Critic of President Xi arrested

China’s official toll nears 1,900 with 1,807 fresh cases as over 73,000 infected globally

Beijing, Feb. 18: The World Health Organisation has warned against a global over-reaction to the new coronavirus epidemic following panic-buying, event cancellations and concerns about cruise ship travel, as China’s official toll neared 1,900 on Tuesday. More than 73,000 people have now been infected in China and hundreds more abroad, although the WHO stressed the disease has infected a “tiny” proportion of people outside its epicentre and the mortality rate remains relatively low. Hubei province, the outbreak’s epicentre, reported 93 of the deaths and 1,807 of the new cases — of which

Beijing, Feb. 18: Police in China have arrested a prominent activist who had been a fugitive for weeks and criticised President Xi Jinping’s handling of the coronavirus epidemic while in hiding, a rights group said Tuesday.

Anti-corruption activist Xu Zhiyong was arrested on Saturday after being on the run since December, according to Amnesty International.

1,600 were in the provincial capital Wuhan.

The outbreak is threatening

China’s ruling Communist Party has severely curtailed civil liberties since Xi took power in 2012, rounding up rights lawyers, labour activists and even Marxist students. The death this month of a whistleblowing doctor who was reprimanded by police for raising the alarm about the deadly new virus before dying of it himself triggered rare

to dent global economy, with China paralysed by quarantine measures.

Xu Zhiyong

calls for political reform and freedom of speech. The “Chinese government’s battle against the coronavirus

Trade fairs, sports competitions and cultural events have been disrupted, has in no way diverted it from its ongoing general campaign to crush all dissenting voices,” said Patrick Poon, China researcher at Amnesty International, in an emailed statement.

Another source, who spoke to AFP on the condition of anonymity, said Xu had been arrested in the southern city of Guangzhou.

while have from

several banned China countries travellers and major