
United Nations chief Antonio Guterres urged governments to use their economic responses to the coronavirus pandemic to tackle the even deeper emergency of climate change, in a message for the 50th anniversary of Earth Day.

Mussels are the first-ever invasive species to take up residence in Antarctica, as found by a new study published last month in Scientific Report. According to the study, scientists found a colony of mussels, most likely transported accidentally to the frozen continent from Patagonia via ship, some 75 miles north of the Antarctic Peninsula.

The last cruise of “Greg Mortimer” when it left Ushuaia on March 15th was an invitation to disaster, and now “we are asking for a humanitarian corridor to take us, as they did with passengers, to our home countries”, said Mauricio Usme, chief medical officer on board the Aurora Expeditions vessel.

US President Donald Trump said on Monday he will sign an executive order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States. “In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States”, Trump said in a tweet late on Monday.

The Falkland Islands Executive Council last Friday agreed in principle that construction activity on the Islands can resume this Wednesday, 22 April. However, Chief Executive Barry Rowland said the final decision would be subject to COVID-19 test swab results from the United Kingdom expected to be received this Tuesday 21 April.

The World Health Organization, WHO, on Monday said that it sounded the alarm on COVID-19 right from the start and had hidden nothing from Washington about the deadly pandemic.

Facebook Inc said on Monday that it has removed events in Nebraska, New Jersey and California promoting protests against stay-at-home measures amid the COVID-19 pandemic caused by the new coronavirus.

Hundreds of passengers from an Italian cruise ship disembarked in Barcelona on Monday after five weeks without setting foot on land because of coronavirus restrictions. Since the ship left the northern Italian city of Venice on Jan 5 for a round-the-world tour, no coronavirus case has been found onboard.

Germany and other parts of Europe took tentative steps to ease lockdown measures on Monday but officials warned the battle against the coronavirus pandemic was far from over. Some shops reopened in Germany and parents dropped their children off at nurseries in Norway as tight restrictions in place for weeks were lifted in parts of the continent.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday urged China to be as transparent as possible about the coronavirus outbreak, as Beijing faces mounting pressure over its management of the crisis.