World Briefs

COVID-19 Several European countries have announced their first coronavirus cases, all apparently linked to the growing outbreak in Italy. Austria, Croatia and Switzerland said the cases involved people who had been to Italy, as did Algeria in Africa. The first positive virus test has been recorded in Latin America – a Brazilian resident just returned from Italy.

HONG KONG’s government is proposing a HKD10,000 cash handout for each resident over 18 years old to help alleviate hardships brought on by the spreading viral outbreak and prolonged political protests. The subsidy was among a slew of emergency measures in a budget presented to the LegCo by Financial Secretary Paul Chan (pictured).

IRAN’s president said Tehran has no immediate plans to quarantine cities over the new coronavirus rapidly spreading across the country, even as the Islamic Republic suffers the highest official death toll outside of China with 19 killed amid 139 cases confirmed yesterday. Others sources indicate the numbers are higher.

ECONOMY Ratings agency Moody’s is lowering its forecast for global auto sales because of the new coronavirus outbreak. It now reckons that sales will decline 2.5% decline in 2020 instead of only 0.9%. This year’s anticipated decline follows a fall in 2019 of 4.6%. Moody’s said in a report sales in China, the world’s biggest car market, would fall as people avoid crowded areas, including auto dealerships.

THAILAND’s normally docile students have been holding rallies around the country to express their discontent with the established political order. The rare mass activism was triggered by a court ruling dissolving a popular opposition political party whose democracy-promoting policies had attracted substantial support among younger Thais. As many as 2,000 students gathered yesterday in Bangkok at the main undergraduate campus of Thammasat University.

INDIA At least 20 people were killed and 189 injured in three days of clashes in New Delhi that coincided with U.S. President Donald Trump’s first state visit to India, with the death toll expected to rise. Violence between Hindu mobs and Muslims protesting a new citizenship law that fast-tracks naturalization for foreign-born religious minorities of all major faiths in South Asia except Islam left shops smoldering.

SYRIA Shelling and airstrikes regular forces killed at least three people in northwestern Syria, where dozens of villages, including major rebel strongholds in the last opposition-held area, have been captured over the past few days. The new push by Russian-backed Syrian troops could worsen the humanitarian crisis that has displaced nearly a million people and left more than 300 civilians dead since the beginning of December.