urticaire sino japonaise dite des Senkaku Daioyu qui a vu les Etats Unis souffler le chaud et le froid sur l'actuel premier ministre Kan et son imprudent nouveau ministre des affaires étrangères Maehara, c'est le numéro 2 du gouvernement, le Chief Cabinet Secretary monsieur Sengoku qui a négocié avec Pékin. Il a préparé la rencontre avec les chinois, 25 minutes à Bruxelles lors de l'ASEM, en la personne du conseiller d'Etat chargé des Affaires étrangères de la République populaire de Chine (rang de ministre) monsieur Dai Bingguo.

Rencontre inespérée alors qu'un certain machiavélisme politico-médiatique s'était mis en route depuis Washington avec ces quelques "haineux théologiens du temps"qui l'emportaient sur le réalisme dans cette délicate adaptation politique chinoise de la Dynamique du Pendule.*

Reste à voir ce que Pékin va dévoiler de ses intentions lors des prochaines réunions à Hanoi, berceau des farouches luttes d'indépendances asiatiques, de l'Asean +3 et du Sommet de l'Asie Orientale (East Asian Summit), du 25 au 30 octobre.

Cela dit, inconditionnel du droit à l'expression et de l'Etat de droit, AG réclame la libération de Liu, et je me demande à présent si ce post sera lisible et accessible en Chine Pop. Donc fidèles lecteurs, à vos stats'!

Mt.Taishan, dans la province du Shandong

*"A chaque oscillation, le pendule repasse exactement par sa position de lancement qui est aussi sa position d'équilibre". C'est la théorie du physicien français Jean Bernard Léon Foucault.

Sources: Traduction de l'anglais d'un "papier" du reporteur.

Kan Boosts Japan's Budget with a Brobdingnagian 5 Trillion Yen check

'Diet VIP Ozawa Ichiro' s hard talks ahead!

Today, Kan's cabinet decided an extra budget worth 5.05 trillion yen ($61.33 billion) to boost Japanese economy. The extra budget includes support for workers seeking employment and increases child-related support and subsidies for environmentally efficient home renovations. Kan's government says it will add 0.6 percentage point to the GDP growth... Yesterday at the Diet some politicians claimed Kan won't even end his mandate 1) as surveys started to enter into a falling spiral effect and 2) because the archipelago entered into a concerted opposition with China regarding the Senkoku Daioyu islands' territorial disputes, 3) unknown crisis factor.

But how to pass such a gigantic budget when the ruling party walks with such a thorn in the foot in the person of the senior DPJ member Ozawa who wrote all the DPJ Manifesto that brought DPJ to victory? -- Ozawa has the nickname of Shadow Shogun and is rumored to be involved in a money scandal--. Ozawa controls one third of the DPJ Diet members and he is ready to rock the DPJ's boat! Facing him, the party VIPs' fear Ozawa could become a liability for the ruling party as it tries to pass this fiscal 2010 supplementary budget through the Diet and will require new sacrifices to Japanese citizens. Especially with such gigantic numbers.

Ichiro Ozawa an enigmatic and resourceful politician, arch enemy of the ex Socialist current Chief cabinet Secretary Sengoku has played central role to Japanese politics for decades and commands a sizable following of lawmakers in Japan's powerful lower house of parliament. Ozawa is repeatedly said by local media to have planned the 2009 DPJ's election campaign which propelled the party to an historic victory that brought an end to nearly half a century of Liberal Democratic rule in Japan.

Court?

A judicial panel of ordinary citizens has decided Ozawa, 68, should be indicted, meaning the Tokyo court must appoint lawyers to prosecute him over a case that goes back to 2004 and involves his political fund management body called Rikuzankai. In June, along with former Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama's resignation, Ozawa, his ally, supporter of an Asian regional organization shaped on the European Union also stepped down from his position as DPJ Secretary General at the same time. He was the prime target of the conservative and US media, curiously associated in a political witch-hunt.

For the records, it is a fact that Japanese politicians receive money gifts from supporters and companies. It is not illegal but under certain rules. For instance, Ozawa is well connected to the construction companies, while Maehara, current foreign affairs minister is said by Japanese sources to be supported by all Japanese firms associated with business operations in the US. Others? Hatoyama Yukio and his conservative brother Kunio both are the beneficiary of a family fortune coming from the Bridgestone empire. Everyone knows in Japan about Zokujin's money.

Maybe the specialist of "Structure of Power", the Literature Nobel Price Vargas Losa, has an answer to explain and maybe resolve this never ending Japanese political earthquake provoked by financial scandals, political instability and denials of political pledges?

Sources: Reporter's Notes

Did Japan try to acquire the nuclear bomb?

According to a senior government official in Tokyo, Japan is to investigate a report that it considered arming itself with nuclear weapons in the late 1960s despite its pacifist vow to shun them. Public broadcaster NHK reports that Japan secretly considered going nuclear and sought advice from what was then West Germany in meetings with foreign ministry officials in February 1969 in the Japanese resort of Hakone.

The explosive report cited confidential West German foreign ministry documents. In the secret talks, the Japanese side said it had sufficient technology to produce nuclear weapons to guard itself against the "nuclearisation" of the region after China conducted a nuclear test in 1964.

Seen as an answer to Chinese successful test?

Indeed China exploded an atomic bomb at 15:00 hours on October 16, 1964, successfully carrying out its first nuclear test. At that time, Chinese propaganda wrote: "The Chinese Government pointed out long ago that the treaty on the partial halting of nuclear tests signed in Moscow in July 1963 by the United States, Britain and the Soviet Union was a big fraud to fool the people of the world, that it was an attempt to consolidate the nuclear monopoly of the three nuclear powers."

History is source of learning...

Sources: Break the Nuclear Monopoly, Eliminate Nuclear Weapons (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1965), pp. 1-5." NHK, Afp, Reporter's notes.

Asem: Japanese PM Kan and Chinese PM Wen playing cat and mouse in Brussels!

Japan Coast Guard personnel seen here disembark Zhan Qixiong

Captain of a Chinese fishing boat arrested by JCG

Japan and China hot on territorial disputes

PM Kan and PM Wen met on the sidelines of the two-day Asia-Europe Meeting that opened Monday in Brussels. They met for 25 minutes after the working dinner. The meeting was not announced in advance. The leaders had earlier seemed to avoid each other during the summit, staying apart during a photo opportunity at the start of the meeting, with the Chinese leader pointedly avoiding eye contact with Kan.

Kan told his Chinese counterpart that the Sentaku Islands are integral part of the Japanese territory. Wen had a bigger picture in mind: "We should intensify macro-economic policy coordination, manage with caution the timing and pace of an exit strategy from economic stimulus, and keep the exchange rates of major reserve currencies relatively stable, promote economic restructuring, gradually remove the systemic and structural risks, enhance fiscal sustainability and build internal drivers of economic growth". Not sure Kan got the whole point in such a short time One plus One in a corridor of Brussels's 8th Asem. But he made it clear in a speech. Indeed Kan is under hot fire domestically for seeming to give in to China's demands to free the captain, and he made a criticism of China in a speech. "It is important to mutually respect shared rules of the international community, including those of transactions of raw materials and trade in order to deepen the mutually interdependent relations between Asia and Europe and to achieve mutual growth."

Voter support for Kan's government dropped to 49 percent from 64 percent last month, a survey by the Mainichi newspaper showed while recent Yomiuri Shimbun survey clearly shows that public opinion toward China has deteriorated severely.

No need to see too far to understand that this story between the Japanese authorities and China agitate the regional order at a moment when the US plays hard cards with Japan on the divisive Okinawa Futenma issue.

"This is the latest incident in a long series of destructive incidents" according to defense specialists sources.

Sources: Mainchi, Asahi, Xinhua, Afp, Reuters, Yomiuri, Reporter's notes.

Europe Asia: Fast Track on the Asian Highway Network!

European and Asian leaders begin three days of talks Monday centered on trade, IMF reform and climate change, after positive commitment from China to the Euro zone and financial support for the Greeks but under the cloud of a territorial spat between Japan and China that puzzles members states, especially on issues of legally bound obligations and treaties. ASEM, which meets every two years, groups the EU, the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), China, Japan, South Korea, India, Pakistan and Mongolia, and new members Australia, New Zealand and Russia.

Leaders will meet at the royal palace in Brussels for the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) for two days, followed by separate European Union summits with South Korea and China on Wednesday. Also the 27-nation EU will sign a major free trade deal with South Korea. With Beijing, the EU wants China to open up its market to European companies while China wants the EU to drop a 21-year-old arms embargo and formally award it recognition as a market economy. In recent years, China has repeatedly demanded an end to the embargo, arguing that its security policies are fully in line with international rules. The EU, meanwhile, wants a summit promise that EU firms will be allowed to bid for state contracts.

Europe Asia represent 60 percent of the world population and global trade. Reform of the IMF will likely feature high on the agenda after the EU signaled Friday its willingness to cede some power at the international lender to emerging powers, which say Europe is over-represented. On climate change, ASEM leaders will share the goal "of reaching urgently a fair, effective and comprehensive legally binding outcome," and the ASEM summit coincides with a final preparatory meeting in the northern Chinese city of Tianjin for UN climate talks opening in November in Cancun, Mexico.

In an ambitious move reminiscent of the organization of the G8 summits set in versailles in the 70's by ex president Giscard d'Estaing, or on currency accords of the 1980s, President Nicolas Sarkozy hopes to open a debate on the currency subject when France takes over the presidency of the G20 group of leading nations in November as France has long advocated greater global economic governance.

As commentator Pfaff wrote "Since the second world war, under the influence of the dual victories of the war and cold war, European politicians, especially in Britain, have regularly pronounced on the long-lived bond uniting Europe and the United States. But even Nicolas Sarkozy now is disabused of this rhetoric". Today the situation has moved so rapidly that France, and EU accelerate the path of their commitment and trade relation with Asia, and China Japan Korea Indonesia Singapore India in particular.

Meaning: an other engagement is available more cooperative and sustainable, trans-national but it first requires a new network and easier circulation for cultural interactions, larger development and trade exchanges. This is what AG highlights in today's insight.

Imagine riding on a 141.204 kilometers Asian Highway, from Western Europe to East Asia!

The Silk Road began in China and traversed Central Asia, West Asia, Africa and reached Europe. This strategic route was instrumental not only in linking the ancient world but also in developing and promoting key economic and cultural partnerships between the East and West, especially the Chinese, Indian, Persian, Arabian, Greek, Roman, Venetian, France cultures. Today, the Silk Road is re-branded as the "The Asian Highway Network."

The 50 billion euro plans of an Asian Highway network interlaces with 32 countries, connects Asia with Europe, and promises to boost regional economies by facilitating trade and tourism through its linkage of Asian seaports, airports and major tourist destinations, highway, roads. It also fleshes out dreams of a Pan-Asian community with a common socio-political-economic identity analogous to the European Union.

The Asian Highway is becoming the latest element of a growing highway economy worldwide, in which highways are increasingly operated as for profit assets. Conceived in 1959, the Asian Highway took off with the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) promoting it more ardently in the past two decades.

A big breakthrough came in April 2004 when 23 Asian countries signed the Asian Highway agreement in the 60th session of UNESCAP at Shanghai. The agreement, active since 2006 July 4, finalized the route map across Asia and established basic technical standards for roads and route signs.

With Eurasia and China, India rising economies joining the Japanese and Korean economical giants boom, and the South East Asian economic development, the project reached a level of necessity. Reason is: Trade is the oldest form of human, economic and cultural exchanges.

No wonder why Japanese, Europeans and north Americans are bringing investments to control major segments of these nations economies passing above the war torn Middle East region.

For her part China consolidates her highway network with the East including the Korean peninsula, the West and the South and the South East of Asia as the maps illustrates.

Not only a journey on concrete roads but also a Hi-Tech journey. It will add technological advances as seen over the years. Researchers worldwide are to take key components from the past and transform them so as to meet a more advanced future. The Silk Road culture has not been ignored. Researchers in the Central Asia region, including Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan, have received EUR 5 million from the EU's Europe Aid Cooperation Office to ensure better and faster internet capacity. More to come.

Japan, the island nation part of the same Network?

An undersea tunnel Japan Korea? In early 2008 the tunnel proposal came under renewed discussions by ten senior Japanese lawmakers who established a new committee to pursue it. This was followed by a study group from both countries in early 2009 that agreed to form a committee for the creation of specific construction plans. Committee head Huh Moon-do, a former director of South Korea's National Unification Board said the tunnel would help regional economics and societies.

In early 2008 the tunnel proposal came under renewed discussions by ten senior Japanese lawmakers who established a new committee to pursue it. This was followed by a study group from both countries in early 2009 that agreed to form a committee for the creation of specific construction plans. Committee head Huh Moon-do, a former director of South Korea's National Unification Board said the tunnel would help regional economics and societies.

On September 23rd, the Korea Herald published the story http://bit.ly/dmsRFa "Korea considers underwater tunnels to China, Japan" "The three undersea tunnels for high-speed trains and automobiles currently being considered are the Mokpo-Jeju (167 kilometers) section; Incheon-Weihai (341 kilometers) section and Busan-Fukuoka (222.6 kilometers) section. If realized it would only take 2 hours and 47 minutes to get to Jeju Island from Seoul. Such projects were mentioned in the ministry’s recently presented plan to expand the country’s bullet train network by 2020, due to the increasing importance of “mega regions” in the global economy."

The Silk Road New Odyssey in a Roadster, from Paris to Tokyo... Soon a reality?

Sources: OECD, IMF, Europe Aid Cooperation Office, ESCAP, Agencies, Nissan photo, Reporter's notes (edited)