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Jun 1: The new coronavirus is losing its potency and has become much less lethal, a senior Italian doctor said on Sunday.

"In reality, the virus clinically no longer exists in Italy," said Alberto Zangrillo, the head of the San Raffaele Hospital in Milan in the northern region of Lombardy, which has borne the brunt of Italy's coronavirus contagion.

"The swabs that were performed over the last 10 days showed a viral load in quantitative terms that was absolutely infinitesimal compared to the ones carried out a month or two months ago," he told RAI television.

Italy has the third-highest death toll in the world from COVID-19, with 33,415 people dying since the outbreak came to light on Feb. 21. It has the sixth-highest global tally of cases at 233,019.

However new infections and fatalities have fallen steadily in May and the country is unwinding some of the most rigid lockdown restrictions introduced anywhere on the continent.

Zangrillo said some experts were too alarmist about the prospect of a second wave of infections and politicians needed to take into account the new reality.

"We've got to get back to being a normal country," he said. "Someone has to take responsibility for terrorizing the country."

The government urged caution, saying it was far too soon to claim victory.

"Pending scientific evidence to support the thesis that the virus has disappeared ... I would invite those who say they are sure of it not to confuse Italians," Sandra Zampa, an undersecretary at the health ministry, said in a statement.

"We should instead invite Italians to maintain the maximum caution, maintain physical distancing, avoid large groups, to frequently wash their hands and to wear masks."

A second doctor from northern Italy told the national ANSA news agency that he was also seeing the coronavirus weaken. "The strength the virus had two months ago is not the same strength it has today," said Matteo Bassetti, head of the infectious diseases clinic at the San Martino hospital in the city of Genoa.

"It is clear that today the COVID-19 disease is different."

Beijing, May 9: Mounting a strong defence of the ruling Communist Party of China, President Xi Jinping has said the COVID-19 fight has once again shown that the CPC leadership and the country's socialist political system can overcome any challenge.

Xi's comments came as China faced global criticism for its initial inaction to act against the novel coronavirus, which according to Chinese officials emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December last year.

Pressure is also mounting on Beijing to agree for an international probe on the origins of the vicious virus, including from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), as claimed by the US leadership.

China curbed the spread of the coronavirus in over a month and brought COVID-19 under control at its first epicentre in Wuhan in about three months, Xi, also the General Secretary of the CPC, said at a symposium held on Friday to get suggestions from non-ruling Communist Party of China (CPC) parties on COVID-19 prevention and control.

He termed the curbing of the COVID-19 pandemic as "hard-won achievements" for the world's most populous country and the second-biggest economy.

The COVID-19 fight has once again shown that the CPC leadership, China's socialist system and its governance system can overcome any challenge and make big contributions to the progress of human civilisation, he said.

Xi said China had basically curbed the spread of the virus in over one month, managed to bring the daily number of new domestically-transmitted cases down to single digits in about two months, and secured decisive achievements in protecting epicentres Wuhan and Hubei province in about three months.

"For a huge country with 1.4 billion people, these are hard-won achievements," he said

Besides the top CPC officials, the symposium was attended by members of the central committees of non-CPC parties in China, the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, and persons without party affiliation.

The speakers at the symposium praised the Chinese leadership in handling the crisis, saying it fully demonstrated the political advantage of China's socialist system and showed that China was a major responsible country.

Xi, who is also the head of the People's Liberation Army, praised China's one-party political system governed by the CPC.

His comments on the country's political system came as Beijing is also defending the role of the CPC as US President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have blamed the ruling party for not being transparent in the fight against the pandemic.

Both Trump and Pompeo have been pressing Beijing to allow American experts for a probe on whether the virus emerged from the WIV, China's premier research lab where viruses of different types are reportedly researched.

At the symposium attended by the top CPC officials, Xi's leadership came for praise for successfully handling the situation, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

"Attendees noted the major strategic achievements in the COVID-19 fight under the strong leadership of the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at the core," the report said.

The meeting was held amid reports of murmurs of internal criticism within the CPC about Xi's handling of the coronavirus crisis.

While China's move of handling the coronavirus from January 23 by locking down Hubei province and its capital Wuhan to prevent the spread of the virus and curbing it by deploying 42000 medical personnel has been praised, Beijing is criticised for its slow reaction after it emerged in December last year.

China used less than a week to identify the full genome sequence of the novel coronavirus and isolate the virus strain, produced various testing kits and swiftly selected a number of effective drugs and treatments. Different types of vaccines have also entered clinical trials.

President Xi said during the COVID-19 fight, China upheld the centralised and unified leadership of the CPC and concentrated the nation's best doctors, the most advanced equipment and the most needed resources to treat patients, with all treatment expenses covered by the state.

It managed to maximise the testing and cure rates while minimising the infection and fatality rates.

As of Friday, the COVID-19 death toll in China remained at 4,633 with no new fatalities reported for several days while the total number of cases stood at 82,887. In contrast, Chinese officials point out the death toll in the US which has crossed 75,000 with over 1.2 million cases, besides the mounting global toll.

Almost all countries in the world have been under lockdown for weeks to control the spread of the virus.

Xi called for mobilising the whole society, leveraging the institutional strength of concentrating resources to get things done and tapping the composite national strength as well as closely relying on science and technology.

On international cooperation, Xi said China had helped countries and international organisations to the best of its ability, demonstrating the nation's sense of responsibility as a major and responsible country.

Xi also stressed fixing the shortcomings in the country's major epidemic prevention and control mechanism and for the national public health system to raise the ability to deal with major public health emergencies.

He emphasised on targeted and effective measures to guard against the importation of cases and prevent a resurgence of the epidemic.

Canberra, May 21: Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison and his Indian counterpart, Narendra Modi, are looking forward to deepening the countries' strategic relationship, with both sides expected to sign a range of pacts from defence to trade in strategic sectors amid heightened tensions with China over Beijing's response to coronavirus pandemic.

During a virtual summit, scheduled to take place on June 4, both leaders are expected to ramp up efforts to diversify Australia's export markets and find trusted suppliers of vital products and components, a local newspaper, The Australian reported on Tuesday.

The new agreements will focus on reliable supply chains in key strategic sectors, including medical goods, technology and critical minerals, amid heightened tensions with China over Beijing's response to coronavirus pandemic.

The leaders will seal a new defence agreement allowing reciprocal access to bases and co-operation on military technology projects, while a new education partnership will be on the table to help overcome Australian university reliance on Chinese students.

The talks in terms of strategic convergence, now have greater significance as COVID-19 exacerbates the strategic contest between the US and China, and forces like-minded countries to seek out reliable partners.

Australian farmers could also benefit, with talks underway on expanding agricultural exports to India, including barley, as China throws up new trade barriers, media reports stated.

The virtual summit follows the cancellation of Morrison's planned state visit to India in January due to the bushfires.

Morrison said last year, ahead of his planned visit, that India was "a natural partner for Australia", referring to the countries' "shared values" -- a point of differentiation with China.

Former Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade secretary Peter Varghese, who wrote a landmark report on the bilateral relationship in 2018, was quoted by the newspaper as saying that India would be even more important to Australia in the post-COVID world. "If one of the lessons from COVID is that countries need to spread their risk, then finding new markets or building up existing markets is a crucial part of that," he added.

Varghese noted that India, a member of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue along with Australia, Japan and the US, was a vital strategic partner to Australia in helping "constrain China's ambitions to be the predominant power".

"That shared objective between Australia and India of not wanting to see the region dominated by China is a key component of building up our geopolitical relationship," he told The Australian.

The summit also follows recent talks between Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne and Indian counterpart Subrahmanyam Jaishankar on the pandemic response and Australia's call for an independent inquiry, which was overwhelmingly backed at the World Health Assembly on Tuesday.

Australia wants to support India to develop a domestic critical minerals processing industry, which would provide Western nations with an alternative to sourcing the materials from China.

Meanwhile, India has strong expertise as a manufacturer of drugs and medical equipment, while Australia is a centre of biomedical research, opening the possibility for closer co-operation in the key sector, the media reported further.