Month: July 2020

Какие могут быть варианты развития событий Хабаровского Майдана

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Какие могут быть варианты развития событий Хабаровского Майдана.

К Хабаровску сейчас приковано огромное внимание, поскольку город стал центром протестных настроений на путляндии и всех прямо таки интересует вопрос, а что же будет дальше?
 

 
 
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На дне пукиномика – Фургал в тюрьме! Хабаровск кипит – доходы холопов рухнули рекордно с 1990х

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На дне пукиномика – Фургал в тюрьме! Хабаровск кипит – доходы холопов рухнули рекордно с 1990х
 

 
 
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Чёкнутый карлик пукин вырубит леса Байкала для экспорта…угля

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Чёкнутый карлик пукин вырубит леса Байкала для экспорта…угля.

Дело в том, что экспорт угля в Европу, куда путляндия традиционно засылала эшелоны падает и с года в год с неуклонной тенденцией. В целом, это закономерно, учитывая что Европа, как и весь цивилизованный мир отказывается от ресурсов с вредными выбросами и проводит декарбонизацию энергетики.

И вот теряя рынок сбыта, пукин хочет уничтожить первозданную природу одного из самых крупных и значительных заповедников, чтобы тарить свой уголь в Китай. При этом Китай также декларирует курс на снижение вредных выбросов, поэтому потенциальный экспорт угля будет рассчитан на весьма ограниченный период. То есть ОПГ вырубит под корень тысячи гектар, чтобы впоследствии пару лет поторговать углем. Полный абсурд, с экономической и политической стороны, и полная катастрофа с экологической
 

 
 
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House Lawmakers Hold Moment of Silence for Civil Rights Icon John Lewis

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Members of the U.S. House of Representatives held a moment of silence Monday in honor of Georgia congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis, who died last week at age 80.The veteran lawmaker and son of sharecroppers was heavily involved in the 1960s civil rights movement, from speaking at the monumental 1963 March on Washington, to marching in his native Alabama in 1965. During a Selma-to-Montgomery march that year, Lewis was beaten badly as he and other protesters attempted to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge to get to the state capital. Lewis suffered a fractured skull during the confrontation with state troopers. The violence came to be known as “Bloody Sunday.”According to a bio about Mourners of the late Rep. John Lewis, a pioneer of the civil rights movement and long-time member of the U.S. House of Representatives, hold a vigil in his memory in Atlanta, Georgia, July 19, 2020.Lewis served as the congressman for Georgia’s 5th District from his first election in 1987 until the day he died. Lewis passed away on Friday, about seven months after he was diagnosed with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer.House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer also gave a tribute to Lewis Monday.Hoyer said that Lewis was “a veteran legislator and person of wisdom and experience” who “still carried in his heart the same energy, optimism, and determined spirit that he bore in his youth. John never stopped being the young man who dreamed of change and knew it could be achieved.”Hoyer concluded by stating, “He was our inspiration, he was our guide, he was our friend, he was our colleague. As I said on Saturday morning, there is a hole in the heart of America.”House Speaker Nancy Pelosi walks towards the House Chamber at the Capitol, July 20, 2020, in Washington. Pelosi, who presided over a moment of silence for Georgia Rep. John Lewis, choked up recalling their last conversation the day before he died.Earlier, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in an interview on the CBS television network, noted she served with Lewis for 33 years in Congress. Pelosi told CBS’s Gayle King that Lewis “challenged our conscience in so many ways in terms of equality and justice. And it was justice for all.” Pelosi also described Lewis as “a patriot.”Separately, photos posted on Twitter showed workers putting a dark-colored drape over the door to Lewis’ Capitol Hill office, where handwritten notes had been left.State law requires that the Georgia Democratic Party appoint a nominee to replace Lewis one business day after his death. The committee in charge of appointing a nominee has announced five finalists to replace him on the ballot in November.
 
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In Fractious Washington, Debate Starts on New Coronavirus Relief Plan

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U.S. Lawmakers returned to Washington on Monday, facing crucial negotiations with President Donald Trump over the scope of a new funding package to combat the vast health and economic effects of the coronavirus pandemic in the United States. The number of newly confirmed infections has soared past 70,000 a day in the U.S. in the past week, and $600-a-week federal payments to millions of unemployed workers are expiring at the end of July. But Trump and his Republican cohorts in Congress and opposition Democrats have yet to reach a consensus on what new aid to approve and how much money to spend. Months ago, the White House and Congress approved a package of bills totaling more than $3 trillion, and there was unusual bipartisan agreement. But now, in what is likely to be the last coronavirus spending deal before the presidential and congressional elections on November 3, Trump, Republican lawmakers and Democrats are voicing an array of coronavirus priorities they need to tackle before Congress leaves Washington in three weeks for its annual August recess. It won’t return until September. White House meetingTrump met Monday with two top Republicans, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, along with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, before they begin what are expected to be contentious negotiations with Democratic leaders. U.S. Treasury Secretary Stephen Mnuchin, left, and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows attend a meeting to discuss legislation for additional coronavirus aid in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, July 20, 2020.Mnuchin said the new spending plan would focus on “kids (returning to school) and jobs and vaccines. “We want to make sure that people who can go to work safely can do so,” Mnuchin told reporters at the White House. “We’ll have tax credits that incentivize businesses to bring people back to work.” McConnell, in an effort to boost the economic recovery, wants provisions that curb the legal liability for businesses and workers from claims that they have infected customers with the coronavirus. Trump has called for a temporary end to the 7.65% payroll tax on workers’ salaries, which would benefit those who are working but not the more than 17 million unemployed U.S. workers because they currently have no paychecks to tax. Unemployment benefitsMeanwhile, Democratic lawmakers want to extend the $600-a-week federal boost to less generous state unemployment benefits through the end of 2020 and provide more aid for state and local governments to weather the coronavirus crisis. Some Republicans want to end the extra federal unemployment payments, saying they are a disincentive to push employees back to their jobs because some employees have made more money while being unemployed than they did from their salaries while working. Some lawmakers have suggested a compromise, extending the jobless benefits but cutting them to between $200 and $400 a week or limiting them to the workers who were paid the least before being laid off. U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) speaks about legislation for additional coronavirus aid during a meeting with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, July 20, 2020.McConnell has said a new coronavirus spending deal could total about $1 trillion, but Democrats want a much bigger plan, more in line with the $3 trillion measure the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives approved in mid-May. That package, however, has languished in the Republican-controlled Senate even as Democrats have called for its passage. In an interview on the “Fox News Sunday” show, Trump advocated for the liability protection for businesses. “Businesses are going to get sued just because somebody walked in,” Trump said. “You don’t know where this virus comes from. They’ll sit down at a restaurant. They’ll sue the restaurant, the guy’s out of business.” He also said police need immunity from coronavirus lawsuits.Trump also said he “would consider” not signing the measure if it does not include cutting the payroll tax. U.S. news outlets have reported that some White House officials want to cut new funding for more coronavirus testing, but Democrats and some Republicans want the opposite: more money for testing and tracing the contacts of those infected. Negotiations Even as Trump and Republican and Democratic lawmakers have laid out their coronavirus spending priorities, there have been no negotiations over a collective package. But with the unemployment aid ending and the number of new coronavirus cases surging, there is general agreement on the need to agree on a plan before Congress departs for its summer recess. Getting to that point in politically fractious Washington could be difficult, especially with the elections in just over three months. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said late last week he had yet to hear from McConnell or Mnuchin. “Senator McConnell is trying to draft a bill in his office,” Schumer said. “But he knows that a bill just drafted by Republicans won’t become law. … McConnell knows from the previous COVID bills that to pass a bill in the Senate he’s got to work across the aisle.”  
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Reuters Exclusive: Sources Say Global Banks Scrutinize Hong Kong Clients for Pro-Democracy Ties

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Global wealth managers are examining whether their clients in Hong Kong have ties to the city’s pro-democracy movement, in an attempt to avoid getting caught in the crosshairs of China’s new national security law, according to six people with knowledge of the matter. Bankers at Credit Suisse Group AG, HSBC Holdings Plc, Julius Baer Gruppe AG and UBS Group AG, among others, are broadening scrutiny under their programs that screen clients for political and government ties and subjecting them to additional diligence requirements, these people said. The designation, called politically exposed persons, can make it more difficult or altogether prevent people from accessing banking services, depending on what the bank finds about the person’s source of wealth or financial transactions. The checks at some wealth managers have involved combing through comments made by clients and their associates in public and in media, and social media posts in the recent past, these people said. The new law prohibits what Beijing describes broadly as secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces, with up to life in prison for offenders. The sources, who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, said the broadened scrutiny of clients also applied to Hong Kong and Chinese officials who had implemented the law in anticipation of any U.S. sanctions against them. One banker at a global wealth manager that holds more than $200 billion in assets said the audit of its clients could go back as far as 2014 in some cases to gauge a client’s political stance since Hong Kong’s 2014 pro-democracy “umbrella” movement. Protesters at the time used umbrellas to shield themselves from tear gas and pepper spray deployed by police. Reuters could not learn the identities of any people who had faced enhanced scrutiny or whether the banks had decided to take any action against people identified as politically exposed. Albert Ho, a veteran Hong Kong democrat who runs a law firm and helps organize an annual candlelight vigil to commemorate victims of the June 4, 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, said he feared that people like him may face “difficulties in the times to come.” “There’s not much you can do, actually, unless you cease all our financial and banking activities in Hong Kong,” Ho said, adding he had not faced additional scrutiny from his bank as of last week. He declined to disclose the name of his bank. HSBC declined to comment specifically on the security law or any U.S. move to sanction local officials. In an emailed statement, it said, “We already have a stringent set of policies and rigorous processes in place which we apply globally.” Credit Suisse, Julius Baer and UBS declined to comment. In an emailed statement, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority said the financial hub implements anti-money laundering requirements “based on international standards including with regard to politically exposed persons.” “The relevant international standards and our guidance to the banking industry have not changed,” the city’s de facto central bank said. China’s Foreign Ministry, the Liaison Office in Hong Kong and the State Council’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office did not respond to requests for comment. Banks in focus 
Global banks have long examined the backgrounds of their clients, including screening them for political ties, to satisfy regulatory requirements. Politicians, government officials and senior executives at state-owned enterprises, as well as their family members, are typically considered politically exposed persons. The rules are meant to enforce laws such as international sanctions and to prevent people from using the banking system to launder ill-gotten wealth. The banks’ move to subject supporters of Hong Kong’s democracy movement to a similar review comes at a time when the stance of some firms on the Chinese law has drawn scrutiny from Western lawmakers and activists. HSBC and Standard Chartered Plc, which have expressed support of the national security law, for example, have faced criticism from UK officials that their actions enabled Beijing to undermine the rule of law in the former British colony. The two London-headquartered banks have said they believed the law would restore stability in Hong Kong. Both Hong Kong and Chinese officials have said the law was vital to plug holes in national security defenses, rejecting criticism from governments, including the United States and the United Kingdom, that China was violating its promise to safeguard Hong Kong’s freedom for 50 years after the 1997 handover.   Regulatory risks  Some wealth managers in Hong Kong say they are worried about the regulatory and reputation risks to their banks if charges under the sweeping security law are brought against some of their politically linked clients, three of the sources said. A top executive at a regional wealth manager said that his firm’s risk and compliance team prepared a list of top 10 Hong Kong individuals identified in local media as pro-democracy sympathizers within a couple of days of the enactment of the law on July 1, the anniversary of the handover. The executive said their firm checked its internal database to see if they had existing relationship with any of them and were “quite relieved” to see that they didn’t. Several elements of the law deal with the seizure of assets, including provisions to give a new police unit greater powers to freeze and confiscate funds and property as well as greater powers to obtain information. Companies can also face penalties, ranging from fines and suspension to the loss of business licenses. One investment manager at a Hong Kong-based hedge fund said he expected more people to come under scrutiny from their bankers now. “I think that if even a moderate democrat came through the door wanting to invest, you’d be thinking long and hard after this law,” the fund manager said.  
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UK Suspends Extradition Arrangements With Hong Kong

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Britain’s government suspended its extradition treaty with Hong Kong on Monday and blocked arms sales to the former British territory, after China imposed a tough new national security law.
As tensions grow with Beijing, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said he had concerns about the new law and about alleged human rights abuses in China in particularly in regard to the treatment of the Uighur minority. He described the measures being taken Monday as “reasonable and proportionate.”
“We will protect our vital interests,” Raab said. “We will stand up for our values and we will hold China to its international obligations.
Raab followed the example of the United States, Australia and Canada by suspending extradition arrangements with the territory.
The arms embargo extends a measure in place for China since 1989. It means that Britain will allow no exports of potentially lethal weapons, their components or ammunition as well as equipment that might be used for internal repression such as shackles, firearms and smoke grenades.
The review of the extradition measures comes only days after Britain backtracked on plans to give Chinese telecommunications company Huawei a role in the U.K.’s new high-speed mobile phone network amid security concerns fueled by rising tensions between Beijing and Western powers.
Johnson’s government has already criticized China’s decision to impose a sweeping new national security law on Hong Kong. The U.K. has accused the Beijing government of a serious breach of the Sino-British Joint Declaration under which the U.K. returned control of Hong Kong to China in 1997, and announced it would open a special route to citizenship for up to 3 million eligible residents of the community.
Beijing has objected to the move. China’s ambassador to Britain, Liu Xiaoming, recently described the offer as “gross interference” in Chinese affairs.  
Liu told the BBC’s Andrew Marr on Sunday that Britain was “dancing to the tune” of the U.S. and rejected the allegations of human rights abuses against the mainly-Muslim Uighur people.
He accused Western countries of trying to foment trouble with China.  
“People say China (is) becoming very aggressive. That’s totally wrong,” he told the BBC “China has not changed. It’s Western countries, headed by United States — they started this so-called new Cold War on China.” 
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Frankfurt Security Officials Ban Parties After Saturday Riot

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Police and security officials in Frankfurt, Germany, announced Monday they have banned late gatherings in that city’s opera square after a party there turned violent over the weekend, resulting in 39 arrests.The square – known locally as the “Opernplatz” – had become a popular gathering place for what locals called “corona parties” as German clubs and bars remain closed because of the COVID pandemic.  Officials say as many as 3,000 people attended such a gathering Saturday and it was mostly peaceful through the night. But Frankfurt police chief Gerhard Beres said in early hours of Sunday, a brawl broke out and as police moved to stop it and help a bleeding man, the crowd turned on them, pelting them with bottles.Beres said police arrested 39 suspected bottle-throwers, eight of whom were still in custody Sunday. Police said 29 of the 39 suspects arrested came to Frankfurt from outside.At a news conference in Frankfurt Monday, Beres, and Frankfurt Security Chief Markus Frank condemned the actions of those who committed the violence and announced the square would now be closed after midnight Fridays and Saturdays. He said the goal was to send a signal to “troublemakers” that “it is just not worth it to come to Frankfurt.” 
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COVID-19 Diaries: Can Tanzania Really Be Coronavirus-Free?

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Kenya-based reporter Ruud Elmendorp has been trapped in Tanzania for 4 months due to the Coronavirus pandemic. The country on April 29 reported 509 confirmed cases of COVID-19. No figures have been published since then.  In June, Tanzania’s president Magufuli announced the country was COVID-19 free, unlike countries surrounding Tanzania where the numbers are rising alarmingly. Ruud decided to do his own survey, and this is what he found.  Camera: Ruud Elmendorp 
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COVID-19 Diaries: Can Tanzania Really Be Coronavirus-Free? 

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Today I decided to do my own coronavirus survey, here in Dar es Salaam. Tanzania. The reason is that I am trying to deal with my confusion.   Two countries in the world don’t report cases of COVID-19 because, officially, it is not there. These are North Korea and… Tanzania. And yes, I happen to be locked down in Dar es Salaam, the main city of… Tanzania.   The number of countries that have reported cases of COVID-19 now stands at 188. I don’t know how I managed to end up in a country that claims not to have the coronavirus, but I did. My arrival in Tanzania was on March 16 and I have been here ever since, safely staying at the Mikadi Beach Camp.   The country stopped reporting cases of COVID-19 on April 29 with 509 infections at the time. But a few weeks ago, President Magufuli declared the pandemic in Tanzania officially over and said people should resume normal lives without even having to wear facemasks.   He said God had solved the issue with a divine intervention after national prayers. “Corona cannot survive in the body of Christ; it will burn,” the president had said.   However, in countries surrounding Tanzania, the number of COVID-19 cases has been rising. South Africa is recording 12,000 news cases per day on average, and in countries like Rwanda and Uganda, the virus is slowly spreading. Kenya has 500 new cases per day on average.   Furthermore Kenya and South Africa are reporting a shortage of hospital beds to take care of people who develop life-threatening symptoms.   So this morning I decided to leave our beach sanctuary, which has kept us safe for more than three months, and go for a survey in town.   The first leap of faith was taking the ferry from the southern part of the city to the central business district. As expected, the ferry was packed with people and cars, there were hardly any facemasks and no physical distancing whatsoever. Amazing, but not strange in a country that has been declared to be coronavirus-free.   I took some comfort from the fact I was wearing a fresh three-ply surgical facemask, but my best efforts to keep some kind of distance from others was in vain.   “There is no Corona in Tanzania,” said the motorbike driver who took me from the ferry into the central business district. And indeed, everywhere I looked there was the normal buzz of Dar es Salaam as I knew it from previous trips.   The shops are open, there are street markets and there are men seated on the street having their conversations. There are the people with sewing machines, the street food kiosks, all connected by the hooting of passing cars and tuk-tuks.   There were hardly any facemasks, and at times it felt like people were looking at me as an alien from outer space with my beautiful mask.   ‘There is Corona in Italy, not in Tanzania,’ said the lady at the coffee shop where I was accustomed to having a double espresso. At that moment it occurred to me that for strict Muslim women, it’s easy to comply with face covering since they were already doing that.   If there were a health crisis caused by the coronavirus, a number of vulnerable people would unfortunately die from it. So I decided to visit graveyards. This wouldn’t enable me to do a statistically reliable survey, but there should be signs of an increased death rate in the form of new graves, or a cluster of recent death dates, or signs that the graveyards are filling up.   I had seen similar signs of tragedy in Zambia during the HIV epidemic, and in Angola during the Marburg virus epidemic.   Here in Dar es Salaam, I visited three graveyards in the center of the city. To my astonishment I found one or two new graves per graveyard, with the newest one dated in June. The median age in Tanzania is low, so I would expect a lower mortality rate, but if the country was suffering a major epidemic like in the United States, Brazil or Russia, there should have been more.   Then I passed by a hospital. Entering proved difficult because of tight security. But the entrance of the main hospital in Dar es Salaam showed no signs of panic. There were no ambulances rushing in and out, no beds outside on the compound marking a crisis.   The situation looked normal except that the hospital staff were wearing facemasks, even the guards. So that was the first sign that there could be something going on, but it’s hard to draw conclusions based on only that.   It’s the same with civil servants in Tanzania; they are all wearing facemasks and gloves. Is there something we don’t know? Another sign was that the hotel where I stayed last year was closed, but that could be because of a lack of tourists. Staying in Tanzania for months, we didn’t hear about any of the lodge staff having lost relatives or friends. So is there really no coronavirus in Tanzania?   Getting weary of being locked down, last week we decided to go to a club since they are open in Tanzania. Health specialists say this poses the greatest risk of contracting the coronavirus.   We danced, we drank, we were holding each other and we laughed. It is now weeks later and none of us has developed symptoms. This can be luck, or we became asymptomatic, who knows, but still …  Maybe Tanzania just did it by closing the borders quickly and the virus never spread. Maybe the Tanzanian Covidol potion inspired on a Madagascar recipe really worked. We at least took several shots of it and we didn’t get sick.   But a few days later I spoke with a colleague working for an international organization. He warned me that the coronavirus is still around in Tanzania and should be taken seriously. He told me he and his colleagues were working from home and advised me to remain careful.   Also, there have been numerous news reports of truck drivers in Tanzania testing positive at the border with Kenya. No more going to the disco then.   It all leads to confusion in the head.   On the way back to the lodge I decided to have a Tanzanian rice pilau dish in a street restaurant, all of which are also open. This is what I used to do during normal days, and having an indigenous Tanzanian pilau again was great.   While enjoying the pilau among Tanzanians with no facemasks, I listened to a public address by President Kenyatta of Kenya, my home. He ended the lockdown of the capital Nairobi and the second city Mombasa, but maintained a curfew to control the spread of the virus. The country is recording a surge in the number of new infections, but he also has to revive the economy.   Meanwhile here in Tanzania we just don’t know what is happening. There might be an invisible danger roaming through the lively streets, or not.   Kenyatta also announced that international flights to Kenya would resume from August 1. At least from then I’ll be free to travel home from supposedly infection-free Tanzania to infected Kenya.   I’m not sure what’s wisdom because maybe there is no coronavirus in Tanzania, but I will take the risk. The coronavirus is not going to defeat me. I will go back home to my girlfriend. 
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AP Says It Will Capitalize Black But Not White

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After changing its usage rules last month to capitalize the word “Black” when used in the context of race and culture, The Associated Press on Monday said it would not do the same for “white.”
The AP said white people in general have much less shared history and culture, and don’t have the experience of being discriminated against because of skin color.
Protests following the death of George Floyd, which led to discussions of policing and Confederate symbols, also prompted many news organizations to examine their own practices and staffing. The Associated Press, whose Stylebook is widely influential in the industry, announced June 19 it would make Black uppercase.
In some ways, the decision over “white” has been more ticklish. The National Association of Black Journalists and some Black scholars have said white should be capitalized, too.
“We agree that white people’s skin color plays into systemic inequalities and injustices, and we want our journalism to robustly explore these problems,” John Daniszewski, the AP’s vice president for standards, said in a memo to staff Monday. “But capitalizing the term white, as is done by white supremacists, risks subtly conveying legitimacy to such beliefs.”
Columbia Journalism Review, the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times, NBC News and Chicago Tribune are among the organizations that have recently said they would capitalize Black but have not done so for white.
“White doesn’t represent a shared culture and history in the way Black does,” The New York Times said on July 5 in explaining its decision.
CNN, Fox News and The San Diego Union-Tribune said they will give white the uppercase, noting it was consistent with Black, Asian, Latino and other ethnic groups. Fox cited NABJ’s advice.
CBS News said it would capitalize white, although not when referring to white supremacists, white nationalists or white privilege.
Some proponents believe that keeping white lowercase is actually anti-Black, saying it perpetuates the idea that whites are the default race.
“Whiteness remains invisible, and as is the case with all power structures, its invisibility does crucial work to maintain its power,” wrote Eve Ewing, a sociologist of race and education at the University of Chicago who said she’s changed her mind on the issue over the past two years.
“In maintaining the pretense of its invisibility, whiteness maintains the pretense of its inevitability, and its innocence,” she wrote on the website Nora.
Kwame Anthony Appiah, a philosophy professor at New York University, wrote in the Atlantic that capitalizing white would take power away from racists, since their similar use “would no longer be a provocative defiance of the norm.”
The AP checked with a variety of experts and sources in making its decision.
“We will closely watch how usage and thought evolves, and will periodically review our decision,” Daniszewski said.
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Separatists Protest Spanish Royals’ Visit to Rural Catalonia 

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Hundreds of Catalan independence supporters protested the visit of King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia on Monday to the northeastern region as part of a royal tour across Spain that is meant to bolster spirits amid the coronavirus pandemic. The visit came as a barrage of media leaks accuse the king’s father, former monarch Juan Carlos I, of allegedly hiding millions of untaxed euros in offshore funds.  Prosecutors in the country’s Supreme Court are determining whether the king emeritus can be investigated for receiving the funds from Saudi Arabia, possibly as kickbacks for a high-speed railway project. Juan Carlos hasn’t publicly addressed the allegations against him. The scandal is the latest to rock the Spanish royal family. In mid-March, it prompted Felipe to renounce any inheritance he could receive from his father and stripped him of the annual stipend as king emeritus. Juan Carlos abdicated on behalf of his son in 2014. With that backdrop, the royal couple launched a visit to all of Spain’s 17 regions that was designed as a show of support for the citizens and the economy as it recovers from the first wave of the pandemic.  The Catalan leg of the tour was initially planned for last week covering several towns and Barcelona, but the monarchy said it had postponed it and scaled it back to a short visit to a monastery because of the spike in virus cases in and around the regional capital. Protesters on Monday carried photos of Felipe upside down and letters completing the sentence “Catalonia doesn’t have a king” during a march organized by ANC, the region’s largest pro-independence civil society group.  The march was headed to the Royal Monastery of Poblet, where the king and the queen were visiting, but police blocked access at the main road. Some of the activists tried to reach the monastery by venturing into nearby vineyards. Spain’s Health Minister Salvador Illa, left, Spain’s King Felipe VI, third left, and Queen Letizia, third right, visit the Royal Monastery of Poblet, northeastern Spain, July 20, 2020.High-speed and regular trains in and out of the northern Catalan city of Girona were also delayed or cancelled due to “acts of vandalism,” according to a tweet by Spain’s railway infrastructure operator, ADIF. A photo circulated on messaging apps showed tires burning on railways next to a sign showing a crossed out upside down image of a crown. Tensions between separatists in Catalonia, which has a population of 7.5 million, and those in support of Spanish unity came to a head in late 2017 following a banned referendum met with police violence that led to the prosecution of top elected officials and activists.  
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Human Rights Watch Reveals Widespread Abuse of Japanese Child Athletes

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A new report by Human Rights Watch has outlined physical, verbal and even sexual abuses allegedly suffered by child athletes in Japan. Investigators say they uncovered numerous incidents of young athletes being punched, kicked, slapped, choked or struck with various objects and deprived of food and water, along with sexual abuse and harassment. They say the abuses led to victims suffering from depression, physical disabilities, lifelong trauma, and in a handful of cases, suicides.   There was no comment from Japan’s Olympic Committee. The report, titled, “I Was Hit So Many Times I Can’t Count,” says one instance of suicide involved a 17-year-old high school basketball player in Osaka who suffered repeated physical abuse at the hands of his coach.   The report from HRW comes seven years after Japanese sports authorities vowed to end the practice of corporal punishment in youth sports known as “taibatsu,” after allegations surfaced amid Tokyo’s successful bid for the 2020 Summer Olympics.   The report was based on interviews with 50 athletes from across several sports, as well as more than 700 athletes who participated in an online survey, including Olympians and Paralympians. The report was released the day the 2020 Tokyo Olympics — which have been postponed a year due to the coronavirus pandemic — were due to begin.  “As Japan prepares to host the Olympics and Paralympics in Tokyo in July 2021,” said Minky Worden, director of global initiatives at Human Rights Watch, “the global spotlight brings a once-in-a-generation opportunity to change laws and policies in Japan and around the world to protect millions of child athletes.”   
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Federal Forces Tear Gas Oregon Protesters, Portland Police Say 

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Portland police early Monday detailed another night of conflict between protesters and federal forces outside the U.S. courthouse in Oregon’s largest city, including a small fire outside the building and tear gas deployed to disperse the crowd.A department statement said police officers did not engage with the the crowd, and that federal authorities periodically came of out of the courthouse to keep demonstrators at bay, according to police and news outlets.  Video posted online also showed protesters taking down fencing that had surrounded the courthouse. “Dozens of people with shields, helmets, gas masks, umbrellas, bats, and hockey sticks approached the doors” before federal law enforcement came out and dispersed the crowd,” police said. “At 1:34 a.m. people lit a fire within the portico in front of the federal courthouse. Others gathered around the fire adding wood and other debris to make it larger. At 1:42 a.m. federal law enforcement came out of the courthouse, dispersed the crowd and extinguished the fire,” the statement  said. Gas was used at least twice to remove protesters, the statement said, but Portland officers “were not present during any of the activity” or deploy any “CS gas.” The statement comes as some local and state leaders have voiced their displeasure with the presence of federal agents in the city that has seen protests every day since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis nearly two months ago.  Speaking on CNN’s ‘State of the Union,’ Democratic Mayor Ted Wheeler said federal officers “are not wanted here. We haven’t asked them here. In fact, we want them to leave.” Top leaders in the U.S. House said Sunday they were “alarmed” by the Trump administration’s tactics against protesters in Portland and other cities, including Washington, D.C. They’ve called on federal inspectors general investigate.A protester walks away from chemical irritants as federal agents use crowd control munitions to disperse Black Lives Matter protesters at the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse, July 19, 2020, in Portland, Oregan. “This is a matter of utmost urgency,” wrote House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-New York, Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson, D-Mississippi, and Oversight and Reform Committee Chairwoman Carolyn B. Maloney, D-New York, in a letter to the inspectors general of Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security. The Democratic lawmakers are seeking an investigation “into the use of federal law enforcement agencies by the Attorney General and the Acting Secretary of Homeland Security to suppress First Amendment protected activities in Washington, D.C., Portland, and other communities across the United States.” President Donald Trump has decried the demonstrations, and Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf blasted the protesters as “lawless anarchists” in a visit to the city last Thursday. “We are trying to help Portland, not hurt it,” Trump tweeted Sunday. “Their leadership has, for months, lost control of the anarchists and agitators. They are missing in action. We must protect Federal property, AND OUR PEOPLE. These were not merely protesters, these are the real deal!” Late Saturday, Portland police declared demonstrations near the federal courthouse a riot after saying protesters broke into the Portland Police Association building and started a fire. Dumpster fires were also set and fencing was moved and made into barricades, police said. Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum sued Homeland Security and the Marshals Service in federal court late Friday. The complaint said unidentified federal agents have grabbed people off Portland’s streets “without warning or explanation, without a warrant, and without providing any way to determine who is directing this action.” Rosenblum said she was seeking a temporary restraining order to “immediately stop federal authorities from unlawfully detaining Oregonians.” It’s unclear whether anyone was arrested or detained during the protest Sunday night.  
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Did China Block Vietnam Offshore Oil Contract?

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The sudden cancellation of an offshore drilling project commissioned by Vietnam is raising fears that the Chinese government pressured it to stop, part of Beijing’s ongoing maritime sovereignty spat with Hanoi.   London-based drilling contractor Noble Corp. said July 9 its Noble Clyde Boudreaux semi-submersible had cancelled a previously announced project with Vietnam. News reports placed the drilling site off Vietnam’s east coast in a zone watched by Chinese survey vessels.   It’s unclear whether officials from Beijing forced the cancelation, but they have pressured other Vietnamese seabed oil drilling contracts in the past. The two countries contest nearby tracts of the broader South China Sea.   “They’re playing some kind of cat and mouse with China,” said Oh Ei Sun, senior fellow with the Singapore Institute of International Affairs. If, he said, “they’re doing drilling here and the Chinese vessel came, they might stop it for a few days or months and then resume it, and so on.”   Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Taiwan also claim all or parts of the 3.5 million-square-kilometer waterway, which is prized for fisheries as well as fossil fuel reserves. China says about 90% of the sea should come under its flag. Beijing has taken a military lead over other countries over the past decade.   Radio Free Asia reported July 13 that Vietnam had cancelled the contract as the Chinese government squeezes Southeast Asian nations that try to exploit South China Sea resources with foreign partners. A Chinese coast guard vessel is “patrolling” now near another Vietnamese oil rig, the report says.   FILE – A ship (top) of the Chinese Coast Guard is seen near a ship of the Vietnam Marine Guard in the South China Sea, about 210 km (130 miles) off shore of Vietnam, May 14, 2014.China has sent two survey ships to waters near Vietnam this year to date. China and Vietnam have rammed each other’s boats in the past. Their vessels got tangled in deadly clashes in 1974 and 1988.   In 2018, Spanish driller Repsol suddenly quit a Vietnamese project at the South China Sea feature Vanguard Bank, apparently under pressure from China. Vietnam still had outposts at the submerged feature as of mid-2019.   But Vietnam has not openly challenged China over the Noble Clyde project cancelation. Noble Corp. did not respond Monday to a request for comment.   Vietnam relies on oil drilling for resources, Oh said, and the Southeast Asian country has a history of “standing up” to China.   “Vietnam is known to stand up for its interests and they don’t want to be seen to be backing down from any kind of pressure from China, because the moment they do that, they would be susceptible to all kinds of pressure, domestically and in China,” said Eduardo Araral, associate professor at the National University of Singapore’s public policy school.   Hanoi may be waiting to see whether the United States acts on its behalf, analysts believe.   U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo said last week his government would help South China Sea claimant states if violated by China. He hinted at using diplomatic and legal means and rejected China’s legal claims to the sea. China cites historic records to justify its use of the waters.   “Vietnam feels the threats from China, and maybe it will hamper their behavior in the South China Sea if the U.S. doesn’t move forward,” said Nguyen Thanh Trung, Center for International Studies director at University of Social Sciences and Humanities in Ho Chi Minh City.  The United States might intervene if it suits President Donald Trump’s politics but avoid armed conflict, said Alan Chong, associate professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.   Trump has ramped up military, trade and economic pressure on China, a fellow superpower and former Cold War foe, since taking office in 2017. A reelection campaign and the COVID-19 crisis now dominate Trump’s agenda.   “I wouldn’t put it past him, if it suited him as a tactical move, but in terms of an actual intervention military wise, I don’t think that is a possibility given the domestic distractions at the moment,” Chong said.   Vietnam will nevertheless be “extremely happy” with Pompeo’s statement since its language supports the Vietnamese claim to an exclusive economic zone in the contested sea, said Derek Grossman, senior analyst with the Rand Corp. research institution in the United States. 
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Prominent Hong Kong Democracy Activist Files Candidacy for Legislature   

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Joshua Wong, one of the leaders of Hong Kong’s 2014 pro-democracy “Umbrella Movement,” is officially running for a seat in the city’s legislature, despite the new national security law imposed by Beijing. Wong filed his candidacy papers Monday to run in the September legislative elections.  He was one of several young activists and so-called “localist” candidates who won a majority of races in unofficial primaries staged more than a week ago by Hong Kong’s pro-democracy parties, despite warnings from both Hong Kong and China that the vote might run afoul of the new national security law. FILE – People queue up to vote in Hong Kong, July 12, 2020, in an unofficial primary for pro-democracy candidates ahead of legislative elections in September.Pro-democracy forces are aiming to win a parliamentary majority that could block passage of the budget and other key legislation, and thereby force the resignation of Chief Executive Carrie Lam. Holding up his application for candidacy, Wong said that even with the possibility of being extradited to China and imprisoned, “I still hope to run for office and receive people’s mandate, and let the world know that we will continue our fight until our last breath.” Under the new law, anyone in Hong Kong believed to be carrying out terrorism, separatism, subversion of state power or collusion with foreign forces could be tried and face life in prison if convicted.   Chinese state media have repeatedly accused Wong and  other prominent pro-democracy figures of “collusion with foreign powers” for their engagements with U.S. and other foreign governments.  The 23-year-old Wong was one of the leaders of the massive demonstrations that shut down much of Hong Kong in an unsuccessful attempt to win full democracy for the self-autonomous city.   The new national security law was a response to the massive and often violent pro-democracy demonstrations that engulfed the financial hub in the last half of 2019. Western governments and human rights advocates say the measure effectively ends the autonomy guaranteed under the pact that switched control of Hong Kong from Britain to China in 1997. 
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No Available Beds in Nearly 50 Florida Hospital ICU Units

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Forty-five hospitals in the southern U.S. state of Florida reported Monday having no intensive care beds available, as the surge in coronavirus cases in the United States puts a strain on the health care system. The state reported more than 12,000 new cases Sunday, its fifth day in a row of reporting more than 10,000. The Miami area is particularly hard-hit, with nine of the 45 over-burdened hospitals located in Miami-Dade County. Francis Suarez, the mayor of the city of Miami, instituted tougher fines starting Monday for anyone cited for not wearing a mask in public, with penalties starting at $50 for a first offense and rising as high as $500 for repeat offenders. On the other side of the country, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said Sunday he is “on the brink” of issuing another stay-at-home order for the nation’s second largest city. Garcetti blamed the Trump administration for what he called a lack of national leadership in battling the disease.  “This was politicized when it should have been unified. We were left on our own when we should have had help,” he told CNN Sunday. “We know this will be a marathon. Stop telling people this will be over soon. … If we don’t come together as a nation with national leadership, we will see more people die.”   Nationwide, the United States recorded more than 500 deaths and 63,000 new confirmed cases Sunday and by far leads the world in totals for both categories. In Europe, leaders are focused on recovery from the economic aspect of the pandemic as they try to agree on a rescue package of hundreds of billions of dollars. EU leaders meet on the sidelines of an EU summit at the European Council building in Brussels, July 19, 2020.The talks were targeted to end Saturday, but with different parts of the continent unable to agree on the exact scope of the measure and whether it should contain strict spending controls, negotiations continued into Monday. Europe has more than 3 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 and more than 200,000 deaths.  The coronavirus has pushed the European Union into a deep recession, with economists predicting the bloc’s economy will shrink 8.3% this year.  Health officials in South Korea reported improvement Monday with 26 new confirmed cases, but only four that were locally transmitted, marking the lowest such number in two months. Vice Health Minister Kim Gang-lip urged people to stay vigilant in their efforts to stop the spread of the virus, encouraging them to avoid large crowds and consider staying home during the summer holiday period. The president of Chile, the world’s largest producer of copper, has announced a five-part plan to reopen the country after some regions showed improvement in the rate of infections.    “These five weeks of improvement allow us to start a new stage today,” President Sebastian Pinera said Sunday. “This plan, which will be step by step, cautiously, prudently, will be applied gradually and flexibly,” he said.    According to the World Health Organization, Chile had 2,300 new cases Sunday, pushing its total to more than 328,000 confirmed cases and nearly 8,500 deaths. 
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Iran Executes a Man Accused of Spying for the US and Israel 

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Iran’s judiciary says a former translator Monday, whom the government accused of spying for U.S. and Israeli intelligence, and of helping to locate Revolutionary Guards commander Qassem Soleimani has been executed. Soleimani was killed in an America drone attack earlier this year.  The execution of Mahmoud Mousavi-Majd, who was arrested in 2018, comes as millions of Iranians have taken to social media to protest the death sentences of three young men accused of participating in anti-government protests last November.Trump Warns Iran Not to Execute 3 Protesters as Their Lawyers Request RetrialLawyers for 3 men sentenced to death for joining November 2019 antigovernment protests in Iran said Wednesday they asked for a retrial One of their attorneys, Babak Paknia, said Sunday that their executions had been suspended. The lawyer identified the three as friends Amirhossein Moradi, a 26-year-old retail worker, Said Tamjidi, a 28-year-old driver for Snapp (Iran’s Uber), and Mohammad Rajabi, also 26 and unemployed. The country’s Supreme Court decided to review their case, state TV also reported on Sunday. “Suspension of execution of three sentenced-to-death defendants and re-examination of the file, after follow-ups of the lawyers of the three defendants accused of robbery by using force, as well as rioting in last year’s November protests, on implementation of Article 474 which means re-examination of the lawsuit, the Supreme Court of the country has accepted their appeal,” Ali Zohourian IRIB newsreader reported. Rights activists said the sentences for the three men were aimed at discouraging future protests and intimidating potential participants. The Farsi hashtag “Don’t execute” was re-tweeted millions of times last week. Meanwhile, state news agency IRNA quoted Iranian police as saying Monday that they had arrested people participating in last week’s protest in Behbahan city, in the southwest of the country, for “an illegal and norm-breaking gathering.”    The number of those arrested and their identities were not revealed. 
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The Unlikely Story of the First ‘Made in Vietnam’ Ventilators to Fight COVID-19

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In times of war, factories were converted from making cars to making tanks and ships. In the time of the coronavirus, Vietnam has retooled a smartphone factory to churn out life-critical ventilators. For many nations fighting COVID-19, ventilators have highlighted a struggle of life and death and of medical shortages. For Vietnam, which reported no local COVID-19 cases in three months, the ventilators are an unlikely story of a little engine that could — that is, could produce machines for a world in a pandemic.  A conglomerate, Vingroup, founded by Vietnam’s richest man, had never dabbled in medical devices before the pandemic, but now makes ventilators at a cost of $7,000 a piece, which is 30% less than the price of the Medtronic model on which they’re based, according to Bloomberg News. While other nations scramble to save patients and supply hospitals, Vietnam has the bandwidth to shift focus to making those supplies, in part, because it tackled the coronavirus early, resulting in 382 cases for all of 2020. Despite its smaller economy, Vietnam is now donating ventilators, masks, and other aid to richer nations. Many ‘firsts’ for Vietnam Vingroup announced this month that its first batch of ventilators have rolled off the factory line and been donated to Singapore, Russia, and Ukraine. The larger economies are still in the thick of the COVID-19 fight. Russia last week was accused of hacking western scientists for a vaccine, while Singapore reached the most COVID-19 cases in Southeast Asia in April after it overlooked its migrant worker population. “We have all seen the mutual support in the hardest of periods,” the Ambassador of Russia to Vietnam Konstantin Vnukov said this month. “The ceremony of awarding ventilators to the Russian Federation today continued to affirm our fruitful friendship.” When installing ventilators, all technicians must use gloves according to technical standards to ensure the quality of assembly.Vingroup has become a sprawling company that operates in nearly every sector in Vietnam. Billionaire Pham Nhat Vuong, who founded the company, told Bloomberg he wants it to keep helping the fast-growing nation reach milestone after milestone. That ranges from Vinfast, the first consumer car produced in and by Vietnam, to ventilators now, a crucial product that has become highly sought after amid the COVID-19 emergency.  No cases since April Perhaps no other company is as identified with Vietnam’s national brand as Vingroup. It has worked closely with the government to get its ventilators up to technical standards and approved to be shipped.  “The Ministry of Health will continue to accompany Vingroup and other manufacturers to develop products and facilitate early evaluation to put products into production, meeting the needs of society in the control and prevention of COVID-19,” said Nguyen Minh Tuan, the Director of the Department of Medical Equipment and Health Works under the Ministry of Health, in a press release sent out by Vingroup.  The company’s steps during the COVID-19 emergency have moved in parallel with those of the state. Vietnam identified domestic cases of the coronavirus early on, quarantined patients and two layers of their contacts, and restricted movement before the virus could become unmanageable. Without any local infections since April, the communist nation then lent its disease-fighting powers abroad, sending donations of ventilators, test kits, masks and other aid to recipients from Europe to Laos.  Vingroup said it does not make a profit on the ventilators and sent 500 to Russia, 300 to Ukraine and 200 to Singapore. It aims to ship another 1,600 machines by the end of August and to produce as many as 55,000 units a month. The ventilators are based on open-source technology made available through the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the company said. If Vingroup was to consider moving to mass production and profit making on the ventilators, government approval would be needed.   
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EU Leaders in Extended Talks to Find Agreement on Financial Package

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European Union leaders took a break Monday morning on their fourth day of talks aimed at agreeing on a $2 trillion budget and funding to help member states cope with the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. The negotiations, which were originally meant to run only through Saturday, were due to resume Monday afternoon. Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said the leaders were making progress, and Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said that while the negotiations have been tough, “we can be very satisfied with today’s result.”EU leaders summit in Brussels, July 19, 2020.The past few days have been defined by a divide that has pitted five wealthy northern European countries – Austria, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and Sweden – against southern nations that have been hit hardest by the coronavirus and which have the support of Germany and France. The northern countries have advocated instituting strict spending controls as part of any deal, while others such as Italy and Spain have sought to minimize such conditions. EU nations have experienced 135,000 deaths from COVID-19, with Italy, France and Spain having among the highest death tolls in the world. The lockdown orders instituted by many governments to stop the spread of the virus have hurt the EU economy, with economists forecasting an 8.3% contraction this year. 
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Downed Ukrainian Airline’s Flight Data Recorders in France for Analysis

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Canada’s Foreign Minister François-Philippe Champagne said the flight data recorders from a Ukrainian passenger plane downed by an Iranian missile are in Paris where they are expected to be taken to France’s Civil Aviation Safety Investigation Authority for analysis Monday. Champagne said on Twitter that officials from Canada’s Transportation Safety Board will be present for the investigation. Most of the 176 people on board the plane were Canadian citizens or residents, or were traveling to Canada.People gather for a candlelight vigil to honor the victims of the Ukraine plane crash, at the gate of Amrikabir University, where some of the victims were former students, in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 11, 2020.Iran says its military accidentally shot down the Ukraine Airlines plane in January, shortly after it took off from Tehran’s airport, mistaking it for an incoming missile. The incident happened during a time of heightened tensions between Iran and the United States, just after Iran had launched missiles at several bases in Iraq in response to the U.S. killing of top Iranian general Qassim Soleimani. Canada, Ukraine and other nations whose nationals were on board the plane have demanded a thorough investigation, and the analysis of the so-called black box recorders recovered from the wreckage has been the subject of negotiation. The plane was manufactured by Boeing, a U.S. company, and due to U.S. sanctions on Iran the United States rejected sending Iran a piece of equipment needed to recover the data from the recorders. 
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Mali Opposition Party Rejects Mediators Plan to End Political Crisis

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Mali’s main political opposition has rejected a plan by regional mediators aimed at ending an escalating political crisis in a country already dealing with a violent Islamic insurgency. The June 5 Movement turned down a plan Sunday by negotiators with the West African regional bloc ECOWAS (Economic Community of West African States) that would call on President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita to form a unity government with the opposition party. The embattled president has already conceded to a previous opposition demand  to dissolve the country’s Constitutional Court.  But the June 5 Movement has remained steadfast in its demand for President Keita’s resignation, as the West African nation remains mired in an economic crisis, corruption, and the eight-year-old Islamic insurgency in central Mali. Anger is also brewing about the results of 31 legislative races that remain in dispute. The political stalemate has led to violent clashes between anti-government demonstrators and security forces that have left at least 14 protestors dead and another 154 injured. ECOWAS has rejected the opposition’s demand for Keita’s resignation. 
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No Available Beds in 50 Florida Hospital ICU Units

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The coronavirus outbreak in Florida grew more dire Sunday as nearly 50 hospitals throughout the state say they have no available beds in their intensive care units. The state is not only the COVID epicenter in the United States, it is one of the world’s hot spots, with more than 12,000 new cases reported Sunday – the fifth straight day that number exceeded 10,000. Miami Mayor Francis Suarez is making mask wearing in public mandatory. Starting Monday, anyone without a face covering gets an immediate $50 fine. A third offense brings a $500 fine. Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber has issued an 8pm curfew for the famed South Beach area, home to countless bars and nightclubs.  “There has been some adherence to the mask rules, not nearly enough. At some points, it was resembling a bit of a party, an outdoor party. We can’t have anything resembling Bourbon Street (in New Orleans) right now in our community,” said Gelber.  In Europe, the focus is on recovery from the pandemic.   European Council President Charles Michel said Sunday that European leaders need to overcome their differences and agree on a budget and a continentwide COVID-19 recovery fund. The 27 European Union leaders appeared to be at an impasse Sunday night on a $2.1 trillion budget that includes $858 billion specifically earmarked to help businesses and others affected by the coronavirus pandemic. “Are the 27 EU leaders capable of building European unity and trust or, because of a deep rift, will we present ourselves as a weak Europe, undermined by distrust,” he implored, telling the leaders to think about the more than 600,000 COVID deaths worldwide.EU leaders meet on the sidelines of an EU summit at the European Council building in Brussels, July 19, 2020.Europe has more than 3 million confirmed cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus as of Sunday, according to data from the World Health Organization (WHO), and more than 200,000 deaths. The coronavirus has pushed the EU into a deep recession, with economists predicting the bloc’s economy will shrink a staggering 8.3% this year. Reporters in Brussels say the dispute is between five wealthier northern EU nations, dubbed “the frugals,” who want stricter controls on spending than southern nations hit hardest by the pandemic, including Italy and Spain, are willing to accept. In the United States, where new COVID-19 case number records are set nearly every day, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti says he is “on the brink” of issuing another stay-at-home order in the country’s second biggest city. This would be the third time since March he made such a decision. Garcetti blames the White House for what he calls a lack of national leadership in battling the disease. “This was politicized when it should have been unified. We were left on our own when we should have had help,” he told CNN Sunday. “We know this will be a marathon. Stop telling people this will be over soon. … If we don’t come together as a nation with national leadership, we will see more people die.”  California Governor Gavin Newsome last week again closed bars and restaurants across the state because of the surge in new cases.  The U.S. reported 67,574 new cases of COVID-19, for a total of nearly 3.7 million confirmed cases, and nearly 140,000 deaths, according to data Sunday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).  The president of Chile, the world’s largest producer of copper, has announced a five-part plan to reopen the country he calls “Step by Step.” “These five weeks of improvement allow us to start a new stage today,” President Sebastian Pinera said Sunday. “This plan, which will be step by step, cautiously, prudently, will be applied gradually and flexibly,” he said. Pinera announced plans to reopen Chile after some of the country’s regions have shown improvement in the rate of infections. According to the WHO, Chile had 2,300 new cases Sunday, more than 328,000 confirmed cases and nearly 8,500 deaths as of Sunday. Nigerian Foreign Minister Geoffrey Onyeama announced he has COVID-19 after his fourth test for the virus came back positive. He said he went for the test at the first sign of a throat irritation. He joins more than 36,000 of his countrymen who have tested positive, according to WHO data. Nearly 800 Nigerians have died of the disease, the WHO data says. Onyeama said he is going to be isolated in a health facility, but did not sound too worried, tweeting Sunday “That is life. Win some, lose some.”  One of life’s biggest winners revealed Sunday that he and his wife had COVID-19 when the pandemic started to take hold in April. Golf legend Jack Nicklaus told the TV audience watching the PGA Memorial tournament that he and his wife, Barbara, tested positive for the coronavirus but were “done with it” by the third week in April.  “It didn’t last very long, and we were very, very fortunate, very lucky,” Nicklaus said. “Barbara and I are both of the age, both of us 80 years old, that is an at-risk age. Our hearts go out to the people who did lose their lives and their families. We were just a couple of the lucky ones.” 
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Trump, Republican Leaders to Discuss Virus Aid as Crisis Deepens

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Top Republicans in Congress were expecting to meet Monday with President Donald Trump on the next COVID-19 aid package as the administration panned more virus testing money and interjected other priorities that could complicate quick passage.Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was prepared to roll out the $1 trillion package in a matter of days. But divisions between the Senate GOP majority and the White House posed fresh challenges. Congress was returning to session this week as the coronavirus crisis many had hoped would have improved by now only worsened — and just as earlier federal emergency relief was expiring.Trump insisted again Sunday that the virus would “disappear,” but the president’s view did not at all match projections from the leading health professionals straining to halt the U.S.’s alarming caseloads and death toll.McConnell and House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy were set to meet with Trump and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin “to fine-tune” the legislation, acting chief of staff Mark Meadows said on Fox News.The package from McConnell had been quietly crafted behind closed doors for weeks and was expected to include $75 billion to help schools reopen, reduced unemployment benefits alongside a fresh round of direct $1,200 cash payments to Americans, and a sweeping five-year liability shield against coronavirus lawsuits.But as the White House weighed in, the administration was panning some $25 billion in proposed new funds for testing and tracing, said one Republican familiar with the discussions. The administration’s objections were first reported by The Washington Post.Trump was also reviving his push for a payroll tax break, which was being seriously considered, said another Republican. Both spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private talks.The new push from the White House put the administration at odds with GOP allies in Congress, a disconnect that threatened to upend an already difficult legislative process. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi already passed Democrats’ vast $3 trillion proposal and virus cases and deaths had only increased since.FILE – Health care workers take information from people in line at a walk-up COVID-19 testing site during the coronavirus pandemic, in Miami Beach, Florida, July 17, 2020.Trump raised alarms on Capitol Hill when he suggested last month at a rally in Oklahoma that he wanted to slow virus testing. Some of Trump’s GOP allies wanted new money to help test and track the virus to contain its spread. Senate Democrats were investigating why the Trump administration had not yet spent some of $25 billion previously allocated for testing in an earlier aid bill.The payroll tax Trump wanted also divided his party. Senate Republicans in particular opposed the payroll tax break as an insufficient response to millions of out-of-work Americans, especially as they tried to keep the total price tag of the aid package at no more than $1 trillion.Trump said Sunday in the Fox News interview that he would consider not signing any bill unless it included the payroll tax break, which many GOP senators opposed.”I want to see it,” he said.Lawmakers were returning to a partially closed Capitol still off-limits to tourists to consider what will be a fifth COVID-19 aid package. After passing the $2.2 trillion relief bill in March, Republicans hoped the virus would ease and economy rebound so more aid would not be needed.But with COVID-19 cases hitting alarming new highs and the death roll rising, the pandemic’s devastating cycle was happening all over again, leaving Congress little choice but to engineer another costly rescue. Businesses were shutting down again, schools could not fully reopen and jobs were disappearing, all while federal emergency aid expired.”It’s not going to magically disappear,” said a somber McConnell, R-Ky., last week during a visit to a hospital in his home state to thank front-line workers.As McConnell prepared to roll out his $1 trillion-plus proposal, he acknowledged it would not have full support.The political stakes were high for all sides before the November election, but even more so for the nation, which now registered more coronavirus infections and a higher death count than any other country.Just as the pandemic’s ferocious cycle was starting again, the first round of aid was running out.A federal $600-a-week boost to regular unemployment benefits would expire at the end of the month. So, too, would the federal ban on evictions on millions of rental units.With 17 straight weeks of unemployment claims topping 1 million — usually about 200,000 — many households were facing a cash crunch and losing employer-backed health insurance coverage.Despite flickers of an economic upswing as states eased stay-at-home orders in May and June, the jobless rate remained at double digits, higher than it ever was in the last decade’s Great Recession.Pelosi’s bill, approved in May, included $75 billion for testing and tracing to try to get a handle on the virus spread, funneled $100 billion to schools to safely reopen and called for $1 trillion to be sent to cash-strapped states to pay essential workers and prevent layoffs. The measure would give cash stipends to Americans, and bolster rental and mortgage and other safety net protections.In the two months since Pelosi’s bill passed, the U.S. had 50,000 more deaths and 2 million more infections.”If we don’t invest the money now, it will be much worse,” Pelosi said. 
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