Politics

Bloomberg China rebuffed a US accusation that it had maintained activity at a nuclear weapons test site, with a foreign ministry spokesman saying the country was upholding its commitment to the international testing ban. In a summary of an annual report assessing global arms-control agreements, the US State Department said that China “maintained a high level of activity” at its ...

Bloomberg Security personnel in Nigeria have killed at least 18 people enforcing restrictions introduced to slow the spread of coronavirus, ThisDay reported, citing a report by the National Human Rights Commission. “Whereas Covid-19 has led to the death of about 11 patients to date, law-enforcement agents have extra-judicially executed 18 persons to enforce the regulations,” the Lagos-based newspaper said, citing ...

Bloomberg Brazil is negotiating with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to airlift diplomatic and military staff who are stranded after his government denied permission for a Brazilian Air Force cargo jet to land in Caracas, two people familiar with the matter said. The plane was scheduled to land in the Venezuelan capital on Friday to pick up diplomatic officials and their ...

Bloomberg Republicans are ratcheting up efforts to paint China as the villain in the coronavirus pandemic, seeking to shift blame as President Donald Trump faces increased criticism of his handling of a crisis that has shuttered the US economy. The Trump campaign sent out a fundraising email that accused China of “lying” about the outbreak and saying the country must ...

Bloomberg China criticised US President Donald Trump’s move to temporarily halt funding to the World Health Organization (WHO) and pledged to support the global health body. Trump said he ordered the move against the WHO because it took China’s claims about the coronavirus “at face value” and failed to share information about the pandemic as it spread. China has “serious ...

Bloomberg South Korea’s ruling party may have won an outright majority in parliament in elections held on Wednesday, in a show of confidence for President Moon Jae-in’s handling of the pandemic that gives him fresh momentum to reshape the economy. Moon’s Democratic Party of Korea, which had 120 seats before the vote, and its satellite party could win at least ...

Bloomberg Prime Minister Shinzo Abe warned Tokyo could be facing as many as 80,000 confirmed coronavirus cases in a month if no action is taken as he declared a state of emergency in the capital and its surrounding regions. In what Abe said was the country’s greatest economic crisis since the end of World War Two, he declared a one-month ...

Bloomberg Spain reported the biggest increase in the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in six days on Wednesday, while the daily death toll declined. There were more than 5,000 new infections in the 24 hours through Wednesday, taking the total to 177,633, according to Health Ministry data. The number of fatalities rose by 523 to 18,579, compared to Tuesday’s increase ...

Bloomberg North Korea fired multiple missiles from its eastern coast on Tuesday, in a show of military might ahead of parliamentary elections in South Korea. The projectiles were fired on Tuesday from sites near Munchon and neighbouring Wonsan on the east coast, the South Korean Ministry of National Defense said in a statement. North Korea launched short-range cruise missiles from ...

Bloomberg Austrians lined up outside hardware and gardening stores that reopened on Tuesday after the country became one of the first in Europe to ease lockdown measures. The soft and partial restart of the economy — also one of the first to clamp down on public life to halt the spread of the coronavirus — will be eyed by others ...