Beijing

Capital set to charge electric cars

Beijing plans to build 10,000 public charging poles for electric cars by 2017, the municipal government announced on Friday. The charging poles will be installed in airports and train stations, public parking lots, highway rest areas, electric car stores and gas stations, according to an electric car promotion plan published by the Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Commission.

New Transformers film rocks box office

China's movie market watchers are still stunned by the unprecedented opening of Transformers: Age of Extinction, estimated to have grossed some 200 million yuan ($32.2 million) on the first screening day. According to Piaofangba, a weibo account on box-office research, the new installment of the Transformer franchise has broken several records in China, including the biggest opening, compared with the previous 122 million yuan, set by The Monkey King.

Shanghai

GM recalls cars with headlight defects

Shanghai General Motors Co will recall 194,107 Excelle GT vehicles over defects in the headlight system, China's top quality supervisor said on Friday. The recall involves 194,107 cars produced between Oct 10, 2009, and July 2, 2012, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine announced in an online statement. Due to problems with the lamp bulbs, the vehicles' high-beam lights may not function properly if they are used frequently, according to the statement. Starting on Friday, Shanghai GM will offer free checks and replacements for the bulbs.

Harbin

New air route will open to Taipei

A new route will open next month between Harbin, capital of Northeast China's Heilongjiang province, and Taipei in Taiwan. Taiwan's Far Eastern Air Transport will operate the new route from July 22, with one direct roundtrip per week. The airline already has several routes linking Taiwan with mainland cities including Tianjin, Taiyuan and Shijiazhuang.

Shijiazhuang

Ancient ruins found to be 3,000 years old

Archaeologists have unearthed ruins of a village in North China's Hebei Province dating back about 3,000 years. A team with Cangzhou city reported finding ruins over an area of about 1.5 hectares in Renqiu city. Excavation began in late April and more than 100 artifacts, including stone tools, bones, earthenware fragments and bronze, have been found.

Guangzhou

Hostage-taker shot by police

Police in South China's Guangdong province shot dead a man who took a woman hostage on Saturday. The incident occurred at about 12:30 pm, when a man armed with a knife allegedly took a woman hostage in a bus station, according to police in Guangzhou city, who said they shot him as he tried to stab a police officer and ignored their warning. The hostage was rescued.

Taiyuan

New rails links Shaanxi and Shanxi capitals

A high-speed rail link between North China's Taiyuan city and Xi'an in the west will start service on July 1. The 570-kilometer railway is part of the Datong-Xi'an high-speed line, and will shorten travel time between the two cities to three hours from the previous 10 hours, according to the China Railway Corp. China plans to increase its rail network to 120,000 km by 2020.

Xinhua

Balancing act Swiss acrobat Freddy Nock fails a second attempt to cross the Tianmen Mountain National Park in Zhangjiajie, Hunan province, by cableway on Saturday. Photo by Shao Ying / for China Daily

(China Daily 06/29/2014 page2)