Year: 2022

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US Takes Ethiopia, Mali, Guinea Off Africa Duty-free Trade Program

WASHINGTON — The United States on Saturday cut Ethiopia, Mali and Guinea from access to a duty-free trade program, following through on President Joe Biden’s threat to do so over accusations of human rights violations and recent coups.

“The United States today terminated Ethiopia, Mali and Guinea from the AGOA trade preference program due to actions taken by each of their governments in violation of the AGOA Statute,” the U.S. Trade Representative’s office said in a statement.

Biden said in November that Ethiopia would be cut off from the duty-free trading regime provided under the U.S. African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) because of alleged human rights violations in the Tigray region, while Mali and Guinea were targeted because of recent coups.

The suspension of benefits threatens Ethiopia’s textile industry, which supplies global fashion brands, and the country’s nascent hopes of becoming a light manufacturing hub. It also piles more pressure on an economy reeling from the conflict, the coronavirus pandemic, and high inflation.

“The Biden-Harris administration is deeply concerned by the unconstitutional change in governments in both Guinea and Mali, and by the gross violations of internationally recognized human rights being perpetrated by the government of Ethiopia and other parties amid the widening conflict in northern Ethiopia,” the trade office statement said.

The AGOA trade legislation provides sub-Saharan African nations with duty-free access to the United States if they meet certain eligibility requirements, such as eliminating barriers to U.S. trade and investment and making progress toward political pluralism.

“Each country has clear benchmarks for a pathway toward reinstatement and the administration will work with their governments to achieve that objective,” it added.

The Washington embassies of the three African countries did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Ethiopia’s Trade Ministry said in November it was “extremely disappointed” by Washington’s announcement, saying the move would reverse economic gains and unfairly impact and harm women and children.

Source: Voice of America

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Israel to Offer 4th COVID Vaccine Shot to People Over 60, Medics

JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said on Sunday that Israel would offer a fourth dose of COVID-19 vaccine to people over 60 and to medical staff as it faces a surge in omicron variant infections.

Israel last week approved a fourth dose of the vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech, a second booster, for people who are immune-compromised and the elderly living in care homes.

“We now have a new layer of defense,” Bennett said in a televised news conference, adding that Israel’s top government medical official, whose approval is needed to expand the booster campaign, had signed off on the latest move.

“Israel will once again be pioneering the global vaccination effort,” Bennett said.

Earlier, the Health Ministry’s Director-General Nachman Ash said Israel could reach herd immunity as omicron infections mounted and Merck & Co’s molnupiravir anti-viral pill was approved for use in COVID-19 patients over 18.

Herd immunity is the point at which a population is protected from a virus, either through vaccination or by people having developed antibodies by contracting the disease.

The highly transmissible omicron variant has caused a wave of coronavirus cases, with worldwide infections hitting a record high, with an average of just over one million cases detected each day between Dec. 24 and 30, Reuters data showed.

Deaths, however, have not risen to the same degree, raising hopes that the new variant is less lethal, a view Bennett also echoed in describing the second booster as largely a bid to prevent serious illness among the elderly.

Daily cases in Israel are expected to reach record highs in the coming three weeks. Bennett said that up to 50,000 people might soon be infected each day, while eligibility for testing could be tightened to help relieve long lines at testing stations.

“The (infection) numbers will have to be very high in order to reach herd immunity,” Ash told 103 FM Radio earlier. “This is possible but we don’t want to reach it by means of infections, we want it to happen as a result of many people vaccinating.”

The head of the health ministry’s coronavirus task force, Salman Zarka, said herd immunity was far from guaranteed, because experience over the past two years showed that some COVID-19 patients who recovered were later reinfected.

Israel’s health ministry says around 60% of its 9.4 million population are fully vaccinated, almost all with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, which means they have either received three doses or have recently had their second.

But hundreds of thousands of those eligible for a third inoculation have so far not taken it.

Over the past 10 days, daily infections have more than quadrupled. Severe cases have also climbed, but at a far lower rate, rising from about 80 to around 100.

Source: Voice of America