China is now gripped by one of the most sensational political scandals in decades.
For hours, China's micro-blogging community was abuzz with anxious tweets: an important announcement would be released at 6:30 or 7 p.m. on the official China Central Television (CCTV).
If body language is a good gauge of political standing, Li Keqiang is looking very much like China's premier-in-waiting.
Earlier this week, I got an email from a nephew who lives in Japan.
"Those who win become emperors, those who lose become bandits."
Entrepreneurs of all stripes are cashing in on the Lin-sanity phenomenon as swiftly as the NBA sensation can pull off his furious fast breaks.
Jeremy Lin's improbable success in the NBA has prompted a spate of "gee-whiz" stories and added "Linsanity" into everyday lexicon.
China will sometimes say "no" and the world should get used to it.
Anyone interested in world affairs, Chinese diplomacy and China's future should know more about Xi Jinping.
Beijing ushered in the Year of the Dragon with a bold move.
Until about four years ago, farmer Zhou Jie and his family had been living in rural Anhui province, growing grain and other staples on a small plot of land.
On a typical day, China's border with Myanmar is quite porous and vibrant. Often from the same ethnic groups, traders from both sides share much in common and do brisk business.
China's recent economic downturn is spurring a new wave of worker strikes, which experts say are the only effective channel for them to air their grievances.
As I type this week's column, I look out of my office window and stare at a depressing sight. A heavy blanket of smog and dust hangs over the sky. Buildings nearby are barely visible. Air is barely breathable.
Despite the global financial crisis, China's rich are getting richer.
I first interviewed blind activist Chen Guangcheng for CNN in 2004. We drove five hours from Beijing to visit him in Dongshigu, a rural hamlet in Shandong province.
The world's population is expected to hit 7 billion around October 31 and one Chinese demographer says that number would have come a lot sooner had it not been for China's "one-child policy."
Wang Yue, the two-year-old girl who was left for dead on a narrow street in southern China after a hit-and-run accident, has died.
In China, it is sometimes the doctors who call for medical help.
Since China adopted a "managed float" of the renminbi (RMB) in 2005, the RMB has appreciated in real terms by over 20 per cent against the U.S. dollar.
China on Thursday launched its first space laboratory module, marking another step upward for its space program.
Elections are underway in China. Not for the country's presidency but for "Renmin Daibiao," or the National People's Representatives Congress.
When an ax-wielding man attacked people on the street in Henan Province on Wednesday, the terse media reports created headlines and public panic. Wang Hongbin, 30, killed six people, including two children, and is said to be mentally ill.
"He who has not climbed the Great Wall is not a real man," the Chinese like to say.
Obsessed with keeping social order, China is now pushing to revise its laws in ways that will broaden police powers.
Liu Jinhua says she almost choked when she heard the news that Steve Jobs has resigned. "I couldn't believe what I heard," says the private entrepreneur. "Then I chose to not to believe it."
As we watch U.S. Vice President Joe Biden hold talks with his Chinese hosts this week, it is apt to look back at the precarious state of China-U.S. relations four decades ago and how far they have come along.
Sasha drags bulging shopping bags onto a trishaw as he heads back to his hotel, ending another hectic day in Beijing. It's hectic but lucrative.
It was the most neck-breaking assignment I've ever covered.
It was the most neck-breaking assignment I've ever covered.
Walking down the streets of Beijing, it's hard to avoid seeing red slogans lining the sidewalks. Switching on a TV at home, almost every channel hosts a gala show performed on a red-colored stage.
As the Communist Party of China (CPC) celebrates the 90th anniversary of its founding, party officials are pledging to continue the fight against corruption.
"Aircraft carriers are tools of imperialism, and they're like sitting ducks waiting to be shot," a senior Beijing official told a group of overseas visitors. "China will never build an aircraft carrier."
One of my first jobs in China was teaching English through songs on CCTV, China's national television station.
There is high tension in Inner Mongolia, China's strategic frontier region, where the death of a Mongolian has triggered rare street protests.
North Korean strongman Kim Jong Il rarely travels overseas.
Mongolia has always conjured a mix of exotic appeal and isolation. Sandwiched between Russia and China, the remote nation has for decades endured severe economic stagnation and political repression.
When hundreds of truckers went on a slowdown strike in Shanghai several days ago, the impact was immediately palpable: The movement of goods in one of China's largest container ports was virtually paralyzed. China watchers wondered how authorities would react. Will they send in the anti-riot troops? How soon will the heavy hand of the state come down?
In a round-table meeting with government advisers and researchers of a government-run think tank on April 14, Premier Wen Jiabao enjoined them to listen to people's voices and relay these truthfully to top leaders.
Three Philippine nationals convicted of drug trafficking in China were executed by lethal injection on Wednesday.
Disasters usually bring out the best and the worst in people.
When the National People's Congress (NPC), China's legislature, closes its annual session in Beijing on Monday, Premier Wen Jiabao will have had the rare chance to speak with the press -- and for the public to size up their leader.
As the Middle East erupts into turmoil, and protesters take to the streets, China's fear of "luan" (chaos) has resurfaced, analysts say.
It's the time of year when the National People's Congress (NPC), China's legislature, and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), a national advisory body of mostly non-Communist delegates, convene.
Celebrating the traditional Lantern Festival this week, many Beijing residents spent a lot of money dining out and setting off fireworks to mark the end of the Chinese Lunar New Year. "For the rich the money they spend is mere peanuts," says Mei Yana, a migrant from rural Henan province working as a restaurant waitress.
For 93-year-old widow Liu Bingdi, the Chinese lunar New Year has always been the happiest time of the year. "It's a time when we all gather for family reunion," says Mrs. Liu.
For 93-year-old widow Liu Bingdi, the Chinese lunar New Year is the happiest time of the year. "It's a time when we all gather for family reunion," says Mrs. Liu.
Chinese celebrate the Lunar New Year as their most important holiday. It's about family reunions and involves the world's largest annual human migration.
The Chinese public, especially those in the social networking community, are abuzz over the case of a man charged with killing a girl in a hit-and-run: He is the son of a local deputy police chief.
Summits often produce nothing more than expectations. The meeting between U.S. President Barack Obama and China's President Hu Jintao showed how different those expectations can be.
When U.S. President Richard Nixon first visited China in 1972, I happened to be in China, working on a state farm in Hunan province. I remember being so stunned by the news.
When I first came to China 39 years ago, airlines distributed cigarettes free of charge during flights. Hotel rooms were invariably furnished with free packs of cigarettes. At meetings and conferences, filter-tipped cigarettes were standard features on the podium alongside writing pads, pencils and ashtrays. Non-smoking cars were unheard of on trains.
Can money buy happiness? Apparently, not for millions of Chinese, including those who have prospered economically during the past three decades.
Inside Beijing's Immaculate Conception Cathedral more than 1,000 parishioners gather to say mass.
More than a month after a raging fire killed 58 residents of an apartment building in Shanghai, China's largest metropolis, nagging questions remain: Exactly what caused it? Are apartment residents safe? Survivors and families of victims are seeking a "jiaodai" -- an accounting -- and closure.
Keeping dissidents locked up, blocking prominent intellectuals from leaving the country and blacking out news reports -- China is pulling out all the stops to keep news about Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Liu Xiaobo out of public sight.
What does it take to count more than one billion people in China? Six-and-a-half million census-takers going door to door, visiting more than 400 million households nationwide for several days.
All eyes are on China after North Korea provoked threats of "enormous retaliation" from South Korea by firing artillery rounds at Yeonpyeong Island.
The sale of a mid-18th century Qing dynasty vase for $68 million last week at a London auction has created quite a stir in China. While the media highlighted it as the most expensive oriental art bought at auction, the identity of the anonymous buyer created greater interest -- especially among the rapidly growing ranks of newly-rich Chinese antique collectors.
In the months leading up to the G-20 summit, China has been branded as the bogeyman -- a scapegoat for many of the intractable problems that dysfunctional economies are now facing. Prickly topics include job losses, trade imbalances and currency manipulation.
When the Communist Party's elite meet in Beijing this weekend for the Central Committee's 5th plenary session, all eyes will be on China's Vice President Xi Jinping.
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