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China censors Hong Kong internet, US tech giants resist
China has unveiled new powers to censor Hong Kong’s internet and access user data using its feared national security law — but US tech giants have put up some resistance citing rights concerns.
The online censorship plans were contained in a 116-page government document released on Monday night that also revealed expanded powers for police, allowing warrantless raids and surveillance for some national security investigations.
China imposed the law on semi-autonomous Hong Kong a week ago, targeting subversion, secession, terrorism and colluding with foreign forces — its wording kept secret until the moment it was enacted.
Despite assurances that only a small number of people would be targeted by the law, the new details show it is the most radical change in Hong Kong’s freedoms and rights since Britain handed the city back to China in 1997.
Late Monday, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke out against “Orwellian” moves to censor activists, schools and libraries since the law was enacted.
“Until now, Hong Kong flourished because it allowed free thinking and free speech, under an independent rule of law. No more,” Pompeo said.
Restore stability
Under its handover deal with the British, Beijing promised to guarantee until at least 2047 certain liberties and autonomy not seen on the authoritarian mainland.
Years of rising concerns that China’s ruling Communist Party was steadily eroding those freedoms birthed a popular pro-democracy movement, which led to massive and often violent protests for seven months last year.
China has made no secret of its desire to use the law to crush that democracy movement.
“The Hong Kong government will vigorously implement this law,” Chief Executive Carrie Lam, the city’s Beijing-appointed leader, told reporters on Tuesday.
“And I forewarn those radicals not to attempt to violate this law, or cross the red line, because the consequences of breaching this law are very serious.”
With pro-democracy books quickly pulled out of libraries and schools, the government signalled in the document released on Monday night that it would also expect obedience online.
Police were granted powers to control and remove online information if there were “reasonable grounds” to suspect the data breaches the national security law.
Internet firms and service providers can be ordered to remove the information and their equipment can be seized. Executives can also be hit with fines and up to one year in jail if they refuse to comply.
The companies are also expected to provide identification records and decryption assistance.
Big tech unease
However the biggest American tech companies offered some resistance.
Facebook, Google and Twitter said Monday they had put a hold on requests by Hong Kong’s government or police force for information on users.
Facebook and its popular messaging service WhatsApp would deny requests until it had conducted a review of the law that entailed “formal human rights due diligence and consultations with human rights experts,” the company said in a statement.
“We believe freedom of expression is a fundamental human right and support the right of people to express themselves without fear for their safety or other repercussions,” a Facebook spokesman said.
Twitter and Google told AFP that they too would not comply with information requests by Hong Kong authorities in the immediate future.
Twitter told AFP it had “grave concerns regarding both the developing process and the full intention of this law”.
Tik Tok, which is owned by Chinese company Byte Dance, announced it was pulling out of Hong Kong altogether.
“In light of recent events, we’ve decided to stop operations of the TikTok app in Hong Kong,” TikTok told AFP.
Tik Tok has become wildly popular amongst youngsters around the world. However many Hong Kongers have distrusted it because of its Chinese ownership.
ByteDance has consistently denied sharing any user data with authorities in China, and was adamant it did not intend to begin to agree to such requests.
In less than a week since the law was enacted, democracy activists and many ordinary people have scrubbed their online profiles of anything that China may deem incriminating.
Monday night’s document also revealed that judicial oversight that previously governed police surveillance powers in Hong Kong had been eliminated when it comes to national security investigations.
Police officers will be able to conduct a search without a warrant if they deem a threat to national security is “urgent”.
“The new rules are scary, as they grant powers to the police force that are normally guarded by the judiciary,” barrister Anson Wong Yu-yat told the South China Morning Post.
July 7, 2020
U.S. attempts to interfere in China’s domestic affairs will never succeed
By Zhong Sheng
Over 70 countries recently voiced support to China’s adoption of the law on Safeguarding National Security in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC). It demonstrates that China’s passage of the law is a justified move winning the recognition of the world.
However, some U.S. politicians are stubbornly standing at the opposite side of justice, groundlessly stigmatizing the legislation and China in the name of the so-called human rights protection and freedom, a “conventional” trick always played by the White House, which fully demonstrates their vicious intention to seek hegemony by political manipulation.
The rights and freedoms of residents will be guaranteed to the maximum extent possible, if the security of a country is guaranteed and its society remains stable.The law on Safeguarding National Security in the HKSAR clearly defines the important principle of the rule of law that Hong Kong shall follow to safeguard national security, stressing in its General Principles that human rights shall be respected and protected in safeguarding national security in the HKSAR.
The rights and freedoms, including the freedoms of speech, of the press, of publication, of association, of assembly, of procession and of demonstration, which the residents of the Region enjoy under the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights as applied to Hong Kong, shall be protected in accordance with the law.
Any right and interest are defined by laws. The one who breaks the limits shall be held accountable accordingly. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights clearly stipulates that the freedoms of religion, speech, peaceful assembly and receiving open trials shall not be subject to any restrictions except those are necessary to protect national security and public order.
It’s written in the constitutions of over 100 countries that the execution of basic rights and freedoms shall not undermine national security. Since the anti-extradition bill protests June the last year, the “Hong Kong independence,” black-clad rioters and “mutual destruction” mobsters have colluded with both domestic and foreign forces and committed violent crimes and activities. They undermined China’s national security, challenged the bottom line of the “one country, two systems” principle, and seriously threatened the life and property security of Hong Kong residents. Their practices went way beyond the freedoms and rights enshrined by law.
The law on Safeguarding National Security in the HKSAR targets a very narrow category of criminal acts and activities that endanger national security and protects the safety and rights and freedoms the vast majority of the Hong Kong residents enjoy in accordance with the law. It is a sharp sword on the necks of those who undermine national security, and a guardian for the majority of Hong Kong residents, including foreigners. Those fanning up “Hong Kong independence,” engaged in black-clad rioters activities and conducting “mutual destruction” activities are the largest enemy to Hong Kong residents’ rights, freedoms and peaceful life, and they must be punished by the law.
It is necessary for China to plug its loopholes in Hong Kong’s national security. The enactment of the legislation will offer stronger institutional guarantee for the long-term and stable development of the “one country, two systems” principle, help Hong Kong maintain long-term stability and prosperity, better safeguards the freedoms and rights enjoyed by Hong Kong residents, and protects the legitimate rights and interests of foreign investors in Hong Kong.
The enactment of the legislation also sends a signal that the anti-China activities supported by the external forces will be eliminated. The anxiety of some U.S. politicians over the law further proves that what they want is the so-called freedom to undermine the long-term stability and prosperity of Hong Kong, to contain and curb the development of China, and to arbitrarily hurt the legitimate rights and interests of Hong Kongresidents.
However, the U.S. itself has a variety of laws on national security. It passed the PATRIOT Act, the Homeland Security Act and the CLOUD Act after the September 11 attacks alone, and a large number of cases have been dealt with under these acts. So why the U.S.,a country that’s highly sensitive to its own national security, can’t stay calm when other countries take normal actions to protect their national security? The country always points fingers at other countries’domestic affairs, but turns a blind eye to its own bad record of human rights protection. The long-term racial discrimination that has been developed into a structural problem of the U.S. society is the best proof. The PRISM program revealed in 2013 just demonstrated how the U.S. is infringing upon its own citizens and foreign citizens’ rights and freedoms for its so-called national security. It’s just a joke that some U.S. politicians, who should’ve long been introspecting their human rights problems, are shamelessly “teaching” other countries to protect human rights.
The Chinese government and people will unswervingly safeguard their national sovereignty, security and development interests, and oppose any external force meddling in Hong Kong affairs. The interference in other countries’ domestic affairs is never a freedom, and the U.S. politicians shall be aware of it. The attempts to interfere in Hong Kong affairs and China’s domestic affairs will never succeed.
July 6, 2020
Coronavirus: US buys up almost entire world supply of COVID-19 drug remdesivir
American officials have bought up all of the remdesivir available for July and 90% of stocks for August and September.
The US has effectively secured the world’s supply of one of only two drugs proven to help treat coronavirus.
Remdesivir, which has previously been used to fight Ebola but has now been found to reduce recovery times among Covid-19 patients, is exclusively manufactured by pharmaceutical giant Gilead Sciences.
This means remdesivir will not be available for use on patients in the UK and Europe until October, Dr Andrew Hill, a senior visiting research fellow at Liverpool University, told Sky News.
He said: “This deal that’s been struck by America means that people with COVID-19 in the UK can’t get access to these treatments that would get them out of hospital quickly and might improve their chances of survival.
UK patients took part in the clinical trials that showed that the drug worked, Dr Hill said. “A lot of drugs haven’t worked, so I think the people in Britain deserve something in return from the United States,” he said.
July 3, 2020
China firmly opposes US interference in China’s internal affairs
By People’s Daily Commentator
The US signed into law the so-called “Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act of 2020” on June 17,
local time.
This so-called Act deliberately denigrates the human rights conditions in China’s Xinjiang Uygur
Autonomous Region, viciously attacks the Chinese government’s Xinjiang policy, blatantly
violates international law and basic norms governing international relations, and grossly interferes
in China’s internal affairs. The Chinese government and people express strong indignation and
firm opposition to this.
It must be pointed out that the essence of Xinjiang-related issues is not about human rights,
ethnicity, or religion hyped by the US, but about combating terrorism and de-radicalization.
Since the 1990s, the “three forces”, namely separatists, religious extremists and terrorists, have
executed thousands of violent terrorist attacks in Xinjiang, inflicting heavy casualties and property
losses and trampling on all the rights of local people.
In light of such conditions, the Chinese government has taken a series of measures to combat these
activities and prevent their re-occurrence, in an approach of addressing both the symptoms and
root causes of the problem. The measures taken are in compliance with Chinese laws. They are
also China’s concrete steps in implementing the international counter-terrorism and de-
radicalization initiatives, including the United Nations (UN) Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy
and the Plan of Action to Prevent Violent Extremism.
These efforts have proven to be efficient. Over the past three years and more, there has not been a
single violent terrorist case in Xinjiang. The rights to life, health and development and other rights
of people of all ethnic groups in Xinjing are protected. The international community shares the
view that China has actively contributed to the international cause of human rights and counter-
terrorism.
The so-called Act disregards facts and distorts truth. Facts speak louder than words. Today, People
of different ethnic groups and religious beliefs in Xinjiang live together as equals, enjoy unity and
harmony, and lead a peaceful and stable life. That’s the what’s needed in the autonomous region.
In 2019, Xinjiang received over 200 million tourists, and its economic growth reached 6.2 percent.
This year, it will eliminate absolute poverty.
Uyghur population in Xinjiang has grown to 11.65 million or 46.8 percent of the total. There are
over 24,000 mosques in Xinjiang, which means there is a mosque for every 530 Muslims on
average. As one of the 56 ethnic groups of China, the Uyghur people are entitled to all the rights
and freedom under the Constitution.
The international community holds a fair opinion on Xinjiang-related issues.
At the 43rd session of the UN Human Rights Council, representatives of multiple countries
praised China for its achievements in counter-terrorism and de-radicalization, speaking highly of
China’s openness and transparency. They also commended China for inviting over 1,000
diplomats officials of international organizations, journalists, and religious figures to visit the
autonomous region, as well as China’s invitations to the UN High Commissioner for Human
Rights to visit Xinjiang.
In July 2019, ambassadors of over 50 countries to the UN Office at Geneva co-signed a letter to
the president of the UN Human Rights Council and the High Commissioner for Human Rights,
applauding China’s respect to and protection of human rights in its counter-terrorism and de-
radicalization efforts. In October, at the Third Committee session of the 74th UN General
Assembly, more than 60 countries commended in their statements the tremendous human rights
progress achieved in Xinjiang and opposed the interference in other countries’ internal affairs
under the pretext of human rights.
Ezzat Saad, director of the Egyptian Council for Foreign Affairs who has been to Xinjiang, said
frankly that the US using the so-called “human rights issues” to meddle in China’s internal affairs
is “blackmail.”
Isabelle Carvalho, an expert at the Brazil-China Chamber of Commerce and Industry, believes that
the true intention of the US is to maintain its global hegemony.
The so-called Act seeks to stigmatize Xinjiang’s measures against terrorism, separatism and
radicalization, and applies double standards on counter-terrorism.
As is known to all, the US has started warfare in Islamic countries such as Iraq and Syria under the
pretext of counter-terrorism, killing and injuring millions of innocent people. It also identified
terrorism with particular countries, regions and ethnic groups, and issued a Muslim ban for
Muslim-majority countries.
A US survey shows that 75 percent of adult Muslims in the US believed that discrimination
against Muslims was pervasive in the country, while 69 percent of the general public held the
same view. Half of Muslims felt that it had become more and more difficult to be a Muslim in the
US in recent years.
It is obvious to all that the US should have seriously reflected on the bad human rights conditions
on its own territory. Some US politicians, out of their own political interests, have staged various
political farces, which once again proved that they are not at all the human rights defenders as they
have proclaimed. They only make a fool of themselves, who disregard facts, make up lies, disdain
justice and have brazen motives.
Xinjiang affairs are purely China’s internal affairs that allow no foreign interference. China
demand the US side to correct its mistakes at once, stop using this Xinjiang-related Act to harm
China’s interests and interfere in China’s internal affairs. The Chinese government and people are
resolute in safeguarding China’s sovereignty, security and development interests.
The US attempt to sow discord among Chinese ethnic groups, undermine prosperity and stability
in Xinjiang, and contain China’s growth under the pretext of Xinjiang-related issues will never
succeed.
June 19, 2020
No one is able to reverse the trend of history
By Zhong Sheng
Washington recently betrayed its public promises, imposing unreasonable visa restriction on
Chinese students and researchers.
To force the implementation of the policy that has been widely criticized by Americans, the White
House groundlessly accused Chinese students and researchers, relating them with technology
theft, spying, and security risks.
Such a practice is purely political persecution and racial discrimination, and seriously violates the
legitimate rights and interests of the Chinese students and researchers in the U.S., placing
extremely negative impacts on the normal people-to-people and cultural exchanges between China
and the U.S.
The White House’s lies to stigmatize Chinese students and researchers are absurd. Officials
acknowledged there was no direct evidence that pointed to wrongdoing by the students who are
about to lose their visas, wrote the New York Times in a report. American universities, the most
straightforward critics of U.S. practices, also expressed their dissatisfaction. “I don’t even
understand the term ‘academic espionage,’” said Mark C. Elliott, Harvard’s Vice Provost for
International Affairs. He said for academics the goal is to publish what they have learned, and it’s
to share. Lee C. Bollinger, president of Columbia University remarked that “Academic research is
intended to be shared — released into the public domain to advance human progress.” He opposes
the U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies to develop more robust protocols for
monitoring foreign-born students and visiting scholars — particularly if they are ethnically
Chinese.
People-to-people and cultural exchanges between China and the U.S., including their educational
cooperation in the past four decades, have received wide support from the two sides, serving as an
important pillar for their bilateral relations.
In late 1970s, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter once told China to send 100,000 students to his
country. Since then bilateral educational cooperation set sail and constantly injected vitality and
energy into the general relationship between the two countries.
At present, there are over 400,000 Chinese students studying in the U.S., and China has been the
largest source of international students in the U.S. for years. The fundamental reason for such
achievements is that Chinese-U.S. educational cooperation conforms to the common demand of
the two countries, as well as the trend of the time of openness and cooperation.
However, to welcome the Chinese students is only a lip service paid by Washington as it
constantly makes troubles for China-U.S. educational exchanges. It limited the length of visas to
one year for Chinese graduate students working in fields deemed “sensitive”, and frequently set
obstacles for Chinese students and researchers in visa application. This time, China-U.S.
educational cooperation was once again deteriorated by the visa restriction imposed by the White
House.
As the U.S. becomes more sensitive, its “national security” is gradually incorporating everything.
It seems like the country is trying to isolate itself with the world. Does the U.S., the world’s only
superpower, think it’s fragile?
Some American politicians are obsessed with Cold War mentality and zero-sum game, paving
road for their anti-China policies with frequent lies. What they did has triggered broad concerns in
the U.S. society. Some insightful people noted that confrontation and mutual consumption would
only damage the U.S. interests. U.S. universities also made voice immediately after the visa
restriction policy was unveiled, stressing the move would result in multiple impacts on science
and technology development, campus culture and universities’ economic performance.
By stigmatizing Chinese students and researchers, the U.S. politicians are indeed fanning up the
so-called external threat so that they can act tougher in diplomacy and seek political gains.
Recently, legal and civil rights organization Asian Americans Advancing Justice denounced the
U.S. ban on Chinese students from studying science, technology, engineering and mathematics in
America, saying this move is rooted in the same racism and xenophobia that led to the expulsion
of countless Chinese Americans and immigrants under the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.
Learning alone without exchanges with others will lead to ignorance. The “decoupling” advocated
by certain U.S. politicians, as well as the new “Cold War” they plan to launch against China,
completely go against the trend of time.
The “handshake across the Pacific” by former U.S. President Richard Nixon started a journey that
benefited not only Chinese and Americans, but also the people from the world. The close
relationship between the two countries nowadays conforms to the common aspiration and interests
of the two peoples.
Washington should immediately correct its wrongdoing, abandon Cold War mentality and
ideological prejudices, and stop its groundless restriction and unreasonable persecution on Chinese
students and researchers.
No one is able to reverse the trend of history. Facilitating friendly exchange between the two
peoples is in line with the will of the people and the trend of time.
(Zhong Sheng is a pen name often used by People's Daily to express its views on foreign policy.)
June 6, 2020
China warns US of countermeasures over Hong Kong trading threats
Beijing has warned the US that it will take “every necessary measure” to protect its interests after a top White House advisor warned that Washington might revoke Hong Kong’s special trading privileges if China enacts a tough new security law.
China plans to impose legislation on the semi-autonomous city that bans treason, subversion and sedition, officials said in response to months of massive, often-violent pro-democracy protests in the financial hub last year.
US national security advisor Robert O’Brien warned Sunday that the new law could cost the city the preferential trading status it enjoys with the United States, the world’s largest economy.
But China’s foreign ministry said Monday the US has “no right to criticise and interfere.”
“What laws, how, and when Hong Kong SAR (Special Administrative Region) should legislate are entirely within the scope of China’s sovereignty,” said foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian.
“If the US insists on hurting China’s interests, China will have to take every necessary measure to counter and oppose this,” he added.
He said Beijing had already made “stern representations to the US.”
Hong Kong residents enjoy rights — including freedom of speech — unseen on the mainland, and the city has its own legal system and trade status.
Many Hong Kongers fear the proposal could spell the end of the territory’s treasured freedoms, and thousands protested on Sunday against the Chinese measure despite a ban on mass gatherings introduced to combat coronavirus.
O’Brien’s remarks came amid soaring tensions between Washington and Beijing — and only a day after China’s foreign minister Wang Yi warned that the two countries seemed poised “at the brink of a new Cold War.”
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Friday the proposed law, which China’s rubber-stamp legislature is expected to act on quickly, would be a “death knell for the high degree of autonomy Beijing promised for Hong Kong.”
May 25, 2020
US Says China Trying To Steal COVID-19 Vaccine Research
US authorities warned Wednesday that Chinese hackers were attempting to steal coronavirus data on treatments and vaccines, adding fuel to Washington’s war with Beijing over the pandemic.
The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said organizations researching COVID-19 were at risk of “targeting and network compromise” by China.
They warned that Chinese government-affiliated groups and others were attempting to obtain “valuable intellectual property and public health data related to vaccines, treatments, and testing.”
“China’s efforts to target these sectors pose a significant threat to our nation’s response to COVID-19,” they said.
The two organizations gave no examples to support the allegation.
But the warning added to the battle between the superpowers over the outbreak that began in China and has killed at least 293,000 worldwide, and more than 83,000 in the United States.
President Donald Trump has accused China of hiding the origins of the virus and not cooperating in efforts to research and fight the disease.
Asked on Monday about reports that the US believed Chinese hackers were targeting US vaccine research, Trump replied: “What else is new with China?… I’m not happy.”
Spies, academics targeted
The warning Wednesday also underscored that Washington believes China has continued broad efforts to obtain US commercial and technology secrets under President Xi Jinping’s drive to make his country a technological leader.
In February the US Justice Department indicted four Chinese army personnel suspected of hacking the database of credit rating agency Equifax, giving them the personal data of 145 million Americans.
On Monday the Department of Justice announced the arrest of University of Arkansas engineering professor Simon Saw-Teong Ang for hiding ties to the Chinese government and Chinese universities while he worked on projects funded by NASA.
The indictment said Ang was secretly part of the Xi-backed Thousand Talents program, which Washington says China uses to collect research from abroad.
Also on Monday Li Xiaojiang, a former professor at Emory University in Atlanta, admitted tax fraud in a case focused on his hidden earnings from China, also as a participant in the Thousand Talents program.
Senator Marco Rubio, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said such cases combined with the coronavirus are forcing China to change its tactics.
“Beijing has shifted its recruitment efforts for the Thousand Talents Program online, and it has increased efforts to hack US medical research institutes for COVID-19 information,” he said.
Race for a vaccine
Beijing has repeatedly denied the US accusations.
The FBI warning comes as dozens of companies, institutes and countries around the world are racing to develop vaccines to halt the coronavirus.
Many more groups are researching treatments for infected patients. Currently there is no proven therapy.
An effective vaccine could allow countries to reopen and potentially earn billions of dollars for its creators.
Most expert believe it will take more than a year to get a vaccine fully approved, and much longer to produce enough of it.
Government-backed cyber operators in Iran, North Korea, Russia and China have been accused of pumping out false coronavirus news and targeting workers and scientists.
Britain said last week it had detected large-scale “password spraying” tactics — hackers trying to access accounts through commonly used passwords — aimed at healthcare bodies and medical research organizations.
Sanctions, compensation
Increasingly US officials are discussing punishing China and seeking compensation for the costs of the pandemic.
In April the US state of Missouri sued China’s leadership over what it described as deliberate deception and insufficient action to stop the virus.
On Tuesday Republican senators proposed legislation that would empower Trump to slap sanctions on China if Beijing does not give a “full accounting” for the coronavirus outbreak.
“Their outright deception of the origin and spread of the virus cost the world valuable time and lives as it began to spread,” Senator Jim Inhofe said in a statement.
May 14, 2020
Anti-intellectualism impedes US COVID-19 fight
Violating social distancing requirements, protesters gathered on Saturday afternoon, April 25, in Austin and Dallas of Texas, to rally against local stay-at-home orders and to demand Texas businesses reopen, according to local news portal the Austin American-Statesman.
Video clips circulating online show protesters holding signs calling COVID-19 “a hoax” with a crowd shouting “Arrest Bill Gates!” During a “You Can’t Close America Rally” in Austin on April 18, some 300 protesters decried local government’s COVID-19 control measures. Protesters shouted “Fire Fauci!” during the rally and declared the virus “a hoax.”
Bill Gates, a philanthropist, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, US top medical expert on the coronavirus
pandemic, have been targets of some right-wing campaigns in the US as both of them have been at
odds with US President Donald Trump on the measures to contain coronavirus.
Such rallies reflect the prevailing anti-intellectualism in some parts of the US, where people have
little scientific knowledge of COVID-19’s severity and of the function of vaccines. Some of them
even believe in a conspiracy theory that says Bill Gates’s goal is to reduce global human
population.
Anti-intellectualism is not new in the US, but the Trump administration’s handling of the
coronavirus has exposed its existence in an unprecedentedly absurd way. President Trump has
been exploiting populism, which drives anti-intellectualism further in the US.
The US is now trapped in a series of problems – governance, policy, anti-intellectualism,
populism, white supremacy, and so on all looped together. The sequence to disentangle the loop is
yet to be found due to severe political polarization.
Many people in the conservative states believe in Trump without a shadow of doubt. They take
anything or anyone at odds with Trump as part of a political conspiracy, regardless if Trump is
correct.
Such being the case, calls to poison control hotlines skyrocketed across the US as more Americans
have questions about using bleach and other disinfectants to kill the coronavirus, after Trump
suggested injecting disinfectant to the lung could be a treatment, Toronto-based CityNews
reported Sunday. Even Canada has issued warnings regarding Trump's suggested COVID-19
treatments.
It is unbelievable to see people in the US, the most powerful and most developed country both
economically and technologically, make such nonsense.
Some argue all these phenomena reflect the degradation of the US. But there are still capable
politicians who could better lead the US. If the US were hit by COVID-19 during Barack Obama’s
tenure, it would have been a very different situation today.
The main factor leading to these astonishing phenomena in the US to a large extent lies in Trump
being a very unusual president, who has made existing problems even more protruding.
For any country including the US, the more critical a crisis, the stronger the leadership it needs,
leadership that can convey correct information, take effective measures, solidify public opinion,
and unite the whole country to fight the pandemic. Trump is incapable of achieving that. Apart
from Trump’s spreading of information that lacks a scientific basis, scenes such as the scramble
for scarce resources between state and federal governments have also been witnessed, igniting the
public’s anxiety and uncertainties over the outbreak. These have fueled some Americans’
willingness to attend public gatherings in an attempt to express their mood.
To some extent, the capacity of a government is matched by the people it governs. The kind of
government it is and the policies it makes determine how the public – at least some of them –
behave or believe. The Trump administration provokes populism and fans anti-intellectualism,
which has contributed to its failure in effectively containing the coronavirus.
The US is the world’s largest economy, and it is strong and powerful in pharmaceutical and
technologic sectors. There should not have been so many infections, so many deaths, nor such a
massive economic and social impact, but all have become the truth and will continue. This is a
tragedy for the US.
The article was compiled by Global Times reporter Lu Yuanzhi based on an interview with Xin
Qiang, deputy director
May 4, 2020
Muslims start Ramadan under lockdown as US beefs up virus support
Muslims across the world began marking the holy month of Ramadan under unprecedented coronavirus lockdowns on Friday as the US added another half a trillion dollars to its already-massive support package for the pandemic-ravaged economy.
The virus has upended life around the planet as nations try to stop the spread of the disease that has so far claimed nearly 190,000 lives, infected close to 2.7 million people and hammered the global economy.
Ramadan spirits have been dampened by movement restrictions on hundreds of millions of Muslims from Southeast Asia to the Middle East and Africa, with bans on prayers in mosques and large gatherings of families and friends to break the daily fast — a centrepiece of the month.
But despite the coronavirus threat, clerics and conservatives in many countries including Bangladesh, Pakistan and Indonesia — the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation — have pushed back against social distancing rules, refusing to stop gatherings in mosques.
Several thousand people attended evening prayers on Thursday at the biggest mosque in the capital of Indonesia’s conservative Aceh province, and there were similar scenes at many sites in Pakistan.
The World Health Organization has called for a stop to some Ramadan activities to lower the risk of infections, and authorities in several countries have explicitly warned of the threat from large religious gatherings.
There have already been explosions of coronavirus cases from three separate Islamic congregations in Malaysia, Pakistan and India since the virus first emerged late last year in China.
Distancing measures and the severe economic impact of the pandemic have also meant many charitable activities during Ramadan, especially food distribution and other donations, have been hit hard.
Salah Jibril, an unemployed Palestinian man who lives with his wife and six children in a cramped two-bedroom apartment in the Gaza Strip, said he was not sure how his family would cope without Ramadan donations.
“The markets and mosques are closed. The good people who give us money or aid each Ramadan are facing a tough situation,” he said.
“This is the hardest Ramadan we have faced. We don’t know how we will cope.”
Massive economic stimulus
The economic devastation wreaked by lockdowns that have half the planet indoors is huge, with the world facing its worst downturn since the Great Depression.
US lawmakers covered their faces with masks and voted in small groups to approve a $483 billion stimulus plan, on top of the $2.2 trillion package already enacted.
The money will back small businesses on the brink of bankruptcy and hard-pressed hospitals as the American economy reels, with more than 26 million people losing their jobs since the pandemic hit.
The United States is now the worst-affected nation in the world, with about 50,000 coronavirus deaths.
In Europe, leaders haggled by video conference over their own package that could top one trillion euros, as the European Central Bank chief warned of the risk of “acting too little, too late”.
The 27-nation European Union agreed to ask the bloc’s executive arm to come up with a rescue plan by May 6, sources told AFP.
The crucial economic discussions come as parts of Europe slowly loosen restrictions after progress on reducing the number of new infections.
But experts have warned of a possible second wave of cases, and authorities are ramping up their capacity to deal with it in Germany — where curbs on public life have been eased recently.
Virologist Christian Drosten of Berlin’s Charite hospital warned that the coronavirus could return with a “totally different force”.
“The virus will continue to spread in the course of the next weeks and months,” Drosten told public broadcaster NDR, adding that it could pop up “everywhere at the same time”.
Race for vaccine
While the disease appears to be peaking in Europe and the United States, other nations are still in the early stages of the fight.
The World Health Organization has warned that strict measures should remain until there is a viable treatment or vaccine.
The race is on around the world to develop one, with the University of Oxford launching a human trial for a potential vaccine on Thursday. Germany announced similar trials will start by next week.
In a briefing at the White House, scientists said they had found that the virus was quickly destroyed by sunlight, raising hopes that the pandemic could ease as the northern hemisphere summer approaches.
“Our most striking observation to date is the powerful effect that solar light appears to have on killing the virus, both surfaces and in the air,” said William Bryan, science and technology adviser to the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.
Their findings, however, have not yet been released and therefore not reviewed by independent experts.
The rapid development efforts are in part down to the vast numbers of patients that have overwhelmed healthcare systems in the developed world and in poorer countries.
In Brazil, where intensive care units at hospitals have been slammed, Dr Fernanda Gulinelli said this “is a new chapter in medicine that we are having to write on the go, and we don’t know what the next sentence will be”.
April 24, 2020
US warns China could face consequences for Covid-19
U.S. President Donald Trump warned China on Saturday that it should face consequences if it was “knowingly responsible” for the coronavirus pandemic, as he ratcheted up criticism of Beijing over its handling of the outbreak.
“It could have been stopped in China before it started and it wasn’t, and the whole world is suffering because of it,” Trump told a daily White House briefing.
It was the latest U.S. volley in a war of words between the world’s two biggest economies, showing increased strains in relations at a time when experts say an unprecedented level of cooperation is needed to deal with the coronavirus crisis.
“If it was a mistake, a mistake is a mistake. But if they were knowingly responsible, yeah, I mean, then sure there should be consequences,” Trump said. He did not elaborate on what actions the United States might take.
Trump and senior aides have accused China of a lack of transparency after the coronavirus broke out late last year in its city of Wuhan. This week he suspended aid to the World Health Organization accusing it of being “China-centric.”
Washington and Beijing have repeatedly sparred in public over the virus. Trump initially lavished praise on China and his counterpart Xi Jinping for their response. But he and other senior officials have also referred to it as the “Chinese virus” and in recent days have ramped up their rhetoric.
They have also angrily rejected earlier attempts by some Chinese officials to blame the origin of the virus on the U.S. military.
Trump’s domestic critics say that while China performed badly at the outset and must still come clean on what happened, he is now seeking to use Beijing to help deflect from the shortcomings of his own response and take advantage of growing anti-China sentiment among some voters for his 2020 re-election bid.
At the same time, however, White House officials are mindful of the potential backlash if tensions get too heated. The United States is heavily reliant on China for personal protection equipment desperately needed by American medical workers, and Trump also wants to keep a hard-won trade deal on track.
Trump said that until recently the U.S.-China relationship had been good, citing a multi-billion agricultural agreement aimed at defusing a bitter trade war. “But then all of a sudden you hear about this,” he said.
He said the Chinese were “embarrassed” and the question now was whether what happened with the coronavirus was “a mistake that got out of control, or was it done deliberately?”
“There’s a big difference between those two,” he said.
April 19, 2020