Li Yizhong, China's work safety chief, says he hopes to be the most neglected person in the ministerial lineup.

"It's better for me to stay out of public attention," Li told a press conference in late December, explaining that media coverage of him is always a euphemism for deadly workplace accidents.

The 62-year-old Li has been endeavoring to curb rampant workplace accidents since he was named minister of the State Administration of Work Safety (SAWS) in February 2005. However, a convincing victory seems far away for the man known as the "busiest minister in China."

Official statistics show that Li, who has made it a customary practice to personally inspect all workplace accidents, had an exhausting agenda in 2007, despite a drop in the number of accidents and deaths.

According to SAWS, about 457,000 accidents were reported from January to November 2007, a year-on-year decrease of 22.4 percent. The number of accident deaths fell to 88,923, down 14 percent. However, the death toll from 83 serious accidents, each of which killed 10 people or more, still hovered at 1,380.

Li has reiterated on many occasions that government officials' dereliction of duty and collusion with business people were significant causes of some accidents. Now, he has new weapons for the ongoing fight against this.

In the wake of a spate of major coalmine disasters, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party of China announced last December that officials who take advantage of their posts to obstruct accident probes could be demoted, sacked or expelled from the Party. It also stipulated that severe punishments would also be imposed on those who try to save people responsible for workplace accidents.

Sources with the State Council's Legislative Affairs Office also revealed that several laws, including the Mine Safety Law, the Coal Law and the Coalmine Safety Inspection Regulations, are scheduled for revision in 2008, in addition to the formulation of the long-awaited Emergency Regulations on Work Safety.

As more than 50 state decrees covering various aspects of workplace safety are now in place, China's goal of establishing a relatively comprehensive work safety monitoring scheme by 2007 has been achieved. Li may have reasons to expect an easier year in 2008.

"Don't let some unscrupulous coalmine owners kill more people in their last frenzy to make a profit."

Li Yizhong, pledging a lasting campaign to improve the country's work safety situation at a national conference

"Some people have pinned their hopes on Li's determination and hard work, others on input increase and restructuring; nonetheless, excessive industrial production continues to punish the country relentlessly."

China Youth Daily, on frequent workplace accidents plaguing the country

"China is capable of producing a bird flu vaccine for human use in appropriate quantities."

Zhang Jiansan, Vice General Manager of Beijing-based vaccine producer Sinovac Biotech, said when China announced on December 25 that its bird flu vaccine for human use had proved to be "safe" and "effective" during the second phase of clinical tests in September-November 2007

"We think that Taiwan's referendum to apply to the United Nations under the name ‘Taiwan' is a provocative policy."

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, telling a news conference in Washington D.C. on December 21 that Taiwan's UN bid unnecessarily raises tensions in the Taiwan Straits and promises no real benefits for the people of Taiwan on the international stage

"It doesn't really matter which party gets in just as long as we have a government as soon as possible."

Anunt, a 60-year-old Bangkok resident, calling for political stability in Thailand when he participated in the parliamentary election on December 23. A party backing ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra won the most seats in the new parliament

"The move is meant to give farmers more benefits and divert more government expenditure into the consumer sector from fixed asset investment and the export industry."

Zeng Xiaoan, an official with China's Ministry of Finance, announcing on December 22 that the government is to give farmers subsidies for purchasing household electric appliances in a bid to stimulate sluggish rural consumption and reduce the rising trade surplus

"When a former prime minister becomes a Catholic, that must be a sign that Catholicism really has come in from the cold in this country."

Catherine Pepinster, the editor of Catholic weekly The Tablet, commenting on former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's conversion from Britain's established church, Anglicanism, to Catholicism in The Sunday Telegraph on December 23