Europe

BEROUN, Czech Republic (Reuters) - Thousands of Czechs quarantining at home due to the COVID-19 pandemic were allowed to vote at drive-in polling stations on Wednesday in a regional and upper house election which comes amid a surge in infections in the country.

The Czech Republic’s spike in virus cases is the second largest in Europe this month when adjusted for population, with more than 40,000 cases in September bringing the total tally to 67,843 in the country of 10.7 million.

30 Sep 2020; MEMO: Forty Conservative party councillors have been reported to an Islamophobia inquiry by anti-racism campaigners, Hope not Hate, as part of a drive for evidence in the party-wide discrimination investigation launched late last year.

LONDON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump and Democratic rival Joe Biden battled over Trump’s record on the coronavirus pandemic, healthcare and the economy in a chaotic and bad-tempered first debate.

Here are some reactions from Europe:

“A chaotic and vicious show, shocking for the most powerful country in the world,” - Spanish newspaper El Pais.

PARIS (Reuters) - France’s top civil court on Wednesday ruled that Rwandan genocide suspect Felicien Kabuga can be handed over to a United Nations tribunal for trial, rejecting his lawyers’ arguments that he should face justice in France.

ROME (Reuters) - China’s Huawei is ready to be thoroughly examined to show that its technology does not pose any risk to the countries that will include its equipment in the creation of 5G networks, the head of its Italian unit said on Wednesday.

“We will open our insides, we are available to be vivisected to respond to all of this political pressure...,” President Luigi De Vecchis said at the opening ceremony of the group’s cyber-security centre in Rome.

The comments came on the same day that U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo began a two-day visit to Italy.

OSLO (Reuters) - Norway will allow most amateur team sports to resume in mid-October and permit larger crowds at matches, as the government looks to ease nationwide restrictions enforced to contain the coronavirus epidemic.

The changes will take effect on Oct. 12, Prime Minister Erna Solberg said on Wednesday, while warning that localised spikes in COVID-19 infections might require tighter restrictions on movement in some parts of the country.

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain’s parliamentary Speaker reprimanded Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government on Wednesday for disregarding the House of Commons with its COVID-19 measures, calling on ministers to better include lawmakers in their decisions.

But Lindsay Hoyle decided against allowing lawmakers the chance to consider a so-called amendment to a vote on the extension of emergency laws to impose restrictions that would have made sure parliament played a greater role.

ROME, Sept. 29 (Xinhua) -- Marking the International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste for the first time since its inception, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on Tuesday launched a call to action to tackle what it called "the big challenge of our time."

Despite the restrictive conditions due to the coronavirus pandemic, a comprehensive conference brought together officials and experts from the FAO, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), other UN agencies, and country representatives in a virtual debate.

LONDON, Sept. 29 (Xinhua) -- Another 7,143 people in Britain have tested positive for COVID-19, the highest daily total ever since the start of the pandemic in Britain, according to official figures released Tuesday.

The newly confirmed infections brought the total number of coronavirus cases in the country to 439,013, the official data showed.

The coronavirus-related deaths rose by 71 to 42,072, according to the latest data.

BRUSSELS (AP) — Almost 500 days after Belgian parliamentary elections, seven parties from both sides of the linguistic aisle agreed early Wednesday on forming a fully functioning majority government that will center on dealing with the pandemic and its devastating economic impact.