XI's FORTRESS AGAINST PANDEMIC CRACKS AS BEIJING CLUSTER GROWS

Beijing, on Monday, began COVID-19 tests for 90,000 people and locked down

several residential areas near a wholesale market in Beijing where a new

cluster of COVID-19 broke out - an unnerving breach in the capital, which

President Xi Jinping had said, should be a "fortress against the pandemic".

That makes it the most serious flare-up in China since February, stoking

fears of a second-wave of the respiratory disease which emerged in the

central city of Wuhan late last year and has now infected more than 8

million people worldwide.

City officials said they had tracked down 79 infections in Beijing over the

previous four days, including 36 on Sunday. All appeared traceable to the

bustling Xinfadi food market.

Inspectors found 40 samples of the virus in the closed market, including on

a chopping board for imported salmon. That prompted some supermarket chains

to take salmon off their shelves over the weekend, and inspect markets,

stores and restaurant.

Beijing health officials said gene sequencing showed the virus strain

causing the new outbreak was related to that in Europe, although it wasn't

clear if it was being spread by the movement of people or transportation of

food. Experts were doubtful the virus was being spread through salmon or

other food products. Ian MacKay, who studies viruses at the University of

Queensland in Australia, said there was no evidence to suggest a link

between outbreaks and food.

This failure in the capital's defences appeared to rile Xi's subordinates.

Two local officials and the general manager of the Xinfadi market were

dismissed on Sunday for what the city leadership said was a failure to move

quickly enough.

Streams of people queued in a Beijing stadium as mass testing was carried

out, and a strict lockdown was extended across 21 Beijing neighbourhoods.

Meanwhile, South Korea is also among those countries seeking to prevent a

resurgence of the outbreak, reporting 37 new cases on Monday.

W.H.O 'FULLY EXPECTS' CHINA TO SHARE GENETIC SEQUENCING OF NEW CORONAVIRUS

CASES

The emergencies chief of the World Health Organization said he "fully

expects" China to share the genetic sequences from the resurgence of

coronavirus that have recently hit Beijing, even though they have not yet

done so.

Chinese officials said that their examination of the virus shows it

originated in Europe, but they have not yet shared the sequences with WHO or

the global scientific community.

"We fully expect our colleagues in China will share that information," said

Dr. Michael Ryan at a press briefing on Monday. Ryan said the finding that

this virus genome "may represent a strain commonly transmitting in Europe"

is significant but that verifying the hypothesis requires the sequences be

shared.

CORONAVIRUS: US WITHDRAWS EMERGENCY USE OF HYDROXYCHLOROQUINE

Emergency use of the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for

coronavirus has been withdrawn by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The FDA said that new evidence from clinical trials meant that it was no

longer reasonable to believe that the drug would produce an antiviral

effect.

President Donald Trump later defended promoting the use of

hydroxychloroquine as a treatment of Covid-19.

In March, the FDA granted the emergency use of the drug for some serious

cases.

But on Monday, the agency said clinical studies had suggested that

hydroxychloroquine was ineffective in treating the deadly virus and failed

to prevent infection among those exposed to it.

NEW ZEALAND CONFIRMS TWO NEW CASES OF CORONAVIRUS

New Zealand said on Tuesday that it has two new cases of the coronavirus,

both related to recent travel from the U.K.

The country declared itself free of COVID-19 last week but had warned that

new cases may emerge in the future.

The two new cases were related, the health ministry said in a statement.

IAEA BEGINS MEET OVER IRAN'S N-PROGRAMME

The UN nuclear watchdog's governing body began meeting on Monday as a row

brews over Iran's refusal to allow access to two sites where nuclear

activity may have occurred in the past. The Vienna-based International

Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) expressed "serious concern" in a report earlier

this month that Iran has been blocking inspections at the sites.

The Board of Governors, one of the agency's policy-making bodies, is

expected to discuss the report during its meeting. If they pass a resolution

critical of Iran, it would be the first of its kind since 2012.

Even though the two sites are not thought to be key to Iran's current

activities, the agency says it needs to know if past activities going back

almost two decades have been properly declared and all materials accounted

for.

Iran told the agency the report was a source of "deep regret and

disappointment" and hinted the queries were based on "fabricated

information" from "intelligence services".

In a statement to the Board of Governors opening this week's meeting, IAEA

Director General Rafael Grossi called on Iran "to cooperate immediately and

fully with the Agency, including by providing prompt access to the locations

specified by us".

U.S. PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP ANNOUNCES MAJOR U.S. TROOP CUT IN 'DELINQUENT'

GERMANY

President Donald Trump has said he is ordering a major reduction in U.S.

troop strength in Germany, a move widely criticised by members of his own

party as a gift to Russia and a threat to U.S. national security.

"We're putting the number down to 25,000 soldiers," Mr. Trump said at the

White House on June 15.

The U.S. currently has about 34,500 troops in Germany - far fewer than

during the Cold War, when Germany was the central focus of American and NATO

efforts to deter invasion by the former Soviet Union.

Mr. Trump faulted Germany for failing to pay enough for its own defence,

calling the long-time NATO ally "delinquent".

"We're protecting Germany and they're delinquent. That doesn't make sense,"

the President said, referring to Germany's failure thus far to attain a goal

set by all NATO members in 2014 to spend at least 2% of gross national

product on defence by 2024. Germany says it hopes to reach 2% by 2031.

In his White House remarks to reporters, Mr. Trump suggested his troop

withdrawal decision was intended to punish Germany, noting that the presence

of American troops is a boost to local economies.

US SUPREME COURT BACKS PROTECTION FOR LGBT WORKERS

The top court in the US has ruled that employers who fire workers for being

gay or transgender are breaking the country's civil rights laws.

In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court said federal law, which prohibits

discrimination based on sex, should be understood to include sexual

orientation and gender identity.

The ruling is a major win for LGBT workers and their allies.

And it comes even though the court has become more conservative.

Lawyers for the employers had argued that the authors of the 1964 Civil

Rights Act had not intended it to apply to cases involving sexual

orientation and gender identity. The Trump administration sided with that

argument.

But Judge Neil Gorsuch, who was nominated to the court by President Donald

Trump, said acting against an employee on those grounds necessarily takes

sex into account.

"An employer who fires an individual for being homosexual or transgender

fires that person for traits or actions it would not have questioned in

members of a different sex," he wrote.

Members of the LGBT community across the US were celebrating on hearing the

news.

BLACK MAN CARRIES INJURED WHITE MAN TO SAFETY DURING ANTI-RACIST PROTEST IN

UK, PIC GOES VIRAL

A photo of a black man carrying an injured white man on his shoulder during

a protest between anti-racist and far-right demonstrators in central London

on Sunday has gone viral on social media, Reuters reported on Monday. The

incident was reported by a photographer who had been covering the protests

against the murder of African-American man George Floyd.

The black protestor, identified as Patrick Hutchinson, a personal trainer,

shouted "That's not what we do!" as he carried off the white man, likely a

counter-protestor, in a fireman's carry on his shoulder. Some people in the

crowd shouted out that the assault victim was a member of the far-right, but

this has not yet been confirmed.

Hutchinson said the man's life was under threat. "So I just went under,

scooped him up, put him on my shoulders and sort of started marching towards

the police with him...whilst all the guys were surrounding me and protecting

me and the guy I had on my shoulder," the personal trainer said. He added

that he felt blows even as he was carrying the man to safety.

"If the other three police officers who were standing around when George

Floyd was murdered had thought about intervening like what we did, George

Floyd would be alive today," Hutchinson said. He credited those who

protected him from the crowd as having contributed to taking the white man

to safety.

Hutchinson told CNN on Sunday that he helped the man to safety because he

did not want the reason for the protests to be undermined with a new

narrative like "Black Lives Matters, Youngsters Kill Protestors".

SUPREME COURT REJECTS TRUMP BID TO VOID CALIFORNIA SANCTUARY LAW

The Supreme Court on Monday rejected the Trump administration's bid to throw

out a California immigrant-sanctuary law that limits local police

cooperation with federal immigration authorities.

The justices' order leaves in place lower court rulings that upheld the law.

Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas voted to hear the administration's

appeal.

The administration said the 2017 state immigrant-sanctuary measure conflicts

with federal immigration law and makes it harder to deport people who are in

the country illegally.

California argued that encouraging local police to participate in federal

immigration enforcement is counterproductive because it makes people less

likely to report crimes if they believe they'll be deported for doing so.

RUSSIA SENTENCES US EX-MARINE TO 16 YEARS IN SPY TRIAL

A Russian court on Monday sentenced former US marine Paul Whelan to 16 years

in a penal colony for espionage in a case that strained ties with Washington

and fuelled speculation of a prisoner swap.

Moscow City Court found Whelan guilty of receiving classified information as

he stood in the dock with a sign that read "Sham trial!" and called pleaded

for US President Donald Trump to intervene in the case.

The court process is "slimy, greasy Russian politics nothing more, nothing

less," he said.

Whelan, 50, has been held in a Moscow jail since his arrest in December 2018

and his trial was held behind closed doors because of the accusations of

seeking to obtain state secrets.

Throughout the trial he maintained his innocence, saying he was framed and

comparing himself to the hapless comedy character Mr Bean.

"Russia thought they caught James Bond on a spy mission, in reality they

abducted Mr Bean on holiday," he said.

The prosecution had asked the judge to sentence Whelan to 18 years in a

strict-regime penal colony, just short of the 20 years maximum term for the

charge.

- 'No evidence' - The US ambassador to Moscow John Sullivan condemned the

trial as unfair and lacking transparency.