Real names required online

    Online real-name registration will be ramped up* to cover instant messaging services, microblogs, online forums and other websites in China.

    The Cyberspace Administration did not give details on how the plan would be carried out, but administration official Xu Feng said on January 13 the agency would “comprehensively” implement the rule.

    Real-name registration would also apply to open online forums, called tieba, Xu said, without elaborating*.

    Taxi drivers go on strike

    More taxi drivers have held strikes* across China as their frustrations grow over poor pay and increasing competition from private-car drivers using smartphone taxi-hailing* applications to offer unlicensed taxi services.

    Thousands of drivers in the cities of Chengdu, Changchun, Jinan, Nanjing and Shenyang have stopped work, with some gathering on the streets. The strikes first started in Shenyang on January 4 and lasted for several days.

    HK halts investment visas

    Hong Kong has called a sudden halt* to its capital* investment immigration program, creating shock waves on both sides of the border.

    In his Policy Address on January 14, Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying announced the suspension of the Capital Investment Entrant Scheme (CIES), beginning on January 15.

    Zhou maybe linked with Bo

    Zhou Yongkang, China’s ex-security chief who is under investigation, once formed a clique* with Bo Xilai, the former Party chief of Chongqing who was sentenced to life imprisonment for corruption, according to a report by Phoenix Weekly.

    An article in the latest edition of the magazine said Zhou and Bo had an off-the-record* talk in Chongqing.

    During the talk, Zhou and Bo agreed that a theory proposed by late Chairman Mao Zedong that the contradiction between the proletariat* and the bourgeoisie* is the principal contradiction in Chinese society is correct and that the policy of reform and opening up should be adjusted.

    (SD-Agencies)