One of China’s most senior pandemic response officials has said the country is entering a “new stage and mission” in the latest indication of the government’s changing approach after mass protests against its zero-Covid policy. Sun Chunlan, China’s vice-premier, made the comments to national health officials on Wednesday, according to state media outlet Xinhua. It came as several regions including Shanghai began to lift lockdowns despite continuing high case numbers. Vic “With the decreasing pathogenicity of the Omicron variant, the increasing vaccination rate and the accumulating experience of outbreak control…
Month: November 2022
China’s anti-government protesters are risking much. They deserve our admiration – and support | Xuyang Dong
On Monday evening hundreds of people gathered at Sydney’s town hall to mourn the deaths from a fire in Urumqi in Xinjiang province in China, where 10 people died and nine others were injured. The gathering was not just a memorial. It was a chance to show support for the protests that erupted in China in the days after the blaze. <gu-island name="TweetBlockComponent" deferuntil="visible" props="{"element":{"_type":"model.dotcomrendering.pageElements.TweetBlockElement","html":" Hundreds at Sydney's Town Hall in solidarity with the protests in China pic.twitter.com/K5j4q99dm6 — Lewis Jackson (@lewjackk) November 28, 2022 \n","url":"https://twitter.com/lewjackk/status/1597171596447580161?s=20&t=v5JJ8aQ4vi-ohR8uwpc5HA","id":"1597171596447580161","hasMedia":false,"role":"inline","isThirdPartyTracking":false,"source":"Twitter","elementId":"6d5ea207-2786-4a12-b383-f2edb640c114"}}”> As the Chinese national…
Zero-Covid: five charts that show how restrictions are throttling the Chinese economy
Protests against pandemic restrictions in China could unleash a new wave of volatility into a global economy already racked by inflation, energy shocks and the war in Ukraine. The government’s continued reliance on lockdowns, quarantine orders and mass testing to limit the spread of the virus has provoked the biggest protest movement in decades. But there’s little evidence that authorities are willing to diverge from the path they have taken. As well as prompting social unrest inside China, there are signs that the zero-Covid strategy is throttling the world’s second…
Australian defence chief warns of rise in ‘grey-zone activities’ in Indo-Pacific region amid China tensions
The chief of the Australian defence force, Gen Angus Campbell, has offered a gloomy assessment of developments in the Indo-Pacific region, warning of a rise in “coercive statecraft and grey-zone activities”. Ahead of a major defence review, Campbell has declared that Australia and Japan are bound together by “increasingly shared strategic challenges” in our region. “Across our region, large-scale military modernisation is accelerating,” he said, in a clear reference to China. “National sovereignty, the law of the sea, freedom of navigation are all facing challenges from both states and non-state…
Aide to Vietnamese Deputy PM held in COVID kit investigation
UPDATED AT 10:12 PM ET ON 11-30-2022 An assistant to Vietnam’s Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam has been arrested for alleged involvement in a COVID-19 test kit scandal involving overpricing and bribery that led to multi-million dollar profits for the company at the heart of the claims. On Wednesday, the Investigative Police Agency of Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security announced the detention of Nguyen Van Trinh for his involvement in the Viet A test kit case. It said Trinh worked for ‘a deputy prime minister’ without saying who. State-controlled…
China Doubles Nuclear Warheads in 2 Years
The pace of China’s accelerating nuclear expansion could enable Beijing to field a stockpile of about 1,500 warheads by 2035. That’s according to the Pentagon’s annual “China Military Power” report to Congress that was released Tuesday. VOA Pentagon correspondent Carla Babb has the details. VOA
Nato concerned by China’s ‘rapid and opaque’ military buildup, says Blinken
Nato allies are concerned about China’s rapid and opaque military buildup and its cooperation with Russia, and discussed concrete ways to address the challenges posed by Beijing, US secretary of state Antony Blinken has said. “The members of our alliance remain concerned by the PRC’s [People’s Republic of China] coercive policies, by its use of disinformation, by its rapid, opaque military buildup, including its cooperation with Russia,” Blinken told a news conference on Wednesday after a two-day meeting of foreign ministers from the defence alliance. “But we also remain committed…
North Korea forcing citizens to change their names to sound more ideological
In the past, North Koreans were encouraged to give their children patriotic names that held some ideological or even militaristic meaning, such as Chung Sim (loyalty), Chong Il (gun), Pok Il (bomb) or Ui Song (satellite). In recent years, though, as the county has become more open to the outside world, North Koreans have been naming their children gentler, more uplifting names that are easier to say, such as A Ri (loved one), So Ra (conch shell) and Su Mi (super beauty), sources inside the country say. Instead of names…
US Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell says China’s strict ‘zero-Covid’ policy hinders global supply chain
Severe restrictions have also sparked rare public protests around the country. The latest official surveys showed on Wednesday that both China’s factory and services activities contracted to seven-month lows and worse than market estimations in November. Advertisement Experts warned that the “inevitable” costs of Chinese cities being forced to impose restrictions amid a surge in coronavirus cases have already started to appear. The International Monetary Fund last week urged Beijing to “recalibrate” its Covid-19 policy to the economy while relying on market reforms to raise productivity and deliver medium- and…
China’s Covid revolt
The broadest and boldest surge of protests in a generation is sweeping China, as people in cities across the country take to the streets to denounce the government’s inflexible and exhausting Covid measures. Last night, in the southern city of Guangzhou, workers and residents resisting a Covid lockdown tore down barricades and threw bottles at riot police. They pushed over a makeshift hut used for Covid tests, while hundreds of onlookers roared in approval. Videos showed hundreds of police officers subduing residents. For more on the protests, I connected with…