Six In The Morning Tuesday 16 March 2021

 

Coronavirus: Alarm at German AstraZeneca pause as cases spike

German leaders have postponed a summit on extending the vaccine rollout as they await fuller confirmation that the Oxford-AstraZeneca jab is safe to use.

Germany is among a number of countries that have halted its use over unproven reports that it causes blood clots, but Vice-Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he was hopeful it could be used again.

The EU regulator has again insisted the drug's benefits outweigh any risks.

The German decision has been criticised by some politicians and doctors.

Mass funerals held as Myanmar coup death toll revised up to 149

Hundreds of mourners gather in townships across Yangon after dozens of people were killed in recent days

Michael Safi

@safimichael

Tue 16 Mar 2021 14.05 GMT

At least 149 people have been killed in Myanmar since the 1 February coup, including five in custody, a UN human rights official has said, as mass funerals were held for dozens of those shot dead by security forces in recent days.

The revised estimate of the death toll follows the bloodiest day in the six weeks since the military’s takeover, with 74 protesters killed on Sunday followed by 20 people the next day.

Mass funerals were held across Yangon on Tuesday, with hundreds of mourners gathering in different townships to say goodbye to those killed.

Kremlin says pressure on countries to reject Russian vaccine is unprecedented

A report suggested that the US had tried to persuade Brazil not to buy the Russian vaccine

Dmitry Antonov

The Kremlin said on Tuesday that pressure on some countries to refuse to buy Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine against Covid-19 was at unprecedented levels but had no chance of succeeding.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov made the remarks when asked to comment on a US government report which appeared to show that the United States had tried to dissuade Brazil from buying Sputnik V.

The report, published on the website of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), detailed the work of the US Office of Global Affairs (OGA) in “combating malign influences in the Americas.”

Turkish prison conditions worsen amid pandemic

Thousands of prison inmates in Turkey were granted an early release due to the pandemic, but others languish behind bars in dire conditions and without proper medical support.

The coronavirus pandemic has had a profound impact all over the world, including in Turkey, where there is widespread dissatisfaction with the government's management of the crisis.

Human rights organizations have long criticized prison conditions in Turkey, and these have worsened further since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic.

Sri Lanka says burqa ban is for national security

The Sri Lankan government insisted Tuesday that preventing Muslim women from wearing a burqa or niqab was a national security move, as it faced protests over the decision.

Sri Lankan Muslims decried the measure as a new act of discrimination against their community, which accounts for 10 percent of the 21 million, Buddhist-majority population.

Colombo's nationalist government has taken a tough security line since suicide bomb attacks in April 2019 that killed 279 people.

With UK police under fire, Boris Johnson pushes new bill that could end peaceful protests

Analysis by Luke McGee, CNN

Updated 1236 GMT (2036 HKT) March 16, 2021

The UK government is attempting to justify flagship legislation that critics say would hand the police and ministers powers that could seriously curb the ability of citizens to protest, at a very difficult time.

Uncomfortably for Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the legislation is being debated in Parliament this week, just days after officers from London's Metropolitan Police physically restrained attendees at a peaceful demonstration mourning the death of a young woman, Sarah Everard. Disturbing images of police forcing women to the ground have led to public outrage. The man accused of killing Everard is a serving member of the same police force.

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill 2021 is several hundred pages long and covers an enormous range of issues that one might typically expect a government to address in multiple pieces of legislation. Tuesday will be the second day of its second reading in the House of Commons.