International

Biden to host Covid-19 summit on Wednesday: White House

  WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — US President Joe Biden will host a virtual summit with world leaders on the coronavirus pandemic next Wednesday, a day after he addresses the United Nations General Assembly, the White House said Friday. “This meeting is about expanding and enhancing our shared efforts to defeat Covid-19” and will seek to “align on a common vision” against the virus, Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement. The summit will […]

Police wounded, hundreds arrested in Melbourne anti-lockdown protest

  MELBOURNE, Australia (AFP) — Several police officers were wounded and hundreds of protesters were arrested in Australia’s second-most-populous city Saturday in violent clashes at an anti-lockdown march. Officers used pepper spray and made over 200 arrests in Melbourne as several hundred attendees flouted stay-at-home orders and marched through an inner-city suburb. The illegal gathering comes as the city goes through its sixth lockdown since the pandemic started, with the wider state of Victoria reporting […]

North Africa virus cases plummeting after summer spike

  by AFP bureaus across the Maghreb Weeks after a spike in coronavirus cases overwhelmed intensive care units across North Africa with severe oxygen shortages sparking public anger, case numbers are sharply declining. Here is a look at the situation in the four countries of the Maghreb — Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria and Libya — based on official figures collected by AFP. – Tunisia – Images of intensive care units overwhelmed with Covid patients in July […]

US panel recommends Covid boosters for people 65 and older

  by Issam AHMED Agence France Presse WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — A panel of leading US medical experts advising the government voted in favor of authorizing boosters of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine for everyone aged 65 and up, as well as people at high risk of developing severe Covid. The same committee however rejected an initial proposal, submitted by Pfizer and backed by President Joe Biden’s administration, to fully approve boosters to everyone aged 16 […]

US admits strike in Kabul killed 10 civilians, including 7 children, not IS militants

  WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — A top general admitted the United States had made a “mistake” when it launched a drone strike against suspected Islamic State militants in Kabul, killing 10 civilians including children instead during the frenzied final days of the US pullout from Afghanistan last month. The strike, a macabre coda to the 20-year US war in Afghanistan, was meant to target a suspected IS operation that US intelligence had “reasonable certainty” […]

E.Guinea tightens Covid-19 restrictions as third wave hits

MALABO, Equatorial Guinea (AFP) — Equatorial Guinea on Friday stiffened measures to tackle Covid-19, citing a third wave of the pandemic in the small central African country. President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo reinstated a curfew, tightened travel restrictions and imposed a complete cycle of vaccination on all civil servants. Those previously affected worked only in the health, safety and education fields. Vaccination is now also compulsory for any citizen who undertakes an approach to the […]

Cambodia begins covid jabs for kids as young as six

by Suy SE PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AFP) — Cambodia on Friday began inoculating children as young as six against coronavirus, even though the World Health Organisation has yet to approve a vaccine for the under-12s. The southeast Asian country has won praise for its swift vaccination programme, which has seen more than 98 percent of the adult population receive at least one dose, according to the health ministry. The latest phase of the drive began […]

‘Ebola is defeated’, says Congolese professor who discovered virus

KINSHASA, DR Congo (AFP) — Ebola has been defeated. Vaccines and medical treatments have brought the deadly and terrifying disease under control, says Jean-Jacques Muyembe, the Congolese professor who first discovered the virus more than 40 years ago. The 79-year-old virologist was speaking at a ceremony in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s capital Kinshasa marking the arrival on the market of the “Ebanga” treatment, which was approved last December by the US Food and Drug […]

Nine killed, 23 injured in Nigerian air strike

KANO, Nigeria (AFP) — An emergency official in northeast Nigeria said Friday nine people were killed and 23 others injured in an air strike this week that reportedly hit civilians, in the first official tally of victims. The Nigerian air force confirmed that earlier in the week it sent an aircraft to the area where Boko Haram and Islamic-state affiliates operate, and that it was investigating claims “civilians were erroneously killed”. Since 2009, Nigeria has […]

Haiti PM dismisses questions over links to president’s murder

  PORT-AU-PRINCE (AFP) — Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry dismissed suspicions raised against him over the assassination of president Jovenel Moise as a “fuss” motivated by “political interests.” In a statement posted on social networks, the head of government blasted “the noise orchestrated at the national and international level around the telephone conversations that took place the night of the murder of the president.” Moise was shot on July 7 at his home in Port-au-Prince, […]

US medical experts to vote on Pfizer Covid boosters

WASHINGTON, United states (AFP) — US medical experts will meet Friday to debate and vote on the controversial question of giving out booster doses of Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine to the general population. President Joe Biden’s administration announced in August a plan to roll out third shots to everyone, not just the immune compromised already able to receive them, starting from September 20. But experts have since expressed reservations about whether they are required, amid concerns […]

Race for Japan’s new prime minister kicks off

by Katie Forster TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — The campaign to become Japan’s next prime minister kicks off on Friday, with four candidates vying for leadership of the ruling party in an unusually close race. The candidates include two women hoping to lead a country that has never had a female prime minister, though both are considered long shots. The race follows Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga’s shock announcement last month that he would not run for […]