新闻纵贯线 The Beijing Hour updated 20:00 2015/02/09（打印版）

The man who admitted to a murder that a teenager in Inner Mongolia was previously convicted and executed for has been sentenced to death...

A senior US official has called on the international community to apply sustained pressure on North Korea over its nuclear program...

The international atomic watchdog will be reviewing progress on Japan's effort to decommission a damaged nuclear plant...

In entertainment...Sam Smith and Beck are among the big winners at the Grammys, held Sunday night in Los Angeles...

Beijing will be clear tonight, with a low of minus 4. It will be sunny tomorrow, with a high of 11 degrees.

Meanwhile Shanghai will be clear tonight, with a low of 0, tomorrow will be sunny, with a high of 10.

Chongqing will be overcast tonight, 7 degrees the lowest, tomorrow it will be cloudy with a high of 11.

Zhao Zhihong, the man who confessed to the 1996 high-profile rape and murder of a woman, has been sentenced to death.

The crime has received much attention in recent months following the retrial and exoneration of an ethnic Mongolian teenager who was executed for the crime months after the woman was killed.

The boy's parents have received state compensation of over two million yuan for the wrongful execution of their son.

"The money includes one million yuan in compensation for mental damages. This is good. One million yuan is a large amount of money for mental damage compensation in one case. This is a big breakthrough, as the amount is usually around 300 thousand yuan. This in itself is quite remarkable, and also can be a good example for future cases."

When it comes to finding accountability for the government officials involved in the miscarriage of justice involving the executed teen, Hong says China needs to further improve its legal system.

"After the rehabilitation, and compensation, it is kind of hard to take individuals to blame. This has taught us a lesson. Starting from now, in the legal system, we should have clear division of responsibility to the people instead of only to departments. Then, when a miscarriage of justice happens, it is possible to find who to blame."

The Hohhot Intermediate People's Court found Zhao guilty of raping and murdering a woman in the bathroom of a textile factory located in the Inner Mongolia regional capital.

The 42-year-old also confessed to raping seven other women and committing a string of robberies around the same time of the murder.

The five, including brothers Liu Han and Liu Wei, were among 34 defendants convicted of organizing, leading, or participating in a gang, as well as on murder charges, last May.

Five other defendants were sentenced to death with a two year reprieve. Four received life in prison and the remaining 22 received prison terms of varying lengths.

The death sentences against the five executed men were upheld by the court in August.

The criminal group had monopolized the gaming business in Guanghan City, seriously harming local economic and social order.

The bodies of three mainlanders who died in the plane crash in Taiwan last week have been transported to Xiamen.

They are the first of 29 victims from the mainland to be returned from the island.

An official says the three victims were accompanied on the flight by family members.

The families of the other 26 mainland victims have yet to decide if their relatives will be cremated in Taiwan or transported home.

Investigators are still looking for the bodies of three passengers. A memorial ceremony for the deceased will be held tomorrow in Taipei.

It's been confirmed Chinese President Xi Jinping is going to be making his first state visit to the US as President.

Chinese ambassador Cui Tiankai says discussions are already underway about the logistics of the trip.

The expected talks between Xi Jinping and Barack Obama are likely to focus on issues related to the Western Pacific.

Xi Jinping was last in the US for an informal summit with Obama in California in June 2013.

China calls for G20's members to play greater role amid complex economic situation

China has called for G20 members to work together closely and improve coordination, to better handle the world's complex economic situation.

The appeal was made in Istanbul on Sunday, just ahead of the first Ministerial Meeting under Turkey's G20 Presidency.

Financial officials and bankers from more than 40 countries have attended the conference.

Chinese Deputy Finance Minister Zhu Guangyao highlighted the risks facing the world economy.

"Now, global economy faces big challenges particularly uncertainty and complexity. (At the) beginning of the year, IMF unfortunately downgraded global economic growth again from 3.8 percent to 3.5 percent. This is consecutively from last year IMF aready four times downgrade global growth in 2015."

According to Zhu, diverging monetary policies and the fall of oil prices are also sources of risk for the global economy.

He also adds that the economic slowdown in Europe is another risk, as Greece casts additional uncertainties to the euro zone.

Therefore, the minister has called on G20 members to join efforts to face the challenges.

"Now that's need more strong policy and real coordination on policy to promote economic sustainable development. And we really hope facing challenge of uncertainty and complexity this year's G20 agenda and Turkey's Presidency can really achieve its target."

The deputy minister has also stressed that China will continue to record strong and sustainable economic growth, contributing to the stable global economic development.

At the same time, the Turkish side has expressed willingness to interact with each member state to improve the global economy.

"G20 enables the countries to have a thorough discussion; you can have actual interactive dialogue. So that you have geographic representation, you have the developing and developed countries and so it focus on the global GDP. So the high presentation power and the ability to really discuss issues in an effective way is something I think make G20 quite a special one."

The G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting kicked off on Monday in Istanbul.

The two-day meeting provides an opportunity for dialogue between senior officials and private-sector leaders in the international financial community.

The topics range from inclusive growth, job creation, private sector support for infrastructure investment, and financial globalization.

New U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken has met with South Korea's first Vice Foreign Minister Cho Tae-yong in Seoul.

Blinken says the pressure on North Korea should be sustained until the country shows its sincerity toward the issue of denuclearisation.

"Look, I think what we've seen working together is that the pressure that the international community has exerted on North Korea has made a meaningful difference in its ability to acquire materials for its weapons and missile programme to put pressure on it to move in a different direction."

Blinken stresses that ultimately it is up to North Korea to decide whether it is serious about having credible and authentic talks.

Ukrainian forces remain in control of the strategic railway hub of Debaltseve in the east of the country, despite intense shelling by rebels.

The commander of the 25th volunteer battalion "Kievska Rus", who goes by the name "Vysota," explains the situation.

"We didn't have any direct encounters (with the rebels) today but our position was shelled by mortars and one particular position was fired at with GRAD rockets. Fortunately no one was killed, but the situation is rather difficult, but we will overcome it."

Ukrainian tanks, Armoured Personnel Carriers, and howitzers could be seen moving toward Debaltseve, while several wounded Ukrainian soldiers were taken to hospital in a nearby town.

Separatists have intensified their shelling of government forces on all front lines and appear to be amassing forces for a new offensives on Debaltseve and the coastal city of Mariupol, according to Ukraine's military.

Meanwhile, this week, the leaders of Germany, France, Russia and Ukraine are preparing for a possible summit in Minsk to discuss a new peace plan for Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin says the meeting may happen on Wednesday if both sides agree on a number of issues.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel says it is uncertain whether further negotiations would lead to a deal with Putin. However, she argued that all opportunities for a diplomatic solution should be pursued.

For more on this, CRI's John Artman spoke to Feng Zhongping, Vice President, China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations.

More than 5,000 civilians, Ukrainian soldiers and pro-separatist fighters have been killed since a separatist rebellion erupted in Ukraine's eastern territories in April.

Russian president Vladimir Putin's two-day visit to Egypt holds special significance, with experts saying Egyptian-Russian cooperation could benefit stability and peace in the region.

"Both countries have a similar stand concerning the Syrian crisis; they condemn the violence in Syria. Both are also similar in that they recognize a Palestinian independent state concerning the Palestinian-Israeli file."

"Russia helped Egypt build the high dam with a 2% interest loan while the world Bank wanted 19% interests. We even paid the loan in fruits and oranges. Russia also built all the heavy industry that drove the economy such as the steel industry, aluminum, and textiles industry and others."

Experts with the International Atomic Energy Agency will review Japan's decommissioning work at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant this week.

Tokyo Electric Power Company has struggled with the unprecedented task to decommission the facility following the devastating earthquake and tsunami of 2011.

The company has proposed building a 1.4-km underground wall of ice to block groundwater from seeping into the Pacific Ocean.

Juan Lentijo is the IAEA Director of the Division of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology.

"One of our objectives in this mission is to review up to what extent these countermeasures progressed, and the situation has been improved since 2013."

The team of 15 experts will visit the Fukushima site to observe the decommissioning work and release a report next week.

At least 25 football fans in Egypt's capital have been killed in clashes with police.

A riot began outside of a major football game, and it caused a stampede and fighting between police and fans.

Security officials said fans tried to force their way into a match without tickets, sparking clashes.

But fans of one of the teams have posted on Facebook that the stampede was caused by police who fired tear gas at the crowd.

Egypt's Cabinet has announced that upcoming football matches are postponed until further notice.

First, let's have a look at the numbers across the Asian markets on this Monday evening.

Chinese stocks closed higher after the launch of the country's first stock option.

At close, both the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index and the Shenzhen Component Index gained around two thirds of a percent.

Total turnover on the two bourses shrank to over 70 billion U.S. dollars, the lowest in three months.

In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index dropped by two thirds of a percent, dampened by the losses in the blue chips.

The Japanese Nikkei added two fifth of a percent. Gains were limited due to weak Chinese trade data.

China launched its first stock options on the Shanghai Stock Exchange today, offering investors a new hedging tool for trading index heavyweights, which regulators long have hoped to boost.

The options are based on the exchange-trade fund that tracks the SSE50 index, composed of the 50 most heavily weighted stocks on the bourse.

"Stock option is a new business for us, and there's been a lot of preparation before the launch of its trading. But it's not until recently that have we finalized the paperwork for private investors, and therefore we do not have an exact number of people who have opened accounts."

Regulators are essentially guiding investors into blue chips, which most investors have avoided in favor of smaller firms.

Components in the SSE50 index have average price-to-earnings ratios of 10 times, compared with 17 times for the broader market.

Options will allow investors to hedge their investments but may also expose speculators to heavy losses.

The premium is the price of option contracts, or the money that investors pay to own option rights.

Analysts forecast the product will have a slow start due to regulatory restrictions to curb risk, although they believe it will benefit Chinese equity markets in the long run.

The retail price of regular gasoline here in China will rise tomorrow, following the National Development and Reform Commission's latest adjustment.

The top economic planner says the retail price of gasoline will rise by 290 Yuan per ton and diesel by 280 Yuan per ton.

This will lead to retail prices of some 6 Yuan per liter. Oil prices had dropped in each of the 13 previous adjustments.

Retail gas prices in China rise when international crude prices change by more than 50 Yuan per ton over a period of 10 working days.

British bank HSBC admitted its Swiss subsidiary helped wealthy customers dodge taxes and conceal millions of dollars of assets.

Earlier media reports by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists revealed how HSBC used the secretive Swiss banking system to conceal the identities of accounts holders to avoid paying taxes.

The number of accounts in HSBC Swiss private bank have fallen from 30-thousand to 10-thousand in the past 7 years.

Swiss authorities have charged the worker with industrial espionage and breaching the country's secrecy laws.

The Bank of China's Sydney branch has officially become the clearing bank for renminbi in Australia.

This means that transactions between Australian firms and their Chinese mainland counterparts using the Chinese currency can be done more efficiently.

The move follows years of efforts by banks and regulators to remove barriers to direct currency conversion between Australian dollars and the yuan.

By increasing their familiarity with the RMB, local financial institutions, investors, and firms are more likely to use the currency.

U.S. regulators have reached a deal with the China-based units of the "Big Four" accounting firms after a lengthy dispute over their 2012 refusal to turn over documents connected to Chinese companies under investigation.

The settlement involves the China units of Deloitte, Ernst & Young, KPMG, and PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The Securities and Exchange Commission sued the firms in 2012 amid a dispute over the release of documents the firms argued would break Chinese secrecy laws.

For more on the settlement, Beijing Hour's Paul James spoke earlier with Mike Bastin, Director of The China Business Centre based in London.

China and New Zealand's customs authorities are to set up a new system to enhance trade.

A new assurance system would involve electronic verification under the New Zealand-China Free Trade Agreement signed in 2008.

New Zealand Customs Minister Nicky Wagner says the new system will ensure exports travel smoothly, with standard documents from both sides.

Insiders say the joint electronic verification system will include tariff preference for Chinese traders.

In 2013, New Zealand meat was left sitting on Chinese wharves, after the failure to properly inform Chinese customs officials about changes in export certification.

A subsidiary of China's leading train maker CSR has signed a deal to buy all shares of British SMD, one of the world's leading subsea equipment manufacturers.

The deal, worth about 1.2 billion yuan, or over 200 million US dollars is still awaiting approval from regulators.

The move will pave the way for Zhuzhou-based CSR to enter the high-end subsea equipment sector and will support business in areas such as maritime wind power and engineering.

Market researchers estimate that spending on subsea remotes between the years 2013 and 2017 will reach nearly 10 billion U.S. dollars

A new electric vehicle rental service has been launched in Beijing by Foxconn and Beijing-based BAIC Motor.

Users can book the vehicles at rental locations or online, including a smartphone app.

A thousand electric cars are available for hire. Users can choose to pay 30 yuan per hour, 160 yuan per day or 99 yuan per night.

Currently, the service offers 12 rental locations and 17 charging points in Beijing.

Beijing municipal government is to help promote the program by building more charging facilities and encouraging more private capital in the electric vehicle rental market.

Alibaba is to buy a minority stake in Chinese smartphone maker Meizu for 590 million U.S. dollars.

The deal aims to help Alibaba push its mobile operating system within China through Meizu's handsets, while giving Meizu access to Alibaba's e-commerce sales channels and other resources.