After 18 months of wondering when this will all be over, it's increasingly clear that there will never be a moment of victory for vaccines against variants or humanity against the virus.
The big picture: Case counts remain stubbornly high even where just about everyone who wants a shot has had one. Countries like Australia and New Zealand that had sought to keep out COVID-19 altogether are now learning to live with the virus.
A decade after the Arab League voted to suspend Syria at the onset of a brutal civil war, Bashar al-Assad is being welcomed back in from the cold by some of America's closest regional allies.
Driving the news: Jordan's King Abdullah II, the first Arab leader to call for Assad to resign in 2011, spoke to the Syrian dictator last week for the first time since the conflict broke out, and recently reopened the two countries' main border crossing to help boost trade.
U.S. special climate envoy John Kerry announced Monday that 24 additional countries agreed to a voluntary pledge to cut emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, by one-third by 2030.
Why it matters: The Global Methane Pledge, which the Biden administration announced with the European Union last month, now includes nine of the world's top 20 methane emitting countries, representing around 30% of total emissions and 60% of the global economy.
Firefighters extinguished a blaze that erupted in a fuel storage tank at Lebanon's Zahrani oil facility, AP reports.
Details: No casualties have been reported. Energy Minister Walid Fayad said the fire started while workers were transferring gasoline from one storage tank to another, per AP. It is not clear what exactly caused the fire.
British police on Monday said they will not take action against Prince Andrew following a review of sexual abuse accusations by a Jeffrey Epstein accuser, AP reports.
Driving the news: Virginia Giuffre has accused Andrew of sexually assaulting her at Epstein's London home in 2001 when she was 17 years old. The prince has denied any wrongdoing.
New Zealand officials announced Monday that COVID-19 vaccines would soon be mandatory for most workers in the education and health sectors.
Why it matters: The country is battling an outbreak of the highly infectious Delta variant, with Auckland the epicenter. NZ's most populous city has been under lockdown restrictions since August.
Sydney businesses reopened Monday after more than 100 days of lockdown measures implemented by Australian authorities.
The big picture: Some bars and entertainment venues in the city of 5 million residents opened at 12:01am, as most restrictions were relaxed for fully vaccinated people in the New South Wales state capital amid declining coronavirus cases.
At least 1,000 migrant children remain without their parents, the leader of a task force established by President Biden to reunite families separated at the southern border told CBS' "60 Minutes" in an interview broadcast Sunday.
The U.S. will send humanitarian aid to Afghanistan even as the Biden administration continues to withhold formal recognition of the Taliban, the group's leaders announced on Sunday, AP reports.
Of note: State Department spokesperson Ned Price said in an emailed statement that the two sides discussed the U.S. providing "robust humanitarian assistance, directly to the Afghan people" during talks in Qatar that concluded Sunday.
Tens of thousands of people attended demonstrations all over Poland Sunday to show support for the country's European Union membership after a constitutional court ruling sparked fears of a possible exit from the union, Reuters reports.
Driving the news: Days earlier Poland's constitutional court ruled that the country's constitution can take precedence over some EU laws, per AP.
The U.S. and Russia have both agreed to lift targeted sanctions against each other in order to enable Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland to travel to Moscow this week, Reuters reports.
Why it matters: The U.S. passed a spate of sanctions against Russia this year and relations between the two powers are strained. Nuland, the third-ranking State Department official, will meet with senior Russian officials this week to discuss bilateral, regional and global issues, per the State Department.
Pfizer will vaccinate all residents over the age of 12 in the Brazilian city of Toledo as part of a study measuring the effectiveness of its COVID-19 vaccine, the company said in a statement.
Why it matters: Researchers in the study hope to monitor viral transmission in a real-life scenario after the population has been inoculated.
President Tsai Ing-wen said Sunday that Taiwan would never "bow to pressure" from China's government and pledged to strengthen the self-governing island's defenses to protect its "democratic way of life," per the BBC.
Why it matters: Tsai's declaration on Taiwan's National Day came one day after China's President Xi Jinping vowed to achieve "peaceful reunification" with Taiwan.
Police in India said Saturday they've arrested the son of a junior minister in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government after nine people died during protests against new farming laws, per AP.
The big picture: It's the latest escalation in massive ongoing demonstrations against the laws, which were introduced in 2020 to deregulate India's agriculture. Farmers say it's driven down crop prices and benefits big corporations.
