WORLD

Madrid, Spain | THE INDEPENDENT |    Real Madrid president Florentino Perez has tested positive for the coronavirus, COVID-19, the club informed on Tuesday. “Real Madrid C. F. would like to inform that our president Florentino Perez has tested positive in the COVID-19 tests that he periodically undergoes, although he is …

Brussels, Belgium | THE INDEPENDENT |   The European Union’s (EU) top health officials held discussions on Sunday with drug giants about rapid development and production of vaccines specially against the new variants of the coronavirus. The emergence of variants of concern “raises the imminent threat of reduced efficacy of recently …

  Berlin, Germany | XINHUA |  After a seven percent drop in production last year, Germany’s electrical industry is expecting production to increase by five percent in 2021, the German Electrical and Electronic Manufacturers’ Association (ZVEI) said on Thursday. “This would make up for around two-thirds of last year’s losses,” …

  Berlin, Germany | XINHUA | The number of new COVID-19 infections in Germany remained below the previous week’s levels, with another 14,022 cases reported within one day, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) said on Friday. So far, more than 2.19 million infections have been registered in Germany since the …

Brussels, Belgium | XINHUA |  The European Commission granted conditional marketing authorization for the COVID-19 vaccine developed by British company AstraZeneca and Oxford University on Friday, although the bloc seems unlikely to get the amount of doses as agreed for the moment. “Securing safe vaccines for Europeans is our utmost …

  United Nations, USA | THE INDEPENDENT |    United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday called on member states to make vaccine solidarity a top priority. “Our first priority for 2021 is to respond to COVID-19. Vaccines are the first great moral test before us,” the UN chief told the …

Canberra, Australia | THE INDEPENDENT |    Australia’s eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant has called for social media giants to take responsibility for the content on their platforms. Under changes to the Online Safety Act proposed by the Australian government, Inman Grant would have the power to prevent cyber abuse, identify …

Geneva, Switzerland | Xinhua | The CEO of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, said on Tuesday that they hope to deliver 145 to 150 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines in the first quarter of 2021 and 500 million doses in the second quarter, and then 1.5 billion in the second half of …

New York, USA | THE INDEPENDENT |   Global COVID-19 cases surpassed 100 million on Tuesday, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University. The global case count reached 100,032,461, with a total of 2,149,818 deaths worldwide, as of 2:22 p.m. local time (1922 GMT), …

United Nations, USA | THE INDEPENDENT |   United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday urged donor countries and banks to significantly increase the volume and predictability of their finance for climate change adaptation and resilience. “Donor countries and multilateral, regional and national development banks need to significantly increase the volume …