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New Zealand's borders fully reopened to visitors from around the world on Monday, for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic closed them in March 2020, Reuters reported.

New Zealand's borders started reopening in February, first for New Zealanders, and restrictions have progressively eased. 

The process of reopening the borders ended Sunday night with visitors who need visas and those on student visas now also allowed to return to New Zealand. New Zealand is now also letting cruise ships and foreign recreational yachts docks at its ports. 

Most visitors arriving in New Zealand still need to be vaccinated against COVID and must take two COVID tests after arriving. However, there are no quarantine requirements. 

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Monday during a speech at the China Business Summit in Auckland that the final staged opening of the borders had been an enormous moment. 

"It's been a staged and cautious process on our part since February as we, alongside the rest of the world, continue to manage a very live global pandemic, while keeping our people safe." 

International students were a significant contributor to New Zealand's economy and educational providers are hoping the reopening of the borders will again provide a boost to schools and universities around the country, according to Reuters.

New Zealand Tourism Minister Stuart Nash said the return of cruise ships will also be a boost for local industries. 

"Most cruise visits are during the warmer months of October to April, and summer is our bumper tourism season overall. This means it will be full steam ahead for the industry," Nash said.

Floods have unleashed by torrential rain in eastern Kentucky have killed at least 28 people, including four children, Governor Andy Beshear says, as authorities work to provide food and shelter for thousands of displaced residents, Reuters reported.

Some homes in the hardest-hit areas were swept away after days of heavy rainfall that Mr Beshear has described as some of the worst in the US state’s history.

Rescue teams guided motor boats through residential and commercial areas searching for victims.

“Everything is gone. Like, everything is gone. The whole office is gone,” one of the flood’s victims, Rachel Patton, told WCHS TV. Around her, houses were half-submerged in water.

“We had to swim out, and it was cold. It was over my head, so yeah. It was scary.”

Officials warn the death toll may continue to rise with more expected rainfall potentially hampering rescue efforts.

The National Weather Service forecasts several rounds of showers and storms through Tuesday, with a flood watch in effect through Monday morning in southern and eastern Kentucky.

“We are still focused on meeting the immediate needs of providing food, water and shelter for thousands of our fellow Kentuckians who have been displaced by this catastrophic flood,” Mr Beshear said in a statement on Sunday.

Mr Beshear, who declared a state emergency over the floods, earlier told NBC that authorities would “be finding bodies for weeks” as rescuers fanned out to more remote areas.

The floods were the second major national disaster to strike Kentucky in seven months following a swarm of tornadoes that claimed nearly 80 lives in the western part of the state in December.

President Joe Biden declared a major disaster in Kentucky on Friday, allowing federal funding to be allocated to the state, according to Reuters.

Mr Beshear’s office said affected residents could begin applying for disaster assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Power lines were widely damaged, with more than 14,000 reports of outages on Sunday afternoon, according to PowerOutage, Reuters reported.

Nepal reported 620 new Covid-19 cases and one death on Sunday.

According to the Ministry of Health and Population, 2, 651 swab samples were tested in the RT-PCR method, of which 496 returned positive. Likewise, 3, 195 people underwent antigen tests, of which 124 were tested positive.

According to the Ministry of Health and Population, 11, 967 have lost their lives to the virus so far.

As of today, there are 4, 567 active cases in the country.

A total of 189 people have gone missing from Baitadi that shares its border with India.

According to the district police spokesperson inspector Lokraj Joshi, police reported 189 cases of people missing in the past three years, and of them, 130 were found.

As he said, the number of missing was 45 in the fiscal year 2076-77 BS (2019-20), 60 in the following FY followed by 84 in the last FY. Of those vanishing, most were women and girls.

According to the Police Chief Deputy Superintendent of Police, Ramesh Pal, missing cases of women and girls are on the rise in the district in recent years. Domestic violence is one of the causes behind the increasing missing cases, it is said.