Mistreating Web addicts prohibited

Psychological instructors who resort to violence while treating addicts at Internet addiction rehabilitation centers will be disqualified from continuing their jobs.

Zhao Jing, director of a national project service center responsible for training and appraising psychological instructors to treat teenage Internet addicts, said those who use violence during treatment will be disqualified.

Their licenses will be revoked by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, Zhao was quoted by Sunday's China Youth Daily as saying.

China began licensing psychological instructors to treat teenage Internet addicts in 2010. Since then, 1,567 instructors have been licensed.

Crackdown hits gambling network

A gang with more than 1,500 members suspected of making and selling gambling devices were arrested in mid-August, the Ministry of Public Security said on Sunday.

More than 1,900 police officers in 30 municipalities, provinces and autonomous regions across China conducted the crackdown on Aug 13 and 16, confiscating more than 20,000 gambling machines and 16-million-yuan ($2.5 million) in illicit money, police said in a statement.

Police in Zhejiang received reports of illegal gambling in April, and the investigation spanned almost the entire country. A large production and sales network, which had more than 500 gambling halls and five "black factories" used for making gambling machines, was destroyed, the statement said.

Ningxia

6 dead in flash flood

Six tourists died and more than 30 were evacuated after a flash flood soaked a mountain ravine in Northwest China's Ningxia Hui autonomous region on Saturday, local authorities said.

The flash flood, triggered by torrential rains in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region, hit the Leek Ravine in the Helan Mountain at 12 pm, Ningxia's regional drought relief and flood control headquarters said in a statement.

Nine tourists were washed away while playing near a waterfall in the ravine. Six of them were found dead by rescuers and the other three were hospitalized with injuries, it said.

At least 30 other tourists were evacuated to the city proper out of safety considerations, said an officer with Ningxia's fire prevention headquarters who led the rescue operation.

Guangdong

4 killed in building collapse

Four people died and five others were injured when a fire brigade office under construction collapsed on Saturday in Guangzhou, capital of South China's Guangdong province.

Sixteen people were working at the site when the building in the Haizhu district toppled at midday, the municipal fire prevention bureau said.

It said seven workers were buried under the rubble and two others were injured.

Four of the missing workers were dead when rescuers found them at 4:30 pm. The other three were seriously injured. All the injured workers were taken to a hospital.

Taiwan

15 injured tourists remain hospitalized

Fifteen of the 24 mainland tourists injured in a bus accident in the Taiwan city of Chiayi are still under hospital observation, the island's tourism authorities said on Saturday.

The authorities also said all of the injured tourists received proper medical treatment at four local hospitals, adding that two tourists who were in intensive care at a local Catholic hospital have been transferred to public wards.

The rest of the tourists are in stable condition.

The accident occurred around 1 pm on Friday, when a bus carrying the tourists from the mainland city of Guangzhou hit the roof of a tunnel in downtown Chiayi.

Sichuan

Female panda cub born in Chengdu

A female panda cub was born at the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in Sichuan province on Saturday.

It was the third panda birth at the site this month, after a female cub was born on Aug 12 and a male cub was born on Aug 19, said the base chief Zhang Zhihe.

Both the mother and cub are under the intensive care of base keepers.

Yuan Yuan, mother of the panda, was born on Aug 1, 2004. Before this birth, she had given birth to four cubs, all of whom are alive, Zhang said.

Shandong

Public wants better tourism services

China should deliver sincere, fair and effective services to the general public, the head of the China Tourism Academy has said.

"The rigid adherence to the so-called rules and standards is actually not what services are about, and services in China should be sincere, fair and effective," said Dai Bin at the third China's Services Development Forum in Tai'an, Shandong province, on Saturday.

Local governments often put large amounts of money into developing tourism attractions, but when it comes to tourism services, they still think that their only role is to charge entrance fees, Dai said.

Jiangxi

Freshwater lake protection 'urgent'

Urgent action by international communities is needed to halt the contamination of freshwater lakes, Marion Hammerl, president the of Global Nature Fund said on Sunday.

Hammerl was speaking on the opening day of a seminar on lake conservancy and regional development in Gongqingcheng, Jiangxi province, where China's biggest freshwater lake, Poyang Lake, lies.

"It's high time for international communities to take action to prevent freshwater lakes from being contaminated, as water resources have been greatly threatened by human activities and climate change," Hammerl said.

China Daily-Xinhua