Reuters World News Summary

Three-year-old rescued from rubble, Turkey quake death toll hits 81 A three-year-old girl was rescued from a collapsed building in the western Turkish city of Izmir on Monday, officials said, nearly three days after a powerful earthquake in the Aegean Sea region which has killed 81 people.

Following is a summary of current world news briefs. Pandemic protests test Putin's influence in ex-Soviet space

When mobs stormed government buildings and hounded the president from office in the Central Asian republic of Kyrgyzstan after disputed elections last month, Vladimir Putin seemed unimpressed. "Every time they have an election, they practically have a coup," Putin told the Valdai discussion club, a gathering of Russian experts, by video conference from his residence. "This is not funny." Europe's COVID curbs prompt pushback as Brexit 'godfather' slams PM Johnson

A wave of COVID curbs has stirred resistance across Europe, with the right-wing British politician who helped force a referendum on Brexit harnessing popular anger at a new lockdown by recasting his Brexit Party under a new banner. The United Kingdom, which has the highest official death toll in Europe from COVID-19, is grappling with more than 20,000 new coronavirus cases a day and scientists have warned the "worst case" scenario of 80,000 dead could be exceeded. UK's Johnson to face his critics after lockdown U-turn

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will on Monday defend his plan to impose a second lockdown on England in the face of criticism from opponents that he has been to slow to act, and from some in his own party who say the measures go too far. After castigating opponents' calls last month for a new national lockdown to contain a second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, Johnson U-turned on Saturday, announcing that new restrictions across England will begin at 0001 GMT on Thursday and last until Dec. 2. French pupils remember slain teacher as anti-Macron protests persist overseas

Schools across France held a minute's silence on Monday in memory of Samuel Paty, the teacher beheaded by a Chechen teenager who wanted to avenge his use of cartoons mocking the Prophet Mohammad during a class on freedom of expression. With France at its highest security level following further attacks since Paty's killing on Oct. 16, some 12 million pupils returned to school for the first time since the 47-year-old was slain in broad daylight on the eve of a two-week school holiday. QAnon received earlier boost from Russian accounts on Twitter, archives show

Russian government-backed social media accounts nurtured the QAnon conspiracy theory in its infancy, earlier than previously reported, according to interviews with current and former Twitter executives and archives of tweets from suspended accounts. Researchers said in August that the archives showed Russian accounts had helped spread QAnon in volume beginning in December 2017, https://reut.rs/2TFWoWc, but that team did not examine the history of specific QAnon promoters. https://bit.ly/2HTReUh U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden seeks Russian passport for sake of future son

U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden and his wife are applying for Russian citizenship in order not to be separated from their future son in an era of pandemics and closed borders, he said on Monday. Snowden's wife, Lindsay, is expecting a child in late December, the RIA news agency cited Anatoly Kucherena, his Russian lawyer, as saying. Israeli settlers pray for Trump re-election at biblical tomb

Jewish settler leaders prayed on Monday for U.S. President Donald Trump's re-election, citing his support for Israel, during a ceremony at a biblical tomb in the occupied West Bank that has been a flashpoint of conflict with the Palestinians. "We have come to bless President Trump, both for the past, to thank him, but also for the future, that he succeeds in the coming election," Yishai Fleisher, spokesman for the Hebron settlers, said at the Cave of the Patriarchs burial site. Three-year-old rescued from rubble, Turkey quake death toll hits 81

A three-year-old girl was rescued from a collapsed building in the western Turkish city of Izmir on Monday, officials said, nearly three days after a powerful earthquake in the Aegean Sea region which has killed 81 people. Rescue efforts were continuing in eight buildings in Izmir where 79 people were killed, making Friday's earthquake the deadliest in Turkey for nearly a decade. Two teenagers died on the Greek island of Samos, authorities said. Nagorno-Karabakh region says military death toll rises to 1,177

The region of Nagorno-Karabakh has lost 11 more soldiers in fighting with Azeri forces, taking its military death toll to 1,177 since the clashes erupted on Sept. 27, the region's defence ministry said on Monday. Fighting has surged to its worst since the 1990s, when about 30,000 people were killed. Vatican moves to clarify pope's comments on civil union laws

The Vatican says comments by Pope Francis on civil union laws in a documentary last month were taken out of context and did not signal a change in Church doctrine on homosexuals or support for same-sex marriage. The documentary, "Francesco", which premiered at the Rome film festival on Oct. 21, made headlines for a comment in which the pope says that homosexuals have a right to be in a family and that civil union laws covering homosexuals are needed.