AP News in Brief at 6:04 a.m. EDT

Countries facing pressure to loosen virus restrictions

TOKYO (AP) — South Korean officials warned Monday that hard-earned progress fighting the coronavirus pandemic could be upset by new infections at bars and leisure spots, highlighting global tensions between governments desperate to maintain social distancing and citizens eager to resume their lives as economic pressure mounts and infections slow in some places.

Some European nations have started tentative moves to ease their shutdowns. Hard-hit Spain, which on Sunday reported its lowest daily growth in infections in three weeks, will allow workers in some nonessential industries to return to factories and construction sites Monday.

South Korea’s caseload has slowed from early March, when it was reporting around 500 new cases a day, but officials have warned of a broader “quiet spread,” pointing to transmissions at locations such as bars that may indicate eased attitudes toward social distancing.

South Korean Prime Minster Chung Sye-kyun said officials were discussing new public guidelines that would allow for people to engage in “certain levels of economic and social activity” while also maintaining distance to slow the spread of the virus.

Social distancing was still on full display for Easter Sunday celebrations around the globe, with many Christians marking the day isolated in their homes while pastors preached to empty pews. St. Peter’s Square was barricaded to keep out crowds, while one Florida church drew a large turnout for a drive-in service in a parking lot.

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Child sex abuse in Pakistan's religious schools is endemic

PAKPATTAN, Pakistan (AP) — Muhimman proudly writes his name slowly, carefully, one letter at a time, grinning broadly as he finishes. He’s just 11 years old and was a good student who had dreams of being a doctor.

School frightens him now. Earlier this year, a cleric at the religious school he faithfully attended in the southern Punjab town of Pakpattan took him into a washroom and tried to rape him. Muhimman's aunt, Shazia, who wanted only her first name used, said she believes the abuse of young children is endemic in Pakistan’s religious schools. She said she has known the cleric, Moeed Shah, since she was a little girl and describes him as an habitual abuser who used to ask little girls to pull up their shirts.

“He has done wrong with boys and also with two or three girls,” Shazia said, recalling one girl the cleric brutalized so badly he broke her back.

An investigation by The Associated Press found dozens of police reports, known here as First Information Reports, alleging sexual harassment, rape and physical abuse by Islamic clerics teaching in madrassas or religious schools throughout Pakistan, where many of the country’s poorest study. The AP also documented cases of abuse through interviews with law enforcement officials, abuse victims and their parents. The alleged victims who spoke for this story did so with the understanding only their first names would be used.

There are more than 22,000 registered madrassas in Pakistan, teaching more than 2 million children. But there are many more religious schools that are unregistered. They are typically started by a local cleric in a poor neighborhood, attracting students with a promise of a meal and free lodging. There is no central body of clerics that governs madrassas. Nor is there a central authority that can investigate or respond to allegations of abuse by clerics, unlike the Catholic Church, which has a clear hierarchy topped by the Vatican.

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Coronavirus upends Putin’s political agenda in Russia

MOSCOW (AP) — Spring is not turning out the way Russian President Vladimir Putin might have planned it.

A nationwide vote on April 22 was supposed to finalize sweeping constitutional reforms that would allow him to stay in power until 2036, if he wished. But after the coronavirus spread in Russia, that plebiscite had to be postponed – an action so abrupt that billboards promoting it already had been erected in Moscow and other big cities.

Now under threat is a pomp-filled celebration of Victory Day on May 9, marking the 1945 defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.

The holiday has become the most important on Russia's calendar, and this year is the 75th anniversary, with world leaders invited to a celebration highlighting the country’s exceptional role in history. Every year, thousands gather in Moscow, including many elderly veterans proudly wearing their medals.

Military units have already rehearsed the traditional Red Square parade, drilling outside Moscow, and leaders such as France’s Emmanuel Macron and India’s Narendra Modi had promised to attend.

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Backup coronavirus hospital in Memphis worries residents

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Faced with the threat of overburdened hospitals, states across the country are converting convention centers, sports facilities and performance spaces into backup treatment sites for coronavirus patients. Tennessee is no exception.

What some Memphis residents don’t get is why in their city, a shopping center in the middle of a predominantly black, low-income residential neighborhood has been targeted.

City and state officials are concerned that an influx of patients from Memphis, as well as nearby Mississippi, Arkansas and rural West Tennessee, will strain hospitals. Their fears are echoed across the country: Governors, mayors and health experts in numerous states are also researching and constructing makeshift medical facilities.

In New York City, they’re turning to the Javits Center convention site; in Chicago, the McCormick Place Convention Center, and in Sandy, Utah, the Mountain America Expo Center.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been scouting locations in Tennessee, and officials here have compiled a list of 35 possible backup sites. They haven’t released the whole list, but Gov. Bill Lee has disclosed a few: the Music City Center in Nashville, the Chattanooga Convention Center, the Knoxville Expo Center — all sites away from residential neighborhoods.

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Analysis: Will voters want a president who feels their pain?

WASHINGTON (AP) — In 1992, Americans ousted an incumbent president in the middle of an economic downturn because his challenger, Bill Clinton, seemed to better feel their pain.

Twenty years later, when the nation was still climbing out of another recession, voters stuck with President Barack Obama rather than siding with challenger Mitt Romney, who was caught on tape dismissing half the population as people who “believe they are the victims.”

Voters may again be seeking solace, as well as solutions, in this year’s presidential race, one still being reshaped by the unprecedented public health and economic turmoil of the coronavirus pandemic.

And if empathy is the question, the contrast is stark and the challenge for President Donald Trump may be steep. Though he has a visceral bond with his most loyal supporters, he’s far more likely to use grievance or even biting humor to make his case. His presumptive Democratic challenger, Joe Biden, meanwhile, is a politician defined by personal grief and loss, who has long had an ability to use his own family tragedies to connect with voters.

“Biden owns the empathy marketplace,” said Douglas Brinkley, a presidential historian. “But that’s just one quality. Sometimes bluster and a can-do attitude also matters.”

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Virus-era decisions: Way too many, and each with high stakes

Should you wash your hands?

Are you going out to get the mail? Should you touch the mailbox? Should you touch the mail? Should you clean the mail?

Should you take a walk? Should you wear a mask? What about gloves? What about neighbors — stay six feet away? Ten? Will they approach? What will you do? Will you be standoffish, or laugh it off?

Should you go to the supermarket? Should you wipe down the groceries? What if you run out of wipes?

Should you stop to get gas? Should you wear gloves at the pump? Should you douse your credit card in sanitizer after sticking it in the slot? Should you remove the gloves before you handle your steering wheel? Should you throw the gloves on the car floor or use the gas station trash can?

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As virus deaths rise, Sweden sticks to 'low-scale' lockdown

STOCKHOLM (AP) — Crowds swarm Stockholm's waterfront, with some people sipping cocktails in the sun. In much of the world, this sort of gathering would be frowned upon or even banned.

Not in Sweden.

It doesn’t worry Anders Tegnell, the country’s chief epidemiologist and top strategist in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic.

The 63-year-old has become a household name in Sweden, appearing across the media and holding daily briefings outlining the progression of the outbreak with a precise, quiet demeanor.

As countries across Europe have restricted the movement of their citizens, Sweden stands out for what Tegnell calls a “low-scale” approach that “is much more sustainable” over a longer period.

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Easter storms sweep South, killing at least 6 in Mississippi

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Strong storms pounded the Deep South on Sunday, killing at least six people in south Mississippi and damaging up to 300 homes and other buildings in northern Louisiana. Storms continued to batter the South overnight, with much of the region under flash flood, tornado and thunderstorm warnings and watches.

Mississippi Emergency Management Agency director Greg Michel said one person killed was in Walthall County, two were killed in Lawrence County and three were killed in Jefferson Davis County. All three counties are more than an hour's drive south of Jackson, near the Louisiana state line.

The two people killed in Lawrence County were a married couple — Lawrence County sheriff's deputy, Robert Ainsworth, and a Walthall County Justice Court deputy clerk, Paula We, a Facebook post from the county sheriff's office said.

The National Weather Service said strong winds were sweeping through other parts of Mississippi, and a tornado was spotted north of Meridian near the Alabama state line.

Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves declared a state of emergency Sunday night after he said several tornadoes had struck the state.

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AP PHOTOS: Ghostly virus-era NYC, captured from a motorbike

In its best days, in its highest moments, New York City is dizzying.

Times Square glows. Penn Station pulses. Wall Street teems with the ambitious. The highways are jammed with trucks and taxis and Ubers and Lyfts, transporting the life of the city — its people, its goods — to and fro. Underneath it all, from Manhattan to the boroughs and back, industrial-strength subways carry industrial-strength people of all shapes and hues from home to work and back again.

Then there are the worst days, the hardest moments. These days. Today, New York City is dizzying in a different way.

For now, it is become a place of familiar landmarks and well-trodden streets thrown off kilter by an invisible adversary that is taking some of its people away and terrifying the rest.

How to understand this city of cities at this moment in time? How to see it as it really feels, to chronicle it as it is knocked back, if not knocked down?

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Fauci says 'rolling reentry' of US economy possible in May

WASHINGTON (AP) — New cases of the coronavirus are certain to arise when restrictions imposed to limit the spread of the virus are eased, said Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top infectious disease expert for the U.S.

But Fauci said Sunday that the economy in parts of the country could have a “rolling reentry” as early as next month, provided health authorities can quickly identify and isolate people who will inevitably be infected. Fauci also said he “can't guarantee" that it will be safe for Americans to vote in person on Election Day, Nov. 3.

When asked on CNN if earlier action on social distancing and “stay at home” policies could have saved lives, Fauci responded in part: “It’s very difficult to go back and say that. I mean, obviously, you could logically say that if you had a process that was ongoing and you started mitigation earlier, you could have saved lives. Obviously, no one is going to deny that. But what goes into those kinds of decisions is complicated.”

President Donald Trump, who has been chafing at criticism that he didn't do enough early on to fight the virus, later reposted a tweet that referenced Fauci's comments and that said “Time to #FireFauci." The president again pointed to his decision in late January to restrict travel from China, writing, “Sorry Fake News, it’s all on tape. I banned China long before people spoke up.”

The tweet was one of several that Trump posted on Sunday that defended his handling of the virus outbreak and blamed others for missteps.