Here is a round-up of the top developments around the world today.
The discovery of a new coronavirus variant sent a chill through much of the world as nations raced to halt air travel, markets fell sharply and scientists held emergency meetings to weigh the exact risks, which were largely unknown.
In response, the United States and Canada joined the European Union and several other countries in instituting travel restrictions on visitors from southern Africa, where the variant brought on a fresh surge of infections and is thought to have originated.
Hundreds of Afghan girls took entrance exams on Friday for a Turkish foundation in Kabul that runs some of Afghanistan’s most highly regarded schools, despite a delay by the Taliban in allowing the 13-year-olds to return to the classroom.
Some 3,500 students sat the highly competitive exams for the Afghan-Turk school system, with girls making up almost 40% of candidates, Reza Parsa, a school official, said. The move came despite the Taliban government’s delay in authorising girls above grade 7 (aged about 13) to return to school following a ban imposed when the movement seized power in August.
Khaleda Zia, Bangladesh’s first female prime minister and archrival of current Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, was admitted to the critical care unit of a Dhaka hospital this month. The 76-year-old former prime minister and leader of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has been suffering from several chronic and life-threatening diseases.
“She has chronic liver disease, among other problems that can’t be treated in Bangladesh. She urgently needs treatment in a developed country like Germany,” Zia’s personal physician AZM Zahid Hossain told DW. However, Zia is not allowed to leave Bangladesh after having been convicted and jailed on graft charges in 2018.
France reacted with fury Friday to Britain’s latest proposals for dealing with the deadly flow of migrants between their shores as the war of words between the two countries over the dangerous crossings across the English Channel ramped up further.
In a public letter to French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson laid out a series of proposals of how the two countries can deal with the crisis, following the sinking of a boat on Wednesday that saw 27 people die.
A team of experts has found a mummy estimated to be at least 800 years old on Peru’s central coast, one of the archaeologists who participated in the excavation said on Friday. The mummified remains were of a person from the culture that developed between the coast and mountains of the South American country. The mummy, whose gender was not identified, was discovered in the Lima region, said archaeologist Pieter Van Dalen Luna.