Traditional Chinese Medicine Helps Blind Man To Be Seen

Leading US spin doctors are today marvelling at the mysterious workings of traditional Chinese medicine, which has miraculously helped them to see a blind man sheltering in their embassy in Beijing.

A few pricks, and the pain has vanished

“There’s no rational explanation for it but hell, it works,” admitted an apologetic Dr Marilyn Strangelove, washing her hands after a complicated operation to save Hillary Clinton’s face tragically failed. “The Chinese swiftly applied a threat to the blind man’s family and suddenly, for the first time, we could see him quite clearly. And we didn’t feel a bit of pain during the extraction. We sure could learn a trick or two from these guys.”

Sceptics remain unconvinced, however, about the ethics of dishing out Chinese medicine, claiming that its unabashed practitioners cynically exploit the desire of the credulous to believe that the problem has magically gone away whilst beautiful, endangered creatures like the Lesser Spotted Human Rights Activist are cruelly ground into paste.

Crapfone Whyhouse To Sell Chinese Phones To China

Even as it shuts down its UK joint venture with US retail giant Bad Buy to sell electrical stuff they don’t need to consumers who can’t afford it, resulting in 1,100 job losses, essential lifestyle toy retailer Crapfone Whyhouse is already making plans with its US partner to sell mobile phones made in China to the people of China.

That thing you make will make your lives complete

“Finally, the Chinese drones who are driven by economic necessity to slave away in latter-day concentration camps like Foxconn will be able to enjoy the fruits of their efforts, neatly completing the circle,” enthused Crapfone Whyhouse CEO and legendary Queen drummer Roger Taylor.

“Imagine how complete their ant-like lives will be once they are compulsorily permitted to spend the tiny portion remaining in their pay packets - after deductions for food, lodging and bus fare from the dormitory part of the compound to the factory area - on the small objects of desire they are banging out for pennies," he explained. "Under China’s wisely restrictive regulations on personal communications, they will be permitted to revel in the daily toilet-break luxury of tweeting to each other just how inordinately happy they feel to be contributing to our profit margins.”

It is also hoped that the labour camps will be eventually spared the expense of playing inspiring Communist marching songs over their factory-wide PA systems, as workers enthusiastically download their personal choice of Communist marching songs at a marginally reasonable price once they have worked enough compulsory overtime to pay for their little pocket friends.

Europe Would Look Nice On Your Mantelpiece, Leaders Tell China

Eurozone leaders are desperately trying to tempt China into adding Europe to its collection of knick-knacks, pointing out that trinkets of such fabulous size rarely come onto the market at such an attractive price.

The Russians haven't got one of these, remember

“Just $100bn buys you over a million square miles of prime development land,” haggled Klaus Regling, head of the EFSF (Eurozone Fire Sale Facility). “That’s just a hundred grand a mile - and we’re throwing in 857m economic production units absolutely free, so in effect you’re getting a lifetime of work out of them for an initial investment of just over a hundred bucks apiece. Go on, have a fling! You won’t get a better deal anywhere else.”

“Just look at some of the fabulous collectibles you’ll be picking up for a song,” he cajoled. “The Eiffel Tower, Versailles, the Parthenon, Pompeii and a fantastic train set – you’re getting the complete job lot in one bargain deal!”

Mr Regling added that, if he was unable to tempt the Chinese, he would be forced to put Europe on eBay with a starting bid of $1 and see what he got for it.

Demand For US Arms Reduction In No Way Connected To Our New Aircraft Carrier, Says China

Well, that's the take-off bit sorted

Speaking from the huge flight deck of the Shanga Lang, the People’s Liberation Navy’s newly-unveiled 65,000-tonne aircraft carrier, as it began its sea trials, Chinese premier Wen Jiabao assured the United States that his warning to scale back their expenditure on defence was nothing more sinister than well-intentioned budgeting advice from a concerned friend.

“China is the world’s friend,” he smiled, as the behemoth set course toward Japan. “And the only reason we are quadrupling our defence budget is because we have so much of your money that we simply don’t know what to do with it all. Look at this aircraft carrier. Only a nation with money to burn would waste so much money on a vessel of this size without having any aircraft to equip it with. Well, apart from the British, of course, but they are a notoriously inscrutable race whose reasons - if indeed they even understand such an abstract concept – have always been impossible to fathom.”

The former Soviet hulk will begin launching enthusiastic Chinese pilots off its steam catapults tomorrow. After a decade or two, if all goes well, Chinese defence researchers say they may even develop an aircraft of some sort to put them in – possibly a reverse-engineered Swordfish biplane, which they hope to develop using a rusty old Fleet Air Arm Gannet as a starting point.

China Explains Revised Principles Of Communism To Washington

It's what Marx would have wanted

1. Workless of the USA, get a job! You have nothing to lose but your food stamps.
2. From each according to his abilities, to each according to his shareholding.
3. Capital is reckless of the health or length of life of the labourer, so stop being ill and old.
4. Religion is the opium of the masses. So keep buying into that Protestant work ethic.
5. The theory of Chinese Communism may be summed up in one sentence: Abolish all welfare.

Chinese Premier Presses Cameron On Human Rights

Spot the oppressor

Chinese premier Wen Jiabao insisted today that human rights were “not off limits” after holding talks with prime minister David Cameron.

As the two leaders announced a package of trade deals worth £1.4 billion, the Chinese leader said he would always raise difficult questions about political freedom and the justice system alongside seeking closer economic ties. Meanwhile, Mr Wen said Britain and Beijing had to treat each other as "equals" on human rights.

“The Chinese people are appalled by the enthusiastic beatings meted out by your thuggish Metropolitan Police against unarmed protesters, and their deplorable mass detention tactics,” he told an inscrutably smiling Mr Cameron, “Not to mention your denial of legal redress for millions of ordinary British peasants, who are monitored constantly by the most comprehensive surveillance camera network in the world. And how can you have the bare-faced cheek to call yourselves civilised when your so-called free press routinely publishes government-sanctioned propaganda demonising the sick and the disabled, and your state denies them the treatment they need while your super-rich friends are cosseted in exclusive private hospitals?”

“No offence, mate,” he added, as Mr Cameron resolutely maintained a fixed grin for the world’s cameras.

Obsolete Aircraft Carrier Will Make China A Superpower At Last, And Might Even Work

This could threaten Japan, albeit quite briefly

A top Chinese military official has announced plans to complete a Russian aircraft carrier left uncompleted after the collapse of the Soviet system 18 years ago, saying that it could be launched before the month is out and, if it floats, will at last propel China into the élite international league of big boys who throw their weight around.

"All of the great nations in the world own aircraft carriers – even Britain, if you count tiny ones. They are symbols of a great nation," said Qi Jianguo, assistant to the chief of the general staff of the People’s Liberation Army. “When the Chinese people have an aircraft carrier at last, we can fill it with glorious J-20 fighters that definitely aren’t shoddy copies of an American F-22 that was shot down over Serbia a couple of years ago. Given 20 or 30 years and an inexhaustible supply of enthusiastic revolutionary pilots, we are confident that we will also discover how to land them back on again on a short, pitching deck.”

Defence experts warn that, once the rust is scraped off, the half-finished antique will be completed to the usual exemplary Chinese quality-control standards – meaning that the fragile balance of global power will be dramatically shifted eastwards for just over a year, until it rolls over and sinks.

Dr Who Arrested As A Counter-Revolutionary

A familiar face will be teaching the Doctor all about The Long March

Veteran time-traveller and enemy of the revolution Dr Who has been detained by the People’s Republic of China for three months, during which he will be forcibly re-educated, announced officials at China’s state TV regulator. The Time Lord’s TARDIS has been impounded by the state and will not be returned on his release, he confirmed, adding that the Doctor’s future travel requirements would be accommodated by a standard-issue bicycle.

“Time travel is not mentioned at all in the writings of Karl Marx or Chairman Mao, and is therefore counter-revolutionary,” explained Ouyang Lina of Oriental TV. “Overseas operatives swooped on this notorious enemy of the state last week, after assassinating his former lackey Sarah Jane Smith, met police detectives on arrival in China and took him to a re-education centre – where they were all detained together, as the glorious people’s government has also designated spies and crime investigators as capitalist running-dogs.”

The Doctor’s friends, a Mr & Mrs Williams of Leadworth, are understood to have travelled to America in the hope of persuading Dr Sam Beckett to come out of retirement and bounce around history at random until he finally arrives in China in the present, where they hope he will formulate some crazy ad-hoc escape plan with the aid of his best friend, a hologram.

Meanwhile, worried leaders of Earth’s other governments have sent a radio message into space, declaring the planet to be under strict quarantine following a terrifying outbreak of the space runs.

MG Proudly Restarts Production With Some Sort Of Car

Much-missed legendary British marque MG is hoping to create a new army of aficionados - restarting manufacture at its Longbridge plant, after a 16-year hiatus, with a blob which looks very much like a car of some sort.

Well, it certainly seems car-shaped

MG’s owners, Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation And Takeaway, have spent years studying what a car looks like, and believe they have at last cracked the elusive formula with the MG6. Leading motoring journalists are already saying that the blob does indeed strongly resemble a car.

MG’s Guy Jones was keen to stress that, although the anodyne lump of metal is bolted together exclusively from other lumps of metal made in China, it was nevertheless 100% designed in Britain – being apparently under the apprehension that inheriting the mantle of the Sinclair C5 and step-in baths is some sort of irresistible lure to more than just the BNP.

Other Shanghai Auto executives, however, put more emphasis on the inclusion of today’s must-have features like doors, wheels and a top speed – confidently predicting that, for people who sort of like cars, this is definitely the sort of car they will sort of like.

Nobel Committee Criticised For Usurping China’s Sovereign Right To Embarrass China

Call that embarrassing?

China’s embarrassing national press has condemned the Nobel Peace Prize Committee after a presentation ceremony for pro-democracy campaigner Liu Xiaobo was held in Oslo with an empty chair symbolising the imprisoned dissident.

Now, this is embarrassing

“How dare the Nobel Committee presume to embarrass the glorious People’s Republic of China in this way?” thundered the English-language China Daily. “That right belongs first and foremost to the completely and utterly democratic Chinese government. Whether the industrious comrades in Beijing are democratically banning anyone who has ever met this dangerous criminal from travelling to Norway; demanding that the Norwegian government shut down the entire Nobel Foundation; propping up North Korea’s reckless dynasty of congenital nutters; shamelessly buying third world countries’ support with exploitative ‘development’ contracts; launching denial-of-service attacks on an innocuous internet search engine because it dares to find criticism of the leaders of the glorious revolution; or swamping the internet with botware to spy on the grovelling national servants of the evil, parasitical plutocrats, who have cynically moved their production here in humbled recognition of the vastly superior productivity of our enlightened proletariat – our political masters will always strive tirelessly for the greater shame of the everlasting Chinese revolution.”

And this is embarrassing

“And furthermore, never let it be said that our new capitalist comrades are shirking from their revolutionary duties,” continued the turgid prose. “These glorious Bentley-owning exploiters of the people have not neglected their duty in the embarrassment of China - cheerfully transforming our rivers into toxic sludge and poisoning the very air we breathe, fearlessly operating the most collapsible mines in the world in order to provide our heroic miners with glorious deaths in the name of revolutionary socialism, and industriously herding the rejoicing suicide regiments of the people’s revolution into vast slave camps to produce subversively defective goods for decadent and corrupted Westerners.”

And this makes an empty chair  look pretty feeble, too

“Let the upstart lackeys of the so-called Nobel Peace Prize Committee also reflect on the embarrassment of the Chinese media, for fearlessly suppressing the truth whenever it presumes to undermine the revolutionary socialist policies of our glorious leaders,” the report droned on remorselessly.

“And finally,” the article concluded on page 104, “May the whole world observe the exemplary enthusiasm with which the patriotic Han proletariat strives gloriously towards its own embarrassment, by its revolutionary racist treatment of ethnic minorities - like the wicked, reactionary Uighur parasites - in response to their misbegotten counter-revolutionary differences.”

"Not to mention their revolutionary fervour for eating endangered animals' penises," added a later supplement.

Cameron Explains Principles Of Western Democracy To China

Prime minister David Cameron has urged China to embrace democracy, pointing out that as long as all parties draw their MPs exclusively from a small, self-perpetuating oligarchy who do whatever big business tells them in return for lucrative directorships, the same elite can remain in power indefinitely while the populace fondly cherish the fantasy that they have some sort of say in how their lives will be ordained.

Just think of it as a waste paper basket for people's dreams

“Look, democracy is just a fetish that people in the west worship above all else, without really understanding it,” he told China’s rulers. “It’s like God used to be, or communism to your people. Just split yourselves into a couple of factions – how you do it doesn’t really matter, because words like ‘labour’, ‘liberal’, ‘conservative’ and ‘democrat’ have long since lost all meaning – and let each group present its arguments as the only sensible way whilst heaping scorn on the other parties’ versions of the same arguments. Nothing will change at the top, I assure you; but the little people in the west will feel so much happier buying your junk if they think Johnny Chinaman has the same illusory choices that they do.”

“And if some artist moans about human rights, well, let him,” Mr Cameron continued. “Nobody will pay the slightest attention to him. Despite all the rights my people have lost over the last 20 years, do you see any signs of bloody revolution in the UK? Just tell your people that bad men want to hurt them, and trust me - they’ll be queueing up to put their rights on a bonfire and dance round it, thanking you for their security.”

China Demands Arrest Of Nobel Prize Ringleaders

The Chinese government is still at something of a loss to understand why their Norwegian counterparts have still not rounded up the ringleaders of the Nobel Foundation, after they outrageously awarded the Peace Prize to imprisoned Chinese human rights activist Liu Xiaobo.

“This award is an obscenity,” shrieked foreign minister Yang Jiechi. “If - as the racist Norwegian authorities claim - the Nobel Foundation is truly an independent organisation over which they exert no control, why on earth have they not locked them all up and thrown away the key?”

Lucy Liu is not related to Liu Xiaobo, says China, so there's no need to bother yourselves about him

Fears are growing in the world’s democracies that, if the Chinese do not obtain satisfaction from the Norwegians, they may react against this overt act of bigotry by switching their vast industrial capacity to making things that actually work.

“The only thing keeping Western economies in business is consumer knowledge that the products they manufacture might very well continue to function satisfactorily after 366 days,” warned the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. “If the Chinese should break into that market, frankly, my advice is to start planting rice fast.”

The US and UK governments are in urgent talks with the Norwegians, pointing out that all that give-me-liberty-or-give-me-death crap is really rather passé nowadays.

China Threatens Tit-For-Tat Restrictions On US Import

The Chinese government has reacted angrily to American moves to place import tariffs on Chinese goods, threatening to impose a similar restriction on next year’s import from the United States.

The row follows a vote by the US House of Representatives in favour of sanctions, based on claims that the Chinese government is effectively subsidising its exports illegally by deliberately undervaluing its currency, the yuan.

“Last year, everything sold in the United States with a plug or a battery was manufactured in China,” admitted a spokesman for China’s Ministry of Commercial Domination. “But let us not forget that we are America’s fastest-growing export market. This year a businessman in Shanghai bought a Cadillac, resulting in a 100% increase in US imported goods over previous years. If we were to respond with trade tariffs of our own, when he gets bored with it next year he may well opt for a luxurious new home-grown Huatai B11 instead, if he knows what’s good for him.”

China's doomsday weapon could see off America's successful export

“By then we will almost certainly have worked out how to make the glorious B11’s wheels turn in the same direction as the steering wheel for the entire warranty period,” he added ominously.

Toyota May Kill You Today or Tomorrow

As it was revealed that a small number of Ford Transit vans share the same defective Chinese-made accelerator pedal that caused the urgent recall of 1.8m Toyotas in Europe and 3.4m in the United States, worried vehicle owners around the world are desperately searching for a car that might not kill them.

"I thought Hondas were a pretty safe bet," said one concerned parent. "But they're recalling cars over a window-heater switch that incinerates the entire car when it fails. It looks like I'll be doing a lot of walking from now on."

China insisted that it was working hard to develop a product that actually worked.

"Unfortunately, our courts would be facing a huge backlog if we tried and executed every factory manager with a laissez-faire attitude to quality control," said a spokesman for the Chinese government. "And international calls for fair trials aren't going to make things any easier."

With scant hopes of finding a car in production today without at least one potentially-lethal Chinese component waiting to maim, roast or skewer its hapless occupants, the British government is rumoured to be considering a non-scrappage scheme, in which owners of cars more than ten years old would be paid £2000 not to replace them with a murderous new model.

Three Cheers For China's Enlightened Wog-Murdering Policy, Says Daily Mail

The entire British media was united today in condemning China's refusal to grant a stay of execution to Akmal Shaikh on the grounds of mental incapacity and translation problems during his trial. Apart, of course, from the Daily Mail, which gave a rousing three cheers to the Chinese authorities for ridding the world of one more evil drug-trafficking wog with bipolar personality disorder.

"You trendy metropolitan liberal junkies make me want to puke," wrote professional ranter Leo McKinstry, in an article which even the Mail's unpleasant editor Paul Dacre might have thought slightly at variance with public sentiment. "This pathetic excuse for a man was carrying four kilos of HEROIN - which, in case you hadn't noticed, stoners, is an illegal drug. Oh, but I forgot - everyone in Britain except moral, upstanding me is probably snorting the vile poison up their hideously-perforated nostrils at this very moment. I hope you all die! Er... where was I?"

Once he had calmed down enough to continue, Mr McKinstry went on to point out that, as if his horrible wog name wasn't a big enough clue, anybody could tell from the colour of Shaikh's skin that he was clearly about as British as a camel's hump, no matter what rubbish might be written in his toytown European passport.

"If the Chinese government - who, slitty-eyed commies though they may be, are apparently not nearly as blind as our druggie-loving government - were to foolishly allow themselves to be swayed by a global wave of misguided, muddle-headed protests, this sinister Paki monster would have been free to join al Qaeda tomorrow and blow up the world by Friday," he continued, warming to his theme. "As for mental illness, don't make me laugh. It's just another hand-wringing liberal excuse for sheer, unmitigated malice on the part of the so-called sufferer. Bipolar disorder? There's no such thing. Are you listening to me, Stephen Fry, you pseudo-intellectual Jew-boy shirtlifter?"

Mr McKinstry finished his zeitgeist-free essay by calling on cannabis-addled ministers to take a leaf out of China's book.

"There is nothing barbaric about the death penalty," he concluded. "The real barbarism lies in refusing to punish criminals."

In response, a spokesman for the government told the Nev Filter: "State-sanctioned murder is deeply repugnant to all civilised people, especially when applied to the incurably deranged. Therefore we suppress our baser instincts and tolerate Mr McKinstry and his toxic poison - abhorrent though it may be to our sensibilities - even if it means that feeble-minded addicts are free to purchase the Daily Mail without prescription on the streets of Britain."

Shelves Cleared of Chinese Products in Quality Control Scare

Britain’s high streets closed down indefinitely today amid fears over the standards of manufacturing quality control in China, prompted by over 53,000 cases of children poisoned by melamine-tainted milk products.

 

The latest scandal involving China’s legendary devil-may-care attitude to safety follows years of product warnings involving dangerous items ranging from children’s toys to pharmaceuticals and pet food.

 

“The safety of our customers is our primary concern, as research shows that dead ones tend not to make repeat purchases,” said a spokesman for the retail industry. “In the wake of this latest incidence of adverse publicity, our members have decided to remove all Chinese products from their shelves until further notice. Unfortunately, this means that they have removed everything from their shelves until further notice. Oh well, at least now we know why all that Chinese stuff was so cheap.”

 

Industry experts are unsure how long it will take to get British manufacturing back in business, as most of the construction industry’s plant has been mothballed for health and safety reasons as it was made in China. There is also a severe lack of skilled labour to fill the factories - if and when they are built - after a generation of industrial decline in which Britain was supposed to become a world leader in the service sector, before all the jobs went to India.

 

“We’re probably going to have to wind the clock back about 250 years and restart the industrial revolution,” admitted a spokesman for the Confederation of British Industry. “My advice to people is to start on a small scale, perhaps sewing buttons on shirts for an enterprising local tailor, until we can work out how to put a loom or a steam engine together. Perhaps one day we can look forward to becoming a booming industrial power again, with belching factory chimneys in every town. Obviously, they won’t be burning Chinese coal, though - it’s probably full of uranium or agent orange or something. Perhaps we ought to start pumping 20 years of flood-water out of our coal mines.”

 

“Our leading scientists tell me that Britain should have home-built treadmill technology in about a fortnight,” said industry minister John Hutton. “At least that’ll bring the unemployment figures down.”

Brown Inspires Afghan Hell-Hole Troops To Emulate To Olympic Heroes

In an impromptu drop-in visit to Afghanistan on his way to what promises to be a truly awesome party in Beijing, Gordon Brown has won the hearts and minds of his hard-pressed forces, praising them for being as brave as Britain’s Olympic medal-winners.

Members of 16 Air Assault Brigade based at Camp Bastion fought to hold back unsoldierly tears of adulation for their leader as the Prime Minister told them: “This week we are celebrating the Olympics where we have had great successes. But this week I also believe our Olympic athletes and everybody else in our country will remember that you have shown exactly the same courage, professionalism and dedication. Hullo, is that a news camera? Well, fancy that. I have no idea how the media managed to find out about this top-secret visit. Gosh, is that the time? Must dash, or I’ll miss the first course.”

As Mr Brown was whisked away, escorted by squadrons of strike fighters and assault helicopters, hard-bitten troopers applauded his death-defying five-minute photo-opportunity.

“Next time I’m out patrolling the lawless, mine-strewn badlands of Helmand province in my paper-thin Land Rover, with my cardboard body armour and a half-decent pair of boots I had to pay for myself, Gordon Brown’s stirring words will inspire me to be as courageous and professional as our do-or-die yachties pottering heroically about in the pollution-infested Chinese waters, risking life and limb in their colourful little dinghies,” said a grizzled sergeant who had served in both Gulf Wars, Northern Ireland and the Balkans.

Another veteran with two tours in the Middle East under his belt expressed the hope that, should his feet be blown off by an improvised pipe bomb, he might find within himself the same stoic endurance in the face of unimaginable suffering as Paula Radcliffe showed when she limped into 23rd place clutching her gammy hip.

Meanwhile, the PM told the press that he would be having stern words about human rights with China’s leaders, between mouthfuls, at the gala dinner he would shortly be attending.

Beijing Olympics Promise Breathtaking Performances

Olympic athletes are still facing serious health risks in Beijing, despite Chinese authorities spending $16bn on reducing pollution for the forthcoming games, according to Frank Kelly, professor of environmental health at Kings College London.

The UN has already reported that pollution levels are more than three times higher than the World Health Organisation’s safe limits, and are unlikely to fall much before the games begin.

“Athletes breathe in ten times as much air into their lungs as spectators,” explained Professor Kelly. “They are pushing their bodies to their limits, so pollution will have serious consequences.”

The Chinese authorities took time out from their busy schedule of rounding up dissidents and putting restrictions on journalists to say they were stepping up last-minute measures to improve air quality in their smog-blanketed capital.

“The people of Beijing are eager to make the games a success,” said President Hu Jintao, “And they have all volunteered to breathe in deeply just before the opening ceremony, and hold their breath until after the games have finished and everyone has gone home.”

Sceptical International Olympic Committee chiefs have been busy making contingency plans. New events have been added to the roster - including the 200m marathon, spitball, the 25m sprint to the lavatory, hurling, the deca-Savlon and throwing the breakfast. Swimmers may be allowed to wear aqualungs, as indeed may all the other competitors.

Some athletes have spoken out, saying that the debilitating effects of pollution mean they will not be fit enough to break any records. They were immediately arrested by the Chinese authorities, put on trial for five minutes and hauled off to labour camps.

In a separate development, Russian tennis star Maria Sharapova has pulled out of the competition, citing a nerve problem.

“I haven’t got the nerve to go to Beijing and risk breathing the lethal cocktail of toxins that passes for air there,” she told reporters.

Coldplay Topple Tibet and the Olympics from Top of News Charts

The weekend saw the Olympic torch pass through the streets of the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, amid heavy Chinese security and suggestions that the people lining the route were hand-picked by the authorities. The re-released story briefly topped the news charts, before being toppled by the exciting news that Coldplay have their first number one hit with their current single, ‘Viva La Vida’.

TV viewers around the world were puzzled to see Tibet and the Olympic torch back on their screens after a gap of several weeks. BBC switchboards were jammed with calls, with “Is this a repeat?” the most common complaint.

“I thought we’d sorted Tibet out weeks ago,” said one viewer. “Now I’m worrying about the fuel prices. When that blows over, I might bother myself slightly about the A-level results, or get vaguely worked up over the length of the parliamentary recess. But Tibet is old news. Boring.”

Inhuman Interest Story

The devastating earthquake that flattened the Wenchuan region of China yesterday, killing at least 10,000 Chinese people, stayed in the news for an extra day when it was discovered that 15 British tourists are missing.

Newsdesk veterans across Britain recalled the heady days of the 1995 earthquake in Kobe, in which over 6,000 Japanese deaths were instantly brushed aside in favour of blanket coverage of the story of the missing British nurse, who later turned up virtually unscathed.

“Look, there’s billions of Chinese, and let’s face it, they all look alike to us,” said one yawning tabloid hack. “But fifteen missing Brits – that’s fifteen desperate families to be relentlessly doorstepped by packs of feral young work-placement graduates, all clutching their shiny new journalism degrees and repeating the time-honoured phrase: ‘Your son or daughter is probably squashed under a collapsed building or lying at the bottom of a yawning chasm – tell me, how do you feel?’ It brings tears to the eyes of jaded journos, I tell you, when you find out there’s at least one Brit casualty. It means you can forget all about all the bad things in life - such as how one distraught, wailing foreigner looks pretty much like another - and reduce an unimaginable catastrophe to a simple human interest story.”

“What would be the icing on the cake,” added the anonymous reporter, “Would be if they can pull a cute little kitten out of the rubble. We’d put that on the front page for sure. We could probably even start up a rescue fund to bring it to Britain and campaign for Madonna to adopt it.”

The massive rescue effort continues.