Covid: Moscow shops and restaurants shut in partial lockdown

Shops, restaurants and schools have shut in Moscow in a partial lockdown, as Russia battles record Covid deaths and infections.

Only essential shops like supermarkets and pharmacies are allowed to open in the capital, while food outlets are only providing takeaways.

Authorities have also given workers across Russia nine days off from Saturday in a bid to curb infections.

Russia has reported a record 1,159 deaths from Covid in the past 24 hours.

The official data also reveals 40,096 new infections in 85 regions of Russia – another record.

Russia’s overall Covid death toll in the pandemic is officially more than 230,000, the highest in Europe and one of the highest in the world. Russia’s last major lockdown was in May-June 2020.

The proportion of Russia’s population fully vaccinated remains low – on 23 October it was 32.8%, Our World in Data reports. Most European countries have much higher rates.

Despite an intensive state vaccination drive, many Russians remain suspicious of the Sputnik V vaccine, which is internationally recognised as an effective shield against Covid.

• Vaccine rejection drives Russia’s Covid nightmare

Faced with this partial lockdown between 30 October and 9 November, many Russians have decided to go on holiday. Resort hotels in Egypt – a popular destination for Russians – are reported to be fully booked, and Russian flights to Egypt are sold out.

The Russian news service Vesti reports some panic-buying because of the new restrictions. There has been a rush on meat and fish at the central market in Orenburg, a city in the Urals east of Moscow.

data in detail

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*Deaths per 100,000 people

Filter:
The world
Africa
North America
Latin America & Caribbean
Asia
Europe
Middle East
Oceania

				New Cases 0 10 100 1k 10k **
Russia	226,464	156.9	8,112,999	JAN 2020 OCT 2021
UK	139,533	208.8	8,773,674
Italy	131,826	218.6	4,741,185
France	117,445	175.1	7,125,868
Germany	95,121	114.4	4,476,078
Spain	87,132	185.1	4,997,732
Poland	76,447	201.3	2,972,927
Turkey	69,112	82.8	7,851,775
Ukraine	68,338	154.0	2,912,683
Romania	44,679	230.8	1,561,928
Czech Republic	30,625	287.0	1,731,287
Hungary	30,492	312.1	843,825
Belgium	25,846	225.1	1,312,360
Bulgaria	23,073	330.8	569,443
Netherlands	18,314	105.7	2,082,563
Portugal	18,133	176.6	1,085,138
Greece	15,628	145.8	716,358
Sweden	14,993	145.8	1,165,996
Slovakia	12,903	236.6	456,438
Bosnia and Herzegovina	11,322	343.0	247,958
Austria	11,251	126.7	798,606
Switzerland	11,182	130.4	862,411
Georgia	9,742	261.9	692,240
Serbia	9,509	136.9	1,098,209
Croatia	9,038	222.2	445,325
Moldova	7,497	282.1	328,000
North Macedonia	7,051	338.4	199,766
Azerbaijan	6,894	68.8	516,325
Armenia	6,013	203.3	295,368
Lithuania	5,661	203.1	390,031
Ireland	5,369	108.7	429,877
Slovenia	4,683	224.3	319,913
Belarus	4,515	47.7	586,234
Latvia	3,028	158.3	202,573
Kosovo	2,974	165.8	160,635
Albania	2,874	100.7	181,696
Denmark	2,699	46.4	376,414
Montenegro	2,065	331.9	140,922
Estonia	1,461	110.1	182,039
Finland	1,139	20.6	153,156
Norway	894	16.7	200,517
Luxembourg	842	135.8	80,603
Cyprus	569	47.5	122,996
Malta	459	91.3	37,551
Andorra	130	168.5	15,404
Channel Islands	102	59.2	12,594
Gibraltar	98	290.8	5,874
San Marino	91	268.8	5,497
Liechtenstein	60	157.8	3,623
Isle of Man	57	67.4	9,197
Monaco	36	92.4	3,389
Iceland	33	9.1	12,899
Faroe Islands	2	4.1	1,615
Vatican	0	0.0	27

This information is regularly updated but may not reflect the latest totals for each country.

** The past data for new cases is a three day rolling average. Due to revisions in the number of cases, an average cannot be calculated for this date.

Source: Johns Hopkins University and national public health agencies

Figures last updated: 25 October 2021, 09:55 BST

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Aryan Khan: Bollywood actor’s son granted bail in drugs case

Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan’s son has been granted bail 26 days after he was arrested for allegedly doing recreational drugs at a party.

Aryan Khan, 23, was taken off a cruise ship that was on its way from Mumbai city to the state of Goa on 2 October.

The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) charged him under laws “related to possession, consumption and sale of illegal substances”.

He has denied the allegations against him.

His lawyer has repeatedly told the court that no drugs were found in the possession of the actor’s son, and that there was “no evidence that he had consumed any drugs”.

Aryan Khan’s lawyers approached the Mumbai High Court after a special court which hears narcotics cases rejected his bail twice in October. The special court also rejected the bail pleas of two others accused in the case.

The high court heard arguments for over two days as both sides presented their arguments.

In an earlier hearing, the prosecution had argued that it was necessary to take a “serious view” of drug use among youngsters. It also argued that Aryan Khan could not be treated differently from the 17 others accused in the case and should therefore not be released on bail.

Officials from NCB raided the cruise ship on 2 October – they said they had been tipped off that there were drugs on board. Aryan Khan was searched and interrogated before he boarded the ship – and eventually taken into custody by the NCB.

He was arrested the following day. He was initially in custody at the NCB’s office, but was later moved to a jail.

In a fresh twist in the case, a key witness has alleged that he was “forced” to sign “blank papers” at the NCB’s office in connection with the case.

In an affidavit before the court, Prabhakar Sail, who made the allegations, said he was a personal bodyguard of Kiran Gosavi, reportedly a private investigator. Sail also alleged that there was a threat to his life.

Gosavi, who was present during the raid on the ship and was seen in a selfie with Aryan Khan after his arrest, is now missing, reports said.

The case has been dominating media headlines. While there has been no official statement from Shah Rukh Khan, some Bollywood personalities have defended Aryan Khan. Experts have also criticised what they say is the “excessive media gaze” around his arrest.

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Many Bollywood actors and TV personalities have been under scrutiny since last year in what appears to be an investigation into claims of widespread drug use in the Hindi film industry. In 2020, the narcotics agency questioned at least four actresses, including Deepika Paduokone, but none have been accused of any wrongdoing.

They had also arrested actress Rhea Chakraborty in September last year for allegedly buying drugs for her actor boyfriend, Sushant Singh Rajput.

Rajput, 34, was found dead in his flat on 14 June. Police at the time said he had killed himself. But the case took an unexpected turn when his family accused Chakraborty of abetment to suicide, sparking months of media coverage and speculation. Chakraborty, who had denied any wrongdoing, was released from jail a month after her arrest.

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Sudan coup leader issues conditions to restore internet

Sudan’s military ruler, Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, has said the internet will be restored “in phases if we feel that the media is telling the truth”, highlighting continued threats to media freedom and accessibility following the 25 October army take over.

Internet freedom monitor, Netblocks, said on Wednesday that the outage persists since the service cut was reported following the coup.

Local media reporting on developments, including protests that broke out following the coup, have also been limited.

State-run Sudan TV has predominantly broadcast messages by Gen Burhan between hours of patriotic and cultural music, while the website of the government news agency, Suna, has not been updated since 24 October.

Online mobilisation has remained crucial to drawing attention to public anger over Sudan’s latest coup. But it is not clear how some are sharing messages online given the internet outage.

The Facebook page of the Ministry of Information and Culture, which appears to be loyal to ousted Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, has posted several statements expressing defiance towards Gen Burhan and calling for protests.

Mr Hamdok was arrested and briefly detained at Burhan’s home, before being released and placed under house arrest.

The Sudanese Professionals Association (SPA) – which was at the forefront of peaceful protests that led to the removal of former President Omar al-Bashir – has also mobilised protests and a civil disobedience campaign on its official Twitter and Facebook pages.

It has also posted dozens of images and videos from the demonstrations in the capital Khartoum. Huge protests are planned for Saturday.

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Max Stahl: Blue Peter host and film-maker who captured East Timor struggle dies

Max Stahl, who went from Blue Peter presenter to award-winning film-maker and East Timor national hero after his footage brought global attention to a massacre there, has died.

He was known as Christopher Wenner when he co-hosted the BBC children’s programme from 1978-80.

As Max Stahl, he filmed the 1991 massacre of 271 protesters against Indonesian rule in East Timor.

Former East Timor President José Ramos-Horta called him a “treasured son”.

“We honour him as one of the true heroes of our struggle,” Ramos-Horta wrote on Facebook shortly before the film-maker’s death.

Indonesia had ruled the former Portuguese colony since invading in 1975, and Stahl had travelled there in 1991.

He heard about a planned protest march to a cemetery after a memorial service for an independence supporter.

Stahl told the BBC in 2016: “I was just getting my camera ready when there was a wall of sound, at least 10 seconds of uninterrupted gunfire. The soldiers who arrived fired point blank into a crowd of a couple of thousand young people.”

He added: “I could easily see that it was only a matter of time before they came to me, and at that point I thought, well, I should move away from here.”

He buried the film in the graveyard, and it was later smuggled out and broadcast around the world.

“There are only a few key points in the history of Timor-Leste where the course of our nation turned toward freedom,” Ramos-Horta wrote. “This was one of those points.

“It was the first time our message broke through to the world. Human rights networks went into action. Senators, Congressmen and Parliamentarians came to our side. And this happened when one man was willing to risk his life to document up close what was happening and smuggled the message out of our country.”

Stahl later revealed how survivors of the Santa Cruz massacre had been brutally killed in the hospital; as well as documenting repression as East Timor declared independence in 1999.

His full name was Max Christopher Wenner, and when he moved behind the camera he adopted his mother’s maiden name Stahl. His journalism career also saw him work as a war correspondent in Beirut.

He died from cancer in hospital in Brisbane, Australia, on Wednesday.

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Laos makes Southeast Asia’s largest ever drug bust

The UN crime agency says it has recorded Southeast Asia’s biggest-ever drug seizure.

Police in Laos intercepted a truck carrying 55 million amphethamine tablets and more than 1.5 tonnes of crystal methamphetamine.

The discovery came after police stopped a truck carrying beer crates in Bokeo, which borders Thailand and Myanmar.

The area – known as the Golden Triangle – has a long history of being a major drug-producing hotspot.

Jeremy Douglas, Southeast Asia regional representative for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), said that it is “by far the largest seizure in the history of East and Southeast Asia”.

The record bust comes after police recently seized a combined 16 million amphetamine tablets in two separate operations in the same area over a one week period.

In the UK, amphetamine tablets are Class B and crystal methamphetamine is Class A.

There has been a significant increase in Golden Triangle drug supply in recent months due to unrest in Myanmar’s Shan state, which borders China, Laos and Thailand, Mr Douglas told the BBC.

“Neighbours and the wider region are getting absolutely flooded with methamphetamine, and there is little doubt it is connected to the governance situation in Shan,” he said.

Strict Covid and security measures on China’s Yunnan border with Myanmar “appear to be at least partly why trafficking has increased east into Laos and south into Thailand” to avoid losses, he added.

The huge haul was packed into Lao Brewery beer crates.

The Lao Brewery Company said it has “no involvement in this case whatsoever”.

“We are deeply disappointed that our crates have been abused as a cover for illegal activities and will not hesitate to take immediate illegal action towards anyone misusing our company assets,” it said in a statement.

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