World Briefs

INDIA Lightning killed at least 10 villagers during thunderstorms and heavy rain in eastern India yesterday, said Pratay Amrit, a Bihar state disaster management official. Nine villagers died as they were plucking vegetables in farms and one later died in a hospital.

SAUDI ARABIA’s King Salman has ordered an end to the death penalty for crimes committed by minors, according to a statement yesterday by a top official. The decision comes on the heels of another ordering judges to end the practice of flogging, replacing it with jail time, fines or community service.

NEPAL Rescuers yesterday recovered the bodies of two South Korean trekkers who had been missing since an avalanche in January buried them in Nepal’s mountains, an official said. An army helicopter flew the bodies — one male and one female — from the Annapurna Trekking Circuit to the city of Pokhara.

LEBANON Unknown assailants lobbed an explosive device at a private bank branch in southern Lebanon on Saturday, damaging its facade and roof, the country’s state news agency reported. The assault on a branch of Fransabank in the southern city of Sidon came at a time of rising public anger against banks in the small country facing its worst economic and financial crisis in decades.

ISRAEL’s embattled health minister yesterday said he would step down following a public uproar over his handling of the coronavirus crisis and his own COVID-19 infection. Health Minister Yaakov Litzman informed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he would step aside as the country forms a new government.

GERMANY’s labor minister wants to enshrine into law the right to work from home if it is feasible to do so, even after the coronavirus pandemic subsides. Labor Minister Hubertus Heil told yesterday’s edition of the Bild am Sonntag newspaper that he aims to put forward such legislation this fall.

NETHERLANDS A group of 25 Dutch high school students with very little sailing experience ended a trans-Atlantic voyage yesterday that was forced on them by coronavirus restrictions. The children, ages 14 to 17, watched over by 12 experienced crew members and three teachers, were on an educational cruise of the Caribbean when the pandemic forced them to radically change their plans.

SOMALIA A police officer in Somalia’s capital has been arrested in the fatal shooting of at least one civilian while enforcing coronavirus restrictions, fellow officer Ahmed Muse said Saturday. The shooting Friday evening sparked protests in Mogadishu that continued Saturday with crowds of angry young men burning tires and demanding justice.

FRANCE The itch to dance, to break out of coronavirus lockdown and bust a few moves in the fresh air, out on the street, has proved too strong for some to resist in Paris after weeks of staying home. Video of Parisians dancing in the street this weekend, some wearing face masks, triggered buzz and criticism on social networks and an apology Sunday from the out-of-work theater technician who blasted the music from his balcony.

SPAIN Shrieks of joy rang out in the streets of Spain as children were allowed to go outside and play yesterday for first time in six weeks, while people in Italy and France were eager to hear their leaders’ plans for easing some of the world’s strictest coronavirus lockdowns.