In 2016, 304 department-level officials from central government bodies received disciplinary punishment, according to disciplinary authorities.

Among the 304 officials, 126 were punished for violating the “eight-point” guidelines against bureaucracy and extravagance, according to a work conference on disciplinary work of central government bodies.

In 2016, discipline inspection authorities dealt with over 22,500 tip-offs concerning disciplinary violations of central state agencies’ officials, four times that of the previous year.

Chinese police solved 83,000 cases of telecom and Internet fraud in 2016, up 49.6 percent year on year, according to the Ministry of Public Security.

The ministry noted that the number of cases has dropped significantly since last September.

The increase in telecom and Internet fraud has been contained, the ministry said in a statement, adding that economic losses caused by telecom and Internet fraud in 2016 decreased by 10.9 percent year on year.

Last year, Chinese police dispatched work teams to several countries, including Kenya, Laos, Malaysia, Cambodia and Spain, and took back 561 telecom fraud suspects, the ministry said.

In 2016, police nationwide busted nearly 7,700 telecom fraud rings.

According to the ministry, Chinese police have successfully stopped bank transfers to 73,000 fraud accounts and recovered 1.13 billion yuan (around 164.8 million U.S. dollars) since June 2016 when banks and police nationwide began cooperation to respond to telecom fraud.

A new human H7N9 avian flu case was reported in central China’s Hunan Province Sunday, the 20th in the province this year.

The 69-year-old female patient, surnamed Zou, was diagnosed in Changsha city, the provincial capital. She had contact with poultry before falling ill and is in a critical condition, according to the provincial center for disease control and prevention.

This is the second H7N9 case in Changsha. Five of the the 20 patients in Hunan died from the virus.

H7N9 is a bird flu strain first reported to have infected humans in China in March 2013. It is most likely to strike in winter and spring.

Most people in the UK currently pay for and take instructions from at least  three or four governments – EU, UK, County, District or Unitary Council.  Many also have Parish Councils.

One of the reasons people voted to get rid of one of the layers of government is that we have too many competing layers, seeking more money and imposing more rules on us than are needed. Sometimes the competing layers seek to achieve different things or impose contradictory rules and requirements. Defra, the Agriculture Department, often lost cases in the ECJ because they found it impossible to implement EU policy in a way which did meet with the satisfaction of the European Court. They were trying to comply!

One of the odd things about UK Opposition politicians and the media that feeds off them was the complete absence of any informed opposition to the EU government whenever the Conservatives were in office. All the government had to do was to claim some law, payment or decision had come from Brussels, and the Opposition parties backed off. They either acquiesced in not even debating it, or they went through perfunctory motions of asking a few polite questions and then voted with the government or abstained  so the measure could pass. Bill Cash, aided by a few good Labour MPs who did wish to probe and question, led his European Scrutiny Committee to require the important issues to be debated in the Commons chamber itself. These debates were usually peopled by a stalwart group of Eurosceptics pointing out the problems or undesirable features to a disinterested House. Government Ministers whichever side was in office always sought to make the debates low profile and could avoid answering any difficult question, safe in the knowledge that there was always a front bench consensus so they would win easily any vote we forced . The media rarely covered them, on the grounds that government and the official opposition both supported whatever measure it was.

This lack of democracy on EU matters allowed Ministers to push through a vast library of new laws and controls, and large amounts of public spending with effectively no democratic check or balance. Whole areas of government, from fishing and farming, through the environment, to trade, energy and business received this treatment. The EU was  brilliant at extending the acquis by increasing the occupied field -their language for the process of establishing their dominance in area after area. Once the EU had legislated on a  subject, the UK Parliament then had to leave it alone or work round the EU laws and rules, never contradicting or modifying them in unapproved ways.

It will take years for successive Parliaments to review and modify where it wishes what was done in our name without our proper consent. Legislation and decisions are better for a probing and sometimes hostile opposition forcing Ministers to think things through and sell them to the public as necessary and desirable. EU laws were pushed through on a vast scale in a lazy way. It meant many people in our country had little idea just how much is now controlled by the EU, and how little room for change the UK has all the time it accepts this legal framework.

Traditional Spring Festival celebrations include firecrackers, family reunions and temple fairs, but today it might be worth adding cinema to the list.

Chinese cinemas posted a record of 3.347 billion yuan (about 487 million U.S. dollars) in ticket sales during the seven-day holiday, from Jan. 27 to Feb. 2, according to industry figures.

China’s box office sales also set a single-day record on Jan. 28, the first day of the Chinese Lunar New Year, at 805 million yuan.

The strong figures came after China registered weak growth in box office sales in 2016, when 45.712 billion yuan was reported, or a 3.73 percent annual growth.

HOT MARKET

As cinemas sprout up nationwide, with the number of screens exceeding 40,000, going to the movies has become a popular holiday pastime.

Full cinemas were found in big cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, but also in smaller cities across the country.

Wu Xiaoqi, 26, chose to spend half a day with her cousins in a cinema near her home in southwest China’s Chongqing Municipality when the holiday was drawing to its end.

“We were hanging out and then decided to see a movie since it was a good way to kill time,” said Wu, who works in Beijing.

After watching “Kung-Fu Yoga,” an action starring Jackie Chan, they decided to stay at the cinema.

“We had a lot of spare time then and my cousins were interested in the story of ‘Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back,’ so we stayed in the theater to watch it,” Wu said.

Directed by Hark Tsui and partly scripted by Stephen Chow, the fantasy-action tells the story of a monk bringing his three disciples to the west, a story immortalized in the Chinese classic novel “Journey to the West.”

Both movies were popular across the country. “Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back” took 1.153 billion yuan over the seven days, topping the holiday box office, while “Kung-Fu Yoga,” earned 870 million yuan.

Though vastly different films, they share two things in common: comedy elements and famous stars.

“The holiday is an important battleground for the Chinese film market,” said Rao Shuguang, secretary-general of the China Film Association. “Due to stiff competition, films screened during this period are more likely to be blockbusters.”

MORE TO IMPROVE

Led by domestic blockbusters, homemade films took the lion’s share of holiday earnings.

However, despite strong ticket sales, worries over the quality of domestic productions persist.

Influential entertainment website douban.com, rated both “Kung-Fu Yoga” and “Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back” as less than 6 out of 10.

Some observers were also worried about the lack of imagination in domestic productions, complaining that the classic “Journey to the West,” had been made several times before.

Observers have said that the film market could face a setback after its short term successes, and that filmmakers should focus on making high-quality films to guarantee the healthy market development.

Yin Hong, a professor at Tsinghua University, said filmmakers should not just be satisfied with targeting box office earnings, but that they also needed to improve the quality of their content.

He said that in order to match ticket sales with favorable reviews, domestic films should make progress in a changing society.