China Update

China Update

8th March 2006

Last month, the General Synod of the Church of England voted to disinvest from the world's biggest supplier of earth-moving equipment to the mining industry.

For three years Caterpillar has been attacked by human rights groups, for supplying its bulldozers to Israel knowing they would be used to demolish Palestinian homes in the occupied terriitories. [see http://www.minesandcommunities.org/Company/caterpillar.htm]

Now, the US company - perhaps fearing a loss of Northern sales - is targeting China, intending not only to take over the domestic market but also "bring the Chinese machinery manufacturing industry under its global industry chain".

Officials in Hunan province say they may close down polluting factories, following the huge spill from a zinc smelter in January

And, from Shanxi province, there comes a plan to "limit" dirty and dangerous coal mining over the next five years.