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Approximately 2.3 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine administered to children 5-12 age group have arrived in Nepal.

Surendra Chaurasiya, chief of the Logistic Management Section, the Department of Health Services confirmed the arrival of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine under the COVAX Facility.

The received vaccine will be administered to the children aged 5 to 12 who have already been administered the first dose, he said.

A total of 3.9 million children in the age group will be administered the vaccine. In the first phase, the vaccination campaign launched from June 23 to 29 in 27 districts. The same group will receive a second dose from July 18 to 24.

In the second phase, children between the age group will get the vaccine from August 21 to 27 and the second dose will be administered from September 12 to 17.

A new sub-variant of Omicron variant of COVID-19 has been detected in Nepal.

According to the Epidemiology and Infectious Disease Control Division director Dr Chumanlal Das, gene sequencing conducted at a lab of Kavrepalanchowk-based Dhulikhel Hospital confirmed the presence of the BA.5 sub-variant.

He said that the Division is conducting a further study about the virus and trying to identify its carrier.

Prior to this, the BA.2 Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 was found and gene sequencing of the sample of infected is underway at the National Public Health Laboratory, Teku.

The COVID-19 infection rate is gradually increasing in the country.

CPN-UML Chairman KP Sharma Oli has called for forming a parliamentary committee to investigate the incident of non-availability of the CCTV footage at the Finance Ministry in course of the budget formulation.

Seeking special time in the meeting of the House of Representatives today, the leader of the main opposition in parliament challenged the government to have this episode investigated and demanded that the Prime Minister should furnish a reply in this connection.

The UML Chair and former Prime Minister claimed that the government’s works in connection to topics such as the nation’s economy and foreign affairs were inappropriate.

He also demanded that the government should make matters clear regarding what has been happening concerning the US State Partnership Program (SPP).

As many as 237,813 foreign tourists have visited Nepal in the last six months.

According to the statistics shared by Nepal Tourism Board, a total of 46,900 tourists came in Nepal via airway last June alone. It is a 69.3 per cent recovery in comparison to the arrival of foreign tourists in June 2019.

In May this year, 53,608 tourists entered Nepal, the Board said, adding last April recorded arrival of over 50,000 tourists.

Over 42,000 came to Nepal in March while February saw arrival of around 20,000. Similarly, 17,000 tourists flew to Nepal in January this year. The foreign tourists’ influx has been improving since the beginning of this year.

Tourism sector was one of the hard hit sectors in Nepal by COVID-19 pandemic. The sector remained affected by the pandemic for over two years.

Among the foreign tourists arriving in Nepal this year, Indian nationals stand atop followed by the American.

The CPN-UML has formed a team under the coordination of Vice Chairperson Bishnu Prasad Poudel to conduct a probe into the leaders and cadres who were involved in defeating their own party candidates in the May 13 local level elections.

The probe team will also recommend the leadership for actions against such cadres and leaders.

The members of the probe team are- chief of party organization department, Khagaraj Adhikari, and chief of election department, Bishnu Rimal. The secretariat meeting of the UML took this decision, according to chief of the central publicity department, Prithvi Subba Gurung.

The party had complaints against various leaders and cadres, arguing that they were involved in defeating their own party candidates.

Gurung further informed that the secretariat meeting also held discussion on making thorough review of the local level election, analyzing existing balance of power, making publicity of good works done by UML-led government, and exposing present government's activities that have negative effects on people.

Some nominations are also made in party departments and new departments formed.

Speaker Agni Prasad Sapkota and Deputy Speaker of Malaysia Mohd Rashid Hasnon held a courtesy meeting today.

They held a meeting on Saturday evening on the sidelines of the Non-Aligned Movement Parliamentary Network's conference in Baku, the capital city of Azerbaijan, Speaker Sapkota's personal secretary Govinda Pathak said.

On the occasion, Speaker Sapkota said that Nepal and Malaysia have been enjoying close and cordial relations ever since the two countries established diplomatic relations in 1960. He added that both countries believed in the NAM policy and were committed to the ideals of the United Nations.

Speaker Sapkota thanked Malaysia for providing employment to a large number of Nepalis, recognizing Nepal as the source country for migrant labourers since the beginning of 2001.

He also described Malaysia as a major business partner of Nepal, stressing on the need of promoting tourism between the two countries. As he said, the direct flight between Nepal and Malaysia started from March 2003 has helped bring the peoples of the two countries even closer.

The Malaysian Deputy Speaker Hasnon said that Nepal is a good friend of Nepal and expressed his happiness at the opportunity to meet with Speaker Sapkota and the Nepali delegation.

Pushpa Bhusal Gautam and Ram Chandra Rai among the members of the Nepali delegation were present in the meeting.

The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology has completed the preparation of drafts of various six bills related to education including the Federal Education Bill.

The long-awaited Education Bill has landed in the Ministry of Finance for advices after its draft amendment, it has been said.

Other bills of which drafts have been prepared include the umbrella bill related to higher education, technical education bill, integrated health sciences academy bill and the bill related to national qualification framework.

Collection of suggestions and feedback for the bills is underway and they are expected to be tabled in the federal parliament soon, said the Ministry’s spokesperson Dipak Sharma.

Meanwhile, the Education and Health Committee under the House of Representatives earlier directed presentation of the Federal Education Bill in the parliament soon.

The weather will be partly to generally cloudy throughout the country today with the possibility of light to moderate rainfall in many places due to the influence of the monsoon wind, the Department of Hydrology and Meteorology said.

The Department said there is the possibility of heavy rain at one or two places in Bagmati and Gandaki provinces in the next 24 hours. It has cautioned against landslides, mudslides, soil erosion, and a rise in water levels in rivers and seasonal streams in the hilly region.

The Department has urged one and all to adopt alert as the rain will likely affect the daily life and the transport sector as well in these areas.

The weather will be partly to generally cloudy with chances of light to moderate rainfall at some places of the hilly region and at a few places in the rest of the country tonight. Heavy rain is predicted at one or two places of Bagmati and Gandaki provinces.

As per the latest weather information shared by the Department, the minimum temperature in Kathmandu Valley was 21.0 degrees Celsius while the maximum was 28.8 degrees Celsius in the last 24 hours.

Similarly, the lowest minimum temperature 15.5 degrees Celsius throughout the country was recorded in Jumla while the highest maximum temperature 34.5 degrees Celsius was recorded in Janakpur in the last 24 hours, the Department stated.