Russia brings back COVID restrictions amid record daily death tolls
CBSN
Moscow — With the number of deaths blamed on COVID-19 setting new records almost daily in Russia, the Kremlin accepted a "share of responsibility" for the first time on Tuesday for the country's lackluster vaccination campaign. Only about 32% of Russia's total population is fully vaccinated against the coronavirus, according to official data, despite the shots being widely available since the beginning of the year. About 57% of Americans are fully vaccinated, by comparison.
The halting uptake of vaccines in Russia has kept hospitalization and death rates high. Russia reported 34,073 new COVID-19 infections on Wednesday, for instance, and set another record with 1,028 fatalities. The United Kingdom, in contrast, where about 66% of the population is fully vaccinated, is still seeing very high daily case numbers — over 40,000 for about a week — but the daily death toll from the virus has hovered for weeks around 150.
"There is a tradition to blame the government for everything," Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a Tuesday conference call. "Of course, the government always feels and acknowledges its share of responsibility."
Khan Younis, Gaza Strip — Hamas on Thursday released the bodies of four Israeli hostages, said to include a mother and her two young children who have long been feared dead and had come to embody the nation's agony following the Oct. 7, 2023, attack by Hamas on Israel.
Concern over a man who'd exhibited "fixated behavior" caused Emma Raducanu to approach the chair umpire in tears and take an unscheduled break in her second-round match at the Dubai Championships, the Women's Tennis Association said Wednesday. The incident unfolded three years after a man in Britain was convicted of stalking the star player at her family home.
Rio de Janeiro — Brazil's prosecutor-general on Tuesday formally charged former President Jair Bolsonaro with attempting a coup to stay in office after his 2022 election defeat, in a plot that included a plan to poison his successor and current President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and kill a Supreme Court judge.
A Delta Air Lines jet crashed Monday during a fiery landing at Toronto Pearson International Airport, skidding down the tarmac before coming to a stop while flipped upside down.
New videos show the moment a Delta flight from Minneapolis crash-landed, flipped and caught fire in Toronto.
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia — Senior officials from Russia and the U.S. met in Saudi Arabia Tuesday to begin talks on improving ties and negotiating an end to the war in Ukraine.
Italian archaeologists recently uncovered a "monumental necropolis" that appeared to honor an elite class of people thousands of years ago, provincial officials announced this month.
Russia has freed a U.S. citizen arrested earlier this month on drug smuggling charges, according to Russian media reports and a U.S. official who spoke with The Associated Press. The move appeared to be an effort to ease tension between Moscow and Washington ahead of talks in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, which are expected to focus on the war in Ukraine and the fragile ceasefire between Hamas and Israel in Gaza.
Beijing — China's Foreign Ministry took issue Monday with a revised U.S. government fact sheet that removed a line on American opposition to independence for Taiwan. The United States "gravely backpedaled" on its position on Taiwan and sent the wrong message to "separatist forces" on the island, ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said.
Israel's prime minister vowed to "open the gates of hell" if Hamas does not return all its hostages and praised President Trump's "bold vision for Gaza's future."
Irish jockey Michael O'Sullivan died on Sunday after suffering injuries in a fall during a race earlier this month, the Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board said. He was 24.
A hockey match between rivals the United States and Canada descended into chaos from the moment the puck was dropped as three fights broke out in the first nine seconds.
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