AUSTRALIA
Suburbs under lockdown
Authorities were to lock down more than 300,000 people in suburbs north of Melbourne for a month from yesterday to contain the risk of infection after two weeks of double-digit rises in new COVID-19 cases in the country’s second-most populous state. From midnight, more than 30 suburbs in the country’s second-biggest city would return to stage 3 restrictions, the third-strictest level in curbs to control the virus. That means residents would be confined to home except for grocery shopping, health appointments, work or caregiving, and exercise.
HAITI
Government defends opening
The country defended its decision to reopen its air borders to the US, with the first plane due to arrive yesterday morning. The US has been one of the worst-hit countries by the COVID-19 pandemic, reporting more than 127,000 deaths from the disease as some states see a spike in fresh cases. The first commercial flight in three months was to land in the capital, Port-au-Prince, from Fort Lauderdale, Florida — a state with a large Haitian diaspora, but which is among those reporting a sharp uptick in infections.
UNITED STATES
Biden not to hold rallies
Former vice president Joe Biden on Tuesday said that he would not hold presidential campaign rallies during the pandemic, an unprecedented declaration that stands in stark contrast with President Donald Trump, who has already held large campaign gatherings. Biden also ramped up his criticism of Trump’s handling of the pandemic, saying that he had “failed” the American people and “waved the white flag” of surrender in the fight against COVID-19.
ETHIOPIA
Four die as protests spread
At least four people were on Tuesday killed as protests spread across several cities after a prominent singer from the country’s largest ethnic group was shot dead. The unrest, which prompted the government to switch off the Internet in the capital, highlighted ethnic tensions that threaten to derail the country’s fraught democratic transition, overseen by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed. The singer Hachalu Hundessa was shot on Monday night. With his political lyrics, he was seen as a voice of the Oromo people during years of anti-government protests that swept Abiy to power in 2018. On Tuesday morning, protesters poured into Addis Ababa from the surrounding Oromia region. Protests were reported in several towns in Oromia, such as central Adama, where the injured said they had been shot by security forces, said Desalegn Fekadu, a surgeon at the Adama Hospital. “Three patients died and there are still critical patients,” he said. “There are also more than 10 patients with burn injuries. They said their houses were set on fire.” A resident of Western Hararge, in Oromia, on condition of anonymity said that his cousin had been killed by young Oromo nationalists, because he was from the Amhara ethnic group.
SOMALIA
Mortars hit stadium
At least three mortar blasts on Tuesday evening sent people ducking for cover, hours after the Mogadishu Stadium reopened following years of instability. The mortar shells struck in and around the stadium, police Colonel Ahmed Muse said. There was no immediate word on any casualties. The al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabaab extremist group often targets the city. The blasts occurred after President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed attended the opening ceremony, which included a soccer match in the nearly empty stadium. He left before the shells hit. The 35,000-seat stadium’s opening, complete with a large ceremonial flame, was a symbol of the nation’s attempts at rebuilding after nearly three decades of conflict.
IRAN
Clinic explosion kills 19
A powerful explosion at a clinic in northern Tehran on Tuesday killed at least 19 people, the Iranian Students’ News Agency reported. The blast at Sina At’har health center damaged buildings in the vicinity and sent a plume of thick black smoke into the night sky, state television reported. “An explosion was reported at 20:56 followed by a fire at Sina At’har clinic. Medical units were dispatched immediately,” Tehran’s emergency medical services said in a statement. “The death of 13 people has been confirmed. Six have also been injured and transferred” to a hospital, it added. Tehran fire department spokesman Jalal Maleki also told the agency that firefighters recovered the bodies of six more people after the blaze was extinguished. The explosion occurred as gas canisters caught fire in the clinic’s basement, Maleki said.
UNITED STATES
Comedy legend dies
Carl Reiner, a driving force in American comedy as a writer for television pioneer Sid Caesar, partner of Mel Brooks, and creator and costar of the classic sitcom The Dick Van Dyke Show, has died at the age of 98. His career spanned seven decades and every medium from theater and recordings to television and movies, including directing Oh, God!, three collaborations with Steve Martin and a role as an elderly con man in the revived Ocean’s Eleven series. Reiner died on Monday night of natural causes at his home in Beverly Hills, his assistant Judy Nagy said on Tuesday.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
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