China's railway tech is 'mature and safe'
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"Some denounced China for stealing their technology. I am curious to know how can we steal from others when we are the fastest," he said.
The ministry plans to use bullet trains running at 380 km per hour on the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed link next year, while France and Germany are developing trains that will run at 360 km per hour, he said.
"China has never denied importing foreign technologies, but we also made a lot of innovations on our own and developed faster trains," he said.
A high-speed rail system demands a lot of technological innovations to enhance the speed even by 30 km per hour on top of the base of 300 km per hour.
"Those reported denouncements and complaints were fired against us because they did not expect China to develop faster trains in such a short time and join the competition trying to cut a slice of the high-speed railway market," he said.
China wants to export its own high-speed technology, and many countries - including the United States, Russia, Brazil and Saudi Arabia - have expressed interest. Its main competitors include Germany, France and Japan.
No articles in the high-speed technology transfer agreements restrict China from exporting its high-speed trains and technologies, Li said.
"China will continue to cooperate with foreign companies and form a consortium to bid for some overseas projects," he said.
China is now home to more high-speed rail lines than any other country in the world, with a total of 6,920 km of train tracks.
The country will spend 800 billion yuan ($120 billion) to double its high-speed rail network by 2012.
Different from slow trains that operate on human judgment, the high-speed trains are generally believed safer, as any glitch detected by the train's operation system will stop the train until the problem is removed.
