France is to mobilise 100,000 police and gendarmes on New Year’s Eve to break up parties and enforce a curfew imposed to combat coronavirus.

The extra security also aims at halting the torching of cars that often takes place on the final night of the year.

France has confirmed 2.6m Covid-19 cases, the fifth highest total in the world, and more than 64,000 deaths.

Like other European countries, France will see muted celebrations for New Year’s Eve amid the pandemic.

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin has ordered a visible security presence in city centres and flashpoint suburbs from 20:00, when the curfew begins.

In Paris half of the metro lines will be closed in the evening, while Mr Darmanin also asked for a wider public transport shutdown across the country to be considered.

Despite rising cases, and concerns over a new more contagious strain of the disease, a government spokesman said there was no need for local lockdowns for now. France has had two national lockdowns and bars, restaurants and cultural attractions will remain closed into January.

Fou Ts’ong, the first Chinese pianist to win global acclaim and success, has died aged 86 after contracting Covid-19.

Fou died on Monday in London, where he had been living since the 1950s.

His death was confirmed by Jianing Kong, a professor at the Royal College of Music and student of Fou’s.

Responding to the news on Tuesday, the renowned Chinese pianist Lang Lang described Fou as “a truly great pianist, and our spiritual beacon”.

Fou was born in China in 1934 to a family of China’s intellectual elite. He first heard western classical music at a young age when his father, the renowned translator Fu Lei, returned to China after several years living in France.

As a budding pianist, he studied with the founder and head of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, Italian conductor Mario Paci, who had been crucial in bringing western classical music to China.

Aged 19, Fou left China to continue his musical education in Europe, moving to then-Communist Poland to study in Warsaw. Two years later, he won awards and international recognition at the prestigious Chopin competition in the city.

In 1959, Fou moved to London and grew into an internationally acclaimed soloist, playing both in Europe and the United States, and performing in 1967 at the BBC’s First Night of the Proms.

In 1960 he had married Zamira Menuhin, the daughter of the renowned violinist Yehudi Menuhin. The couple had a son and divorced in 1969. Fou later married the Chinese pianist Patsy Toh and had another son.

While he was living in London, Fou’s parents were persecuted in Maoist China during the anti-intellectual Cultural Revolution. They took their own lives in 1966.

A landslide in a Norwegian village has buried homes under dark mud, injuring 10 people – one seriously – and leaving 11 missing.

Rescue workers are continuing to search for those missing, who include children, in the village of Gjerdrum, 25km (15 miles) north-east of the capital, Oslo.

About 900 people have so far been evacuated from the village.

Police said some people were feared to be trapped in mud and debris.

“We are quite certain that there are people in the affected area, but we don’t know if all 11 are there or if the number is smaller,” police spokesman Roger Pettersen told reporters.

The landslide began during the early hours of Wednesday, with residents calling emergency services and telling them that their houses were moving, police said.

On Wednesday afternoon two more houses collapsed into the crater formed by the landslide, while others remained perched precariously on its lip.

Prime Minister Erna Solberg said the situation was still so unstable that only rescues by helicopter could be carried out.

“There could be people trapped… but at the same time we can’t be sure because it is the New Year’s holiday, which means people could be elsewhere,” she told reporters.

Residents have been speaking to Norwegian media about what happened.

“There were two massive tremors that lasted for a long while and I assumed it was snow being cleared or something like that,” Oeystein Gjerdrum, 68, told broadcaster NRK.

“Then the power suddenly went out, and a neighbour came to the door and said we needed to evacuate, so I woke up my three grandchildren and told them to get dressed quickly.”

Large quantities of earth were continuing to move, Toril Hofshagen, the regional head of the Norwegian Water Resources and Energy Directorate (NVE), told reporters.

The local municipality warned that up to 1,500 people could need to leave the region because of concerns about the condition of the ground.

An NVE spokeswoman told AFP that the landslide was a so-called “quick clay slide” measuring about 300m by 700m (985ft by 2,300ft).

“This is the largest landslide in recent times in Norway, considering the number of houses involved and the number of evacuees,” Laila Hoivik said.

Quick clay is a kind of clay found in Norway and Sweden that can collapse and become fluid when it comes under stress.

However Ms Hoivik said further slides were unlikely.

Broadcaster NRK said heavy rainfall may have made the soil unstable.

Norway’s King Harald, 83, said that the incident had “made a deep impression on me and my family”.

“My thoughts are with everyone affected, the injured, those who lost their homes and are now living in fear and uncertainty of the full extent of the disaster,” he said in a statement released by the royal palace

The Oyo State Government has admonished the Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, Oyo State chapter to adhere strictly to the 12:00 AM to 4:00 AM curfew imposed by the federal government and conduct its cross-over services earlier, rather than the traditional midnight services on every 31st of December.

The technical team of the Oyo state Covid-19 task force gave the admonition on Tuesday while addressing newsmen on the outcome of a meeting held among the members of the Covid-19 task force at the state’s Emergency Operation Center, ‘Yemetu Ibadan.

While reading the communique of the state’s Covid-19 task force to the newsmen, the coordinator, Oyo State Isolation Centers, Professor Temitope Alonge, said the state government has banned street Carnivals in all the nooks and crannies of the state with immediate effect.

He added that the existing Nationwide curfew from 12 midnight to 4:00 AM will be reinforced, and advised worship centers, night-clubs, bars, and lounges to adhere strictly to the restriction, while event centers are reminded of the existing advisory on the recommend occupancy for events not exceeding 50% of capacity.

Also speaking, the state commissioner for health, Dr. Bashir Bello, and the clinical epidemiologist working with the state’s emergency operation center, Dr. Akindele Adebiyi, explained that Oyo state has recorded 90 cases within two weeks and cautioned residents of the state not to exploit the benevolence of government as younger ones have started to lose their lives as a result of complications from the dreaded virus.

The duo who noted that Orelope and Ibadan North local government areas have been identified as Covid hot spot maintained that necessary machinery has been put in motion to ensure that Covid-19 test results are released within 72 hours, while treatment of infected persons is guaranteed.

In his remarks, Professor of virology, David Olaleye, who confirmed the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, called on the Oyo state citizens to go for the Covid-19 test at 30 collection sites located in the state in a bid contain and curb the spread of the virus as the country battles the second wave of the pandemic.

A magnitude 6.4 earthquake has struck southern Croatia, with reports of many injuries and at least one death.

A 12-year-old girl was killed in Petrinja, the prime minister said as he visited the town.

The mayor said around half the town had been destroyed and people were being pulled from the rubble.

The earthquake could be felt in the Croatian capital Zagreb, in neighbouring Bosnia and Serbia, and as far away as Italy.

“We are pulling people from the cars, we don’t know if we have dead or injured,” Darinko Dumbovic, the mayor of Petrinja, told regional broadcaster N1.

“There is general panic, people are looking for their loved ones,” he added.

https://t.co/tEJ58O8eab https://twitter.com/IFRC_Europe/status/1343889908809814018?s=20

Pierre Cardin, the French designer whose famous name embossed myriad consumer products after his Space Age styles shot him into the fashion stratosphere in the 1960s, has died aged 98.

Cardin was born on 7 July 1922 in a small town near Venice, Italy, to a modest, working-class family. When he was a child, the family moved to Saint-Étienne in central France, where Cardin was schooled and became an apprentice to a tailor at age 14.

Cardin would later embrace his status as a self-made man, saying in the same 1970 interview that going it alone “makes you see life in a much more real way and forces you to take decision and to be courageous”.

“It’s much more difficult to enter a dark woods alone than when you already know the way through,” he added.

After moving to Paris, he worked as an assistant in the House of Paquin starting in 1945 and also helped design costumes for the likes of Jean Cocteau. He also was involved in creating the costumes for the director’s 1946 film Beauty and the Beast.

After working briefly with Elsa Schiaparelli and Christian Dior, Cardin opened his own house

Cardin’s name was carried by thousands of products, from wristwatches to bed sheets, and in the brand’s heyday in the 1970s and 80s, goods bearing his fancy cursive signature were sold at 100,000 outlets worldwide.

That number dwindled dramatically in later years, as his products were increasingly regarded as cheaply made and his clothing, which, decades later, remained virtually unchanged from its 60s-era styles felt almost laughably dated.

A savvy businessman, Cardin used the fabulous wealth that was the fruit of his empire to snap up top-notch properties in Paris, including the Belle Epoque restaurant Maxim’s, which he also frequented.

The number of patients hospitalized across the US with Covid-19 is the highest it’s ever been — and at this rate health experts warn they may have to ration nurses, respirators and care.

“When you run out of capacity, physicians and bioethicists in these hospitals will need to decide which patients are salvageable — potentially salvageable — and which patients aren’t,” CNN medical analyst Dr. Jonathan Reiner explained.

The US reported 121,235 patients hospitalized with coronavirus Monday, the highest it has been since the start of the pandemic, according to the Covid Tracking Project. ICU coronavirus patients have increased from 16% in September to 40% last week, and health experts anticipate holiday travel could mean a “surge on top of a surge”

Follow us@naijapremiumgist

Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, France’s president from 1974 to 1981, has died at the age of 94.

He died of complications from coronavirus, surrounded by his family at his estate in central France.

A centre-right, pro-Europe politician, Giscard d’Estaing also liberalised laws on divorce, abortion and contraception during his seven years in power.

President Emmanuel Macron said his presidency had transformed France and his direction still guided its way.

“A servant of the state, a politician of progress and freedom, his death has plunged the French nation into mourning,” he said in a statement.

The late president’s family said his funeral would take place amid “strict intimacy”.

His career in politics

In later life, Giscard d’Estaing liked to portray himself as the grand old man of French politics.

As one of France’s youngest presidents – he was 48 when he came to power, he had a longer career in politics after he left high office than he had enjoyed on his way to the Élysée Palace.

He was seen by many as arrogant and aloof; his presidential popularity was short-lived and he was eventually squeezed out of office by a strengthening of opposition from both the left and the right.

He was also caught up in a scandal surrounding his support for a corrupt African dictator.

Valéry Marie René Georges Giscard d’Estaing was born on 2 February 1926 in Koblenz, in what was then French-occupied Germany.

His father was a civil servant who worked for the French occupying forces, while his mother was descended from King Louis XV of France via one of his mistresses.

Giscard d’Estaing’s education was disrupted by World War Two. He was just a teenager when he joined a French resistance group in occupied Paris before enlisting in a tank battalion in 1944, earning the Croix de Guerre in the last months of the war.

He worked for a while as a teacher in Montreal before graduating from the Ecole Nationale d’Administration and joining the tax and revenue service.

In 1955 he spent some time on the staff of prime minister Edgar Faure before winning the seat of Puy-de Dome in the National Assembly, the area from which his mother’s family came.

He became secretary of state for finances in 1959, a post he held for almost four years until his party broke with the ruling Gaullists with whom they were in a coalition. However, Giscard d’Estaing refused to leave the government and founded the Independent Republicans, which allied itself to the majority Gaullists.

He was sacked from the cabinet in 1966 but, as chairman of the National Assembly committee that scrutinised the country’s finances, he remained a powerful voice, latterly increasingly critical of the De Gaulle government.

Thrown out of his chairmanship by the Gaullists in 1968, he gained his revenge by supporting Georges Pompidou in the 1969 presidential elections, whereupon he was reappointed to the finance ministry.

When Pompidou died suddenly in 1974, Giscard d’Estaing announced he would run for the Élysée Palace, presenting himself as a modern and moderate alternative to the austere conservatism of Gaullism.

Death sentences

He successfully gained the support of the centre while, at the same time, taking advantage of divisions among the Gaullists, some of whom – notably Jacques Chirac – announced their support for Giscard d’Estaing as the only hope of defeating the left.

Giscard d’Estaing narrowly defeated the socialist François Mitterrand in the second round of voting with just 50.7% of the poll, becoming the third youngest president in French history.

After years of Gaullist stagnation, he made his intentions plain: “You want a deep political, a deep economic and a deep social change. You will not be disappointed,” he said.

At home, he made several reforms early on in his term in office. The voting age was lowered from 21 to 18, while divorce and abortion laws were relaxed, in spite of fierce opposition from the Catholic Church.

He also saw through laws on equal pay and opportunities for women, reduced the retirement age to 60 and allowed Paris to elect its own mayor.

Although he voiced his opposition to the death penalty, he refused to commute three of the death sentences passed during his term, and the last use of the guillotine in France took place in 1977.

A fan of technology, Giscard d’Estaing was a strong advocate of the French high-speed train network, the TGV, construction of which began in earnest in 1976.

He was also an enthusiastic supporter of the drive to increase France’s dependence on nuclear power, following the oil crisis of 1973.

Other programmes

Giscard d’Estaing was committed to the European ideal and developed a close relationship with Germany’s Chancellor Helmut Schmidt. Together they turned their dream of a more integrated Europe into reality.

His main contribution was the formation of the European Council in 1974 – bringing together the heads of states of all member countries – which, in 1979, pushed forward a European monetary system.

However, his domestic reforms worried his more conservative political allies, with Jacques Chirac resigning as prime minister in 1976. His successor, Raymond Barre, introduced a programme of austerity and unemployment began to rise.

The right won a majority in the 1978 coalition elections and Giscard d’Estaing responded by founding the Union for French Democracy (UDF).

Giscard d’Estaing’s popularity began to wane. His standing was not enhanced after he was accused of accepting a gift of diamonds from the self-styled Emperor of the Central African Republic, Jean-Bedel Bokassa.

Bokassa’s brutal dictatorial regime had received a great deal of support from the French government, with Giscard D’Estaing declaring in 1975 that he was a “friend and family member” of Bokassa.

France played a major part in Bokassa’s lavish coronation ceremony in 1977, which cost more than the annual gross domestic product of the impoverished country.

In 1979, the French satirical magazine, Le Canard enchaîné, alleged that Giscard d’Estaing had received the diamonds in 1973, when he was finance minister.

His initial explanation that he had sold them and given the proceeds to a number of charities was undermined when one of the alleged recipients, the Red Cross, denied having received any funds.

Giscard d’Estaing lost the 1981 presidential election to Francois Mitterrand. He defeated Jacques Chirac in the first round of voting, but Chirac’s failure to call on his supporters to support Giscard d’Estaing in the second round widened the gulf between the former allies.

Subsequently, he based himself in his political heartland – the Auvergne region of central France – delivering regular pronouncements to newspapers and on television about the state of the nation.

His national standing sank so low that he became known as Monsieur Ex in Parisian political circles.

His hopes of becoming prime minister under Mitterrand in 1986 were dashed and he refused to support either right-wing candidate in the 1988 presidential elections.

Between 1989 and 1993, he served as a member of the European Parliament and seemed destined to end his days in political obscurity.

But, in 2002, he returned to the limelight when he was chosen to head up the convention tasked with drawing up a constitution for the European Union

His selection for the job was the result of intensive lobbying by French President Jacques Chirac, who is said to have insisted on it at the EU’s summit in the Belgian town of Laeken in December 2001.

Profound embarrassment

Many criticised the choice of a man in his late 70s for a job designed to bring the EU closer to the people, and especially the young.

There was also criticism over Giscard d’Estaing’s reported demands for a salary in excess of €20,000 per month, plus expenses. He is said to have asked for a luxury suite of rooms in a Brussels hotel for a year and for a handpicked private staff.

However, he denied that he was being greedy. “It is simply that things should be comfortable,” he told Le Monde newspaper.

In 2004, European heads of state signed a European Constitution that was based primarily on the work carried out by Giscard d’Estaing’s convention.

A year later, and to Giscard d’Estaing’s profound embarrassment, the constitution was roundly rejected by the French people. He later complained that “the rejection of the Constitutional treaty by voters in France was a mistake that should be corrected”.

In 2005, he and his brother purchased the castle of Estaing in the French district of Aveyron, which had previously been owned by Admiral d’Estaing. Giscard d’Estaing’s family had no direct connection with the deceased naval officer and there was much criticism that he was attempting to buy his way into the nobility.

In 2009, he published a novel about a relationship between a fictional French president and the fictional Princess of Cardiff. It led to speculation that it was based on a relationship between Giscard d’Estaing and Diana, Princess of Wales, although he eventually poured cold water on those suggestions.

Earlier this year, he was accused of groping a German reporter during a 2018 interview – charges he denied.

Valery Giscard d’Estaing was something of an enigma. Intellectually gifted, he lacked the common touch and never became popular with the French people.

His single-minded approach to greater European integration was not to everyone’s taste and his aloof nature meant he often fell out with his allies.

Bitterly disappointed that Britain decided to leave the European Union in 2016, he described it as a “backward step”. But the enthusiastic architect of European unity was, by now, in his nineties. He felt, he said, inclined to take the long view.

“We functioned without Britain during the first years of the European Union,” he said, with a Gallic shrug. “So we will rediscover a situation that we have already known.

President Cyril Ramaphosa has announced new tougher coronavirus restrictions, a day after South Africa recorded more than one million Covid-19 cases.

Indoor and outdoor gatherings will be banned, a curfew introduced from 21:00 to 06:00, and alcohol sales prohibited.

Mr Ramaphosa said the country was at an extremely dangerous point in the pandemic and action had to be taken.

Recently authorities confirmed a new, faster-spreading variant of the virus had been detected in South Africa.

Some hospitals and medical centres have reported a huge rise in admissions, putting a heavy strain on resources.

In a televised speech, Mr Ramaphosa said the new 501.V2 variant was now well established in South Africa, and the recent rise in cases was a “cause for great alarm”.

“We have simply let our guard down,” said the president.

He added that the new measures would come into effect at midnight on Monday (22:00 GMT) and last at least until 15 January.

He said gatherings excepts for funerals and a few other limited exceptions would be banned, no-one would be able to leave their homes between 21:00 and 6:00 without a permit, and all shops, bars and other venues would have to close by 20:00.

All alcohol sales would also be banned, and every individual who failed to wear a mask in public places would face possible fines or imprisonment, he added.

Spain is to set up a registry of people who refuse to be vaccinated against coronavirus and share it with other European Union nations, the health minister has said.

Salvador Illa said the list would not be made accessible to the public or to employers.

He said the way to defeat the virus was “to vaccinate all of us – the more the better”.

Spain has been one of the countries in Europe worst affected by the virus.

It is currently rolling out the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine which was approved for EU member states last week.

In an interview with La Sexta television on Monday, Mr Illa emphasised that vaccination would not be mandatory.

“What will be done is a registry, which will be shared with our European partners… of those people who have been offered it and have simply rejected it,” he said.

“It is not a document which will be made public and it will be done with the utmost respect for data protection.”

He added: “People who are offered a therapy that they refuse for any reason, it will be noted in the register… that there is no error in the system, not to have given this person the possibility of being vaccinated.”

According to a recent poll, the number of Spanish citizens who have said they will not take the vaccine has fallen to 28% from 47% in November.

In other comments on Monday, Mr Illa said people would be contacted by regional authorities when it was their turn to be inoculated.

“People who decide not to get vaccinated, which we think is a mistake, are within their rights,” he told reporters. “We are going to try to solve doubts. Getting vaccinated saves lives, it is the way out of this pandemic.”

The number of people who have died from Covid-19 in Spain rose above the 50,000 mark on Monday. The country has registered more than 1.8 million infections during the pandemic.

Spain is under a nationwide curfew, between 23:00 and 06:00, until early May. In many places, people are only allowed out in that period to go to work, buy medicine, or to care for elderly people or children.

Regional leaders can modify curfew times and can also close regional borders for travel.

Agencies critical to US security have suffered “enormous damage” at the hands of the Trump administration, US President-elect Joe Biden has said.

Mr Biden said his team was not getting the information it needed, including from the Department of Defense, as it makes its transition to power.

He spoke after a briefing by national security and foreign policy aides.

Mr Biden takes office on 20 January but President Donald Trump has refused to accept defeat in November’s election.

For weeks after the 3 November election, Mr Biden was blocked from receiving key intelligence briefings, an essential and normally routine part of a presidential transition.

Following Mr Biden’s remarks on Monday, Acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller said officials had been “working with the utmost professionalism to support transition activities”.

“The Department of Defense has conducted 164 interviews with over 400 officials and provided over 5,000 pages of documents – far more than initially requested by Biden’s transition team,” he said.

A spokesman said the Pentagon had been “completely transparent” with the Biden team.

In a speech following a video conference call with advisers which he posted on Twitter, Mr Biden said his team was facing “roadblocks” in the Department of Defense and the Office of Management and Budget.

“Right now, we just aren’t getting all the information that we need from the outgoing administration in key national security areas,” he said.

“It is nothing short, in my view, of irresponsibility.”

The president-elect added that his team needed a “clear picture of our force posture around the world” and that US adversaries could exploit any confusion that resulted.

He said: “Many of the agencies that are critical to our security have incurred enormous damage.

“Many of them have been hollowed out in personnel, capacity and in morale. The policy processes have atrophied or have been sidelined.”

Mr Trump sacked his Defence Secretary Mark Esper shortly after the election, apparently over Mr Esper’s disagreement with his call to deploy the military against anti-racism protesters.

Mr Trump’s subsequent installation of loyalists in the department was viewed with concern by political opponents, who saw it as an attempt to sow chaos in the final weeks of his administration

England’s “very high” Covid infection level is a “growing concern” as the NHS struggles to cope with rising patient numbers, a health official has said.

Today Monday, a further 41,385 Covid cases and 357 deaths were reported in the UK.

Some data for Scotland and Northern Ireland is not being released over the Christmas period.

Dr Yvonne Doyle, medical director at Public Health England, said: “Despite unprecedented levels of infection, there is hope on the horizon.”

She urged members of the public to “continue to play our part in stopping the spread of the virus” as the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccine is rolled out.

“This very high level of infection is of growing concern at a time when our hospitals are at their most vulnerable, with new admissions rising in many regions,” Dr Doyle said in a statement.

Monday’s figure for new cases is the highest daily number reported by the UK government, and the first time the daily total has surpassed 40,000.

However, it is thought the infection rate was much higher during the first peak in April – but testing capacity was too limited to detect the true number.