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Wednesday, March 4, 2020

ANALYSIS: WHO warns of global shortage of medical equipment to fight coronavirus

March 4, 2020 12H:43 GMT/ZULU

by Rachel Rubin, Isabelle Roussel, and Biodun Iginla, BBC News and Reuters News Analysts, WASHINGTON/GENEVA

WASHINGTON/GENEVA - The World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday warned of a global shortage and price gouging for protective equipment to fight the fast-spreading coronavirus and asked companies and governments to increase production by 40% as the death toll from the respiratory illness mounted.

Crowds wearing protective masks, following the outbreak of the coronavirus, are seen at the Shinjuku station in Tokyo, Japan, March 3, 2020. REUTERS/Athit Perawongmetha

Meanwhile, the U.S. Federal Reserve cut interest rates on Tuesday in an emergency move to try to prevent a global recession and the World Bank announced $12 billion to help countries fight the coronavirus, which has taken a heavy toll on air travel, tourism and other industries, threatening global economic growth prospects.

The virus continued to spread in South Korea, Japan, Europe, Iran and the United States, and several countries reported their first confirmed cases, taking the total to some 80 nations hit with the flu-like illness that can lead to pneumonia.

Despite the Fed’s attempt to stem the economic fallout from the coronavirus, U.S. stock indexes closed down about 3%, safe-haven gold rose 3% and analysts and investors questioned whether the rate cut will be enough if the virus continues to spread.

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U.S. lawmakers were considering spending as much as $9 billion to contain local spread of the virus.

In Iran, doctors and nurses lack supplies and 77 people have died, one of the highest numbers outside China. The United Arab Emirates announced it was closing all schools for four weeks.

The death toll in Italy, Europe’s hardest-hit country, jumped to 79 on Tuesday and Italian officials are considering expanding the area under quarantine. France reported its fourth coronavirus death, while Indonesia, Ukraine, Argentina and Chile reported their first coronavirus cases.

About 3.4% of confirmed cases of COVID-19 have died, far above seasonal flu’s fatality rate of under 1%, but the virus can be contained, the WHO chief said on Tuesday.

“To summarize, COVID-19 spreads less efficiently than flu, transmission does not appear to be driven by people who are not sick, it causes more severe illness than flu, there are not yet any vaccines or therapeutics, and it can be contained,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva.

Health officials have said the death rate is 2% to 4% depending on the country and may be much lower if there are thousands of unreported mild cases of the disease.

Since the coronavirus outbreak, prices of surgical masks have increased sixfold, N95 respirators have tripled in cost and protective gowns cost twice as much, the WHO said.

It estimates healthcare workers each month will need 89 million masks, 76 million gloves and 1.6 million pairs of goggles.

The coronavirus, which emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year, has spread around the world, with more new cases now appearing outside China than inside.

There are almost 91,000 cases globally of which more than 80,000 are in China. China’s death toll was 2,946, with more than 166 fatalities elsewhere.

In a unanimous decision, the Fed said it was cutting rates by a half percentage point to a target range of 1.00% to 1.25%.

Finance ministers from the G7 group of rich countries were ready to take action, including fiscal measures where appropriate, Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso said. Central banks would continue to support price stability and economic growth.

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In the United States, there are now over 100 people in at least a dozen states with the coronavirus and nine deaths, all in the Seattle area.

Slideshow (10 Images)

Amid criticism of Americans not being able to get tested for coronavirus unless they met certain limited criteria, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence said on Tuesday that anyone can now get tested with a doctor’s order under new guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

New York state reported its second case, a man in his 50s who works in Manhattan and has been hospitalized.

The public transportation agency in New York, the most densely populated major U.S. city of more than 8 million, said on Twitter it was deploying “enhanced sanitizing procedures” for stations, train cars, buses and certain vehicles.

China has seen coronavirus cases fall sharply, with 129 in the last 24 hours the lowest reported since Jan. 20.

With the world’s second largest economy struggling to get back on track, China is increasingly concerned about the virus being brought back into the country by citizens returning from new hotspots elsewhere.

Travelers entering Beijing from South Korea, Japan, Iran and Italy would have to be quarantined for 14 days, a city official said. Shanghai has introduced a similar order.

The worst outbreak outside China is in South Korea, where President Moon Jae-in declared war on the virus, ordering additional hospital beds and more masks as cases rose by 600 to nearly 5,000, with 34 deaths.

WHO officials also expressed concerns about the situation in Iran, saying doctors lacked respirators and ventilators needed for patients with severe cases.

WHO emergency program head Michael Ryan said the need in Iran was “more acute” than for other countries.

While the case numbers in Iran appear to be bad, he said, “things tend to look worse before getting better.”

The International Olympic Committee on Tuesday said the summer games in Tokyo set to begin on July 24 were still expected to happen despite Japan having nearly 1,000 coronavirus cases and 12 deaths. Health officials said they would continue to monitor the situation in Japan before any final decision on the Olympics is made.

Sunday, July 21, 2019

BREAKING: White House's Kushner to finalize Palestinian economic plan on Middle East tour

July 22, 2019 02H39 GMT/ZULU

by Suzanne Gould and Biodun Iginla, BBC News and Reuters, WASHINGTON

WASHINGTON - White House senior adviser Jared Kushner will lead a U.S. delegation on a tour of the Middle East to finalize details of his proposed $50 billion economic development plan for the Palestinians, Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon, an administration official said on Sunday.

Kushner, Middle East envoy Jason Greenblatt, State Department official Brian Hook and Kushner aide Avi Berkowitz are expected to make make stops in Israel, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, the official said.

They leave late this month and return to Washington in early August.

The official said the purpose of the trip is to “continue on the momentum that was created at the workshop in Bahrain and finalize the economic portion of the plan.”

They will also discuss the possibility of locating the development fund in Bahrain, the official said.

Kushner, U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and the plan’s main architect, sought to build support for his ambitious economic proposals for the Palestinian territories at an international meeting in Bahrain in June.

Palestinians poured scorn on the Trump administration’s $50 billion investment plan to help achieve Middle East peace, but U.S. Gulf Arab allies said the economic initiative had promise if a political settlement is reached.

Kushner and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin last week discussed creation of the fund with World Bank President David Malpass, the official said. The World Bank has a role in managing the fund.

The delegation was not expected to discuss Trump’s long-awaited political plan for the Middle East, and when it will be released remains unclear.

Sunday, May 26, 2019

ANALYSIS: Equatorial Guinea struggles for place in world tourism

Date created : 26/05/2019 - 14:31 GMT/ZULU

The town was carved out of an ancient forest in 2011 at a cost of 600 million euros ($670 million) AFP

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by Tokun Lawal and Biodun Iginla, France24 News Analysts

Gleaming but eerily empty, the luxurious Sipopo resort with its five-star hotel and exclusive facilities rises from a tropical beach, symbolising the dilemma of Equatorial Guinea -- a notoriously closed country that has turned to tourism to help fill its coffers.

The purpose-built town was carved out of an ancient forest in 2011 at a cost of 600 million euros ($670 million), initially to host a week-long African Union summit and showcase the rise of the tiny oil-rich state.

A 16-kilometre (10-mile) drive from Equatorial Guinea's capital Malabo, the resort boasts a vast conference centre, the Sofitel Malabo Sipopo Le Golf hotel, as well as 52 luxury villas -- one for every head of state to attend the summit -- each with its own swimming pool.

There is also an 18-hole golf course, several restaurants and exclusive beaches guarded by police.

For almost a decade, Sipopo has been the crown jewel in a strategy to lure high-end visitors to Equatorial Guinea to diversify an economy badly hit by a slump in oil revenue.

But the town, visited by a France24 reporter two months ago, seemed quite empty -- an impression strengthened by conversations with people who live or who work there.

"It's depressing, there's no-one," said a visiting Gabonese consultant.

A worker, who asked not to be named, said the complex was quiet year-round: "You can hear the sound of your own footsteps."

The occasional visitors tend to be well connected, rich and in search of privacy, the sources said.

Many are guests of a government described by Human Rights Watch as corrupt and repressive.

One of the villas, according to the sources, was occupied by former Gambian dictator Yahya Jammeh after he fled his country in 2017.

- Empty lobby -

At Easter, the 200-room hotel's guests included a Spanish couple on honeymoon, a few families and some businessmen, who were all foreigners.

In the echoing lobby, a huge black and white portrait of the country's 76-year-old authoritarian president, Teodoro Obiang Nguema -- Africa's longest-serving ruler -- hung on the wall, watching over the vacant reception area.

A 1.5-kilometre (nearly mile-long) beach -- an artificial shore secluded from curious eyes -- was virtually deserted, in contrast to a public beach near the capital. The three-lane highway leading from Malabo to Sipopo was mostly empty of traffic.

A hospital was added after the villas were built, but is unused, the sources said.

In 2014, a mall was built at the resort to house 50 shops, a bowling alley, two cinemas and a children's play area.

But a hotel receptionist said the complex was not open yet, adding: "If you want to buy a souvenir, you will have to go to Malabo." At night-time, shiny limousines arrived at a luxury restaurant to drop off diners.

- Tourism hopes -

Located on the mid-Atlantic coast of central Africa, Equatorial Guinea has flooded social media with messages of its allure as a holiday destination.

Plans to build a new passenger terminal at the airport in Bata city have also just received a 120-million-euro ($133-million) injection from the Development Bank of Central African States.

Figures for visitors are unavailable, and the tourism ministry in Malabo did not respond to France24's requests for information. In the latest global compilation of figures posted by the World Bank, the number of tourists for Equatorial Guinea has been left blank.

But much of the tourism in evidence are business people, such as oil company workers, relaxing for a few days, or attending energy or economic conferences.

A few travel firms offer trips tailor-made for both luxury and adventure, but they also allude to the difficulties, notably of being allowed to enter the country.

"The country has been a mystery to outsiders, who were discouraged from entering by a difficult visa process and a lack of tourism infrastructure," says the website of British tour operator Undiscovered Destinations.

The firm claimed, however, that "things are changing fast... with an excellent road network and numerous hotels springing up seemingly overnight."

Few Equatoguineans have the chance of staying in such places. At Sipopo's hotel, a basic room costs the equivalent of more than 200 euros ($224) a night, while exclusive accommodation tops 850 euros.

The discovery of vast oil reserves off the coast in the mid-1990s has boosted the country's gross national income to a theoretical annual $19,500 per person per year, according to the UN Development Programme.

But that wealth benefits a small elite among the country's 1.2 million inhabitants. More than two-thirds of Equatoguineans live below the poverty line, and 55 percent of the population aged over 15 are unemployed.

Friday, August 24, 2018

Analysis: Rohingya crisis a year on: refugees going nowhere as cash crunch looms

24 August 2018 - 09H40 GMT/UTC/ZULU TIME

by Wang Yang and Biodun Iginla, France24 News Analysts, COX'S BAZAR (BANGLADESH)

COX'S BAZAR (BANGLADESH) -

With a repatriation plan in tatters and funding evaporating for a million refugees with ever-growing needs, Rohingya Muslims who fled Myanmar to Bangladesh face a grim future one year after the latest eruption of a decades-old conflict.

Raids by Rohingya militants on August 25 last year across Myanmar's Rakhine state spurred an army crackdown which the United Nations has likened to "ethnic cleansing".

Around 700,000 of the Muslim minority fled by foot or boat to Bangladesh, their villages ablaze behind them, in an exodus unprecedented in speed and scale.

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The crisis has heaped enormous pressure on Bangladesh's impoverished Cox's Bazar district, which already hosted around 300,000 of the stateless group.

Myanmar says it is ready to take those who fled back.

But it refuses to recognise the Rohingya as citizens, falsely labelling them "Bengali" illegal immigrants.

A deal between Myanmar and Bangladesh to start sending them back has also gone nowhere, caught up in bureaucracy and mistrust, with fewer than 200 having been repatriated so far.

Myanmar's civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi this week said it was up to Bangladesh "to decide how quickly" repatriation can be done, while insisting the "terrorist threat" posed by Rohingya militants remains "real and present".

Without safety, citizenship and compensation for homes and land torched or commandeered by the army since they fled, the Rohingya do not want to go back.

- Funding crunch -

But life in the camps, among the most densely populated places on earth, looks set to get harder.

A UN-led appeal for around $1 billion to fund the refugees until March has yielded only a third of that sum.

The slow response has alarmed experts.

"Giving generally peaks in that first year (of a crisis)... then it's much harder to fund," Dr Peter Salama, the emergency response chief of the World Health Organization (WHO), told us at France24.

Without a major cash injection, "remarkable" success in controlling outbreaks of diphtheria, cholera and other diseases could be undone, he said, and provision of non-life saving help -- such as family planning and mental health -- will likely evaporate.

"Bangladesh's government really deserves more regional and international solidarity and support," he added.

The World Bank has pledged $500 million to help with infrastructure, health and education of the Cox's region.

But Bangladesh is tiring of its role as host and insists it will soon relocate around 100,000 Rohingya from Cox's to a remote, flood-prone island.

- 'History of darkness' -

Myanmar has driven out its Rohingya since the late 1970s.

"Our history is of darkness," said Mohammed Kashim, 27, one of thousands of Rohingya refugees born in Bangladesh, but denied citizenship by both countries.

"I have never stepped on Myanmar soil."

And he probably never will.

First he must be "verified" as someone who belongs in Myanmar -- near impossible given he was born outside the country.

Refugees who are verified are required to take a 'NVC' card that does not grant them full citizenship or rights.

Myanmar is unrepentant about last year's crackdown and denies widespread human rights violations, murders, rapes and mass arson of Rohingya villages despite reams of evidence.

But international pressure for accountability is mounting.

Last week Washington hit four Myanmar military commanders and two infantry divisions with punitive financial sanctions over rights abuses and "ethnic cleansing".

The UN Security Council is set to meet next week to discuss the issue, while testimony is being gathered across the camps to press the International Criminal Court (ICC) into launching proceedings against Mynamar.

"There is finally a recognition (in Myanmar) that they cannot merely outlast the opprobrium," Aaron Connelly from the Lowy Institute think tank told us at France24.

But Myanmar is shielded at the UN by ally China, a permanent member of the Security Council. Meanwhile state media reported that the Myanmar military's Commander-in-Chief was in Russia -- another permanent member -- on the eve of the anniversary of a crackdown he ordered.

- Security high in Rakhine -

Myanmar has remade northern Rakhine state without the Rohingya, redistributing land and building new security posts.

It has built massive "transit" camps -- some with room for 30,000 -- for any returnees.

Rohingya refugees fear without citizenship those camps will become permanent, like the ones holding 129,000 Rohingya since 2012.

"We are citizens by birth," said Nay Lin Aung, 35, among hundreds of Rohingya living on a patch of no-man's land between the two countries.

"We won't go back as they (Myanmar) are not calling us with a sincere mind."

Inside Rakhine fear, tension and hatred are razor sharp.

"Both communities (of remaining Rohinya and eEthnic Rakhine Buddhists) have their worries now... so the government has reinforced security," ahead of the anniversary said Ye Htoo, deputy administrator of Maungdaw district on a government-steered trip to Rakhine this week.

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