Author: News Desk

Beijing shut scores of metro stations and bus routes and extended COVID-19 curbs on many public venues on Wednesday, focusing efforts to avoid the fate of Shanghai, where millions have been under strict lockdown for more than a month. The central city of Zhengzhou earlier also announced restrictions, joining dozens of big population centres under some form of lockdown as China seeks to eliminate a virus believed to have first emerged in Wuhan city in late 2019. But that uncompromising battle is undermining its growth and hurting international companies invested there, data shows, and has also fuelled rare public outbursts…

The Fak Kurba initiative, which seeks to free those jailed for insolvency in Oman, has so far managed to release more than 1,000 prisoners during the month of Ramadan. The highest number of released prisoners are from Muscat governorate at 196, 190 from North Al Batinah and 148 from South Al Sharqiyah.

Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA) announced its entry into the metaverse with the establishment of its metaverse headquarters in the dynamic virtual world of ‘The Sandbox’. As the world’s first Regulator to make its debut in the metaverse, VARA seeks to ensure that the regulator is accessible to its industry in their environment, and facilitate collaborative engagement between global Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs), industry thought-leaders, and international regulatory authorities.

Authorities in Saudi Arabia have arrested more than 60 people for attempting to smuggle drugs into the Kingdom. The 61 suspects attempted to smuggle 760 kilograms of hashish and 45.6 tons of the narcotic plant khat in the regions of Jazan, Najran and Asir. Of the 61 suspects, 41 were Saudi citizens, 11 were Ethiopian, seven were Yemeni and two were Pakistani.

The European Union proposed its toughest sanctions yet against Russia on Wednesday, including a phased oil embargo, as Kyiv said Moscow was intensifying an offensive in eastern Ukraine and close Russian ally Belarus announced large-scale army drills. Nearly 10 weeks into a war that has killed thousands of people, uprooted millions and flattened Ukrainian cities, Russia was intensifying its assault, Ukraine’s defence ministry said, with nearly 50 air strikes carried out on Tuesday alone. Russia also stepped up strikes on targets in western Ukraine, saying it was disrupting Western arms deliveries. A new convoy of buses began evacuating more civilians…

Kyiv will be ready if Belarus’s armed forces join Russia’s war effort in Ukraine, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian State Border Service said on Wednesday. Belarus, a close ally of Russia, said its military had begun large-scale drills on Wednesday to test their combat readiness and that they posed no threat to its neighbours. “We do not rule out that the Russian Federation could at some point use the territory of Belarus, the Armed Forces of the Republic of Belarus, against Ukraine,” said Andriy Demchenko, spokesperson for Ukraine’s State Border Service. “Therefore, we are ready,” he said, adding that the…

The Kremlin on Wednesday dismissed speculation that President Vladimir Putin planned to declare war against Ukraine and declare a national mobilisation on May 9 when Russia commemorates the Soviet Union’s victory in World War Two. Putin has so far characterised Russia’s actions in Ukraine as a “special military operation”, not a war. But Western politicians and some Russia watchers have speculated that he could be preparing for a major announcement next Monday with a range of possible scenarios ranging from an outright declaration of war to a declaration of victory. Asked about speculation that Putin will declare war against Ukraine…

The Russian Orthodox Church scolded Pope Francis on Wednesday for using the wrong tone after he urged Patriarch Kirill not to become the Kremlin’s “altar boy”, cautioning the Vatican that such remarks would hurt dialogue between the churches. Francis told Italy’s Corriere Della Sera newspaper that Kirill, who has given the Ukraine war his backing, “cannot become [President Vladimir] Putin’s altar boy”. The Russian Orthodox Church said it was regrettable that a month and a half after Francis and Kirill, the patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, had spoken directly, the pope had adopted such a tone. “Pope Francis chose…

The Swiss government is setting up a gas sector crisis intervention group and a monitoring system for early detection of an impending electricity shortage, it said on Wednesday, as it prepares for the possibility of “severe” power shortages. The Swiss government began drawing up plans in April for a potential gas shortage in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, saying measures were being developed ranging from appealing to the public to reduce consumption to possible power rationing in the event of a crunch. It has now tasked national grid operator Swissgrid with developing and operating a new monitoring system…

Chancellor Olaf Scholz urged Ukraine on Wednesday to help unblock an embarrassing diplomatic impasse, after the German president was stopped from visiting Kyiv amid disquiet over his past support of rapprochement with Russia. Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany has called Scholz an “offended liver sausage” for refusing to visit the country before President Frank-Walter Steinmeier is welcomed there. “It is a problem for the German government and for the German people that the president was asked not to come,” Scholz told reporters following talks with his cabinet. “Ukraine must also play its part,” he said, without elaborating how. The row has…