Dargie I think you have hit the nail on the head.The Chinese Gov...

Dargie I think you have hit the nail on the head.
The Chinese Gov hate Rio Tinto's MD Tom Albanese when he ditched their offer back in June for the BHP J/V deal. Remember a week later Stern Hu was chucked in jail for spying on the Chinese he's still in jail.
Now they hate BHP for giving RIO the J/V offer so who do the Chinese buy ore from?
Anyone but RIO and BHP just look at the number of funding or J/V deals that have been done since the Chinese RIO deal got smashed,AQA,BCI,AGO,GBG,FMG not to mention any overseas producers,they seem to be chucking money at any one who has an iron ore deposit.
The way I look at it is the China Daily is a state run newspaper every article is ether written or checked by the Gov for its content so why would they let that statment go if it wasn't an indication of their plans.
Also we need to remember that the RIO and BHP signed a binding agreement on the 5th of december regarding their J/V deal.If you go back to the original article the context it was written in looks like a big finger sign to BHP and RIO.
So IMO the Chinese have every intention of buying into Aurox there just trying to get it for the best price at the moment.I think the J/V deal will be ann by the end of Jan or early Feb.