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March
China reports first COVID-19 deaths in more than a year
Written by nuke
People line up amid snowfall at a mobile nucleic acid testing site, following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Beijing, China March 18, 2022. REUTERS/Tingshu Wang -
Mainland China reported its first COVID-19 deaths in more than a year on Saturday (Mar 19), said a post on the National Health Commission's website.
The two deaths happened in China's northeastern region of Jilin that borders North Korea and Russia, where case numbers make up over two-thirds of total domestic infections.
China reported two deaths for the whole of 2021, with the last one logged on Jan 25.
The country reported 2,228 new confirmed coronavirus cases on March 18, compared with 2,416 a day earlier.
Of the new cases, 2,157 were locally transmitted, compared with 2,388 a day earlier, with 78per cent appearing in Jilin and others found in the southeastern province of Fujian and the southern province of Guangdong among others.
The number of new asymptomatic cases, which China does not classify as confirmed cases, stood at 1,823 compared with 1,904 a day earlier.
The death toll went up to 4,638//CNA
March
Syria's Assad visits UAE, first trip to Arab state since war began
Written by nuke
FILE PHOTO: Syrian President Bashar al-Assad addresses the government committee that oversees measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Damascus, Syria in this handout released by SANA on May 4, 2020 -
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad visited the United Arab Emirates on Friday (Mar 18) in his first visit to an Arab state since the Syrian war began in 2011, underlining warming ties with a US-allied country that once backed rebels who sought his ouster.
Assad met Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan who "stressed that Syria is a fundamental pillar of Arab security, and that the UAE is keen to strengthen cooperation with it", Emirati state news agency (WAM) reported.
Assad's only trips outside Syria during the war have been to Iran and Russia, close allies whose military support helped him turn the tide against opponents who had been backed by governments including U.S.-allied Gulf states.
A video posted by WAM showed Assad smiling as he stood alongside Sheikh Mohammed in front of the Syrian and Emirati flags, as well as gesticulating and smiling during talks.
The United States has opposed efforts to normalise ties with Assad or rehabilitate him until progress is made towards a political solution to the conflict, which has killed hundreds of thousands of people since spiralling out of an uprising against Assad.
Washington expressed concern in November when the UAE foreign minister visited Damascus and met Assad.
But Washington has eroded its political capital with both Riyadh and Abu Dhabi by not heeding their concerns about regional rival Iran, ending its support for their war in Yemen and slapping conditions on US weapons sales to the Gulf states.
WAM said the sides emphasised "the preservation of the territorial integrity of Syria and the withdrawal of foreign forces" from the fragmented country where Russia, Iran, Turkey and the United States all have a military presence.
They also discussed political and humanitarian support for Syria and its people to reach a peaceful solution to all the challenges it faces, WAM reported.
WAM said Sheikh Mohammed "expressed his wishes that this visit will pave the way for goodness, peace and stability to prevail in Syria and the entire region". Assad briefed him on the latest developments in Syria, it said.
Assad was seen off by Sheikh Mohammed at the airport.
Assad also met Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, the Syrian presidency said in a statement.
The meetings marked the latest in a series of diplomatic overtures that point to a shift underway in the Middle East where several Arab countries are reviving ties with Assad.
Signs of rapprochement between Assad and Arab states grew last year, including a phone call with King Abdullah of Jordan, another US ally.
Analysts say political and economic considerations loom large for Arab states that are seeking closer ties with Assad, including how to counter the influence of Iran and Turkey//CNA
March
Erdogan opens huge suspension bridge linking Europe and Asia
Written by nuke
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan attends opening ceremony of the 1915 Canakkale Bridge over the Dardanelles, in Can 18, 2022. Presidential Press Office/Handout via REUTERS -
President Tayyip Erdogan opened a massive suspension bridge across Turkey's Dardanelles Strait on Friday (Mar 18), the latest in a series of major infrastructure projects which he has prioritised during his two decades in power.
Connecting Turkey's European and Asian shores, the 1915 Canakkale Bridge was built by Turkish and South Korean firms with an investment of 2.5 billion euros (US$2.8 billion). It has the longest main span - the distance between the two towers - of any suspension bridge in the world.
Such mega projects have been central to Erdogan's achievements since his AK Party first came to power in 2002, including a new Istanbul airport, rail and road tunnels beneath Istanbul's Bosphorus strait, and a bridge over it.
"These works will continue to provide profit for the state for many years," Erdogan said at an opening ceremony on the anniversary of a 1915 Ottoman naval victory against French and British forces in the Dardanelles during World War One.
"These projects have a large share in putting our country ahead in investment, workforce and exports," he said.
Last year he launched what he previously called his "crazy project": a US$15 billion canal in Istanbul intended to relieve pressure on the busy Bosphorus Strait. However critics have questioned the project's viability given Turkey's economic woes, environmental risks and public opposition.
Ahead of national elections scheduled for 2023, opinion polls have shown a slide in the popularity of Erdogan and his AK Party, boosting the opposition's prospects of ousting him.
The main opposition CHP has criticised the potential cost of the bridge to the public purse, with media reports saying the build-operate-transfer agreement includes an annual payment guarantee of 380 million euros (US$420 million) to the operators or a total 6 billion euros over the duration of the accord.
Erdogan said the price for passenger vehicles to use the bridge would be 200 lira (US$13.50).
Work on the Dardanelles bridge project was launched in March 2017, with more than 5,000 workers involved in the construction.
The 2,023m length of its midspan is an allusion to the Turkish Republic's 100th anniversary in 2023.
It is the fourth bridge linking the European and Asian shores in Turkey, alongside the three built in Istanbul.
Its towers are 318m high and the total length of the bridge is 4.6 km (2.9 miles) including the approach viaducts.
Until now, vehicles travelling between Anatolia and the Gallipoli peninsula had to cross the Dardanelles in a one-hour ferry journey, which including waiting time amounted to as much as five hours. The journey will now take around six minutes//CNA
March
World Food Programme says food supply chains 'falling apart' in Ukraine
Written by nuke
Wheat is seen in a field near the southern Ukranian city of Nikolaev, Jul 8, 2013. (File photo: Reuters/Vincent Mundy) -
A World Food Programme (WFP) official said on Friday (Mar 18) that food supply chains in Ukraine were collapsing, with a portion of infrastructure destroyed and many grocery stores and warehouses empty.
"The country's food supply chain is falling apart. Movements of goods have slowed down due to insecurity and the reluctance of drivers," Jakob Kern, WFP Emergency Coordinator for the Ukraine crisis, told a Geneva press briefing by videolink from Poland.
He also expressed concern about the situation in "encircled cities" such as Mariupol, saying that food and water supplies were running out and that its convoys had been unable to enter the city.
WFP buys nearly half of its wheat supplies from Ukraine and Kern said that the crisis there since the Russian invasion on Feb 24 had pushed up food prices sharply.
"With global food prices at an all-time high, WFP is also concerned about the impact of the Ukraine crisis on food security globally, especially hunger hot spots," he said, warning of "collateral hunger" in other places.
The agency is paying US$71 million a month extra for food this year due to both inflation and the Ukraine crisis, he said, adding that such an amount would cover the food supplies for four million people. "We are changing suppliers now but that has an impact on prices," he said. "The further away you buy it, the more expensive it gets."//CNA
March
A Basilosaurus whale fossil dating back 36 million years is displayed at the Museum of Natural History after its discovery in the Ocucaje desert, in Lima, Peru Mar 17, 2022. (Photo: Reuters/Sebastian Castaneda) -
Paleontologists have unearthed the skull of a ferocious marine predator, an ancient ancestor of modern-day whales, which once lived in a prehistoric ocean that covered part of what is now Peru, scientists announced on Thursday (Mar 17).
The roughly 36-million-year-old well-preserved skull was dug up intact last year from the bone-dry rocks of Peru's southern Ocucaje desert, with rows of long, pointy teeth, Rodolfo Salas, chief of paleontology at Peru's National University of San Marcos, told reporters at a news conference.
Scientists think the ancient mammal was a basilosaurus, part of the aquatic cetacean family, whose contemporary descendents include whales, dolphins and porpoises.
Basilosaurus means "king lizard," although the animal was not a reptile, though its long body might have moved like a giant snake.
The one-time top predator likely measured about 12m long, or about the height of a four-story building.
"It was a marine monster," said Salas, adding the skull, which has already been put on display at the university's museum, may belong to a new species of basilosaurus.
"When it was searching for its food, it surely did a lot of damage," added Salas.
Scientists believe the first cetaceans evolved from mammals that lived on land about 55 million years ago, about 10 million years after an asteroid struck just off what is now Mexico's Yucatan peninsula, wiping out most life on Earth, including the dinosaurs.
Salas explained that when the ancient basilosaurus died, its skull likely sunk to the bottom of the sea floor, where it was quickly buried and preserved.
"Back during this age, the conditions for fossilisation were very good in Ocucaje," he said//CNA
March
Japan adds Russia sanctions, US envoy offers home to Ukrainians
Written by nuke
Rescue workers move the body of a person who was killed when a shell hit a residential building, as Russia's invasion of Ukraine continues, in Kyiv, Ukraine Mar 18, 2022. (Photo: Reuters/Thomas Peter) -
Japan will impose sanctions on 15 Russian individuals and nine organisations, it said on Friday (Mar 18), among them defence officials and the state-owned arms exporter, Rosoboronexport.
The sanctions, which include the freezing of assets, are Japan's latest measures since Russia's invasion of Ukraine that began on Feb 24.
They now cover 76 individuals, seven banks and 12 other bodies in Russia, the finance ministry said.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova and several makers of military equipment, such as United Aircraft, which manufactures fighter jets, are among those sanctioned in Friday's measures.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy may deliver an online speech to Japan's parliament on Mar 22, broadcaster TV Asahi said, citing a ruling party lawmaker.
Russia calls its action in Ukraine a "special operation" that is not designed to occupy territory but to destroy its southern neighbour's military capabilities and capture what it regards as dangerous nationalists.
The US ambassador to Japan, Rahm Emanuel, who praised Japan's action as "hitting at the heart of Russia's war machine", has offered to host Ukrainian refugees fleeing the war in his residence until they find permanent housing in Japan.
Long refugee-shy, Japan is preparing to take in Ukrainian evacuees, with 47 having arrived since the outbreak of the war.
"We would like to do our part, too, by assisting the evacuees until they are able to move into more permanent housing," Ambassador Emanuel, the grandson of Ukrainian immigrants, said in a statement.
This week, a US Air Force cargo jet flew to Ukraine helmets and other non-lethal military equipment donated by Japan.
A main US security ally in Asia, Japan still has stakes in gas and oil projects in Russia's Sakhalin island, after energy majors, Shell and Exxon Mobil pulled out of them.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has given no clear indication of the fate of Japan's investment in the projects, underscoring both their importance for its energy security and his intention to keep step with G7 peers' sanctions against Russia.
The Russian ambassador to Japan has said it was logical to maintain "mutually beneficial" energy projects in Sakhalin.
Japan does also not intend to ban Russian seafood, the Jiji Press news agency said.
Seafood comprises 9 per cent of Japan's total imports from Russia, on which it relies heavily for items such as sea urchin and frozen crab, the non-profit think tank Japan Forum on International Relations says//CNA
March
Thailand to scrap pre-travel COVID-19 test to boost tourism
Written by nuke
Thailand's tourism industry accounts for about a fifth of the country's economy. (Photo: AFP/Alex OGLE) -
Travellers to Thailand will no longer have to take a COVID-19 test before boarding the plane, under plans announced on Friday (Mar 18) as part of efforts to reboot the kingdom's pandemic-battered tourism sector.
From Apr 1, the requirement to take a negative test within 72 hours of travel will be scrapped, and instead visitors will be tested on arrival in Thailand, Taweesin Visanuyothin, spokesman for the country's COVID-19 task force, said.
Draconian travel curbs helped Thailand limit COVID-19 case numbers and deaths in the early stages of the pandemic, but hammered its crucial tourism industry, which accounts for about a fifth of the country's economy.
Thailand is currently recording around 25,000 new cases of COVID-19 a day as the Omicron variant spreads around the country, but officials hope this will tail off in time for them to move to a "post-pandemic" phase from July.
Seeking to bounce back from its worst economic performance since the 1997 Asian financial crisis, Thailand has gradually eased travel restrictions over the past nine months.
But hotels, restaurants and other tourist-dependent businesses have urged the government to go further and faster to entice visitors back to the kingdom's beaches and resorts.
The tourism industry estimates that around five million foreign visitors will travel to Thailand in 2022 - down from nearly 40 million in the year before the pandemic//CNA
March
Sri Lanka secures Indian lifeline as IMF signals help
Written by nuke
The International Monetary Fund has agreed to a surprise request by Sri Lankan president Gotabaya Rajapaksa (pictured) for bailout talks (Photo: Sri Lanka's parliament/AFP/-) -
Cash-strapped Sri Lanka has secured a billion-dollar credit line from India to buy urgently needed food and medicine, officials said Friday (Mar 18), as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) confirmed it would discuss a possible bailout.
The South Asian nation is suffering its worst economic crisis since independence in 1948, with crippling shortages of essentials and fears it will default on its foreign debt or ask bondholders to take a "haircut" on repayments.
India and Sri Lanka formally entered into the credit agreement on Thursday during Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa's visit to New Delhi, Treasury Secretary Sajith Attygalle told reporters in Colombo.
"India stands with Sri Lanka," Indian Foreign Minister S Jaishankar said on Twitter. "US$1 billion credit line signed for supply of essential commodities."
The latest loan was on top of another US$500-million Indian credit line to help its island neighbour buy oil.
Meanwhile, the IMF on Friday confirmed it was considering President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's surprise Wednesday request to discuss a bailout.
"We will discuss with the authorities how best we can assist Sri Lanka going forward," IMF spokesman Gerry Rice said in a statement to reporters in the capital.
Rajapaksa's announcement that he would go to the IMF - a U-turn from his previous position - increases the likelihood that Sri Lanka will seek to renegotiate some of its estimated US$51 billion in foreign debts.
Rice said the IMF had already highlighted the urgent need for Sri Lanka to implement a "credible and coherent strategy to restore macroeconomic stability and debt sustainability".
Around US$6.9 billion of Colombo's debt needs to be serviced this year. Its foreign currency reserves stood at about US$2.3 billion at the end of February.
Sri Lanka earlier this year asked one of its main creditors, China, to help put off debt payments, but there has been no official response yet from Beijing//CNA
March
Ukraine president says he expects progress on EU membership bid within months
Written by Nur Yasmin
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said he spoke with the head of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen on Friday and Ukraine expects progress to be made on its application to join the European Union in the coming months.
"Had substantial conversation with EC President," Zelenskiy said on Twitter. "EC opinion on UA (Ukraine) application for #EU membership will be prepared within few months. UA Government and EC are instructed. Moving to our strategic goal together." (Reuters)
March
Putin discusses Ukraine with Russian security council
Written by Nur Yasmin
Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed Moscow's conflict with Ukraine and its international repercussions with his security council on Friday, the Kremlin said on its website.
Russia sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24 in what it called a special operation to degrade its neighbour’s military capabilities and root out people it called dangerous nationalists.
Unlike some of the previous meetings with the council, Putin's video conference was not televised on Friday.
"The current international situation was discussed at the meeting and the exchange of views on the ongoing special operation of the Russian Armed Forces in Ukraine continued," the Kremlin said in a statement.
"The president informed the participants in great detail about his numerous international telephone calls," it read.
Putin told German Chancellor Olaf Scholz during a phone call earlier on Friday that Kyiv was attempting to stall peace talks with Russia but that Moscow was still keen to continue negotiations. read more
Ukrainian forces have mounted stiff resistance to Russia's invasion and the West has imposed sweeping sanctions on Russia in an effort to force it to withdraw its forces.
Earlier, Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said comments by U.S. President Joe Biden, in which he labelled Putin a "war criminal" and a "murderous dictator", were "personal insults" that appeared to have been fuelled by irritation, fatigue and forgetfulness. (Reuters)