North America

NORFOLK, Va. (AP) — President Donald Trump backed away from calling for a quarantine for coronavirus hotspots in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, instead directing Saturday night that a “strong Travel Advisory” be issued to stem the spread of the outbreak.

Vice President Mike Pence tweeted that the CDC was urging residents of the three states “to refrain from non-essential travel for the next 14 days.”

28 Mar 2020; MEMO: Half a dozen US lawmakers accused Saudi Arabia of waging “warfare” against US dominance over the global energy market.

UNITED NATIONS, March 28. /TASS/: Russia has submitted an initiative to the United Nations General Assembly that a declaration on global cooperation in the fight against the coronavirus be adopted, the Russian mission to the UN said in a statement on its website.

"On 26 March 2020 the Russian Federation submitted to the UN General Assembly an initiative to adopt a UNGA Declaration on solidarity in countering the coronavirus," the statement reads.

Washington, Mar 28 (PTI) For millions of American kids staying indoors with their parents due to coronavirus shutdown in the US, President Donald Trump has a word of advice: sit back, behave, wash your hands and be proud of your country.

Much of life in America, and across the globe, has ground to a near halt as the coronavirus pandemic spreads, resulting in closing of schools, thwarting travel, forcing employees to work from home and shutting institutions.

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) - The director of one of Haiti’s top hospitals was kidnapped on Friday, prompting staff to refuse to take in new patients in protest as the impoverished country battles an outbreak of the novel coronavirus amid a spike in gang violence.

Dr. Jerry Bitar, a surgeon, was kidnapped shortly after leaving for work at Hospital Bernard Mevs from his home in an upmarket neighborhood of the capital, hospital staff told Reuters.

WASHINGTON, March 27 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump said Friday that Peter Navarro will coordinate the use of the Defense Production Act (DPA), a wartime law the president recently invoked to cope with the spread of the coronavirus in the country.

Announcing the decision at the daily White House Coronavirus Task Force news briefing Friday, Trump said "my order establishes that Peter will serve as national Defense Production Act policy coordinator for the federal government."

UNITED NATIONS, March 27 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese permanent representative to the United Nations, Zhang Jun, in his capacity as president of the Security Council for the month of March, attended a virtual joint briefing by the UN principal organs to member states on COVID-19 response.

COVID-19 is posing huge challenges to the operation of UN organs, including the Security Council, which has primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security, said Zhang.

WASHINGTON, March 28 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The United States now has more than 100,000 confirmed cases of the new coronavirus, a tracker maintained by Johns Hopkins University showed.

There have been 100,717 cases including 1,544 deaths as of 6 pm Eastern time (2200 GMT).

The biggest cluster by far is in New York, home to almost half the cases, overwhelming the hospital system.

The United States has around 15,000 more confirmed cases then the second country on the list, Italy, and 20,000 more than China, where the disease was first identified but has since peaked.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Navy, the military service hit hardest by the coronavirus, scrambled to contain its first at-sea outbreak, with at least two dozen infected aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt, one of 11 active aircraft carriers whose mission is central to the Pentagon’s strategy for deterring war with China and Iran.

WASHINGTON, March 28 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The coronavirus pandemic has driven the global economy into a downturn that will require massive funding to help developing nations, IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva said.

“It is clear that we have entered a recession” that will be worse than in 2009 following the global financial crisis, she said in an online press briefing.

With the worldwide economic “sudden stop,” Georgieva said the fund’s estimate “for the overall financial needs of emerging markets is $2.5 trillion.”