| Anger and virus cases grow in China with 722 total deaths Posted: 07 Feb 2020 04:50 PM PST  The number of confirmed cases of the new virus has risen again in China while fatalities increased to 722 on Saturday, as the ruling Communist Party faced anger and recriminations from the public over the death of a doctor who was threatened by police after trying to sound the alarm about the disease over a month ago. The government announced that another 3,399 people had been diagnosed over the last 24 hours, reversing two days of declines, and raising the total accumulated number of cases on the mainland to 34,546. Cruise ship passengers faced more woe as Japan reported three more cases for a total of 64 on one quarantined vessel and turned away another.
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| Ireland’s Varadkar Risks Defeat as Voters Head to Polls Posted: 07 Feb 2020 04:30 PM PST ![Ireland's Varadkar Risks Defeat as Voters Head to Polls]( "Ireland's Varadkar Risks Defeat as Voters Head to Polls") (Bloomberg) -- Ireland goes to the polls Saturday, with Prime Minister Leo Varadkar's party facing a struggle to retain power after almost a decade in office.Voting starts at 7 a.m. and finishes at 10pm. State broadcaster RTE will release an exit poll immediately after voting ends. Counting is set to begin Sunday, with a clear picture of the outcome expected to emerge around midday.During the campaign, Fine Gael highlighted the premier's success in keeping the country's border with Northern Ireland free of checks after Brexit. That, however, seems to be falling flat amid voter discontent over a housing shortage, an ailing health service and a general sense that the privately-educated, former doctor has failed to connect with voters.Brexit Halo Fades for Irish Leader Now Fighting for SurvivalFianna Fail, which oversaw the 2008 economic crash and the international bailout that followed, is set to return to power, polls indicate. Sinn Fein, the left-wing nationalist party, once the political wing of the IRA terrorist group, is also set to make gains."A government led by one of the two establishment parties, with minority support from the other, seems to be the most likely outcome," Bert Colijn, an economist with ING Groep NV said. That "would largely mean continuity from a financial and economic policy perspective."Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin, 59, has a 96% shot of heading the government, odds at bookmaker Paddy Power signal. Varadkar has a 6% chance of returning to power after the ballot.Sinn Fein's performance may prove a complicating factor. With 25%, the party led in the final poll of the campaign, published by the Irish Times on Feb. 3.However, the party is running only 42 candidates so it can't win anywhere enough seats needed to become the dominant force in the 160-strong parliament.How Sinn Fein Ignited Irish Election (But Won't Win): QuickTakeFianna Fail will take over 50 seats, Fine Gael around 35 and Sinn Fein, about 30, according to Eoin O'Malley, a politics professor at Dublin City University. With no party coming near the 80 mark, the Greens and Labour Party are potential kingmakers.Martin, a former foreign and health minister, has shifted Fianna Fail to center-left in preparation for coalition talks, said O'Malley."That gives him a much easier route to power," he said. "It makes it more straightforward to do a deal with Labour and the Greens."Late Swing?Varadkar is banking on a late swing to save his job, and the party has attacked Fianna Fail and Sinn Fein's economic policies as it scrambles to hold on to power."Some parties are promising you everything -- to go wild on the state's credit card, ignore the bill, with interest, that will come in the post," Foreign Minister Simon Coveney said in a final appeal to voters. "Their attitude is that someone else will pay for it."For now, it seems that's falling on deaf ears. To his counterparts across Europe, Varadkar, 41, is the cool head who delivered a viable agreement that kept the land border with the U.K. province of Northern Ireland free of checkpoints.Strong EconomyThe openly gay son of an Indian immigrant, he also completed a social revolution by seeing through historic abortion legislation. That was all while cementing the Irish economy's position as one of the continent's strongest and getting unemployment down toward the lowest in a decade, achievements many in Ireland also acknowledge.Yet, opposition parties paint Varadkar as aloof and out of touch, and that's striking a chord with some voters.Hugh Reilly, 62, said he's positive about Varadkar's background and sexuality, but adds the Fine Gael leader "has a huge image issue.""He doesn't connect with the ordinary people," said Reilly, from Cavan, about 100 kilometers northwest of Dublin. "I think that is in some ways working against him here now, particularly against the background of the housing crisis."\--With assistance from Rachel McGovern.To contact the reporter on this story: Peter Flanagan in Dublin at pflanagan23@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Ambereen Choudhury at achoudhury@bloomberg.net, Dara Doyle, Andrew DavisFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Here's Why PayPal and Venmo Allow You to Pay Someone for 'Cocaine' But Not 'Iran' Posted: 07 Feb 2020 03:30 PM PST  Why PayPal Allows You to Send Money for 'Cocaine' But Not 'Iran'
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| 'Serious discussions' about DNC changes, top Democrat says Posted: 07 Feb 2020 02:56 PM PST  A top Democrat in Congress said Friday the party's future under Tom Perez is under scrutiny amid fallout from the Iowa caucuses and the winnowing of the presidential primary field to the exclusion of candidates of color. Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, the third-ranking House Democrat, stopped short of saying Perez must go as leader of the Democratic National Committee.
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| Macron urges greater EU role in curbing nuclear threats Posted: 07 Feb 2020 12:13 PM PST  French President Emmanuel Macron called Friday for European nations to play a more direct role in halting a new nuclear arms race, saying they "cannot remain spectators" against a threat to the continent's collective security. "In the absence of a legal framework, they could rapidly face a new race for conventional weapons, even nuclear weapons, on their own soil," Macron told military officers in a speech laying out France's post-Brexit nuclear strategy. Following Britain's departure from the EU France is now the only nuclear-armed power in the European bloc, Union at a time when long-standing accords on limiting the growth of nuclear arsenals appear increasingly at risk.
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| UN refugee agency: Major rise in migrants stopped off Libya Posted: 07 Feb 2020 11:45 AM PST ![UN refugee agency: Major rise in migrants stopped off Libya]( "UN refugee agency: Major rise in migrants stopped off Libya") The U.N. refugee agency reported Friday that the total number of migrants intercepted by the Libyan coast guard in the past month rose 121% from the same period last year. The UNHCR said in January alone, it registered 1,040 refugees and migrants the coast guard stopped and brought back to Libyan shores, a dramatic increase from the 469 rescued that month the year before. The relentless war in Libya has turned the country into a major conduit for migrants fleeing war and poverty in Africa and the Middle East.
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| Doctor’s death highlights dangers on front lines of outbreak Posted: 07 Feb 2020 11:10 AM PST  The death of a doctor who issued an early warning about the new virus in China represents a grim reminder that the first health care workers to recognize new outbreaks are sometimes among their earliest victims. Dr. Li Wenliang's death underlined the dangers health workers have faced in similar epidemics, including SARS and Ebola. On Dec. 3, Li wrote on his social media account that he saw a test sample suggesting the presence of a coronavirus similar to SARS.
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| American democracy is dying Posted: 07 Feb 2020 11:07 AM PST  This past week was a litany of democratic disasters. First, on Monday, the Iowa Democratic Party catastrophically botched its caucus. Second, on Wednesday, President Donald Trump was acquitted in the Senate impeachment trial, after the Republican majority voted to hear no new witness testimony. Every Democrat voted to convict, and every Republican except Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah voted to acquit. What's more, we learned the attempt of a Wall Street billionaire, Mike Bloomberg, to straight-up buy the Democratic presidential nomination has a real possibility of success, as he rockets past Pete Buttigieg in national polls.A nakedly corrupt president who blatantly tried to rig the 2020 election now has full license to try the same trick again, and the Democratic Party has proved itself incapable of carrying out elementary electoral procedures every democratic nation mastered decades (if not centuries) ago. And now a case of behind-the-scenes oligarchic corruption has metastasized into full-blown democracy for sale.American democracy is cracking up.The impeachment trial result was always a foregone conclusion, given the cancerous infestation of corruption and screeching propaganda that infests the Republican Party. That is why I and others argued the Democrats should use the process to uncover as much of Trump's corruption and abuse of power as possible — particularly his violently unconstitutional looting of public money into his own pockets. At least Democrats could use subpoenas to reveal what Trump is doing, in great detail and at great length, if they couldn't get him out of office.But Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi instead chose to focus the impeachment very narrowly on Trump's attempt to blackmail Ukraine into faking up a corruption investigation into Joe Biden, and to get it done as quickly as possible. This was indeed a spectacular abuse of power, and, according to the Government Accountability Office, a violation of the law. But it left out the clearest instance of Trump's corruption and put the Democrats in the uncomfortable position of appearing to defend Hunter Biden's genuinely corrupt buckraking off his father's position as vice president (as well as explicitly defending imperialist misadventures in Eastern Europe as noble protection of U.S. national security).By making impeachment so narrow, and letting Trump get off so quickly, Democrats may have picked the worst of all possible choices. Trump avoided close scrutiny of much of his worst behavior and now has a blank check to meddle in the 2020 election with nearly a year left in his term.Nevertheless, Trump still very obviously deserved to be removed from office even on the narrow grounds of the Ukraine scandal. Many Republican senators didn't even dispute that he had done it, basing their vote to acquit on ludicrously tendentious arguments that the misconduct wasn't bad enough to warrant being removed from office (Lamar Alexander of Tennessee), or that Trump would be chastened by getting off the hook (Susan Collins of Maine). Republicans reacted with scandalized outrage at the idea that senators who didn't vote the party line would be attacked by GOP hacks, only to sit quietly when Romney received a torrent of abuse for exactly that.One must conclude that the impeachment mechanism basically does not work. We are right now living James Madison's worst nightmare — a nakedly corrupt demagogue who is plainly incapable of discharging the duties of the presidency is sitting in the White House, and when the constitutional method of removing him was tried, it could not get even a majority in the Senate, let alone the two-thirds supermajority necessary.Now, as Duncan Black points out, if Barack Obama had done even half of what Trump has, Democrats almost certainly would have supported his impeachment and removal from office, because that party is not nearly as corrupt or brain-poisoned by partisan media. But a mechanism to remove a corrupt president that only functions when used against a party that is far less likely to be corrupt in the first place can't be said to work reliably.The American constitutional structure is simply far too brittle and unwieldy. Even the worst president in history, Andrew Johnson, escaped being removed from office by a single vote after being impeached. What's more, a major reason why Trump got off is because the U.S. constitutional system has gradually funneled more and more power to the executive. The framers of the Constitution hated political parties, feared state tyranny, and tried to design Congress and the presidency as checks on each other to prevent those eventualities. The idea was each branch would jealously guard its power and thus stymie the "mischiefs of faction," but it turns out parties are vitally necessary to the functioning of any democracy, and partisan loyalty can easily trump any checks-and-balances motivation. If different parties control different branches of government, and the parties are polarized, instead of compromise the legislative process breaks down. This problem was previously dodged when the two parties both had liberal and conservative wings (hence making compromise easier), but as they have become ideologically coherent, with a conservative GOP and a liberal-left Democratic Party, compromise gets harder and harder.But any nation still requires government, and with Congress hamstrung most of the time power flows to the executive and the courts. The powers of the "imperial presidency" which have grown like fungus over the decades are precisely those which Trump abused to stymie investigation into his misdeeds (especially by preventing testimony from his cronies that participated in the Ukraine plot), with the active assent of congressional Republicans. What abuses might he try next to keep himself in office? Instructing Attorney General Barr to open a fake investigation into whoever wins the Democratic primary in late October? Or hacking his opponents campaign's emails and dribbling out the most inflammatory private messages over a period of months? Straight-up rigging the vote count? The possibilities are limitless.In short, the United States has a galloping case of authoritarian rot, in large part because the fundamental ideas motivating the Constitution are poles apart from how people actually behave. A political document drafted by people obsessed with putting limits on government power has fueled a tyrannical, unaccountable president.That brings me to the 2020 Democratic presidential primary. This party is in the first stages of picking its nominee, who will contest the only method still remaining for turfing Trump out of office — namely, the election this November. And at the very first contest, the party faceplanted in unprecedented fashion, botching the caucus worse than it has ever been botched.Now, there were new rules and new numbers which had to be recorded (partly the result of requests from the Sanders camp for additional transparency), which surely made the caucuses more difficult to conduct. But the new procedures were mostly not that complicated, and the Iowa party has had several years to prepare. But instead, the party elected to use a phone app to report the results that had been slapped together in a matter of weeks, had severe security flaws, and had not even been given a full test before the day it was used.Then when the app unsurprisingly failed completely on caucus night, the Iowa party headquarters apparently did not have enough people manning the phone banks to record the results in a timely fashion. Precinct captains attempting to call in their results were stuck on hold for hours (though to be fair, apparently 4chan trolls somehow got hold of the number and jammed it up).The people contracted to build this app are part of an incomprehensible labyrinth of Democratic-connected nonprofits and consulting firms whose main purpose is to enrich party insiders. The primary figure behind the app, one Tara McGowen, previously worked for the main Super PAC supporting Hillary Clinton in 2016. As Alex Pareene writes at The New Republic, "almost immediately after she failed to win the most important election she had ever worked on, McGowan managed to convince some of the wealthiest liberals in the country to shower her with money to produce ineffective trash."But even after all the results had been delivered, the party still had tremendous difficulty actually tabulating the results. Days passed as results trickled in — and those that did were riddled with errors and arithmetic mistakes. (Election analysts are speculating that many of the caucuses may not have been conducted properly, and we may never have clear results.) And when it looked likely that Bernie Sanders would take the lead in both state delegates and the popular vote, Democratic National Committee chair Tom Perez abruptly demanded a recanvass. Sanders supporters understandably wondered if this all wasn't somehow semi-deliberate.At a moment when the whole world was focused on the Democratic Party, wondering if it will be able to unite the anti-Trump factions among the American population, the party failed in truly spectacular fashion, undermined by a termitic infestation of corruption and insider self-dealing — and in the process sowed division and suspicion among the rapidly-growing leftist segment of its base. As Eric Levitz writes at New York, "those failures haven't just undermined the Democratic Party's attacks on Trump's incompetence. They've also inflamed the party's most wrenching internal disputes and demoralized its most ardent activists."That brings me to Mike Bloomberg. The Wall Street billionaire (who made his money by assembling a quasi-monopoly on financial communication technology), has funded his campaign with $200 million of his personal fortune as of a week ago — a gigantic sum for a presidential primary but only a tiny fraction of his estimated $58 billion fortune. After the Iowa debacle, Bloomberg doubled his already-gargantuan ad spending and brought his staff up to over 2,000.It is absolutely inconceivable that Bloomberg could be a Democratic presidential contender without his money. This is a guy who was a Republican until 2007 (well into his 60s), who endorsed George W. Bush in 2004 and thanked him at the Republican National Convention for starting the Iraq war, who has numerous sealed sexual harassment lawsuit settlements, and who reportedly plagiarized huge chunks of his 2020 campaign platform.This isn't even the first time Bloomberg has bought an election. In 2008, he spent big to overturn New York City's term limits law so he could get a third term as mayor (and bought off the billionaire who had originally pushed for the limits by promising him a seat on a powerful city board), and spent a further $102 million to win the ensuing election. As my colleague Damon Linker argues, Bloomberg is without question a Russia-style oligarch whose campaign is "an expression of highly developed rot at the core of the American political system."If Trump is undermining faith and trust in American democracy from the top down, the Democratic Party is undermining it from the bottom up, and the corrosive concentration of wealth in the billionaire class is dissolving it from the inside.Americans often boast that the United States is the world's oldest democracy. It's a dubious claim, but it is true that the U.S. Constitution has been in continuous operation longer than any other. What we see today is the sclerosis of age. The founders made a decent effort for the 1780s, but constitutional design has come a long way in 240 years. American-style separation of powers has proved far inferior than European-style parliamentary systems. Literally every other country that followed the American model saw their democratic institutions collapse into dictatorship or revolution — indeed, when U.S. occupation forces set up governments in Germany and Japan after the Second World War they did not copy the American model.I see two basic paths forward for the United States: Either a crusading reformist president and Congress breathe new life into the American system with a major overhaul of both its structure and economy, or a right-wing (or oligarch) president finishes coring out the few remaining elements of republican government and buries the American Constitution for good, auguring in a Napoleon-style period of overtly authoritarian rule. And given the absolute shambles the Democratic opposition has made of the 2020 campaign so far (not to mention the strong economy buttressing Trump's support) I would not remotely count out the latter possibility.The end of American democracy would be a disaster, of course. But it may not last long. Dictatorships tend to be unstable, because they are incompetent, corrupt, and tend to suffer succession crises. Vladimir Putin has kept a grip on power in Russia for over two decades, but Napoleon lasted less than 16 years from the coup of 18 Brumaire in 1799. It goes without saying that Trump is no Putin, much less a Napoleon.At any rate, all this is to say that we live in dangerous times. A lot of history may well happen very quickly in the next few years. Patriotic Americans should work to the utmost to defend our democracy, but failing that, we should also be prepared for to rebuild it from the ground up.About every other country has suffered a constitutional collapse at some point; our number may well be up quite soon.More stories from theweek.com Elizabeth Warren's last chance How to watch the New Hampshire Democratic debate Alexander Vindman's twin brother wasn't an impeachment witness. He was still fired.
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| Tunisia fires UN envoy over draft response to US peace plan Posted: 07 Feb 2020 10:35 AM PST ![Tunisia fires UN envoy over draft response to US peace plan]( "Tunisia fires UN envoy over draft response to US peace plan") Tunisia's ambassador to the U.N. has been abruptly called home and fired for lack of consultation on a Security Council resolution he helped draft responding to the U.S. Middle East peace initiative, authorities said Friday. Moncef Baati was faulted for an "absence of coordination and consultation" with the foreign ministry and with representatives of Arab and Islamic countries at the United Nations, the official TAP news agency quoted the Tunisian president's office as saying.
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| It's 65 degrees in Antarctica today Posted: 07 Feb 2020 10:23 AM PST  You'd need more layers in Texas today than you would in Antarctica.On Friday, scientists saw a likely record-breaking 65 degrees Fahrenheit on Antarctica's northernmost tip. The measurement taken at Esperanza Base along Antarctica's Trinity Peninsula beats out a previous record of 63.5 degrees taken in 2015, and comes just days after the end of the warmest January in the world's recorded history, The Washington Post reports.The Argentinian base announced Antarctica's T-shirt weather on Friday, but the United Nations' World Meteorological Organization said it would have to confirm the reading before declaring a record. The wave of warm area seems to be tied to a "foehn," or a rush of air that comes down from a slope or mountain and compresses air to warm it, the WMO's climate extremes expert told The Associated Press.The Antarctic Peninsula has been recorded as one of the fastest-warming regions on Earth, according to the WMO. A huge majority — around 87 percent — of the peninsula's glaciers have continually retreated over the past 50 years, an obvious sign of ongoing global warming. And with no definitive action being taken toward curbing human-caused climate change, glaciologist Eric Steig told the Post we can expect to see these records broken again soon.More stories from theweek.com Elizabeth Warren's last chance American democracy is dying How to watch the New Hampshire Democratic debate
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| Top EU diplomat talks to US on Iran trip, Mideast plan Posted: 07 Feb 2020 10:22 AM PST  Top EU diplomat Josep Borrell on Friday briefed US leaders on a trip to Iran aimed at easing tensions and discussed a US Middle East plan that he has denounced. Borrell earlier in the week visited Tehran where he met President Hassan Rouhani and voiced hope for an easing of tensions and preservation of a 2015 accord that sharply curtailed Iran's nuclear program. Fears of all-out war soared last month when the United States killed Iran's most powerful general, Qassem Soleimani, in a drone strike in Iraq.
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| Tunisia fires envoy to UN, reportedly over Trump plan Posted: 07 Feb 2020 09:46 AM PST  Tunisia fired its ambassador to the UN on Friday accusing him of failing to consult the foreign ministry on key issues that diplomatic sources said included Washington's controversial Middle East peace plan. "Tunisia's ambassador to the United Nations has been dismissed for purely professional reasons concerning his weak performance and lack of coordination with the ministry on important matters under discussion at the UN," a foreign ministry statement said. Diplomatic sources said that ambassador Moncef Baati, who has occupied a seat at the UN Security Council since the start of the year, had gone further than President Kais Saied wanted in his criticism of US President Donald Trump's long-delayed peace plan.
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| Payback: Trump ousts officials who testified on impeachment Posted: 07 Feb 2020 09:37 AM PST  Exacting swift punishment against those who crossed him, an emboldened President Donald Trump on Friday ousted two government officials who had delivered damaging testimony against him during his impeachment hearings. The president took retribution just two days after his acquittal by the Senate. First came news that Trump had ousted Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the decorated soldier and national security aide who played a central role in the Democrats' impeachment case.
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| Merkel's party in turmoil after far-right vote debacle Posted: 07 Feb 2020 08:48 AM PST  German Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives are in crisis mode after regional MPs sided with the far right in a key vote, causing nationwide outrage and testing her leadership. Merkel condemned Wednesday's "unforgivable" vote in the small state of Thuringia, where her CDU party voted in the same camp as the anti-immigrant AfD to block the re-election of a leftist state premier. Thanks to the CDU and AfD, Thomas Kemmerich of the liberal Free Democrats, one of Germany's smaller parties, ousted incumbent premier Bodo Ramelow from the far-left Die Linke party by one vote.
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| EU goes into meeting frenzy ahead of February 20 summit on next seven-year budget Posted: 07 Feb 2020 08:31 AM PST  European Union leaders and institutions went into a frenzy of meetings this week to start the toughest job the bloc faces this year: agreeing on a seven-year budget that for many is the most tangible sign of what a united Europe will look like after Brexit.
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| EU goes into meeting frenzy ahead of Feb 20 summit on next 7-year budget Posted: 07 Feb 2020 08:28 AM PST ![EU goes into meeting frenzy ahead of Feb 20 summit on next 7-year budget]( "EU goes into meeting frenzy ahead of Feb 20 summit on next 7-year budget") European Union leaders and institutions went into a frenzy of meetings this week to start the toughest job the bloc faces this year: agreeing on a seven-year budget that for many is the most tangible sign of what a united Europe will look like after Brexit.
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| Russia says Israel nearly shot down passenger plane in Syria Posted: 07 Feb 2020 08:04 AM PST  Russia's Defense Ministry said Friday that Israeli air forces nearly shot down a passenger jetliner in Syria during a missile strike on the suburbs of Damascus a day earlier. The allegation comes as tensions run high in Syria, where fighting has escalated in the northern province of Idlib. Syrian government forces, backed by the Russian military, have clashed with Turkish troops that support the opposition there after failing to observe a cease-fire.
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| How Modi supporters are trying to cloak an anti-Muslim bill in American law Posted: 07 Feb 2020 07:32 AM PST  America's harsh anti-immigration policies under the Trump administration are hardly a good example for the rest of the world. But leave it to the supporters of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to distort a well-intentioned American law for nefarious ends. They have dusted off something called the Lautenberg Amendment, an obscure Cold War-era law, to justify Prime Minister Narendra Modi's anti-Muslim Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).Modi's law has sparked massive protests in India and condemnation around the world. But his supporters claim there is no functional difference between America's Lautenberg and India's CAA.A recent piece in News18, CNN's Indian news site, dismissed the West's reaction to the CAA as "ill informed" because it "ignored the similarities to the U.S.'s Lautenberg Amendment." Likewise, the HAF (the Hindu American Foundation), a U.S.-based outfit dedicated to fighting Hinduphobia, advises U.S. critics to read the Lautenberg Amendment before criticizing the CAA. Meanwhile, Modi supporters in the Indian-American community are petitioning the Seattle City Council to reject the "severely misguided, misinformed" anti-CAA resolution floated by one of its members because CAA is India's Lautenberg.But this is pure posturing meant to confuse the world.It is true that America passed Lautenberg, named after the Democratic Jewish senator from New Jersey who sponsored it, in 1990 to hand Jews and Christians in the Soviet Union and some Southeast Asian countries — Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos — an expedited pathway to gain refugee status in America. Typically, prospective refugees have to individually prove they are facing persecution to gain admission (and they have to flee to another country and apply through international organizations like the United Nations). But Lautenberg created a presumption of persecution for Jews and Christians because of concerns that the political turmoil generated by the collapse of the Soviet Union might make them even more vulnerable to persecution than usual. So they had to show merely a generalized — not individualized — fear to be considered for admission. (Also sometimes they could apply directly from their home countries without fleeing first.) When Lautenberg was passed, International Refugee Assistance Project's Betsy Fisher told The Week, it created additional pathways to expand America's relatively generous refugee program at the time (before the current administration gutted it).What does the CAA do?It fast-tracks citizenship for Hindus, Christians, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains, and Parsees from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh who arrived in India before December 2014 — but leaves out persecuted Muslims such as the Ahmaidyas from Pakistan or the Rohingya from Myanmar. In other words, it imposes a religious test for citizenship.CAA's supporters argue this is functionally similar to Lautenberg because just like Lautenberg, the CAA creates special channels for some groups without eliminating existing channels for any group. Muslims who are left out of the CAA can still access normal channels for admission, just like refugees not covered by Lautenberg can apply through usual channels.But this analysis strains the truth at every level.For starters, unlike the CAA, Lautenberg is a flexible, ongoing program, not a one-time deal. Its underlying purpose is to create a mechanism to rescue the most vulnerable religious groups in the world at any given time. Hence, the law has to be reauthorized every year at which point lawmakers have the option of revising the list of groups needing help. In 2004, Lautenberg was extended to Iran — and not just the Jews and Christians in the country but also the Baha'is, a religious sect that is considered heretical by Iran's mullahs.In other words, Lautenberg cuts against dominant prejudices while the CAA caters to them. Moreover, Lautenberg, laudably, aimed to admit more refugees into America, not create a discriminatory citizenship standard for those inside the country. When it comes to U.S. citizenship, one uniform standard applies to everyone regardless of race, caste, creed, religion, or nationality.But the biggest lie that CAA supporters tell is that refugees not fast-tracked by the law can still avail normal channels, just like Lautenberg.Lautenberg relaxed standards for some refugees to admit more in. The CAA admits not a single extra refugee. Furthermore, once admitted, refugees in America have a pretty straightforward path to citizenship. But India's existing refugee and citizenship channels are a sick joke.Unlike much of the world, India has studiously refused to sign the United Nations convention on refugees or other similar protocols. So it is under no obligation under international law to extend even minimal care or assistance to those fleeing to its shores. Moreover, notes Ipsita Chakravarty of Scroll.In, one of the few unafraid and honest publications left in India in the Modi era, India has no dedicated law that guarantees basic due process rights to refugees. It relies, instead, "on a thicket of other laws" and vague operating procedures to determine who has a "well-founded fear" of persecution.This basically leaves refugees to the tender mercies of bureaucrats. The upshot unsurprisingly is that those groups the CAA targets for favoritism already get better treatment than the others from the Indian system.Even before the CAA, notes Chakravarty, Hindus fleeing Pakistan and Bangladesh were able to obtain driving licenses, bank accounts, and PAN cards (the equivalent of Social Security cards). They even got access to education and health-care facilities and can buy "small dwelling units for self-occupation and self-employment." This is not a lot but it is a lot more than what the Rohingya or the Ahmadiyas get.These groups have been herded into filthy camps and can't even obtain SIM cards for cell phones. More shockingly, two years ago when tens of thousands of Rohingyas were desperately trying to escape Myanmar because of the unspeakable brutality of the security forces, Modi declared the Rohingya refugees in India a "terror threat" and wanted to deport them back to their country to be slaughtered. Indeed, thousands of Rohingyas live in just five Indian cities but only 500 have been granted long-term visas.In other words, referring these folks to "normal channels" means consigning them to either a sub-human existence in camps or certain death back home.But the biggest lie that CAA supporters peddle is that the law won't leave these groups any worse off. What the law's proponents conveniently don't acknowledge is that the CAA is only one arm of Modi's pincer to disenfranchise Muslims on India's soil. The other is the National Registry of Citizenship.This registry, which Modi's Muslim-baiting home minister has declared will be implemented nationwide by 2024, would require India's 1.3 billion individuals to prove to the government that they are citizens. Every man, woman, and child in India will have to arrange papers showing, for example, that they have ancestors going back to a specified cutoff date along with other requirements.This is a near-impossible task for India's poor and illiterate especially given the notoriously bad record keeping at the municipal level –— and the Modi government knows this. Indeed, if the pilot program in the province of Assam is any indication, the upshot of this exercise will be that hundreds of millions of Indians of all faiths will be unable to come up with the proper paperwork to make the cut.The whole point of the CAA is to hand Hindus and other select groups who don't make it on the NRC a way out while stripping citizenship rights from an untold number of India's 140 million Muslims, not just recent refugees but also those with ties going back generations. The Modi government is reportedly building detention camps all over the country for those excluded from the NRC.This is the opposite of Lautenberg — both in letter and spirit.To be sure, Lautenberg has never fully lived up to its promise. Like the rest of the refugee program, it's become hostage to competing special interests and the foreign policy whims of the sitting administration. And, shamefully, phony national security considerations have prevented the law from being extended to groups like the Iraqi Yazidis who were facing genocide by ISIS.India has invoked bad American immigration laws for its nativist ends in the past. For example, a 2005 Indian Supreme Court ruling actually quoted from the U.S. Supreme Court's notorious and largely discarded 1889 Chinese Exclusion decision to declare that "the highest duty of a nation" is to "give security against foreign aggression and encroachment" including from "vast hordes" of foreigners "crowding in upon us."But turning a well-intentioned American law on its head to justify the Modi government's sinister designs is obscene. The world should see this insidious comparison by Modi cheerleaders for the disinformation campaign that it is: A new low.Want more essential commentary and analysis like this delivered straight to your inbox? Sign up for The Week's "Today's best articles" newsletter here.More stories from theweek.com Elizabeth Warren's last chance American democracy is dying How to watch the New Hampshire Democratic debate
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| Mexico Removes the Actual Jet From Its Presidential Jet Raffle Posted: 07 Feb 2020 07:32 AM PST ![Mexico Removes the Actual Jet From Its Presidential Jet Raffle]( "Mexico Removes the Actual Jet From Its Presidential Jet Raffle") (Bloomberg) -- Mexico has taken the jet out of its Presidential Jet Raffle and will sell the aircraft in the normal way -- even as the game goes forward.The contest will continue, but the plane itself won't be a prize. There will, however, be a picture of the jet on the tickets, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador told reporters Friday.The government will sell 6 million tickets for 500 pesos ($27) each, with money earmarked for buying medical equipment and paying for maintenance on the presidential plane. The president universally known as AMLO has eschewed the aircraft, which has been depreciating in a California hangar over the past year as the country tried to find a buyer.AMLO put the Boeing Dreamliner up for sale after his inauguration in December 2018. The president flies on commercial airlines, to symbolize a frugal style of government.Lopez Obrador repeatedly criticized the purchase of the plane as too lavish for a country in which millions live in poverty. Mexico bought the plane in 2012 for more than $200 million. It is now worth about $130 million, according to a U.N. valuation.In the new jetless Presidential Jet Raffle, as many as 100 people may win a 20 million peso ($1 million) cash prize, Lopez Obrador said. A used 1957 Piper Cub was available on eBay for $150,000 on Friday, so winners still stand a chance of going aloft.To contact the reporters on this story: Lorena Rios in Mexico City at lriost@bloomberg.net;Cyntia Barrera Diaz in Mexico City at cbarrerad@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Matthew Bristow at mbristow5@bloomberg.net, Stephen MerelmanFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Containment is the Correct Strategy for the Bipolar Middle East Posted: 07 Feb 2020 07:08 AM PST  Trump has shown great restraint in the Middle East. He did not fire back after the September attacks on Saudi oil facilities. He has given measured, proportional responses, similar to Reagan's restraint when Iran took out an American warship in 1988. And despite a publicly confrontational posture, he has minimized the risk of escalation.
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| Merkel Party Chief Faces Deepening Divide Over Far Right Episode Posted: 07 Feb 2020 07:04 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- The leader of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats is struggling with a deepening divide in her party over how to deal with regional lawmakers' rogue alignment with the far-right.CDU Chairwoman Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer failed in an effort to convince legislators in the eastern state of Thuringia to support growing calls for a new election. Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Social Democrats and others had demanded a fresh vote as the best way to clean the slate after the Thuringian CDU aligned with the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany, or AfD, earlier this week to elect a new state premier, triggering a political firestorm.But Kramp-Karrenbauer faced a room of angry lawmakers from her party in a five-hour meeting that ended early on Friday in the state capital Erfurt, ending in a standoff as they refused to back a new election. Their leader said she had caused "irritation" among the group.The tumultuous political events triggered by the CDU's flirtation with the far right has laid bare rogue elements in the party and the eroding ability of Kramp-Karrenbauer to assert authority. The CDU leader and Merkel will hold talks on Saturday with their Social Democratic coalition partner, which has derided the party's maneuver in the shock vote on Wednesday.Following consultations with the CDU leadership back in Berlin, Kramp-Karrenbaur said that "a whole series of mistakes" were made in the Thuringia affair, but put most of the blame on local lawmakers who acted "against the clear recommendation of the national party."Read More:Merkel's Awkward Heir May Never Live Down Brush With ExtremistsMeet Chancellor Angela Merkel's Potential SuccessorsWhy the Far-Right AfD Creates Shock Waves in Germany: QuickTakeMainstream parties in the current legislature now needed to find common ground to choose a new premier without the help of the far right, she added."There can be no cooperation with the AfD, directly or indirectly," Kramp-Karrenbauer told reporters in Berlin on Friday. She expected the Greens and the Social Democrats to "present a candidate that doesn't split but unite the country."AKK, as she is widely known, said the ball was now in the court of the Social Democrats.While she said her stance got unanimous support from the top leadership body, rivals in her ranks have also been quick to point out her flaws."It's clear that nothing worked," CDU Deputy Chairman Armin Laschet said in an interview on ARD television. The leadership "should have known what would happen there," he said in reference to the party headquarters.The head of the CDU youth organization, Tilman Kuban, also weighed in, telling ARD that the party "needs a leadership that is clear, that has a clear stance, a clear message, and is able to exert pressure."The risks for the CDU were clear in a Forsa poll that showed Merkel's party in Thuringia falling almost 10 percentage points to 12% since the October election. The AfD was little changed at 24%.The fallout reverberated across the political spectrum. Christian Lindner, the chairman of the Free Democrats, whose candidate in Thuringia was elected with the help of the CDU and AfD, was forced to call a confidence vote in his party. While he got the backing from most of the members of the central committee, Lindner continued to field questions over his leadership and acknowledged that he had underestimated the AfD.(Updates with result of FDP confidence vote in last paragraph)To contact the reporters on this story: Arne Delfs in Berlin at adelfs@bloomberg.net;Patrick Donahue in Berlin at pdonahue1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Ben Sills at bsills@bloomberg.net, Raymond Colitt, Andrew BlackmanFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Mexico won't really raffle off huge presidential jet Posted: 07 Feb 2020 06:36 AM PST  Mexicans will no longer have to worry about where to park a Boeing Dreamliner when the government raffles off the luxurious presidential jet: the air force will keep it. In fact, nobody will win the actual $130 million Boeing 787 plane in the lottery-style raffle to be held in coming months. Among the many desperate attempts to get rid of the expensive plane, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador had toyed with the idea of actually awarding the plane to the winner, along with a year's paid maintenance and parking.
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| Golden Irish boy abroad, unloved at home, Leo Varadkar braces for electoral defeat Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:57 AM PST  Ireland's prime minister wanted to play the Brexit card. Voters have other concerns.
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| The Philippines has rated 'Golden Rice' safe, but farmers might not plant it Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:50 AM PST  "Golden Rice" is probably the world's most hotly debated genetically modified organism (GMO). It was intended to be a beta carotene-enriched crop to reduce Vitamin A deficiency, a health problem in very poor areas. But it has never been offered to farmers for planting.Why not? Because Golden Rice has an activist problem, according to its proponents. They insist that the rice would have prevented millions of child deaths by now had it not been blocked by anti-science activists. In particular, they single out Greenpeace, which has campaigned against approval of Golden Rice as part of its broader opposition to GMOs. Greenpeace responds that its actions are not what has kept Golden Rice from reaching the market.We study developing-world agriculture, including use of genetically modified crops, and are conducting ongoing research on Golden Rice, originally funded by the Templeton Foundation. We advocate keeping an open mind about Golden Rice, which may eventually have some nutritional potential in limited cases. But our view, based on numerous scientific studies, is that the rice is still beset by problems that have little to do with activists. Filling a nutritional gap?Vitamin A is one of many nutrients lacking in the diets of the world's poorest children. Vitamin A deficiency, or VAD, can cause blindness and even premature death. The vitamin comes directly from animal products and indirectly from beta carotene in plants, which the human body can convert to Vitamin A. Plant scientist Ingo Potrykus, who co-developed Golden Rice, has claimed that "VAD often occurs where rice is the major staple food." White rice grains contain no beta carotene. But it's not rice's job to provide vitamins. Most diets across Asia and Africa consist of a carbohydrate core such as rice or maize, which provides calories and bulk, and a sauce, stew or soup for flavor and nutrients. Since rice is a poor source of vitamins and minerals, any child eating a rice-only diet will be sick. Genetically modifying rice to contain beta carotene is at best a band-aid for extreme cases of VAD, not a corrective for a widespread problem. Decades of developmentPotrykus and colleagues devised a strategy for producing Golden Rice in 1992, and announced in 2000 that they had developed an experimental prototype. Potrykus appeared on the cover of Time magazine with his rice, which the cover proclaimed "could save a million kids a year."The biologists were on to something, but the prototype was nowhere near ready for farmers or consumers. The beta carotene concentration was far too low, and researchers did not know if the plants would grow well. The prototype was also a rice variety that farmers in VAD areas would not grow. In 2002 Golden Rice research moved to the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippines to be developed for Filipino farmers. Meanwhile scientists at the global agricultural company Syngenta, which had acquired commercial rights to the rice, began to develop a new package of genes to improve the beta carotene levels. By 2005 they unveiled Golden Rice 2, which accomplished this.Next, researchers inserted these GR2 genes into multiple plants, with the goal of introducing them without disrupting other genes. Each insertion is called an "event." IRRI breeders took the most promising event and began breeding the trait into two trusty lowland rice varieties.But there was a problem. Field trials showed that the introduced genes had indeed disrupted other genes and lowered the rice's productivity, so breeders turned to a different event. By 2017 field trials showed that this rice grew adequately. The rice was submitted to the Philippine Bureau of Plant Industry, which designated it as safe in December 2019.However, Golden Rice still has to be approved for commercial sale and still needs a company to grow marketable quantities of seed. Proponents' claim that the rice would be given free to farmers is false: No one has offered to produce and distribute the rice seed for nothing. And even if someone were to grow marketable quantities of seed for sale, two crucial problems remain. Unanswered questionsFirst, the claim that Golden Rice will remedy Vitamin A deficiency remains unproven. As IRRI scientists themselves stressed in 2013, "It has not yet been determined whether daily consumption of Golden Rice does improve the vitamin A status of people who are vitamin A deficient."Vitamin A is fat-soluble, and children with VAD rarely have fats in their diet. Moreover, they usually suffer from gut parasites and infections that make it harder to convert beta carotene to vitamin A. A 2012 study, which has been cited over 70 times – despite being retracted in 2015 for breaching research ethics – seemed to show that Golden Rice would raise children's vitamin A levels. But children in the study were fed balanced meals that included fats, thus demonstrating only that Golden Rice worked in children who did not need it. Even the latest analysis of Golden Rice's safety points out that research has yet to show that it will mitigate VAD. And by the time Golden Rice gets to undernourished children, its beta carotene level may be very low, since the compound deteriorates fairly quickly.Second, there is no clear way for the rice to get to the children who need it. Projections of the benefits of Golden Rice assume that farmers will immediately grow it, but families poor enough to be affected by VAD often lack land to grow rice for themselves. VAD in the Philippines has been highest in Mountain Province, where farmers are unlikely to plant lowland rice varieties, and in part of metro Manila where no rice farming occurs.To reach undernourished kids in areas like these, Golden Rice would have to be grown by commercial farmers and sold in markets. We examined whether farmers would plant Golden Rice in a new study of seed selection practices in a "rice bowl" area of the Philippines.Farmers choose from a large and rapidly changing array of rice seeds, based on agronomic performance, market demands and local trends. Their choices show that varieties containing the "Golden" trait are out of fashion, overtaken by newer and better performing varieties.Some might adopt Golden Rice if it could fetch a premium in the market, but extremely poor customers are unlikely to pay it. Farmers may need subsidies to plant Golden Rice, but it is unclear who would pay them to plant it. An oversold solutionThe old claim, repeated again in a recent book, that Golden Rice was "basically ready for use in 2002" is silly. As recently as 2017, IRRI made it clear that Golden Rice still had to be "successfully developed into rice varieties suitable for Asia, approved by national regulators, and shown to improve vitamin A status in community conditions."The Philippines has managed to cut its childhood VAD rate in half with conventional nutrition programs. If Golden Rice appears on the market in the Philippines by 2022, it will have taken over 30 years of development to create a product that may not affect vitamin levels in its target population, and that farmers may need to be paid to plant. [ You're smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversation's authors and editors. You can get our highlights each weekend. ]This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * Can gene editing provide a solution to global hunger? * Climate change will make rice less nutritious, putting millions of the world's poor at riskGlenn Davis Stone has received funding from the National Science Foundation, the Wenner-Gren Foundatioin for Anthropological Research, the John Templeton Foundation, and the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation.Dominic Glover has received funding from various sources to support different pieces of work on the spread and impacts of transgenic crop technologies in the global South, including the John Templeton Foundation, the UK's Economic and Social Research Council and the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights (UNHCHR, on behalf of the UN's Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food).
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| As China suffers from coronavirus, some wonder: Is it really that serious? 3 questions answered Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:50 AM PST  Editor's Note: The coronavirus outbreak continues to worsen in China, with 28,200 confirmed cases as of Feb. 6, 2020. The Chinese government has announced even stricter measures to stop the spread of the disease, including the rounding up of people in Wuhan, the city where the outbreak began, for mass quarantine. And the doctor who warned authorities about the disease has died. Just how bad might this outbreak become? Virologist and public health expert John A. Lednicky explains. 1\. Is this outbreak really that serious?Epidemics are spreading more quickly and farther in the 21st century than in previous centuries due to globalization and air travel. When outbreaks occur, there is a predictable pattern that can be summarized as: (a) There is a delay in recognizing that an outbreak is occurring; (b) a significant impact on trade and travel typically occurs due to quarantine measures; (c) the public panics due to misinformation and fear of the unknown, and this can be exacerbated by media coverage. This outbreak is serious to China, to millions of people there, to its economy and potentially to the world's economy. China's main concern is for its own citizens. It has experience controlling outbreaks of different types of influenza viruses, SARS coronavirus, and so on, and the resources to effectively deal with large outbreaks.China's government can exert stringent outbreak control measures, such as shutting down public transportation, and take unprecedented moves, such as imposing a citywide quarantine, which would not be easy to do in other countries. Because it is a wealthy country, China is also able to respond to large areas affected by an outbreak, whereas many countries would not be able to afford to do this.Unlike country-specific responses to outbreaks, the World Health Organization provides guidance on how to control outbreaks worldwide. Its stated primary purpose is to direct international health within the United Nations' system and to lead partners in global health responses. The WHO does not have the financial resources to cover all the expenses of a public health response to an epidemic or pandemic. It does provide a limited supply of materials needed for the performance of diagnostic tests to qualified laboratories. The major benefit to the world community is that the WHO releases information regarding the status and severity of an outbreak, and guidance on how to control the outbreak. The manner in which individual countries respond to outbreaks, whether epidemic or pandemic, is less predictable, especially for those that lack the resources, infrastructure and trained personnel needed for an adequate response.If the outbreaks are effectively controlled and people remain quarantined for the near-term, the major impacts to the people of China will revolve around issues related to loss of wages, and quality of life issues, such as obtaining sufficient food. If the outbreaks are not controlled, the consequences will be severe. Businesses and school systems will be adversely impacted, and public attitudes toward the government could lead to general discontent and civil disorder. 2\. Have there been previous quarantines on this scale?Small-scale quarantine has been practiced since ancient times, exemplified by the Israelites' confinement of lepers to specific living areas, onto the present, such as some of the quarantine measures undertaken to control Ebola outbreaks. The quarantine procedures being imposed in China in response to the new coronavirus are unprecedented in scale and complexity. They will be intensively analyzed by scientists and epidemiologists, and will inform the next generation of infection control practitioners. 3\. Is there an end in sight?It is too early to predict an end in sight. Many public health specialists are optimistic that the outbreak will burn out as a consequence of stringent infection control and quarantine practices. And as that happens, the hope is that the virus will be eradicated, as was the case for SARS coronavirus. We also hope that the virus does not mutate to a form that is well-adapted to complete its life cycle in humans; that is, that it does not become a common human respiratory virus such as what is thought to have occurred with human coronavirus NL63, a virus that appears to have jumped species from bats to humans. [ Expertise in your inbox. Sign up for The Conversation's newsletter and get a digest of academic takes on today's news, every day. ]This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * A clue to stopping coronavirus: Knowing how viruses adapt from animals to humans * R0: How scientists quantify the intensity of an outbreak like coronavirus and its pandemic potentialJohn A. Lednicky does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
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| Research in China is complicated by the Communist Party's influence, says researcher who worked there Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:50 AM PST  What is the coronavirus? How does it spread? Should I be worried? When a new virus surfaces, the unknowns loom big. When a new virus comes out of China, potentially clarifying information needs to be weighed and considered alongside the realities of practicing science and research there. I am a social scientist, specializing in psychological anthropology and mental health in China. I was born in China and immigrated to the U.S. as a child with my parents, who came for graduate school. I've been working with psychologists, therapists, psychiatrists and other medical professionals in China since 2011. I've worked on research projects that were commissioned by Chinese Communist Party departments, as well as more personal projects driven by a researcher's passion for improving the life and health of an underserved community. Although I've not worked on research projects concerning the coronavirus, I've experienced and observed firsthand the challenges a research scientist faces in China across a variety of health-related projects. Research life on a Chinese university campusSince I began fieldwork pre-2013, also known as pre-Xi Jinping, there's been a noticeable progression in how both I and Chinese researchers approach projects. In addition to fulfilling the requirements for a research visa, it is normal practice for researchers anywhere to depend on collaboration with local universities for access to data, interviewees and sites. As China's fast-growing higher education system is mostly state-owned, politics has always influenced Chinese academics. Not all university researchers are members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), but I have found every department typically has at least one if not more among both faculty and students. During fieldwork, I would attend department meetings, talks and classes that some students and faculty would routinely miss due to mandatory attendance at Party meetings and classes held on campus. Party ideology classes on Marxism, Mao Zedong thought, etc. are mandatory courses for undergrad and graduate students, though to be fair, I should note that many students skip or take naps during these large lecture classes. The taboo 'T's'It has never been advisable or especially feasible for foreign scientists looking to conduct research on certain sensitive topics, such as the famous Three T's – Tiananmen, Tibet and Taiwan. Potential local research collaborators must make their careers within institutions embedded with CCP members and party ideology. Concern about how research may reflect on the CCP stands even for research not on the Three T's, though. Research funding still comes from the government, and academic careers in China rely almost exclusively on researchers' ability to do and publish research. Professors get paid for each paper they publish. The amount varies depending on the rank or impact factor of the publication. It is interesting to note that, because international journals and publishers are generally ranked much higher than Chinese publications, Chinese researchers often end up publishing research on problems in China for the eyes of outsiders. I've helped edit articles about grief processing in Chinese children orphaned by the HIV/AIDs blood donation scandal, internet gaming addiction in youth and PTSD screening in rural Chinese children. Any of these articles could be potential jumping-off points for serious criticism of the corruption, inefficiency and negligence of the CCP system. But those connections to the system are not made publicly explicit, at least to my knowledge. Research gets separated from the social and political context, localized and individualized. The grief-processing and PTSD articles that I helped edit, for example, focus on testing and developing diagnostic models and interventions. The emphasis is on what can and should be done now, which in and of itself is an important research project. By providing minimal insight into what led to the situation in the first place, however, a reader unfamiliar with the greater Chinese context misses out on unequal and powerful structural forces created and enforced by the CCP-led system. Instead, researchers and officials alike often invoke "traditional Chinese culture" and place responsibility on the immediate individuals involved. Or, they claim that local politics are holding up the central government's directives somehow. Research as riskOn a research trip to rural Hunan province concerning the lack of effective primary medical care, I saw local party members try to deflect blame not by criticizing the CCP per se but by blaming lack of resources and asking us, the foreign researchers, for funding. Even at the local level a researcher has to be careful, as access to rural communities can be ruled tightly by local officials who are somewhat outside the reach of the central CCP in Beijing.In my experience, the move toward decontextualizing research from larger social and political structures has gotten more absolute over time. Now it can be risky to write at all about any potentially unflattering social reality, especially when it comes to health. Buzzfeed News recently reported on arrests for "spreading rumors" about the coronavirus, including the detention of the initial eight in Wuhan who raised the alarm. It's no longer just the Three T's that are off-limits; the boundaries have become opaque. The opaqueness of CCP actions is only matched by their real impact in people's everyday lives. I saw this firsthand during the passage of the mental health law in 2013, which among many things, eliminated a counseling licensing system overseen by the Ministry of Labor and created an unclear, undefined distinction between psychological counseling (咨询) and psychotherapy (治疗) that is more medicalized and favors hospital care.Even though a few of the most senior professors in the psychology department I was affiliated with were supposedly consulted and invited to meetings during the writing of the law, there were multiple department meetings where psychology and counseling students and faculty alike struggled to understand the vague rules and purpose of the law. A popular theory was that the law was the result of an internal struggle between the Ministry of Health and Ministry of Labor, with the Ministry of Health gaining the upper hand this time.Another consequence of the opaqueness of the CCP is the "businessfication" of higher education. For example, the psychology department I affiliated with has spun off a business development group. Some professors and their graduate students are working on developing books and courses they can sell to the general public. As a viable career in truthful and rigorous research becomes more and more limited, I see Chinese academics redirecting their energy towards packaging their existing knowledge to sell to consumers as a long-term business outside the university.In a system where conducting research can be at great professional and personal risk to a scientist, it is not hard to imagine the challenges involved in current scientific work on the coronavirus in China. [ You're smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversation's authors and editors. You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter. ]This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * A clue to stopping coronavirus: Knowing how viruses adapt from animals to humans * R0: How scientists quantify the intensity of an outbreak like coronavirus and its pandemic potentialWenrui Chen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
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| Fighters step up attacks in Mozambique gas region, beheadings reported - U.N. Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:47 AM PST ![Fighters step up attacks in Mozambique gas region, beheadings reported - U.N.]( "Fighters step up attacks in Mozambique gas region, beheadings reported - U.N.") People are fleeing a surge of attacks in northern Mozambique where witnesses have described beheadings, mass kidnappings and villages burned to the ground, the United Nations said on Friday. Officials said armed groups had stepped up assaults in Cabo Delgado province, the centre of an Islamist insurgency that has killed hundreds since it started in 2017. The northern region is also home to one of the world's biggest recent gas finds, where Exxon Mobil Corp, Total and others are working.
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| Iraq's top cleric calls for state to protect protests Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:09 AM PST  Iraq's most powerful Shiite cleric called for security forces to protect anti-government protesters in a Friday sermon, after weeks of violence in Baghdad and southern Iraq, and amid seething tensions between demonstrators and followers of a radical preacher. Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani's words came two days after at least eight protesters were killed in the holy southern city of Najaf.
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| UK appoints new US diplomat before big year for trade talks Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:09 AM PST ![UK appoints new US diplomat before big year for trade talks]( "UK appoints new US diplomat before big year for trade talks") Britain has appointed Karen Pierce as the country's new ambassador to the United States , replacing a veteran diplomat whose unvarnished portrayal of the Trump administration led to an embarrassing trans-Atlantic spat. The appointment of Pierce, who is currently ambassador to the United Nations, comes as Britain embarks on critical efforts to strike a trade deal with the United States following its departure from the European Union. "It is a time of huge opportunity for the friendship between the U.K. and U.S. and I am delighted that Karen Pierce will take forward this exciting new chapter in our relationship," Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said Friday.
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| U.K. Names Pierce Envoy to U.S. at Critical Time for Allies Posted: 07 Feb 2020 04:58 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Prime Minister Boris Johnson's government named Karen Pierce as the U.K.'s new ambassador to the U.S., filling a crucial post as it seeks to burnish post-Brexit ties with its closest ally.Pierce, 60, will be the U.K.'s first female ambassador to Washington, and will start her new role as soon as the U.S. government approves her appointment, Johnson's spokesman, Jamie Davies, told reporters on Friday. Pierce will move to Washington from New York, where she's been the envoy to the United Nations for the past two years."It is a time of huge opportunity for the friendship between the U.K. and U.S. and I am delighted that Karen Pierce will take forward this exciting new chapter in our relationship," Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said in an emailed statement. "We're proud to be sending to Washington such an outstanding diplomat, and I warmly congratulate her on her appointment."The U.K.'s previous ambassador, Kim Darroch, quit in July after falling out with President Donald Trump, just one of a series of recent flash-points between the two sides that have come at a pivotal moment. Having left the European Union last month, Britain is trying to strengthen links with the world's biggest economy by striking a trade deal this year.Angry CallTrump berated Johnson during a heated phone call after the prime minister rejected Washington's request to ban Huawei from the U.K.'s 5G networks, according to a person familiar with the matter. The U.S. president had spent months trying to persuade the British government block the Chinese company on security grounds.Trump Attacked U.K.'s Johnson Over Huawei in Heated Phone CallThe two governments have clashed in recent weeks on issues including Iran, U.K. plans to tax American technology companies, the involvement of a U.S. diplomat's wife in a fatal car accident in England and the role of Huawei Technologies Co. in the U.K.'s next-generation broadband networks."The U.K. has an excellent relationship with the United States and Dame Karen's ability as a diplomat is proven by her career," Davies said when asked if Pierce's first task would be to heal the rift between the two countries.'Uniquely Dysfunctional'Pierce must tread carefully while still fighting the U.K.'s corner. Her predecessor resigned after cables in which he called the Trump administration "inept" and "uniquely dysfunctional" were leaked, sparking a major diplomatic row. Trump froze out the envoy, saying he'd no longer deal with him.Johnson -- then the front-runner in the race to succeed Theresa May as prime minister -- notably failed to back Darroch, feeding into the envoy's decision to resign. In a televised debate, Johnson would not commit to keeping Darroch in his job, in sharp contrast to the endorsements and support the ambassador received from May and other senior politicians.Pierce joined the Foreign Office in 1981 and has previously served as ambassador to Afghanistan. She also appears to have made a good impression on Trump during her role as UN ambassador. She attended a dinner with the president in early December, and the Mail on Sunday reported later that month he described her as "fab."(Updates with U.K. spokesman's comment in seventh paragraph)\--With assistance from Jessica Shankleman.To contact the reporters on this story: Alex Morales in London at amorales2@bloomberg.net;Thomas Penny in London at tpenny@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Stuart Biggs, Thomas PennyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Ireland’s two-party system shaken by Sinn Fein surge Posted: 07 Feb 2020 04:43 AM PST  Ireland's elections are usually two-horse races. As Irish voters prepare to choose a new parliament on Saturday, a restive electorate is rattling the two parties that have dominated the country's politics since it won independence from Britain a century ago, Fianna Fail and Fine Gael. Polls show a surprise surge — maybe even a lead — for Sinn Fein, the party historically linked to the IRA and its violent struggle for a united Ireland.
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| Syrian advance sends hundreds of thousands fleeing in Idlib Posted: 07 Feb 2020 04:36 AM PST  Turkey on Friday sent more troops and tanks to bolster its military presence in northwestern Syria, where President Bashar Assad's forces have been advancing in a devastating, Russian-backed offensive that has sparked a massive wave of people fleeing in wet and blustery winter weather. Syria's Idlib region near the border with Turkey is the last rebel-held bastion in the war-ravaged country. The push by Assad's forces into towns and villages in the province over the past months has uprooted more than a half-million people who fled the advancing troops.
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| Merkel Party Leader Gets Unanimous Backing for Thuringia Plan Posted: 07 Feb 2020 04:21 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- The leader of Chancellor Angela Merkel's party backed off her call for an immediate new election in the eastern state of Thuringia after running into resistance from regional lawmakers.Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, the chairwoman of the Christian Democratic Union, said she had unanimous support from the party's top leadership to call for a new parliamentary majority in Thuringia with the help from the SPD and Greens -- and to turn to a new election if those efforts fail."The focus now will be on establishing clear and stable conditions" in Thuringia, Kramp-Karrenbauer told reporters on Friday in Berlin. To contact the reporters on this story: Patrick Donahue in Berlin at pdonahue1@bloomberg.net;Arne Delfs in Berlin at adelfs@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Ben Sills at bsills@bloomberg.net, Raymond ColittFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| UK woman loses challenge aimed at restoring her citizenship Posted: 07 Feb 2020 03:53 AM PST ![UK woman loses challenge aimed at restoring her citizenship]( "UK woman loses challenge aimed at restoring her citizenship") A U.K. woman who as a teenager ran away to join the Islamic State group lost a legal challenge Friday aimed at restoring her citizenship, which was revoked on national security grounds. Shamima Begum, one of three east London schoolgirls who traveled to Syria in 2015, resurfaced at a refugee camp in Syria last year and told reporters she wanted to come home. Former Home Secretary Sajid Javid revoked her citizenship, but she challenged the decision before the Special Immigration Appeals Commission.
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| In war-torn Yemen, zoo animals face daily struggle Posted: 07 Feb 2020 03:51 AM PST  Yemen's war makes life a daily struggle for millions of civilians, but creatures in the country's neglected zoos, including lions, leopards and baboons also face an uncertain future. At the country's main zoo in Sanaa, the capital seized in 2014 by the Iran-backed Huthi militias who control much of the north, a man unloaded one of a dozen dead donkeys trucked in each day to feed 31 resident lions. Like the rest of the country, where millions have been driven to the brink of famine after five years of conflict, the zoo's 1,159 animals, which include two critically endangered Arabian leopards, are at risk.
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| Macron says 'Europeans cannot remain spectators' in new arms race Posted: 07 Feb 2020 03:40 AM PST "Europeans must realise collectively that in the absence of a legal framework, they could rapidly face a new race for conventional weapons, even nuclear weapons, on their own soil," Macron told military officers in a speech laying out France's post-Brexit nuclear strategy. France is now the only nuclear-armed power in the EU borders at a time when long-standing accords on limiting the growth of nuclear arsenals appear increasingly at risk. "The vital interests of France now have a European dimension," Macron said.
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| France seeks lead post-Brexit role in EU nuclear strategy Posted: 07 Feb 2020 03:34 AM PST  French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday advocated a more coordinated European Union defense strategy in which France, the bloc's only post-Brexit nuclear power, and its arsenal would occupy a central role. Macron outlined France's nuclear strategy during a speech to graduating military officers one week after Britain, Europe's only other nuclear-armed state, officially exited the EU. The French leader said his country sees its nuclear weapons as a deterrent against attacks from belligerent foes, though acknowledged that France's nuclear might is diminished after its military scaled down its arsenal to under 300 nuclear weapons.
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| Theater group "Girl Be Heard" aims to empower young women Posted: 07 Feb 2020 03:33 AM PST  The program has already reached audiences from the White House to the United Nations, and aims to reach girls "from all walks of life," according to its artistic director.
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| Egypt frees pro-democracy activist imprisoned for 4 years Posted: 07 Feb 2020 03:05 AM PST  Egypt on Friday freed a pro-democracy activist who spent over four years in prison and rose to local prominence as one of the faces of the country's 2011 uprising, his lawyer said. Ramy Sayed, 31, had coordinated protests for the April 6 youth movement, a group that helped catalyze the Arab Spring uprising in Egypt that toppled autocratic President Hosni Mubarak. In October 2015, Sayed was convicted of taking part in an unauthorized demonstration, as well as related charges such as rioting and disturbing the peace.
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| Doctor's death unleashes mourning, fury at Chinese officials Posted: 07 Feb 2020 03:05 AM PST  The death of a young doctor who was reprimanded for warning about China's new virus triggered an outpouring Friday of praise for him and fury that communist authorities put politics above public safety. In death, Dr. Li Wenliang became the face of simmering anger at the ruling Communist Party's controls over information and complaints that officials lie about or hide disease outbreaks, chemical spills, dangerous consumer products or financial frauds. The 34-year-old ophthalmologist died overnight at Wuhan Central Hospital, where he worked and likely contracted the virus while treating patients in the early days of the outbreak.
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| Trump says "great discipline" in China to tackle coronavirus outbreak Posted: 07 Feb 2020 02:50 AM PST ![Trump says "great discipline" in China to tackle coronavirus outbreak]( "Trump says \"great discipline\" in China to tackle coronavirus outbreak") U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday after a phone conversation with Chinese President Xi Jinping that Beijing is showing "great discipline" in tackling the coronavirus outbreak that has killed more than 600 people in China. "Nothing is easy, but he will be successful, especially as the weather starts to warm & the virus hopefully becomes weaker, and then gone," Trump said on Twitter https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1225728756456808448.
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| Germany Shaken by an Extremist Surprise Posted: 07 Feb 2020 02:45 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Want to receive this post in your inbox every day? Sign up for the Balance of Power newsletter, and follow Bloomberg Politics on Twitter and Facebook for more.The German establishment's playbook for dealing with populism is simple: you ignore the problem and hope it goes away.So when a state leader from Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats threw in his lot with the far right this week, he met with opprobrium across the mainstream. Merkel called it "unforgivable." Her coalition partner said a "taboo" had been broken.That much is clear.But Mike Mohring, the CDU chief in Thuringia, might legitimately ask what else he was supposed to do. He's been fighting to keep the party relevant in the poorer east where many voters feel its center-right policies have failed them and resent the support Merkel has offered to a wave of refugees.And he knows that the fundamental challenge isn't the nationalist Alternative for Germany, or AfD's local leader — a bona fide fascist according to a German court ruling — but that 260,000 voters decided to back him.National party leader and Merkel heir Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer may never recover from the humiliation, and it may well push more angry easterners into the arms of the anti-immigrant AfD.That would leave the CDU no closer to tackling the real issue — the shadow of fascism in Germany.Global HeadlinesGrowing discontent | President Xi Jinping's government has worked hard to channel anxiety over the coronavirus into patriotic fervor. But the death of a 34-year-old doctor today has unleashed a wave of fury that's sparking a rare crisis of confidence in China's Communist Party. The death of Li Wenliang, who was sanctioned by authorities after blowing the whistle on the disease last month, was met with an outpouring of grief and outrage by hundreds of millions of social media users.Post-Iowa showdown | Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders will meet face-to-face on the debate stage tonight in New Hampshire, amid a bitter and unanswered dispute over which one of them will come out victorious from the Iowa caucuses. Their tie sets them up as the co-front-runners in the all-important delegate race and — for now — the standard-bearers of two distinct wings of the Democratic party.Click here for more on Sanders's efforts to win in delegate-rich California.Fearing reprisal | Now that President Donald Trump has been acquitted of two impeachment charges, many career national security officials fear that he could unleash on the foreign policy establishment he's long equated with what some of his advisers and supporters call the "Deep State."Jennifer Jacobs and Nick Wadhams exclusively report that the White House is weighing a plan to dismiss Alexander Vindman from the National Security Council after he testified in Trump's impeachment inquiry.Syria's defiance | A day after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan demanded that Syria end its siege of two Turkish military outposts in northwestern Idlib province, the Russian-backed forces loyal to Damascus captured a strategic town, besieging a third Turkish military outpost. The assault heightened tensions between Ankara and Moscow following an attack on Monday by Syrian troops that killed seven Turkish soldiers and a civilian.Falling behind | Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar looks set to lose power in tomorrow's election. He may have scored successes in Brexit negotiations, but as Dara Doyle reports, voters don't seem to care much — they're focused on the nation's ailing health service, a housing shortage and Varadkar's "posh boy" persona. Polls indicate the Fianna Fail party, which oversaw Ireland's economic collapse and the 2010 bailout, will emerge as the winner.What to WatchRussian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov visits Venezuela for talks with President Nicolas Maduro. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party is set for a tough fight in the Delhi state election tomorrow, in the first major test at the polls of his religion-based citizenship law that's spurred nationwide protests. The U.S. announced yesterday plans to start trade negotiations with Kenya in what could be the first such agreement with a sub-Saharan African nation.Pop quiz, readers (no cheating!). What African country's Constitutional Court ordered fresh elections within five months after annulling the results of a presidential vote last year that the opposition said was rigged? Send us your answers and tell us how we're doing or what we're missing at balancepower@bloomberg.net.And finally ... Months of protests in Hong Kong have brought a large number of women to the front lines, upending gender roles that saw them act more as cheerleaders during a previous pro-democracy movement in the financial hub. They're not the only ones, as Shelly Banjo and Josie Wong found. Women — from Sudan to India — are bucking tradition and putting themselves at the forefront of a global wave of protests. \--With assistance from Karen Leigh, Kathleen Hunter, Dara Doyle and Selcan Hacaoglu.To contact the author of this story: Ben Sills in Madrid at bsills@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Ruth Pollard at rpollard2@bloomberg.net, Karl MaierFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Danish Transport Giant Girds for ‘Chaotic’ U.K.-EU Negotiations Posted: 07 Feb 2020 02:16 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- DSV Panalpina A/S, the world's fourth-largest freight forwarder, is bracing itself for a turbulent year of negotiations between the U.K. and the European Union after Brexit."I don't think the negotiations over the exit deal will become anything else than chaotic," Chief Financial Officer Jens Lund said in a telephone interview in Copenhagen."Many companies need to adjust to the changes that are coming, and then we need to react to make sure the goods can keep flowing," he said. "The changes obviously hinge on how the EU negotiations pan out, but based on what we have seen so far, we expect them to be chaotic."The company, which operates in more than 80 countries, including the U.K., on Friday reported fourth-quarter results that largely met analyst estimates. It listed Brexit and the coronavirus as posing potential headwinds to its 2020 outlook.To contact the reporter on this story: Christian Wienberg in Copenhagen at cwienberg@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Christian Wienberg at cwienberg@bloomberg.net, Nick RigilloFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| NSC Russia Director Was Under Suspicion Before He Got the White House Job Posted: 07 Feb 2020 02:03 AM PST  Multiple officials in the State Department and the White House are cooperating in a security-related investigation into Andrew Peek, the former senior director for Russia and Europe at the National Security Council, The Daily Beast has learned. Peek was escorted off the grounds of the White House on Jan. 17 and placed on administrative leave pending investigation, the details of which have been closely held. Axios previously reported that Peek was expected to attend the World Economic Forum in Davos prior to his exit. He had barely been on the Russia job for two months. Since then, rumors have swirled within the ranks of the White House, State Department, and on social media about the reason for Peek's sudden exit. The Trump administration has said nothing to explain Peek's departure.But two officials familiar with the probe tell The Daily Beast that the investigation has been ongoing for several months and that Peek's State Department colleagues raised concerns about him before he left to join the White House's staff. However, one official who spoke to The Daily Beast also said Peek had close, collegial working relationships with several individuals at the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs during his time at State. Peek has also retained counsel, those officials said.Peek did not comment on the record for this story. The White House and State Department also did not respond to a request for comment.Peek, a graduate of Princeton University and Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, got his start in the Trump administration working in the State Department as deputy assistant secretary of state for Iraq and Iran. Before that, Peek worked as a U.S. Army intelligence officer in Afghanistan after Gen. David Petraeus selected him for his commander's initiatives group. He also previously advised Sens. Gordon Smith (R-OR) and Mike Johanns (R-NE). Peek's mother is a contributor to Fox News and his father works in the Manhattan banking industry. Several days after his departure, President Donald Trump tweeted and quoted Elizabeth Peek: "'This is all about undermining the next Election.' Liz Peek, @FoxNews."As part of his job in the Trump administration, Andrew Peek traveled often to the Middle East and worked on Iran policy in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the State Department. National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien, who previously served as State's special envoy for hostage affairs, tapped Peek for the senior role on the National Security Council this past summer, several officials told The Daily Beast.The last two officials in Peek's role at the NSC, Tim Morrison and Fiona Hill, testified in the House impeachment investigation into Trump. Matt Dimmick, formerly the director for Russia at the Pentagon, has taken Peek's place at the National Security Council.Fiona Hill Ties Trump's Ukraine Pressure Back to RussiagateMultiple other White House officials have been pushed out of their positions in the Trump era. Rob Porter, who served as a senior aide to the president, was forced out after multiple allegations that he emotionally and physically abused women. Darren Beattie, a speechwriter and policy aide to Trump, was ousted in 2018 after it became known that he attended a conference frequented by white nationalists. He was later hired by Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL). Reince Priebus, Trump's former chief of staff, got the boot in July 2017 due to unsatisfactory job performance reviews from top Trumpworld figures including the president himself. He was replaced by Gen. John Kelly who was then replaced by Mick Mulvaney.Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Irish Voters Ready for Change But It Might Not Come Just Yet Posted: 07 Feb 2020 01:57 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Childcare worker Amy O'Neill thinks the old ways of Irish politics may have run their course.The 26-year old from Tipperary works two jobs to make ends meet and usually votes for Fine Gael, one of the two parties that have largely dominated Ireland's political landscape since the foundation of the state a century ago. As she prepares to vote in Saturday's election, she's considering making a change."I'm leaning toward Sinn Fein," said O'Neill.She's not the only one. The left-wing nationalist party, once the political wing of the IRA terrorist group, jumped into the lead in one poll in the final days of campaigning.The electoral math of a fragmented system means Sinn Fein won't lead the next government, but its rise speaks to the shifting tectonic plates that are upending traditional power structures in Ireland and across Europe.When O'Neill joined an estimated 20,000 childcare workers marching through Dublin on Feb. 5 to demand better pay and conditions, the buzz was all about a shift to the left."That's what everyone here is talking about," she said.Voting began on some of Ireland's islands on Friday, with the mainland going to the polls on Saturday. State broadcaster RTE will release an exit poll immediately after voting ends at 10 p.m. tomorrow. Around Sunday lunchtime, it will become clear if the centrist hold on power has been broken. The traditional divide in Irish politics runs between Prime Minister Leo Varadkar's Fine Gael and Fianna Fail, separated by little except where they stood on the division of Ireland in 1921.In 1982, the two dominant tribes accounted for 84% of the vote. By 2016, they had less than 50% of the vote and that's likely to fall further tomorrow as Sinn Fein makes inroads.The shift in Ireland matches a pattern that has seen traditional parties eroded in places like Germany, Italy and Spain -- and all but wiped out in France where President Emmanuel Macron and the right-wing populist Marine Le Pen overturned the old guard in 2017.In Ireland, Sinn Fein can't lead the next government because it isn't running enough candidates to clinch a majority. But Fianna Fail's Micheal Martin, the favorite to take power, may face an awkward dilemma: does he bring Sinn Fein into his coalition or allow them to become the main opposition?He's officially ruled out a pact, though the bookmakers still make it the most likely outcome. Either way, Sinn Fein's influence is set to grow."There is something important going on here," said Eoin O'Malley, a politics professor at Dublin City University. "After almost 100 years, voters are becoming sick of the two big parties, Fianna Fail and Fine Gael and are looking for change."He said Sinn Fein could be in a position to take power itself come the next election.Before then, Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald may force the next government to do more to protect workers rights and boost wages. She's promised people like O'Neill she would spend an extra 500 million euros ($550 million) on childcare providers, raise entry-level wages and make the state responsible for pay and pensions in the sector.Irish voters may be open to a more regulated economy after both the main parties ran into trouble for their handling of the state finances -- Fianna Fail is struggling to shake off its role in Ireland's 2008 economic crash while Varadkar has overseen vast cost overruns on projects like the new National Children's Hospital.Nevertheless, Varadkar and Martin both attacked her tax-and-spend plans during an election debate last month."Listening to these men you'd never imagine that one had crashed the economy and that the other is so fiscally irresponsible that he's producing the most expensive hospital in the world," McDonald replied.The Irish BorderSinn Fein's main historical mission has been to reunite the two parts of the island of Ireland and the deal that Varadkar struck last year over the border with Northern Ireland has already weakened the ties binding the six Irish provinces to the rest of the U.K.Brexit has also helped soften opposition to reunification in the north and Sinn Fein, the only group with a significant representation in institutions on both sides of the border, could increase the chances of a vote on the issue.The party only began seriously contesting Irish elections in the 1980s under a strategy known as "the Armalite and the Ballot Box" -- in which the Republican movement sought to further its goals through both democratic means and violence.The end of the Troubles in 1998 helped to normalize the party, but it's still never been in government. And in an election where voters are demanding change, that's a significant advantage.Sinn Fein may be tapping into "a latent republican sentiment, also fueled by the long Brexit saga," said Diarmaid Ferriter, professor of history at University College Dublin. But mainly, he added, the party is "a lightning rod for the discontent out there, for the things that people feel are wrong about their lives."(Adds election details in seventh paragraph)\--With assistance from Ben Sills, Peter Flanagan and Rachel McGovern.To contact the reporter on this story: Dara Doyle in Dublin at ddoyle1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Chad Thomas at cthomas16@bloomberg.net, Ben SillsFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Putin Orders Payments for WWII Veterans in Russia and Baltics Posted: 07 Feb 2020 01:57 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- President Vladimir Putin ordered payments to be made to Russian World War II veterans in Russia and the Baltic States as well as to those who were held in Nazi concentration camps.The one-time payments of 50,000 rubles to 75,000 rubles ($790-$1,200) will also go to the widows or widowers of veterans in Russia as well as Russian citizens in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, according to a Kremlin decree published Friday. Those held in detention as children in camps "created by the fascists and their allies" will get 75,000 rubles, while those held in camps and ghettos as adults will receive 50,000 rubles, it said.The money will be paid in April and May as part of 75th anniversary commemorations of the 1945 victory over Nazi Germany in the Great Patriotic War, as WWII is known in Russia. The Kremlin is preparing for the May 9 Victory Day celebrations in Moscow that will include a traditional military parade on Red Square attended by world leaders. Putin said during his visit to Jerusalem last month that he's also inviting leaders of the permanent member states of the United Nations Security Council to attend a summit this year. He said in November that it would be the "right step" if U.S. President Donald Trump accepts his invitation to attend the May 9 parade.To contact the reporter on this story: Stepan Kravchenko in Moscow at skravchenko@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Gregory L. White at gwhite64@bloomberg.net, Tony Halpin, Natasha DoffFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Bad weather moves into Eastern states; 5 dead in South Posted: 07 Feb 2020 01:36 AM PST  Extreme wind gusts, blowing snow and widespread flooding made traveling treacherous on Friday as a storm system moved into the northeastern United States, leaving rising water and at least five deaths in its wake across the South. More than 400,000 homes and businesses were without power Friday after the National Weather Service warned of gusts up to 60 mph (97 kph) from Virginia into New England. North Carolina and Virginia, where hundreds of people had to be pulled from flooded homes, had the most customers without electricity, according to poweroutages.us.
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| US Attorney General William Barr blasts 'China's playbook' and Huawei's dominance of 5G, suggests alliance with Nokia and Ericsson Posted: 07 Feb 2020 01:30 AM PST  The US is locked in a technological and ideological battle with China that, if mishandled, threatens the nation's economic prosperity, values and way of life, America's top justice official said on Thursday."China has emerged as the United States' top geopolitical adversary," said US Attorney General William Barr in a speech at the Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). "For China, success is a zero-sum game."Barr called on American universities, industry, society and its democratic allies to join together in countering the "blitzkrieg" threat posed by China's authoritarian system before it is too late.At one point he suggested that US companies should take controlling stakes in the international rivals of Chinese tech giants to counter their rise.FBI Director Christopher Wray (shown on Tuesday) spoke along with Attorney General William Barr and called the Chinese threat "diverse and multilayered". Photo: Reuters alt=FBI Director Christopher Wray (shown on Tuesday) spoke along with Attorney General William Barr and called the Chinese threat "diverse and multilayered". Photo: ReutersPast administrations and many in the private sector had "too often been willing to countenance China's hardball tactics " and it has been this administration that has finally moved to confront and counteract China's playbook", said Barr, prompting enthusiastic applause from a handful of attendees in the packed hall.He focused fully half his speech on what he characterised as an era-defining rivalry over 5G technology, an arena in which Chinese companies enjoy somewhat rare technological superiority over their US counterparts."The time is very short and we and our allies have to act quickly," Barr said.Barr's past experience as a Verizon telecommunications executive was on display as he outlined the 5G challenge, diving into details on spectrum, base stations, US telecoms infrastructure shortfalls and the need to create a viable market alternative to Huawei Technologies.In the absence of any real competition, Huawei " which Barr's department has targeted with numerous criminal indictments over commercial espionage and fraud " is currently pursuing a campaign to supply critical 5G infrastructure to municipal and national governments around the world.Most recently, and despite Washington's braying, Britain approved the limited use of Huawei technology in the development of its own 5G network.Barr said on Thursday that the US should consider throwing its weight behind Huawei's closest " though still distant " rivals: Finland's Nokia and Sweden's Ericsson.Such a strategy would see American companies take a controlling stake in one or both of the European firms, either directly or through an alliance with other private sector entities from US allies."Putting our large market and financial muscle behind one or both of these firms would make it a far more formidable competitor and eliminate concerns over its staying power, or their staying power," said Barr. "We and our closest allies certainly need to be actively considering this approach."Barr was delivering an update on the Department of Justice's "China Initiative", a US policy set up by his predecessor in 2018 to identify and counter the Chinese theft of trade secrets and other strategic assets.The conference included a host of top FBI and Justice Department speakers.FBI Director Christopher Wray said his agency was honing a variety of traditional and non-traditional tools and tactics to counter what he called the "diverse and multilayered" Chinese threat.The FBI is conducting some 1,000 China-related investigations across all 56 of its field offices, bureau officials said, complemented by Department of Justice prosecution team leaders centred in five US offices: New York; San Francisco; Boston; Dallas, Texas; and Huntsville, Alabama.Under the China Initiative, the FBI arrested 24 people during the fiscal year ending in September, up from 15 arrests five years ago, officials said. In the last four months, it said it had arrested 19 more people."We are not seeking a rise in cases for the numbers," said John Brown, assistant director of the FBI's counterintelligence division, but rather to check what he called the biggest US threat since Washington tried to counter Moscow during the Cold War.The US government's aggressive pursuit of such criminal cases has prompted accusations " from individuals in academia, the private sector and even the military " of racial profiling.On Thursday, officials sought to dispute that charge."This is not about the Chinese people as a whole and it's sure as heck not about Chinese-Americans," said Wray. "But it is about the Chinese government."Barr, who has generally limited his public criticism of China to matters of commercial malpractice, also fired shots at Beijing over its treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, its internet censorship and its opposition to "self-determination" in Hong Kong.According to recent reporting by The New York Times, which cited an unpublished manuscript by former national security adviser John Bolton, Barr has expressed unease at US President Donald Trump's apparent closeness with Chinese President Xi Jinping.In private conversations with Bolton, Barr raised concerns that Trump had led autocratic leaders, including Xi, to believe that he had "undue influence" over what should be considered independent judicial matters, The Times reported.In May 2018, Trump announced that he was working with Xi to get ZTE, a Chinese telecommunications giant that Washington had banned from procuring US technology, "back into business". Several weeks later, the US administration lifted the ban under an agreement in which the company put US$400 million in escrow.Sign up now for our 50% early bird offer from SCMP Research: China AI Report. The all new SCMP China AI Report gives you exclusive first-hand insights and analysis into the latest industry developments, and actionable and objective intelligence about China AI that you should be equipped with.This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP's Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright © 2020 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved. Copyright (c) 2020. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
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| Palestinians deny US charges of incitement, blame Trump plan Posted: 07 Feb 2020 01:27 AM PST  The Palestinians on Friday rejected U.S. allegations of incitement after a day of clashes and attacks left three Palestinians dead, including a member of the security forces, and wounded more than a dozen Israeli soldiers. "Those who introduce plans for annexation and apartheid and the legalization of occupation and settlements are the ones who bear full responsibility for deepening the cycle of violence and extremism," senior Palestinian official Saeb Erekat said in a statement.
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