UK just weeks behind Italy in coronavirus outbreak, warns Boris Johnson

New York, Jan 11: The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) on Friday renewed a six-year-long cross-border humanitarian aid deliveries mechanism into Syria.

According to Sputnik, the Security Council voted in favour of a resolution on Friday that allows cross border deliveries to be conducted via Turkey, preserving two checkpoints and excluding the Al-Yarubiyah border crossing with Iraq and the Al-Ramtha crossing with Jordan, until July 10, 2020.

Russia proposed to amend the adopted resolution by replacing a part of the draft which stipulates that humanitarian assistance into Syria should be delivered based on the principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality and independence by the phrase that such aid should be provided "in accordance with the guiding principles of humanitarian emergency assistance, as contained in UNGA resolution 46/182."

The agreement was reached after Belgium and Germany decided to amend the original version of their joint resolution, which proposed keeping three points for cross-border deliveries into the Arab republic.

In December last year, the United Nations had said that over 235,000 people fled the Idlib region in the last two weeks after Russia and Syria launched airstrikes in a bid to take over the last major opposition bastion.

Russia backed Syria government launched a fresh assault to capture the province.

Syrian Bashar al-Assad regime, backed by Iran, has reportedly promised to take back the rebel-controlled area and broke a ceasefire that was announced in August.

They have since December 19 seized dozens of towns and villages from armed fighters amid clashes that have killed hundreds on both sides.

Beijing, Feb 18: Police in China have arrested a prominent activist who had been a fugitive for weeks and criticised President Xi Jinping's handling of the coronavirus epidemic while in hiding, a rights group said Tuesday.

Anti-corruption activist Xu Zhiyong was arrested on Saturday after being on the run since December, according to Amnesty International.

China's ruling Communist Party has severely curtailed civil liberties since Xi took power in 2012, rounding up rights lawyers, labour activists and even Marxist students.

The death this month of a whistleblowing doctor who was reprimanded by police for raising the alarm about the deadly new virus before dying of it himself triggered rare calls for political reform and freedom of speech.

The "Chinese government's battle against the coronavirus has in no way diverted it from its ongoing general campaign to crush all dissenting voices," said Patrick Poon, China researcher at Amnesty International, in an emailed statement.

Another source, who spoke to news agency on the condition of anonymity, said Xu had been arrested in the southern city of Guangzhou.

Guangzhou police did not respond to requests for comment.

Xu went into hiding after authorities broke up a December gathering of intellectuals discussing political reform in the eastern coastal city of Xiamen in Fujian province, prior to the coronavirus crisis.

Over a dozen lawyers and activists were detained or disappeared after the Xiamen gathering, according to rights groups -- and Xu's detention appears linked to his presence at the meeting, explained Poon.

But while on the run, Xu continued to post information on Twitter about rights issues.

On February 4 Xu released an article calling on Xi to step down and criticised his leadership across a range of issues including the US-China trade war, Hong Kong's pro-democracy protests and the coronavirus epidemic, which has now killed nearly 1,900 people.

"Medical supplies are tight, hospitals are filled with patients, and a large number of infected people have no way to be diagnosed," he wrote. "It's a mess."

"The coronavirus outbreak shows just how important values like freedom of expression and transparency are -- the exact values that Xu has long advocated," Yaqiu Wang, China researcher at Human Rights Watch, told news agency.

But the disappearance of Xu illustrates how the Chinese state "persists in its old ways" by "silencing its critics", she said.

Xu -- who founded a movement calling for greater transparency among high-ranking officials -- previously served a four-year prison sentence from 2013 to 2017 for organising an "illegal gathering".

"That he was a fugitive for so many days while continuing to speak out, that in itself was... a kind of challenge to (Chinese authorities)," said Hua Ze, a long-time friend of Xu who told AFP she lost contact with the Chinese activist on Saturday morning.

Stockholm, Jun 15: Nuclear powers continue to modernise their arsenals, researchers said Monday, warning that tensions were rising and the outlook for arms control was "bleak".

"The loss of key channels of communication between Russia and the USA... could potentially lead to a new nuclear arms race," said Shannon Kile, director of the nuclear arms control programme at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) and co-author of the report.

Russia and the US account for more than 90 percent of the world's nuclear weapons.

Kile was referring to the future of the New START treaty between the US and Russia, which is set to expire in February 2021.

It is the final nuclear deal still in force between the two superpowers, aimed at maintaining their nuclear arsenals below Cold War levels.

"Discussions to extend New START or to negotiate a new treaty made no progress in 2019," the SIPRI researchers noted.

At the same time, nuclear powers continue to modernise their weapons while China and India are increasing the size of their arsenals.

"China is in the middle of a significant modernisation of its nuclear arsenal. It is developing a so-called nuclear triad for the first time, made up of new land- and sea-based missiles and nuclear-capable aircraft," SIPRI said.

The country has repeatedly rejected Washington's insistence that it join any future nuclear arms reduction talks.

The number of nuclear warheads declined in the past year.

At the start of 2020, the United States, Russia, Britain, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea together had 13,400 nuclear arms, according to SIPRI's estimates, 465 fewer than at the start of 2019.

The decline was attributed mainly to the United States and Russia.

While the future of the New START treaty remains uncertain, Washington and Moscow have continued to respect their obligations under the accord.

"In 2019, the forces of both countries remained below the limits specified by the treaty," the report said. But both nations "have extensive and expensive programmes underway to replace and modernise their nuclear warheads, missile and aircraft delivery systems, and nuclear weapon production facilities," it added.

"Both countries have also given new or expanded roles to nuclear weapons in their military plans and doctrines, which marks a significant reversal of the post-Cold War trend towards the gradual marginalisation of nuclear weapons."

The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), a cornerstone of the global nuclear non-proliferation regime, celebrates its 50th anniversary this year.

The number of nuclear arms worldwide has declined since hitting a peak of almost 70,000 in the mid-1980s.

The five original nuclear powers -- Washington, Beijing, Moscow, Paris and London -- in March reiterated their commitment to the treaty.