World roundup: October 20 2021

Stories from Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Romania, and more

INTERNATIONAL

In today’s global news:

• Worldometer is tracking COVID-19 cases and fatalities.

• The New York Times is tracking global vaccine distribution.

MIDDLE EAST

SYRIA

The bombing of a Syrian army bus in Damascus killed at least 14 people on Wednesday. Attacks like this have become a rarity in the Syrian capital and according to The Guardian this is the deadliest one in at least four years. Not long after the bombing, the Syrian army shelled the town of Ariha in Idlib province, which is controlled by the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, killing at least 13 people. As far as I know the government hasn’t characterized that attack as retaliation for the Damascus bombing but it’s probably reasonable to infer that it was.

Elsewhere, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says that at least six pro-government militia fighters were killed in an explosion at an arms depot in Hama. There’s a fair chance that this was some sort of accidental blast but at this point the cause is undetermined. There are also reports of an explosion, possibly from a drone strike, at the US outpost in the southern Syrian region of Tanf, though there’s no word on any casualties. And a suspected Turkish drone strike on the town of Kobani in northeastern Syria wounded three people on Wednesday morning. Kobani is under the control of the Kurdish YPG militia.