First Zika epidemic 'went unnoticed' in French Polynesia

Some scientists say that French authorities did not do enough to stop the spread of the Zika virus after a significant outbreak of the disease in French Polynesia in 2013-2014.

Dr. Didier Musso, who co-authored several papers about the dangers of Zika during the 2013-2014 outbreak, says that French authorities did not take findings by doctors in the French overseas territory seriously enough.

“In 2014 and 2013, the outbreak of Zika [in French Polynesia] went unnoticed in mainland France,” Musso told Le Point in February. “We managed on our own to isolate the virus, update the diagnostic tests, treat the patients and deal with the first severe medical complications, which no one expected.”

The current Zika epidemic in Latin America, where more than 1.5 million people have been infected, is thought to have been transmitted by international travelers from French Polynesia, a French overseas territory in the South Pacific made up of 118 islands, including Tahiti and Bora Bora.

Scientists say the virus sequences of the strains in Brazil and the Pacific are nearly identical.

No longer a benign disease

The Zika outbreak in French Polynesia was the most widespread up to that point. It affected up to 28,000 people, and more than 10 percent of the local population reported symptoms. Zika then spread from French Polynesia to New Caledonia (France), the Cook Islands (New Zealand) and Easter Island (Chile).

Musso, along with Sophie Ioos, Henri Pierre Mallet, Van-Mai Cao-Lormeau and other doctors at the Institut Louis Malardé and the Institut de Veille Sanitaire in Tahiti, were some of the first to report that Zika was not a “benign” disease as previously thought. In late 2013 they linked Zika to Guillain-Barré syndrome, which can cause paralysis and, in some cases, death.

They were also the first medical team to report a possible case of sexual transmission of the disease in early 2015.

‘Heads in the sand’

Musso says authorities ignored the seriousness of the situation in French Polynesia because it was so far away from mainland France. “When you live at the far end of the world, you get used to coping,” he told Le Point.

Musso also said that when the French High Council on Public Health did finally issue recommendations about Zika in 2015, he was not consulted.

“To be frank, French authorities never ask the opinion of people who have actually experienced these problems,” Musso added.

Others point out that the world health community, and not just the French government, shares the responsibility for ignoring Zika in the Pacific. In 2007, an outbreak of Zika in the Yap Islands, east of the Philippines, affected approximately 50 people. It was the first time Zika was detected outside of Africa.

“I think there was not enough attention given to either the Yap or the French Polynesian epidemics by any of us working in infectious diseases,” said Duane Gubler, who studies infectious diseases for Duke University. “We all had our heads in the sand.”

China, US 'make progress' on UN sanctions for N. Korea

The United States and China made progress Tuesday toward a draft UN sanctions resolution to punish North Korea for its recent nuclear tests and push it to the negotiating table.

After talks in Washington, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi and US Secretary of State John Kerry said the draft was still being “evaluated” by officials before being submitted to the UN Security Council.

But both powers vowed that they would not accept a nuclear-armed North Korea and expressed confidence the resolution would be strong enough to force Kim Jong-Un’s isolated regime to reconsider its strategy.

China wants its neighbour to halt its weapons program — most recently shown by the January 6 test of an atomic bomb Pyongyang claims was a new thermonuclear device — and return to six-party international talks.

But Beijing has been more cautious than Washington in its approach, fearing that too severe a response could trigger the collapse of the pariah regime and a political and humanitarian crisis on its border.

Nevertheless, Wang said his talks with Kerry had made progress in agreeing on a draft sanctions resolution to be presented to the full UN Security Council.

“We do not accept the DPRK’s nuclear missile program and we do not recognise the DPRK as a nuclear weapons state,” he said, using the abbreviation for North Korea’s official name.

“Important progress has been made in the consultations and we are looking at the possibility of reaching agreement on a draft resolution and passing it in the near future.”

Both men said the goal of the resolution is not to worsen the standoff with Kim Jong-un’s isolated regime, but to persuade it to resume talks on ending his nuclear program.

“We have made significant progress, it has been very constructive in the last days,” Kerry said.

“And there is no question that if the resolution is approved, it will go beyond anything that we have previously passed,” he added. “I believe that what we are considering is significant but, as I say, it is in the appropriate evaluative stages and we both hope that this can move forward very soon.”

• China
• military
• Taiwan

Asia-pacific

China missiles in Paracel Islands inflames South China Sea row

 
 
 
 
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© AFP archive | The the of Yongxing, also known as Woody island in the disputed Paracel chain.

Text by NEWS WIRES

Latest update : 2016-02-17

China has deployed an advanced surface-to-air missile system to one of the disputed islands it controls in the South China Sea, Taiwan and U.S. officials said, ratcheting up tensions even as U.S. President Barack Obama urged restraint in the region.

Taiwan defence ministry spokesman Major General David Lo told Reuters on Wednesday the missilebatteries had been set up on Woody Island. The island is part of the Paracels chain, under Chinese control for more than 40 years but also claimed by Taiwan and Vietnam.

A U.S. defence official also confirmed the “apparent deployment” of the missiles, first reported by Fox News.

China’s foreign minister said reports by “certain Western media” should focus more on China’s building of lighthouses to improve shipping safety in the region.

“As for the limited and necessary self-defence facilities that China has built on islands and reefs we have people stationed on, this is consistent with the right to self-protection that China is entitled to under international law so there should be no question about it,” Wang Yi told reporters in Beijing.

The Chinese defence ministry told Reuters in a statement that defence facilities on “relevant islands and reefs” had been in place for many years, adding that the latest reports about missile deployment were nothing but “hype”.

China claims most of the South China Sea, through which more than $5 trillion in global trade passes every year, and has been building runways and other infrastructure on artificial islands to bolster its title.

The United States has said it will continue conducting “freedom of navigation patrols” by ships and aircraft to assure unimpeded passage through the region, where Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines and Taiwan have rival claims.

Admiral Harry Harris, the commander of the U.S. Pacific Command, said the deployment of missiles to the Paracels would not be a surprise but would be a concern, and be contrary to China’s pledge not to militarize the region.

“We will conduct more, and more complex, freedom of navigation operations as time goes on in the South China Sea,” Harris told a briefing in Tokyo. “We have no intention of stopping.”

Rising tensions

News of the missile deployment came as Obama and leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations concluded a summit in California, where they discussed the need to ease tensions in the South China Sea but did not include specific mention of China’s assertive pursuit of its claims there.

China’s increasing military presence in the disputed sea could effectively lead to a Beijing-controlled air defence zone, analysts said.

“(The missile deployment) reinforces the view that China intends to exert growing control in these international waters, including potentially by declaring an Air Defence Identification Zone,” said Rory Medcalf, Head of the National Security College at the Australian National University.

Mira Rapp-Hooper, a South China Sea expert from the Center for a New American Security, said it was not the first time that China had sent such weapons to the Paracels.

“I do think surface-to-air missiles are a considerable development,” she said. “If they have been deployed they are probably China’s effort to signal a response to freedom-of navigation operations, but I don’t think it is a totally unprecedented deployment.”

A U.S. Navy destroyer sailed within 12 nautical miles of Triton Island in the Paracels last month, a move China condemned as provocative.

China last month said it would not seek militarization of its South China Sea islands and reefs, but that did not mean it would not set up defences.

“Woody Island belongs to China,” said Ni Lexiong, a naval expert at the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law.

“Deploying surface-to-air missiles on our territory is completely within the scope of our sovereign rights. We have sovereignty there, so we can choose whether to militarize it.”

Taiwan President-elect Tsai Ing-wen said tensions were now higher in the region.
“We urge all parties to work on the situation based on principles of peaceful solution and self-control,” Tsai told reporters.

Vietnam’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment. But in a rare move, the country’s prime minister on Monday pressed Obama for a greater U.S. role in preventing militarization and island-building in the South China Sea.

International show two batteries of eight surface-to-air missile launchers on Woody Island, as well as a radar system, Fox News said.

The missiles arrived over the past week and, according to a U.S. official, appeared to show the HQ-9 air defence system, which has a range of 125 miles (200 km) and would pose a threat to any airplanes flying close by, the report said.

In November, two U.S. B52 strategic bombers flew near artificial Chinese-built islands in the Spratly Islands.

Asked about the report, Bill Urban, a Pentagon spokesman, said: “While I cannot comment on matters related to intelligence, we do watch these matters very closely.”

(REUTERS)

Date created : 2016-02-17

• France
• French Polynesia
• François Hollande

Asia-pacific france 24

Hollande acknowledges 'consequences' of nuclear tests on Polynesia trip

 
 
 
 
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© Stéphane de Sakutin, AFP | François Hollande arrives on the Island of Wallis on Sunday, February 21.

Text by FRANCE 24 

Latest update : 2016-02-23

Compensation for the victims of three decades of French nuclear tests was a focus of President François Hollande's visit to French Polynesia on Monday, his first stop on a tour of the Pacific and Latin America.

Hollande's first move was to lay a wreath at the grave of Pouvanaa a Oopa, the anti-colonialist considered the founder of modern Tahitian political culture. But the focus of the visit was very much on the victims of 193 nuclear tests carried out by France between 1966 and 1996 on the atolls Mururoa and Fangataufa.

The French president acknowledged Monday in Papeete that the nuclear tests conducted in French Polynesia had affected the environment and the health of the islands.

"I recognise that the nuclear tests conducted between 1966 and 1996 in French Polynesia had an environmental impact, and caused health consequences," he said.

Hollande said he wanted to “turn the page” on nuclear tests, while hailing Polynesia’s crucial role in developing France’s nuclear capabilities.

Without its overseas territories, “France would not now have nuclear weapons and the power of dissuasion”, he said, using the French expression for nuclear deterrence. 

Hollande also announced a review of the application process for compensating the victims of the tests. Only around 20 people have received compensation for the spread of cancers allegedly linked to the tests from among some 1,000 plaintiffs.

France’s “nuclear debt” owed to Polynesia, dubbed the “Chirac Billion” (in Francs, now worth around €150 million), is an annual payment to the islands that has been reduced year after year, and which Polynesians want to be made permanent.

Hollande's arrival in the Wallis and Futuna islands marks the first time a French president has visited Wallis since Valéry Giscard d'Estaing in 1979 and the first-ever visit to Futuna.

The far-flung Pacific islands are among many French Overseas Departments and Territories scattered around the world, vestiges of France's colonial empire that today still boast an aggregate coastline, or Exclusive Economic Zones, second only to those of the United States.

Hollande was due to fly to Peru late on Monday, followed by Argentina and Uruguay later in the week - where he is set to promote scientific, cultural and university ties.

Although he is travelling with a delegation of business leaders from top French firms such as Carrefour and Thales, no major economic deals are expected to be signed on the trip.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)

Date created : 2016-02-22

US and China agree on North Korea sanctions resolution

 
 
 
 
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© Saul Loeb, AFP | US Secretary of State John Kerry shakes hands with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi during a press conference at the State Department in Washington, DC, February 23, 2016.

Text by NEWS WIRES

Latest update : 2016-02-25

The United States and China have reached agreement on a UN resolution that would impose tougher sanctions on North Korea as punishment for its latest nuclear test and rocket launch, UN diplomats said Wednesday.

One Security Council diplomat called the draft resolution "significantly substantive" and expressed hope that it will be adopted in the coming days. Another said the draft had been circulated on Wednesday to the three other permanent council members - Russia, Britain and France.

The Security Council is scheduled to hold closed consultations Thursday afternoon on compliance with the North Korean sanctions resolutions, and the US-China draft could be discussed then with the 10 non-permanent council members.

Both diplomats spoke on condition of anonymity because all discussions on the proposed resolution have been private.

Their comments follow a flurry of activity in Washington, including meetings between China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi and US Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday, and with National Security AdviserSusan Rice on Wednesday afternoon.

National Security Council spokesman Ned Price said Rice and Wang agreed "on the importance of a strong and united international response to North Korea's provocations, including through a UN Security Council resolution that goes beyond previous resolutions."

"They agreed that they will not accept North Korea as a nuclear weapons state," Price said.

Earlier on Wednesday, Kerry told a Congressional hearing: "We're on the brink of achieving a strong United Nations Security Council resolution."

North Korea started off the new year with what it claims was its first hydrogen bomb test on Jan. 6 and followed that up with the launch of a satellite on a rocket on Feb. 7 that was condemned by much of the world as a test of banned missile technology.

Over the past 10 years, North Korea has conducted four nuclear tests and launched six long-range missiles – all in violation of Security Council resolutions.

South Korea's UN Ambassador Oh Joon has urged the Security Council to adopt "extraordinary" measures to make clear to the North "that it will no longer tolerate its nuclear weapons development."

The US, its Western allies and Japan, also pressed for new sanctions that go beyond the North's nuclear and missile programs. But China, Pyongyang's neighbor and supporter on the council, is reluctant to impose measures that could threaten the stability of North Korea and cause the country'seconomy to collapse.

Wang said Tuesday that a new UN resolution alone cannot resolve the North Korean nuclear issue and that dialogue was needed.

He said China was urging a "parallel track" in which there were both talks on denuclearization – the top priority of the United States – and replacing the armistice that ended the 1950-53 Korean War with a formal peace treaty, a key demand of Pyongyang.

While the US and China were discussing a new UN resolution, the United States took tougher steps of its own against North Korea, tightening sanctions and announcing it will hold formal talks with South Korea on deploying a missile defense system that China fears could be used against it as well North Korea.

South Korea and Japan have also announced new measures against Pyongyang.

(AP)
 

Date created : 2016-02-25