Extracts. Musharraf May Visit China, Saudi Arabia: Pakistani Official. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf intended to visit Pakistan's two closest allies, China and Saudi Arabia, for talks on the crisis resulting from Tuesday's terrorist attacks on the United States , a foreign office official said Sunday. "The president is considering a short trip to both China and Saudi Arabia," said the official, adding "the exact program has not yet been finalized, but he may leave for China on Monday." It is known that Musharraf has already held discussions with Chinese ambassador to Islamabad in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks in the U.S., which are likely to trigger retaliatory strikes on Afghanistan, where Osama bin Laden, the alleged "prime suspect", is believed to live. **** Israel Asked by US to Join Anti-Terrorism Coalition:Sharon. The United States has invited Israel to participate in the proposed anti-terrorism coalition following last Tuesday's unprecedented attacks in America, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon revealed on Monday. Sharon told Israel's Army Radio that he spoke with U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell by phone overnight, in which Powell promised that "if Israel wishes to join, it is certainly invited." U.S. President George W. Bush is assembling a coalition to " fight against terrorists," specifically those from Islamic radical organizations, who Bush believed were behind the attacks in New York and Washington. It was reported that while Washington is eagerly trying to invite some Arab states, such as Syria and Iran, into the coalition to fully isolate its prime target, Afghanistan's Taliban movement, the U.S. is reluctant to ask Israel to join due to Israel's bad image in the Arab world. Israel has occupied the Palestinians' West Bank and Gaza Strip since the 1967 Mideast war and it has clashed with the Palestinians for nearly a year since last September. More than 800 people, most of them Palestinians, have been killed in the violence. In an interview with Israel's Jerusalem Post daily, which was published on Monday for marking the Jewish New Year on Tuesday, Sharon said: "Will Israel be a factor in the coalition? We are not building the coalition - we are willing to help." Sharon also told Army Radio that the U.S. should condition Syria's inclusion into such a coalition on that the Muslim state stops hosting militant groups against Israel. The hawkish prime minister urged the U.S. to prevent Syria from joining the United Nations' Security Council, if Syria refuses to " expel terrorist groups." On whether Washington, in building such a coalition, may push Israel to the side or even urge Israel to make concessions regarding the relations with the Palestinians, Sharon said: "I have made it clear to the (U.S.) administration, as well as to a list of countries in Europe, that while stability in the Middle East is important to them and is very important to Israel, we will not pay the price for that stability. We will simply not pay for it." "If you ask me whether Israel will make concessions so that one Arab country or another will take part in the coalition, the answer is an emphatic NO," Sharon added. **** S.Korean President Meets Head of DPRK Delegation. South Korean President Kim Dae-jung said Monday that delegations from Seoul and Pyongyang should understand and cooperate each other at the fifth inter-Korean ministerial meeting in bid to achieve more fruits. During meeting with Kim Kyong Song, head of the delegation of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) Monday afternoon, President Kim also expressed hope that the South-North Joint Declaration signed on June 15 last year could be carried out so that the inter-Korean ties could further improve. Meanwhile, President Kim pointed out that the international situation has become more complicated due to the terrorist attacks in the United States, the two sides should further seek peace and implement the joint declaration at the special time. In response, Kim Kyong Song, senior cabinet councilor of the DPRK, said the ministerial talks held under the current complex international situation show the efforts by both sides to implement the joint declaration, which was signed by President Kim and DPRK leader Kim Jong Il at the close of the first inter-Korean summit in Pyongyang. The DPRK official also said he will try his best to make the talks fruitful, adding that both sides could make great progress in their ties so long as they work in accordance with the spirit of the joint declaration. The two delegations are close to an agreement on the issues of common concerns and they will issue a joint statement after completing the talks Tuesday, said Lee Bong-jo, spokesman of the South Korean delegation, Monday afternoon. Last Tuesday, the negotiators held a series of working-level discussions, including early relinking the severed inter-Korean railway and highway, restoration of inter-Korean Red Cross talks, a tourism program of an overland route for South Koreans to the DPRK Mount Kumgang and sports exchanges. "Negotiations are still underway, but we expect a good result on the Mount Kumgang tourism project," the spokesman said in an evening briefing. However, he indicated that talks on the DPRK demand for electricity aid failed to make progress. At Sunday's talks, the DPRK delegation repeated its earlier demand for electricity supply. At the fourth ministerial inter- Korean talks last December, Pyongyang required Seoul to provide 500,000 kilowatts of electricity. Earlier Monday, Kim Ryong Song expressed his optimism about the prospects for the talks, saying "opinions between South and North are being narrowed considerably and the speedy progress is a promising sign." The 27-member DPRK delegation arrived here Saturday afternoon for the four-day talks. **** Seoul, Pyongyang Agree to Further Cooperation. The fifth inter-Korean ministerial meeting ended Tuesday in Seoul with a five-point agreement reached. The two sides promised to increase official and civic cooperation and exchanges. **** Primary Need for Standardizing Government Behavior In recent years, along with the reform of government institutions, change in government functions as well as the gradual establishment of a socialist market economic structure, the State has made unremitting efforts and achieved fruitful results in standardizing government behavior. However, there is no need for reticence, the step taken to standardize government behavior is obviously lagging behind the requirement for market economic development. The phenomenon in which the government acts both as an "athlete" and the "umpire", both as the formulator of the rules of a game and as a participant in the distribution of benefits, has not been completely eradicated; the overlapping of functions and unclearly defined division of labor between government departments have resulted in man-less or redundant management; some managerial personnel are still used to the way of management adopted under the planned economic system, etc. Non-standardization of government behavior is, on the one hand, due to no distinction between administration and enterprise and between administration and institution, when the government is drafting policies and regulations, it will inevitably make these policies and regulations in favor of the enterprises and institutions with which it has countless ties, and has therefore brought about the monopoly of trade or unfair competition; and, on the other hand, due to relations of interest, it is hardly possible for the government to be fair, open and just while conducting market inspection and management. As a result, some punishable market acts are not duly penalized, there exist serious phenomena of regional and departmental protection and the connection of power and benefit has fundamentally weakened government inspection and management over the market., which constitutes an important reason for the chaos in market order. In addition, the government has managed many things which it shouldn't have to, thus decentralizing the limited managerial resources and resulting in insufficient management effort and also making it difficult to establish the authority of inspection and management. At the same time, the government behavior caused by the motivation of benefits can easily become a hotbed for breeding corruption. The above-mentioned phenomenon, if allowed to develop unchecked, will bring adverse effect on the in-depth development of the work of rectifying and regulating the market economic order, to avoid this, it is essential to make up our minds to further standardize government behavior. To this end, it is necessary to further straighten out the functions of government departments, clearly define responsibilities and division of labor, and avoid redundancy or omissions in management resulted from the overlapping of functions; government at all levels should dissociate themselves completely from various kinds of production and business activities and intermediary institutions, really introduce the separation of administration from enterprises, and administration from institutions, act as good "umpires" and refrain from acting as "athletes"; they should earnestly reduce administrative examination and approval, accelerate the liquidation of items for administrative examination and approval, administrative examination and approval without a legal basis or which can be substituted with market mechanisms should be resolutely abolished, with regard to administrative examination and approval which is needed to be retained according to law, it is necessary to make public procedures and simplify formalities, at the same time, it is necessary to establish a system of investigating and affixing responsibility for administrative examination and approval; it is necessary to break regional blockade and monopoly of trade, dismantle various kinds of "fence walls" that partition the market, forbid any work units and individuals from obstructing or interfering by any form in the entry of non-local products or engineering construction service into the local market, and really set up a unified, open, competitive and orderly market system. Non-Standard Government Behavior Disrupts Bidding Market The bidding for the construction of a new outpatient building attached to the Zhangzhou City Hospital in Fujian <http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/data/province/fujian.html> Province, which is in serious violation of the bidding law, is only an example illustrating the chaotic situation of the bidding market. Over the past year and more since the bidding law was put into practice, various public works and the State's key construction projects that met the State-set scale standards have generally followed the bidding system. However, problems remain very serious, for example, some construction units resorted to deception by evading public bidding; in the process of invitation for bid, they violated the legal procedures, their operation was non-standard; administrative departments in charge of construction failed to manage effectively, law enforcement was not strict enough, and no distinction was made between administration and enterprises and between administration and institutions. According to an official with the policy and regulation department under the State Development Planning Commission <http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/data/organs/statecouncil.shtml#sdpc> , the non-standard government behavior in public bidding is manifested mainly in the following four aspects: 1. Illegal administrative examination and approval, interference in bidding activities, and harming the legitimate rights and interests of the tender-invitation person. 2. Some bidding agencies make no distinction between administration and enterprise, practice monopoly operation, extort forced service, thus harming the rights and interests of the tender-invitation person. 3. The prevailing of local protectionism.. 4. The tangible construction market is faced with many problems. Experts have pointed out that a major innovation made in the bidding law is giving prominence to the leading position of the bid-invitation person. Law gives power to the bid-invitation party with the aim to give full play to the role of the market in the allocation of resources, to safeguard and promote fair competition and improve project quality. The fact that many government departments which act both as "umpires" and as "athletes" has disrupted the bidding market and finally bring hidden trouble to engineering quality. **** Premier Zhu's Four Nation Tour Fosters Diplomacy: Foreign Minister. Chinese Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan described Premier Zhu Rongji 's tour of Ireland, Belgium, Russia and Kazakhstan as an important diplomatic mission for the country. The foreign minister summarized the four biggest achievements of Premier Zhu's visits: Zhu's visit to Russia has enhanced the economic and trade ties with Russia. Seven signed agreements, including one on China's purchase of Russian civil planes and one on joint construction of a petroleum pipeline between the two countries, have cleared the way for concrete economic and trade co-operation. The trade imbalance is the major problem, and Zhu and his Russian counterpart Kasyanov agreed that measures would be taken to solve the problem. The fourth regular meeting between Zhu and EU leaders strengthened their ties in politics and security to safeguard world peace and stability. Both said they would try to expand exchanges and co-operation in trade, information technology, environment, energy resources and culture. Both sides have also held frank exchanges on the question of Taiwan, Tibet and Falun Gong. The EU has explicitly declared that it will stick to its one-China stand and not support Taiwan's separation. The EU also said it will continue to hold talks with China on the basis of equality and mutual respect, though both still have differences in human rights issues. The joint statement said both will establish an all-round partnership. The sixth regular meeting between the prime ministers of the Shanghai <http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/data/province/Shanghai.html> Co-operation Organization in Almaty, Kazakhstan, has started the process of multi-lateral economic and trade co-operation. The meeting is the first of its kind since the organization was established in Shanghai. The signed referendum mapped out short-term and long-term goals for multi-lateral economic and trade co-operation. The five prime ministers also issued a joint statement condemning the terrorist act in the United States <http://www.peopledaily.com.cn/english/data/usa.html> and reiterating their resolve to fight terrorism. Zhu's visit to Kazakhstan has reached a series of agreements on co-operation in such fields as trade, energy resources, transportation, environment and the use of cross-border river resources. In his visit to Ireland, Zhu suggested that both would further co-operate in the areas of high-tech, culture and education. Belgium's government will send an economic and trade delegation on an inspection mission to China's western region. _________________________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. Box 66 00841 Helsinki Phone +358-40-7177941 Fax +358-9-7591081 http://www.kominf.pp.fi General class struggle news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe mails to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Geopolitical news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________
