World

BEIJING, (Reuters) – China played down today World Health Organization (WHO) concern about a delay in authorisation for a visit by team of experts looking into the origins of the novel coronavirus, saying arrangements were being worked out.

HONG KONG,  (Reuters) – Hong Kong police arrested 53 people in dawn raids on democracy activists today in the biggest crackdown since China last year imposed a new security law which opponents say is aimed at quashing dissent in the former British colony.

ATLANTA,  (Reuters) – Democrats won one U.S. Senate race in Georgia and surged ahead in another today, moving closer to a stunning sweep that would give them control of Congress and the power to advance President-elect Joe Biden’s policy goals.

CARACAS, (Reuters) – Venezuela’s ruling Socialist Party yesterday inaugurated a parliament controlled by allies of President Nicolas Maduro, while the opposition convened a rival committee of legislators in a virtual session, following disputed elections on Dec.

MOSCOW/LONDON/DUBAI,  (Reuters) – Saudi Arabia pledged additional, voluntary oil output cuts of one million barrels per day (bpd) in February and March as part of a deal under which most OPEC+ producers will hold production steady in the face of new coronavirus lockdowns.

SEOUL, (Reuters) – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said his five-year economic plan had failed to meet its goals “on almost every sector” as he kicked off a congress of the ruling Workers’ Party, state media KCNA reported yesterday.

SAN SALVADOR, (Reuters) – A civil court in El Salvador yesterday found former President Elias Antonio Saca and his wife Ana Mixco guilty of “illicit enrichment” and ordered them to return $4.4 million to state coffers, authorities said.

BEIJING,  (Reuters) – The former chairman of China Huarong Asset Management Co has been sentenced to death, a court in the northern city of Tianjin said today, in one of the country’s highest profile corruption cases.

LONDON, (Reuters) – British Prime Minister Boris Johnson yesterday ordered England into a new national lockdown to contain a surge in COVID-19 cases that threatens to overwhelm parts of the health system before a vaccine programme reaches a critical mass.

DUBAI, (Reuters) – Iran has resumed 20% uranium enrichment at an underground nuclear facility, the government said yesterday, breaching a 2015 nuclear pact with major powers and possibly complicating efforts by U.S.

CALGARY, Alberta, (Reuters) – Eight Canadian politicians resigned or were demoted yesterday after travelling internationally over the Christmas holidays despite urgings from government officials to avoid non-essential trips during the COVID-19 pandemic.

BRASILIA/RIO DE JANEIRO, (Reuters) – Brazil made a diplomatic push yesterday to guarantee an Indian-made shipment of British drugmaker AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine, hoping to avoid export restrictions that could delay immunizations during the world’s second-deadliest outbreak.

NEW YORK, (Reuters) – A U.S. judge on Monday blocked the Trump administration from sanctioning human rights lawyers for supporting the work of the world’s war crimes tribunal, the International Criminal Court.

WASHINGTON,  (Reuters) – Georgia’s top election official said yetserday that President Donald Trump, a fellow Republican, had pushed him to take an “inappropriate” call in which he pressured the state to overturn his November presidential election defeat there.

WASHINGTON,  (Reuters) – The U.S. Treasury Department yesterday issued a new license allowing certain transactions with Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido despite U.S.

ATLANTA, (Reuters) – President-elect Joe Biden urged Georgia voters yesterday to send two Democrats to Washington in Tuesday runoffs that will decide control of the U.S.

CARACAS,  (Reuters) – Venezuela’s ruling socialist party will today install a congress controlled by allies of President Nicolas Maduro, a change in control that many Western nations have assailed as the product of a fraudulent election.

BEIJING, (Reuters) – Alibaba founder Jack Ma’s absence from public view in the past two months, including missing the final episode of a TV show on which he was to appear as a judge, has fueled social media speculation over his whereabouts amid a Chinese regulatory clampdown on his sprawling business empire.

LONDON,  (Reuters) – Britain began vaccinating its population with Oxford University and AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 shot today in a world first, racing to give protection to the elderly and vulnerable as a new surge of cases threatened to overwhelm hospitals.

LONDON,  (Reuters) – A British judge ruled today that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange should not be extradited to the United States to face criminal charges including breaking a spying law, saying his mental health problems meant he would be at risk of suicide.