U.S. vice president to speak with Mexican president on tree-planting proposal
by Reuters

Saturday, 24 April 2021 

Central Americans work in the "Sowing Life" government program, in Tapachula

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The program aims to create 1.2 million jobs and plant 3 billion additional trees through expansion into southeastern Mexico and Central America

MEXICO CITY, April 24 (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris will speak with Mexico's president on May 7 about his proposal to expand a tree-planting program to Central America as way to reduce poverty and migration, Mexico's foreign minister said on Saturday.

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has suggested the U.S. government offer temporary work visas and eventually citizenship to those who take part in the tree-planting program, called "Sembrando Vida," or "Sowing Life."

Harris' senior advisor and chief spokesperson, Symone Sanders, confirmed next month's virtual meeting between the U.S. vice president and Obrador.

"This meeting will deepen the partnership between our countries to achieve the common goals of prosperity, good governance, and addressing the root causes of migration," Sanders said in a statement.

The program aims to create 1.2 million jobs and plant 3 billion additional trees through expansion into southeastern Mexico and Central America, Lopez Obrador said at a White House virtual climate summit last week.

He also said U.S. President Joe Biden "could finance" the program's extension to Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.

Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said in a Tweet that he and Economy Minister Tatiana Clouthier would participate in the May 7 meeting, which is also slated to touch on cooperation against the COVID-19 pandemic.

Biden tapped Harris last month to lead diplomatic efforts to cut immigration from Mexico and Central America.

(Reporting by Daina Beth Solomon, additional reporting by Lucia Mutikani in Washington; editing by Diane Craft and Marguerita Choy)

SPACE RACE 2.0

China reveals moon station plan with Russia, openness on Space Day

Open-mindedness for intl cooperation emphasized

By 

Deng Xiaoci

 in Nanjing  

APRIL 25/2021 

Photo shows China's first lunar sample at the opening ceremony on the Space Day of China on April 24, 2021. Photo: Deng Xiaoci/GT

In the latest show of China’s consistent open-mindedness in the space sector, China National Space Administration and its Russian counterpart issued a joint declaration on cooperation in the creation of the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), with the two sides emphasizing the facility is open to all international partners interested in cooperation, the CNSA disclosed to the Global Times on Saturday, which marked the Space Day of China 2021.

CNSA deputy head Wu Yanhua said in a statement the agency provided to the Global Times on Saturday that China and Russia will work with other international partners in the cooperation of building the ILRS.

The ILRS will be another major contribution that China and Russia shall make to the promotion of long-term and sustainable development of UN outer space activities, Wu said.

Such a joint declaration also showcased the determination and confidence of China-Russia cooperation in the field of lunar and deeper-space exploration, the CNSA told the Global Times.

The ILRS is a complex set of experimental research facilities created on the surface and/or in the orbit of the moon with possible involvement with other countries and international organizations and partners, said the joint declaration. 

It is designed to carry out multidisciplinary and multipurpose research activities, including the exploration and use of the moon, lunar observations, fundamental research experiments and technology verification with the possibility of long-term unmanned operation with the prospect of ensuring human presence, per the document.

China and Russia clarified in the joint declaration that ILRS is open to all international partners interested in cooperation in the planning, justification, design, development, implementation and operation of the ILRS, strengthening research exchanges and promoting peaceful exploration and use of outer space for the interests of all humankind. 

To support the ambitious plan of building a moon base, Mou Yu, an official with China’s Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology’s general designing department, disclosed in his speech at a session of the China Space Conference, which started on Saturday as part of the Space Day of China activities, that China is developing a 10-meter-diameter heavy-lift carrier rocket.

Such a rocket would be capable of launching a payload of no less than 50 tons to the lunar orbit, which will strongly support the moon base building, as well as even bigger scale lunar exploration activities, Mou told the Global Times.

Besides the future ILRS, China will also host international experiments on its upcoming space station, as it might be the only one of its kind in orbit after the International Space Station’s retirement. 

As the centerpiece of an ambitious 2021 in space, China is slated to carry out consecutive missions for the construction of a space station which is to become fully operational by around 2022, exactly three decades after China approved the manned space project in 1992. 

The Long March-5B Y2 carrier rocket and Tianhe core cabinet capsule for China’s space station were rolled out to the launch tower in the Wenchang Space Launch Center, South China’s Hainan Province on Friday, with pre-launch checkups underway, according to the China Manned Space Engineering Office (CMSEO).

China’s space station is set to operate for 10 years, but can be extended to 15 years under proper repair and maintenance, developers have told the Global Times. 

Following the core module’s launch, the cargo spaceship Tianzhou-2 is expected to be sent to space in May if system evaluation goes smoothly. The Shenzhou-12 crewed spacecraft is scheduled for launch in June, sending astronauts to orbit for about three months, during which the regenerative life support system and maintenance will be tested.

China has scheduled 11 launches for space station building in the next two years, including four manned missions and four cargo missions.

China and the United Nations Committee on Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) announced in June 2019 that the first batch of nine international scientific experiments of 17 countries and 23 research bodies would be included in China’s space station.

The first batch of selected space science experiments to fly to China’s space station include Gamma-ray burst polarimetry jointly proposed by Switzerland, Poland, Germany and China and a spectroscopic investigation of nebular gas by India and Russia.

Also on Saturday during the opening ceremony of the Space Day of China 2021, CNSA deputy head Wu Yanhua officially unveiled the name of China’s Mars rover to be Zhurong, the same as that of a fire god in Chinese mythology, drawing a conclusion to the months-long global naming campaign.

Hopefully, by giving such a name to the rover, it will ignite the spark of China's interplanetary exploration and guide humanity deep into the vast and still unknown outer space, according to the CNSA.

CNSA explained that even separately, the two Chinese characters of the name each carries a wonderful message.

“Zhu,” or “blessing” in Chinese, embodies humanity’s best wishes in the pursuit of dreams in the vast universe, while “rong,” meaning “converge,” represents China’s stance and vision of peaceful use of space, enhancing humanity’s wellbeing, and joining forces with partners from home and abroad, now and in the future, so as to make great contributions to the harmonious development of human society.

China’s romanticism in naming space missions Infographic: Xu Zihe/GT

Day of celebration

Having achieved numerous milestones in the space sector in 2020 and ahead of the upcoming landing of its first Mars probe as well as the launch missions for China’s space station construction, China kick-started Space Day annual celebrations in Nanjing, capital East China’s Jiangsu Province.

Themed "Voyaging into space, pursuing dreams," this year’s Space Day of China provides a window not only for the Chinese public, but also the world to get a better understanding of China’s aerospace progress.

The Global Times found Saturday that envoys and representatives from a dozen countries and international organizations, such as Russia, the US, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Australia and the Asia-Pacific Space Cooperation Organization (APSCO), participated in the opening ceremony for the Space Day of China 2021.

“I am proud of participating in such a Chinese event,” a representative from Bangladesh told the Global Times, as he browsed what he called a “marvelous exhibition” featuring lunar samples retrieved by the Chang’e-5 robotic lunar probe in 2020.

Aside from moon samples, the parachute and return capsule of the robotic lunar probe were also displayed in the exhibition, which, according to the China National Space Administration (CNSA), is the first display of its kind to be held outside Beijing.

The United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs Director Simonetta Di Pippo, Russia’s space agency Roscosmos Director Dmitry Rogozin, and officials with Pakistan’s space agency Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission also sent congratulations to the Space Day of China on Saturday via video link.

“I am really impressed with all the achievements and progress China is making in space. It is extraordinary and incredible. It is really amazing for everyone here to see how China has progressed throughout the years in space,” Aisha Jagirani, director general with the Department of External Relations and Legal Affairs under the APSCO, told the Global Times on Saturday.

Aisha said what impressed her the most at the event was “the history of development of Chinese rockets; how China in a short span of time has developed space technology, explored the moon and Mars also… That is really amazing and encouraging.”

China designated April 24 as Space Day in 2016 to mark the anniversary of the country's first satellite launch, Dongfanghong-1 in 1970.

Photo shows China's first lunar sample at the opening ceremony on the Space Day of China on April 24, 2021. Photo: Deng Xiaoci/GT

Fruitful 2020 on display
China has achieved multiple milestones in space in the past year.

The Long March-5B carrier rocket, a shorter version of Long March-5, the strongest member of the Long March launch vehicle family, made its successful maiden flight in May 2020, successfully sending a new-generation manned spaceship into space.

The Chang’e-5 lunar probe concluded an epic Earth-Moon round trip, and managed to carry some 2 kilograms of lunar samples back to Earth on December 17, 2020, making China the third country in the world to achieve such a feat, and the first in more than four decades.

The success of the Chang’e-5 lunar mission also involved several breakthroughs in China’s space technology, including the first-ever sample collection on the lunar surface, a complex takeoff from the rough lunar terrain, and most challenging of all, the rendezvous and docking in lunar orbit, which are all believed to build a solid foundation for future manned lunar missions. 

Also, in 2020, China launched the country’s first independent Mars probe mission, Tianwen-1, and the craft reached Mars’ orbit in February this year. China’s Tianwen-1 will deploy a lander and a rover bundled together for landing at Utopia Planitia in mid or late May.

China in August 2020 launched the full global service of the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System – or BDS – China’s largest space-based system and one of four global navigation networks, alongside the US' GPS, Russia's GLONASS and the European Union's Galileo.

The world hijacked by Washington’s selfishness: Global Times editorial
By Global Times
Published: Apr 25, 2021


Illustration: Chen Xia/GTNow the whole world is talking about how selfish the US is regarding COVID-19 vaccines. The most developed country in the world that talks about human rights the most refuses to export vaccines to other countries that are severely hit by the pandemic. Washington is determined to let its citizens get vaccinated first before it shares vaccines with others.

More than a quarter of Americans are fully vaccinated against the coronavirus now, while about 40 percent of people in the US have received at least one shot. Not everyone wants to get vaccinated, so it is predicted that there will be a surplus of vaccines in the country after mid-May. At the same time, many developing countries are suffering vaccine shortage. In Namibia, an African country with a population of 2.5 million, only 128 people have received two doses of a vaccine until now.

The ugly "America First" doctrine on vaccines was fully revealed by the coronavirus outbreak in India. A humanitarian disaster has developed in the country. However, India's call for Washington to ease curbs on the export of vaccine raw materials was rejected. US State Department spokesperson Ned Price said Tuesday that the priority of the country is "ensuring the distribution of a safe and effective vaccine to millions of Americans, to all Americans who are able to take advantage of it." Washington also turned down calls from India, South Africa and others to waive patents on COVID-19 vaccines.

To date, the US has made almost no actual contribution to the global fight against the pandemic. As the most developed country in the world, it did a poor job in the epidemic fight, failing to contribute any positive experiences to other countries. The country imported a huge amount of supplies such as masks and ventilators that were in short supply in the world last year. Washington undermined global cooperation against the virus by attacking the World Health Organization for quite a long time. The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine is Washington's most important product to fight against the pandemic. But until now it has been used primarily to protect Americans and a limited number of US allies.

"America First" is a very crude principle. It has become a practical guide to bipartisan actions in the US. The former administration of Donald Trump had both said and acted according to this principle. Although the Biden administration hasn't talked about it, it is in fact also acting in line with the principle.

Transmitted to the political center through each American constituency, the US' selfishness has formed a kind of "rightfulness" under American democracy. Meanwhile, Washington is keen to promote its idea of "human rights" to the world. It acts like it has compassion for all humanity, and surprisingly, it does not feel awkward about it at all.

The world cannot allow the US to abuse the right to define international justice. Washington has refused to share vaccines with developing countries proportionally. The world should jointly condemn it, making Washington bend its head, like a rat scurrying across the street with everybody chasing it. However, till today, the US is still arrogantly claiming it is a global moral leader. It even accuses China and Russia's efforts to share vaccines of being "vaccine diplomacy." The US has totally called white black and black white.

The US has misled and hijacked various countries' national security concept. This is where its arrogance comes from. The world is in an era of peaceful development, but US elites have successfully fanned many countries' anxieties over geosecurity, as the US is the one who has the most abundant resources to play the geopolitical game. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is the biggest security shock that countries have encountered in recent years, but many countries have deeply fallen into the geopolitical myth and been hijacked by Washington. Therefore, they indulged Washington's misdeeds.

India in fact has become a victim of the US tricks. India already had an economic slump before the outbreak of the pandemic. India's relations with China have been manipulated by the US so severely that even its vaccine assistance provided to other countries took China as a target. However, now India has suddenly become the epicenter of the global pandemic. It is caught in a predicament where it is unable to deal with the situation by itself, receives no support from the US, while it is too embarrassed to accept China's help.

In short, the US has caused harm to the whole world in recent years. Despite being a self-proclaimed world leader, it failed to act as a responsible power in terms of economy, security and the anti-pandemic fight. However, Washington has managed to keep the "moral high ground" and issue orders. It is fair to say that it is the world, including countries like India, that has indulged it. We are suffering a tragedy caused by ourselves.


Lack of international cooperation glaring in India’s epidemic ballooning: Global Times editorial

By Global Times
Published: Apr 24, 2021




A man rides a bicycle on an empty bridge during a weekend lockdown imposed by the government as a preventive measure against the COVID-19 epidemic in Allahabad, India, on Sunday. Photo: AFP

India's COVID-19 epidemic situation is clearly out of control. India on Saturday reported a new single-day high of some 346,000 COVID-19 cases and as many as 2,624 deaths in the past 24 hours. The Indian medical system has, in fact, collapsed. Many hospitals lack oxygen for critically ill patients, and different states and hospitals have said they would "rob" for oxygen. The New Delhi High Court angrily asked the Modi administration to "beg, borrow, steal or import" oxygen to save people's lives.

The Indian government is accused of underestimating the aggressiveness of the coronavirus variant. India not only allowed some large-scale religious activities to be held earlier this year but also did not emphasize basic prevention and control measures such as wearing masks, leading to the recent outbreak of the epidemic. It took less than two months for India's daily COVID-19 infections to jump from about 10,000 to over 300,000. There has never been such a spread rate anywhere in the world, even during the peak of the US' outbreak.

Currently, Western countries have canceled almost all diplomatic personnel exchanges with India, and are quickly moving to suspend flights from India. The US, the UK and some other Western countries have expressed their intention to support India's COVID-19 fight, but have not taken actions yet. The US is still restricting the export of vaccine raw materials that India urgently needs.

India's public health system is weak, so is the Indian society's grassroots organizational capability. Relying on India's own strength to deal with the current situation will very likely worsen this humanitarian disaster. Many infected Indian people have died without being treated. It is very necessary for the international society to cooperate with India to alleviate the epidemic situation. It is all parties' joint responsibility to promote such cooperation together.

China on Thursday has expressed its willingness to provide necessary support and assistance for India to control the epidemic. China-India relations have worsened due to their border disputes. It is a test of whether the two countries can put disputes aside and actively reach urgent cooperation on the COVID-19 fight.

We believe there may be some Indian people who hold a grudge about accepting China's aid. But now, people's lives are at stake, and there is no time for further hesitation. In fact, there are also some Chinese people who oppose proactively offering help to India. However, the Chinese Foreign Ministry's statement on Thursday is more representative of China's mainstream attitude.

Developed countries such as the US and the UK have dominated the international public opinion's focus on the COVID-19 pandemic and have shaped the Western world's moral view. Western public opinion has not shown the same concern about India's epidemic situation as it did to that of Europe and the US. Or maybe it is because India's population is too large, and they believe it is not realistic for the West to "save India."

This pandemic shows that the West's getting closer to India is more in a geopolitical sense. There is actually a gap of people's livelihoods and public interests between them. Their closeness to each other is fragile and superficial.

China and India feel more empathy for each other. In terms of fundamental interests, including development and improvement of people's livelihood, the two countries should have been partners in the same camp. But it is a pity that the significance of border disputes is amplified, concealing the true bond of China-India relations and blurring the two countries' huge common interests.

What should be the essence of a country's foreign relations? What is national security comprised of and what are the priorities? These are worth thinking about. At present, geopolitics continues to hold an overwhelming position in international relations, which is not in line with the actual challenges faced by the world today. The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the seriousness of this problem. Human society needs the ability to seek truth from facts and get out of this dilemma.

Can China and India take an active exploratory step in this direction together? People will have to wait and see..

Watched related Hu Says video

India's epidemic mirrors hypocrisy of US, West

By Qian Feng

GLOBAL TIMES

Published: Apr 25, 2021 


Multiple funeral pyres of COVID-19 victims burn at a site converted for mass cremations in New Delhi, India on Saturday. Indian authorities are scrambling to get medical oxygen to hospitals when the country reported a new global daily record of more than 346,000 infections for a third straight day. Photo: APThe US has refused India's request to ease exports for vaccine raw materials. Meanwhile, India's COVID-19 epidemic is getting into its "worst possible phase." By contrast, the US has celebrated its milestone of reaching the goal of 200 million shots. How ironic!

The US government has spiritually supported India in the epidemic fight in various occasions. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken tweeted on Sunday to show sympathy and support to the Indian people. He wrote, "Our hearts go out to the Indian people in the midst of the horrific COVID-19 outbreak. We are working closely with our partners in the Indian government, and we will rapidly deploy additional support to the people of India and India's health care heroes."

Nonetheless, as the US still faces challenges posed by COVID-19, it will continue to focus on meeting its domestic demands. Thus, in the near future it will be hard to see Washington give a substantial hand to other countries, including India, to fight the virus.

Countries like India should be aware that they are pawns to the US. They might be picked up when the US needs them, but then discarded like used tissue when they are not useful any more. The US has been attempting to bind India to its anti-China chariot. But when it is about support with practical moves, the US has stepped back with its commitment to take care of Americans "first and foremost." Hypocrisy of the US and the West has been exposed in this regard, together with their selfishness.

Some Indians have realized such hypocrisy. "If COVID-19 has taught us anything, it's that Western emphasis on human rights is one humungous farce," wrote K Bhattacharjee, an Indian author, at OpIndia media.

However, the US has attached special importance to India's strategic value as a leverage to suppress China. If India was weakened by the still wildly spreading COVID-19, it would obviously be less effective to the US' anti-China campaign. The US won't want to see this happen. So it is possible that Washington will reach out to New Delhi with some symbolic supports, including donations. In addition, the US-led Quad maybe has also disappointed India. At the "historic" Quad summit, the leaders of the US, Australia and Japan vowed to ramp up production of vaccines in India. This was done to counter China's vaccine distribution assistance to other countries and regions.

However, as India is more severely hit by the epidemic, both the US and Australia have issued only their vocal support. But Japan has remained silent so far. The Quad said it is committed to delivering up to 1 billion doses by the end of 2022 to address vaccine supply shortages across Southeast Asia and elsewhere. But the plan hasn't been carried out effectively. As a result, India will probably become reluctant when it comes to cooperating closely with its Quad partners.

When the US refused to help India with raw materials for vaccine, countries including China have expressed their good will to lend a hand. Actually, China has also capabilities to help its neighbor out. As a responsible major power, China clearly knows its international and regional responsibilities. It is willing to go through thick and thin together with its neighbors.



Photo:VCGNew Delhi hasn't responded to Beijing's olive branch. The Modi administration must be in a great hesitation. It desperately desires help from the international community as it is facing grave shortages of materials, including oxygen and personal protective equipment. Simultaneously, due to deteriorated relations with Beijing in recent years, New Delhi is restrained by domestic pressures from anti-China political forces.

What lesson can people draw from India's failure in getting a helping hand from the US? First, a big developing and emerging country as India should primarily focus on its own epidemic prevention to maintain its people's safety. This being the case, India should put aside all unrealistic diplomatic plans. India's attempts to earn influence by aiding others with COVID-19 vaccines go against not only Indian people's interests and epidemic prevention but also the country's future development.

Second, India should keep its strategic autonomy rather than tilting toward any side. India has been an upholder of autonomous development. But due to its geopolitical needs over the past few years, India has increasingly tilted toward the US and thus engaged in a game with China. But what India has been through has proven that the US and the Quad are not reliable.

It is believed that different voices from the international community will show that the real America does not care to help India right now as infections explode across the Asian country. India can perceive a very real America because of this.

The author is director of the research department at the National Strategy Institute at Tsinghua University. opinion@globaltimes.com.cn

Devastating epidemic 'may drag Indian economy back to 20 years ago'; China stands ready to help

By Zhang Hui

GLOBAL TIMES

Published: Apr 24, 2021 

Multiple funeral pyres of COVID-19 victims burn at a site converted for mass cremations in New Delhi, India on Saturday. Indian authorities are scrambling to get medical oxygen to hospitals when the country reported a new global daily record of more than 346,000 infections for a third straight day. Photo: AP

As India suffers its worst humanitarian crisis amid the devastating second wave of COVID-19 with the fastest rise in new daily cases any country has experienced since the outbreak, the Chinese government and enterprises have made goodwill gestures by offering help or donating medical supplies despite sour bilateral ties.

Chinese analysts, who project India's daily new cases may surge to 500,000 in two weeks, called on India to put aside political biases to learn from China in improving testing ability and building makeshift hospitals.

India has been breaking the record of the world's highest daily surge in the past days with more than 346,000 new cases and 2,624 deaths reported in the past 24 hours.

A shortage of medical oxygen, hospital beds and other necessary drugs continued to plague more hospitals in India on Saturday. Several hospitals either stopped admitting new patients due to no oxygen or posting SOS messages for help.

Moolchand Hospital in New Delhi tweeted on Saturday, "Urgent SOS help. We have less than 2 hours of oxygen supply."

Chinese analysts predicted daily new cases in India may peak at 500,000 in the next two weeks, and it needs at least a month optimistically for India to control the second wave. The real numbers are much higher than recorded as many homeless people infected with the virus have not been included, analysts said.

The worsening coronavirus situation in India will also deal a heavy blow to its economy, as its economy may be back to the size it was 20 years ago, and is likely to affect the stability of South Asia, Hu Zhiyong, who has closely followed the coronavirus situation in India since a year ago, told the Global Times on Saturday.

While expressing sympathies to India, the Chinese Foreign Ministry for two consecutive days this week said China is ready to provide support and help according to India's needs, and China is in communication with India on this, a good gesture that Chinese analysts said was the "friendliest signal" China has sent to India recently.

Donations from Chinese companies are also on the way.

With demand for medical oxygen cylinders skyrocketing in India, Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi on Thursday announced it will donate INR 3 Crores to procure more than 1,000 oxygen concentrators for hospitals across India.

The Global Times learned from a source close to the matter on Saturday that a Chinese logistics company plans to donate 300,000 KN95 face masks to India, and the source is contacting recipients in India. A Chinese motorcycle company has donated more than 200,000 masks to a hospital in Delhi, and a Chinese company in the textile industry has purchased a ventilator in China and is sending it to a hospital in India.

Wang Guangfa, a respiratory expert at Peking University First Hospital who shared China's epidemic control and prevention experience with many countries including India last year, told the Global Times on Saturday that with a large population, India's priority is to learn from China on strict prevention and control measures, including improving its testing ability to find more patients, and building field hospitals to quarantine and treat patients.

Wang said that these measures could effectively control the source of infection and cut the virus transmission route as China's experience showed that many patients were detected from testing.

Aside from providing medical supplies, China could help India with testing equipment, testing reagents, construction materials for building makeshift hospitals as well as technical support, Wang said.

A Chinese merchant in India told the Global Times on condition of anonymity that he's concerned Indian government may be reluctant to receive Chinese donations and help, and even if accepted, Indian politicians would not stop fanning the flames of anti-China sentiment for their political gain.

He said that Indian residents did not show any hatred toward Chinese in India, but it's those Indian politicians and media who incite nationalism.

The Times of India reported on Thursday that India was looking to import oxygen from countries in the Gulf and Singapore, but not China even if China said it is ready to help, as China was "not among the countries India was looking to source oxygen from."

India was excluding China's help, Hu said, noting that India should drop its ideological biases and put lives first.

India wants to move closer with Western countries led by the US. But Western countries are busy canceling diplomatic exchanges and suspending flights from India, and the US did not lift its restrictions of exports of vaccine raw materials that India urgently needs, Hu said.

Covid-19 'swallowing' people in India, overwhelming crematoriums

Apr 25 2021

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VIDEO India faces COVID-19 'tsunami'

Overwhelmed hospitals in India begged for oxygen supplies on Saturday as the country's coronavirus infections soared again overnight in a "tsunami" of disease, setting a new world record for cases for the third consecutive day.

India’s crematoriums and burial grounds are being overwhelmed by the devastating new surge of Covid-19 infections tearing through the populous country with terrifying speed, depleting the supply of life-saving oxygen to critical levels and leaving patients to die while waiting in line to see doctors.

For the fourth straight day, India on Sunday set a global daily record for new infections, spurred by an insidious, new variant that emerged in the country, undermining the government’s premature claims of victory over the pandemic.

AP

Multiple funeral pyres of victims of Covid-19 burn in a ground that has been 

converted into a crematorium for mass cremation in New Delhi.

The 349,691 confirmed cases over the past day brought India’s total to more than 16.9 million, behind only the United States. The Health Ministry reported another 2767 deaths in the past 24 hours, pushing India’s Covid-19 fatalities to 192,311.

Experts say that toll could be a huge undercount, as suspected cases are not included, and many deaths from the infection are being attributed to underlying conditions.

AP

The visceral reality of mass Covid-19 casualties.

READ MORE:
* Inside a Delhi hospital in India, oxygen runs fatally short as Covid-19 cases mount
* Covid-19: Indian hospitals plead for oxygen, country sets virus record
* Covid-19: Travel restricted from new 'very high risk countries' to citizens only

The crisis unfolding in India is most visceral in its graveyards and crematoriums, and in heartbreaking images of gasping patients dying on their way to hospitals due to lack of oxygen

Burial grounds in the Indian capital New Delhi are running out of space and bright, glowing funeral pyres light up the night sky in other badly hit cities.

ALTAF QADRI/AP

The Covid-19 disaster in India is most vividly apparent in mass cremations.

In central Bhopal city, some crematoriums have increased their capacity from dozens of pyres to more than 50. Yet officials say there are still hours-long waits.

At the city’s Bhadbhada Vishram Ghat crematorium, workers said they cremated more than 110 people on Saturday, even as government figures in the entire city of 1.8 million put the total number of virus deaths at just 10.

MANISH SWARUP/AP

Health workers take rest in between cremating Covid-19 victims.

“The virus is swallowing our city’s people like a monster,” said Mamtesh Sharma, an official at the site.

The unprecedented rush of bodies has forced the crematorium to skip individual ceremonies and exhaustive rituals that Hindus believe release the soul from the cycle of rebirth.

MANISH SWARUP/AP

A relative of a person who died of Covid-19 reacts during cremation, in New Delhi.

“We are just burning bodies as they arrive,” said Sharma. “It is as if we are in the middle of a war.”

The head gravedigger at New Delhi’s largest Muslim cemetery, where 1000 people have been buried during the pandemic, said more bodies are arriving now than last year. “I fear we will run out of space very soon,” said Mohammad Shameem.

The situation is equally grim at unbearably full hospitals, where desperate people are dying in line, sometimes on the roads outside, waiting to see doctors.

AJIT SOLANKI/AP

A Covid-19 patient breathes with the help of an oxygen mask as he waits

 inside an auto rickshaw to be attended to and admitted in a dedicated hospital 

in Ahmedabad, India.

Health officials are scrambling to expand critical care units and stock up on dwindling supplies of oxygen. Hospitals and patients alike are struggling to procure scarce medical equipment that is being sold at an exponential markup.

The crisis is in direct contrast with government claims that “nobody in the country was left without oxygen,” in a statement made Saturday by India’s Solicitor General Tushar Mehta before Delhi High Court.

AJIT SOLANKI/AP

Ambulances carrying patients line up waiting for their turn to be attended to

 at a dedicated Covid-19 government hospital in Ahmedabad, India.

The breakdown is a stark failure for a country whose prime minister only in January had declared victory over Covid-19, and which boasted of being the “world’s pharmacy,” a global producer of vaccines and a model for other developing nations.

Caught off-guard by the latest deadly spike, the federal government has asked industrialists to increase the production of oxygen and other life-saving drugs in short supply. But health experts say India had an entire year to prepare for the inevitable – and it didn’t.

ALTAF QADRI/AP

A patient receives oxygen outside a Gurdwara, a Sikh house of worship, in New Delhi, India.

Dr. Krutika Kuppalli, assistant professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases at the Medical University of South Carolina, said the Indian government has been "very reactive to this situation rather than being proactive.”

She said the government should have used the last year, when the virus was more under control, to develop plans to address a surge and “stockpiled medications and developed public-private partnerships to help with manufacturing essential resources in the event of a situation like this.”

“Most importantly, they should have looked at what was going on in other parts of the world and understood that it was a matter of time before they would be in a similar situation,’’ Kuppalli said.

Kuppalli called the government’s premature declarations of victory over the pandemic a “false narrative,” which encouraged people to relax health measures when they should have continued strict adherence to physical distancing, wearing masks and avoiding large crowds.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is facing mounting criticism for allowing Hindu festivals and attending mammoth election rallies that experts suspect accelerated the spread of infections.

RAJESH KUMAR SINGH/AP

A relative of a person who died of Covid-19 prepares to wear his mask

 after performing rituals at the confluence of rivers Ganges and Yamuna 

in Prayagraj, India.

In one such election rally two weeks ago, Modi barely managed to hide his delight when he declared to his supporters in West Bengal state: “I have never seen such huge crowds.” At that time, the virus had already started to rear its head again and experts were warning a deadly surge was inevitable.

With the death toll mounting, Modi’s Hindu nationalist government is trying to quell critical voices.

On Saturday, Twitter complied with the government’s request and prevented people in India from viewing more than 50 tweets that appeared to criticise the administration’s handling of the pandemic. The targeted posts include tweets from opposition ministers critical of Modi, journalists and ordinary Indians.

A Twitter spokesperson said it had powers to “withhold access to the content in India only” if the company determined the content to be “illegal in a particular jurisdiction.” The company said it had responded to an order by the government and notified people whose tweets were withheld.

India’s Information Technology Ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

Even with the targeted blocks, horrific scenes of overwhelmed hospitals and cremation grounds spread on Twitter and drew appeals of help.

ALTAF QADRI/AP

A Covid-19 patient sits inside a car and breathes with the help of oxygen provided

 by a Gurdwara, a Sikh house of worship, in New Delhi, India. India’s medical oxygen 

shortage has become so dire that this gurdwara began offering free breathing sessions 

with shared tanks to Covid-19 patients waiting for a hospital bed. They arrive in their 

cars, on foot or in three-wheeled taxis, desperate for a mask and tube attached to the 

precious oxygen tanks outside the gurdwara in a neighborhood outside New Delhi.

White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Sunday said the United States is “deeply concerned” by the severe Covid-19 outbreak in India. “We are working around the clock to deploy more supplies and support to our friends and partners in India as they bravely battle this pandemic,” Sullivan tweeted.

Help and support also appeared to arrive from archrival Pakistan, with politicians, journalists and citizens in the neighbouring country expressing support for people in India. Pakistan's Foreign Affairs Ministry said it offered to provide relief support including ventilators, oxygen supply kits, digital X-ray machines, PPE and related items.

“Humanitarian issues require responses beyond political consideration,” Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said.

The Indian government did not immediately respond to Qureshi’s statement.

AP