Here’s a round-up of the highest developments all over the world in the present day.

1. New omicron variant stokes world fears, triggers journey bans

The invention of a brand new coronavirus variant despatched a chill by a lot of the world as nations raced to halt air journey, markets fell sharply and scientists held emergency conferences to weigh the precise dangers, which had been largely unknown.

In response, the US and Canada joined the European Union and several other different international locations in instituting journey restrictions on guests from southern Africa, the place the variant introduced on a contemporary surge of infections and is assumed to have originated.

2. Afghan women take exams for Turkish-run faculties in Kabul

Tons of of Afghan women took entrance exams on Friday for a Turkish basis in Kabul that runs a few of Afghanistan’s most extremely regarded faculties, regardless of a delay by the Taliban in permitting the 13-year-olds to return to the classroom.

Feminine highschool college students at a faculty in Sheberghan, Afghanistan on Could 5, 2021. (Kiana Hayeri/The New York Instances)

Some 3,500 college students sat the extremely aggressive exams for the Afghan-Turk college system, with women making up nearly 40% of candidates, Reza Parsa, a faculty official, stated. The transfer got here regardless of the Taliban authorities’s delay in authorising women above grade 7 (aged about 13) to return to high school following a ban imposed when the motion seized energy in August.

3. Bangladesh’s BNP opposition celebration in dire straits as chief’s well being deteriorates

Khaleda Zia, Bangladesh’s first feminine prime minister and archrival of present Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, was admitted to the crucial care unit of a Dhaka hospital this month. The 76-year-old former prime minister and chief of the Bangladesh Nationalist Occasion (BNP) has been affected by a number of persistent and life-threatening ailments.

Bangladesh’s former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia (AP/File)

“She has persistent liver illness, amongst different issues that may’t be handled in Bangladesh. She urgently wants therapy in a developed nation like Germany,” Zia’s private doctor AZM Zahid Hossain advised DW. Nonetheless, Zia shouldn’t be allowed to depart Bangladesh after having been convicted and jailed on graft fees in 2018.

4. France lashes out at Britain’s newest proposal on migrants

France reacted with fury Friday to Britain’s newest proposals for coping with the lethal movement of migrants between their shores because the confrontation between the 2 international locations over the damaging crossings throughout the English Channel ramped up additional.

In a public letter to French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson laid out a sequence of proposals of how the 2 international locations can cope with the disaster, following the sinking of a ship on Wednesday that noticed 27 folks die.

5. Archaeologists discover 800-year previous mummy in Peru

A staff of consultants has discovered a mummy estimated to be not less than 800 years previous on Peru’s central coast, one of many archaeologists who participated within the excavation stated on Friday. The mummified stays had been of an individual from the tradition that developed between the coast and mountains of the South American nation. The mum, whose gender was not recognized, was found within the Lima area, stated archaeologist Pieter Van Dalen Luna.