International

Austria reports first two coronavirus cases after Italy outbreak

  VIENNA, Austria (AFP) — Two people in Austria have tested positive for the new coronavirus, authorities said Tuesday, marking the country’s first cases after an outbreak in northern Italy. The two 24-year-olds have been quarantined in a hospital in Innsbruck, the capital of Tyrol province, which borders Italy, according to Tyrol Governor Guenther Platter. One of them is from Lombardy, one of the Italian regions hit with the outbreak, but it is not yet […]

Italy coronavirus outbreak spreads south as cases spike

  by Ella IDE and Jastinder KHERA Agence France Presse Italy’s new coronavirus spread south on Tuesday to Tuscany and Sicily, as the civil protection agency reported a surge in the number of infected people and Rome convened emergency talks. Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has blamed poor management in a hospital in the country’s north for the outbreak, which has caused seven deaths in Italy so far and infected the largest number of people in […]

Nine killed, many injured in India capital as Trump visits

  NEW DELHI, India (AFP) — Clashes over a contentious citizenship law roiled India’s capital for a second day Tuesday — coinciding with a visit by US President Donald Trump — as the death toll in rose to at least nine. There have been widespread protests since the law that critics say is anti-Muslim was passed in mid-December, with more than 25 people killed. “There have been nine confirmed deaths,” Guru Teg Bahadur Hospital official […]

UPDATED: Iran’s deputy health minister says he has coronavirus

  TEHRAN, Iran (AFP) — Iran’s deputy health minister confirmed on Tuesday that he has tested positive for the new coronavirus, amid a major outbreak in the Islamic republic. Harirchi coughed occasionally and appeared to be sweating during a press conference in Tehran on Monday with government spokesman Ali Rabiei. At the time he denied a lawmaker’s claim that 50 people had died from the virus in the Shiite shrine city of Qom, saying he […]

JUST IN: Egypt’s ex-president Hosni Mubarak dead at 91: family

  CAIRO, Egypt (AFP) — Egypt’s former long-time president Hosni Mubarak died Tuesday at age 91 at Cairo’s Galaa military hospital, his family and state TV said. His son Alaa Mubarak tweeted that “this morning my father, president Mubarak, passed away”. Mubarak’s brother-in-law, General Mounir Thabet, told AFP that the family was at the hospital and that the presidential office would organize the funeral. Mubarak had long been battling an illness and recently been admitted […]

Three more dead in Iran coronavirus outbreak, bringing death toll to 15, says state media

TEHRAN, Iran (AFP) — The novel coronavirus has claimed three more lives in Iran, state media reported, taking the country’s overall death toll from the outbreak to 15 — the highest outside China. Iran has been scrambling to contain COVID-19 since Wednesday when it announced its first two deaths in Qom, a centre for Islamic studies and pilgrims that attracts scholars from abroad. Two of the dead were elderly women in the central province of […]

18 children among 52 hurt in Germany car ramming

  FRANKFURT AM MAIN (AFP) — A car that rammed into a carnival procession in central Germany Monday injured 52 people, including 18 children, police said, adding that the perpetrator’s motive remains unclear. “Among the victims are 18 children (while)… at present 35 people are still undergoing treatment in the hospital and 17 were already able to leave,” police in Hesse state posted on Twitter Tuesday. A 29-year-old local man ploughed his car into the […]

Bryant’s widow sues helicopter company over fatal crash

  LOS ANGELES, United States (AFP) — Kobe Bryant’s widow Vanessa filed a lawsuit on Monday against the operators of the helicopter that crashed on January 26, killing the NBA icon and eight others. The suit was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on the same day that Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and the other seven crash victims were memorialized in a public ceremony at the Staples Center. The lawsuit names Island Express Helicopters, […]

More than 27,500 persons infected with COVID-19 recover, as total cases hit more than 80,000

  (Eagle News) — Total confirmed cases of the highly contagious coronavirus disease (COVID-19) worldwide has now reached 80,146 with the number of deaths almost 2,700. As the cases increased, more persons who contracted the disease recovered with the latest number at 27,563 as of Tuesday, Feb. 25, according to the live virus dashboard of the John Hopkins University (JHU) monitoring the COVID-19 cases. The most number of cases is still in mainland China at […]

Fourth person from quarantined Japan ship dies: local media

  TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — A fourth person has died after being taken to hospital from a quarantined coronavirus-stricken cruise ship off Japan, local media reported on Tuesday. Public broadcaster NHK and other local outlets said the fatality was a man in his eighties, with the Yomiuri Shimbun saying the man had tested positive for the new coronavirus and died of pneumonia. The health minister did not immediately respond to a request to confirm the […]

S. Korea reports 60 new COVID-19 cases bringing total to 893, the biggest outside mainland China

  SEOUL, South Korea (AFP) — South Korea reported 60 more novel coronavirus cases on Tuesday, the smallest increase for four days in the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s morning updates. The country now has 893 cases, the KCDC said — the largest national total anywhere outside China — adding one more person had died, taking the toll to eight. For the previous three days, KCDC had reported triple-digit increases each morning as […]

Virus ‘peaked’ in China but could trigger global pandemic: WHO

  by Dario Thuburn and Agnes Pedrero with Laurent Thomet in Beijing Agence France Presse GENEVA, Switzerland (AFP) — The World Health Organization on Monday said the new coronavirus epidemic had “peaked” in China but warned that a surge in cases elsewhere was “deeply concerning” and all countries should prepare for a “potential pandemic”. WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the peak in China occurred between January 23 and February 2 and the number of […]