Word: premieres
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...Music and Performing Arts in Stuttgart. "Nobody should pretend that these two things are not linked." That lesson is being learned at the Staatsoper on Unter den Linden in Berlin. The city of Berlin faces debts of more than €45 billion, so the opera house and other premier cultural venues are feeling the pinch. Like all German arts organizations, the Staatsoper relies heavily on state funds. This year, it will receive about €44 million in subsidies out of a total budget of €66 million. Less than 1% of the opera's money comes from private donations, with...
When a group of 15 executives from multinational mining companies met with Wen Jiabao, China's Premier-designate, in late 2001, they hoped to be getting face time with a kindred spirit. The execs, among them heavyweight representatives of giant mine operators such as Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton, wanted to discuss the opening of China's mineral-extraction market to foreign investment. Wen, a geologist by training, was in a position to make a difference as the country's Vice Premier. As everybody sipped green tea in a meeting room at Zhongnanhai, the Beijing leadership compound, Wen listened politely...
...China's National People's Congress, when it opens March 5 to rubber-stamp Wen's promotion to Premier, will complete a generational changing of the guard. The enigmatic Hu Jintao, already named last year to lead the Communist Party, is set to succeed Jiang Zemin as President. Meanwhile Wen, 60, will replace Zhu Rongji. He has some size-14 hobnailed boots to fill. The brilliant but overbearing Zhu, 74, brought China into the World Trade Organization and hacked away for a decade at the stultifying vestiges of the command economy. For the world's most prominent businessmen, including Microsoft...
...succeeds Zhu?who championed his promotion to Premier and to the nine-member politburo Standing Committee?carrying a reputation as a buttoned-down technocrat who lacks not only his mentor's fiery bravado but also his business savvy. Even during his four-year stint as Vice Premier, Wen was rarely called upon to deal with foreigners or promote market economics. Some question whether he has the clear vision and political will to run China's contentious Cabinet while managing a trillion-dollar economy, overseeing the layoffs of millions of angry workers in state companies and forcing another round of market...
...accounts, Wen has traits that have come to define China's latest crop of leaders, including incoming President Hu: a mild demeanor, punctilious organizational skills and competence as an administrator. Those attributes have not always been enough. Zhu promoted Wen to Vice Premier in 1998 and tapped him to run the problem-plagued financial and agricultural sectors. Despite efforts to make the country's banks stop lending to money-losing state enterprises, bad loans continue to mount, jeopardizing the nation's financial system. Agriculture has also fared poorly under Wen, with farmers' incomes stagnating while China's economy grows...