ROME — The Latest on the coronavirus epidemic sweeping the globe (all times local):
8 a.m.
Organizers of the annual Holocaust remembrance march in southern Poland say it has been postponed this year because of fears about the new coronavirus sweeping the globe.
Each year the “March of the Living” aims to walk 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) between the two parts of the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau. The organizing committee’s chairman Shmuel Rosenman says Monday that after consulting with health officials he was forced to announce “with a heavy heart” that this’ year’s march would be postponed.
The event was expected to draw 110 delegations from around the world.
During World War II, Nazi Germany killed some 1.1 million people in Auschwitz-Birkenau, the vast majority of them Jews. Some 300,000 people have walked in the march since it began in 1988.
Israel has so far confirmed 39 cases of coronavirus and 20,000 people have been ordered into 14-day home quarantines protectively. Scores of flights in and out of the country have been canceled.
Poland has 11 cases of the virus.
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7 a.m.
Albania’s Health Ministry has reported the country’s first two infections from the COVID-19 coronavirus, a father and son who had returned from Florence in Italy.
After exhibiting symptoms they were hospitalized. Authorities are trying to find all their contacts.
Italy, the epicenter of Europe’s outbreak, on Sunday quarantined 16 million people in the country’s north in a bold move to try to contain the virus. Italy has 7,375 confirmed infections and 366 deaths of virus patients, one of the most severe outbreaks outside of China, where the virus first emerged late last year.
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7 a.m.
The state oil giant Saudi Aramco saw its shares drop by 10% as Riyadh’s stock market opened on Monday, halting trading.
The Tadawul market only allows stocks to fluctuate by 10% a day, meaning it halted traded as the market opened. The drop came as global oil prices suffered their worst losses since the start of the 1991 Gulf War.
Other Mideast markets fell as well as the new coronavirus has affected global energy prices and OPEC failed to make a production cut deal with Russia last week.
Boursa Kuwait shut down within 30 minutes of opening Monday as stocks again dropped by 10%, the third such emergency halt to trading in recent days.
Earlier Monday, coronavirus concerns led Saudi Arabia to cut off air and sea travel to and from nine countries: Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Italy, Kuwait, Lebanon, South Korea, Syria and the United Arab Emirates. That comes after the kingdom earlier closed off its land borders as well.
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7 a.m.
A special North Korean flight carrying presumably dozens of diplomats and other foreigners arrived in Russia’s Far East on Monday, as the North tightens a lockdown intended to fend off the coronavirus.
North Korea has not publicly confirmed a single case of the COVID-19 illness, but its state media have reported that thousands of people have been quarantined as part of strict prevention measures.
Seemingly dozens of passengers, most of them wearing face masks and some accompanied by children, lined up at Pyongyang International Airport. North Korean health workers wearing white protective suits scanned them for fevers.
It wasn’t immediately clear how many were flown out to Vladivostok in Russia. The North lifted a monthlong quarantine on foreign diplomats based in Pyongyang on March 2, allowing them to leave the country if needed.
Colin Crooks, the British ambassador to Pyongyang, tweeted, “Sad to say farewell this morning to colleagues from German Embassy and French Office #NorthKorea which are closing temporarily.” He said the British Embassy would remain open.
