CHINESE WHISPERS

 “China’s greatest gift to Cannes summit is that we have maintained 9.0% (growth) and trade reaching $3 trillion,”

Chinese Commerce Minister Chen Deming

The Australian Financial Review

'I don’t know how a country where a writer trembles when he takes up his pen can build itself into a cultural great nation"

Han Han, race-car driver and blogger

China Media Project

“Shut up is not something that changes the nature of these things because we are handling this in a friendly way,”

Chinese Ambassador to India Zhang Yan, when asked about his off-hand remark to an Indian journalist protesting about a map that marked disputed territory as part of China.

The Hindu

“Microblogging is like air-conditioning: once you have it, you don’t know how you managed to survive without it.”

Qi Jianxiang Activist's son

BBC

"The shipping industry is in a downturn, which is worse than the financial crisis in 2008 […] this condition may last for a relatively long period of time."

Transportation minister Li Shenglinh

Reuters

“Without income from land sales, where can we get enough money to build roads, schools, hospitals and other projects that Beijing ordered us to do?"

A man surnamed Wang who works at Changsha's land auction centre.

Reuters

“China's air quality should not be judged from data released by foreign embassies in Beijing,”

Du Shaozhong, vice head and spokesman of Beijing’s environmental protection bureau

Caijing

CHINA BY NUMBERS

24 meters

Height of new statue of Song Qingling in Zhengzhou

Beijing News

200

Number of air purifiers installed in Zhongnanhai

South China Morning Post

11

A Buddhist nun Sichuan Province Thursday became the 11th Tibetan to self-immolate.

New York Times

90%

A consultancy estimated that 90 percent of Chinese applicants to U.S. universities submit false recommendations

Chronicle of Higher Education

42%

Year-on-year growth in Macau gambling revenue

Macau Daily Times