World health officials say an outbreak of pneumonia in the central Chinese city of Wuhan is being caused by a new strain of the virus that led to the deadly SARS outbreak over a decade ago. VOA’s Jeff Custer reports from Washington.

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At home and in their own lives, Americans by and large have an upbeat view of the year to come. When it comes to how the country will fare in 2020, well, that’s another matter.
A new poll released Friday by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that close to 4 in 10 Americans expect a better year ahead for them personally, while another half expect things to stay about the same. Only about 1 in 10 expect a downturn in their own lives in 2020.
America’s mood takes a darker turn when it comes to the year ahead for the country overall, with about 4 in 10 saying the way things are going nationwide will get worse. Only about 3 in 10 think things will get better for America overall in the next 12 months.
“It’s going to be fine for me. I’ll always be fine no matter what happens, I’m that kind of person,” said Leslie Schulgren, a 75-year-old Democrat and retired science teacher in Atlanta. But, she added, “this particular year, 2020, is not going to be pretty — there’s going to be too much fighting.”
2020 is an election year, and, perhaps not unexpectedly, that might have something to do with it: Most Democrats and Republicans alike say they’re dissatisfied with the state of politics.
“Everybody is Republican or Democrat, and there’s less in between,” said Caleb Jud, a 29-year-old customer service representative in Cincinnati. Jud is a left-leaning independent who supports Democratic presidential hopeful Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, and he is optimistic that the old way of politics is at a breaking point.
“They’ve been saying for years that the middle class is shrinking, but it’s starting to seem now that it’s not just a buzzword,” Jud said.
Roberta Hunt, a 78-year-old Republican in Santa Ana, California, is also frustrated by partisanship. “It’d be fine if we could eliminate the Democrats,” she said of the political system.
Hunt and her husband still have to work to support themselves, and she’s not optimistic that their situation will improve. But she does think the country is on the right track — “there’s less poverty, more people at work.”
Republicans such as Hunt are more likely than Democrats to express optimism that the way things are going in the country will improve, 54% to 11%. They’re also somewhat more likely to feel that their personal situation will improve, 50% to 33%.
Economy, health care
The poll also finds that few Americans are confident that the government will make progress this year on the issues they care about, with pocketbook and health care-related issues topping the country’s to-do list.
Asked to name their top five priorities for government action in 2020, rather than picking from a list, about 6 in 10 Americans identified economic issues — including jobs and unemployment, the federal budget and trade. Half said health care. While Democrats and Republicans were about as likely to want a focus on at least one economic issue, 15% of Republicans identified trade specifically as a priority, compared with just 5% of Democrats. Democrats were more likely than Republicans to name issues related to health care.
Hunt sees homelessness and government limiting its own role as top priorities, but she doubts there will be official progress on either. To fix homelessness, a particularly acute problem in Southern California, will require more action by both the private sector and individuals, Hunt said.
Immigration, foreign policy
The share of Americans mentioning issues related to immigration declined from a year ago. About a third now name immigration-related issues, including more Republicans than Democrats, compared with about half heading into 2019.
The poll was conducted before President Donald Trump ordered the Jan. 2 airstrike that killed Iranian Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani. Even so, about 3 in 10 Americans named foreign policy concerns other than immigration among the top issues facing the nation, including those related to national security, U.S. involvement overseas and specific adversaries, such as China and Russia.
Even some who identified domestic concerns brought a tinge of foreign affairs to their issues. Jing Zhou, a naturalized citizen from China and an auto engineer in Rochester Hills, Michigan, identified education as a top priority. “I want to see my son, who is American now, compete better than his counterpart in China,” Zhou said.
The 45-year-old is concerned, however, that divisions in the political system will prevent progress. “It’s good to have a difference of opinion, but opinions are too wide apart,” Zhou said. “There’s almost no way to come to a middle ground.”
The poll found that the country is about evenly split on whether its best days are ahead of it or behind it. Zhou said there’s no question America’s role as the world’s lone superpower is diminishing, but he still believes the future will be bright.
In Cincinnati, Jud, the customer service representative, came to a similar conclusion. “If you look at the best days of the U.S. being No. 1 on the world stage, those days are coming to an end,” Jud said. “But I feel that, overall, things will be better.”
 

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An American warship was “aggressively approached” by a Russian Navy ship in the North Arabian Sea, the U.S. Navy said Friday.
Navy Cmdr. Josh Frey, spokesman for U.S. 5th Fleet, said that the USS Farragut was conducting routine operations Thursday and sounded five short blasts to warn the Russian ship of a possible collision. He said the USS Farragut, an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, asked the Russian ship to change course and the ship initially refused but ultimately moved away.
Even though the Russian ship moved away, Frey said the delay in shifting course “increased the risk of collision.”
 

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South Sudanese First Vice President Taban Deng Gai is denying allegations of human rights abuses and criticizing U.S. sanctions against him.
The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned Deng on Wednesday. Officials say Deng arranged and directed the deaths of two prominent activists — human rights lawyer Samuel Dong Luak and opposition politician Aggrey Iddri — and tried to derail South Sudan’s peace process. Conflict broke out in 2013 following a power struggle between President Salva Kiir and then-Vice President Riek Machar.
The U.S. government also says Deng worked to divide opposition opponents and members of the broader ethnic Nuer community who were displaced because of the conflict. Officials say he directed the actions to solidify his position within Kiir’s government and to intimidate members of the SPLM-IO, of which Iddri was a member.

FILE – Children play with a suitcase in a displaced persons camp for the Nuer ethnic group inside the UNMISS compound in Bor, South Sudan, Feb. 27, 2014.Deng called the sanctions “regrettable and baseless.”
The U.S. move is the latest in a series of sanctions against South Sudanese individuals.
The Treasury Department accuses South Sudan’s government of refusing to create “political space for dissenting voices, from opposition parties, ethnic groups, civil society, or media,” an issue it said has been a key factor in the country’s inability to implement a peace agreement and ongoing acts of violence against civilians.
In September 2018, Kiir and Machar signed a revitalized peace agreement that called for the formation of a national unity government by May 2019. Government and opposition leaders extended that deadline twice, but have not taken steps to create a unified national army — one of the measures seen as key to implementing the peace deal. The biggest remaining obstacle between the government and the opposition is the dispute over the number of states and their boundaries.
Kiir and Machar are scheduled to form the unity government in February.
Defending Deng 
Deng’s office manager defended his boss and his activities.
“In discharging his duties as the first vice president of the Republic of South Sudan, he dedicated and committed himself to working for the unity and peaceful co-existence among the people of South Sudan to secure a future for them,” Adel Sandrai told VOA.
The U.S. said the sanctions fall under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act, which targets perpetrators of serious human rights abuse and corruption.

FILE – South Sudan’s First Vice President Taban Deng Gai, left, speaks with President Salva Kiir after Taban was sworn in, replacing opposition leader Riek Machar, at the presidential palace in Juba, South Sudan, July 26, 2016.The Treasury Department noted in its statement that since the September 2018 peace deal, which included a permanent cease-fire, hundreds of civilians have been killed, raped and abducted. It said the U.S. will not hesitate to target individuals who have perpetuated the conflict.
Sandrai maintains that Deng has worked to restore peace in South Sudan.
“Despite the sanctions wrongly imposed on him, H.E General Taban Deng Gai pledges to continue to work with the United States and the international community to demonstrate such commitment and to prove the unfounded nature of the allegations against him,” Sandrai said.
The sanctions freeze all cash or assets held in the U.S. and block Deng from accessing the American financial system.
Next steps
Abraham Kuol Nyuon, professor of political science at the University of Juba, said Kiir should fire the officials already on the list of people sanctioned by the United States.
“The president should be able to redeem himself by trying to make sure he disassociates himself from the people who have already been sanctioned and the people who have become spoilers to the peace agreement,” Nyuon told VOA’s South Sudan in Focus program.
Nyuon said he believes the only way Kiir can turn things around is by convincing the international community he is ready to cooperate.
“All the people around the president are already sanctioned and now the United States is seriously watching every step of the president,” Nyuon said.
In December, the U.S. sanctioned Defense Minister Kuol Manyang Juuk and Cabinet Affairs Minister Martin Elia Lomuro, saying they fueled the five-year conflict and obstructed peace in South Sudan, the world’s youngest country. Five other South Sudanese were sanctioned last month.  
 

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The Islamic State group gloated over the recent U.S. killing of a senior Iranian general, who rose to prominence by advising forces fighting the extremists.
In the first IS comments since Gen. Qassem Soleimani’s slaying, the group said his death “pleased the hearts of believers.” The editorial was released in the group’s al-Nabaa online newspaper late Thursday.
Although the U.S. and Iran strictly avoided working together directly, they were once on the same side in the fight against IS. Neither side wants to see the extremists stage a comeback.
But as the various players in Iraq jockey to come out ahead in a post-Soleimani landscape, Islamic State militants may find an opening. Thousands of fighters are scattered among the group’s sleeper cells, and have claimed attacks in both Iraq and neighboring Syria in recent months.
As the head of Iran’s elite Quds Force, Soleimani was one of the main commanders on the ground spearheading the fight against IS. He sent thousands of Iran-backed fighters to Iraq and Syria to battle the extremists, and directed Iraqi Shiite militias as well. A top Iraqi militia commander was killed alongside Soleimani in last week’s U.S. drone strike.
The IS editorial said that its members tried for years to kill the two commanders, but that “God brought their end at the hands of their allies.” It said both men “have gone too far in shedding the blood of Muslims in Iraq and Syria.”
Iraq’s caretaker prime minister has now asked Washington to start working out a road map for withdrawing the more than 5,000 American troops in Iraq, in response to Soleimani’s killing. But the U.S. State Department on Friday bluntly rejected the request.
Iraqis have felt furious and helpless at being caught in the middle of fighting between Baghdad’s two closest allies.
 
 

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The United Nations human rights office accused members of the ethnic-Lendu community in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Ituri Province of mass violations against the ethnic Hema community, which could constitute crimes against humanity.
Inter-ethnic tensions between the Lendu and Hema communities over land and other resources have gone on for decades.  But the U.N. human rights office reports those disputes have spiraled out of control and become particularly dangerous and alarming.  
A U.N. investigation from December 2017 to September 2019 found more than 700 people were killed, 168 injured and at least 143 people sexually violated in the territories of Djugu and Mahagi in DRC’s Ituri Province.  U.N. human rights spokesman Rupert Colville said most of the perpetrators are Lendu and most of the victims are Hema.
“The report documents numerous cases of women being raped, of children—some in school uniforms—being killed, and of looting and burning of villages,” he said. “The violence could contain some elements of crimes against humanity through murder, torture, rape and other forms of sexual violence, pillage and persecution.”  
The report said the barbarity of the attacks reflects the desire of the attackers to inflict lasting trauma to the Hema communities and force them to flee and not return to their homes.  The U.N. said schools and health clinics were attacked and destroyed, houses and villages burned to the ground.  The attacks occurred in June and December during the harvest and planting seasons and aimed to prevent the Hema from cultivating their land and have them experience food shortages.
Colville told VOA those tactics have some characteristics of genocide.  But he said the burden of proof for genocide is so high one has to be very cautious before jumping to such conclusions.  
“I think what they are doing in the report is just flagging this element is there,” he said. “It is inter-ethnic.  It appears to be targeting on a big scale.  It is organized and systematic, and there are elements that could lead to, perhaps depending on what happens in the future to a characterization of genocide.  But it is a very tentative reference.  It is not dwelled on at any length.” 
The U.N. human rights office recommended DRC authorities address the root causes of the Lendu-Hema conflict, urged authorities to conduct an independent and impartial investigation into the violence, and to compensate the victims.

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About 97% of internet users in Taiwan use Facebook. The island also has Asia’s second highest smartphone penetration after South Korea. Given these statistics, the first announced by Facebook in 2018 and the other by a market research firm, it made sense that a lot of campaigning for Saturday’s presidential election would jump from the streets to the internet.
But the rise of internet campaigning has challenged voters to know what’s true or false, and to follow a growing suite of anti-fake news laws, as politicians allege that mountains of online campaign information are untrue, illegally posted and often planted by Taiwan’s political rival China.
“Beginning from last year we saw that China is using modern technology, in short it’s the social media platforms, to try to interrupt in our discussions on the internet, either through Facebook or through Twitter or even a popular online chat mechanism called Line,” Taiwan Foreign Minister Joseph Wu told a news conference Thursday. “The fake news situation seems to be quite serious.”

Taiwanese Foreign Minister Joseph Wu gestures while speaking during an interview with The Associated Press at his ministry in Taipei, Taiwan, Dec. 10, 2019.Last year officials passed laws that ban the spread of that information and local media say police are investigating several cases.
Rise of social media
Social media such as Facebook, Line and Twitter appeal to people younger than 40 because those voters tend to trust information received through social media as posted by their friends, said George Hou, a mass communications lecturer at Taiwan-based I-Shou University. They find print and television news too formal as well as subject to manipulation by politicians, he said.
Incumbent President Tsai Ing-wen and her chief rival Han Kuo-yu aggressively use Facebook to promote campaign events throughout the day and live broadcast some of them. Tsai’s official Facebook page led Han in followers at 2.6 million as of Jan. 3.
Tsai also worked with a YouTube celebrity who asked her mock pickup lines, effectively freshening up her image before the vote.
“The internet stars are an important point, and they can let people get to know a different side of (the politicians),” Hou said. “Even more so, they let people feel that an authority is close to them, not so high and mighty.”

Han Kuo-yu, Taiwan’s 2020 presidential election candidate of the KMT or Nationalist Party, speaks during a campaign rally in Taipei, Taiwan, Jan. 9, 2020.Glut of ‘fake news’
So-called fake news comes from more than 1,000 venues in China every day, Chen Chih-wei, international affairs deputy director with the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, told a news conference Tuesday. A study by the V-Dem Institute at University of Gothenburg in Sweden lists Taiwan as one of the most vulnerable places of more than 200 surveyed worldwide.
China sees Taiwan as part of its territory with no rights to elect its own leaders. The two sides have been separately ruled since the Chinese civil war of the 1940s.
Taiwanese officials believe China tries to steer voters toward candidates whom they like. The incumbent has needled China since taking office in 2016 by rejecting its condition that both sides belong to the same country. Her chief opponent advocates dialogue on China’s condition. Taiwanese will also elect a new parliament.
Older voters who are new to social media particularly struggle to know truth from lies, said Wu Yih-hsuan, a 28-year-old Taiwanese doctoral student. His parents, both 64, are dabbling in social media. 
“The young generation joined the social media starting around a decade ago, while the seniors, taking my parents for instance, started to use Line four years ago only,” he said.
Corrections and crackdowns
Officials try to rebut as much fake news as possible, the foreign minister said. They, too, work with Line and Facebook to block fake accounts and remove false news, he said, and sometimes consult a local nonprofit fact-checking service.
The Cabinet tightened two criminal codes in April to ban the spread of fake news, including resending false content. On Dec. 31, parliament passed an anti-infiltration law criminalizing influence from offshore in Taiwan’s elections.
Police detained a National Taiwan University political science professor last month over a 2018 Facebook post criticizing the government-run National Palace Museum, according to local media reports. Someone also posted to Line the false information that Tsai’s party spent the equivalent of NT$30 million to organize an LGBT pride parade in Taipei, according to the website PinkNews.com.
 
“This problem has become quite obvious close to the election,” said Huang Kwei-bo, vice dean of the international affairs college at National Chengchi University in Taipei. Police probes now risk violating people’s rights to express opinions, he added. “The power to suppress free speech has grown bigger,” Huang said.
But fake news probably has little impact on people’s voting decisions, said Shelley Rigger, a visiting researcher with National Taiwan University’s College of Social Sciences. Most youth are skeptical of what they read and Taiwanese overall have long known that “the PRC is trying to undermine their democracy.”

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MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida, was briefly put on lockdown Friday morning after a report of an armed suspect outside the base.
Base officials were assisting local law enforcement in searching for the suspect, Lt. Brandon Hanner, a spokesman for MacDill said. All MacDill gates to the base were reopened except for the one closest to the location where the suspect was seen.
MacDill first responders were on the scene and isolated the response to an area outside one of the base’s gates, a news release from the base said.
Traffic was at a standstill on numerous roads around the base, which is near downtown Tampa, news outlets reported. MacDill is the headquarters for U.S. Central Command and U.S. Special Operations Command.
MacDill is the home of the 6th Air Refueling Wing. There are more than 15,000 military personnel at the base. A large number of military personnel and their families live on the base in military housing.
Friday’s lockdown came a month after 2nd Lt. Mohammed Alshamrani, a 21-year-old Saudi Air Force officer, killed three U.S. sailors and injured eight other people Dec. 6 at Naval Air Station Pensacola.
 

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Iran has invited the National Transportation Safety Board, the U.S. accident investigation agency, to participate in the probe of the Ukrainian Boeing commercial jetliner that crashed near Tehran earlier this week.
The NTSB said in a statement Thursday it had received “formal notification” about the crash from the Aircraft Accident Investigation Board of the Civil Aviation Organization of Iran and is sending “an accredited representative to the investigation of the crash.”
Iran has also invited Boeing, the U.S. manufacturer of the plane, to be a part of the investigation team.
It is not, however, immediately clear what level of participation the two U.S. entities would have in the investigation because of the U.S. sanctions placed on Iran and the heightened tensions between the two countries.
Ukraine is also taking part in the investigation.

A color-infrared view shows the area where an Ukraine International Airlines plane crashed after takeoff from Iran’s Imam Khomeini airport, on the outskirts of Tehran, Maxar’s WorldView-2 satellite image taken Jan. 9, 2020.The latest development comes as U.S. President Donald Trump publicly voiced suspicion that Iran may have accidentally shot down the Ukrainian airliner.
“Somebody could have made a mistake on the other side,” said Trump of Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752. “Some people say it was mechanical. Personally, I don’t think that’s even a question.”
Ballistic missile attack
The crash occurred just hours after Iran launched a ballistic missile attack on Iraqi bases housing U.S. soldiers in response to last week’s U.S. drone attack that killed Iranian Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani.
Iranian officials have maintained the Boeing 737-800, at an altitude of 2,400 meters, suffered a catastrophic engine failure early Wednesday, local time. All 176 people on the plane bound for Kyiv died, including 63 Canadians.

Mourners attend a vigil at University of Toronto student housing for the victims of a Ukrainian passenger jet, which crashed in Iran, in this still image taken from a video, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, Jan. 8, 2020.Government sources have told VOA that U.S. officials have examined satellite data and imagery leading them to believe the airliner, just after taking off from Tehran, was hit by a Russian-made surface-to-air missile after being targeted accidentally.
A U.S. official confirmed to VOA that he is confident the plane was shot down by Iran.
“At some point they’ll release the black box. Ideally, they’ll get it to Boeing,” Trump added in remarks to reporters in the White House Roosevelt Room Thursday.
Video of the aircraft shows it breaking up in the air in a fireball over Iran.
The head of Iran’s of Civil Aviation Organization denies the plane could have been hit by a missile.
“Scientifically, it is impossible that a missile hit the Ukrainian plane and such rumors are illogical,” ISNA quoted Ali Abedzadeh as saying.
The New York Times posted video on its website late Thursday that the newspaper identified as “verified video showing the moment a Ukrainian airliner was hit in Iran.” The Times said the video, provided by Maxar Technologies, appeared to show a missile hitting a plane, which did not explode immediately. The Times said the aircraft turned back “toward the airport ablaze before it exploded.”

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks to the press, Jan. 9, 2020, in Ottawa, Canada. He said Canada had intelligence from multiple sources indicating that a Ukrainian airliner that crashed near Tehran was mistakenly shot down by Iran.Canada and Ukraine
The governments of Ukraine and Canada are not accepting the initial assessment by Iran that the cause of the crash appeared to be a mechanical issue.
Citing what he called “intelligence from multiple sources,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Thursday that “the intelligence indicates that the plane was shot down by an Iranian surface-to-air missile.”
Trudeau added, “This may well have been unintentional.”
Andriy Shevchenko, Ukraine’s ambassador to Canada, expressed solidarity with Canada.
“We, Ukrainians, share the pain that Canadians feel, and the stories that we see on television there are just as heartbreaking to us as the stories about our flight attendants and our pilots that we see on Ukrainian television,” Shevchenko told VOA’s Ukraine service Thursday. “We just feel that we have to walk through this pain together.”
Asked if Trudeau’s announcement would hinder the investigation, Shevchenko said he wouldn’t speculate.
“I wouldn’t speculate on the reasons of the crash either,” he said, “but I would say that it is in the everyone’s interest, including Iran, to have very good, transparent and genuine investigation into this tragedy. I think that truth and only truth is something that can get us moving forward.”

Flowers and candles are placed in front of the portraits of the flight crew of the Ukraine International Airlines Boeing 737-800 plane that crashed in Iran, at a memorial at the Boryspil International airport outside Kiev, Ukraine, Jan. 8, 2020.Sixty-three of the crash victims were from Canada, which has more than 200,000 citizens of Iranian descent. It is also popular with Iranian students.
“I’m glad that Prime Minister Trudeau is taking this so seriously, but I was saddened and angry that the evidence points to an Iranian missile being responsible for the crash,” Avideh Montmaen-Far, president of the Council of Iranian Canadians, told VOA’s Persian service.
“I hope Canada and other international experts will be involved in order to ensure the investigation is thorough, because families of the victims deserve truth and closure,” she said.
Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s Security Council, said there were several working theories regarding the crash, including a missile strike.
“A strike by a missile, possibly a Tor missile system, is among the main [theories], as information has surfaced on the internet about elements of a missile being found near the site of the crash,” he told reporters.
Britain urges full investigation
In Britain, government officials told reporters it is looking into “very concerning” reports the plane had been struck by a surface-to-air missile.
Following a phone call Thursday between British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the British government said there needs to be “a full, credible and transparent investigation in what happened.” But British officials added that they did not think the downing of the jet was intentional.
The global security risk company IHS Markit issued a briefing Thursday claiming that the UIA flight was hit by an SA-15 missile fired by a unit of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Security officers and Red Crescent workers are seen at the site where the Ukraine International Airlines plane crashed after takeoff from Iran’s Imam Khomeini airport, on the outskirts of Tehran, Iran, Jan. 8, 2020.Ukraine’s deputy foreign minister said his government has sent a team of experts who are on the ground in Iran, working with their Iranian counterparts to sift through the crash debris for evidence of the cause.
“Our priority is that all the pieces of information should be collected and preserved,” Sergiy Kyslytsya told a small group of reporters in New York. “On the black boxes, there are rules and they should be followed, and I am looking forward to the full cooperation of Iran — it is in their best interest.”
He discouraged speculation and conspiracy theories, saying they would hurt the families of the victims.
“My other concern is that the international protocols, conventions and regulations should be duly implemented when it comes to the investigation,” Kyslytsya said. 
Investigators in Iran said the voice and data recorders from the Boeing 737 aircraft, built in 2016, were recovered from the crash site on the outskirts of the Iranian capital, but that the so-called black boxes were damaged and some data had been lost.
The Convention on International Civil Aviation, to which Iran is a signatory, does not require Tehran to hand over the data recorders to the NTSB or Boeing, Andriy Guck, a Ukraine-based attorney and aviation expert, said.
“There is a duty to investigate,” Guck told VOA’s Ukrainian Service in a phone conversation. “Iran can decide to investigate the black boxes by itself or transfer them to a foreign laboratory. But if the Iranians do not allow anyone else to participate in the examination of the boxes, it will raise doubts about their investigation.”
VOA Pentagon Correspondent Carla Babb, VOA National Security Correspondent Jeff Seldin, U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer, Jamie Dettmer, Michael Lipin of VOA Persian, and Tatiana Vorozhko of VOA’s Ukrainian Service contributed to this report.

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The U.S. has deployed tens of thousands of troops across the Middle East region, many of them stationed in countries near Iran. Here is a look at U.S. troops in each country in the region at a time of high tensions between the U.S. and Iran.

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GUAYANILLA, Puerto Rico — More than 2,000 people in shelters. Nearly 1 million without power. Hundreds of thousands without water.
The aftermath of a 6.4-magnitude earthquake that killed one person, injured nine others and severely damaged infrastructure in Puerto Rico’s southwest coast is deepening as the island’s government says it is overwhelmed.
Many in the affected area are comparing the situation to Hurricane Maria, a Category 4 storm that hit in September 2017, as hundreds of families who are unable to return to their damaged homes wonder where they’ll stay in upcoming weeks and months as hope fades of electricity being restored soon.
“We have to remain outside because everything inside is destroyed,” said 84-year-old Brunilda Sanchez, who has been sleeping outdoors in a government-supplied cot in the southwest coastal town of Guanica. “We don’t know how long we’ll have to stay here.”

Residents, from left, Alma Torres Nazario, Olga Ramos, Danny Ramos and Elizabeth Ramos sit in an outdoor area of the Bernardino Cordero Bernard High School, amid aftershocks and no electricity in Ponce, Puerto Rico, Jan. 8, 2020.Trump declares emergency
U.S. President Donald Trump declared an emergency in Puerto Rico several hours after Tuesday’s quake hit, a move that frees up federal funds via the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency for things ranging from transportation to medical care to mobile generators. But some local officials worry the help won’t arrive soon enough.
“FEMA is a very bureaucratic agency and it moves very slowly. So slowly that we’re still waiting for federal funds from Maria,” Daniel Hernandez, director of generation for Puerto Rico’s Electric Power Authority, told The Associated Press.
He said FEMA has pledged to bring mobile generators to bolster the company’s biggest plant, which is near the island’s southern coast where the quake hit and is severely damaged. Hernandez said it’s unclear how quickly the plant can be repaired, noting that a damage assessment is ongoing, although some officials estimated it could take up to one year to repair.
Complicating efforts to restore power are strong aftershocks, with more than 40 earthquakes with a 3.0-magnitude or higher occurring since Tuesday’s quake, according to experts. Every time it shakes, personnel have to evacuate and further damage to the plant’s infrastructure is feared, Hernandez said.
Power company director Jose Ortiz said he expects nearly all customers to have electricity by early next week, adding that extremely preliminary assessments show that at least $50 million in damage occurred.

A car is crushed under a home that collapsed after the previous day’s magnitude 6.4 earthquake in Yauco, Puerto Rico, Jan. 8, 2020. More than 250,000 Puerto Ricans remained without water and another half a million without electricity.Highway closes, aftershocks fill shelters
On Thursday, transportation officials closed a portion of one of Puerto Rico’s busiest highways because of what they called serious structural failures related to the quake. Both directions of Highway 52 that runs from the capital of San Juan to the southern coastal city of Ponce were indefinitely closed near Ponce.
Meanwhile, those aftershocks have led to a rise in the number of people seeking shelter in southwest Puerto Rico as government officials continue to inspect homes and public housing complexes.
Fernando Gil, secretary of Puerto Rico’s Housing Department, urged people to stay with family or in shelters if they felt unsafe in their homes as the government relocated more than two dozen people from damaged residences.
“Meanwhile, we will continue to identify what kind of help is needed to support all affected families,” he said.
Schools damaged
The future of hundreds of schoolchildren in the island’s southwest region also is uncertain as officials delayed the start of classes that was scheduled for Thursday. A three-story school in Guanica that houses nearly 450 children alone saw its first two floors flattened by the quake. There were no children in the school at the time.
Education officials said 24 schools were affected by the quake but that teams of engineers were inspecting all of the island’s schools. They said it’s too early to say when classes might start.
While officials say it’s too early to provide an estimate of total damage, they say hundreds of homes and businesses were affected by Tuesday’s quake and the 5.8-magnitude one that preceded it on Monday.
Teresa Arroyo, a 47-year-old resident of the southern town of Penuelas, said her home is heavily damaged but she plans to stay there.
“Where else am I supposed to go?” she said. “Everyone is depressed. This is serious.”

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Two award-winning documentaries capture death and destruction in the war-torn Syrian cities of Aleppo and Eastern Ghouta through the eyes of women. Waad al-Kateab’s film “For Sama,” and Feras Fayyad’s film “The Cave,” document civilians’ struggle to survive in devastated cities where doctors in makeshift hospitals tend to throngs of injured and dying people. VOA’s Penelope Poulou interviewed both filmmakers and has more.

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