Wang Zaixi, Vice President of the Chinese mainland's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), has become the highest-ranking ARATS official to visit Taiwan in 13 years.

At the invitation of Chiang Pin-kung, Chairman of the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF), Wang embarked on a one-week visit to Taiwan from July 6, during which he attended a symposium on China's modernization, and experienced the folklore of central and south Taiwan by personally visiting local farmhouses.

Though he denied having a task for cross-straits negotiations, Wang expressed hope that the mainland and Taiwan would enhance contact. He also indicated that Chen Yunlin, President of ARATS, would very likely visit Taiwan after the Beijing Olympics, a milestone in cross-straits ties.

ARATS and SEF, two nongovernmental organizations that are authorized to help deal with cross-straits exchanges, resumed bilateral talks in Beijing last month, after a nine-year break, resulting in agreements that allow chartered passenger flights across the Taiwan Straits on weekends and mainlanders' visits to the island.

The 67-year-old Wang, who served as vice minister of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council in 2000-06, was elected vice president of ARATS in May.

Volleyball Coach Seeks Answers

Though the Chinese women's volleyball team tasted bitter defeat at the 2008 World Grand Prix Final with only a 1-4 win-loss record, head coach Chen Zhonghe, who led the team to gold in the 2004 Athens Olympics, was not over duly worried about his team's poor performance.

"It is not that we lose that matters, but why," said Chen after returning home from Japan, noting that lack of physical strength, too many unnecessary mistakes and poor teamwork are major problems facing his players. Additionally, veteran players Zhao Ruirui and Feng Kun have long been tortured by injuries, and Chen will have to bring new faces into the squad to replace them.

The 51-year-old Chen successfully coached the Chinese women's volleyball team to the top spot in 2004, three years after taking over as head coach. The long-awaited victory for Chinese volleyball fans made him a national hero for his devotion to the team. But excessive drills and tournaments have worsened the players' injuries, hindering the team's buildup to the Beijing Olympics.

Lenovo's Recipe for Success

Head founder of computer giant Lenovo Group, 64-year-old Liu Chuanzhi, has always been considered to have the Midas touch when it comes to leading the way for a Chinese business to gain a competitive edge worldwide.

This year, after Lenovo became the first Chinese non-state enterprise to enter the Fortune 500 List, ranking number 499 with annual sales of $16.78 billion, he decided it was time to share his experience with other entrepreneurs.

At an industrial summit on July 15, Liu attributed Lenovo's success to its pioneering efforts to commercialize hi-tech innovations, compete with overseas industry leaders, establish a share-holding system and bring a scientific approach to corporate operation procedures.

Liu founded Lenovo in 1984 in Beijing. By acquiring IBM's PC business in 2005, Lenovo became then third largest PC producer in the world. Liu quit as Lenovo's president in 2006. He is now president of Legend Holdings that holds a controlling stake in Lenovo.

"China's arms sales were very small in scale and never made to non-sovereign entities. We have strict end-user certificates."

Liu Guijin, China's special envoy for Darfur, when commenting on a recent BBC documentary alleging China has violated the UN arms embargo in Darfur as being biased and made with ulterior motives

"Today, China's growing infrastructure commitments in Africa are helping to address the huge infrastructure deficit of the continent."

Obiageli Katryn Ezekwesili, World Bank's Vice President for the Africa region, when releasing a report that said that the Asian giant is spearheading a massive infrastructure revolution on the continent critical to reducing poverty on July 10

"Some people want to sell Western democracy to China, some want to make money."

Hugo de Burgh, Director of China Media Center at the University of Westminster, saying that Westerners tend to evaluate China by proceeding from their own interests in the country, at a public debate, dubbed "Battle for China," in London on July 12

"It is an extremely moving and important moment for me-something that we have been dreaming about for some time and that dream has now come true."

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who spearheaded the Union for the Mediterranean, after EU and Mediterranean countries officially launched the bloc at a summit in Paris on July 13

"The challenges facing governments in managing globalization are formidable, and success in spreading prosperity more widely requires a strong common purpose."

Director General Pascal Lamy of the World Trade Organization, writing in the introduction of the world body's annual report, which said that trade has allowed nations to benefit from specialization and economies of scale to produce more efficiently

"Japan should not repeat its behavior of promising a forward-looking relationship with Korea but then stirring up a dispute such as the Dokdo issue [once in a while] when the government changes."

Statement from South Korea's presidential office, after Japan said it would write about a longstanding island dispute in school textbooks. South Korea and Japan both lay claim to a group of desolate, rocky islets that Seoul calls Dokdo and Tokyo calls Takeshima