Mexican officials are trying to identify the gunmen who attacked a drug rehabilitation center in central Mexico on Wednesday, killing at least 24 people and wounding seven others in the town of Irapuato.Pedro Cortes, secretary of public security in Irapuato, told the French News Agency (AFP), the suspects forced the victims to the ground and opened fire before fleeing in a red vehicle.Cortes said the victims were in an unregistered annex of the rehabilitation center, where street level drug dealers are known to seek shelter from drug gangs.In response to the attack, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said his government would not allow the country “to fall into anarchy and disorder.”The attack occurred northwest of Mexico City, in Guanajuato state, where the Jalisco cartel has been part of a violent turf battle. But it is unclear if Wednesday’s attack is linked to an organized crime group.The La Jornada newspaper said there have been four attacks since December on annexes in Irapuato, where people were abducted, some killed, and a building was set on fire. 
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A showdown that could determine if Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro will solidify his grip on power is set for early December. The opposition is already rejecting the December 6 poll as a sham, which favors Maduro’s ruling Socialist Party.  Opposition leaders say Maduro is maneuvering to end rival opposition politician Juan Guaido’s leadership of the legislative body.  Guaido is considered Venezuela’s leader by several countries, including the United States, following Maduro’s disputed 2018 re-election. Guaido has also led unsuccessful efforts supported by the  United States to remove Maudro from office. During a televised address Wednesday,  Maduro seemed to reference Guaido, without mentioning his name.  He said,  “Venezuela needs a new National Assembly, legit and constitutional. Maduro then expressed confidence in the outcome of the upcoming vote, saying, he is already   imagining, January 5, 2021, Federal Legislative Palace, the lawmakers elected by the people arrive and a new National Assembly is born.” Maduro also urged voters to turn out in large numbers, and he said election officials assured him they will take measures to ensure a safe voting process amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.  
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A modernized U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade pact took effect Wednesday, ensuring continuity for manufacturers and agriculture, but the threat of disputes is exposing cracks in what was meant to be a stronger North American fortress of competitiveness.As the deal kicks in, the Trump administration is threatening Canada with new aluminum tariffs, and a prominent Mexican labor activist has been jailed, underscoring concerns about crucial labor reforms in the replacement for the 26-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement.The U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement includes tighter North American content rules for autos, new protections for intellectual property, prohibitions against currency manipulation and new rules on digital commerce that did not exist when NAFTA launched in 1994.Trump had lambasted NAFTA as the “worst trade deal ever made” and repeatedly threatened to end it.Virus-related recessionsUSMCA launches as the coronavirus has all three countries mired in a deep recession, cutting their April goods trade flows — normally about $1.2 trillion annually — to the lowest monthly level in a decade.”The champagne isn’t quite as fizzy as we might have expected — even under the best of circumstances — and there’s trouble coming from all sides,” said Mary Lovely, a Syracuse University economics professor and senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington. “This could be a trade agreement that quickly ends up in dispute and higher trade barriers.”FILE – Workers check screens for faults at an LG flat screen TV assembly plant in Reynosa, Mexico, across the border from McAllen, Texas, March 23, 2017.Issues dogging USMCA include hundreds of legal challenges to Mexico’s new labor law, seeking to ensure that workers can freely organize and unions are granted full collective bargaining rights.A ruling against the law would harm Mexico’s ability to deliver on provisions aimed at ending labor contracts agreed upon without worker consent that are stacked in favor of companies and have kept wages chronically low in Mexico.Tougher labor provisionsDemocrats in the U.S. Congress had insisted on the stronger labor provisions last year before granting approval, prompting a substantial renegotiation of terms first agreed upon in October 2018. The arrest of Mexican labor lawyer Susana Prieto in early June has fueled U.S. unions’ arguments that Mexican workers’ rights are not being sufficiently protected.”I remain very concerned that Mexico is falling short of its commitments to implement the legislative reforms that are the foundation in Mexico for effectively protecting labor rights,” U.S. Representative Richard Neal, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said Tuesday, adding that USMCA’s success “truly hinges” on its new labor enforcement mechanism.On Wednesday, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer in a FILE – U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer testifies before the Senate Finance Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, June 18, 2019.But Lighthizer has also said he will file dispute cases “early and often” to enforce USMCA provisions, citing Mexico’s failure to approve U.S. biotech products.That could lead to increased tariffs on offending goods, such as products from individual factories where labor violations are found. Former USTR general counsel Stephen Vaughn, a legal architect of the Trump administration’s “Section 301″ tariffs on Chinese goods, was appointed on Wednesday to a U.S. roster of panelists to settle state-to-state dispute cases under USMCA.Carlos Vejar, a former Mexican trade negotiator, said it was in the country’s interest to uphold pledges made to strengthen unions and end child labor.”If Mexico isn’t mindful of this, there will be cases against Mexico, and Mexico will lose them,” Vejar said.U.S. national security tariffs on imported steel and aluminum — including from Canada and Mexico — were a major irritant during USMCA negotiations until a deal for exemptions was reached last year. But now, USTR is considering domestic producers’ request to restore the 10% duty on Canadian aluminum to combat a “surge” of imports.Energy sectorAnother source of disputes may be the energy sector, where the main U.S. oil and gas lobby has complained that recent actions by Mexico favoring state oil company Pemex already violate USMCA’s protections for private investors.Canada has also complained about new Mexican rules formally threatening investment in renewable energy.USMCA will put new compliance burdens on the region’s automotive manufacturers as the coronavirus craters consumer spending and auto production. Within three to five years, vehicles’ minimum North American content rises to 75% from 62.5%. Automakers must also produce 40% of their vehicles’ content in “high wage” areas — effectively the United States and Canada.A U.S. International Trade Commission study found this would draw more auto parts production to the United States, but may curb U.S. vehicle assembly and raise prices, limiting consumer choice in cars. The same panel found that after 15 years, the deal would add $68.5 billion annually to U.S. economic output and create 176,000 jobs compared with a NAFTA baseline.
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Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador will travel to Washington next week to meet with U.S. counterpart Donald Trump. Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard announced on Twitter Tuesday that Lopez Obrador will spend two days in Washington beginning July 8. Ebrard said further details about the visit will be released later Wednesday. The visit with President Trump will be the first foreign trip for Lopez Obrador since he first took office in December 2018.  He said earlier this week that his trip to the United States will celebrate the start of the new U.S.-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement, which goes into effect Wednesday.  But Lopez Obrador has come under intense criticism for his planned visit with Trump,  who is widely disliked for demonizing Mexican immigrants as drug dealers and criminals when he launched his presidential campaign, as well as his vow to make Mexico pay for building a proposed wall at U.S.-Mexican border. 
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Canada has failed to take back dozens of Canadian citizens detained in Syria for suspected links with the Islamic State (IS) terror group, an international rights watchdog said. The New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a report released Monday that Canadian authorities have not repatriated any of the estimated 47 Canadians who have been detained in overcrowded camps in northeast Syria. The HRW said during the coronavirus outbreak Canada has repatriated 40,000 Canadian citizens from 100 countries, including 29 from Syria, but has failed to bring back those held in Syrian detention camps. “If Canada can bring home tens of thousands of citizens from around the world in a matter of weeks, surely it can find a way to repatriate fewer than 50 others trapped in horrific conditions in northeast Syria,” Letta Tayler, a senior crisis and conflict researcher at HRW, said in a statement Monday. “The lives of Canadians are on the line, and the time to bring them home is now.” Among those detainees are 26 children, most of whom are under the age of six. Canadian officials say they are aware of Canadian citizens held in northeast Syria and that they are “particularly concerned with cases of Canadian children in Syria.” “Canadian consular officials are actively engaged with Syrian Kurdish authorities to seek information on Canadians in their custody. We continue to monitor the situation very closely,” Barbara Harvey, a spokesperson for Canadian Foreign Affairs Ministry, told VOA. Given the security situation on the ground and the current COVID-19 context, Canada’s ability to provide any kind of consular assistance in Syria remains limited, Harvey added. Despite Canada’s security concerns, the HRW report said that dozens of other countries, including the United States, Germany and France, have repatriated their citizens from Syria.  Last week, France took back 10 children of IS fighters who were held in Kurdish-run camps in northeast Syria. Dire conditions There are about 12,000 foreigners held at three camps for displaced people in northeast Syria, including al-Hol Camp where humanitarian groups say they suffer malnutrition and disease. Amarnath Amarasingam, an assistant professor who teaches extremism and terrorism at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada, visited al-Hol Camp last year. “Al-Hol can only be described as an urgent humanitarian catastrophe… It’s crowded, it’s dirty, violence breaks out often, and there are just small children everywhere,” he told VOA. Amarasingam said, “Around April 2018, there was definitely contact between Canadian officials and their Kurdish counterparts.” “Canadian officials even spoke to some of the detainees and started paperwork to get them identification documents and so on,” he said, “Then, a month later, the whole process was mysteriously shelved. It’s not clear why, but there has been no new attempt to repatriate Canadians.” Contacted by VOA, Kurdish officials declined to comment on whether there has been recent contact between them and Canadian authorities regarding Canadian citizens held in Syria, including 8 men who are accused of fighting for the Islamic State. But a Canadian official told VOA on a condition of anonymity that, “Investigating, arresting, charging and prosecuting any Canadian involved in terrorism or violent extremism is a priority for the Government of Canada.” Foreign fighters Syrian Kurdish officials have called on countries to take back their detained citizens, cautioning they do not have enough resources to keep IS prisoners and their families indefinitely. In addition to women and children, the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) has more than 10,000 IS fighters in their custody, including about 2,000 who come from more than 50 countries.  U.S. military officials say their SDF partners in Syria have been overwhelmed to keep IS prisoners. “The global coalition believes that through appropriate international laws and protocols, there should be a final resolution for what happens with the foreign terrorist fighters,” Col. Myles Caggins, spokesman for the anti-IS global coalition, told VOA in a recent interview.  He added that the coalition continues to support the SDF with stipends for the detention center guards and equipment “to make the detention centers safer for the Asayish [Kurdish security forces] who are providing security, as well as safer and more humane treatment  for the detainees.” Over the past few months, there have been several prison break attempts by IS prisoners held in a detention facility in the northeastern Syrian city of Hasakah. The most recent one was on Monday when a riot took place inside a major IS detention center in the city, triggering a rapid response by SDF fighters and their coalition backers to contain the situation, local news reported. In a congressional testimony in March, General Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr., commander of United States Central Command, said the best way to alleviate the problem of IS prisoners in Syria is to repatriate them. “While some countries have made efforts to reclaim their foreign fighters, full resolution requires a comprehensive diplomatic and international effort,” Gen. McKenzie said, adding that, “This problem will not go away by ignoring it, and can only be addressed by the international community working together to accept its shared responsibilities.” Local Kurdish authorities have said since the international community doesn’t have concrete plans to repatriate and prosecute IS prisoners in their home countries, they would proceed to try them in local courts in Syria. However, rights groups fear that given the current security situation in Syria, it would be challenging to make sure IS prisoners receive fair trials. “The fact that the Syrian government led by [President Bashar] Assad has little real control over the country and no due process, and SDF territory has a multitude of militias and foreign militaries present, the process of trying detainees in court is convoluted and difficult,” Philippe Nassif, Advocacy Director for Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty International, told VOA. 
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Haiti reopened its two international airports in Port-au-Prince and Cape Haitian, as well as four official border crossings in Anse-a-Pitres, Malpasse, Belladere and Ouanaminthe on Tuesday. President Jovenel Moïse announced the news in a national address.  The airports closed to all nonlocal flights on March 16 to stop the spread of the coronavirus, but exceptions were made for some nonlocal flights, including to fly people who were stuck in Haiti back to their home countries.JetBlue Flies American Citizens, Residents Stuck in Haiti Home Passengers boarding flight to Fort Lauderdale told VOA they are not afraid and look forward to returning to Haiti Safety measures  
 
Officials told VOA that safety measures are in place to limit vehicular traffic in and around the airport, with special attention paid to passenger pick-up and drop-off zones. Agents will limit the number of passengers around airline check-in counters and security check points. Face masks are mandatory.  “Security agents will accompany passengers going through immigration, where we placed signs indicating where they should stand in adherence with social distancing measures,” Joseph Frantz Sedras, director of equipment for Toussaint Louverture International Airport in Port-au-Prince, told VOA Creole.   Protective glass barriers are in place at all agent counters, and procedures are in place to keep passenger lines moving forward.  Sedras told VOA that social distancing will be mandated at every step of the departure and arrival process and that security agents will search passengers and their luggage before they reach the immigration area. In addition, counters and equipment will be disinfected often, he said.    “When the passenger reaches the departure lounge, he/she will be allowed to occupy every other seat in accordance with social distancing guidelines,” Sedras said. “These measures will be mandated throughout the departure lounge.”   Hand sanitizer dispensers have been installed throughout the airport for passenger and employee use.     COVID-19 infections  Haiti currently has 5,933 confirmed cases of COVID-19, according to data published by the published health ministry on June 29. That number is an increase of more 1,000 cases since June 20 when the confirmed infection toll stood at 4,916. The current death toll is 105.  Health officials say the hardest-hit regions are the northeast, west and Artibonite departments, but there is speculation that the toll could be higher nationwide, where fear of stigmatization keeps people from seeking medical treatment.Workers with the Haiti’s Ministry of Public Health and Population walk outside of International Airport Toussaint Louverture, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, March 15, 2020.Diaspora travelTravelers from the Haitian diaspora are essential to the country’s economy, according to Prime Minister Joseph Jouthe. During a visit to the Port-au-Prince airport before its reopening, he told VOA Creole he recognizes their desire to tend to property, as well as attending annual religious festivals.    “I can’t keep them from coming to dance at the festivals. And if the airport in Puerto Plata (Dominican Republic) is open and we are not, Haitians will find a way to get here somehow,” he said.  With regards to the pandemic and its spread, the prime minister said he consulted the country’s top health experts on a timeline but was not given an answer.     “Community transmission is an issue. There are many people who say they have a fever or a cold, they insist it’s not corona(virus). But we know how Haitians are. I guess if I had it, I would say I didn’t, too. So, all we can do is reinforce the security measures and preventative measures already in place,” he said.  Jouthe said hand washing and wearing masks are a necessity, even though they are not always comfortable.  Criticism  
Opposition Sen. Jean Renel Senatus told VOA that he, too, understands there are people who need to travel to Haiti to deal with important matters, but he doubts the government’s information about the current COVID-19 situation.  He also expressed concern about the surge in U.S. cases.   “We’ve heard that cases are spiking in Miami. And most of the planes arriving in Haiti are coming from Miami, Florida,” the senator said. Scheduled flights   Eleven flights are scheduled to arrive in Haiti on July 1, according to FlightRadar24, a website that tracks air traffic worldwide in real time. Among those, five flights from U.S. carriers American Airlines, Spirit and JetBlue departing from Miami and Fort Lauderdale, Florida and New York City, are due to arrive between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. local time.     
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The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) has called for urgent action to stop female genital mutilation, child marriage and other harmful practices carried out against millions of women and girls around the world each year.UNFPA made that call as it presented its State of the World Population report from UN headquarters in Geneva Monday. The report was embargoed until Tuesday.UNFPA Director Mónica Ferro told journalists the report cites at lease 19 practice against girls and women girls that have been universally denounced as human rights violations – from breast ironing to virginity testing.  Ferro said the study was also groundbreaking in that it treats these practices as human rights violations. The study indicates that every day, hundreds of thousands of girls around the world are subjected to practices that harm them physically or psychologically – with the full knowledge and consent of their families and communities.Ferro said the three widespread practices that cause harm are genital mutilation, child marriage and preference for male children.  Genital mutilation is the removal or partial removal of all external female genitalia for non-medical reasons. Ferro said this year, 4.1 million girls around the world are at risk for genital mutilation.The report also estimates that some 33,000 girls under the age of 18 are forced into marriage, often to men much older than them. And report says, because of gender-bias towards males, extreme neglect of female children has led 140 million “missing” females world-wide.While Ferro reports the “tide is turning,” with more laws being pass to prevent these abuses and traditional practitioners are changing their ways, she says the COVID-19 pandemic could reverse some of that progress.  Ferro said pandemic-related lockdowns have separated woman from medical and domestic-issue-related caregivers, and cases of violence against women could surge. She said “We cannot slow down the pace.” of addressing these issues.
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For two months, the Malta-flagged oil tanker Alkimos has been quietly floating off the Gulf Coast of Texas, undisturbed by the high-stakes legal fight playing out in a federal courtroom as a result of American sanctions on Venezuela.
The commercial dispute, which hasn’t been previously reported, has all the drama of a pirate movie: a precious cargo, clandestine sea maneuvers and accusations of a high seas heist.
It pits Evangelos Marinakis, one of Greece’s most powerful businessmen and owner of its most successful soccer club, Olympiakos, against a fellow shipping magnate from Venezuela, Wilmer Ruperti, who has a long history of helping the country’s socialist leaders.
Round one appears to have favored Marinakis, whose Piraeus-based Capital Ship Management Corp, operates the Alkimos. On Wednesday, federal marshals in Houston are scheduled to auction off the ship’s’ cargo: 100,266 barrels of high octane gasoline estimated to be worth more than $5 million. The auction is in response to Judge Lynn Hughes’ order seizing the cargo, which he said would’ve likely ended up in Venezuela, while arbitration over a $1.7 million lien continues.  
“This clearly demonstrates that sanctions work,” said Russ Dallen, who closely monitors maritime traffic as the head of Miami-based Caracas Capital Markets. “But although this shipowner appears to have done the right thing, there are lots of other unscrupulous cockroaches in the shipping industry that won’t hesitate to do business with Venezuela.”
The U.S. has been trying for months to cut off fuel shipments to and from Venezuela, hoping to accelerate Nicolás Maduro’s downfall by depriving him of the oil income that is the lifeblood of the socialist country. But so far the biggest losers have been regular Venezuelans, who are forced to wait in line for days to fill up their cars due to a lack of domestically-refined gasoline.  
To date, the Trump administration has sanctioned more than 50 vessels found violating sanctions. This month it added five Iranian captains to a list of individuals blocked from doing business with the U.S. after Maduro leaned on his fellow anti-American ally to deliver gasoline that skittish commodity traders are increasingly unwilling to supply Venezuela.  
The Alkimos’ saga, which was pieced together from court filings reviewed by The Associated Press, began innocently enough. In late March, the Chinese-built carrier, which measures 156 meters (480 feet), was docked in Panama when it was hired to deliver the gasoline to Aruba.  
But almost immediately something seemed off.
The shipping instructions indicated the cargo would be transferred at sea to another ship that had been visiting Venezuelan ports exclusively for the past year. And payent for the freight was wired from a third party, a company called Ultra Travel, which was purportedly based in Montenegro.
Moreover, ES Euroshipping AG, the Swiss-registered company that chartered the Alkimos, was owned by Ruperti, a businessman connected to Venezuela’s government.  
In 2002, Ruperti chartered a fleet of Russian tankers to help then President Hugo Chávez break a months’ long strike at the state-run oil company PDVSA. Now, he was trying come to the rescue again.
In March, a separate Swiss company he controls billed PDVSA for a 12 million euros advance with which he planned to purchase up to 250,000 barrels of the same 95-octane gasoline he hired the Alkimos to transport, according to a copy of the invoice obtained by the AP. To get around the U.S. sanctions, the company opened a bank account in euros and rubles at Moscow-based Derzhava Bank.
The Alkimos tanker is owned by Brujo Finance Company, a company registered in the Marshall Islands. But its operator, whose name and corporate logo is painted on the ship, is Capital Ship Management, which operates a fleet of 54 tankers.  
Capital’s chairman, Marinakis, is the owner of football clubs Olympiakos in Greece and Nottingham Forest in England.  
In 2018, prosecutors opened a preliminary investigation against him for drug trafficking stemming from the record seizure of 2.1 tons of heroin aboard one of his vessels. He has strongly denied the charges, saying they were an attempt by the leftist government at the time to silence dissent. In the past, he also faced match-fixing charges but was later cleared.
Marinakis did not respond to a request to comment made through his website and Capital.
While the arbitration between the two shipping magnates is likely to take months, U.S. officials see the case as a sign that sanctions on Venezuela are increasingly effective.
In May, the U.S. Departments of State and Treasury and the U.S. Coast Guard issued an advisory warning the maritime industry that such ship to ship transfers of the sort the Alkimos was being asked to perform are frequently used to evade sanctions. While the report focuses on Iran, North Korea and Syria—not Venezuela—it urges shippers to enhance due diligence and sanctions compliance practices to avoid running afoul of U.S. regulations
“The global shipping community is moving out of doing business with Venezuela,” Elliott Abrams, the Trump administration’s special representative for Venezuela, told the AP. “The most reputable firms, including the largest Greek shipping companies, have been cooperative and have shown that they value their reputations and their global businesses.”  
In the case of the Alkimos, its owners suspected something was amiss. So its lawyers pressed ES Euroshipping for additional information, pointing out that the contract contained a “sanctions clause” giving the shipowner “absolute discretion” to refuse to carry out any trade that it deems exposes it, or its crew, to U.S. sanctions.
“Just to be clear in advance. Owner WILL NOT participate in any illegal trading,” according to an email sent March 31 by the shipowner’s broker.
Despite its misgivings, the ship departed Panama on April 9 — days after the AP reported that Ruperti had started purchasing oil in what he would later describe as a “humanitarian work” that didn’t violate the U.S. sanctions.
“I am 100% sure that I am doing this legally and that I am complying with the rules and obligations,” he told the AP in an April interview. He declined to comment when contacted this week about the seized cargo.
 
En route to Aruba, the back and forth continued—and the Alkimos’ owners grew more suspicious. The rendezvous point with the other ship, the Beauty One, was located in the open seas—50 miles west of Aruba off the northern coastline of Venezuela—rather than an area designated by Aruban authorities for ship-to-ship fuel transfers. Further, the supervisor of the risky procedure, ATM Marine Services, were unknown to the ship’s owners, without even a web page to identify it. No agents had been appointed to coordinate with Aruban authorities.  
“URGENT responses to the above are requested. The matter is most serious,” the Alkimos’ broker wrote shortly before its schedule arrival off Aruba on April 11.
Throughout the ordeal, tanker rates were surging — something that ES Euroshipping contends was driving the shipowner’s rush to unload its cargo and move on to the next job. With the world economy shutting down due to the COVID crisis, there was a glut of fuel being produced. The mammoth oil carriers, which in some cases saw their daily rates jump 10-fold, were suddenly in demand as floating storage devices even as crude prices were crashing.
After two deadlines to provide alternate voyage orders passed, the Alkimos turned around on April 26 and headed to Houston. But it first advised ES Euroshipping that it would seek a lien on the cargo for $1.7 million to compensate for losses, including $500,000 in fees it racked up being adrift for so long.  
ES Euroshipping contends Capital Ship Management and the ship’s owners stole the cargo and is seeking damages worth $2.3 million. In court filings, attorney Michael Volkov said that that after much stonewalling by the ship owner, which refused to accept its assurances there was no sanctions risk, Euroshipping did provide alternate instructions — to take the cargo first to the Bahamas and then Trinidad.  
But Ruperti’s company claims its instruction were nonetheless ignored and accused the ship owner of setting off on an illegal, 7-day voyage to Houston to find a favorable jurisdiction to legalize its “theft” when much closer ports existed for the parties — none of the U.S. nationals — to litigate their competing breach of contract claims. It also accused Alkimos of fleeing Aruban waters without notifying the harbormaster, leaving behind $11,500 in fines and fees for the unauthorized departure.  
“Brujo is but a pirate who plundered cargo at sea, fled the Aruban authorities without proper authorization, diverted its vessel to a port in this District, and then deceived this Court,” Volkov said in a May 29 filing.
Ruperti appears to have some powerful backers of his own. On May 1, Hans Hertell, a former U.S. Ambassador to the Dominican Republic, wrote a letter to Ryan Patrick, the U.S. attorney for the southern district of Texas, calling on prosecutors to open a criminal probe against the shipowners.  
“We were simply astounded to learn that the Vessel Owners had so brazenly stolen and converted our clients’ cargo in this manner,” according to the letter.
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Bahamas Prime Minister Dr. Hubert Minnis strongly urged citizens against non-essential travel to countries where COVID-19 cases are spiking, including the United States, which is a primary tourism market for the Bahamas. During a national address Monday, Minnis told Bahamians, “I beg you. I implore you to stay at home. If you must fly, visit our Family Islands.” The Prime Minister’s plea comes as the Bahamas reopens its borders on Wednesday since closing in March because of the COVID-19 outbreak. Minnis said people traveling to the Bahamas must show they tested negative for the coronavirus within the past seven days starting July 7. He said people caught not wearing face mask face a $200 and or one month in jail. The Royal Bahamas Police Force (RBPF) will head a new COVID-19 Enforcement Unit to ensure compliance with and enforcement of emergency orders. The Bahamas has confirmed more than 100 cases and 11 deaths. 
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Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has given the European Union’s ambassador in Caracas 72 hours to leave the country. Maduro’s order on Monday came not long after the EU slapped sanctions on officials close to the socialist leader.  Maduro was also apparently angered EU leaders backed Juan Guaido as Venezuela’s interim president. Maduro said the European Union is bending to whims of U.S President Donald Trump, who like the EU support a democratic transition in Venezuela that does not include Maduro. Despite dozens of countries backing Guaido as Venezuela’s leader, Maduro remains in charge with control over the military and international support from allies including China, Russia, Iran and Cuba.  The European Union’s sanctions on dozens of Venezuelans also includes a travel ban and it freezes assets.  
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For months, experts have warned of a potential nightmare scenario: After overwhelming health systems in some of the world’s wealthiest regions, the coronavirus gains a foothold in poor or war-torn countries ill-equipped to contain it and sweeps through the population. Now some of those fears are being realized. In southern Yemen, health workers are leaving their posts en masse because of a lack of protective equipment, and some hospitals are turning away patients struggling to breathe. In Sudan’s war-ravaged Darfur region, where there is little testing capacity, a mysterious illness resembling COVID-19 is spreading through camps for the internally displaced. FILE – people enquire about their relatives from a health worker at a COVID designated hospital in New Delhi, India, June 10, 2020.Cases are soaring in India and Pakistan, together home to more than 1.5 billion people and where authorities say nationwide lockdowns are no longer an option because of high poverty. Latin America
In Latin America, Brazil has a confirmed caseload and death count second only to the United States, and its leader is unwilling to take steps to stem the spread of the virus. Alarming escalations are unfolding in Peru, Chile, Ecuador and Panama, even after they imposed early lockdowns. The first reports of disarray are also emerging from hospitals in South Africa, which has its continent’s most developed economy. Sick patients are lying on beds in corridors as one hospital runs out of space. At another, an emergency morgue was needed to hold more than 700 bodies. “We are reaping the whirlwind now,” said Francois Venter, a South African health expert at the University of Witswatersrand in Johannesburg. Worldwide, there are 10 million confirmed cases and over 500,000 reported deaths, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University of government reports. Experts say both those numbers are serious undercounts of the true toll of the pandemic, due to limited testing and missed mild cases. FILE – A student is screened as schools begin to reopen after the coronavirus disease lockdown in Langa township in Cape Town, South Africa, June 8, 2020.Africa
South Africa has more than a third of Africa’s confirmed cases of COVID-19. It’s ahead of other African countries in the pandemic timeline and approaching its peak. If its facilities break under the strain, it will be a grim forewarning because South Africa’s health system is reputed to be the continent’s best. Most poor countries took action early on. Some, like Uganda, which already had a sophisticated detection system built up during its yearslong battle with viral hemorrhagic fever, have thus far been arguably more successful than the U.S. and other wealthy countries in battling coronavirus. But since the beginning of the pandemic, poor and conflict-ravaged countries have generally been at a major disadvantage, and they remain so. The global scramble for protective equipment sent prices soaring. Testing kits have also been hard to come by. Tracking and quarantining patients requires large numbers of health workers. “It’s all a domino effect,” said Kate White, head of emergencies for Doctors Without Borders. “Whenever you have countries that are economically not as well off as others, then they will be adversely affected.” Global health experts say testing is key, but months into the pandemic, few developing countries can keep carrying out the tens of thousands of tests every week that are needed to detect and contain outbreaks. “The majority of the places that we work in are not able to have that level of testing capacity, and that’s the level that you need to be able to get things really under control,” White said. South Africa leads Africa in testing, but an initially promising program has now been overrun in Cape Town, which alone has more reported cases than any other African country except Egypt. Critical shortages of kits have forced city officials to abandon testing anyone for under 55 unless they have a serious health condition or are in a hospital. Venter said a Cape Town-like surge could easily play out next in “the big cities of Nigeria, Congo, Kenya,” and they “do not have the health resources that we do.” Lockdowns are likely the most effective safeguard, but they have exacted a heavy toll even on middle-class families in Europe and North America and are economically devastating in developing countries. India
India’s lockdown, the world’s largest, caused countless migrant workers in major cities to lose their jobs overnight. Fearing hunger, thousands took to the highways by foot to return to their home villages, and many were killed in traffic accidents or died from dehydration. The government has since set up quarantine facilities and now provides special rail service to get people home safely, but there are concerns the migration has already spread the virus to India’s rural areas, where the health infrastructure is even weaker. Poverty has also accelerated the pandemic in Latin America, where millions with informal jobs had to go out and keep working, and then returned to crowded homes where they spread the virus to relatives. FILE – Portraits of people who died of the COVID-19, are seen inside the Cathedral, in Lima, Peru, June 13, 2020.Peru’s strict three-month lockdown failed to contain its outbreak, and it now has the world’s sixth-highest number of cases in a population of 32 million, according to Johns Hopkins. Intensive care units are nearly 88% occupied, and the virus shows no sign of slowing. “Hospitals are on the verge of collapse,” said epidemiologist Ciro Maguiña, a professor of medicine at Cayetano Heredia University in the capital, Lima. Aid groups have tried to help, but they have faced their own struggles. Doctors Without Borders says the price it pays for masks went up threefold at one point and is still higher than normal. The group also faces obstacles in transporting medical supplies to remote areas as international and domestic flights have been drastically reduced. And as wealthy donor countries struggle with their own outbreaks, there are concerns they will cut back on humanitarian aid. Mired in civil war for the past five years, Yemen was already home to the world’s worst humanitarian crisis before the virus hit. Now the Houthi rebels are suppressing all information about an outbreak in the north, and the health system in the government-controlled south is collapsing. “Coronavirus has invaded our homes, our cities, our countryside,” said Dr. Abdul Rahman al-Azraqi, an internal medicine specialist and former hospital director in the city of Taiz, which is split between the rival forces. He estimates that 90% of Yemeni patients die at home. “Our hospital doesn’t have any doctors, only a few nurses and administrators. There is effectively no medical treatment.”   
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Seven Colombian soldiers have pleaded guilty in a closed hearing to the gang rape of a 13-year-old Indigenous girl.According to a report in The New York Times, a military spokeswoman said the military would not provide lawyers for the men because the charges did not have any “relation to their work as soldiers.”The Guardian reports the men could receive prison sentences of between 16 and 30 years.The girl, a member of the Embera community, was found Monday after going missing from her home.Human rights activist Aida Quilcue said, ”We know that this is not an isolated issue.”Colombia’s military has a long history of abuse against women and Indigenous people.“Colombia must be merciless with sexual abusers of minors, adolescents and women,” Marta Lucia Ramirez, the country’s first female vice president, posted on Twitter.   
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A massive dust cloud that originated in Africa’s Sahara desert has arrived in the coastal towns and beach resorts of Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula.The Sahara dust cloud traveled three thousands of kilometers from North Africa before reaching the Caribbean and now Mexico.Antonio Ladino, a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico’s Atmospheric Sciences Center is urging people to wear face masks to prevent nose and throat irritations. He also said high concentrations of dust ingested can be very dangerous.Weather experts say the heavy dust will hover over Mexico and the southeastern United States, including Florida until the middle of next week.The presence of the dust cloud in Florida could be especially problematic because the state is experiencing a surge in COVID-19 cases.  People with preexisting conditions, who are already urged to restrict travel because of the coronavirus, are encouraged to avoid outdoor activities when the dust turns the skies hazy.Health authorities say the dust can be especially harmful to people with respiratory and heart illnesses. 
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Mexico City’s chief of police was shot and injured in an assassination attempt early Friday morning when gunmen set upon him in an upscale neighborhood of the capital, killing two of his bodyguards, authorities said. Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum said on Twitter that public security chief Omar Garcia Harfuch was “out of danger” following the attack at around 6.30 a.m., which shocked residents of the Lomas de Chapultepec area of the city. Police officers arrive at the area where a shooting took place in Mexico City, Mexico, June 26, 2020.An unspecified number of people had died, Sheinbaum added, without giving details. A Mexico City official said two of Garcia’s police escorts were killed in the incident and that the police chief sustained three bullet wounds. Separately, Ernestina Godoy, attorney general of Mexico City, said 12 people had been arrested. Speaking at a regular government news conference, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador attributed the outbreak of violence to the work of local officials to establish order in the city. People react near the area where a shooting took place in Mexico City, Mexico, June 26, 2020.Residents said heavy gunfire rang out for several minutes during the attack in Lomas de Chapultepec, which is home to many wealthy residents and the location of ambassadorial residences. Police converged on the area in the west of the city, which is rarely troubled by the violence that in recent years has afflicted many parts of the country, particularly poorer ones. Television images showed dozens of police cordoning off a main road in the area. Mexican broadcaster Televisa said at least two police were injured in the incident.  
 
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A massive dust cloud that originated in Africa’s Sahara desert has arrived in the coastal towns and beach resorts of Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula.The Sahara dust cloud traveled three thousands of kilometers from North Africa before reaching the Caribbean and now Mexico.Antonio Ladino, a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico’s Atmospheric Sciences Center is urging people to wear face masks to prevent nose and throat irritations. He also said high concentrations of dust ingested can be very dangerous.Weather experts say the heavy dust will hover over Mexico and the southeastern United States, including Florida until the middle of next week.The presence of the dust cloud in Florida could be especially problematic because the state is experiencing a surge in COVID-19 cases.  People with preexisting conditions, who are already urged to restrict travel because of the coronavirus, are encouraged to avoid outdoor activities when the dust turns the skies hazy.Health authorities say the dust can be especially harmful to people with respiratory and heart illnesses. 
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Brazil has converted a football (soccer) stadium into a drive-in movie theater, its latest effort to lift national morale as the country struggles with the coronavirus pandemic.The Palmeiras football club’s converted stadium in Sao Paulo accommodates up to 300 cars.Alessandro Tessari, a fan of the football team said, he could never imagine he would be watching a movie in the stadium.Brazil’s movie theaters were among the first sectors of the economy to stop operations as the coronavirus outbreak grew, so it seems fitting fans are enjoying movies again, although it’s unclear if more theaters will reopen, because the virus remains active.Aside from showing films, the stadium hosts stand-up comedy and children’s theater.The converted entertainment space, which opened Wednesday, will remain open until July 19. Those attending the drive-in pay between $23 to $100, with no more than four people to a car.The theater experience is an outlet for a country that remains one of the coronavirus hot spots in Latin America, with more than 1.2 million COVID-19 cases and more than 55,000 deaths.
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The United Nations marks the 75th anniversary of its founding on Friday, in a much different world than it was born into. VOA U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer looks at how the organization has matured and the challenges it faces going forward.
Produced by: Jesusemen Oni
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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is refusing to release Chinese high-tech executive Meng Wanzhou in exchange for two high-profile Canadians under arrest in Beijing. Meng is the chief financial officer of Huawei and is wanted by the United States accused of fraud. Nineteen former Canadian politicians and diplomats, including ex-foreign affairs ministers Lloyd Axworthy and Lawrence Cannon, sent a letter to Trudeau appealing to him to free Meng.  They wrote that it would give Canada the opportunity to “redefine its strategic approach to China.” “There is no question that the U.S. extradition request has put Canada in a difficult position. As prime minister, you face a difficult decision. Complying with the U.S. request has greatly antagonized China,” the letter says, according to the CBC.  But Trudeau said that “randomly arresting Canadians doesn’t give you leverage over the government of Canada. … We cannot allow political pressures or random arrests of Canadian citizens to influence the functioning of our justice system. So I respect these individuals, but they’re wrong.” Canadian authorities arrested Meng in Vancouver in 2018 on a U.S. warrant. She is out on bail. Shortly after her arrest, Chinese authorities detained former Canadian diplomat Michael Kovrig and entrepreneur Michael Spavor, charging them with spying.  Their arrests infuriated Canada. Both are in a Beijing jail and have not had access to Canadian diplomats since January. Canada has also placed trade sanctions on a number of Chinese exports. The Trump administration wants to extradite Meng from Canada for trial. As chief financial officer of Huawei — one of the world’s largest manufacturers of smartphones — Meng is accused of lying to U.S. officials about Huawei’s business in Iran, which is under U.S. sanctions.  The U.S. has also warned other countries against using Huawei-built products, suspecting the Chinese government of installing them with spyware.  Both Meng and Huawei deny all the U.S. allegations.   
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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau Thursday rejected calls from former Canadian parliamentarians and diplomats, as well as the Chinese government, to release executive Meng Wanzhou of China’s telecom giant Huawei and unilaterally end her extradition process.This week, a group of 19 high-profile Canadians, including former foreign affairs ministers Lloyd Axworthy and Lawrence Cannon, signed a letter to Trudeau saying Canadian Justice Minister David Lametti should intervene to free Meng.Speaking in Ottawa at his regular COVID-19 update briefing, Trudeau said he respected the signees of the letter, but, “I deeply disagree with them.” He said giving in to China’s demands would put other Canadians at risk by showing other nations the country can be intimidated.In 2018, Canadian authorities took Meng into custody regarding U.S. allegations of violating sanctions on Iran. Her extradition case is now before a court in British Columbia.Soon after Meng was arrested, Beijing detained two Canadians, entrepreneur Michael Spavor and former diplomat Michael Kovrig, on allegations of undermining China’s national security. Canada considered those detentions as retaliation.Trudeau Thursday described Spavor and Kovrig’s detentions as “arbitrary” and “political,” and said he will continue to work to get them released.
 
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Colombian President Ivan Duque said he is receptive to prosecutors seeking a life sentence if several soldiers accused of raping a 12-year-old girl Monday are charged and convicted.Gito Dokabu Indigenous Governor Juan De Dios Queragama said a human rights official told him seven uniformed soldiers raped the girl. He said the girl was unable to walk when friends assisting her mother found at her at her school.No circumstances of the alleged attack were immediately made public. The case comes a week after Colombia’s Senate approved a life in prison sentence for cases involving the rape or murder of minors.Colombia’s attorney general is investigating whether the soldiers were involved and will determine if they will face charges. 
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A massive cloud of Saharan dust darkened much of Cuba on Wednesday and began to affect air quality in Florida, sparking warnings to people with respiratory illnesses to stay home.The dust cloud swept across the Atlantic from Africa over the past week, covering the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico since Sunday and hitting south Florida in the United States on Wednesday, authorities there said.Conditions over the Cuban capital, Havana, are expected to worsen on Thursday, specialists on the Communist-run island reported.Francisco Duran, head of Epidemiology at the Ministry of Health, said the cloud is likely to “increase respiratory and allergic conditions.”Air quality in Miami is currently “moderate,” the city’s health department said, asking people with respiratory problems to stay home.Powered by strong winds, dust from the Sahara travels across the Atlantic Ocean from West Africa during the boreal spring.But the density of the current dust cloud over Cuba “is well above normal levels,” said Cuban meteorologist Jose Rubiera.”The highest concentration over the capital will occur (Thursday),” he said.In Havana, scientist Eugenio Mojena said the phenomenon “causes an appreciable deterioration in air quality.”Mojena said the dust clouds are loaded with material that is “highly harmful to human health.”Mojena listed “minerals such as iron, calcium, phosphorous, silicon and mercury” in the dust, and said the clouds also carried “viruses, bacteria, fungi, pathogenic mites, staphylococci and organic pollutants.”According to the Institute of Meteorolgy, temperatures in Cuba’s eastern province of Guantanamo reached a record for the time of year of 37.4 degrees Celsius on Wednesday.Duran ruled out any link with the coronavirus pandemic.The government said its epidemic is under control and last week began to relax quarantine measures, with Havana the only area where restrictions remain because it continues to register infections.The island reported a single new case on Wednesday, bringing the total number of infections to 2,318, with 85 fatalities from COVID-19. 
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Coronavirus hospitalizations and caseloads hit new highs in over a half-dozen states as signs of the virus’ resurgence mounted, with newly confirmed infections nationwide back near their peak level of two months ago.  
After trending downward for six weeks, the U.S. caseload has been growing again for over a week, particularly in the South and West. Some 34,700 new cases were reported nationwide Tuesday, according to the count kept by Johns Hopkins University. The number was higher than any other day except April 9 and the record-setting date of April 24, when 36,400 cases were logged.
 
While new cases have been declining steadily in early U.S. hot spots such as New York and New Jersey, several other states set single-day case records Tuesday, including Arizona, California, Mississippi, Nevada and Texas. Some of them also broke hospitalization records, as did North Carolina and South Carolina.  
“The question of how we’re doing as a nation is: We’re not doing so well. How are we doing as a state? Not doing so well,” said Dr. Jeffrey Smith, the county executive in Santa Clara County, California, home to Silicon Valley. Nearly 5,600 people have died of the virus in California, the most populous state.VOA Graphic COVID-19 Cases June 2020Cases are also surging in some other parts of the world. India reported a record daily increase of nearly 16,000 new cases. Mexico, where testing rates have been low, also set a record with more than 6,200 new cases.
But China appears to have tamed a new outbreak in Beijing, once again demonstrating its ability to quickly mobilize its vast resources by testing nearly 2.5 million people in 11 days.
In the U.S., the nation’s top infectious-disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, told Congress that the next few weeks are critical to tamping down the surge and that people should avoid crowds or at least wear masks in them.  
Hours later, President Donald Trump rallied hundreds of young conservatives in a megachurch in Arizona as the state reported a record 3,600 new infections.
Ahead of the event, the Democratic mayor of Phoenix, Kate Gallego, made clear that she did not believe the speech could be safely held in her city, and she urged the president to wear a face mask. He did not. Trump has refused to wear a mask in public, turning it into a conservative-vs.-liberal issue.
In China, an outbreak that has infected more than 200 people in the capital this month appeared to be waning. China on Wednesday reported 12 cases, down from 22 the day before. Beijing reported seven new cases, down from 13.
Officials in Beijing said they tested more than 2.4 million people between June 12 and June 22. That’s more than 10% of the capital’s population of about 20 million.  
Authorities began testing people in and around food markets, then expanded the initiative to restaurant staff and the city’s 100,000 delivery workers. China also said it used data to find people who had been near markets for testing. It did not elaborate.
South Korea, which tamed its first wave of infections, is seeing another rise — this time in the Seoul region, where most South Koreans live. Authorities reported 51 cases Wednesday. The country has reported 40 to 50 new cases a day over the past two weeks.  
In India, with a population of more than 1.3 billion, the capital city of New Delhi is a rising concern, with the government criticizing its poor contact tracing and a lack of hospital beds. India has reported more than 450,000 cases of the virus, including more than 14,000 deaths.
Mexico reported nearly 800 new deaths on Wednesday. The country has recorded more than 190,000 cases and over 23,000 deaths, though officials acknowledge both are undercounts because of extremely low testing rates. Mexico has performed about half a million tests, or one for every 250 inhabitants.
In Europe, countries are both easing and increasing restrictions as the outbreaks evolve. Slovenia reintroduced mandatory use of face masks in public transportation and other enclosed public spaces after cases spiked in recent days, while Belgium said theaters and swimming pools could reopen next month. Infections there have nosedived over the past two months.  
In Africa, African Centers for Disease Control and Prevention chief John Nkengasong said the outbreak is “picking up speed very quickly,” with a steep increase in cases and deaths as more countries loosen lockdowns. Africa has seen nearly 325,000 cases and over 8,600 deaths.
Worldwide, more than 9.2 million people have been confirmed infected, and close to a half-million have died, by Johns Hopkins’ count.
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The United States on Wednesday imposed sanctions on five Iranian ship captains who had delivered oil to Venezuela, and the U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo reaffirmed Washington’s backing for Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido.   FILE – Secretary of State Pompeo speaks during a press conference at the State Department, June 24, 2020 in Washington.Speaking at a press conference at the State Department, Pompeo said the ships delivered around 1.5 million barrels of Iranian gasoline and related components, and warned any mariners against doing business with the government of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, whose ouster Washington wants.   “As a result of today’s sanctions, these captains’ assets will be blocked. Their careers and prospects will suffer from this designation,” Pompeo said in a statement later. “Mariners who are considering work with Iran and Venezuela should understand that aiding these oppressive regimes is simply not worth the risk,” he said.   The Trump administration, which is seeking both to block Iran’s energy trade and bring down Maduro, has threatened reprisals and warned ports, shipping companies and insurers against facilitating the tankers.   The OPEC member’s exports are hovering near their lowest levels in more than 70 years and the economy has collapsed, but Maduro has held on — to the frustration of the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump.   Iran has since April sent five tankers totalling about 1.5 million barrels to the leftist government of fuel-starved Venezuela, though the shipments have done little to alleviate hours-long lines at gas stations. 
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With the death toll surpassing 100,000 deaths, Latin America has emerged as the world’s newest epicenter for the novel coronavirus pandemic. Brazil leads the region with 1,145,906 confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 52,645 deaths, making it the world’s second-highest number of cases in both categories after the United States, according to Johns Hopkins University. The nation recorded 39,436 new confirmed cases over the last 24-hour period on Tuesday, including more than 1,300 deaths.   The pandemic has reached such a crisis that a federal judge ordered President Jair Bolsonaro to wear a face mask in public or pay a fine of nearly $400 a day.  A man, wearing a protective face mask walks past a mural depicting a tug-of-war between health workers and President Bolsonaro, with a message that reads in Portuguese: “Which side are you on?”, Sao Paulo, June 19, 2020.The judge said Bolsonaro is violating local law in Brasilia aimed at slowing the spread of the virus. Bolsonaro has so far refused to cover his mouth at large political rallies where he comes in close contact with voters and children.  Bolsonaro has shrugged off the pandemic as just a “flu” and said anyone worried about the virus is just being neurotic.  Analysts attribute the rise in confirmed cases and deaths in the Latin American region to a combination of widespread poverty, widespread distrust of the government, and leaders, such as Bolsonaro and Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who have either downplayed or dismissed the true risk of the virus and failed to impose stringent lockdowns.   With the rising death toll in Latin America, the total number of deaths around the world now stands at more than 477,000, part of a combined 9.2 million cases.  Wearing face coverings, John Williams, right, and Jeff Lee play chess, June 23, 2020, in Santa Monica, Calif.US has most cases, deaths
The United States continues to lead the world in both categories with 2.3 million confirmed cases and 121,228 deaths.  According to The Washington Post, seven states — Arizona, Arkansas, California, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas — have reported their highest number of COVID-19 hospitalizations since the start of the pandemic.   Its top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, told a congressional panel Tuesday there will be more testing, not less, even after President Donald Trump asked health officials to slow down testing.   The White House has said the president wasn’t serious when he said more testing is the reason there are so many cases in the U.S. But Trump said Tuesday that he wasn’t joking.  From left to right, Dr. Robert Redfield, Dr. Anthony Fauci, ADM Brett P. Giroir and Dr. Stephen M. Hahn testify before a House Committee on Energy and Commerce on the Trump administration’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, June 23, 2020.Fauci also said he is cautiously optimistic a coronavirus vaccine will be available as early as the end of 2020. But he has previously said even if a vaccine is ready, there is no guarantee it will work or give any long-term protection.  Ban on American travelers The New York Times reports that European Union nations plan to stop U.S. citizens from crossing its borders because of what officials call the U.S. failure to control the virus.  The newspaper is basing its story on what it says are draft lists of who will be allowed to travel to the EU starting July 1. It says it confirmed the lists with two EU officials in Brussels, but the Times says none of the 27 EU members are obligated to adopt it.  The World Health Organization says the coronavirus pandemic is still growing even as countries start to ease lockdowns and other restrictions.    “The epidemic is now peaking or moving towards a peak in a number of large countries,” WHO emergencies chief Dr. Michael Ryan said.  People wait in a queue for the COVID-19 rapid antigen test in New Delhi, India, June 24, 2020.Several nations, including Germany, South Africa and India — which reports about 15,000 new cases of COVID-19 every day — are looking at reimposing lockdowns and preparing to treat an influx of new cases.   WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said it took three months for the world to confirm its first 1 million cases, but just eight days for the most recent 1 million to be identified.  “The greatest threat we face now is not the virus itself. It’s the lack of global solidarity and global leadership,” Tedros said without naming any specific country or leader he believes has failed.   Serbia’s Novak Djokovic returns the ball during an exhibition tournament in Zadar, Croatia, June 21, 2020.Tennis star, wife test positive
Meanwhile, tennis star Novak Djokovic said Tuesday he and his wife have tested positive for COVID-19 after he hosted a series of exhibition events he organized in his native Serbia and Croatia.  Three other players who participated in the matches also tested positive for the virus, which could threaten professional tennis’s hopes of resuming play this year. 
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