Over the weekend, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao offered a glimpse into China's apprehension toward the popular uprisings in the Arab world when he rejected comparisons between China and the Middle East.
"We have followed closely the turbulence in some north African and Middle Eastern countries," said Wen, according to the Associated Press. "We believe it is not right to draw an analogy between China and those countries."
His remarks coincided with two worthy op-eds in the U.S. media questioning the likelihood that unrest may spread to China. "The communist government in Beijing is clearly worried," wrote Francis Fukuyama in the Wall Street Journal, while Guobin Yang asserted in the New York Times that the government's posture has prompted protesters to "express modest and concrete goals rather than demand total change."