author - oman observer

GENEVA: A World Health Organization committee will meet on Jan. 27 to consider whether the COVID-19 pandemic still represents a global emergency, a spokesperson said on Tuesday, three years after it...

JERUSALEM: The Omicron-adapted COVID-19 vaccine booster developed by Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE sharply reduced hospitalizations among older patients, Israeli researchers said on Monday, in some of...

HONG KONG/BEIJING: Travellers streamed into China by air, land and sea on Sunday, many eager for long-awaited reunions, as Beijing opened borders that have been all but shut since the start of the...

VATICAN CITY: Pope Francis led the funeral of former Pope Benedict on Thursday, tenderly touching the coffin of his predecessor as he stood supported on a cane before tens of thousands of mourners,...

GENEVA: The Omicron subvariant, XBB.1.5, is causing concern among scientists after its rapid spread in the United States in December.Here is what we know so far: WHAT IS THE XBB.1.5 SUBVARIANT AND HOW...

BEIJING: Global health officials tried to determine the facts of China's raging COVID-19 outbreak and how to prevent a further spread as the Communist Party's mouthpiece newspaper on Wednesday...

MANILA: Philippine authorities halted flights in and out of Manila on New Year's Day due to a malfunction of air traffic control, causing chaos for tens of thousands of travellers. A total of 282...

SHANGHAI/BEIJING: China's sprawling and thinly resourced countryside is racing to beef up medical facilities before hundreds of millions of factory workers return to their families for the Lunar New...

VATICAN CITY: Former pope Benedict, 95, who in 2013 became the first pontiff in 600 years to step down, is "very sick", his successor Pope Francis said on Wednesday, asking the church to pray for...

New York: A brutal winter storm that brought Christmas chaos to millions of Americans will be slow to dissipate, the US National Weather Service said Monday, after intense snow and frigid cold caused...

BEIJING/SHANGHAI: Mask-wearing Beijing and Shanghai commuters crowded subway trains on Monday as China's two biggest cities edged closer to living with COVID-19 even as frontline medical workers...

KATHMANDU: A former Maoist guerrilla who led a decade-long insurgency against Nepal's Hindu monarchy was on Sunday appointed prime minister for a third time, in alliance with the main opposition...

BEIJING: China's Zhejiang, a big industrial province near Shanghai, is battling around a million new daily COVID-19 infections, a number expected to double in the days ahead, the provincial government...

SHANGHAI/BEIJING: A Shanghai hospital has told its staff to prepare for a "tragic battle" with COVID-19 as it expects half of the city's 25 million people will get infected by the end of next week,...

SHANGHAI: Recuperating after receiving her fourth COVID-19 vaccine shot, Xu Yafa, a 64-year-old retiree living in a small village on the outskirts of Shanghai, was very clear about the reasons why she...

KYIV/WASHINGTON: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy was en route to Washington on Wednesday to meet President Joe Biden, address Congress and seek "weapons, weapons and more weapons" in his first...

Pakistani security forces on Wednesday killed all militants who had taken over a counter-terrorism centre two days after they had held security officers and detainees hostages at the northwestern...

KYIV: Moscow launched a "kamikaze" drone attack on Monday, hitting key infrastructure in and around Kyiv, hours before Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in Belarus, fuelling fears he will...

DOHA: Croatia beat Morocco 2-1 in the World Cup third-place playoff on Saturday to leave Qatar on a high after the European side failed to reach a second consecutive final.Mislav Orsic's late...

NEW DELHI: A surge in travel that overwhelmed India's busiest airport this week as the holiday season sets in has eased after authorities added staff and security equipment to cope with the surge in...