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China Reports New Daily Record COVID Cases, Curbs Tighten across Country

Women wearing face masks walk by a worker sweeping along the shuttered shops as part of COVID-19 controls in Beijing, Thursday, Nov. 24, 2022. (AP)
Women wearing face masks walk by a worker sweeping along the shuttered shops as part of COVID-19 controls in Beijing, Thursday, Nov. 24, 2022. (AP)
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China Reports New Daily Record COVID Cases, Curbs Tighten across Country

Women wearing face masks walk by a worker sweeping along the shuttered shops as part of COVID-19 controls in Beijing, Thursday, Nov. 24, 2022. (AP)
Women wearing face masks walk by a worker sweeping along the shuttered shops as part of COVID-19 controls in Beijing, Thursday, Nov. 24, 2022. (AP)

China on Friday reported another record high of daily COVID-19 infections, as cities across the country enforce measures and curbs to control outbreaks.

Thursday's new local COVID-19 infections set a daily record for a second consecutive day, beating a figure set in mid-April, when the commercial hub of Shanghai was crippled by a citywide lockdown of its 25 million residents that lasted two months.

Excluding imported infections, China reported 32,695 new local cases on Thursday, of which 3,041 were symptomatic and 29,654 were asymptomatic, up from 31,144 a day earlier.

Big outbreaks are numerous and far-flung, with the southern city of Guangzhou and southwestern Chongqing recording the bulk, although hundreds of new infections have been reported daily in cities such as Chengdu, Jinan, Lanzhou, Xian and Wuhan.

Cases quadrupled in Shijiazhuang to 3,197 on Thursday from the previous day.

China's capital, Beijing, reported 424 symptomatic and 1,436 asymptomatic cases on Thursday, compared with 509 symptomatic and 1,139 asymptomatic cases the previous day, local government data showed.

Financial hub Shanghai reported nine symptomatic cases and 77 asymptomatic cases on Thursday, compared with nine symptomatic cases and 58 asymptomatic cases a day before, the local health authority reported.

Guangzhou, a city in the south of nearly 19 million people, reported 257 new locally transmitted symptomatic and 7,267 asymptomatic cases yesterday, compared with 428 symptomatic and 7,192 asymptomatic cases a day before, local authorities said.

Chongqing reported 258 new symptomatic locally transmitted COVID-19 infections and 6,242 asymptomatic cases for Thursday, compared with 409 symptomatic and 7,437 asymptomatic cases the previous day, local government authorities said.

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World

Russia Urges Restraint as Trump Warns Iran of Possible Strike

Iranians drive past an anti-Israeli billboard carrying a sentence in Persian reading "We are ready, are you ready?" hanging at Palestine Square in Tehran, Iran, 24 December 2025. (EPA)
Iranians drive past an anti-Israeli billboard carrying a sentence in Persian reading "We are ready, are you ready?" hanging at Palestine Square in Tehran, Iran, 24 December 2025. (EPA)
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Russia Urges Restraint as Trump Warns Iran of Possible Strike

Iranians drive past an anti-Israeli billboard carrying a sentence in Persian reading "We are ready, are you ready?" hanging at Palestine Square in Tehran, Iran, 24 December 2025. (EPA)
Iranians drive past an anti-Israeli billboard carrying a sentence in Persian reading "We are ready, are you ready?" hanging at Palestine Square in Tehran, Iran, 24 December 2025. (EPA)

The Kremlin on Tuesday said it was ​necessary to develop a dialogue with Iran and urged all parties to refrain from escalation after ‌US President ‌Donald Trump ‌said ⁠Washington ​would ‌support another massive strike on Iran.

Flanked by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump suggested on Monday ⁠that Tehran may be ‌working to ‍restore ‍its weapons programs after ‍a US strike in June. Iran denies it has a nuclear ​weapons program.

Moscow has cultivated closer ties ⁠with Tehran since the start of its war in Ukraine, and this year signed a strategic partnership treaty with Iran.

World

Russia’s Nuclear-Capable Oreshnik Missiles Have Entered Active Service, Moscow Says

In this image made from video provided by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Monday, Dec. 29, 2025, Russia's Oreshnik missile system is seen during a training in an undisclosed location in Belarus. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
In this image made from video provided by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Monday, Dec. 29, 2025, Russia's Oreshnik missile system is seen during a training in an undisclosed location in Belarus. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
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Russia’s Nuclear-Capable Oreshnik Missiles Have Entered Active Service, Moscow Says

In this image made from video provided by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Monday, Dec. 29, 2025, Russia's Oreshnik missile system is seen during a training in an undisclosed location in Belarus. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
In this image made from video provided by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Monday, Dec. 29, 2025, Russia's Oreshnik missile system is seen during a training in an undisclosed location in Belarus. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)

Russia’s nuclear-capable Oreshnik missile system has entered active service, Russia’s Ministry of Defense said Tuesday, as negotiators continue to search for a breakthrough in peace talks to end Moscow’s war in Ukraine.

Troops held a brief ceremony to mark the occasion in neighboring Belarus where the missiles have been deployed, the ministry said. It did not say how many missiles had been deployed or give any other details.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier in December that the Oreshnik would enter combat duty this month. He made the statement at a meeting with top Russian military officers, where he warned that Moscow will seek to extend its gains in Ukraine if Kyiv and its Western allies reject the Kremlin’s demands in peace talks.

The announcement comes at a critical time for Russia-Ukraine peace talks. US President Donald Trump hosted Zelenskyy at his Florida resort Sunday and insisted that Kyiv and Moscow were “closer than ever before” to a peace settlement.

However, negotiators are still searching for a breakthrough on key issues, including whose forces withdraw from where in Ukraine and the fate of Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, one of the 10 biggest in the world. Trump noted that the monthslong US-led negotiations could still collapse.

Putin has sought to portray himself as negotiating from a position of strength as Ukrainian forces strain to keep back the bigger Russian army.

At a meeting with senior military officers Monday, Putin emphasized the need to create military buffer zones along the Russian border. He also claimed that Russian troops were advancing in the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine and pressing their offensive in the southern Zaporizhzhia region.

Moscow first used the Oreshnik, which is Russian for “hazelnut tree,” against Ukraine in November 2024, when it fired the experimental weapon at a factory in Dnipro that built missiles when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union.

Putin has praised the Oreshnik’s capabilities, saying that its multiple warheads, which plunge toward a target at speeds up to Mach 10, are immune to being intercepted.

He warned the West that Moscow could use it against Ukraine’s NATO allies who've allowed Kyiv to use their longer-range missiles to strike inside Russia.

Russia’s missile forces chief has also declared that the Oreshnik, which can carry conventional or nuclear warheads, has a range allowing it to reach all of Europe.

Intermediate-range missiles can fly between 500 to 5,500 kilometers (310 to 3,400 miles). Such weapons were banned under a Soviet-era treaty that Washington and Moscow abandoned in 2019.

World

Türkiye Detains 357 ISIS Suspects Nationwide after Deadly Clash

Police officers block a road leading to a site where Turkish police launched an operation on a house believed to contain suspected ISIS militants, and where, according to state media, seven officers were wounded in a clash, in Yalova province, Türkiye, December 29, 2025. REUTERS/Umit Bektas
Police officers block a road leading to a site where Turkish police launched an operation on a house believed to contain suspected ISIS militants, and where, according to state media, seven officers were wounded in a clash, in Yalova province, Türkiye, December 29, 2025. REUTERS/Umit Bektas
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Türkiye Detains 357 ISIS Suspects Nationwide after Deadly Clash

Police officers block a road leading to a site where Turkish police launched an operation on a house believed to contain suspected ISIS militants, and where, according to state media, seven officers were wounded in a clash, in Yalova province, Türkiye, December 29, 2025. REUTERS/Umit Bektas
Police officers block a road leading to a site where Turkish police launched an operation on a house believed to contain suspected ISIS militants, and where, according to state media, seven officers were wounded in a clash, in Yalova province, Türkiye, December 29, 2025. REUTERS/Umit Bektas

Turkish police detained 357 suspects in a nationwide operation against the ISIS group on Tuesday, the interior minister said, a day after three police officers and six militants were killed in a gunfight in northwest Türkiye. Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said authorities carried out raids in 21 provinces across the country.

"Just as we have never given an opportunity to those who try to bring this country to its knees with ‌terrorism, we will never ‌give them an opportunity in the ‌future ⁠either," he ‌said on X.

Earlier, the Istanbul prosecutor's office had said police raided 114 addresses in Istanbul and two other provinces, and various digital materials and documents were seized.

Police clashed with the militants on Monday in an eight-hour siege at a house in the town of Yalova, on the Sea of Marmara coast south of Istanbul, a week after more than 100 suspected ⁠ISIS members were detained in connection with alleged plans to carry out Christmas and ‌New Year attacks.

Eight police officers and another ‍security force member were wounded in ‍the raid on that property, which was one of more ‍than 100 addresses targeted by authorities on Monday.

Türkiye has stepped up operations against suspected ISIS militants this year, as the group returns to prominence globally.

The US says it carried out a strike against the militants in northwest Nigeria last week, while two gunmen who attacked a Hanukkah event at Sydney's Bondi Beach this month appeared to be inspired ⁠by ISIS, Australian police have said. On December 19, the US military launched strikes against dozens of ISIS targets in Syria in retaliation for an attack on American personnel.

Almost a decade ago, the extremist group was blamed for a series of attacks on civilian targets in Türkiye, including gun attacks on an Istanbul nightclub and the city's main airport, killing dozens of people. Türkiye was a key transit point for foreign fighters, including those of ISIS, entering and leaving Syria during the war there.

Police have carried out regular operations against the group in subsequent ‌years and there have been few attacks since the wave of violence between 2015-2017.