CHINA ASKS AFGHANISTAN, NEPAL TO BE LIKE 'IRON BROTHER' PAKISTAN AT A

FOUR-COUNTRY MEET

China on Monday convened a rare quadrilateral dialogue with the Foreign

Ministers of Afghanistan, Nepal and Pakistan, pledging to strengthen

cooperation among the four nations in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic as

well as boosting their economic recoveries, including through regional

connectivity projects.

ChinaÂ’s State Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi outlined four

proposals at the meet, including for the four countries to cooperate under

ChinaÂ’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

He proposed extending the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) to

Afghanistan, as well as taking forward an economic corridor plan with Nepal,

called the Trans-Himalayan Multi-dimensional Connectivity Network.

The video-conference was chaired by Mr. Wang, and attended by AfghanistanÂ’s

acting Foreign Minister Mohammad Haneef Atmar, Nepal Foreign Minister

Pradeep Kumar Gyawali, Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, and

PakistanÂ’s Economic Affairs Minister Makhdum Khusro Bakhtiar, according to a

statement from ChinaÂ’s Foreign Ministry.

Mr. Wang told the conference the four countries were “connected by mountains

and rivers”, and offered four proposals to strengthen four-way ties.

The first, he said, was to share consensus in fighting the pandemic as “good

neighbours”. He hit out at countries that had “politicised” the pandemic and

“undermined cooperation for their own political needs”, saying they would be

“nailed to history’s pillar of shame forever”.

He also called on the countries to learn from China and PakistanÂ’s joint

prevention and control model, and suggested the four countries could look at

opening up “green channels” as soon as possible.

China has also offered its expertise in fighting COVID-19 and said vaccines

that are being developed would be shared with the three countries. Mr. Wang

called on the group to continue cooperating under the framework of the Belt

and Road Initiative.

He said China would take forward the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, the

Trans-Himalayan Multi-dimensional Connectivity Network project with Nepal,

and supported extending the corridor to Afghanistan.

The four countries pledged their support to the ongoing peace and

reconciliation process in Afghanistan, the statement from Beijing said.

REPUBLICANS INTRODUCE $1TN PANDEMIC RECOVERY PLAN

Republicans have proposed spending an additional $1tn (£776bn) to address

the economic damage caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

The plan includes $100bn for schools and issuing stimulus payments of up to

$1,200 to most Americans.

Under the plan, the payment would replace a $600 boost to unemployment

benefits during the pandemic.

The proposal sets the stage for negotiations with Democrats who have called

it "totally inadequate".

The US has already spent more than $2.4tn on virus relief measures, sending

billions of dollars in aid to businesses and individual households. But

economists have warned since the spring that more would be necessary.

Senator Mitch McConnell said Republicans wanted to see how existing

programmes were working, but had now produced a "tailored and targeted

draft" to address the economic fallout of the pandemic.

The proposal would reduce the $600 weekly unemployment benefit supplement to

$200 until states can set up a more targeted system that replaces 70% of a

person's previous wage.

The reduction reflects worries that the current benefits discourage workers

from returning to work, since an estimated two thirds of recipients are

getting more from unemployment than they did working.

Mr McConnell said Republicans "want to continue" the unemployment

supplement, which expires this week. "But we have to do it in a way that

does not slow down reopening."

TRUMP SEEKS POLITICAL SHOT IN THE ARM IN VACCINE PUSH

President Donald TrumpÂ’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic put his

political fate in grave jeopardy.

Now heÂ’s hoping to get credit for his administrationÂ’s aggressive push for a

vaccine — and crossing his fingers that one gets approved before Election

Day.

Mr. Trump and Vice President Mike Pence were both visiting vaccine

development sites on Monday, marking the beginning of the largest vaccine

research trial yet. Their trips to North Carolina and Florida, respectively,

come as the White House is grappling with its most prominent virus case

since the crisis begin and a nationwide spike in the virus.

“We’re doing well on vaccines, we’re doing well on therapeutics. And now I’m

heading to North Carolina to look exactly at that, Mr. Trump said as he

departed the White House.

Mr. TrumpÂ’s standing in the polls, trailing former Vice President Joe Biden

less than 100 days before the election, underscores the urgency to highlight

vaccines and therapeutics — which include the antiviral drug remdesivir and

convalescent plasma.

The economic toll of the pandemic has undone the job gains of TrumpÂ’s

presidency and his administration has faced bipartisan criticism for its

handling of efforts to test and contain the outbreak. Trump aides view the

hunt for the vaccine as something they can still get right.

Privately, many White House officials have pinned their reelection hopes on

the potential emergence of a vaccine for the coronavirus, believing it to be

the ultimate October surprise.

US WARPLANES SPOTTED CLOSE TO SHANGHAI

American warplanes have approached the Chinese mainland, with one reaching

within 76.5km of Shanghai, one of the closest passes in recent years, a

media report said on Monday amid deepening tensions between the two nations

following the tit-for-tat closure of consulates.

A United States P-8A (Poseidon) anti-submarine plane and an EP-3E

reconnaissance plane entered the Taiwan Strait, flying near the coast of

Zhejiang and Fujian on Sunday, according to the South China Sea Strategic

Situation Probing Initiative, a Peking University think tank.

It first tweeted about the operation on Sunday morning, later adding that

the reconnaissance plane was flying back after approaching Fujian and the

southern part of the Taiwan Strait.

The think-tank tweeted again at night, saying the US Navy P-8A was operating

near Shanghai, with the USS Rafael Peralta, a guided-missile destroyer,

following a similar route, asking “might be a joint operation?, Hong

Kong-based South China Morning Post reported.

According to a chart from the think tank, the P-8A came within 76.5km of

Shanghai, the closest any US planes have come to mainland China in recent

years, while the other plane came within 106km of Fujian's southern coast,

the report said.

It was the 12th day in a row that US military planes have approached the

mainland coast, it said.

NEW ZEALAND SUSPENDS EXTRADITION TREATY WITH HONG KONG

New Zealand has suspended its extradition treaty with Hong Kong and made a

number of other changes following China's decision to pass a national

security law for the territory, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters said

on Tuesday.

“New Zealand can no longer trust that Hong Kongs criminal justice system is

sufficiently independent from China,” Peters said in a statement. “If China

in future shows adherence to the one country, two systems framework then we

could reconsider this decision.”

Australia, Canada and the U.K. all suspended extradition treaties with Hong

Kong earlier this month. U.S. President Donald Trump has ended preferential

economic treatment for Hong Kong.

Peters said New Zealand will treat military and dual-use goods and

technology exports to Hong Kong in the same way as it treats such exports to

China as part of a review of its overall relationship with Hong Kong.

Travel advice has been updated to alert New Zealanders to the risks

presented by the new security law, he added.

China is New Zealands largest trading partner, with annual two-way trade

recently exceeding NZ$32 billion ($21 billion).

New Zealand's ties with China have frayed recently after the pacific nation

backed Taiwan's participation at the World Health Organization (WHO).

CORONAVIRUS | IMF APPROVES $4.3 BILLION TO HELP SOUTH AFRICA TO FIGHT

DISEASE

The International Monetary Fund on Monday said it had approved $4.3 billion

in aid to South Africa to help it fight the coronavirus pandemic.

“The IMF approved $4.3 billion in emergency financial assistance under the

Rapid Financing Instrument (RFI) to support the authorities' efforts in

addressing the challenging health situation and severe economic impact of

the COVID-19 shock,” the Washington-based crisis lender said in a statement.

South Africa is the continent's most-industrialised economy and has the

largest number COVID-19 cases, with more than 445,000 detected and 6,769

deaths as of Monday, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and

Prevention.

South African Finance Minister Tito Mboweni in June predicted the economy

would shrink 7.2 percent in 2020, its deepest slump in 90 years, and

compared the ballooning public debt to a “hippopotamus... eating our

children's inheritance.”

The South African treasury said the IMF money would go towards stabilising

the debt, creating jobs, helping frontline health workers fighting COVID-19

and reforming the economy to spur growth.

“Going forward, our fiscal measures will build on our policy strengths and

limit the existing economic vulnerabilities which have been exacerbated by

the COVID-19 pandemic,” Mboweni said in a statement.

CHINA COLLECTING DNA SAMPLES OF MILLIONS, EXPERTS SUSPECT DEVLOPING TOOL FOR

GENETIC SURVEILLANCE

Chinese authorities have been collecting DNA samples from across the country

to develop a massive genetic database, in a bid to create a new tool for

their emerging high-tech surveillance state.

In an opinion piece in the New York Times, Emile Dirks, a PhD student in

Political Science at the University of Toronto, and James Leibold, an expert

on ethnic issues in modern China, say dissent is a crime in China and police

operations are a key part of the state's apparatus of repression.

They estimated that the authorities' goal is to gather the DNA samples of 35

million to 70 million Chinese males.

"Matched against official family records, surveillance footage or witness

statements in police reports, these samples will become a powerful tool for

the Chinese authorities to track down a man or boy- or, failing that, a

relative of his- for whatever reason they deem fit," they wrote.

The Chinese government has denied the existence of any such program. The

authors said that they have continued to uncover online scattered evidence

revealing the program's enormous scale, including government reports and

official procurement orders for DNA kits and testing services.

In a report published by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute last

month, the authors said they had exposed the extent of the Chinese

government's program of genetic surveillance. "It no longer is limited to

Xinjiang, Tibet and other areas mostly populated by ethnic minorities the

government represses," they wrote.

"We have continued to find photographic evidence that the police are

collecting blood from children, pinpricking their fingers at school- a clear

violation of China's responsibilities under the United Nations Convention on

the Rights of the Child," they say.

"And we have found fresh proof, including official documents, showing that

DNA samples are also being gathered in major urban centers," they add.