State-owned China Aerospace Science & Industry Corp. (CASIC) announced plans for a network of 156 mini-satellites that would facilitate global broadband coverage.

This is the first low orbiting, networked satellite project, which will orbit 1,000 km above the ground, developed by China amid its wider push for commercial space development, said the CASIC.

“The network is a general satellite platform,” said Bei Chao, an engineer with the CASIC, who added that add-ons and upgrades would be explored next.

Nine people were killed and six injured when a section of scaffolding collapsed Monday in central China’s Hubei Province, the local government said Friday.

It took the emergency services 59 hours to rescue all the trapped workers, the last was found Thursday. All the injured are receiving hospital treatment, the Macheng city government announced.

The accident occurred at an amusement park construction site in Macheng city at 2:35 p.m. Monday.

Nine people are in police custody.

The provincial safety production supervision authority has sent a work team to the city to investigate the incident.

China’s first domestically built aircraft carrier is being outfitted with equipment and the work is progressing smoothly, Defense Ministry spokesman Wu Qian said on Thursday.

As for the carrier’s launch, Wu said the date is coming soon and “we won’t keep the public waiting for too long”.

Wu made the remark in response to media speculation that the new carrier would be launched on April 23－the 68th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Liberation Army Navy.

Outfitting usually implies installing radar, engines and other key components. But some equipment, like the weapons systems, also has to be installed after the ship has been launched into the water, said Zhu Chenghu, a professor at National Defense University.

“The launch is only the first step,” he said. “By current progress, the new carrier would still have to undergo one to two years of testing, both at the dock and at sea, before it could be officially handed to the Navy.

“Nevertheless, China launching its first domestically designed aircraft carrier is a monumental step toward building a world class navy,” he said. “The valuable lessons learned from building a carrier from scratch will help China build more carriers faster in the future and enable them to reach combat readiness quicker.”

According to the Defense Ministry, the new aircraft carrier is under construction in Dalian, Liaoning province. It will have a displacement of about 50,000 metric tons, as well as conventional engines and fighter jet launch systems similar to those of the CNS Liaoning－China’s first aircraft carrier.

The most important difference lies in the roles of the two vessels, Zhu said. While the Liaoning is primarily for training and research purposes, the new carrier will focus on combat and defense.

The new carrier will have more cargo room, more sophisticated radar, more advanced weapons systems, and more reliable engines than the Liaoning, which was refitted from an unfinished Soviet-era carrier－the Varyag－that “did not leave much leeway for optimization and improvement due to its old design,” he added. It was commissioned by China in 2012.

PLA Major General Peng Guangqian, a military strategist, said China’s carriers, as well as the carriers from other nations, are still far behind US carriers in terms of size, scale and combat capability, “because US Navy doctrine requires unchallenged global dominance, while Chinese carriers are mainly used for self-defense”.

When asked about the Chinese military’s recent drills on the Chinese side of the Sino-Myanmar border following clashes between Myanmar security forces and ethnic rebels, Wu said the drills were part of the annual training schedule and China had informed Myanmar of the drill before it began.

Northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region has introduced China’s first local regulation, which will come into effect on Saturday, to contain and eradicate extremism.

The regulation clarifies major acts of extremism, proposes detailed measures to prevent, contain and purge them, and identifies responsibilities of government departments and the public.

According to the regulation, 15 actions are categorized as extremism, including interfering with others’ religious freedom, forcing others to participate in religious activities, driving believers of different religions away from their homes, expanding the concept of “halal” to areas other than food, wearing or forcing others to wear burqa-like robes, marriage or divorce through religious means rather than legal processes, and depriving children of the right to national education.

The introduction of the regulation draws a clear line between legal religion and illegal religion, which provides legal support for protecting the former and purging the latter, said Chen Tong, president of the law school under Xinjiang Normal University.

Wildlife protectionists and herders said the diversity of wild animals has increased in the Sanjiangyuan area, China’s first planned national park.

A three-year observation project, which began in 2014, recorded frequent sightings of snow leopards, brown bears, lynxes, Tibetan foxes, wolves, steppe cats and otters in the region, said Xiao Lingyun with Peking University’s Center for Nature and Society.

These animals were observed in a 2,000-square-kilometer area, Xiao said.

“From images captured by infrared cameras, we can see these animals often move around, not alone, but in groups, and their movements show they have a rather casual lifestyle,” she said.

It is generally known that wild animal habitats have grown increasingly fragmented due to human activity, but the fact that wild carnivores were frequently observed at the source of the Lancang River is a key sign that the area has a diverse animal population, Xiao said.

“Some wild species establish their habitats near residences of local herders, and they are not fearful of humans,” said Zhao Xiang, a wildlife protectionist with the Shanshui Nature Protection Center.

Sanjiangyuan literally means “the source of three rivers”, referring to the Yangtze, Yellow and Lancang (Mekong) rivers.

The national park is expected to open in 2020.