Taiwan premier Liu Chao-shiuan has snubbed a gift of a large black and white wooden panda left outside the gates of Taipei. The panda was a goodwill present from the government in Beijing. Liu said he was suspicious that something like this had been tried before.



Beijing denied any foul play, saying the panda was a gift to Taiwan Province to show the continued progress which has been made in cross-Straits dialog.

Political commentators expressed concern that the panda might contain a battalion of Chinese Red Army troops. When our Shangzilla correspondent approached the panda, she was convinced she heard "Shhhh, shhhh" from inside the panda's belly, but this was explained by a government spokesperson as "the sound of bamboo digesting".

Scientists at the Shanghai Giant Panda Research Facility claim to have made a breakthrough in understanding why giant pandas are so reticent about mating. "We had tried everything to get our pandas in captivity to breed with each other" explained Liu Ye, chief panda scientist. "Aphrodisiac bamboo, videos of other pandas having sex, Viagra. They just seemed to be really bad at having babies". Without sufficient levels of breeding, the giant panda population will collapse, moving them closer to extinction.

The scientists now believe the lack of breeding was caused by a poorly worded memo relating to the one-child policy. "We believe the pandas misunderstood one of the characters in the memo for a similar hanzi, and thought the one-child policy applied to them too. All this time we've been thinking pandas are dumb and actually they've been trying to work for the good of the country."

The scientists hope to next investigate whether the panda's strict diet of bamboo is actually due to them mistakenly following a celebrity diet they read about in Cosmopolitan.

Paralympic mascot Fu Niu Lele has blasted the graphic designer responsible for drawing him, saying his depiction was crude and offensive.

"The Friendlies have had a lot of time and effort spent on them", argued Fu Niu Lele, "and their design reflects thematic elements and the colours of the Olympic rings. Me? I'm just a poorly-drawn afterthought."

"Look at me!" complained the mad cow, warming to his theme, "I'm incredibly patronising to disabled people! I look like I was drawn by a child of five, with pink and yellow splodges! I look like some kind of retarded cow! Is this the best you could do?"

Contacted by Shangzilla, graphic designer Xiao Longbao stroked his goatee beard and flapped his arms ineffectually.

After calming down, the mad cow reflected that things could be worse: "At least I look better than Haibao."

A land dispute in a province in south-western China has turned ugly. Businessman Mr Han owns a large tract of farmland, known as Zhongguo Farm, which is rented out to various tenants. Han is upset with the behavior of one of his tenants, Da Lai who has opened a llama colony on part of the land.

"Da Lai's llamas are revolting" Mr Han told Shangzilla. "The llamas have been acting violently and destroying Han property, including my tractor. The llamas must acknowledge that this land is, was and always has been part of Zhongguo Farm."

For his part, Da Lai claims Han plans to illegally take his land. "Han has constantly harrassed me for the past thirty years" he argued. "The final straw was when he and his henchman marched through my land with a large flaming torch. I will not be intimidated."

160 million Shanghai rats celebrated the arrival of the Year of the Human last night, with rats in party hats enjoying the fireworks across the city. Rats celebrated by scurrying around, drinking baijiu and spreading bubonic plague. There was a particularly large concentration of rats in City Diner's kitchen.

Rats born in the Year of the Human are known for their intelligence, imagination, and regular destruction of the natural environment and each other.

For many rats there would be little to celebrate this year though, with the worse weather in a generation freezing sewer systems and preventing rats from visiting their relatives in other provinces.