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Police in Morocco have arrested more than 80,000 people during the last six weeks for violating the coronavirus lockdown, according to official figures from the Direction Générale de la Sûreté Nationale (DGSN). On Wednesday alone, 4,582 were arrested – the highest daily total so far.
Other… Read more
Covid-19 has reappeared in Yemen with the announcement of five new cases in the southern city of Aden. This could scarcely have come at a worse time. Last week the city was declared a disaster area after flash floods swept several people away and caused streets to be bathed in sewage. In the… Read more
Thousands of undocumented migrant workers are awaiting repatriation from Kuwait under a government scheme aimed at countering the spread of Covid-19.
Crowded living conditions make migrant workers especially vulnerable to infection and the effect of the scheme will be to reduce their numbers.… Read more
Worldwide, more than three million people are now known to have been infected by the Covid-19 coronavirus. Among those, slightly less than two million are currently recorded as "active" cases – the numbers are reduced by people recovering or, in some cases, dying.
Changes in the number of active… Read more
In a controversial move to mark the start of Ramadan, the Algerian government has eased restrictions in Blida – the province at the centre of the country's Covid-19 epidemic. A total lockdown of Blida imposed on March 23 has now been reduced to a partial curfew running from 2pm to 7am daily.
This… Read more
Saudi Arabia has announced an easing of its coronavirus restrictions to allow for "the return of some economic activities in line with health instructions".
On the face of it, this could be a risky move because the Covid-19 virus is still spreading more rapidly in the kingdom than among any of its… Read more
So far, Libya has only 61 confirmed cases of Covid-19 but limited capacity for testing means an unknown number of infections are going undetected. At the same time, Libya faces a series of additional problems that make tackling the virus more difficult.
The country is now in its ninth year of… Read more
Yemen is officially clear of coronavirus cases following the recovery of its first – and so far only – Covid-19 patient.
A Yemeni man working in the port of ash-Shihr, on the Indian Ocean coast of Hadramaut province, was diagnosed with the virus on April 10. The town was immediately placed under… Read more
In Saudi Arabia the number of known Covid-19 infections has more than doubled during the past week. Earlier this month, when the tally was just over 2,000, the health minister warned that expert studies were predicting a minimum of 10,000 and a maximum of 200,000 confirmed cases "over the next few… Read more
More than 60 cases of Covid-19 have been detected at a prison in Morocco. This is the third outbreak in the country's jails which altogether hold about 80,000 prisoners.
On April 8, a staff member staff at the vast Loudaya prison in the desert near Marrakesh was taken ill with the virus and,… Read more
ARAB ART ONLINE: Susan Hefuna: Al Sabr Gamil (Patience is Beautiful) 2007. Ink stained on wood 140 x 170 cm. More information | Click to enlarge
