BEIJING (AP) From ceremonial fires on the Great Wall to
all-night shopping for a burgeoning middle class, China greeted the
new millennium as an era of promise for an ancient civilization.
Torchbearers in imperial-era regalia lighted signal fires on
watch towers on the Great Wall, which snakes 3,000 miles from the
Gobi desert in the west to the North China Sea in the east.
As Friday turned to Saturday and 1999 to 2000, dragons were
everywhere on fluttering flags and held aloft by dancers in
yellow silk a reminder that by the traditional lunar calendar the
Year of the Dragon starts Feb. 5. The dragon year is seen as very
lucky but, like the mythical beast, potentially dangerous.
''We won't be able to sleep tonight. To us in China, this
millennium is very important,'' said Zhang Yin, a college student
who with her friends joined thousands on Beijing's Wangfujing
shopping street. ''It's also important because it's a dragon year.
We're very happy.''
In western Beijing, a few miles from Tiananmen Square, President
Jiang Zemin and members of the ruling Communist Party Politburo
celebrated the new year at the Century Altar a sundial-shaped
monument built for the celebration. Jiang promised the ''great
rejuvenation'' of China by uniting with rival Taiwan and building a
''culturally advanced and modern socialist country.''
In a dig at perceived bullying by the United States, Jiang said
the Chinese people ''are willing to work with people of all other
countries to oppose hegemonism and power politics.''
The ceremony ended as scheduled, eight minutes after midnight.
Revelry reigned elsewhere. In Shanghai, China's business
capital, the Peace Hotel, a pre-war Art Deco landmark, charged 250
guests $240 a ticket for a lavish ball. Fireworks exploded over
Pudong, the futuristic financial district across the Huangpu River.
With mild temperatures in the 50s, stores in one upscale
pedestrian mall were staying open to greet the millennium with a
favorite Shanghai pastime shopping.
Beijing's Tiananmen Square, China's political heart, was at its
most festive. Students, families with young children, people by the
thousands strolled the vast plaza taking pictures. People scattered
confetti and held sparklers.
At the Century Altar, Jiang pressed a button lighting a new
eternal flame, dubbed ''the Sacred Flame of China.'' State media
said the flame was brought to Beijing by torch runners 28 miles
from Zhoukoudian, where the remains of prehistoric ''Peking Man''
were found in the 1920s.
The Chinese government already claims 5,000 years of history,
something archaeologists have yet to prove. The ceremony at the
altar marked an attempt to lay claim to a continuous link with an
era dating back more than 100,000 years.
In an appeal toward ending the 50-year standoff with Taiwan,
China's senior envoy to the island, Wang Daohan, sent a New Year's
greeting reiterating his willingness to visit once Taipei drops its
insistence on being treated as a sovereign state, the state-run
Xinhua News Agency.
