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WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — The United States on Thursday saluted Albania, Canada, Chile, Mexico and Uganda for agreeing to take in Afghans being evacuated in a major airlift after the Taliban victory. Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke by telephone with Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama, who announced Sunday just as the Taliban were taking over Kabul that he had agreed to a request to accept hundreds of Afghans temporarily on their way to […]
SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Sydney extended its two-month-old lockdown for another month and introduced a partial curfew Friday, as Australia’s largest city struggled to contain a fast-spreading coronavirus outbreak. New South Wales premier Gladys Berejiklian announced the “difficult” decision, telling the city’s population of five million it was time to “bunker down”. “Unfortunately the case numbers continue to grow,” she said. “This is what life will look like for most of us until the end […]
by David FOX KABUL, Afghanistan (AFP) — Defiant protesters waved Afghan flags at scattered rallies Thursday to mark the country’s independence day, as a UN document suggests the Taliban are rounding up people placed on a blacklist for working with the Afghan government, or US-led forces. As the small-scale demonstrations unfolded, the son of the nation’s most famous resistance fighter vowed to take up arms against the Islamist hardliners, who are back in power after […]
by Mohamad Ali Harissi DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AFP) — Dozens of evacuees from Afghanistan waited nervously to board a Britain-bound Royal Air Force plane during a stopover in the United Arab Emirates on Thursday after fleeing the Taliban takeover. At Dubai’s Al-Maktoum airport, a steady stream of aircraft ferrying passengers from Kabul and onwards to Britain shuttled back and forth as London stepped up its evacuation efforts. Dozens of exhausted passengers waited at one […]
DAKAR, Senegal (AFP) — Guinean health officials are monitoring 172 contact cases of a man who died of Marburg virus, Health Minister Remy Lamah said Thursday. West Africa’s first recorded case of the virus — which belongs to the same filovirus family as Ebola but is somewhat less deadly — was confirmed on August 9. The virus, which is carried by bats and has a historic fatality rate of up to 88 percent, was found […]
KABUL, Afghanistan (AFP) — An Afghan woman journalist has said she was barred from working at her TV station after the Taliban took control of the country, and pleaded for help in a video posted online. Wearing a hijab and showing her office card, well-known news anchor Shabnam Dawran said “our lives are under threat” in the clip on social media. Under the Taliban’s regime from 1996 to 2001, women were excluded from public life, […]
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AFP) — Ivory Coast has detected its first cases since 2015 of the H5N1 bird flu in poultry farms, the government said Thursday. “Since July 20, high death rates among poultry were spotted in traditional and modern poultry firms in Mondoukou” east of the country’s economic hub Abidjan, Livestock and Fisheries Minister Sidi Tiemoko Toure said in a statement. He added that “laboratory analysis confirmed the highly pathogenic H5N1 avian flu virus”. […]
by Michael Mathes WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — A man who threatened to set off a bomb on Washington’s Capitol Hill surrendered to police Thursday, ending an hours-long standoff that rattled lawmakers still shaken by January’s pro-Trump insurrection. The incident triggered evacuations and a massive police response, and sent jolts of anxiety through a city that has spent months on alert, as political tensions soared following the deadly US Capitol riot. The suspect, an apparent […]
JERUSALEM, Undefined (AFP) — Israelis aged 40 and over will be able to receive coronavirus vaccine booster shots starting this weekend, Health Minister Nitzan Horowitz said Thursday, as the country battles a spike in infections. Israel was one of the first countries to launch a vaccination drive in mid-December via an agreement with Pfizer to obtain millions of paid vaccine doses in exchange for sharing data on their effectiveness. The inoculation campaign was hailed as […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Three US senators from different political affiliations and different parts of the country said Thursday they have tested positive for the coronavirus. The lawmakers, who were vaccinated, are among the 71 members of Congress to be diagnosed with Covid-19 since the beginning of last year, according to the nonpartisan group GovTrack. “I’ve tested positive for a breakthrough case of COVID-19. I feel good but will isolate per docs instructions,” Senator […]
NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — Alex Gorsky will step down as chief executive of Johnson & Johnson in January, ceding the role to longtime company executive Joaquin Duato, the health care giant announced Thursday. Gorsky, the CEO since 2012, is stepping aside “due to family health reasons,” according to a company press release, which said he will stay on as executive chairman. Gorsky oversaw development of the company’s one-shot Covid-19 vaccine. His tenure also […]
by Patrick FALLON Agence France Presse SUSANVILLE, United States (AFP) — A wildfire that erupted outside California’s state capital just a few days ago had exploded to cover 54,000 acres by Wednesday, an eight-fold increase in 24 hours. At least two people had to be airlifted to hospital as the Caldor Fire tore through a small town around 80 kilometers (50 miles) from Sacramento. Thousands of people have been told to seek safety, with […]
