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tv   Newsweek South Asia  PBS  August 15, 2013 11:30pm-12:01am PDT

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due to noncompliance of standard security procedures. even after the search continues for the eight teen navy seamen on board, they are fearing for the worst. >> multibillionaire businessman orozco was sown in as the president of paraguay on thursday. a number of regional leaders were absent, symbolic of the difficulties marking the new leaders rise to power and the challenges he faces. >> are a seo cortes new president of paraguay, sworn in on a bitterly cold morning. several regional heads of state and dignitaries and an enthusiastic crowd of flag- waving supporters were out in force. cortez is a successful businessman who owns more than 20 companies ranging from banking and tobacco to fruit juice. he has been criminally investigated and spent 60 days
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in jail in 1986 for fraud charges that were later dropped. the u.s. one sink used him of being -- once accused him of being involved in the drug trade, an accusation he strongly denied. he claims to have put his past behind him. >> i am not in politics to make myself rich. i am in politics to serve the people. >> he convincingly won elections in april, returning to power the party that was in office for 60 years and played a key role in supporting the military from 1954 to 1989. the party eventually lost to this man, a former bishop in 2008. his controversial impeachment by congress last year led to paraguay boss -- paraguay's exclusion from the regional trade bloc. it is clear the new president
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has bridges to build. >> we can say we have contradictions between what he said during his campaign and the first weeks of his the -- and the first weeks of his presidency, and now. >> he has chosen technocrats and business people for notes. placing the presidential sash in a peaceful transfer of power has not been the norm in paraguay. democracy in paraguay is among the most fragile in latin america. there are, however, several unanswered questions, and the new president faces a number of difficult challenges. adam schreiber, as easy tv. >> -- cctv. >> coming up next, why is china
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investing heavily in mongolia's energy industry?
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>> welcome back. exports of japanese goods to china hit a four-year low in the first half of this year. if you look at this graph carefully, it is pretty clear that there is less trade with china, which is usually second to the u.s. as japan's top customer. the report also comes as japan marks a world war ii defeat. china and korea both suffered under japanese rule at that time. rising diplomatic tensions between china and japan could affect 150,000 japanese living in shanghai. revisited a japanese restaurant to find out how tensions are affecting business. >> this japanese restaurant opened in shanghai five years ago. it has sushi and sashimi. the owner said he came to
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shanghai nine years ago because china had more business opportunities at that time. >> in japan, economics were going down and down. in china, they were going up and up. >> he adds it was not always easy to be japanese in shanghai. when he first opened the restaurant, some chinese customers were not friendly to japanese people because they had bad memories of the war. some called for a boycott of japanese goods. the number of people at his restaurant did not decline. >> japanese people enjoy chinese food. chinese people enjoy japanese food. >> he also hires chinese sushi chefs. >> people come for good food. they are interested in knowing more about the food they like
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it. then they will know more about the japanese culture. >> he is now training about 20 chinese shops and hopes to open other restaurants by the end of the year. >> for more on this, from honolulu, hawaii, the director of the eurasian business coalition. rob, it is good to see you over there as opposed to here in washington, d.c. i need your help though. explain to us for -- how for the past 20 years, or you can go all the way back to world war ii if you want, give us the historical perspective on this relationship . >> certainly, since world war ii, relations between china and japan have been very strange. the chinese still remember a lot of the atrocities committed by the japanese imperial army to many chinese.
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there is certainly not a lot of respect and rapport among the chinese chinese and japanese people. that being said, trade is one area where they have broken down a lot of cultural social areas because of the ideas that strong, improved economic relations will create -- >> what is the problem? i mean, i have spoken to a lot of people, obviously from the chinese side about this. one of the sticking points is that they feel that japan, number one, isn't sorry, and they haven't taken the position to apologize. very similar to what germany did to a lot of other countries and nationalities during world war ii. do you think that is an accurate assessment? >> can you repeat the question? >> there are -- there is a lot of discussion from the chinese to say the reason they are very angry about the situation is the
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fact that many japanese, at least officials, have not apologized for the atrocities during world war ii. i am wondering if there is a way to resolve that, or perhaps maybe it never gets resolved. what is your perspective. >> yes, i certainly think that in order to move relations forward between the two countries, you're going to have to have a acknowledgment by the japanese about the atrocities committed against the chinese people. when i am in china doing business, that is one of the things they always talk about, how much they remember the hard times of the chinese people under japanese occupation. certainly, if japanese small and medium-size honeys -- medium- size companies want to get into china, that is going to be very, very helpful for them to get into the market. right now, if you are a japanese multinational company, it is
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fairly easy to get into china, especially if it is an area that the chinese you like they can benefit from, like electronics. >> i want to talk about the economic impact of all of this. we also have concern over the islands between china and japan. this is now really starting to hurt the economy area that is the whole point of the story or this discussion. -- hurt the economy. that is the whole point of this tory or this discussion. political disagreements are hurting the economy of the country. i was in japan not too long ago and people worse eating mandarin. -- were speaking mandarin. do both sides realize this? >> certainly, there are a lot of ross cultural exchanges between japan -- cross-cultural exchanges between japan and china.
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there is a strong desire among the japanese people to understand chinese culture, language, history, etc.. but there is still a very strong nationalist sentiment in japan, especially among the leaders of government, and that makes the chinese very, very nervous, especially in the situation involving these disputed islands. the japanese feel they have a long-standing claim, and so do the chinese. >> is the economic relationship big enough, is it strong enough, is there enough interest on both sides, so to speak, to compel politicians to find a resolution to this? i may be overly optimistic, but i am curious what your take is. >> i would hope there would be, but the problem is, chinese-
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japanese trade was 320 $9 billion last year. that was already down mike -- $329 billion last year. that was already down 35% this year. it is certainly having an affect on economic development. that being the case, if you could get more small and medium- sized japanese companies into china, that would help improve the situation. right now, the multinationals that have been doing well in china are certainly unwilling to help small and medium-size companies to get in. the japanese certainly want the trade, they want to get into china, but they don't want to give up nationalistic trends and tendons these that have been drummed into them from the time -- trends and tendencies that have been drummed into them from the time they were born. >> thank you for your time.
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this is a very serious issue being affected by a lot of history. thank you for giving us your perspective. now, looking north to china, beijing has also invested heavily in energy and infrastructure in mongolia. that is a trend that has been growing in recent years, with half of all foreign investment coming from china. >> you do not have to travel far in mongolia to see chinese investment. the new sports complex by the airport is here thanks to china. china calls it a gift. this downtown tower with luxury shops below and upscale offices above was built using chinese construction. and that is not all. >> the chinese are investing heavily in infrastructure, especially energy. for example, hydropower and
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thermal power projects. >> roughly half of all foreign investment in mongolia now comes from china. as its largest consuming neighbor, china now accounts for three quarters of mongolia's economic activity, largely thanks to exports. 90% of all outbound mongolian goods go directly to china. it was not wholly like that. historically, russia was china's -- was mongolia's main backer. signs of the soviet influence. the country from steam pipes to railroads. >> as in most soviet satellite states, they are built to russian standards. for china, they are built to international standards. that means a train traveling
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this route would have to make a long stop at the border to have its wheels adjust it. that could be difficult and expensive. thus the hot debate here. how should mongolia build new rails? one option, going from mining deposits at the border to the coast. the second option, from the chinese border and onwards to the chinese coast, a distance that is significantly low serve. this train is also under construction, but the gauges are still wide, not narrow like taunus. -- like china's. he says that is not sustainable for the long run, and warns that is china invest more here, a
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better, cheaper solution to getting its returns out will have to be found. cctv, mongolia. >> next up, checking on wall street's disappointing numbers. the markets got hammered. and we will talk about getting smarter. global smart phone sales hitting a milestone as more countries switch to the next generation of networks. we will be talking to one expert about the future of the thing we are pretty much all addicted to. stay tuned.
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>> you are watching biz asia america, your link to asia and beyond. u.s. markets took a pounding today. the dow dropped 225 points or 1.5%, its biggest loss in almost
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two months. the s&p 500 dropped 1.4%. the nasdaq was the hardest hit, falling one point seven percent. the chicago board of exchange's volatility index, or the fix, which is seen as wall street's fear gauge, spiked about 11% today. there was a broad selloff. every major sector was in the red, led by consumer discretionary and technology stocks. cisco fell seven percent after revealing plans to cut 4000 jobs, citing difficult economic conditions. and walmart, the world's biggest retailer, cut down its four year outlook and reported lower-than- expected u.s. sales. shares fell 2.6%. well, the world's largest pc maker now sells more smart phones and tablets than it does pcs. it doubled second-quarter sales over the same time last year. it sold 11.4 million smart
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phones and 1.5 million tablets. those sales helped it become the fourth-largest smart phone maker, with the marketshare share of 4.7%. the company's business relies heavily on china, which accounts for about 80% of sales, but lenovo is trying to expand its global presence. the president says he is looking to expand business but refused to comment on whether he will make a bid for blackberry as part of that strategy. and for the first time ever, smart phones are out sony -- outselling basic cell phones. the smartphone is a device that has built-in applications and can connect to the internet. according to gartner, a us-based technology research firm, 405 million smart phones were sold in the second quarter this year. about 225 millions of those were
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used to do something other than make calls. feature phones perform fewer functions, but have stayed in the market so long mostly because they are priced cheaper. joining me with more on the smart phone market is chris, technology editor. thanks for joining us. smartphone versus feature phone. smartphones now overtaking them. what is the significance of this development? >> the really big thing here is that people's mobile computing needs are really changing. people want computing needs on the go, so they are looking for pc functionality within a smartphone or tablet. that is why you're seeing smartphones overtakes feature phones right now. >> we know that has had a big impact on the pc market, with pc sales something -- tumbling
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quarter after quarter. our feature phones on their way to becoming obsolete? >> they're not going to be obsolete anytime soon, but they are on the decline. people really want more functionality on their phones. they can go on the internet, check e-mails, sports, stocks, what have you. they can even change the lights in their home from a smartphone. that is what they really want right now. >> who is still in the market for regular phones? >> people in underdeveloped countries, africa, parts of asia, even in america, people who either do not see the need for a smartphone or have not migrated towards it yet. >> if these regular phones, which are predominantly used in third world markets, are slowly overtaken by smartphones, what does this mean with regards to the improving infrastructure and technology of these emerging markets? >> cell phone companies are really looking toward third
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world countries as the next area of growth. that is why you're starting to see smartphone sales take up -- pick up and overtake feature phones. people are starting to realize that these devices, while a little more expensive than feature phones, have benefits that outweigh that. >> what is the price differential between a regular phone and a smartphone? >> in some cases, it is pretty differential. on a samsung gallery versus your generic flip phone, you could see a price difference of 600 or $700 if the phone is unsubsidized. a feature phone might be $79. that is a big difference. >> the world's largest pc maker is now selling more smartphones than it does pcs. but samsung is still holding the top spot in terms of ranking. there has been a big dispute between apple and samsung lately. how has that balanced the
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smartphone market? >> i think lenovo is doing a job in terms of positioning itself in the smart phone market. -- done and excellent job in terms of positioning itself in the smart phone market. they are positioned well for the future. >> speaking of the future, what can we expect in terms of new smartphone trends? >> the big new trend you're going to see in a couple of months when apple releases the iphone 5 s. the big trend is going to be fingerprint technology. >> biometrics. >> late 2013 or 2014. >> we have seen how phones like blackberry have become fallen
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heroes. who is coming in with the new technology? >> i think apple really has the empire. biometrics is going to be the big thing for technology and smartphones, and you're going to see other people copy that. >> so you're still confident that apple can innovate. what about blackberry? are they going on private sale? do you think that is likely to happen and who could possibly be in the market for them? >> i think blackberry eventually will go private. we have seen speculation that investment firms are going to take the company private. there are also -- there is also talk to companies like microsoft or lenovo could bring blackberry into their fold, but i don't think that will happen anytime soon. >> we have to leave it there, but thank you so much. u.s. stocks took a pounding today, their biggest two-day loss since june. will asian markets follow suit?
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>> caffe will tell us what is happening, including the latest reports from some of china's biggest tech companies. kathy joins us live from hong kong. hello. >> it has been a flurry of big earnings announcements here, one after the other. china mobile, the world's biggest mobile carrier, with more than 740 million subscribers, says it may be close to a deal with apple. it is a deal that apple says would bring china back into the game. net profits are in line with market expectations, but for the first half of this year, it grew only 1.5% over the year before. china mobile is the only chinese carrier that does not have a contract with apple to sell iphones. the chairman address that on thursday after the markets closed.
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they are in talks with apple about reaching a possible agreement. china mobile shares in hong kong are up. lenovo shares are now up about half a percent after rising two percent on thursday. the world's largest piece the maker -- pc makers 23% jump in its first quarter, delivering its second-best orderly earnings ever. the world's largest cosmetics group, l'oreal, has offered to acquire a chinese company for $840 million. l'oreal announced this move on thursday, and said the offer of $6.30 per share is supported by the board of directors. shares are rallying on this announcement. >> here is a recap of what is happening in the world today. we go back to the top story that
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we have been covering over the last couple of days, and that is the situation in egypt. the international community in condemning violence against supporters of ousted president mohamed morsi. the u.s. is calling on both sides to exercise maximum restraint and end the violence that is spreading across the country. rock obama has also canceled a joint u.s. and egyptian -- barack obama has also canceled a joint u.s. and egyptian military exercise. stay with us. thank you very much for watching. we will see you tomorrow. captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org--
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