Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has lifted the state of emergency for Tokyo and four neighboring prefectures imposed last month at the height of the coronavirus outbreak. The move ends nationwide restrictions as businesses begin to reopen their doors. 
 
The prime minister announced the move Monday during a televised speech, hours after a special coronavirus panel approved a plan to lift the decree for the Japanese capital and its surrounding areas. The decision was made after the number of new infections began trending downward.    Men, wearing face masks, walk at a park in Yokohama, near Tokyo, May 14, 2020, after Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced the lifting of a coronavirus state of emergency in most of the country except for several high-risk areas.The prime minister initially declared a 30-day state of emergency on April 7 for Tokyo and six other prefectures, including the central port city of Osaka, as the number of COVID-19 infections began to rise. Prime Minister Abe extended the measure nationwide just a few days before it was set to expire, then gradually lifted it as the outbreak appeared to ease. The decree was set to expire on May 31. The COVID-19 disease is caused by the coronavirus. 
 
The emergency declaration stopped short of imposing a legally binding nationwide lockdown, due to Japan’s post-World War II constitution, which weighs heavily in favor of civil liberties.   
 
Japan currently has more than 16,500 confirmed cases of COVID-19 infections with  820 deaths, a relatively low figure compared with other nations. Abe said Monday that the country’s success in containing the coronavirus in such a short period of time showed the strength of the “Japan model.” 
 A masked woman walks past an electronic stock board showing Japan’s Nikkei 225 index at a securities firm in Tokyo, May 21, 2020.The outbreak, however, has pushed the Japanese economy into a recession and forced postponement of the Tokyo Summer Olympic Games for a year. Abe’s approval ratings have also plunged to record lows due to his apparent slow response to the pandemic. 
 
Also Monday, Japan’s professional baseball league announced that its season will begin on June 19 after a delay of nearly three months because of the outbreak.  Commissioner Atsushi Saito said no fans will be allowed into the stadiums when the league begins play, becoming the first major professional sport in Japan to return to action since the start of the pandemic.          
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Asian markets are in mixed territory Monday. Tokyo’s Nikkei index closed 1.7% higher on news that the government was set to lift the coronavirus state of emergency on Tokyo, while the Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index is 0.15% lower as the financial hub was rocked by new protests over China’s proposed national security law critics say will bring an end to the city’s semi-autonomous status. Shanghai’s index closed slightly (0.15%) higher, while Sydney’s S&P/ASX is up over 2%. Seoul’s KOSPI is up 1.2%, while Taiwan’s TSEC index finished the trading day 0.5% higher. In oil trading, U.S. crude oil is $33.60 per barrel, up 1%, while the international standard, Brent crude, is $35.27 per barrel, up 0.4%.   All three U.S. stock exchanges will be closed in observance of Monday’s Memorial Day holiday.  
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Uighur community members in the United States are expressing skepticism after the Chinese government media in a series of separate videos showed their families in Xinjiang allegedly denouncing their detention as propaganda.
 
Those Uighurs say their family members, after disappearing for years, are now reaching out to them via Chinese social media platforms to discourage them from speaking out against the crackdown in Xinjiang region.
 
One of the Uighurs residing in the U.S., Samira Imin, told VOA that China Daily earlier this month showed her father, Iminjan Seydin, in a video on its Twitter account after he had gone missing in a Chinese detention camp for more than two years. Seydin also contacted Imin via WeChat, rejecting his detention and telling his daughter that she was “deceived by anti-China forces.””In our first online conversation on WeChat, after (nearly) three years, he is demanding me to delete my posts in the past and not publish anything on social media apps such as Twitter,” Imin, a 27-year-old medical worker in Boston, told VOA. She said she is convinced that her father has been coerced by Chinese authorities to ask her halt pro-Uighur activism.
 
“The Chinese government’s attempt to control my actions and thoughts through my father is not acceptable,” she said, adding “I want my father to be free from all types of state surveillance. I want to have normal conversations with him.”
 ‘Inciting extremism’Before his arrest in mid-2017, Seydin was a full-time professor of Chinese history at the Xinjiang Islamic Institute in the region’s capital Urumqi. At the same time, he owned a publishing organization called the Imin Publishing House, which since its inception in 2012, had printed nearly 50 books on topics such as language, education, technology and psychology.
 
Imin said she did not know the whereabouts of her father for months until 2019 when her contacts in Beijing said he was put in a so-called “re-education camp.” She was told Seydin was sentenced to 15 years in prison for “inciting extremism” in a secret trial.FILE – Security cameras are seen above the perimeter fence of what is officially known as a vocational skills education center in Dabancheng, in Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, China, Sept. 4, 2018. Critics call these centers “re-education camps.Imin has since garnered the power of social media to raise awareness about the Uighur plight and demand her father’s release who she says was arrested for publishing an Arabic grammar book.
 
Imin is not the only Uighur abroad who has found her family on Chinese media after being missing for years.
 
Kuzzat Altay, 36, found his father, Memet Kadir, in a video by China’s state media Global Times in January. The 68-year-old had been missing for about two years.
 
“For up to two years, I just didn’t know if he was alive or not. All of a sudden, I see my father denouncing me on Chinese state TV saying that I should stop my activism or he would sever his blood relation with me,” Altay said, adding that his father looked half paralyzed and his statements were staged.
 
The young Uighur activist fled Xinjiang in 2005 and moved to McLean, Virginia where he heads the Uighur American Association. He started his activism after his father, in a voice message in February 2018, told him that the Chinese police were taking him to an internment camp in Xinjiang’s capital Urumqi.
 ‘My father did need skills’
 
“My father was a healthy retired businessman and he didn’t need any skills training to find a job as China claims what the camps are for. He was capable of creating jobs, not in need of a job. But they took him in anyway,” Altay told VOA.
 
Confident that his father has been compelled to appear on the Chinese media, he said, “I ask China to let my father come to the U.S. and testify as he did in Global Times video.”
 
Rights organizations say China since late 2016 has started a systematic campaign of massive surveillance and arbitrary detention of Uighurs and other Muslim minorities in the northwest region of Xinjiang.  The U.N. earlier this year demanded ‘unfettered access’ to the region where as many as a million people could be held.FILE – Uighur activists and their supporters rally in defense of Uighur rights in China, in front of the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, in New York City, Feb. 5, 2019.The Chinese government, however, is rejecting the accusations saying it is running a “transformation-through-education centers” campaign in Xinjiang. Chinese officials have called the camps “vocational training” facilities for people who were exposed to “ideas of extremism and terrorism.” In other occasions, the officials have said the camps teach the people skills needed to undertake new jobs.
 
Francisco Bencosme, the Asia Pacific Advocacy Manager at Amnesty International USA, told VOA that the growing number of videos coming out of Xinjiang are the latest “harassment” effort by Beijing against vocal Uighurs abroad who are lobbying for their people in Xinjiang. He said his organization has documented many such cases which are “really chilling and extremely concerning.”
 
“They are just a part of a larger pattern where China has used forced confessions and coercion of family members to silence activists,” said Bencosme.
 Online harassment
 
According to Louisa Greve, a global advocacy director for the Uyghur Human Rights Project, the attempt to undermine Uighur voices abroad is already taking a toll on the activists. She said they are “secondary survivors of this total persecution” and many of them are suffering from trauma.
 
“They are always being put in a dilemma of fear and guilt of whether they are causing more suffering to their family in China by speaking out. It is despicable,” said Greve.
 
Among the Uighurs who remained quiet for a while after she lost contact with her mother in September 2018 is Ziba Murat. She told VOA that she initially thought inaction was the best she could do for her mother. Her relatives in Xinjiang told her that her online activism could prove more harmful to their cause.
 
“Staying silent became unbearable,” said the Tampa, Florida-based 34-year-old corporate analyst and mother of a toddler. She said her family has yet to hear about her mother, Gulshan Abbas, who was a retired dermatologist from a hospital in Urumqi before suddenly disappearing in late 2018.
 
“There is still that fear inside me that I might put somebody back home in jeopardy. But If I don’t speak out then who will speak out for my mom…I will speak out more and more until they release her,” she told VOA.
 
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Britain and other Western countries have been naive in thinking they can tame China’s Communist leaders by “cozying up” to them, says Britain’s last governor of Hong Kong. As protests rage in Hong Kong over a new security law, Christopher Patten says successive governments have fallen for a myth about China “that somehow at the end of all the kowtowing there’s this great pot of gold waiting for us.” “We keep on kidding ourselves that unless we do everything that China wants we will somehow miss out on great trading opportunities. It’s drivel,” he told Britain’s The Times newspaper on Saturday. In an excoriating interview, focused mainly on Hong Kong and the Chinese government’s decision this week to sidestep the island’s legislature and to force through a new draconian national security law that would allow Beijing to stifle political dissent in the enclave, Patten said,“ What we are seeing is a new Chinese dictatorship.” Patten, who served in the Cabinets of British prime ministers Margaret Thatcher and John Major, and is now chancellor of Oxford University, oversaw Britain’s handover of Hong Kong to China in 1997.  He was Britain’s lead negotiator in the talks that led to the Joint Declaration, an international treaty meant to guarantee political and economic freedoms in Hong Kong until 2047. The declaration established the principle of “one nation-two systems.” His intervention came as clamor mounted in Britain’s parliament for a review of the country’s relationship with China.  British lawmakers accuse China of using the coronavirus pandemic, which they say spread globally as a result of Beijing’s efforts to cover up the initial outbreak, to extend its global reach.  A newly-formed Conservative group in the House of Commons called the China Research Group, is urging Prime Minister Boris Johnson to take a robust line with China’s communist leaders, saying that Beijing’s move to stamp out political opposition in Hong Kong should serve as a “final wake-up call.” Hong Kong Police Use Force to Disperse Rally Against Beijing Security LawChina reveals plans to bypass Hong Kong’s legislature to impose a new national security law to prevent and punish acts of ‘secession, subversion or terrorism activities’Last week British newspapers reported that Johnson had instructed officials to draft plans to end Britain’s reliance on China for vital medical supplies and other strategic imports in light of the coronavirus crisis.  According to a recent think tank report, Britain is strategically dependent on China for 71 critical goods categories.  These include pharmaceutical ingredients and consumer electronics including mobile phones and laptops, according to trade data analyzed by the Henry Jackson Society, a foreign policy think tank based in London. Prime Minister Johnson is also reportedly considering reversing a previous decision and to reduce the role of Chinese tech giant Huawei in the building of Britain’s future 5G phone network. U.S. officials have been urging London for months on security grounds to block Huawei from participating in the development of the network. Patten welcomed the idea of possibly excluding Huawei’s involvement, saying,“ If people argue we should deal with Huawei because they’re just like any other multinational company, that is for the birds: if they come under pressure from the Communist government to do things which are thought to be in Beijing’s interest they will do it.” “We need an urgent rethink of our approach,” says Neil O’Brien, a Conservative lawmaker and co-founder of the China Research Group. He and other like-minded MPs are now calling for the British government to offer political asylum to any citizens of Hong Kong who fear the loss of basic rights such as freedom of speech and to make it easier for Hong Kongers to live and work in Britain. On Friday, Dominic Raab, Britain’s foreign secretary, issued a joint statement with his Canadian and Australian counterparts expressing “deep concern.” The foreign ministers said:“ Making such a law on Hong Kong’s behalf without the direct participation of its people, legislature or judiciary would clearly undermine the principle of ‘one country, two systems ’under which Hong Kong is guaranteed a high degree of autonomy.” Their condemnation was echoed by Mike Pompeo, the U.S. secretary of state.  China has defended the new security law for Hong Kong, saying that pro-democracy agitation in Hong Kong poses a security risk to the whole of the country.  Analysts say while the world is distracted by the coronavirus pandemic, Beijing is becoming more expansionist. Critics note that last week the National People’s Congress reaffirmed its traditional goal to “reunify” with Taiwan, but for the first time dropped the word “peaceful” in the text outlining the aim. The omission has rattled Taiwan. According to Chinese media reports, a war games exercise is being planned by the People’s Liberation Army in the coming weeks which will involve a simulated large-scale landing on Taiwanese territory. “It’s not just Hong Kong,” says Patten. “We need to have a review across government and get real. China cheats, it tries to screw things in its own favor, and if you ever point this out these ‘wolf warrior ’diplomats try to bully and hector you into submission. It’s got to stop otherwise the world is going to be a much less safe place and liberal democracy around the world is going to be destabilized,” he warned.  
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Hong Kong police fired tear gas and used water cannon and pepper spray Sunday on thousands of protesters who turned out in droves to demonstrate against Beijing’s plan to impose national security laws on the Asian financial hub.China Friday revealed its plan to bypass Hong Kong’s legislature to impose a national security law on Hong Kong to prevent and punish acts of “secession, subversion or terrorism activities” that threaten national security.The move, which would also allow Chinese national security organs to set up agencies in Hong Kong, has been widely criticized around the world, with the U.S. threatening consequences for China.On Sunday afternoon, thousands congregated in the downtown shopping districts of Causeway Bay and Wanchai, chanting anti-government slogans and singing “Glory to Hong Kong” – an unofficial anthem of the ongoing anti-government protest movement, which started last June.Pro-democracy protesters march during a protest against Beijing’s national security legislation in Hong Kong, May 24, 2020.The unapproved demonstration was originally intended to protest against another controversial law that would criminalize the mockery of the Chinese national anthem, but China’s plan to introduce national security law revealed in last week’s annual parliamentary meeting prompted more people to turn up on Sunday.In contrast with the jovial atmosphere of approved protests in the past, a sense of nervousness and despondency pervaded in the unsanctioned protest Sunday, as protesters said they felt helpless in the face of the imminent enactment of the national security law, which is almost certain to pass next week at China’s National People’s Congress.“I know it’s dangerous to come out today, but I am here precisely because the national security law is so dangerous,” said a said a 63-year-old wheel chair-bound man named Wong, who would not give his first name.A 64-year-old woman who would not reveal her name said she wanted to “support our young people.“I feel so sorry for our children and grandchildren, they have to live under China’s national security law,” she said.Riot police detain a protester during a demonstration against Beijing’s national security legislation in Causeway Bay in Hong Kong, May 24, 2020.A young father dressed in black who was holding the hands of his two young sons said, “We have done no wrong.  It’s them who are afraid, not us.”A young man waved a flag emblazoned with the message “Hong Kong Independence” and said he wanted to do “the right thing,” even if it meant going to jail under the new law forced upon Hong Kong.Most of the slogans protesters chanted, such as “Rejuvenate Hong Kong, revolution of our time” or “Fight for freedom, Stand with Hong Kong” were often used in past protests, but the slogan “Hong Kong Independence, the only way” was heard for the first time, indicating people’s increasing antagonism towards China.Until now, protesters over the past year largely targeted the Hong Kong government, as the controversial extradition law which triggered the protests was supposedly initiated by the city’s own government.Police fired the first shot of tear gas 30 minutes into the initially peaceful rally, driving protesters running into side streets as shops and buildings hurriedly shuttered.  Police later unleashed water cannon on protesters.  Some protesters smashed traffic lights, blocked traffic with trash bins, traffic cones and railings, dug up bricks, and set small fires. Anti-government protesters run away from tear gas during a march against Beijing’s plans to impose national security legislation in Hong Kong, China, May 24, 2020.The police anti-riot vehicle shot out several bursts of a clear liquid in mid-afternoon, while more rounds of tear gas was fired on busy shopping streets.  Police said some officers retreated after firing multiple rounds of tear gas, because people started throwing objects at them.  They also shot pepper-balls.Police said at least three officers were hurt after they were allegedly struck by bricks thrown at the police.  They said glass bottles were thrown down from buildings.  By late afternoon, the police said, more than 120 people had been arrested, mostly on illegal assembly charges.“Police are taking resolute action to make arrests and to stop the unlawful and violent acts,” a statement said.Earlier in the day, more than 20 pro-democracy politicians and activists staged smaller protests in groups of eight, to comply with social distancing rules in front of China’s liaison office against the proposed national security law.”Under a tyrant, nobody is safe,” former legislator Leung Kwok-Hung said. “Under the state security law, nobody is safe.” 
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Hong Kong police fired tear gas and pepper spray at hundreds of people protesting a proposed new security law they believe infringes on the city’s freedoms.The demonstrators chanted pro-democracy slogans as riot police using loudspeakers ordered them to disperse, calling the gathering unlawful.The proposed bill introduced Friday at the opening session of China’s national legislative body forbids secessionist and subversive activities, and what it labels foreign interference and terrorism.About 200 political figures from around the world, including 17 members of the U.S. Congress, signed a joint statement Saturday saying Beijing’s proposed laws are a “comprehensive assault on the city’s autonomy, rule of law and fundamental freedoms.”The statement also said the proposed bill constituted a “flagrant breach” of the Joint Declaration which returned the former British colony to China in 1997 under the framework of “one country, two systems.” 
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In its biggest relaxation of COVID-19 controls, New South Wales, Australia’s most populous state, is to allow bars, cafes and restaurants to serve up to 50 people at a time starting June 1, although strict hygiene rules will still apply.Each person must have at least 4 square meters of space. Patrons will not be permitted to stand, mingle or dance. Currently, venues are allowed to host up to 10 diners. Authorities in New South Wales say a further relaxation of the regulations on June 1 is a “big step” in the state’s economic recovery from the new coronavirus.“This will be with very strict guidelines in place,” State Premier Gladys Berejiklian said. “It has to be in adherence to the 4-square-meter rule, so some venues are small in space. They will only be able to have as many customers as is allowed in that space according to the 4-square-meter rule, and nobody will be able to take bookings of more than 10 people. Nobody will be able to be standing up in these venues. You have to be seated at a table even if it is a pub.”Other states and territories in Australia’s federated system have different approaches to winding back lockdown restrictions. In South Australia, pubs can serve food to up to 20 diners; 10 inside and 10 more outside. In the state of Victoria, authorities are taking a phased approach to reopening the hospitality industry. By mid-July up to 100 people will be permitted to eat at a cafe or restaurant. In Western Australia, public swimming pools, libraries and places of worship can reopen under strict distancing and hygiene regulations.Easing disease controls will boost the Australian economy, which is facing its biggest contraction ever because of the COVID-19 crisis.An administrative bungle has forced the federal government to revise a historic economic rescue package announced in March. Officials had said mammoth wage subsidies would keep 6.5 million Australians in work during lockdowns. They now say mistakes in applications from businesses mean the plan will now cover 3.5 million workers, cutting the cost from $85 billion to $45 billion.Opposition Labor leader Anthony Albanese said it’s an embarrassing error.“This is a mistake you could have seen from space, and this is a government that could not run a bath,” he said. “How about someone in this government accept responsibility just once?”Just over 7,000 confirmed coronavirus cases have been recorded in Australia since the disease was first reported here in late January. As of Saturday, 102 people had died. 
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Once poised to become a global leader in the coming advent of 5G wireless networks, Chinese tech giant Huawei warns its survival is at stake following the latest U.S. decision to cut it off from semiconductor suppliers.”Survival is the key for us now,” said Guo Ping, rotating chairman at Huawei’s annual analyst conference on Monday. “We will now work hard to figure out how to survive.”Washington’s latest ban, announced by the U.S. Commerce Department on Friday, requires foreign manufacturers using U.S. chipmaking gear to get a license before being allowed to sell semiconductors to Huawei.The United States has long been concerned about the security implications of Huawei’s 5G network, contending that the technology could be used to spy on Americans, allegations the Chinese tech firm has repeatedly denied.In its first official reaction to the new planned U.S. restrictions, Huawei says it is undertaking a comprehensive examination of this new rule.”We expect that our business will inevitably be affected,” Huawei said in a statement.Cutting off global suppliersIn May 2019, the Commerce Department added Huawei and 114 of its overseas-related affiliates to the Export Administration Regulations Entity List, requiring U.S. companies wishing to export their items to Huawei and its affiliates to obtain a license. However, the department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) said last Friday that Huawei has continued to use U.S. software and technology to design semiconductors, undermining the national security and foreign policy purposes of the Entity List.In an email to VOA, Kevin Wolf, former head of the Commerce Department’s export control section,  said the rule thus expands the scope of the Export Administration Regulations (EAR)  Entity List-related prohibitions “over otherwise uncontrolled foreign-made commodities, software, and technology outside the United States related to computers, telecommunications, and electronics, particularly semiconductors, in Huawei’s contract manufacturing supply chain.”Huawei has in recent years successfully developed five series of chips that are used in different products.Huawei has used Taiwan’s chipmaker TSMC to fabricate some of its key components, and under the new restriction, Huawei’s access to TSMC could be limited.
 
Because Huawei and its designated affiliates are on the EAR’s Entity List, “applications for licenses to ship such foreign-made items to the listed Huawei entities will be presumptively denied,” said Wolf, now a Washington lawyer.Huawei has been looking to diversify its chip production to the Shanghai-based firm SMIC. However, analysts said that SMIC does not have the ability to produce all the chips Huawei needs.John Feffer, director of Foreign Policy in Focus at the Institute for Policy Studies, said this new U.S. Commerce Department restriction will hurt Huawei a great deal in the short term, “since it relies on TSMC for 90% of Huawei’s smartphone chips.”By some analysis, Huawei has about 50 core foreign suppliers, and TSMC is only one of them. “Other major suppliers would also be subject to the same restriction, since they also use U.S.-made equipment.” Feffer told VOA in an email.Huawei remains defiantOne day after the latest U.S. ban, Huawei posted a headline on its official Weibo account that reads, “Apart from victory, we have nowhere to go.” Under the slogan is a photo featuring an Ilyushin Il-2 aircraft that keeps flying, despite being hit by antiaircraft shells and machine-gun fire during World War II. While Huawei’s chairman said Monday the company is now fighting for survival, Guo also said there is no doubt that the tech giant will pull through.”Huawei is confident that this aircraft will continue to fly forward, and Huawei will never give up.” said Guo.Gan Bin, Huawei’s vice president in charge of the company’s 5G development, claims China has a complete supply chain.”Regardless of base stations and terminals, China has a complete 5G industry chain, including equipment manufacturing,” Gan said in a keynote speech at a 5G forum held in Beijing on Sunday.Shen Dingli, a professor of international relations at Fudan University in Shanghai, said he believes the new U.S. restriction will bring certain challenges to Huawei, but the Chinese firm can survive.”This might hinder Huawei’s competitiveness, but will not suppress its domestic market and certain international market,” said Shen.Hours after the U.S. ban was published on the Commerce Department’s website, a huge package of investment in chipset development, $1.5 billion from China’s National Integrated Circuit Fund II, and $750 million from the Shanghai Integrated Circuit Fund II, were announced by the Chinese government.”In the medium term, it’s possible that with an enormous amount of investment provided by the Chinese government combined with corporate R&D spending, the domestic industry can address the current technology gap between the capabilities of the TSMC and U.S. technology supply chain, ” said Ross Darrell Feingold, a lawyer and political risk analyst.US-China relations affectedThe latest ban on Huawei has also dealt a fresh blow to the already souring ties between the U.S. and China amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.China on Sunday warned it would retaliate to protect Huawei.”China will take all necessary measures to resolutely protect the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese firms,” an unidentified spokesperson for China’s Commerce Ministry said in a statement.On Saturday, China’s Foreign Ministry called on the United States to stop its “unreasonable suppression” of Huawei and other Chinese companies. The Foreign Ministry told Reuters that it would “firmly defend its companies’ legal rights,” in response to a question about possible retaliation in response to the U.S.While the Chinese government ministries did not directly threaten to push back in their response, Global Times, a Beijing-controlled publication, Friday quoted an anonymous source as saying China was planning countermeasures, such as “imposing restrictions” against U.S. companies like Apple, Cisco and Qualcomm. The source also suggested China may stop buying Boeing airplanes.Jin Canrong, associate dean of Renmin University of China’s School of International Studies in Beijing, said Monday on Weibo, a Twitter-like social media platform, theU.S. decision could seriously affect U.S.-China relations.“It may affect Huawei’s bottom line and even survival, but it will definitely actually affect the future direction of the entire Sino-U.S. relationship,” said Jin. “The U.S. decision will surely open a Pandora’s box.”
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China’s No. 2 leader on Friday promised higher spending to revive its pandemic-stricken economy and curb surging job losses but avoided launching a massive stimulus on the scale of the United States or Japan.  
Premier Li Keqiang told lawmakers Beijing would set no economic growth target, usually a closely watched feature of government plans, in order to focus on fighting the outbreak. The virus battle “has not yet come to an end,” Li warned.  
Also Friday, legislators took up a proposed national security law  for Hong Kong that reflects Beijing’s desire to tighten control over the former British colony. No details were released, but Washington has warned it might withdraw Hong Kong’s preferential trade status if the “high degree of autonomy” promised by the mainland is eroded.
The coronavirus pandemic that prompted China to isolate cities with a total population of 60 million people has added to strains for the ruling Communist Party that include anti-government protests in Hong Kong and a tariff war with Washington.  
China has reported 83,000 virus cases and 4,634 deaths from the virus. It was the first country to shut down factories, shops and travel to fight the pandemic and the first to reopen in March but it is still struggling to revive activity.
Private sector analysts say as much as 30% of the urban workforce, or as many as 130 million people, have lost their jobs at least temporarily. They say as many as 25 million jobs might be lost for good this year.
Beijing will give local governments 2 trillion yuan ($280 billion) to spend on preventing job losses, making sure the public’s basic needs are met and helping private companies survive, Li said.  
The government’s budget deficit will swell by 1 trillion yuan ($140 billion) this year to help meet targets including creating 9 million new urban jobs, Li said. That is in line with expectations for higher spending but a fraction of the $1 trillion-plus stimulus packages launched or discussed by the United States, Japan and Europe.  
“These are extraordinary measures for an unusual time,” the premier said in the nationally televised speech.  
The world’s second-largest economy contracted by 6.8% over a year earlier in the three months ending in March after factories, offices, travel and other businesses were shut down to fight the virus. Forecasters expect little to no growth this year, down from 2019’s 6.1%, already a multi-decade low.  
The big deficit “indicates significant policy support for the domestic recovery,” Louis Kuijs of Oxford Economics said in a report.  
However, Beijing is reluctant to launch a stimulus that would add to already high Chinese debt and strains on the financial system, Kuijs said.
Li also promised to work with Washington to carry out the truce signed in January in their fight over Beijing’s technology ambitions and trade surplus. The premier gave no details, but President Donald Trump has threatened to back out of the deal if China fails to buy more American exports.  
Strains with Washington have been aggravated by Trump’s accusations that Beijing is to blame for the virus’s global spread.  
Also Friday, the government announced the military budget, the world’s second-biggest after the United States, will rise 6.6% to 1.3 trillion yuan ($178 billion). The military budget excludes some large items including acquisitions of major weapons systems.
This year’s annual session of the ceremonial National People’s Congress is being held under intensive anti-disease controls. Officials are holding news conferences by video instead of meeting reporters face to face. Reporters are required to undergo laboratory tests for the virus before being allowed into the press center.
Li said the proposed Hong Kong law would create “enforcement mechanisms for safeguarding national security.”
Beijing has pushed for measures in Hong Kong such as punishment for showing disrespect for the Chinese flag and increasing patriotic-themed education in schools.  
Friday’s move appears to have been prompted by anti-government protests in Hong Kong that began in June over a proposed extradition law and have expanded to cover other grievances and demands for more democracy. A similar measure was withdrawn from Hong Kong’s legislature in 2003 following massive public protests.
The Trump administration is delaying submission to Congress of a report on Hong Kong’s status to see whether the NPC takes steps that “further undermine” its autonomy, said a spokesman for the American Embassy in Beijing.
“Any effort to impose national security legislation that does not reflect the will of the people of Hong Kong would be highly destabilizing, and would be met with strong condemnation from the United States and the international community,” the spokesman, Frank Whitaker, said in an email.
Hong Kong’s main stock market index tumbled 5.6% on the news. Other Asian markets also  declined due to concern about U.S.-Chinese tension but none by such a wide margin.
Traders are waiting to see “how severe the terms are” and the White House response, said market analyst Stephen Innes of AxiCorp in a report.
Li urged officials to make progress in an array of areas including employment, trade, attracting foreign investment, meeting the public’s basic living needs and ensuring the stability of industrial supply chains.
Ensuring economic growth is “of crucial significance” even though Beijing set no official target, Li said. Pressure on employment has “risen significantly,” he said.  
Automakers and other manufacturers say production has rebounded almost to normal levels, but consumer spending, the main engine of economic growth, is weak amid widespread worries about potential job losses.
Forecasters say China is likely to face a “W-shaped recovery” with a second downturn and millions of politically volatile job losses later in the year due to weak U.S. and European demand for Chinese exports.  
The ruling party hopes to achieve longer-term goals this year including eliminating rural poverty despite virus-related disruptions of efforts to double economic output and incomes from 2010 levels by this year.  
“We will give priority to stabilizing employment and ensuring people’s livelihood, resolutely win the battle to overcome poverty,” the premier said.
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Hong Kong has prohibited a planned annual march to mourn the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown and effectively banned a candlelit annual vigil that has taken place without interruption for 30 years, the organizer said Thursday.The Hong Kong police banned a march and two rallies that were to take place on May 31, citing the risk of COVID-19 infection, said Richard Tsoi, spokesman for the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China. The government has also effectively banned the vigil for the Tiananmen Square massacre, which has taken place annually since 1990 and been attended by tens of thousands, sometimes more than 100,000, people.  Tsoi said while police have yet to formally respond to an application for the annual vigil, to be held in Victoria Park, they were not optimistic.Tsoi expressed his group’s dissatisfaction with the government’s decision.“I can’t believe there had been no political considerations in killing these protest events,” he told VOA, adding that social distancing measures have eased for many other gatherings.  After many days without local transmissions of COVID-19, the authorities have in recent weeks announced the easing of some restrictions, including allowing restaurants, bars and many public facilities including swimming pools and libraries to reopen, but not sports grounds.  Saunas, party venues, nightclubs and karaoke bars will reopen May 28 while students from upper forms at high schools can return to their classrooms starting May 27.Hong Kong’s secretary for food and health, Sophia Chan, told reporters Tuesday authorities had extended social distancing measures for 14 days, limiting gatherings to eight until June 4, which is the crackdown anniversary.  The restrictions, implemented to prevent the spread of COVID-19, were to expire Thursday.The extension means the annual June 4 vigil led by pro-democracy groups can’t be held at the massive lawn and football grounds at downtown Victoria Park for the first time in three decades but officials dismissed allegations that political considerations were involved. Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam listens to reporter’s question during a press conference in Hong Kong, Tuesday, May 19, 2020.Hong Kong’s leader Carrie Lam said decisions on social distancing measures were purely based on the public health and safety and not political considerations.Critics have accused police and government authorities of using anti-epidemic laws to bar protests, which have been emerging amid increasing encroachments by Beijing.  Police have in past weeks broken up protests at shopping centers, treated protesters and journalists roughly and arrested dozens of people. Pro-democracy lawmaker Wu Chi-wai, the chairman of Democratic Party, said in a Legislative Council session Thursday that the coronavirus restrictions have become “a tool for the crackdown on the freedom of speech and assembly.”He said it was possible for protests and rallies to take place while respecting social distancing rules, but the police were using the pandemic as a pretext to stop demonstrations.    Lee Cheuk-yan, chairman of the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, said the Tiananmen vigil represented “a litmus test for one country, two systems.””We have to have a plan B,” Lee was quoted by Reuters as saying. “Instead of one point, we will do it everywhere, still with the powerful candlelight to condemn the massacre and mourn for those who died in 1989.”The actual number of deaths from the crackdown on the Tiananmen prodemocracy movement remains unknown as China has never provided a full accounting of the incident.The death toll given by officials days after the 1989 crackdown was about 300, most of them soldiers, with only 23 students confirmed killed. A secret diplomatic cable from then-British ambassador to Beijing, Alan Donald, dated June 5, 1989, and released in  2017, said the Chinese army killed at least 10,000 people. This death toll is much higher than previously cited estimates, which ranged from hundreds to about 3,000. 
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Researchers say stress and alcohol consumption during the COVID-19 pandemic are likely to increase rates of family violence in Australia.  Research has found that a fifth of Australians have bought more alcohol than usual during lockdowns. Of those, 70% are drinking more. Health campaigns are urging Australians not to turn to alcohol because of concerns about the coronavirus.“None of us could ever imagine finding ourself in this situation, so it is OK to feel stressed, it is OK to feel anxious and a little bit uncertain.  But we just need to be careful that we are not using alcohol to try to cover all of that up.”  Recent research, though, shows that 20% of Australian households have bought more alcohol than usual during the crisis.  Caterina Giorgi is the chief executive of Australia’s Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education.“We found that 1 in 5 households are purchasing more alcohol, and when we looked at these households, we found that 70% are drinking more and that a third are worried about their drinking or the drinking of someone in their household,” said Giorgi. “We also found that these people are drinking earlier in the day and they are more likely to drink daily, and that contributes to larger problems down the track, including alcohol dependence and alcohol-fueled chronic diseases like cancer.” There are likely to be other more sinister consequences, too.  Australian courts have heard more cases of domestic violence, and paramedics are responding to more emergency calls.  The police have conducted dozens of random checks on known offenders and victims.  In the Northern Territory, doctors have reported a 15% increase in the number of people requiring surgery due to family violence.  Collated national figures are not yet available, but Nicole Lee, a professor at Curtin University’s National Drug Research Institute, believes rates of domestic abuse will increase.“Alcohol consumption has got quite a complex relationship with family violence, but while we don’t have any data about the rates of family violence during lockdown, I expect that we would see an increase in family violence,” said Lee. “That is especially likely because [of] increased stress in the household and increases in unemployment.” More funding is being given to crisis support services for victims of violence in the home.  Australia’s alcohol industry denies the survey findings.  It says overall Australian beer, wine and spirits consumption is lower than it was a year ago because of pandemic-related closures of pubs, bars and restaurants. 
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Asian markets closed mostly lower Thursday as investors reacted to bad economic news from Japan, and to China’s worsening trade and diplomatic relations with Australia and the United States.Tokyo’s benchmark Nikkei index lost 0.2 percent at its closing bell after the government announced that Japan’s exports fell 21.9 percent last month, the biggest drop since the 2008 global financial crisis. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index was down 0.4 percent in late afternoon trading, while Shanghai was 0.5 percent lower and the S&P/ASX 500 in Sydney was down 0.4 percent. Seoul closed 0.4 percent higher, and Taipei posted a 0.9 percent increase.Monday’s major rally on global markets after news of a potential coronavirus vaccine faded after Beijing imposed massive tariffs on Australian barley imports, plus the Trump administration’s increasingly heated rhetoric against China over its initial response to the coronavirus pandemic, which was first detected late last year in Wuhan.The Dow Jones, S&P 500 and Nasdaq are all lower in futures trading, indicating a lower opening on Wall Street Thursday.Oil markets are in positive territory Thursday, with U.S. crude trading at $34.11 per barrel, up 1.85 percent, while Brent crude, the international benchmark, is trading at $36.29 per barrel, up 1.5 percent.
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