Saturday, May 16, 2026

China Building Its Biggest Search and Rescue Ship Yet For South China Sea

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China Building Its Biggest Search and Rescue Ship Yet For South China Sea

China says it is nearing completion of a 450-foot-long search and rescue ship, the largest such vessel in its fleet, that will enter service with the Ministry of Transport’s South China Sea Rescue Bureau.

The ship will dwarf coastguard vessels from other nations in those disputed waters, where accidents at sea are increasingly common, and China’s maritime presence looms increasingly large.

A subsidiary of state-owned China State Shipbuilding Corporation announced the completion and installation of stabilizer components for the search and rescue (SAR) ship Monday.

A contract to construct the ship itself was signed between the South China Sea Rescue Bureau and a subsidiary of Hong Kong-based China Merchants Group in November according to a release on the China Merchant Industrial Holdings’ website. The signing ceremony was overseen by the South China Sea Rescue Bureau’s Party Secretary, Zhuang Zeping.

According to the original tender put out by the Ministry of Finance, the design and technical plans for the ship should be done by this month, leaving only construction of the ship left. The tender doesn’t specify when construction should be complete.

The SAR ship is simply called the 14,000 Kilowatt Large Cruiser Rescue Ship. If the dimensions specified under the original tender and in the China State Shipbuilding Corporation release are accurate, this would indeed be the largest and most powerful ship operated by China’s search and rescue service.  It would be roughly 450 feet long, 88 feet wide, and 36 feet deep. In comparison, the ship’s predecessor and China’s current largest, most powerful SAR vessel, the Dong Hai Jiu 101, is 360 feet by 54 feet, with a depth of 25 feet.

China says it will be the world’s largest search and rescue vessel – a claim that RFA could not immediately confirm. It would certainly be significantly larger than any other SAR ships in the region, and larger than any coastguard ships owned by other claimants in the South China Sea.

China’s Ministry of Transport operates many “rescue bureaus” under its SAR agency, the China Rescue Service (CRS). The South China Sea Rescue Bureau is based at Haikou, Hainan province, and has set up regional rescue centers on disputed rocks and islands in the South China Sea: one on Fiery Cross Reef in the Spratlys, and one on Woody Island in the Paracel Islands. Even where there are no formal centers, SAR ships have been permanently based at such artificial islands as Subi Reef.

The Large Cruiser Rescue Ship is set to be the most advanced SAR ship in China’s fleet, capable of hauling shipwrecks out of the deep sea with a 133-ton crane. However, no rescue mission practiced by the CRS in the South China Sea to date has necessitated such a vessel. The original tender elaborates on the rescue ship’s purpose, stating it will be used for “search and rescue of people, ships, and aircraft in distress in the South China Sea, participate in international rescue operations,” and “maintain national rights and interests.”

The CRS is not part of the China Coast Guard (CCG) and solely focuses on maritime rescue or salvaging after accidents at sea involving other ships or civilians. It has been increasingly active in disputed waters, where Chinese fishermen and maritime militia are encouraged to operate to assert China’s sweeping maritime claims. According to Chinese state media, since the establishment of the rescue center on Fiery Cross, four rescue missions have been completed.

Most recently, the CRS rescued the crew of a fishing boat grounded in the Paracel Islands on May 21, Chinese state media reported. The rescue took place after China declared its annual summer fishing moratorium north of the 12th parallel in the South China Sea on May 1 – a unilateral ban that has drawn protests from Vietnam and the Philippines over China’s assertion that it has jurisdiction over the area. The Paracels falls within the zone covered by the moratorium but it wasn’t clear from the report whether the boat in question was on a fishing expedition.

The CRS was not folded into the coastguard along with other agencies and bureaus in the 2013 reform process that created the China Coast Guard as it is today. This could be because of the aggressive purpose of the China Coast Guard in pressuring other claimants in the South China Sea, which precludes its ability to function as a ‘normal’ coastguard. However, CRS vessels have been accompanied by the CCG in the past when working. China’s State Council issued new guidelines for the CRS in December 2019, emphasizing the importance of maritime SAR capabilities as economic activity increases in Chinese waters.



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House Passes Uighur Human Rights Bill, Prodding Trump to Punish China

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House Passes Uighur Human Rights Bill, Prodding Trump to Punish China

WASHINGTON — The House voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday to pass a measure that would punish top Chinese officials for detaining more than one million Muslims in internment camps, sending President Trump a bill intended to force him to take a more aggressive stand on human rights abuses in China.

The bipartisan vote, 413 to 1, cleared legislation that would compel Mr. Trump to impose sanctions on Chen Quanguo, the top Communist Party official in Xinjiang, where the camps are, and mandate that the director of national intelligence produce a list of Chinese companies involved in the construction and operation of the camps.

The bill’s passage reflected broad congressional support to punish Beijing for its ruthless campaign against Uighurs, Muslim ethnic minorities, and to press the administration into action to condemn China’s mass detentions. The Senate passed the legislation, which was sponsored by Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida, earlier this month.

“With this overwhelming bipartisan legislation, the United States Congress is taking a firm step to counter Beijing’s horrific human rights abuses against the Uighurs,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi said. “We must continue to raise a drumbeat and shine the light of abuse perpetrated by Beijing against the Uighurs whenever we can, from this House floor to the State Department to other multilateral institutions.”

Representative Thomas Massie, Republican of Kentucky, was the sole lawmaker to oppose the bill.

The drive to pass the legislation has been a yearlong effort by lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, especially China hawks, who have grown frustrated at the administration’s reluctance to punish human rights abuses by Beijing despite damning reports outlining a brutal indoctrination campaign against Uighurs.

Tensions have since risen with China during the coronavirus pandemic, and Mr. Trump’s campaign aides in recent weeks have taken up a partywide strategy of attacking Beijing, in part to divert from the administration’s own handling of the health crisis.

China has vehemently denied reports of abuses in Xinjiang, and has described the camps as corrective facilities aimed at training workers. But overwhelming evidence, including official documents, news reports and testimony from released detainees, shows the country’s most sweeping internment program since the Mao era.

On the House floor on Wednesday, Representative Christopher H. Smith, Republican of New Jersey and one of the sponsors of the bill, recounted one such story that he heard from a released detainee who came before the House to detail her experience in one of the camps.

“She broke down weeping, telling us that she pleaded with God for her life, and her Chinese jailers restrained her to a table, increased the electrical currents coursing through her body and mocked her belief in God,” Mr. Smith said.

“We cannot be silent,” he continued. “Xi Jinping is smashing and obliterating an entire people.”

Last year, Congress unanimously passed legislation supporting the Hong Kong protests, forcing Mr. Trump to sign the bill. Mr. Trump, who had previously said he was “standing with” Mr. Xi, the Chinese leader, risked being overruled by Congress and criticized as weak on China if he had vetoed the measure. But when he signed the bill, he issued a statement saying he would “exercise executive discretion” in enforcing its provisions.

The focus on human rights in Congress has extended beyond China, with some Republicans breaking from Mr. Trump to support other human rights causes. Last year, over the administration’s objections, lawmakers passed legislation recognizing as a genocide the 1915 killings of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians, and another bill, included in the annual defense policy bill, that imposed sanctions on Syrian officials responsible for human rights violations during the nation’s civil war.

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Jason Chaffetz Finds His COVID-19 Calling

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Jason Chaffetz Finds His COVID-19 Calling

Fox News pundit and former Utah congressman Jason Chaffetz appears to have found his cause during the deadly coronavirus pandemic: ensuring that America’s national parks are open and packed full of people.

On May 7, as the U.S. death toll from COVID-19 topped 75,000, Chaffetz penned an op-ed blasting the Interior Department for keeping dozens of popular parks shuttered ― closures that local park superintendents made in an effort to slow the spread of COVID-19. He argued that “perhaps there is no better way to be socially distant than going into the mountains” and ― falsely ― that shutting them down is “counter to science and common sense.” 

“If I stay 300 feet from a bear and six feet from other people, why should it remain closed?” he asked of Yellowstone, adding that he goes there to “enjoy the beauty and get away from people.”

As Yellowstone’s partial reopening less than two weeks later highlighted, people inevitably won’t stay six feet apart or keep their distance from dangerous wildlife. Crowds of out-of-state visitors, few of them wearing masks, flocked to Old Faithful geyser, and a woman was “knocked to the ground and injured” by a bison when she approached the animal. 

Memorial Day weekend drew large crowds to popular national parks like Yellowstone, Zion and Great Smoky Mountain. The scenic drive in Zion filled up so quickly on Sunday that authorities had so close access by 6:30 a.m., the Las Vegas Journal-Review reported. 

As a resident of Utah, which is home to five iconic national parks known as the “Mighty Five,” Chaffetz ought to know that there are scores of park visitors who never hike a remote trail or camp in the backcountry. Instead, they stick to roads and create bottlenecks at easily accessible attractions and trails. Yet Chaffetz has emerged as one of the loudest voices demanding President Donald Trump immediately reopen parks and monuments amid a pandemic that has already claimed nearly 100,000 American lives. 

“It is bizarre. It’s a really odd fixation for Chaffetz to have right now considering a lot of these small towns in Utah are totally unprepared and would be unable to handle a resurgence of COVID-19,” said Aaron Weiss, media director at Colorado-based conservation group Center for Western Priorities. “He knows full well there is no way to socially distance in Zion.” 

“I don’t know why Chaffetz in particular is on this tear,” Weiss added, “but it truly is going to endanger the lives of Utah residents.” 

In a May 15 letter, House Natural Resources Chairman Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.) urged Interior and the National Park Service “to exercise extreme caution” in reopening sites. “Ensuring the safety of NPS employees, visitors, and gateway communities is your responsibility, and human safety must take precedence over any politically motivated decisions to reopen national park sites,” he said.

In his op-ed, Chaffetz offered this advice for gateway towns: “If a restaurant, hotel or local business feels the risk is too high, then don’t open, but denying Americans access to their parks is fundamentally wrong and counter to the goal of socially distancing.”

It is clear that Trump and his team have felt the pressure from Chaffetz and other conservative lawmakers and talking heads. 

“Nothing like the great outdoors!” Interior Secretary David Bernhardt wrote in an April 22 tweet responding to Chaffetz calling for parks to reopen. “We are working to keep your public lands accessible to you and the American people.”

Earlier that same day, Trump addressed the issue during a speech on the White House lawn, saying “we will begin to reopen our national parks and public lands for the American people to enjoy.” And in a statement on April 25, Bernhardt announced that Interior and the National Park Service would begin working closely with state governors to “reopen the American people’s national parks as rapidly as possible.”

Unsatisfied with the speed at which that’s played out, Chaffetz has continued his public campaign. He’s tweeted about it more than a dozen times in recent weeks. “Except most of them are closed,” he wrote in response to a video Bernhardt posted May 7 about First Lady Melania Trump’s anti-bullying campaign and the importance of children experiencing the outdoors. “Why are you doing these videos when you should be opening our National Parks?” The post kicked off a testy exchange between Chaffetz and Interior’s press office. 

That Chaffetz suddenly fancies himself a champion of public access to federally controlled lands is ironic. In 2017, while still in Congress, Chaffetz reintroduced legislation to sell off 3.3 million acres of public land in 10 western states that he said had “been deemed to serve no purpose for taxpayers.” He ultimately pulled the bill less than two weeks later in response to backlash from conservationists, hunters, anglers and outdoor enthusiasts. 

As the powerful chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Chaffetz showed little interest in holding the Trump administration accountable. He declined to investigate Michael Flynn’s contact with the Russian government or Trump’s many financial conflicts of interest, but in early 2017 vowed to probe a tweet from Bryce Canyon National Park welcoming Utah’s Bears Ears National Monument ― and a second Obama-era monument in Nevada ― to the National Park Service family. He told the Salt Lake Tribune at the time that he suspected Bryce Canyon officials may have had advanced knowledge of the monument’s designation, of which Chaffetz was a staunch critic. 

Chaffetz had an abysmal 2% lifetime score from the League of Conservation Voters. 

It’s unclear why Chaffetz is so motivated to carry this torch during the COVID-19 crisis, or if he’s considered what reopening park sites too soon could mean for the health and safety of workers, visitors and neighboring communities. He did not respond to HuffPost’s request for comment. 

But Jayson O’Neill, director of public lands watchdog group Western Values Project, has a theory.  

“He’s auditioning for secretary of the Interior on Trump’s favorite state-controlled news station,” he said. The extent to which Fox News influences Trump’s thinking is no secret.

The Trump administration appears to have decided that the optics of having iconic national parks closed is too much to bear, even though reopening them too soon could cost lives. Additional national parks, including Rocky Mountain in Colorado and Arches and Canyonlands in Utah, are slated to start welcoming back visitors this week.

During the month of May, Interior has issued three separate press releases titled “In Case You Missed It: Interior Continues to Safely Restore Access to Public Lands.”

A HuffPost Guide To Coronavirus



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At Least 100,000 People Have Now Died From COVID-19 In The U.S.

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At Least 100,000 People Have Now Died From COVID-19 In The U.S.

The confirmed COVID-19 death toll in the United States has surpassed 100,000, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

The development falls in line with a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention projection in mid-May that the U.S. would reach that milestone by June 1. 

Three New York City counties with a combined total of more than 13,000 deaths round out the top of JHU’s list. 

The U.S. continues to have the greatest coronavirus death toll of any country in the world — around triple that of the United Kingdom, which ranks second in total deaths.

Though the U.S. ranks ninth in deaths per capita, varying methodology between countries may obscure the real picture. Belgium, which has reported the greatest mortality rate, is including all deaths suspected of being linked to the COVID-19 in its tally, regardless of whether the deceased patient was tested for the virus. 

Less than four months ago, President Donald Trump baselessly claimed that the coronavirus ― then concentrated in China’s Wuhan province ― would probably disappear “in April as the heat comes in.” Infectious disease experts warned him not to be so sure. Nearly 59,000 Americans died from COVID-19 during the month of April alone.



Workers move a deceased coronavirus patient in New Jersey. 

The president has repeatedly revised his predictions of the U.S. death toll upward as the pandemic sweeps the country, an act that’s allowed him to boast of the job he’s doing regardless of how bad things get. A New York Times analysis of all Trump’s public comments on the pandemic from March 9 to April 17 found that he congratulated himself on the U.S. response to coronavirus roughly 600 times. He rarely expresses any empathy for the victims but dedicates lots of time to attacking his critics.

The U.S. would not be hitting 100,000 deaths this soon had it acted earlier, one analysis concluded. A recent Columbia University study found that if the country had put broad social distancing measures in place just a week earlier than it did in March, roughly 36,000 deaths could have been prevented. 

The Trump administration is under more fire than ever for brushing off the advice of medical experts early on before the disease began spreading on U.S. soil. Rick Bright, the recently ousted government vaccine official, testified before Congress this month that he “pushed for our government to obtain virus samples from China and to secure more funding … to get started quickly on the development of critical medical countermeasures,” only to be fired from his job. 

The 100,000 deaths milestone comes as Trump, public health officials and state leaders remain divided on how quickly to reopen the economy. While some governors have heeded advice from infectious disease experts and are taking a slower approach to reopening their states, others have resumed more normal business operations with encouragement from Trump. 

A HuffPost Guide To Coronavirus



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More than 100,000 people have died of coronavirus in the United States

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More than 100,000 people have died of coronavirus in the United States

The COVID-19 death toll in the U.S. surpassed 100,000 Wednesday as the number of cases around the world inched closer to 5.7 million.

The U.S. has led the world in the number of positive cases since late March, when it surpassed the case count in Italy, an early COVID-19 hot spot, and China, where the virus was first reported. By Wednesday, over 1.6 million cases had been reported in the U.S., according to a virus tracker created by Johns Hopkins University. Brazil and Russia followed as the countries with the second and third-highest case counts, with fewer than 400,000 cases reported in each country.

The U.S. also leads the world in the number of COVID-19 deaths, with the United Kingdom following far behind at fewer than 40,000 deaths and all other countries reporting even fewer virus-related fatalities.

Though the 100,000 death count marks a grim milestone for the U.S., federal officials have predicted the numbers of COVID-19 cases and fatalities will continue to rise. According to death rate projections shared by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) last week, as many as 110,000 Americans are expected to die from COVID-19 by June 13. The death rate projections have fluctuated since the pandemic began, with some early estimates predicting fewer deaths than have currently been reported and others saying the U.S. could see more than 240,000 fatalities.


A 911 Memorial with the American Flag seen flying at half-mast in Morris Plains, New Jersey. On April 3, Governor Phil Murphy requested all flags will be lowered to half-staff immediately and indefinitely to honor all who have died from coronavirus in New Jersey. On May 21, President Donald Trump ordered all national flags be flown at half-staff for three days as the number of lives lost in the U.S. during the pandemic neared 100,000.
Ira L. Black/Corbis/Getty

Even so, states across the country have begun the process of reopening their local economies and lifting restrictions put in place when the pandemic began.

New York, which has been the hardest hit state in the U.S. with more than 364,000 cases and nearly a quarter of the entire country’s deaths by Wednesday, began allowing some regions to reopen earlier this month using a slow, phased approach. On the opposite coast, California has also begun lifting restrictions for regions that qualify for early phases of reopening, despite reporting more than 96,000 cases and 3,800 deaths on Tuesday.

Places of worship in the U.S. also began to reopen to congregants last week. Though they were initially discouraged from holding in-person services due to the CDC’s restrictions on groups of 10 individuals or more, President Donald Trump last Friday announced he was adding places of worship to the federal list of essential services and called for governors to reopen them immediately.

Schools have also presented a question for states unsure of how to plan for the start of the next academic year in the fall. While some governors decided early they would keep schools closed to in-person instruction through the end of the academic year, Trump on Sunday said in a tweet that schools “should be opened ASAP.”

While many health experts have advised caution as states begin pulling back their pandemic restrictions, some of the nation’s top COVID-19 advisors have said in recent days that they believe it is time for the country to begin moving forward.

During meetings with the press last week, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and member of the White House’s coronavirus task force, said for the first time he thought many states were ready to begin reopening.

While he said there was a possibility outbreaks would continue to pop up during the reopening process, he said responsible strategies for resuming some aspects of normal life would be key to keeping new case counts low and stifling outbreaks when they occurred.

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Scenes from inside Brazil’s worst-hit city

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Scenes from inside Brazil’s worst-hit city

It’s unclear how coronavirus — what Bolsonaro called a “little flu” — made it to this remote place in the Amazon. It tore through the rich areas, and then moved on to the poorer. Now it is hitting the indigenous communities that live in the suburbs and slums.

Here are some of the people we met recently and their stories.

The doors on each side of the plane gape open, as hazmat-suited medics clamber inside to reach the seriously ill patients, hurrying them into an ambulance. Manaus is not a city that you want to be rescued to — it’s the hardest-hit city in Brazil from coronavirus — yet it still offers hope for the most acutely ill across the Amazon area.

This flight brought two people from down the river in Parintins, a city with a population of just over 100,000 about 230 miles (370 km) away. They need the medical care Manaus can provide. One of the patients, a man, is able to move himself with the help from medics onto a stretcher. The only motion from the other patient, a woman, is the slow heave of her chest.

Waiting ambulances take the two away. The crew begin cleaning and refurbishing the plane. This team never lost a patient in flight, although they have had to intubate one midair.

Dr. Selma Haddad is part of a team that flies the sickest patients to Manaus.

Dr. Selma Haddad climbs out of her protective clothing on the tarmac and inhales. “It’s very hard. You carry a weight that you don’t see. Every time I carry this weight.”

Constant stream of grief

Workers have made hundreds of crosses to mark new graves at the Parque Taruma Cemetery.

At the Parque Taruma Cemetery, more than 1,500 graves have been dug since the pandemic came to the Amazon. Men and heavy machinery sometimes work at night to meet the demand, opening up large trenches as mass graves.

Five coffins that arrive in just two hours get placed in a group grave.

Pedro Chaves said it was distressing to not only lose his mother but to have to wait for her to be buried.

Standing in mourning for his mother is Pedro Chaves, angry that he has to wait for the trench to be full before the coffin is covered. “We are here around 30 minutes waiting for more bodies,” he says. “I just want to put my Mum there and finish this. My family doesn’t need this.”

Chaves says his mother died from complications of diabetes, not the virus. Others say Covid-19 was not to blame for their losses. With so little testing, it is impossible to know for sure.

As a constant parade of angry, grief-stricken locals passes through the cemetery, workers sit in a corner, hammering makeshift crosses and grave boundaries together in the Amazonian humidity.

Indigenous people pack field hospital

Across town, at the newly built Gilberto Novaes field hospital, a stream of new patients arrives. A dozen indigenous people from the outer limits of the city stagger breathless from the ambulances into wheelchairs and straight to the ICU.

Health workers and patients fight coronavirus in the ICU of Gilberto Novaes hospital.

The ICU is frenetic, packed with the sick and those trying to save them.

Circulating among the beds is Miqueias Moreira Kokama, the head of the Kokama indigenous community. He was appointed just two weeks ago when his father died from coronavirus.

In pictures: Coronavirus surges in Brazil

“I took my father into hospital where he was intubated for 5 days,” he says. “Now we have 300 with symptoms and 30 in hospital.”

Deathly quiet in the slums

In the Kokama community itself, the virus has emptied the streets. Resident Vanda Ortega Witoto points at each house on one road, ticking off the families that are now self-isolating.

At the next street, she explains that the deathly silence stems from everyone being in hospital.

Miqueias Moreira Kokama lost his father to coronavirus and then had to lead his community.

At first they felt their distance from the city gave them protection. But then the first symptoms appeared and the slum’s poor sanitation helped the virus take hold.

Yet help did not come, Witoto says, with local officials saying it was the duty of the federal government to help the indigenous people and the federal government doing nothing.

So when a relative was coughing, in pain and unable to get out from a hammock, she donned a mask and gloves to drive them herself to the hospital. “It was a very difficult moment, to expose myself and seek help for her.”

The Kokama feel doubly under threat, from the pandemic and the actions of the government whom they accuse of threatening their very existence.

Witito says Bolsonaro “has been behaving in this pandemic by attacking our territory, expelling the indigenous people from their territories and opening our lands to agribusiness.”

At the end of the day, a moment of hope warms the community. Witoto’s mother, Brazileia Martiniano Barrozo, has been released from the hospital and returns to streets now echoing with celebratory fireworks and cheers from neighbors.

A city caught by the President’s rhetoric

Manaus Mayor Arthur Virgilio Neto isn’t just fighting the spread of Covid-19, he’s also caught in a row with President Bolsonaro who called him a “piece of sh**” in a cabinet meeting, the recording of which the Supreme Court released last week.

Virgilio Neto told us he felt Bolsonaro’s “dream is to be a dictatorship but he’s too stupid.”

He added the President should “shut up and stay at home,” and was partially responsible for Brazil’s rising death toll because of the way he had dismissed the danger as a “little flu.”

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Cambodia’s PM Hun Sen Reopens Border to Cambodians Stranded Abroad Due to Pandemic

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Cambodia’s PM Hun Sen Reopens Border to Cambodians Stranded Abroad Due to Pandemic

Cambodia’s Prime Minister Hun Sen on Wednesday announced that he was reopening the country’s borders to Cambodian nationals who have been living abroad during the coronavirus pandemic, regardless of whether they have been medically cleared of infection.

“Any Cambodians who are holding Cambodian passports and want to return to Cambodia are not required to have doctors’ notes certifying that they don’t have COVID-19,” the strongman said during a speech in the capital Phnom Penh, referring to the disease caused by the coronavirus.

“This measure will help people who are living overseas return to Cambodia faster to unite with their families in their own country.”

On return to Cambodia, he said, those who were living abroad will be required to undergo a medical exam that includes a test for COVID-19 and will be placed in isolation for 14 days before they are permitted to return to their families. To date, 124 cases have been confirmed in the country.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Health issued a statement on Wednesday saying that any foreign nationals in Cambodia must have a health certificate stating that they are free of the virus and be in possession of health insurance coverage that totals at least U.S. $50,000.

Cambodian migrant workers in Malaysia welcomed the news and told RFA’s Khmer Service they need help from the government to return home because they have been stranded abroad for months with no income as a result of the pandemic’s impact on the local economy.

“Earlier, Hun Sen wouldn’t allow me to return and I was very worried,” said stranded construction worker Ham Saly, who said he lost his job in Malaysia and was struggling financially.

“Now he is going to let us come home. I can’t wait to see my wife and children.”

A restaurant worker in Malaysia named Sreang Sam Oeun, who has also been out of a job, said he was glad that the government won’t require that he obtain a medical clearance to return home, but urged Cambodia’s embassy in Kuala Lumpur to assist him and others who are stuck in the country.

“If they want us to return, please hurry up [with assistance],” he said.

“I am suffering here. I don’t have any money for rent or food. At least 150 [Cambodian] people are stranded in Malaysia.”

Dy Thehoya, program officer at the Center for Alliance of Labor and Human Rights, told RFA Hun Sen’s announcement is insufficient on its own and called for the government to provide those stranded in Malaysia with food and accommodation until they can return home.

Protest blocked

Meanwhile, authorities in Banteay Meanchey province’s Poipet city on Wednesday deployed at least 25 members of the security forces to surround the home of Din Puthy, the head of the Cambodia Informal Economy Reinforced Association, to prevent him from leading a protest against the ongoing closure of the border with Thailand to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

“I have never seen any officers deployed in front of my house,” he said in an interview with RFA.

“This is a threat against our morals, an attempt to split our unity, and an attack on freedom of expression and movement.”

Din Puthy had written a May 25 letter to Banteay Meanchey provincial authorities demanding permission to lead a demonstration on Wednesday of some 1,500 people urging the government to request that Thai authorities reopen the border by the end of the month.

His letter was prompted by the concerns of several local residents who rented stalls and booths in Thai markets but have been unable to resume their businesses because of the border shutdown.

Banteay Meanchey Deputy Police Chief Vong Prathna refused to comment on Din Puthy’s claims that security personnel had been deployed to block off his house and monitor him.

Sum Chankea, Banteay Meanchey provincial coordinator for local rights group Adhoc, called the deployment “a threat against villagers” meant to prevent them from demonstrating and said the move constituted a violation of their freedom of speech.

“This is a form of intimidation,” he said, adding that the government has done little to help those affected by the outbreak. “When people can’t work, they don’t make any income.”

The Thai-Cambodian border was shut down on March 23 to prevent the spread of the outbreak, forcing many Cambodians who rely on their businesses in Thailand to turn to scavenging to earn a living.

Reported by RFA’s Khmer Service. Translated by Samean Yun. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.



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Medical Groups Ask FDA To Ease Access To Abortion Pill During The Pandemic

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Medical Groups Ask FDA To Ease Access To Abortion Pill During The Pandemic

In this photo illustration, a person looks at an Abortion Pill (RU-486) for unintended pregnancy from Mifepristone displayed on a computer on May 8 in Arlington, Va.

OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images


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In this photo illustration, a person looks at an Abortion Pill (RU-486) for unintended pregnancy from Mifepristone displayed on a computer on May 8 in Arlington, Va.

OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images

Reproductive rights advocates are suing the Trump administration, asking a federal court to suspend restrictions on the abortion drug mifepristone during the coronavirus pandemic.

The drug mifepristone was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration 20 years ago for use in medication abortions in early pregnancy. It’s also used to help manage miscarriages for some women trying to avoid surgery.

In a federal lawsuit filed in Maryland on behalf of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and other groups, the American Civil Liberties Union requests an emergency order lifting regulations requiring patients in the United States to pick up the drug at a hospital or medical facility.

Julia Kaye, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, said that requirement is putting patients at risk during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“A patient who has already been evaluated by a clinician, either through telemedicine or at a prior in person visit, still must make this entirely unnecessary trip just to pick up their prescription,” Kaye said during a conference call announcing the lawsuit.

ACOG supports lifting the restrictions, called the Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy or REMS, and has said they are medically unnecessary to preserve patient safety. In 2017, the ACLU filed a federal lawsuit in Hawaii, seeking to force the FDA to remove the REMS for mifepristone.

But this new lawsuit is more narrow, Kaye said, in asking the court to suspend the rules during the pandemic only. The lawsuit asks for an emergency order allowing the mifepristone to be dispensed through the mail or by pharmacies. It notes that in other areas of medicine, federal agencies “have taken substantial action … to encourage telemedicine use” and “forego unnecessary in-person visits” during the coronavirus crisis.

Abortion rights opponents have asked the FDA to keep the regulations in place during the pandemic, arguing that women should be required to see a doctor before taking abortion pills.

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SpaceX calls off ‘Launch America’ mission at last minute – Here’s why

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SpaceX calls off ‘Launch America’ mission at last minute – Here’s why

Those who tuned to the SpaceX and NASA live streams in no doubt felt the excitement build as astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley prepared for the long flight to the International Space Station (ISS).

We marvelled at the artwork by Tristan Eaton on board the Crew Dragon capsule and felt a tug at hour heartstrings looking at the mosaic of graduates, courtesy of the class of 2020. And then it all went South, figuratively speaking.

SpaceX and NASA’s first crewed mission postponed

Safety is of paramount importance, especially considering that two astronauts will be shooting through space as they make their way to the ISS.

“It’s better to be on the ground wishing you were flying, than flying wishing you were on the ground”.

SpaceX made the announcement mere minutes after they gave the green light for launch. However, NASA reiterated that the issue was not related to the equipment, the crew or the astronauts.

The team confirmed that “everything else was looking good today, on the vehicle itself, Bob and Doug are ready, the vehicles were healthy”, unfortunately, the only team player to didn’t do their part, was the weather.

‘Weather is the one thing we actually cannot control’

NASA said that “weather is the one thing we actually cannot control on our missions, so, unfortunately, it did cause us to scrub today. The vehicles are healthy. Bob and Doug were ready to go and will be ready on our next launch attempt”.

NASA explains why the team has to wait for an “instantaneous launch window”. The Falcon 9’s “whole sequence is scripted”, meaning if one part of the sequence fails, the entire sequence has to be rerun.

“In the case of Flacon 9, once we start the propellant load at t-minus 35 minutes, it doesn’t matter so much if you can move 5 or 10 minutes left or right because the whole sequence is scripted. We do the flight an analysis assuming the temperature of the propellants are below a certain amount so we know how much performance is available to rocket how much margin we’ll have”.

The team cannot stop the countdown at any given time to attend to one aspect of the plan as they would simply not have the time to “cut into those margins”.

Time and date of next launch

NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine adds that if the flight is delayed, even by 90 minutes, “the International Space Station won’t be anywhere near where we need it to be”.

SpaceX and NASA are now targeting Saturday 30 May 2020 for Falcon 9’s launch of Crew Dragon’s Demo-2 mission from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

“The instantaneous launch window opens at 3:22 p.m. EDT, or 19:22 UTC, with a backup instantaneous launch opportunity available on Sunday, May 31 at 3:00 p.m. EDT, or 19:00 UTC. Tune in here to watch the launch webcast. Coverage will begin about 4 hours before liftoff.”



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The Takeaway: Hagel: “I don’t think we can afford to abandon Iraq”

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The Takeaway: Hagel: “I don’t think we can afford to abandon Iraq”

 
The lead: Hagel spoke with Sisi “more than 50 times” after 2013 coup that overthrew Morsi
 

 

Former US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel held one of the most important roles in the US government when a coup ousted President Mohammed Morsi in Egypt, a key Middle Eastern ally of Washington’s, in July 2013. Hagel become a point person for the US government afterward, speaking with coup leader Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi “more than 50 times” to steady the US-Egypt relationship.

Background: Hagel served as US senator from Nebraska from 1997-2009; co-chair of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board from 2009-2013; and as secretary of defense from 2013-2015. In the Senate, he was a member of the Foreign Relations and Select Intelligence Committees. He spoke with me in the latest “On the Middle East” Al-Monitor podcast this week.

Here are just a few highlights of the interview:

On Morsi: Morsi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, narrowly won election for president in 2012 after popular demonstrations led to the downfall of Hosni Mubarak. Hagel said that on his first trip to Egypt as secretary of defense in 2013, “I didn’t sense that I was talking to the president of a large and important nation, who really has any confidence in his own decisions, or that he could make his own decisions.”

On Sisi: Hagel’s conversations with Sisi, who became president of Egypt in June 2014, served as a kind of diplomatic lifeline for US-Egypt ties as many in the Obama administration wanted to cut off military and economic aid in response to the coup. Hagel describes Sisi, his onetime counterpart as defense minister, as both clever and confident, if at times elusive, referring at one point to Sisi’s “Abraham Lincoln speech” to justify the coup. During their many talks, Hagel pressed Sisi to loosen up on restrictions during the post-coup crackdown. Hagel adds that Israel made it “very clear” that it didn’t want the United States to cut security ties with Egypt.

On Iraq: “I don’t think we can afford to abandon Iraq…nor should Iraq or anyone else look to the US after almost 20 years to continue combat missions.”

On Joe Biden: “I don’t think there is an American today that understands foreign policy as well as Joe Biden, as effective as Joe Biden, his personal style, his relationships.”

On Russian President Vladimir Putin: “We may not like Putin…but we have to deal with him…face it directly and be creative.”

Listen here: Listen here to the full interview with former Secretary Hagel, and sign up for “On the Middle East” on your favorite podcast platform.
 

 
Three quick takes on Egypt, Turkey and Jordan:
 

 

1. Egypt: Government cracks down on women social media influencers

“The Egyptian government has expanded its crackdown on free expression to target YouTubers and social media influencers, particularly women, detaining and prosecuting several in recent weeks,” writes Shahira Amin. Egypt’s “cybercrime law has been criticized by free speech advocates and rights groups including the Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression, which said the law ‘legalizes the blocking of websites and full surveillance of Egyptians.’”

Read Amin’s article here.
 

 

2. Turkey: Erdogan threatens to turn Hagia Sophia into a mosque

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s communication chief this week flashed the “Hagia Sophia” card – where the former church (and now a museum) would be converted back into a mosque — in what Kadri Gursel calls the “holy grail” for Turkey’s Islamist movement.

Background: “The Hagia Sophia — ‘Holy Wisdom’ in Greek — was built as a church during Byzantine times in 537 and functioned as such for 916 years before the Ottomans conquered Istanbul on May 29, 1453, and converted the edifice into a mosque on the same day,” Gursel explains. “Almost half a millennium later, on Nov. 24, 1934, the Hagia Sophia became a museum by a Council of Ministers decree under the modern Turkish republic.”

Final battle for Islamists: “The Hagia Sophia is the only subject of ‘victimhood’ that the movement has left for political use after the abolition of the headscarf ban for public servants and students, starting from secondary school,” Gursel explains. The symbolism of the Hagia Sophia is an especially welcome distraction as Turkey wrestles with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Not as easy as it seems: “Converting the Hagia Sophia is not as easy as it might seem — and not only because of the outcry that such a move would trigger in the Christian world,” Gursel writes. “The Hagia Sophia’s museum status allows the coexistence of Islamic and Christian symbols in the edifice. Its conversion to a mosque open to worship would raise religious and political complications.”

Our take: Erdogan might use the May 29 anniversary of the Ottoman conquest of Istanbul to stoke the issue among his Islamist populist base or, in the most extreme scenario, even announce the conversion of the Hagia Sophia from museum to mosque.

Read Gursel’s article here.
 

 

3. Jordan: King weighs options to respond to annexation

King Abdullah has warned of “a massive conflict” between Jordan and Israel “if Israel really annexed the West Bank in July,” and that Jordan is weighing all options in response.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said again May 26 that he will not miss a “historic opportunity” to annex parts of the occupied West Bank, considering it a “top task” of the unity government.

But, what, exactly, would Jordan do in response if Israel goes ahead with annexing settlements in the West Bank? Is “massive conflict” really being contemplated? What does that mean?

Steps short of war: Osama Al Sharif has the scoop on the likely initial response by Jordan to annexation. “Al-Monitor has learned that Jordan is considering, among other options, suspending parts of the 1994 peace treaty claiming that the Israeli annexation of the Jordan Valley violates the delineation of borders between Israel and Jordan, in addition to being illegal under international law and pertinent United Nations resolutions,” he writes. “Immediate reaction may include expelling the Israeli ambassador in Amman and recalling the Jordanian ambassador in Tel Aviv.”

Existential threat: “The unilateral annexation of parts of the West Bank is seen as presenting an existential threat to Jordan’s national security,” explains Sharif. “It not only renders the two-state solution irrelevant, but it resurrects some far-right Israeli claims that Jordan is a de facto Palestinian state. It also raises fears about the fate of over 2 million Palestinian refugees living in Jordan. Jordan had not supported Trump’s peace vision, unveiled last January, and rallied Arab and international support for the two-state solution.”

Read Sharif’s article here.
 
 
One cool new thing: New major archaeological discovery
 
 

Tourists take pictures at the burial chamber and sarcophagus of King Djoser inside the standing step pyramid of Saqqara, south of Cairo, Egypt, March 5, 2020. Photo by Reuters/Mohamed Abd El Ghany.

A joint Egyptian-Spanish archaeological mission has announced a major discovery of an ancient Roman burial site in the Bahnasah region, in Minya governorate.

The head of the mission said in a statement that the excavations also uncovered eight tombs from the Roman era with a domed and nonengraved roof. Inside of these tombs, several Roman tombstones, bronze coins, small crosses and clay seals were found, Rasha Mahmoud reports.

Bahnasa, which located on the west bank of the Nile, was a major city during the Roman era, home to more than 30,000 monks and a large number of monasteries.

Read Mahmoud’s article here.



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