In 1962, thousands of Indians of Chinese descent were sent to prison camps during a brief war with Beijing. Recent clashes on the India-China border have revived Chinese Indians’ fears of persecution.
The head and co-founder of a company that produces one of the most widely used Covid jabs, Ugur Sahin, has commented on an interview in which he revealed that he and his family had not been vaccinated.
A video of Sahin, the German immunology and oncology professor who helped develop the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, telling a reporter he was not immunized against the coronavirus recently went viral on social media. In an interview with the German DW TV channel, conducted in English, the reporter queries whether the CEO will “allow personal questions,” before asking, “I have heard that you yourself have not taken the vaccine yet. Why not?” Sahin responds that he is “legally not allowed to take the vaccine at the moment,” due to there being a priority list. “It is more important for us that our co-workers and partners get vaccinated,” he says, adding, “What is also important, we were even not allowed to participate in clinical trials.”
In an apparent response to the video, Sahin posted a rebuttal on the professional networking site LinkedIn this week. His friends had been urging him to share a photograph of himself being inoculated against the deadly virus, he wrote, but he had thus far “refused to do so,” explaining that he had been of the view that his communications should not be about himself, but “should contribute to scientific transparency and provide data, facts, and insights.”
However, he said, since the aforementioned interview, he and his wife had each received two doses and a boosterof the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. The LinkedIn post was accompanied by a photo of Sahin being jabbed against Covid-19 “in early 2021,” he said, to address the “false rumors” circulating on social media that he had refused to be vaccinated.
Urging others to follow suit,and citing the experience of a friend “fighting for his life” against severe Covid, Sahin added that his company was currently developing another vaccine “to address the Omicron variant, irrespective of whether it will be needed or not.”
The video of the interview, which is still doing the rounds on Twitter, has garnered so much attention that the BioNTech press office has also been obliged to comment on it. The statements its then-unvaccinated CEO made in it were accurate at the time, it said, but were now “completely outdated,” a spokesperson told Reuters. The interview was recorded a year ago, when only older people and those in high-risk groups in Germany were legally eligible to receive a Covid-19 shot.
Farmers in south-west of Haiti are cultivating a future for the country as they continue to work their land despite the challenges caused by the 14 August earthquake. The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) has been supporting their development over many years as FAO’s Jérémie-based staff member Mykerlange Balmir explains.
British Columbia experienced major disasters this year that scientists say show the intensifying effects of climate change. Many of those affected by fires and floods took shelter at Camp Hope.
The defense ministries of France and Greece have both confirmed that a competing offer from the US will have no impact on an already “signed” and “final” multibillion deal to purchase three French Belharra frigates.
France’s armed forces ministry stated on Saturday that a defense contract with Athens was already “initialled a few days ago,” before the US State Department announced the approval of the potential sale of American frigates.
Since we have been in discussion with the Greeks, the American offer is no longer on the table… We also signed the contract with the Greeks.
Greece’s Defense Ministry also confirmed that since the deal with Paris was “final,” since it had been negotiated at the “highest level possible” and “personally announced” by the Greek PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis. The contracts are expected to be ratified by the Parliament “soon.”
The US Defence Security Cooperation Agency said on Friday it had approved the sale for $6.9 billion of four Lockheed Martin combat frigates, and a separate $2.5 billion program to upgrade Greece’s MEKO class frigates.
The announcement triggered some concerns over the Athens-Paris agreement, especially after a long-existing submarine building “deal of the century” between France and Australia was abruptly tanked by a bombshell AUKUS pact in September. Outraged Paris accused Washington and Canberra of “stab in the back” without any prior warning, while just two weeks later Macron took the stage with the Greek PM to personally announce the sale of at least three French warships to Athens for around $3.5 billion, saying it was time to “stop being naive” while touting the deal as a sign of “Europe’s strategic autonomy and sovereignty.”
This time around, according to the French military, the US “had warned us that this announcement was going to come out” and that Americans allegedly had “no inclination to go further” with an actual sale of the frigates.
