World

UNITED NATIONS, United States — After two years the COVID-19 pandemic is not yet over and could be prolonged further due to "scandalously unequal" vaccine distribution, the UN secretary general warned on Wednesday.

"The pandemic's most tragic toll has been on the health and lives of millions, with more than 446 million cases worldwide, more than 6 million deaths confirmed, and countless more grappling with worsening mental health," said UN chief Antonio Guterres in a statement marking the second anniversary of the global crisis.

"Thanks to unprecedented public health measures, and the extraordinarily rapid development and deployment of vaccines, many parts of the world are bringing the pandemic under control," he said.

"But it would be a grave mistake to think the pandemic is over."

Guterres noted that the "distribution of vaccines remains scandalously unequal," and that while 1.5 billion doses of vaccine are produced each month, "nearly 3 billion people are still waiting for their first shot."

"This failure is the direct result of policy and budgetary decisions that prioritize the health of people in wealthy countries over the health of people in poor countries," said Guterres.

He added that the two-tiered recovery is "a recipe for more variants, more lockdowns and more sorrow and sacrifice in every country".

The statement concluded by calling on the whole world to "re-dedicate ourselves to ending this pandemic... and closing this sad chapter in humanity's history, once and for all".

ANTALYA, Turkey — The Russian and Ukrainian foreign ministers will Thursday hold face-to-face talks in southern Turkey in the first high-level contact between Kyiv and Moscow since Russia invaded its neighbour two weeks ago.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has pushed for Turkey to play a mediation role, has expressed hope the talks can avert tragedy and even help agree a ceasefire.

But analysts fear there are only the lowest chances of a breakthrough at the meeting in Antalya between Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba.

Senior Ukrainian officials, including the defence minister, have held a sequence of meetings with a Russian delegation in Belarus largely devoted to humanitarian issues, but Moscow has not sent any ministers to the talks.

Lavrov and Kuleba will be joined at the meeting Thursday morning by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, with NATO member Turkey keen to maintain strong relations with both sides despite the conflict.

Kuleba confirmed in a video on Facebook he was preparing to meet Lavrov on Thursday, warning that his expectations were "limited".

He said the success of the talks would depend on "what instructions and directives Lavrov is under" from the Kremlin at the discussions.

"I am not pinning any great hopes on them but we will try and get the most out of" the talks with effective preparation, he said.

'Active neutrality' 

The visit to Antalya will be the first trip abroad for Lavrov since Russia was isolated by the Western world with biting sanctions that have also targeted President Vladimir Putin's long-serving top diplomat.

Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova confirmed on Wednesday that Lavrov would be attending the meeting, which will be on the sidelines of a diplomatic forum organised by Cavusoglu in Antalya, his home city.

“We are working to stop this crisis transforming into a tragedy,” Erdogan said on Wednesday.

“I hope the meeting between the ministers will open the way to a permanent ceasefire.”

Turkey is a traditional ally of Ukraine and has supplied the country with Bayraktar drones, made by a firm whose technology director is Erdogan’s own son-in-law, which Kyiv has deployed in the conflict.

But it is seeking to maintain good relations with Russia, on which Turkey depends heavily for gas imports and tourism revenues.

Erdogan called the Russian invasion “unacceptable” but at the same time, Ankara has not joined Western sanctions against Moscow and refused to close its airspace to Russian planes.

“This active neutrality succeeded in bringing Turkey to the centre of the diplomatic game,” said Berk Esen of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs.

Low ‘breakthrough’ chance 

The war has sparked Europe’s largest refugee crisis since World War II, with more than two million people crossing Ukraine’s borders, according to the United Nations.

The West’s sanctions on Russia have failed to dissuade Putin from pushing on with his assault.

“I think every effort helps, but I don’t think there is much hope for a breakthrough just yet,” the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Middle East Programme Director Aaron Stein told AFP.

The talks are a boost for Erdogan who has in recent years found himself increasingly cold-shouldered by the West over unilateral Turkish operations in Syria and concerns over human rights.

Turkey is also enduring a severe economic crisis that has seen a crash in the value of the lira. A breakdown in relations with Russia could spell disaster for the economy.

Washington Institute fellow Soner Cagaptay said he would “be highly surprised” if the Antalya talks led to a major breakthrough, with other leaders including French President Emmanuel Macron and Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett also seeking to mediate.

But he praised as a “huge success for Turkish diplomacy” the fact that the two foreign ministers “are agreeing to meet in person in a neutral territory”.

“That’s quite significant even if there’s no breakthrough,” he told AFP.

KYIV — US President Joe Biden banned imports of Russian oil on Tuesday to punish Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine as desperate civilians fled besieged cities and fresh fighting raged.

Britain said it would also phase out Russian oil by the end of the year and the EU planned to slash gas imports by two-thirds, as Western sanctions finally began to target the economic lifeline for Russia's war.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has pressed on despite unprecedented sanctions, although Moscow agreed set up "humanitarian corridors" from four Ukrainian cities on the 13th day of the conflict.

The number of refugees flooding across Ukraine's borders to escape towns devastated by shelling and air strikes passed two million, in Europe's fastest-growing refugee crisis since World War II, the UN said.

Buses streamed out through an evacuation corridor from the northeastern city of Sumy, where 21 people were killed in air strikes overnight, while civilians on foot took an unofficial escape route out of the bombarded Kyiv suburb of Irpin.

But Ukraine accused Russia of attacking a corridor from the beleaguered southern port city of Mariupol, where aid workers said tens of thousands were living in “apocalyptic” conditions.

Kyiv has branded the corridors a publicity stunt as many of the exit routes lead into Russia or its ally Belarus. Both sides accuse each other of ceasefire violations.

Biden said Ukraine would “never be a victory” for Putin, as he announced the measures targeting the energy sector that props up the Russian economy and its war effort.

The Pentagon estimated that between 2,000 and 4,000 Russian soldiers had been killed so far. Russia said on March 2 that 498 Russian troops had been killed in Ukraine.

‘Hiding in the basement’ 

Russian troops are slowly encroaching on Kyiv despite intense efforts by outgunned Ukrainian forces, and moving faster through the east and north of the country.

Despite the sound of nearby shelling in Irpin, seen as a critical point for the advance on the capital, civilians fled in icy wind and thick snowfall, AFP reporters saw.

People waited in a long line to cross over the Irpin river on makeshift walkways of planks and mangled metal, after the Ukrainians blew up the bridge leading into the capital to hamper any Russian advance.

“I didn’t want to leave, but there’s nobody left in the homes around us, no water, no gas and no electricity,” Larissa Prokopets, 43, told AFP.

She said she was leaving after several days spent “hiding in the basement” of her home, which kept “shaking” due to bombardment nearby.

Russia had refused calls for a humanitarian corridor in Irpin and the nearby suburbs of Bucha and Gostomel “although we had everything ready for this”, Ukrainian interior ministry official Anton Gerashchenko said.

Evacuations had however begun in Sumy, near the Russian border and 350 kilometres east of Kyiv, where Russia had formally declared a humanitarian corridor, officials said.

Dozens of buses had already left in the direction of Lokhvytsia, to the southwest, with the corridor designed to evacuate civilians, including Chinese, Indians and other foreigners, officials said.

The evacuation came after 21 people, including two children, were killed in Sumy overnight. Three people were killed and three children wounded by a landmine in Chernigiv, north of Kyiv, officials said.

‘Alone, exhausted, frightened’ 

Ukraine’s defence ministry also accused Russia on Tuesday of violating a ceasefire to ease a days-long blockade of Mariupol, describing it as “genocide”.

A six-year-old girl identified only as Tanya died from dehydration under the rubble of her destroyed home in Mariupol, the city council said.

“In the last minutes of her life she was alone, exhausted, frightened and terribly thirsty,” Mayor Vadym Boychenko said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky denounced what he called unkept promises by the West to protect his country and renewed calls for a no-fly zone that leaders have so far dismissed.

“It’s been 13 days we’ve been hearing promises, 13 days we’ve been told we’ll be helped in the air, that there will be planes,” Zelensky said on a video broadcast on Telegram.

Global outrage mounted over the invasion and the plight of civilians caught up in the bloodshed.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said Mariupol residents faced “atrocious” conditions and were running out of food, water and medical supplies.

“The bottom line today is that this situation is really apocalyptic for people,” ICRC head of media Ewan Watson said in Geneva.

At least 474 civilians have been killed since the start of Russia’s assault on its ex-Soviet neighbour, according to the UN, although it believes the real figures to be “considerably higher”.

Premier League suspension 

The onslaught has created a huge refugee crisis for European countries that have taken in Ukrainians fleeing the conflict, particularly Poland.

“It doesn’t stop,” Filippo Grandi, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, said as he announced that two million people had fled.

Russia has warned that oil sanctions would have “catastrophic consequences”.

But the United States has led the push for energy sanctions — partly because Russia accounts for less than 10 per cent of US imports of oil and petroleum products, which means the impact on the world’s largest economy would be easier to bear.

Biden said the ban had been decided “in close consultation” with allies, especially those in Europe, who depend on Russia for 40 per cent of their gas needs.

The European Commission said it wanted to cut Russian gas imports by two-thirds, while Britain said it would phase out oil imports in line with the United States.

The pressure has grown on businesses and sports to also sever ties with Moscow.

The Premier League announced it would suspend its deal with its Russian broadcast partner, while oil giant Shell said it would withdraw from Russian oil and gas immediately.

But the West has so far steered clear of the no-fly zone demanded by Zelensky, with Putin warning it would be considered as “participation in the conflict” with nuclear-armed Russia.

Putin has equated sanctions with a declaration of war and put nuclear forces on alert. He has pledged the “de-Nazification” of Ukraine and demands its “neutralisation” and demilitarisation.

At home, Russia has cracked down on dissent, arresting more than 10,000 people for anti-war protests and clamping down on independent media.

PARIS — Over 6 million people have died worldwide from COVID-19 since the pandemic began, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP on Tuesday.

A total of 6,003,081 people have succumbed to the virus, AFP counted at 11:00 GMT.

The milestone comes as the number of infections and deaths continues to plummet in most regions of the world, except in Asia, where Hong Kong is suffering its worst-ever outbreak, and Oceania, where New Zealand has recorded a jump in cases.

Average global daily deaths over the past seven days have fallen to 7,170, down 18 per cent in a week, continuing a trend seen since the peak of the Omicron wave in early February despite many countries relaxing restrictions.

The United States has recorded 960,311 deaths from the coronavirus, followed by Brazil on 652,341 and India on 515,210.

While much of the world is learning to live with the disease, China remains committed to stamping it out and has instructed Hong Kong to also pursue a zero-tolerance approach.

Hong Kong has launched controversial plans to test all 7.4 million residents and build a network of isolation camps. The number of weekly infections in the city has doubled in a week to 290,987 while the number of deaths has more than tripled to 1,543.

In regional terms Europe — which is defined widely by the World Health Organisation to include Russia, Israel and countries in the Caucasus and Central Asia — is currently reporting the largest number of cases.

It also accounted last week for nearly two fifths of the world’s deaths.

Countries reporting the highest death rates in proportion of their population were Hong Kong with 20.58 per 100,000 inhabitants, Latvia (6.42), Georgia (5.89), Denmark (5.13), and Hungary (5.04).

AFP’s tally is based on COVID-19 deaths reported by national health authorities.

The World Health Organisation believes that the real figure could be two to three times higher.

KYIV — Ukraine dismissed Moscow's offer to set up humanitarian corridors from several bombarded cities on Monday after it emerged some routes would lead refugees into Russia or Belarus.

The Russian proposal of safe passage from Kharkiv, Kyiv, Mariupol and Sumy had come after terrified Ukrainian civilians came under fire in previous ceasefire attempts.

Russia unleashed another night of relentless attacks from air, land and sea, compounding the humanitarian disaster that has pushed more than 1.5 million people across Ukraine's borders.

International sanctions intended to punish Moscow have so far done little to slow the invasion, and Washington said it was now discussing a ban on Russian oil imports with Europe.

Oil prices soared to near a 14-year high and gas prices rocketed on the developments while stock markets plunged as investors worried about the fallout on the global economy.

Horrifying scenes at the weekend saw Ukrainian civilians being cut down as they tried to flee various cities, adding to the international outrage.

Moscow’s defence ministry had earlier Monday announced new plans for humanitarian corridors, with the defence ministry confirming a “regime of silence” had started at 0700 GMT.

But several routes led into Russia or its ally Belarus, raising questions over the safety of those who might use them.

“This is not an acceptable option,” Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said. The civilians “aren’t going to go to Belarus and then take a plane to Russia”.

Moscow had said the decision was taken after a “personal request” by French President Emmanuel Macron, who spoke with Russia’s Vladimir Putin on Sunday.

Macron’s office however denied there had been such a request.

‘They are monsters’ 

AFP journalists saw thousands of civilians early Monday fleeing the fighting via an unofficial humanitarian corridor in Irpin, a strategic suburb west of Kyiv.

“I am so happy to have managed to get out,” said Olga, a 48-year-old woman leaving with her two dogs.

Children and the elderly were carried on carpets used as stretchers on the route, which leads over a makeshift bridge and then a single path secured by the army and volunteers.

Desperate people abandoned pushchairs and heavy suitcases to make sure they could get on the buses out of the war zone.

A day earlier a family of two adults and two children were killed by a shell as they tried to leave the war-torn area in scenes that horrified the world.

“They are monsters. Irpin is at war, Irpin has not surrendered,” mayor Oleksandr Markushyn said on Telegram, adding that he had seen the family killed with his own eyes.

Two recent attempts to allow some 200,000 civilians to leave the key Azov Sea port of Mariupol, where the International Committee of the Red Cross warned of “devastating scenes of human suffering”, have also ended in disaster.

One family which did manage to leave the city described spending a week without heat or electricity and running out of food and water.

“On the road, we saw there were bodies everywhere, Russians and Ukrainians... we saw that people had been buried in their basements.”

There was no let-up in the violence overnight into Monday, with air sirens sounding in cities across the country, and intense aerial bombardment in Ukraine’s second city Kharkiv, which has endured almost non-stop fire in recent days.

“The enemy continues the offensive operation against Ukraine, focusing on the encirclement of Kyiv, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Sumy and Mykolayiv,” the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said in a statement.

The mayor of Gostomel, the town north of Kiev that is home to a crucial military airfield, was shot dead by Russian forces along with two other people while “distributing bread to the hungry and medicine to the sick,” local officials said.

The bodies of nine people — five civilians and four soldiers — were found in the rubble of Vinnytsia airport in central Ukraine after it was destroyed in a Russian missile attack on Sunday, rescue services said.

However a key town in the Kharkiv region, Chuguiv, has been retaken in a counterattack by Ukrainian forces, Anton Gerashchenko, an aide to the interior minister, wrote on Telegram.

10,000 arrested 

in Russia 

Ukraine’s President Volodymr Zelensky renewed calls for the West to boycott Russian exports, particularly oil, and to impose a no-fly zone to stop the carnage.

“How many more deaths and losses must it take to secure the skies over Ukraine?” he said in a video message.

Twelve days of fighting have killed hundreds of civilians and wounded thousands. An unending stream of people — mostly women and children — has poured into neighbouring countries in what the UN calls Europe’s fastest growing refugee crisis since World War II.

Western allies have imposed unprecedented sanctions against businesses, banks and billionaires in a bid to choke the Russian economy and pressure Moscow to halt its assault.

But Russian President Vladimir Putin has equated global sanctions with a declaration of war and warned that Kyiv is “putting in question the future of Ukrainian statehood” by continuing to resist.

Moscow has been forced to restrict sales of essential goods to limit black-market speculation, while on Sunday payment giant American Express halted operations there, a day after Visa and MasterCard announced similar steps.

Streaming giant Netflix suspended its service in Russia while social media titan TikTok halted the posting of new videos from Russia.

Despite harsh punishments for those voicing dissent, protests in Russia against the Ukraine invasion have continued, with more than 10,000 people arrested since it began.

Putin vows ‘neutralisation’ 

Putin has pledged the “neutralisation” of Ukraine “either through negotiation or through war”, and expectations remain low for a third round of Russian-Ukrainian talks set for Monday.

China said on Monday it was open to helping mediate peace, but stressed that the friendship between close allies Beijing and Moscow remained “rock solid”.

The International Court of Justice meanwhile began hearing Ukraine’s appeal for it to order Russia to halt the fighting, but Moscow declined to attend the sitting of the UN’s top court in The Hague.

NATO allies have so far rebuffed Ukraine’s calls for a no-fly zone, with one senior US senator, Marco Rubio, saying Sunday that it could lead to “World War III” against nuclear-armed Russia.

Putin has threatened “colossal and catastrophic consequences not only for Europe but also the whole world” if a no-fly zone is imposed.

Kyiv also has urged the West to boost its military assistance, with Zelensky pleading for Russian-made planes that his pilots are trained to fly.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington was “working actively” on a deal with Poland to supply it with American jets.

Moscow has also warned Ukraine’s neighbours against hosting Kyiv’s military aircraft, saying they could end up involved in armed conflict.

Weapons, ammunition and funds have poured into Ukraine from Western allies as they seek to bolster Kyiv.

TEHRAN — Iran said Monday it was awaiting "details" on Russia's demands for US guarantees that could potentially delay reaching an agreement in talks aiming to restore Tehran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Saturday that Moscow wants written guarantees from Washington that Western sanctions imposed on it over the Ukraine conflict will not affect its economic and military cooperation with Tehran, ahead of any conclusion of a revived Iran nuclear deal.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday dismissed these demands as "irrelevant". Sanctions on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine "have nothing to do with the Iran nuclear deal", he said on CBS talk show "Face the Nation."

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said Monday "we have also seen and heard Mr Lavrov's remarks in the media".

"We are waiting to hear the details of that through diplomatic channels," he added, during his weekly news conference.

"Iran's peaceful nuclear cooperation should not be affected or restricted by any sanctions, including Iran's peaceful nuclear cooperation with Russia, China and other countries," he said.

Russia, which was slapped with wide-ranging economic sanctions by the US and the EU following its invasion of Ukraine, is party to ongoing talks in Vienna aimed at reviving the 2015 nuclear deal, along with Britain, China, France and Germany. The United States is participating indirectly.

The 2015 agreement gave Iran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear programme, but the US unilaterally withdrew from it in 2018 under then-president Donald Trump who reimposed heavy economic sanctions on Tehran.

That prompted Iran to begin rolling back on its own commitments.

The Vienna talks aim to return the US to the nuclear deal and lift sanctions on Iran, while Tehran would in turn return to full compliance with its commitments.

As with the original agreement, Moscow is expected to play a key role in the implementation of any fresh deal with Tehran, for example by receiving shipments of enriched uranium from Iran.

"Russia's approach so far has been a constructive one in order to reach a collective agreement in Vienna," Khatibzadeh stressed.

SEOUL — South Korea will elect a new president on Wednesday and voters face a stark choice: a feminist-bashing conservative or a scandal-plagued liberal? So far, it's a dead heat.

The two frontrunners, dour former prosecutor Yoon Suk-yeol of the People Power Party and the incumbent Democratic party's maverick ex-governor Lee Jae-myung are trapped in a neck-and-neck race to become the next leader of Asia's fourth largest economy.

And what propels one of them to victory will not be their populist campaign promises or North Korea policy, analysts say. Instead, it's what the papers have dubbed a "cycle of revenge" in South Korea's famously adversarial politics.

“This election is a battle between two opposite forces, the progressives and conservatives,” said political analyst Park Sang-byoung.

South Korean presidents are allowed by law to serve a single five year term, and every living former president has been investigated and jailed for corruption after leaving office.

Outgoing President Moon Jae-in himself swept to power in 2017 after his disgraced predecessor Park Geun-hye was impeached over an influence-peddling scandal that also put a Samsung heir behind bars.

Now, Park’s conservatives are eager for revenge.

Ironically, their candidate Yoon was chief prosecutor under Moon and pursued Park when she was impeached — an experience that boosted his profile and popularity and pushed him to enter politics.

South Korean politics has seen a “deepening division” in recent years, with elections more focused on party rivalry than policy, analyst Yoo Jung-hoon told AFP.

“Many conservatives still hold a grudge over the impeachment of Park Geun-hye,” he said.

Yoon is appealing to these disgruntled voters, offering a chance at “revenge” for Park’s ousting, even going so far as to threaten to investigate Moon for unspecified “irregularities”.

“We should do it,” Yoon said last month, referring to prosecuting Moon and his administration.

His comments earned a rare rebuke from the presidential Blue House and the ruling Democratic party’s candidate Lee said they indicated his rival was not fit to lead the nation.

But analysts say it’s just political business as usual in Seoul.

“The Moon administration has prosecuted many former officials in the name of rooting out deep-rooted corruption,” Shin Yul, a political science professor at Myongji University.

“I expect the same standard to be applied under the Yoon government should wrongdoings be found,” he said.

Yoon’s wife in January gave an unwitting insight into the realpolitik to come, claiming enemies and critics would be prosecuted if her husband won because that’s “the nature of power”, according to taped comments released after a court battle.

Where’s the policy? 

Polls show that voters’ top concerns this election cycle are skyrocketing house prices in the capital Seoul, stagnant growth, and stubborn youth unemployment, but campaigning has been dominated by mud-slinging.

Lee, a former mayor and provincial governor, has a slew of fresh policy offerings, from universal basic income to free school uniforms — but they’ve been overshadowed by media coverage of his scandals.

He is being scrutinised over a suspect land development deal, with two key witnesses to the case having killed themselves.

He was forced to start his campaign by apologising for a profanity-laden family phone call, his wife was accused of misappropriating public funds, and he’s been dogged by rumours of mafia-links.

His rival Yoon has himself made a series of gaffes, most recently having to delete a “tone deaf” tweet on Ukraine which included a tangerine with an angry face drawn on, a bizarre reference to that country’s Orange Revolution.

Moreover, Yoon’s most memorable policy is an offer to abolish the gender equality ministry, on the basis that, despite voluminous data to the contrary, South Korean women do not suffer “systemic gender discrimination”, he says.

Yoon is more hawkish than Lee on North Korea, threatening a pre-emptive strike on the South’s nuclear-armed neighbour if needed.

But, despite a record-breaking seven weapons tests in a month in January, North Korea is not a major deciding factor in the vote, analysts say.

“The North’s launches have minimal impact in elections because South Korea’s competition for supremacy with the North is long over,” said analyst Yoo.

“South Korean elections have revolved around political rivalry rather than policy issues for many years.”