VZCZCXRO4971
RR RUEHCN RUEHGH
DE RUEHBJ #0278/01 0340954
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 030954Z FEB 10
FM AMEMBASSY BEIJING
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 7884
INFO RUEHOO/CHINA POSTS COLLECTIVE
RHMFIUU/CDR USPACOM HONOLULU HI

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 BEIJING 000278 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR INR/R/MR, EAP/CM, EAP/PA, EAP/PD, C 
HQ PACOM FOR PUBLIC DIPLOMACY ADVISOR (J007) 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958:  N/A 
TAGS: PREL ECON SENV KGHG KMDR OPRC CH
 
SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION: ARMS SALES TO TAIWAN, DALAI LAMA, 
AFGHANISTAN, GOOGLE 
 
-------------------- 
  Editorial Quotes 
-------------------- 
 
¶1. ARMS SALES TO TAIWAN 
 
"U.S. arms sales will have a serious negative effect on 
Sino-American exchanges and cooperation on many issues" 
 
The official Communist Party People's Daily (Renmin Ribao)(02/03)(pg 
3): "Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson, Ma Zhaoxu said that 'The 
United States insisted on selling arms to Taiwan regardless of 
China's resolute opposition to it.  The U.S.'s move will severely 
damage China's core interests and Sino-U.S. relations.  Inevitably, 
this will also damage China's cooperation with the U.S. on relevant 
key international and regional issues.  The U.S. side should assume 
full responsibility.  We'll urge U.S. companies involved to stop 
pushing for, and participating in, the sale of arms to Taiwan.  Ma 
Zhaoxu also said that the U.S.'s move seriously violated the 
Sino-U.S. three communiqu, especially the principle in '8.17' 
Bulletin.  This will also seriously damage China's national security 
and harm China's course of peace and unification, which is severely 
opposed by China." (Note: Another major official newspaper Guangming 
Daily has also published this report.)" 
 
¶2. DALAI LAMA 
 
"U.S.-China disputes now start with the Dalai round" 
 
The People's Daily-sponsored and internationally-focused commercial 
news publication Global Times (Huanqiu Shibao)(02/03)(pg 1): 
"Analysts predict that the already chaotic Sino-U.S. relationship 
may have a new challenge - the next Dalai Lama round.  On February 
2, Chinese officials warned President Obama to not meet the Dalai 
Lama and that the issue of Tibet's sovereignty is nonnegotiable. 
Within one short month, Sino-U.S. relations have been overturned. 
Niu Xinchun, a Chinese scholar, said that the next Dalai round will 
allow the United States to be even more unreasonable in its series 
of offenses toward China.  Chinese society will become more concrete 
under the West's pressure.  In fact, the two ideological camps, the 
West and China, will both become consolidated.  Analysts said that, 
due to disagreements on the Dalai issue, there will be two possible 
outcomes for Sino-U.S. relations:  first that the worsening of the 
relationship gets way beyond out of control; or that President Obama 
is throwing all his 'bombs' at the beginning of the year and will 
later,  by year's end, restore Sino-U.S. relations in an easy 
manner.  Yuan Peng, the director of China Institute of Contemporary 
International Relations, said that if Obama meets the Dalai, then 
Sino-U.S. strategic competition will start.  The U.S. and China have 
a cognitive gap between these disputes (arms sales and Dalai 
meeting.)  The U.S. thinks that China should understand its domestic 
political factors, but China has changed, it is now a country which 
no longer fears other countries.  Regarding the equal positions of 
the two countries, they can't discuss issues within the old 
bilateral framework.  The possible Obama-Dalai meeting will 
definitely impact the U.S., who is relying on how the meeting goes, 
positively or negatively.  This time is substantially different from 
previous times - China wants to change the rules of the game." 
 
¶3. AFGHANISTAN 
 
"The new Anglo-American way of thinking: counter-terrorism through 
'development'" 
 
The Shanghai-based Shanghai Media Group (SMG) publication, China 
Business News (Diyi Caijing)(02/03)(pg A6): "U.S. counter-terrorism 
has always gone along with strong political motives and double 
standards.  The two international conferences, held in London last 
month on anti-terrorism in Afghanistan and Yemen, began to stress 
the importance of 'development' in counter-terrorism.  This is the 
result of a rational reflection on the counter-terrorism strategies 
of the Bush administration.  Such changes deserve attention.  Wang 
Shida, export on the Afghanistan issue at China Institute of 
Contemporary International Relations, said that, looking from the 
military angle, it seems impossible for U.S. troops to withdraw in 
¶2011.  However, at the same time, the U.S. and UK government have to 
face domestic pressures.  What's more, their amnesty policy will 
only work toward low-ranking Taliban forces, but won't likely effect 
core leadership in the Taliban.  But the London conference still had 
some transitional significance in strategy because this amnesty 
policy is a new way of thinking when resolving the Afghanistan 
issue.  Western countries have shown an obvious inclination for more 
collaboration." 
 
¶4. GOOGLE 
 
"The United States is not the teacher of 'information freedom'" 
 
 
BEIJING 00000278  002 OF 002 
 
 
The People's Daily-sponsored and internationally-focused commercial 
news publication Global Times (Huanqiu Shibao)(02/03)(pg 14): "Since 
the start of the Internet Age, the United States, has used one hand 
to ask other countries to implement network information freedom and 
remove their firewalls, so that, with the other hand it can spread 
its American values without obstacles.  However, it builds its own 
network firewall and it filters information which it feels is 
harmful to its values [and ideology]. In fact, the U.S. is 
challenging China's core interest.  This issue presents 
confrontational factors for the Sino-U.S. relationship.  China hopes 
to possess information freedom.  But when a certain country is still 
damaging China's long term national interests and security, 
regrettably China, which is the same as the United States and other 
countries, will not implement full information freedom at the 
current time.  China is not supposed to implement information 
freedom without condition; otherwise it would be an irresponsible 
move for the country.  China's censorship over the Internet content 
has existed before the Google incident and will not change because 
Google leaves.  We have to apologize to Google since we won't 
provide extraterritoriality to it.  Any foreign companies in China 
must obey China's laws.  Information freedom is not yet a reality. 
As long as nation-states still exist and there is competition, there 
will be a large distance from the ideal situation of total 
information freedom.  The United States should not pursue China to 
shorten the distance, through policies that threaten China and 
suggest it correct its own practices." 
 
HUNTSMAN