Coronavirus live updates | Six African countries to receive mRNA vaccine technology

Hong Kong to postpone election amid COVID-19 surge

President Joe Biden said on Friday the U.S. national emergency declared in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic will be extended beyond March 1 due to the ongoing risk to public health posed by the coronavirus.

Biden said the deaths of more than 900,000 Americans from COVID-19 emphasized the need to respond to the pandemic with “the full capacity” of the federal government.

“There remains a need to continue this national emergency,” Biden said in a letter on Friday to the speaker of the House of Representatives and the president of the Senate.

The letter was released by the White House. — Reuters

The Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics Organizing Committee said on Saturday that no new COVID-19 cases were detected among games-related personnel on February 18. — Reuters

Police began arresting demonstrators and towing away vehicles Friday in Canada's besieged capital city, and a stream of trucks soon began leaving under the pressure, raising authorities' hopes for an end to the three-week protest against the country's COVID-19 restrictions.

The crackdown on the self-styled Freedom Convoy began in the morning, when hundreds of police, some in riot gear and some carrying automatic weapons, descended into the protest zone and began leading demonstrators away in handcuffs as holdout truckers blared their horns in protest. Police smashed through the door of at least one RV camper before hauling it away.