A Giving Garbageman

(IC)

Liu Shenglan, a 90-year-old trash collector in a village of Yantai, east China's Shandong Province, has recently moved the nation with his selflessness.

Liu has used his meager income to aid more than 100 poor students nationwide for the past 17 years. He has sent these poor students more than 70,000 yuan ($11,000) after reading about their hardship in newspapers. Liu himself, however, lives on vegetables collected from garbage heaps.

He receives 1,800 yuan ($283.5) a year from the government, which he donates to struggling students. His neighbors and relatives cannot understand why Liu donates all his savings to others, leaving little for himself. Liu responds that he has no children and he doesn't want to pass away without leaving anything to the world. Liu stopped collecting trash earlier this year due to old age.

Serious Illness Insurance

China on August 30 announced a decision to expand the coverage of the country's healthcare insurance system to include the treatment of critical illnesses, aiming to prevent patients from being reduced to poverty from high healthcare costs.

The new arrangement will further increase the level of coverage that China's healthcare insurance system can offer, according to a document co-issued by the National Development and Reform Commission and five other central government departments. Sun Zhigang, head of the Health Reform Office under the State Council, said it aims to ensure that each patient's total medical expenditure is no more than the "household expenditure for healthcare," which is set at the level of the regional annual per-capita disposable or net income.

Though around 1.3 billion people, or more than 95 percent of China's population, were covered by the healthcare insurance system at the end of last year, medical expenditures incurred by patients with severe medical conditions remain huge, Sun said.

Local governments have been asked to design regulations on fundraising, reimbursement and other details regarding the new insurance plan in line with local conditions, according to the document.

Qualified commercial insurers will be selected to operate the critical-illness insurance program through bidding, the document said.

Official Facing Charges

Wang Lijun, former vice mayor and police chief of southwest China's Chongqing Municipality, was charged with bending the law for selfish ends, defection, abuse of power and bribe-taking by the Chengdu City People's Procuratorate, Xinhua News Agency learned from authorities on September 5.

According to the indictment, although Wang had known beforehand that Bogu Kailai, the wife of former Chongqing Party chief Bo Xilai, was under serious suspicion of murdering Briton Neil Heywood, he consciously neglected his duty and bent the law for personal gain so that Bogu Kailai would not be held legally responsible. Wang was indicted for the crime of bending the law for personal gain.

Prosecutors said that Wang, while he was performing his official duties, left his post without authorization and defected to the United States Consulate General in Chengdu.He was therefore indicted for the crime of defection.

Wang was indicted for the crime of power abuse for illegally using technical reconnaissance measures, either without the approval of authorities or by forging approval documents. Wang also took advantage of his position and accepted massive bribes in a bid to secure benefits for other individuals, leading to the indictment for the crime of bribe-taking.

The Chengdu City Intermediate People's Court has accepted the case and will hold a trial at a later date, said a Xinhua report.

Far-sea Territory Monitoring

The availability of remote-sensing images brought by China's satellites has allowed the country to better monitor its territory in the far seas, including Huangyan, Diaoyu and Xisha islands and the surrounding sea areas.

The Overseas Edition of the People's Daily cited sources with the State Oceanic Administration (SOA) as saying it is a significant move in terms of extending China's maritime monitoring network coverage from the near to far seas.

The network went into service in 2009 after construction began in 2006.

By combining satellite, aerial remotesensing and ground-based monitoring methods, the system monitors development activities in China's coastal and sea areas "in a stereo and dynamic manner," the paper said on September 3.

China's monitoring of its sea territory had long been constrained by its lagging monitoring capacity, mainly due to the shortage of satellites, the report said, citing experts. The situation improved following the activation of the maritime monitoring network.

Pensions Recipients

More than 180 million Chinese were receiving their basic pensions in August with some 600 million people covered by the country's pension system, a senior social security official said on September 3.

Among the pension recipients, 116 million were rural and urban residents who contribute to their own pension accounts while 70 million are retirees from enterprises and public institutions, said Hu Xiaoyi, Vice Minister of Human Resources and Social Security.

The official said that the government will gradually increase the fiscal support for the new rural endowment insurance and urban residents social pension insurance programs.

About 427 million Chinese have been insured by the programs at the end of August, according to the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security.

Colliery Safety

China will launch a new round of safety inspections in collieries nationwide, said Yang Dongliang, head of State Administration of Work Safety, on September 4.

Yang stressed that the inspections would be panoramic and thorough.

The announcement came after a deadly colliery blast on August 29 in southwest China's Sichuan Province, which caused the death of 45 miners.

For mine owners who push miners to work overtime or under high intensity in order to increase coal output, Yang ordered an immediate halt of production and temporary seizure of business licenses.

Yang urged mine owners to make detailed precautions and implement reliable technical measures to guarantee safety.

Those who fail safety inspections will not be allowed to continue in the mining business, Yang said.

Mobile Map Users

China is boasting a promising mobile map market, with the number of users estimated to reach 600 million at the end of 2015, according to a report released by market researcher Analysys International on September 5.

Mobile map clients will account for about 64.6 percent of all cellphone users, the report stated.

By the end of June, the average number of daily active mobile map users in China had reached 5.54 million, or only 2.4 percent of mobile phone users, the report said.

The total number of mobile map users is expected to hit 287 million at the end of the year.