Stop debating Beijing’s intentions and take Xi Jinping both seriously and literally.

Can we pay the Chinese Communist Party the compliment of acknowledging that it means what it says and knows what it wants? That may be the key to understanding Beijing’s strategic ambitions in the coming decades.

A long-standing trope in the U.S. debate on that subject is that China itself doesn’t know what it seeks to achieve, that its leaders haven’t yet worked out how far Beijing’s influence should reach. Yet there is a growing body of evidence, assembled and interpreted by talented China experts, that the Chinese government is indeed aiming for global power and perhaps global primacy over the next generation — that it seeks to upend the American-led international system and create at least a competing, quasi-world order of its own.

It doesn’t take unparalleled powers of deduction to reach this conclusion. Top Chinese officials and members of the country’s foreign policy community are becoming increasingly explicit in saying so themselves.

President Xi Jinping more than hinted at this goal in his landmark address to the 19th Party Congress in October 2017. That speech represents one of the most authoritative statements of the party’s policy and aims; it reflects Xi’s understanding of what China has accomplished under Communist rule and how it must advance in the future.

Xi declared that China “has stood up, grown rich, and is becoming strong,” and that it was now “blazing a new trail for other developing countries” and offering “Chinese wisdom and a Chinese approach to solving the problems facing mankind.” By 2049, Xi promised, China would “become a global leader in terms of composite national strength and international influence” and would build a “stable international order” in which China’s “national rejuvenation” could be fully achieved.

This was the statement of a leader who sees his country not just participating in global affairs but setting the terms, and it testifies to two core themes in China’s foreign policy discourse.

The first is a deeply skeptical view of the existing international system. Chinese leaders recognize that the global trade regime has been indispensable to the country’s economic and military rise. Yet when they look at the key features of the world Washington and its allies have made, they see mostly threats.

In their view, American alliances do not preserve peace and stability; they stunt China’s potential and prevent Asian nations from giving Beijing its due. Seen through that lens, promoting democracy and human rights is neither moral nor benign, but propaganda supporting a dangerous doctrine that threatens to delegitimize the Communist government and energize its domestic enemies. U.S.-led international institutions appear as tools for imposing America’s will on weaker states. The Communist Party recognizes that the liberal international order has brought benefits, writes Nadege Rolland, a senior fellow at the National Bureau of Asian Research, but “the party abhors and dreads” the principles on which it is based.

The second theme is that the international order must change — not a little, but a lot — for China to become fully prosperous and secure. Chinese leaders have, understandably, been somewhat opaque in describing the world they want, but the outlines are becoming easier to discern.

If one studies the statements of Xi and other top officials, China expert Liza Tobin concludes, what emerges is a vision in which “a global network of partnerships centered on China would replace the U.S. system of treaty alliances” and the world would view Chinese authoritarianism as preferable to Western democracy.

Based on a similar analysis, Rolland agrees that China has “a yearning for partial hegemony,” a loose dominance over large swaths of the global south. When it comes to global governance, still other examinations show, Beijing wants a system in which international institutions buttress rather than batter repressive regimes. Meanwhile, Chinese strategists and academics are talking openly about building a “new China-centric global economic order.”

There is little indication, in any of this, that Beijing’s strategic horizon is limited to the Western Pacific or even Asia. Xi’s invocation of a “community with a shared future for humanity” indicates a global tableau for Chinese influence. One hardly has to read between the lines to understand that this agenda will require fundamentally resetting the current geopolitical balance. As Xi remarked several years ago, China must work resolutely toward “a future where we will win the initiative and have the dominant position.”

Of course, there’s not need to take literally everything national leaders say, or even everything that makes it into official speeches. In Beijing’s case, however, Chinese leaders are actually saying less than what the country is doing.

Whether it is the naval shipbuilding program that is churning out vessels at astonishing rate; the drive to control existing international organizations and build new ones; the projection of military power in the Arctic, the Indian Ocean and points beyond; the quest to dominate the world’s high-tech industries; the ever-more systematic efforts to support authoritarian regimes and weaken democratic institutions; or the Belt and Road Initiative that encompasses multiple continents, China is hardly acting like a country that lacks a grand geopolitical design.

As with so many aspects of the U.S.-China competition, there is a Cold War parallel. During the 1970s, some leading American Sovietologists insisted that Moscow was becoming a satisfied, status quo power. Yet that claim required ignoring what Soviet leaders said about detente and peaceful coexistence — that it was a way of ensuring the triumph of socialism without war — as well as their efforts to build military superiority and positions of strength in the Third World. The warning signs were evident then, as they are today.

China probably doesn’t have a step-by-step checklist for achieving global primacy, any more than the Soviet Union did in the 1970s. Chinese leaders aren’t insensitive to costs and obstacles: Xi may ritualistically restate the importance of unifying the Chinese nation, but that doesn’t mean he’s hell-bent on war over Taiwan.

Beijing may not even have decided which of its two paths to global influence is preferable: Establishing dominance in the Western Pacific and then expanding outward from there, or outflanking the U.S. position in the region by building up economic and political power around the world. Finally, China may ultimately fail to accomplish any of this. Perhaps the coronavirus will so weaken the U.S. and the liberal order that China’s ascent will be accelerated. Or perhaps China will run into so many internal problems, and so much external resistance, that its drive will stall.

Yet we ought to recognize that the debate about what China wants is growing stale, because China’s leaders and behavior have increasingly answered that question. When a proud and powerful challenger starts to advertise its global ambitions, Americans should probably err on the side of taking those ambitious seriously.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

To contact the author of this story: Hal Brands at Hal.Brands@jhu.edu

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Tobin Harshaw at tharshaw@bloomberg.net

@ Bloomberg

Authorities in the US’s New Jersey are reporting another 249 deaths associated with the coronavirus outbreak, bringing the state’s total to 5,863 lives lost in the pandemic.

Gov. Phil Murphy on Saturday called it “an extraordinary loss of life by any measure.”

“Just to put that in perspective … that is more than the lives lost from New Jersey in World War I, the Korean War and the Vietnam War combined,” the governor said.

Murphy also announced another 3,457 cases, bringing the total number of cases to 105,523, and called on residents to redouble their efforts to stem the spread of the disease.

“This is up to us and us alone,” the governor said. “The 5,863 who we have lost must be our inspiration so we do not lose another 5,863.”

Health commissioner Judith Persichilli said hospitalizations for COVID19 have decreased, and although the number of critical care patients has flattened but not decreased, the numbers requiring ventilators have dropped.

“Hospitalizations, however, are declining in the north, flattening in the central part of the region and actually are on a slight increase in the southern region,” she said.

– AP

Governors in U.S. states hardest hit by the novel coronavirus sparred with President Donald Trump over his claims they have enough tests and should quickly reopen their economies as more protests are planned over the extension of stay-at-home orders.

New York continued to see hospitalizations decline to 16,000 from a high of 18,000, and the number of patients being kept alive by ventilators also fell. There were 507 new deaths, down from a high of more than 700 a day.

“If the data holds and if this trend holds, we are past the high point and all indications at this point are that we are on a descent,” Governor Andrew Cuomo said at a daily briefing, while urging residents to continue social distancing. “We showed you can control the beast. But it’s only half time. We still have to make sure we keep the beast down.”

To get a baseline of how many people were infected with the novel coronavirus, Cuomo said the state would do the most aggressive anti-body testing in the nation in the next week using a random sample.

New York will test 2,000 people a day or 14,000 per week out of the 19 million residents in the state.

The United States has by far the world’s largest number of confirmed coronavirus cases, with more than 740,000 infections and over 40,000 deaths.

It took the United States 38 days after recording its first fatality on Feb. 29 to reach 10,000 deaths on April 6 but only five more days to reach 20,000 dead, according to a Reuters tally. The United States’ toll rose to 40,000 from 30,000 in four days after including untested but probable COVID-19 deaths reported by New York City.

Cuomo, along with other governors, are clamoring for more tests to detect new infections as well as to test for immunity as part of their plans to reopen their states.

Republican Governor Larry Hogan of Maryland during a CNN interview said claims by Trump and Vice President Mike Pence that states have plenty of tests were “just absolutely false.”

Democratic Governor Ralph Northam of Virginia told CNN the idea states have enough tests was “delusional.”

The region of Maryland, Virginia and Washington D.C. is still seeing increasing cases. New Jersey reported on Sunday that its new cases rose by nearly 3,900, the most in more than two weeks. Boston and Chicago are also emerging hot spots with recent surges in cases and deaths.

Several states, including Ohio, Texas and Florida, have said they aim to reopen parts of their economies, perhaps by May 1 or even sooner. The governors of Michigan and Ohio on Sunday said they could double or triple their testing capacity if the federal government helped them acquire more swabs and reagents, chemicals needed as part of the testing process.

Trump’s guidelines to reopen the economy recommend a state record 14 days of declining case numbers before gradually lifting restrictions. Yet the Republican president appeared to encourage protesters who want the measures removed sooner with a series of Twitter posts on Friday calling for them to “LIBERATE” Michigan, Minnesota and Virginia, all run by Democratic governors.

Governor Jay Inslee of Washington redoubled his attacks on Trump’s call to “liberate” states, saying the president was encouraging people to violate state laws on self-isolating.

“These orders actually are the law of these states,” he said. “To have an American president encourage people to violate the law, I can’t remember any time during my time in America where we have seen such a thing.”

Demonstrations to demand an end to stay-at-home measures that have pummelled the U.S. economy have erupted in a few spots in Texas, Wisconsin and the capitols of Ohio, Minnesota, Michigan and Virginia. More than 22 million Americans have filed for unemployment benefits in the past month.

Trump had touted a thriving economy as the best case for his re-election in November.

On Saturday, several dozen protesters gathered in the Texas capital of Austin chanting “USA! USA!” and “Let us work!”

In Brookfield, Wisconsin, hundreds of demonstrators cheered as they lined a main road and waved American flags to protest at the extension of that state’s “safer at home” order.

The demonstrators mostly flouted the social-distancing rules and did not wear the face masks recommended by public health officials.

U.S. lawmakers are very close to an agreement on approving extra money to help small businesses hurt by the coronavirus pandemic and could seal a deal as early as Sunday, congressional and Trump administration officials said.

Congress established the program last month as part of a $2.3 trillion coronavirus economic relief plan, but it has already run out of money.

Reporting by Barbara Goldberg in New York and Doina Chiacu in Washington; Additional reporting by Gabriella Borter in New York; Writing by Lisa Shumaker; Editing by Daniel Wallis @ Reuters

The U.S. coronavirus crisis took a sharp political turn on Friday as President Donald Trump lashed out at four Democratic governors over their handling of the pandemic after having conceded that states bear ultimate control of restrictions to contain the outbreak.

The Republican president targeted three swing states critical to his re-election bid – Michigan, Minnesota and Virginia – where his conservative loyalists have mounted pressure campaigns challenging those governors’ stay-at-home orders.

Amplifying a theme that his supporters have trumpeted this week in street protests at the state capitals of Lansing, St. Paul, and Richmond, Trump issued a series of matching Twitter posts touting the slogans: “LIBERATE MICHIGAN!” “LIBERATE MINNESOTA!” and “LIBERATE VIRGINIA!”

Michigan has become a particular focus of agitation to relax social-distancing rules that rank among the strictest in the nation after Governor Gretchen Whitmer, widely seen as a potential running mate for presumed Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, extended them through the end of April.

Protesters defying the restrictions from the steps of the state Capitol on Wednesday shouted “lock her up,” a chant that was a staple of Trump’s campaign rallies and originally referred to his 2016 Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton.

‘WHEN IT’S SAFE’

Whitmer said on Friday she was hopeful her state, which suffered one of the country’s fastest-growing coronavirus infection rates, can begin to restart parts of its economy on May 1. But she urged doing so cautiously to avoid reigniting the outbreak just as it was being brought to heel.

Responding to Trump’s critique later in the day, Whitmer said Michigan will re-engage its economy when it’s safe, adding: “The last thing I want to do is to have a second wave here.”

Trump also took renewed aim at one of his favorite political foils, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, suggesting on Twitter that his state, the U.S. epicenter of the outbreak, had asked for too much assistance that was never fully used.

At his daily news briefing, Cuomo shot back saying Trump should “maybe get up and go to work” instead of watching TV, and accused the president of favoring the airline industry and business cronies in a recent bailout package that left little for the states.

The flare-up in political sparring came as the number of known coronavirus infections in the United States surpassed 700,000, the most of any country. At the same time, the tally of lives lost from COVID-19, the highly contagious lung disease caused by the virus, has soared to more than 35,000. New York state accounts for nearly half those deaths.

While the death toll continued to climb, the rate of hospitalizations and other indicators have been leveling off, a sign that drastic social-distancing restrictions imposed in 42 of the 50 U.S. states were working to curtail the outbreak.

Stay-at-home orders and the closure of non-essential businesses have also strangled U.S. commerce, triggering millions of layoffs and forecasts that America is headed for its deepest recession since the economic collapse of the 1930s.

The result has been mounting pressure to ease the shutdowns, leading to clashes between Trump, who had touted the strength of the U.S. economy as the best case for his re-election in November, and governors in hard-hit states who warned against lifting restrictions too quickly.

Trump, who played down the coronavirus threat in its early stages, had been pressing to restart idled businesses as soon as May 1, at first declaring “total” authority to do so and branding governors who resisted his approach, many of them Democrats, as “mutineers.”

STATE CONTROL AND TESTING

In the end Trump acknowledged it was up to the governors to decide when and how to relax the restrictions they themselves had imposed since last month, presenting new federal guidelines on Thursday as recommendations.

While the guidelines call for a phased-in, science-based strategy in keeping with the advice of leading health experts, the plan hinges on widespread testing to gauge the scope of infections and how many people might have developed immunity to the virus.

At a White House briefing on Friday, Trump’s coronavirus task force members, through statements and graphics, pushed back against criticism from some governors and lawmakers that limited testing ability is impeding the country’s return to normalcy.

“We believe today that we have the capacity in the United States to do a sufficient amount of testing for states to move into phase one in the time and manner that they deem appropriate,” Vice President Mike Pence told reporters.

Cuomo argued earlier that the Trump administration was foisting responsibility for a massive testing program on the states without providing necessary financial resources.

“Is there any funding so I can do these things that you want us to do? No. That is passing the buck without passing the bucks,” Cuomo said.

Even as Cuomo was addressing reporters, Trump immediately took to Twitter in Washington to fire back, saying he “should spend more time ‘doing’ and less time ‘complaining.’”

Trump struck a more conciliatory tone during the White House briefing. Asked about criticism leveled at him earlier in the day by Washington state Governor Jay Inslee, a Democrat who accused Trump of “fomenting domestic rebellion” with his “LIBERATE” tweets, the president demurred.

Trump denied he was suggesting that Michigan, Minnesota and Virginia lift their stay-at-home orders altogether, but added, “I think elements of what they’ve done are too much.”

Of the protesters, Trump said, “These are people expressing their views.” He added, “They seem to be very responsible to me. … But they’ve been treated a little bit rough.”

Reporting by Maria Caspani, Nathan Layne, Susan Heavey and Lisa Lambert; Writing by Grant McCool and Steve Gorman; Editing by Frank McGurty, Howard Goller and Daniel Wallis @ Reuters

Italy’s Civil Protection Agency says 175 people have died from coronavirus since Friday, raising the death toll to 1,441 across the country.

The total number of positive cases registered in Italy reached 20,455 on Saturday, with an increase of 2,795 new cases recorded in the past 24 hours, the agency reported.

President Trump and Vice President Mike Pence said today that the administration is considering some domestic travel restrictions, specifically with regards to certain areas hard hit with the coronavirus.

Trump did not provide any specifics or a possible timeframe.

“We’re working with the states, and we’re considering other restrictions,” Trump told reporters during a White House news briefing without providing any specifics or a possible timeframe.
“We are considering a broad range of measures,” Pence added during the briefing.

There have been internal discussions about restricting travel to areas in Washington state and other places considered “hot spots” for the virus. It’s unclear how far along they are in implementing them, people familiar with the matter told CNN.

There are preliminary conversations about halting some air or train travel between some major US cities as a potential additional step going forward.

Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection and Department of Transportation officials have discussed possibilities with the coronavirus task force, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Some flights have already slowed to those places and there’s an expectation that if other hotspots pop up, flights would similarly slow down due to lack of demand, which might mean they don’t need to put formal restrictions in place.

@ CNN

The telecoms regulator said Friday that major internet providers in the US – including Comcast Corp, AT&T Inc and Verizon Communications Inc – agreed not to terminate service for subscribers for the next 60 days if they are unable to pay their bills due to disruptions caused by the coronavirus.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai said after calls with more than 50 companies that they also agreed to waive any late fees residential or small business customers incur because of their economic circumstances related to the coronavirus pandemic.

They also agreed to open Wi-Fi hotspots to anyone who needs them.

According to Reuters, millions of Americans are expected to work and study from home as employers and states urge people to stay away from workplaces and schools to reduce the potential to spread the coronavirus.

Others agreeing to take part include Alphabet Inc’s Google Fiber, Charter Communications Inc, CenturyLink Inc, Cox Communications [COXC.UL], Sprint Corp, T-Mobile US Inc.

“As the coronavirus outbreak spreads and causes a series of disruptions to the economic, educational, medical and civic life of our country, it is imperative that Americans stay connected,” Pai said in a statement. “Broadband will enable them to communicate with their loved ones and doctors, telework, ensure their children can engage in remote learning.”

Many companies also agreed to waive data limits for the next 60 days.

Charter Communications said it would offer free broadband and Wi-Fi access for 60 days and waive installation fees to households with students without its service.

For customers with international long distance plans, Sprint will provide free international calling rates from the United States to countries with large coronavirus outbreaks.

FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, a Democrat, praised the companies adopting the pledge, but said the FCC should do more.

She called on the commission to “provide hotspots for loan for students whose school doors have closed” and “work with healthcare providers to ensure connectivity for telehealth services are available for hospitals, doctors, and nurses treating coronavirus patients and those who are quarantined.”

Pai also said he had asked providers that offer low-income consumers lower-speed cheaper service to increase speeds and expand eligibility. Comcast said Thursday it was raising its speeds for all its low-income users, while AT&T said it was waiving data caps for home consumers that have plans with usage caps.

Internet firms expressed confidence that U.S. networks can withstand the predicted jump in traffic.

The trade group U.S. Telecom said in a letter to Congress on Friday that in areas where workers are being told to stay home the group has “not observed time shifted traffic exceeding peak network capacity.”

Verizon said it had “not seen any measurable increase in data usage on any of its networks.” More than 60% of U.S. network traffic is video and content streaming.

Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Dan Grebler and Rosalba O’Brien & Reuters

Washington has reported 37 deaths. The first — a man in his 50s who had chronic underlying health issues — was reported February 29 at EvergreenHealth, a hospital in Kings County, Washington.

Two of the Washington patients died February 26, but their diagnoses were confirmed posthumously on March 10, making them the earliest known coronavirus fatalities in the US. 

California’s four deaths included a woman in her 60s in Santa Clara County, a woman who was treated at Kaiser Permanente in Placer County, and a woman in her 90s from Sacramento County.

Florida’s three were in Lee County, Santa Rosa County, and Orange County.

New Jersey announced its first death on Tuesday: a man in his 60s.

South Dakota confirmed its first death on Tuesday as well, also a man in his 60s, though the exact cause of death has yet to be confirmed. 

Georgia and Kansas both recorded their first death on Thursday.

Colorado also announced its first death on Friday in El Paso County.

One person who died in California was likely exposed to the coronavirus on the Grand Princess cruise ship. That passenger had disembarked, but at least 21 people who were on board in early March tested positive.

The ship has unloaded passengers at the Port of Oakland. Sixty-two people on board had been on the last voyage with the person who died in California.

Two passengers and 19 crew members have tested positive, but it is still unclear how many of those people are from the US, so they do not yet factor into the country’s total number of cases.

The healthy US passengers will be quarantined for 14 days at military bases in California, Texas, or Georgia. Crew members — including some who tested positive — are staying on the ship.

Washington has confirmed 569 cases of the virus and 37 deaths. More than 50 residents of a nursing facility in King County have tested positive.

Nineteen of the Washington deaths are linked to the long-term care facility, called Life Care Center.

Most of the cases in Washington have occurred in King, Snohomish, Spokane, and Pierce counties, as well as several others.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee declared a state of emergency on February 29. On Wednesday, he banned gatherings of more than 250 people.

California has confirmed 299 cases and five deaths.

Of the state’s cases, 79 are in Santa Clara County, and Los Angeles County has more than 40, including two medical professionals who screened passengers at Los Angeles International Airport.

The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health confirmed its first coronavirus-related death on Wednesday — a woman over 60 with underlying health issues. There was also a new case in Pasadena.

Santa Clara, Placer, and Sacramento counties have also reported one death each.

California declared a state of emergency on March 4.

The other cases in California were either passengers on the Diamond Princess cruise ship that was quarantined in Japan or evacuees from Wuhan.

In total, the US coronavirus case count includes 46 cases among passengers who had been on the Diamond Princess. 

Japanese authorities imposed a 14-day quarantine on that cruise ship last month after a person tested positive for the coronavirus, but at least 700 people wound up with COVID-19.

More than 300 Americans who were on the ship were flown back to the US. On the evacuation flight, 14 citizens who had tested positive for the virus flew in an isolation box, while others who’d been on the ship sat in a separate area. More than 30 others got sick.

The infected passengers from the cruise ship were taken to the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, Nebraska and to the Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center in Spokane, Washington. Passengers who tested negative were quarantined at two US military bases: the Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield, California, and the Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. Most have been released.

Three evacuees from Wuhan also tested positive for the coronavirus.

Read full auricle on Business Insider

President Donald Trump declared a U.S. national emergency over the quickly spreading coronavirus on Friday, opening the door to more government aid to combat a pathogen that has infected more than 138,000 people worldwide and left over 5,000 dead.

The impact of the coronavirus on everyday life deepened around the world. It was detected for the first time in several countries, with the World Health Organization (WHO) calling Europe the pandemic’s current epicenter. More schools and businesses closed, the global sporting calendar was left in tatters, and people faced greater restrictions on where they could go. Reuters reports.

“To unleash the full power of the federal government to this effort today, I am officially declaring a national emergency – two very big words,” Trump said in remarks at the White House Rose Garden, adding that the U.S. situation could worsen and “the next eight weeks are critical.”

Trump, whose action makes available $50 billion in federal aid to states and localities, had faced criticism from some experts for being slow and ineffective in his response to the crisis and playing down the threat.

According to Reuters, the latest steps came two days after Trump announced travel restrictions blocking U.S. entry for most people from continental Europe. While Britain was among the countries exempted, Trump said on Friday that might change because infections there had risen “precipitously.”

The president, who was photographed last Saturday at his private Florida club with a Brazilian official who has tested positive for the coronavirus, said he himself likely would be tested “fairly soon,” a reversal of his previous stance. But Trump, 73, said he did not plan to isolate himself, noting he was suffering no symptoms.

Travel bans have hammered airlines and travel companies worldwide, while financial markets have been hit by panic selling this week.

The three major U.S. stock indexes rallied more than 9% on Friday, rebounding from Wall Street’s biggest daily drop since 1987. But the indexes were still about 20% below record highs hit in mid-February.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Europe now had more reported cases and deaths than the rest of world combined, apart from China, where the coronavirus originated but where new cases have slowed to a trickle. The WHO called the death toll reaching 5,000 globally “a tragic milestone.”

The WHO’s top emergency expert, Mike Ryan, said social distancing was a “tried and tested method” to slow the spread of a virus but “not a panacea” that would stop transmission.

“Blanket travel measures in their own right will do nothing to protect an individual state,” Ryan said.

CULTURAL LANDMARKS

More cultural landmarks were shuttered to try to stop the spread of the virus. In Paris, the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre museum and the Moulin Rouge cabaret closed their doors. The Smithsonian museums in Washington were preparing to do so on Saturday and Broadway theaters in New York went dark.

The kissing of the Blarney Stone, one of Ireland’s oldest tourist traditions, was suspended.

U.S. President Donald Trump declares the coronavirus pandemic a national emergency as Vice President Mike Pence listens during a news conference in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, U.S., March 13, 2020. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

Central banks worldwide acted to shore up money markets after cratering share prices drove a rush for cash, hitting many regional currencies and threatening a surge in short-term borrowing costs.

In China, which bore the brunt of the economic fallout from the coronavirus in the first few months of 2020, authorities late on Friday cut banks’ reserve requirements for the second time this year.

The U.S. Federal Reserve followed suit with $37 billion of Treasury bond purchases, accelerating the enhanced market liquidity measures announced on Thursday.

Japan’s central bank pledged to buy 200 billion yen ($1.90 billion) of five- to 10-year Japanese government bonds and also inject an additional 1.5 trillion yen in two-week loans.

The European Union proposed a 37 billion euro ($41 billion)investment initiative as part of a package to cushion the bloc’s economies from the coronavirus impact.

In Italy, which after China has been hardest hit by the respiratory illness, the death toll jumped by 250 to 1,266 in the last 24 hours, authorities said. The total number of cases also rose to 17,660 from a previous 15,113, despite draconian measures to restrict the movement of people.

In the northern region of Lombardy, at the heart of Italy’s coronavirus epidemic, authorities asked for even stricter steps.

In hard-hit Iran, security forces will empty the streets in cities across the country, state television reported.

NEW COUNTRIES RECORD CASES

The virus continued its persistent march across the globe. Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan and Guinea all confirmed their first cases, giving the disease a foothold in 18 countries on the African continent.

Kosovo, Venezuela and Kazakhstan also confirmed their first cases, and Spain declared a state of emergency.

World leaders, sports stars and actors were among the tens of thousands of people hit by the virus. Golf’s crown jewel, The Masters, England’s top-flight soccer Premier League, and the Boston and London marathons joined the long list of elite sporting events to be canceled or postponed.

But sport’s biggest showpiece, the Olympics, will proceed as planned, according to Tokyo organizers.

Reporting by Jeff Mason in Washington and Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva; Additional reporting by Steve Holland in Washington, Mily Chow and Wang Jing in Beijing, Daniel Leussink and Kaori Kaneko in Tokyo, Tom Westbrook in Singapore, Duncan Miriri and Omar Mohammed in Nairobi, Elizabeth Howcroft in London; Fatos Bytyci in Pristina, and Francesco Guarascio and Philip Blenkinsop in Brussels.; Writing by Will Dunham, Lincoln Feast and Mike Collett-White; Editing by Bill Berkrot and Rosalba O’Brien

In a primetime address to millions of Americans, President Trump misrepresented the travel restrictions he is imposing on travel between the United States and Europe.

Trump said “we will be suspending all travel from Europe to the United States for the next 30 days” before adding that there will be “exemptions for Americans who have undergone appropriate screenings.”

Those exemptions are far more extensive than the President made them out to be. They apply to all US legal permanent residents, citizens and some of their family members, according to a statement from the Department of Homeland Security.

The travel restrictions Trump is enacting are in fact far more similar to those enacted on China. CNN reports.

The ban also does not apply to all of Europe but to nations in the Schengen zone. That includes Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland.

What this means: Americans and US permanent residents who are in Europe will still be allowed to fly to Europe and be allowed back into the United States during this 30-day period.

They will simply be screened upon entry to the United States and face quarantine or restrictions on their movement in the US for 14 days.

However, it is not clear whether airlines will still fly the routes if passenger demand from European nationals dries up because of the ban.

Trump also appeared to correct himself on a ban on cargo. In his speech he said, “There will be exemptions for Americans who have undergone appropriate screenings and these prohibitions will not only apply to the tremendous amount of trade and cargo, but various other things as we get approval. ”

A few minutes ago, the President tweeted, “…please remember, very important for all countries & businesses to know that trade will in no way be affected by the 30-day restriction on travel from Europe. The restriction stops people not goods.”

This is not to say the President is not taking an extremely severe step, but it is not the all-encompassing suspension on travel between the United States and Europe that the President portrayed.

From CNN’s Jeremy Diamond

The novel coronavirus has killed close to 4,500 people globally and infected over 108,000. Most of northern Italy is under lockdown, affecting nearly 16 million people, amid a growing Europe-wide outbreak.

There are 550 cases of the novel coronavirus in the United States, according to the state and local health agencies, governments and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

There are 49 cases of repatriated citizens, including three from Wuhan China, 46 from the Diamond Princess cruise ship and 21 on the Grand Princess cruise ship currently docked off the coast of California.

There are 480 cases in 34 states and the District of Columbia, bringing the total number of coronavirus cases to 550, according to CNN Health’s tally of US cases that are detected and tested in the United States through public health systems.

A total of 21 people have died from the coronavirus in the US.

China reports 40 new coronavirus cases and 22 deaths

Forty new cases of coronavirus and 22 deaths were reported in mainland China on Sunday, according to China’s National Health Commission.

Since the virus was first identified in the Chinese city of Wuhan late last year, the death toll across mainland China has risen to 3,119, with 3,007 deaths in Hubei, of which Wuhan is the provincial capital. The total number of confirmed cases in mainland China now stands at 80,735.

Of the 40 new cases on Sunday, 36 are in Wuhan. The other four cases outside Hubei are imported cases from people arriving from overseas. Hubei province had 21 of the 22 reported deaths on Sunday.

The NHC added that in total, 58,600 patients have now recovered and been discharged from hospitals.

Reporting by Hollie Silverman, Sarah Faidell and Shanshan Wang @ CNN