At least 21 people have been killed in a strong earthquake that struck south-western China and was felt by millions of people confined to their homes under a strict Covid lockdown in Chengdu. The 6.6-magnitude quake hit about 26 miles (43km) south-east of the city of Kangding at a depth of about six miles, the US Geological Survey (USGS) said. Fourteen people died in Shimian County and seven were killed in nearby Luding County, while more than 30 were injured, according to the state broadcaster, CCTV. Tremors also shook buildings…
Month: September 2022
China Imposes More Covid Lockdowns, Stoking Anxiety
In the hours before the southern Chinese city of Chengdu entered a coronavirus lockdown, Matthew Chen visited four vegetable markets in an attempt to stock up on fresh food. But seemingly the entire city had the same idea, and by the time he got to each place, most of the shelves had been stripped bare, except for hot peppers and fruit, he said. Mr. Chen, a white-collar worker in his 30s, managed to scavenge enough cherry tomatoes, meat and greens for about one day, and since then has been ordering…
In India and China, farmers fret as drought and heat threaten rice harvest
Extreme weather across the world’s major rice producing countries including India, China and Pakistan is threatening global output of the grain this year, possibly affecting more than 2 billion people in Asia that depend on it as a staple food, experts say. Due to the drought, China’s rice yields will be affected, and thus may affect the export capacity Guillherme Campo Even against a backdrop of soaring food prices this year, rice has remained largely affordable due to four years of plentiful harvests previously. Advertisement But a confluence of factors,…
Chinese motorcyclists join Chongqing wildfire battle
Throughout August, wildfires raged across parts of China, triggered by a record long heatwave and drought. Thousands of firefighters were mobilised across the country. Around the south-western city of Chongqing, which was one of the worst-hit areas, local off-road motorcyclists joined the effort, transporting emergency workers and essential supplies to areas that were otherwise hard to reach. Two of the volunteers spoke to the BBC about their efforts and coming face to face with the effects of climate change. BBC
India’s Electric Vehicle Push Is Riding on Mopeds and Rickshaws
In the United States, luxury-car buyers are snapping up Teslas and other electric cars that cost more than $60,000, and even relatively cheap models cost more than $25,000. Here in India, those are all out of reach of the vast majority of families, whose median income is just $2,400. But an electric vehicle movement is taking place nonetheless, not on four wheels, but on two and three. Electric mopeds and three-wheeled rickshaw taxis that sell for as little as $1,000 are zipping along India’s congested urban thoroughfares, cheered on by…
Joe Biden has picked a fight with tyranny. The west must hope he wins | Simon Tisdall
It was a deadly week for democracy. US president Joe Biden launched a rescue effort to save the “soul of the nation” that the dementor-in-chief, Donald Trump, AKA Lord Voldemort, is conspiring to steal. Russia lost a great man whose titanic struggle for reform was fatally torpedoed by a pint-sized usurper named Vladimir Putin. And China was saddled with indefinite dictatorship under the dead hand of Xi Jinping. Is there hope of resurrection? Perhaps. The more the western democracies are threatened externally by totalitarian regimes and internally by populist extremism,…
China Threatens Reaction After U.S. Announces Arms Sales to Taiwan
HONG KONG — China threatened over the weekend to take countermeasures after the Biden administration approved the sale of more than $1.1 billion worth of arms to Taiwan. A spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington said the sale of military equipment to Taiwan, designed to repel a seaborne invasion from China, would “severely jeopardize China-US relations and peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.” In a series of messages posted to Twitter on Saturday, Liu Pengyu, the spokesman, also called on the United States to “immediately revoke” the decision…
When my family was reunited in Australia, I had to learn to be a dad to a son I’d never met | Sadam Abdusalam
In December 2020, I finally got what I fought so hard for: my family back. I was over the moon when I was reunited with my wife Nadila and son Lutfi after being forced apart for three and a half years. I could finally hold my baby boy in my arms – every father’s dream. I was able to go on dates with my love; watch TV and eat dinner together as a family. They may sound like simple things, but not for us. Like many Uyghurs, we had been…
US announces $1.1bn arms sale to Taiwan, angering China
The Biden administration has announced a $1.1bn arms sale to Taiwan as US-China tensions escalate over its status. The sale included $355m for Harpoon air-to-sea missiles and $85m for Sidewinder air-to-air missiles, the state department said. The largest portion of the sale is a $655m logistics support package for Taiwan’s surveillance radar programme, which provides air defence warnings. Early warning air defence systems have become more important as China has stepped up military drills near Taiwan, which it regards as a renegade province. The state department said the equipment was…
New Zealand’s shadow foreign affairs spokesperson faces criticism for response to UN report on Uyghurs
New Zealand’s shadow foreign affairs spokesperson said a UN report on the human rights abuses of Uyghurs includes recognition that China is “dealing with a terrorist problem essentially”, in remarks criticised by China analysts. “It’s good that it acknowledges that there has been a terrorism problem in the particular part of China that the report is on,” Gerry Brownlee, a lawmaker for the centre-right National party, told Radio New Zealand (RNZ) on Thursday in an interview about the UN findings. In the damning report, the outgoing UN human rights commissioner,…