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* The failure of this week’s US-China meeting to build strategic trust has heightened the need for Beijing and Washington to improve crisis management regime, a senior Chinese military scholar and adviser told a Beijing forum on Saturday.

* An earthquake struck northeastern Japan on Saturday, hitting areas devastated by the 2011 disaster, generating a tsunami of 1 metre and shaking buildings. The quake, with a magnitude of 7.2, hit the coast of Miyagi Prefecture at 6:26 p.m. (0926 GMT) at a depth of 60 km (40 miles), the Japan Meteorological Agency said. All tsunami alerts were lifted about an hour later, broadcaster NHK said after warning the public not to go near the shore.

* India’s financial capital Mumbai is facing a second wave of COVID-19 that could overwhelm its health facilities after a record daily increase in cases in its home state Maharashtra.

* The Philippines recorded a record daily increase in COVID-19 infections, as authorities tightened curbs in the capital and approved Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine for emergency use.

* Coronavirus-related deaths in the European region surpassed 1 million as vaccination efforts attempt to keep up with new variants causing a third wave of infections that could once again overwhelm hospitals.

* The world’s seven largest advanced economies moved to boost the International Monetary Fund reserves for the first time since 2009, a step aimed at helping developing countries cope with the pandemic, Britain said.

* Europe’s airlines and travel sector are bracing for a second lost summer, with rebound hopes increasingly challenged by a hobbled COVID-19 vaccine rollout, resurgent infections and new lockdowns.

* Russia on Saturday reported 9,632 new COVID-19 cases, including 1,728 in Moscow, pushing the national tally of cases to 4,447,570 since the pandemic began. The government coronavirus taskforce said that 392 people had died in the last 24 hours, taking the overall death toll to 94,569.

* The US government updated its COVID-19 mitigation guidance to narrow the acceptable distance between students who are wearing masks to at least three feet from at least six feet, potentially easing the path for schools that have struggled to reopen under previous recommendations.

* Germany will supply general practitioners with vaccines and deliver additional doses to regions on the Czech and French borders as it seeks to get its campaign back on track.

* British Prime Minister Boris Johnson received his first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine and urged the public to do the same, saying “he did not feel a thing.”

* Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi said he would personally take the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine.

* Belgium tightened measures to control the spread of the coronavirus to preserve plans to open up the economy in May.

* Greece will lift some COVID-19 restrictions next week as part of a plan to gradually reopen the economy and relieve national fatigue even as its hospitals remain under severe pressure from stubbornly high infections.

* Palestinians took another step in preparations for their first parliamentary election in 15 years on Saturday, opening registration offices to admit the political parties and independent candidates that will take part. The May 22 election in the West Bank and Gaza is part of a broader push for reconciliation between President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah faction and rival Islamist group Hamas. This is seen as vital to building broader support for any future statehood talks with Israel, frozen since 2014.

* Russia has postponed the launch of its Soyuz-2.1a rocket to Sunday, state news agency RIA quoted Roscosmos space agency Director General Dmitry Rogozin as saying on Saturday. Rogozin said the decision to postpone from Saturday was made after a voltage spike ahead of the planned launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, RIA reported.

* Australia’s east coast was smashed by heavy rains on Saturday, sparking dangerous flash flooding that forced the evacuation of multiple regions as the fast-moving waters unmoored houses, engulfed roads, stranded towns and cut power lines.

* Papua New Guinea reported rising coronavirus infections on Saturday, continuing a surge that highlights the need for tougher social distancing restrictions taking effect on Monday.

* Cameroon approved Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine for use, and suspended use of AstraZeneca’s shot which it was scheduled to receive on March 20 under the COVAX vaccine-sharing scheme.

* More than 123,000,000 people have contracted the novel coronavirus and at least 2,712,980 have died, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

* AstraZeneca’s coronavirus vaccine received a major boost after data from a large trial showed it was safe and effective, potentially paving the way for its emergency authorisation in the United States as countries in Asia accelerated its rollout.

* Cuba announced on Sunday it would vaccinate 150,000 frontline workers as part of the final phase of a clinical trial of the country’s leading COVID-19 vaccine candidate.

* The euro zone’s economic outlook is marred by uncertainty about the evolution of the pandemic and the speed of the vaccination campaign, European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde said.

* Relations between the European Union and Russia are at a low point, with disagreement in many areas, European Council President Charles Michel told Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday.

* Russia has completed clinical trials for its one-shot “Sputnik-Light” version of its vaccine, Health Minister Mikhail Murashko said, adding that representatives from the European Medicines Agency (EMA) will visit the country next month.

* Boris Johnson warned that the third wave sweeping across Europe could be heading towards Britain. One of his spokesmen said Britain does not want to see other countries placing export restrictions on COVID-19 vaccinations.

* The European Union has not formally blocked the shipment of Astrazeneca vaccines from a Netherlands factory to Britain because no export request has been made but such a request would not be approved, an EU official said.

* French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson spoke on the phone on Sunday about vaccine supplies, at Johnson’s request, a French official said on Monday.

* The number of US air passengers screened topped 1.5 million Sunday for the first time since March 2020, as air travel continues to rebound from a pandemic-related drop, the US Transportation Security Administration (TSA) said Monday.

* The Russian embassy in Sofia called on Monday the expulsion of two Russian diplomats from Bulgaria groundless and said Moscow would reserve its right to retaliate. Earlier on Monday Bulgaria’s foreign ministry expelled two Russian diplomats over alleged involvement in espionage.

* Hungary is the first EU country to approve for emergency use China’s CanSino Biologics vaccine and CoviShield, the Indian version of AstraZeneca’s shot.

* Miami Beach officials voted on Sunday to extend an 8 p.m. curfew and emergency powers for up to three weeks to help control unruly and mostly maskless crowds that have converged on the party destination during spring break.

* New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern will announce a date for quarantine-free travel with Australia within two weeks, despite mounting pressure from business to open borders with neighbouring countries.

* Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed victory over COVID-19 by making Israel a “vaccination nation”.

* AstraZeneca expects the EU drug regulator to give approval for a factory in the Netherlands that is helping make its vaccine later this month or in early April.

* Sinovac Biotech has supplied 160 million doses to 18 countries and regions, including China, its chief executive officer Yin Weidong said.

* Saudi Arabia presented on Monday a new peace initiative to end the war in Yemen which includes a nationwide ceasefire under U.N. supervision, the kingdom’s foreign minister said.

* Poland is seeing an increase in people willing to take AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine, the prime minister said on Monday, after reports that as many as 70% in some places had been unwilling to get the shot due to safety concerns.

* Croatia is putting safety at the heart of its campaign to lure back tourists this year, offering testing at resorts and other preventive measures to combat the coronavirus, Tourism Minister Nikolina Brnjac said on Monday.

* Mauritius has approved Sputnik V vaccine for use, Russia’s RDIF sovereign wealth fund said.

* Thailand has granted emergency authorisation to Janssen, the single-dose coronavirus vaccine of Johnson & Johnson, the third vaccine to be cleared for local use.

* China’s central bank on Thursday said it would deepen exchange rate reform and increase yuan exchange rate flexibility, as well as improve the green financial system in order to achieve carbon neutrality.

* The transport minister of Singapore, the world’s top transhipment hub, said on Thursday the blockage in the Suez Canal could temporarily disrupt supplies to the region.

* Oil prices fell 4% per barrel, extending a string of market weakness on renewed lockdowns in Europe and Asia to head off a rising coronavirus infection rate.

* European Union leaders met to navigate a common path out of the pandemic as infections surge in many of their countries, while President Joe Biden set a new goal of administering 200 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine in the United States in his first 100 days in office.

* As the “best guardians” of Latin America’s forests, indigenous tribes need greater access to climate finance and secure land tenure to stem deforestation and climate change, the United Nations said on Thursday.

* Germany plans to enforce strict quarantine restrictions on travellers from France where new cases of the coronavirus are exploding, two government sources said.

* Three additional French regions including the Rhone department around the city of Lyon will be put under tightened restrictions for four weeks.

* Portugal extended a state of emergency for 15 days as it gradually eases strict lockdown measures imposed in mid-January.

* Poland will shut kindergartens, hair salons and limit church service attendance as of Saturday after setting another consecutive daily record of new coronavirus cases.

* Mexico’s coronavirus death toll topped 200,000, making it only the third country in the world to hit the grim milestone.

* Chilean health officials extended a lockdown across the capital Santiago to tame a second wave of infections even as the South American nation continues to plow ahead with the world’s fastest per capita vaccination campaign.

* Peru said it had confirmed a record high of 11,260 new cases of coronavirus in a single day amid a new more contagious variant first identified in Brazil.

* The first 723,000 of up to 7 million vaccine doses that MTN Group is donating to African countries have arrived in nine nations, the African Union’s disease control body said.

* Iraq received 336,000 doses of AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine on Thursday, the first sent there under the global COVAX vaccine-sharing scheme.

* Israel has administered two doses of COVID-19 vaccine to more than half its population, a world-beating roll-out that has helped the country emerge from pandemic closures.

* AstraZeneca said its vaccine was 76% effective in a new analysis of its US trial – only a tad lower than the level in an earlier report this week criticised for using outdated data.

* Europe’s drugs regulator said its safety panel will call a meeting of experts on March 29 to further study the reported cases of blood clots linked to AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine.

* African elephants living in forests and savannas are increasingly threatened with extinction, the Red List of species in trouble showed on Thursday, as conservationists called for an urgent end to poaching.

* Poland could extend sanctions against Belarus, a deputy foreign minister said on Thursday, as a diplomatic spat between the two countries escalates after Belarusian authorities detained two Poles this week.

* Oman will impose a curfew from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. from Sunday and extending until April 8, as the Gulf Arab states tightens restrictions to curb a rise in coronavirus cases, state media reported on Thursday.

* China reported 8 new COVID-19 cases on March 27, compared with 12 new infections the previous day, the country’s national health authority said on Sunday. The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in mainland China now stands at 90,167 while the death toll remained unchanged at 4,636.

* Russia has registered 9,088 new COVID-19 cases over the past 24 hours, bringing the national tally to 4,519,832, the country’s COVID-19 response center said Sunday. Meanwhile, as Russia reported 336 more deaths and 8,630 new recoveries, the respective total stood at 97,740 and 4,139,128, the center said.

* Cambodia on Sunday reported 86 new local COVID-19 cases and one new death, the country’s Ministry of Health (MoH) said in a statement. Of the new infections, 25 were found in capital Phnom Penh.

* Mexico on Saturday reported 4,922 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 567 more fatalities, bringing the country’s total to 2,224,767 infections and 201,429 deaths, according to health ministry data.

* Britain recorded 4,715 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday, down from 6,187 the day before, with 58 more deaths within 28 days of a positive coronavirus test result. Official statistics showed that 29.7 million people had received a first dose of COVID-19 vaccine.

* The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany increased by 17,176 to 2,772,401, data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases showed on Sunday. The reported death toll rose by 90 to 75,870 , the tally showed.

* Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi is scheduled to visit Tajikistan and lead the Pakistani delegation at the 9th Heart of Asia-Istanbul Process ministerial conference to be held in Dushanbe, the capital of Tajikistan, the Foreign Ministry of Pakistan said on Sunday.

* New Zealand reported one new case of COVID-19 on Sunday, said the Ministry of Health in a statement. The total number of active cases of COVID-19 in New Zealand on Sunday was 75, and the total number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the country reached 2,126.

* Iran reported 8,751 new COVID-19 cases on Sunday, raising its nationwide caseload to 1,855,674. The pandemic has so far claimed 62,397 lives in Iran, up by 89 in the past 24 hours.

* The active coronavirus cases in Israel dropped by 717 on Sunday morning to 9,996, the lowest since Nov. 29, 2020, the state’s Ministry of Health said. The new figure reflects a sharp decline in active cases since Feb. 5, when 84,784 active cases were registered.

* Argentina on Saturday surpassed 2.3 million COVID-19 cases, the Ministry of Health reported. According to the ministry, 10,338 new cases were reported, bringing the total to 2,301,389, with 173,793 cases in the active stage.

* Summer holidays and visits to restaurants to be possible from the end of June, supported by the mass rollout of vaccines against the coronavirus, German Deputy Economy Minister Thomas Bareiss told a German newspaper.

* Malta limited the number of people who can meet in public spaces to two on Sunday as it seeks to prevent a surge of COVID-19 cases over Easter.

* A record number of Ukrainians were taken to hospital with COVID-19 over the past 24 hours, health ministry data showed on Sunday as the country grapples with a surge in infections. Ukraine also reported 11,932 new infections in the past 24 hours and 203 coronavirus related deaths.

* Daily coronavirus cases in Saudi Arabia have risen above 500 for the first time since October and the health ministry on Saturday blamed the increase on gatherings and laxity in complying with preventive measures such as social distancing.

* Turkey has recorded 30,021 new coronavirus cases in the space of 24 hours, the highest number this year, health ministry data showed on Saturday. Measures to curb the pandemic in Turkey were eased this month.

* The Saudi-led coalition battling Yemen’s Houthi forces has destroyed two explosive-laden boats that the Iran-aligned group planned to use in an “imminent” attack launched from the Red Sea port of Hodeidah, Saudi state media reported on Sunday.

* India has received more than a third of the nearly 28 million Indian-made AstraZeneca vaccine doses delivered so far by the global programme for poor countries, according to data from UNICEF and vaccine alliance Gavi.

* Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro on Monday unveiled the biggest cabinet reshuffle since he took power in January 2019 as he replaced six ministers, including those at the ministries of foreign affairs and defence.

* US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen spoke on Monday with French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire about the importance of working together toward a solution in the ongoing OECD discussions on international taxation, the Treasury said in a statement.

* German leaders will discuss the use of AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine, after several states said they would stop giving the shot to people under the age of 60 following further reports of a rare brain blood disorder.

* Britain could approve Novavax’s vaccine next month, the chief investigator for the shot’s trial told the Evening Standard newspaper.

* Austria is in talks with Russia to buy a million doses of its Sputnik V vaccine, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz’s office said.

* Poland will widen access to vaccines in April to those in their 40s and 50s, the government said.

* US President Joe Biden urged states to pause reopening efforts and a top health official warned of “impending doom”, amid a surge in COVID-19 cases that threaten efforts to quash the coronavirus pandemic.

* Canadian health officials said they would stop offering AstraZeneca’s vaccine to people under age 55 and require a new analysis of the shot’s risks and benefits based on age and gender.

* Pakistan will import more coronavirus vaccines made by China’s CanSino Biologics next month, equivalent to 3 million doses, the minister in charge for COVID-19 operations said.

* BioNTech said it and partner Pfizer expect to increase manufacturing capacity of their vaccine to 2.5 billion doses by the end of 2021.

* German biotech firm CureVac said it had partnered with Swiss contract manufacturer Celonic to produce more than 100 million doses of its vaccine candidate.

* COVID-19 vaccines developed by Pfizer with BioNTech and Moderna based on messenger RNA technology reduced risk of infection by 80% two weeks or more after the first of two shots and by 90% about two weeks after the second shot – including asymptomatic infections, according to data from a real-world US study.

* Global stock markets rose as investors shook off worries about a hedge fund default that hit international banking stocks overnight, and remained focused on the global COVID-19 vaccination programme.

* Higher energy prices and supply chain disruptions pushed Germany’s annual consumer price inflation in March above the European Central Bank’s target of close to but below 2%, Federal Statistics Office data showed.

* The cost of supporting businesses, workers and the unemployed from the fallout of the pandemic is likely to top EUR14 billion this year, costing Greece nearly double what it had projected, the finance minister said.

* Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Italy’s League leader Matteo Salvini and Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki will meet for talks in Budapest on Thursday, state news agency MTI reported on Tuesday.

* Iran said a fourth wave of the coronavirus pandemic had taken hold in western and central areas of the country, triggered by widespread travel and celebrations during the current Iranian New Year holidays.

* A new coronavirus strain has been identified in Israel, the Health Ministry said, and the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine appeared to be effective against it.

* Kuwait’s government took the oath of office in parliament on Tuesday, state news agency KUNA said, after a months-long standoff between the elected assembly and the appointed prime minister as the country tries to boost its finances.

* Mali has approved the use of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine, the Russian Direct Investment Fund said.

* The third phase of vaccination to curb the COVID-19 pandemic began in India on Thursday, during which all people aged above 45 years would be given vaccine jabs. So far over 65 million people (65,117,896) have been vaccinated across the country.

* Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Wednesday that the United States has shown “encouraging signs” with regards to finding a compromise and returning to the Iran nuclear deal.

* Japan’s first doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine are coming from plants in the United States, not Europe as initially expected, the company said.

* Republic of Korea said it will issue so-called COVID-19 vaccine passports to immunized citizens.

* The French government is still expecting that upcoming regional elections will be held in June as planned, providing health conditions allow it, Prime Minister Jean Castex told parliament on Thursday, a day after the country announced a third lockdown to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic.

* Asian stocks were set to edge higher early on Thursday after big tech rallied on Wall Street and as US President Joe Biden announced a US$2.3 trillion infrastructure investment plan.

* Republic of Korean capital Seoul said on Thursday that it has sent a proposal for co-hosting the 2032 Olympics with the Democratic People’s Republic of Korean’s Pyongyang to the International Olympic Committee (IOC), in an effort to keep its hopes alive despite Brisbane being the frontrunner. The IOC has already picked the Australian city as the preferred partner for hosting the Games.

* The Mexican government raised the forecast for the expansion of its gross domestic product (GDP) in 2021 from 4.6 to 5.3 percent, while projecting a stronger domestic market as vaccination against COVID-19 progresses, the Finance Ministry said on Wednesday.

* On the eve of the Easter holidays, World Health Organization (WHO) Europe warned Europeans on Wednesday against making “individual” travel plans that could “affect more people than those close by” and could “also impact communities.”

* European Union states are expected to receive 107 million doses of vaccines by the end of March, hitting a revised-down target but far below initial plans.

* Brazil health regulator Anvisa said it approved emergency use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine while it rejected a request from the government to import doses of Covaxin, citing a lack of safety data and documentation.

* Russia reported 9,169 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, including 2,151 in Moscow, pushing the infection tally in the country to 4,554,264 since the pandemic began. The government coronavirus taskforce said that 383 people had died in the last 24 hours, taking Russia’s death toll to 99,233.

* President Emmanuel Macron ordered France into its third national lockdown and said schools would close for three weeks as he sought to push back a third wave of COVID-19 infections.

* Belgian hospitals have been ordered to reserve 60% of their intensive care beds for COVID-19 patients as a third wave of infections takes hold, doctors said.

* Brazil has detected a new COVID-19 variant that is similar to the one first seen in South Africa, the head of Sao Paulo’s Butantan institute said.

* Johnson & Johnson said it had found a problem with a batch of the drug substance for its vaccine being produced by Emergent Biosolutions, and said the batch did not advance to the final fill-and-finish stage.

* Pfizer and BioNTech said their vaccine was safe and effective and produced robust antibody responses in those aged 12 to 15, paving the way for them to seek approval in the United States and Europe in weeks.

* Europe’s medicines regulator said it had not yet identified any risk factors such as age, sex or a previous history of blood clotting disorders, for clotting cases reported after inoculation with AstraZeneca’s vaccine.

* Poland will increase its support scheme for the economy amid the pandemic lockdown by around PLN30 billion (US$7.63 billion), Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Thursday.

* The economy of the Maldives is recovering sooner than expected following difficulties posed by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, local media reported on Thursday, quoting Spokesperson at the President’s Office Mohamed Mabrook Azeez.

* The Portuguese parliament approved on Wednesday the renewal of the mandatory use of masks in public spaces until June 13 to contain the spread of COVID-19 in the country.

* The total number of people vaccinated against the coronavirus exceeded 2 million in Romania on Wednesday, reaching 2,015,307. Of the inoculated people, 1,072,985 have received both shots of one of the three vaccines — Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna and AstraZeneca — currently approved for use in Romania, according to the National COVID Vaccination Coordination Committee.

* German biotechnology company BioNTech and US company Pfizer said on Wednesday that their COVID-19 vaccine was 100-percent efficient in children aged between 12 and 15.

* Nigeria hopes to receive up to 70 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine this year through the African Union, its primary healthcare chief told Reuters, amid concerns about delayed deliveries of AstraZeneca shots.

* Egypt received 854,400 doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine as part of the global COVAX agreement, the health ministry said.

* Israel plans to administer the Pfizer vaccine to adolescents upon FDA approval, the health minister said.

* Rates of stillbirth and maternal deaths rose by around a third during the pandemic, with pregnancy outcomes getting worse overall for both babies and mothers worldwide, according to an international data review.