EUROPE

In a landmark verdict in one of the mining world's most high profile legal cases, a Swiss criminal court found Israeli businessman Beny Steinmetz guilty of corruption and forgery on Friday and sentenced him to five years in jail with a sizeable fine.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Friday the new English variant of COVID-19 may be associated with a higher level of mortality although he said evidence showed that both vaccines being used in the country are effective against it.

The World Health Organization said on Friday it had reached an agreement with Pfizer/BioNTech for 40 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine and should be able to start delivering vaccines to poor and lower-middle income countries next month under its COVAX programme.

Europe's COVID-19 vaccination drive was dealt another blow on Friday when AstraZeneca said initial deliveries to the region will fall short of the targeted volumes because of a production glitch.

There is evidence that people who tested positive for the so called 'UK variant' of COVID-19 have an increased risk, the UK's Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance said on Friday.

The COVID-19 variant identified in England last month could carry a higher risk of causing death although data is limited, according to one of the government's scientific advisory groups, ITV political editor Robert Peston said on Twitter on Friday.

Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats confirmed centrist Armin Laschet as their new party leader on Friday after a postal ballot, which was required to legally uphold his election by delegates in a digital vote on Saturday.

BioNTech is to supply 50 million specialty needles at no profit to countries struggling to extract a sixth dose from vials of its COVID-19 vaccine, while Europe's immunisation campaign is hampered by a temporary supply shortfall.

A German app developer has filed a complaint with European Union antitrust authorities against Google and Apple which he said last year rejected a game aimed at encouraging compliance with government COVID-19 rules.

U.S. President Joe Biden's decision to join the COVAX vaccine facility could make a "huge difference" to the financing of the scheme, intended to deliver coronavirus vaccines to poor countries, a diplomat with a lead role in COVAX said on Friday.

The White House's new national security chief on Thursday held introductory calls with officials from France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Japan, according to a National Security Council spokeswoman's statement released on Friday.

Denmark is registering a rise in infections with a more contagious coronavirus variant known as cluster B.1.1.7, first identified in Britain, despite seeing regular infections fall.

The European Commission will seek clarification from Pfizer over delays reported by EU countries for the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines next week, a spokesman for the EU executive said on Friday.

It is the end of January, so time for the Davos World Economic Forum (WEF), and Chinese President Xi Jinping, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and European Central Bank chief Christine Lagarde are among this year's big-name speakers.

The number of people testing positive for the coronavirus in England decreased slightly in the latest week but prevalence overall remained high, the UK's Office for National Statistics said on Friday.

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Economic activity in the euro zone shrank markedly in January as stringent lockdowns to contain the coronavirus pandemic hit the bloc's dominant service industry hard.

Amazon will raise fees for Spanish companies using its platform by 3% from April after the government imposed a digital tax, a company document seen by Reuters showed.

Russian pipe-laying and other vessels are heading to Nord Stream 2 pipeline construction sites in the Baltic Sea, ship tracking data showed on Friday, amid U.S. pressure to scrap the project that aims to pump more Russian gas to Europe.