What the Mainland Media Say | Press freedom needed to win China's choking air pollution battle
Public anger has seen Beijing back action to tackle smog, yet local officials continue to collude with business for personal gain
While President Xi Jinping was addressing about 150 leaders at the United Nations climate summit in Paris on Monday, the Chinese capital was enduring the worst air pollution this year.
For several days, Beijing residents were choking under a thick blanket of smog, with the concentration of hazardous particulate matter peaking at about 900 in some parts of the city of 22 million people.
The World Health Organisation recommends average 24-hour exposure to PM2.5 - the finest pollutant particles smaller than 2.5 microns in diameter that can cause the greatest harm to public health - at 25 or below. But the air quality index hit the 500-mark, the maximum, at all monitoring stations in Beijing.
As social media was filled with pictures of blanketed skylines and criticism of the government's failure to improve the situation, state media used the global summit to trumpet rising public awareness and government action.
Internet users ridiculed the timing of China's latest disaster. Some suggested the global climate summit should be held in Beijing rather than in Paris.
Echoing public anger, the party-run Global Times said smog was one of the most hated aspects of pollution among the Chinese people. "This rising [public] awareness will help facilitate the climate agenda," its English edition said.
China Daily said that "the municipal government cannot shirk its responsibility to do whatever it can to mitigate as much as possible the harm smog may cause to residents' health".