China was blanketed by heavy snow and pummeled by severe weather yesterday during the third consecutive day of harsh weather. The whiteout left several people dead and caused hundreds of injuries. It also froze traffic in many cities and grounded hundreds of flights.
German luxury carmaker BMW Group announced yesterday in Beijing that it planned to increase production capacity in China to further tap the growing luxury vehicle market in the country. Friedrich Eichiner, a BMW board member, said the group would have a total production capacity of 300,000 cars a year in the long term, without revealing a specific timetable.
Home prices in the central parts of China’s capital have kept climbing to approach the psychologically-important mark of 20,000 yuan per square meter (US $272/sq ft), official figures showed.
Hainan Airlines, a major Chinese carrier, is to open the first direct flight between Beijing and the Sudanese capital Khartoum next Tuesday amid booming trade between the two nations in recent years. The Beijing-Khartoum flight with Airbus 340-600 takes off at 1:30 a.m. from Beijing every Tuesday and Friday and arrives in Khartoum at 9:20 a.m. local time.
American Airlines, the second-largest U.S. carrier, is considering investing in Japan Airlines jointly with leading U.S. investment fund TPG, it was learned Wednesday. According to a report by Bloomberg, American Airlines and TPG plan to invest more than 300 million dollars (27 billion yen) in the financially ailing JAL. By making a cash infusion into JAL, American Airlines apparently aims to gain the edge over Delta Air Lines in the competition to cement business links with JAL.
Skynet Asia Airways Co. said Thursday it will start offering a discount one-way fare for foreign tourists from Dec. 1, enabling them to fly on all its eight domestic routes each at a flat rate of ¥10,000. The Visit Japan fare is up to 65 percent lower than regular fares. It is the first time a Japanese airline has offered a discount fare aimed only at tourists from abroad, according to the Miyazaki-based budget airline.
Thousands of protesters marched through the Taiwanese capital Taipei on Saturday to protest against resuming imports of certain US beef products, over fears of the spread of mad cow disease. Taiwan last month decided to lift a ban on US beef-on-the-bone and cow organs, sparking accusations that the government had ignored concerns over mad cow disease, the common name for bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).
Japan’s Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama said Saturday that his country, which is battling low birth rates and an ageing population, should make itself more attractive to migrants. Japan has some of the world’s strictest controls on immigration, and Hatoyama admitted that he was broaching a “sensitive issue”. But he said that as well as introducing pro-family policies, Japan should attempt to encourage migrants to live and work there.
South Korean President Lee Myung-bak said Saturday his country can achieve 5 percent economic growth next year, higher than forecast by major international financial institutions, if everything goes as planned. “Foreign institutions say it will grow between 3.6-3.9 percent, but I believe it will grow 4 to 5 percent if things go as expected,” Lee said in a meeting with South Korean residents and business representatives in Singapore.
Taipei’s residential prices may rise 15 percent in 2010, more than in Singapore, Hong Kong and China, because there is more competition among homebuyers in Taiwan’s capital, according to CLSA Ltd. analyst Tayher Lim.