WHY NOW?

FlorCruz reports that the sudden verdict and sentencing of Wei after he spent 20 months in jail without being charged with anything has many Western observers puzzled. "They've been able to get away with indefinitely detaining him without hearing too much international outcry. So why try him now? Perhaps internal politics demand that the leadership do something firm to appear strong they prepare for the upcoming struggle over Deng's succession."

Quotes of the Day »

RAY KELLY, New York City Police Commissioner, on the arrest of a New Jersey man in one of the nation's most baffling missing-children cases, the disappearance more than three decades ago of 6-year-old Etan Patz.
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