Since residents in the UAE have been staying indoors for almost 60 days now due to movement restrictions in the country in view of the COVID-19 pandemic, resulting in negligible exposure to sunlight, they could well suffer from Vitamin D deficiency, medical practitioners have warned.

Uttarakhand reported the worst daily increase in COVID-19 cases on Friday as 102 people tested positive for the virus, pushing the state's tally to 602, officials said. Dehradun district reported the maximum 55 followed by Almora (15), Bageshwar and Tehri (8 each), Udham Singh Nagar and Haridwar (four each), Nainital (3), Pauri and Rudraprayag (2 each) and Pithoragarh (1), a state health department bulletin said.

Twitter accused President Donald Trump on Friday of "glorifying violence", attaching a disclaimer to one of his tweets about unrest in Minneapolis that it said broke its rules.

Delhi's COVID-19 death tally has jumped by 82 in the last 24 hours, due to inclusion of 69 deaths that were reported late, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said on Friday. He said 13 deaths occurred on Friday while the remaining 69 took place in the last 34 days and were reported late.

Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd said on Friday that it received Indian regulatory approval to start clinical trials of pancreatitis drug nafamostat mesilate in COVID-19 patients.

Three Naxals were killed and two apprehended after a gunbattle with security forces in Jharkhand on Thursday, officials said. They said the encounter, followed by an ambush on a reinforcement party of the Central Reserve Police Force, took place in the Manmaru-Tebo area of West Singhbhum district.

Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Thursday asked the central government to unlock its coffers and help the needy affected by the coronavirus-induced lockdown.

An Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, UAV, launched by the terrorist Houthi militia against civilian targets in the Saudi city of Najran was successfully intercepted, Col Turki Al Maliki, the official spokesman of the Arab coalition supporting Yemen's legitimate government, said in statement carried today by Saudi Press Agency, SPA.

The US military withdrawal from Afghanistan is considerably ahead of schedule, an official told AFP on Wednesday, as President Donald Trump reiterated calls for the Pentagon to bring troops home. The developments came as questions loomed over the next phase of Afghanistan's long war following a historic, three-day ceasefire that led to a major drop in civilian casualties.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday asked the Centre to identify private hospitals where COVID-19 infected patients could get treatment for free or at a nominal cost.

NewDelhi, saw temperatures rise to 47.6C on Tuesday, as most of north India faced severe heatwave conditions. The heatwave, which officials say is likely to last until the weekend, comes even as the region struggles with rising Covid-19 infections and swarms of locusts that are ravaging crops.

The Embassy of India Abu Dhabi announced, in the wake of the travel restrictions due to the Covid-19 pandemic, that Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) cardholders will be granted extension time until December 31, 2020, to register for re-issuance of the privilege card. With the OCI card, people of Indian origin can travel visa-free to India from anywhere in the world.

A post by US President Donald Trump has been given a fact-check label by Twitter for the first time. President Trump tweeted, without providing evidence: "There is NO WAY (ZERO!) that Mail-In Ballots will be anything less than substantially fraudulent."

Google has set July 6 the date for its employees to return to office in a gradual, phased manner and has announced to give $1,000 to each of its workers globally for expenses on necessary equipment and office furniture as they work from home.

In India, Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Ltd said on Tuesday it will begin a new clinical trial to test a combination of two anti-viral drugs, favipiravir and umifenovir, as a potential COVID-19 treatment.

Uber Technologies Inc will cut around 600 jobs in India as part of its plans to cut 23% of its global workforce, as the company navigates a lockdown that has brought businesses in the country to a grinding halt.

The Central Industrial Security Force on Tuesday reported 20 fresh coronavirus cases, with 18 from its unit that guards the Delhi airport, officials said. As per news report of PTI, the force has a total of 78 active COVID-19 cases, while 132 personnel have recovered from the disease till now.

In India the death toll due to COVID-19 rose to 4,167, while the number of cases climbed to 1,45,380, registering an increase of 146 deaths and 6,535 cases since Monday 8 am,?the Union Health Ministry said. The number of active COVID-19 cases climbed to 80,722. As many as 60,490 people have recovered and one patient has migrated, it said.

Russia's coronavirus caseload exceeded 350,000 on Monday, with health officials reporting almost 9,000 new infections over the past 24 hours and 92 deaths, which brought the overall death toll to 3,633. The country's comparatively low mortality rate raises questions among experts both in Russia and in the West, with some suggesting the government may be manipulating the statistics and underreporting virus-related deaths.

Indian skies will open up for domestic passenger services from Monday after a gap of two months, with Delhi-Pune and Mumbai-Patna flights being among the first to take off, aviation industry sources said. All scheduled commercial passenger flights have been suspended since March 25 when the government imposed a nationwide lockdown to curb the coronavirus pandemic.