Six opposition rebels have been killed after days of clashes in Myanmar, an anti-junta defence force made up of civilians said Sunday, as Britain and the United States (US) condemned the military's violence against civilians.Myanmar has been in uproar since the military ousted civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi in a 1 February coup, triggering a massive uprising which authorities have sought to quell with lethal force. Pope Francis on Sunday called for an end to the bloodshed and

Five people suffocated in a Nepal hospital after oxygen ran out this week, just the latest victims of a vicious COVID surge that risks devastating the impoverished country and its ill-equipped healthcare system.Daily new cases have risen 60-fold since 1 April and nearly a thousand people have died in the past 10 days, according to official figures which, as in neighbouring India, are seen as under-reporting the scale of the virus.The mountainous country of almost 30 million is now seeing seve

World health experts issued a grim warning Friday that the second year of COVID-19 was set to be "far more deadly", as Japan extended a state of emergency amid growing calls for the Olympics to be scrapped."We're on track for the second year of this pandemic to be far more deadly than the first," said the World Health Organization's (WHO) director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.The mood also darkened in Japan where the coronavirus state of emergency took in a

Beaten, kicked in the groin and threatened with sexual violence – a young Myanmar teenager detained by the junta's security forces has described the treatment suffered by some women and girls behind bars.Ma Chaw, 17, and her mother were arrested on 14 April in Yangon, Myanmar's commercial capital, which has been blanketed with heavy security since the military seized power in a coup.As they were walking to a friend's house from a morning protest, she said, they were stopped by

Indian doctors have recorded a huge spurt in cases of mucormycosis, an aggressive, hard-to-treat fungal infection, among COVID-19 patients.For 35-year-old Milind Deshmukh, contracting the COVID-19 infection has been a devastating, life-altering experience.The mechanical engineer from Thane, a suburb of Mumbai, caught a fungal infection known as mucormycosis while battling the viral disease.

Thailand reported its largest ever spike in coronavirus infections Thursday, with more than half coming from two Bangkok prisons where prominent democracy activists have been detained.The kingdom is battling a third wave of the virus that has forced the government to impose restrictions on movement, rules on mask-wearing and close public spaces.Alarm bells sounded this week when an activist at the forefront of Thailand's democracy movement announced she had tested positive for COVID-19 f

Muslims around the world marked a sombre Eid al-Fitr on Thursday amid rising hostilities between Israel and Palestinians, in the second celebration in the shadow of the coronavirus pandemic.The three-day festival, which marks the end of the holy fasting month of Ramadan, is traditionally celebrated with mosque prayers, family feasts and shopping for new clothes, gifts and sweets.But casting a pall on the festival, already subdued due to the raging pandemic, was deadly violence between Israel

As Myanmar’s national COVID-19 response collapses following a 1 February military coup, one ethnic armed organisation in the country’s north has quietly vaccinated 20,000 people in areas it governs, with support from across the border in China.The vaccines, produced by the Chinese company Sinovac Biotech, were supplied and administered with assistance from the Red Cross Society of China, a member of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. The Kachin Inde

The catastrophic scale of the COVID-19 pandemic could have been prevented, an independent global panel concluded Wednesday, but a "toxic cocktail" of dithering and poor coordination meant the warning signs went unheeded.The Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response (IPPPR) said a series of bad decisions meant COVID-19 went on to kill more than 3.3 million people so far and devastate the global economy.Institutions "failed to protect people" and science-denyi

A former Myanmar beauty queen has joined ethnic rebels to take up arms against the country's military junta, posting photos of herself with an assault rifle.Myanmar has been in chaos and its economy paralysed since the military seized power on 1 February, ousting civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi.Htar Htet Htet represented Myanmar in the first Miss Grand International beauty pageant in Thailand in 2013, competing against 60 contenders in swimsuit and national costume rounds.Fast forward e