VIETNAM
Schools reopen one year on
More than 17 million students were yesterday due to return to school for the first time in about a year, the Ministry of Health said. The country lifted many of its COVID-19 curbs in October, but almost all students had been confined to taking online classes since early last year. Most schools in the country are due to reopen by the middle of this month, the ministry said in a statement. Separately, the government said that it intends to buy 21.9 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for children aged five to 12. Schools in the capital, Hanoi, are to reopen from today, with precautions such as temperature checks and protocols in place in case positive cases are detected, authorities said.
CHINA
‘Millions dead’ if no curbs
Restoring normal population mobility to “zero COVID” regions would cause about 2 million deaths in one year and the key to controlling the virus is developing vaccines that are better at preventing infection, a team of local scientists said in a paper published on Friday in the weekly bulletin of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Even with a global vaccination rate of 95 percent, if population mobility was restored to 2019 levels, the researchers estimated that all “zero COVID” regions would see more than 234 million infections within one year, including 64 million symptomatic cases and 2 million deaths. “The human race should continue to develop vaccines and explore new ways to improve vaccine protection against infection,” the team said.
INDONESIA
Crash kills 13; dozens hurt
At least 13 people were killed and dozens more injured after a tour bus carrying factory workers to a beach holiday crashed on Java, police said. The bus and its 47 passengers were headed from Sukoharjo in Central Java to a family gathering in Yogyakarta Province when the driver lost control going downhill, the police said late on Sunday. “Witnesses we questioned said they saw the driver panicking as he tried to manage the gear stick, so there’s an indication that the brake was not functioning, or faulty,” Bantul District Police Chief Ihsan, who like many residents uses only one name, told reporters.
INDIA
Editor arrested in Kashmir
A prominent journalist has been arrested under terrorism and sedition laws, as a crackdown on the press in Kashmir continues to escalate. Fahad Shah, the founder and editor of the widely read local news Web site The Kashmir Walla, was arrested on Friday evening when he was summoned to a police station in the southern district of Pulwama. Inspector General Vijay Kumar, the police chief of Kashmir, told reporters that Shah, 33, “has been arrested on the basis of one of the three FIRs [first information reports] lodged against him for frequently glorifying terrorism, spreading fake news and instigating people for the past three to four years.”
TUNISIA
Navy rescues 163 migrants
The navy has rescued 163 migrants, including women and children, off the country’s east coast, the Ministry of Defense said on Sunday. “As part of a joint operation with the coast guard, a naval unit rescued 163 illegal migrants on Saturday,” the ministry said. Nine women and 16 children were found aboard the boat 12km off the coast of Sfax, it said. Sfax is a key departure area for migrants seeking to make their way to European shores, usually in Italy.
GREECE
Police seek 10 for stabbing
Thessaloniki police on Sunday said they had issued 10 arrest warrants in connection with the fatal stabbing of a 19-year-old soccer fan last week and the injuries of his two friends. Six people have already been arrested, police said. A 23-year-old man was yesterday to appear before prosecutors after being arrested last week as a suspect in the attack outside the stadium of top-flight club Aris. “We had said from the first moment that it is a matter of honor for the Greek police, for justice, for the state as a whole, for the investigation into the murder of 19-year-old Alkis Kampanos to reach the end,” Citizen Protection Minister Takis Theodorikakos said.
GREECE
Three climbers found dead
Three mountain climbers were on Sunday evening found dead near the popular ski resort of Kalavryta, the fire service said. The three men, aged 40, 49 and 56, had been missing since Saturday, the Athens News Agency said. They had left Kalavryta in the morning to climb the 2,355m Mount Helmos. At least 22 firefighters searched for hours on Sunday. The men’s bodies were found after some of their belongings were spotted in the snow from a helicopter. Authorities are investigating whether they were killed by an avalanche, the news agency said.
COSTA RICA
Ex-president heads to run-off
Former president Jose Maria Figueres on Sunday comfortably led the preliminary vote count in the presidential election, with former finance minister Rodrigo Chaves poised to defy expectations to face him in a second-round run-off on April 3. Figueres was expected to win 27.3 percent of the vote based on returns from nearly three-quarters of polling stations, with Chaves pulling past evangelical Christian Fabricio Alvarado to carve out an advantage in second with 16.6 percent of the tally. To win the first round outright, a candidate had to secure more than 40 percent of votes.
HONDURAS
Castro tests positive
President Xiomara Castro on Sunday said that she was infected with COVID-19, but will continue working remotely. “The result of the PCR [polymerase chain reaction test] yesterday [Saturday] was negative, today’s is positive,” the 62-year-old president, who replaced Juan Orlando Hernandez, wrote on Twitter. “According to the tests it is mild. With the blessing of the Creator of the universe, I continue to follow my Plan of Government to return to democratic and constitutional order,” she added. The president is vaccinated against the virus, said her husband, Manuel Zelaya, a former president who was ousted in 2009. Castro carried out public engagements last week, participating on Tuesday and Thursday in the celebrations for the 275th anniversary of the apparition of the Virgin of Suyapa, in the basilica in the east of Tegucigalpa.
ECUADOR
Quito flooding toll raised
The heaviest flooding to hit the country in two decades claimed 28 lives in the capital, Quito, this week and injured 52 people, the city’s mayor said on Sunday. Rain that drenched Quito for 17 hours caused flooding and surges of mud that damaged roads, agricultural areas, clinics, schools, a police station and an electric power substation. “The total number of dead is 28, 52 people were injured, seven of whom were hospitalized,” Quito Mayor Santiago Guarderas told a news conference. Guarderas earlier said that Monday’s downpour brought down 75 liters per square meter following 3.5 liters on Saturday.
‘TERRORIST ATTACK’: The convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri resulted in the ‘martyrdom of five of our armed forces,’ the Presidential Leadership Council said A blast targeting the convoy of a Saudi Arabian-backed armed group killed five in Yemen’s southern city of Aden and injured the commander of the government-allied unit, officials said on Wednesday. “The treacherous terrorist attack targeting the convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri, commander of the Second Giants Brigade, resulted in the martyrdom of five of our armed forces heroes and the injury of three others,” Yemen’s Saudi Arabia-backed Presidential Leadership Council said in a statement published by Yemeni news agency Saba. A security source told reporters that a car bomb on the side of the road in the Ja’awla area in
‘SHOCK TACTIC’: The dismissal of Yang mirrors past cases such as Jang Song-thaek, Kim’s uncle, who was executed after being accused of plotting to overthrow his nephew North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has fired his vice premier, compared him to a goat and railed against “incompetent” officials, state media reported yesterday, in a rare and very public broadside against apparatchiks at the opening of a critical factory. Vice Premier Yang Sung-ho was sacked “on the spot,” the state-run Korean Central News Agency said, in a speech in which Kim attacked “irresponsible, rude and incompetent leading officials.” “Please, comrade vice premier, resign by yourself when you can do it on your own before it is too late,” Kim reportedly said. “He is ineligible for an important duty. Put simply, it was
Yemen’s separatist leader has vowed to keep working for an independent state in the country’s south, in his first social media post since he disappeared earlier this month after his group briefly seized swathes of territory. Aidarous al-Zubaidi’s United Arab Emirates (UAE)-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) forces last month captured two Yemeni provinces in an offensive that was rolled back by Saudi strikes and Riyadh’s allied forces on the ground. Al-Zubaidi then disappeared after he failed to board a flight to Riyadh for talks earlier this month, with Saudi Arabia accusing him of fleeing to Abu Dhabi, while supporters insisted he was
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa on Sunday announced a deal with the chief of Kurdish-led forces that includes a ceasefire, after government troops advanced across Kurdish-held areas of the country’s north and east. Syrian Kurdish leader Mazloum Abdi said he had agreed to the deal to avoid a broader war. He made the decision after deadly clashes in the Syrian city of Raqa on Sunday between Kurdish-led forces and local fighters loyal to Damascus, and fighting this month between the Kurds and government forces. The agreement would also see the Kurdish administration and forces integrate into the state after months of stalled negotiations on
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