A new ship is seen at a dock in Sansha of south China’s Hainan province, Jan. 30, 2017. The ship completed its maiden voyage on Monday from east China’s Shanghai to Sansha where it will serve. The 32-meter vessel weighs 498 tonnes. It has endurance of 45 days and is able to resist gales with speed of more than 60 kilometers per hour, according to its captain Yin Minzeng. It was designed to help extinguish fires on the sea, tow vessels that lose power and assist law-enforcement vessels. In addition, it will provide supplies for islands of Sansha. (Xinhua/Dai Chao)

A new ship completed its maiden voyage on Monday from Shanghai to China’s southernmost island city of Sansha where it will serve.

The 32-meter vessel weighs 498 tonnes. It has endurance of 45 days and is able to resist gales with speed of more than 60 kilometers per hour, according to its captain Yin Minzeng.

It was designed to help extinguish fires on the sea, tow vessels that lose power and assist law-enforcement vessels. In addition, it will provide supplies for islands of Sansha.

Sansha City was established in 2012 to administer islets and reefs in the Xisha, Zhongsha and Nansha islet groups as well as waters in this area.

Northeast China’s Liaoning Province on Monday reported two human H7N9 avian flu cases.

The two patients, from cities of Shenyang and Chaoyang, respectively, are being treated and in stable conditions, the provincial health authorities said in a statement.

In response to the disease, authorities in the two cities have taken disease control measures.

In addition to Liaoning, human infections have also been reported in the provinces of Guangdong, Guizhou, Hubei, Henan, Hunan, Jiangxi and Shandong, as well as in Shanghai, Hong Kong and Macao.

The public are advised to avoid direct contact with poultry and see doctors timely when developing symptoms including headache, fever and coughing.

At least ten people have died from the virus since the start of the year, according to disease control centers in Henan, Guangdong and Hunan provinces.

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

China’s top auditor has found that 17.6 billion yuan (about 2.56 billion U.S. dollars) of fiscal funds earmarked in 2016 for pollution control and resource management was not used effectively.

The finding was part of the results released after the National Audit Office (NAO) sent inspection teams to 18 provincial regions to review the use of fiscal funds for water pollution prevention and control.

The NAO inspectors also found that a total of 397 water pollution protection projects had failed to achieve desired effect, and some environment funds were not distributed in accordance with special protection plans.

The NAO noted increasing pressure from regional water environment protection, adding that in some regions, environment protection laws were not enforced strictly.

In response to the audit, local authorities in the 18 provincial regions have improved the distribution and use of more than 3 billion yuan of environment funds, and pushed forward the progress of 77 water pollution control projects.

Meanwhile, the NAO urged local auditors in 31 provincial regions to audit the funds meant for water pollution prevention.

Chinese authorities have punished 3,229 government officials for fiscal violations found when auditing the central government’s 2015 budget.

A new ship completed its maiden voyage on Monday from Shanghai to China’s southernmost island city of Sansha where it will serve.

The 32-meter vessel weighs 498 tonnes. It has endurance of 45 days and is able to resist gales with speed of more than 60 kilometers per hour, according to its captain Yin Minzeng.

It was designed to help extinguish fires on the sea, tow vessels that lose power and assist law-enforcement vessels. In addition, it will provide supplies for islands of Sansha.

Sansha City was established in 2012 to administer islets and reefs in the Xisha, Zhongsha and Nansha islet groups as well as waters in this area.

Archaeologists have discovered a large Neolithic ruin dating back more than 5,000 years in northwest China’s Shaanxi Province.

The site, covering over one million square meters, was found in Yulin City following a six-month excavation, according to the provincial archaeology institute.

Dwellings and ditches made between 3000 B.C. and 1000 B.C. have been discovered in seven sites.

The ruin is identified as belonging to the late Yangshao Culture period and the early Longshan Culture period of the Neolithic Age.

The Yangshao Culture originated on the middle reaches of the Yellow River and is considered an important part of Chinese civilization.

Shaanxi has 2,040 ruins of the Yangshao Culture, accounting for 40 percent of the country’s total.