Pope face-to-face with the faithful again as COVID declines in Italy
Vatican CityReuters Pope Francis expressed his delight on Wednesday as he resumed his weekly general audience in public for the first time in six months, reflecting a decline in coronavirus cases in Italy. During the winter and early spring, the Pope had delivered his weekly address via a video link from the Vatican’s Apostolic Library. […]
US sends envoy as Israel-Gaza barrages spiral, Hamas commander killed; war crimes concerns
Gaza/Jerusalem, IsraelReuters Israel killed a Hamas commander and vowed no let-up in its Gaza barrages on Wednesday as Palestinian militants rained rockets far across the border and Washington dispatched an envoy to try to calm their most intense hostilities in years. At least 65 people have been killed in Gaza since violence escalated on Monday, […]
Pandemic’s hard realities worsen Venezuelan child labour crisis
Cordero/Caracas, VenezuelaReuters Twelve-year-old Moises Bracamonte knows how to prepare fertiliser and water the black beans and corn that his family grows in Venezuela’s western Tachira state. He says the most difficult part of agricultural work is “breaking the ground” to sow the seeds without a tractor or an ox. “Why is it difficult with a pick? Because the […]
Global economic growth to mask widening inequality in 2021, UN says
New York City, USThomson Reuters Foundation The world economy will fare better this year than previous projections indicated, but a slow roll-out of COVID-19 vaccines in many developing countries will hamper their economic recoveries, the United Nations said on Tuesday. Global economic growth is expected to reach 5.4 per cent this year, bouncing back from 2020‘s […]
StrangeSights: Vlad the vaccinator; the ‘Battle of the Joshes’; and, Putin hits the ice…
DAVID ADAMS reports on the odder side of life…
For Yemenis fleeing war, US peace efforts offer only faint hope
Marib, YemenReuters In the al-Jafeenah camp for internally displaced people outside the Yemeni city of Marib, Jamal al-Jaberi, forced to flee fighting near his home, is counting on the United States to help broker a peace deal and end the seven-year war. The Yemen conflict has triggered the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, and US President […]
Forests as big as France have grown back since 2000, research shows
Thomson Reuters Foundation From Mongolia to southern Brazil, forests big enough to cover France have grown back during the last 20 years, but the gains did not make up for losses elsewhere, a study found on Tuesday. An analysis of satellite data by a team of researchers led by the World Wide Fund for Nature, […]
Bodies float down Ganges as nearly 4,000 more die of COVID in India
Lucknow, IndiaReuters Scores of bodies are washing up on the banks of the Ganges as Indians fail to keep pace with the deaths and cremations of around 4,000 people a day from the novel coronavirus. India currently accounts for one in three of the reported deaths from coronavirus around the world, according to a Reuters […]
‘Day by day’: Musical ‘Godspell’ celebrates 50th anniversary
MARK KENNEDY, of Associated Press, reports on a milestone for one of the world’s most famous musicals based on the Gospels…
New survey of US Jews reveals worries, strengths, divisions
United StatesAP A comprehensive new survey of Jewish Americans finds them increasingly worried about anti-Semitism, proud of their cultural heritage and sharply divided about the importance of religious observance in their lives. The survey, released Tuesday by the Pew Research Center, estimated the total Jewish population in the country at 7.5 million — about 2.3 per […]