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world news Diamars 29 December 2020

As South Africa's virus spikes, president bans liquor sales

(AP) — South African mulative virus cases above 1 lated incidents. Many holiday
President Cyril Rama- million. gatherings involve high lev-
phosa reimposed a ban els of alcohol consumption,
on alcohol sales and or- Ramaphosa announced the which in turn often lead to
dered the closure of all new measures after a Cabinet increased trauma cases.
bars Monday as part of meeting and an emergency
new restrictions to help meeting of the National “To alleviate the pressure on
the country battle a resur- Coronavirus Command the system during this time
gence of the coronavirus, Council. of the year, where we only
including a new variant. have skeleton staff work-
The country surpassed the 1 ing, especially in the public
In a nationwide address, Ra- million mark in confirmed sector, as well as in the pri-
maphosa also announced the virus cases on Sunday night, vate sector, we are asking for
closure of all beaches and when authorities reported stricter restrictions regarding
public swimming pools in that the country's total cases social gatherings,” Angelique
the country’s infection hot- during the pandemic had Coetzee, chairwoman of the
spots, which include Cape reached 1,004,413, including medical association told The
Town, Johannesburg, Dur- 26,735 deaths. Associated Press. as 60%, according to govern- when the country imposed a
ban and several coastal areas. ment statistics. When the ban hard lockdown during April
Like Britain, South Africa “South Africa has got a histo- on alcohol sales was lifted, and May that also banned all
South Africa will extend its is battling a variant of CO- ry of very high alcohol abuse trauma cases went back up to liquor sales.
nighttime curfew so all resi- VID-19 that medical experts and binge drinking, especial- previous levels.
dents must be at home from think is more infectious than ly over the weekends. In cer- South Africa's 7-day rolling
9 p.m. until 6 a.m., the presi- the original. The variant has tain areas that leads to a lot of Amid a resurgence of CO- average of confirmed daily
dent said. become dominant in many trauma cases, assaults, motor VID-19 in early December, cases has risen over the past
parts of the country, accord- vehicle accidents and domes- South Africa limited sales of two weeks from 11.18 new
The president said that wear- ing to experts. tic violence,” she said. alcohol to Monday through cases per 100,000 people on
ing masks is mandatory and Thursday between the hours Dec. 13 to 19.87 new cases
that anyone found not wear- The South African Medical The medical association has of 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. The per 100,000 people on Dec.
ing a mask in a public place Association, which repre- called on the government to country also has a nightly 11 27.
will be subject to a fine or a sents nurses and other health impose stricter restrictions p.m.-4 a.m. curfew.
criminal charge punishable workers as well as doctors, on the sale of alcohol, espe- The 7-day rolling average of
by a possible jail sentence. warned Monday that the cially where large gatherings Various alcohol traders had daily deaths in the country
health system was on the are concerned. pleaded with the government has risen over the past two
Ramaphosa said the in- verge of being overwhelmed to avoid a total ban on alco- weeks from 0.26 deaths per
creased restrictions are nec- by the combination of higher When South Africa previ- hol sales, citing the economic 100,000 people on Dec. 13 to
essary because of a surge in numbers of COVID-19 pa- ously had a total ban on li- damage it would cause. South 0.49 deaths per 100,000 peo-
COVID-19 infections which tients and people needing quor sales, trauma cases in Africa's alcohol industry ple on Dec. 27.
has pushed South Africa’s cu- urgent care from alcohol-re- hospitals dropped by as much was among those hardest hit

Officer, 2 suspects die in attack on police in Chechnya

(AP) — Two brothers at- of rampant rights abuses, in-
tacked police with knives Kadyrov said the brothers cluding arbitrary arrests and
Monday in Chechnya, came from the neighbor- extrajudicial killings by his
killing an officer and in- ing region of Ingushetia and feared security forces.
juring another before be- were working at a bakery.
ing shot dead, the Russian Despite Kadyrov's relent-
republic's leader said. The Kremlin has relied on less crackdown on suspected
Kadyrov to stabilize Chech- extremists, some of whom
Ramzan Kadyrov, the strong- nya after two separatist wars have sworn allegiance to the
man head of Chechnya, said in the 1990s and has provided Islamic State group, militants
the men attacked road police generous subsidies to help have continued to launch
in the center of the provincial rebuild the region. sporadic attacks in Chechnya
capital, Grozny, in an attempt International human rights and other regions in Russia's
to seize their weapons. groups have accused Kadyrov North Caucasus.

Shanghai police say suspect detained in games tycoon's death

(AP) — Police in Shang- The business magazine Caix- to Hurun Report, which fol- lows China’s wealthy.
hai say they have detained A police statement said a in, citing unidentified indus-
a suspect in the death by 39-year-old coworker, identi- try sources, said the suspect is
possible poisoning of the fied only by the surname Xu, an employee of Yoozoo’s film
billionaire founder of a was detained. The statement division and was working on
Chinese video game com- said the victim was hospital- “The Three-Body Problem.”
pany that makes films ized Dec. 17 and diagnosed
based on the popular sci- with possible poisoning but Yoozoo also is know for its
ence fiction novel “The gave no other details. game “Game of Thrones:
Three-Body Problem.” Winter Is Coming,” based on
An employee who answered the popular TV series.
Lin Qi, 39, died on Christ- the phone Monday at the
mas Day after being hospital- Shanghai police press office Lin ranked No. 870 among
ized, according to his compa- said there was no additional China’s richest entrepreneurs
ny, Yoozoo Games Co., also information to release. with a net worth of 6.8 billion
known as Youzu Interactive. yuan ($1 billion), according