World
France reports sharp decrease in new daily coronavirus cases before vaccine roll out
French health authorities reported 3,093 new coronavirus infections over the past 24 hours on Saturday, sharply down from the 20,000+ figure recorded over the two days before Christmas Day (Dec. 25) But the number of people hospitalised for the disease increased by 85, at 24,477, the first increase in six days. France will launch its vaccination campaign on Sunday along with most other EU countries. Its COVID-19 death toll increased by 146 versus Friday, to 62,573, the seventh-highest globally. Get more stories like this on Twitter You Deserve to Make Money Even When you are looking for Dates Online. So we reimagined what a dating should be. It begins with giving you back power. Get to meet Beautiful people, chat and make money in the process. Earn rewards by chatting, sharing photos, blog...
U.S. agents search Nashville blast site, seeking clues behind Christmas explosion
Police and federal agents were scouring the charred site of a Christmas Day explosion in Nashville on Saturday, trying to determine how and why a motor home blew up and injured three people in the heart of America’s country music capital. The fiery blast, heard from miles away, destroyed several vehicles, damaged more than 40 businesses and left a trail of glass shards around the area. The motor home, parked on a downtown street of Tennessee’s largest city, exploded at dawn on Friday moments after police responding to reports of gunfire noticed the recreational vehicle and heard an automated message emanating from it warning of a bomb. The means of detonation and whether anyone was inside the RV when it blew up were not immediately known, but investigators were examining what they believed...
Germany starts coronavirus vaccines a day early
A 101-year-old woman in an elderly care home became the first person in Germany to be inoculated against coronavirus on Saturday, a day before the official vaccination campaign was scheduled to get under way in both Germany and the EU. Edith Kwoizalla was one of around 40 residents and 10 staff in a care home in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt to receive a jab of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, the home’s manager Tobias Krueger told AFP. The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine became the first to get the go-ahead for use in the West, when Britain gave its approval on December 2. As other nations from the United States to Saudi Arabia to Singapore followed suit, Germany impatiently prodded the EU’s drugs regulator, the European Medicines Agency, to bring forward its decision from December 29. The EMA f...
Ever-present Boko Haram threat casts shadow in Niger
Seven years after the first Boko Haram attacks in southeastern Niger, people in the city of Diffa, dare not even speak the group’s name. Residents live in a state of siege, frightened and struggling with the economic impact of the Islamist threat. For fear of reprisals, people speak of “insecurity”, of the “problems” or the “current situation”. The fear is well-founded, according to one security source who says Boko Haram sympathisers in the city pass on information to the group. Among the poorest countries in the world, Niger, which is holding presidential elections on Sunday, faces jihadist groups from the Sahel in the west and Boko Haram in the east. “I don’t have 1,000 CFA francs (1.5 euros) in my pocket. I have been unemployed for four years,” says Abdou Maman, 46, who has two wives a...
Russia says intercepted IS attack plot
Russia’s FSB security service said Saturday it had foiled an attack planned by a cell loyal to the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group in the country’s unstable southern republic of Dagestan, arresting four people. “Members of the group planned to detonate an explosive close to an administrative building belonging to security services, followed by an armed attack against interior ministry employees” in regional capital Makhachkala, the FSB said in a statement. As well as arresting four “members of the international IS terrorist group”, investigators found “firearms and bladed weapons, a large amount of ammunition and an explosive device”, it added, along with mobile phones containing “exchanges with organisers located abroad”. On December 17, police killed two attackers targeting security fo...
Japan to halt all new entries from abroad next week
Japan will halt all new non-resident foreign arrivals coming from overseas from Monday until late January, Tokyo said Saturday, as the country reported its first cases of a new strain of the coronavirus. Japan currently restricts entry for foreigners from most countries over fears of the virus, requiring all visitors to undergo mandatory quarantine upon arrival. Tokyo now plans to strengthen those requirements: Japanese travellers and foreign residents from countries where the new coronavirus strain has been reported must take tests within 72 hours ahead of their departure for the country and again upon arrival at Japanese airports. It will also strengthen quarantine requirements on all travellers returning to Japan. Citing the Japanese government, the Jiji Press and Kyodo agencies said th...
World Bank: Pandemic to push over 115 million people into extreme poverty
A report by the World Bank has noted that over the past 12 months, the Covid-19 pandemic has harmed the poor and vulnerable the most, and it is threatening to push millions more into poverty. This year, the World Bank said, after decades of steady progress in reducing the number of people living on less than $1.90/day, COVID-19 will usher in the first reversal in the fight against extreme poverty in a generation. The report said the latest analysis warns that COVID-19 has pushed an additional 88 million people into extreme poverty this year – and that figure is just a baseline. “In a worst-case scenario, the figure could be as high as 115 million. The World Bank Group forecasts that the largest share of the ‘new poor will be in South Asia, with Sub-Saharan Africa close behind. ddAccording ...
India arrests 75 in Kashmir after local elections
The Indian government has arrested at least 75 Kashmiri political leaders and activists to forestall political unrest after an alliance of Kashmir’s regional political parties won local elections, leaders and a police official said on Saturday. The District Development Council elections, concluded early this week, were the first local polls since Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government revoked the special status of the Muslim-majority region last year. New Delhi then cracked down on the opposition and rounded up hundreds of people to preempt protests and violence. The latest detentions, which include separatist leaders and members of the banned Jamat-e-Islami group, were for preventive custody, said a senior police official, who asked not to be identified. But Imran Nabi Dar, spokesman f...
China to hold talks on EU investment pact at its own pace
China will conduct talks on an investment pact with the European Union at its own pace, raising doubts about whether a deal can be sealed by year-end. China’s Foreign Ministry said, on Friday, that negotiations for the EU-China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment, which would grant European companies greater access to the Chinese market, have gone on for six years. An EU official said earlier that a deal was close, following a push from Germany, which holds the EU presidency until the end of the year and is the biggest European exporter to China. But the latest comments by the Chinese government suggest otherwise. China will “conduct talks at its own pace on the premise of safeguarding its security and developmental interests’’, foreign ministry spokesman, Wang Wenbin, told a news briefi...
Christmas celebrated under pandemic’s shadow
Hundreds of millions across the world celebrated pared-down Christmas festivities on Friday due to coronavirus restrictions, as Pope Francis called for vaccines for everyone, describing them as “glimmers of hope in this period of darkness and uncertainty”. The pandemic has claimed more than 1.7 million lives and is still running rampant in much of the world, but the recent launching of mass vaccine campaigns has boosted hopes that 2021 could bring a respite. Like so many across the globe, the pope was forced to break with normal Christmas tradition, holding his annual “Urbi et Orbi” speech by video from the apostolic palace, to prevent a crowd from gathering in St Peter’s Square. “I call on everyone, on leaders of states, on businesses, on international organisations, to promote cooperatio...
Italy reports 459 coronavirus deaths on Friday – ministry
Italy reported 459 coronavirus-related deaths on Friday against 505 the day before, the health ministry said. The daily tally of new infections increased by 19,037 from 18,040 the day before, taking the total number of cases since Italy’s epidemic began to 2.02 million. Italy on Thursday became the eighth country in the world to exceed 2 million officially recorded cases. The number of swab tests carried out in the past day was 152,334 from a previous 193,777, the health ministry said. The first Western country hit by the virus, Italy has reported 71,359 deaths since its outbreak came to light on Feb. 21, the highest toll in Europe and the fifth highest in the world. Patients in hospital with COVID-19 stood at 23,402, down by 668 from the day before. The current number of intensive care pa...
CAN urges churches to be security conscious
File Photo The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has asked churches to be security conscious as they celebrate Christmas. CAN President, Dr. Samson Ayokunle, gave the advice in a press statement yesterday titled, ‘The Power of His Presence, Our Hope of Tomorrow’. He encouraged Christians not to be weighed down by the adversities experienced in the year 2020. Ayokunle said, “Christmas is not a myth, not a tradition, not a dream. It is a glorious reality. It is a time of joy. The fact of the cross illuminates Christmas day and hallows it. “Christmas is also a season to advocate peace in the world that is full of wars, strives, terrorism, banditry, kidnapping, armed robbery and other criminalities. “It is painful that many people are mourning due to the demise of their loved ones as a re...
