Virus policy critics’ social media accounts suspended in China
BEIJING — China has suspended or closed the social media accounts of more than 1,000 critics of the government’s policies on the COVID-19 outbreak, as the country moves to roll back harsh anti-virus restrictions.
The popular Sina Weibo social media platform said it had addressed 12,854 violations including attacks on experts, scholars and medical workers and issued temporary or permanent bans on 1,120 accounts.
The ruling Communist Party had largely relied on the medical community to justify its tough lockdowns, quarantine measures and mass testing, almost all of which it abruptly abandoned last month, leading to a surge in new cases that have stretched medical resources to their limits. The party allows no direct criticism and imposes strict limits on free speech.
The company “will continue to increase the investigation and cleanup of all kinds of illegal content, and create a harmonious and friendly community environment for the majority of users,” Sina Weibo said in a statement dated Thursday.
Criticism has largely focused on heavy-handed enforcement of regulations, including open-ended travel restrictions that saw people confined to their homes for weeks, sometimes sealed inside without adequate food or medical care.
Anger was also vented over the requirement that anyone who potentially tested positive or had been in contact with such a person be confined for observation in a field hospital, where overcrowding, poor food and hygiene were commonly cited.
The social and economic costs eventually prompted rare street protests in Beijing and other cities, possibly influencing the party’s decision to swiftly ease the strictest measures.
Ant Group founder: E-commerce billionaire Jack Ma will give up control of Ant Group, the leading Chinese financial technology provider he founded.
In a statement posted Friday, Ant Group said that after an ownership restructuring, “no shareholder, alone or with other parties” will have “control over Ant Group.” The company is an affiliate of e-commerce giant Alibaba, which Ma also founded.
The move follows other efforts over the years by the Chinese government to rein in Ma and the country’s tech sector more broadly. Two years ago, the once high-profile Ma largely disappeared from view for 2½ months after criticizing China’s regulators.
The government at the same time also forced Ant Group to call off a highly anticipated IPO that would have raised over $3 billion, just days before it was to launch.
Yet Ma’s surrender of control comes after other signs the government has been easing up on Chinese online firms. Late last year Beijing signaled at an economic work conference that it would support technology firms to boost economic growth and create more jobs.
And last month, the government said it would allow Ant Group to raise $1.5 billion in capital for its consumer finance unit.
A top U.N. envoy met with the Talibanled Afghan government’s higher education minister Saturday to discuss the ban
Afghan women:
on women attending universities.
Markus Potzel is the first international official to meet with him since the ban was introduced last month.
Taliban authorities on Dec. 20 ordered public and private universities to close for women immediately until further notice. It triggered widespread international condemnation.
Higher Education Minister Nida Mohammad Nadim has defended the ban, saying it is necessary to prevent the mixing of genders in universities and because he believes some subjects violate Islamic principles.
That ban was followed days later by a ban on Afghan women working for national and international nongovernmental groups, another decision that caused global condemnation and the suspension of work by major aid agencies.
The U.N. mission in Afghanistan said that Potzel called for the urgent lifting of these bans in his meeting
with Nadim, saying the country is entering a new period of crisis. “Taliban bans on female education and work for aid agencies will harm all Afghans,” the mission said.
$1B lottery jackpot: Another Mega Millions drawing, another night without a big winner.
No one hit all six numbers to win the estimated $940 million jackpot, pushing the lottery prize to an estimated $1.1 billion ahead of the next drawing Tuesday night.
The prize is now the third-largest in U.S. history.
The numbers drawn late Friday were: 3, 20, 46, 59, 63 and gold Mega Ball 13.
Mexico subway collision: Two subway trains collided between two stations Saturday in Mexico City, killing at least one person and injuring dozens, authorities said.
Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum said one woman was killed and 57 people injured, who were taken to seven
hospitals. Four people were trapped in the wreckage, including the driver of one of the trains, who was reported in serious condition.
Dozens of police and soldiers swarmed into nearby subway stations, while ambulances and rescue teams arrived to treat the injured.
In lamenting the accident, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on his Twitter account that the federal government was supporting the city officials dealing with accident.
In May 2021, an elevated section of the subway system collapsed, causing 26 deaths and injuring nearly 100 people.
An investigation blamed the structural failure on deficiencies in the construction process.
Satellite falling: A 38-yearold retired NASA satellite is about to fall from the sky.
NASA said Friday the chance of wreckage falling on anybody is “very low.” Most of the 5,400pound
satellite will burn up upon reentry, according to NASA. But some pieces are expected to survive.
The space agency put the odds of injury from falling debris at about 1 in 9,400.
The science satellite is expected to come down Sunday night, give or take 17 hours, according to the Defense Department.
The California-based Aerospace Corp., however, is targeting Monday morning, give or take 13 hours, along a track passing over Africa, Asia, the Middle East and the westernmost areas of North and South America.
The Earth Radiation Budget Satellite, known as ERBS, was launched in 1984 aboard the space shuttle Challenger. Although its expected working lifetime was two years, the satellite kept making ozone and other atmospheric measurements until its retirement in 2005.
The satellite studied how Earth absorbed and radiated energy from the sun.