China is trying to exploit the global crisis triggered by the coronavirus outbreak by wresting control of companies such as Imagination Technologies and changing the way the internet works, a senior British lawmaker said on Wednesday.
Tom Tugendhat, the chair of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, told Sky:
We’re seeing quite a lot of action by the Chinese state, or state-owned companies, that seem to be exploiting this moment.
Companies like Imagination Technologies … it’s been facing a rather hostile change in management in the last few weeks, which happened to coincide not just with the Covid crisis but also the prime minister being taken into hospital and the Easter weekend.
Tugendhat said he was concerned by US President Donald Trump’s decision to suspend funding for the World Health Organization.
“I’m concerned by this,” he said. “This is of course an important time for the WHO to be doing its job.”
“I understand his concerns with the way that the WHO has failed to call out China or indeed recognize the success that has been going on in Taiwan amongst other places.”
Amazon faces having its operations reduced to a bare minimum in
The court in Nanterre, outside Paris, said Amazon France had “failed to recognize its obligations regarding the security and health of its workers”, according to a ruling seen by AFP.
While carrying out the health evaluation, Amazon can prepare and deliver only “food, hygiene and medical products”, the court said.
The injunction must be carried out within (hours, or Amazon France could face fines of € 1m (£ 968, 602) per day
Amazon has one month to carry out the evaluation.
The ruling comes as consumers around the world flock to Amazon during the coronavirus lockdown. But concern has grown over the safety precautions taken by the company, and dozens of workers protested in the US last month .
Amazon has been hiring thousands of workers as business booms in countries affected by the coronavirus outbreak, after authorities imposed business closures and stay-at-home orders to try to limit infections.
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(EU sets out roadmap for members to ease lockdowns
The European Union moved on Wednesday to head off a chaotic and potentially disastrous easing of restrictions that are limiting the spread of the coronavirus, warning its nations to move very cautiously as they return to normal life and base their actions on scientific advice.
With Austria, the Czech Republic and Denmark already lifting some lockdown measures, the EU’s executive arm, the European commission, was rushing out its roadmap for members to coordinate an exit from lockdown, which it expects should take several months
The Commission said those scientists should be relied upon to guide national exit strategies in the weeks and months to come.
Russia on Wednesday announced a
At this rate, the confirmed caseload will double every five days.
Starting today, Muscovites are required to carry a QR-code giving them permission to travel to work or other destinations in the city. The permission slips became mandatory on Wednesday for drivers and passengers in taxis or on public transport.
Demand is high: the city on Monday said it had already issued 3.2m passes But the system’s clumsy rollout has sparked outrage, with critics saying the government has created a potential new hotbed for infections.
On Wednesday, large traffic jams formed coming into Moscow as police began checking all cars for the mandatory passes, while metro passengers were forced into queues that could last more than an hour
Sergey Elkin, a popular cartoonist, posted a photo from the Preobrazhenskaya Ploshchad metro station comparing the current situation to the outrage at Muscovites flocking to the parks several weeks ago when Vladimir Putin declared a non-working week.
“Now this is the work of the government,” he wrote.
Moscow’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, blamed the police for creating the queues. “I spoke with the head of the police department and asked them to organize their work so that further checks would not lead to a mass gathering of people,” he wrote.
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In a first step towards easing coronavirus-related restrictions,
Travel restrictions to and from Uusimaa, the capital region, to the rest of the country began on 50 March, to prevent people from spreading the virus to other parts of the country.
Marin said the government no longer had legal grounds to continue the lockdown, considering it an extreme measure to restrict people’s freedom of movement so strictly.
“It is no longer an absolutely necessary restriction measure in the way required in the Emergency Powers Act,” Marin said.
The government nevertheless recommended people avoid all unnecessary travel, she said.
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