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.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
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