Yunnan CBA team up for sale
The Honghe Running Bulls, one of the worst teams in the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA), is up for sale.

The team's owner is unable to pay its players, according to a Reuters report, which is a reflection of the financial issues the CBA is currently facing.

The CBA's 2008-9 season was a lesson in overreach, with the season expanding to 450 games from 200 the year before and league teams combining to lose 115 million yuan (US$16.8 million), putting the league's existence in danger.

CBA director Xin Lancheng singled out foreign players as being one of the league's major problems, saying they were overpaid and hard to manage, adding that rules regarding foreign players would be revised.

Last year the CBA revised rules to allow teams to field two non-Chinese players. The rule change's goal was to raise competition and interest in the CBA, but dominance by foreign players like Bonzi Wells became embarrassing for the league – 19 of last season's top 20 scorers in the CBA were foreigners.

Qiu He calls for transport construction progress report
Kunming Municipal Party Secretary Qiu He held a meeting yesterday with municipal and county officials overseeing the numerous traffic infrastructure projects around the city to assess progress and to ask for understanding, cooperation and support from the city's residents, according to a report in party paper Kunming Daily.

Qiu, the most powerful leader the Kunming municipal government has seen in more than a decade, emphasized the need for research on the progress and quality of the major overhaul of the city's inefficient and overworked traffic infrastructure.

"How much construction has been completed up to this point?" Qiu asked the city officials. "What difficulties are arising during the construction process? How many shifts are there supervising all this work?"

Currently there are several major transportation infrastructure projects underway: the second ring road is being rebuilt with a new elevated road above it, a tunnel through Gangtou mountain will be added to the third ring road, the first lines of the city's subway and elevated rail network are being built, hills have been leveled to make way for the new airport now under construction and major renovation work is being done on Beijing Lu, Xiba Lu, Haigeng Lu and Rixin Lu.

Python goes on chicken-eating rampage
The China Daily is reporting that a python entered a chicken farm in Menghai county on Monday, where it ate 42 chickens before being stopped by the farm's owner. The protected animal was captured alive and was turned over to the local wild animal protection center.