Opinion | First thing China, August 17

Citing Japanese media, CCTV has reported that the 14 activists from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China currently detained for illegal entry into Japan upon their arrival this week to the Diaoyu Islands will be deported Friday evening, making calls this week for boycotts against Japanese goods and nationwide protests this coming Sunday less likely to escalate.

The Beijing transport commission yesterday announced that construction of the first phase of the city's second airport will be completed by 2015, bringing with it an additional annual capacity of 40 million air passengers. Also announced yesterday were details concerning Beijing's other major construction projects set to take place during the country's 12th five-year plan (2011-15), including a plan to have built a total of 1,000 kilometres of expressway within the municipality, and to give the city its own entry to the G2 Beijing–Shanghai expressway, which currently requires drivers to detour through Tianjin.

With a thousand jobs are slated to be cut from Motorola's China operations, employees this week formed a protest outside the company's Nanjing Software Park office aimed at parent company Google, claiming that Motorola is illegally threatening to fire those who don't sign an agreement to dissolve existing contracts but under conditions they find unfair.