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SHIMLA, India (AFP) — At least 2,000 people were evacuated on Friday after a massive landslide in India’s ecologically fragile Himalayan north blocked a major river, officials said. The people were evacuated from 13 villages in the Lahaul area of Himachal Pradesh state as a “preventative measure” in case of flash floods, a senior district official told AFP. Hundreds of tonnes of rocks and other debris slid into and partially blocked the Chenab — one […]
JERUSALEM, Undefined (AFP) — Israelis aged 50 and over began receiving vaccine booster shots against the coronavirus Friday as part of a government bid to stem spiking infections driven by the Delta variant. The government announced on Thursday that it was offering third shots to people aged over 50, two weeks after launching a campaign to give the elderly booster jabs. “This is an important step in the fight against the Delta pandemic,” Prime Minister […]
ATHENS, Greece (AFP) — Fires burning for over a week that caused Greece’s worst ecological disaster in decades were finally placed under control Friday, the fire department said. “As of yesterday, there is no major active front, just scattered pockets,” a fire department spokesman told AFP. Rain and falling temperatures helped the fire-dousing effort, but crews remain on alert for possible flare-ups in hard-to-access ravines on the island of Evia and in the region of […]
BEIJING, China (AFP) — At least 21 people died as heavy downpours struck central China’s Hubei province, authorities said Friday, weeks after record floods wreaked havoc and killed hundreds in a neighbouring province. China has been battered by unprecedented rains in recent months, extreme weather that experts say is increasingly common due to global warming. In Hubei, torrential rains caused power cuts and landslides, destroying hundreds of homes and forcing the evacuation of nearly 6,000 […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — A cargo ship ran aground and broke into two off northern Japan, the coastguard said Thursday, with the crew of the Panama-flagged vessel taken to safety. Aerial images showed the separated stern of the Crimson Polaris tipped upwards and the other part of the stricken boat listing into the sea. A fuel leak from the ship has spread around 24 kilometers (15 miles), a coastguard spokesman told AFP, but the extent […]
SEOUL, South Korea (AFP) — South Korea’s Navy received its first ballistic-missile-capable submarine on Friday to counter the threat of underwater missiles from the nuclear-armed North. Pyongyang has been developing submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) technology for years. It showed off four such devices at a military parade overseen by leader Kim Jong Un in January, with state media KCNA calling them “the world’s most powerful weapon”. Days earlier, Kim told a congress of his ruling […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Tens of thousands of people were urged to evacuate on Friday as “unprecedented” levels of torrential rain hit western Japan, raising the risk of floods and landslides, the weather agency said. The downpours are forecast to continue for several days over a large swathe of the country, from the northern Tohoku region to Kyushu in the south. “There is a possibility that a grave disaster will occur” in the coming days, […]
BEIJING, China (AFP) — China on Friday rejected the World Health Organization’s calls for a renewed probe into the origins of Covid-19, saying it supported “scientific” over “political” efforts to find out how the virus started. Pressure is once more mounting on Beijing to consider a fresh probe into the orgins of a pandemic which has killed more than four million people and paralyzed economies worldwide since it first emerged in the central Chinese city […]
by Dessy SAGITA / Haeril HALIM Agence France Presse JAKARTA, Indonesia (AFP) — Tirsa Manitik gave birth to her first girl in June and buried her a month later — another casualty of virus-battered Indonesia’s soaring child death toll. The Southeast Asian nation has been hit by its worst Covid-19 surge yet as the ultra-infectious Delta variant sent deaths skyrocketing and left a trail of devastated parents in its wake. “My heart is broken. […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — The United States on Thursday authorized an extra dose of Covid vaccine for people with weakened immune systems, as the country struggles to thwart the Delta variant. Emergency use authorization for a third injection of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines was granted by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulator. “The country has entered yet another wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, and the FDA is especially cognizant that immunocompromised […]
by Katy LEE PARIS, France (AFP) — Cryptocurrency investors have been transfixed over the past few days by the antics of a mysterious hacker who stole more than $600 million — before gradually giving it back. But was the thief a good samaritan who stole the money to expose a dangerous security flaw, or did they simply realise they were about to be caught? The hacker struck Poly Network, a company that handles cryptocurrency transfers, […]
SAN FRANCISCO, United States (AFP) — Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates on Thursday said his climate fund would pour $1.5 billion into projects with the United States if the government enacts a program to cut carbon emissions currently working its way through Congress. A $1.2 trillion infrastructure package passed by the US Senate this week would funnel billions of dollars to the Department of Energy for projects battling climate change. If the infrastructure package becomes law, […]
