Live Streaming
Program Highlight
Company Profile
International News (6893)
November
China downgrades diplomatic ties with Lithuania over Taiwan
Written by nuke
China has downgraded diplomatic ties with Lithuania after Taiwan established a de facto embassy in Vilnius. (File photo: AFP/PETRAS MALUKAS) -
China downgraded its diplomatic ties with Lithuania on Sunday (Nov 21), expressing strong dissatisfaction with the Baltic State after Taiwan opened a de facto embassy there, escalating a row that has sucked in Washington.
China views self-ruled and democratically governed Taiwan as its territory with no right to the trappings of a state and has stepped up pressure on countries to downgrade or sever their relations with the island, even non-official ones.
Lithuania expressed regret over China's move but defended its right to expand cooperation with Taiwan, while respecting Beijing's "One China" policy, and said its foreign minister would go to Washington to discuss trade and investment projects.
Taiwan, meanwhile, reported that two Chinese nuclear-capable H-6 bombers had flown to the south of the island on Sunday, part of a pattern of what Taipei views as military harassment designed to pressure the government.
Beijing had already expressed its anger this summer with Lithuania - which has formal relations with China and not Taiwan - after it allowed the island to open an office in the country using the name Taiwan. China recalled its ambassador in August.
Other Taiwan offices in Europe and the United States use the name of the city Taipei, avoiding reference to the island itself. However, the Taiwanese Representative Office in Lithuania finally opened on Thursday.
China's Foreign Ministry said in a brusque statement that Lithuania had ignored China's "solemn stance" and the basic norms of international relations.
Beijing said relations would be downgraded to the level of charge d'affaires, a rung below ambassador.
The move "undermined China's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and grossly interfered in China's internal affairs", creating a "bad precedent internationally", it said.
"We urge the Lithuanian side to correct its mistakes immediately and not to underestimate the Chinese people's firm determination and staunch resolve to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity," China's foreign ministry said.
No matter what Taiwan does, it cannot change the fact that it is part of China, it said.
Lithuania's Prime Minsiter Ingrida Simonyte said on Sunday that the opening of the representative office, which does not have a formal diplomatic status, should not have come as a surprise to anyone.
"Our government's programme says Lithuania wants a more intense economic, cultural and scientific relationship with Taiwan," she said. "I want to emphasise that this step does not mean any conflict or disagreement with the 'One China' policy."
The prime minister of Lithuania's larger EU neighbour Poland said on Sunday that it supported the stance taken by Vilnius.
Taiwan says it is an independent country called the Republic of China, its official name, and that the People's Republic of China has never ruled it and has no right to speak for it.
Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council denounced China's "rudeness and arrogance", saying Beijing had no right to comment on something that was not an internal Chinese affair and purely a matter between Taiwan and Lithuania.
Taiwan has been heartened by growing international support in the face of China's military and diplomatic pressure, especially from the United States and some of its allies.
Washington rejects attempts by other countries to interfere in Lithuania's relationship with Taiwan, US Under Secretary of State Uzra Zeya told a news conference in Vilnius on Friday.
Lithuania Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis will go to Washington on Tuesday where he expects to discuss the opening of the US market to Lithuanian goods and developing common investment projects, the ministry said in a statement on Sunday.
Landsbergis will meet US Under Secretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment Jose W Fernandez "to discuss possibilities to expand and deepen mutually beneficial economic ties", it said.
Washington has offered Vilnius support to withstand Chinese pressure and Lithuania will sign a US$600 million export credit agreement with the US Export-Import Bank on Wednesday.
Only 15 countries have formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan.
Taipei could lose another ally to Beijing after the Honduran presidential election later this month, where a candidate backed by main opposition parties is leading in opinion polls.
If elected, Xiomara Castro has vowed to establish official relations with China//CNA
November
El Salvador plans first 'Bitcoin City', backed by bitcoin bonds
Written by nuke
FILE PHOTO: A sign reads, "Bitcoin accepted here", outside a store where the cryptocurrency is accepted as a payment method in San Salvador, El Salvador, Sep 24, 2021. (Reuters/Jose Cabezas) -
El Salvador plans to build the world's first "Bitcoin City" which will be funded initially by bitcoin bonds, President Nayib Bukele said on Saturday (Nov 20), doubling down on the Central American country's bet on the cryptocurrency.
Speaking at an event to mark the close of a week to promote bitcoin in El Salvador, Bukele said the city planned in the east of the country would get its energy supply from a volcano and would not levy any taxes except for value added tax (VAT).
"We'll start funding in 2022, the bonds will be available in 2022," Bukele told a cheering crowd at the event.
Speaking alongside Bukele, Samson Mow, chief strategy officer of blockchain technology provider Blockstream, said El Salvador would initially issue a US$1 billion bond backed by bitcoin to begin raising funds for the planned city.
El Salvador in September became the first country in the world to adopt bitcoin as legal tender//CNA
November
Saudi holds top oil supplier to China in October - customs data
Written by nuke
FILE PHOTO: Oil and gas tanks are seen at an oil warehouse at a port in Zhuhai, China October 22, 2018. REUTERS/Aly Song/File Photo -
Saudi Arabia held its position as the biggest supplier of crude oil to China for an 11th month in a row in October, with volumes up 19.5per cent from a year ago, customs data showed on Sunday.
Saudi oil arrivals totalled 7.1 million tonnes, or 1.67 million barrels per day (bpd), data from the General Administration of Customs showed, which is 19.5per cent higher than 1.4 million bpd a year and compares with 1.94 million bpd in September.
Inflows from Russia, including pipeline oil, inched up by 1.3per cent from a year ago to 6.6 million tonnes last month, or 1.56 million barrels per day (bpd). That compared with 1.49 million bpd in September.
The growth in Russian supplies, primarily of its flagship oil ESPO blend, followed China's release of fresh import quotas in August and October that allowed independent plants to lift purchases of one of their favourite grades.
Still, China's overall October crude oil imports fell to the lowest in three years amid Beijing's broad cap on independent refiners' imports.
Supplies from Brazil were down 53.2per cent from a year earlier, while those from the United States slumped by 91.8per cent.
Reuters reported China's imports of Iranian oil have held above half a million barrels per day on average between August and October, as buyers judge that getting crude at cheap prices outweighs any risks from busting U.S. sanctions.
Most of these barrels were passed on as exports from Oman, the United Arab Emirates and Malaysia, weighing on competing supplies from Brazil and West Africa.
Official data has consistently shown China has imported zero oil from Iran or Venezuela since start of 2021, as national oil companies stayed on the sidelines on worries over U.S. sanctions//CNA
November
Venezuelan musicians set world's largest orchestra record
Written by nuke
Members of the National Orchestra System play a 12-minute Tchaikovsky piece to try and break a Guinness World Record in Caracas, Venezuela on Nov 13, 2021. (Photo: AP/Ariana Cubillos) -
Thousands of Venezuelan musicians, most of them children and adolescents, have earned the title of the world’s largest orchestra.
The record was set by 8,573 musicians. Guinness World Records in a video released on Saturday (Nov 20) announced that the musicians, all connected to the country’s network of youth orchestras, earned the designation with a performance a week earlier of Tchaikovsky’s Slavonic March.
The musicians, ranging in age from 12 to 77, attempted the record during a patriotic concert at a military academy in the capital of Caracas. To set the record, more than 8,097 had to be tallied playing at the same time during a five-minute period of Tchaikovsky’s piece.
The network of orchestras known as El Sistema, or The System, assembled some 12,000 musicians for the concert. The repertoire included Venezuela by Pablo Herrero and Jose Luis Armenteros, the South American country’s national anthem and Pedro Gutierrez’s Alma Llanera, which Venezuelans consider their unofficial anthem.
More than 250 supervisors were each assigned a group of musicians to observe during the record attempt.
The previous record belonged to a Russian group that played that country’s national anthem//CNA
November
Oil sheen spotted near Southern California's oil spill
Written by nuke
This aerial photo taken with a drone, shows beachgoers as workers in protective suits continue to clean the contaminated beach in Huntington Beach, California on Oct 11, 2021. (Photo: AP/Ringo H W Chiu) -
Officials were investigating an oil sheen spotted on Saturday (Nov 20) near last month’s crude pipeline leak off Southern California's coast.
The US Coast Guard said in a statement the oil sheen is about 21m by 9m and that it has dispatched “pollution responders, aircraft and boats” to investigate.
The oil sheen is located in the same area where a massive oil spill was confirmed last month off the coast of Orange County, officials said.
The spill confirmed on Oct 2 from a ruptured underwater pipeline owned by Houston-based Amplify Energy leaked up to about 25,000 gallons (94,635 litres) of crude. Oil washed ashore, tarring the feathers of dozens of birds and leading to rescues of marine mammals, though it wasn’t as bad as environmentalists feared.
The impact of the spill was less than initially feared, but it affected local wetlands and wildlife and shut the shoreline in surf-loving Huntington Beach for a week//CNA
November
Rabbi Michael Ben Yosef raises his fist in front of City Hall in the Loop to protest the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse on Nov (Photo: Chicago Sun-Times/Pat Nabong via AP) -
Law enforcement in Portland on Friday night (Nov 19) declared a riot as about 200 demonstrators protested the acquittal of a teen who killed two people and injured another in Wisconsin.
The Multnomah County Sheriff's Office said the protesters were breaking windows, throwing objects at police and talking about burning down a local government building in downtown Portland, KOIN TV reported, but the crowd had dispersed by about 11pm. Several people were given citations, the Portland Police Bureau said, but only one person who had an outstanding warrant from another matter was arrested.
The protesters gathered following the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse, 18, in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Rittenhouse killed two people and injured another during a protest against police brutality in Wisconsin last year.
Protests have been held in several other US cities nationwide over the verdict, including New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.
About 1,000 people marched through downtown Chicago Saturday afternoon, organised by Black Lives Matter Chicago and other local activist groups. According to the Chicago Tribune, protesters held signs that stated, “STOP WHITE SUPREMACY” and “WE’RE HITTING THE STREETS TO PROTEST THIS RACIST INJUSTICE SYSTEM” with a picture of Rittenhouse carrying a weapon.
Tanya Watkins, executive director of Southsiders Organized for Unity and Liberation, spoke at a rally in Federal Plaza before the march, according to the Tribune.
“While I am not surprised by yesterday’s verdict, I am tired. I am disappointed. I am enraged. … I have lost every ounce of faith in this justice system,” said Watkins, who is black.
In North Carolina, dozens of people gathered on Saturday near the state Capitol building to protest the verdict, the Raleigh News & Observer reported. Speakers led the crowd of roughly 75 people in chants of “No justice, no peace!” and “Abolish the police!” Police officers on motorcycle accompanied the protesters and blocked traffic for them as they marched down a street past bars and restaurants.
After the murder of George Floyd last year by police in Minneapolis, there were ongoing, often violent protest in Portland. Some activists complained that the police were heavy-handed in their response. Shortly after the Rittenhouse verdict, Portland Police Bureau Chief Chuck Lovell said that officers were working on plans for Friday night and the weekend.
By about 8.50pm, about 200 protesters had gathered in downtown Portland and blocked streets. By 9pm, windows were broken and doors of city facilities were damaged.
The police tweeted: “A crowd has gathered near SE 2nd Avenue and SE Madison Street and participants have begun breaking windows and damaging doors of city facilities in the area. People are throwing objects at police officers in the area.”
The Multnomah County Sheriff's Office designated the event a riot, and said in a news release early Saturday morning that some demonstrators had thrown urine, water bottles and batteries at deputies//CNA
November
Blinken says US investing in Africa without unsustainable debt
Written by nuke
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Saturday (Nov 20) his country was investing in Africa without imposing unsustainable levels of debt, as he witnessed the signing of contracts worth more than US$1 billion in Senegal's capital Dakar.
The deals between four US companies and Senegal are being billed as part of his country's pitch to help Africa build infrastructure with transparent and sustainable deals.
Careful not to directly criticise Chinese infrastructure projects, which have proliferated across the continent in the past decade, Blinken said during a visit to Nigeria on Friday that international deals were too often opaque and coercive.
The US is investing "without saddling the country with a debt that it cannot handle," he said during the signing ceremony with Senegal's Economy Minister Amadou Hott.
He said he had a deep concern for the stability of neighbouring Mali, which has experienced two coups in the last 18 months, and that the upcoming election there must follow a timetable drawn up by the regional bloc ECOWAS.
Earlier this month ECOWAS, West Africa's main political and economic bloc, imposed sanctions on Mali's transitional leaders, after they informed the organisation they would not be able to hold presidential and legislative elections in February.
"We look forward to resuming the full array of assistance as soon as this democratically elected government takes office," Blinken told reporters.
Reuters reported in September that Mali's military junta was in discussions about deploying a Russian military contractor, Wagner Group, in Mali to help fight a growing Islamist insurgency.
"It would be especially unfortunate if outside actors engaged in making things even more difficult and more complicated and I'm thinking particularly of groups like the Wagner Group," Blinken said.
Blinken said the US has real concerns, widely shared with partners in Europe, over Russia's "unusual activity" at the Ukrainian border, after Ukraine said it feared Russia might be preparing an attack.
"We do know the playbook of trying to cite some illusory provocation from Ukraine or any other country and using that as an excuse to do what Russia was planning to do all along," Blinken said.
During a visit to Dakar's Institute Pasteur bio-medical research center, Blinken said the United States was working with partners to generate more financing for vaccine manufacturing in Senegal.
In October BioNTech signed an agreement with the Institut Pasteur de Dakar and the Rwandan government to construct the first mRNA vaccine facilities in Africa, starting in mid-2022//CNA
November
Thousands expected to protest upcoming COVID-19 lockdown in Vienna
Written by nuke
Police officers check the vaccination status of visitors during a patrol at a Christmas market in Vienna on Nov 19, 2021. (File photo: AP/Lisa Leutner) -
Thousands of protesters were expected to gather in Vienna on Saturday (Nov 20) after the Austrian government announced a nationwide lockdown to contain the quickly rising COVID-19 infection numbers in the country.
The far-right opposition Freedom Party is among those who have called for the protest, and vowed to combat the new restrictions.
Demonstrations against virus measures are also expected in other European countries including Switzerland, Croatia and Italy.
On Friday night, Dutch police opened fire on protesters, and seven people were injured in rioting that erupted in downtown Rotterdam around a demonstration against COVID-19 restrictions.
The Austrian lockdown will start early on Monday and initially will last for 10 days, and will then be reevaluated. At the most, it will last 20 days.
Most stores will close, and cultural events will be cancelled. People will be able to leave their homes only for certain specific reasons, including buying groceries, going to the doctor or exercising.
The Austrian government also said that the country will make vaccinations mandatory from Feb 1 next year.
Vaccinations in Austria have plateaued at one of the lowest rates in Western Europe, and hospitals in heavily hit states have warned that their intensive care units are reaching capacity. Average daily deaths have tripled in recent weeks.
About 66 per cent of Austria’s 8.9 million people are fully vaccinated, according to government figures.
Austrian Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg apologised to all vaccinated people on Friday night saying it wasn't fair that they had to suffer under the renewed lockdown restrictions when they had done everything to help contain the virus.
“I’m sorry to take this drastic step,” he said on public broadcaster ORF.
Freedom Party leader Herbert Kickl, who announced earlier this week that he had tested positive for COVID-19, referred to the measures as “dictatorship”. Kickl must self-isolate for 14 days, so he won’t be able to attend the Vienna protest//CNA
November
Corals and cable cars: Vietnam tourist island Phu Quoc reopens with big dreams
Written by nuke
The Vinpearl leisure complex in Phu Quoc boasts a 12,000-room hotel complex, an amusement park, an 18-hole golf course, a casino, a safari park and a miniature Venice (Photo: AFP/Nhac Nguyen) -
Tour guide Lai Chi Phuc has been counting down the days until travellers return to the white-sand beaches and thick tropical jungle of Vietnam's Phu Quoc, a once-poor fishing island pushing to be Asia's next holiday hotspot as COVID-19 pandemic restrictions ease.
On Saturday (Nov 20), around 200 South Koreans touched down on the island, which lies a few kilometres off Cambodia in the azure waters of the Gulf of Thailand, after a vaccine passport scheme kicked off this month in Vietnam.
Among the arrivals was Tae Hyeong Lee, who was returning to the island for a third time and keen to make a beeline for the beach.
"It's wonderful to be here. This is my first time travelling out of South Korea since the pandemic started," he told AFP.
But others may skip the lazy beach break in favour of action and entertainment as they shuffle between a 12,000-room hotel complex, an amusement park, an 18-hole golf course, a casino, a safari park and a miniature Venice.
The US$2.8-billion leisure resort, part of the "sleepless city" model, opened six months ago as COVID-19 ravaged tourism across the world - and as other Asian countries reliant on the industry, like Thailand, were rethinking their mass tourism frameworks.
For 33-year-old Phuc, who remembers a poverty-stricken childhood where "everyone wanted to escape Phu Quoc", the island's growing popularity gave him a way to return home after years of scratching out a living as a salesman in the nearby cities of the Mekong Delta.
"But it's a pity also," he told AFP, lamenting the loss of the island's palm-fringed beaches to resorts.
Ahead of Saturday's reopening, staff at Vinpearl resort - where the arrivals are staying - swept beaches, arranged cutlery on tables and laid out sunbeds. Others busied themselves painting delicate flowers on conical hats.
"When we heard visitors were coming back, I was just so excited," said duty manager Ngo Thi Bich Thuong.
Before the pandemic in 2019, around 5 million people, including half a million foreigners - mostly from China, South Korea, Japan and Russia - holidayed on Phu Quoc.
Vingroup - the enormously powerful conglomerate behind the new complex - is pushing to make the island "a new international destination on the world tourist map".
To cater for the tourist boom, 40,000 hotel rooms have been built and planned, vice chairman of the Vietnam Tourism Advisory Board Ken Atkinson told AFP - "that's more hotel keys than they have in Sydney, Australia".
Globally popular vacation spots such as Thailand's Phuket have given Vietnam something to aim for.
Atkinson took a group of senior Vietnamese government officials there in 2005 - but while Phuket's vibrant international tourist scene took years to build up, "Vietnam has a tendency of wanting to do everything all at once", he noted.
"Unfortunately I don't think there was enough attention given to what would be in the long-term benefit of the island," he added.
Phu Quoc is a UNESCO biosphere reserve - surrounding waters are stuffed with coral reefs, and its beaches were once nesting spots for hawksbill and green turtles.
But no nesting has taken place in recent years, the United Nations body said in their last assessment in 2018.
The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) has warned of "an almost unimaginable flood of plastic" that chokes rivers, canals and sea life.
Around 160 tonnes of trash - almost enough to fill 16 trucks - is generated every day, according to WWF, which says that the island's waste management is not fit to cope with the tourism explosion.
"More and more tourists are very conscious of the environment. They don't want to be going to places where beaches are littered or where effluent is going into the sea," Atkinson warned.
But alongside the trash, and the garish headline attractions - including the world's longest non-stop three-rope cable car and Vietnam's first teddy bear museum - there are still pockets of paradise.
Chu Dinh Duc, 26, from mainland Vietnam, first saw Phu Quoc from the back of a motorbike in 2017.
Speeding through dense forests and winding his way to the few remaining sleepy villages where fishermen cast their nets into the ocean as the sun came up, he fell in love.
Two years later, he opened a simple homestay business catering to foreigners.
"My goal here is not to take a lot of their money," he said. "But I want as many as possible to come."
"If Phu Quoc remained undeveloped, it would just be a pearl undiscovered."//CNA
November
Pro and anti-vaccination protesters take to Australia streets
Written by nuke
Protesters took over the street in Australia on Vaccine jab -
Several thousand people took to Australia's streets on Saturday (Nov 20) protesting COVID-19 vaccination mandates, while smaller crowds gathered to support the measures that have elevated the country to be one of the most inoculated in the world.
Nearly 85 per cent of Australians aged 16 and above have been fully vaccinated against the coronavirus as of Nov 19.
While nationwide vaccinations are voluntary, states and territories have mandated vaccinations for many occupations and barred the unvaccinated from activities such as dining out and concerts.
Chanting "Freedom, freedom" and carrying "End Segregation Now" signs, several thousand anti-vaccination protesters marched through Melbourne's downtown, Australia's second-most populous city that was hit the hardest by the pandemic.
Protesters gathered also in Sydney, Brisbane and other cities, with no immediate reports of unruly behaviour.
A banner in Sydney read, "My life is not a gift from the government, it is a gift from God," according to The Age newspaper.
The anti-vaccination rallies have continued for weeks in Australia, becoming occasionally violent and attracting lose groups of regular citizens, as well as far-right and conspiracy theory supporters.
The anti-vaccination movement, however, remains small, with polls showing nationwide opposition in the single digits.
A counter-rally of several hundred took place in Melbourne, organised by the Campaign Against Racism & Fascism group under the slogan of "Don't scab, get the jab".
The chief of the Australia Open tournament, the year's first Grand Slam tennis tournament and one of Australia's biggest sporting events, said on Saturday, that all players will have to be vaccinated to compete in January in Melbourne.
On Saturday, there were 1,166 new COVID-19 infections in the state of Victoria, of which Melbourne is the capital.
Five more people died. The most populous state of New South Wales, where nearly 92 per cent of people are fully vaccinated, reported 182 new cases.
Despite the Delta outbreaks that led to months of lockdown in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia has had only about 760 confirmed cases and 7.5 deaths per 100,000 people, according to data from the World Health Organisation, far lower than many other developed nations.
The United Kingdom, for example, has had more than 14,000 confirmed cases and 211 deaths per 100,000 people.
Neighbouring New Zealand, which is also learning to live with the coronavirus through high vaccination rates, reported 172 new cases.
As of Friday, 83 per cent of the Pacific nation's population have been fully vaccinated//CNA