The Trump administration said Thursday it is seeking $3 billion from Congress to top up the country’s strategic petroleum reserves, potentially propping up U.S. oil producers after crude prices crashed globally. President Donald Trump had directed the Energy Department last week to fill the United States’ emergency stash of crude oil to the top, over […]

The palace of Monaco says its ruler, Prince Albert II, has tested positive for the new coronavirus but his health is not worrying. Albert, 62, appeared to be the first head of state who has publicly said he contracted the virus. In a statement Thursday, the palace said he is being treated by doctors from […]

Saudi Arabia’s public prosecutor on Thursday ordered the arrest of two people who appeared in a video drinking a disinfectant in a bid to stave off the new coronavirus. The young men were separately seen gulping down a steriliser in a video that went viral, triggering a flurry of angry comments online. On Twitter, the […]

United State’s Washington Lt. Gov. Cyrus Habib said Thursday that he is not running for re-election and will join the Jesuit order of the Catholic Church to start the process of becoming a priest. Habib, the state’s first blind lieutenant governor, said the decision comes after “two years of careful and prayerful discernment.” A Democrat […]

Mali said on Thursday that an upcoming parliamentary poll long delayed by insecurity would go ahead, despite coronavirus fears. The country is grappling with a jihadist conflict that first broke out in the country in 2012, having caused thousands of civilian and military deaths since. It has yet to detect a positive coronavirus case, but […]

With the Israeli government enacting a series of emergency measures to stem the spread of the new coronavirus, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is facing growing accusations that he is exploiting the crisis to entrench himself in power and undermining the country’s democratic foundations. Amid a wave of sweeping restrictions that have put Israel in near […]

To manage stress in the face of the coronavirus pandemic or just to pass the time under quarantine, Canadians and tourists have been lining up for several days at pot shops and flooding online cannabis retailers’ sites to stock up on the mood-altering drug that was legalized here in 2018. In front of the Societe […]

South Africa said Thursday it would erect or repair 40 kilometres (25 miles) of fence along its border with Zimbabwe to secure porous entry points in a bid to curb the spread of coronavirus. Meandering along the Limpopo river, the Beitbridge border between South Africa and Zimbabwe is prone to illegal crossovers, especially by economic […]

The number of United States citizens (Americans) filing new claims for unemployment benefits surged last week by 70,000 to the highest level in more than two years, indicating that the effect of the coronavirus was starting to be felt in rising layoffs in the job market. The US Labor Department reported Thursday that applications for […]

Describing himself as a “wartime president” fighting an invisible enemy, United States President, Donald Trump, invoked rarely used emergency powers to marshal critical medical supplies against the coronavirus pandemic. Trump also signed an aid package — which the Senate approved earlier Wednesday — that will guarantee sick leave to workers who fall ill. Trump tapped […]