Regional and int'l news briefs

Haiti records more than 1,000 COVID cases within a week

PORT AU PRINCE (CMC):

Haiti has recorded more than 1,000 cases of the coronavirus within a seven-day period as the number of cases in the French-speaking CARICOM country neared 3,000 on Saturday.

The Ministry of Public Health yesterday confirmed 184 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total since March 19 to 2,924 cases, with the majority – 59.3 per cent – being men.

The authorities said that the number of active cases had increased to 2,850 during the past 24 hours, while the number of suspected cases investigated since March 19 stood at 6,626.

Haiti has so far recorded 50 deaths from the virus that was first detected in China last December and blamed for more than 370,000 deaths and the infection of 6.7 million persons worldwide.

Publisher of Barbados' oldest newspaper dies

BRIDGETOWN (CMC):

The publisher of the Barbados Advocate newspaper and owner of Barbados Broadcasting Service Ltd, Sir Anthony Bryan, died on Friday at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in the eastern Caribbean country.

In a brief statement posted on its Facebook page, the newspaper extended “sincere condolences to his immediate family”. It gave no other details.

The Barbados Advocate is the oldest newspaper in the island.

In 2017, Sir Anthony was made a Knight of St Andrew for his exceptional contribution to publishing, broadcasting and business as Barbados celebrated its 51st anniversary of political independence.

“I always ask God, in everything I go to do, to give me a sign that I may know that You are with me. If I don’t get that sign, I do not start,” he said a celebratory ceremony soon after he was knighted.”

He was married for 47 years before his wife, Astoria, passed away. Sir Anthony leaves to mourn three sons.

Protests support Floyd, Black Lives Matter on three continents

BERLIN, Germany (AP):

Tens of thousands of people gathered Saturday in cities from Australia to Europe to express anger over the death of George Floyd and to demand an end to racial discrimination in a sign that the Black Lives Matter movement is going global.

Demonstrators in Paris, France, tried to gather in front of the US Embassy, defying restrictions imposed by authorities because of the coronavirus pandemic. They were met by riot police who turned people away as French security forces sealed off the embassy behind an imposing ring of metal barriers and road blocks.

Yesterday, an afternoon protest at London's Parliament Square headed towards the UK Home Office, which oversees the country's police, and then on to the US Embassy, as protesters showed "solidarity for the people of America who have suffered for too long".

In Berlin, where police said 15,000 people rallied peacefully on the city's Alexander Square, protesters chanted the name of George Floyd and held up placards with slogans such as "I can't breathe."

Floyd, a black man, died after a Minneapolis police officer pressed a knee on his neck even after he pleaded for air while handcuffed and stopped moving.

His death has struck a chord with minorities protesting discrimination elsewhere; demonstrators in Sydney highlighted indigenous Australians who died in custody.

In South Korea's capital, Seoul, protesters gathered for a second straight day to denounce Floyd's death.

Wearing masks and black shirts, dozens of demonstrators marched through a commercial district amid a police escort, carrying signs such as "George Floyd Rest in Peace" and "Koreans for Black Lives Matter".

Protesters outside the US consulate in Naples chanted "Freedom!" and "No Justice, No Peace, (expletive) the police" in English and Italian as they clapped and carried handmade signs and a big banner printed with "Black Lives Matter" and a clenched black fist.