China, Lacking a Key Port, Looks Longingly to Russia By JAMES BROOKE:

With a 10-mile-wide sliver of Russian territory blocking Manchuria from the Sea of Japan, China is drawing on its own history for a solution, pushing Russia to sign a 49-year lease to convert the midsize cargo port on Trinity Bay here to a Chinese economic enclave, a Hong Kong of Russia's Far East.

So far, the Russians have not agreed. But the Chinese are making their intentions plain: they have built a six-lane highway to the door of the border crossing closest to here and, according to Russian officials, ordered Chinese companies to boycott Russia's ports in the Sea of Japan until Moscow agrees to the scheme.

In the 19th century, European powers strong-armed long-term leases on ports from a weak Chinese government. After the 16th-century Portuguese occupation of Macao, the British took Hong Kong, the French took Zhanjiang and the Germans took Qingdao. The Americans, Austrians, Belgians, French, Italians and Russians negotiated concessions in Tientsin and Shanghai...

Russians gained their foothold in the Far East through a treaty signed in 1858, but they remain insecure about their presence here. About 100,000 tourists from China are now visiting every summer, making use of new, direct flights from Harbin and two other Chinese cities. The presence clearly unsettles some local Russians. "I went to get an ice cream cone last summer at a cafe and I thought, 'Whose town is this anyhow?' " recalled Olga Luzganova, a tour operator.

Don't the Russkies realize that like Taiwan, this territory was "always part of China?" Or at least that's what they'll claim once they get their hands on Taiwan.