UPDATE - Turkey: New virus measures inevitable if rules flouted

UPDATES WITH MORE QUOTES FROM ERDOGAN

By Merve Aydogan

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey may introduce new restrictions to curb the spread of the coronavirus if citizens fail to comply with rules, the country's president said Monday.

"We have decided to continue implementing current [normalization] measures across our cities and to closely monitor the developments," Recep Tayyip Erdogan said after a Cabinet meeting at the presidential complex.

He warned that new restrictions are "inevitable" if citizens do not comply with the COVID-19 precautionary measures.

In January, Turkey began a mass COVID-19 vaccination campaign, and a gradual normalization from coronavirus restrictions began on March 1.​​​​​​​

Erdogan said 11.5 million vaccine doses have been administered nationwide, making it one of the top five countries where vaccination is going as planned.

These include 7.94 million first doses and 3.57 million second doses.

He said the country would continue acquiring vaccines from abroad until its locally developed COVID-19 vaccine is ready for use.

Since it originated in China in December 2019, the pandemic has claimed over 2.65 million lives in 192 countries and regions.

Over 120 million cases have been reported worldwide, with recoveries now exceeding 68 million, according to figures compiled by the US' Johns Hopkins University.

The US, Brazil and India remain the worst-hit countries in terms of cases.