A Turkish military cargo plane carrying hospital supplies and a field hospital departed for Bangladesh early Saturday following the March 22 deadly blaze in Cox’s Bazar which shelters thousands of Rohingya refugees.

On the instructions of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey's Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) and Health Ministry along with the Environment and Urbanization Ministry began work to deliver aid to the region.

A new field hospital, prepared to help the damaged Turkish field hospital become operational again, was loaded on an A 400M-type military cargo plane at the Etimesgut Military Airport in the capital Ankara.

A total of 22 personnel from the Turkish Health Ministry, AFAD, and Turkey's Housing and Development Administration also departed for Bangladesh.

The Turkish field hospital was one of the largest healthcare centers in the refugee camp said to be the world's largest. It houses more than 750,000 Rohingya refugees who fled violence and persecution in Myanmar in August 2017.

The UN has confirmed that at least 15 people have been killed, 560 injured, and 400 still missing, while at least 10,000 shelters have been destroyed.

Besides others, Turkish humanitarian agencies have also mobilized their resources to respond to the emergency.

At least 17 people were injured in a car bomb attack on Friday in the Cauca governorate in southwestern Colombia. 

Most of the victims were municipal employees, who were injured when the bomb exploded near city hall in the Corinto district.

Authorities said it was a terror attack.

The injured are being treated at nearby hospitals. The blast caused extensive damage to surrounding houses and businesses.

President Ivan Duque condemned the attack. "Terrorism is the weapon of cowards. I gave the security forces instructions to find the criminals. We will continue to fight terrorism relentlessly wherever it is,” he wrote on Twitter.

Defense Minister Diego Molano Aponte announced he would go to the area to discuss the attack with security officials.  /aa

An business representative from Tehran province in Iran said a Turkey-Iran Social Security Agreement inked on March 24 would contribute to strengthening the commercial and economic relations between the two countries. 

Fatih Cayabatmaz from the Independent Industrialists and Businessmen Association (MUSIAD) told Anadolu Agency that the agreement offers important opportunities for the business world.

"Implementation of the Turkey-Iran Social Security Agreement will increase the Iranian businessmen's interest in Turkey.

Noting that Iranians were at the top of the list of foreigners establishing a company in Turkey, Cayabatmaz said, "In February, Iranians came first on the list with 75 companies.” In addition to reinforcing relations, it will warm “the two nations towards each other," he said.

Cayabatmaz said with the new agreement, an Iranian businessman who founded a company in Turkey has to submit documents indicating that he paid insurance in his home country for the Iranian staff he employs, while not having to pay insurance in Turkey.

"The time the Iranian workers spend working in Turkey will be valid in Iran. This will reduce costs and increase the possibility of Iranian businessmen investment in Turkey. The same applies for Turkish businessmen operating in Iran and their personnel," he said.

He noted that health insurance for an employer would be valid in the other country, allowing workers to access health services free of charge.

A previous Social Security Agreement between Turkey and Iran, inked on April 16, 2016, was approved and took effect once again by the Turkish parliament on March 24.

With the addition of Iran, the number of countries with effective social security agreements with Turkey rose to 34. /aa

The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) on Thursday condemned an attack on a mosque in Limassol province in the Greek Cypriot Administration’s area. 

According to Turkish News Agency-Cyprus (TAK), unidentified individuals wrote slogans praising the Greek uprising on its anniversary of March 25, 1821 along with the Greek flag and a cross drawn on the walls and doors of the mosque in the village of Episkopi (Piskobu-Yalova) in Limassol.

President Ersin Tatar said that Greek provocations were raised before the negotiation process on the Cyprus issue today just as in the past, according to a statement from the press and public relations department of the TRNC presidency.

While there are only a few days left before the informal 5+1 meeting led by the UN on the Cyprus issue will be held on April 27-29 in Geneva, Switzerland, Tatar emphasized that Greek provocations have intensified.

He said all mosques and sacred places located in the Greek side are being attacked, like yesterday’s attack on the mosque in Limassol province, recalling that the attackers wrote “All Turks shall die” along with other “racist and fascist” slogans and drawings of Greek flags on the walls of the mosque.

Tatar mentioned that the “Greek Cypriot mentality was once again demonstrated by this event,” saying "it is also worth recalling that during the period of 1963-1974, hundreds of our mosques were attacked and destroyed.”

“Our advice to the Greek Cypriot Administration and its leadership is that it should not organize and support such racist and fascist attacks, prevent them and arrest those responsible as soon as possible,” he added.

Meanwhile, Turkish Cypriot Prime Minister Ersan Saner also condemned the attack and the “racist attitude” being demonstrated by the incident.

Saner stressed that the Greek Cypriot Administration should locate the perpetrators of the incident and bring them to justice, saying what was done was a provocation and could not be accepted.

Noting that the criminals should not go unpunished, he reminded that the perpetrators of various attacks on mosques and racist attacks against Turkish Cypriots who passed to Southern Cyprus were not found and all attacks went unpunished.​​​​​​​ 

"Is the Greek government so helpless? It cannot find the perpetrators of such attacks and bring them to justice. We expect the criminals to be found and punished," he added, inviting the Greek Cypriot Administration to take a deterrent stance against the attacks./aa

French President Emmanuel Macron lashed out against pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca on Thursday for not honoring its contract and expressed support for the European Union’s decision to block all coronavirus vaccine exports as long as laboratories do not keep their commitments.  

Speaking on the sidelines of the European Council summit, Macron affirmed that Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna had kept up with their commitments with regard to the supply of COVID-19 vaccines. 

The contractual commitments France had with AstraZeneca have not been honored, he said.

Holding a chart comparing the number of doses promised and those supplied by the three vaccine makers, he said the British-Swedish company had assured “120 million doses to the EU, but are now promising to deliver 30 million doses. And the deliveries are not there. It was necessary to put in controls.” 

Following the discovery of 29 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine in a "raid" in Italy, Macron said he hoped the doses will add to the recovery.  

He added that the control mechanisms activated by the European Commission have helped in identifying doses that would have been diverted. 

“It is not a question of protectionism but of preventing other developed countries from using [the vaccine doses] themselves at the expense of the European Union,” he said, without naming any country. 

Following the shortage of deliveries by AstraZeneca, which has continued to meet the targets for the UK, the EU on Wednesday tightened export regulations to halt shipments of COVID vaccines outside the bloc. 

The new rules will govern exports based on the epidemiological situation, the vaccination rate and access to vaccines in the destination country./aa

The European Union is at the start of a third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, the president of the European Commission warned Thursday. 

Ursula von der Leyen was speaking at a press conference following a virtual summit of EU leaders where the EU heads of state and governments discussed the bloc’s response to the health crisis.

“We are at the start of the third wave in Europe, and in many European member states, infections are on the rise again, mostly due to the variant B117,” said von der Leyen.

She said the concerning situation “highlights the importance of a fast and speedy vaccination” on which EU leaders also agreed.

Although the bloc signed advanced purchase agreements last year with six vaccine producers to buy about 2.6 billion vaccine doses, it has been struggling to kick off vaccination campaigns and to ensure the contracted deliveries.

Some 88 million vaccine doses were delivered to the EU, out of which 62 million were given to patients, while 18.2 million people or 4.1% of the bloc’s population received two jabs, said von der Leyen.

However, she reassured that deliveries for the second quarter of the year were promising, which “means that we are on track to achieve our goal, that this summer we want to have 70% of the adult population in the European Union vaccinated.”

In light of the situation, EU leaders also agreed to maintain restrictions on non-essential travel.

At the same time, they promised to intensify work on common European digital certificates as preparation for a gradual lifting of measures.

US President Joe Biden also joined the videoconference. EU leaders agreed with him to discuss the new transatlantic agenda as well as their commitment to maintaining the global supply chain of COVID-19 vaccines./aa

UK lawmakers voted Thursday to extend emergency powers in the Coronavirus Act for another six months.

MPs voted 484 to 76 in favor of the move, supporting Health Secretary Matt Hancock in his appeal to renew the “essential” rules as the UK slowly navigates out of its third lockdown.

The Coronavirus Act became law in March 2020, when the first death from COVID-19 in the UK was confirmed and the country entered its first lockdown. It gives the government unprecedented powers ranging from shutting down restaurants to detaining individuals deemed at risk or dangerous in containing the spread of the virus.

The emergency laws will remain in effect until September, when they will be voted on again by MPs. Ministers, however, have pledged to only use them when absolutely necessary and that 12 provisions in the act are no longer needed due to the progress made against the virus through the country’s vaccination program.

"Although this act remains essential and there are elements of it which we are seeking the renewal of, we have always said we will only retain powers as long as they are necessary," Hancock said in a statement to his fellow parliamentarians.

On Thursday, another 6,397 people tested positive for the virus, taking this week’s total to 38,424. This represents a 2% decrease compared to the previous seven days.

A total of 63 deaths were reported within 28 days of testing positive for the virus on Thursday. Between March 19 and March 25, there were 520 deaths within 28 days of testing.

Some 28.9 million people had been administered their first dose of the vaccine by the end of March 24, with 2.7 million people receiving the second. Vaccines are currently administered in two doses 21 days apart, and nearly 43% of the population has now received at least one dose of the vaccine.

The latest R range for the UK stands at 0.6-0.9, with the current growth rate at -6% to -3% per day. The R number is a mechanism used to rate the virus’s ability to spread, with R being the number of people that one infected person will pass the virus on to.

France on Thursday clarified that it upholds religious rites and has not issued any ban concerning the slaughter of poultry animals in line with Islamic principles.

France’s position on the 2009 European regulation to waive the obligation of prior stunning of animals in the event of ritual slaughter, “remains unchanged,” the Agriculture and Food Ministry said in a press statement.

The controversy on the ban on halal slaughtering rites came to light after the authorities of three major mosques in Paris, Lyon and Evry on March 18 issued a joint statement, expressing concern for the French-Muslim community ahead of the holy month of Ramadan.

A ministerial instruction dated Nov. 23, 2020 could lead to the ban on the slaughter of poultry according to the halal ritual, as of July 2021, they said.

The response from the senior Muslim leaders sparked a flurry of social media posts and misinformed claims.

The ministry said the new circular clarifies control methods applicable to all types of poultry slaughter and stunning methods, without modifying the existing rules in practice nationally. It does not call into question the possibility of practicing ritual slaughter, it said.

Jewish kosher and Islamic halal rites involve slaughtering animals or poultry by swiftly slitting their throat, as against the EU directive requiring prior stunning of the animal.

Slaughter operators who wish to derogate from the stunning obligations for religious purposes are permitted to do so by French regional authorities./aa

The World Health Organization (WHO) Africa office on Thursday made a call for equitable COVID-19 vaccine access to widen reach in Africa.

Speaking at a virtual press conference, Matshidiso Moeti, the WHO Regional Director for Africa, underlined that Africa urgently needs more vaccines as deliveries have begun to slow and initial batches were nearly exhausted in some countries.

"A slowdown in vaccine supply could prolong the painful journey to end this pandemic for millions of people in Africa," said Moeti, stressing that acquiring jabs "must not be a competition. Fair access will benefit all and not just some of us."

"While some high-income countries are seeking to vaccinate their entire populations, many in Africa are struggling to sufficiently cover even their high-risk groups," he added.

So far, 44 African countries have received vaccines through the COVAX facility or through donations and bilateral agreements and 32 of them have begun vaccinations, according to the WHO.

"Vaccines remain our surest way of beating this pandemic," said Richard Mihigo, the immunization and vaccines development program coordinator for the WHO Africa.

"It's unfair that some high-income countries are looking to vaccinate their entire populations, while others -- including most in our region -- are struggling to reach a significant proportion of at-risk populations," he added.

There are over 4.1 million confirmed COVID-19 cases on the African continent, with more than 3.7 million recoveries and 110,860 deaths.

During the past four weeks, deaths in Africa have dropped by 45% compared with the previous four weeks. But, the case-fatality ratio for cumulative deaths on the continent is 2.7%, which is still higher than the global figure of 2.2%, according to the WHO./aa

A bomb threat which led to the evacuation of parliamentary buildings and the surrounding area in The Hague turned out to be a false alarm, Dutch police said on Thursday.

Earlier, the Hague police said in a statement on Twitter they were investigating the scene because of a bomb threat.

However, in a subsequent update, police said the investigation had ended and nothing was found./aa