China's plan to dominate the 21st century hangs in the balance as the deadly coronavirus outbreak spreads.
The big picture: Coronavirus is stress-testing Chinese President Xi Jinping's industrial and economic vision for the future as factories, supply chains and companies navigate the crisis.
As Syrian troops push into opposition-held towns and villages in the provinces of Idlib and Aleppo, roughly 600,000 civilians have evacuated their homes, fleeing to the Turkish border, The Washington Post reports.
Why it matters: This latest emigration could quickly become one of the "worst humanitarian crisis" since the war started in 2011, the Post writes. Already, it is among the biggest single population dislocations throughout the nine-year war, a United Nations spokesperson told the Post.
A 60-year-old U.S. citizen died from the novel coronavirus in Wuhan, China on Thursday — making it the first known American death from the illness, according to a State Department spokesperson.
The state of play: The U.S. government has been proactively trying to evacuateU.S. citizens from China, as the coronavirus death toll has grown to more than 720. As of Friday evening, 34,546 cases of the respiratory illness have been confirmed in mainland China.
Vigils were held Friday in Hong Kong and Wuhan to mourn Li Wenliang, an ophthalmologist at Wuhan Central Hospital who sounded the alarm on the coronavirus, for which Chinese authorities attempted to silence him. Wenliang reportedly died this week after contracting the virus.
The big picture, per the New York Times' Li Yuan: "For many people in China, the doctor’s death shook loose pent-up anger and frustration at how the government mishandled the situation by not sharing information earlier and by silencing whistle-blowers."
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle made their first public appearance since stepping back from their royal duties at a JPMorgan event in Miami on Thursday, reports the New York Post.
Why it matters: As part of their agreement with Buckingham Palace, Harry and Meghan agreed to forego their royal titles and stop receiving public funds — in line with the couple's announcement that they plan to become "financially independent." The BBC notes that Harry spoke at the event, but it was not confirmed whether he was paid to appear.
The White House confirmed in a statement on Thursday that an operation in Yemen killed Qassim al-Rimi, co-founder and leader of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
Why it matters:Reports of Rimi's death via an airstrike circulated last weekend, but President Trump did not directly confirm the event. Al-Rimi had been a U.S. target for years, per the Washington Post, and was a deputy to standing al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri.
