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India is airlifting in emergency medical supplies as countries around the world offer to help it battle a catastrophic second wave of Covid-19 infections that Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said “had shaken the nation”.

New Delhi reported a world record 349,000 new infections on Saturday, along with more than 2,700 deaths as the country’s second wave breaks global milestones.

A total of 190,000 people are reported to have died from Covid-19 in India, though experts believe the true number of cases and deaths is being widely undercounted as sick patients struggle to get tested and fatalities are misreported.

Chronic shortages of beds and oxygen have left hospitals in hotspots such as Delhi pleading publicly for relief, while patients die for want of treatment even while they queue outside hospitals waiting to be seen. More than 20 patients died at one private hospital in Delhi, Jaipur Golden, after oxygen supplies ran low.

Coronavirus digest

  • Japan has enacted a state of emergency in Tokyo, Osaka, Hyogo and Kyoto prefectures between April 25 and May 11 in an effort to halt a rapid rise in cases.

  • A fire at a Baghdad hospital for coronavirus patients has killed at least 80 people and injured more than 100.

  • Boris Johnson’s team is braced for allegations from his former aide Dominic Cummings that the prime minister could have prevented thousands of deaths in the winter wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.

  • Vaccine makers have warned US officials that temporarily scrapping patents for Covid-19 shots would risk handing novel technology to China and Russia, according to people familiar with the talks.

  • The chief executive of Qatar Airways poured cold water on hopes for a rapid recovery in aviation and warned of a need for more co-operation in creating vaccine passports to save the industry.

Read More:  Toyota's new hydrogen race car faces Taikyu test

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In the news

Global chip shortage spreads The deepening global chip crunch is spreading to makers of smartphones, televisions and home appliances, according to suppliers in Asia, as companies boost stockpiles of in-demand semiconductors.

Russia signals plans for Putin-Biden summit A summit between President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart Joe Biden is likely to take place as early as June, a senior Kremlin official said on Sunday, amid hopes that face-to-face talks between the two leaders will ease heightened tension between Moscow and Washington.

Turkey rejects Biden’s recognition of Armenian genocide After Joe Biden on Saturday described the killing and deportation of as many as 1.5m Armenians beginning in 1915 as a genocide — breaking with decades of presidents who have avoided the term — Turkey warned Biden his words had “opened a wound” in relations between the two Nato allies.

A torchlight procession in Yerevan, Armenia, on Saturday, marking the 106th anniversary of the massacre of Armenians by Ottoman Turks © AP

Indonesia locates sunken submarine near Bali Indonesia has found a missing submarine split into three parts in deep waters near Bali, declaring all 53 crew dead after a five-day search. Based on the evidence found by rescuers, the diesel-powered submarine “has sunk and all of its crew have died”, Marshal Hadi Tjahjanto, Indonesia’s military chief, told reporters on Sunday.

South Korea’s retail investor army declares war on short-sellers The wave of amateur Korean traders has been inspired by a US campaign against hedge funds that had made bearish wagers on companies such as gaming retail chain GameStop. Kstreetbets, an online forum that targets short-sellers, is named after the popular Reddit group r/WallStreetBets.

MPs declare China’s treatment of Uyghurs genocide British MPs on Thursday unanimously approved a parliamentary motion denouncing China’s treatment of Uyghurs as genocide, as pressure grew on Boris Johnson’s administration to adopt a tougher stance against Beijing.

Read More:  Chinese wary as Beijing pushes mass vaccination

Beijing fights Ant Group over control of data China’s central bank is attempting to take control of Ant Group’s trove of consumer lending data, one of the most valuable assets in Jack Ma’s internet empire, marking the latest front in the government crackdown on the billionaire’s financial technology group.

Ant’s growing share of revenue from lending

The day ahead

The Oscars The Academy Awards will kick off at 8pm EDT/8am HKT on April 25. Catch up on our coverage of the nominated films.

Earnings Canadian National Railway will report results on Monday. Meanwhile, the board of Kansas City Southern is set to review a proposed $33.7bn offer from Canadian National, the latest twist in the takeover battle for the US rail operator which could yield the largest merger of the year. Tesla and Pearson also set to report earnings.

What else we’re reading

‘Drowning in insecurity’: young people after the pandemic In the first of a series, younger readers describe to the FT how they feel the social contract for their generation is broken. Plus, you can sign up here to attend our FT Next Gen: A New Deal for the Young free webinar series this week.

“If I carry on the way I am, I’m not sure what I’ll be able to pass down,” Akin Ogundele, 34, says. “It can’t be good for the country — the disparities are just going to grow, the wealthy are going to grow wealthier and those that aren’t will get more and more removed.”

Multiple line chart showing the employment rate of young people around the world has been slow to recover after the financial crisis. In most places, it was yet to reach pre-recession levels before the Covid-19 pandemic

Barbarians are knocking on Japan’s corporate gates The Toshiba-CVC deal may have evaporated for now, but it will surely prompt others, writes Leo Lewis. If private equity funds have been submitting proposals to a company as sensitive as Toshiba since last year, you can be sure that less controversial proposals are sitting in CEO inboxes across corporate Japan.

Read More:  HK sets 10-day target to stop virus transmission – Asia Times

China and Hollywood: the end of the affair If Chloé Zhao nabs any of the Academy Awards she is nominated for, she will make history as the first Chinese woman to break into the upper echelons of Hollywood. But tension with China over her ascent illustrates how the world’s two most important movie markets are diverging. Get ready for a different moviegoing experience post-Covid. (FT, Atlantic)

Beijing-born Chloé Zhao in February became the first Asian woman to win a Golden Globe for best director © 20th Century Fox/The Hollywood Archive/Alamy
Beijing-born Chloé Zhao in February became the first Asian woman to win a Golden Globe for best director © 20th Century Fox/The Hollywood Archive/Alamy

There’s no place like home — and the labour market needs to adjust A more location-based approach to job creation is gaining steam, writes Rana Foroohar. Research shows that communities adapt very differently to economic downturns so a variety of approaches are needed — rather than just policies designed to create job growth at a national level.

End of an era for the International Space Station The International Space Station, the largest global collaboration in science and engineering, has been a meeting point for astronauts since 1998. Moscow’s departure from the project is expected to lead to more space collaboration with Beijing — and bring two decades of rare co-operation with the west to a close.

Astronaut James H Newman during a spacewalk in 1998 © NASA/Getty
Russia announced this week that it will withdraw from the $150bn ISS in 2025, ending a remarkable period of international co-operation that dates back to the perestroika period at the end of the cold war © Getty Images

Video of the day

Will zero emissions aviation ever take off? Aviation must find an alternative to fossil fuels if countries are to hit ambitious net zero targets by 2050. As the FT’s Peggy Hollinger explains, intriguing options using electric batteries, bio and synthetic fuels, and hydrogen propulsion are being explored, but so far nothing can compete with the cost and efficiency of carbon-polluting kerosene.

Thank you for reading. Send your recommendations and feedback to firstft@ft.com

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