US denies its envoys in Hong Kong with COVID-19 invoked diplomatic immunity to avoid quarantine
16 March, 2021
AMERICA on Tuesday (Mar 16) accused Chinese state media of publishing "disinformation" about its diplomats in Hong Kong since it denied its staff invoked immunity in order to avoid isolating after positive COVID-19 tests.
Washington temporarily closed its consulate on Mon to carry out deep cleaning and get in touch with tracing after two personnel were infected with the virus.
The consulate - and Hong Kong health authorities - possess said the set were headed to a hospital isolation ward as required by the city's anti-coronavirus rules.
But state media outlets and a respected pro-Beijing trade union have accused the staff members of invoking diplomatic immunity, which US officials flat away rejected.
"The disinformation from PRC condition media about both of these cases not complying with quarantine is false," a US STATE DEPT. spokesperson told AFP.
"We reject these efforts to spread disinformation in regards to a critical public ailment."
The reports of diplomatic immunity first ran on Mon in Dot Dot Media, an online news outlet in Hong Kong.
It is portion of an opaquely owned press group that answers to Beijing's Liaison Office.
Following the reports, China's state-operate Global Conditions tabloid repeated the diplomatic immunity accusation, and accused the US diplomats of "arrogant outlaw behaviour".
People walk at night United States consulate construction in Hong Kong after its temporary closure. (Picture: AFP/Peter Parks)
Hong Kong's largest pro-Beijing labour group - the Federation of Trade Unions - said it could stage a protest beyond your US consulate later on Tuesday.
When reached for touch upon Tuesday morning simply by AFP, one of the protest organisers, who gave simply his surname Zhang, said the group would even now just do it with its rally.
Public gatherings greater than four people are banned on Hong Kong as a result of COVID-19.
Hong Kong has placed infections low thanks to some of the strictest quarantine measures on earth, recording some 11,000 infections and 200 deaths since the pandemic began.
Relations between the US and China experience plunged recently, partly because of Beijing's crackdown against dissent found in Hong Kong following huge and often violent protests in 2019.
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