Author: Middle East Correspondent

Twitter Inc said on Wednesday it is testing a new feature that will allow users to tweet using their voice, capturing up to 140 seconds of audio in a single tweet. As a result, the feature will be available to a limited number of users on Apple’s iOS platform for now and be rolled out for more iOS users in the coming weeks, Twitter said in a blog post. The micro-blogging platform said users will be able to create a voice tweet using a new “wavelengths” icon on the Tweet composer screen. https://twitter.com/AJMartinSky/status/1273540988305367040 Social media companies including Twitter have long…

INDIA has rebutted Chinese claims of ownership of the Galwan river valley, the site of a bloody brawl between the neighbours. Monday night’s fight left at least 20 Indian soldiers dead and sparked fresh tensions between the two countries. India’s foreign ministry said the Chinese claims on the valley were “exaggerated and untenable”. Meanwhile, an image of a weapon used to attack soldiers during the clash has caused outrage in India. Both sides have exchanged protests over the clashes in the disputed Himalayan border area. CHINA has not released casualty figures. Unconfirmed reports in Indian media say at least 40…

President Donald Trump has said the country will not close again as several US states reported new coronavirus cases on Wednesday. “We won’t be closing the country again. We won’t have to do that,” TRUMP  said in an interview. Trump’s comments come after White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin both said the United States could not shut down the economy again. In a call with governors, Vice President Mike Pence encouraged them to repeat the administration’s claim that increased testing accounts for the spike in numbers. The paper’s analysis found that positive cases outstripped the…

HSBC is resuming a massive redundancy plan that had been put on pause after the outbreak of CORONAVIRUS, with 35,000 jobs set to be cut. The job cuts will be made over the medium term, while the lender will also freeze almost all external recruitment, said chief executive Noel Quinn in a memo sent to the bank’s 235,000 staff worldwide. “We could not pause the job losses indefinitely — it was always a question of ‘not if, but when’,” Quinn said. https://twitter.com/AlinSneha/status/1273173084401537024 HSBC had postponed the job cuts, part of a wider restructuring programme to cut $4.5bn (£3.6bn) in costs,…

Nationwide demonstrations in France demanding better pay and resources for health workers have been marred by violence in the capital, Paris. Police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of masked protesters who threw stones and other projectiles and overturned a car. Officials said they have 19 officers injured, furthermore, they made more than 30 arrests. Across France, hospital staff have been demanding government action on pay, recruitment and more beds in hospitals. https://twitter.com/EuropeanUnionC/status/1273203149046759424 President Emmanuel Macron’s government has announced bonuses for healthcare staff who have worked through the coronavirus crisis. But unions say the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed weaknesses in…

Oman reported Wednesday 810 new cases of the novel CORONAVIRUS, bringing to 26,079 the country’s overall infections. The newly diagnosed cases include 468 Omanis and 342 foreign residents, the Health Ministry said. The ministry announced two more deaths from COVID-19 over the previous day, making Oman’s total of such fatalities to 116. https://twitter.com/OmanVSCovid19/status/1273175032064335875 The country’s overall recoveries from the disease have reached 11,797, the ministry said. There are 102 patients receiving intensive care treatment. https://twitter.com/Shamalsharji14/status/1272053952801050624 Oman has conducted 2,797 coronavirus tests over the past 24 hours, the ministry added. Earlier this week, Omani authorities have enforced a lockdown on the Governorate…

INDIA impatiently awaited Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s response on Wednesday to the death of at least 20 soldiers in a border clash with Chinese troops as the country’s media vented its fury and political rivals goaded Modi over his silence. Modi, in a Twitter message, called for an all-party meeting on Friday to discuss the situation but did not make any other comment on the confrontation between the nuclear-armed neighbours. CHINA said it does not want to see any more clashes on the border with India following Monday’s violence. Foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian repeated that China was not to…

The Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing has issued a circular to allow the reopening of water parks in the emirate of DUBAIas of Thursday, June 18. Showers and locker rooms will also reopen. https://twitter.com/tirsa_zel/status/1272829544320270337 The circular was also issued to hotels and recreational facilities. It stated that eight other types of activities will also reopen according to the revised regulations, including desert safari trips, dune bashing, dhow sailing, kayaking, helicopter rides and jet skiing. The guidelines further stated that water parks will operate at 50 percent capacity, and stressed that staff requires to follow safety guidelines, including temperature checks, masks…

There could be as many as 1.2 million foreign workers leaving the Saudi Arabian labour market in 2020, a report from Jadwa Investment Company found. Hospitality, food services, administrative and support activities, which include rent and lease activities, travel agencies, security and building services, will be the most affected and will see the highest exit of foreigners, Jadwa said. However, despite the expat exodus, the unemployment rate among Saudi nationals will remain unchanged by the end of 2020, at 12 percent, it added. https://twitter.com/Zuby215/status/1272840748476633089 Expectations show that these conditions will hard-hit travel, hotels, restaurants, tourism and environment sectors, with a…

An estimated 1.7 billion people — more than 20% of the world’s population — risk becoming severely infected with the new CORONAVIRUSdue to underlying health problems such as obesity and heart disease, a study showed on Tuesday. The novel coronavirus, which has killed more than 420,000 people globally during the first wave of the pandemic, adversely affects patients suffering from co-morbidities. People with health problems, 350 million will likely get sick A team of experts from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine analysed global data sets of illnesses including diabetes, lung disease and HIV used these to estimate how…

Indian experts hospitalized Health Minister Satyendar Jain on Tuesday with high fever and tested him for CORONAVIRUS as the pandemic cases continue to rise in  INDIA. India has opened up businesses, public transport and shopping malls to revive a battered economy but the ending of the nearly 70-day lockdown has come just as cases are rising at their fastest daily levels. https://twitter.com/TimesNow/status/1272747528077709312 The total number of infections stood at 343,091, the world’s fourth most after the United States, Brazil and Russia, the health ministry data showed. At least 9,900 people have died, far fewer than the United States and Brazil, but…

Police are hunting for a man who attacked an Egyptian doctor in a clinic, security sources said. “Clad in Kuwaiti white robe and checkered headscarf, a Syrian man verbally and physically assaulted an Egyptian doctor, breaking his legs in a clinic in Al Jahra, a town located 32km west of Kuwait City in Kuwait,” a source said. The source added the suspect was identified through the ID card of his son who was visiting the clinic when the incident occurred. https://twitter.com/1972Jammy/status/1272130370230644737 “Immediately, a number of security men went to the scene, and it was found that the doctor was unable…

Hong Kong Disneyland Resort will reopen on Thursday after being closed for almost five months because of the CORONAVIRUS. The theme park will operate at a reduced capacity and with a new ticket reservation system for all guests. Hotel services at the resort are also to reopen gradually, while MTR train services on the Disneyland Resort line will resume on Wednesday. https://twitter.com/carlyewisel/status/1272349000276930560 Ocean Park, the city’s other theme park, reopened at the weekend, and the government said the move to open both was a key step in rebooting an economy In a press release, Disneyland said during the initial reopening phase,…

Bollywood lost yet another actor as Sushant Singh Rajput committed suicide at his residence in Mumbai. While the industry is still reeling with the passing away of Irrfan Khan and Rishi Kapoor, Bollywood has to now deal with yet another loss. Sushant was a young aspiring actor, at 34 years old and people remarkably loved him for his performances on the small screen as well as in movies. Sushant Singh Rajput committed suicide at his Bandra residence by hanging himself on Sunday, Additional Commissioner of Police Dr Manoj Sharma confirmed. We await more details. https://twitter.com/TheFarahKhan/status/1272136262053322754 “Sushant Singh Rajput has committed suicide, Mumbai Police is…

Top Mexican beach getaway reopens Foreign visitors have begun to trickle back to the white sands and warm waters of the Caribbean coast of Mexico as its popular beaches gradually reopen to tourism with new sanitary measures in place to prevent the spread of the  CORONAVIRUS. “I’ve been stuck in New York City in my apartment for three months, so I decided that on the beach somewhere open was probably a good call,” said web designer Sam Leon, 31, after arriving Saturday at the airport of famed resort town Cancun. He said he planned to head to the trendy beach…

Australia’s two largest states will further ease public coronavirus restrictions at libraries, community centres and nightclubs, officials said on Sunday, despite recording increases in new infections. New South Wales (NSW), the most populous state, said that from July 1, a 50 person limit on indoor venues such as restaurants and churches would be scrapped, so long as the venues observed a one person per four square metre rule. Nightclubs and music festivals would operate from August if new cases remain low, NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said. The state on Saturday reported the first locally transmitted COVID-19 case in weeks, and…

PALESTINE will declare statehood over all of the West Bank and Gaza, with Jerusalem as its capital, and push for global recognition if ISRAEL goes ahead with plans to annex land it occupies, the Palestinian prime minister has said. Speaking from his office in Ramallah to an audience of foreign media organisations, Mohammad Shtayyeh said that the Palestinian Authority would unilaterally declare an independent state along with the 1967 partitions, with Jerusalem as its capital. Mohammad Shtayyeh described the possible step pledged by the Israeli leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, as an “existential threat” to a decades-long international effort for Israelis and…

Philippines officials announced on Monday, they will not allow tens of millions of children back to school until a CORONAVIRUS vaccine is available, saying they may have to broadcast lessons on TV. Nations like France and South Korea resumed face-to-face classes as they got their outbreaks under control, but Philippine authorities see the risk as too great. President Rodrigo Duterte said last month that even if students could not graduate, they needed to stay out of school to fight the spread of the virus. Philippines education secretary words, children restrictions “We will comply with the president´s directive to postpone face-to-face…

Lockdowns have saved more than three million lives from CORONAVIRUS in Europe, according to a new study. The team at Imperial College London said the “death toll would have been huge” without lockdown. But they warned that only a small proportion of people had been infected and we were still only “at the beginning of the pandemic”. They found restrictions had a “substantial effect” in reducing transmission levels of the virus in a modelling study involving data from 11 countries from the continent up to early May. Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.…

Indian officials have sentenced a tiger to a life in captivity after killing three people, stating it was “too dangerous” to be allowed to roam free. Moreover, It is blamed for attacking cattle. The five-year-old male predator had embarked on a trek more than 500 kilometres (310 miles) long from western Maharashtra state to central India’s Betul district in Madhya Pradesh state in 2018. “We gave it several chances to re-wild but it habitually went into human habitations,” Madhya Pradesh’s chief wildlife warden, S.K. Mandal, told local news agency. Tiger captivity procedures “The only option left was to put it…

New Zealand health authorities announced that the country had no active cases of  COVID-19 cases after the country´s final patient was given the all-clear and released from isolation. A lone woman in her 50s, who lived in Auckland, was the last person in New Zealand known to be suffering from Covid-19. On Monday, health officials said, she had reported 48 hours symptom-free and was now considered recovered. https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1269910347110060032 The milestone was “really good news” health department director-general Ashley Bloomfield said. “and an achievement the whole of New Zealand could take heart from,” he added Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern “did a…

India’s authorities have moved at least 100,000 people including coronavirus patients to safety as India’s west coast braced for a cyclone – especially Mumbai- It is the first such storm to threaten Mumbai in more than 70 years. Cyclone Nisarga, which is approaching from the south-west, would be the first serious cyclone to make landfall in the city since 1891.  People evacuation in Mumbai, coronavirus patients The chief minister of Maharashtra state, Uddhav Thackeray, of which Mumbai is the capital, said they instructed people living in flimsy homes near the shore to move to safer places before Cyclone Nisarga made its…

Marriott has reopened all of its hotels in China and the group says it has seen a recovery in business travel. The world’s third-largest hotel chain has 350 outlets across China and says that the occupancy rate is now at 40%. Marriott gave an upbeat statement on Monday about its business in China as it emerges from  Coronavirus lockdowns. Coronavirus pandemic effect on Marriott, travel industry Last week it said the financial impact from the pandemic has been more severe for the hotel chain than 9/11 and the 2008 financial crisis combined. Marriott chief executive Arne Sorenson said the occupancy…

Civil unrest flared and curfews were imposed in several major U.S. cities on Saturday as demonstrators took to the streets to vent outrage at the death of a black man – GEORGE FLOYD- shown on video gasping for breath as a white Minneapolis policeman knelt on his neck. From Los Angeles to Miami to Chicago, protests marked by chants of “I can’t breathe” – a rallying cry echoing the dying words of George Floyd – began peacefully before turning unruly as demonstrators blocked traffic, set fires and clashed with riot police, some firing tear gas and plastic bullets in an effort…

A Belgian prince has contracted Coronavirus after attending a party during lockdown in Spain, the country’s royal palace says. Prince Joachim, 28, travelled from Belgium to Spain for an internship on 26 May, the palace said. Two days later, he went to a party in the southern city of Córdoba, before testing positive for Covid-19. Irresponsible, Discovered party Under Córdoba’s lockdown rules, a party of this size would be a breach of regulations. Gatherings of no more than 15 people are currently permitted. Spanish police have launched an investigation into the party. Subsequently, those found to have flouted lockdown rules…