Tag: NEWS

(Xinhua)09:52, July 01, 2020

MOSCOW, June 30 (Xinhua) — The COVID-19 pandemic is not significantly impacting Russias armed forces, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said during a conference call on Tuesday.

The preparation plan for the winter training period is almost completed. For the summer period, only a small part of the activities was postponed, Shoigu said, adding that the planned rearmament of the army and navy continued despite the pandemic.

Since the beginning of the year, 776 units of the latest weapons and vehicles have been delivered to troops, including 58 airplanes and helicopters, over 140 armored combat vehicles and 510 multi-purpose vehicles, Shoigu said, adding that the navy has received a strategic missile submarine and two support vessels.

The planned progressive development of the armed forces and a qualitative increase in the level of their condition will continue in the second half of the year, he said.

(Xinhua)09:54, July 01, 2020

BRUSSELS, June 30 (Xinhua) — The Council of the European Union (EU) on Tuesday adopted a recommendation to lift entry restrictions for residents of some third countries starting Wednesday, and the United States is noticeably shut out.

The council recommended the lifting of travel restrictions for residents of Algeria, Australia, Canada, Georgia, Japan, Montenegro, Morocco, New Zealand, Rwanda, Serbia, South Korea, Thailand, Tunisia, and Uruguay. Residents of Andorra, Monaco, San Marino, and the Vatican are to be considered as EU residents for the purpose of the recommendation.

The United States, a traditional ally of the EU and a significant source of tourism, is not on the list.

The external borders of the bloc have been closed since mid-March due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The council said the criteria to determine the group of countries for which current travel restrictions should be lifted cover, in particular, their epidemiological situations and containment measures. The list of safe third countries will be reviewed every two weeks.

The council also recommended that residents of China be allowed to travel to the EU, subject to confirmation of reciprocity.

While highly anticipated, the councils recommendations are not legally binding, since border control is still its member states competency, the council said.

The member states may, in full transparency, lift only progressively travel restrictions towards countries listed. A Member State should not decide to lift the travel restrictions for non-listed third countries before this has been decided in a coordinated manner, the council said.

(Xinhua)16:42, July 01, 2020

BRUSSELS, July 1 (Xinhua) — A pan-European poll has found that the majority of respondents hold an increasingly negative view of the United States amid the coronavirus outbreak, U.S. media CNBC reported on Monday.

The survey, commissioned by the European Council on Foreign Relations, a pan-European think tank, interviewed 11,000 people from nine European countries from the last week of April this year to early May, reported CNBC.

Around two-thirds of respondents in Denmark, Portugal, France, Germany and Spain said the U.S. image has been damaged in their mind, while only 2 percent of people surveyed said the United States was helpful in the battle against the novel coronavirus, the poll showed.

Around 46 percent of the French people surveyed said their view of the United States has worsened a lot, while 42 percent of the German respondents said the U.S. reputation has been deteriorated a lot during the coronavirus outbreak, the poll said.

(CGTN)16:55, July 01, 2020

Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus,the World Health Organizations (WHO) Director-General(Xinhua/File Photo)

The World Health Organizations (WHO) Director-General, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned on Monday that the COVID-19 pandemic is speeding up and the worst is yet to come.

Tedros also noted in his daily briefing that the lack of national unity and lack of global solidarity was actually helping the virus spread.

The WHO chief pointed out five priorities that every single country must focus on now to save lives. And the politicization of the pandemic is not one of them.

Some countries are now experiencing a resurgence of cases as they start to re-open their economies and societies. Most people remain susceptible. The virus still has a lot of room to move, he said. But the hard reality is: This is not even close to being over. Although many countries have made some progress, globally the pandemic is actually speeding up.

Please quarantine COVID politics, he said, adding that the virus has two dangerous combinations 鈥?one is its fast, its contagious and second is, its a killer. It can exploit divisions.

Your health is in your hands 鈥?That includes physical distancing, hand hygiene, covering coughs, staying home if you feel sick, wearing masks when appropriate, and only sharing information from reliable sources.

You may be in a low-risk category, but the choices you make could be the difference between life and death for someone else, he said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin also remarked that theres no reason to suspect that the coronavirus was introduced deliberately and that nothing good would come out of anyone insisting otherwise, during an interview with Rossiya 1 TV channel.

As the president explained, in their current predicament, countries should join forces instead of accusing one another.

We need to do everything that leads us to deliverance from this threat, Putin said, adding that thats where success awaits us rather than on the way of confrontation.

The second priority marked by Tedros is to improve surveillance to find cases, he added while repeatedly stressing on the importance of tracing and quarantining.

He added that if any country is saying contact tracing is difficult, it is a lame excuse.

The lame excuse is there are too many 鈥?Trust me there are not too many in war situations. If contact tracing helps you to win the fight, you do it even risking your life鈥?

The third priority should be to save lives. Early identification and clinical care saves lives. Providing oxygen and dexamethasone to people with severe and critical disease, saves lives, he said and advised countries to pay special attention to high-risk groups.

Fourth is to accelerate research, while fifth is political leadership.

He emphasized that global solidarity was crucial to the pandemic response and to implement a comprehensive strategy to suppress transmission.

Weve already learned a lot about this virus, but theres still a lot we dont know 鈥?and there are still tools we need, concluded the WHO chief.

(CGTN)17:04, July 01, 2020

（Photo/Xinhua）

A majority of Europeans are having an increasingly negative perception of the U.S. as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, according to a recent poll commissioned by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR).

The pan-European survey was conducted by Datapraxis and YouGov in nine EU member states in the last week of April 2020, and into early May. The research was published on Monday by ECFR under the title European foreign and security policy.

The survey for 11,000 people revealed that respondents from almost all nine countries had a worsened view of the United States.

Participants in France and Germany, 46 percent and 42 percent respectively, said their view of the U.S. had worsened a lot as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

Poland and Bulgaria were the only countries where the most people said there had been no change in their view of the United States.

It also shows that only two percent of Europeans surveyed expressed the view that the U.S. was a helpful ally in the fight against COVID-19.

Author of the research, Susi Dennison and Pawel Zerka, noted: The proportion of respondents who felt that the U.S. had been a key ally through the crisis was vanishingly small, with the largest proportion in Italy, at just six percent.

Meanwhile, 25 percent of respondents from Italy saw China as the most useful ally in the crisis, as China was seen sending ventilators, medical experts and personal protective equipment to Italy and some other European countries.

In a frightening world, one looks around for friends. But Europeans are uncertain who they can rely on. As a pan-European poll ECFR carried out in 2019 showed, Europeans preferred the idea of an EU that was strong enough not to be forced to choose sides in a conflict but, ultimately, would usually side with the United States over any other ally. Now, Europeans trust in Trumps America is gone.

On Tuesday, European Union approved to exclude the United States from its initial safe list of countries from which the bloc will allow non-essential travel from Wednesday.

The reports authors also said that many respondents were appalled by the U.S.s response to tackling the coronavirus crisis at a global level, although the White House has repeatedly denied that it has mishandled the pandemic.

Although, the coronavirus crisis had appeared to galvanize public support for the European Union to take more coordinated action to tackle global threats, as few respondents to the survey had a positive view of the EUs coronavirus response.

However, and when asked who has been your countrys greatest ally during the coronavirus crisis a majority of respondents from seven countries answered no one.

Europeans have digested the fact that the U.S. is no longer necessarily a friend for Europe in times of need. As Germany takes over the Presidency of the EU, next month, this important shift in public opinion towards the U.S. may push European governments to pursue a more independent line in the rebuilding of the international order after COVID-19.