ASIA / PACIFIC
Page 16 n THE ASIAN REPORTER
June 6, 2016
Chinese detergent maker sorry
for harm done by racist ad
BEIJING (AP) — A
Chinese laundry detergent
maker has apologized for
harm caused by the spread
of an ad in which a black
man “washed” by its prod-
uct was transformed into a
fair-skinned Asian man.
Shanghai Leishang Cos-
metics Ltd. Co. said it
strongly shuns and con-
demns racial discrimina-
tion but blamed foreign
media for amplifying the
ad, which first appeared on
Chinese social media in
March but was halted after
it drew protests in late May
following media reports.
“We express regret that
the ad should have caused
a controversy,” the state-
ment read. “But we will not
shun responsibility for
controversial content.”
“We express our apology
for the harm caused to the
African people because of
the spread of the ad and the
over-amplification by the
media,” the company said.
“We sincerely hope the
public and the media will
not over-read it.”
The ad for Qiaobi laun-
CLIFFSIDE COMMUTE. Children wearing their school backpacks climb a cliff on their way home from
school in Zhaojue county, in Sichuan province. A village in China’s mountainous west where school children
must climb a 2,625-foot-high bamboo ladder secured to a sheer cliff face may get a set of steel stairs to
improve safety. (Chinatopix via AP)
Chinese kids who climb cliffside
ladder home will get stairs
BEIJING (AP) — Just to get home from
school, they climb 2,625 feet toward the
sky — on a ladder made of bamboo secured
to a sheer cliff face.
After pictures surfaced of the chal-
lenging trek faced by schoolchildren in a
poor corner of China’s mountainous west,
their village may be getting some assis-
tance by way of a safer, more modern piece
of infrastructure: a solid set of steel stairs.
The hardship faced by residents in the
village of Atuleer in Sichuan province
underscores the vast gap in development
between China’s prosperous, modern east
and parts of the remote inland west that
remain mired in poverty.
The bamboo ladder is the only means of
access to the village to which the 15
children between six and 15 years old
return every two weeks from the school at
which they board. The 72 families who live
there are members of the Yi minority
group and subsist mainly by farming
potatoes, walnuts, and chili peppers.
A news release from the Liangshan
prefectural government that oversees the
county said a set of stairs would be built as
a stop-gap measure while officials consider
a longer-term solution.
It quoted local residents as saying that
in addition to the safety issue, the ladder-
only access exposed villagers to exploita-
tion because traders knew they would be
unable to carry unsold produce back up the
cliff.
“The most important issue at hand is to
solve the transport issue. That will allow
us to make larger-scale plans about open-
ing up the economy and looking for oppor-
tunities in tourism,” county Communist
Party secretary general Jikejingsong was
quoted as saying in the news release.
The dramatic photos that appeared on-
line earlier show children wearing colorful
backpacks climbing the 17 separate
ladders accompanied by a pair of adults.
The photos garnered even more attention
after appearing on the front page of the
English-language China Daily and other
newspapers.
A team of 50 officials from the Zhaojue
county government’s transport, education,
and environmental-protection depart-
ments travelled to the area to assess safer
alternatives, the Global Times reported. It
said the county is considering building a
road to the village, although the cost would
be exorbitant for such a poor region.
China pulled almost 700 million people
out of poverty following the implementa-
tion of economic reforms in the early 1980s
and says less than 10 percent of the popu-
lation still suffers from extreme privation.
Most of China’s poorest people are from
long-marginalized minority groups or are
farmers and herders living in the
mountainous southwest, where rope
bridges, aerial runways, canoes, and
cliffside ladders remain crucial to
accessing the outside world.
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MARKETING MISFIRE. Two scenes from a detergent ad by
Shanghai Leishang Cosmetics Ltd. Co. are shown on computer screens
in Beijing. The Chinese laundry detergent maker has apologized for harm
caused by the spread of an ad in which a black man “washed” by its
product was transformed into a fair-skinned Asian man. (AP Photo/
Mark Schiefelbein)
dry detergent drops shows
When speaking to the
a black man entering a Chinese nationalist news-
room and attempting to paper The Global Times, a
flirt with an Asian woman. Mr. Wang of Leishang said
He is carrying a pail of the critics were “too
paint, wears dirty clothes, sensitive” and the issue of
and has a soiled face. She racial discrimination never
feeds him a detergent drop came up during produc-
and stuffs his body into a tion of the video.
The ad’s content rekin-
top-loading washer. When
the cycle completes, a dled discussions on racial
fair-skinned Asian man in discrimination in China,
a clean white t-shirt where prejudices against
emerges to the delight of blacks are likely to be
the woman.
dismissed.
q
In Mongolia, Kerry hails ‘oasis of democracy’
By Bradley Klapper
The Associated Press
LAN BATAR, Mongolia — U.S.
Secretary of State John Kerry is
hailing Mongolia as an “oasis of
democracy” on his rare, high-profile visit
to the Asian country.
Noting Mongolia’s difficult geographical
location between undemocratic China and
increasingly authoritarian Russia, Kerry
also welcomes its parliamentary elections
in July.
Mongolia has been democratic for 25
U
years. It wants to safeguard its
sovereignty and has reached out to
Washington as part of its “third neighbor”
policy.
The U.S. is reciprocating interest at a
time it also is cultivating closer ties with
southeast Asian nations threatened by
China’s rise.
Kerry’s brief stop in the homeland of
Genghis Khan, famous for its traditional
ger dwellings, came before his trip to
Beijing for annual U.S.-China strategic
and economic talks.