British Prime Minister Boris Johnson offered a five-step plan Thursday to his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, to prevent irregular migration. 

"Tonight I have written to President Macron offering to move further and faster to prevent Channel crossings and avoid a repeat of yesterday’s appalling tragedy," Johnson said on Twitter.

He was referencing an accident during the dangerous crossings to reach the UK, where 31 migrants were reported dead as a boat capsized off the French coast of Calais.

Johnson said the steps should be taken "as soon as possible," including joint patrols; deploying advanced technology, like sensors and radar; reciprocal maritime patrols; deepening the work of our Joint Intelligence Cell, with better real-time intelligence-sharing; immediate work on a bilateral returns agreement with France, alongside talks to establish a UK-EU returns agreement and an agreement with France to take back migrants who cross the Channel through the dangerous route.

He added that if those who reach this country were "swiftly returned the incentive for people to put their lives in the hands of traffickers would be significantly reduced."

Johnson said he is confident that taking the steps and building on existing cooperation between the UK and France could address "illegal migration and prevent more families from experiencing the devastating loss we saw yesterday."/aa

Flights from South Africa and five other countries will be suspended beginning midday Friday because of a new coronavirus variant, British Health Secretary Sajid Javid said late Thursday. 

“UKHSA [UK Health Security Agency] is investigating a new variant. More data is needed but we're taking precautions now. From noon tomorrow six African countries will be added to the red list, flights will be temporarily banned, and UK travellers must quarantine,” Javid tweeted.

Arrivals from Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, Zimbabwe ​​​​​​​must quarantine in a hotel for 10 days and pay for the stay.

The new variant, B.1.1.529, was first identified Nov. 11 in Botswana.

“The early indication we have of this variant is it may be more transmissible than the Delta variant and the vaccines that we currently have may be less effective against it," Javid was quoted in the media.

“We’ve got plans in place, as people know, for the spread of this infection here in the UK and we have contingency plans – the so-called Plan B.

“But today’s announcement, this is about a new variant from South Africa -- it’s been detected in South Africa and Botswana -- and this is about being cautious and taking action and trying to protect, as best we can, our borders.”

World Health Organization officials will meet Friday with South African officials to assess the situation./aa

Portugal, a country with one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, will be implementing a host of new measures to control COVID-19, including tighter border controls and a week of post-holiday confinement, the prime minister announced on Thursday. 

“We don’t want to repeat the tragic experience of last January,” Antonio Costa said, referring to a time when Portuguese hospitals were overwhelmed with COVID-19 patients.

From Dec. 1, the country will enter a “state of calamity” that gives the government legal powers to implement tighter measures.

Requiring all arrivals to Portugal by plane, whether vaccinated or not, to present a negative COVID-19 test result is one of the measures.

Masks will again become mandatory in all indoor environments, including offices. Also making a return is the COVID passport, meaning everyone must show a vaccine certificate or negative test to use hotels, restaurants, and other leisure facilities.

As the holiday season approaches, the government is also reminding people of the importance to take at-home COVID-19 tests before going to social gatherings with friends or family.

A post-holiday “containment week” has also been planned. From Jan. 2, remote work will be mandatory, bars will close, and school holidays will be extended.

Portugal has one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, with 86% of its entire population fully immunized.

Still, the two-week infection rate has quickly reached 250 cases per 100,000 people.

It, however, is significantly lower than other European countries such as Austria, Slovenia, Belgium, or the Czech Republic, where the infection rate is more than 1,000.

“Despite our vaccination success ... we are entering a high-risk phase because we are seeing an increase in the pandemic in the rest of Europe and Portugal is not an island,” said Costa./aa

The YPG/PKK terror group set free families from a camp in northeastern Syria, according to information obtained by an Anadolu Agency correspondent from sources on Thursday. 

Nineteen families, compromised of 70 people, were allowed Wednesday to leave the camp following talks with tribal leaders in the region.

After the leaders in the east of the Euphrates assured those held in the camp were civilians, the families were taken to settlements in the province and countryside of northern Syria's al-Hasakah province.

On Sept. 15, YPG/PKK terrorists handed over 324 Syrian nationals, mostly women and children; and 115 Iraqi families on Sept. 29 to Iraqi government officials from the camp in al-Hol.

YPG/PKK terrorists had previously released hundreds of Daesh/ISIS members from the camp.

In its more than 30-year terror campaign against Turkey, the PKK -- listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the US and the European Union -- has been responsible for the deaths of nearly 40,000 people, including women, children and infants. The YPG is the PKK's Syrian branch.  

Al-Hol camp

The YPG/PKK built the camp in April 2017 in al-Hol to keep civilians who fled clashes with the Daesh/ISIS terror group in Deir-Ez-Zor and also some Daesh/ISIS members and their families.

According to local sources, civilians detained by the terror group live in inhumane conditions in the camp.

Non-hygienic toilets and shower cabins, torn tents, expired food, lack of medication for those with chronic illnesses and lack of patient care are some of the main problems at the camp.

The UN and NGOs warn that the humanitarian situation in the camp is growing worse every day and have sought access to centers where Daesh/ISIS militants are held.

According to a UN official, the camp was initially built to house up to 10,000 internally displaced people, but more than 73,000 individuals remain interred.

The vast majority of those at the camp are women and children under the age of 12.

The Al-Hol camp hosts thousands of foreign terrorist fighters from around 50 countries, as well as a large number of Syrian and Iraqi terrorists./aa  

Germany's economic growth slowed in the third quarter of 2021, from the previous quarter, the Federal Statistical Office Destatis data showed on Thursday. 

Europe's largest economy saw its gross domestic product (GDP) rising by 1.7% in July-September, from the quarter before.

The German economy had grown by 2% in the second quarter, according to revised results based on most recent calculations, Destatis said.

The economy expanded by 2.5% in the third quarter, from the same period of last year.

The third-quarter GDP, however, is still 1.1% lower compared to the last three months of 2019, which was the quarter before the coronavirus pandemic started, it said./aa

About 300 migrants trying to reach Europe were rescued by Italian coast guard units from an overloaded boat in the Mediterranean Sea. 

The migrants were saved in an overnight operation off the coast of the southern Italian island of Lampedusa, according to statement by the Italian coast guard.

A total of 296 migrants, including eight children and 14 women, some of them floating in the sea, were rescued in the operation overnight on Wednesday and Thursday, it added.  

Rescue group appeals for help

German NGO Sea-Watch International said its rescue ship, Sea Watch 4, has 463 people on board and in dire need of a port of safety.

“A storm is coming, the situation on the #SeaWatch4 is critical. Many of the 463 rescued people on board have already been at sea for more than a week. They are exposed to rain and wind on the decks,” the group said on Twitter.

“They need protection and have the right to disembark in a port of safety! Now!”

The NGO said the situation on the rescue vessel “is increasingly unbearable.”

“These people have seen their rights denied for far too long. We are not asking for a favor here, it is the right of these people to disembark! Don't delay further, it's time for a port of safety!” it added.​​​​​​​

The Chinese government announced Thursday it strongly protests the US sanctions imposed on 12 of its firms, according to Chinese state-owned news agency Xinhua.

"The US has overstretched the concept of national security and imposed sanctions arbitrarily," Commerce Ministry spokesperson Shu Jueting told a news conference.

"This action seriously lacks a factual basis, and its procedures are very opaque," she said, according to Xinhua.

She added that the sanctions undermine the safety of global industrial and supply chains, as well as global economic recovery.

The US Commerce Department announced Wednesday its Bureau of Industry and Security added a total of 27 foreign entities and individuals to the blacklist amid their activities against the US national security and foreign policy interests.

While 12 of those are located in China, rest are in Japan, Pakistan, and Singapore, and another entity is based in Russia.

US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo said Wednesday in a statement Washington's actions will prevent the diversion of American technologies to China's and Russia’s military advancement as well as to Pakistan’s nuclear activities and ballistic missile program.

"Global trade and commerce should support peace, prosperity, and good-paying jobs, not national security risks," she said./aa

The drowning tragedy in the English Channel was a “dreadful shock” but “not a surprise,” the UK’s home secretary told lawmakers on Thursday.

There is “no quick fix” to the “complicated issue,” Priti Patel said in remarks in Parliament after 31 migrants drowned when an inflatable vessel bound trying to reach Britain from France sank in the Channel.

“This is about addressing long-term pull factors, smashing the criminal gangs that treat human beings as cargo and tackling supply chains. It does need a Herculean effort and it will be impossible without close cooperation between all international partners and agencies,” she said.

“We are not working to end these crossings because we don’t care or are heartless,” she added, insisting that Britain has a “clear, generous and a humane approach” to dealing with the issue.

Shadow Home Secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds told MPs that Wednesday’s incident was the “most awful of reminders of the dangers of crossing the Channel and that people’s lives are at risk every day.”

“It’s a sobering moment, for our country, for France and for the international community,” he said.

“Yesterday’s terrible tragedy must be a moment for change. The time for urgent action to save lives is now,” he added.

British press reacts

Wednesday’s tragedy dominated the front pages of British newspapers, with many blaming France.

The right-wing Daily Mail’s front page read: “Tragedy in the Channel. At 7.15am yesterday French police sit and watch as people traffickers launch migrants on perilous trip to Britain. Hours later, 31 others drown in horrific Channel disaster. Now despairing PM tells Macron … You’re Letting Gangs Get Away With Murder.”

Right-wing publication The Sun said: “Now will leaders finally act? SHAMEFUL. French police idly look on as rafts head to UK. Hours later, 33 migrants die ... one a little girl.”

The left-wing Daily Mirror’s front page read: “Within hours of these little children being crammed into a dinghy for a perilous journey to the UK … under the noses of watching French cops … 31 other desperate people had died in the freezing English Channel. A Human Tragedy.”

The Guardian, a liberal and left-wing paper, went with: “Tragedy at sea claims 31 lives in deadliest day of refugee crisis.”

A report in the right-wing The Daily Telegraph – titled “The day the luck ran out: How the migrant tragedy unfolded in the Channel” – read:

“Hours before the disaster, the French police had stood and watched; done nothing to prevent a flimsy rubber dinghy from launching into the Channel for the perilous journey to Britain.

“They had turned a blind eye, seemingly unconcerned by the huge risks being taken by the 40 or so desperate migrants carrying the vessel into the water. An alarming photograph showed police officers watching the people smugglers putting their human cargo to sea and failing to intervene. That boat, on that occasion, made it.

“Another, launching a few miles away from close to Calais, did not.”/aa