WORLD

The World Health Organization has repeatedly voiced concern that China's official statistics are not showing the true impact of its current surge in Covid cases.

Moscow named a new commander for its invasion of Ukraine while Russian private military firm Wagner Group said its capture of the salt mining town Soledar in eastern Ukraine was complete.

Demonstrations have swept Iran since the September 16 death of Iranian Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini, 22, after her arrest in Tehran for allegedly failing to adhere to the dress rules which demand women wear hijab headscarves.

The succession of Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, who was believed to have been killed in a U.S. raid last year, remains unclear, a U.S. intelligence official said on Tuesday.

President Isaac Herzog appealed to Israeli politicians on Tuesday to "lower the temperature" amid confrontional exchanges between the new hardline nationalist coalition government and the centre-left opposition.

Kharkiv has faced heavy bombardment during the war, but the frontline has moved east since a Ukrainian counter-offensive last year retook territory from Russian forces.

President Vladimir Putin's defence minister vowed on Tuesday to build a deeper arsenal of weapons, bolster aviation technology to better evade air defences and improve drone production after a series of battlefield humiliations in Ukraine.

The U.N. Security Council on Monday unanimously approved the delivery of humanitarian aid to some four million people in northwestern Syria for another six months, avoiding a traditional fight with Russia over the issue.

Russia has stepped up a powerful assault on Soledar in eastern Ukraine, officials in Kyiv said, forcing Ukrainian troops to repel waves of attacks led by the Wagner contract militia around the salt mining town and nearby fronts.

The latest sentences -- for three men convicted of killing three members of the security forces -- bring to 17 the official total of detainees condemned to death in connection with nearly four months of protests.

The pilgrimage -- one of five pillars of Islam, and which all able-bodied Muslims with the means are required to perform at least once -- is scheduled for June.

Nearly 10 documents were found at Biden's office at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement, CBS News reported.

A sacked executive of US banking giant Wells Fargo accused of urinating on a fellow passenger aboard an Air India flight has been arrested, a police spokesperson said Saturday.

The latest hangings double the number of executions to four over the nationwide unrest, which has escalated since mid-September into calls for an end to Iran's clerical regime.

Authorities had been given a "serious tip" that had prompted the overnight raid, said Herbert Reul, interior minister for the North Rhine-Westphalia region.

The Russian statement did not say when exactly the strike had taken place -- only that Russian intelligence had "over the past 24 hours" located more than 1,300 Ukrainian troops in two buildings in Kramatorsk.

The founder of Russia's most high-profile mercenary group said on Saturday he wanted his forces and the regular Russian army to capture the small city of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine because it possessed "underground cities" that can hold troops and tanks.

Travellers streamed into China by air, land and sea on Sunday, many eager for long-awaited reunions, as Beijing opened borders that have been all but shut since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Protesters gathered in the west German village of Luetzerath on Sunday to challenge the extension of an open-air coal mine they say runs counter to the country's climate commitments.

Pakistan is still reeling from the unprecedented monsoon floods unleashed last August which killed more than 1,700 people and affected some 33 million others.

A surge in the cost of most food commodities last year, as the disruption caused by Russia's invasion of Ukraine raised concerns of shortages, sent the U.N.

Idlib has recorded more than 14,000 suspected cholera cases and Aleppo more than 11,000 since the outbreak began in September.

The Guardian reported that Saudi authorities provided food donations to insurgency victims in Borno state, Nigeria, through the King Salman Humanitarian Aid Relief Centre (KSrelief).

An Australian court granted conditional bail on Friday to a woman arrested on charges of entering and remaining in areas of Syria held by the militant group Islamic State.

China, the world's largest crude oil importer, has ended its stringent zero-COVID policy, leading to a surge in COVID infections across the country.

Israel, which together with Egypt maintains a blockade around Gaza citing security concerns, says it is worried about militant groups commandeering such machines for military purposes.

Videos posted on social media and Kurdish-language media showed police blocking one group.

In a joint statement after a call between President Joe Biden and Chancellor Olaf Scholz, the United States said it would provide Ukraine with Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles while Germany would provide Marder Infantry Fighting Vehicles.

"The Turkish embassy did request that we use this spelling in our communications," State Department spokesman Ned Price said.