Dozens of residents of Beirut, Lebanon, took the streets late Thursday to demand accountability from their government after an explosion destroyed much of the city’s port area, leaving at least 150 dead, 5,000 injured, and hundreds of thousands homeless. Security forces responded by tear-gassing desperate residents.
Lebanese President Michel Aoun said on Friday that the cause of the titanic explosion in Beirut on Tuesday “has not been determined yet,” and authorities have not ruled out “possibility of external interference through a rocket or bomb or other act.”
A natural gas pipeline exploded in China’s north-central city of Yulin on Wednesday. Authorities blame the blast on recent flooding in the region and have issued a warning to area citizens to expect more heavy rains in the coming days.
Thousands of biometric surveillance cameras made by Chinese-owned Huawei are “en route” to Serbia, part of Belgrade and Beijing’s joint plan to install the Chinese telecom giant’s signature “Safe City” surveillance system in the capital, Albania’s Exit News reported on Wednesday.
Japan solemnly observed the 75th anniversary of the U.S. dropping an atomic bomb on Hiroshima Thursday in a local ceremony scaled down due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
Italy has expelled three radical Islamic extremists deemed to be security risks, including an Egyptian imam who headed an Islamic cultural association in the province of Venice.
Chinese military aggression continues to increase along the contested Line of Actual Control (LAC), an Indian Defense Ministry document noted on Thursday, warning that conflict between the two sides in the disputed border area is likely to be prolonged.
The governor of the Japanese prefecture of Osaka declared in a press conference this week that he would make gargling mouthwash “strictly enforced” to fight the Chinese coronavirus, the nation’s Asahi Shimbun newspaper reported on Thursday.
A court in Pakistan ruled on Tuesday that 14-year-old Christian girl Maira Shahbaz voluntarily converted to Islam and is legally married to an older Muslim man named Mohamad Nakash, even though Maira and her family say Nakash kidnapped her at gunpoint with two accomplices during the coronavirus lockdown in April.
The U.S. “should lift sanctions imposed against Lebanese people” following the port explosion in Beirut on Tuesday, Iran’s Foreign Ministry said on Thursday.
India banned an uncertain number of Chinese smartphone apps Tuesday, adding to the 59 banned at the end of June and 47 more, mostly clones and alternate versions of the original 59, in July.
Canadian citizen Xu Weihong was sentenced to death in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou on Thursday after being vaguely charged with “making drugs.”
A Lebanese lawmaker revealed evidence on Wednesday that customs officials tried to get the government to secure a stash of ammonium nitrate, a combustible material, at least six times and received no guidance.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday declared that the “tide is absolutely turning” against China.
A woman being filmed in her wedding dress on Tuesday was knocked to the ground by a massive explosion in Beirut, Lebanon, but she survived.
Iran’s state-run Fars News Agency quoted “experts” on Wednesday who said the massive explosion in Beirut, currently deemed an accident by Lebanese officials, bears a suspicious resemblance to “Israeli-style operations in the past.”
A prominent commentator in Lebanon suggested late Wednesday that a top Chinese construction firm could take up the herculean task of reconstructing the Port of Beirut after a massive explosion destroyed much of the site and surrounding neighborhoods.
French President Emmanuel Macron toured the streets of Beirut, Lebanon, on Thursday, becoming the first head of state to do so following Tuesday’s devastating explosion, including Lebanese President Michel Aoun.
A video recorded by a young male model inside a Chinese Uyghur detention facility in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region and published this week provides new insight into the country’s concentration camps for ethnic minorities.
The U.N. said this week that the pandemic had triggered the “largest disruption of education ever,” affecting “over 1 billion students.”
The Royal Navy will be needed to perform returns of illegal boat migrants to France in the English Channel, said the union representing the UK Border Force.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has in the past threatened to annihilate Israel with what he described as a “nuclear” explosion at the Haifa port using the same chemicals found at the Beirut blast, The Jerusalem Post reported Wednesday.
Beirut has endured many horrors in its 5,000-year history, but nothing like the massive explosion that ripped through the ancient Mediterranean port city on Tuesday, leaving thousands of casualties, 300,000 homeless, and over $10 billion in damage in its wake. Now the indomitable Lebanese are digging themselves out from the rumble and demanding answers from their political elites.
A senior Egyptian official has refuted the claim by Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk that the pyramids were built by aliens, and invited him to visit the country to inspect the historic sites for himself.
Syrian authorities on Wednesday said they had found a large number of foreign-made weapons and ammunition, “including U.S.-made shells and Israeli-made mines left behind by terrorists,” in the southern part of the war-ravaged country.
The test results for a man in North Korea suspected of being the country’s first official coronavirus case were “inconclusive,” a World Health Organization (W.H.O.) official told Reuters on Wednesday.
Chinese state media continued its frenzied response to the prospective U.S. ban on TikTok with editorials slamming the Trump administration for “robbery” and a “flagrant heist” because the app can only survive in the U.S. if Microsoft agrees to purchase it.
The government of Iran and leaders of Hezbollah, Iran’s terrorist proxy group in Lebanon, offered assistance to the city of Beirut after a massive explosion on Tuesday caused enormous damage and casualties.
China’s dictator Xi Jinping rapidly issued a statement lamenting the deadly explosion in Beirut, Lebanon, reportedly expressing condolences to President Michel Aoun on Wednesday.
A major fire erupted at an Iranian market in Ajman, United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.), on Wednesday, multiple local news outlets reported.
