Some 280,000 antigen rapid test (ART) kits have been and will be distributed to citizens and residents of Brunei Darussalam registered under the National Welfare System (SKN), Minister at the Prime Minister’s Office and Minister of Finance and Economy II said at the daily press conference yesterday.
In response to a question regarding the COVID-19 fatality recorded, Dato Seri Setia Dr Haji Mohd Amin Liew said compared to neighbouring countries, the Sultanate recorded the lowest number of fatalities. “As announced last Sunday, nine deaths were recorded in which out of the total figure, two were due to COVID-19 while the other seven were not due to the pandemic. The two cases had not received their vaccination, while the seven had prior medical conditions.”
HANOI (XINHUA) – Vietnam reported 131,713 new COVID-19 cases yesterday, down 9,438 cases from Sunday, according to its Ministry of Health (MoH).
The new infections, logged in 63 localities nationwide, included 131,709 domestically transmitted and four imported.
Vietnamese capital Hanoi remained the epidemic hotspot with 17,916 cases yesterday, followed by central Nghe An province with 5,403 cases, and northern Phu Tho province with 5,348 cases.
AP – Cambodia’s foreign minister arrived yesterday in Myanmar’s capital Naypyitaw on his mission as a special regional envoy seeking to facilitate peacemaking in the fellow Southeast Asian nation, which was plunged into an extended violent political crisis after the army seized power last year.
Prak Sokhonn is representing the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which last April reached a five-point consensus on Myanmar. It called for the immediate cessation of violence, a dialogue among all concerned parties, mediation by an ASEAN special envoy, provision of humanitarian aid through ASEAN channels, and a visit to Myanmar by the special envoy to meet all concerned parties.
HONG KONG (AP) – Hong Kong’s leader yesterday said that the city would lift flight bans on countries including Britain and the United States (US) as well as reduce quarantine time for travellers arriving in the city as coronavirus infections in its latest outbreak plateaus.
The city’s chief executive Carrie Lam announced during a press conference yesterday that a ban on flights from nine countries – Australia, Canada, France, India, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Britain and the US – would be lifted from April 1.
LVIV, UKRAINE (AP) – Ukrainian officials defiantly rejected a Russian demand that their forces in Mariupol lay down arms and raise white flags yesterday in exchange for safe passage out of the besieged strategic port city.
Even as Russia intensified its attempt to bombard Mariupol into surrender, its offensive in other parts of Ukraine has floundered. Western governments and analysts see the broader conflict grinding into a war of attrition, with Russia continuing to barrage cities.
In the capital Kyiv, Russian shelling devastated a shopping centre near the city centre killing at least eight people.
TUNIS (AFP) – A head-on collision between two passenger trains injured 95 people yesterday morning in the south of the Tunisian capital, emergency services said.
“The injured were taken to hospitals and there were no deaths,” civil defence spokesman Moez Triaa told AFP, adding that only one of the trains was carrying passengers.
Most of the injured were suffering from fractures and bruises, none of them life-threatening, he said.
AP – NASA’s new space telescope has gazed into the distant universe and shown perfect vision: a spiky image of a faraway star photobombed by thousands of ancient galaxies.
The image released last Wednesday from the James Webb Space Telescope is a test shot – not an official science observation – to see how its 18 hexagonal mirrors worked together for a single coordinated image taken 1.6 million kilometres away from Earth. Officials said it worked better than expected.
Last month, NASA looked at a much closer star with 18 separate images from its mirror segments.
BEIJING (AP) — A Chinese airliner with 133 people on board crashed in the southern province of Guangxi on Monday, state media has reported.
Broadcaster CCTV said the accident involving a China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737 and occurred near the city of Wuzhou in Teng county. Media said the crash sparked a mountainside fire. It said rescuers had been dispatched and there was no immediate word on numbers of dead and injured.
File photo of a China Eastern aircraft. PHOTO: AFP
The twin-engine, single aisle Boeing 737 is one of the world’s most popular planes for short and medium-haul flights.
It was not immediately clear which variant of 737 was involved in the accident. China Eastern operates multiple versions of the common aircraft, including the 737-800 and the 737 Max.
The 737 Max version was grounded worldwide after two fatal crashes. China’s aviation regulator cleared that plane to return to service late last year, making the country the last major market to do so.
China Eastern is one of China’s three major air carriers.
COLOMBO (AFP) – At least two people in Sri Lanka died while waiting in long queues for fuel, officials said yesterday, as widespread shortages cause misery and hardship across the island nation.
Sri Lanka is battling the worst economic crisis in its history as an independent nation, with a lack of foreign exchange to purchase vital imports shrinking the supply of essential goods.
Motorists are forced to wait hours for petrol and the government has imposed rolling blackouts as power utilities are unable to pay for enough foreign oil to meet demand.
Police said a 70-year-old man, who was standing in line to buy gasoline, collapsed and died at a filling station on the outskirts of the capital Colombo yesterday.
It was the second such death in as many days, after another elderly man collapsed in Kandy while waiting for kerosene oil to use as cooking fuel, police in the city confirmed.
Local media reports said multiple women standing in the hot sun to buy cooking gas had fainted at several locations across the island over the weekend.
Oil and liquefied petroleum gas shipments have sat idle at Colombo’s main port, with importers unable to scrape together enough foreign currency to pay for them.
The COVID-19 pandemic throttled Sri Lanka’s tourism sector – a key foreign exchange earner – and foreign worker remittances have also declined.
Authorities announced last week that the country will seek an International Monetary Fund bailout to resolve its worsening foreign debt crisis and shore up reserves. Rating agencies and foreign analysts have cast doubt on the cash-strapped nation’s ability to service its USD51 billion external debt, with USD6.9 billion due in repayments this year.
A woman walks past a closed petrol station in Colombo. PHOTO: AFP
SEOUL (AFP) – South Korea’s president-elect said yesterday he will relocate his office from the “imperial” Blue House, in a move critics charged is linked to his belief in shamanistic spiritual practices.
Yoon Suk-yeol, who won a tight election earlier this month, pledged on the campaign trail that he would move presidential business out of the Blue House – home to South Korea’s leaders since 1948.
The former prosecutor has accused the hilltop headquarters of fostering an “imperial” presidency and undermining communication with the public.
He is not the first to try to relocate. Outgoing President Moon Jae-in also pledged to move out “to eradicate the authoritarian presidential culture” but faced security and logistical hurdles.
Those hurdles remain – the move has raised concerns for its reported cost of around KRW50 billion (USD41 million), and because roads in crowded Seoul would have to be closed every day during the presidential commute.
South Korea’s president-elect Yoon Suk-yeol talks about his planned relocation of the presidential office. PHOTO: AFP
Yoon’s critics have said his desire to move is tied to his belief in feng shui, a traditional practice which stresses the importance of harmony between humans and nature.
The former prosecutor has been dogged by accusations of ties to a shaman, which he has denied.
The Blue House has long been rumoured to foster bad luck for its residents, given the impeachment, corruption trials and imprisonment that have befallen South Korean presidents.
At a press conference yesterday, Yoon said he will start to work from the Defence Ministry compound after his inauguration on May 10.
“It’s a difficult task, but it’s a decision I made for the future of the country,” Yoon told reporters.
Yoon said the Defence Ministry compound was equipped with the necessary national security facilities and would minimise inconvenience compared to other possible new offices.
Addressing the concerns around the move, he said his decision was aimed at making the president more accessible and approachable.
“If I move into the Blue House compound, I think it will be harder to be free from the imperial power that is symbolic of the Blue House,” he said.
The Blue House will be fully open to the public starting May 10, he added.
Perched in the mountains of northern Seoul and named for its azure roof, the grounds around the Blue House were home to royalty as well as the colonial governor-general during Japan’s annexation of Korea.
It then became home to South Korea’s president in 1948.
