In what is possibly the worst oil spill in China's history, some 430 square kilometers of the Yellow Sea are covered with a slick following a July 16 explosion at a pipeline terminal in the northeast port of Dalian. At least one worker has drowned in crude during the clean-up operation. The slick has doubled in size despite earlier government assurances that it was being contained. Supplies have been cut to two local PetroChina refineries. The terminal receives crude from Yellow Sea rigs run by the China National Offshore Oil Corp. (CNOOC). The Chinese government estimates the spill at 400,000 gallons. A Beijing-based biotechnology company, Weiyeyuan, is providing 23 tons of oil-eating bacteria to help clean up the slick. (BGN, WSJ, July 22; The Guardian, July 21; China Daily, July 20)

A Chinese farmer has resorted to the use of improvised rockets to fend off demolition crews sent to evict him from his lands to make way for the construction of commercial buildings. Since February, Yang Youde, a 56-year-old farmer on the outskirts of Wuhan, capital of central China's Hubei province, has resisted two attempts to flatten his hut by using his homemade rocket system. "I shot only over their heads to frighten them, " said Yang. "I didn't want to cause any injuries."

A Chinese appeals court on June 9 upheld the conviction of earthquake activist Tan Zuoren who was sentenced in February to five years in prison on subversion charges. Tan was charged with and convicted of inciting subversion to state power, allegations stemming from e-mails critical of the government's 1989 policy toward the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy demonstrators. Advocacy groups and Tan's supporters maintain that he was arrested after he sought to release an independent report documenting the lethal consequences of substandard construction in the Sichuan province's 2008 earthquake, which left some 90,000 dead.

South Korea's Defense Ministry on May 20 formally charged North Korea with the attack on a South Korean Navy ship that killed 46 sailors—in the face of angry denials from Pyongyang, including a threat of "all-out war" if the South responds militarily. An official South Korean study found the Cheonan was sunk by a North Korean torpedo in the March incident in waters near the intra-Korean border. (CSM, May 20; JoongAng Daily, May 18)

Chinese lawyers and US-based rights group ChinaAid Jan. 15 called on Beijing police to conduct a search for missing Chinese rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng. Police reported the previous day that Gao, who has been in police custody since last February, went missing in September. Gao's brother, Gao Zhiyi, said he was told that police believe his brother "got lost and went missing while out on a walk"—from a high-security prison. Rights groups suspect Gao died while under torture.

Chinese rights activist Liu Xiabo was sentenced to 11 years in prison on Dec. 25 on subversion charges. Liu was tried two days earlier in a trial that lasted only two hours and was closed to foreign diplomats. The trial was called "a travesty of justice" by international rights groups in including Human Rights Watch, which said before the trial that although "Liu's crimes are non-existent ... his fate has been pre-determined." It is unclear whether Liu's legal team will appeal the sentence.

A Chinese court sentenced human rights activist Huang Qi to three years in prison Nov. 23 on charges of illegally holding state secrets. Huang was a critic of the government's handling of the 2008 earthquake in Sichuan province that killed about 90,000 people. After the quake, he posted articles online criticizing the government's response and talked to foreign media outlets about how some children's deaths were the result of poorly-built schools. Huang was originally detained on June 10, 2008.

Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of Tokyo despite a heavy police presence during President Barack Obama's visit on Nov. 13, to demand an end to US bases under the banner "Break up the Japan-US summit." Anti-nuclear activists held a separate rally as survivors of the US atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki took a letter to the US embassy demanding that Obama follow through on his pledge to work toward the abolition of nuclear weapons. A Nov. 8 pre-summit protest drew more than 20,000 on the southern island of Okinawa, where more than half of the 47,000 US troops in Japan are stationed.