WORLD

Russia announced Sputnik V as the world’s first successful coronavirus vaccine earlier in August. Since then, authorities have claimed that they have inoculated many people, even in President Putin’s close circles.

On Monday, a hospital in southern Moscow claimed that it had received the first batch of Sputnik V vaccines for public use and that they had inoculated the local population last week.

Countries around the world are currently racing to roll out vaccines. US drugmakers Moderna and Pfizer claim that their vaccines are 94 per cent effective. Sputnik V makers claim that it is 92 per cent effective in protecting people from the virus.

The Central City Hospital in Domodedovo announced on its website that people who want the COVID-19 shot should register on a government website in advance, and also bring with them a negative COVID-19 test result, and government identification.

Pakistan’s Imran Khan’s government on Saturday evening rushed to release a statement on references to Jammu and Kashmir in a resolution, which it said, had been passed by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation at the meeting of foreign ministers in Niger’s capital Niamey. Pakistan’s foreign office was the first to tweet, celebrating the customary references to Kashmir as a huge win.

“The inclusion of Jammu and Kashmir dispute in the Niamey Declaration – being an important part of the CFM’s (Council of Foreign Ministers) outcome documents - is yet another manifestation of the @OIC_OCI’s consistent support to the Kashmir Cause," Pakistan’s foreign office tweeted.

Foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi who has had to face some embarrassing moments at home over OIC’s refusal to discuss Kashmir as a separate item followed up on Sunday morning.

It's going to be almost a year since COVID-19 came on the Globe and since then our lives have never been the same. 

Whether it’s working from home, maintaining social distancing or the fear one gets when they catch a common cold or cough. And all our hopes trickle down to the vaccines that are in development, to take down SARS CoV-2.

While Moderna was the first to announce that it is working on a vaccine against the novel coronavirus, people were most hopeful for the vaccine being developed by researchers at Oxford University. Even Indians were hoping for the success of the vaccine since India’s Serum Institute was going to manufacture these vaccines and provide it to the nation at an affordable price. 

India, Sri Lanka and the Maldives are set to revive their trilateral maritime security cooperation dialogue when National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval visits Colombo on Friday for the first meeting of the group since 2014, people familiar with developments said on Thursday.

As part of efforts by the three countries to expand maritime security cooperation in the Indian Ocean, three more countries—Bangladesh, Seychelles and Mauritius—have been invited as observers for the meeting, people in New Delhi and Male said on condition of anonymity.

The revival of the dialogue, which was suspended after India’s relations with the Maldives soured under the previous Abdulla Yameen regime, has been on the cards since the Easter Sunday attacks in Sri Lanka in 2019 that were claimed to have been perpetrated by the Islamic State.

The United States plans to distribute 6.4 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine in the first week after it is cleared for emergency use, which is likely next month, officials said Tuesday.

A committee of the Food and Drug Administration will meet on 10 December to decide whether to green light the medicine.

Latest figures on Tuesday showed that the country had recorded a total of 259,600 COVID-19 deaths and 12.5 million cases — with over 2,000 deaths and 167,000 new cases in just the last 24 hours.