Authorities around the world are imposing or considering curbs on travellers from China as COVID-19 cases in the country surge following its relaxation of “zero-COVID” rules.

They cite a lack of information from China on variants and are concerned about a wave of infections. China has rejected criticism of its COVID data and said it expects future mutations to be potentially more transmissible but less severe.

Below is a list of regulations for travellers from China.

UNITED STATES

The United States will impose mandatory COVID-19 tests on travellers from China beginning on Jan. 5. All air passengers aged two and older will require a negative result from a test no more than two days before departure from China, Hong Kong or Macau. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also said U.S. citizens should also reconsider travel to China, Hong Kong and Macau.

The UK will require a pre-departure negative COVID-19 test from passengers from China as of Jan. 5, the Department of Health said on Friday.

France will require travellers from China to provide a negative COVID test result less than 48 hours before departure, the health and transport ministries said on Friday.

From Jan. 1, France will also carry out random PCR COVID tests upon arrival on some travellers coming from China, a government official told reporters.

The country has mandated a COVID-19 negative test report for travellers arriving from China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea and Thailand, the health minister said. Passengers from those countries will be quarantined if they show symptoms or test positive.

Japan will require a negative COVID-19 test upon arrival for travellers from mainland China. Those who test positive will be required to quarantine for seven days. New border measures for China went into effect at midnight on Dec. 30. The government will also limit requests from airlines to increase flights to China.

Italy has ordered COVID-19 antigen swabs and virus sequencing for all travellers from China. Milan’s main airport, Malpensa, had already started testing passengers arriving from Beijing and Shanghai. “The measure is essential to ensure surveillance and detection of possible variants of the virus in order to protect the Italian population,” Health Minister Orazio Schillaci said.

Spain will require a negative COVID-19 test or a full course of vaccination against the disease upon arrival for travellers from China, the country’s Health Minister Carolina Darias said.

Malaysia will screen all inbound travellers for fever and test wastewater from aircraft arriving from China for COVID-19, Minister Zaliha Mustafa said in a statement.

Taiwan’s Central Epidemic Command Centre said all passengers on direct flights from China, as well as by boat at two offshore islands, will have to take PCR tests upon arrival, starting on Jan. 1.

South Korea will require travellers from China to provide negative COVID test results before departure, South Korea’s News1 news agency reported on Friday.

AUSTRALIA

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Australia was monitoring the situation in respect of China “as we continue to monitor the impact of COVID here in Australia as well as around the world.”

The Southeast Asian country is being “very cautious” and could impose measures such as testing requirements on visitors from China, but not an outright ban, Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista said.

Peruvian President Dina Boluarte on Sunday urged lawmakers to reconsider a proposal to advance elections to later this year, promising she would propose a constitutional reform to move general elections to October if lawmakers fail to do so.

Lawmakers were set to continue debate on Monday after rejecting a motion last week that would open the door to holding elections this year.

Friday’s vote drew consternation from the president, who is increasingly under pressure as nationwide protests call for her resignation.

In an address to the nation, Boluarte also said if Congress does not reconsider the proposal to move elections, she would present a bill to task the next elected Congress with overseeing a “total reform” of Peru’s 1993 constitution.

The reformed constitution would be submitted to a referendum, Boluarte said.

Public anger grew after a protester died in Lima on Saturday night, the first victim in the country’s capital since protests began in December.

Peru’s attorney general’s office said on Sunday it had opened a preliminary investigation into the protester’s death as a possible homicide after an autopsy showed the victim died from a head injury caused by a “hard blunt element.”

The total death toll from the unrest sits at 58, according to Peru’s ombudsman, which on Sunday issued a statement calling for authorities to end the violence.

“The most morally repulsive way to act is to let people die when you have in your hands the political power to bring peace and change today’s tragic direction,” the statement said.

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Russian missile strikes killed three people in the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson while fighting raged in the eastern Donetsk region where Russia again shelled the key town of Vuhledar, Ukrainian officials said.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Ukraine was facing a difficult situation in Donetsk and needed faster weapons supplies and new types of weaponry, just days after allies agreed to provide Kyiv with heavy battle tanks.

“The situation is very tough. Bakhmut, Vuhledar and other sectors in Donetsk region – there are constant Russian attacks,” Zelenskiy said in a video address late on Sunday.

“Russia wants the war to drag on and exhaust our forces. So we have to make time our weapon. We have to speed up events, speed up supplies and open up new weapons options for Ukraine.”

Three people were killed and six injured on Sunday by Russian strikes on Kherson that damaged a hospital and a school, the regional administration said.

Russian troops had occupied Kherson shortly after Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, and held the city until Ukrainian forces recaptured it in November. Since its liberation, the city has regularly been shelled from Russian positions across the Dnipro river.

Later on Sunday a missile struck an apartment building in the northeastern town of Kharkiv, killing an elderly woman, regional Governor Oleh Synehubov said.

A Reuters picture from the scene showed fire engulfing part of a residential building in the country’s second most-populous city.

Russia on Saturday accused the Ukrainian military of deliberately striking a hospital in a Russian-held area of eastern Ukraine, killing 14 people. There was no response to the allegations from Ukraine.

Ukraine’s General Staff said in a statement late on Sunday that Russian forces had shelled Bakhmut, the focus of Moscow’s offensive in the eastern Donetsk region, as well as Vuhledar to the southwest where fighting has intensified in recent days.

Ukrainian military analyst and colonel, Mykola Salamakha, told Ukrainian Radio NV that Russian troops were mounting waves of attacks on Vuhledar.

“From this location we control practically the entire rail system used by the Russians for logistics … The town is on an upland and an extremely strong defensive hub has been created there,” he said.

“This is a repetition of the situation in Bakhmut – one wave of Russian troops after another crushed by the Ukrainian armed forces.”

Reuters was unable to verify the battlefield reports.

Sunday’s civilian casualties came three days after at least 11 people were killed in missile strikes which were seen in Kyiv as the Kremlin’s response to pledges from Ukraine’s allies to supply battle tanks.

After weeks of wrangling, Germany and the United States last week said they would send Ukraine dozens of tanks to help push back Russian forces, opening the way for other countries to follow suit.

While a total of 321 heavy tanks had been promised to Ukraine by several countries, according to Kyiv’s ambassador to France, they could take months to appear on the battlefield.

Ukraine is keen to speed up the delivery of heavy weapons as both sides in the war are expected to launch spring offensives in the coming weeks.

Talks were also under way between Kyiv and its allies about Ukraine’s requests for long-range missiles, a top aide to Zelenskiy said on Saturday. Ukraine has also asked for U.S. F16 fighter jets.

Zelenskiy said he had sent a letter to French President Emmanuel Macron as part of his campaign to keep Russian athletes out of the Paris Olympic Games.

He said that allowing Russia to compete at the 2024 Paris Games would be tantamount to showing that “terror is somehow acceptable”.

“Attempts by the International Olympic Committee to bring Russian athletes back into the Olympic Games are attempts to tell the whole world that terror is somehow acceptable,” Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address.

Referring to the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin when the Nazis were in power, he said: “The Olympic movement and terrorist states definitely should not cross paths.”

Russia, he said, must not be allowed to “use (the Games) or any other sport event as propaganda for its aggression or its state chauvinism”.

The International Olympic Committee said last week that it welcomed a proposal from the Olympic Council of Asia for Russian and Belarusian athletes to be given the chance to compete in Asia.

Russia says it launched its “special military operation” in Ukraine to fend off a hostile West and “denazify” the country. Ukraine and its allies say the invasion was an unprovoked act of aggression.

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I wrote an article last week where I listed in detail everyone and everything the GOP thinks is out to get them. I must now add one more item to the never-ending list. And that item is — DirecTV.

That’s right. The GOP House is puffy with indignation and is reportedly planning to hold hearings on why DirecTV is out to get them. This is real. And it all has to do with the dumping of the pro-Trump channel “Newsmax.”

The horrible station was dropped this past week by DirecTV, to the glee of many democrats and the rage of many republicans. The reason for the cancellation of NewsMax came down to money. Doesn’t it always? Newsmax had reportedly asked for licensing fees, and DirecTV said no way. And then they dropped them.

But republicans who relentlessly cry out “freedom” at any given opportunity now appear to be furious at the fact that companies can decide which channels they want to carry. NewsMax accused DirecTV of trying to censor conservative voices. And quicker than one could say paranoia, republicans were on it.

That might be why some republican house members actually sent DirecTV a letter threatening to investigate them! Is the GOP paranoia ever done? The answer to that question is no, it isn’t.

Republican House oversight chair James Comer has promised an investigation into this. The fact that DirecTV replaced NewsMax with another conservative station apparently does not matter to them.

Can we call them the “out to get us” party? When one stops and thinks about it, the GOP really does not DO anything other than accuse everyone and everything it comes into contact with of being out to get them. It would be a heck of a lot more honest a name than the grand old party.

The post These right wing loons are even further gone than we thought appeared first on Palmer Report.

Peruvian President Dina Boluarte on Sunday evening promised to propose a constitutional reform to move general elections to October 2023 if lawmakers do not reconsider a proposal to advance the elections to later this year.

Lawmakers on Friday rejected a proposal that would open the door to holding elections this year.

If Congress does not reconsider the proposal on Monday, Boluarte said she would also present a bill that would require the next elected Congress to oversee a “total reform” of Peru’s 1993 constitution.

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A Mercedes-Benz AMG EQS sedan. The German automotive company said its Level 3 autonomous driving system will be available for EQS sedans in the US by the second half of 2023.

John Locher/AP

• Mercedes-Benz announced it will introduce its Level 3 autonomous driving system in Nevada.
• Level 3 requires less driver input, allowing a user to, for example, play videogames while driving.
• As of December, Tesla’s self-driving feature remains at Level 2, according to US News. 

Mercedes-Benz plans to introduce a higher level of autonomous driving for its US customers by the second half of 2023, according to an announcement made Thursday.

The German automotive company’s “Drive Pilot” system is equipped with Level 3 autonomous driving features based on the standards set by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE).

The feature will be available as an option for the 2024 Mercedes-Benz S-Class and EQs Sedan models, the company said. A US price point was not disclosed. In Germany, the system costs $5,300 on the S-Class and about $8,000 on the EQS model, according to Auto News Europe.

Unlike a Level 2 system, which requires constant supervision from the driver as the vehicle steers and accelerates, Level 3 automation gives drivers more leeway. The SAE defines Level 3 as a system where the user is not driving when “automated driving features are engaged — even if you are seated in ‘the driver’s seat.'”

A driver, for example, can move their head and eyes away from the road to talk with a passenger or watch a movie, according to The Drive, an automotive news outlet that tested the Drive Pilot system.

During the demo, the test driver played Tetris and browsed the internet as the Mercedes EQS handled all aspects of driving. 

However, a Level 3 system still requires a driver to be able to regain control of the vehicle at a moment’s notice. This means that a driver cannot fall asleep or obstruct their face while the vehicle is moving. When The Drive’s test pilot put a camera in front of his face, Mercedes’s autonomous driving system disengaged.

The system is also restricted to certain road conditions, and Mercedes-Benz said that its Drive Pilot feature will only allow the vehicle to go up to 40 mph.

Still, by setting a 2023 date to bring a Level 3 autonomous system to Nevada customers, Mercedes-Benz appears to be on track to surpass some of its major electric vehicle competitors in the US, including Tesla, Ford, and GM.

Since as far back as 2015, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has promised to deliver what Tesla calls “Full Self-Driving” features to its vehicles. But its rollout has either been delayed or faced criticism from lawmakers, safety experts, and customers.

Some critics have also accused the company of misleading its customers by calling the company’s autonomous driving system “Full Self-Driving.”

In November,  Musk announced the “Full Self-Driving Beta” for North American customers, however, the system is still rated at Level 2, US News reported, which means the vehicle requires full driver attention.

The feature almost immediately attracted negative media scrutiny with reports of a Tesla Model S in “Full Self-Driving” mode causing an eight-car pileup in the San Francisco Bay Area in November.

According to The Intercept, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has investigated 35 crashes since 2016, in which Tesla’s “Full Self-Driving” or “Autopilot” system was in use. The accidents have killed 19 people, the outlet reported.

Mercedez-Benz said in its announcement that its technology complies with Nevada state regulations, suggesting that the autonomous system will only be available for customers based in Nevada. Mercedes-Benz added that it has also filed certification documents in California. 

Spokespersons for Mercedes-Benz, Tesla, and SAE did not respond to a request for comment.

Pakistani College students stranded in Ukraine seeks enable from Govt to evacuate them properly amid Russia Ukraine war. Argus Information is …

supply

The post Russia Ukraine War: Pakistani Students stranded in Ukraine seeks help from Govt to evacuate them appeared first on Ukraine Intelligence.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg urged South Korea on Monday to increase military support to Ukraine, citing other countries that have changed their policy of not providing weapons to countries in conflict after Russia’s invasion.

Stoltenberg is in Seoul, the first stop on a trip that will include Japan and is aimed at strengthening ties with U.S. allies in the face of the war in Ukraine and rising competition with China.

In meetings with senior South Korean officials, Stoltenberg argued that events in Europe and North America are interconnected with other regions, and that the alliance wants to help manage global threats by increasing partnerships in Asia.

Speaking at the Chey Institute for Advanced Studies in Seoul, he thanked South Korea for its non-lethal aid to Ukraine, but urged it to do more, adding there is an “urgent need” for ammunition. Russia calls the invasion a “special operation”.

South Korea has signed major deals providing hundreds of tanks, aircraft and other weapons to NATO member Poland since the war began, but South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol has said that his country’s law against providing arms to countries in conflicts makes providing weapons to Ukraine difficult.

Stoltenberg noted that countries such as Germany, Sweden, and Norway had similar policies but have changed them.

“If we don’t want autocracy and tyranny to win, then (the Ukrainians) need weapons, that’s the reality,” he said.

In a statement carried by state media on Monday, North Korea called Stoltenberg’s visit a “prelude to confrontation and war as it brings the dark clouds of a ‘new Cold War’ to the Asia-Pacific region.”

Last year South Korea opened its first diplomatic mission to NATO, vowing to deepen cooperation on non-proliferation, cyber defence, counter-terrorism, disaster response and other security areas.

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While the media is largely moving on from the non-existent classified documents scandal the GOP has been fomenting, they’re going to their other favorite subject – that the Republicans are going to do a whole bunch of evil things and the Democrats will either a) let them do it or b) be powerless to stop it.

While the GOP is planning to do a whole bunch of evil things, and the Democrats will inevitably face a lot of heat depending on how much they’re able to do about it, what we need to do is stop getting sucked into this narrative that the GOP will just get away with it all – since that does nothing more than help the GOP by giving them leverage they don’t have.

The debt ceiling – which won’t become an issue until June, if at all, is one of these concerns, as the GOP has threatened to use it as an excuse to implement ridiculous tax cuts for their donors in exchange for cutting social security. The problem for Republicans is that it’s rapidly becoming unpopular and their House leadership is eyeing an extension on the debt limit through Sept 30 to avoid the risk of a default.

It’s clear that even with a majority the GOP can’t make good on their threats if the pushback is significant- and this agreement should be all the incentive we need to keep standing up to their incompetence and corruption.

The post Looks like House Republicans are already preparing to cave on the debt ceiling appeared first on Palmer Report.

RowVaughn Wells, mother of Tyre Nichols, who died after being beaten by Memphis police officers, is comforted at a news conference with civil rights Attorney Ben Crump in Memphis, Tenn., Friday, Jan. 27, 2023.

AP Photo/Gerald Herbert

• The parents of Tyre Nichols are invited to next week’s presidential State of the Union address.
• Rep. Steven Horsford of Nevada, chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, extended the invitation.
• Horsford said Sunday on MSNBC he aims to push for reforms to the criminal legal system.

The parents of Tyre Nichols, who died earlier this month after being beaten by Memphis police officers, have been invited to next week’s State of the Union address.

Rep. Steven Horsford of Nevada, the chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, extended the invitation to Nichols’ grieving parents. In an appearance PoliticsNation on MSNBC, Horsford said he spoke with the man’s family “to first extend our condolences to them, to let them know that we stand with them, to ask them what they want from us in this moment.”

Horsford went on to say in both the MSNBC appearance and a statement released through the Caucus that he was calling for President Joe Biden to meet with the family and would be pursuing national reforms to the criminal legal system.

“Everyone should agree people should be safe, safe in our communities and law enforcement has an obligation to do its job,” Horsford told host Rev. Al Sharpton in his PoliticsNation interview.

Ben Crump, the civil rights attorney representing RowVaughn and Rodney Wells, mother and stepfather of Nichols, did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment. Representatives for Rep. Horsford did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment. 

The address will take place on Tuesday, February 7. Reuters reported the war in Ukraine is expected to be a prevalent topic in the annual speech, but Nichols’ death has reignited national protests and political conversation about police accountability and reform that may also be highlighted.

“Like so many, I was outraged and deeply pained to see the horrific video of the beating that resulted in Tyre Nichols’ death,” Biden said in a statement on Friday evening, calling for “real and lasting change” to use of force policies and describing Nichols’ death as “yet another painful reminder of the profound fear and trauma, the pain, and the exhaustion that Black and Brown Americans experience every single day.”