Europe

LONDON (Reuters) - Oil prices fell for the third session on Wednesday with U.S. crude futures tumbling to an 18-year low as travel and social lockdowns sparked by the coronavirus epidemic knocked the outlook for demand.

U.S. crude Clc1 was down $2.51 cents, or over 9%, at $24.44 per barrel by 1219 GMT, having earlier fallen to $24.42, its lowest since mid-2002.

The last time oil was trading that low, China had only begun its rise as a major global economic power that propelled the world’s oil consumption to record highs in subsequent years.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Russian media have deployed a “significant disinformation campaign” against the West to worsen the impact of the coronavirus, generate panic and sow distrust, according to a European Union document seen by Reuters.

Pushing fake news online in English, Spanish, Italian, German and French, the Russian campaign uses contradictory, confusing and malicious reports to make it harder for the EU to communicate its response to the pandemic, the report said.

The Kremlin denied the allegations on Wednesday, saying they were unfounded and lacked common sense.

ZURICH, March 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Switzerland’s health care system could collapse by the end of the month if the new coronavirus keeps spreading at current rates, a government official warned.

Swiss authorities estimated that 2,650 people had tested positive for the coronavirus and said 19 people had died, while predicting cases will likely soar in the weeks ahead.

DUBLIN, March 18 (NNN-Xinhua) — Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar called on the public to be fully prepared for a prolonged impact of the coronavirus outbreak in the country and promised that his government will do whatever it requires to do in the battle against the disease.

In a national televised speech, Varadkar said Ireland is “in the midst of a global and national emergency — a pandemic, the likes of which none of us has seen before.”

ROME, March 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Italy will rush 10,000 student doctors into service, scrapping their final exams, in an effort to help the struggling health service cope with the coronavirus which claimed another 345 lives.

The death toll rose to 2,503 over the past 24 hours, the Civil Protection Agency said, while the total number of confirmed cases increased to 31,506 from a previous 27,980 – the largest number outside China.

DUBLIN, March 17 (Xinhua) -- Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar Tuesday called on the public to be fully prepared for a prolonged impact of the coronavirus outbreak in the country and promised that his government will do whatever it requires to do in the battle against the disease.

In a national televised speech, Varadkar said Ireland is "in the midst of a global and national emergency -- a pandemic, the likes of which none of us has seen before."

Berlin, Mar 16 (AFP/PTI) The German government has promised to defend itself against alleged attempts by US president Donald Trump to buy exclusive rights to a German company's research into a vaccine against the coronavirus.

"Germany is not for sale," economy minister Peter Altmaier told broadcaster ARD, reacting to a front page report in Welt am Sonntag newspaper headlined "Trump vs Berlin".

MOSCOW, March 17. /TASS/: The Kremlin can understand the emotions of Belarusian authorities but refutes Minsk’s criticism of Moscow’s decision to close the Russian-Belarusian border amid the coronavirus spread as unfair, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday.

MOSCOW, March 17. /TASS/: Moscow has not received offers to conduct the G20 summit on coronavirus counteraction without personal presence yet, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday.

"I don’t know if something came through diplomatic channels, but we have not received any detailed information yet, we have only seen media reports," the spokesperson said.

MOSCOW, March 17. /TASS/: More than 2,000 artillerymen from Russia’s Southern Military District, located at the North Caucasus, have conducted a massive military exercise at Krasnodar Region foothills, using the recently shipped Msta-S self-propelled howitzers, the District press service told TASS.