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People wearing face masks wait for a bus in Auckland, New Zealand, Aug 31, 2020. (Photo: REUTERS/Fiona Goodall) - 

New Zealand will extend the COVID-19 alert level in the capital Wellington for two days, as authorities said on Sunday (Jun 27) there is still a risk from an Australian tourist who tested positive for the coronavirus after visiting the city last weekend.

Wellington, which moved to Alert Level 2 on Wednesday, will now remain at that level until Tuesday.

New Zealand will extend the COVID-19 alert level in the capital Wellington for two days, as authorities said on Sunday (Jun 27) there is still a risk from an Australian tourist who tested positive for the coronavirus after visiting the city last weekend.

Wellington, which moved to Alert Level 2 on Wednesday, will now remain at that level until Tuesday.

The measure means social distancing rules will be in place across the city, but offices, schools and businesses may remain open.

New Zealand halted quarantine-free travel from Australia on Saturday for three days, saying there were too many cases and outbreaks.

"The three-day pause will give us time to look at whether we need to impose additional measures, as well as give us time to further understand the situation in Australia," Hipkins said//CNA

EBRD president Odile Renaud-Basso says Lebanon is in a difficult situation after its economy contracted by 25 per cent last year. (Photo: AFP/JACQUES DEMARTHON) - 

Odile Renaud-Basso, the first female president at Europe's development bank, hopes to restore the EBRD's green investment targets while addressing workplace equality as COVID-19-hit economies recover.

Before presiding over her first EBRD annual meeting this week, in an interview with AFP, Renaud-Basso also highlighted the rapid workplace digitalisation that is affecting the bank's regions of investment as well as her own institution.

The lender, whose shareholders comprise almost 70 countries, has grown to invest in 38 emerging economies spanning central and eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East and North Africa.

"On average, 2020 was less negative than expected" in the EBRD's countries of investment, Renaud-Basso told AFP.

This year the EBRD foresees "much better than expected" economic growth across its countries of investment, after most economies contracted last year owing to pandemic turmoil, she said.

The bank is to publish its latest forecasts on Tuesday.

Renaud-Basso pointed to rebounds in manufacturing and industrial production, as well as the positive impact of higher commodity prices for the better-than-expected outlook.

But "big uncertainties remain", with countries reliant on tourism, notably Tunisia, hit hard by COVID-19 travel restrictions.

Elsewhere, "Lebanon remains very difficult after minus 25 per cent GDP in 2020, so this has a huge impact on the average".

The EBRD last year invested a record €11 billion (US$13.4 billion) across emerging economies meanwhile, to help counter fallout from the coronavirus crisis.

That marked a 10-per cent increase from 2019.

No stranger to transition projects, the EBRD is targeting 2025 as the year when more than half its investments will be in green projects.

"We were very close to this objective in 2019 but with the crisis the figure has dropped" to under 30 per cent last year, the bank chief said.

"The objective is to increase again ... (to) 40 per cent in 2021."

Renaud-Basso noted that "it is quite challenging to have this level of private sector investment" in green projects compared with large public infrastructure schemes bankrolled by governments.

But the EBRD is pushing ahead and is looking at being fully aligned with the goals of the Paris accord by the end of next year.

"It means screening all our projects, all our activities, including (that) our investments are consistent with the Paris agreement.

"This is a big step forward ... This will have huge implications for our activities and the way we interact with the countries," she insisted.

The 2015 Paris climate agreement aims to limit global temperature rises to less than two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to go down to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Experts believe this can be achieved only by the world reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050.

The EBRD chief also wants the bank to "better support" countries' digital transformations brought on by the pandemic//CNA

The first round of France's regional elections were shunned by a record 66.72 per cent of voters. (Photo: AFP/THOMAS COEX) - 

France votes in the second round of regional elections on Sunday (Jun 27) after a first round that saw a drubbing for President Emmanuel Macron's ruling party, disappointment for Marine Le Pen's far-right and record low turnout.

For some observers, the outcome of the Jun 20 first round raised doubts over whether the 2022 presidential election would come down to a duel between Macron and Le Pen in a run-off long seen as the most likely scenario.

Analysts warn against too much extrapolation onto a nationwide scale from the results of the regional elections, which choose the heads of France's 13 mainland regions from Brittany in the northwest to the Provence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur (PACA) region in the southeast.

But there was cross-party concern over the turnout for last week's polls, which were shunned by 66.72 per cent of voters - a record in modern France.

"What we are seeing is the culmination of a disconnection between voters and the political class," said Jessica Sainty, politics lecturer at Avignon University, while acknowledging the COVID-19 crisis also played a role in high abstention rate.

The woeful turnout prompted a debate over how to improve participation, with several figures including government spokesman Gabriel Attal suggesting electronic voting could help in future.

According to a poll published Thursday, just 36 per cent of voters plan to cast their ballots on Sunday. "France is sulking," the Le Parisien newspaper said.

The first-round results put Le Pen's National Rally (RN) ahead in just one region, PACA, a major disappointment after polls showed a possible breakthrough in several areas.

One of the most closely watched races on Sunday will be whether RN candidate Thierry Mariani can defeat his right-wing rival Renaud Muselier in the region.

The first-round results made even more unpalatable reading for Macron and his LREM, confirming the party's failure to put down local and regional roots despite controlling the presidency and lower house of parliament.

LREM has almost no chance of winning control of a single region and is currently just number five among political parties in France.

The Socialists are expected to pick up some regions, partly due to support from the far-left France Unbowed party//CNA

British Health Secretary Matt Hancock leaves Downing Street in London, Britain, March 10, 2021. REUTERS/John Sibley - 

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock resigned on Saturday (Jun 26) following revelations that he broke the government's own coronavirus restrictions during an affair with a close aide.

The frontman for Britain's response to the pandemic, particularly the nationwide vaccine roll-out, quit in a letter to Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

"We owe it to people who have sacrificed so much in this pandemic to be honest when we have let them down as I have done by breaching the guidance," he wrote.

"The last thing I would want is for my private life to distract attention from the single-minded focus that is leading us out of this crisis," he added.

Johnson said he was "sorry" to receive Hancock's resignation, and that he should be "immensely proud" of his service.

The prime minister had initially stood by his beleaguered health secretary after he admitted to breaking COVID-19 rules on social distancing, at a time when he was urging the public to stick by the measures, including curbs on funeral numbers.

Opposition parties accused the government of hypocrisy over breaches of lockdown rules which have seen many members of the public slapped with fines.

Hancock conceded he had let the public down after The Sun newspaper published a security camera still obtained apparently from a whistleblower showing him kissing the aide in his office on May 6.

The main opposition Labour party said the government needed to answer questions about the undisclosed appointment of the aide, former lobbyist Gina Coladangelo, to Hancock's top advisory team.

Both she and Hancock are married, and first met at university.Britain was due to fully ease restrictions on Jun 21, but the emergence of the Delta variant, first found in India, has led to an extension of social distancing rules//CNA