There's a great series of posts on the Lunar New Year in China at <a href="http://www.soapboxjams.com/china/">Voluntarily in China</a>, starting with "<a href="http://www.soapboxjams.com/china/archive/000065.html">Spring festival less festive this year</a>."  This is his first year as part of a Chinese family, and he has carefully documented the Chinese New Year experience, including lots of photographs.  When I was in China, I took advantage of the vacation time by travelling and spent the CNY in Hong Kong, so I'm very interested in what happens in <q cite="http://www.soapboxjams.com/china/archive/000063.html">in real China</q>.

--I'm not real clear on the format I should use to post Chinese articles, if I'm going to be doing that more consistently.  I'll try the usual style first:

--<a href="http://news.xinhuanet.com/world/2004-01/27/content_1288949.htm" title="Xinhuanet">欧盟就取消对华军售禁令问题进行讨论</a>:

<quote>(rough translation)

<strong>European Union Initiates Discussion Over Lifting the Ban on Sales to the Chinese Military</strong>

On the afternoon of the 26<sup>th</sup>, a meeting of European Union foreign ministers discussed lifting the current ban on arms sales to the Chinese military.  Furthermore, a subcommittee of permanent representatives, and a group of political and security affairs representatives were commissioned to deliberate on the matter.</quote>

More info at the New York Times, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/27/international/europe/27CHIN.html?pagewanted=print" title="New York Times article">France Makes Headway in Push to Permit Arms Sales to China</a>.  The leader in this movement is France, althought it can't exactly be called a leader because nobody else is following its lead.  Other bigwigs in the EU like Germany and Britain have expressed open disagreement.  This year, France is officially celebrating its relationship with China with cultural events, etc; we'll see if this was more than just a friendly gesture to mark Chinese president Hu Jintao's visit to Paris.