New research suggests that Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine can protect against a mutation found in two highly contagious variants of the coronavirus that erupted in Britain and South Africa.

Lebanon began a 25-day nationwide lockdown Thursday to limit the spread of the coronavirus as infections hit a new record in the tiny nation and patients overwhelm the health care sector.

The lockdown in Lebanon is the third since the first case was reported in late February. It closes most businesses and limits traffic by imposing an odd and even license plate rule on alternating days. It also reduces the number of flights at the country's only international airport.

The unveiling of a large statue in a Beirut suburb of an Iranian commander killed by the U.S. last year has sparked indignation among many in Lebanon -- the latest manifestation of a growing schism between supporters and opponents of Iran-backed Hizbullah.

The bronze bust of Gen. Qassem Soleimani was erected Tuesday by the Ghobeiry municipality in a Hizbullah stronghold near Beirut's airport to commemorate the slain general's supportive role in Lebanon's wars with Israel. Soleimani, the architect of Iran's proxy militias in the Middle East, was killed in a U.S. drone strike near Baghdad airport a year ago.

Former Renault-Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn said in an interview aired Monday that French investigators are coming to question him in Lebanon over some legal challenges in France, asking why don't the Japanese do the same thing.

Ghosn's comments came two weeks after a Lebanese justice ministry official said a team of French investigators will come to Beirut in January to participate in interrogating the former auto executives.

Renowned Lebanese lyrical author, composer, orchestra arranger and conductor Elias Rahbani passed away on Monday at the age of 82, his family said.

Rahbani was hospitalized last week suffering low oxygen after he contracted the coronavirus and succumbed to COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus, on Monday.

Lebanese authorities are mulling on Monday for a new lockdown in the country after a surge in coronavirus cases mainly after the Christmas and New Year celebrations that saw a large part of Lebanese partying “irresponsibly.”

Thousands of minority-owned small businesses were at the end of the line in the U.S. government's coronavirus relief program as many struggled to find banks that would accept their applications or were disadvantaged by the terms of the program.

Data from the Paycheck Protection Program released Dec. 1 and analyzed by The Associated Press show that many minority owners desperate for a relief loan didn't receive one until the PPP's last few weeks while many more white business owners were able to get loans earlier in the program

Hizbullah on Sunday marked the anniversary of the killing of Qasem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis with a symbolic event on a hill in south Lebanon overlooking the border area with Israel.

A group of Hizbullah fighters dressed in military uniforms swore the oath of Hizbullah while officials raised the group's yellow flag with posters of Soleimani and al-Muhandis on it.

A Connecticut aquarium has agreed to delay its acquisition of five beluga whales for research amid a lawsuit by an animal rights group trying to stop the delivery.

Mystic Aquarium will not import the whales before March 31 to allow time for a judge to decide the lawsuit and avoid an effort by Friends of Animals to obtain a preliminary injunction to stop the delivery, according to documents filed in federal court in Hartford on Dec. 23.

By SAMY MAGDY Associated Press

CAIRO (AP) — Yemen's prime minister on Saturday said that a missile attack on the airport in Aden was meant "to eliminate" the country's new government as it arrived in the key southern city — a daring assault which he blamed on Iran-backed rebels.