Weather Tracker: unseasonal cold air brings widespread snowfall to China

Low pressure developed across eastern China on Sunday, tracking across the northern coast of the sea of Japan on Monday. On the west side of this low, an unseasonably cold air mass was drawn south across north-eastern China, resulting in a broad area of significant snowfall. More than 30cm of snow is expected across higher parts of the Chinese provinces of Inner Mongolia, Jilin, and Heilongjiang. Clear skies accompanying the widespread snow cover will lead to temperatures significantly below normal on Tuesday. For example, Shenyang is expected to experience subzero…

Don’t ‘quench your thirst with poison’, Taiwan tells Honduras after switch to China

Taiwan has urged Honduras not to “quench your thirst with poison and fall into China’s debt trap”, adding it would not compete monetarily with China to keep its formal allies after its decision to switch diplomatic ties from Taipei to Beijing this week. Honduran president Xiomara Castro announced on Tuesday that her country would begin to establish an official relationship with Beijing, in effect severing its ties with Taipei. Her foreign minister, Eduardo Enrique Reina, said on Wednesday the country had asked Taiwan to double its annual aid to $100m…

Honduras to switch ties from Taiwan to China, says president

Honduras President Xiomara Castro says she has instructed her foreign minister to bring about the opening of official relations with China, a move that would end its ties with Taiwan. Castro made the statement on Twitter on Tuesday. The leader of the Central American country had floated the idea of cutting ties with Taiwan and starting relations with China during her electoral campaign, but said in January 2022 that she hoped to maintain ties with Taiwan. Castro said in the tweet the decision was “a sign of my determination to…

Hospitals under fire and hard-won abortion rights: human rights this fortnight – in pictures

Rama, a 16-year-old Syrian refugee, holds a smiley face as she sits in the office of an organisation that cares for girls who have been forced into early marriage in Saadnayel, Lebanon. Rama was married at 14, divorced a year later and is a mother to an 18-month-old baby. Photograph: Marwan Naamani/DPA The Guardian