Briefly

AUSTRALIA

Victoria on alert as new variant detected

Australia's Victoria state authorities said on Friday they had detected the highly infectious Delta COVID-19 virus variant for the first time in the latest outbreak in Melbourne, stoking concerns of a major spike in cases. The Delta variant, which has been classified by the World Health Organization as among the four COVID-19 variants of concern due to evidence that they spread more easily, likely caused the latest devastating outbreak in India. "It is a variant of significant concern," Victoria state Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton told reporters in Melbourne.

South Korea

Air force chief resigns over woman's death

South Korea's air force chief resigned on Friday, apologizing and taking responsibility for the death of a member of the force who took her own life, according to her family, after being sexually harassed by a colleague. Lee Seong-yong offered to step down a day after an air force master sergeant was arrested on charges of molesting and injuring a female colleague of the same rank in March. The family of the victim said she had suffered mental distress and persistent bullying, and accused the air force of trying to cover up the assault and silence her over the past two months. President Moon Jae-in immediately accepted Lee's resignation, his press secretary said, making him the shortest serving air force chief after appointing him in September.

IRAN

Huge refinery fire near Teheran put out

A massive fire that broke out at an oil refinery near Iran's capital and sent a huge plume of black smoke into the sky over Teheran was extinguished on Thursday, after more than 20 hours, the semiofficial ISNA agency reported. Temperatures in Teheran reached nearly 40 C on Wednesday. Hot summer weather in Iran has caused fires in the past. The blaze came the same day a fire struck the largest warship in the Iranian navy, which later sank in the Gulf of Oman.

Agencies - Xinhua