UK-CHINA TIES FREEZE WITH DEBATE OVER HUAWEI, HONG KONG

Only five years ago, then-British Prime Minister David Cameron was

celebrating a "golden era" in U.K.-China relations, bonding with President

Xi Jinping over a pint of beer at the pub and signing off on trade deals

worth billions.

Those friendly scenes now seem like a distant memory.

Hostile rhetoric has ratcheted up in recent days over Beijing's new national

security law for Hong Kong. Britain's decision to offer refuge to millions

in the former colony was met with a stern telling-off by China. And Chinese

officials have threatened "consequences" if Britain treats it as a "hostile

country" and decides to cut Chinese technology giant Huawei out of its

critical telecoms infrastructure amid growing unease over security risks.

All that is pointing to a much tougher stance against China, with a growing

number in Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservative Party taking a long,

hard look at Britain's Chinese ties. Many are saying Britain has been far

too complacent and naive in thinking it could reap economic benefits from

the relationship without political consequences.

"It's not about wanting to cut ties with China. It's that China is itself

becoming a very unreliable and rather dangerous partner," said lawmaker and

former Conservative leader Iain Duncan Smith.

He cited Beijing's "trashing" of the Sino-British Joint Declaration - the

treaty supposed to guarantee Hong Kong a high degree of autonomy when it

reverted from British to Chinese rule - and aggressive posturing in the

South China Sea as areas of concern.

"This is not a country that is in any way managing itself to be a good and

decent partner in anything at the moment. That's why we need to review our

relationship with them," he added.

The company has been at the center of tensions between China and Britain, as

U.K. officials review how the latest U.S. sanctions - imposed over

allegations of cyber spying and aimed at cutting off Huawei's access to

advanced microchips made with American technology - will affect British

telecom networks.

MAJOR FIRE BREAKS OUT ON US NAVY SHIP IN CALIFORNIA

An explosion on a United States Navy ship moored at a base in California set

off a major fire on Sunday injuring 21 people, officials and local media

said.

The USS Bonhomme Richard, an amphibious assault vessel, was in port in San

Diego for maintenance when the explosion erupted.

Thick smoke could be seen billowing from large sections of the ship, as

scenes broadcast by CNN showed fireboats using water cannon to try to

control the blaze.

The official Twitter account of Naval Surface Forces, US Pacific Fleet, said

17 sailors and four civilians were taken to the hospital for minor injuries.

Several firefighters reportedly also suffered burns and smoke inhalation.

Colin Stowell, head of the San Diego fire department, told CNN that the fire

could go on "for days" and "just burn down to the waterline."

The cause of the explosion was not immediately clear.

About 160 sailors were on board at the time. San Diego is the ship's home

port.

PAKISTAN RESTORES BANK ACCOUNTS OF HAFIZ SAEED, HIS FOUR TOP AIDES: REPORT

Pakistan has restored the bank accounts of the outlawed Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD)

chief and the 2008 Mumbai terror attack mastermind Hafiz Saeed and his four

top aides, a media report said on Sunday.

Saeed, a UN designated terrorist whom the US has placed a $10 million bounty

on, was arrested on July 17 last year in the terror financing cases. He was

sentenced to 11 years in jail by an anti-terrorism court in February this

year in two terror financing cases. He is lodged at the Lahore's

high-security Kot Lakhpat jail.

Abdul Salam Bhuttavi, Haji M Ashraf, Yahya Mujahid and Zafar Iqbal - all on

the UN Security Council's terrorists list - were the other members of the

JuD and Lashkar-e-Taiba who got their bank accounts restored, The News

reported.

They are currently facing sentences ranging 1 to 5 years in Lahore jail for

terror financing cases filed against them by the Punjab Counter Terrorism

Department (CTD), the paper said.

"The restoration of bank accounts has taken place following formal approval

of the Sanctions Committee of the United Nations Security Council," the

paper said.

Citing sources, the paper said that the JuD leaders had appealed United

Nations for restoring their bank accounts that they could run their family

affairs.

AFTER HARVARD AND MIT, JOHNS HOPKINS SUES TRUMP ADMIN TO BLOCK RULE ON

FOREIGN STUDENTS

Johns Hopkins University has joined a growing list of prestigious higher

education institutions in the US suing the Trump administration over its

"cruel" decision not to allow foreign students to take online-only courses

this fall semester.

Many American universities have scaled back or eliminated in-person classes

due to the raging Covid-19 pandemic.

Johns Hopkins University (JHU) filed a lawsuit in federal court on Friday,

pushing back against the Trump administration order that would abruptly

rescind accommodations for online learning during the Covid-19 pandemic for

the nearly 5,000 international students at the university and thousands more

across the country.

Johns Hopkins said the policy change sending international students back to

their home countries if they don't enroll in in-person classes, "suddenly

and unexpectedly" plunged Johns Hopkins, and virtually all of higher

education in the United States, into chaos.

The JHU's complaint, filed in US District Court in Washington, D.C., seeks a

temporary restraining order against the proposal by the US Immigration and

Customs Enforcement (ICE), stating that it is "arbitrary and capricious,"

unlawful, and a reversal of earlier guidance upon which months of careful

planning is based.

"The administration's decision is gratuitous, cruel, and inimical to what

this country is about," JHU President Ronald J. Daniels said.

"The university was left with no option but to bring an emergency lawsuit in

federal court to stop the administration from pushing ahead with an illegal

and unconstitutional directive that, if permitted to stand, would

fundamentally undermine the educational freedoms and humanitarian values

that animate higher education in our country," he said in a statement.

MISALIGNED RADAR LED TO UKRAINIAN JET'S DOWNING IN JANUARY, SAYS IRAN

Iran said that the misalignment of an air defence unit's radar system was

the key "human error" that led to the accidental downing of a Ukrainian

passenger plane in January.

"A failure occurred due to a human error in following the procedure" for

aligning the radar, causing a "107-degree error" in the system, the Iranian

Civil Aviation Organisation (CAO) said in a report late on Saturday.

This error "initiated a hazard chain" that saw further errors committed in

the minutes before the plane was shot down, said the CAO document, presented

as a "factual report" and not as the final report on the accident

investigation. Flight 752, a Ukraine International Airlines jetliner, was

struck by two missiles and crashed shortly after taking off from Tehran's

main airport on January 8, at a time of heightened U.S.-Iranian tensions.

The Islamic republic admitted several days later that its forces

accidentally shot down the Kiev-bound plane, killing all 176 people on

board. The CAO said that, despite the erroneous information available to the

radar system operator on the aircraft's trajectory, he could have identified

his target as an airliner, but instead there was a "wrong identification".

The report also noted that the first of the two missiles launched at the

aircraft was fired by a defence unit operator who had acted "without

receiving any response from the Coordination Center" on which he depended.

TRUMP, BIDEN WIN LOUISIANA PRIMARY

President Donald Trump and former Vice-President Joe Biden have won

Louisiana's twice-postponed presidential primary.

Trump faced no true challenger for the Republican nomination, but four other

GOP contenders ran against him on Louisiana's ballot Saturday.

Biden faced 13 Democrats on the ballot, though he already had locked up

enough delegates in other states to become the party's nominee.

SUDAN REFORMS STRICT ISLAMIST LAWS AFTER 30 YEARS

After more than 30 years of Islamist rule, Sudan has outlined wide-reaching

reforms including allowing non-Muslims to drink alcohol, and scrapping the

apostasy law and public flogging.

"We [will] drop all the laws violating the human rights in Sudan," Justice

Minister Nasredeen Abdulbari said.

A raft of new laws were passed last week but this is the first public

explanation of their contents.

Sudan has also banned female genital mutilation (FGM).

Under the new laws, women no longer need permission from a male relative to

travel with their children.

The reforms come after long-time ruler Omar al-Bashir was ousted last year

following massive street protests.

The current government is an uneasy mixture of those groups which ousted Mr

Bashir and his former allies in the military, who ultimately staged a coup

against him.

Non-Muslims are now allowed to consume alcohol in private, however the ban

on Muslim drinking remains, Mr Abdulbari told state TV.

Non-Muslims could still be punished if they are caught drinking with

Muslims, the Sudan Tribune reports him as saying.

XU ZHANGRUN: OUTSPOKEN PROFESSOR FREED AFTER SIX DAYS

An outspoken critic of China's rulers, Professor Xu Zhangrun, has been

released after six days in police custody, friends say.

The Beijing constitutional law professor was already under house arrest when

he was detained on 6 July.

He had criticised China's response to coronavirus and what he sees as a

Mao-like cult of personality under China's current leader, Xi Jinping.

The authorities have not confirmed his release from detention.

News of his release has come from friends speaking to international media

outlets.

One friend told the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post that Mr Xu, 57,

returned home in the morning and was well.

It is not known why he was detained. After his arrest, a friend said Mr Xu's

wife had received a call saying he was accused of soliciting prostitution

while in the city of Chengdu - a charge the friend dismissed as ridiculous.

Open criticism of the authorities in China carries the risk of arrest and

jail sentences. Mr Xu's criticism of the ruling Communist Party in a series

of recent essays had drawn unfavourable attention from the Chinese

government.