Covid-19: Is China’s vaccine diplomacy working?

The UN health body has given the new variant a name and said it is a variant of concern. The WHO urged against hasty travel curbs while it gathers more data.

In Montenegro, the construction of a motorway to open up the Balkan nation – a project launched in 2014 – is now more than two years behind schedule. With its high environmental and financial costs (more than $1 billion), this pharaonic project has dangerously increased the debt of the country of 600,000 inhabitants. FRANCE 24 investigates. The work is being financed by a Chinese bank and largely carried out by a Chinese state-owned company and a local firm close to the previous government, which signed the deal. But if Montenegro defaults on its loan, the contract stipulates that the country must relinquish sovereignty over certain parts of its territory. This burden on the country’s new government has aggravated the strong suspicions of corruption around the building site.

Protesters in the Solomon Islands called on the prime minister to resign as riots took place for a second day. Australia said it would send a peacekeeping force to the Pacific nation seized by inter-island tension.

United Arab Emirates General Ahmed Naser al-Raisi has criminal complaints against him in five countries. The decision was announced amid the global law enforcement agency's annual gathering in Istanbul.

Dwayne Johnson, the action star whose films pull in big bucks at global box offices, is aiming to entertain viewers in their living rooms with his next movie spectacle, the globe-trotting Netflix heist caper "Red Notice." Johnson stars in the movie with Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds about a race to locate and steal three valuable artifacts. The movie will stream on Netflix starting Friday after playing for a week in a limited number of movie theaters. The film ranks among the most expensive ever made by Netflix with a pricetag of roughly $200 million.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has moved to reassure allies of US commitment to the region and said Washington would look at all other options if Iran didn't engage "seriously."