Aurelia Butler

SHANGHAI (Reuters) -China’s capital Beijing kicked off a fresh round of mass testing for COVID-19 on Saturday and shut more bus routes and metro stations, as it seeks to avert the fate of Shanghai, where millions of residents have been locked down for over a month. The draconian movement curbs on Shanghai, an economic and financial hub, have caused frustration among its 25 million residents and triggered rare protests over issues such as access to food and medical care, loss of income and crowded as well as unsanitary conditions at central quarantine centres. While some people have been let out for light and air in recent weeks, residents for the most part say they still cannot leave their housing compounds. Beijing is striving to avoid an explosion in cases like that of Shanghai, China’s largest city, by conducting rounds of mass testing, banning restaurant dining-in services in multiple districts and shutting more than 60 subway stations, about 15% of the network. Shanghai cases have fallen for eight days and the city says its outbreak is under effective control, allowing it to shut some of the makeshift hospitals it raced to build as case numbers ballooned. But authorities have also indicated that a full easing is still far off, warning against complacency to stick to China’s zero-COVID goal. Underscoring that expectation, Shanghai officials on Saturday postponed the city’s “gaokao” university entrance exam by a month to early July. The last time that happened was in 2020, during the initial coronavirus outbreak. The city’s top Communist Party official, Li Qiang, a close ally of President Xi Jinping, told a Friday government meeting that it was “necessary to issue military orders at all levels, and take more resolute and powerful actions to overcome the great war and great tests,” according to an official statement.The number of infections in Shanghai outside areas under lockdown – a gauge of whether the city can further reopen – fell to 18 on Friday from 23 the day before. Total new cases declined slightly to around 4,000, data released on Saturday showed.Shanghai is also building thousands of permanent PCR testing stations, in line with other cities, as China looks to make regular testing a feature of everyday life.CAR SALES TUMBLE China’s COVID policy is increasingly out of step with much of the rest of the world, where governments have eased restrictions, or dropped them altogether, in a bid to live with COVID even as infections spread.But Chinese leaders this week reiterated their resolve to battle the virus, threatening action against critics of their strict measures. Beyond Shanghai, dozens of cities have imposed full or partial lockdowns, relaxing and tightening curbs at various times. The measures are exacting a mounting economic toll that has fuelled complaints from global industry groups and businesses at home. China’s auto association on Friday estimated that sales plunged 48% in April from a year earlier, as zero-COVID policies shut factories, limited traffic to showrooms and put the brakes on spending in the world’s largest car market.In Shanghai, although the government has provided guidelines on how companies can restart operations, a survey of Japanese firms in late April found most still struggling to restart due to the onerous requirements.Since Friday, organizers have cancelled, postponed or relocated a slate of major international sporting events set to take place in China in the second half of the year, including the Asian Games set for Hangzhou in September and Diamond League athletics meets originally scheduled for Shanghai on July 30 and Shenzhen on Aug. 6.The moves, which followed a government meeting on Thursday chaired by Xi that called for doubling down on the zero-COVID approach, defy a global sporting calendar that has largely returned to normal. On Saturday, Beijing kicked off the first of three new rounds of daily testing in five districts including the biggest, Chaoyang, home to embassies and large offices. Beijing officials said that while they had figured out the main COVID transmission chains, they still believed there were hidden infection sources in society and that the city could not lower its guard. The capital reported 45 new symptomatic COVID-19 cases for Friday, down from 55 a day earlier. It recorded eight asymptomatic cases, which China counts separately, versus 17 a day earlier. More

COLOMBO (Reuters) -Streets in Sri Lanka’s commercial capital Colombo were calm on Saturday after the president declared a state of emergency following escalating anti-government protests.Details of the latest emergency regulations were not yet made public, but previous emergency laws have given greater powers to the president to deploy the military, detain people without charge and break up protests. [L2N2WY1RR]”The President has taken this decision due to the public emergency situation in Sri Lanka and in the interests of public security, the protection of public order and the maintenance of supplies and services essential to the life of the community,” a statement released by his office said. There were no initial reports of late-night disturbances following the emergency declaration shortly before midnight, while traffic proceeded as normal in Galle Face, a central area of Colombo that has been a major site of protests and marches. At the main protest site in the city outside the Presidential Secretariat, around 100 people gathered to listen to anti-government speeches despite the state of emergency, while passing cars sounded their horns in support. “This emergency will not stop the protests,” said Waheeda Lafir, a teacher delivering food supplies to the village of tents that has stood at the site for almost a month. “The government has brought this on themselves, they should resign.”The announcement – the second time President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has declared emergency law in little over a month – drew condemnation from Sri Lanka’s opposition and several western countries. “Concerned by another state of emergency,” United States ambassador to Sri Lanka Julie Chung said in a tweet.”The voices of peaceful citizens need to be heard.”On Friday police fired tear gas at dozens of demonstrators outside parliament, in the latest in more than a month of sporadically violent anti-government protests amid shortages of imported food, fuel and medicines.Aid agency UNICEF said it was concerned that children had been among those affected by the tear gas.”Every adult must act with a sense of responsibility and avoid exposing children to any form of violence, including during protests,” it said in a statement. Hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, rising oil prices and government tax cuts, Sri Lanka has been left with as little as $50 million in useable foreign reserves, the finance minister said this week.The country has approached the International Monetary Fund for a bailout.The IMF will meet with Sri Lankan officials in a virtual meeting beginning on Monday, a statement from Masahiro Nozaki, the IMF’s mission chief for Sri Lanka, said on Saturday. More

HAMILTON, Ohio (Reuters) – President Joe Biden boasted on Friday of a U.S. manufacturing surge and introduced a new small business program in the key swing state of Ohio during his sixth visit there as presidentBiden was buoyed by strong numbers earlier in the day that showed the U.S. added 428,000 jobs in April https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-job-growth-solid-april-unemployment-rate-steady-36-2022-05-06, more than expected and the 12th straight month of job gains in excess of 400,000. Manufacturing has seen the largest 15-month job gain in 15 years, he noted.”These manufacturing jobs matter because they fuel our economic growth. They fuel exports. And, as we’ve seen, they can fuel innovation,” Biden, a Democrat, said after touring United Performance Metals, a metal manufacturer near Cincinnati. The president announced an initiative to encourage large companies to adopt an emerging technology known as additive manufacturing.Driven by 3D printing, the technology allows complex shapes to be built up in layers from particles of plastics or metal. It is viewed by the administration as a sort of innovation that will enable U.S. manufacturers to flourish and create jobs.The initiative, dubbed AM Forward, is a voluntary program. Companies sign a public commitment to increase use of the technology and also rely on small- to medium-sized U.S.-based supply companies. GE Aviation, Siemens Energy, Raytheon Technologies (NYSE:RTX) and Lockheed Martin (NYSE:LMT) are the initial participants, the official said. Biden used the visit to call on Congress to pass the Bipartisan Innovation Act, which aims to boost manufacturing in the United States, particularly the production of semiconductor chips.No longer a ‘Rust Belt,’ American manufacturing areas are home to smaller companies building chips and other critical components that can help keep prices down, Biden said, which could boost U.S. competitiveness with China.While Americans are worried about rising prices, more manufacturing facilities across the United States will help, Biden said.”It matters a great deal, because the pandemic and the economic crisis that we inherited and Putin’s war in Ukraine have all shown the vulnerability when we become too reliant on things made overseas,” he said.Biden gave a shout out to labor unions that organize workers in many of the companies involved in the new initiative, calling them “the single best workers in the world.”Biden is facing headwinds as he tries to help his fellow Democrats stave off a Republican takeover of Congress in the Nov. 8 midterm elections. Inflation is at a 40-year high and gasoline prices are soaring, weighing down Biden’s job approval ratings, and Republicans frequently attack Biden’s handling of the economy.Former President Donald Trump took Ohio in 2016 and 2020 in part because of his appeal to Rust Belt voters tired of seeing jobs disappear.The trip was Biden’s sixth to Ohio since taking office in January 2021.In recent days, he has made more overt political remarks as he girds for the five months of political campaigning. On Wednesday he sharply criticized Trump’s devoted followers, referring to them by the MAGA acronym for Trump’s Make America Great Again slogan. In primaries this week Trump-backed Republican J.D. Vance won the nomination for a U.S. Senate seat while Democratic incumbent Representative Shontel Brown handily defeated progressive candidate Nina Turner in the U.S. congressional district which includes Cleveland. (This story corrects paragraph 7 to add Raytheon (NYSE:RTN)) More