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704.788.8778 The Premier Showrooms Since 1959 www.efirds.net JC 62 17 08 0 By Tim Johnson McClatchy Newspapers BEIJING China on Friday opened major cracks in its Great Firewall, allowing Inter- net users in the largest cities rare glimpses at foreign Web sites that censors have blocked for years. China loosened its Internet restrictions after several days of intense foreign criticism that it had reneged on a pledge to relax censorship around the period of the Aug. 8-24 Beijing Olympic Games. In a highly unusual meeting with a group of foreign journal- ists early Friday, President Hu Jintao said that China would stand by the pledges of open- ness it made in 2001 when it was bidding for the right to host the Summer Games. Chinese government and the Chinese people have been working in real earnest to honor the commitments made to the international communi- Hu told the journalists.

At the televised news con- ference, Hu warned foreign journalists to abide by Chinese laws but said that even after the Games are over, China will foreign journalists and facilitate their Hours earlier, the Interna- tional Olympic Committee and China appeared to be at logger- heads over the contin- ued blocking of numerous for- eign Internet sites. An IOC statement said that two senior IOC officials, Hein Verbruggen and Gilbert Felli, had met with Chinese officials Thursday to discuss Internet access problems encountered by early arrivals among some 20,000 accredited journalists expected for the Games. trust them to keep their the statement said. Shortly after meeting with foreign reporters, the broad easing of Internet con- trols was readily apparent in Beijing and Shanghai. Web sites run by human rights groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch were unblocked.

The main Pentagon Web site became accessible. A smattering of Web sites re- mained blocked, however, in- cluding those linked to the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement, the government- in-exile of overseas Tibetans and China Digital Times, a news aggregator. McClatchy blogs at type- pad.com also remain blocked. China lets the Web get a little wider Many but not all blocked sites are open to millions of Internet users. By Cara Anna Associated Press China After a year of freakish natural disasters, crowds of Chinese watched a total solar eclipse along the ancient Silk Road on Friday, one week before the start of the Summer Games.

It was a welcome respite af- ter a 2008 that began with hea- vy snowstorms at the Chinese New Year, followed by deadliest earthquake in a gen- eration, then river flooding and even a huge algae bloom at the Olympic sailing site. But on Friday evening, the eclipse once a bad omen for imperial rulers was cheered by a country eager for any auspicious sign before the games. State media called Chi- first solar eclipse of the century the and TV stations broadcast it live. I think everyone hopes this will bring some said Xiao Ning, one of hundreds watching on the old city wall in as the eclipse darkened the sky near sunset in this ancient capital and Silk Road terminus. Told by the local newspa- front-page story to watch the eclipse safely through dark- ened film, people held up X- rays of teeth and other bones.

The eclipse began in the Ca- nadian Arctic, then passed ov- er Greenland, western Siberia and Mongolia before reaching China. It took a poetic course across China, where the first recorded solar eclipse was found scratched into Shang Dynasty oracle bones more than 3,000 years ago. Following the northern route of the ancient Silk Road, it passed over the western des- ert county of Yiwu, where about 10,000 tourists gathered to watch after astronomers said it would have the best view; over Dunhuang, where the oldest known map of the stars was found in a desert cave a century ago; and over Jiu- quan, where China launched its first manned spaceflight. In ancient times, an eclipse was believed to be a dragon eating the sun. Emperors were blamed and had to apologize for angering the heavens.

wows crowds along Silk Road ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO A total solar eclipse is seen in Jiuquan, in western Gansu province, on Friday..