By Seda Sevencan
ANKARA (AA) – Anadolu Agency is here with a rundown of the latest developments on the coronavirus pandemic and other news in Turkey and around the world.
– Virus in Turkey
Turkey lifted coronavirus travel restrictions for the cities of Adana, Diyarbakir, Mardin, Trabzon, Ordu, Denizli, Kahramanmaras, Sanliurfa and Tekirdag on Monday.
The country will also impose a 4-day partial curfew beginning Friday at midnight in an effort to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus.
The Health Ministry announced that 95,780 people have recovered from the virus so far.
Over the past day, the death toll reached 3,841 with 55 more fatalities. Some 1,114 new cases were also registered, bringing the tally to 139,771, said Health Minister Fahrettin Koca.
As many as 32,722 tests were conducted in the country over the last 24 hours, with the total number of tests rising over 1.4 million, he said.
Meanwhile, Turkey’s volleyball season for both the men’s and women’s leagues as well as the season for all basketball leagues were ended Monday with no champions as part of the response to the coronavirus pandemic.
Meanwhile, Turkey raised nearly 2 billion Turkish liras ($282 million) in donations for the National Solidarity Campaign to help fight the coronavirus, said President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
– Coronavirus continues doing damage
Since the virus emerged in Wuhan, China last December, it has spread to 187 countries and regions.
The global death toll from the novel coronavirus has exceeded 285,400, with more than 4.16 million cases, according to a running tally by US-based Johns Hopkins University.
Additionally, more than 1.45 million people worldwide have recovered from COVID-19.
The US is still the most affected country in the world, with around 1.35 million cases and more than 80,000 fatalities.
The UK confirmed 210 more fatalities, bringing its death toll to 32,065.
Italy, one of the worst-hit countries in Europe by the coronavirus, reported 179 new fatalities, bringing the total to 30,739.
Another country that is among the worst affected by the virus, Spain, recorded 123 new deaths in the last 24 hours. So far, 26,744 people in the country have died from the virus.
France also reported 263 additional fatalities. The death toll rose to 26,643, with the number of infections over 177,000.
The coronavirus death toll in Iran rose to 6,685 with 45 more fatalities over the past 24 hours, state media reported Monday.
Russia on Monday outnumbered the UK and Italy to rank third in the number of coronavirus cases globally.
The total number of cases in the country reached 221,344, while the death toll rose to 2,009.
The number of coronavirus cases in Africa rose to 63,325 on Monday with 2,668 new cases recorded across the continent in the last 24 hours, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
The continent also saw 176 more COVID-19 deaths over the period, bringing the total number of fatalities to 2,290, said the Africa CDC.
In Latin America, the coronavirus death toll surpassed 20,000 and the region has reported more than 370,000 COVID-19 cases.
The coronavirus also continues to spread among Arab states.
– Other latest developments
In Turkey, unemployment in February fell to 13.6%, down 1.1 percentage points from the same month last year.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held a phone call with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and they discussed opportunities for cooperation in the fight against COVID-19 and the steps to be taken in the post-pandemic period as well as bilateral relations and regional issues.
The Yemeni government on Monday declared the temporary capital, Aden, a "disaster zone" due to the spread of the novel coronavirus and other epidemics, according to local media.
Afghan security forces on Monday claimed to have arrested Ziaul Haq, the head of Daesh/ISIS for South Asia and the Far East, along with other key terrorists of the group.
Also, an Iranian destroyer mistakenly shot and sank a second Iranian vessel during a naval exercise Sunday in the Persian Gulf, killing at least 19 people, according to unofficial reports.
