Taiwan can fill gap left by Confucius Institutes: AIT

With the closure of China’s Confucius Institutes in the US, it is time for Taiwan to fill the Mandarin teaching gap and share “a different version of history” with US students, American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Director Brent Christensen told the Chinese Language Symposium to Support the US-Taiwan Education Initiative in Taipei yesterday. “We have all read news stories about the closing of many of the PRC’s [People’s Republic of China] Confucius Institutes in the US. Now is the time for Taiwan to step forward and help fill this gap — not only to teach Mandarin and learn English, but to more fully tell Taiwan’s story to their American students,” Christensen said in Mandarin. The US Department of State in August last year designated the Confucius Institute US Center as a Chinese “foreign mission” for multifaceted propaganda efforts. After Taiwan and the US last month signed a memorandum of understanding on international education cooperation, both sides have agreed to expand existing programs, including the Fulbright Foreign Language Teaching Assistant Program, Christensen said. Wishing good luck to about 60 program participants who are to teach Mandarin in the US, he told them they play a crucial role in teaching young Americans a language spoken by 1.3 billion native speakers around the world and have the opportunity to tell a different version of history than the one taught at Confucius Institutes. ‘CIVIC AMBASSADORS’ Encouraging Taiwanese instructors to serve as “civic ambassadors” and make more friends, National Security Council (NSC) Deputy Secretary-General Hsu Szu-chien (徐斯儉) said the government attaches great importance to the program, and the council since May last year has been coordinating inter-agency efforts to make plans to promote Mandarin teaching in the US and Europe. Many senior US researchers on Chinese affairs had learned Mandarin in Taiwan during or after China’s Cultural Revolution, Department of North American

By Lin Chia-nan

Virus Outbreak: Mike Pompeo pushes new allegation of China covering up origin of COVID-19

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday said that there were COVID-19-like illnesses among staff at a Chinese virology institute in autumn 2019, casting further blame on Beijing as health experts arrived in the country to probe the COVID-19 pandemic’s origins. The top US diplomat in a statement urged the WHO team that landed on Thursday in Wuhan, where COVID-19 was first detected, to “press the government of China” on the “new information.” “The United States government has reason to believe that several researchers inside the [Wuhan Institute of Virology] became sick in autumn 2019, before the first identified case of the outbreak, with symptoms consistent with both COVID-19 and common seasonal illnesses,” Pompeo said. He said this contradicted reports that none of the staff at the institute had contracted COVID-19 or related viruses. “Beijing continues today to withhold vital information that scientists need to protect the world from this deadly virus, and the next one,” Pompeo said. COVID-19 was first detected in Wuhan in late 2019 and has since billowed out across the world, killing more than 2 million people so far, infecting tens of millions and eviscerating the global economy. The WHO has said establishing the pathway of the virus from animals to humans is essential to preventing future outbreaks. The outgoing administration of US President Donald Trump has consistently blamed China for COVID-19, which has killed 392,000 people in the US, with the president routinely calling it the “China virus.” In related news, India yesterday began one of the world’s biggest coronavirus vaccine programs, a colossal and complex task compounded by safety worries, shaky infrastructure and public skepticism. The world’s second-most populous nation hopes to inoculate about 300 million of its 1.3 billion people by July — a number equal to almost the entire US population. Health workers, people over 50 and those deemed

CFR rates Taiwan conflict top concern

‘HIGH IMPACT’: The potential for a conflict over Taiwan was raised from ‘Tier 2’ in previous years, joining the ranks of potential US disputes with Iran and North Korea

The New York-based Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) on Thursday listed a possible conflict between the US and China over Taiwan as a top-tier concern for the first time in its annual Preventive Priorities Survey. The report assessed the likelihood and effects of 30 potential conflicts that could break out over the next year based on responses from 550 US government officials, foreign policy experts and academics. Those conflicts are classified into one of three tiers, and the possibility of “intensifying political and economic pressure from China against Taiwan, leading to a severe crisis with the United States,” was classified as a “Tier 1” risk for the first time. A US-China conflict over Taiwan was listed as a “Tier 2” risk in 2019 and last year, but was moved up based on its potentially “high impact” on US interests and the moderate likelihood of it occurring, the report said. A high impact on US interests refers to a contingency that directly threatens the US, a defense treaty ally or a vital strategic interest, and is thus likely to trigger a major US military response, based on the council’s definitions. A “moderate” likelihood means that there is some chance of an event happening. By contrast, the possibility of “an armed confrontation in the South China Sea involving China and the United States over freedom of navigation and disputed territorial claims” was downgraded from a Tier 1 to a Tier 2 risk, as it was judged to have a low likelihood of occurring in the coming year. In addition to a crisis over Taiwan, the council also ranked as Tier 1 contingencies the heightening of military tensions with North Korea over its nuclear program, and an armed confrontation between Iran and the US or one of its allies over Iran’s involvement in regional conflicts and support of militant proxy

Biden unveils US$1.9tn virus stimulus plan

TALL ORDER: The incoming US administration plans to tackle economic troubles and COVID-19, while the US Senate goes ahead with the impeachment of Trump

US President-elect Joe Biden on Thursday unveiled plans for fighting COVID-19 and injecting US$1.9 trillion into a battered US economy, but already his ambitious first 100-days agenda is overshadowed by the looming US Senate trial of his soon-to-be predecessor Donald Trump. Biden promised “a new chapter” for the nation on the day after Trump became the first US president to be impeached twice, as the incoming president sought to seize the narrative in a prime-time address and encourage Americans to look forward again. “We will come back,” he said in a speech from his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware. “We didn’t get into all this overnight. We won’t get out of it overnight, and we can’t do it as a separated and divided nation,” he said. “The only way we can do it is to come together, to come together as fellow Americans.” With his Democrats narrowly controlling both houses of the US Congress, Biden, 78, has a shot at passing what would be the third massive COVID-19 pandemic aid package. However, what he is less keen to talk about is the impending trial of Trump, something that would potentially introduce a nightmarish mix of scheduling complications and political drama into an already tense Senate. In his 25-minute televised speech, Biden made no mention of Trump, impeachment or the deadly violence that nearly overwhelmed Washington last week. Instead he addressed “the twin crises of a pandemic and this sinking economy,” a challenge exceeding even that which faced him as vice president to former US president Barack Obama when they assumed office following the 2008 financial crisis. The pandemic continues to hit new peaks, the COVID-19 vaccination program is stumbling and there are fears that the economic recovery from last year’s cratering could backslide. His proposal, dubbed the “American Rescue Plan,” would include a host of measures aimed at revitalizing the

Indonesia quake kills at least 37, topples buildings

A powerful earthquake yesterday rocked Indonesia’s Sulawesi island, killing at least 37 people, leveling a hospital and severely damaging other buildings, authorities said, as they warned that there were people still trapped beneath rubble. Hundreds were also injured when the magnitude 6.2 earthquake struck in the early hours, triggering panic among the residents of the island, which was hit by a huge earthquake and tsunami two-and-a-half years ago that killed thousands. So far, 29 bodies have been hauled from beneath crumpled buildings in Mamuju, a city of about 110,000 in West Sulawesi province, while another eight were killed south of the area. “We don’t know how many more are missing,” said Arianto of the rescue agency in Mamuju. “There are still people trapped beneath the rubble.” Rescuers were searching for more than a dozen patients and staff trapped under a leveled Mamuju hospital. “The hospital is flattened — it collapsed,” said Arianto, who like many Indonesians goes by one name. Earlier yesterday, rescuers said they were also trying to reach a family of eight who were under their destroyed home. At least one hotel had partially collapsed, while the regional governor’s office was also extensively damaged after the earthquake struck at 2:18am local time. Images from the scene showed residents trying to flee the seaside city in cars and motorbikes, as they drove past corrugated metal roofs and other building debris scattered on the roadside. However, landslides triggered by heavy rains and the earthquake blocked the main access road out of Mamuju. The meteorological agency warned residents that the area could be hit by strong aftershocks and to avoid the beachfront in case of a tsunami. Taiwan is willing to provide humanitarian assistance to the victims of the earthquake, the Presidential Office said. President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) has instructed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to express her government’s sympathies and concerns to

Temperatures to plummet with new cold front: CWB

A strong cold air mass is expected to send temperatures plummeting across the country from today to Monday, the Central Weather Bureau (CWB) said yesterday. The bureau has issued cold warnings — temperatures dropping below 10°C — for most areas of central and southern Taiwan over the three-day period. Hsinchu, Miaoli, Taichung, Changhua, Nantou, Yunlin and Chiayi counties, as well as Tainan and Kaohsiung, are likely to be the worst-affected areas, it said. Northern and eastern Taiwan could experience rain showers over the weekend, while most other areas are likely to see cloudy to clear skies, the bureau said. Starting on Tuesday, the cold air mass could ease, with temperatures rising 1°C to 3°C across the nation, it said. However, another weather front is expected later in the week, bringing more rain to the nation, forecasters said. On Thursday, the Council of Agriculture said that the cold spell caused an estimated NT$118.14 million (US$4.15 million) of agricultural losses nationwide. The most heavily damaged crop was wax apples, which accounted for more than NT$70 million of the losses, the council said, citing data from Dec. 30 last year to Thursday. The council said that 657 hectares of crops were damaged. Milkfish farms sustained losses totaling NT$21.79 million, while livestock losses amounted to about NT$25,000, it added. Pingtung County was the hardest hit, with NT$66 million in agricultural damage, or 56 percent of the national total, the council said. Yunlin County sustained the second-highest losses, totaling NT$16.13 million, followed by Penghu County, with NT$8.64 million, it said.

China places 20,000 in central quarantine

China has sent more than 20,000 people living in the epicenter of the country’s latest COVID-19 outbreak to state-run quarantine facilities, as Beijing yesterday reported the worst nationwide figures since March last year. The country had largely brought the virus under control after strict measures including mass testing and travel restrictions, but case numbers have been climbing, especially in the north, prompting a fresh wave of lockdowns and a race to build a massive new quarantine center. The government yesterday reported 144 infections — the highest single-day tally since March last year — mostly in Hebei Province, where more than 22 million people are in lockdown. More than 20,000 residents from villages near Shijiazhuang — about 294km southwest of Beijing — had been sent to quarantine facilities starting from Wednesday, state broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV) said. They are being housed in hotels, with family members separated. “It’s natural that they feel anxious and panic,” Liu Jinpei, a psychologist involved, told CCTV, adding that authorities had set up a mental health hotline. Officials are also rushing to build a massive “centralized medical observation center” in the area, with more than 3,000 makeshift beds. The surge in cases appears to be fueled by asymptomatic cases, mostly in rural areas on the outskirts of cities. The state-run Global Times warned the high number of cases in the regions “sounds an alarm regarding loopholes in epidemic control” as many residents are elderly. Hundreds of millions of migrant workers are expected to return to their home villages for the Lunar New Year holiday next month, and China is rushing to vaccinate 50 million people in key groups before the festival. Meanwhile, Germany yesterday passed 2 million COVID-19 cases as a WHO emergency committee readied to issue advice on stemming the spread of new, more contagious strains of the disease. The surge in Europe’s biggest economy

US stands by Taiwan, Craft tells Tsai

PILLARS OF DEMOCRACY: US Ambassador to the UN Kelly Craft posted online after the virtual meeting that Taiwan should be able to share its successes in global venues

President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and US Ambassador to the UN Kelly Craft yesterday held a virtual meeting, during which Tsai described Taiwan as a “force for good” that deserves a place on the world stage, while Craft reaffirmed Washington’s support for Taiwan’s international participation. The virtual talk was held at about 11am, after Craft’s trip to Taiwan was abruptly canceled. She had been scheduled to meet with Tsai in person at the Presidential Office in Taipei yesterday morning as part of a three-day visit to Taiwan. On Tuesday, the US Department of State canceled all of its planned trips, citing a need to focus on the transition to US president-elect Joe Biden’s team. The virtual meeting was first reported by Chinese-language online news outlet Up Media and followed by three consecutive posts on Twitter from Craft. “A great privilege to speak today w/President Tsai @iingwen. We discussed the many ways Taiwan is a model for the world, as demonstrated by its success in fighting COVID-19 and all that Taiwan has to offer in the fields of health, technology & cutting-edge science,” Craft wrote. “Unfortunately, Taiwan is unable to share those successes in @UN venues, including the World Health Assembly, as a result of PRC [People’s Republic of China] obstruction. If the pandemic has taught us anything, it is that more information, more transparency, is part of the answer,” she said in another post on Twitter. “I made clear to President Tsai that the US stands with Taiwan and always will, as friends and partners, standing shoulder to shoulder as pillars of democracy,” she added. In a video released by the Presidential Office, Tsai thanked Craft for “always speaking up for Taiwan at the most important time.” “The people of Taiwan have been inspired by your action. They actually like you a lot,” Tsai told the ambassador, citing many

By Lin Chia-nan

Trump impeached for historic second time

BIPARTISAN REPROACH: At the final count in the US House of Representatives, 10 Republicans broke ranks, including the party’s No. 3, US Representative Liz Cheney

US President Donald Trump became the first president in the country’s history to be impeached twice when the US House of Representatives voted on Wednesday to charge him with inciting last week’s mob attack on the US Congress. “Today, in a bipartisan way, the House demonstrated that no one is above the law, not even the president of the United States,” US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said after the vote. The US Senate would not hold a trial before Wednesday next week, when US president-elect Joe Biden is to be inaugurated, meaning that Trump is to escape the ignominy of being forced to leave office early. However, he is set to face a Senate trial later and if convicted he might be barred in a follow-up vote from seeking the US presidency again in 2024. “Donald Trump has deservedly become the first president in American history to bear the stain of impeachment twice over,” said US Senator Chuck Schumer, who in a week’s time is to become Senate leader. “The Senate is required to act and will proceed with his trial.” In the House, the only question was how many Republicans would join the lockstep Democratic majority in the 232-197 vote. At the final count, 10 Republicans broke ranks, including the party’s No. 3 in the House, US Representative Liz Cheney. “I am in total peace today that my vote was the right thing and I actually think history will judge it that way,” said Adam Kinzinger, a vocal Trump critic and one of the Republicans who crossed the aisle. In the White House, Trump issued a videotaped address in which he made no mention of impeachment or his attempts to persuade half of the country into believing that Biden’s victory was fraudulent. Instead, the comments focused on an appeal for Americans to be “united,” avoid violence

Hundreds more hospital workers to be given tests

The Central Epidemic Command Center yesterday said it would test up to 400 more employees at the hospital where the nation’s two latest domestic cases of COVID-19 worked, although the center did not expect the results to reveal new cases. The two local infections — case No. 838, a physician in his 30s who works at a hospital in northern Taiwan, and case No. 839, a nurse at the same hospital who is also the physician’s girlfriend — were confirmed by the CECC on Tuesday. The doctor contracted the disease after treating a COVID-19 patient, while the nurse, who did not treat a confirmed COVID-19 case, is not believed to have contracted the infection at work, the center said. Among the 468 people who were tested for potential exposure to the pair at the hospital — including 41 doctors, 185 nurses, 40 administrative staff members, and 202 patients and their relatives — all have tested negative, Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center, told a news conference in Taipei. Seventy-seven of them had shown symptoms or were in “very close” contact with the doctor and nurse, so they were tested twice, he said, adding that those results also returned negative. Fifty-four contacts of the pair outside the context of the hospital were tested for COVID-19 and had returned negative results, he said. To meet public expectations and put the hospital employees at ease, the center would test an additional 300 to 400 people who were in the same hospital division and might have had contact with the pair for “very short” periods of time, said Chang Shan-chwen (張上淳), convener of the center’s expert advisory panel. They are not a cause of concern for the center, he said, adding that the tests are likely to reveal “no problems.” The health of all of the

By Sherry Hsiao

Ministry expresses approval for Biden’s pick for ‘Asia tsar’

Speaking about former US official Kurt Campbell, who has been tapped by US president-elect Joe Biden to join his Cabinet, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday expressed confidence in his knowledge of cross-strait affairs. Campbell, who is chairman of Washington-based advisory firm Asia Group, served as assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs from 2009 to 2013 under then-US president Barack Obama. The Asia Group on Wednesday confirmed that Campbell is to join the Biden administration as the deputy assistant to the president and coordinator for Indo-Pacific affairs on the National Security Council. Naming the veteran foreign policy expert for the newly created role of “Asia tsar” is a move designed to reflect the growing importance of US-China relations, the Financial Times reported. Expressing her congratulations to Campbell, Representative to the US Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) wrote on Twitter that he “is well known and highly respected around Asia.” “He has strategic vision as well as practical experience. I look forward to working with him in the future,” she added. Campbell has been friendly to Taiwan and kept abreast of the latest developments across the Taiwan Strait, as well as Taiwan-US relations, Department of North American Affairs Director-General Douglas Hsu (徐佑典) said yesterday in response to media queries. Campbell last month gave a virtual speech at the Taiwan-US-Japan Trilateral Indo-Pacific Security Dialogue, hosted by the Prospect Foundation in Taipei. President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) also participated. US Democrats and Republicans alike understand the challenges presented by Beijing’s military and economic aggression in the Indo-Pacific region, as well as the strategic interest of maintaining a strong relationship with Taiwan, Campbell said at the time. Taipei and Beijing should resume some dialogue to ease cross-strait tensions, he said. However, the initiative appeared to be in Beijing’s hands, Campbell added. With his insightful analyses, Campbell and his new post are believed to be

By Lin Chia-nan

Lawyer, others arrested over case of ‘Hong Kong 12’

Hong Kong police yesterday arrested a lawyer and 10 others on suspicion of helping 12 Hong Kong pro-democracy advocates try to flee the territory, media reported. The fresh wave of arrests comes a week after 55 advocates were apprehended in the largest move against Hong Kong’s democracy movement since Beijing imposed the National Security Law in June last year. Police arrested eight men and three women aged 18 to 72 for “assisting offenders,” the South China Morning Post reported, citing unnamed sources. They were quoted as saying that investigations so far indicated those arrested were not in breach of any offenses under the national security legislation. Those arrested are suspected of helping the 12 Hong Kongers who were detained at sea by mainland Chinese authorities while attempting to sail to Taiwan in August last year. Some of the fugitives were wanted in Hong Kong for offenses related to anti-government protests in 2019. Police did not immediately comment on the arrests. District councilor and lawyer Daniel Wong Kwok-tung (黃國桐) posted on his Facebook page that national security officers had arrived at his home. He was later taken to his office, where police conducted a search. Wong, who is a member of the Democratic Party, is known for providing legal assistance to hundreds of advocates arrested during the 2019 protests. Last month, 10 of those detained at sea were sentenced to prison in Shenzhen, China, for illegally crossing the border, with sentences ranging from seven months to three years. The two other detainees, who are minors, were handed over to Hong Kong and could face further charges in the territory for absconding, authorities said.

Taiwan key to curbing China: US report

‘ASSERTIVE STEPS’: The report says that the US should enable Taiwan to construct asymmetric defense capabilities that would allow it to engage China on its own terms

US President Donald Trump’s administration on Tuesday declassified a report that casts the defense of Taiwan as critical to the Indo-Pacific strategy of checking China’s ascent, Bloomberg reported yesterday. “US Strategic Framework for the Indo-Pacific” has governed the US’ strategic response to China since Trump approved it in February 2018, Bloomberg reported, citing a statement by US National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien. “Beijing is increasingly pressuring Indo-Pacific nations to subordinate their freedom and sovereignty to a ‘common destiny’ envisioned by the Chinese Communist Party [CCP],” O’Brien was cited as saying. The report assumes that China would “take increasingly assertive steps to compel unification with Taiwan,” Bloomberg quoted the document as saying. China’s presumptive aim is to “dissolve US alliances and partnerships in the region” before moving to “exploit vacuums and opportunities created by these diminished bonds,” the report says. It advises the US to devise and implement a defense strategy that is capable of denying China sustained air and sea dominance inside the first island chain in a war, and defending Taiwan and other first nations on the island chain. Part of that defense strategy would be to enable “Taiwan to develop an asymmetric defense strategy and capabilities” that would allow the nation to “engage China on its own terms,” the report says. The report highlights China’s “predatory economic practices” that “freeze out” foreign competition, undermining US competitiveness and furthering the CCP’s ambitions to “dominate the 21st-century economy.” Beijing is also expected to seek dominion over “cutting-edge technologies, including artificial intelligence and bio-genetics, and to harness them in the service of authoritarianism,” the report says. The US should contend with China’s economic practices by building an international consensus that Beijing’s industrial and unfair trade politics are detrimental to the global trading system, it says. Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Zhao Lijian (趙立堅) yesterday said that the strategic framework for

By Jonathan Chin

Calling off Craft’s trip ‘too bad, but understandable’

MISSED OPPORTUNITY? Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Wang Ting-yu said stickers for the public with the words ‘Taiwan, join UN’ could be saved for future use

The government yesterday expressed regret that US Ambassador to the UN Kelly Craft’s trip to Taiwan was canceled, but refuted a rumor that her flight was airborne when the cancelation was announced. “We are expecting shortly a plan from the incoming administration identifying the career officials who will remain in positions of responsibility on an acting basis until the [US] Senate confirmation process is complete for incoming officials,” US Department of State spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said in a statement on Tuesday. “As a result, we are canceling all planned travel this week, including the secretary’s trip to Europe,” Ortagus said, referring to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s planned overnight visit to Belgium yesterday. All travel has been canceled, Ortagus added. Craft’s delegation was scheduled to arrive in Taipei yesterday afternoon for a three-day visit, a schedule released by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday showed. The delegation planned to meet with President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) on the second day, and Craft was to give a speech to foreign envoys, officials and college students who had joined Model UN events, the schedule showed. The Presidential Office and the ministry said that they respected and understood Washington’s decision. While regretting that Craft could not make the trip, they said they would welcome her in the future. Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Wang Ting-yu (王定宇) also expressed respect for Washington’s decision, although a day earlier he was encouraging people to pick up stickers with the words “Taiwan, join UN” at DPP lawmakers’ offices. The decision did not specifically target Taiwan, and the stickers could be saved for future use, he said. Craft’s visit was unduly politicized by some Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) members, as they had falsely accused her of trying to tout her husband Joseph Craft’s coal business in Taiwan, Wang said,

By Lin Chia-nan

Travel quarantine revised for S Africa and Eswatini

Starting today, travelers who have been to South Africa or Eswatini within 14 days before entering Taiwan would be subject to centralized quarantine upon arrival, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday, as it confirmed Taiwan’s first person infected with a new variant of COVID-19 circulating in South Africa. Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center, said that travelers arriving in Taiwan after midnight today and who have been to South Africa or Eswatini, including transit passengers, would be required to stay at a centralized quarantine facility. They would be required to undergo two polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests at the quarantine facility — when they arrive and upon completing the 14 days of quarantine — he said, adding that those who test negative would be allowed to return home for another seven days of self-health management. Chen said that the special program adopts the same quarantine measures as the policy on travelers who have been to the UK within 14 days of entering Taiwan. Travelers would not be charged for the tests or their stay at a centralized quarantine facility, he said, urging them to honestly report their health conditions to quarantine officers upon arrival. He said that 38 specimens have since October last year been collected from COVID-19 patients with higher viral loads — those with PCR cycle threshold values of 27 or under — for genome sequence analysis. Among them, five were confirmed to have been infected with a new variant first reported in the UK and one was infected with the variant circulating in South Africa, he added. Chen said that more than 1.25 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 have been reported in South Africa — about 22,014 confirmed cases per 1 million population — and an average of 17,021 new cases have been reported daily in

By Lee I-chia

UK to use fines to target forced labor in Xinjiang

British companies are to face fines unless they meet new government requirements showing that their supply chains are free from forced labor, British Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs Dominic Raab said on Tuesday as he announced measures aimed at tackling human rights abuses against Uighurs in China’s Xinjiang region. Raab said that the British government has issued guidance to local companies with links to the Xinjiang region on how to carry out due diligence. The government intends to exclude suppliers when there is evidence of rights violations in their supply chains and also to review export controls to prevent the shipping of any goods that could contribute to such violations in Xinjiang. “Our aim, put simply, is that no company that profits from forced labor in Xinjiang can do business in the UK, and that no UK business is involved in their supply chains,” Raab told lawmakers. Raab said that mounting evidence, including first-hand testimony and nonprofit group reports, supports claims of unlawful mass detention in internment camps, widespread forced labor and forced sterilization of women on an “industrial scale.” The evidence “paints a harrowing picture” and showed the practice of “barbarism we had hoped lost to another era,” Raab said. Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Zhao Lijian (趙立堅) said that China would “take all necessary measures to defend national interests and dignity, and firmly safeguard its sovereign, security and development interests.” “Individual countries, including the UK, have funded, concocted and deliberately spread lies and rumors to smear and discredit China on the pretext of so-called human rights issues,” Zhao told reporters at a daily briefing. China has denied mass internments of Uighurs, saying that it merely operated voluntary centers for deradicalization and job training, and that all participants have since “graduated.”

North Korea’s Kim vows to bolster nuclear arsenal

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un pledged to strengthen his country’s nuclear arsenal as he delivered his closing address to a top ruling party meeting, state television showed yesterday, days before Joe Biden takes office as US president. Kim is looking to grab the attention of the incoming Biden administration, analysts have said, with his country more isolated than ever after closing its borders to protect itself against the COVID-19 pandemic. A nuclear summit between Kim and outgoing US President Donald Trump in Hanoi in February 2019 broke down over sanctions relief and what Pyongyang would be willing to give up in return. “We must further strengthen the nuclear war deterrent while doing our best to build up the most powerful military strength,” Kim told the Workers’ Party congress, footage broadcast on Korea Central Television showed. Thousands of delegates and attendees — none of them wearing masks — repeatedly rose to their feet in the cavernous April 25 House of Culture venue to interrupt his speech with applause. Earlier in the eight-day meeting, which has lasted twice as long as the previous gathering in 2016, Kim called the US “the fundamental obstacle to the development of our revolution and our foremost principal enemy.” Its policy toward the North “will never change, whoever comes into power,” he added, without mentioning Biden by name. The North had completed plans for a nuclear-powered submarine, he said — a strategic game-changer — and offered a shopping list including hypersonic gliding warheads, military reconnaissance satellites and solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). Pyongyang’s weapons programs have made rapid progress under Kim, and at a parade in October it showed off a huge new ICBM that analysts said was the largest road-mobile, liquid-fueled missile in the world. The change of leadership in Washington presents a challenge for North Korea: Biden, who characterized Kim as a “thug” during