European leaders gathered to seek agreement on an economic rescue plan at a time when some of their countries faced the threat of a second wave of the Corona pandemic, and while India joined the list of countries with over a million infections, it was announced in Singapore a scientific progress that could pave the way for defeating the virus.

In light of the preventive measures that included wearing masks, preventing shaking hands and just touching the facility, the European Union leaders started today, Friday, in Brussels, an extraordinary two-day summit during which they will seek to agree on the union's budget in the next six years, in addition to the size of the economic rescue fund to face the consequences of the Corona virus.

At this first summit of its kind since the imposition of the closure measures last March, European leaders - who wore protective masks - will try to bridge their differences over the crisis, and also over the rescue plan that was proposed last April with a value of more than 500 billion euro.

There are profound differences between the supporters of the bailout that the European Union’s southern European countries, particularly Italy and Spain, should benefit from, and between countries committed to the foundations of the European budget.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel acknowledged that there are major differences between member states, and said that the path to reach a solution on the rescue plan is still difficult, adding that it may not happen at the current summit.

The Netherlands is leading a front that opposes giving aid in the form of grants to a number of member states affected by the Corona crisis rather than converting it into debt, while Italy, the largest affected by the epidemic in Europe, refuses to compromise the amount of aid it can receive.

While the Dutch Prime Minister ruled out reaching an agreement at this emergency summit, French President Emmanuel Macron spoke of what he described as a moment of truth.

For his part, European Central Bank Vice President Luis de Gendos said today that he expects European leaders to reach an agreement on the economic recovery fund very soon.

Restoration of restrictions
The Brussels summit comes at a time when some European countries are witnessing a return to restrictions with the emergence of corona virus hotspots in some regions. Currently, most European countries have entered advanced stages of plans to end the closure imposed months ago.

In Germany, the authorities gave the green light to adopt strict isolation measures in some areas, with a ban from exiting them if the outbreak of the Corona Virus was reached.

Germany fears the emergence of a second wave that holidaymakers may return to leave, after it was one of the most successful European countries in avoiding the crisis.

In Spain, residents of Barcelona, ​​the capital of Catalonia and home to 1.6 million residents, were asked to stay in their homes and not go out except for necessity, after recording a jump in HIV infections.

The Catalan government has decided to close cinemas, theaters and cabarets, to prevent gatherings of more than ten people, and to prevent visiting the homes of the elderly, as well as not to allow bars and restaurants to receive more than half the number of customers.

In Britain, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced the expansion of the powers of local councils to take necessary measures to deal with any local hotspots for the Coruna virus, including closing shops and canceling gatherings.

As his government prepares for a second wave of the epidemic next winter, Johnson said that life in his country will not return to normal until next November at the best, warning that nightclubs and children's play areas should remain closed, and that weddings remain limited.

In the context, two sources in the European Union told Reuters that the latter is negotiating pre-agreements to purchase potential vaccines for the prevention of coronavirus with the pharmaceutical companies Moderna, Sanofi and Johnson & Johnson, and with the biotechnology companies "Bio-tech" and "Curvac".

These negotiations come after four countries in the European Union entered into a deal last month with AstraZeneca to buy 400 million doses in advance of its possible vaccine against the Corona virus.

Other areas
and outside Europe, the Israeli government announced new measures to deal with the increasing incidence of corona, including the closure of some public places during the weekend.

In China, which had previously confirmed that it had succeeded in containing the Corona virus, the record of several cases of the virus in the Xinjiang region (West) raised fears of a pandemic in other areas of the country, and the local authorities in Xinjiang prevented most trips to the city today and closed the express train network and buses Try to stop an outbreak.

In turn, India today, Friday, became the third country in the world to register more than a million cases of coronavirus after the United States and Brazil, while infection spread more in the countryside and small cities in this country.

The United States set a new record yesterday, with more than 75,000 casualties recorded in one day.

The outbreak also continued in Russia according to a high rate, with the daily average stabilizing above 6 thousand injuries, while the Japanese capital Tokyo set a new daily record with about 300 injuries, and South Korean officials today expressed their optimism about controlling the epidemic despite the increase in injuries, and most of them From abroad.

In Australia, the state of Victoria set a daily record today with 428 new infections, and the authorities imposed isolation on the city of Melbourne and its suburbs last week due to the outbreak of infection.

For its part, the World Health Organization announced today the injury of more than 10 thousand medical workers in Africa.

The number of injuries worldwide has increased to 14 million and 58,000 today, of whom 595,000 have died, while the number of healers has increased to 8 million and 360,000.

UN Warning
The United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator, Mark Lowcock, warned that the Corona pandemic and the recession would lead to the first increase in the global poverty rate in three decades.

Lockook added that this could push 265 million people into starvation by the end of this year.

Arab countries in the
Arab world, Iraq and Saudi Arabia are today in terms of the number of deaths, and despite the decline of the disease, several Arab countries are still recording hundreds of injuries daily.

Today, Iraq recorded 94 deaths from the Corona virus, Saudi Arabia 37 deaths in addition to more than 2600 cases, and the Sultanate of Oman 8 deaths, two deaths in Kuwait and the UAE, and one death in Qatar, according to official data.

In Tunisia, local infections appeared in people who had been infected by the migrants, and for weeks the country had remained free of injuries.

Antibodies
In terms of scientifically facing corona, researchers in Singapore have discovered antibodies that attack the virus across four places and completely neutralize it, according to the newspaper, "The Straits Times," based on findings by scientists from the National Center for Infectious Diseases and the Agency for Science, Technology and Research.

According to scientific results published by the "Nature Communications" and "The Lancet" magazine, that antibodies can prevent the virus from controlling a human cell in the first place, or prevent it from reproducing inside it.

The researchers indicated that these results could lead to the discovery of a vaccine or verification of the effectiveness of a vaccine.

This development comes at a time when several countries say they have reached advanced strides in the production of an anti-Coronavirus vaccine through clinical trials of thousands of people.