More US citizens have been evacuated from China amid concerns that American government personnel and their families may be the target of “sonic attacks” by a rival country. US state department officials said on Wednesday it had sent “a number of individuals” from its consulate in Guangzhou back to the US for “further evaluation and a comprehensive assessment of their symptoms”. Last month, a consulate worker in Guangzhou was found to have suffered a mild traumatic brain injury after reporting “abnormal sensations of sound and pressure” from late 2017 through to April 2018. The department sent a team to Guangzhou in late May to examine other US staff and their families, and investigate possible links between their symptoms and those of US diplomats in Cuba last year, an incident that prompted Washington to pull its staff from the country and expel Cuban diplomats from the US. The US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, on Tuesday announced the formation of a task force to investigate unexplained health incidents among US government personnel and their families overseas. The latest evacuation suggests what was previously described as an isolated case may turn into a wider diplomatic crisis, at a time when US-China ties are already at a low. China’s foreign ministry on Thursday said it had not been informed by the US about the new cases. “If the United States communicates with us, we will adopt a responsible attitude to investigate this,” foreign ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said at a regular news conference. Hua said the government had investigated the incident reported in May and found no suspicious activity. “We haven’t found the cause or clues that would lead to the situation mentioned by the United States,” she said. China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, previously described the incident in May involving the US consulate worker as an “individual case”, and one Beijing hoped would not be “magnified, complicated or even politicised”. When the US issued a health alert in May to US citizens in China to report any “unusual acute auditory or sensory phenomena”, it said it was not aware of other similar cases within or outside the US diplomatic community in China. That has been disputed by Mark Lenzi, a security engineering officer at the consulate in Guangzhou, who, according to the New York Times, was among the personnel evacuated on Wednesday. Lenzi, who lived in the same complex as the consulate worker who suffered brain trauma, said he had been hearing sounds like “marbles bouncing and hitting a floor” since April last year. That was followed by excruciating headaches and sleeplessness, symptoms his family also experienced. When he brought his concerns to his superiors, he was prescribed painkillers. Lenzi sent an email to staff of the consulate criticising the fact that the first employee was evacuated in April, but US citizens weren’t alerted until a month later. The health alert suggested it was a single case. “They knew full well it wasn’t,” he told the paper. When asked about Lenzi’s allegations, a US state department spokesperson said the government does not comment on specific cases out of privacy concerns. “The state department has been and will continue to be diligent and transparent in its response to our employees’ concerns,” departmental spokesperson Heather Nauert said.<doc-sep>“Imagine a CSI investigation — this famous TV program — where the investigators don’t have the murder weapon, don’t have the place, don’t have access to the victims. How the hell do you investigate that? It’s impossible!” Late 2016, Havana. “Dr. Rosenfarb, are you aware of any type of technology that would cause this?” “No, I’m not, sir.” American diplomats were complaining of crushing headaches, extreme fatigue. “Who would do this?” And, an intense sound. “Secretary Tillerson ordered the departure of non-emergency personnel.” The Cubans? They said they knew nothing about it. “Sporadic attacks continued until late April. But that sound is why this building is nearly empty at this important moment for Cuba. For the first time in 60 years, its leader will not be a Castro. “Two things we know for sure.” Here’s what the U.S. government has said about the sound: “People were hurt, and the Cuban government knows who did it. Whatever happened to these people happen as a result of some sophisticated technology that, quite frankly, is so sophisticated we don’t understand it. It leads you then …” In Washington, Senator Marco Rubio convened a hearing. “It was the early opinion of the security professionals who looked at it that it was likely a form of harassment.” “O.K. In late 2016, staff at the United States Embassy in Havana began complaining of strange noises, and among the descriptions that they complained of, high-pitched beam of sound or just intense pressure in one ear. There are 24 Americans, who during their time in Havana, have experienced symptoms that are consistent with what you would see in mild traumatic brain injury and/or concussion.” Doctors said that diplomats’ brain matter had actually changed. What started out as a mysterious nuisance — “We know it happened to 24 people” — — became a suspected instrument of attack. “Tillerson reacted as he would have reacted when he was an oil executive. He heard something happen in an oil rig. Get everybody out of there.” Secretary of State Rex Tillerson ordered his staff: “We are convinced these were targeted attacks. We don’t like our diplomats being targeted.” Depart your post, he said. Leave Cuba. And they did. Everyone from the people who discussed trade down to those who processed visas. The incident had become political. “This is entirely about the health, and the safety, and the well-being of Americans. We still have an investigation that’s underway. So I hope Cuba would focus instead on helping us with the investigation and be less concerned about claiming this is political.” [music] “So here the contrast, the contrast which is —” Carlos Alzugaray was a Cuban diplomat for decades. He’s a bit of an unofficial government spokesperson. “Why throw down the Embassy? The bad thing about it is that probably the guys who have been affected more are the regular Cubans, not the government.” By the time the diplomats left, the warming started by President Obama had undeniably chilled. The U.S. issued a travel advisory, and tourism dropped. On the streets of Havana, the idea that Cuba was involved in a sonic attack was met with skepticism. It wasn’t long after the incident became public that sound experts began downplaying the idea of a sonic attack. Sound can’t easily change brain matter, among other reasons. “You’ve got a long, long way to go before you even attribute this to sound. It’s not going to cause physical effects. If the sound goes through air before reaching you, it’s not going to cause that.” “It may have been a situation where people were drawn more closely together.” It wasn’t only the sound experts who struggled to explain what happened. “Infectious cause is what I would say.” Engineers also tried. “It could have just been a malfunctioning ultrasonic device, perhaps used for some other nefarious purpose.” And psychologists. “Well, these people were on an island. Fears can spread in a tight group. Things can get more intensified. Anything is possible.” A microwave expert. “If you direct a beam of microwave, the microwave would produce an acoustic wave.” This doctor said it could have just been a virus. ”An infection, of some type.” “So an ultrasonic weapon is not science fiction. I could build one. I could put it in the house of somebody I didn’t like, and I could annoy them. What its — really seems science-fiction is the idea that you could build an ultrasonic rifle that will shoot 100 meters and target somebody, and shoot through a wall and get just that one person.” Dr. Leighton is referring to this hotel, where some diplomats reported hearing the sound. Look up. It’s unlikely you could direct a weaponized sound wave across this street, 11 stories up through walls and windows, and hit individuals repeatedly without anyone noticing. The U.S. wouldn’t share any evidence of an attack with the Cubans. So they did their own investigation. For reference, 140 decibels is about the sound of a plane’s jet engine at takeoff. “You ask, what we think is that some people were ill, and that there was a psychogenic contagion. And other people started reporting that they were feeling ill. These are English-speaking communities that are relatively isolated from the Cuban population. They live among themselves. They exchange. And any kind of anxiety or stress —” Doctor Sosa is referring to mass hysteria, a psychological condition. There was no, quote unquote, attack. This theory is actually the current official Cuban standpoint. Today, the lights are on at the Embassy, but the doors remain locked. ”The administration’s reaction to all of this is so drastic, to make permanent the drawdown of the U.S. Embassy to ridiculously low, unnecessary levels, which has an element of spite to it.” Fulton Armstrong is a former C.I.A. analyst who covered Cuba. He made a career in searching for motives. “They were so desperate to make their case that it was sonic attacks. This is serious stuff. You’re accusing them of doing line-of-sight attacks with a weapon that no one knows exists.<doc-sep>Employees at the American consulate in Guanzhou, China have fallen ill and exhibited symptoms similar to those displayed by U.S. workers in Cuba, who in 2016 also heard strange noises. At least two diplomats have recently been evacuated from China with the number possibly to rise soon, the New York Times reports. An American medical team has flown in to Southern China to check the diplomats and their families. For months, American officials have been worried that their diplomats have been subjected to targeted attacks involving odd sounds, leading to symptoms similar to those "following concussion or minor traumatic brain injury," the State Department says. The cases in China have broadened a medical mystery that started in 2016, when American Embassy employees and their family members began falling ill in Havana. In all, 24 of them were stricken with headaches, nausea, hearing loss, cognitive issues and other symptoms after saying they heard odd sounds. The issue has roiled relations with Cuba, which immediately fell under suspicion, and led the United States to expel Cuban diplomats. Investigations are still underway in China in an attempt to figure out the true cause of the symptoms, including whether sonic attacks are actually to blame. Other theories about what could be causing the symptoms have included toxins, listening devices that accidentally emitted harmful sounds, or even mass hysteria. Shortly after the first reports of such illnesses in Guanzhou, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told Congress they "are very similar and entirely consistent with the medical indications that have taken place to Americans working in Cuba." The consulate in Guanzhou is designed to withstand electronic eavesdropping and other hi-tech intelligence intrusions. While the sonic attacks in Cuba initially rattled U.S.-Cuba relations, the occurrence of similar symptoms in Guangzhou has raised suspicions about whether China, Russia, or another country might be to blame.<doc-sep>One path would be for the United States to suggest that the two countries conduct a joint investigation, they added. In a statement released on Wednesday night in Washington, the State Department’s spokeswoman, Heather Nauert, said: “As a result of the screening process so far, the department has sent a number of individuals for further evaluation and a comprehensive assessment of their symptoms and findings in the United States.” The statement did not disclose how many complained of the illness associated with the mysterious sounds and sensations. A State Department statement this week listed the symptoms as “dizziness, headaches, tinnitus, fatigue, cognitive issues, visual problems, ear complaints and hearing loss, and difficulty sleeping.” According to experts who studied the previous cases in Cuba, those afflicted so far in Cuba and Guangzhou — suffered injuries consistent with a concussion without ever having received a blow to the head. One official said that “a sizable number” of people working in Guangzhou had requested examinations, which are being carried out in the consulate’s medical facilities. The officials cautioned that not everyone who experienced the sonic effects or showed symptoms would necessarily show signs of injuries. The consulate is the largest by far in China, and is a major site for the issuing of visas for travel to the United States. Many of the American diplomats are in their first or second postings overseas, making the mysterious nature of the illnesses particularly unsettling. In addition to the State Department’s medical team, which arrived on May 31, specialists from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also arrived in China this week to join in the investigation in Guangzhou.<doc-sep>
The United States has evacuated some Americans from its consulate in the Chinese city of Guangzhou after an employee was confirmed to be suffering symptoms consistent with the mysterious illness that led to the removal of more than half of the U.S. Embassy staff in Cuba, the State Department said Wednesday. Heather Nauert, the State Department's spokeswoman, said "several" consulate employees had returned to the United States from China for further evaluation after they were screened as part of a task force Secretary of State Mike Pompeo created last month. The force is investigating reports of hearing, vision, balance and memory damage. The medical screenings in China are continuing, Nauert said. There are about 170 U.S. diplomats or employees and their families in Guangzhou. The State Department said in a health alert last month that the employee in Guangzhou reported "subtle and vague, but abnormal, sensations of sound and pressure" that had no immediate explanation. Pompeo said then that the employee's symptoms were eerily similar to those reported by the Cuban embassy staff. Doctors said in February that the symptoms among some 24 Havana embassy staffers were similar to those caused by concussions — headaches, balance problems, sleep disturbances and visual and hearing difficulties. U.S. experts have said they know of no technology that would explain the symptoms. But President Donald Trump and other U.S. officials have accused Cuba of having targeted U.S. personnel with some kind of "acoustic sonic weapon" for unknown reasons, an allegation the Cuban government has forcefully denied. The State Department responded by pulling 60 percent of its workers out of the Havana embassy in early October and expelled two-thirds of Cuba's staff in Washington.