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DUBAI / WAM The Ministry of Community Development (MoCD) has launched four interactive channels under a new initiative named ‘Taaluf’ to provide family counselling for free to all UAE community members. In a statement, the Ministry said that the launch of the counselling initiative aims to mitigate the psychosocial and mental health impacts of Covid-19 on individuals during home quarantines ...

Bloomberg China’s leaders normally spend a lot of time and money on keeping the country’s 1.4 billion people in line — and that was before a global pandemic ravaging the world economy threatened to put millions out of work. A rare street clash over the weekend on the border of virus-stricken Hubei province shows the challenges president Xi Jinping faces ...

Bloomberg Chinese manufacturing activity rebounded strongly in March, signalling that the world’s second-largest economy is restarting just as it faces a growing threat from slumping external demand. For manufacturing, the official purchasing managers’ index rose to 52.0 this month, according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on Tuesday. That’s up from a record low of 35.7 ...

Bloomberg Indian Railways, the world’s fourth-biggest network, is converting at least 5,000 coaches into isolation wards amid fears the world’s most populous country after China may not have adequate infrastructure to deal with the pandemic. Mosquito nets and charging points for mobile phones and laptops have been fitted, and space has been created for paramedics, Indian Railways said in a ...

Bloomberg Economic sentiment in the euro area plunged the most on record after the furious spread of the coronavirus forced businesses in vast parts of the region shut and prospects dwindled that life will return to normal any time soon. The European Commission reading — following similarly downbeat reports out of the region’s biggest economies — comes at the end ...

Bloomberg Before the coronavirus pandemic besieged Europe, Kike Sarasola worried about whether he was building enough hotels to capitalise on the region’s long-running tourism boom. Such concerns have disappeared, along with the tourists. The only guests at three of his six boutique hotels in Madrid are doctors and nurses fighting the deadly disease. The transformation of Sarasola’s Room Mate Laura ...

Bloomberg Bulgaria’s plan to join the euro area hit a road block, with the central bank saying the coronavirus crisis had rendered targets to integrate deeper this year “unrealistic.” It’s the latest setback in efforts of the bloc’s poorest member to join both the ERM-2, known as the waiting room for the euro area, and the euro-area’s banking union by ...

DUBAI / WAM Smart Dubai has launched the ‘Dubai Registers’ initiative to build a network of accurate, reliable, and interconnected data registries for a sustainable and happy city. The project is part of the Government Development track — one of six development tracks announced by the Dubai Council in early 2020, said a Smart Dubai press release on Monday. The ...

ABU DHABI / WAM PayBy, an innovative fintech company, has officially launched its mobile payment services in the UAE on Monday. In partnership with the First Abu Dhabi Bank (FAB) PayBy offers a secure payment solution that is superior to cash and payment cards. The new payment solution will allow consumers to use their smartphones to make contactless and cashless ...

Abu Dhabi / WAM The National Emergency Crisis and Disasters Management Authority (NCEMA), held a joint meeting with the Emirates Scientists Council, to discuss ways of employing scientific research to contain the spread of coronavirus (Covid-19). The meeting was attended by Sarah bint Yousif Al Amiri, Minister of State for Advanced Sciences and President of the Emirates Scientists Council, Saif ...