December 2008 - Posts
NBC News' Martin Fletcher reports from the Israel-Gaza border, where the number of tanks has built up over the past few days, but Israel's intentions for a possible ground invasion are unclear.
By Martin Fletcher, NBC News Correspondent
TEL AVIV – As Israel vows a war "to the bitter end" against Hamas, the surge in violence has spurred worries about another regional Mideast war as well as speculation about Israel’s ultimate aim with its broad assault on targets inside the Gaza Strip.
On the former question, there’s not a chance. Who would fight it?
Apart from the usual suspects -- Iran, Syria and their Lebanese proxies, Hezbollah -- most Arab leaders are probably delighted that Israel is taking apart Hamas fighting ability. Most pleased, some of my regular Fatah sources tell me privately, is the West Bank Palestinian leadership of Fatah, which saw Hamas obliterate its own power structure in Gaza in a few violent days 18 months ago.
This is payback time, courtesy of Israel. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and other Fatah leaders, after calling for an urgent cease-fire, blame Hamas for provoking Israel by its refusal to continue the six-month truce, and its repeated rocket attacks into Israel.
Just as pleased is Egypt, which fears that its own fundamentalist Muslims will be encouraged by Hamas' success in Gaza. A bloody nose for Hamas fits Egypt's needs perfectly. Just as Palestinian police in the West Bank opened fire on pro-Hamas protestors on Sunday, so did Egyptian police on their border with Gaza.
Likewise, pro-Hamas demonstrations in Arab capitals like Amman and Baghdad will not force any military moves against Israel by their governments. And Iran, apart from its ability to support and encourage Hezbollah and Hamas, is a thousand miles away. The most Syria can do is to call off its indirect peace talks with Israel, which it has already done.
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By Eric Baculinao
NBC News Beijing bureau chief
Three Chinese navy ships set sail today to join the international fight against pirates off the coast of Somalia, marking a defining moment in China's efforts to project its force and gain a greater role in maintaining global peace and security.
But the deployment is also triggering concerns that China may be slowly giving up the long-standing "lie-low" strategy that Deng Xiaoping had espoused to guide China's diplomatic and security strategy.
The task force — consisting of two missile-armed destroyers and one supply ship — is China's first significant long-range naval combat mission since the 15th century Ming dynasty period, according to observers.
"It's the first time we go abroad to protect our strategic interests armed with military force," said Wu Shengli, commander of the Chinese Navy, at a ceremony to see off the approximately 1,000 sailors, according to Xinhua news agency.
"It is a huge breakthrough in China's concepts about security," Li Wei, director of the anti-terrorism research center at the China Institute of Contemporary Relations, told China Daily.
Deng's 24-character strategy
The mission — will provide armed escort to Chinese merchant vessels as well as foreign ships that seek protection against pirates — is seen by experts as symbolic of China's growing self-confidence and rising global status, which brings into question the continued validity of Deng's previous ideas on strategy.
In the early 1990s, Deng propounded a so-called 24-character strategy, a succinct guide for the conduct of China's diplomatic and military affairs, which essentially shunned unnecessary international entanglements or provocations. "Observe calmly, secure our position, hide our capacities and bide our time, be good at maintaining a low profile and never take the lead," were the key elements of Deng's strategic dictum.
However, according to Professor Yan Xuetong, director of International Studies Institute at Tsinghua University, times are changing.
"There is no issue here of going against Deng's lie-low policy of the '90s because at that time we had very little businesses and interests abroad, we mainly attracted businesses and investments into China," he said.
"But now China has expanding economic interactions with the world, and we have to adopt the necessary means to deter the illegal attacks on China's growing interests and businesses abroad," he added, citing the pirates' increasing attacks on Chinese merchant ships.
"We are entering a new stage in China's foreign policy reflecting the new stage in our development and relations with the world," he added.
For Professor Zhu Feng, director of International Security Program at Peking Univesity, China's anti-piracy flotilla is more a "symbolic" projection of force, credible enough for purposes of patrolling.
"Technically speaking, it is not a very substantial display of power, essentially a gesture that China's navy is ready for some international exposure and capable of making contributions to international peacekeeping mission," he said. "This doesn't necessarily mean giving up Deng's strategy on foreign policy."
Growing power but no 'China threat'
Professor Yan argues that China's naval deployment is sign that China's military capability is undergoing a "strong momentum of development" but that there is no basis for concern that China is a growing military threat.
"Whether China will be a threat or not should be judged not on the basis of its capability but on the basis of its policy," he said. "The U.S. has vastly superior military and naval capability but nobody talks of an 'America threat'."
Yan cited the 1999 NATO bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade as a turning point in China's military modernization. "But the speed and efficiency of China's military modernization are moderate to low, compared to the U.S., so the gap between the two is not getting narrower," he said.
For Professor Zhu Feng, China's decision shows China's "growing importance and growing self-confidence" in world affairs.
"For deploying the navy ships, China has done its cost-benefit calculation and the conclusion was that it would benefit China's image and interests," he said.
"It won't be cheap," he added.
The Chinese naval mission will last for three months, after which replacement will be decided based on the conditions then. Its final diplomatic and security impact still remains to be seen.
By Carol Grisanti, NBC News Producer
KABUL, Afghanistan – Alberto Cairo describes himself as moody, temperamental, impatient and pushy. But to the disabled patients he has treated for 19 years at the Red Cross Rehabilitation Center – most of them victims of violence in this war-torn country – he is an angel of mercy.
"If you see someone coming here depressed, and you see if after a few minutes he’s a little less depressed, and then after a few days he’s even better, and then he starts smiling again – that’s a huge reward," Cairo said. "What can you expect, more than that?" he asked.
In a back corner of the Red Cross center’s male ward, 12-year-old Mohammed smiled broadly as Cairo walked over to him. Mohammed was sitting with his younger brother, Ahmad, on the edge of a cot. His one good foot, shod in a torn shoe, dangled down.
"Look at him," Cairo said to me. "Sometimes he uses his prostheses and sometimes he doesn’t. He’s a naughty boy, but no one at home is really taking care of him," he said.
The lanky Cairo inspected the stump of Mohammed’s amputated leg and affectionately ruffled his younger brother’s hair before moving on through the ward, dashing in and out of the center’s therapy rooms in his mid-length Red Cross smock.
The gray-haired Italian lawyer turned physiotherapist, teased and scolded the male patients in fluent Dari, their native language. He hugged the kids and then bicycled over to the female area to chat with the women. Cairo, 51, seemed to be everywhere at once, the driving force at the clinic, which is the largest orthopedic center in the world for disabled persons.
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Zahara, 13, and her older cousin, Shamsiya, were walking to the Mirwais Mina girl's school in Kandahar, Afghanistan when three men on motorbikes suddenly blocked their path and sprayed something in their faces.
They thought it was water - just a prank - until it started to sting. The two girls were the victims of a brutal acid attack. Their crime according to the militants who threw the acid: going to school. Now NBC News' Jim Maceda reports on how they have become the faces of defiance in Kandahar.
BEIJING – The number eight is considered so auspicious here that the Chinese leadership decided to launch the Summer Olympic Games at 8 p.m. on the eighth day of the eighth month of the year.
The number eight has long suggested luck and good fortune because in Mandarin it sounds like the word for prosperity, as Raymond Lo, a feng shui expert, explained to us back in July. But, depending on the time cycle mapped out on the Chinese calendar of elements, eight could have positive or negative portents. "This year [suggests] the earth is not stable," said Lo. "And, also, the number eight also represents children."
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| Reuters file |
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China's national flag is raised during the opening ceremony of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games at the National Stadium, also known as the Bird's Nest, on August 8, 2008. |
Indeed 2008 turned out to be a turbulent year for China — and two of the worst disasters befalling its youth were the Sichuan earthquake and the baby milk scandal.
The quake, which struck early on a May afternoon, destroyed thousands of classrooms and may have killed as many as 19,000 children out of the estimated 90,000 people killed or missing.
And in September, just two weeks after the Olympics ended, the public learned that a leading brand of powdered baby formula contained melamine (a chemical used to artificially boost the milk’s protein content), which was later reported to have killed at least six infants and sickened nearly 300,000 others.
Between the success of the Summer Olympics and everything else, 2008 was, as cultural critic Raymond Zhou observed, "a year of extremes" for China.
Click here to read the rest of Adrienne Mong's report on China's tumultuous year.
By Eric Baculinao, NBC News Beijing Bureau Chief
Eric Baculinao is the NBC News Beijing Bureau Chief. He first moved to China from the Philippines in 1971 as a member of a visiting youth delegation and has lived in China ever since.
BEIJING – I remember the palpable air of excitement in our school as the news began to trickle in.
Thirty years ago, on Dec. 18, 1978, a pivotal secret meeting of China's Communist Party leadership began, concluding in a decisive victory for Deng Xiaoping.
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| Courtesy Eric Baculinao |
| Eric Baculinao, center of back row, in a 1970's group photo outside of Mao's village home. |
The party's decision to shift the country's focus to economic modernization marked the beginning of China's new era of open door policies and economic reform. But for foreign students like us, there was a more practical, immediate cause for celebration
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Confused’ gatekeeperDeng was popular because he symbolized open-mindedness and pragmatism, as opposed to the Maoist radicalism and isolationism of the past. Foreign students in Beijing took Deng's political ascendancy as a signal, at last, for throwing away restrictions and relating with China and the Chinese people in a new and normal way.
For weeks, my dormitory on the campus of the Beijing Language Institute pulsated with dance parties, as if Boney M and the Bee Gees were the anthem of reform.
The restrictive system of curfews and gate registration – that effectively barred Chinese guests or Chinese girl friends during late hours – broke down. I once asked the old gatekeeper why he was no longer doing the job of screening and registering guests.
"It's supposed to be open-door now," he said. "I'm not sure, I'm confused."
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With Tehran nestled in a basin between mountains,and most cars well over 20 years old, air pollution is a major problem. Thick smog blankets the city leaving some residents suffering from a range health issues such as burning eyes to respiratory problems. NBC News' Ali Arouzi reports from Tehran.
By NBC’s Warangkana Chomchuen
BANGKOK – Someone once said living in Thailand is like having a sports day every day. But instead of having five teams in five colorful jerseys compete the way Thais do in primary school, we only have yellow and red, sported respectively by anti- and pro-government protesters who take turns venting their angst in the streets.
The yellow-clad protesters, or the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), recently made themselves known internationally by blockading Bangkok airports. The country was forced to shut down its air links, leaving roughly 300,000 travelers stranded while damaging the country's economy.
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| AP |
| Protesters attack a car coming out of parliament with rocks after the voting for the country's new prime minister in Bangkok, Thailand on Dec. 15. |
But just as the yellows protesters left the streets, and the new prime minister – the third in half a year – was named by parliament on Monday, the protesters in red shirts showed up.
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By NBC News’ Karim Hilmi
BAGHDAD – Many Iraqis were surprised when an Iraqi reporter hurled his shoes at President George W. Bush during a press conference with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Sunday. While some Iraqis were shocked, others said the shoe-throwing was an act of valor.
But in general, many Iraqis believe that the insult directed towards Bush has really reflected badly on them – particularly because of their long history of traditions and customs that focus on respecting the guest – even if that guest is considered an "enemy."
"It is a reckless act and it will have bad effect on Iraqi journalists," said Emad Saleem, 40, a reporter for the Saudi Akhabria satellite TV channel. "Our picture as people of the fourth power will be weakened."
Mais Hassan, a 35-year-old editor for the Iraqi Belad newspaper, agreed. "This is not the good way to express one's resentment. The correspondent could yell at Bush or curse him to show his objection to his policies in Iraq."
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By Eric Baculinao, NBC News Beijing Bureau Chief
BEIJING – Against the bleak winter sky, the white-tiled two-story building in the southwestern outskirts of Beijing looked depressing and non-descript.
But the location, iron-grilled windows and the colored gate with Olympic mascots, fit the description of the "black jail" where Li Chunxia and Men Aijing say they spent several days and nights in forced confinement.
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| Eric Baculinao / NBC News |
| Exterior of alleged “black jail” on the southwestern outskirts of Beijing. |
The so-called black jail, used to temporarily detain disgruntled citizens to prevent them from holding embarrassing protests in Beijing, is just one of the methods of control used by China's officialdom to protect political stability.
However, as the pain of global economic crisis spreads across China, with thousands of factories closed and millions laid off, there is growing fear among experts that China's social unrest could exceed the intensity of previous years, and that old methods may no longer suffice to forestall greater turmoil.
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By Martin Fletcher, NBC News Correspondent
UITENHAGE, South Africa – In South Africa’s Xhosa language, "Esihle" means "A Beautiful Gift." And indeed little Esihle, a three-year-old girl small for her age, would be a beautiful gift for anybody.
Her eyes are wide and she smiles quickly. She is kind: as I look on, she puts an arm around her friend and pats her gently on the head, then laughs silently. When she looks up at you, you have to take her in your arms.
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| Paul Goldman / NBC News |
| NBC News' Martin Fletcher visits with his new friend Esihle. |
But Esihle lives in a children’s home because her parents can’t cope. They’re healthy enough, but they live under a bridge in Uitenhage in South Africa’s Eastern Cape Province. Healthy enough for poor people here means it has not been confirmed that they are HIV positive. But in a country where one out of every five is HIV positive, social workers say that the odds are high that at least one of her parents is infected.
A social worker found Esihle in July, dirty, hungry and crying, and brought her here, to this home where my producer, Paul Goldman, and I have been filming an altogether different story.
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Thanks to improved security in Baghdad, Iraqis are able to celebrate Eid, one of Islam's most important holidays, for the first time in many years. With visits to family and friends, Iraqis enjoy the new security gains.
By Lawahez Jabari, NBC News Producer
JERUSALEM – On the first day of Eid al-Adha, the four-day Festival of Sacrifice which began on Monday, Muslims are expected to sacrifice a sheep and give it to poor people. But Samer Khaleel, 65, who lives in the Jabalia Refugee Camp in Gaza wasn't able to do that, he was waiting for someone else to bring him meat so he could celebrate with his family.
For the last two years Khaleel has been without a job – the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees has been helping him provide for his family.
He was distraught about the fact that he could not provide for his family during one of Islam’s most important holidays when Muslims usually enjoy lavish meals of lamb or beef and give gifts of clothes, sweets and money to family and friends.
"I was wearing my pajamas all day, asking God for someone to bring me meat to cook for my family, five of my children couldn't go out, they have no new clothes, they felt shame," he said over the phone from the refugee camp. "I am hurt."
While the global economic crisis has put a dent in the celebrations of many Muslims this year, Palestinians living in Gaza are particularly feeling the pain because of Israel’s stepped up blockade of the area in response to ongoing rocket attacks by Hamas militants.
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With traffic in downtown Baghdad typically a snarled mess, the old commuter train has been re-introduced to combat commuter nightmares. Ride the train with NBC News' Kianne Sadeq as it dodges goats, cars and weaves through Baghdad.
By Paul Goldman, NBC News Producer
MUSINA, South Africa – Watching the Zimbabwe refugees sitting here, just over the border in South Africa, was a strange scene.
On one hand, it was incredibly depressing to see women and children sitting on dirty cardboard boxes being used as beds – which are also probably their only belongings. On the other hand, their great spirit was hard to ignore.
Everyone was fascinated with my Sony camera. Kids always love looking straight into the camera lens expecting something to pop out. But here, in this awful place, the grownups were also giggling endlessly and laughing at every move I made.
Here we were trying to capture the misery of the Zimbabwe refugee’s plight and everyone was laughing at me.
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China's powerhouse economy is being hit by the global financial meltdown just three months after the success of the Olympics – potentially threatening the country's hard-won social stability gained after 30 years of robust growth. NBC News’ Adrienne Mong reports from Beijing.
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By Martin Fletcher, NBC News Correspondent
MUSINA, South Africa – I saw terror in the eyes of the four men from Zimbabwe, although we were separated by three coiled rows of vicious razor-wire.
When they saw me they ran away, away from freedom in South Africa and back to oppressive, diseased, starving Zimbabwe. They thought Paul Goldman, my producer, and I were South African policemen who would jail them.
We had been driving along the border road between these two countries, hoping to spot refugees fleeing Zimbabwe. Sure enough, after only a few minutes we saw four men crouching in the bushes, just inside South Africa.
They had already snuck under the razor-wire, after a trek though the bush that normally takes several days, with no food or water. But when we stopped our vehicle and stepped out, cameras in hand, they panicked and desperately raced back to the country they had just fled, squeezing back under the wire. In his haste, one man abandoned his small, brown backpack.
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By Ian Williams, NBC News correspondent
BANGKOK, Thailand – A strange thing happened in Bangkok today on the king's 81st birthday. Very few people wore yellow.
In Thailand, colors represent different days of the week. Yellow is the royal color, since it stands for Monday and King Bhumibol Adulyadej was born on a Monday. On his previous birthdays Bangkok has been a sea of yellow. Not today.
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| AFP - Getty Images |
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Thai King Bhumibol Adulyadej sitting next to Queen Sirikit during a review of the honor guard for his birthday celebrations on Tuesday. |
There may be a straightforward explanation for this. Yellow was the color worn by the royalist anti-government protesters, the Peoples Alliance for Democracy (PAD), which seized Bangkok’s main airports and closed them for more than a week, causing immense damage to Thailand’s economy and image.
Most Thais were appalled by this, and by the increasingly cult-like behavior of the PAD’s leaders and the violence of their armed "security guards," and simply don’t want to wear anything associated with them.
But the lack of yellow today does beg a bigger question: has the PAD by its actions damaged the very institution it claimed to be defending?
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By Paul Goldman, NBC News Producer
TEL AVIV, Israel – Up to the age of 30, David Fiquette, who originally hails from Orlando, Fla., used to drink six glasses of vodka and shoot drugs everyday. Everything in David’s world was falling apart – he had already lost several members of his family to either drug overdoses or suicide. It was then that David decided to change his way of life and do something for others.
Two years ago he opened a shelter for prostitutes in the middle of Tel Aviv's central bus station and called it "The Door for Hope." His mission is to provide food, showers and clean beds for women who work all night in the streets.
Watch the video to see how David is helping provide a safe shelter for a vulnerable portion of the population that is often forgotten.
By Ian Williams, NBC News correspondent
SUVARNABHUMI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, Bangkok - Serirat Prasutanond has perhaps the least enviable job in Thailand right now. "We are doing our best, really," he told me. "We want the tourists to start coming back to Thailand."
Prasutanond is the acting president of Suvarnabhumi, Bangkok's international airport, which was taken over and closed for a week by anti-government protesters, and today he was supervising the clean-up. He said the computer systems were fine and the inside of the vast terminal -- which resembled a refugee camps, strewn with bodies just a few hours earlier - was mostly cleared of rubbish.
He has told the Thai media that the airport could be fully open by Friday, but was cautious when I asked him if this was realistic. "It all depends on security. The security systems have to be approved," he warned.
As we spoke, teams of cleaners hauled away bags of rubbish, and hundreds of sheets of cardboard, which the protesters had used as mats to sleep on. Others dusted and washed the floors, while earnest-looking airline officials hovered with clipboards. At a Thai Airways check-in desk, a supervisor told me their systems were fine and they'd soon be testing the baggage belts, which a few hours earlier were being used as beds. "There was no damage," she told me, "they (the protesters) were educated people," betraying her sympathy for a group that has largely drawn its support from Bangkok's middle class.
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By Mary Murray, NBC News Havana Bureau Chief
HAVANA – Cuba’s government took a significant step toward improving relations with the Roman Catholic Church this past weekend. President Raul Castro attended mass with the island’s Catholic hierarchy and thousands of faithful
to beatify a 19th century Cuban friar known as the "father of the poor."
For months leading up to the beatification of Friar Jose Olallo Valdes, the Cuban press – which normally ignores religious news – published half a dozen stories depicting his life.
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| AP |
| Cuba's President Raul Castro, right, greets Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins during the beatification ceremony for Friar Jose Olallo Valdeslallo Valdes on Nov. 29. |
At the same time, no one interfered with the church as it put up posters with Olallo’s portrait across the island.
Those events along with President Castro’s surprise attendance Saturday at Camaguey’s Church of the Virgin of Charity are being seen as positive signs of the growing rapprochement between Cuba’s communist government and the Catholic Church.
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NBC News’ Charlene Gubash interviewed Mahmoud Hammad, an Egyptian captain whose ship was hijacked by Somali pirates. He gives a first-hand account of the 23-day ordeal he and his crew went through.
CAIRO – Egyptian Captain Mahmoud Hammad quickly dispelled any notion that Somali pirates treat their captives well.
"Any movement and they would put a gun to our heads or in our sides," he said of the pirates who seized his ship. "Every second, we didn't know what would happen next."
Hammad was transporting a cargo of cement from Karachi to Djibouti with his 24 shipmates aboard the Mansoura, an Egyptian-owned, Panama-flagged ship, when pirates struck.
"On the third of September at 7:20 a.m., pirates surrounded us in two small boats, seven men to a boat. When we saw them, we rang the alarm bell to warn the crew."
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| NBC News/Mohamed Muslemany |
| Captain Mahmoud Hammad, safe and sound back in Cairo after his 23-day pirate ordeal. |
The captain’s first thought: "How can we resist them? They have weapons. I have nothing. The second thought was that I wanted the crew to be safe. They threatened to hit us with rocket-propelled grenades and sink us if we didn’t stop."
The crew grabbed high-pressure fire hoses and began shooting water to sink the small boats, just as they had been trained to do. But water was no match for bullets.
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By Ian Williams, NBC News correspondent
U-TAPAO, Thailand – It once was a forward operating base for the U.S. Air Force during the Vietnam War. About 100 miles southeast of Bangkok and renamed as U-Tapao International Airport, it now has become the capital city's only air link to the outside world – and a way out for the tens of thousands of tourists stranded in Thailand.
Used mostly by occasional charter flights, the airport only has one runway, one small terminal, and one X-ray machine. It has only four check-in counters, and one crane to lift luggage onto planes.
Yet they were hoping to get 50 flights out today – an impressive total, but only a fraction of the 700 flights a day that routinely used Bangkok's main airport, Suvarnabumi, before it was seized by anti-government protesters. (Airlines are also stepping up departures out of Thailand's other main international gateways, Chiang Mai and Phuket.)
This morning U-Tapao was chaos. "Organized chaos," according to John Landon from Colorado, who was making his way back home from a vacation on the resort island of Koh Samui. "The Thais have done really well to get this up and running."
Hundreds of tourists lined in the hot sun outside the tiny terminal building. "Don't worry," said a woman through a handheld loudspeaker, "Everybody will get on the plane. We won't go without you."
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By Eric Baculinao, NBC News Beijing Bureau Chief
BEIJING – With colorful kites, art exhibits and inspirational performances across Beijing from the Bird’s Nest Olympic stadium to the chic 798 Art District, Chinese and U.N. organizers marked World AIDS Day with a commitment to wage battle against the epidemic threatening the world's most populous nation.
The display of broad unity, with the attendance of some AIDS activists that have been targets of China's sporadic crackdowns in the past, was a touching tribute to this year's theme of "One Goal, One Dream – of a World without Stigma."
"Stigma and discrimination are major obstacles in an effective response to AIDS," said Health Minister Chen Zhu at the launch of the campaign at the Bird's Nest Olympic stadium. "We need to engage all sectors of society in China to combat these issues and work to stop the disease."
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| Reuters |
| People walk past a giant red ribbon set up on the facade of the Bird's Nest during a World AIDS Day event in Beijing on Sunday. |
The gravity of public misconceptions, persistent prejudice against AIDS victims, and new evidence showing that HIV/AIDS is quickly spreading from traditionally high-risk groups to the mainstream population are some of the forces compelling China to reassess how it deals with the epidemic.
In particular, the steady rise of unprotected intercourse with sex workers as a primary source of HIV/AIDS transmission is rekindling bold calls for the legalization of China's booming, but underground, commercial sex industry.
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