'Where is Peng Shuai?': T-shirts in support of the Chinese tennis player, banned at the Australian Open

AUSTRALIA-CHINA

The organizers of the Australian Tennis Open yesterday prevented some spectators from entering the stands wearing "Where's Peng Shuai?" T-shirts. The former Chinese tennis player disappeared and reappeared in November after reporting that she was sexually assaulted by a Chinese leader. His personal situation remains uncertain.

TAIWAN-CHINA

Taiwanese air force planes took off yesterday to repel the entry of 39 Beijing military aircraft into Taiwan's defensive air identification zone, in the largest Chinese incursion since October 2021. China has been flying over for more than a year the area close to Taiwan, the island that the communist leaders consider a "rogue province".

JAPAN-TONGA

A Japanese air force plane has left to deliver aid to Tonga, the Pacific archipelago left on its knees by last week's massive underwater volcanic eruption and subsequent tsunami. The Tongan authorities reported that volcanic ash and the tsunami affected 84% of the population (105,000 inhabitants) and confirmed the deaths of three people.

THAILAND-SAUDI ARABIA

Starting tomorrow, Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha will pay a visit to Saudi Arabia. It will be the first high-level meeting between the two countries in more than 30 years. Riyadh cut diplomatic relations with Bangkok in 1989 after a robbery at the Saudi prince's palace in which a Thai citizenship custodian stole $20 million worth of jewelry.

INDIA

In the Indian state of Karnataka, cases of Covid-19 have risen among children under the age of 10. In the first three weeks of January, 12,800 new cases were reported, up from 376 in December and 322 in November.

AFGHANISTAN

This morning, the three-day meeting between the Taliban delegation and Western government authorities began in Norway. Since its return to power in Kabul in August 2021, it is the first time that the Afghan Islamist movement has held this type of debate in Europe. The central themes of the meeting will be respect for human rights and the humanitarian situation in the country.

RUSSIA

Vorkuta, a town in Russia's far north notorious for its Stalinist labor camps, has assembled an extraordinary collection of artifacts and objects that belonged to the prisoners at the Gulag Museum. It should be noted that the inhabitants are opposed to the exhibition since they do not want to revive the memory of those years and also, as some citizens declared, "the situation of current Russia takes us back to that time."

ARMENIA

Armenian President Armen Sarkisyan resigned three years before the end of his term. In statements, he said that the reason is "to promote the unity of the nation and not subject the prestige of the institutions to slander and conspiracy theories." Many urged the Head of State, whose position is only honorary, to intervene against Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian, highly criticized by the opposition.