Taiwanese people don’t mind queueing. They’ll do it for a well-reviewed restaurant, promotional giveaways, or to take an Instagram photo at a popular tourist site. But at 3pm outside a Gongguan pharmacy in Taipei, there’s grumbling in the line. It’s an inconvenient time to leave work, but for now it’s the only way to get your hands on a rapid Covid-19 test. Twenty minutes after the sales window opens, a woman walks out to the waiting customers: they’ve sold out. People are frustrated, having waited for up to two hours,…
Day: May 8, 2022
Your Monday Briefing: Russia’s Pre-Holiday Push
Good morning. We’re covering Russia’s nationalist holiday, Hong Kong’s new leader and a Taliban decree targeting women. Lee, the top architect of the crackdown on Hong Kong’s antigovernment protests in 2019, plans to push through laws on treason, secession, sedition and subversion, and to root out critics in the civil service. He inherits a city that has been tamed and cowed: Sweeping national security laws imposed two years ago have quashed dissent, gutted the free press and put critics behind bars or sent them into exile. He will also face…
EU voices concerns as former Hong Kong security chief made new leader
The European Union has condemned the appointment of Hong Kong’s former security tsar, who oversaw the crackdown on Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement, as the Chinese territory’s new chief executive with 99% of the vote in a secret ballot on Sunday. Josep Borrell, the bloc’s foreign policy chief, said the selection process that led to John Lee being elected is yet “another step in the dismantling of the ‘one country, two systems’ principle”. The EU “calls on Chinese and Hong Kong authorities to abide by their national and international commitments, notably…
John Lee Wins Hong Kong’s Rubber-Stamp Election
HONG KONG — John Lee “will make Hong Kongers and international investors feel relaxed, at ease and full of confidence,” a pro-Beijing newspaper declared. He will help the city “start anew to achieve greater glories,” the state-run China Daily wrote, in one of a series of articles praising him. His rise to the top leadership position is “a concentrated embodiment of public opinion,” said China’s official arm in Hong Kong, though only 1,424 members of a government-vetted committee voted for him on Sunday, in an uncontested race controlled by Beijing.…