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Beijing, Feb. 24 (PTI): China's coronavirus-hit Wuhan city on Monday revoked its decision to partially lift a month-long lockdown barely three hours after the announcement, a media report said, as the death toll climbed to 2,592, while the number of confirmed cases increased to more than 77,000.
The Wuhan local administration earlier announced that people who are not quarantined and seeking special treatment or stranded in the city can leave in batches. The city of 11 million people was the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak.
China locked down Wuhan city on January 23, followed by the entire Hubei province with over 50 million people. Wuhan is the provincial capital of Hubei. Over 18 cities in the province have been sealed.
The evacuation has evoked hope for many as no residents were allowed to leave the city since then, including several hundred foreigners, mainly students.
Meanwhile, the death toll climbed to 2,592 with 150 new fatalities while the total number of confirmed cases increased to over 77,000, health officials said on Monday.
China's National Health Commission (NHC) said it received reports of 409 new confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus infection and 150 deaths from 31 provincial-level regions on Sunday.
The overall confirmed cases in mainland China has reached 77,150 with a total of 2,592 fatalities by the end of Sunday, the NHC said.
Hubei province and its capital Wuhan, the ground zero of the virus, continued to bear the brunt with 149 death while one person died in Hainan province, it said.
China postpones annual
Parliament session for 1st time in decades
In
an unprecedented move, China on Monday postponed the annual session of
Parliament from March 5 due to the coronavirus outbreak, state media reported
as the country grapples with the deadly virus that has claimed over 2,500 lives
and infected more than 77,000 people.
The ruling Communist Party of China (CPC) showcases its political clout in the annual Parliament session.
The country's top legislature, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), met here and approved a draft decision on postponing the NPC's annual session due to coronavirus, China Global Television Network TV reported.
The third annual session of the 13th NPC, one of China's biggest political events, was originally planned to open on March 5 in Beijing.
Every year, the NPC and the top advisory body Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), which together have over 5,000 members in their ranks, meet during March to approve the government's annual agenda including the budget.
But the coronavirus outbreak continues to be a major concern.
The postponement of the NPC, which is often viewed as a rubber-stamp parliament for its routine approval of the CPC proposals, is regarded as an unprecedented move.
Expelled
Wall Street Journal reporters leave China after headline row
Two
Wall Street Journal reporters left China on Monday after being expelled over a
controversial headline in an op-ed that angered Beijing.
Three reporters were ordered out of the country last week over what Beijing deemed a racist headline that the journalists were not involved in writing -- marking one of the harshest moves against foreign media in years.
But analysts noted that the decision to revoke their credentials came a day after Washington tightened rules on Chinese state media operating in the United States -- raising suspicion that Beijing had retaliated.
The Journal opinion piece -- headlined "China is the Real Sick Man of Asia" -- was written by a US professor who criticised the Chinese government's initial response to the coronavirus outbreak.
China's foreign ministry said it was "racially discriminatory", and as the newspaper wouldn't apologise, the three China-based reporters had their press cards revoked.
Deputy bureau chief Josh Chin and reporter Chao Deng, both US nationals, as well as reporter Philip Wen, an Australian, were given five days to leave the country, according to the Journal.
The three journalists work for The Wall Street Journal's news section, which is not linked to the editorial and opinion pages.
A letter from 53 Journal reporters and editors called for the newspaper's leadership to apologise, according to reports in the Washington Post and the New York Times, saying the headline was "derogatory".
An AFP reporter saw Chin and Wen, wearing face masks, check-in for their flight at Beijing's main international airport and then pass through security.
Deng, the third journalist affected, had been reporting from Wuhan -- the epicentre of the virus outbreak which has killed over 2,500 people.
The Journal confirmed to AFP that she was still in the quarantined city.
The phrase "sick man of Asia" originally referred to China in the late 19th and early 20th century, when it was exploited by foreign powers during a period sometimes called the country's "century of humiliation".