Hong Kong
CNN
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More than 200 kindergarten students in northwestern China have been found to have abnormal blood lead levels after kitchen staff used paint as food coloring, and authorities embrace anger in a country that has long been plagued by food safety scandals.

Eight people, including the principal of the private kindergarten where the children attended, are in detention “on suspicion of producing toxic and harmful foods,” according to a report released on Tuesday by the Tianshui city government, cited by China’s state broadcaster CCTV.

The school’s principal and financial supporters have allowed Hesi Paicin’s kindergarten kitchen staff to use paint pigments to color their children’s food, leading to contamination, which has followed ongoing cases for the next few days.

Of the 251 students enrolled in kindergarten, 233 were found to have abnormal levels of lead in their blood, the report found. The children were currently receiving treatment for 201 people in the hospital, authorities said. Medical assessments of the effects of exposures that can cause long-term and developmental harm have not been published yet.

Local media said pediatrics professors suggest that chronic lead poisoning may be present, and that chronic lead poisoning may be present for more than three months.

During the investigation, the figures cited in the research report found that two food samples from kindergarten (a red date steamed breakfast cake and sausage corn roll) had lead levels of more than 2,000 times the national food safety standard for contamination.

The paint was also seized by the authorities and found to contain lead. And the package was clearly labelled as unfulfilled, the report says. Tianshui’s top law enforcement officer told CCTV that the principal and his investors were aiming to “attract more registrations and increase revenue” with colorful food. CNN is reaching out Heshi Peixin Kindergarten has been several times for comments.

Authorities said they began an investigation on July 1 after they noticed reports of children at school having abnormal blood lead levels. Lead exposure in children can have serious consequences, including affecting their brain development, behavior, and IQ.

The government’s report did not reveal how long the revelations have progressed. Some affected parents said they noticed over months of months of unusual signs of their child’s health and behavior when interviewed by state media.

“My heart has become blank,” said the mother of a student affected by one He spoke to the state media According to a report published by Outlet China National Radio (CNR), the revelation that a child learns that he has a blood lead level of 528 micrograms per liter is a revelation that was revealed after telling her that the blood concentration is normal.. China’s National Health Organization classifies “severe lead poisoning” as more than 450 micrograms per liter.

“Now I’m not thinking about compensation. I just want my child to be healthy,” she was quoted as saying.

The case raised very familiar concerns in China about the level of food safety and transparency, particularly in a system where independent journalism is tightly controlled and officials are under pressure to resolve issues quickly.

Earlier this month, after schools conducted student tests but did not publish individual results, many parents took their children to Xi’an, a major city, a drive from Tianshui, for the test, about four hours drive from Tianshui, according to a report released by a news outlet belonging to civil servants.

Reports from the state-affiliated media found that 70 children tested on Xi’an had blood lead concentrations above the lead poisoning threshold, of which six cases exceed 450 micrograms per liter. According to official Chinese guidelines, this level is classified as “stricken.” The overall picture of the outcomes for all students with unusual levels was not published.

One mother told people’s daily outlets that she was confused by her daughter’s constant stomach ache, loss of appetite for the past six months and changes in behavior, but she didn’t improve after treating her with traditional Chinese herbal medicine.

Others expressed skepticism about the results of the official investigation.

“Children just eat three-color jujubu steamed cakes and corn sausage rolls once or twice a week. Why are they poisoned so seriously?” one mother who gave them the last name told CNR. “If this happens to the kids at school, at least explain it. There’s nothing at all now.”

Earlier this week, Mayor Tianshui Lujang said the city will “do everything possible to ensure protections in the treatment, rehabilitation and follow-up of children.”

The incident led to widespread expressions of anger across China’s social media. The latest dozens of high-profile scandals have been reported by local media since the early 2000s.

“We need to maintain serious accountability and we cannot ignore or relax food safety issues. If it involves the life safety of young children, we need to impose severe penalties,” wrote one commentator on platform Weibo, like X.

“Children are family hopes. We hope they can recover quickly and grow healthy,” another person said.

Past scandals have also affected children. In one of the worst cases, six infants died, and around 300,000 babies were ill from milk powder formula containing toxic industrial chemical melamine. Several executives, who were found to be responsible for the 2008 lawsuit, were ultimately sentenced to death, and the tragedy led to deep distrust over China’s domestic product and food safety.

Lead poisoning was once a wider problem in China. In 2010, the central government allocated special funds for the first time to prevent heavy metal contamination, as more than 4,000 people with at least 12 blood lead levels remained in response to at least 12 well-known cases, according to state media.

Officials have also moved to tighten food safety regulations in recent years, but have shown that more needs need to be made from an enforcement perspective and that public trust should be built, experts say.

Improving the food regulation system calls for “transparency in food safety, a more thorough investigation,” says Yanzhong Huang, Senior Global Health Fellow at the Council of Foreign Relations in New York and author of “China’s Environmental Health Crisis and the Challenge of the Chinese Nation.”

Fans also said there was a shortage Public trust in safety systems can evolve into a “trust crisis.”

CNN
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The White House is holding its “Leaders of Africa” ​​summit this week. However, only five countries from 55 continents are eligible to participate.

Liberia said the president is one of five African heads of state invited by US President Donald Trump to attend the “high-level summit” in Washington, D.C., and intended to “deepen diplomatic relations, advance economic goals and strengthen security cooperation.”

Other invitees revealed by the President of Liberia include leaders from Gabon, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania and Senegal.

However, according to Liberia, none of the biggest African companies were asked to attend, including South Africa, Nigeria, Egypt and Ethiopia’s biggest economies. These countries are allied with BRICS, a group of emerging economies founded by Brazil, India, the enemy of America, Russia and China. BRICS members face the threat of being hit by new tariffs from Trump in order to support “anti-American” policies.

Although details of Trump’s African leadership summit have not been released by the White House, analysts say the selection of invitees remains a challenge, explaining the continent’s changing U.S. policy as “high stakes gambling.”

Christopher Afolk Isaiche, professor of African politics and international relations at the University of Pretoria in South Africa, describes Trump’s handpicked guests for his US summit as “low fruits” in his quest to counter the Chinese and Russian influences in Africa.

“On the other hand, Trump is eager to have some deals to show his base that he is getting US results. But some of these are also focused on countering China’s influence in Africa and making Russian activities malignant that undermine our profits on the continent,” he told CNN.

“The majority of African regions are aiming to be in BRICS as key members or participate as key partners,” Isike said, adding, “These five countries (attending the US Summit) are not falling into that category and are fruits with such a low attitude.”

China is Africa’s largest bilateral trading partner, but ally Russia has expanded its footprint on the continent and emerged as a major supplier of military hardware.

This is not the first time Trump has hosted a small group of African leaders in the United States. This deviates from the approach of Barack Obama and Joe Biden, who held a more fulfilling gathering of African government chiefs while in the White House.

During his first term of office, considered “boring bored towards Africa,” Trump held a “working lunch” with nine African heads of state in 2017.

“There is an incredible business potential in Africa,” Trump said at a conference that includes leaders from Nigeria, Ethiopia and South Africa.

Now, in his second term, Trump is focusing on the wealth of African minerals, and the United States is eager to challenge China’s access to key minerals in the region. However, he advocates a trading policy that exchanges charities for strategic US investments.

When a Trump-brokered peace agreement was signed last month by Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, it has large mineral deposits that are important for the production of electronic devices, Trump told reporters that the United States can “get many mineral rights from the Congo.”

The signed peace agreement does not specifically confiscate U.S. mineral rights, but the document includes a framework for “a framework for expanding foreign trade and investments derived from the regional key mineral supply chains,” particularly “connecting the two countries in partnerships between the US government and US investors, where necessary.”

On July 1, Secretary of State Marco Rubio welcomed the end of the US Organization for International Development (USAID), delivering US humanitarian aid overseas, saying that “the countries that benefit most from our generosity are usually unable to travel,” and that “future US aid and investment must “follow America’s number one foreign policy.”

The Trump administration has previously cancelled more than 80% of USAID’s programs, imposing “mutual” tariffs on several countries, including many in Africa, whom Trump said had trade obstacles with the United States. South Africa has described the “mutual” tariffs that are expected to take effect on August 1, saying they are not based on “an accurate representation of available trade data.”

Trump has also banned travel in 12 countries, mostly in Africa and the Middle East, citing security risks amid the aggressive tightening of immigration by his administration. An expanded expansion of travel restrictions would halt travel to the US due to the West African belt if implemented.

Meanwhile, China has eased the impact of US tariffs on Africa, and last month announced that almost all imports of African partners would be suspended.

Small economies are rich in mineral resources such as oil and gas, gold, iron ore and rare earth elements in Gabon, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania, Senegal and Liberia. West and Central African countries are also the general starting points for immigration to the United States.

Debate at the Trump-remaining summit will expand beyond commerce, according to Ousmane Sene, who heads the Senegal-based research institute, West African Studies Centre (WARC).

“There may be other interests. As with the trends and “security” of immigration from West Africa to Nicaragua and the US, “just as five (5) countries are open in the Atlantic,” Sene told CNN.

Last year, the New York Times reported that the US is growing the number of African immigrants at its southern border, citing government data. The number has increased from 13,000 in 2022 to 58,462. The Mauritania and Senegal nationals were at the top of the list.

For Mama Dutior, a Dakar-based journalist and political analyst who covered the first US and African leadership summit hosted by Obama in 2014, the five African countries’ leadership leaders must be “as smart as Donald Trump” when the story begins at the White House.

“Trump is a businessman, so only American interests are interested in him,” Tior said. “USAID, a key partner in a country like Senegal, no longer exists. It’s up to them to talk to Trump and we can see what new cooperation they can propose.”

In Isike’s view, “The conference is set to launch a new US diplomatic model, which is traded with US economic reform (and) trade achievements.”

Nevertheless, five African countries can “expect to leverage private sector partnerships, investment, infrastructure development and security cooperation with the US,” he said.

These countries are not new to high-stakes relationships with global forces. They were each courted by China, and they increased the amount of trade between them and boosted the funded infrastructure in Gabon and Senegal.

When Guinea-Bissau President Umaro Sisoko Embaro met his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in Beijing in September, the former had kind words to his host country.

“For Africa,” Embaro said, according to a statement from China’s Foreign Ministry, “China represents the future and is a brother.”

“Guinea-Bissau is willing to become a trusted friend and partner in China,” he added.

Last month Senegale Prime Minister Osmane Songko also praised China and thanked him for awarding “preparation scholarships” to athletes and coaches from his country ahead of next summer’s Youth Olympics.

In the same statement, Sonko expressed her dissatisfaction with the US decision to deny visas to “several members of Senegale’s national women’s basketball team,” the leading African women’s basketball squad.

According to Isaac, Trump made one thing clear at the broader African leadership summit, which is being discussed by the White House later this year. “From traditional aid to strategic commerce-led engagement”

However, this shift is “high stakes gambling that not only resets influence in Africa through investment, but also aligns with America’s goal of fighting China and fostering economically independent African partners.”

“The way Africa can become independent is not because he (Trump) loves Africa, but because he doesn’t have patience in a country that only wants handouts from the US.

CNN
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Doctors in Gaza say they were forced to cram multiple babies into one incubator as hospitals warned that fuel shortages were forced to stop critical services and put patients at risk.

The UN warns that the fuel crisis is a critical point, with the small available supply being short and “virtually no additional accessible stocks remain.”

“The hospitals are being distributed. Ambulances are stuck. The water system is on the brink, and unless Israeli authorities allow new fuel urgently, regularly and in sufficient quantities, deaths caused by this could quickly spike.”

The 11-week Israeli lockdown on humanitarian assistance at the beginning of the year led to the enclave’s population of over 2 million Palestinians facing hunger, deepening the humanitarian crisis. Limited aid delivery was reopened in May in the enclave, but the aid group said it wasn’t the only way to meet the scale of its needs.

CNN approached Cogat, an Israeli agency responsible for coordinating the delivery of aid to Gaza, for comments on fuel shortages.

The director of Al Ali Hospital, south of Gaza city, posted photos on social media on Wednesday, posting photos of multiple newborn babies sharing a single incubator taken at another facility, Al Herrow.

“This tragic overcrowding is not just a matter of missing equipment. It is a direct result of the relentless war with Gaza and the choking blockade that has crippled the entire health care system.”

“The siege transformed the daily care of premature babies into a struggle for life or death. We should not be born into a world where bombs and blockades decide whether to live or die.”

The director of Alsifa Hospital in northern Gaza said the shortage has forced the kidney dialysis section to close, allowing them to concentrate on intensive care and theater.

“If fuel is not available in the next few hours to Alsifa Hospital, the hospital will no longer be working for the next three hours, which will lead to many deaths,” Dr. Mohammad Abu Sirmiyah told CNN, telling CNN that hundreds of patients are at risk, including 22 babies in the incubator.

Videos from inside the hospital were shown by doctors using flashlights to treat patients.

Another facility, Nasser Medical Complex, said it had 24 hours of fuel left and was concentrated in key departments such as childbirth and intensive care.

In addition to fuel shortages, it is also forced to shut down more due to the difficulty of finding replacement parts for generators that will power the risks of hospitals in Gaza.

“Not only is fuel a major issue for operating a hospital generator, our main issue is that the generators now find spare parts to replace the old ones,” Gaza’s health ministry told CNN on Wednesday.

The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in central Gaza issued an urgent statement that the facility’s main generator had broken down due to a lack of spare parts, forcing it to rely on smaller backup units.

“The fuel will run out within the next few hours, putting hundreds of patients at risk within the ward,” the statement said.

“The closure of hospitals is threatening to disrupt the health services of half a million people in the central government.”

Beyond hospitals, fuel is essential to continuing to carry out basic services in Gaza. The territory relies heavily on the power of vehicles used for cooking, desalination, importing wastewater plants, and rescue operations.

Israel has restricted fuel intrusion during conflict, and previously claimed Hamas could use it to fire weapons.

Doctors from the aid group warned in a statement Tuesday about what was called an “unprecedented humanitarian crisis” that was unfolding in Gaza, calling for a ceasefire and much greater levels of humanitarian aid entry.

“Our team has been treating the injured, treating the overwhelmed hospitals as indiscriminate attacks and working to make the siege threaten millions of men, women and children,” MSF said.

“We urge the accomplice government that will now siege these atrocities, including the Israeli government and the British government, and allow them to take action to prevent the elimination of Palestinians from Gaza.”

CNN
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Russia has launched its biggest drone attack on Ukraine since the invasion began, Ukrainian officials said on Wednesday, just hours after US President Donald Trump pledged more military support to Kiev and accused Russian Vladimir Putin of throwing “Bursh*t” in peace talks.

According to the Ukrainian Air Force, the massive air attack included 728 drones and 13 missiles, overturning previous record numbers for the 539 drones set on July 4th, but it was largely repelled, with limited damage and no immediate reports of deaths.

“This is an empirical attack, and happens when there are so many attempts to achieve peace and stop the fire, but Russia rejects everything,” Ukrainian President Voldimi Zelensky wrote in Telegram.

“Our partners know how to apply pressure so that Russia is forced to think about ending the war rather than a new strike. Everyone who wants peace must act.”

barrage, It was so intense that the Polish forces scrambled aircraft in airspace, mainly targeting Lutsk city in northwestern Ukraine. It comes after weeks of intensifying Russia’s airstrike in Ukraine.

“Last night, our area was once again subjected to massive attacks,” Ivan Rudnitsky, head of the military regime in the Volin region, home to Lutsk, told Telegram. “Perfectly everything was flying towards Rootsk.”

The Ukrainian Air Force said it destroyed 718 drones. There were no immediate reports of deaths. One woman was hospitalized with a chest injury in Brobury, near Kiev, the mayor said.

According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, Ukraine fired 86 drones at Russia overnight.

Moscow’s attack on Kiev followed an astonishing 48 hours at the White House, when Trump pledged more support to Ukraine, as Russian leader Vladimir Putin over his lack of commitment to the peace deal.

“If we want to know the truth, we’re throwing lots of burs* at Putin,” Trump told the cabinet meeting. “He’s always so lovely, but it turns out to be pointless.”

On Monday, Trump pledged to restore military aid to Ukraine. Last week, a senior White House official told CNN that the US would suspend shipping weapons to Kiev, including air defense missiles.

Kiev urgently needs more US-made patriot intercept missiles to fight off Russian attacks.

“We’re going to send more weapons (to Ukraine),” Trump said Monday evening. “We have to do — they have to be able to protect themselves.”

“They’re being hit very hard. We have to send more weapons,” Trump added. “It’s mainly defensive weapons, but they’re being hit very hard.”

A Pentagon spokesman later said: “At President Trump’s direction, the Pentagon will send additional defensive weapons to Ukraine, allowing Ukrainians to protect themselves while they strive to ensure lasting peace and stop the killings.”

According to five sources familiar with the issue, Defense Secretary Pete Hegses did not notify Trump last week before allowing the weapons to be suspended.

Meanwhile, the German Prime Minister pledged on Wednesday to continue Berlin’s support for Ukraine, saying that diplomatic measures to resolve the war are “exhausted.”

“If a criminal government with military violence openly question the existential rights of the whole country and seeks to destroy the democratic political order across the continent, this government, which I lead, will do everything with its power to prevent this accurately.”

Fix: This story has been updated to correct the number of drones fired in Ukraine.