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Costa Rica seeks unity for COVID fight as WHO assembly looms

WHO chief insists ‘nothing hidden from US’ on coronavirus

11:58 pm April 20, 2020

Geneva: World Health Organisation (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus insisted on Monday that the UN agency had not hidden from the United States any information it had about the coronavirus pandemic. He said the presence of embedded US government secondees working at the WHO headquarters in Geneva “means there is nothing hidden from the US, […]

France fast-tracks citizenship for foreign virus fighters

France virus toll tops 20,000 after 547 new deaths: official

11:49 pm April 20, 2020

Paris: France on Monday announced that more than 20,000 people had now died from the coronavirus in the country after 547 new deaths, even as tentative signs grew that the epidemic was steadying. “Tonight, our country has passed a barrier that is symbolic and particularly painful,” top health official Jerome Salomon told reporters, announcing a […]

Italy’s Conte doubles down on demand for coronabonds

11:54 pm April 19, 2020

Berlin: The “full firepower” of the European Union will be needed to overcome the historic shock of the coronavirus crisis, Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte told German media Sunday, repeating calls to pool European debt. Ahead of a video conference between EU leaders this Thursday, Conte reiterated demands for controversial pooled debt instruments known as […]

EU commissioner slams Europe’s ‘morbid dependency’ on China

11:51 pm April 19, 2020

Prague: European Commission vice-president Vera Jourova on Sunday chided the EU for what she said was its “morbid dependency” on China and India for medical supplies, a situation highlighted by the coronavirus crisis. “This crisis has revealed our morbid dependency on China and India as regards pharmaceuticals,” Jourova said in a debate on Czech state […]

Virus spread scales down Warsaw Ghetto commemoration events

11:49 pm April 19, 2020

Warsaw: Sirens wailed and Jewish prayers were said for the heroes of the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto uprising, but the annual memorial observances were scaled down Sunday and moved to the internet because of the coronavirus pandemic and the need for social distancing. Poland’s chief rabbi, Michael Schudrich, said prayers at the monument to the ghetto […]