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Every weekend, Asia Pacific Daily will provide you with a run-down of the latest hot news.
This week, the following hot news you should know:
Top 1 | UK bans Huawei from 5G network
The UK has decided that Huawei equipment should be removed from Britain's 5G network by 2027 and the telecom providers in the country should stop purchasing 5G equipment from Huawei from the start of next year, said Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden in the House of Commons on Tuesday.
Earlier in the day, Chinese Foreign Ministry's Spokesperson Zhao Lijian responded to relevant issues about Huawei at a regular press conference.
Zhao said "whether the UK can provide an open, fair and non-discriminatory business environment for Chinese companies in the country is the 'litmus test' of where the UK market will go after Brexit."
Top 2 | White House sidelines Fauci even as coronavirus cases soar
Despite spearheading the U.S. fight against COVID-19, the country's top infectious diseases expert Anthony Fauci has been sidelined by the White House, reported several U.S. news outlets.
The Trump administration has prepared a list of comments made by Dr. Fauci about the virus to ascertain the number of times he made wrong remarks. The list includes remark made in January, claiming the virus was not a significant threat to the U.S. people and was not driven by asymptomatic carriers, as well as an observation made in March, which suggested there was no need for face coverings.
But Fauci explained that he didn't suggest masks early in the outbreak, because he wanted to reserve them for frontline health care workers who needed them most, especially considering the mask shortage.
Top 3 | Trump lags Biden on people of color in top campaign ranks
President Donald Trump lags Democratic rival Joe Biden in the percentage of people of color on their campaign staffs, according to data the campaigns provided to The Associated Press.
Twenty-five percent of the Republican president’s senior staff are nonwhite, compared to 36% of Biden’s senior staff. Biden’s overall campaign team is 35% nonwhite; Trump’s campaign did not provide a comparable number. And neither campaign provided racial breakdowns for their nonwhite staff, nor the total number of staffers who are on their payrolls, including senior staff.
Advocates for minority groups say staff diversity is necessary to ensure political candidates hear a full range of voices and viewpoints to help them understand the concerns of various communities and interest groups — especially at a time when racial injustice is front and center in the national conversation. And while Biden has an edge on Trump, there is plenty more to be done in presidential campaigns overall.
Top 4 | EU holds masked budget summit in pandemic times
European Union leaders acknowledged Friday they are about as far apart from reaching a deal on an unprecedented 1.85 trillion euro ($2.1 trillion) EU budget and virus recovery fund as the seating distance imposed upon them for health reasons at their summit.
The challenges facing the 27 EU leaders — some of whom arrived masked, some unmasked — are formidable. The bloc is suffering through the worst recession in its history and member states are fighting over who should pay the most to help other countries and which nations should get the most to turn around their battered economies.
As the summit got underway all leaders were wearing masks. The usual hugs, handshakes and kisses were replaced by friendly nods and elbow bumps. The jovial atmosphere was not expected to last long at what will likely be one of the most brutal and bruising summits of recent times. What is slated as a two-day meeting could go even longer, if necessary, to bridge the differences between leaders.
Top 5 | France celebrates Bastille Day with little fanfare amid pandemic
Without the traditional military parade down the famous avenue of the Champs Elysees and public celebration, French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday presided over the Bastille Day ceremony overshadowed by the coronavirus crisis.
For this year's celebration, the military parade, which traditionally attracted huge crowds, was cancelled for the first time since 1945 and replaced by a downsized defile in the Place de la Concorde square in central Paris.
Following a government ban on public gatherings with more than 5,000 people due to the coronavirus pandemic, nearly 2,500 men and women from France's army, navy and air force -- half of the usual number -- took part in the ceremony. Without mask but respecting physical distance, about 2,000 participants, including 1,400 medical staff and representatives of civil society, joined the gathering.
Top 6 | Trump wears mask on camera for first time as he visits military hospital
U.S. President Donald Trump was seen wearing a mask while visiting a military hospital near Washington, D.C., on Saturday, the first time he did so on camera since the coronavirus pandemic broke out in the country.
"I'll probably have a mask," Trump told reporters ahead of his trip to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, where he visited injured soldiers and medical workers tasked with containing the coronavirus.
Trump has been refusing to wear a mask himself since the pandemic broke out, citing his good health and frequent negative tests for the virus. "I have no problem with a mask. I don't think you need one when you're tested all the time, everybody around you is tested, you're quite a distance," he said on Thursday. Even Republican lawmakers have advised him to do so publicly so as to curb the spread of the contagion.
Top 7 | Trump’s reelection campaign gets a reboot as virus persists
President Donald Trump’s campaign reboot is getting a reboot. He will take baby steps back out onto the road Friday after a multiweek hiatus caused by a nationwide surge in coronavirus cases and after his planned comeback in Oklahoma turned into a debacle.
Trump, trailing in the polls, is eager to signal that normal life can resume despite a rampaging virus that has killed more than 130,000 Americans. He’ll hold his first in-person fundraiser in a month on Friday in Florida and then a rally on Saturday night in New Hampshire.
Trump’s rally in Portsmouth was scheduled after aides spent weeks studying what went wrong in Tulsa three weeks ago. It was billed as a massive, defiant return to the political stage but instead produced a humiliating sea of empty seats and questions about the campaign’s ability to attract people to large events in a pandemic.
Top 8 | Scott Morrison says Australia cannot shut down to contain second wave of Covid-19
Scott Morrison says the response to a second wave of Covid-19 infections cannot be shutting the country down to try to eliminate the virus, and he’s moved to reassure people his government will not be withdrawing income support “for those in need”.
With renewed debate around whether Australia should respond to the latest outbreak and a spike in community transmission with more forceful lockdowns, Morrison said on Wednesday elimination was impractical, but Victoria’s chief health officer Brett Sutton told reporters it was an idea “worthy of consideration”.
With Victoria reporting another 238 cases of the illness, and another fatality, Sutton said he would “love” elimination, but now wasn’t the time to make “a detailed examination about its feasibility”. He said any shift in the public health strategy would require consideration by chief medical officers and leaders through the national cabinet.
Top 9 | Brazil's Bolsonaro gets new positive coronavirus test result
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said Wednesday he has tested positive for the new coronavirus for a second time, following his July 7 announcement that he had COVID-19.
The far-right leader said he hasn't experienced serious symptoms of the disease as he isolates at the presidential residence in capital of Brasilia. According to the World Health Organization, the median time from onset to clinical recovery for mild cases is approximately two weeks.
Before his diagnosis, Bolsonaro had spent many of his weekends since the beginning of the pandemic mingling in crowds, sometimes without wearing a mask. He is treating his COVID-19 with the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine, although it has not been proven effective against the virus.
Top 10 | Kiev disagrees with Iran's theory on Ukrainian jet crash: Ukrainian FM
Ukraine does not agree with Iran's claim that the downing of the Ukraine International Airlines passenger plane was due to human error, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Tuesday.
Kuleba added that Iran would be responsible for the downing under international law, and the Foreign Ministry would do everything to ensure that Iran pays the highest price for what happened.
The Boeing-737, en route from Tehran to Kiev, was shot down by two rockets shortly after takeoff from Tehran's Imam Khomeini International Airport on Jan. 8. The tragedy resulted in the deaths of all 167 passengers and nine crew members on board, who were citizens of Ukraine, Iran, Canada, Sweden, Afghanistan, and the United Kingdom. Later, Iran's armed forces confirmed that an "unintentional" launch of a military missile by the country was the cause of the incident.
Related news:
APD | Public in the UK deprived of most advanced technology – Huawei 5G
APD | US-India relationship to be one of the main beneficiaries of China-India crisis
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
