"There has clearly been greater transparency on the part of the Chinese."

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, commenting on General Zhang Qinsheng's

introduction to China's military budget at the Shangri-La Dialogue

"Most Asian countries do not see China's military buildup or increased defense spending as a threat to regional security. Instead, they see it as the specific response to the cross-Taiwan Strait situation."

Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong

"They're motivated by the same hatred that motivates Al Qaeda."

New York's Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, disclosing that the four men charged with plotting to bomb fuel tanks and a pipeline at the city's

John F. Kennedy International Airport had no direct ties to Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda, though they did share the same philosophy with the terrorist group,

a day after authorities disclosed the alleged conspiracy on June 2

"All Beijing residents who have moved house because of Olympic venue construction have been supported in their change of residence and none of them had been forced to move out of the capital city."

Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Jiang Yu, slamming a report released by a Geneva-based center on Housing Rights and Evictions that said some 1.5 million people would have been displaced by the time the Beijing Games are held in 2008,

at a regular press conference in Beijing on June 5

"These freedoms did not leave us when Hong Kong became a special administrative region of China in 1997."

Joseph Wong, Hong Kong's Secretary for Commerce, Industry and Technology, speaking at the Hong Kong Journalists Association's 39th Anniversary Gala Dinner on June 3, citing independent surveys by the University of Hong Kong that show the rating for freedom of speech in Hong Kong was 7.46 in January this year, compared with 7.17 in August 1997, a month after the handover of sovereignty

"Trees are giant carbon pumps, sucking carbon from the air and pumping it into the ground, trunks and branches."

Luke Chamberlain, Australian environmentalist, calling for an end to native forest logging at a rally marking the World Environment Day on June 5, in the southern Australian state of Victoria

"Even under current Russian law I am still a long way away from retirement age, and it would make no sense to just sit at home and twiddle my thumbs."

Russian President Vladimir Putin, answering questions about his plans after leaving the presidential post in a June 4 interview with newspaper journalists from G8 member countries in Moscow