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‘We do our best to wash their bodies’: Idlib hospital struggles to cope with Covid-19 spike

Idlib (Syria) (AFP) – Hospitals in Syria’s rebel-held city of Idlib are struggling to keep up with incoming Covid-19 cases as the number of those infected with the deadly virus soar to critical levels across the country. In the Idlib region, where around half of the more than three million residents have been displaced by conflict, the number of recorded daily infections has increased sharply and now often tops 1,000 a day.

©AFP

Locked down Sydney left leaderless after Premier Berejiklian’s corruption resignation

Sydney (AFP) – The leader of Australia’s most populous state resigns amid a corruption investigation, leaving Sydneysiders — deep in months of lockdown — without a political leader. A state corruption watchdog is investigating allegations including whether she favoured a former boyfriend, then a member of parliament, in the awarding of grants in his electorate. The projects included funding for the Australian Clay Target Association and the Riverina Conservatorium of Music in Wagga Wagga, a small New South Wales town. Berejiklian denied the allegations.

©AFP

Red Cross warns health system on verge of collapse in Afghanistan

Kabul (AFP) – Regional Red Cross director, Alexander Matheou, warns that a dire lack of funding is pushing Afghanistan’s health system to the brink. Devastated by more than four decades of war, the Afghan economy has all but ground to a halt since the Taliban’s takeover last month, amid sanctions and a cutoff in foreign aid. This has taken a particularly heavy toll on the health sector, which was primarily run by NGOs with internal funding before the Taliban came to power.

©AFP

Head in the sky: 8-year-old Brazilian girl dubbed world’s youngest astronomer

Fortaleza (Brazil) (AFP) – When Nicole Oliveira was just learning to walk, she would throw up her arms to reach for the stars in the sky. Today, at just 8 years of age, the Brazilian girl is known as the world’s youngest astronomer, looking for asteroids as part of a NASA-affiliated program, attending international seminars and meeting with her country’s top space and science figures.

©AFP

In French prison, inmates and guards team up to break rowing record

Rennes (France) (AFP) – At the Rennes women’s prison in western France, a team of inmates and guards are working hard to beat the French indoor rowing record for the most kilometres covered in 24 hours, a challenge that offers a moment of escape, cohesion and self-improvement.

©AFP

Scientists race to save Florida coral reef from mysterious disease

Islamorada (United States) (AFP) – Biologists in Florida are fighting to save the species that make up the only coral reef in the United States’ continental waters. They’ve recreated the coral reef habitat found in the waters off the southern tip of the state in huge aquariums in a bid to preserve it from a disease that is affecting the coral in the wild. Stony coral tissue loss disease, or SCTLD, has killed about half of stony coral species.

©AFP

Lava from Canary Islands volcano spreads into the sea

La Palma Island (Spain) (AFP) – of lava at night Lava from the erupting volcano on La Palma in the Canary Islands that began cascading into the ocean 36 hours ago already covers more than 25 acres at sea. Since it began on September 19, the dramatic eruption has forced thousands out of their homes, while lava has destroyed hundreds of houses, businesses and huge swathes of banana plantations.

©AFP

Taliban fighters hit a Kabul fairground as Afghans fear for freedoms

Kabul (AFP) – Taliban fighters laugh and whoop onboard a pirate ship ride at an amusement park in the west of Afghanistan’s capital Kabul. An incongruous scene, and one that might have been unimaginable during the group’s brutally oppressive reign in the 1990s. But while the Islamist hardliners have promised a more moderate rule this time, many Afghans have already seen their freedoms curbed.

©AFP

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