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Secret Chinese Military Data Adds New Terrifying Detail to Coronavirus Reporting

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By Isaac Stone Fish and Maria Krol Sinclair. Beijing claims that since the coronavirus pandemic began at the end of last year, there have been only 82,919 confirmed cases and 4,633 deaths in mainland China. Those numbers could be roughly accurate, and in that case a detailed account would be an important tool in judging the spread of the virus. But it’s also possible that the numbers presented to the rest of the world are vastly understated compared to Beijing’s private figures. The opaqueness and mistrust of outsiders in the Chinese Communist Party’s system makes it hard to judge—but learning more about the coronavirus data used directly by Chinese officials is invaluable for governments elsewhere.

A dataset of coronavirus cases and deaths from the military’s National University of Defense Technology, leaked to 100Reporters, offers insight into how Beijing has gathered coronavirus data on its population. The source of the leak, who asked to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of sharing Chinese military data, said that the data came from the university. The school publishes a data tracker for the coronavirus: The online version matches with the leaked information, except it is far less detailed—it shows just the map of cases, not the distinct data.

The dataset, though it contains inconsistencies, is the most extensive dataset proved to exist about coronavirus cases in China. More importantly, it can serve as a valuable trove of information for epidemiologists and public health experts around the globe—and has almost certainly not shared with U.S. officials or doctors. (The World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did not immediately respond to requests for comment.)

While not fully comprehensive, the data is incredibly rich: There are more than 640,000 updates of information, covering at least 230 cities—in other words, 640,000 rows purporting to show the number of cases in a specific location at the time the data was gathered. Each update includes the latitude, longitude, and “confirmed” number of cases at the location, for dates ranging from early February to late April. (Read more from “Secret Chinese Military Data Adds New Terrifying Detail to Coronavirus Reporting” HERE)

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New York Eases Ban, China Reports No New Cases

By Bloomberg. China reported no new coronavirus cases on May 22 and said there are two suspected cases, one local and one that was imported, according to statement posted on website of National Health Commission.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo dropped the state’s ban on gatherings of any size Friday, issuing an executive order saying up to 10 people are now allowed to be together as long as they abide by other social distancing guidelines adopted during the coronavirus pandemic, the Associated Press reported. Hertz Global Holdings Inc. became the latest company to file for bankruptcy amid the pandemic after sweeping travel restrictions destroyed demand for its vehicles.

Singapore’s contact-tracing phone app, “Trace Together,” will remain voluntary for “as long as possible,” Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan said in an interview with Sky News Australia. (Read more from “New York Eases Ban, China Reports No New Cases” HERE)

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Wuhan Bans Consumption of Wild Animals

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The city at the center of the coronavirus crisis has banned the eating of wild animals and Chinese farmers are being offered cash to quit breeding exotic animals. Both moves come amid mounting pressure for China to crack down on the illegal wildlife trade blamed by many for the pandemic that has killed more than 320,000 people.

The local administration in Wuhan, the city of about 11 million people in China’s central Hubei province where cases of the new coronavirus were first recorded late last year, announced Wednesday that the eating of all wild animals was officially banned.

The city also banned virtually all hunting of wild animals within its limits, declaring Wuhan “a wildlife sanctuary,” with the exception of government sanctioned hunting for “scientific research, population regulation, monitoring of epidemic diseases and other special circumstances.”

Wuhan also imposed strict new controls on the breeding of all wild animals, making it clear that none could be reared as food. City officials said the local administration would take part in the wider national scheme to buy wild animal breeders out.

The national plan is the first time Chinese authorities have pledged to buy out breeders in an attempt to curb exotic animal breeding, animal rights activists say. (Read more from “Wuhan Bans Consumption of Wild Animals” HERE)

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Nationwide, Feds Find Cozy Connections Between China And University Professors

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The Chinese Virus began infiltrating the United States in early 2020, but the communist country already had a foot in the door well before then.

In the last year, Campus Reform has covered multiple instances of U.S. law enforcement officials charging professors and students with lying about their ties to China while conducting U.S.-funded research and even attempting to smuggle U.S.-funded researched to China. . .

In the summer of 2019, UCLA adjunct professor Yi-Chi Shih was found guilty of conspiring to steal U.S. missile secrets for China. . .

A University of Kansas associate professor and researcher was indicted for allegedly lying about his ties to China while conducting U.S.-funded academic research. . .

The Harvard University chemistry department chair was arrested for his alleged ties to a Wuhan, China laboratory, where he was paid up to $1.5 million to build the lab, plus an additional $50,000 per month. (Read more from “Nationwide, Feds Find Cozy Connections Between China And University Professors” HERE)

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U.S. Semiconductor Giant Shuts China Factory Hailed as ‘a Miracle’, in Blow to Beijing’s Chip Plans; WHO Summit Devolves Into U.S.-China Proxy Battle

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By South China Morning Post. US chip giant GlobalFoundries has halted operations at a joint venture factory in China, the company has confirmed, dealing a potential blow to China’s bid to own a bigger slice of the global semiconductor market.

The closure of the firm’s only China facility comes just three years after it announced plans to make chips in the mainland, and comes amid an escalating tech war with the United States.

The winding down, however, has little to do with the fierce superpower rivalry. It comes after two years of speculation as to what was actually happening at the US$100 million facility, which was hailed as “a miracle” by local media when announced to fanfare in 2017, but which never got off the ground.

Nonetheless, the symbolism is rich. China is struggling in its efforts to boost its domestic chip research and production in a bid to counter US efforts to block it from American technology. (Read more from “U.S. Semiconductor Giant Shuts China Factory Hailed as ‘a Miracle’, in Blow to Beijing’s Chip Plans” HERE)

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WHO Summit Devolves Into U.S.-China Proxy Battle

By Politico.The United States and China hijacked the annual meeting of the World Health Assembly, the World Health Organization’s governing body, part of an ongoing diplomatic battle over Covid-19 that has left a global leadership vacuum.

Chinese President Xi Jinping opened the summit in Geneva with an announcement of $2 billion in extra funding for the pandemic response. Less than 24 hours later, President Donald Trump countered in a letter to the World Health Organization, giving it 30 days to “commit to major substantive improvements” and threatening to permanently cease U.S. funding to the U.N. public health agency if it fails to do so.

The WHO has real questions to answer about its sluggish coronavirus response — it formally declared the outbreak a pandemic only in mid-March, after the virus was known to have spread to more than 100 countries.

But the dueling carrots and sticks approaches from Beijing and Washington overshadowed global consensus on that front: At least 144 countries co-sponsored a resolution for an independent global pandemic inquiry, and no countries objected to the resolution. (Read more from “WHO Summit Devolves Into U.S.-China Proxy Battle” HERE)

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Pentagon Sources Warn: U.S. ‘Would Lose a War With China’ in the Pacific, ‘Fears the Guam Military Base Is at Risk Now’; U.S. Increases Military Pressure on China

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By Daily Mail. The US would lose a war with China fought in the Pacific, is unable to defend Taiwan from an invasion and fears the Guam military base is at risk now, US defense sources have warned.

‘Eye-opening’ Pentagon war games have revealed growing fears the US is vulnerable to threats from China and that any attack would lead to the US ‘suffering capital losses’, the sources said.

The worrying analysis is expected to come to light in the Pentagon’s 2020 China military power report this summer.

The stark warning comes as tensions continue to mount between the two nations after US President Donald Trump has blasted China’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic and repeatedly suggested the nation lied about the extent of its crisis.

US defense sources told The Times that one Pentagon simulation based on the year 2030 when China would have new attack submarines, aircraft carriers and destroyers resulted in the US being overwhelmed by the nation’s force. (Read more from “Pentagon Sources Warn: U.S. ‘Would Lose a War With China’ in the Pacific, ‘Fears the Guam Military Base Is at Risk Now'” HERE)

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U.S. Increases Military Pressure on China as Tensions Rise Over Pandemic

By CNN. The US is upping military pressure on China amid increased tensions over the South China Sea and accusing Beijing of seeking to leverage the coronavirus pandemic to extend its sphere of influence in the region.

Over the last few weeks US Navy ships and Air Force B-1 bombers have undertaken missions aimed at sending a very public message that the US military intends to maintain a presence in the region and reassure allies.

It’s also a top priority for the Pentagon to get the virus-stricken aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt back out to sea in the region by as soon as the end of the month. (Read more from “U.S. Increases Military Pressure on China as Tensions Rise Over Pandemic” HERE)

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Trump Tweets an Ultimatum to the World Health Organization

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By The Blaze. President Donald Trump sent a letter to the World Health Organization laying out their failures in the response to the coronavirus pandemic, and giving them an ultimatum. . .

The letter accuses the WHO of downplaying the pandemic and echoing propaganda from the communist Chinese government.

“You also strongly praised China’s strict domestic travel restrictions, but were inexplicably against my closing of the United States border, or the ban, with respect to people coming from China,” the letter read.

“I put the ban in place regardless of your wishes. Your political gamesmanship on this issue was deadly, as other governments, relying on your comments, delaying imposing life-saving restrictions on travel to and from China,” the letter claimed.

The president says that unless the WHO makes substantive changes, the U.S. may leave the organization and take away its funding permanently. (Read more from “Trump Tweets an Ultimatum to the World Health Organization Over Coronavirus and China” HERE)

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Trump Threatens to Keep WHO Funding Freeze in Place After WH Investigation

By Fox News. . .The White House has insisted that Beijing downplayed the virus’ threat in December, which led to the subsequent outbreak. China has denied the charge.

Trump announced in April that the U.S. would halt funding to the organization. He said at the time that his administration would undertake a 60-to-90 day investigation into why the “China-centric” WHO had caused “so much death” by “severely mismanaging and covering up” the coronavirus’ spread, including by making the “disastrous” decision to oppose travel restrictions on China.

The U.S. was the WHO’s largest single donor. Trump said the United States contributes roughly $400 to $500 million per year to WHO, while China offers only about $40 million.

The WHO “consistently ignored credible reports of the virus” in December 2019. By the end of that month, it was clear at the organization that the virus was a “major health concern.” Taiwanese authorities told health officials at the organization about human-to-human transmission, but that revelation was not shared with the international community. . .

Dr. Rick Bright, a whistleblower who ran the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, blamed the Trump administration for its own slow response to the pandemic and said the administration was instead worried about politics instead of science. (Read more from “Trump Threatens to Keep WHO Funding Freeze in Place After WH Investigation” HERE)

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Chinese Ambassador to Israel Found Dead at Home; China Emerges as Potential Strain on U.S.-Israel Relationship

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By Fox News. China’s ambassador to Israel was found dead inside his home north of Tel Aviv on Sunday, the Israeli Foreign Ministry said.

Du Wei, 57, arrived in Israel in mid-February amid the coronavirus outbreak and was living in the coastal city of Herzliya on the outskirts of Tel Aviv. He previously served as China’s envoy to Ukraine.

Staff found Du unresponsive in his bed with no signs of violence to his body, the Haaretz daily reported. Initial media reports said Du’s cause of death appeared to be from a cardiac incident. (Read more from “Chinese Ambassador to Israel Found Dead at Home” HERE)

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China Emerges as Potential Strain on U.S.-Israel Relationship

By The Hill. Increasingly close ties between China and Israel risk straining the special relationship Israel has with the U.S., especially as Washington ramps up its feud with Beijing over the spread of the novel coronavirus pandemic.

The historic alliance narrowly avoided a diplomatic fallout this week with Israel relenting to U.S. concerns and delaying a Chinese infrastructure project in the country, coinciding with a whirlwind visit by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to Jerusalem.

While the U.S. has long expressed concern to Israel over its ties with China, Israeli officials have signaled they are not stepping back from relations with Beijing entirely.

Pompeo used his latest visit to highlight the risk of doing business with the Communist Party.

“We do not want the Chinese Communist Party to have access to Israeli infrastructure, Israeli communication systems, all of the things that put Israeli citizens at risk,” Pompeo said in an interview Thursday with an Israeli news channel, “and in turn put the capacity for America to work alongside Israel on important projects at risk as well.” (Read more from “China Emerges as Potential Strain on U.S.-Israel Relationship” HERE)

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WH Trade Adviser: China Deliberately Allowed Coronavirus to Spread Outside Its Borders; Navarro Ties Obama, Biden and China Together in Coronavirus Attack

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By Breitbart. During an interview broadcast on Friday’s edition of the Fox Business Network’s “WSJ at Large,” White House Trade Adviser Peter Navarro stated that China deliberately allowed the coronavirus to spread to the rest of the world and that the virus “could have been contained in Wuhan.”

Navarro said, “China hid the virus behind the shield of the World Health Organization, and that was a time, Gerry, when that virus could have been contained in Wuhan. Instead, what China did was put hundreds of thousands of Wuhanians and Chinese on planes that were allowed to go to Milan and New York and elsewhere, but not to Beijing and Shanghai.” (Read more from “WH Trade Adviser: China Deliberately Allowed Coronavirus to Spread Outside Its Borders” HERE)

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Navarro Ties Obama, Biden and China Together in Coronavirus Attack

By Politico. White House adviser Peter Navarro came out swinging against former President Barack Obama, former Vice President Joe Biden and China in a vigorous defense of the Trump administration’s handling of the coronavirus crisis.

On Sunday morning, Navarro started off by calling Obama’s administration a “kumbaya of incompetence.”

“I’m glad Mr. Obama has a new job as Joe Biden’s press secretary,” Navarro responded on ABC’s “This Week.” “As far as I’m concerned, his administration was a kumbaya of incompetence in which we saw millions of manufacturing jobs go off to China.” . . .

That statement led Navarro to his next target: Using the term “China virus,” he said it could have been contained in Wuhan, where it was thought to have originated. However, he said, the Chinese government intentionally hid information and sent its citizens to other countries to “seed” the virus. (Read more from “Navarro Ties Obama, Biden and China Together in Coronavirus Attack” HERE)

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Senate Republicans Mobilizing to Confront China; China Acknowledges Destroying Early Coronavirus Samples

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By Daily Caller. Several Senate Republicans are mobilizing plans to confront China for its delay, cover up and suppression of critical information in the lead up to the global coronavirus pandemic, the Daily Caller has learned. Options on the table even include “authorizing U.S. courts to seize Chinese government assets” once an investigation “determine[s] the damages China owes the US — and the world.”

Chinese leader Xi Jinping personally asked the World Health Organization (WHO) to delay the release of information regarding its coronavirus outbreak, German intelligence reported. Xi met with WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Jan. 21 to request that he withhold information and delay the declaration of a global pandemic, according to German magazine Der Spiegel’s report, published May 8.

“We now know that leaders at the highest levels of the Chinese Communist Party actively hid the coronavirus outbreak from the world, silencing those who tried to sound the alarm, prevent a global pandemic, and save lives,” Texas Sen. Ted Cruz told the Daily Caller. “Next week, I will introduce the Ending Chinese Medical Censorship and Cover Ups Act of 2020, just one of the legislative steps I am taking to hold the Chinese officials involved in medical censorship directly accountable.” (Read more from “Senate Republicans Mobilizing to Confront China” HERE)

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China Acknowledges Destroying Early Coronavirus Samples, Confirming U.S. Accusation

By Newsweek. China has acknowledged it destroyed some samples of the novel coronavirus in the early stages of the outbreak, but challenged U.S. allegations that this was conducted as part of a cover-up.

Liu Dengfeng, a supervisor at the science and education division of China’s National Health Commission, said at a news conference Friday in Beijing that the Chinese government issued an order on January 3 to dispose of novel coronavirus samples at certain facilities not qualified to handle such highly infectious diseases as a measure to “prevent the risk to laboratory biological safety and prevent secondary disasters caused by unidentified pathogens.”

The move came after the novel coronavirus, known now officially as SARS-CoV-2, was classified as Class II or “highly pathogenic” based on research and expert recommendations, Liu said. This decision necessitated “clear requirements on the collection, transportation, experimental use and destruction of the pathogen” in order to avoid a potential mishap or leakage, he said. (Read more from “China Acknowledges Destroying Early Coronavirus Samples, Confirming U.S. Accusation” HERE)

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China: Trump ‘Like a Giant Baby on the Brink of a Meltdown’

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Chinese state media ridiculed U.S. allegations of wrongdoing in the coronavirus pandemic in a spate of editorials on Thursday and Friday, mocking U.S. President Donald Trump as a baby throwing a temper tantrum and repeating the Communist Party’s standard line that all questions about China’s conduct are merely attempts by other nations to distract from their own purportedly inferior responses to the coronavirus.

China’s Global Times claimed people around the world think Trump is “insane” for threatening to disengage economically from China in the wake of the pandemic. . .

The threats advanced by the CCP through its Global Times included ominous warnings about invading Taiwan, as well as confident predictions that American consumers would suffer more than the CCP from disengagement, which sound very similar to the entirely incorrect predictions CCP mouthpieces made before the pre-coronavirus trade war:

China has nothing to be afraid of as “in the past, we didn’t solve the Taiwan question because we wanted to maintain the China-US relationship, and if the US unilaterally cuts it off, we can just reunify Taiwan immediately since the Chinese mainland has an overwhelming advantage to solve this long-standing problem.”

“Trump is like a giant baby on the brink of a meltdown as he faces tremendous pressure due to massive failures that caused such a high death toll,” Shen Yi, an expert from Fudan University, told the Global Times. “It’s like someone who wants to show his guts when he passes by a cemetery in midnight. He needs to shout to give himself the courage,” he said.

(Read more from “China: Trump ‘Like a Giant Baby on the Brink of a Meltdown’” HERE)

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