The Trump administration is making ever louder pronouncements casting blame on China for the COVID-19 pandemic, aiming to sidestep domestic criticism of the president’s own response, tarnish China’s global reputation and give the U.S. leverage on trade and other aspects of U.S.-China competition.  President Donald Trump has vowed to penalize China for what U.S. officials have increasingly described as a pattern of deceit that denied the world precious time to prepare for the pandemic. The opening salvo isn’t in the form of tariffs or sanctions but in a one-sided accounting of China’s behavior that could yank the Chinese lower on the global reputation meter.The State Department, the Department of Homeland Security and the White House have all launched public efforts in recent days to lay bare what they say is clear evidence that China tried to mask the scale of the outbreak and then refused to provide critical access to U.S. and global scientists that could have saved lives. More than 250,000 people have died globally from COVID-19, including more than 68,000 in the U.S.The Trump administration, a senior administration official says, is trying to convince the world that China isn’t playing by the same rules as everyone else, and that may be the biggest punishment for an intensely proud emerging superpower. The official was not authorized to publicly discuss the issue and spoke only on condition of anonymity.To that end, the administration has pushed its China criticism beyond the bounds of established evidence.Trump and allies repeat and express confidence in an unsubstantiated theory linking the origin of the outbreak to a possible accident at a Chinese virology laboratory. U.S. officials say they are still exploring the subject and describe the evidence as purely circumstantial. But Trump, aides say, has embraced the notion to further highlight China’s lack of transparency.Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos” that there is “enormous evidence” that the virus began in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.  The institute, which is run by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, is about 8 miles, or 13 kilometers, from a market that is considered a possible source for the virus. It has done groundbreaking research tracing the likely origins of the SARS virus, finding new bat viruses and discovering how they could jump to people.Pompeo said China has denied the U.S. and World Health Organization access to the lab. But Trump says he has seen information that gives him a high degree of confidence that the Wuhan institute is the origin of the virus. Asked why he has such confidence, Trump said: “I can’t tell you that. I’m not allowed to tell you that.”FILE – An aerial view shows the P4 laboratory of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, in Wuhan, China, April 17, 2020.Health officials are dubious.  “From our perspective, this remains speculative,” WHO emergencies chief Dr. Michael Ryan says of the lab theory. “But like any evidence-based organization, we would be very willing to receive any information that purports to the origin of the virus.”Trump’s ouster of more than a handful of top intelligence officials has given him an additional credibility problem when it comes to the administration’s pronouncements based on intelligence.”These purges have already, I fear, politicized the intelligence community’s work in key ways,” said Mike Morell, a former acting CIA director under President Barack Obama who now hosts the “Intelligence Matters” podcast. One of our institutions critical to the pursuit of the truth has a large crack in it.”China strongly rejects Trump’s version of events.On Monday, China’s official Global Times newspaper said Pompeo was making “groundless accusations” against Beijing by suggesting the coronavirus was released from a Chinese laboratory.  The populist tabloid published by the ruling Communist Party mouthpiece People’s Daily said the claims were a politically motivated attempt to preserve Trump’s presidency and divert attention from the U.S. administration’s own failures in dealing with the outbreak.While Trump’s and Pompeo’s critical statements have been at the forefront of the administration’s anti-China rhetoric, U.S. government agencies, including the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security, have been compiling often publicly available information to try to support the allegations.DHS documents, obtained by The Associated Press on Sunday and Monday, accuse the Chinese government of intentionally downplaying the scope and severity of the spread of the virus in order to buy up international stocks of personal protective equipment and other medical supplies needed to combat the disease.Although any country might be expected to purchase large quantities of materials necessary to combat a major threat to public health, the administration has sought to portray China’s actions as secret, irresponsible and dangerous for the rest of the world.One such document, drawing from open source material, emphasizes reports about the disappearance of Chinese doctors who raised early alarms about the virus and the response, the Chinese government’s alleged suppression and destruction of virus samples and closure of relevant laboratories.  It also reports on China’s early resistance to acknowledging human-to-human transmission of COVID-19, the failure of authorities to immediately block domestic or international travel out of Wuhan and China’s opposition to calls for an international inquiry into the pandemic.The focus on China comes as Trump’s own record has faced persistent scrutiny. White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, told the AP on Monday that Trump was first briefed by intelligence agencies about the virus on Jan. 23, and then again on Jan. 28.Providing a rare glimpse into one of the most sensitive U.S. government practices, the highly classified presidential daily briefing, McEnany said it was only in that second briefing that Trump was told that the virus was spreading outside China.  Trump, she added, was told that all the deaths were still occurring inside China and that Beijing was not sharing key data. Days later, Trump moved to severely curtail travel to the U.S. from China. The White House’s descriptions of the briefing were prepared by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, a spokesperson said.But reference to the coronavirus was included in at least passing mention in the written version of the intelligence briefing on Jan. 11 and Jan. 14, according to a senior U.S. government official within the intelligence community, who said that other officials, including Defense Secretary Mark Esper, were briefed.  Officials emphasized that much of the U.S. government’s attention during that period was on Iran, after the killing of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Gen. Qasem Soleimani in a Jan 3 U.S. drone strike and the subsequent downing of Ukrainian airliner over Tehran. 
 
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It’s a side of Singapore not often seen: Colorful T-shirts hang from the bunks, or from rods attached to the beds as makeshift closets. The taupe colored walls of the dorm room are bare, except for the occasional fan jutting out. But the foreign workers’ dorms are coming into the spotlight as COVID-19 surges among their residents, forcing Singapore to bring back restrictions it thought had already stemmed the spread of the disease. The latest wave of infections, mostly among migrant workers, highlights how Singapore ricocheted from a seeming success case to having the most infections in Southeast Asia. Out of 18,778 virus cases reported by Monday, 16,393 came from workers living in dorms, according to the Singapore Ministry of Health. The workers are part of the island’s two-track economy, which attracts British traders and bankers, as well as Philippine cleaners and Bangladeshi construction workers. The latter tend to reside in dorms, bunking up to 20 people a room. “Transient Workers Count Too,” an advocacy group, said it had been warning that this crowding posed a risk for viral spread.  “There’s no denying now that density and poor ventilation in our dorms are key factors enabling pathogen transmission,” said Alex Au, the vice president of the organization.  However he said that the dorms are just a symptom of a broader issue.  “I would point out that Singapore has an addiction to cheap labor,” he said in a webinar. “We have an economic model that is reliant on them for our prosperity.”  Migrant workers are in the spotlight now because they account for the vast majority of new COVID-19 cases in Singapore, a nation better known for gleaming towers and “crazy rich” Asians than manual labor. Before then, the focus had been on the rapid response of the technocratic government, dominated by a single party. Singapore was hailed alongside states like South Korea and Taiwan because it quickly treated patients, contact traced, and cut off foreign travel.  But travel restrictions wouldn’t address domestic transmission of COVID-19, which Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said was “hidden” as it spread, particularly among laborers. Daily cases have passed 1,000 multiple times in the past three weeks, versus a few hundred before that.Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong delivers a keynote address at the IISS Shangri-la Dialogue in Singapore, May 31, 2019.Singapore’s case load of 18,778 is the highest in Southeast Asia, yet it has the smallest population in the region except for Brunei. More than one in five people in Singapore are foreign workers.  “The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that migrant workers are indispensable to the functioning of our country,” HOME, a nonprofit that helps workers with living conditions, wage theft, and employer abuse, said in a statement. “We need to make it possible for them to advocate for their own well-being and for them to speak up without fear of persecution.” Manpower Minister Josephine Teo said there is “no question” in her mind that Singapore should improve dorm conditions. In the short term her ministry is coordinating food distribution and overseeing managers who increase the cleaning of dorms. However she said the nation must overcome the virus emergency before it can address workers’ living conditions “in a dedicated way” in the long term.  The Health Ministry also said it is increasing testing in the dorms, contact tracing, and surveillance.  “In preparation for the expected increase in the number of cases, especially from the dormitories, we have rapidly expanded our healthcare capacity,” Health Minister Gan Kim Yong said Monday. “This includes both medical facilities, as well as healthcare manpower.” Part of the challenge for Singapore is the fraction of cases that are “unlinked,” meaning authorities can’t determine how the virus spread from one person to another. That’s why the prime minister warned of a “hidden reservoir” of virus cases in the community.  Beyond the pandemic, Au, the worker advocate, hopes this will be a teachable moment for Singapore to address broader issues, such as exorbitant recruiter fees and unpaid overtime for migrant workers. Labor inequities are part of a “structural problem” that leaves the nation vulnerable, Au said, adding, “It’s hard to predict where the next crisis might come from.” 
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Leaders from Australia and New Zealand are discussing the possible creation of a travel agreement— or “travel bubble” between the two nations as they begin to roll back their coronavirus-related restrictions.In March, both countries implemented strict travel restrictions, banning entry to almost all foreigners. But with coronavirus outbreaks appearing to have been brought under control, Australia and New Zealand are now seriously considering slowly lifting restrictions on flights with a possible “trans-Tasman travel bubble” later this year.New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has accepted an invitation from Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison to join in a meeting of the Australian government’s National Cabinet on Tuesday to discuss the proposal.”If there is any country in the world with whom we can reconnect with first, undoubtedly that’s New Zealand,” Morrison said during a press conference last month.New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern briefs the media about the COVID-19 coronavirus at the Parliament House in Wellington, April 27, 2020.Ardern discussed the concept of a travel agreement with reporters, suggesting that opening flights between the two nations would offer “huge advantages” to both and could help to reinvigorate their economies.Ardern, however, warned that unrestricted international travel, even with Australia, might still be further away and that more health measures will have to be implemented before the “travel bubble” can take effect.”One thing I’m not willing to do is jeopardize the position that New Zealand has got itself into by moving too soon to open our borders — even to Australia,” Ardern said in a live press conference on April 27. “Don’t expect this to happen in a couple of weeks’ time. We need to make sure we are locking in the gains all New Zealanders have helped us achieve and make sure we have health precautions in place.”New Zealand and Australia have both achieved a COVID-19 mortality rate of just 1% and managed to slow the increase in new cases. Going forward, leaders say they will continue to discuss how to prevent the possibility of a second wave of COVID-19 infections as they begin to reopen the countries and attempt to kick start industries that have been maimed by the restrictions. The coronavirus causes the COVID-19 disease.While similar precautions and restrictions were employed by the two countries to combat the spread of the coronavirus, New Zealand does not have a contact tracing app like CovidSafe, which Australia  launched last week.An illustration picture shows the new COVIDSafe app by the Australian government on a mobile phone, as the country works to curb the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), April 28, 2020.About 4.4 million Australians have already downloaded the CovidSafe app; however, this total is still a couple of million people short of Morrison’s goal of 40% of the 16 million citizens with smartphones. If the federal government is to recall national restrictions, officials warn that more people will have to download and sign up for the app. New Zealand has indicated that it intends to release a similar app soon.Australia and New Zealand have one of the closest bilateral relationships in the world, and they contribute heavily to each other’s industries.Australian passport holders can travel and work in New Zealand without a visa, and vice versa. According to an international visitor survey conducted by the New Zealand Ministry of Business, Innovation, and Employment, Australians account for almost 40% of international travelers. In Australia, New Zealanders compose approximately 15% of international arrivals.Tourism in both nations is an extremely lucrative and essential industry. In New Zealand, tourism is the No. 1 export industry and contributes more than 20% of total exports according to a report by the TIA. While tourism is only Australia’s fourth-biggest export industry, it generates billions of dollars and employs 5% of the work force. 
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Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has extended the country’s state of emergency over the coronavirus pandemic until the end of May. Prime Minister Abe made the announcement on Monday after meeting with the government’s coronavirus task force. The original 30-day decree imposed by Abe on April 7, which is set to expire on Wednesday, covered Tokyo and six other prefectures, but was later extended nationwide as the number of infections continued to rise.   The prime minister said the number of new infections have slowed in recent days, but not enough to lift the state of emergency. Japan has now reported 15,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 infections with 510 deaths, a situation that has overwhelmed the country’s healthcare system, hobbled its economy and forced it to postpone the Tokyo Summer Olympic Games for a year. The emergency declaration gives local authorities the legal power to call on its citizens to stay at home and to ask schools and businesses to close, but stops short of imposing a legally binding nationwide lockdown. Japan’s post-World War II constitution, which weighs heavily in favor of civil liberties, does not empower the government to impose a mandatory quarantine. The extension will keep the original restrictions in place for Tokyo and the other six prefectures named in the original decree, while the others will be allowed to ease restrictions provided they have low rates of infection. Abe’s government has been criticized for its slow response to the outbreak and its failure to set up an aggressive testing program.  
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Bangladesh has relocated more than two-dozen Rohingya refugees who had been stranded at sea for several days to a flood-prone island in the Bay of Bengal. Officials say the refugees, including 15 women and six children, were taken to Bhasan Char island Saturday.  The group is believed to have been among 500 Rohingyas who have been stranded on two fishing vessels that were turned away by Malaysia due to strict border controls imposed because of the coronavirus pandemic.  Bangladesh has built facilities for 100,000 people on Bhasan Char in an effort to relieve the pressure from the crowded camps on Cox’s Bazar in southern Bangladesh, where about one million Rohingya have been housed in recent years. But officials say none of those refugees have agreed to voluntarily relocate to Bhasan Char.  About 700,000 Rohingyas living in the Cox’s Bazar camps crossed over from neighboring Myanmar to escape a brutal, scorched-earth military campaign against them in 2017 that the United Nations described as ethnic cleansing – involving rapes, killings and torching of homes.  Buddhist-majority Myanmar does not consider the Rohingya citizens, despite the fact they have lived in the country for generations.  Thousands of Rohingyas over the years have attempted to escape the Bangladesh camps by boarding crowded boats bound for either Malaysia or Thailand.    
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U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Sunday there is “enormous evidence” that the coronavirus pandemic originated in a laboratory in Wuhan, China, not a nearby market, but declined to say whether the U.S. believes the virus was intentionally released. U.S. intelligence officials said last week that it is investigating whether the initial COVID-19 outbreak was the result of exposure to wild animals or a laboratory accident at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.  “Remember, China has a history of infecting the world, and they have a history of running substandard laboratories,” Pompeo said on ABC News’s “This Week.” “These are not the first times that we’ve had a world exposed to viruses as the result of failures in a Chinese lab.” The top U.S. diplomat said there is a “high degree of confidence” that the virus came from the Wuhan lab, which was studying the presence of the virus in bats. “There’s enormous evidence that that’s where this began,” Pompeo said. Pompeo said he has no reason to doubt the U.S. intelligence community’s consensus that the virus was “not manmade or genetically modified.” But he blamed China for delays in informing the world of the emerging threat of Covid-19. He said the worldwide number of cases — now more than 3.4 million, with a death toll of nearly 245,000 — would not have been so extensive had China not “attempted to conceal and hide and confuse. It employed the World Health Organization as a tool to do the same. “We can confirm that the Chinese communist party did all that it could to make sure world didn’t learn in a timely fashion about was taking place,” he said. “There’s lots of evidence of that.” Pompeo said that U.S. and international scientists have not been allowed to visit the Wuhan laboratory and that China has not provided a sample of the original virus. “We have said from the beginning, that this was a virus that originated in Wuhan, China,” Pompeo said. “We took a lot of grief for that from the outset.” Now, he said, China has embarked on a campaign to keep the world from further investigating its role in the pandemic’s origin. “We’ve seen the fact they’ve kicked journalists out,” Pompeo said. “We saw the fact that those who were trying to report on this, medical professionals inside of China, were silenced. “This is a classic communist disinformation effort that created enormous risk,” he said. “And now you can see hundreds of thousands of people around the world and tens of thousands in the U.S.” who have contracted the virus. He said U.S. President Donald Trump is “very clear: we’re going to hold those responsible, accountable. We’ll do so on a timeline that is ours.”        
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North Korea fired multiple gunshots that struck a South Korean guard post in the heavily fortified border region separating the two countries, Seoul’s military said Sunday.The South Korean side reported no casualties or damage but returned fire along with a warning broadcast across the border, according to the South Korean joint chiefs of staff.South Korea’s military says it is trying to understand the situation and prevent any further tension by using a military communication channel with the North. However, the statement is vague about whether the North has responded.It is not clear what led to the North Korean gunfire, which South Korea says began at 7:41 a.m. local time. North Korea has not commented on the incident.The exchange comes a day after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un appeared in public for the first time in 21 days, amid intense speculation about his health.  
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Press freedom in Cambodia, in decline since the 2017 FILE – The Cambodian government’s suppression of Radio Free Asia and Voice of America broadcasts was front page news in The Cambodia Daily on Aug. 29, 2017. The paper has since closed. (Hean Socheata / VOA Khmer)International condemnationLocal journalists and media organizations say the government’s assault on free and independent media is ongoing.“Threats to press freedom, intimidation and harassment against journalists, including lawsuits, [criminal] charges and arrests, remain as reflected in the RSF report,” said Nop Vy, the outgoing media director of Cambodian Center for Independent Media.The center is one of the few remaining independent media organizations still operating in the country.“The media have not been pluralistic, with mostly one-sided reporting,” said Vy, who now leads a new Cambodian Journalists Alliance, established to promote and protect press freedom and journalists working in Cambodia.Despite constitutional guarantees of press freedom, the media are tightly controlled by the ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) and its allies.Tightening restrictionsAs the CPP sought to consolidate its power ahead of the 2017 local and 2018 national elections, there was a rise in independent journalists and political and civic activists being charged, threatened or attacked.Radio Free Asia (RFA), one of VOA’s sister broadcast outlets funded by the U.S. Congress, closed its Phnom Penh bureau in September 2017, citing “unprecedented” government intimidation of the media. By the end of 2017, Cambodia’s government had closed more than two dozen local radio stations, some of which had rebroadcast VOA and RFA programming.The Cambodia Daily, an award-winning English-language newspaper that had helped train journalists and strengthen the country’s fragile democracy for over 20 years, was also forced to close.Two of its former reporters, one of whom is now a FILE – Journalists Uon Chhin, left, and Yeang Sothearin arrive at the municipal court, in Phnom Penh, Oct. 3, 2019.Yeang Sothearin, who was arrested along with former RFA colleague Uon Chhin, said their case was pending.“Even though we can now live with our families, we have no freedom as anybody else does,” Sothearin told VOA Khmer.He has become more cautious since his arrest, especially when posting to social media, in case “those ideas could be deemed affecting the government or any governmental agencies.”“Sometimes, because of those concerns, I am refraining from expressing my opinions on social media,” said Sothearin, who is now working on a short-term project with a local organization. “This is one form of my self-restriction.”Questioning ‘professionalism’Information Ministry spokesperson Ouk Kimseng denies that the government has restricted press freedom or harassed journalists.“[RSF] has never seen anything positive in press freedom or freedom of expression the government has provided so far in Cambodia,” he told VOA, adding that de-licensing measures were justified.“Those [reporters] did not follow the [professional] journalistic roles and responsibilities,” he said. He declined to comment on the earlier arrests of the RFA and Daily reporters, saying the cases were in the hands of the courts.Echoing the government view that Cambodia has greater press freedom than at any other time, Pen Bona, top editor of PNN TV — owned by business tycoon and ruling CPP party Senator Ly Yong Phat — said authorities need a better grasp of journalistic roles and responsibilities.“In some cases, authorities have taken too strong measures, like the arrests and lawsuits [against journalists],” said Bona, adding that both journalists and state officials should try harder to understand each other.A veteran journalist and president of the independent Club of Cambodian Journalists, which is widely viewed as a government-aligned organization, Bona also said some journalists aren’t actual professionals, but just “self-proclaimed journalists” who “practice the profession incorrectly.”“So, it’s both ways,” he said.VOA contributor Chhengpor Aun reported from Phnom Penh. This story originated in VOA’s Cambodian service.
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Locked down in COVID-19 biosecurity zones, thousands of kilometers from Australia’s big cities, aboriginal artists are performing online to global audiences for the first time.  Musicians from northeast Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory are joining the worldwide trend of artists in lockdown performing from home.For a month, indigenous artists are giving free weekend performances online.  The virtual concerts are helping to sustain the region’s musicians during the age of COVID-19.  Festivals and other cultural events have been canceled.The executive producer, Nicholas O’Riley, hopes new audiences will enjoy what they hear.“Doing the East Arnhem live is great, [a] great opportunity for them to keep playing, but also, you know, open up their music to a whole different audience from, you know, right around the world,” he said. “Hopefully we will see, you know, an EP [extended play record] or a small album come out of it.”There are no known cases of COVID-19 in Arnhem Land.  The government said aboriginal Australians are one of the groups most at risk from the disease because of widespread ill health and overcrowded housing.Indigenous people make up about 3 percent of the Australian population, and they suffer high rates of chronic disease, poverty and imprisonment.Travel to and from remote parts of the Northern Territory is being tightly controlled under efforts to protect indigenous communities from the spread of the new coronavirus. 
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The mother of China’s first cyberdissident, who has been in detention since 2016, has published an open letter asking for permission to visit her son before she dies.Huang Qi is serving a 12-year sentence for leaking state secrets.  His 87-year old mother published her letter earlier this month, and it has been circulating online.In the letter, Huang’s mother, Pu Wenqing, said she’s suffering from several chronic illnesses including diabetes and cancer and doesn’t have much time left to live.“I have two requests,” she wrote, “to see my son for the last time, and talk with him about his case.”Chinese dissident Huang Qi is pictured with his son at their home in Chengdu, in southwest China’s Sichaun province.Who’s Huang Qi?Huang Qi is widely considered China’s first cyberdissident. He ran a website called “64 Tianwang,” named after the June 4, 1989, crackdown on Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protesters.The news website is blocked in China, because it covers local corruption, human rights violations and other topics routinely censored in Chinese media.The website was awarded a Reporters Without Borders (RSF) Cyberfreedom Prize in November 2016. A few weeks after that, Huang was detained. Three years later, he was Huang Qi’s mom meets with diplomats from five countries in Chengdu to advocate for her son in 2018. (Web screenshot)A mother’s last appealHuang’s mother has long been advocating for her son. She has been kept under police surveillance since Huang’s sentence in 2019.Pu said in her letter that while she still trusts China’s judicial system, she believes her son’s case has been handled unjustly.“Internally, they all know Huang Qi has been set up. There’s no official document regarding his sentence. It’s all been sealed up in an envelope and labeled as classified,” she wrote. Pu added  that she believes the local Sichuan authorities have made up the charges against her son.Pu Fei, a former volunteer with 64 Tianwang, told VOA that no one has been able to visit Pu Wenqing since she was placed under constant police surveillance.“Her physical condition is deteriorating. It makes no sense to make her suffer mentally,” he told VOA.Pu Fei said he understood that prisons and detention centers have been closed to visitors since the start of the COVID-19 epidemic. “However, we hope that the authorities could make an exception in this case, since Huang’s mom doesn’t have much time, and visiting her son is within her rights.”Respect for rights urgedChen Yunfei, a well-known rights activist in Sichuan, urged officials in China’s legal system to respect Huang’s and his mother’s rights, citing the case of a top security official now under investigation for legal abuses.“I urge officials in the public security system to stop following Sun Lijun’s methods. His cruel ways of dealing with activists have long been ignoring the law,” he said.Sun Lijun, a vice minister of public security, is under investigation for serious violation of party discipline and the law, according to a brief statement issued by China’s top investigating agencies.Analysts describe Sun as an “invisible hit man” who had played a key role in top leader Xi’s past efforts to maintain social stability by rounding up dissidents.Observers have been paying close attention to how his arrest will impact prosecution law across the country.
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South Korea is one of very few countries to contain the coronavirus without resorting to mass lockdowns. So how did they do it?At the forefront of South Korea’s strategy was a rapid rollout of coronavirus testing that is widely seen as the global standard. The testing campaign has been so successful that South Korean companies are now exporting test kits across the world.But underpinning South Korea’s coronavirus success is a sweeping web of digital surveillance that lawmakers have reinforced specifically to contain epidemics.Burned by the previous MERS virus outbreak, which killed 39 South Koreans, lawmakers in 2015 loosened digital privacy laws. During outbreaks, authorities now have access to personal data without needing court approval. And there is lots of it, since South Korea is one of the world’s most-wired countries.The data – including cell phone, GPS, and bank records, along with closed-circuit TV footage – supercharged South Korea’s attempts to locate the path of individual coronavirus infections, as well as inform and isolate those exposed.Digital tracing also allowed South Korea to fight the coronavirus in a more targeted way without shutting down its economy. Even at the height of the outbreak, life in South Korea has never felt “locked down” as in many other parts of the world.As a result, more South Koreans have been able to keep their jobs, leave their homes to shop or eat at restaurants, and in recent elections, even vote at the highest rate in nearly three decades.South Korea Shows World How to Slow Spread of Coronavirus This softer approach may provide a model for virus containment effortsEffectively, South Koreans may have given up a degree of digital privacy, but they have kept what some see as more fundamental freedoms.Still, as in other countries that have expanded digital surveillance to deal with Covid-19, there are concerns about whether South Korea is striking the right balance between public safety and personal privacy.Some accuse South Korean officials of disclosing too many personal details about confirmed coronavirus patients. There are also questions about how long the expanded digital surveillance will last, since the law is vague on that point and the coronavirus may be around for years.In other words: Digital tracing campaigns like the one employed by South Korea may help contain the coronavirus, but they risk reshaping the way governments around the world interact with personal data during emergencies.Movements, means, contactsSouth Korea’s digital tracing efforts have been aided by the country’s national registration system. Under the system, phone companies must require all customers to provide their real names and national identification numbers.When combined with the new surveillance powers, the data allow health officials to quickly determine the movements, means of transportation, and recent contacts of confirmed and suspected coronavirus patients.As a result, authorities can quickly test and isolate those who have been exposed to the virus. It also allows central and local governments to send detailed reports – mostly in the form of non-optional, emergency text messages – to those who live or have visited nearby.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
This photo illustration shows a man holding her phone showing emergency alert text messages announcing locations that confirmed COVID-19 patients have visited, among others, in Seoul on March 10, 2020.Authorities have defended their approach, pointing out they set up a system whereby confirmed patients can file a complaint if they feel the reports are too revealing.South Korean authorities also insist the data is secure and the collection is legal. Only a specified number of epidemiological investigators, they say, have access to anyone’s personal information.Long-term powers?But it’s not clear how long the expanded surveillance powers will last.Although the law intends for it to be temporary, South Korean officials now concede they are prepared for a long-term battle against the coronavirus. Some health experts estimate it could take years to defeat the disease.”The concern, of course, is that once a government has data, they never want to give it up,” says Phil Robertson of Human Rights Watch.That may not be a huge worry in democratic South Korea, where the public has repeatedly shown it is capable of holding accountable leaders who are seen as abusing their power.Still, Robertson says Seoul should place an expiration date on its expanded surveillance powers, after which the government would need to ask lawmakers for an extension.”Democratic governments and countries like South Korea … could set as a model that, (even though) we recognize that these urgent times may require this kind of action, when we go back to a normal time, we will not do this,” he says.Autocratic governments across the world have already used the coronavirus to grab further power – monitoring and restricting free speech, arresting dissidents, and preventing freedom of movement – often with very little resistance.FILE – A woman wearing a face mask to help protect against the spread of the new coronavirus casts a vote for the parliamentary elections at a polling station in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, April 15, 2020.Advancing democracyBut South Korean authorities say the success of their response helped advance the cause of democracy in last week’s parliamentary elections. Voters felt safe enough to turn out at a rate of 66 percent – the highest level in 28 years.South Korean President Moon Jae-in, whose approval rating had been sagging as recently as two months ago, campaigned heavily on his successful COVID-19 response. Voters apparently approved, giving his ruling party a landslide win.The results showed it is possible not only to move ahead with elections during the pandemic, but that political leaders could receive a boost if they are perceived as having effectively dealt with the virus and kept people safe.”I think (South Korea’s approach) makes more sense to limit personal freedoms involving privacy,” said Seoul resident Kim Jae-gyu, “rather than to limit everyone’s freedom, like if things were locked down.”
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During a recent Covid-19 press conference, VOA Khmer reporter Kann Vicheika sought answers from Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen on a ‘state of emergency’ draft law.
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