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Two people sickened with the novel coronavirus have died in the United States, as the global death toll from the viral outbreak that began in China nears 3,000. Both patients who succumbed to the newly identified virus, known officially as COVID-19, were residents of Washington state’s King County, officials said. …

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, will hold talks this week in Moscow amid mounting tensions in Syria, Turkey’s presidency said March 2. Turkey confirmed on March 2 that it had launched a full military operation against Russian-backed Syrian forces following increasing clashes in the …

Iraq Iraq detected two new coronavirus patients, both of whom had recently visited Iran, the Health Ministry said on Monday, bringing the total cases recorded so far to 21. The two new cases were detected in Baghdad and had recently returned from Iran, the ministry said in a statement. The …

A member of Iran’s Expediency Council died Monday from coronavirus, according to the official IRNA news agency. Mohammad Mirmohammadi, 76, lost his life from the virus at a hospital in the capital Tehran, IRNA said. Mirmohammadi was a former member of parliament for Qom province. In 2018, he was appointed …

A man was shot and about 30 people taken hostage on Monday by a gunman at a mall in the Philippine capital, Manila, where armed police and negotiators attempted to end the standoff peacefully. The gunman, a former security guard at Virra Mall in Manila’s San Juan City, shot a …

China is currently producing large amounts of favipiravir, a first antiviral drug approved to fight the Covid-19 outbreak, from which about 1,770 people have already died and the other 70,548 have been infected. According to China Daily, this is a generic version of the anti-catarrhal fapilavir and the National Medical …

Gunmen have killed 24 people and wounded 18 in an assault on a village church in northern Burkina Faso, officials say. The regional governor said on Monday that the local pastor was targeted in the attack. A group of “armed terrorists” burst into the village of Pansi, in Yagha, a …

Syria President Bashar al-Assad says Syrians are determined to liberate the whole country from the clutches of foreign-sponsored terrorists, amid a full-scale offensive by the army in the northwestern province of Idlib, the last militant bastion in a nine-year war. Assad made the comment during a meeting with Iran’s Parliament …

Boris Johnson is facing harsh criticism from Tory MPs after plans to scrap the BBC’s license fee model were described as “cultural vandalism”. Conservative backbenchers, decrying the suggestion that No 10 Downing Street could ‘compel’ the BBC to downsize its operations and take on a Netflix-style subscription service, urged the …

Flights have been canceled and the army drafted in as Britain prepares for Storm Dennis with the authorities warning of heavy rain and flooding in parts of England. EasyJet has warned of “significant disruption” to its operations whilst Luton Airport is advising passengers to check with their airlines before setting …

An airstrike in Afghanistan has killed at least eight civilians, officials said Saturday, as the war-torn country prepares for a “reduction in violence” under a deal between Taliban militants and the United States. The incident took place in the eastern province of Nangarhar on Friday when a vehicle carrying civilians …

Thousands of people were expected to take to the streets in Erfurt on Saturday to demonstrate against any future political coalitions with the far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD). The protest is the latest in the fallout from a controversial vote that saw politician Thomas Kemmerich elected as state premier …

France’s health minister has announced the first coronavirus death in Europe. Minister Agnes Buzyn says Saturday that “I was informed last night of the death of an 80-year-old patient who had been hospitalized … since Jan. 25.” The patient, a Chinese tourist from the province of Hubei, had a lung …

At least 30 civilians have been killed and many others injured in fresh air raids conducted by Saudi warplanes on Yemen’s northern Jawf Province, Yemeni media report. The al-Masirah TV channel reported Saturday that the Riyadh regime carried out eight aerial assaults on Jawf’s al-Maslub district. The strikes, it added, …

Ethiopia’s election board on Friday set a date of Aug. 29 for parliamentary elections that will be the first test of voter support for Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who has eased political restrictions since he took office in 2018. The date is two weeks later than the electoral board had …

French President Emmanuel Macron suffered a setback on Friday when one of his closest lieutenants, Benjamin Griveaux, pulled out of the race to become mayor of Paris after it was alleged he sent sexual images to a woman who is not his wife. “I have decided to withdraw my candidacy …

-China reported 121 new deaths on Friday, bringing the toll to 1,380. Another 5,090 new cases were confirmed, pushing up the number of infected patients to 63,851. -In Hubei province, the epicentre of the outbreak, daily new cases jumped by 4,823, while the number of new deaths rose by 116. …

German police detained 12 men on Friday suspected of setting up a far-right organization with the goal of carrying out attacks against politicians, asylum seekers, and Muslims, the Federal Prosecutor’s Office (GBA) said. Prosecutors said four of the suspects had set up a “terrorist organization” in September 2019 and regularly …

Commander-in-Chief of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps has warned Israel and the US that if they make any mistake, their forces will be targeted. Referring to a Zionist official’s statement that the job of targeting Iranian forces in Syria and Iraq has been divided between the US and Israel, Major …

Thousands of people have staged nationwide demonstrations across Bahrain on the eve of the ninth anniversary of the popular uprising against the ruling Al Khalifah dynasty. Demonstrators took to the streets in the capital Manama as well as the village of Sanabis, which lies in the suburbs of Manama, the …