New Events
Covid-19 Dashboard
… now: over 7.5 (+0.9m) million cases, 421k deaths
… 6/5: over 6.6 (+0.8m) million cases, 391k deaths
… 5/29: over 5.8 million cases, 360k deaths
Trackers: Johns Hopkins, NYT, CovidTracking.com
Travel re-opening
Indonesia resumes domestic air travel.
… Greater Surabaya ends partial lockdown.
Bangladesh resumes international flights.
Slovakia allows travel from 16 countries.
Saudi Arabia considers limiting the hajj amid Covid-19 fears.
I am looking for new, good, regular news & analysis sources for North, East and West Africa.
N. Africa/Egypt-Sudan (266m)
Libya: Haftar says he’s ready for talks to end war
… saw the collapse this week of his 14-month campaign …
… Egypt offers new Libya plan …
… Haftar got closer to Assad, Syrians fighting in Libya …
… Turkey ‘secures a reprieve’ from Haftar …
Bottom line: a ‘frozen conflict’ for the near future.
Morocco easing lockdown measures.
Tunisia may have beaten Covid-19.
… ‘and in the process strengthened its democracy’ …
E. Africa/Horn (520m)
China’s business elite are sending masks to East Africa
… ‘a chance to repair China’s image, gain credit with Pres. Xi’
Talks resumed about the Blue Nile dam.
W. Africa/Nigeria-Sahel (457m)
Nigeria: VOM report alleges 620 Christians killed in 2020
… around 12,000 killed over past 5 years? …
… Boko Haram + Fulani violence …
Nigerian group condemns rampant rape cases in the north.
Conflict-hit families in the North under lockdown, need aid.
W. Asia / Saudi-Iran (303m)
Turks stream out for first lockdown-free weekend in 2 months.
Kuwait to resume daily prayers at some mosques.
Saudi considers limiting hajj pilgrims amid Covid-19 fears.
… even apparently considering cancelling the hajj season …
… and, wants to find a Yemen exit strategy.
Qatar begins phased re-opening.
Lebanon currency plunges, protests surge.
Syria’s Idlib war-wrecked province, readies for Covid-19.
Yemen’s qat markets full despite coronavirus threat.
South-central Asia (2.1b)
India
Is hurtling into a coronavirus crisis: now 4th in the world.
… sees record 10,000 new cases in a single day …
… hospitals are turning patients away.
Mask wearing worshippers in temples as India reopens
… in spite of rise in coronavirus cases …
“Worse than a war zone”: Covid-19 batters Mumbai.
… apps to help people find hospitals with empty beds …
… public hospitals in Delhi also full, turning people away …
… morgues over full …
… “attempting to balance health and hunger” …
… Mumbai has surpassed Wuhan’s peak …
Pakistan
‘Rolling emergency’ of locusts decimating Africa, Asia, Mideast.
… China could deploy 100,000 ducks to Pakistan to eat locusts.
… 1 duck = 200 locusts/day?! …
Pakistan hospitals running out of beds.
… WHO urges Pak. to reinstitute ‘intermittent’ lockdown …
Bangladesh
Covid cases spike 4-fold in a month.
How Covid ‘red zones’ work.
… food for 2 weeks, no mosques, text alerts
Central Asia Kazakhstan returns several towns to lockdown after Covid spike.
East Asia (1.6b)
China
A ‘Golden Goose’ loses its luster: why willing to risk HK.
China’s spy agencies are coming to Hong Kong.
HK Christians respond as Beijing’s grip tightens.
‘The disappeared’: China’s global kidnapping campaign.
US says it will allow China two passenger flights per week.
Korea
North rules out more nuclear concessions.
… ‘will pursue weapons development’
Southeast Asia (700m)
Indonesia holds firm on hajj cancellation.
… has seen hundreds of child deaths related to Covid.
… concern about a post-pandemic baby boom to poor families.
Malaysia bars citizens from the hajj.
Singapore’s Changi Airport sets up new transit holding area.
… preparing for the resumption of transit passenger services …
Europe/North America (1,125m)
New Zealand is Covid-19 free.
New York eases restrictions, 400k to return to work.
New Data
ChinaSource Quarterly: Doing mission with Chinese characteristics.
Infographic: The State of Global Peace, 2020.
… global peacefulness has declined for the 9th time in 12 years …
New Learnings
The number of cases and deaths from Covid-19 is certainly an undercount. Some governments are taking steps to hide data.
… Brazil stopped releasing death tolls, wiped data from official site.
… South Asia: official Covid-19 numbers disguise undercounting.
… Most USA states don’t count probable positives.
Futuristics/Technology
Zoom shut down accounts of US-activists due to China:
… admits to shutting down accounts at request of China
… SCMP: ‘US-based Chinese dissidents‘
… Then, reactivated those accounts.
… ‘Ties under scrutiny after it muzzles human rights group‘
… Bill Bishop wants to know how they knew the activists were there
Zoom plans ability to block people based on location
… ‘to comply with requests from local authorities’
My alternatives: Google Meet, Blue Jeans.
… Google Meet has a new, fine-tuned presentations layout …
… has debuted new background noise cancellation feature …
Google Maps launches features for traveling during Covid-19
… only on trips affected by Covid-19 restrictions …
Delta going out of its way to make travel safe.
… what you can do when you have half as many people traveling? …
China’s oil demand has nearly returned to normal.
… second largest oil consumer, will affect oil prices & travel prices …
IBM pulls out of all facial recognition.
… fearing racial profiling, mass surveillance …
… Amazon: moratorium on police use of facial recognition tech
… Microsoft won’t sell face-recognition tech to US police
… but lots of other vendors sell the tech
Several articles related to protest security can also serve as inventories of security “how-tos” that can be helpful to field workers:
… How to hide faces & scrub metadata from photos
… and another catalog of similar tools to scrub faces
… Anonymous Camera is a new tool that anonymizes photos
Surveillance: “Person re-identification” despite clothing changes.
Wired on how to get the most out of Signal and encrypted chat.
Inside Iran’s massive drone army.
… the most combat drones in the Middle East …