South Korea reports 1,030 coronavirus cases, second daily record

Women walk on an empty street affected by heightened social distancing rules amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in Seoul
Women walk on an empty street affected by heightened social distancing rules amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in Seoul
By Cynthia Kim

By Cynthia Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea reported 1,030 new coronavirus infections on Sunday, the second daily record in a row as a country that had initial success controlling COVID-19 now battles a harsh third wave.

Of the new cases, 1,002 were locally transmitted. It brings the total to 42,766 infections with 580 deaths, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency said.

Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun on Saturday said further tightening social distancing restriction to the nation's highest level would be inevitable if the spread continues, which would be practically a lockdown for the first time in Asia's fourth-largest economy.

South Korea was praised for its earlier success in containing the virus without a lockdown by relying heavily on contact-tracing and testing since the country's first case was confirmed in January.

On Saturday, South Korea reported 950 new infections, prompting President Moon Jae-in to order the mobilisation of police, military personnel and public medical doctors to block the spread, which he called an "emergency."

Greater Seoul is under level 2.5 restrictions. Raising that to 3, the highest of the five levels, would require schools to switch to remote learning, allow only essential workers in offices and ban gatherings of more than 10 people.

(Reporting by Cynthia Kim; Editing by Daniel Wallis and William Mallard)

Latest Stories

  • Ted Cruz says Senate will likely blockade Biden's nominations based on debunked election fraud allegations

    Some Republican senators are using their unfounded election fraud claims as an excuse to muddy President-elect Joe Biden's transition.Biden has spent the past few weeks since the election filling out his Cabinet, hoping quick confirmations will help him get a quick start on reversing President Trump's policies. But "as long as there's litigation ongoing, and the election result is disputed, I do not think you will see the Senate act to confirm any nominee," Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) told Axios.The Senate typically starts hearing from an incoming president's Cabinet nominees before Inauguration Day, allowing them to more quickly be confirmed and start work as soon as a new president is sworn in and can formally nominate them. That's especially essential during a pandemic — something retiring Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) noted to Axios on Friday.But much of the Republican Senate and House have yet to acknowledge Biden's win. More than 100 of those congressmembers joined Texas' lawsuit Thursday aimed at overturning the election results in four states that went for Biden. The lawsuit alleges Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin improperly changed voting rules in the 2020 election, but is unlikely to succeed in the Supreme Court, not least because several states included on the suit made similar changes by the same means.Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) meanwhile wants a chance to challenge Biden's nominees on their credentials, particularly his controversial Defense Secretary pick retired Gen. Lloyd Austin.More stories from theweek.com The Constitution has an answer for seditious members of Congress Prominent GOP donor urges Republican senators to confirm Biden's DHS pick 5 scathing cartoons about Congress' stimulus gridlock

  • Authorities in Tennessee, Kentucky look for escaped inmates

    Authorities searched Saturday for two Tennessee inmates who escaped prison, kidnapped a Kentucky highway department employee and stole a resident's truck, officials said. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation said Robert Brown and Christopher Osteen escaped Friday morning from Northwest Correctional Complex in Lake County, Tennessee. Brown is serving an 18-year sentence for aggravated rape and Osteen is serving an eight-year sentence for burglary, authorities said.

  • Vaccine refusal in Brazil grows to 22%, most reject Chinese shot: poll

    The share of Brazilians unwilling to take any COVID-19 vaccine grew to 22% this week, from 9% in August, and most said they would not accept one made in China, a new poll showed on Saturday, as President Jair Bolsonaro’s comments stoked wider skepticism. The survey by pollster Datafolha found 73% of respondents plan to take a shot and 5% do not know if they will, compared to 89% and 3%, respectively, in August. Late last month, Bolsonaro said he would not take any coronavirus vaccine that becomes available.

  • DoorDash driver fired after confronting customer for allegedly lying about receiving delivery

    A DoorDash driver has lost her job after a video of her confronting a customer went viral on Reddit. The driver accused the customer of lying about not receiving their delivery. According to the Daily Dot, the incident took place at a CVS Pharmacy in Garner, North Carolina.

  • Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms reportedly went from Biden's VP list to being offered a Bahamas ambassadorship

    Talk about a demotion.Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms (D) played a big advocacy role in President-elect Joe Biden's 2020 bid, no doubt helping him lock up the typically red state of Georgia. Bottoms was expected to be offered a White House role in return, perhaps as the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development or the head of the Small Business Administration, or even Biden's vice president.After the naming of Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) as Biden's running mate over the summer, and after Biden slotted Rep. Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio) into the HUD spot, Bottoms' choices seemed to be slimming. But as sources tell The New Yorker's Charles Bethea, Bottoms was offered a role as the U.S. ambassador to the Bahamas, which she declined.> Mayor Bottoms' Press Secretary did not immediately offer comment when reached this morning. gapol (2/2)> > — Charles Bethea (@charlesbethea) December 11, 2020An ambassadorship to the Bahamas is typically given to apolitical Foreign Service professionals or, in some cases, top political donors. In either case, it's generally not considered a spot for a rising star in the Democratic party.More stories from theweek.com The Constitution has an answer for seditious members of Congress Prominent GOP donor urges Republican senators to confirm Biden's DHS pick 5 scathing cartoons about Congress' stimulus gridlock

  • GOP Congressman-elect calls the coronavirus pandemic 'phony' while rallying with Trump supporters in DC

    "It's a serious virus, but it's a virus," Bob Good said to a cheering crowd. "It's not a pandemic. Thank you for saying no to the insanity."

  • US schedules first federal execution of woman since 1953

    Lisa Montgomery is due to become the first woman to face federal execution in the US in 67 years.

  • First woman detained under India's controversial Love Jihad laws 'forced into miscarriage'

    The first woman detained under India's controversial new 'Love Jihad' laws has miscarried in custody, her family have told The Sunday Telegraph. Yesterday a distraught Muskan Jahan, 22, called her mother-in-law, from a government shelter where she is being held in the city of Moradabad in Uttar Pradesh, saying she had bled profusely and then lost her baby. Mrs Jahan believes her three-month-pregnant daughter-in-law was given an injection to abort the baby by staff because she converted from Hinduism to Islam and married a Muslim man. “The tyrannical world has said goodbye to this child before he was able to see the world,” said Mrs Jahan. Muskan's husband Rashid, 27, is being held in an unknown prison in Uttar Pradesh for allegedly coercing Muskan into converting from Hinduism to Islam by marrying her. Uttar Pradesh passed legislation last month designed to prevent marriages arranged to convert Hindu women into Muslims, a practice known as 'Love Jihad'. But critics say the law is a poorly disguised attempt by the Hindu nationalist ruling party of prime minister Narendra Modi to break up interfaith unions.

  • Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez calls Joe Biden's agenda 'a little hazy' and criticizes his Cabinet picks as lacking an 'overall vision'

    Joe Biden has promised to build the "most diverse cabinet based on race, color, based on gender that's ever existed in the United States of America."

  • Jury: Black bikers' race was a factor, but city won't pay

    The city of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, was motivated by race when it created a traffic plan designed to “suck the fun” out of Black Bike Week, a federal jury has found. Civil rights groups accused the city of racially discriminating against the Black tourists by treating them differently than white bikers who attend Harley Week earlier each May, and who are responsible for many of the same public nuisances, from binge drinking to noise complaints. The Black bikers have been particularly frustrated by a 23-mile (37-kilometer) one-way no-exit traffic chute that funnels them out of town during the peak nights of Atlantic Beach Bikefest, otherwise known as Black Bike Week.

  • Former Hong Kong lawmaker urges U.S. to punish China's 'ATM': the banking sector

    The United States should target Hong Kong's financial sector with tougher sanctions to deprive China from its 'ATM' and to force Beijing to the negotiating table over its crackdown on the Asian financial hub, a former Hong Kong lawmaker told Reuters. Sixtus "Baggio" Leung said he hopes to meet with advisers of President-elect Joe Biden to urge him to ramp up pressure on China, which tightened its grip over the former British colony with the imposition of new national security laws in June. "There's a stronger way to respond to China's repression: Hong Kong financial system, which is one of the ATMs of China right now - if we can do something on this, it will be much more powerful," he said in Washington, after fleeing to seek asylum in the United States last month.

  • Prominent GOP donor urges Republican senators to confirm Biden's DHS pick

    President-elect Joe Biden's transition team doesn't seem too worried about homeland security nominee Alejandro Mayorkas' chances of getting confirmed by the Senate, noting that the choice has received an "overwhelmingly positive reaction," but there does appear to be some skepticism among Republican lawmakers, The Associated Press reports.Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), for instance, told AP that Mayorkas' "brand of leadership isn't good for agency culture or the security of our nation." He was specifically referring to the findings of a 2015 report from the Office of Inspector General which concluded Mayorkas "created an appearance of favoritism and special access at Citizenship and Immigration Services when he was director from 2009 to 2013," per AP.Still, even if there are holdouts, Biden will likely only need a handful of Republican senators to back Mayorkas, and prominent GOP donor John Rowe told AP he plans to push the party to confirm. "This is an easy vote," Rowe, the former CEO of Exelon Corporation, said. "Some of the other immigration votes are not that easy for Republicans who have to go home to primaries. No one is going to lose their seat because they vote to confirm Mayorkas." Read more at The Associated Press.More stories from theweek.com The Constitution has an answer for seditious members of Congress 5 scathing cartoons about Congress' stimulus gridlock 7 criminally funny cartoons about Trump's potential pardon spree

  • Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez ripped into GOP Sen. Mike Lee after he blocked the creation of Latino and women's history museums during a dramatic Senate session

    Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez and GOP Sen. Susan Collins both pushed back against Lee, who said Americans didn't need "separate but equal" museums.

  • Driver arrested after plowing into New York City protesters, injuring 6

    A city official said this was one of several collisions where protesters gathered near vehicles, and drivers panicked and accidentally accelerated.

  • Pro-Trump protests decry president's election loss, opposing groups clash in Washington

    Conservative groups claiming without evidence that the Nov. 3 election was stolen from President Donald Trump staged protests across the country on Saturday, with one in Washington turning violent at times as police broke up sporadic clashes after dark. Organizers of Stop The Steal, linked to pro-Trump operative Roger Stone, and church groups urged supporters to participate in "Jericho Marches" and prayer rallies. But groups of pro-Trump "Proud Boys" protesters and "Antifa" counterprotesters brawled in downtown Washington on Saturday night.

  • Rudy Giuliani on Trump election fight: We have ‘1,000 affidavits from witnesses in 6 different states’

    President Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani provides insight into the strongest piece of evidence he will present for legal challenge.

  • Republican congressman rips Texas GOP for suggesting secession and says 'my guy Abraham Lincoln and the Union soldiers already told you no'

    Kinzinger said the Texas GOP chairman should be fired for suggesting some states should "form a Union of states that will abide by the constitution."

  • More Inside AD100 Designer Pierre Yovanovitch’s History-Rich Parisian Apartment

    In the hands of Pierre Yovanovitch, the Paris apartment that iconic designer Jean-Michel Frank once called home gets a spectacular new lease on lifeOriginally Appeared on Architectural Digest

  • 2 killed when helicopter crashes into field in West Texas

    Two men were killed when a helicopter crashed in a field in West Texas, authorities said. Mitchell County Sheriff Patrick Toombs said Friday night that the helicopter crashed Thursday about eight miles (13 kilometers) southwest of Colorado City, which is about 250 miles west of Dallas. Toombs said the pilot, Zane Whitesides, 31, and the passenger, Zack Pfeuffer, 32, were killed.

  • Police considering 'voluntary disappearance' in case of missing hiker Esther Dingley

    Authorities searching for a British woman who went missing while hiking in the Pyrenees are reportedly considering the possibility she has deliberately disappeared because her nomadic lifestyle was about to end. Esther Dingley and Dan Colegate had been travelling throughout Europe since 2014 and she was expected to return from a solo trek on December 2. The 37-year-old set out to hike from the Port de la Glere to the Port de Venasque, a trek which follows the border between France and Spain, according to local police. Captain Jean-Marc Bordinaro of France's Gendarmerie de Saint-Gaudens told The Times: "Esther Dingley wanted to continue with her current way of life, journeys in a camper van and sporting activities including hiking, whilst Daniel Colegate seems a little tired of this nomadic life." He added: "Did Esther Dingley want to go off on her own to live her life and organise her own disappearance? There is nothing enabling us to eliminate this working theory." A spokesman for missing persons charity LBT Global, which is assisting Mr Colegate, told The Times "there is absolutely no suggestion that (Ms Dingley) was seeking 'another life"'. Mr Colegate said in a Facebook post on December 1 that the "prevailing opinion" of authorities was Ms Dingley was not in the mountains following extensive searches. She is now listed as a national missing person in Spain and her case has been passed to "a specialised judicial unit in France", Mr Colegate added. "As things stand tonight, Esther is now listed as a national missing persons case in Spain and the case has been passed to a specialised judicial unit in France. "This means they will be looking at other options beyond a mountain accident." Mr Colegate said he was "very grateful" for the extensive efforts of rescue teams in Spain and France, which had utilised helicopters, dogs and a drone. "While this is a terrifying development in many ways, I'm trying to focus on the fact that it leaves the door open that Esther might still come home," he said in the post. "She was so utterly happy and joyful when we last spoke, I'd do anything to see her face and hold her right now." The couple, from Durham, started to travel after Mr Colegate had a serious health scare, and had been documenting their campervan adventures online. A Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office spokesman has previously said its staff were "supporting the family of a British woman reported missing in the Pyrenees and are in contact with the French and Spanish authorities".