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TikTok disappears from Hong Kong app stores after new national security law comes into...
The Logo of social media app TikTok (also known as Douyin) is displayed on a smartphone on December 14, 2018 in Berlin, Germany.
Thomas Trutschel | Photothek | Getty Images
TikTok has been pulled from Apple's App Store and the Google Play Store in Hong Kong, days after a sweeping new national security law was introduced in the city.
Users who had already downloaded the popular short video app can no longer use it.
TikTok, which is owned by Beijing-based ByteDance, flagged earlier this week it would be exiting Hong Kong "in light of recent events," referencing the national security law passed at the end of June.
Under the new law, people found guilty of secession or subversion can be punished with a life sentence in prison. But the law also gives authorities powers to police online content including requiring technology platforms and internet service providers to delete content that falls foul of the legislation, or face fines.
Major U.S. organizations including Twitter and Facebook said they were pausing requests for user data from Hong Kong law enforcement while they evaluate what this law means.
Hong Kong TikTok users were greeted with the following message when they opened the app: "Thank you for the time you've spent on TikTok and giving us the the opportunity to bring a little bit of joy into your life!"
"We regret to inform you that we have discontinued operating TikTok in Hong Kong," it continued.
TikTok has come under fire from Washington which has accused it of censoring content on its platform that may be sensitive to Beijing. The app has denied that it does this.
The U.S. is also concerned that TikTok's data could be accessed by China. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said earlier this week the Trump administration is "looking at" banning TikTok and other Chinese social media apps.
TikTok said it has "never provided user data to the Chinese government, nor would we do so if asked."
The social media app has also come under fire in India where it was recently blocked along with 58 other Chinese apps. The Indian government said it took the action to ban the apps, alleging "they are engaged in activities which is prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defense of India, security of state and public order." Meanwhile, tensions between India and China have been rising over their disputed border in the Western Himalayas and a clash earlier this month left 20 Indian soldiers dead.
TikTok has been trying to distance itself from its Chinese parent. It hired an American CEO in the form of Kevin Mayer, a former Disney executive. His priority was seen as rebuilding trust with regulators.
And on Friday, ByteDance told CNBC it is "evaluating changes to the corporate structure of its TikTok business," but did not add further details as to what exactly that would entail.
ByteDance operates a version of TikTok in China called Douyin but a spokesperson said that the company "does not have plans" to make the app available on Hong Kong app stores. Douyin has local Hong Kong users who downloaded the app in mainland China, the spokesperson added.
— CNBC's Uptin Saiidi contributed to this report.
Coronavirus poses cultural threat to Brazil's Amazon people
AMAJARI, BRAZIL (AFP) - In the heart of the Brazilian Amazon, the advance of Covid-19 presents indigenous people with a cruel cultural dilemma - remain in their villages with little medical help, or seek safety in the city and risk being deprived of their ancestral funeral rites.
Ms Lucita Sanoma lost her two-month-old baby to suspected coronavirus on May 25. The boy was buried, without her knowledge, 300km from her village.
The infant died in hospital in Boa Vista, capital of the north-western state of Roraima.
The burial followed government health guidelines that run counter to Yanomami culture, which dictates that the dead must be cremated.
The authorities "have to understand and respect the cultural issue", indigenous leader Mauricio Yekuana told AFP, outraged at the suffering of the young mother and three other women with similar experiences.
As part of the Yanomami's funerary rites, the remains are displayed in the forest before they are cremated. The ashes are collected in an urn to be buried in a new ceremony much later.
"I want to bring my son's body back to the village, we must mourn him together," Ms Lucita Sanoma told AFP through an interpreter.
Her long black hair falling over her shoulders, the young woman wiped away tears as she described her distress in her own language.
"I went straight to the hospital with my son... The last word I received is that he died. I never saw him again," she said in a soft, rhythmic voice.
Not being able to mourn in her community, according to her ancestral rites, "is a lack of respect, which has a strong psychological effect on the mother", said Mr Junios Yanomami, president of the Yanomami Indigenous Health Council.
After her ordeal, Ms Lucita Sanoma returned to her village in the region of Auaris, in Brazil's north-west.
But her son's body remains in an unmarked grave in a Boa Vista cemetery, until the authorities decide if she can bring him home to grieve with her relatives.
DISREGARD FOR INDIGENOUS CULTURE
Mr Mauricio Yekuana said such situations are the result of health policies that disregard the indigenous perspective.
"The government just wants to impose its view of things on the indigenous people and force them to listen to what it wants to do," he told AFP. "It uses them for propaganda."
An online appeal for donations has been started by the Uniao Amazonia Viva collective to buy medical equipment, including respirators, to avoid sick people having to travel to the city.
In the meantime, the villagers are trying as best they can to respect social distancing measures and wear protective masks.
But their task has been made even more difficult by far-right President Jair Bolsonaro.
On Wednesday, he watered down a law that would force the government to provide indigenous people with access to healthcare and clean drinking water.
Of the nearly 8,000 cases of Covid-19 the government has registered in indigenous communities, 186 are from the Yanomami, four of whom died. Most were infected in the city.
Although there are no confirmed cases in Auaris, home to some 4,000 Yanomami and Yekuana people, the concern is palpable.
'WE ARE AFRAID'
Many locals wear masks and gloves, and the word "coronavirus" has entered the vocabulary.
"We are afraid," said Paulo, a community leader who wears a mask, a T-shirt and shorts and uses an arrow as a cane. He says that many went into the jungle to escape the virus.
Last week, the army distributed medicines and protective equipment to the indigenous people in the Auaris region.
"Nobody dares threaten our Amazon," reads a sign at the entrance to the military base where rapid Covid-19 tests are being carried out.
Nearby, youngsters play football in a field, oblivious to a sudden, soaking downpour.
The government minister for indigenous health, Mr Robson da Silva, says the main reason indigenous people contracted the virus was due to their constant movement.
But the Yanomami, who measure distances in terms of the time it takes to walk somewhere, say the danger to them has come from outside, especially from illegal gold miners who make regular incursions into their 96,000 sq km territory.
"Without that, we'd be safe," says Mr Mauricio Yekuana, whose white mask contrasts sharply with the black genipap-based paint that lines his face.
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