In China, an outbreak of a newly identified viral respiratory disease had infected more than 17,000 people as of press time, 361 of whom had died. The virus is a coronavirus, in the same family as the agent that causes the disease called SARS, which killed more than 700 people, mostly in China, during 2002-2003. While there is some evidence that the virus can be transmitted by people who are asymptomatic, this has not yet been confirmed. **

Outside of China, 150 cases of the...

Thousands of people in Baghdad, Iraq, protested the presence of US troops in Iraq on Jan. 24, demanding that the US military leave the country. The protest occurred near the US Embassy in Baghdad’s central Green Zone. At press time, around 5,000 members of the US armed forces were stationed in Iraq.

The US military’s presence in Iraq has been controversial since Iranian general Qasem Soleimani along with ranking members of an Iraqi militia were killed in a US drone strike...

A series of avalanches and landslides in Pakistan-administered Kashmir killed at least 74 people, Jan. 12-14, and powerful snowstorms blocked rescue teams from reaching the hardest-hit areas, located in isolated mountain valleys.

A number of deaths caused by extreme weather were reported throughout the region during this time, including in Pakistan’s Balochistan Province, where 20 people were killed, in India’s Jammu and Kashmir province, where eight were killed, and in...