Mastercard and Visa are suspending their operations in Russia, the companies said Saturday, in the latest blow to the country's financial system after its invasion of Ukraine. Mastercard said cards issued by Russian banks will no longer be supported by its network and any Mastercard issued outside the country will not work at Russian stores or ATMs. “We don't take this decision lightly,” Mastercard said in a statement, adding that it made the move after discussions with customers, partners and governments. READ: Mastercard, Brac unveil Mastercard Millennial Titanium Credit Card Visa said it's working with clients and partners in Russia to cease all Visa transactions over the coming days. "We are compelled to act following Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, and the unacceptable events that we have witnessed,” Visa Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Al Kelly said in a statement. The twin suspensions were announced within 16 minutes of each other, and they followed a private video call earlier in the day between President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine and U.S. lawmakers. During that conversation, Zelenskyy “asked us to turn off MasterCard and Visa for Russia," Rep. Brad Sherman, a Democrat from California, tweeted. “I agree,” he added, before Mastercard and Visa made their announcements. Earlier in the week, Visa and Mastercard had announced more limited moves to block financial institutions from the networks that serve as arteries for the payments system. Russian people have already been hit hard by heavy sanctions and financial penalties imposed by the U.S. government and others. Since the invasion of Ukraine, the value of the Russian currency, the ruble, has plunged by more than a third to a record low. That's pushing up inflation for Russian households, and all the fear has helped cause long lines at ATMs. Many other companies around the world have also made moves to increase the financial pressure on Russia and its people because of its attack on Ukraine. Some are selling their stakes in Russian companies, such as energy giant BP, while others like Harley-Davidson halted product shipments to the country. "This war and the ongoing threat to peace and stability demand we respond in line with our values," Visa's Kelly said. The moves by Mastercard and Visa could make real differences to their bottom lines. Russia accounted for 4% of all of Visa's net revenue in its last fiscal year, including money made from domestic and cross-border activities. Ukraine accounted for about 1%, Visa said in a filing with U.S. securities regulators this week. READ: Nagad, Southeast Bank, Mastercard Launch ‘Add Money’ Service Mastercard said in its own filing that about 4% of its net revenues during 2021 came from business conducted within, into and out of Russia. Another roughly 2% was related to Ukraine.

All examinations of National University have been suspended till further notice in view of surging  Covid-19 pandemic. This was announced in a press release  issued by the university authority on Friday. The schedule of these exams will be informed when the situation gets normal, said the release. READ: National University starting online classes Earlier in the day, all schools, colleges and universities of the country were instructed to remain closed from January 21 to February 6 to contain the covid surge. READ: National University postpones Sunday’s exams The Cabinet Division issued a notification in the morning imposing renewed pandemic restrictions  in the country amid a worrying spike in Covid-19 cases.

Dhaka University on Friday suspended all physical classes till February 6, following a Cabinet Division order in the wake of an alarming surge in Covid cases in the country. However, all online education activities will continue with the participation of teachers and students, the prestigious university said in a statement. All offices of the university will remain open on a limited scale during the period from 9am to 1pm. All emergency services -- electricity, water, gas, internet, healthcare -- on the campus will also remain uninterrupted, according to the statement. READ: DU dormitories to reopen on Oct 5 DU authorities advised students to stay in their respective dormitories adhering to all Covid-safety protocols and avoid all public gatherings. The authorities also urged all concerned not to arrange meetings or seminars on the university campus. READ: Female student complains of harassment  at DU dorm "If we close dormitories, students will get scattered and the risk of spreading the virus will increase. So, we are not planning to shut the halls and dormitories," said Prof Md Akhtaruzzaman, Vice-Chancellor of DU.

Rabindra University teacher Farhana Yeasmin Baten who ignited protests after allegedly trimming the hair of its 14 students as "punishment" has been suspended. The decision was taken at an urgent meeting of the syndicate committee on Thursday night, chaired by acting Vice Chancellor Abdul Latif, the university said in a release. All examinations and administrative activities of the university have also been suspended till further notice, it said. While acting Vice Chancellor Abdul Latif presided over the syndicate meeting, Dean of Arts Faculty of Dhaka University Prof Abu Mohammad Delwar Hossain, Joint Secretary-3 of the Education Ministry Syeda Nawara Jahan and Registrar of Rabindra University Md Sohrab Ali were present. All the members present at the meeting expressed regret over the incident and decided to suspend Farhana Yasmin Baten, UNB has learnt. Besides, a call will be taken on the dismissal of the teacher after the probe committee submits its report. READ: HC wants to know of steps against teachers in Rabindra University incident On Thursday, student protests gripped Rabindra University against the teacher. The protesters demanded that Farzana be permanently sacked from the university for humiliating their peers. Meanwhile, the High Court on Thursday asked the Vice-Chancellor and the registrar of Rabindra University to inform it about steps taken against the teachers who were involved in forcefully trimming the hair of 14 students as punishment. The court gave them a month to file their responses. The court also questioned why legal action will not be taken against Associate Prof  Farzana, the Chairman of Cultural Heritage and Bangladesh Studies Department of RU, assistant professors Rajib Adhikari and Jannatul Ferdous Moon, as well as why direction to compensate the humiliated students with Tk 20 lakh each should not be given. On September 29, amid student protests, Farhana quit the three positions of assistant proctor, head of Cultural Heritage and Bangladesh Studies Department and syndicate member. Earlier, the university authorities formed a five-member committee to probe the incident. On September 26, while entering the examination halls to sit for their final exams, Farzana instructed an office assistant to trim the hair of 14 first-year students, and he did it accordingly. Unable to bear the humiliation, Nazmul Hasan Tuhin, 25, a student of the department and a resident of Magura district, allegedly consumed sleeping pills on Monday in an effort to take his own life. READ: Haircut humiliation: Rabindra University students continue protests However, Farhana denied the allegation and claimed it was just a propaganda against her as she did not defer the exam as per the request of a few students.

Launch and ferry services on Shimulia-Banglabazar route will not ply at night time due to increasing strong current and high tide in Padma, authorities said Monday night. According to the announcement, the night services were suspended until further notice. However, the services will be open during the day time. READ: Ferry with heavy vehicles banned from plying under Padma bridge: Khalid  BIWTC joint-general manager Ahmed Ali said, “The tides are getting high which is why ferry service remain closed at night for the time being.” During the day, the ferry to Shimulia will run through the 12th and 13th pillars of the Padma Bridge. The Banglabazar-bound ferry will move through the 6th and 7th pillars, he said. During the day, a limited number of vehicles cross on the five available ferries. So, he requested the emergency vehicles to use alternative routes. After the announcement services were suspended around 6 pm Monday. Shimulia River Port Naval Safety and Traffic Management Assistant Director Shahadat Hossain said that according to the decision of the concerned committee, the ferry movements will remain closed from 6:30 pm to avoid accidents due to strong currents in the river. The decision was taken for the safety of passengers, launches and staff.   READ: Ferry services on Shimulia-Banglabazar route suspended for bad weather The new schedule would be implemented from Tuesday, he said.

Facebook announced Friday that former President Donald Trump’s accounts will be suspended for two years, freezing his presence on the social network until early 2023, following a finding that Trump stoked violence ahead of the deadly Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol. At the end of the suspension, the company will assess whether Trump’s “risk to public safety” has subsided, Nick Clegg, Facebook’s vice president of global affairs, wrote in a blog post. He said Facebook will take into account “external factors” such as instances of violence, restrictions on peaceful assembly and other markers of civil unrest. Facebook also announced that it would end a contentious policy that automatically exempted politicians from rules banning hate speech and abuse, and that it would stiffen penalties for public figures during times of civil unrest and violence. READ: Online speech shield under fire as Trump Facebook ban stays The former president called Facebook’s decision on the suspension “an insult.” The two-year ban replaced a previous ruling that ordered Trump to be suspended indefinitely. “They shouldn’t be allowed to get away with this censoring and silencing, and ultimately, we will win. Our Country can’t take this abuse anymore!” Trump said in a news release. Social platforms like Facebook and Twitter have become indispensable tools for politicians to get their messages out and to raise small-dollar donations. Without the megaphone of Twitter and the targeted fundraising appeals his campaign mastered on Facebook, Trump could be at a serious disadvantage relative to other politicians. Trump has teased running for president again in 2024. His aides say that he has been working on launching his own social media platform to compete with those that have booted him, but one has yet to materialize. A blog he launched on his existing website earlier this year was shut down after less than a month. It attracted dismal traffic. On Facebook, Trump’s suspension means that his account is essentially frozen. Others can read and comment on past posts, but Trump and other account handlers are unable to post new material. Twitter, by contrast, has permanently banned Trump from its service, and no trace of his account remains. “What they’ve done here is shield themselves from potential presidential rage” with a reassessment of Trump’s account in two years, said Jennifer Grygiel, a Syracuse University communications professor. In a color-coded chart on its blog post, the company said public figures who violate its policies during times of crisis can be restricted from posting for a month (yellow) or as long as two years (red). Future violations, it said, will be met with “heightened penalties, up to and including permanent removal.” READ: Facebook board’s Trump decision could have wider impacts   The policy that exempted politicians from rules on hate speech and abuse was once championed by CEO Mark Zuckerberg. The company said it never applied the policy to Trump, but on Friday backtracked to say it did use it once, in 2019 for a video of a rally on his Facebook page. The social media giant said it will still apply the “newsworthiness” exemption to certain posts it deems to be in the public interest, even if they violate Facebook rules. But it will no longer treat material posted by politicians any differently than other posts. In addition, Facebook said it will make public whenever it does apply the exemption to a post. The announcements are in response to recommendations from the company’s quasi-independent oversight board. Last month, that panel upheld a decision by Facebook to keep Trump suspended, but the board said the company could not merely suspend him indefinitely. It gave the company six months to decide what to do with his accounts. In its decision last month, the board agreed with Facebook that two of Trump’s Jan. 6 posts “severely violated” the content standards of both Facebook and Instagram. “We love you. You’re very special,” Trump said to the rioters in the first post. In the second, he called them “great patriots” and told them to “remember this day forever.” Those comments violated Facebook’s rules against praising or supporting people engaged in violence, the board said. Specifically, the board cited rules against “dangerous individuals and organizations” that prohibit anyone who proclaims a violent mission and ban posts that express support for those people or groups. The two-year suspension is effective from Jan. 7, so Trump has 19 months to go. A group calling itself the Real Facebook Oversight Board, which is critical of Facebook and its oversight panel, said in a statement Friday that the ban brings Trump back just in time for the 2024 presidential election and shows “no real strategy to address authoritarian leaders and extremist content, and no intention of taking serious action against disinformation and hate speech.” Due to its sheer size and power, Facebook’s decision has broad implications for politicians and their constituencies around the globe. Chinmayi Arun, a fellow at Yale Law School’s Information Society Project, said it’s good that the company laid out a standard for when it will suspend political leaders and for how long. “What’s tremendous is that Facebook took the oversight board’s recommendation to reevaluate the real-world context and the offline tensions, while deciding what to do with a politician’s online speech,” she said. But she remains concerned that suspensions cannot be reviewed unless Facebook asks. READ: Trump goes after Pence, McConnell in speech to party donorsFor years, Facebook gave the former president special treatment and free reign to spread misinformation and threats on the platform. Outside critics and even Facebook’s own employees called for the company to remove Trump long before the Jan. 6 comments. Last summer, for instance, Zuckerberg decided to leave up posts by Trump that suggested protesters in Minneapolis could be shot, using the words “when the looting starts, the shooting starts.” Trump’s comment evoked the civil-rights era by borrowing a phrase used in 1967 by Miami’s police chief to warn of an aggressive police response to unrest in Black neighborhoods. While Facebook put labels on many of Trump’s election posts, he did not face penalties such as suspension for repeatedly and falsely claiming victory in 2020. In Friday’s post, Clegg anticipated criticism from both sides of the political aisle. “We know that any penalty we apply — or choose not to apply — will be controversial. There are many people who believe it was not appropriate for a private company like Facebook to suspend an outgoing President from its platform, and many others who believe Mr. Trump should have immediately been banned for life,” he wrote. Facebook’s job, he said, is “to make a decision in as proportionate, fair and transparent a way as possible, in keeping with the instruction given to us by the Oversight Board.” But by staying in the middle, some experts said Facebook had once again punted the decision instead of taking a firm stance. “It’s the wait-and-see approach,” said Sarah Kreps, a Cornell professor and director of the Cornell Tech Policy Lab. “I think they’re hoping this can just resolve itself with him not being kind of an influential voice in politics anymore.”

South Korea has suspended visas for Bangladeshis as there has been an upswing in Covid-19 cases among the citizens of the South Asian nation visiting the southern half of the Korean Peninsula recently. Bangladesh Embassy in Seoul confirmed this on Friday – the day when the ban came into effect. Read S Korea gives 95,000 Covid-19 rapid test kits to Bangladesh Many Bangladeshi passengers who entered South Korea have tested positive for Covid-19, said the embassy. The withdrawal of the restriction will depend on the Covid-19 situation in Bangladesh, said an embassy official. Also read: Hopeful of starting tourist visa soon: Doraiswami

Kazakhstan has suspended all flights, train and bus services to neighboring China and stopped issuing visas to Chinese nationals due to the outbreak of a new virus.

Ferry services on the key Paturia-Daulatdia route in the Padma River resumed after an eight-hour suspension on Wednesday morning after visibility improved.