Petar Kujundzic / Reuters

Liu Xia, wife of jailed Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Liu Xiaobo, looks out of a car window after a trial outside a court in the Huairou district of Beijing on Sunday. The court sentenced Liu Hui, brother-in-law of Liu Xiaobo, to 11 years in prison on charges of fraud in a case that rights activists have called another example of official retribution on the Liu family.

HUAIROU, China -- A Chinese court on Sunday sentenced the brother-in-law of jailed Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo to 11 years in prison on charges of fraud in a case that rights activists have called another example of official retribution on the Liu family.

Supporters of Liu Hui say his case was trumped up, aimed at thwarting the increasing attention by the rights community on the plight of Liu Xia, who has remained under effective house arrest since her husband Liu Xiaobo won the Nobel Prize in 2010.

The court in Huairou, a one-hour drive northeast of Beijing, convicted Liu Hui, a manager in a real estate company in the southern city of Shenzhen, on charges of defrauding a man named Zhang Bing of $490,000 with another colleague, lawyer Mo Shaoping told reporters.

"As Liu Hui's defense attorney, I definitely do not approve of this verdict, because we see this fundamentally as a civil issue, and it fundamentally does not constitute criminal fraud. Also, there is not sufficient evidence," Mo said.

Liu Hui has maintained his innocence, according to his lawyers.

In a rare statement to media, a weeping Liu Xia told reporters from the front passenger seat of her car as she drove away from the courthouse that she was extremely angry with the verdict and vowed to launch an appeal.

"I absolutely cannot accept this. This is simply persecution," she said. "This is completely an illegal verdict."

Liu Xia said she had "completely lost hope" in the government.

"I can't even leave my house."

After about two minutes, security forced journalists away from the car, which moved off.

Liu Hui was out on bail last September, but then arrested again in January, after several rights activists and foreign reporters forced their way past security guards late last year to visit Liu Xia, one of his other lawyers, Shang Baojun, told Reuters before the verdict.

Raphael Droszewski, a first secretary at the European Union Delegation to China, told reporters outside the courthouse that the EU was deeply concerned by Liu Hui's sentence. He called for Liu Xiaobo's release and the ending of restrictions on Liu Xia.

"As it is clear Liu Xia is under house arrest, the EU urges the Chinese authorities to end all forms of extra legal restriction on her," he said.

The ruling is seen as a setback for hopes for political reform from new Chinese President Xi Jinping, whose government has detained anti-corruption activists and tightened free expression on the Internet following his appointment in March.

"Everything related to the Liu Xiaobo case previously could have been seen as the legacy of the previous leadership," said Nicholas Bequelin, a researcher at Human Rights Watch, a New York-based advocacy group.

"But with this sentence the new leadership buys into this suppression and persecution of the family. It deems the prospect unlikely that the government is amenable to the release of Liu Xiaobo, or will make any concessions on the case."

The case will also renew international criticism of the plight of Liu Xiaobo's family.

The verdict was handed down within hours of Xi and U.S. President Barack Obama completing an informal summit in California. U.S. and European diplomats were present outside the courthouse in Huairou, a one-hour drive northeast of Beijing.

Speaking in California after the summit, China's top diplomat, State Councilor Yang Jiechi defended the country's achievements in human rights as "there for all to see".

"With China's economic and social development, human rights causes in China will enjoy even greater progress in the future," Yang told reporters, though he did not refer directly to the Liu Hui trial.

Liu Xiaobo, a veteran dissident involved in the 1989 Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests crushed by the Chinese army, was jailed for 11 years in 2009 on subversion charges for organizing a petition urging the overthrow of one-party rule.

His wife Liu Xia is rarely allowed out and is almost never allowed to receive visitors. She has not been convicted of any crime.

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• For Chinese winner's wife, Nobel is no prize

BEIJING – Dr. Jiang Rongmeng had no sooner walked out of the hospital door when he was mobbed by journalists. Camera crews jostled for position and microphones jousted in front of his face as he was bombarded with demands for information about the latest case of bird flu.

In Hong Kong or Taiwan this wouldn't be an unusual sight, but in Beijing it's rarer to see such raw displays of journalistic pushiness.

Rongmeng is Dr. Bird Flu -- he is the chief physician at the Center for Infectious Diseases at Beijing's Ditan Hospital. Since the weekend, when the capital announced its first case of the deadly new H7N9 virus -- the victim is a 7-year-old girl -- he's been a man in demand.

On Monday a 4-year-old boy was found to be carrying the virus -- though without symptoms, a discovery that has further puzzled experts. In both cases the parents were live poultry traders.

The girl was well enough Tuesday to leave intensive care; the boy remains in quarantine.

When asked if he expected more cases, Ronmeng said: "It is possible. It's certainly possible."

As the figures have ballooned -- 63 cases now with 14 deaths since March -- and spread from the eastern provinces, the authorities seem to have concluded after initial hesitation that openness is the best strategy.

It appears they have learned from the deadly SARS pandemic that struck 10 years ago. It started in China before spreading worldwide, killing hundreds, and was made worse by a government cover-up.

The World Health Organization has even praised the authorities for their new openness.

To some extent, though, they are bowing to the inevitable: H7N9 is the first such outbreak in the era of social media. Information is tougher to control, and when it's restricted, rumor can run rife.

One local newspaper reported that 13 people have been arrested for spreading rumors about the disease on social media.

But not everybody is convinced. At the Ditan Hospital, Yang Shengli scoffed at the suggestion of government openness.

"It's hard to say if the government really is telling the truth," she said, as she brought in her feverish 16-year-old daughter for tests. Thankfully it wasn't bird flu.

In Beijing the response to the first case, the 7-year-old girl, seems to have been quick and efficient. Her parents had reportedly bought their chickens in the east, in Tianjin, and some of those chickens were sold to the neighbor of the 4-year-old boy hospitalized Tuesday.

Health authorities quickly followed the chicken trail, and when NBC arrived in the boy's village on the outskirts of Beijing Monday, loudspeakers were calling on anybody to come forward if they had bought chickens from the neighbor or the boy's parents.

Officials in white coats and masks were disinfecting the streets and roadblocks had been set up in and out of the village. Cars were searched, and even frozen poultry was confiscated.

So far there is no evidence that the H7N9 virus spreads from human to human, although there is one ambiguous case of a husband and wife in Shanghai that is causing concern.

One big challenge for the authorities is that chickens carrying the virus do not appear to show any signs of sickness. And the symptomless 4-year-old is also creating more uncertainty.

But there are no signs of panic -- only worry, with sales of chicken pretty much drying up and neighboring countries on alert.

"We absolutely should not be panicking," said Dr. Tristan Evely, medical director of the International SOS China, a Beijing clinic. "But high vigilance and monitoring of the situation is absolutely crucial at this point of time."

Related links: 

It started with a cough: Deadly China bird flu outbreak raises fears of pandemic

Deaths from new bird flu underscore grim fears, reports show

US rushes to make vaccine against new bird flu -- just in case

New H7N9 bird flu has officials worried about skimpy resources

This story was originally published on Tue Apr 16, 2013 11:05 AM EDT

Jon Woo / Reuters

Villagers carry a gravestone of an ancestral tomb away from a construction site in Taiyuan, Shanxi province, China on December 18, 2012.

AP

Workers lay the foundations for a residential complex around a solitary tomb site in Taiyuan on December 6, 2012.

A tomb which was left standing in the middle of a Chinese construction site began to be exhumed on Tuesday.

Helped by local villagers, family members relocated four coffins containing the remains of the deceased, Reuters reports.

For seven months a 33-foot mound of earth containing the tomb, the sole survivor from a cemetery that had previously occupied the site, had stood at the center of a building project in the city of Taiyuan, Shanxi province.

Grave interruption: Building around a tomb in China

Some reports had called it a "nail grave" — a variant on the term "nail house", which describes those lone homes that stand in the way of development, like nails stuck in a board that can't be pounded down with a hammer.

'Nail house' holds up traffic as homeowners fight local government

According to local reports cited by Reuters, the family did not fulfill their agreement with village officers which had required them to move the tomb before December 15, saying instead that they were waiting for an auspicious date to perform the relocation. 

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Jon Woo / Reuters

Villagers stand around an ancestral tomb which is being relocated in Taiyuan on December 18, 2012.

Jon Woo / Reuters

Villagers carry coffins containing remains from an ancestral tomb in Taiyuan on December 18, 2012.

Clockwise from top left: Carlos Barria / Reuters, Ng Han Guan / AP, Alexander F. Yuan / AP, How Hwee Young / EPA

Scenes from the corridors and anterooms of the Great Hall of the People during the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.

By Le Li, NBC News

BEIJING — More than a thousand reporters turned up at the Great Hall of the People on Wednesday, expecting to cover the closing session of the Chinese Communist Party’s 18th Congress where the final leadership line-up would be revealed. But they soon discovered the election of the country's new leaders had ended before they had even entered the main conference hall.

Instead, they heard about the results the same way everyone else did: from state news agency Xinhua.

Xinhua live-blogged the event – both in Chinese on Sina Weibo and in English on Twitter, even though the latter is still blocked in China.  When the news agency posted a message that President Hu Jintao was casting a vote, the journalists were all stuck in the long corridors of the Great Hall of the People.

Ed Jones / AFP - Getty Images

Journalists wait in a corridor to be allowed access to the main hall during the closing ceremony of the Communist Party Congress on November 14, 2012.

I was one of them. By then, we had been waiting for over 10 minutes. Most of the others had been in the Great Hall of the People for almost three hours, but I was in good spirits, joking with the journalists around me about when we'd be allowed in.

When I saw Xinhua’s tweet announcing that Hu would be casting his vote, those feelings evaporated. There was nothing we could do – the line of reporters still wasn't moving. I could feel the temperature rising around me.

China's communists pick country's new leader

Clockwise from top left: Vincent Yu / AP, Wang Zhao / AFP - Getty Images, David Gray / Reuters, David Gray / Reuters

Scenes from the Great Hall of the People during the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.

Xinhua started reporting that Vice-President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang had been elected as members of the Central Committee, the highest authority in the party. Although we had shuffled forward a bit, we were still outside the entrance to the main hall. Some journalists didn’t even bother to wait in line and sat around with the conference hall staff pouring themselves tea.   

Le Li / NBC News

Surrounded by tea cups, a reporter rests while waiting in the bowels of the Great Hall of the People.

I tried posting the news on Weibo but the name “Xi Jinping” was blocked.

“Was the previous Party Congress like this, too?” a man asked someone behind me.

A woman replied, “No, I came here ten years ago. It was not like this at all.”

I turned around and saw they were reporters for a local Chinese news website. “Can you tell me what’s different?” I asked.

She took one look at my press pass and stopped talking. On my pass, it was clearly written in big Chinese characters: “USA.” She turned her head away.

Carlos Barria / Reuters

Security personnel sitting as they guard different areas of the Great Hall of the People.

Communist Party's Congress grinds on amid widespread indifference in China

I tried checking Weibo again but there were no updates from Xinhua. Instead, I heard a quarrel at the entrance. Some photographers were arguing with security guards who were trying to block the half-open entrance. One guard yelled, “No one is allowed to enter!”

Eager to know what was going on, I pushed to the front of the line. Suddenly, the entrance opened and the grand, cavernous Great Hall of the People lay before us.

Mark Ralston / AFP - Getty Images

The closing ceremony of the Party Congress at the Great Hall of the People on November 14, 2012.

From my distant vantage point, I aimed my camera at the stage and started madly snapping photos.

But which one was Xi Jinping? All of the men were wearing the same clothes. The only person who stood out was Liu Yandong – a woman, and she was wearing bright blue.

Yawns and other expressions of boredom as China's Communist Party Congress begins

I looked at my phone and read Xinhua’s final tweets. “The voting concludes,” Xinhua said. “The new Central Committee of the Communist Party Congress and the new Central Commission for Discipline Inspection have been elected. The hall filled with great applause.”

Le Li / NBC News

Reporters taking pictures of cars parked in the courtyard of the Great Hall of the People.

It was all over.

All I had done was wait around in a corridor and take some pictures – along with every other journalist there. The best shot was of the courtyard, where more than 50 Audis were parked. Everyone else took the same photo and posted it on Twitter. The pictures were deleted within minutes, after netizens questioned why the Chinese leaders did not drive their own national brand, Red Flag.

One blogger noticed a Lexus among the Audis and commented, “One is even Japanese brand.” 

We might not have been able to report on the Chinese Communist Party’s 18th Congress, but at least we could prove that the Audi is the Chinese leadership’s car of choice.

Read more about China on NBC's Behind the Wall

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Carlos Barria / Reuters

Black Audi cars fill a parking lot inside the Great Hall of the People.

Andy Wong / AP

Chinese families bring their babies to the Ritan Park in Beijing Wednesday, Oct. 31, 2012. A government think tank says China should start phasing out its one-child policy immediately and allow two children for every family by 2015. It remains unclear whether Chinese leaders are ready to take that step.

BEIJING -- A Chinese government think tank is urging the country's leaders to start phasing out its unpopular one-child policy immediately and allow two children for every family in the country by 2015.

Some demographers saw the timeline put forward by the China Development Research Foundation, which is close to the central leadership, as a bold move. Others warned that the gradual approach, if implemented, would be insufficient to help correct the problems that China's strict birth limits have created.

Xie Meng, a press officer with the foundation, said the final version of its report would be released "in a week or two," but Chinese state media were given advance copies.

The official Xinhua News Agency said the foundation was recommending a two-child policy in some provinces from this year and a nationwide two-child policy by 2015. It also proposed all birth limits be dropped by 2020.

"China has paid a huge political and social cost for the policy, as it has resulted in social conflict, high administrative costs and led indirectly to a long-term gender imbalance at birth," Xinhua said, citing the report.

The foundation's press officer told NBC News that the report was "the result of two years of effort." 

"China's demographic changes were analyzed in connection with seven areas," she said, citing the challenges of aging, unemployment, child and women's welfare, urbanization, education, health and family planning.

But it remains unclear whether Chinese leaders are ready to take up the recommendations. China's National Population and Family Planning Commission had no immediate comment on the report Wednesday.

'Change is inevitable'
While they are known to many as the one-child policy, the actual rules are more complicated. The government limits most urban couples to one child, and allows two children for rural families if their first-born is a girl. There are numerous other exceptions as well, including looser rules for minority families and a two-child limit for parents who are themselves both singletons.

Cai Yong, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, said the report carries extra weight because the think tank is under the State Council, China's Cabinet. He said he found it remarkable that state-backed demographers were willing to publicly propose such a detailed schedule and plan on how to get rid of China's birth limits.

Gruesome photos put spotlight on China's one-child policy

"That tells us at least that policy change is inevitable, it's coming," said Cai, who was not involved in the drafting of the report, but knows many of the experts who were. Cai is currently a visiting scholar at Fudan University in Shanghai. "It's coming, but we cannot predict when exactly it will come."

Adding to the uncertainty is a once-in-a-decade leadership transition that kicks off Nov. 8 that will see a new slate of top leaders installed by next spring.

Cai said the transition could keep population reform on the back burner or changes might be rushed through to help burnish the reputations of President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao on their way out.

There has been growing speculation among Chinese media, experts and ordinary people about whether the government will relax the one-child policy — introduced in 1980 as a temporary measure to curb surging population growth — and allow more people to have two children.

Though the government credits the policy with preventing hundreds of millions of births and helping lift countless families out of poverty, it is reviled by many ordinary people. The strict limits have led to forced abortions and sterilizations, even though such measures are illegal. Couples who flout the rules face hefty fines, seizure of their property and loss of their jobs.

Read more international stories on NBCNews.com

Many demographers argue that the policy has worsened the country's aging crisis by limiting the size of the young labor pool that must support the large baby boom generation as it retires. They also say it has contributed to the imbalanced sex ratio as some families abort baby girls, preferring to try for a male heir.

The government has recognized those problems and has tried to address them by boosting social services for the elderly. It has also banned sex-selective abortion and rewarded rural families whose only child is a girl.

Outdated or engine of growth?
Many today also see the birth limits as outdated, a relic of the era when housing, jobs and food were provided by the state.

"It has been 30 years since our planned economy was liberalized," commented Wang Yi, the owner of a shop that sells textiles online, under a news report about the foundation's proposal. "So why do we still have to plan our population?"

Ren Hao, a Chinese journalist who recently married, told NBC that he welcomed the proposed policy change but suggested that it be accompanied by new measures in education, health care and economy in order to succeed.

Read more China coverage on NBC's Behind The Wall

"Raising a child is quite a burden nowadays so, in the end, it's up to the couples to decide whether they want to have one child or more based on their conditions," he said.

Ji Jianming, a Beijing construction project manager, argued in favor of the policy. "The one-child policy was good," he said. "It allowed China to develop rapidly and improve people's lives faster."

Though open debate about the policy has flourished in state media and on the Internet, leaders have so far expressed a desire to maintain the status quo.

President Hu said last year that China would keep its strict family planning policy to keep the birth rate low and other officials have said that no changes are expected until at least 2015.

Wang Feng, director of the Brookings-Tsinghua Center for Public Policy and an expert on China's demographics, contributed research material to the foundation's report, but has yet to see the full text. He said he welcomed the gist of the document that he's seen in state media.

It says the government "should return the rights of reproduction to the people," he said. "That's very bold."

But Gu Baochang, a professor of demography at Beijing's Renmin University and a vocal advocate of reform, said the proposed timeline wasn't aggressive enough.

"They should have reformed this policy ages ago," he said. "It just keeps getting held up, delayed."

NBC News' Eric Baculinao and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

More world stories from NBC News:

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Jason Lee / Reuters

Visitors use toy weapons to shoot pictures of Japanese soldiers at a theme park in Wuxiang, Shanxi province, China, on Oct. 20.

Visitors at two Chinese theme parks can participate in performances (complete with actors and professional sound and lighting effects) where they can role play as soldiers from the Japanese army or the Chinese Eighth Route Army, one of the main military forces of the Communist Party during the Second Sino-Japanese War. The parks, located near the former headquarters of the Eighth Route Army, cost the local Wuxiang government around $80 million to construct.

Tensions between China and Japan have escalated in recent months over disputed islands in the East China Sea and anti-Japanese sentiment is on the rise in China. 

Jason Lee / Reuters

A woman dressed as a Japanese soldier runs along a trench during a live-action role-playing game at a theme park in China.

Jason Lee / Reuters

A boy dressed as a Japanese soldier pretends to shoot.

Jason Lee / Reuters

Actors dressed as Japanese soldiers pretend to shoot a man dressed as a plainclothes Eighth Route Army soldier during a performance at the Eighth Route Army Culture Park in Wuxiang, Shanxi province, on Oct. 20.

Jason Lee / Reuters

Actors dressed as Japanese military soldiers and Chinese villagers perform during a show at the Eighth Route Army Culture Park.

Jason Lee / Reuters

Pictures of Japanese military soldiers are displayed as targets for shooting at a theme park in Wuxiang, Shanxi province, China, on Oct. 20.

Also on PhotoBlog: 

• Taiwan boats enter waters disputed by Japan and China
• Communist ideals still strong in China's Nanjie village
• In China, super flowers rise above Tiananmen Square ahead of National Congress

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Reuters

A man covers an art piece by Beijing-based artist Chi Peng with paper after government officials from the cultural bureau deemed it unfit for display before the inauguration of the SH Contemporary Art Fair at the Shanghai Exhibition Center on September 6, 2012.

Reuters

Government officials from the cultural bureau inspect artworks before the inauguration of the fair.

Reuters reports — The pot-bellied official in a tan golf shirt paused in front of a poster-sized image for a few seconds, asked a member of his entourage to make a note of it, then continued to lead the group on its awkward march through the Shanghai Exhibition Center.

A few hours later, the digitally manipulated photo of China's legendary Monkey King facing Tiananmen Gate, by Beijing-based artist Chi Peng, was pulled from the wall, one of several works at the SH Contemporary Art Fair deemed unfit for display by Shanghai's culture police.

"It's especially sensitive this year because the 18th Party Congress will start soon," said a fair organizer after trying to convince another booth to remove a painting that censors didn't like because it appeared to include images of Mao Zedong. Read the full story.

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Reuters

Workers cover an art piece after it was deemed unfit for display. Censorship of political content has long been a feature of the Chinese art world under Communist Party rule, but gallery owners and artists at SH Contemporary were told on Thursday that city officials were being extra careful ahead of a once-a-decade leadership transition set to take place in Beijing next month.

Carlos Barria / Reuters

A view of the Oriental Pearl TV Tower, right, and downtown Shanghai seen through the haze on May 15, 2012.

Aly Song / Reuters

A young man wearing a mask walks along the Bund in Shanghai on May 15, 2012.

The U.S. Consulate in Shanghai began posting hourly air quality readings for the city this week, with data showing "very unhealthy" conditions at times on Tuesday afternoon.

The consulate's classification reflects U.S. pollution standards but operates on a different scale than the Shanghai Environmental Protection Bureau, which called conditions "slightly polluted". 

Denied access to official data, Chinese citizens take their own pollution readings

A similar monitor on the roof of the U.S. Embassy in Beijing has long been seen as the most reliable source of information on air quality in the Chinese capital.

Bathed in smog: Beijing's pollution could cut 5 years off lifespan, expert says

Read more about the Shanghai monitor at the US Consulate's website and find the latest readings on their dedicated Twitter feed.

Reuters contributed to this report

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Reuters

Huang Sufang reacts as she sees a part of her house being taken down by demolition workers at Yangji village in central Guangzhou city, Guangdong province, China on March 21, 2012.

Huang Sufang, a resident of the Chinese city of Guangzhou, mounted a desperate last stand to protect her home as demolition workers moved in on Wednesday.

According to local media cited by Reuters, part of Huang's house was mistakenly demolished as workers were flattening another building nearby.

Hers was one of more than 1,000 homes in Yangji, a former village that has been swallowed up by the rapid expansion of Guangzhou, China's third-largest city with a population of over 12 million.

In 2010, China Daily reported that Yangji was one of 138 'urban villages' in Guangzhou earmarked for demolition to make way for new developments in the next decade.

Disputes over land rights are the leading cause of surging unrest across China, according to a study cited by Bloomberg News.

Reuters

Huang Sufang tries to attack a worker with a brick after a part of her house was demolished.

AFP - Getty Images

Huang Sufang attempting to protect her home as workers move in for demolition.

Reuters

A relative holds Huang Sufang as she wipes away tears.

AFP - Getty Images

Workers demolish a group of villagers' houses in Yangji village.

Reuters

Huang Sufang lies on the ground after a part of her house was demolished.

Andy Wong / AP

Tan Liang, a resident of Beijing, prepares to take readings on a PM2.5 detector outside his residential compound in Beijing, China, on Dec. 3, 2011.

The Associated Press reports from BEIJING:

Armed with a device that looks like an old transistor radio, some Beijing residents are recording pollution levels and posting them online. It's an act that borders on subversion.

The government keeps secret all data on the fine particles that shroud China's capital in a health-threatening smog most days. But as they grow more prosperous, Chinese are demanding the right to know what the government does not tell them: just how polluted their city is.

"If people know what their air is like, they are more likely to take action," said Wang Qiuxia, a researcher at local environment group Green Beagle, who shows interested residents how to test pollution on a locally made monitoring machine. Continue reading.

Andy Wong / AP

Tan Liang carries a PM2.5 detector towards a garbage-burning facility located near his residential compound in Beijing on Dec. 3, 2011.

Andy Wong / AP

Wang Qiuxia, right, a volunteer from an environmental group, teaches Cheng Jing, left, how to operate the PM2.5 detector in Beijing on Dec. 7, 2011.

Related content:

• China begins to admit 'fog' is really smog
• A smog by any other name
• More world news stories

Reuters reports from BEIJING:

The number of new HIV/AIDS cases in China is soaring, state media said on Wednesday, citing health officials, with rates of infections among college students and older men rising.

The Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention issued figures showing 48,000 new cases in China in 2011, the official Xinhua news agency said.

David Gray / Reuters

A nurse gives an infected patient medicine as she lies in her bed at the HIV/AIDS ward of Beijing YouAn Hospital on Dec. 1, 2011.

Str / AFP - Getty Images

An AIDS patient receives free treatment at the Ying Zhouqu Huangzhuang AIDS treatment center in Fuyang, in Anhui province, China, on Nov. 28, 2011.

AP

Boys infected with the AIDS virus participate in a classroom performance at a special school for AIDS-infected children in Linfen, in northern China's Shanxi province, on Nov. 30, 2011. Chinese characters on the chalkboard read "Hand in hand to prevent AIDS."

"The distribution of HIV/AIDS cases in our country is now wider and more scattered than ever, posing great difficulties for prevention and control efforts," Wu Zunyou, the director of the Center, said according to Xinhua.

The number of officially registered HIV carriers and AIDS patients in China is expected to jump from 346,000 to 780,000 by the end of 2011 after the data is updated, Xinhua said. Read the full story.

Eugene Hoshiko / AP

A mdoctor talks to guests during an AIDS awareness event on World AIDS Day, Dec. 1, 2011, in Shanghai.

Jason Lee / Reuters

Drug addicts attend a class about AIDS during psychological treatment at a compulsory drug rehabilitation center in Kunming, capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province, on Nov. 28, 2011.

Related content: Few Americans with HIV have virus under control