ЦІКАВЕ

Advances in childhood cancer are a success story in modern medicine. But in the past decade, those strides have stalled for Black and Hispanic youth, opening a gap in death rates, according to a new report published Thursday.

Childhood cancers are rare and treatments have improved drastically in recent decades, saving lives.

Death rates were about the same for Black, Hispanic and white children in 2001, and all went lower during the next decade. But over the next 10 years, only the rate for white children dipped a little lower.

“You can have the most sophisticated scientific advances, but if we can’t deliver them into every community in the same way, then we have not met our goal as a nation,” said Dr. Sharon Castellino, a pediatric cancer specialist at Emory University’s Winship Cancer Institute in Atlanta, who had no role in the new report.

She said the complexity of new cancers treatments such as gene therapy, which can cure some children with leukemia, can burden families and be an impediment to getting care.

“You need at least one parent to quit their job and be there 24/7, and then figure out the situation for the rest of their children,” Castellino said. “It’s not that families don’t want to do that. It’s difficult.”

More social workers are needed to help families file paperwork to get job-protected leave and make sure the child’s health insurance is current and doesn’t lapse.

The overall cancer death rate for children and teenagers in the U.S. declined 24% over the two decades, from 2.75 to 2.10 per 100,000, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report.

The 2021 rate per 10,000 was 2.38 for Black youth, 2.36 for Hispanics and 1.99 for whites.

Nearly incurable 50 years ago, childhood cancer now is survivable for most patients, especially those with leukemia. The leading cause of cancer deaths in kids is now brain cancer, replacing leukemia.

Each year in the U.S. about 15,000 children and teens are diagnosed with cancer. More than 85% live for at least five years.

The improved survival stems from research collaboration among more than 200 hospitals, said Dr. Paula Aristizabal of the University of California, San Diego. At Rady Children’s Hospital, she is trying to include more Hispanic children, who are underrepresented in research.

“Equity means that we provide support that is tailored to each family,” Aristizabal said.

The National Cancer Institute is working to gather data from every childhood cancer patient with the goal of linking each child to state-of-the-art care. The effort could improve equity, said Dr. Emily Tonorezos, who leads the institute’s work on cancer survivorship.

The CDC’s report is “upsetting and discouraging,” she said. “It gives us a roadmap for where we need to go next.”
…

U.S. President Joe Biden said he made “positive steps” during an intense hourslong meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping Wednesday.

The two agreed to re-establish lapsed military communications, work together to assess the threats posed by artificial intelligence, and work to combat the scourge of fentanyl.

However, Biden’s off-the-cuff comment that he still sees the powerful Chinese leader as a “dictator,” revealed that the two leaders remain, in some ways, far apart.  

“Well, look, he is,” Biden said, in response to a shouted question from the clamoring throng of journalists at the secluded meeting site outside of San Francisco, where 21 Asia-Pacific economies are holding a summit this week.

“He is a dictator in a sense that he is a guy that runs a country, a communist country, that’s based on a totally different form of government than ours.”

The White House chose a sprawling, bucolic estate more than an hour’s drive from San Francisco for this heavily symbolic visit covering a range of key issues that included Taiwan – the self-governing island that China claims – the possible resumption of military communications, touchy trade disagreements, the origination of fentanyl ingredients in China, and human rights issues. 

The scenic grounds cover the San Andreas fault, where the Pacific and North American tectonic plates touch.

Biden said he was “candid” on these tough issues that divide the two countries – as seen in the mixed reception that residents of this diverse city gave to the Chinese leader, with both anti-communist protesters and pro-Xi greeters lining the streets. On Wednesday, groups in at least two locations descended into fisticuffs, as documented in videos posted on social media. 

Xi, in his brief remarks before the leaders began their meeting, said the two nations are inextricably linked.

“For two large countries like China, the United States turning their back on each other is not an option,” he said. “It is unrealistic for one side to remodel the other. And conflict and confrontation has unbearable consequences for both sides.

I’m still of the view that major country competition is not to the prevailing trend of current times and cannot solve the problems facing China and the United States or the world at large.

Planet Earth is big enough for the two countries to succeed and one country’s success is an opportunity for the other.”

So did the presidents of the world’s two most powerful nations manage to paper over the cracks in their relationship? 

Biden spoke to the press afterwards. Xi, as is his habit, did not.

The two did not release a joint statement. 

“I welcome the positive steps we’ve taken today,” Biden said. ”And it’s important for the world to see that we’re implementing the approach in the best traditions of American diplomacy. We’re talking to our competitors, just talking and being blunt with one another so there’s no misunderstanding.”

Biden stopped far short of praising Xi, saying, “We have disagreements. He has a different view than I have on a lot of things. But he’s been straight. I don’t mean that good, bad or indifferent – just been straight.”

In the administration’s post-meeting readout, the White House said Biden repeated Washington’s long-held stance on Taiwan. 

“President Biden emphasized that our one China policy has not changed and has been consistent across decades and administrations,” the readout said. “He reiterated that the United States opposes any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side, that we expect cross-strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means, and that the world has an interest in peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.  He called for restraint in the PRC’s use of military activity in and around the Taiwan Strait.”

Craig Singleton, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington, told VOA he was struck by the leaders’ words on Taiwan. 

“China often claims the U.S. is seeking to alter the status quo in the Strait,” he said. “The opposite is true. Xi’s stark comments expose, yet again, his desire to speed up reunification timetables, either through military force or coercion.”

Many watching this meeting said they weren’t expecting major results, but are glad the two leaders are talking. 

“This engagement, for example, between President Biden and Xi Jinping, to me it is critical because it should give a clear message that we are here to be able to work together and trust each other to resolve serious problems: Climate, issues in Ukraine or Gaza,” said Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim. ”There are too many contentious issues in the world and you must try and engage.”

Analysts say the success of the ongoing summit of Asia-Pacific economies – happening simultaneously in San Francisco – depends on the world’s two largest economies getting along. 

“I think it’s an important meeting between President Biden and President Xi, with the primary goal of stabilizing the relationship heading into 2024,” said Michael Froman, president of the Council on Foreign Relations.

“Both for bilateral purposes but also very importantly for the broader APEC region. The countries there, the economies there, want the U.S. and China to have some kind of modus vivendi, some kind of stable relationship, particularly in anticipation of Taiwan’s election in January, the U.S. election in November.”

Biden, when asked what he told Xi about Taiwan’s elections, said: “I made clear I didn’t expect any interference.” 

The Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Singleton told VOA that he interpreted Xi’s words on “peaceful coexistence” differently, saying it “harkens back to Cold War-era language by Nikita Khrushchev, who promoted the notion of ‘peaceful coexistence’ between the U.S. and Soviet Union. Like today, previous policies aimed at stability counter-intuitively extended the Soviet system’s survival, treating the Soviet Union as an immutable juggernaut, rather than one whose demise was inevitable.”

Biden said the leaders will continue to talk. And on Thursday, they will give the other 19 Asia-Pacific economies a visual reminder of where they each stand, when the leaders pose for the so-called “family photo” — a ritual that is a hallmark of these major summits. 
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Among the guests at a $2,000-a-plate dinner for Xi Jinping Wednesday night was Luca Berrone, attending as a guest of the Chinese government.

The Des Moines businessman worked with the volunteer-driven Iowa Sister States program to establish a relationship with Hebei Province in 1983. It was a connection made with corn and solidified with soybeans by an organization that “is dedicated to connecting Iowans with to the world community.”

The group’s mission, it says “is to develop and implement programs that promote the cultural, economic and other interests of Iowa and its friends around the world.”

One of those friends rose decades later to become the leader of a 1.4 billion-person-strong global superpower while retaining a fondness for the Iowans he met almost 40 years ago despite the mutual suspicion that marks China’s relationship with the U.S.

In the spring of 1985, as the coordinator of the nonprofit Iowa Sister States, Berrone hosted Xi, then party committee secretary of Zhengding County, Hebei Province, and his delegation. Berrone arranged their itinerary and escorted Xi for two weeks as they explored the farmland around Muscatine, a city of about 24,000 people in southeast Iowa.

The not-yet-famous Xi bunked in a bedroom in the home of a local family, freed up because their son was away at college. That solution to a logistical problem, Berrone told The Des Moines Register, is key to Xi’s bond with Iowa.

“The only hotel available in Muscatine was all booked up. So I reached out to Sarah Lande, who was on the (Iowa Sister States) committee, and I asked if it was possible to organize home stays for the Chinese delegation, and she was able to contact a few families that were interested,” Berrone told the Register. “And it turned out those home stays were a turning point in building those long-term friendships.”

The People’s Daily, the Chinese Communist Party’s official newspaper, noted that the delegation “visited elderly people in the local community, attended a birthday party, had six interviews with local media outlets and attended five welcome banquets held by the U.S. side.”

Berrone told VOA Mandarin on Monday afternoon that the five gentlemen of Hebei Province were congenial and personable.

“President Xi was very curious and intelligent,” he told VOA Mandarin. “I made sure they learned as much as possible about agricultural methods, technology and processing.”

In addition, there was a hog roast, a boat trip on the Mississippi River and rides on advanced farming equipment.

“We had a really good time in two weeks,” Berrone told Fortune. “We were like the road movie — five or six guys on a road trip.”

While the term “old friend” is often used by China to pay tribute to foreigners seen as beneficial to the interests of the Party, such as Henry Kissinger, it also can also carry a nostalgic feeling shared by longtime companions who respect and enjoy each others’ company.

Xi returned to Iowa in 2012, the year before he started his first five-year term as president and met with Berrone along with other old friends. Lande recalled Xi saying, “You were the first people I met in America, and to me, you are America,” according to Fortune.

In October 2013, Iowa companies and organizations signed 20 cooperative trade agreements with Hubei Province counterparts with a combined value touted at more than $1 billion.

In March 2019, when Xi visited Italy, then-Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte invited Berrone to welcome Xi, an event Berrone told VOA Mandarin was a highlight of his life. 
…

It was a meeting a year in the making.

President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping sat down together on Wednesday just outside of San Francisco, where Asian leaders gathered for an annual summit. It was almost exactly one year since their last encounter in Bali, Indonesia, on the sidelines of another global gathering.

In addition to a formal bilateral meeting, Biden and Xi shared a lunch with top advisers and strolled the verdant grounds of the luxury estate where their meeting took place.

There’s no word on whether Chinese pandas will return to Washington’s zoo. But Biden said the meeting included “some of the most constructive and productive discussions we’ve had.” Here’s a look at how the day panned out.

New agreements

Biden left the meeting with commitments on key issues.

Xi agreed to help curb the production of the illicit fentanyl that is a deadly component of drugs sold in the United States. A senior administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a private meeting, said the shift will be a setback for Latin American drug dealers.

“It’s going to save lives, and I appreciated President Xi’s commitment on this issue,” Biden said at a press conference after his meeting.

In addition, Biden and Xi reached an agreement to resume military-to-military communications. That means Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin will speak with his Chinese counterpart once someone is named to the job, the official said. Similar engagements will take place up and down the military chain of command.

The official said Biden was “very clear” to Xi that such communications between U.S. and China should be institutionalized and that they are “not done as a gift or as a favor to either side.”

Biden said the U.S. and China would talk more about artificial intelligence as well.

“We’re going to get our experts together and discuss risk and safety issues,” he said.

The agreements helped fulfill the White House’s goal for the meeting — prove to voters that Biden’s dedication to personal diplomacy is paying off.

On Sunday, national security adviser Jake Sullivan told CNN that Biden wanted “practical ways” to show that meeting with Xi can help “defend American interests and also deliver progress on the priorities of the American people.”

Zoe Liu, a fellow for China studies at the Council for Foreign Relations, described the meeting between Biden and Xi as a positive step, albeit an incremental one.

“These agreements will not change the structural challenges in the bilateral relations, but it paves the way for more detailed working-level discussions, which is more important,” she said.

Economic challenges

Xi arrived in San Francisco at a time of economic challenges back in China, where an aging population and growing debt have hampered its recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to Beijing’s description of the meeting, Xi pressed Biden to lift sanctions and change policies on export controls for sensitive equipment.

“Stifling China’s technological progress is nothing but a move to contain China’s high-quality development and deprive the Chinese people of their right to development,” the readout said. “China’s development and growth, driven by its own inherent logic, will not be stopped by external forces.”

There’s no indication that Biden will agree to take such steps. But even the meeting itself could calm jittery nerves back in China, where there have been signs foreign investment is tapering off.

Zhang Lei, a Chinese businessman whose company, Cheche Group, is listed on NASDAQ, said high-level meetings such as the one between Biden and Xi can help assure companies that have been hesitant to invest in China.

“Confrontations don’t work,” he said. “You don’t make money with confrontations.”

It’s personal

Biden and Xi go back years, and Biden often repeats the story of their meetings when they were both vice presidents.

But on Wednesday, it was Xi’s turn to reference their previous encounters during brief public remarks, although he eschewed the embellishments that Biden usually adds to the tale.

“It was 12 years ago,” Xi said. “I still remember our interactions very vividly, and it always gives me a lot of thoughts.”

Biden also emphasized the length of their relationship and the value of their interactions.

“We haven’t always agreed, which was not a surprise to anyone, but our meetings have always been candid, straightforward and useful,” Biden said. He added, “It’s paramount that you and I understand each other clearly, leader to leader, with no misconceptions or miscommunication.”

Bilateral meetings aren’t always conducive to a personal touch, and Biden and Xi were flanked by advisers on opposite sides of a long table. However, a senior administration official said they spoke about their wives, and Biden wished Xi’s wife a happy birthday.

The official, who requested anonymity to discuss a private conversation, said Xi was embarrassed, and he admitted that he had forgotten his wife’s upcoming birthday because he’s been working so hard.
…

It began as a familiar old story.

In the early 2000s, multinational mining giant Rio Tinto came to the wilds of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula to dig a nickel mine.

Environmentalists feared pollution. The company promised jobs.

The usual battle lines were drawn. The usual legal fights ensued.

But this time, something different happened.

The mining company invited a respected local environmental group to be an independent watchdog, conducting pollution testing that goes above and beyond what regulators require.

More than a decade has passed, and no major pollution problems have arisen. Community opposition has softened.

“I was fiercely opposed to the mine, and I changed,” said Maura Davenport, board chair of the Superior Watershed Partnership, the environmental group doing the testing.

The agreement between the mining company and the environmentalists is working at a time when demand for nickel and other metals used in green technologies is on the rise, but the mining activity that supplies those metals faces fierce local resistance around the world.

Historic mines, polluting history

The shift to cleaner energy needs copper to wire electrical grids, rare earth elements for wind turbine magnets, lithium for electric vehicle batteries, nickel to make those batteries run longer, and more. Meeting the goals of the 2015 U.N. Paris climate agreement would mean a fourfold increase in demand for metals overall by 2040 and a 19-fold increase in nickel, according to the International Energy Agency.

That means more mines. But mines rarely open anywhere in the world without controversy. Two nearby copper-nickel mine proposals hit major roadblocks this year over environmental concerns.

For the third year running, mining companies listed environmental, social and governance issues as the leading risk facing their businesses in a survey by consulting firm EY.

Mining is not new to the Upper Peninsula, the northern tip of the state of Michigan that is mostly surrounded by the Great Lakes. The region was the nation’s leading copper and iron producer until the late 1800s. An open-pit iron mine still operates about 20 kilometers (12 miles) southwest of the college town of Marquette.

Most of the historic copper mines closed in the 1930s. But the waste they left behind is still polluting today.

Residue left over from pulverizing copper ore, known as stamp sands, continues to drift into Lake Superior, leaching toxic levels of copper into the water.

“The whole history of mining is so bad, and we feared … for our precious land,” Davenport said.

The ore Rio Tinto sought is in a form known as nickel sulfide. When those rocks are exposed to air and water, they produce sulfuric acid. Acid mine drainage pollutes thousands of kilometers of water bodies across the United States. At its worst, it can render a stream nearly lifeless.

When Rio Tinto proposed building the Eagle Mine about 40 kilometers (25 miles) northwest of Marquette, “it divided our community,” Davenport said.

“The Marquette community was against the mine,” she said, but the “iron ore miners, they were all about it.”

Mining dilemma

It’s the same story the world over, according to Simon Nish, who worked for Rio Tinto at the time.

“Communities are faced with this dilemma,” Nish said. “We want jobs, we want economic benefit. We don’t want long-term environmental consequences. We don’t really trust the regulator. We don’t trust the company. We don’t trust the activists. … In the absence of trusted information, we’re probably going to say no.”

Nish came from Australia, where a legal reckoning had taken place in the 1990s over the land rights of the country’s indigenous peoples. Early in his career, he worked as a mediator for the National Native Title Tribunal, which brokered agreements between Aboriginal peoples and resource companies who wanted to use their land.

It was a formative experience.

“On the resource company side, you can crash through and get a short-term deal, but that’s actually not benefiting anybody,” he said. “If you want to get a long-term outcome, you’ve actually really got to understand the interests of both sides.”

“Absolutely skeptical”

When Nish arrived in Michigan in 2011, Rio Tinto’s Eagle Mine was under construction but faced multiple lawsuits from community opponents.

In order to quell the controversy, Nish knew that Rio Tinto needed a partner that the community could trust. So he approached the Superior Watershed Partnership with an unusual offer. The group was already running programs testing local waterways for pollution. Would they be willing to discuss running a program to monitor the mine?

“We were surprised. We were skeptical. Absolutely skeptical,” Davenport said. But they agreed to discuss it.

SWP insisted on full, unfettered access to monitor “anything, any time, anywhere,” Nish said.

SWP’s position toward Rio Tinto was “very, very clear,” he recalled: “‘We’ve spent a long time building our reputation, our credibility here. We aren’t going to burn it for you guys.'”

Over the course of several months — “remarkably fast,” as these things go, Nish said — the environmental group and the mining company managed to work out an agreement.

SWP would monitor the rivers, streams and groundwater for pollution from the mine and the ore-processing mill 30 kilometers (19 miles) south. It would test food and medicinal plants important for the local Native American tribe. And it would post the results of these and other tests online for the public to see.

And Rio Tinto would pay for the work. A respected local community foundation would handle the funds. Rio Tinto’s funding would be at arm’s length from SWP.

“We didn’t want to be on their payroll,” said Richard Anderson, who chaired the SWP board at the time. “That could not be part of the structure.”

Not over yet

The agreement launching the Community Environmental Monitoring Program was signed in 2012. More than a decade later, no major pollution problems have turned up.

But other local environmentalists are cautious.

“I do think [Eagle Mine is] really trying to do a good job environmentally,” said Rochelle Dale, head of the Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve, another local environmental group that has opposed the mine.

“On the other hand, a lot of the sulfide mines in the past haven’t really had a problem until after closure.

“It’s something that our grandchildren are going to inherit,” she said.

As demand for metals heats up, opposition to new mines is not cooling off. Experts say mining companies are wising up to the need for community buy-in. Eagle Mine’s Community Environmental Monitoring Program points to one option, but also its limitations.

So far, so good. But the story’s not over yet.
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Among California’s farmers and ranchers, the recent return of the long-absent gray wolf also means a return of fears of livestock losses. From Tulare County, California, VOA’s Robin Guess reports. VOA footage by Matt Dibble.
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Democratic Party candidates who favor the right to an abortion recently secured big electoral wins in several conservative states. But to what extent could the issue of reproductive rights influence how Americans vote in the 2024 presidential election? VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias consulted with the experts.
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U.S. lawmakers are urging President Joe Biden to prioritize the release of U.S. citizens deemed wrongfully detained by China when he meets Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Wednesday in San Francisco. 

The U.S. State Department says Texas businessman Mark Swidan, Chinese American businessman Kai Li from Long Island, New York, and California pastor David Lin are wrongfully detained by China.

Republican Representative Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has repeatedly spoken out for Mark Swidan. McCaul urged Biden to put the release of Americans wrongfully detained by China high on the agenda for his meeting with Xi.

McCaul said in a statement sent to VOA Mandarin, “The Biden administration must stop making any concessions based on false promises and hold the [Chinese Communist Party] accountable for its gross human rights violations.”

In a letter to the White House on Nov. 8, Republican Representative Mike Gallagher, chairman of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, along with 12 Republican members of the committee, asked that Biden raise 10 issues with Xi, one of which is to release all American citizens the U.S. government has determined to be wrongfully detained in China.

Democratic Senator Ben Cardin, chairman of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also wrote to Biden, according to Reuters. 

“With the holiday season approaching, and the opportunity to start the New Year on a more positive note in bilateral U.S.-China relationships, I implore you to secure commitments from President Xi to release these Americans immediately,” Cardin wrote.

According to Reuters, a State Department spokesperson has noted that it continually raises wrongfully detained U.S. nationals during engagements with senior Chinese officials.

China says such cases are handled according to law.

Swidan, a Texas businessman, was arrested on drug-related charges in Guangdong Province in 2012 on his first trip to China.

In 2013, the Jiangmen Intermediate People’s Court in southern Guangdong convicted him of manufacturing and trafficking drugs.

In 2019, it handed down a death sentence with a two-year suspension. Under Chinese law, this means the sentence can be commuted to life imprisonment after two years, depending on the convict’s behavior.

This year, his appeal was denied, and the original sentence was upheld. 

The U.S. Embassy in China said in a statement, “We are disappointed by this decision and will continue to press for his immediate release and return to the United States.”

The Working Group on Arbitrary Detention of the United Nations Human Rights Council also characterized Swidan’s detention as illegal and called on Chinese authorities to immediately release him and provide compensation.

“It is 11 years this month since Mark was detained,” Swidan’s mother, Katherine Flint Swidan, 73, told VOA Mandarin. She said Biden must bring up those wrongfully detained in China when he meets Xi because “they are pawns.”

She told VOA Mandarin that the Chinese government has denied visitation requests from the U.S. consulate since September, and Beijing was transferring her son to Dongguan Prison, near the border with Hong Kong. 

She last heard her son’s voice during a call in 2018 and since then has communicated by letter.

In one, Swidan described dislocated knees, fluid accumulation in his legs and constant bleeding in his mouth.

She said Nicholas Burns, the U.S. ambassador to China, told her in August after visiting Swidan that he was in poor health and had suicidal tendencies.

Katherine Swidan lives in a small apartment in Luling, Texas, about 76 kilometers south of Austin. She needs a walker and relies on Social Security benefits to make ends meet.

She worries she may never see her son again and that he may never leave China safely.

 

Katherine Swidan said she spoke to Burns over the weekend, according to Reuters. She described the conversation as “disappointing” because the ambassador would not say whether Biden would raise her son’s name with Xi.

The U.S. Embassy in China has not provided updated information to VOA’s inquiries.

Kai Li’s son, Harrison Li, sent a letter to Biden last week, saying, “I’m following up now on my letters to you dated April 8, 2022, and June 15, 2022, to urge you to earn my father’s release in advance of your anticipated meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in San Francisco later this month.”

Harrison Li told VOA Mandarin, “The detainee issue is the type of small but important thorn in the bilateral relationship that can and should actually be resolved through dialogue. Our government has an obligation to take advantage of the current apparent warming in U.S.-China relations to move progress forward on these longstanding detainee cases.”

Chinese authorities arrested Kai Li at the Shanghai airport in 2016. Two years later, he was convicted of espionage charges, which he denies, and sentenced to 10 years in Shanghai’s Qingpu Prison, where many foreigners are incarcerated.

A former fellow prisoner, released from the institution housing Kai Li, told VOA Mandarin in September that Kai Li was sometimes called on by prison staff to help them communicate with foreign prisoners who spoke English.

The former prisoner asked not to be identified because he is afraid of retaliation by Chinese authorities.

He said Kai Li translated when prisoners were taken to the hospital and also managed the prison library. He added that Kai Li also often spoke of his son Harrison and was proud of Harrison for constantly speaking up about his case.

David Lin, a pastor from Orange County, California, was arrested in 2006, then convicted and sentenced to life on what the U.S. government says were bogus charges of contract fraud. A year ago, before the Biden-Xi meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali, Indonesia, Chinese authorities reduced Lin’s sentence to 24 years, meaning he will be 75 when freed in 2030.   

According to ChinaAid, Lin was detained in 2006 for helping a house church to build a church building, something that is illegal in China.

“Subsequently, authorities restricted him from leaving the country. He was arrested in 2009 on suspicion of ‘contract fraud.'”

Lin was sentenced to life in prison on the charge later that year.

Peter Humphrey, a British journalist turned consultant, was detained with his wife in 2013. They were found guilty of illegally obtaining information on Chinese citizens. Humphrey was sentenced to two and a half years in prison.

His wife was sentenced to two years. Both were released early in June 2015 for health reasons.

He now helps foreigners imprisoned by the Chinese government and campaigns for their release.

He believes there are more than three Americans wrongfully incarcerated by China.

Humphrey told VOA Mandarin, “The ordeals of the many Americans held in Xi’s jails should be high on the agenda for Biden’s meeting with Xi if Biden cares at all about wrongfully incarcerated American citizens. That means all American prisoners and not just a tiny select handful.”

“Not a single one of them has had a fair and transparent trial in front of an impartial judge because the Chinese legal and judicial system does not provide any such thing,” he said.

He suggested Biden hand over a list of all American citizens incarcerated in China, demand a mass prison transfer swap agreement to bring them home to an American facility, and then review their cases, none of which “would survive the scrutiny of an American court.”

Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report.

 
…

Hundreds of people gathered Tuesday in Washington to urge the Biden administration to extend labor protections to undocumented immigrants in the United States.

The Here to Work Day of Action march, organized by a coalition of dozens of migrant advocacy groups, called on U.S. President Joe Biden to allow immigrants living in the U.S. for years to apply for work permits. 

Lydia Walther-Rodríguez, one of the march organizers, told VOA that more than 3,000 people attended the event. They visited members of Congress to ask them for support and to press Biden to give work permits to the estimated 11 million people who are here undocumented. 

Walther-Rodríguez, who is a member of CASA, an immigration advocacy group, said allowing people to work and giving them temporary protection would also prevent family separation. 

“We are talking about security, but a security that gives the migrant movement the peace of mind to continue on a path to citizenship,” she said. 

Since February 2023, the Here to Work Coalition has brought together more than 300 businesses, Republican and Democratic governors, and members of Congress to urge the Biden administration to expand work permits for immigrants who have been paying taxes in the U.S. for years. 

According to immigrant advocates, the president can take this action by expanding humanitarian parole, Temporary Protected Status, and Deferred Enforced Departure. All three policies allow individuals who meet specific requirements to stay in the country and work temporarily.  

U.S. Congressman Jesus “Chuy” García, a Democrat from Illinois, addressed the protesters and supported their appeals, saying Biden must deliver for immigrants and that “We must all be heard.”

In a written statement after the march, Garcia added: “Whether you arrived days ago or decades ago, immigrants deserve dignity. Many of my constituents have worked and paid taxes for years, but still live without the protection and stability that comes from a work permit.” 

US labor shortage

In an October report, Stephanie Ferguson, director of Global Employment Policy and Special Initiatives at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, wrote that the country is facing “unprecedented challenges” trying to find enough workers to fill open jobs. 

“Right now, the latest data shows that we have 9.6 million job openings in the U.S., but only 6.4 million unemployed workers. We have a lot of jobs, but not enough workers to fill them. If every unemployed person in the country found a job, we would still have around 3 million open jobs,” Ferguson wrote.

According to data from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, there are 68 workers for every 100 open jobs.

Decades in the U.S.

Catalina Bueno, a Mexican immigrant who has lived in the United States for more than 30 years, traveled from Chicago to Washington. She hopes a work permit and Temporary Protected Status could help her immigration status.  

“We’ve made our lives here, and I think it is fair that they take us into account, which is fair to us because we have a life here … My whole life is here and returning to Mexico is difficult for me … We must all be heard, and the president, more than anything, must be fair to everyone,” she said.

Temporary protection 

The Biden administration recently announced an extension and redesignation of the program that gives temporary protection from deportation for nationals of Sudan and Ukraine. Nationals of El Salvador, Honduras, Nepal and Nicaragua also have had their protection extended. 

Advocates also called for new TPS designations. Immigrant rights groups have ongoing campaigns for Mauritania and Democratic Republic of Congo.

TPS allows migrants whose home countries are considered unsafe to live and work in the United States for a period of time if they meet certain requirements established by the U.S. government.  

Other forms of relief include deferred action, deferred enforced departure, or parole. Each has distinguished requirements while offering temporary relief from deportation and work authorization.

Some Republican lawmakers have pushed for legislation that would make U.S. immigration law more restrictive. 

Senate Republicans released a proposal on Nov. 6 that could prohibit or limit Biden officials’ use of temporary protection for migrants coming to the U.S.-Mexico border and those already in the United States.

The one-page plan narrows the scope of the parole statute to clarify that it is to be used rarely and limits granting parole to one year, with up to one one-year extension or less. 

Renata Castro, an immigration lawyer based in Florida, told VOA that Congress needs to act and that immigration is about economic growth.

“We need an innovative economy and the only way we will be able to do that is if we have meaningful immigration reform that deals with the needs and the problems of the United States of today, not of 30 or 40 years ago,” Castro said. 

The immigration attorney said other countries are taking note of the immigration challenges in the United States, and they are working hard to attract the best and the brightest.

“I, as a practicing immigration attorney, think that United States employers, particularly small businesses in the service industries, construction and hospitality, are really struggling because they cannot find individuals who are ready, willing and available to work. … Meaningful immigration reform could solve all of that,” she added.

Humanitarian parole or temporary status or protection, such as TPS or DED, is not a pathway to permanent residency. 
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