Singapore will do away with requirements to wear masks indoors starting August 29, as the country sees its COVID-19 situation stabilise further, the health minister said on Wednesday.
For the first time in more than two years, people in the Southeast Asian city-state will no longer be required to wear masks indoors except on public transport and in high-risk settings like healthcare facilities.
The health ministry also updated rules for non-vaccinated travellers, dropping a 7-day quarantine requirement starting next week.
Singapore, which is a major Asian financial and travel hub, lifted most pandemic curbs, including travel restrictions, earlier this year.
About 70 per cent of the city-state's 5.5 million population has already contracted COVID-19, Ong Ye Kung, the health minister said in a news conference, adding that the re-infection rate is so far "very low".
Singapore has vaccinated more than 90 per cent of its population and has among the lowest COVID-19 mortality rates in the world.
Portugal's authorities have said that between July 27 and August 15, 1,331 excess deaths from extreme heat were reported, with the over 75 age group particularly hard hit, Euronews reported on Saturday.
A tour bus carrying more than 50 people veered out of control and rolled over on an Upstate New York highway on Friday, killing at least five people and injuring dozens of others, authorities said.
Foreign ministers from European countries, Australia and Britain on Friday jointly condemned Israel's plans to construct a settlement east of Jerusalem.
Famine has struck an area of Gaza and will likely spread over the next month, a global hunger monitor determined on Friday, an assessment that will escalate pressure on Israel to allow more humanitarian aid into the war-torn Palestinian enclave.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un lauded his country's "heroic" troops who fought for Russia in the war against Ukraine, in a ceremony where he decorated returning soldiers and consoled children of the bereaved with hugs, state media said on Friday.
As part of ‘’Operation Chivalrous Knight 3’’, the “Life and Hope (2)” convoy has delivered a large shipment of urgently needed medicines, medical devices, and supplies to support hospitals in the Gaza Strip.
His Highness Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, on Saturday met with Milojko Spajić, Prime Minister of Montenegro, in the capital Podgorica, to enhance bilateral relations and explored prospects for cooperation across various sectors.