外媒看中國 長城爲何漸漸消失
Around 30 percent of China's Ming-era Great Wall has disappeared over time as adverse natural conditions and reckless human activities -- including stealing the bricks to build houses -- erode the UNESCO World Heritage site, state media reported。
據官媒報道，中國的明長城大約有30%隨着時間的推移已經消失，這是由於不利的自然條件和不計後果的人類活動(包括偷長城上的磚蓋房子)侵蝕了這座由聯合國教科文組織認定的世界文化遺產。In places it is so dilapidated that estimates of its total length vary from 5,600 to 13,000 miles, depending on whether missing sections are included. Despite its length it is not, as is sometimes claimed, visible from space。
長城有些地方破舊不堪，所以對它長度的估算從5600英里到13000英里不等，這取決於是否把消失的部分涵蓋在內。儘管長城很長，但不像有時人們說的那樣從太空裏能看見它。Of that, 1,200 miles has melted away over the centuries, the Beijing Times reported。
《京華時報》報道稱：“幾個世紀以來，其中有1200英里已經消失了。”
Some of the construction weathered away, while plants growing in the walls have accelerated the decay, said the report Sunday, citing a survey last year by the Great Wall of China Society。
週日的報道引用了中國長城學會去年的調查，說一部分長城風化掉了，還有的城牆裏植物瘋長加速了損毀。"Even though some of the walls are built of bricks and stones, they cannot withstand the perennial exposure to wind and rain," the paper quoted Dong Yaohui, a vice president of the society, as saying。
《京華時報》引用學會的副會長董耀會的話說：“即使部分城牆用磚石砌成，也禁不住常年風吹雨淋。”Tourism and local residents' activities are also damaging the longest human construction in the world, the paper added。
報紙補充說：“旅遊業和當地居民的活動也正在破壞這個世界上人類最長建築。”Poor villagers in Lulong county in the northern province of Hebei used to knock thick grey bricks from a section of wall in their village to build homes, and slabs engraved with Chinese characters were sold for 30 yuan ($4.80) each by local residents, it said。
據報道，位於華北的河北省的盧龍縣裏村民很窮，過去經常敲下村裏部分城牆上青灰色的厚磚拿去蓋房，而且刻有漢字的磚被當地居民賣到30元(4.80美元)一塊。Under Chinese regulations people who take bricks from the Great Wall can be fined up to 5,000 yuan, the Global Times said on Monday。
《環球時報》週一稱：“中國條例規定從長城上偷磚會被處以高達5000元的罰款。”"But there is no specific organisation to enforce the rules. Damage could only be reported to higher authorities and it is hard to solve when it happened on the border of two provinces," said Jia Hailin, a cultural relics protection official in Hebei, according to the report。
報道稱，河北文化遺產保護官員賈海林說：“但是沒有專門的部門來執行這一規定，破壞行爲只能報告上級機關，如果發生在兩省交界處就很難處理了。”It added that explorations of undeveloped parts of the Great Wall -- an increasingly popular leisure activity in recent years -- had brought those sections more tourists than they could bear, damaging them severely。
報道還提到，近些年探索未開發部分的長城作爲休閒活動逐漸興起，帶來的遊客數量超出了這些野長城的負荷，對長城損毀嚴重。
