Over in Cyprus there are mounting concerns over the number of asylum seekers testing positive for coronavirus at checkpoints dividing the war-torn island.
The Greek Cypriot health minister, Constantinos Ioannou, says authorities in the island’s internationally recognised south have registered a growing number of infections among migrants crossing over from the breakaway Turkish-run north.
Crossing points between the two sectors reopened in late June after three months of closure due to coronavirus restrictions. Health officials point to at least eight Syrian migrants testing positive for the highly contagious virus in the last week.
“The virus is still here. We have not got rid of it as many think,” said Ioannou emphasising that Covid-19 tests were currently being conducted at crossing points along the 120 –mile UN-patrolled ceasefire line separating the ethnically-split state.
The route from north to south is a well-trodden one among migrants and refugees seeking asylum in the Greek-administered EU member south. Most are believed to cross over to the Mediterranean island from Turkey – where infection rates until recently had surpassed a 1,000 a day.
Migrants seeking to evade detection attempt to traverse the porous dividing line by circumventing check points and taking other more out of the way routes. But once they appear before Greek Cypriot authorities they are tested for the virus before being placed in reception centres.
Cyprus has so far managed to keep the virus in check recording less than 1,000 confirmed cases and 19 deaths. The breakaway north has registered 121 cases and four deaths with the territory’s own health minister announcing three new cases on Sunday.
This is not explicitly coronavirus news but it is significant nonetheless.
Saudi Arabia’s 84-year-old ruler, King Salman bin Abdulaziz, has been admitted to hospital in the capital Riyadh suffering from inflammation of the gall bladder, state news agency SPA said on Monday.
The king, who has ruled the world’s largest oil exporter and close US ally since 2015, is undergoing medical checks without giving details, Reuters reports.
The de facto ruler and next in line to the throne is the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, widely referred to as MbS, who has launched reforms to transform the kingdom’s economy and end its “addiction” to oil.
The 34-year-old prince’s reforms have been accompanied by a purge of top royals and businessmen on charges of corruption, and a costly war in Yemen, which have all unnerved some Western allies and investors.
His prestige also suffered a blow after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018 at the hands of Saudi security personnel seen as close to him.
Beijing, meanwhile, has gone 14 days without a case of local transmission, and city authorities on Sunday said they were downgrading the emergency response level from two to three. The move is largely symbolic, with measures including mandatory social distancing, temperature checks and 14-day quarantines for passengers arriving from abroad remaining in place, AP reports.
China also Monday reported 5,370 people had been arrested for pandemic-related crimes between January and June. More than 40% were charged with fraud, the state prosecutor’s office announced on its official microblog. Another 15% were charged with obstruction of law enforcement, with others accused of producing and selling fake and shoddy goods, creating public disturbances and transporting and selling endangered species.
China has strengthened protection for wild animals following the emergence of the virus, which may have originated in bats before jumping to humans via an intermediary species such as the anteater-like pangolin.
More now on China’s latest coronavirus outbreak spreading to a second city in the northwestern region of Xinjiang, from AP.
One of the 17 new cases reported on Monday was in the ancient Silk Road city of Kashgar, the regional government said on its official microblog. The remainder were in the regional capital of Urumqi, where all other cases have been reported since the outbreak that has now infected at least 47 people emerged earlier this month.
Authorities in Urumqi have tried to prevent the spread by closing off communities and imposing travel restrictions.
Xinjiang is a vast, thinly populated region of mountains and deserts and had seen little impact from the pandemic that emerged from the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year and was largely contained within China in March. Another five new cases reported Monday by the National Health Commission were imported.
Updated
at 1.12am EDT
