Europe

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - Returning to a fully functioning internal market in the European Union would do more to help economic recovery than a mooted recovery fund, Swedish Finance Minister Magdalana Andersson said on Tuesday.

“Any step we take forward has to be combined with a fully functioning internal market for all goods,” she told reporters.

Andersson said Sweden supported an EU role in supporting economic growth but that the 500 billion euros ($548 billion)suggested by France and Germany was “very high” and needed to be discussed.

LONDON (Reuters) - The British government has awarded more than 32 billion pounds ($39 billion) in loans and guarantees to businesses to see them through the coronavirus pandemic, finance minister Rishi Sunak said on Tuesday.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union is willing to drop its current “maximalist” approach on fisheries in negotiations with Britain next week, sources said, in what would be the first major concession from the bloc in talks on their ties after Brexit.

The EU has so far demanded to keep the status quo, in which fishing mostly takes place in UK waters but most of the catch goes to the bloc’s fishermen.

Britain has said it would become an independent coastal state after Brexit materialises in practice from next year, and wants to be in control of its waters and fish.

MOSCOW, May 25 (Xinhua) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday held a phone conversation with Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, to discuss stabilizing the global oil market and the situation in Syria, the Kremlin said in a statement.

Putin and al-Kadhimi gave a positive assessment to the agreements on oil output cuts reached with the participation of Russia and Iraq in the OPEC+ format, which are aimed at overcoming the acute phase of the oil crisis, the statement said.

GENEVA (AP) — The World Health Organization said Monday that it will temporarily drop hydroxychloroquine — the anti-malarial drug U.S. President Trump says he is taking — from its global study into experimental COVID-19 treatments, saying that its experts need to review all available evidence to date.

LONDON (AP) — British leader Boris Johnson’s powerful chief aide insisted Monday that he wouldn’t resign for driving the length of England while the country was under strict lockdown — a trip he made without informing the prime minister first.

The government is facing a tide of anger from politicians and the public over the revelation that Dominic Cummings traveled more than 250 miles (400 kilometers) from London to his parents’ home in Durham, northeast England at the end of March.

MOSCOW, May 25. /TASS/: There are no plans to introduce exit visas for citizens traveling abroad, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told the Komsomolskaya Pravda radio station on Monday.

"Despite numerous rumors and fake news stories, there are no plans to introduce restrictions such as exit visas. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov made a special statement on the matter," she pointed out.

MOSCOW, May 25. /TASS/: Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov has told TASS that he was discharged from a hospital where he was receiving treatment after testing positive for coronavirus.

"[I] was discharged from hospital. For now, I will be in quarantine," he said.

Peskov added that he is planning to slowly get back to work. "I will gradually start working from home," he clarified.

MOSCOW, May 25. /TASS/: The coronavirus situation in Russia is stabilizing, Anna Popova, chief of Russia’s sanitary watchdog, said on Monday.

"The epidemic situation in Russia is stabilizing. This is an obvious fact. The daily tally of newly confirmed cases is decreasing," she told a briefing on the prospects for the revival of the country’s travel sector.

She stressed that the Russian authorities are taking all possible measures to protect people’s health.

MOSCOW, May 25. /TASS/: Nearly 1,000 staff of the Federal Penitentiary Service and 238 inmates have contracted the coronavirus, the Russian prison authority’s press service told TASS on Monday.

"To date, the number of confirmed cases of disease caused by COVID-19 among suspects, defendants and convicts stands at 238, and there are 980 cases among staff and workers of the service," the press service said.