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BEIJING (Reuters) China has a stake in helping euro zone countries get through their debt crisis, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said in comments published on Sunday, pointing to Europe’s importance as a market and hinting at more possible support for beleaguered exporters.

Wen’s remarks, reported by the official Xinhua news agency, built on comments he made during German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s recent visit to China, when he said Beijing was considering increasing its participation in rescue funds to address the European debt crisis.

This time, Wen urged skeptical Chinese citizens to understand that supporting Europe was in their own benefit

“Now Europe is facing a debt crisis and we must consider relations with Europe strategically to protect our national interests,” Wen said while visiting the export-dependent southern Chinese province of Guangdong on Saturday, said Xinhua.

China, with its $3.2 trillion worth foreign exchange reserves, is often seen as a potential source for funds needed to bail out some European governments.

The Chinese premier’s latest comments on the euro crisis again did not include any specific commitments to European economies. But he stressed the stake that China holds in defusing the euro crisis.

“On the one hand, our biggest export market is Europe,” said Wen. “On the other hand, Europe is our biggest source for importing technology. From this perspective, helping to stabilize European markets in fact amounts to helping ourselves. We must make all quarters of society understand this point.”

At a joint media briefing in Beijing with Merkel on Thursday, Wen said China was studying how it might lend Europe further support.

“China is also considering increasing its participation in the solution of the European debt crisis through the channels of the EFSF and ESM,” Wen said at that briefing.

The ESM, a 500-billion-euro ($650 billion) permanent bailout fund due to become operational in July, is expected to replace the EFSF, a temporary fund that has been used to bail out Ireland and Portugal and will help in the second Greek package.

China has repeatedly said it supports a stable euro, and according to most estimates, China has about a quarter of its foreign exchange reserves in euro assets.

But Beijing has consistently been reluctant to make specific promises about any contributions to the rescue funds.

China’s exports to advanced economies, including Europe, have been hit by their continued woes, and Wen said his country’s manufacturers would have to adapt and open up new markets. He also hinted that more support might come.

“Import and export policy must maintain overall stability,” said Wen in a discussion with Guangdong manufacturers, according to Xinhua.

“If there must be adjustments, it should be more in the form of encouragement than restrictions,wholesale paco chicano,” said Wen.

(Reporting by Chris Buckley; Editing by Nick Macfie)

BEIJING A Chinese court has jailed 17 people for fighting with police over the demolition of housing in a northwestern city amid widespread tensions over rapid urban development.

Areas throughout China suffer frequent conflicts over government land seizures for redevelopment and demolition of unauthorized building to house migrant workers. But most confrontations are peaceful.

The official Xinhua News Agency says the court in Lanzhou convicted the 17 of beating and throwing bricks at police who were tearing down makeshift housing. The sentences ranged from three to six months in prison.

Xinhua said in Saturday’s report that the violence in Lanzhou was “a scenario which has become all too familiar in China in recent years.”

LOS ANGELES In a move that heightens the growing tension between Silicon Valley and Hollywood, Wikipedia and other websites went dark Wednesday in protest of two congressional proposals intended to thwart the online piracy of copyrighted movies and TV programs.

The web-based encyclopedia is part of a loose coalition of dot-coms and large technology companies that fear Congress is prepared to side with Hollywood and enact extreme measures possibly including the blocking of entire websites_ to stop the online sharing and unauthorized use of Hollywood productions.

The fight will test which California-based industry has the most sway in Washington.

For now, Silicon Valley appears to have the upper hand. Supporters of the legislation called the Stop Online Piracy Act in the House and the Protect Intellectual Property Act in the Senate say the bills are aimed at protecting jobs in the movie and music industries. But a campaign including tech heavyweights such as Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. has successfully portrayed the bills as an attack on a free and open Internet.

“It has nothing to do with stolen songs or movies,” said Justin Ruben, executive director of MoveOn.org, which is participating in the blackout. Ruben says tougher legislation even directed overseas could make domestic cultural commentators more prone to legal attack.

Rather than showing encyclopedia articles, Wikipedia displayed a blacked-out page describing the protest and offering more information on the bills. Many articles were still viewable on cached pages.

Reddit.com shut down its social news service for 12 hours. Other sites made their views clear without cutting off services. Google blacked out the logo on its home page, directing people to a page where they could add their names to a petition.

The one-day outage was timed to coincide with key House and Senate committee hearings as they prepare to send the bills to the full floor for debate.

However, sponsor Rep. Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican, sought last week to remove a controversial provision from the House bill that could force Internet service providers to interfere with the way Web addresses work for foreign sites deemed dedicated to piracy. He postponed work on the measure until February.

Critics believe such tinkering with core Internet technology treads into dangerous territory that could lead to online censorship. It might also give hackers a new way to wreak havoc.

The White House raised concerns that the bills could stifle innovation. Over the weekend, the Obama administration reacted to two online petitions, saying it “will not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk or undermines the dynamic, innovative global Internet.”

At the same time, the administration called on all sides to “pass sound legislation this year that provides prosecutors and rights holders new legal tools to combat online piracy originating beyond U.S. borders.”

That nuanced stance is President Barack Obama’s attempt at “threading the needle” between two important constituencies as he seeks re-election in November, said Jeffrey Silva, a technology policy analyst at Medley Global Advisors in Washington.

On the one hand, his administration has defended a free, open Internet as it watched repressive regimes fall in the Middle East with help from social media such as Twitter. It has also been a proponent of the concept of “net neutrality,” which prevents Internet service providers from slowing online traffic that comes from file-sharing sites known to trade in pirated content.

On the other hand, Obama and other Democrats have gone to Hollywood dozens of times to raise campaign funds over the years.

“The administration is trying to fight to protect the Internet space,” Silva said. “But at the same time, it doesn’t want to disenfranchise Hollywood and the business community.”

Indeed, behind the protests and public posturing, both Hollywood and Silicon Valley spend generously to lobby causes in Washington. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the movie, television and music industries spent a combined $91.7 million on lobbying efforts in 2011, compared with the computer and Internet industry’s $93 million.

In the 2012 election cycle, the movie, television and music industry offered up $7.7 million in direct campaign contributions to congressional candidates. The computer and Internet industry contributed $6.6 million.

Despite the uproar on websites and blogs, PIPA remains firmly in play. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy said Tuesday that he intends to push the bill toward a floor vote on Jan. 24. He said much of the criticism of the bill is “flatly wrong.”

But amid the high-tech campaign against the bills, several lawmakers came out in opposition. At least three Senate Republicans who had previously cosponsored the Senate bill Orrin Hatch of Utah, Roy Blunt of Missouri and John Boozman of Arkansas issued statements Wednesday saying they were withdrawing their support.

It remains to be seen whether the two industries can come to the table and negotiate a compromise.

“There are good companies, and then there are companies simply out to preserve the Wild West, free-to-steal business model,” said Recording Industry Association of America CEO Cary Sherman. He expects to know “within the next few weeks” whether the legislation can survive.

Lawmakers may have a personal incentive to keep online piracy on the nation’s political radar, said Fred Wertheimer, president of Democracy 21, a non-partisan government-accountability watchdog. If the issue stays alive through the current election cycle, it may help bring in campaign contributions from high-tech donors and Hollywood later this year.

The issue “becomes an opportunity for raising more money from these groups,” Wertheimer said. “If you’re into an important issue and money is flowing in on both sides, then both sides can up the ante.”

____

Congressional reporter Jim Abrams contributed to this report from Washington.

NEW YORK After bringing back George Stephanopoulos to replace Christiane Amanpour on Sunday’s “This Week” political talk show, ABC is making a change behind the scenes as well.

The network’s news president, Ben Sherwood, said Friday that Jon Banner will replace Rick Kaplan as the show’s executive producer. Banner was a longtime producer of “World News” before taking on a wider role recently at ABC News.

Sherwood says Kaplan will produce ABC’s New Hampshire primary and offer a “critical voice” in news and election coverage later.

“This Week” has been sinking in the ratings behind NBC and CBS,wholesale Christian Louboutin shoes, and Stephanopoulos agreed to come back to the show while continuing as co-anchor of “Good Morning America” during the week.

Jackman — Hugh Jackman — wasn’t interested in being agent 007.

“I meditation every masculine by some point thinks about playing James Bond,” he said. “So it was not right then, but it may be right whether it comes behind.”

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“I was about to shoot X-Men 2 and Wolverine had transform this thing in my life,” he explained. “I didn’t absence to be doing two such iconic roles in a moment.”

The 43-year-old Real Steel star was considered for the role of James Bond in the 2006 film Casino Royale, but the timing equitable wasn’t right.

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Tell Us: Would you like apt discern Hugh Jackman melodrama James Bond?

“I got a cry from my agency saying, ‘There namely some possible amuse in you as Bond. Are you interested?’” he told the Press Association, as excerpted at TotalFilm.com. “At the period, I wasn’t.”

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The character ultimately went to Daniel Craig, but Jackman shouldn’t be discounted for hereafter Bond flicks.

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