Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Yuli Edelstein quits amid row over decision to shut Knesset citing coronavirus crisis
The speaker of Israel’s Knesset has resigned after fierce criticism of his refusal to reopen parliament, which he suspended last week citing a ban of large gatherings while the country tackled the coronavirus.
Yuli Edelstein – a close ally of Benjamin Netanyahu in the ruling Likud party – came under fire as the suspension was decried as an attempt to shield both him and the embattled prime minister.
Two allies of crown prince among suspects charged over killing of dissident journalist
Turkish prosecutors have formally charged 20 Saudi nationals over the murder of the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul in 2018, including two men close to the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman.
The former royal court adviser Saud al-Qahtani and former deputy head of intelligence Ahmed al-Asiri were among the suspects charged with “instigating a premeditated murder with the intent of [causing] torment through fiendish instinct”, the office of the Istanbul chief prosecutor, Irfan Fidan, said on Wednesday. Assisted by three intelligence officers, a team of 15 men then travelled to Istanbul and carried out Qatani and Asiri’s orders, the statement said.
Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael say they’ve “agreed the need form a strong, stable government” in Ireland as the number of confirmed cases in the country rises by 235 to 1,564. Ireland’s health department has also confirmed two more deaths, bringing the total number to nine.
The Irish general election earlier this year resulted in an almost tied result with Sinn Féin, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael dominating. None won enough seats to form a government by itself and numerous rounds of talks between parties have failed to result in an agreement to form a coalition government. The statement reads:
Both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael met this afternoon and had a productive meeting. They both agree the need to form a strong stable government that will help Ireland recover post Covid-19.
They are working to develop a programme for government that provides stability and majority support in the Dáil. They will meet again over the coming days and will both continue to reach out and engage with other parties.
Andy Burnham, a former UK health secretary and now the mayor of Greater Manchester in the north of England, says he is taking legal advice on whether firms forcing employees to work without adequate protection and not observing guidance to keep them two metres apart are breaking the law.
After a conference call with Greater Manchester MPs, he tweeted:
... I am taking legal advice about whether @gmpolice or other GM agencies can take enforcement action against companies which are exposing their employees in this way. If you would like to make a confidential report, please do so using: the.mayor@greatermanchester-ca.gov.uk 2/2
Following government instructions to stay at home, the move to accommodate hundreds of homeless people in hotel rooms is a recognition of the vulnerability of many rough sleepers and homeless people in shared accommodation spaces, and their need for support and a safe place to stay at this difficult time.
Deaths jump in Spain; France tightens lockdown; Afghanistan appeals for help amid new cases; South Africa prepares for lockdown. Follow the latest updates
Thailand’s leader said on Tuesday he would invoke sweeping emergency powers in the face of surging coronavirus infections, Reuters reports.
In a sign of toughening official action a man was arrested over allegations of creating panic on social media.
Thailand and neighbouring Cambodia were among Southeast Asian countries accused by New York-based Human Rights Watch of using the pandemic to crack down on criticism. Both countries reject the accusations and say their measures are needed to keep order and combat disinformation.
The UK’s supreme court has adapted to physical distancing by holding its first remote, live hearing on Tuesday morning, reports my colleague Owen Bowcott.
The building in Westminster is closed but the case is being conducted via video links and can be watched online. The judges are determined that justice should be transparent even in times of pandemic.
The first appeal using the technology is the case of Fowler v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, dealing with the intricacies of the UK-South Africa Double Taxation Treaty.
In the Nabadoon camp on the outskirts of Mogadishu, Asho Abdullahi Hassan, a 40-year-old mother of seven, has heard about the coronavirus on the radio.
“I am very scared about this deadly virus. I only heard about it from the news. It is like we are waiting for death to come,” she says.
Europe seems unconcerned by the chaos smouldering on its doorstep, as the five-year-old conflict becomes world’s main theatre of drone combat
The most recent ally of Khalifa Haftar, the general who has been attacking the Libyan capital Tripoli since April last year, is Syrian president Bashar al-Assad.
This union was formalised last week with the opening of a “Libyan embassy” in Damascus. The alarming partnership has been forged almost completely without comment. What happens with Libya no longer seems to concern anyone. It’s as though the whole conflict has ceased to exist.
Hundreds of refugees forced to leave a UN-run centre in Libya earlier this year, including survivors of the Tajoura detention centre bombing, are among those worried about being cut off from aid in the coronavirus outbreak.
Last week, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) announced it would suspend some activities in Libya, including work at a Tripoli community day centre and a registration centre where new arrivals can sign up for help. UNHCR will also stop making visits to detention centres until staff are given personal protective equipment, though a spokesperson said the agency will increase phone counselling and outreach to refugee community leaders. Both UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration have halted resettlement flights for refugees and migrants globally.
Edouard Philippe, the French prime minister, has said that country’s lockdown could last several more weeks, with new restrictions – including limits on daily exercise outside the home – now in place:
Any morning constitutional/jogging now has to be within 1km of home, 1 hour max, alone, and only once per day. https://t.co/3CvQzDtZpb
The International Olympic Committee is facing almost irresistible pressure to postpone the Tokyo Olympics this week rather than wait until its mid-April deadline – with a growing number of athletes, governments and national federations saying it is unfair to keep them in limbo during the coronavirus pandemic.
Veteran IOC member Dick Pound told USA Today that the Games would be postponed, likely to 2021, with the details to be worked out in the next four weeks. “The parameters going forward have not been determined, but the Games are not going to start on July 24, that much I know.”
The first two cases of Covid-19 in Gaza have been confirmed, raising fears about how the besieged territory’s overstretched health system will cope if the virus spreads through its population of 2 million.
In the West Bank, Mohammad Shtayyeh, the Palestinian prime minister ordered people to stay at home for two weeks from Sunday night in an effort to slow the spread of the virus, with exemptions for medical personnel, pharmacists, grocers and bakers. People will be allowed out to shop for food.
Roland Marchal, whose colleague remains in detention, reportedly released in return for Iranian engineer
Emmanuel Macron says Iran has freed a French researcher imprisoned in the country, after France reportedly released an Iranian threatened with extradition to the US.
Macron said on Saturday he was “happy to announce the release of Roland Marchal, imprisoned in Iran since June 2019” and urged the Iranian authorities to immediately also free fellow researcher Fariba Adelkhah, the French president’s office said.
The pandemic is ravaging an already weakened economy. But Iranian activists across society are stepping up
On Monday evening, just five days ahead of Nowruz, the Persian new year holiday, police descended upon a small local market in west Tehran. They ordered local vendors to pack up their wares, their socks, colanders, and plastic flowers, telling them that by selling goods in public they were helping spread the coronavirus. On Tuesday evening, they returned, and found one tenacious seller hawking in the same place. “You, here again!” barked a security officer. “If I don’t sell, how am I going to pay my rent?” the woman asked plaintively.
It should not have come as a surprise. Life had already been upended in China. Iran and Italy have been reeling for a month. And yet it still felt sudden, this week, when walls were raised across the world, entire societies were quarantined and billions of people realised they had crossed a dividing line: from life before coronavirus to after.
After weeks of governments prevaricating over whether to ban mass gatherings, close businesses or seal borders, restrictions came in a flurry. “We are at war,” announced the French president, Emmanuel Macron. But without adequate weapons to fight the virus, let alone enough hospital beds or ventilators, this was the week the world beat a tactical retreat.
Experts fear swarms like those seen in Africa will become more common as tropical storms create favourable breeding conditions
The locust crisis that has now reached 10 countries could carry on to endanger millions more people, forecasters have said.
Climate change created unprecedented conditions for the locusts to breed in the usually barren desert of the Arabian gulf, according to experts, and the insects were then able to spread through Yemen, where civil war has devastated the ability to control locust populations.
Qatar’s largest labour camp for migrant workers has become a virtual prison and is in total lockdown after hundreds of construction workers became infected with Covid-19.
Police are guarding the perimeter of a huge zone within the “Industrial Area”, leaving thousands of workers trapped in squalid, over-crowded camps, where the virus can spread rapidly. No one can enter or leave, say workers who live in the area, many of whom had been working on Fifa World Cup 2022 infrastructure projects.
Competition laws will be temporarily relaxed to allow supermarkets to collaborate in feeding the UK.
Retailers will be able to pool staff, share data on stock levels, and share distribution depots and delivery vans as supermarkets face intense demand, the government confirmed.
Donald Trump sowed fresh confusion about the US government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic by claiming that a therapeutic drug will be available “almost immediately” – only to be contradicted by officials.
In a rambling performance at Thursday’s White House press conference, the president asserted that chloroquine, used to combat malaria, had been approved and would be made available by prescription.
They’re doing great with the vaccines but there’s still a long process, but the therapies are something we can move on much faster potentially. And the treatments that will be able to reduce the severity or duration of the symptoms – make people better.
Chloroquine, or hydroxychloroquine, this is a common malaria drug. It’s also a drug used for strong arthritis … It’s been around for a long time, so we know if things don’t go as planned it’s not going to kill anybody … It’s shown very, very encouraging early results, and we’re going to be able to make that drug available almost immediately.
Pres. Trump touts chloroquine, an old malaria drug, that doctors say may help treat novel coronavirus, claims it will be available "almost immediately."
Researchers find people are being forced from their homes because poor water supplies are leaving families unable to sustain themselves through agriculture
• Photographs by Tom Peyre-Costa for the Norwegian Refugee Council
Family of women’s rights campaigner Loujain Hathloul pledge to fight on after her court hearing is cancelled
Loujain al-Hathloul first realised that speaking up could make a difference when she was five years old. Her father, a navy veteran who wanted his children to be strong swimmers, took her to the local pool where other visitors chastised him for bringing a girl in a pair of swimming trunks to the male-only area.
“He told them that if they were uncomfortable with what a five-year-old girl was wearing then that was their problem,” said Loujain’s sister, Lina. “After that, lots of fathers started taking their little girls along to swim.”
Analysis reveals devastating impact from warring parties on country’s hospitals and doctors
Hospitals and doctors in Yemen have been targeted at least 120 times by the conflict’s warring parties, according to a report that gives the most comprehensive analysis to date of the devastating effect of war on the country’s healthcare system.
There were 120 incidents across 20 of Yemen’s 22 governorates between March 2015 and December 2018, including airstrikes, ground attacks, military occupation, assaults on health workers and other violations such as looting and restrictions on humanitarian aid, according to analysis co-published by Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) and the Yemeni human rights group Mwatana on Wednesday.
Breaking: Nicola Sturgeon announces schools and nurseries in Scotland will close to pupils at the end of the week.
The first minister said there will be further announcements to support low income students on free school meals as well as students who have exams.
A person has died from coronavirus in Burkina Faso, the first known death from the disease in sub-Saharan Africa, writes the Guardian’s international correspondent Michael Safi.
The country, where security has been deteriorating for months due to attacks by armed groups including some linked to Islamic State and Al-Qaeda, has emerged as a hotspot in Africa, with 27 confirmed cases and at least 200 more people suspected of having the disease.