Media player Media playback is unsupported on your device Video Hong Kong protests: graffiti, tear gas and riot police Thousands of people are marching in Hong Kong in the latest of a series of protests by pro-democracy campaigners. Protesters ignored the designated finish line, continuing on to China's government headquarters in Hong Kong, where anti-China graffiti was sprayed.The BBC's Stephen McDonell was amid the pro-democracy protesters as tear gas began to be fired.

Confirmed cases of the new, deadly coronavirus in the United States almost doubled over the holiday weekend thanks to the messy evacuation of Americans from a cruise ship in Japan, while fresh numbers from China suggested the disease might be deadlier than first believed.The U.S. government evacuated 328 American passengers from Tokyo early Monday on two chartered cargo jets, leaving dozens others behind who preferred to stay on the Diamond Princess cruise ship—despite a strong disembarkation recommendation from the federal government. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said over the weekend that it recommended repatriation so that it could take responsibility for care of the Americans and “to reduce the burden on the Japanese healthcare system.”Dr. William Walters, managing director of operational medicine at the State Department, told reporters Monday that authorities evacuated passengers without knowing their test results because it was “unpredictable” when the results would come back. None of the diagnosed evacuees were showing symptoms, and they flew home in separate chambers—made of 10-feet-tall plastic sheets—from the other 314 passengers. The government planned to house all uninfected evacuees for 14 days at federal quarantine sites at Travis Air Force Base in California and Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland in Texas.Infected evacuees, on the other hand, were sent to hospitals in California and at the University of Nebraska for treatment. Another five passengers on the flights had reportedly been put in isolation after developing fevers, a development that was likely to add to public skepticism of the U.S. and Japanese governments’ response to the virus, even as officials insisted that the risk to the general American public was still “low.”Eiji Kusumi, a doctor specializing in infectious diseases at Navitas Clinic in Tokyo, told The New York Times that the quarantine of the cruise ship, which remained docked in Yokohama, south of Tokyo, was an “unprecedented failure” and that officials should “learn from this lesson that a quarantine on a ship is impossible.”The cruise ship has for weeks housed the largest outbreak outside of China, and Japanese health authorities said Tuesday there were a total of 542 confirmed cases on the Diamond Princess—88 new ones since last count—out of 3,700 passengers and crew members. As of Tuesday, 2,404 people on board had tested negative for the virus.The vessel-wide quarantine, which began on Feb. 3, was set to end on Wednesday, but those who bunked with passengers or crew members who tested positive were slated to remain on board for longer. Only about 500 people were expected to be released on Wednesday, while more than 100 total U.S. citizens remained either on board or in hospitals in Japan, according to the CDC.Dr. Anthony Fauci, of the National Institutes of Health, also admitted on Monday that the quarantine on the cruise ship “failed.” After weeks of debate about the subject, Japan said it would test everyone aboard the ship before allowing them to disembark.Outside of evacuees from the Diamond Princess, the CDC said there remained 15 confirmed cases in the U.S. on Tuesday out of 467 people under investigation for the coronavirus. Some 392 of those patients tested negative, while 60 remained pending on Tuesday. Several Americans who, before being released Tuesday, were stuck in federal quarantine in San Diego after returning from Wuhan earlier this month voiced concern over the effectiveness and thoroughness of the CDC’s response, some going so far as to draft a petition after the government mistakenly reintroduced an infected woman to the general population.Jacob Wilson, a 33-year-old American evacuee who works at a tech start-up in Wuhan, told The Daily Beast that he and his fellow evacuees were “swamped” by press at the airport after they were released.“Now hopefully I can get back to some normalcy,” he said.Meanwhile, as of Tuesday morning, China had reported 72,528 coronavirus cases, including 1,870 related deaths, according to Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization. Outside of China, there were 804 cases in 25 countries, he added, with 12 other countries having confirmed instances of human-to-human transmission.“At the moment, we don’t have enough data on cases outside China to make a meaningful comparison on the severity of the disease or the case fatality rate,” said Tedros.But as the Times reported, an analysis by Chinese authorities from data on 44,672 patients suggested that about 2.3 percent of cases of the disease had been fatal as of Feb. 11. Nearly 14 percent of people who tested positive for the infection had severe cases, and about 5 percent had critical illnesses, according to Chinese authorities. The data showed that 30 percent of those who died from the virus were in their 60s, 30 percent were in their 70s, and another 20 percent were 80 or older. Since then, daily figures indicated the virus’s fatality rate had only increased.

TOKYO (Reuters) - As the virus-stricken Diamond Princess cruise ship is evacuated, Japan faces deepening criticism over its response to the outbreak, tarnishing what was supposed to be a triumphant Olympic year for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. More than 540 people onboard have been infected with the coronavirus, the most outside of China. The United States evacuated more than 300 citizens from the ship on Monday, and more countries are following suit. But as the crisis in the port of Yokohama winds down, focus now turns to Tokyo, where critics say the government’s response has seemed more concerned with managing public perception than the outbreak. Some of the most pointed criticism has come from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which said the quarantine may not have been sufficient. Japan is just months away from hosting the 2020 Olympic Games. For some Japanese, the outbreak carries an uneasy echo of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear meltdown, when the government was widely criticised for downplaying another crisis. “The spread of the virus is wider than the government said,” said Shinichi Niwa, an adjunct professor at Fukushima Medical University. “During the (Fukushima) disaster, the government said there was no meltdown. So they hid the truth at the time, and I’m afraid the same situation is happening with the coronavirus.” The health ministry did not respond to requests for comment. The government has repeatedly said its response has been appropriate, and some prominent doctors have defended it. “Epidemiological evidence shows that our isolation strategy worked,” Shigeru Omi, president of the Japan Community Healthcare Organization, told reporters at a recent briefing. “Almost 4,000 people stay on this ship, which is not designed for isolation for several weeks, and this is a very challenging situation.” The CDC praised Japan’s “extraordinary efforts” in the quarantine but questioned whether they were enough. “CDC’s assessment is that it may not have been sufficient to prevent transmission among individuals on the ship,” it said. “The rate of new infections on board, especially among those without symptoms, represents an ongoing risk.” Passengers and crew on the ship will be required to wait at least 14 days after disembarking from the ship before travelling to the United States, the CDC said. The British-flagged Diamond Princess arrived in Yokohama on Feb. 3 with about 3,700 people onboard after a man who disembarked last month in Hong Kong was diagnosed with the virus. From the start, experts raised questions about the quarantine process. Unlike the United States, Japan does not have a central disease-control agency. One Japanese infectious disease specialist who spent a day as a volunteer doctor on the ship has sharply criticised the quarantine, saying it was run by “bureaucrats” who stoked the crisis by failing to follow basic protocols. Passengers weren’t confined to their rooms until Feb. 5. The day before, as officials screened them, onboard events continued, including dances, quiz games and an exercise class, one passenger said. Passengers also said that during early screening visits, Japanese health officials wore only masks, not full protective suits. The virus, SARS-CoV-2, was later diagnosed in two quarantine officers. Meanwhile, the virus spread, most likely by people within their own cabins or by asymptomatic crew members interacting with passengers, experts said. “How is this quarantine going to be lifted when there is practically continuous exposure?” said Eyal Leshem, director of the Center for Travel Medicine and Tropical Diseases at Sheba Medical Center in Israel. “It doesn’t make sense epidemiologically.” Japan also let people off the boat piecemeal, including those over 80 who tested negative, which experts said went against common protocols. The contagion may have been fuelled below deck, where the crew of about 1,100 worked and slept in cramped quarters, sharing living spaces and bathrooms. “The terror of the coronavirus is increasing at every moment,” Indian crew member Binoy Kumar Sarkar said in a Facebook post on Feb 7. “I request the government to take us out of here and isolate us. We should be screened and isolated.” Some have said Japan should have quarantined passengers on land. “Quarantine on ship may be increasing risk of infection and creating a barrier to accessing medical care,” said Esther Chernak, an associate clinical professor and director of the Center for Public Health Readiness and Communication at Drexel University in Philadelphia. A Kyodo news agency poll on the weekend said 53 percent of respondents weren’t happy with how Abe handled the situation. People walk to a taxi queue after leaving the cruise ship Diamond Princess, at the Daikoku Pier Cruise Terminal in Yokohama, south of Tokyo, Japan February 19, 2020. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-hoon“The Diamond Princess has proved a bit of a blind spot for us,” a lawmaker from Abe’s ruling party told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter. “But beyond that, there isn’t a big problem for Japan with the coronavirus.” Early on, the health ministry said cases on the ship would not count toward Japan’s domestic tally of infections, in line with World Health Organization guidelines. But some experts said it also showed how Japan wanted to avoid the stigma of being seen as a virus hot spot. “I like to believe that public health decisions were driven by science and not influenced by politics,” said Mark Kortepeter, a professor at the University of Nebraska College of Public Health. “But I am not naive, having worked in this space for decades. If that was the impetus, then it backfired.” Reporting by Elaine Lies and Rocky Swift; Additional reporting by Yoshifumi Takemoto in Tokyo and Shilpa Jamkhandikar and Promit Mukherjee in Mumbai; Editing by David Dolan and Gerry DoyleOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Republican lawmakers have persisted in using "Wuhan virus" or "Chinese coronavirus," despite remarks by Democrats and the director of the CDC that such phrases are inaccurate and even racist.Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., used the term "Wuhan virus" on Thursday in announcing that his Washington office was closing because of the illness. His comments came two days after the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Robert Redfield, agreed when questioned at a House hearing that it was "absolutely wrong and inappropriate" to use such labels.Redfield said the virus had now expanded beyond China to other parts of the world, particularly Iran, South Korea, Italy and "now all of Europe."Other GOP officials who have referred to the virus by country or ethnicity have been accused of perpetuating racist associations with the virus. Wuhan is the Chinese city where the outbreak began.Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., called it the "Wuhan Virus," Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., referred to the “Chinese coronavirus," and President Donald Trump retweeted a comment using the term “China Virus.”Gosar and other Republicans defended themselves by saying the media had used the same terms in early reporting on the outbreak.The WHO said it deliberately chose COVID-19 as the official name to avoid such stigmatization.The Morning RundownGet a head start on the morning's top stories.Three Asian American Democrats in the House, Reps. Ted Lieu and Judy Chu of California, and Grace Meng of New York, as well as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California demanded an apology from McCarthy this week.Meng told NBC Asian America that she confronted McCarthy in person on Tuesday and described the bullying and racist attacks that some Asian Americans have dealt with as a result of misinformation around the virus. She said she was “disappointed with his response and his reaction.”“He was not very interested in hearing stories of people being bullied or assaulted,” she said.“He just kept saying to me, ‘Well, if The New York Times had done this … would you call them out?’ And I said, ‘Easily, when I’ve seen it, I have called them out. … It's my job, to try to help share and inform people.’ And he laughed as he walked away and he said, ‘Well, at least you're consistent.’”McCarthy’s office did not respond to Meng's criticisms, but responded to NBC News’ request for comment with a link to a "TODAY" show video that also referred to the illness as “Chinese coronavirus” in the title but not the actual clip. The title has since been changed after it was brought to the site’s attention.The Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus sent a letter to their colleagues in Congress urging them to “help us prevent hysteria, ignorant attacks and racist assaults that have been fueled by misinformation pertaining" to the coronavirus.The letter urged all members of Congress to share only "confirmed and verifiable information."Meng said that the rhetoric used by some GOP lawmakers could be a tactic to distract from what they say has been Trump’s mishandling of the response to the outbreak.“I have talked to longtime hardcore Trump supporters who have never been critical of anything that the president has said or done, but for the first time have shared with me that they have been really disappointed with his handling of the virus outbreak," she said.She added that she thinks it’s likely some officials are using China or Asian Americans as scapegoats “versus actually dealing with the problem at hand.”“Even if it's not intentional, it is definitely the consequence,” she said of their words.Lieu said that by viewing the virus as a Chinese issue, Republicans had "totally dropped the ball" on the response. “What we need are test kits, not inflammatory statements by the GOP House leader," he said.Lieu also called out Republican lawmakers who “are putting the country in danger by failing to note the gravity of this situation unfolding on American soil.”“They’re afraid of Trump, but they should be more afraid of what this virus can do to our country if left unchecked,” he said. “It is time for GOP Leadership to focus on facts, instead of on ethnicity.”

HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hong Kong reported its second death from the new coronavirus on Wednesday as authorities drew up plans to fly home hundreds of city residents stranded on a virus-stricken cruise ship in Japan. The 70-year-old man who died had underlying illnesses and was one of 62 confirmed cases in the Chinese-ruled city, a Princess Margaret Hospital spokeswoman said. In addition to those cases, 52 Hong Kong residents have tested positive for the coronavirus on the cruise ship Diamond Princess in Japan. There are 352 Hong Kong residents on the ship. The ship has been quarantined in the port of Yokohama since Feb. 3 after a man, who disembarked in Hong Kong before it traveled to Japan, was diagnosed with the virus. More than 540 people have tested positive for the virus on the liner - the biggest concentration of infected people outside China. Speaking in Hong Kong’s Legislative Council, Security Secretary John Lee said 200 out of the 352 Hong Kong residents on the ship, which is operated by Carnival Corp, were willing to take free, government charter flights home. The government was trying to convince the rest to board the flights, he said. Those coming back would be required to undergo 14 days of quarantine upon arrival. “We’ve urged the Japanese government to prioritize our cases,” Lee said. “We wouldn’t rule out the possibility of sending more charter flights but we’ll try our best to handle all of them in one day.” The flights are expected to return to Hong Kong on Thursday. The United States evacuated more than 300 nationals on Monday on two chartered flights and six South Koreans and one Japanese spouse flew to South Korea on Wednesday on a chartered flight. Australia also plans to evacuate 169 people to its northern city of Darwin, where they will be quarantined for 14 days. Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam has urged both Hong Kong people on the cruise ship and those at home to accept the government’s quarantine plans. There has been opposition in some Hong Kong neighborhoods to government plans to set up quarantine centers. Hundreds of people marched in different places over the weekend to voice opposition to the proposed centers. The crisis over the virus comes after months of anti-government demonstrations in the former British colony over the perceived erosion of freedoms by Beijing, which China denies, and the virus has opened up a new front for protesters. In addition to the opposition to quarantine centers, many members of the public have been calling on Lam to shut the entire border with mainland China. Some medical workers have been on strike to press that demand. But Lam has said the full closure of the border would be impractical, inappropriate and discriminatory and the government’s response to the outbreak was based on scientific advice and World Health Organization guidelines. Reporting by Sarah Wu, Jessie Pang, Donny Kwok; writing by Marius Zaharia; Editing by Himani Sarkar, Robert BirselOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST: We're watching demonstrations in Hong Kong this morning. Protesters are angry over Beijing's tightening control and have taken to the streets again this weekend. NPR's Julie McCarthy is in Hong Kong, and she joins us now. Hi there.JULIE MCCARTHY, BYLINE: Hi, Lulu.GARCIA-NAVARRO: So, Julie, what have you seen? What's been happening there this weekend?MCCARTHY: Well, I just came from the scene of one of these clashes. Tear gas is billowing through the streets, and protesters are taking them on in what has sort of become a staple of these protests. The police, as I say, were firing rounds of tear gas at protesters. Clouds of it were wafting over a large area. What looked like elite officers from a special tactical squad of police was deployed. They were nimble, well-equipped. But the only shots fired - or that I heard - appeared to be the detonation of tear-gas canisters.For most of the night, the protesters had played cat and (inaudible) games with the police, who then moved in full riot gear and kept coming. They raised a black flag, warning them tear gas was coming, and it caused pandemonium in this area that's filled with high-end shops and restaurants. The protesters are running from the scene, choking, flushing their eyes. And this is just an extension, Lulu, of the turmoil that has plunged Hong Kong into the worst crisis in its recent history.GARCIA-NAVARRO: Yeah, these marches have been going on since June. I mean, have the demands changed? What do the people want?MCCARTHY: Well, you know, what we've got is - earlier, we had a bill that would have allowed extradition to mainland China. And that really animated these protests. But - and they still want that completely withdrawn. But, you know, this entire movement has morphed into something else. It's now about political reform, and that's at the core of the demands. Protesters want the government to preserve their liberties, not erode them and say the only way that's going to happen is if they can elect their own leaders. And those leaders are now heavily vetted by Beijing and, in some cases, appointed by them. One demonstrator, 61-year-old Yuan Quoc Wai (ph), told me that Hong Kong was at serious risk. Here he is.YUAN QUOC WAI: (Foreign language spoken).MCCARTHY: He's saying, "The Uighurs, the Muslims of China were the precedent and that Hong Kong will be next. China is re-educating the Uighurs. It's brainwashing them," he says. "I've been in Hong Kong for 60 years, living under freedoms that we have. But, under China," he says, "we enjoy no such thing. There is no democracy."Lulu, he's basically saying China isn't honoring what Hong Kong was promised when it reverted back to China - that is, one country, two systems - and that China is eroding Hong Kong's system.GARCIA-NAVARRO: Yeah, how is the government of Hong Kong reacting?MCCARTHY: Well, they're furious tonight. In fact, they're really putting the blame on the protesters. Now, in - as a corollary to that, the protesters themselves seem to reserve a lot of tolerance for the more hardcore among them. They say, you know, no one wants violence. Most of us will not be part of any escalation. But they will extend empathy for those who do take part in more violent courses. They say, look. The protesters don't bear the burden of responsibility. The government does for ignoring them.GARCIA-NAVARRO: That's NPR's Julie McCarthy in Hong Kong. Thank you so much.MCCARTHY: Thank you.Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

U.S. intervention, on the other hand, tends to be for discrete military or counterterrorism goals, be it in Syria, Libya, Yemen, or Somalia. While U.S. forces do train local partners on how to secure and govern their areas, the mission is a distant second to the immediate combat operation. That much was clear with the SDF, as there was no political vision or broader U.S. Syria policy guiding the partnership. The investment is primarily military and short-term, with no grander strategy or regional diplomatic and security plan to which the campaign is meant to tie in. Once the mission is achieved, American forces scale down or withdraw, leaving their proxy no clear political path forward in its host nation. The SDF’s Kurdish leaders now find themselves in the precarious situation of having no powerful patron, internal or external to Syria, who supports their goal of a semiautonomous Kurdish state or even a future role in the Damascus government.Second is who the U.S. chooses to enable. Iran enjoys a natural choice for its partnerships: an array of Shia partners and proxies cultivated over decades across the Middle East. These groups share not only the Iranian regime’s unique Shia ideology, but a shared identity as members of an “axis of resistance” to Israel, the United States, and Saudi Arabia. This ideological affinity has deepened through the cauldron of multiple wars, while the unifying narrative instills motivation and loyalty to Iranian goals.Lacking such geographic proximity and historical bonds, the U.S. selects partners based on their capability and will to fight right now. The problem is that both those things can shift or atrophy over time. Although militias may clear terrorist-held territory very ably, they may be ill-suited to hold, defend, police, and govern it, particularly when they are not from that area. While sharing an immediate motivation to fight a common foe, the proxy may have other enemies to whom it will ultimately direct its arms and attention that may not necessarily be in line with U.S. aims. Such is the case with the SDF. They were committed to the fight against ISIS, but the SDF’s Kurdish leaders also used the campaign to expand the emerging Kurdish statelet, Rojava, much to the fury of Turkey, a NATO ally. From the beginning of the U.S.-SDF partnership, this fundamental misalignment in ultimate aims was understood but discarded, in the name of operational expediency. As the SDF and Turkey go to war, this fissure is laid bare.Slowly but surely, Iran has transformed its “axis of resistance” with Hezbollah and the Syrian regime into a regional alliance spanning from Iraq to Yemen. No longer simply Iranian proxies, groups like Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iraqi PMF now form a group of ideologically aligned, militarily interdependent, political-military actors committed to one another’s mutual defense—a resistance NATO, so to speak, with military footholds across the region, political influence in key Arab capitals, and a network of dedicated partners. Indeed, Iran’s return on investment has been high. Tehran can now better deter its adversaries, fight them when it suits its goals, and more generally steer policies and events in the region in its favor.

Hong Kong has been left in shock after a night of violence on Sunday, which saw dozens of masked men storm a train station.The men - dressed in white shirts and suspected to be triad gangsters - assaulted pro-democracy protesters and passers-by in the Yuen Long area.This is the first time this kind of violence has been seen in the ongoing anti-extradition demonstrations. Several lawmakers questioned why police were slow to arrive at the scene. Footage posted on social media showed dozens of men attacking people with wooden rods and metal sticks inside the station.Forty-five people were injured, with one person in critical condition.Hong Kong's Chief Executive Carrie Lam told reporters the gang attacks were "shocking". She also condemned protesters for defacing China's main representative office in the city earlier on Sunday.Pro-democracy protesters were set upon as they travelled back from a rally in the centre of Hong Kong, where riot police had fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters.The masked men stormed Yuen Long MTR station at about 22:30 local time (14:30 GMT).Local media said they were targeting people dressed in black - the colour most protesters were wearing. Were triads involved in Hong Kong violence? What are the protests about? Profile: Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam In a statement, the government said: "This is absolutely unacceptable to Hong Kong as a society that observes the rule of law. The SAR [Special Administrative Region] Government strongly condemns any violence and will seriously take enforcement actions."One journalist, Gwyneth Ho, was attacked while she was in the middle of live streaming for news website Stand News. She is currently in hospital. The Hong Kong Journalist Association said some reporters on the scene had equipment seized. One witness - Galileo Cheng, 34 - told the BBC he had suffered several blows to his back and arms when he stepped in to try to help Ms Ho.He said he saw another woman with a baby being assaulted too. It is not known who organised the attack.Opposition lawmaker Lam Cheuk-ting suggested the mob had ties to organised crime syndicates."Is Hong Kong now allowing triads to do what they want, beating up people on the street with weapons?" he asked reporters.Another pro-democracy lawmaker, Ray Chan, tweeted a complaint about the police response. "Hong Kong has one of the world's highest cop to population ratio ... Where were [they?]"Video footage also surfaced of pro-Beijing lawmaker Junius Ho, shaking hands with men in white and giving them the thumbs-up signal.On Facebook, he denied a connection with the men and said he was just responding to their greetings when they recognised him on the street after he left a restaurant. His office was later ransacked. Police on Monday said they had not made any arrests but were still carrying out investigations.Some of the assailants did not seem too concerned about masking their identity, posting selfies online, before during and after the attack, reported the BBC's China correspondent Stephen McDonell.By Martin Yip, BBC News Chinese, Hong KongYuen Long is a centuries-old farming and trading town, which has hugely expanded in recent decades. Most of its village leaders and their clans are pro-China. On Sunday evening, people began to share photos online that showed coach loads of men in white shirts congregating in the area. Later - after the train station attacks - many of these men were seen running back to the surrounding villages, intensifying speculation that they were backed by the locals, if not hired by them. Pro-democracy demonstrators have now announced that they want to move a pre-planned rally to Yuen Long next Sunday as a reaction to the outburst of violence. Until now all rallies have been held more centrally.One villager told me that local clans are concerned by the shift, as it feels like people are "messing around on their doorstep". He said they consider the protesters to be thugs who need to be taught a lesson. Mass protests have been held for weeks, initially over an extradition deal with mainland China, which the Hong Kong government has since suspended.The unrest has now spread to cover broader demands for democratic reform and reflect concerns that freedoms are being eroded.In a rare act, protesters defaced the liaison office, China's central government building, on Sunday. One of the graffiti slogans read: "You taught us peaceful marches are useless."Ms Lam strongly condemned the vandalism by "radical demonstrators", saying they had acted "maliciously" and "challenged the nation's sovereignty". Some protesters also covered CCTV cameras outside a police station with spray paint. Organisers of the protest say more than 430,000 people took part in the rally, but police put the figure at 138,000.On Saturday a counter-rally, in support of the police and against protest violence, drew 300,000 people according to organisers and 103,000 people according to police.They were sparked by the proposed extradition bill that would have allowed people to be sent to China for trial.Critics said it would undermine Hong Kong's judicial independence and could be used to target those who spoke out against the Chinese government.The former British colony is part of China but run under a "one country, two systems" arrangement that guarantees it a level of autonomy. It has its own judiciary, and a legal system that is independent from mainland China.

Enlarge this image Wendy and Norm Alvarez lost their home to the Carr Fire earlier this summer. Low-income people often face more challenges when it comes to recovering from a natural disaster. Sam Harnett/KQED hide caption toggle caption Sam Harnett/KQED Wendy and Norm Alvarez lost their home to the Carr Fire earlier this summer. Low-income people often face more challenges when it comes to recovering from a natural disaster. Sam Harnett/KQED Fires, like all natural disasters, disproportionately affect those who are low income. They often lack insurance and resources to rebuild or move elsewhere. The effects on families and communities can be long-lasting.A paper published last year by the National Bureau of Economic Research analyzed 90 years of natural disaster data. It found that major catastrophes increase a county's poverty rate — the percentage of people living below the poverty line — by an average of 1 percent. That's because disasters encourage those who are well off to leave, and it makes those with low income poorer.Wendy and Norm Alvarez had a unique living arrangement in Redding, Ca., about 95 miles north of the Camp Fire in Butte County. Norm is a carpenter and had taken care of an antique dealer's house for years. The place was on a scrubby country road on the outskirts of town. It had a workshop where Norm did small jobs for other clients, and it had an in-law unit. Two years ago Norm and Wendy moved in.It was an ideal setup, one that they thought would carry them into a fairly comfortable retirement."It was peaceful and quiet to sit out here in the evening with all the trees and birds and animals," Wendy said, "We had a good life."About three months ago, the Carr Fire forced Norm and Wendy to evacuate. The next day they were watching the news and saw footage of their neighborhood. Some of the houses were untouched. Theirs was completely destroyed.Nearly everything they owned was burned. Wendy said she felt like suddenly they might never recover financially. And she's right. They might not. The set back has been tremendous.Not only did they lose their possessions, their affordable living situation and Norm's caretaking arrangement, they also lost what Norm used to make money: his tools. All he has left is a drill, which happened to be in his truck when they fled.Like many who lost homes in these fires, the couple did not have renters insurance. For the first time in their lives they had to ask for help."Financially we are in a position we haven't had to be in," Wendy said, "It's been very uncomfortable to humble yourself to ask for help."In the immediate aftermath of the fire, organizations like the Red Cross, the Buddhist Tzu Chi Foundation and the Lion's Club gave them some money for food and clothes. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) helped cover a few months rent. Right now they're splitting rent on an apartment with other fire survivors. "None of us know which direction we're going to go," Wendy said.Wendy and Norm need to start generating income. They're trying to scrape together money to buy Norm tools so he can get some work helping others rebuild. All of their losses have made it hard for them to even think about a long-term plan."It strips you from the inside out," Wendy said, "It doesn't leave you feeling like you have any value. You don't have any hope left to go forward. I am a godly woman, so I ask God every day, 'give me the strength.'"Poor communities may never recoverThe longterm effects of natural disasters like fires on families quickly add up for a community.In Shasta County, where Wendy and Norm live, the percentage of people living below the poverty line is 17.5 percent. To the south, in Mendocino, it's close to 20 percent. Next door in Lake County it's 25 percent. These counties have been pounded by wildfires since the drought that began in 2011. Since that fire season, well over half of Lake County, for instance, has burned.Just this year, the Carr Fire in Shasta County and the Mendocino Complex Fire destroyed over 1,300 homes. Many of those who lost their homes may never fully rebound financially. Good jobs and affordable housing are hard to replace in rural Northern California. Losing a home can destabilize a family for years or even generations. Many fire survivors from previous years are still in limbo, like John and Ellen Brackett.FEMA gave them $21,000 — it didn't go farJohn and Ellen's house in Mendocino County burned in the fires last October. They lost everything.The couple had two acres that John's grandparents had bought. They lived on the property with their two children. The place was all paid for, they just needed to cover taxes.The property was filled with three generations of stuff: tools, trailers and lots of motorbikes. John only saved his Harley — that's how he escaped the flames.Like Wendy and Norm, the couple had no insurance. After the fires, FEMA gave them $21,000. It didn't go very far. Ellen said they used almost all of the money just to fix their well and get drinking water.They needed the well on their property to get a FEMA trailer. They have been living in the trailer since February. The walls are bare except for one small photo of the family.The family has no real savings. Ellen has a job doing in-home care. John was a sheetrocker. But a motorcycle accident and years of hanging drywall destroyed his shoulder. He just had surgery, and is in a sling. His doctor told him he's done with manual labor.John said he's the kind of guy who likes to give help, not receive it. But right now they need help.In Mendocino, 402 families lost their homes last October. Only one family has rebuilt and moved back in, according to a local organization called Mendocino Rebuilding Our Community. Around 50 families like the Bracketts are living in FEMA trailers or even tents.You only get a FEMA trailer for 18 months. Ellen and John will lose theirs next April. If they don't have a home by then, Ellen said they will have to live in a tent."We have be done with our plan by April," Ellen said, "We have to have a place out here. Because my kids, his mom, I mean we can rough it in a tent, but a 15-year-old, a 12-year-old and a 70-year-old? They cannot be in a tent."Mendocino Rebuilding Our Community estimates it would take around $9 million for everyone to rebuild. The group has raised $3 million. The state plans to start issuing a handful of low or no interest home-building loans. Ellen and John are praying they're one of the lucky few to get one."Hopefully we will get approved," Ellen said, "and then, we're just going to slap in a five-bedroom modular, and hopefully get our lives back together. Because this is crazy."In the couple's bedroom they have a large plastic storage tub. In it, John keeps the remains of stuff his family has collected over the years: small antiques, coins, very old guns and knives.These few things may not have been worth that much, but they give Ellen and John a sense of security. They thought they could sell some of this stuff in a pinch. One thing of value survived the fire: a 100-year-old gold dollar coin."This one piece amongst all of this is kind of like a hope," Ellen said, "There has to be. This can't be what ends it. There has to be something better."This story was originally published on September 19, 2018

SAN FRANCISCO -- An Apple engineer who died when his Tesla Model X slammed into a concrete barrier had previously complained about the SUV malfunctioning on that same stretch of Silicon Valley freeway. His complaints were detailed in a trove of documents released Tuesday by federal investigators in two Tesla crashes involving Autopilot, one in California and the other in Florida. The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the March 2018 crash that killed Walter Huang near Mountain View, California. It's also probing a crash in Delray Beach, Florida, that happened about a year later and killed driver Jeremy Banner. The documents say Huang told his wife that Autopilot had previously veered his SUV toward the same barrier on U.S. 101 near Mountain View where he later crashed. Huang died at a hospital from his injuries. “Walter said the car would veer toward the barrier in the mornings when he went to work,” the Huang family's attorney wrote in a response to NTSB questions. Records from an iPhone recovered from the crash site showed that Huang may have been using it before the accident. Records obtained from AT&T showed that data had been used while the vehicle was in motion, but the source of the transmissions couldn’t be determined, the NTSB wrote. One transmission was less than a minute before the crash. Huang had described Autopilot's previous malfunctioning to his brother, the Huang family attorney wrote, in addition to talking with a friend who owns a Model X. Huang, a software engineer, discussed with the friend how a patch to the Autopilot software affected its performance and made the Model X veer, according to the attorney. The Huang family is suing Tesla and California’s Department of Transportation for allegedly failing to maintain the highway. Autopilot is a partially automated system designed to keep a vehicle in its lane and keep a safe distance from vehicles in front of it. It also can change lanes with driver approval. Tesla says Autopilot is intended to be used for driver assistance and that drivers must be ready to intervene at all times. The full NTSB board is scheduled to hold a hearing on the Mountain View crash on Feb. 25. At that time, it will determine a cause and make safety recommendations. NTSB staff members have already recommended that California transportation officials move faster to repair highway safety barriers damaged by vehicles. A report from the agency says California officials failed to fix the barrier that was damaged in a crash 11 days before Huang was killed. In that incident, a 2010 Toyota Prius traveling over 75 mph (120 kmh) crashed against the attenuator, a cushion that protects vehicles from hitting the end of concrete lane dividers. The California Highway Patrol responded to the March 12 crash but did not notify the state Department of Transportation of the damage as required, the NTSB said. Huang's 2017 Tesla Model X was traveling at 71 mph (114 kph) when it crashed against the same attenuator, which the NTSB determined had been damaged and repaired more frequently than any other left-exit in Caltrans' District 4, which includes all of the San Francisco Bay Area. In the three years before the Tesla crash, the device was struck at least five times, including one crash that resulted in fatalities. A car struck it again on May 20, 2018, about two months after the Tesla crash, the NTSB said. NTSB first released some details from its investigation in September. The California Department of Transportation said in a statement Tuesday that it has “identified and is implementing several steps to enhance monitoring and tracking of the repair of damage” to highway infrastructure. “These efforts include updates to its policies and maintenance manual, training of staff, and enhanced reporting on the timely repair of high priority traffic safety devices,” Caltrans said. In the Florida crash, Banner turned on the Autopilot function of his Model 3 sedan 10 seconds before the crash, then took his hands off the steering wheel, NTSB documents said. The car then drove underneath a tractor-trailer that was crossing in front of it, sheering off the car's roof and killing Banner. It was eerily similar to another Florida crash in 2016 in which a Tesla on Autopilot went beneath a semi trailer. The NTSB said in a preliminary report that it still hasn’t determined the cause of the crash. According to the report, traffic was light on the four-lane highway and dawn was breaking when Banner, 50, set his speed at 69 mph (111 kph) and activated the autopilot as he headed to work. The speed limit was 55 mph (88 kph). Seconds later, a tractor-trailer driven by Richard Wood, 45, pulled from a driveway and began to cross to the other side of the highway. Wood said he saw two sets of car headlights coming toward him, but he thought he had time to make it across. “It was dark and it looked like the cars was back further than they was,” Wood told NTSB investigators four days after the crash. A photo taken by the NTSB from Tesla’s front-end video camera showed Wood’s trailer fully blocking the road 1.5 seconds before the crash. Data from the Tesla’s computer shows that Banner hit his brakes less than a second before the crash, but the car went under the trailer. Wood says he saw a second car but it didn't hit the trailer. ———— Krisher reported from Detroit. Terry Spencer contributed from Orlando, Florida.

The Venezuelan politician fighting to depose Nicolás Maduro has accused his rival of attempting to obliterate the opposition challenge to his rule with a campaign of “state terrorism”.Speaking to the Guardian nearly two weeks after his failed uprising against Maduro, Juan Guaidó claimed Venezuela’s strongman president was illegally targeting opposition leaders who took part.At least 10 Guaidó allies are facing years in jail for their role in the abortive 30 April insurrection – with three seeking refuge in diplomatic compounds and one fleeing to Colombia in recent days.The current location of Edgar Zambrano, the vice-president of Venezuela’s opposition-controlled parliament, is unknown after he was seized by intelligence agents last Wednesday.“Today what we are seeing is terror, the sowing of terror, which is all the Maduro regime has left,” Guaidó said during an interview at his party headquarters in Caracas.“What they are doing right now is basically state terrorism – because they are using the state apparatus to spread fear.”Venezuela’s foreign minister, Jorge Arreaza, has rejected international criticism of his government’s clampdown, asking critics how they would respond to a similarly “foolhardy operation” to remove their leader.Maduro and his backers describe the botched mutiny as a US-backed coup attempt that was defeated thanks to the loyalty of Venezuela’s armed forces.But Guaidó, the 35-year-old president of Venezuela’s national assembly, claimed Maduro’s pursuit of opposition lawmakers reflected the desperation of a regime “in its final moments”.“All that he has left, regrettably, is persecution,” Guaidó said of Maduro, who took power after Hugo Chávez’s 2013 death and was returned to office last year in elections widely denounced as a fraud.Several key Maduro confidants were reportedly involved in the plot against him – including the defence minister and the head of the supreme court – and Guaidó said he believed Maduro was now racked with paranoia. “I think he mistrusts everyone … even the person who serves him coffee.”He called the defection of Venezuela’s top spy – who Maduro has accused of being a CIA mole – proof of a deep split within the military and predicted: “There will be more and more [defections].”Despite the recent upheaval, Guaidó cut a confident and carefree figure during the half-hour interview, at one point spontaneously breaking into a falsetto rendition of his campaign jingle: “Vamos bien!” (“We’re doing good!”). As the Guardian left his office, Guaidó beamed and flashed a V sign with his left hand.But for all that outward bounce the politician’s life has been upended since he launched his campaign against Maduro in January by declaring himself Venezuela’s rightful interim president – a decision now endorsed by 54 governments, including the US and Britain.Thickset security guards prowl the corridors of his offices with walkie talkies strapped to their hips. Guaidó’s wife and baby daughter have reportedly left Venezuela.“There have been lots of threats,” he said, calling recent days “very complicated”.Guaidó has yet to be detained or charged – something many attribute to Maduro’s reluctance to provoke the White House.But several close allies have gone into hiding or fled abroad after being stripped of their parliamentary immunity and accused of crimes including treason, civil rebellion and instigating insurrection.On Saturday, Venezuela’s El Nacional newspaper said Zambrano faced up to 30 years in prison for his role in the so-called “Operation Freedom” against Maduro.Guaidó recalled feeling “great expectation” as he headed to Caracas’ La Carlota airfield to launch the rebellion in the early hours of 30 April. But by noon it was clear crucial support from top military and political figures had not materialised. “We needed more,” Guaidó admitted.Despite the setback – which some view as a calamitous defeat and others a temporary hitch - Guaidó insisted the opposition was close to achieving its objective.He hinted secret negotiations aimed at securing Maduro’s departure continued and said he would talk to any civil or military figure prepared to back his cause.Asked how long Maduro had left, Guaidó said he hoped it was “nanoseconds”.“They have already lost. Venezuela hasn’t won yet … [but] I believe it is just a matter of time.”Maduro loyalists see the uprising as part of a gringo plot masterminded by Donald Trump’s White House. Pedro Carreño, a top Maduro ally, branded Guaidó’s movement a “despicable” jukebox that would play whatever tune it was paid to.Guaidó rejected his depiction as a “diabolical imperialist puppet” and urged foreign critics to consider how Chavista criminality – not US sanctions – had caused Venezuela’s collapse.“It wasn’t a tornado. It wasn’t a hurricane. It wasn’t an earthquake. It wasn’t a fire that spread uncontrollably,” Guaidó said. “No – it was caused by the corruption of this regime.”Additional reporting by Patricia Torres in Caracas Topics Venezuela Americas Juan Guaidó Nicolás Maduro news

Republican lawmakers have persisted in using "Wuhan virus" or "Chinese coronavirus," despite remarks by Democrats and the director of the CDC that such phrases are inaccurate and even racist.Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., used the term "Wuhan virus" on Thursday in announcing that his Washington office was closing because of the illness. His comments came two days after the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Robert Redfield, agreed when questioned at a House hearing that it was "absolutely wrong and inappropriate" to use such labels.Redfield said the virus had now expanded beyond China to other parts of the world, particularly Iran, South Korea, Italy and "now all of Europe."Other GOP officials who have referred to the virus by country or ethnicity have been accused of perpetuating racist associations with the virus. Wuhan is the Chinese city where the outbreak began.Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., called it the "Wuhan Virus," Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., referred to the “Chinese coronavirus," and President Donald Trump retweeted a comment using the term “China Virus.”Gosar and other Republicans defended themselves by saying the media had used the same terms in early reporting on the outbreak.The WHO said it deliberately chose COVID-19 as the official name to avoid such stigmatization.The Morning RundownGet a head start on the morning's top stories.Three Asian American Democrats in the House, Reps. Ted Lieu and Judy Chu of California, and Grace Meng of New York, as well as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California demanded an apology from McCarthy this week.Meng told NBC Asian America that she confronted McCarthy in person on Tuesday and described the bullying and racist attacks that some Asian Americans have dealt with as a result of misinformation around the virus. She said she was “disappointed with his response and his reaction.”“He was not very interested in hearing stories of people being bullied or assaulted,” she said.“He just kept saying to me, ‘Well, if The New York Times had done this … would you call them out?’ And I said, ‘Easily, when I’ve seen it, I have called them out. … It's my job, to try to help share and inform people.’ And he laughed as he walked away and he said, ‘Well, at least you're consistent.’”McCarthy’s office did not respond to Meng's criticisms, but responded to NBC News’ request for comment with a link to a "TODAY" show video that also referred to the illness as “Chinese coronavirus” in the title but not the actual clip. The title has since been changed after it was brought to the site’s attention.The Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus sent a letter to their colleagues in Congress urging them to “help us prevent hysteria, ignorant attacks and racist assaults that have been fueled by misinformation pertaining" to the coronavirus.The letter urged all members of Congress to share only "confirmed and verifiable information."Meng said that the rhetoric used by some GOP lawmakers could be a tactic to distract from what they say has been Trump’s mishandling of the response to the outbreak.“I have talked to longtime hardcore Trump supporters who have never been critical of anything that the president has said or done, but for the first time have shared with me that they have been really disappointed with his handling of the virus outbreak," she said.She added that she thinks it’s likely some officials are using China or Asian Americans as scapegoats “versus actually dealing with the problem at hand.”“Even if it's not intentional, it is definitely the consequence,” she said of their words.Lieu said that by viewing the virus as a Chinese issue, Republicans had "totally dropped the ball" on the response. “What we need are test kits, not inflammatory statements by the GOP House leader," he said.Lieu also called out Republican lawmakers who “are putting the country in danger by failing to note the gravity of this situation unfolding on American soil.”“They’re afraid of Trump, but they should be more afraid of what this virus can do to our country if left unchecked,” he said. “It is time for GOP Leadership to focus on facts, instead of on ethnicity.”

President Donald Trump tweeted support for anti-government Iranian protesters in both English and Farsi Saturday evening, writing, “I’ve stood with you since the beginning of my Presidency, and my Administration will continue to stand with you. We are following your protests closely, and are inspired by your courage.” To the brave, long-suffering people of Iran: I've stood with you since the beginning of my Presidency, and my Administration will continue to stand with you. We are following your protests closely, and are inspired by your courage.— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2020 به مردم شجاع و رنج کشیده ایران: من از ابتدای دوره ریاست جمهوریم با شما ایستاده‌ام و دولت من همچنان با شما خواهد ایستاد. ما اعتراضات شما را از نزدیک دنبال می کنیم. شجاعت شما الهام بخش است.— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2020 Protests began Saturday at two universities in Iran, as Iranians gathered to mourn the 176 lives lost on Ukraine International Airlines Flight PS752, which the Iranian government admitted to accidentally shooting down early Saturday. That flight contained 82 Iranian citizens; Iran initially blamed its crashing on a technical error, calling US and Canadian claims that it had been shot down “lies.”Angered over the Iranian government’s apparent attempt to hide the accidental killing of civilians, mourners in the crowd turned hostile, chanting anti-regime slogans and tearing up pictures of senior Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in a US airstrike on January 3. Ahead of shooting down the plane, Iran responded to Soleimani’s death with missile strikes on US positions in Iraq; the government said “human error” led to military officials mistaking the aircraft for an enemy plane in the wake of those strikes. At the protests, Iranians chanted “commander in chief resign,” referring to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and “death to liars.” Some also chanted, “They are lying that our enemy is America, our enemy is right here.” Chants of می‌کشم، می‌کشم، آن که برادرم کشت - which roughly translates to "I will kill those who killed my brother." Protests in #Iran following the government admitting it shot down the Ukrainian airliner by mistake. Outside Amir Kabir University pic.twitter.com/c6h70Kre9n— Nilo Tabrizy (@ntabrizy) January 11, 2020 Iranian security forces reportedly broke up the protests using tear gas. It isn’t clear how many people attended the demonstrations, or how widespread they were. Iran’s semi-official news agency, Fars, said there were roughly 1,000 people protesting, however, given that the agency is seen as being pro-Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, it is possible the number was higher. The US continued to encourage the protests Sunday, with Trump warning Iran to allow the protests to continue. He also called on the country to restore internet access — there were reports on social media that it had been shut down to limit the spread of protest videos, a tactic Iran has used in the past — and, despite his own attacks on reporters, Trump demanded Iran allow journalists complete freedom of the press. To the leaders of Iran - DO NOT KILL YOUR PROTESTERS. Thousands have already been killed or imprisoned by you, and the World is watching. More importantly, the USA is watching. Turn your internet back on and let reporters roam free! Stop the killing of your great Iranian people!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2020 He also demanded protesters not be killed, a nod to the anti-government protests in Iran last fall, during which more than 1,000 people were arrested, and at least 300 killed.During 2019’s protests, the Trump administration actively worked to encourage protesters with messages of support. And this weekend, it issued similar messages, with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, a key voice in the push for war with Iran, saying “America hears you. America supports you. America stands with you. May God bless the people of Iran.”This weekend’s anti-regime protests are the first in Iran since the airstrike that killed Soleimani. Last year, however, thousands of Iranians took to the streets to protest a sudden 50 percent rise in gas prices, and difficult economic realities more broadly. The rise in fuel prices came two days after Iranian President Hassan Rouhani announced that the government faced a deficit that amounted to nearly two-thirds of its $45 billion budget.Iran has been hit hard by economic woes, in large part due to heavy sanctions imposed by Trump, but the demands of the anti-government protesters were obscured earlier this month by the thousands who turned out for Soleimani’s funeral and anti-US protests that followed. The US State Department endorsed those earlier protests, but Trump initially did not, later saying he did.Iran dismissed that US support as “hypocritical,” and it is not clear how much of an effect the State Department’s statements and Trump’s tweets had on the demonstrations. Nor is it clear the demonstrators in the most recent protests will take Trump’s latest tweets as the words of an ally. As Vox’s Jen Kirby explained, Trump’s recent threat to bomb Iranian cultural sites eroded some Iranians’ trust in the US leader: For some, the promise to attack cultural sites also proved that, despite all of Trump’s rhetoric, he — and maybe his administration, too — didn’t actually care about the Iranian people after all. Maryam, the student from Kermanshah, said she once believed Trump separated the Iranian government from the people. That’s how she saw the economic sanctions: as punishment against the regime, not the people. But when Trump threatened to bomb Iran’s cultural sites, she thought, what harm would that do to the government? None. “That’s when we realized he isn’t anti-regime, he’s just anti-Iranian all along, and we didn’t know it,” Maryam said. Regardless of what Trump has to say about them — and the risks involved — the anti-government protests seem set to continue. Journalist Yashar Ali reported that more protests are planned for Sunday night, and according to Reuters, protests continued in Tehran throughout the day Sunday with “scores” of demonstrators calling for government reforms.

The Trump administration has given ever-changing answers about its reasons for deciding to kill Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani, first claiming that the leader posed an “imminent threat” to the US, before suggesting that maybe the threat wasn’t so imminent after all.The rationale took a new turn Friday evening when President Donald Trump gave Fox News’s Laura Ingraham what has been perhaps the most definitive answer so far on what the threat was; according to the president, Soleimani was planning attacks on “four US embassies,” including the one in Baghdad, which faced violent protests on New Year’s Eve.But the president’s assertion about the four embassies has already begun to unravel, in part due to efforts by his top defense officials Sunday to string together a consistent narrative justifying Soleimani’s killing. On Meet the Press Sunday, National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien suggested that there may not have been intelligence explicitly tying Soleimani to plans to attack embassies, saying Trump interpreted the US’s “exquisite intelligence” that stated “[Iranians] were looking at US facilities throughout the region and that they wanted to inflict casualties on US soldiers, sailors, and marines, as well as diplomats.”O’Brien said Trump’s “interpretation” of the available intelligence — namely the conclusion that four embassies were at immediate risk — was “consistent” with what the brief said. WATCH: Nat’l Sec. Adviser O’Brien defends Trump’s claim an attack was imminent on embassies in Baghdad and 4 unnamed countries. #IfItsSunday@chucktodd: “What did you do for the other 3 embassies?”O’Brien: “We took measures … I am not going to get in the details of that.” pic.twitter.com/0voWTs9Cy9— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) January 12, 2020 On Fox News Sunday, O’Brien suggested that the idea the embassies would be attacked was an assumption. “It’s always difficult even with the exquisite intelligence we have to know exactly what the targets are,” he said, adding, “It’s certainly consistent with the intelligence to assume they would have hit embassies in at least four countries.”Defense Secretary Mark Esper further muddied the issue Sunday morning on Face the Nation. He said that while he “believed” there “probably, could have been attacks” that put Americans in the Middle East in immediate danger, he “didn’t see” specific intelligence indicating an imminent attack on multiple embassies, an odd statement given that, as secretary of defense, Esper ought to have seen such intelligence, if it exists. — Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) January 12, 2020 And he refused to elaborate on the existence of intelligence showing four embassies at risk on CNN’s State of the Union, saying only, “There was intelligence that there was an intent to target the US embassy in Baghdad.” Defense Secretary Mark Esper: "There was intelligence that there was an intent to target the US embassy in Baghdad. What the President said with regard to the four embassies is what I believe as well" #CNNSOTU pic.twitter.com/CNwo6PLK41— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) January 12, 2020 Complicating the administration’s narrative even further was a Washington Post report Friday from Shane Harris, Josh Dawsey, and Seung Min Kim indicating that US embassy officials in Baghdad were not warned of a larger imminent threat. “The embassy in Baghdad did not receive an alert commensurate to the threat Trump described, said a person familiar with the situation, who was not authorized to comment publicly,” read the Post report.When asked why the embassy in Baghdad was not alerted, O’Brien told ABC’s This Week Sunday that the US isn’t “going to cut and run every time someone threatens us,” before saying that the US will not have another “Tehran 1979” or Benghazi. When asked the same question on Meet the Press, O’Brien said “this was a very fast-moving situation” and said he couldn’t “get into the details” about what action — if any — was taken to protect the other embassies Trump said were in danger. Pressed on why embassies allegedly targeted by Iran's Gen. Soleimani weren't alerted or evacuated, national security adviser Robert O'Brien: "We're not going to cut and run every time somebody threatens us...we're not going to have another Benghazi." https://t.co/A9mOySQrdm pic.twitter.com/EczuftS6kr— This Week (@ThisWeekABC) January 12, 2020 The Trump administration’s messaging on Soleimani has been muddled from the beginning, as Vox’s Alex Ward explained: From political rallies to press conferences to secret briefings to official documents, Trump administration officials have repeatedly failed to provide evidence that Soleimani posed more danger to Americans at the time he was killed than he routinely did for decades. Trump’s team has so bungled its justification for the strike that even some Republicans have criticized the administration. Without evidence establishing the “imminent threat” rationale, which could help bolster a self-defense case, experts say the government would struggle to legally justify greenlighting the operation in court. And despite having now had over a week to provide that evidence to the public, officials from President Donald Trump on down have increasingly begun to talk about the operation as retribution for the killing of an American contractor in Iraq by members of an Iranian-backed militia and the storming of the US embassy in Baghdad in late December. And as Ward reported, the administration has had trouble not just explaining the rationale behind the assassination to the public, but to Congress. Republican Sen. Mike Lee called a Wednesday congressional briefing in which the administration laid out its intelligence and reasoning for the strike “probably the worst briefing I’ve seen, at least on a military issue, in the nine years I’ve served in the US Senate.”That briefing also became an issue Sunday, as O’Brien was asked to explain why a number of lawmakers said the administration failed to mention the supposed threats to the embassies.In his Fox News Sunday interview, O’Brien again obfuscated, saying he was not present at the congressional briefing, and that perhaps the threat wasn’t mentioned because lawmakers didn’t ask the right questions. “I wasn’t at the briefing,” O’Brien said. “I don’t know how the Q and A went back and forth — sometimes it depends on the questions that were asked, or how they were phrased.”He added, “All I can tell you is that we’ve been clear from the start that there were very significant threats to American facilities in the region and to American military officials, officers and men and women and also to US diplomats and I think that’s consistent with what the president’s been saying now.” Members of Congress say the Iranian threat to blow up multiple U.S. embassies was not mentioned in the intel briefing. But the President says there were threats to four embassies. Plus, is the Trump administration's strategy working? Robert O'Brien reacts. #FNS pic.twitter.com/hqIMScY2Tk— FoxNewsSunday (@FoxNewsSunday) January 12, 2020 But none of the administration’s most recent statements offer any sort of proof that there was, in fact, a specific imminent threat killing Soleimani would have prevented. Nor is it clear whether the threat to the embassies existed — Trump says it did, O’Brien says Trump assumed it did, and Esper says he never saw any intelligence explicitly stating the threat existed. Instead, the official reasons behind Soleimani’s killing are as opaque as ever, and still require Americans to take the Trump administration at its word — something that is difficult to do given the administration often lies.

Kayleigh McEnany’s first briefing as White House press secretary started off on a hopeful note — with a promise from her not to lie. That lasted for about all of 15 minutes.“I will never lie to you. You have my word on that,” McEnany said early during the briefing, in response from a question from the Associated Press’s Jill Colvin. "I will never lie to you. You have my word on that." -- Kayleigh McEnany during her first press briefing as press secretary (bookmark this) pic.twitter.com/PqUhRAWiun— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 1, 2020 It’s a standard question White House reporters ask new press secretaries, and one that is rarely, if ever, lived up to fully. But it took all of two questions for Trump’s fourth press secretary to break that promise. McEnany’s first lie from the White House podium came in response to a question about comments President Donald Trump made earlier in the day characterizing Tara Reade’s sexual assault allegation against Joe Biden as “far more compelling” than the accusations made against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh during his confirmation hearings. Asked to flesh out Trump’s thinking, McEnany characterized the Kavanaugh allegations as “verifiably false.”“I think it was a grave miscarriage of justice with what happened with Justice Brett Kavanaugh. There’s no need for me to bring up the salacious, awful, and verifiably false allegations that were made against Justice Kavanaugh,” she said. "The salacious, awful, and verifiably false allegations that were made against Justice Kavanaugh" -- McEnany just lied, breaking the promise she made not to just minutes ago. The allegations against Kavanaugh were not verifiably false.It was a good run. pic.twitter.com/XQp1yer9vt— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 1, 2020 But that’s a lie. Instead of being “verifiably false,” multiple accusations against Kavanaugh were found to be credible during the course of an investigation conducted by the New York Times that was published last fall, roughly a year after his confirmation to the court.That wasn’t the only lie McEnany told during her first briefing. Asked about newly released FBI notes regarding the investigation of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn that Trump and White House officials have been hyping as evidence that Flynn was “set up,” McEneny misquoted what the documents say to make them sound more incriminating than they are.“We have a handwritten FBI note that says, quote, we need to get Flynn to lie, quote, and get him fired,” she said. MeEnany just lied again. She misquoted the FBI notes that Trump is hyping (misleadingly) as bombshell evidence exonerating Michael Flynn. Compare what she said with what the note actually says: https://t.co/fwS2XHsXjy pic.twitter.com/iuOPZuhLl9— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 1, 2020 But the notes don’t say that. All they reveal is that before a January 2017 interview with Flynn, one investigator wrote down, “What is our goal? Truth/admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?” It’s important to keep in mind that at the time, the FBI had already gathered evidence that Flynn had broken the law. The notes do not indicate investigators went into the interview with the goal of manipulating Flynn into lying, as McEnany suggested.There was more. Asked later why the public should find the sexual misconduct allegations against Trump from more than 20 women less credible than the one against Biden, McEnany said that “the president has swiftly denied all of these allegations that were raised four years ago.” While many of the allegations against Trump were made in 2016, E. Jean Carroll accused Trump of rape just last year. McEnany's rationale for why Trump's denials of sexual assault are more convincing than Biden's is that "the president has swiftly denied all of these allegations that were raised four years ago. He's always told the truth on these issues." pic.twitter.com/dKKcmmEDpE— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 1, 2020 McEnany then concluded the briefing by reiterating her lies about the Flynn notes.If her first outing is any indication, McEnany may end up being less hostile with reporters than Sarah Sanders. She may be less gaffe-prone than Sean Spicer. She may be more available to the public than the recently departed Stephanie Grisham, who never held a press briefing, making Friday’s the first one held by a White House press secretary in more than a year.But like her predecessors, McEnany will use the White House briefing room to tell lies — even right after she promises reporters she won’t.Support Vox’s explanatory journalismEvery day at Vox, we aim to answer your most important questions and provide you, and our audience around the world, with information that has the power to save lives. Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment: to empower you through understanding. Vox’s work is reaching more people than ever, but our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes resources — particularly during a pandemic and an economic downturn. Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation, but it will enable our staff to continue to offer free articles, videos, and podcasts at the quality and volume that this moment requires. Please consider making a contribution to Vox today.

Riot police have fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters in Hong Kong following a large pro-democracy rally in the city. Officers charged demonstrators who threw objects at police lines.The clashes came after marchers ignored a designated finish line, continuing on to China's central government offices and throwing eggs at the building.Organisers of Sunday's protest say more than 430,000 people took part but police put the figure at 138,000. Mass protests have been held for weeks, initially over an extradition deal with mainland China but now covering other issues on democracy in Hong Kong.Late on Sunday, riot police equipped with masks and shields were seen swarming towards protesters close to a ferry terminal on the main island. Images outside of the liaison office, China's central government building, show signs covered in graffiti. One of the slogans reads: "You taught us peaceful marches are useless."Some protesters also covered the CCTV cameras outside a police station with spray paint. A number of pro-democracy protesters were later attacked by masked men inside Yuen Long metro station in the north of Hong Kong. Video footage from the scene show the group hitting people with sticks. At least 36 people were taken to hospital following the incident, local media reports.The latest rally was put on edge after a huge haul of explosives was found along with protest leaflets.On Saturday, a counter-rally in support of the police and against protest violence drew tens of thousands. The background you need on the Hong Kong protests Did Hong Kong violence sway public opinion? Tear-gas, rubber bullets, the trashing of parliament by protesters and sporadic clashes have created the worst crisis in the territory's recent history.The Hong Kong government has since suspended trying to pursue the extradition bill.The former British colony is part of China but run under a "one country, two systems" arrangement that guarantees it a level of autonomy. It has its own judiciary, and a legal system that is independent from mainland China.Sunday's protests marked the seventh consecutive weekend of mass demonstrations in Hong Kong. The protest route was altered with protesters told to stop at Wan Chai rather than Central, where the key government offices are located. Some 4,000 police officers were deployed. Bonnie Leung from the Civil Human Rights Front urged Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam to "stop turning a deaf ear to the Hong Kong people's demands".She told reporters after the march: "Carrie Lam really needs to respond and I hope we will see that soon."Previous marches have also largely been peaceful, but have sparked violence on the fringes. Last weekend's protests left 28 people, including 13 police officers, injured.Hong Kong police are still investigating. Three men are under arrest.Officers discovered the haul when they entered an industrial building in the Tsuen Wan district on Friday evening.They said they found 2kg (4.4lb) of the highly volatile TATP, as well as 10 petrol bombs, acidic substances, weapons including knives and metal rods, and gas masks and goggles.There were also banners and leaflets opposing the extradition bill and a T-shirt bearing the logo of the pro-independence Hong Kong National Front group.It took place in the central Hong Kong district of Admiralty on Saturday, attracting 103,000 people according to police, but more than 300,000 according to organisers.It was themed "Safeguard Hong Kong". The South China Morning Post said attendees included locals, mainland immigrants, members of ethnic minorities and visitors from across the border. The rally, which won coverage in Chinese state media, focused on support for the police and condemnation of the violence that has marred pro-democracy rallies.Views differed, however, on how the Hong Kong government had tackled the crisis.They were sparked by the proposed extradition bill that would have allowed people to be sent to China for trial.Critics said it would undermine Hong Kong's judicial independence and could be used to target those who spoke out against the Chinese government.The Hong Kong government suspended the bill, but this has not halted the demonstrations, which now reflect broader demands for democratic reform and concerns that freedoms are being eroded.

That was then. Since the assassination of Qassem Soleimani, I suspect that he and other senior Iranian officials have upgraded their security protocols. Soleimani, who was Khamenei’s military counterpart, died in Baghdad. But America’s unwillingness to attack Iran’s leaders, even inside Iran, can no longer be assumed, and it would take only a minimal level of rationality for Khamenei to conclude that death could come from above (in an air strike), below (a car bomb), or any other direction, and that he should minimize contact with random weirdos on the street.Killing Soleimani did not begin World War III, but it did start another familiar conversation, about whether the Iranian government is so stressed that it might topple soon. Those in Washington’s “regime change” crowd have taken up this line, but of course their word is worth little. They are attempting to diagnose and prescribe in the same action: By saying that collapse is imminent, they are trying to make it imminent, encouraging revolution by convincing Iranians that revolution is inevitable anyway. When John Bolton, the recently departed national security adviser and an Iran hawk of long standing, says the regime “has never been under more stress,” it is impossible to know whether he is stating a fact or a desire.What is clear is that the Iranian regime is facing public protests more intense than at any point in recent memory—perhaps beyond even the Green Movement of 2009, which the government put down with near-Tiananmen-like force. Sanctions are cutting into the general population deeply, subsidies are being slashed, and after the accidental shooting-down of a Ukrainian airliner filled with Iranians—and the subsequent denial, then acceptance, of responsibility—hatred of the regime is rising fast. The images from Iran show beyond doubt that large crowds of Iranians do not fear the reaction of their government, and that they are willing to risk becoming its latest victims.But I hesitate to infer from these images imminent regime collapse. In Iran, as in many other countries, elite opinion is a poor guide to popular opinion. Visitors to Iran—especially journalists—usually spend their time in big cities such as Tehran, Isfahan, and Shiraz. In the rare cases when they enjoy real freedom of movement and can spend more than a few days in the country, they might add Mashhad and Tabriz.On that same backpacking trip, in Tehran and Isfahan, I met many Iranians whose greatest fear was that their government would develop nuclear weapons, thus guaranteeing its survival—and their own captivity in a totalitarian theocracy—for the next half century or more. The mood in Tehran in particular was depressive. Even during the Green revolt, they thought rebellion was pointless, because the government would outlast the protests. The only adversary to the Iranian government that mattered, they said, was the United States, whose intervention they both feared and desired, like a rough course of chemo that was the last chance to shrink a cancer that their own body had failed to contain.

“Words matter”: Asian Americans confront President Trump’s ‘Chinese Virus’ rhetoric02:11President Trump says it's not racist to call Covid-19 the "Chinese Virus" in a White House briefing — but here's why it is.March 18, 2020

The 2020 Democratic primaries are taking place next year, but the contest to be the presidential nominee is already throwing up some unforgettable images.We’ve already seen Beto O’Rourke standing on things, Elizabeth Warren cracking open a beer, and Bernie Sanders shouting and pointing, but step aside, all of you, because now, we have a mind-boggling photo of “Mayor Pete” Buttigieg meeting the Rev Al Sharpton in front of every single photographer in New York City.Buttigieg dined with Sharpton, the longtime civil rights activist and founder of the National Action Network, at Sylvia’s restaurant in Harlem on Tuesday.The meal and chat, as Buttigieg seeks to further boost his campaign, spawned an image that scans like a postmodern take on privacy and politics in the modern era: dozens of journalists straining for a glimpse from outside a window as Sharpton and Buttigieg have a nominally private conversation.Both men are pretending to be oblivious to the scrum of photographers. An earnest-looking Buttigieg animatedly gestures and smiles at an utterly impassive Sharpton, the scene bringing to mind an eager sales rep trying to foist a new line of faucets on a department store owner.If the setting looks familiar, well, it should. Silvia’s is Sharpton’s go-to place to fix Democratic presidential hopefuls with his inscrutable gaze.The California senator Kamala Harris met Sharpton in the same restaurant, and sat in the exact same spot, just last week. Sharpton again looked as though he was taking part in a staring contest.Back in 2016, Sharpton was staring at Bernie Sanders – although on that occasion at least both men seemed equally skeptical of each other – and Sharpton met Obama at Sylvia’s there in 2007, peering at the eventual president as Obama crammed a chicken wing into his mouth.Buttigieg was in New York as he attempts to bolster his support among African Americans, after surging in Iowa and New Hampshire polls.It’s unclear if his effort will be successful, and unclear if Buttigieg can sustain his meteoric rise.One thing, though, is certain: he won’t be the last candidate to be stared at by Sharpton in Harlem. Topics New York Democrats Beto O'Rourke Pete Buttigieg Restaurants Kamala Harris US elections 2020 news

If you were to get all of your news last month from Twitter (and, well, maybe you did), you might reasonably conclude that the Democrat to beat in 2020 is none other than a 37-year-old Indiana mayor with a knack for linguistics and a tongue-twister of a name. According to the social media monitoring service Crowdtangle, Pete Buttigieg got the most interactions on Twitter of any Democratic candidate over the past 30 days. But if you were to take just one glance at how much cash each Democratic candidate has—a time-honored proxy for figuring out who the front-runner is—you would see that same name, Pete Buttigieg, way down toward the bottom of the list of 2020 contenders.That stands to reason, of course. The candidate with the biggest bank account, Senator Bernie Sanders, declared his candidacy long before Buttigieg and already had a robust list of donors from his 2016 presidential run. The second richest, Senator Elizabeth Warren, transferred more than $10 million from her senate race, and former Maryland congressman John Delaney donated nearly $12 million of his own money to his campaign.And yet it's hard to ignore the glaring gap between Buttigieg's success on Twitter and the other, more tangible metrics, like money, that have traditionally framed the presidential horse race. The disparity raises a distinctly modern question about campaigning in the social media age: What value does a candidate's internet stardom have?Issie Lapowskycovers the intersection of tech, politics, and national affairs for WIRED.The biggest problem with answering that question is that there's limited data to work with. Twitter, after all, is just 12 years—or precisely three presidential cycles—old. We know that at least one president masterfully used it during his campaign to circumvent the press, drive the news cycle, and command more coverage than all of his competitors combined. But Donald Trump was already far more famous than anyone he was running against, making it a little unfair to compare his dominance on social media to that of unknown candidates like Buttigieg or, say, Andrew Yang, both of whom rose out of relative obscurity to become darlings of the internet.As The Upshot recently pointed out, there are ample stats indicating that Democrats on Twitter do not, in fact, represent the broader Democratic electorate. Off of social media, the Democratic Party is more moderate and less news-obsessed, while the Democratic Twitterati are more white, more college-educated, and more active in protests and political fund-raising.A cursory comparison between candidates' overall funding and their popularity online would seem to suggest that viral success on Twitter is a weak proxy for the health of a campaign overall. That is, with the exception of Senator Kamala Harris, who excels at both.By comparison, popularity on Facebook hews a bit more closely, though still not exactly, to the fund-raising stats. Facebook also has a much larger user base than Twitter.So, does this mean that Buttigieg and other candidates who take off on Twitter ought to be written off as creatures exclusively of the internet's chattering class? Not necessarily. All that online conversation may indicate who the most viable candidates are, as the first quarter fund-raising numbers show. With the exception of Yang (sorry, #YangGang), the top performers on Facebook and Twitter were also the top fund-raisers in the first quarter, which ended on March 31.