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Germany crossed the sombre threshold of 100,000 COVID-19-related deaths on Thursday with a surge in new infections posing a challenge for the new government.

Since the start of the pandemic, 100,119 people have died with the virus in Germany, data from the Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases showed. The number of new daily cases hit a new record of 75,961.

Hospitals in some areas, especially in eastern and southern Germany, are under pressure and virologists have warned that many more people could die.

The head of the Robert Koch Institute has put the mortality rate at about 0.8%, meaning that at daily case numbers around 50,000, some 400 people per day will end dying.

Germany's incoming three-party government, which announced its coalition deal on Wednesday, said it would create a team of experts who would assess the situation on a daily basis.

Greens co-leader Annalena Baerbock said the new government, comprising the Social Democrats (SPD), Greens and Free Democrats (FDP), had set itself 10 days to decide if further restrictions are needed.

Germany has already limited large parts of public life in areas where the situation is acute to people who have been vaccinated or have recovered.

FDP leader Christian Lindner said tighter regional restrictions would probably be needed if a national lockdown, like that in neighbouring Austria, is to be avoided.

With a vaccine rate of just 68.1%, far behind some European countries such as Portugal, Spain and even France, Chancellor-in-waiting Olaf Scholz promised to ramp up vaccinations and did not rule out making it compulsory.

"We must vaccinate and give booster shots to prevent the spread of the virus," said Scholz. "Vaccination is the way out of this pandemic," he said.

He said long queues for booster shots in some areas that are slowing things down had to be sorted out.

A growing number of politicians are calling for compulsory vaccinations, initially for workers in some sectors, but possibly later for everyone. (reuters)

Global police agency Interpol elected Emirati Inspector General Ahmed Nasser Al-Raisi as its president on Thursday, despite accusations from rights groups that he failed to act on allegations of torture of detainees in the United Arab Emirates.

Although the presidency is a part-time role and does not oversee day-to-day operations of the agency, the president is a high profile figure who chairs meetings of Interpol's assembly and executive committee.

Human Rights Watch and the Gulf Centre for Human Rights said in May that his department had not investigated credible allegations of torture by security forces, and electing Raisi would put Interpol's commitment to human rights in doubt.

A spokesperson for the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation said Raisi "strongly believes that the abuse or mistreatment of people by police is abhorrent and intolerable".

Responding to questions about Raisi's candidacy and Interpol's election process, Secretary General Jurgen Stock said Interpol did not intervene in politics.

"We also do not have the mandate to, for instance, start any investigation on national issues. That is the national sovereignty where we have to stay away," Stock said this week.

Human Rights Watch has said hundreds of activists, academics and lawyers are serving lengthy sentences in UAE jails, often following unfair trials on vague and broad charges. The UAE has dismissed those accusations as false and unsubstantiated.

Two men said this week they had filed a criminal case with Turkish prosecutors against Raisi, while he was in Istanbul for the election at the Interpol general assembly.

Matthew Hedges, 34, an academic at the University of Exeter, said he was held in solitary confinement for seven months in 2018 in the UAE over allegations of espionage when he went to the country do to research for his doctorate.

He said he was threatened with physical violence or rendition to an overseas military base and harm to his family. "This was done by the Emirati security services within a building that Naser al-Raisi ... has responsibility for," Hedges told Reuters in Istanbul.

"The possibility of al-Raisi becoming Interpol president sets an extremely dangerous precedent where systematic abuses are legitimised and normalised for other states continue using them around the world," he added.

The UAE has said Hedges was not subjected to any physical or psychological mistreatment during his detention.

Ali Issa Ahmad, 29, said he was detained during a holiday when he went to UAE to watch the Asian Cup in 2019 because he wore a T-shirt with a Qatar flag, at a time when there was diplomatic row between the two countries.

He said he was electrocuted, beaten and deprived of food, water and sleep during several days of his detention.

The UAE ministry spokesperson said that any legal complaint filed with allegations against "Raisi is without merit and will be rejected".

Turkish authorities have not said whether they will pursue the two men's complaints. (reuters)

 The Kremlin on Thursday said Russia had nothing to do with the so-called 'Havana Syndrome', a mysterious ailment which has affected about 200 U.S. diplomats, officials and family members overseas.

It was responding to a report in The Washington Post the previous day which said that CIA Director William Burns had told the leaders of Russia's spy agencies during a recent visit to Moscow that it would be "beyond the pale" for foreign intelligence agencies to cause brain injury and other ailments to U.S. personnel and family members. 

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the issue had not been discussed in political meetings during the CIA director's trip or with President Vladimir Putin.

He said he could not comment on private conversations held with Russia's security services.

"Here we can only firmly deny any hints, suggestions or statements about the supposed involvement of the Russian side in these cases," said Peskov. "We don't have anything to do with this." (reuters)

France and Britain sought answers on Thursday on how to deter migrants from trying to cross the sea separating them after 27 people died making the attempt in an inflatable dinghy, the worst accident of its kind in the Channel on record.

President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Boris Johnson had differing views over who was to blame for the tragedy. read more

In a phone call with Johnson on Wednesday night, Macron emphasised the shared responsibility the two governments carried. Johnson said Britain had had difficulty persuading the French to tackle the problem in the correct way.

French Prime Minister Jean Castex was due to hold a crisis meeting on Thursday morning, as authorities announced that a fifth suspected people smuggler had been arrested in connection with the disaster.

British Interior Minister Priti Patel said she would be having talks with her French counterpart Gerald Darmanin, who said Britain, Belgium and Germany needed to do more to help France tackle the illegal migrants and human trafficking.

"It's an international problem," Darmanin told RTL radio.

Britain said the drownings highlighted how the efforts of French police to patrol their beaches and secure their northern border were inadequate.

"We have had difficulty persuading some of our partners, particularly the French, to do things in a way that we think the situation deserves," Johnson said on Wednesday.

He repeated an offer to have joint British-French patrols of the northern French coast near Calais, from where Britain can be seen on a clear day and from where most migrants launch their bid to reach England's shores.

Paris has previously resisted such calls. London has in the past threatened to cut financial support for France's border policing if it fails to stem the flow.

The number of migrants attempting to cross the Channel, one of the world's busiest shipping lanes, has jumped in recent months after the British and French governments clamped down on other forms of illegal entry, such as hiding in the backs of trucks crossing from ports in France.

Darmanin accused London of "bad immigration management".

Regaining control of Britain's borders was a totem for Brexit campaigners ahead of the 2016 referendum on Britain's membership of the European Union.

Reuters witnessed one group of migrants emerging from the sand dunes near Wimereux, near Calais, before piling into an inflatable dinghy. The same group was seen landing hours later in Dungeness, southern England, having safely crossed the 30 km stretch of water.  (reuters)