German health officials have U-turned on the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine and recommended it is safe for use on over-65s.
The German health ministry said on Thursday that its independent vaccine committee has now formally approved the COVID-19 jab for use in that age group.
It comes after disproved claims in Europe that the jab was as little as 8% effective among the elderly.
Image:Several EU countries have restricted use of the AstraZeneca jab on the elderly
German health officials have also said that delaying the second dose of the Oxford jab by 12 weeks - as the UK is doing - increases its efficacy.
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Health minister Jens Spahn said the change in position is "good news for older people who are waiting for a vaccination", adding: "They will get vaccinated faster."
Germany had previously claimed that there was not enough reliable efficacy data to allow the AstraZeneca jab to be used on the over-65s.
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Other European countries, including Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden, followed, with French President Emmanuel Macron claiming it was "quasi-ineffective" on pensioners.
But this week, France U-turned on its decision and approved it for use on people aged between 65 and 74 with underlying health conditions.
Mr Macron said he would accept the vaccine himself and urged his German counterpart Angela Merkel to do the same.
There has been widespread criticism of the comparatively slow rollout of coronavirus vaccines within the EU, with many saying the bloc failed to secure adequate supplies.
Original claims by a German newspaper that the Oxford jab was less than 10% effective on the elderly have also been widely disproven.
Researchers in Bristol this week found that the AstraZeneca vaccine is 80.4% effective in preventing the over-80s being hospitalised with the virus.
Other studies have also suggested it is just as effective against the Kent variant in preventing severe disease.
EU President Ursula von der Leyen claimed the UK had compromised on safety by fast-tracking its authorisation, despite the EU regulator reaching the same conclusions on it as the UK's MHRA.
But with mounting research to the contrary, she appears to have changed position in recent weeks, telling German newspaper Augsburger Allgemeine: "I would take the AstraZeneca vaccine without a second thought, just like Moderna's and BioNTech-Pfizer's products."
The EU currently has three COVID vaccines approved for use: Oxford-AstraZeneca, Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.
Calls for diplomatic intervention in Myanmar have grown after the UN said the military had killed at least 38 people in the bloodiest day of violence since the overthrow of Aung San Suu Kyi’s civilian government last month.
In Yangon, the country’s largest city, security forces shot six people dead on Wednesday. Camera footage shared widely online showed police arresting three medical first responders and beating them with their guns.
In Mandalay, Myanmar’s second city, Kyal Sin, a 19-year-old woman known as “Angel”, died after being shot in the head.
The UK has requested a UN Security Council meeting on Myanmar on Friday.
“The systematic brutality of the military junta is once again on horrific display throughout Myanmar,” Tom Andrews, the UN’s special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar wrote on Twitter. “I urge members of the UN Security Council to view the photos/videos of the shocking violence being unleashed on peaceful protesters before meeting in Friday's close-door session.”
Ned Price, US state department spokesman, said Washington was “appalled and revulsed” by what he called “horrific violence”.
The increasing use of violence by senior General Min Aung Hlaing’s military regime has led his opponents to describe the protests as a “revolution” and many have abandoned hope that the international community will intervene.
“The outside world will just wait and see,” Thinzar Shunlei Yi, a protest leader and activist, told the Financial Times. “They forget injustice everywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
A former television youth presenter, she donned a hard-hat last month to join nationwide strikes and protests that have drawn hundreds of thousands and paralysed the country’s economy.
But as the regime has responded with intensifying crackdowns this week, the huge crowds have thinned and diplomatic efforts to de-escalate the conflict have accelerated.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which has a principle of “non-interference” in members’ affairs, held its first virtual meeting with a junta representative on Tuesday. Asean has yet to formally recognise the military regime as Myanmar’s official government and called on security forces to “exercise maximum restraint” and urged “communications and dialogue” in the country.
Indonesia, Singapore, the Philippines and Malaysia also called for Aung San Suu Kyi’s release.
Analysts, however, held little hope that the regional group could broker a solution.
“The problem for Asean is that Myanmar’s armed forces have brought the bar so low — without wiggle room — with their naked seizure of power after losing yet another election in a landslide,” said Thitinan Pongsudhirak, professor of political science at Thailand’s Chulalongkorn University, referring to a ballot in November. “The Myanmar junta puts up no pretence of popular legitimacy, only a raw power grab that has turned the entire population against it.”
The remnants of Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party have taken steps to form an interim government. Most of the party’s senior leadership were among the nearly 1,500 people arrested after the coup, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma), a human rights group.
The Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw named its first four acting “ministers” this week.
Kyaw Moe Tun, Myanmar’s permanent representative to the UN, was sacked by the junta after delivering a speech in which he urged the world to use “any means necessary” to reverse the coup. The regime named his deputy Tin Maung Naing as his replacement, but who represents the country in the international body is now in dispute.
Some protesters want the UN to invoke its Responsibility to Protect principle, meant to stop atrocities, which the Security Council invoked to authorise military intervention against Libya’s Muammer Gaddafi in 2011.
Most experts believed this was unlikely, and some in Myanmar have faulted the international community — particularly western governments — for using rhetoric that misleads protesters.
“They think intervention is on the table now, and it clearly isn’t,” said Aye Min Thant, 28, a Yangon-based former Reuters journalist. “There is no world in which the UN or anyone is sending boots on the ground, and yet that’s what some people in Myanmar think.”
Eight people have been injured in a Swedish town after a stabbing attack police say could be terror-related.
A man in his 20s attacked people in the town of Vetlanda, about 210 miles south of the capital Stockholm, on Wednesday afternoon.
Aftonbladet said the weapon used was a knife but the Associated Press reported it was an axe.
Police said people had been stabbed in at least five locations in the town of roughly 13,000 people, and some of the victims were in a serious condition.
The attacker's motive was not clear but Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said terrorism was possible.
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He said: "In the light of what has emerged so far in the police investigation, prosecutors have initiated a preliminary investigation into terrorist crimes.
"We confront such heinous acts with the combined force of our society."
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Sweden's domestic security agency SAPO is also working on the case, he said, adding: "They continuously assess whether there are reasons to take security-enhancing measures and are prepared to do so if necessary."
Regional police chief Malena Grann said: "We have started a preliminary investigation of attempted murder but there are details in the investigation that make us investigate possible terror motives."
Asa Karlqvist owns a flower shop in the town and told local newspaper Vetlanda-Posten: "We heard a scream from the street.
"Then we saw a man enter the store, shouting that he had been stabbed.
"Blood was pouring from his shoulder, so we got towels and applied pressure on the wound."
Meanwhile, the attacker is in hospital after being shot by police before he was arrested.
Local police chief Jonas Lindell said "it seems that the injuries are not life-threatening" but he did not give further details.
Police have not identified the attacker publicly but said he was previously known to them for minor crimes.
There is no indication that others were involved in the attack, they added.
Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said a possible ‘terrorist’ motive was being investigated.
A man armed with an axe attacked and wounded eight people in a southern town in Sweden on Wednesday before being shot and arrested.
“We heard a scream from the street. Then we saw a man enter the store, shouting that he had been stabbed,” Asa Karlqvist, owner of a florist shop, told local newspaper Vetlanda-Posten.
“Blood was pouring from his shoulder so we got towels and applied pressure on the wound,” she said.
Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said a possible “terrorist” motive was being investigated.
“In the light of what has emerged so far in the police investigation, prosecutors have initiated a preliminary investigation into terrorist crimes,” he said.
Shortly after his statement, investigators at a police news conference said they started a preliminary investigation into attempted murder with details “that make us investigate any terrorist motives”.
“But at the moment I cannot go into details,” regional police chief Malena Grann said.
Police said the man in his 20s attacked people in the small town of Vetlanda, 190km (118 miles) southeast of Gothenburg, Sweden’s second-largest city. His motive was not immediately known.
The man was shot by police, who said the condition of those attacked and of the perpetrator was not immediately known. Officials did not provide details on the identity of the suspect, who was taken to hospital.
Local police chief Jonas Lindell said “it seems that the injuries are not life-threatening” but could not give further details.
The events took place in downtown Vetlanda with police saying they got calls just after 14:00 GMT about a man assaulting people with an axe. Police also said there are five crime scenes in this town of roughly 13,000.
Lofven condemned “this terrible act” and added Sweden’s domestic security agency SAPO was also working on the case.
”They continuously assess whether there are reasons to take security-enhancing measures and are prepared to do so if necessary,” he said in a statement.
Another 38 people have been killed in Myanmar as the military tries to quell demonstrations by pro-democracy campaigners against last month's coup, the United Nations said.
It was the bloodiest day since generals seized power on 1 February, with more than 50 people now dead and many others wounded, according to UN special envoy Christine Schraner Burgener.
A human rights group said the military had killed at least 18 on Wednesday but by the end of the day that number had risen sharply.
"It's horrific, it's a massacre. No words can describe the situation and our feelings," youth activist Thinzar Shunlei Yi told the Reuters news agency.
Image:Police stand on a road during an anti-coup protest in Mandalay, Myanmar
Image:Protesters cover with makeshift shields during an anti-coup protest in Mandalay
Four children were reportedly among the latest fatalities, including a 14-year-old boy who was shot dead by a soldier on a passing convoy of military trucks in Myingyan, Radio Free Asia claimed.
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Security forces have fired tear gas, rubber bullets and live rounds in several towns and cities to break up protests, giving little warning, witnesses said.
In the main city of Yangon, they claimed at least eight people were killed, one early in the day and seven others in the early evening.
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Six people died in the central town of Monywa, the Monywa Gazette reported.
And two were killed during clashes at a protest in the country's second-biggest city Mandalay, a witness and media reports said.
Image:A pro-democracy activist displays the three-finger salute, known to be a symbol of resistance
Image:Eight people was reportedly killed when police opened fire in the main city of Yangon
A spokesman for the ruling military council did not answer telephone calls seeking comment, Reuters said.
The security forces detained about 300 protesters as they broke up protests in Yangon, Myanmar Now news agency reported.
According to activists, a total of 1,300 people have been detained, among them six journalists in Yangon.
The violence comes a day after foreign ministers from Myanmar's southeast Asian neighbours urged the military to end the protests but failed to unite behind a call for the military to release ousted government leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
The chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) said in a statement: "We expressed ASEAN's readiness to assist Myanmar in a positive, peaceful and constructive manner."
Myanmar's state media said the military-appointed foreign minister attended the ASEAN meeting that "exchanged views on regional and international issues", but made no mention of the focus on Myanmar's problems.
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Myanmar protesters honour killed comrade
Image:A spokesman for the ruling military council did not answer telephone calls seeking comment
The 1 February coup ended Myanmar's tentative steps towards democratic rule and triggered nationwide protests and international outcry.
Generals seized power, claiming there was fraud in last November's election which the party of de facto civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi won by a landslide.
Analysis: The bullets keep on coming
By Siobhan Robbins, Southeast Asia correspondent
In Myingyan, a 14-year-old has been confirmed dead.
Photos showed a woman, believed to be his mother, sitting beside his body.
It's reported her boy had been shot in the head by a bullet during the protests.
Desperate demonstrators were filmed trying to save him but he didn't have a chance.
In Mandalay, guns and tear gas were also being fired at protesters.
A video shows 19-year-old Ma Kyal Sin crouching down, desperately trying to stay low.
"Everything will be ok" her T-shirt promises - but the bullets keep on coming and Ma Kyal Sin's family is preparing to bury her.
"Before the crackdown, most of us noticed the little sister who got shot from the back of the head because she was very active and at the frontline," said an eyewitness who asked to remain anonymous.
"Then there was a crackdown at 12 and we were running, we were streaming live too. The girl got hit behind her head. It would not be accidentally because of her height. We assumed that she was targeted. Another man also died. They were shooting at us from 12 to the evening."
Around the country, the death toll and injuries being reported continued to rise.
Image:Generals seized power in Myanmar after claiming there was fraud in last November's election
The crackdown has become increasingly brutal - live ammunition is now regularly fired at protesters along with tear gas and rubber bullets.
One especially distressing video from North Okkalapa, Yangon, shows a man in white being led away by police when he suddenly appears to be shot.
When he falls to the ground, his body is viciously kicked and then later he is callously dragged off.
Hein Thar, a journalist at Frontier Myanmar, told Sky News he has witnessed high levels of violence against demonstrators in North Okkalapa.
"They started to shoot with mortars again, not only with rifles and I heard the "dededededede", they continuously shoot," he said. "They don't need to beat people who are lying on the ground but they do. They beat the people who are lying on the ground. They shoot the people."
Frustrated by the ongoing civil disobedience movement and the powerful resistance which it had possibly been underestimated, Myanmar's military is doing what it can to crush the opposition.
"An arms embargo is very important. The reason is the military is using these arms against its own people, the civilians. So no one should sell arms or keep any military to military relations with Burma," said Kyaw Win, director of the Burma Human Rights Network.
The generals who took over the country in February's coup have previously proven they will kill Myanmar's civilians if needed.
How many more will die on the streets which are fast becoming battlefields?
