United States Virgin Islands

U.S. appeals court judges on Wednesday appeared skeptical of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's claim that it can require an idled oil refinery in the U.S. Virgin Islands to obtain a costly new pollution permit before restarting operations, Reuters reported. During oral arguments in St. Croix, a three-judge panel of the Third U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals questioned whether the federal Clean Air Act allows the agency to require Port Hamilton Refining and Transportation LLLP, the refinery's owner, to obtain the permit, since they are typically only necessary for new projects.

Before the pandemic, the Caribbean was the world’s most tourism-reliant region, according to recent calculations by the World Travel Tourism Council. Made up of dozens of sovereign nations, territories and dependencies that often reacted disparately to the virus, the region was struck unequally by the coronavirus, the New York Times reported. Some islands were walloped by staggering caseloads, while infections on others sometimes dwindled to single digits.