Society

Severe drought in Southwest China to last until mid April: Forecast

KUNMING: It's been months since Li Shaorong and his wife have tasted soup.

They've been eating plain rice, pickles and a few slices of radish for every meal of the day.

Their house is dusty, and the towels have turned as hard as cardboard. They don't even remember the last time they had a bath.

Li's village of Shiyanzi in Xundian county of Southwest China's Yunnan province lies at the center of the worst drought to hit the region in a century.

The village has had no rain for the past six months.

"The horse beans and rape have withered in the field, and we're going to run out of grain soon," Li said.

The local government has been rationing water to each household in the village since January, but just a meager amount, enough to keep everyone alive.

The mainland agreed on Wednesday to discuss the issue of military security and mutual trust across the Taiwan Straits.

"We maintain that (both sides) can contact and make exchanges on military issues and discuss the establishment of military security and a mutual trust mechanism at a proper time," Yang Yi, spokesman of the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office, told a press conference.

"Related work should be done step by step, starting from the easy ones."

Yang made the remarks one day after Taiwan raised two "preconditions" for the discussion.

On Tuesday, Wu Den-yih, head of Taiwan's "executive yuan", said two premises should be guaranteed before both sides enter negotiations, referring to "guaranteeing Taiwan safety" and "step by step negotiation".

Yang said the exchange of retired servicemen, as well as relevant experts and scholars, would be a good way to begin the work.

The symposium held by the mainland and Taiwan on 60 years of cross-Straits relations in Taipei in November 2009 was a good start, Yang said.

The event was attended by more than 110 scholars from the two sides, and touched upon a string of issues covering politics, the economy, culture and military affairs.

American computer giant Hewlett-Packard has apologized for any inconvenience caused to its consumers due to the quality of its products and services, and pledged to extend the warranty period for certain types of laptops.

The company's apology comes just a day after a lawyer representing 60 consumers sent a complaint to the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine regarding the quality of some HP laptops.

HP, one of the world's largest information technology companies, is under fire from hundreds of consumers in China over faulty graphic chips and display screens in its laptops. Some of the cases date back three years.

"We will listen to what our clients have to say and take immediate action. We will provide them with the best service," Zhang Yongli, vice-president of HP China, said in a statement on the company's website.

The mood within Google's China headquarters is "business as usual" with most staff believing they will not lose their jobs if the Internet giant closes its Chinese search engine.

In January, Google threatened to abandon google.cn and quit China altogether over allegations of cyber attacks.

However, according to sources within the US company's Beijing office no official word has been given to employees about their fate, or the reported imminent closure of the Google.cn site, despite the news being replayed as a certainty around the world.

"There will certainly be no exodus," according to one employee inside their China operation who wished to remain anonymous.