Chinese Cultural News: Weekly Highlights

Following are the cultural news highlights released by Xinhua from April 14 to 20:

-- China Stresses Fire Prevention At Heritage Sites China's State Administration of Cultural Heritage (SACH) has issued a circular requesting localities to tighten fire safety measures at heritage sites throughout the country.

The state's highest relics protection authorities urged local administrations to strictly control combustible or explosive substances near relics sites.

-- China, Japan Jointly Shoot TV Serial The Sichuan Television (SCTV), based in Chengdu, the capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province, and the NHK of Japan on April 17 began shooting a TV serial on cooperation and friendship between businessmen from the two countries.

The TV serial, entitled "A Valley Reddens under the Shine of Cherry," is the first time cooperation between the well-known Japanese television company and a local television firm in China.

-- Playbill for Coming Beijing Performance Gala Set Producers of the upcoming Beijing performance gala released on April 17 the playbill for the event scheduled for May 1 to 31.

More than 1,000 artists from 24 countries and regions will join the largest-ever performance festival ever held in China, sources with the China Performing Arts Agency (CPAA) said.

-- China Starts Digital Library Project China launched the China Digital Library Project this week by establishing China Digital Library Corp. Ltd. (CDLC).

CDLC will set up high-quality multimedia repositories, provide digital information services and develop e-commerce.

-- Fujian Clamps Down On Pirated VCD, DVD Producers Copyright protection authorities in east China's Fujian province have dealt harshly with the pirated VCD and DVD producers with over 70,000 discs confiscated since the beginning of this year.

Fujian police have cracked down on two production lines that manufacture pirated VCDs and DVDs since 1997.

-- 450-Year-Old Stone Sculptures Found in North China Chinese archeologists have found two stone sculptures, dating back to the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), in Jizhou, a historic city in north China's Hebei Province.

The sculptures are 1.5 meters high and in shape of an ancient male warrior and a fairy goddess. The discovery will be valuable for the study on the city's history and culture.

-- Huge Tibetan Painting Shown in Beijing A Tibetan painting 618 meters long and 2.5 meters wide is now being exhibited at the Museum of Chinese History in Beijing. The painting, the longest of its kind in the world, depicts the history, religion, customs, culture, legends, and daily life of the Tibetan people, as well as the traditional Tibetan medicine and architecture in Tibet.

-- Chinese Historians Focus on Borderland Research Chinese historians are looking to the past to find solutions to modern-day problems in the border areas.

A new study on borderlands will take an in-depth look at historic events in those areas, said Ma Dazheng, director of the Research Center for Chinese Borderland History and Geography under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS).

-- Some 700 Rare Books Returned to China Some 700 rare books have been returned to China after an absence of nearly one hundred years.

Well-known Chinese-American octogenarian collector Weng Wan'ge recently agreed to transfer these books, some of which are the only existing copies in the world, to an organization in Shanghai.

Chinese antique dealers regard this group of books as "very precious," with extremely high artistic and academic value.

-- On-Line Chinese Newspapers Mushroom Nearly 273 of Chinese newspapers have created websites of their own, accounting for one seventh of the country's total.

The 21st China Internet Conference held this week released that about 116 Chinese newspapers have registered their independent domain names, accounting for 42.6 percent of the country's total.

The rest have established their own homepages on other websites. Nearly one fourth of the 273 newspapers are national ones and about 213 regional and local newspapers have been providing on- line services.

-- International Art Festival in Kunming A major international art festival opened on April 20 in Kunming, in southwest China's Yunnan province.

Artists from Viet Nam, Sierra Leone, Japan, the United States, and some European countries, will perform during the one-month festival. Viennese conductor Peter Guth conducted an Austrian orchestra during a two-hour concert at the opening ceremony.



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