BEIJING, May 12 (Xinhua) -- The following are the updates on the global fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
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TEHRAN -- Iran's Education Ministry announced Tuesday that all schools nationwide will reopen as of May 16 after nearly three months of closure due to the novel coronavirus outbreak.
Education Minister Mohsen Haji Mirzaee said teachers and school staff will be at schools during the working hours, according to Tasnim news agency.
It is not obligatory for the students to attend the schools, but they can partake in classes to ask questions and make preparations for exams, Haji Mirzaee was quoted as as saying.
All schools have received the health protocols and instructions by the health ministry and will be obligated to observe the health rules when the students return to classes, he said.
On Tuesday, Iran announced a total of 110,767 confirmed cases, of whom 6,733 have died.
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DOHA -- Qatar's Health Ministry on Tuesday reported 1,526 new confirmed infections of the novel coronavirus, bringing its total tally to 25,149, of which 22,116 people are being treated.
"Also, 179 people recovered, bringing the total number of recoveries to 3,019, while the fatalities remain at 14," the official Qatar News Agency reported, quoting a ministry statement.
Most of the new cases are of expatriate workers who have been subject to quarantine after they were found to have been in contact with confirmed cases.
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GAZA -- Egypt reopened on Tuesday the Rafah Crossing Point on the border with the Gaza Strip to enable Palestinians stranded in Egypt to return home, officials said.
Iyad al-Bozzom, spokesman of the Hamas-run Ministry of Interior, told a news briefing in Gaza city that reopening Rafah Crossing will enable around 1,700 people to return from Egypt to the Gaza Strip.
He said it is the second time that Egypt reopens this border crossing point for stranded Palestinians since the outbreak of coronavirus pandemic in Palestine on March 5.
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LONDON-- Another 627 COVID-19 patients have died in Britain as of Monday afternoon, bringing the total coronavirus-related death toll in the country to 32,692, the Department of Health and Social Care said Tuesday.
The figures include deaths in all settings, including at hospitals, care homes and the wider community.
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ANKARA -- Experts urged vigilance saying that the danger is not over yet as Turkey inches back towards normal amid a downward trend in COVID-19 cases.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced last week that the country will return to normal gradually from May to July within the framework of a "new normalization," in order to reopen economy.
Most of the shopping malls, barbershops and beauty salons across Turkey resumed operations on Monday. Numerous factories in the country will restart production in the next week.
Ahead of the reopening, the Council of Shopping Centers said that personnel and customers should wear masks and continue to observe social distancing rules in all malls.
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BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN -- Brunei reported no new confirmed cases of COVID-19 on Tuesday, with the national tally remaining at 141.
There has been one death resulting from the COVID-19 in Brunei.
So far 108 individuals are still undergoing quarantine and some 16,073 laboratory tests for COVID-19 have been conducted.
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VIENTIANE -- The South Korean government has provided an aid package worth 600,000 U.S. dollars to Laos to support the country's fight against COVID-19.
The aid package, including 300,000 U.S. dollars cash and medical equipment worth 300,000 U.S. dollars, was presented to the Deputy Prime Minister Somdy Douangdy by South Korean Ambassador Shin Sung-Soon on Monday, Lao News Agency (KPL) reported Tuesday.
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RIGA -- The Riga marathon, which the Latvian capital city traditionally hosts in May, has been rescheduled to Oct. 10 and 11 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, organizers said Tuesday.
Depending on the COVID-19 restrictions that still might be effective in Latvia at that time, the annual international mass sporting event, which marks its 30th anniversary this year, will be held either in its usual format or as a virtual running competition if the epidemiological situation is not safe enough.
"For the first time in the event's history, the marathon may also happen virtually, with participants being given the opportunity to run their Rimi Riga marathon race individually, recording their distance and time in a specially-developed app," said Andris Nords, the long-standing director of the Riga marathon.
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BEIRUT -- The Lebanese cabinet announced on Tuesday that it will completely shut the country down for four days from Wednesday night until Monday morning amid an increase in new COVID-19 cases.
Due to the effectiveness in containing the virus since its outbreak in Lebanon on Feb. 21, the government decided to reduce lockdown measures to allow people to return to work amid a dire economic situation.
However, the country has seen a rise in new cases recently.
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HELSINKI -- Finland plans to amend its education laws to allow schools to transition to distance or online learning for grades one to nine.
Minister of Education Li Andersson said on Tuesday that it may be necessary for the country's schools to offer both in-class contact teaching and distance learning in the autumn 2020 semester.
Following the closing of schools in mid-March due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the government used its emergency powers to arrange for a switch to distance learning. Now that the COVID-19-related restrictions are planned to be gradually eased, the legislation in force does not allow distance learning to be offered to students in grades one to nine, Andersson said at a government press conference. The government thus plans to amend the law to allow distance learning temporarily, as an alternative.
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BERLIN -- New COVID-19 infections in Germany remained under last week's average as the number of confirmed cases increased by 933 within one day to 170,508, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) announced on Tuesday.
Over the course of last week, an average of 960 daily cases had been reported by the RKI, the federal government agency for disease control and prevention.
However, the reproduction rate of COVID-19 in Germany remained above one at 1.07, according to the daily situation report by the RKI for Monday. Until Saturday, the reproduction rate had been well below one.
"We are approaching a plateau of daily case numbers," said RKI Vice President Lars Schaade. "The second wave can be avoided if we avoid chains of infection."
According to the RKI, the number of deaths from COVID-19 in Germany increased by 116 to 7,533 on Tuesday, resulting in a fatality rate of 4.4 percent.
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MOSCOW -- Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has been hospitalized after contracting COVID-19, Russian media reported Tuesday.
Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, Culture Minister Olga Lyubimova and Construction Minister Vladimir Yakushev are also among the Russian officials infected with COVID-19.
Russia has reported 232,243 confirmed COVID-19 cases as of Tuesday, making the country's tally the world's second highest, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
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OTTAWA -- After providing emergency relief in the form of loans and wage subsidies to small and medium-sized enterprises, the Canadian government offered support on Monday to Canada's bigger businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic.
A new program, called the Large Employer Emergency Financing Facility (LEEFF), will provide bridge financing starting at 43 million U.S. dollars for major companies with annual revenues of at least 214 million dollars.
LEEFF is not a bailout, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said during his daily COVID-19 news conference. Rather, its purpose is to help large corporations "weather the storm and "avoid bankruptcies," he said. It is "not to fix pre-existing insolvencies or restructurings" or "to provide low-cost lending to companies that don't need it."
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MUMBAI -- India's western state of Maharashtra on Tuesday decided to release around 17,000 or close to half of an total of 35,239 prisoners statewide on temporary bail as part of its efforts to curb the spread of COVID-19.
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CAPE TOWN -- South Africa on Tuesday reported 698 confirmed COVID-19 cases, the highest surge in a 24-hour cycle since the country reported its first case in early March.
This brought the country's total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases to 11,350, Health Minister Zweli Mkhize said in a daily update.
A total of 369,697 tests have been conducted to date, with 13,630 tests done in the past 24 hours, Mkhize said.
The minister reported no increase in death toll from Monday's number of 206.
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BANJUL -- The Gambia Presidency has announced on Tuesday that the government has received a consignment of COVID-Organics from Madagascar to treat patients infected with the novel coronavirus.
"The public is hereby informed that The Gambia has received a consignment of three boxes of COVID-Organics from the President of the Republic of Madagascar, H.E. Andry Rajoelina," State House said in a statement.
COVID-Organics is a herbal tea which gives results in seven days to COVID-19 patients, Andry Rajoelina was quoted as saying.
The Gambia has reported 22 confirmed cases of COVID-19, including nine recovery case and one death.
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MADRID -- The Spanish government announced on Tuesday that it will impose a 14-day quarantine on all travelers who arrive from another country as another measure to help stop the spread of COVID-19.
The measure was published in the official State Bulletin (BOE), which said that incoming travelers will have to remain indoors and only be allowed outside in order to shop for food, to visit health centers or in a "situation of need," and they would be obliged to do this while wearing a face mask.
The order comes into effect on May 15 and expires on May 24, when the current State of Alarm, which limits freedom of movement in the country, is due to end.
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NANNING, China -- South China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region has donated a batch of medical supplies to the Flying Tiger Historical Organization in the United States to aid its fight against the coronavirus pandemic.
The donation, which includes 6,000 medical masks and 4,000 pairs of medical gloves, arrived in San Francisco and was received by Larry Jobe, president of the organization.
The supplies will be distributed to the members of the organization, relatives, and friends of the Flying Tigers veterans, as well as to people who have made donations to the Flying Tiger Heritage Park in the city of Guilin, Guangxi.
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HONG KONG -- Asia-Pacific countries, home to nearly 60 percent of the world's population, are still witnessing a growing outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic on Tuesday with Bangladesh reports 969 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the country's total cases to 16,660.
Bangladesh confirmed 11 more fatalities from the COVID-19 Tuesday, bringing the country's death toll to 250.
Some 280 new COVID-19 cases were reported in Afghanistan within the past 24 hours, the country's Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) said on Tuesday.
Malaysia reported 16 new COVID-19 cases on Tuesday, bringing the national total to 6,742, the health ministry said.
This marks the lowest number of new cases reported in a day since the government imposed a movement control order on March 18.
In the largest single day spike in COVID-19 cases, Nepal's Ministry of Health and Population on Tuesday reported 57 new cases, bringing the total number of cases in the Himalayan country to 191. Enditem
