The head of the World Health Organization is warning that “no country can just pretend the pandemic is over.” Speaking to reporters during a virtual briefing from the agency’s headquarters in Geneva Monday, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said countries must be serious about “suppressing transmission and saving lives” if they are considering reopening their economies to everyday activities in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.   “The more control countries have over the virus, the more they can open up,” Dr. Tedros said.  “Opening up without having control is a recipe for disaster.” Dr. Tedros offered “four essential things” for all countries, cities and individuals to observe to bring the virus under control, including preventing large gatherings at stadiums and nightclubs, and implement a rigorous program of testing, contact tracing and isolation.  He said countries should take steps to protect vulnerable people, including the elderly, people with underlying conditions and essential workers, which he said will help save lives and alleviate the burden on their health systems. Dr. Tedros also urged individuals to wear face masks, observe social distancing and frequently wash their hands.   At the same time, the global health agency is also sounding a word of caution over the race to produce a safe and effective vaccine against COVID-19 in response to remarks by Dr. Stephen Hahn, the head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, that the agency would consider authorizing an emergency use of a vaccine before its late-stage human trials are complete.   Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, WHO’s chief scientist, said issuing such an authorization “has to be done with a great deal of seriousness and reflection. It’s not something that you do very lightly.” A health worker takes a nasal swab sample to test for COVID-19 at a state bus station in Ahmedabad, India, Aug. 29, 2020.Dr. Mike Ryan, the agency’s director of the Health Emergencies Program, said any country’s vaccine policy “must be guided by the highest possible ethical standard.” Coincidentally, a new survey from the World Economic Forum conducted by the firm Ipsos reveals that about 74% of all adults around the world said they would receive a coronavirus vaccine if one became available.  Of the 20,000 people across 27 countries surveyed, China was the country most enthusiastic about a vaccine, with 97% in support, while people in Russia were the least enthusiastic, with just 54% expressing a willingness to be vaccinated. Of respondents in the United States, which leads the world with more than 6 million confirmed COVID-19 cases and 183,585 deaths, about 67% said they would get the vaccine. Although the rate of new infections in several states has stabilized or even declined on average, several states in the U.S. midwest, including Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio and North and South Dakota, have reported an alarming number of new cases in recent days.As of Tuesday, the total number of novel coronavirus cases around the world stands at over 24.5 million, with nearly 850,000 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins University coronavirus tracking project.   
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After scientists determined that the coronavirus likely spread from an animal to a human, there came a flurry of statements from nations around Asia promising to ban the trafficking of animals. Now there is data to suggest that authorities, at least in Vietnam, are following through with enforcing the bans. Among the cases of trafficked wildlife that was seized in Vietnam, the percent that led to arrests reached 97% in the first half of this year, according to Education for Nature Vietnam, an environmental organization.  From 2015 to 2019, the number had remained steady at around 87%. Scientists believe the pandemic may have begun after human contact with an infected bat or pangolin in China.  Vietnam and other Southeast Asian nations act as a frequent conduit for illicit animal products that end up in China. In recent years police have seized pangolins, a scaly mammal that resembles armadillos, as well as endangered turtles, gibbons, and langurs in Vietnam. ‘More serious’“ENV’s prosecution analysis attests to the strength of the current penal code and the elevated efforts of Vietnam’s law enforcement and criminal justice courts to take down wildlife criminals,” Bui Thi Ha, the vice director of Education for Nature Vietnam said, referring to the penal code that was revised in 2018. “Since the new law has been in force, and especially this year in 2020, evidence shows that wildlife trafficking crimes are being taken more seriously in Vietnam.”A view over the Saigon river next to Ho Chi Minh city’s financial district. An expert in illegal wildlife trafficking says many of the people involved in the illicit trade in rhino horn are from this and other Vietnamese cities.Ever since the outbreak of the coronavirus, ending wildlife trafficking has become more urgent to stop a potential source of disease, as well as any harm to wildlife, environmentalists say. Facebook has responded by taking down hundreds of posts offering illegal animals and animal parts in Southeast Asia.  In Vietnam, in addition to the increase in the arrest rate, more criminals are going to prison. Among trafficking cases that went to court, the percent that resulted in a prison sentence reached 68% this year, according to data compiled by ENV. That contrasts with 2015 to 2019, when the percentage did not go beyond 49%. Prison Terms “This suggests the courts are taking a much more assertive stance to wipe out wildlife crime in 2020 than in previous years,” ENV said in an analysis of 552 cases in the past five years. It recommended that Vietnam, to fully end the trafficking, next turn its attention to the leaders of the trafficking rings, as well as the state officials who support them. The Southeast Asian nation can also focus enforcement on ports and airports, as well as on the use of money laundering, ENV said. Vietnam says it is taking a “whole of government” approach to enforcement. Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc published a directive in July prohibiting the import and sale of wildlife products. The premier’s order assigns a task to each office, from the defense ministry increasing border patrols, to the health ministry checking that pharmacies don’t sell drugs with illegal animal parts. The state prosecutor said in a statement it will enforce the directive by increasing investigations of transnational criminals, as well as impose “severe penalties on masterminds and leaders who abuse positions and powers to commit crimes.” 
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Czech Foreign Minister Tomáš Petříček Monday pushed back on his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi’s assault over the Czech Senate delegation’s visit to Taipei — signs, observers say, that suggest the tide is turning against China in Europe. Relations between Prague and Beijing may take another plunge. While visiting in Slovenia, Petříček tweeted that Wang’s comments toward the delegation were “over the edge,” shortly after the Chinese official warned of “a heavy price” for Czech Senate President Milos Vystrčil to pay, now that he has defied China’s objection to the visit to Taiwan. Beijing considers Taiwan a renegade province.     “Minister Wang’s statements are over the edge. Such strong words do not belong in the relations between the two sovereign countries,” Petříček tweeted, calling on China to pursue “factual, practical cooperation without emotions that do not belong in diplomacy.”   Exchanges of protests   The Czech foreign minister said he had instructed his deputy to summon China’s ambassador in Prague and expressed the Czech ministry’s “fundamental disagreement” with China’s repeated negative words toward the delegation. Although the Czech government does not support the delegation’s visit to Taiwan, Petříček added that he has demanded an explanation from China and anticipated the delegation’s trip would have a negative impact on its relations with China. The Czech government, led by Czech President Miloš Zeman and Prime Minister Andrej Babis, still favors closer ties to China.   But while meeting U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo in the Czech Republic in mid-August, Babis complained that the Chinese have not invested in the Czech Republic in the way he would imagine they should.  Pompeo’s warm reception was considered a warning sign to the once-promising relationship between Prague and Beijing.U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, front left, shakes hands with Czech Republic’s Foreign Minister Tomas Petricek, right, during a ceremony at the General Patton memorial in Pilsen near Prague, Czech Republic, Aug. 11, 2020.A heavy price to pay According to a statement released by China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Monday, Wang described Vystrčil’s trip to Taipei as “an unendurable provocation for which there will be retribution.”   He was quoted as saying “the Chinese government and Chinese people won’t take a laissez-faire attitude or sit idly by and will make him pay a heavy price for his short-sighted behavior and political opportunism,” the statement said. In return, China’s Vice Foreign Minister Qin Gang Monday also summoned the Czech Republic’s ambassador in Beijing to tell him that Vystrcil “violated China’s sovereignty by openly supporting Taiwan ‘independence’ and splittist forces.” Another outcry in Czech   Wang’s threats, part of China’s coercive diplomacy that backfired and failed to stop the Senate delegation’s visit to Taiwan, are expected to provoke another public outcry, said Karel Picha, a Czech who has lived in Taiwan for eight years and currently runs the only Czech cuisine restaurant in Taipei.   “I think most of the Czech people, they will respond negatively to these threats. They are probably not going to be polite,” Picha told VOA. He said that the wounds from 30 years of occupation by communist Soviet Union are too fresh to the Czech people, who hate it more than anything else when another communist country threatens them.   Doing the right thing Vystrčil also responded to Wang’s threat in Taipei by saying that “delegation members made the trip voluntarily, and we believe we are doing the right thing. In the short run, the outcome looks negative. But there will be long-term benefits.” He said the Czech people know how it feels to be controlled by a big brother who will never relent.   Two analysts who spoke to VOA said China’s repeated bashing of Vystrčil can only result in soured relations, while it is also likely for China to make good on its threat.   “China is too pushy. It turns even more aggressive when other countries or companies have been willing to go along (with its one-China policy),” DPP legislator Lo Chih-cheng told VOA. “But there comes a time when people say, ‘Enough is enough.’ “China has turned into such a bully because for a long time, Western countries have put up with it,” he added, referring to Wang’s threat to punish the Czech Republic. Worsening relations  Lo urges China to realize that any coercive move it plans to take will only backfire and worsen their relations.   Jean-Pierre Cabestan, a political science professor at Hong Kong Baptist University, agreed that China will make the Czech Republic pay. But it remains to be seen how damaging China’s sanctions will be, since the Czech economy isn’t heavily dependent upon China.   He said the Czechs are “courageous” to have made the trip to Taiwan regardless of the Chinese pressure.  “I think it kind of underscores a pushback from a number of countries in Europe which feel much more sympathy with Taiwan, a democratic country, as opposed to authoritarian China,” Cabestan told VOA by phone. China-Europe relations are on a rocky path, as more European countries have become vocal over the situation in Hong Kong, Xinjiang and the potential flash point in Taiwan or the South China Sea, according to Cabestan. China’s popularity in Europe has fallen in recent years and will take some time to improve, he said. Cabestan said Wang was touring Europe because the country’s “wolfish” diplomacy has done harm to its relations with many European countries, and Wang was there to minimize the damage. 
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A jailed Iranian lawyer and human rights defender has suffered a significant decline in her health on the 21st day of a hunger strike to protest Iran’s treatment of political prisoners, according to her husband.  Speaking to VOA Persian by phone from Tehran, Reza Khandan said he learned of his wife’s worsening health in a phone call that authorities allowed her to make from the city’s Evin prison on Monday. Nasrin Sotoudeh, who has been detained at Evin since June 2018, began her second hunger strike of this year on August 11. In a letter written by Sotoudeh and sent to VOA on the same day, she said she was demanding the release of political prisoners such as herself from overcrowded and unsanitary Iranian jails infested with the coronavirus.  “Unfortunately, she was not in a good condition and we are more concerned about her health now,” Khandan said, referring to himself and the couple’s two children. “She said a doctor told her that she needed a serum injection due to low blood pressure, but she was not given a blood pressure reading and she refused to get the injection.” Khandan said Evin authorities were limiting Sotoudeh’s ability to make phone calls from the women’s prison ward, allowing her to do so only once every two or three days rather than daily.  In a Monday Facebook post, Khandan said Iran’s judiciary has an “extraordinary enmity” toward prisoners in the Evin women’s ward, limiting their phone calls to 10 minutes in duration.پس از دو روز بی‌خبری، امروز تماس کوتاهی با نسرین داشتیم. در بیست و یکمین روز اعتصاب غذا، به دلیل افت شدید فشار خون به او…Posted by Reza Khandan on Monday, August 31, 2020“For eight months, authorities have suspended prisoners’ face-to-face meetings with visiting family members, especially children,” he wrote. “But they have not added a single minute to the phone call duration for the mothers among Evin’s female inmates.”  Khandan told VOA that he has been trying to follow up with Tehran judicial officials on Sotoudeh’s demands but they have refused to speak with him.  “Every time we go to the judiciary or prison office, there are soldiers at the front entrance. They don’t let us enter and just ask us to write a letter, but we never get a response,” he said.Jailed Rights Lawyer on Hunger Strike to Protest Keeping Iranian Dissidents in Coronavirus-Infested PrisonsNasrin Sotoudeh’s husband told VOA that she started her second hunger strike of the year Tuesday at Tehran’s Evin prison, where she has been detained since June 2018In her August 11 letter, Sotoudeh wrote: “The conditions of political prisoners [in Iran] have become so difficult that it is impossible to continue their detention under these oppressive conditions.”  Iran temporarily released tens of thousands of inmates from its prisons in March as the nation’s coronavirus outbreak intensified but refused to release dissidents sentenced to more than five years in prison for peaceful activities designated as national security offenses. Sotoudeh said many such dissidents were now eligible for conditional parole under recent reforms to Iranian law, but authorities were denying them their rights to seek judicial relief.  The prominent lawyer began her first hunger strike of this year on March 16 and continued it for several weeks as she made similar demands for Iranian authorities to free jailed dissidents.  Rights activists have said Sotoudeh is serving a sentence of more than 30 years for alleged national security offenses related to her work. Before her 2018 arrest, she defended Iranian women detained for removing their compulsory hijabs or headscarves in acts of public protest against Iran’s ruling clerics. Activists have said Sotoudeh must serve 12 years before being eligible for parole.  Sotoudeh’s latest hunger strike and worsening health have prompted an upsurge of support for her on social media. Thousands of Twitter users have tweeted the hashtag #FREENASRIN in recent days.Nineteen days have passed since my client Nasrin Sotoudeh went to a hunger strike. Her life is in danger, release her.#FREENASRINpic.twitter.com/i693Ahdc0r— Mohammad Moghimi (@DUSrp0Boo1KdJmr) August 29, 2020Among them is Sotoudeh’s lawyer, Mohammad Moghimi, who posted an August 29 tweet saying authorities should release her because her life is in danger.نمیدانم چندمین بار است که #نسرین_ستوده متوسل به اعتصاب غذا شده است. تاریخ نشان خواهد داد که جمهوری اسلامی چه بر سر زندانیان آورده است. #FREENASRIN— Shahin Milani (@shahinmilani81) August 29, 2020In another tweet on the same date, Iranian human rights activist Shahin Milani said he does not know how many times Sotoudeh has gone on hunger strike, but he believes “history will show” what Iran’s Islamist rulers have done to their political prisoners.We stand with & are deeply concerned about the well-being of Nasrin Sotoudeh. In 2010, Nasrin was sentenced to nearly 40 years in prison for her peaceful work as a human rights attorney. We call on the regime to release Nasrin & all political prisoners unjustly detained in #Iran. pic.twitter.com/XXzowZGnrF— U.S. State Dept | Office of Global Women’s Issues (@StateGWI) August 14, 2020The U.S. State Department tweeted its concern about Sotoudeh’s hunger strike on August 14 and called on Iran to release her and “all political prisoners unjustly detained” in the country.  Khandan was detained in September 2018 and charged with subversion for publicly campaigning for the release of his wife. He was released in December 2018 and sentenced the following month to six years in prison but has remained free pending an appeal.  This article originated in VOA’s Persian Service. Click here for the original Persian version of the story. 
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While the S&P boasted its steepest August percentage gain in more than three decades it ended Monday slightly lower and the Dow also lost ground as investors took a pause although the Nasdaq closed higher thanks to high-flying stocks including Apple Inc.The Federal Reserve’s commitment to tolerate inflation and keep interest rates low, positive developments in vaccines and treatments for COVID-19 and a rally in tech-focused stocks have helped the S&P 500 and Nasdaq hit record highs in August.But while some states continued to ease restrictions Monday, investors noted that across the United States, total coronavirus cases topped 6 million Sunday as many states in the Midwest reported increasing infections, according to a Reuters tally.”It’s a momentum trade. People are flooding to the technology companies they think will do well regardless of the pandemic,” said Chris Zaccarelli, chief investment officer, Independent Advisor Alliance.’Pandemic is here to stay'”The U.S. just passed 6 million cases, a further reminder that the pandemic is here to stay until we do something about it. Clearly it has an impact on all businesses, but some are more pandemic resistant,” he said.The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 223.82 points, or 0.78%, to close at 28,430.05, the S&P 500 lost 7.7 points, or 0.22%, to 3,500.31 and the Nasdaq Composite added 79.82 points, or 0.68%, to 11,775.46.Technology, then health care and utilities stocks were the biggest percentage gainers among the 11 major SP sectors while energy was the biggest percentage decliner.Investors show cautionWith the S&P reaching 3.8% above its pre-crisis record during the session, Mona Mahajan, senior U.S. investment strategist at Allianz Global Investors in New York, said investors were showing some caution by favoring technology as they looked warily at U.S. and overseas COVID-19 numbers.”After such a strong summer run, we’re reverting back to the old pandemic playbook. So we see tech outperforming,” she said. “Really that’s a defensive move as people think about stay-at-home more as we’re heading toward that fall season.”The Nasdaq, meanwhile, ended the day almost 20% above its pre-crisis record closing high. Its top two boosts for Monday were from Apple Inc and Tesla Inc after their stock splits.While the splits did not provide a fundamental reason to buy the stocks, Mahajan noted that the lower prices may be making the momentum stocks more attractive to some retail investors.For the month the S&P showed a gain of 7.01%, its biggest advance for August since 1986 when it rose 7.1% that month.Three main indexes on riseThe three main indexes showed their fifth straight monthly rise following March lows, even as economic data pointed to an uneven recovery from the steep downturn.For the S&P, this was its longest winning streak on a monthly basis since a six-month run from April to September 2018.And the benchmark’s 35.6% gain since April marked the strongest five-month run for the S&P since 1938, according to data from Bespoke Investment Group.
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