KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian air defenses downed 32 of 35 Shahed exploding drones launched by Russia early Tuesday, most of them in the Kyiv region, officials said, in a bombardment that exposed gaps in the country’s air protection after almost 16 months of war.

Russian forces mostly targeted the region around the Ukrainian capital in a nighttime drone attack lasting around three hours, officials said, but Ukrainian air defenses in the area shot down about two dozen of them.

June 20 (Reuters) - Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said on Tuesday that Moscow had information that Ukraine was planning to strike Russian-controlled Crimea with longer-range U.S. and British missiles and warned Russia would retaliate if that happened.

Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, but considers it to be outside the scope of what it calls its "special military operation" which is focused in eastern and southern Ukraine where Ukraine is fighting to retake territory.

BERLIN (AP) — Trade, climate change and the war in Ukraine are on the agenda Tuesday as German Chancellor Olaf Scholz meets Chinese Premier Li Qiang, who is on his first foreign trip since taking office.

The meeting in Berlin is the seventh time Germany and China have held high-level government consultations and comes a day after Chinese President Xi Jinping met with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, indicating an effort by Beijing to reach out to the West and improve frosty relations.

MOSCOW, June 20. /TASS/: The State Duma at a plenary session on Tuesday adopted in the second and third readings a bill to rename the Day of Military Glory (September 3) to the Day of Victory over Militaristic Japan and the end of World War II.

The document was introduced by a group of deputies last June. The changes are to be made to the law On the Days of Military Glory and Commemorative Dates of Russia. The Day of the End of World War II, celebrated on September 3, will now be officially referred to as the Day of Victory over Militaristic Japan and the end of World War II.

RAMALLAH/GAZA, June 19 (Xinhua) -- The Palestinians strongly condemned the Israeli government's decision to expedite the process for building settlements in the West Bank.

During a weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday, the Israeli government authorized pro-settlement Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich to assume main responsibility for settlement planning and construction in the West Bank, and shortened political approval process for settlement planning and construction that had been in place for 25 years.

BUDAPEST, Jun 20 (NNN-XINHUA) – A Boeing B787-9 Dreamliner of Shanghai Airlines, a subsidiary of China Eastern Airlines, was warmly received at Liszt Ferenc International Airport in Budapest, Hungary’s capital city, last night.

China Eastern Airlines commenced a direct flight service between east China’s Ningbo city and Budapest.

CALBAYOG, Philippines (AP) — Delfina Guiwan’s heart was pounding as she snuck back to her village, now abandoned and eerily quiet, in the fertile foothills of gently erupting Mayon volcano in the northeastern Philippines.

When patrolling police spotted her, they warned that the village is off-limits because of the danger of a violent eruption at any time. Guiwan, 47, said she knew the risks but begged to stay a few minutes more to get her daughter’s school uniform from their shack and feed her pigs.

June 20 (Reuters) - China and Cuba are negotiating to establish a new joint military training facility on the island, sparking alarm in the U.S. that it could lead to the stationing of Chinese troops and other security operations just 100 miles off Florida's coast, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday citing current and former U.S officials.

19 June 2023; MEMO: Kuwait formed a new government on Sunday, naming Saad Al Barrak as Oil Minister to replace Bader Al-Mulla and re-appointing Finance Minister, Manaf Abdulaziz Al Hajri, AFP reports.

According to the report, Sheikh Ahmad Nawaf Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah, who was re-appointed as Prime Minister last week, formed the new cabinet announced in a decree carried by the state news agency, KUNA.

19 June 2023; MEMO: International donors, on Monday, pledged close to $1.5 billion in humanitarian aid to Sudan and the broader region, responding to a call by the United Nations to boost aid amid a conflict that has forced some 2.2 million people from their homes, Reuters reports.

The United Nations said $3 billion was needed this year for humanitarian relief inside Sudan and for refugees fleeing the country, only a fraction of which had been funded.

BEIJING (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met on Monday with Chinese President Xi Jinping and said they agreed to “stabilize” badly deteriorated U.S.-China ties, but America’s top diplomat left Beijing with his biggest ask rebuffed: better communications between their militaries.

After meeting Xi, Blinken said China is not ready to resume military-to-military contacts, something the U.S. considers crucial to avoid miscalculation and conflict, particularly over Taiwan.

NEW YORK (AP) — Lashing out after his arraignment on federal charges last week, Donald Trump took aim at President Joe Biden and Democrats with language that seemed to evoke another era: He was being persecuted, he said, by “Marxists” and “communists.”