MOSCOW, July 8. /TASS/: The lower house of the Russian parliament, the State Duma, is set to decide in July on the draft law banning gender reassignment surgery, State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin said on Saturday.

"Traditional family values are of great importance for each of us," Volodin wrote on his Telegram channel. "Czech President [Petr Pavel] said yesterday that ‘if, God forbid, Russia wins, all Western values will be tarnished’."

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — Cities across China opened their air raid shelters to offer residents relief from the heat Friday as unusually high temperatures across parts of the country started claiming lives.

Northern China is experiencing strings of days with record-high temperatures, compounded by drought. Earlier this week, Beijing reported more than nine straight days with temperatures exceeding 35 C (95 F), according to the National Climate Center — a streak unseen since 1961.

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 8 (NNN-XINHUA) – UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, stands by his condemnation of Israel, for the excessive use of force in Jenin, said his deputy spokesman, yesterday.

At a press encounter at the UN headquarters in New York on Thursday, Guterres condemned Israel for its excessive use of force in Jenin, in the occupied West Bank.

(AP) --- Mily Trevino-Sauceda was 9 when her mother fell as she worked to move irrigation pipes along rows of potato and alfalfa on an Idaho farm. Mily’s 10-year-old brother splashed water over their mother’s face and body while her children looked on, scared and crying. Their mother had fainted from the heat, and could never again work as fast or as long in the sun.

Decades later, the memory remains sharp for Trevino-Sauceda, who says few systemic changes have been made to safeguard farmworkers from extreme heat.

TOKYO, July 7 (Xinhua) -- Several non-profit organizations (NPOs) in Japan announced Friday the launch of a marine-protection project aimed at preventing the government's plan to discharge nuclear-contaminated water from the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant to the ocean.

The NPOs, including the Citizens' Nuclear Information Center and the Japan Congress Against A- and H-Bombs, will start the project titled "Future of the Ocean" on July 17, which is recognized as "Marine Day" in Japan.

MOSCOW, July 8. /TASS/: A one-on-one meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is possible, but the exact dates for such meeting have not been defined as of yet, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Saturday.

Turkish President Erdogan announced on Friday said that his Russian counterpart Putin could visit Turkey next month.

"Such contact is possible. No exact dates set as of yet," Peskov said.

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel’s army announced Friday that it has disciplined five officers, but would not file criminal charges for their actions during Israel’s 2021 war in the Gaza Strip — a conflict in which human rights advocates say Israel committed war crimes.

The soldiers, who received army reprimands for their actions, did not obey standard procedures when striking Gaza, the army statement said. It did not say when the incidents took place, what occurred or whether they involved civilian deaths.

BEIRUT, Jul 8 (NNN-NNA) – The UN-Habitat and the Lebanese environment ministry, yesterday, launched a project aimed to reduce marine litter in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Funded by Germany’s Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Nuclear Safety and Consumer Protection, at a budget of 4.57 million euros (5.2 million U.S. dollars), the project will “engage municipal authorities and local communities, to devise local plans to reduce marine litter and manage their waste in an integrated manner,” according to a statement from the UN-Habitat.

SONNEBERG, Germany (AP) — Mike Knoth is more than thrilled that a far-right populist party’s candidate recently won the county administration in his hometown in rural eastern Germany for the first time since the Nazi era.

The gardener despises the country’s established parties, he doesn’t trust the media and he feels there are too many migrants in the country. The far-right party Alternative for Germany, or AfD, he hopes, will improve everything that’s not going well in his eyes in Sonneberg, which is in the southeastern state of Thuringia.

MOSCOW, July 8 (Reuters) - Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu has inspected troops and overseen training of newly formed units made up of contracted servicemen, his ministry said on Saturday.

The ministry released video footage on its Telegram channel showing Shoigu in khaki military fatigues inspecting soldiers at a shooting range, in his first public appearance with troops since last month's aborted mutiny by the Wagner mercenary group.

The ministry did not say when the video was filmed or when the inspection took place.

WASHINGTON, July 8. /TASS/: The US decided to supply cluster munitions to Ukraine out of despair, but the move won’t affect Russia’s determination to achieve the goals of its special military operation, Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said on Friday.

UNITED NATIONS, July 7 (Xinhua) -- UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday called for the continuation of the agreements that allow food and fertilizer exports from Russia and Ukraine.