The restart has divided opinion among the players, with some 200,000 new COVID-19 cases being reported globally every day and international travel restrictions still in place.

From Black Lives Matter protests in the United States to deadly floods in Japan, here's all the top stories in images from the past week.

'Open conflict would be a disaster for both China and India.'

Tennis's flagship team events the Davis Cup and Fed Cup Finals have been postponed until 2021 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the International Tennis Federation (ITF) said on Friday. Professional tennis has been suspended since March and will not return until August.

'At a time when the economy is depressed, a pandemic is raging, and the Chinese are making noises on the border, the NRC could be resuscitated.'

Vandalism of the statue of the apostle of peace comes during the week of nationwide protests against the custodial killing of African-American George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25.

Trump also said all Americans were "rightly sickened and revolted by the brutal death" of Floyd, and asserted that justice will be served.

The wave of deaths, one-third of which has come from the world's financial capital of New York and neighbouring New Jersey and Connecticut, has had a devastating impact on American economy which has now gone into recession with an unprecedented over 35 million losing their jobs in the last three months.

The new law permits for the first time Chinese security agencies to open their establishments and operate in Hong Kong.

'Post the pandemic, when India is turning a new leaf in its economic policy with an eye on foreign capital and global supply chains that are likely to leave China, heightened tensions on the India-China border creates an atmosphere of uncertainty,' observes Virendra Kapoor.

This is the first time that the Indian government has made a comment on the origin of the deadly contagion.

India is currently under the 21-day lockdown since March 25, with only essential services exempted to contain the fast-spreading virus.

The Union Health ministry put the number of positive cases at 82, eight more since Thursday night, which includes the woman and a 76-year-old man from Karnataka who became the country's first coronavirus fatality besides 17 foreign nationals, Health Ministry officials said.

Tamal Bandyopadhyay, columnist and author of several books like From Lehman to Demonetisation: A Decade of Disruptions and Sahara: The Untold Story, tells Rediff.com why Yes Bank depositors should not panic and the current crisis at India's fifth largest private lender does not pose any systemic risk.

Modi may take satisfaction from his display of considerable political skill in managing a mercurial, temperamental and unpredictable US president and nudging him into uncharacteristic restraint and even carefully orchestrated remarks. This personal chemistry will come in handy if Trump returns as president in the November elections, says former foreign secretary Shyam Saran.

A realistic assessment will tell us that not much has changed between India and Pakistan; the relationship remains as fraught as before with little prospect of reconciliation, notes Ajai Shukla.

The ones who came more recently were clutching the green cards that gave them an escape hatch through which to return to green pastures: Arvind Panagariya, Raghuram Rajan, Arvind Subramanian and other perfectly honourable gentlemen like them, points out T N Ninan.

In the mid-1980s, India and the US struggled to arrive at sufficient confidence for Washington to even sell a supercomputer to India for monsoon prospecting. Now, the most sensitive military technologies, data, and intelligence resources are being shared. This would not have happened without that one, big deal that changed the fundamentals of India-US relations, notes Shekhar Gupta.

This will be probably for the first time since the 9/11 attacks that the representative of a duly elected Afghan government and the Taliban would be meeting face-to-face for peace talks.

'New Delhi and Washington are now on the same page, on dealing with growing Chinese assertiveness, across the entire Indo-Pacific region,' notes Ambassador G Parthasarathy, Chancellor, Central University of Jammu.

'If there were no Ahmedabad programme -- no flashy town hall event in a huge cricket stadium with thousands cheering him on -- then Trump may well have decided not to go to India.'

Trump will pay a state visit to India on February 24 and 25 at the invitation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who on Wednesday said the US President's visit will be a 'very special one' and it will go a long way in further cementing India-USA friendship.

Despite all of the PM's many strengths, it is increasingly clear that he does not necessarily have a coherent and clear worldview on matters of macro policy.

The plan, which was three years in the making, offers a path towards a two-state solution and presents a "contiguous" territory for a Palestinian state, the US president said.

India's 71st Republic day celebrations in the United States on Sunday were marred by protests and marches, albeit peaceful ones, against recent changes in the citizenship law by large number of Indian Americans in various cities of the country.

'Galbraith had a powerful ally in Washington -- not as blunt and direct as the ambassador -- but committed to see Krishna Menon go.' 'This was President Kennedy himself.'

'New Delhi showed itself willing -- at least for a period -- to tolerate the risk of conflict and to withstand Beijing's implicit and explicit threats.' 'But it also continued to try to cut some kind of deal with China to reduce tensions.'

'Outside investors don't want to get tangled up in a religious war.'

The CAA does not change basic structure of Constitution, MEA spokesperson said at a media briefing.

16 Indians were missing after the incident that happened at Seela Ceramic Factory in Bahri area in Khartoum, the national capital, on Tuesday.

'Unless we change and we see a change in the direction we are taking, times can only get worse.'

'The Democrats have stacked the deck against President Trump and the Republicans. They have leaked out everything,' Trump said in a series of tweet.

Images from Thursday's second T20I between India and Bangladesh, at Rajkot.

Mushfiqur Rahim hit an unbeaten half-century to steer Bangladesh to first-ever victory in T20 Internationals against India, at the Arun Jaitley stadium.

The teams are ready to battle it out and with no established name figuring in India's bowling department

These users span across four continents and included diplomats, political dissidents, journalists and senior government officials.

In the face of climate disaster, a new environmental movement by the name of Extinction Rebellion has risen up, and they will make sure you hear their plea -- 'To governments of the world: we declared a climate and ecological emergency. You did not do enough. To everybody else: rebel' The environmental group, which was founded in the United Kingdom, has planned a large coordinated movement -- called International Rebellion -- in more than 60 global cities. Demonstrators blocked roads and bridges leading to the Palace of Westminster in central London. They staged a "die-in" in Wellington, New Zealand. They obstructed a major roundabout in Berlin and splattered fake blood on Wall Street's "Charging Bull" sculpture. Here are some of the most powerful images from the movement.

The officials said the freed Taliban leaders include Sheikh Abdur Rahim and Mawlawi Abdur Rashid, who had served as the insurgent group's governors of Kunar and Nimroz provinces respectively during the Taliban administration before it was deposed by the US-led forces in 2001.

'Modi skillfully navigated Trump's ego and pushed the right buttons.' 'Critics assailed Modi's speech for its personalism, but in the Trump era this is par for the course.'

'Vajpayee used to consult the Opposition; Indira Gandhi used to consult the Opposition. Which khet ki mooli is Modi?'