World News Roundup: Survey shows Indian Americans split over direction India headed; Egypt opens Rafah crossing with Gaza until further notice: sources and more

TV journalists face three years in prison for reporting on Belarus protests Two Belarusian journalists working for the Polish television channel Belsat went on trial in the capital Minsk on Tuesday on charges related to their coverage of mass protests in 2020, the Belarusian Association of Journalists said.

Following is a summary of current world news briefs.

Survey shows Indian Americans split over direction India headed

Indian Americans, who turned out in huge numbers at Prime Minister Narendra Modi's rock star-like rallies in the United States, are divided over the direction India is headed, a new survey showed on Tuesday. Modi's nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party has extolled the achievements of the Indian diaspora in America and elsewhere, seeing them as a large support base to advance India's interests in host countries.

Egypt opens Rafah crossing with Gaza until further notice: sources

Egypt on Tuesday opened its Rafah border crossing with the Gaza strip until further notice, Egyptian and Palestinian sources said, a move described as an incentive for reconciliation between the main Palestinian factions, meeting in Cairo. Leaders of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction, which controls the West Bank, and of Hamas, the armed Islamist movement that opposes any negotiations with Israel, began Egyptian-brokered talks on Monday to address long-standing divisions ahead of elections planned for later this year.

Hong Kong tycoon Jimmy Lai denied bail in national security case

Hong Kong's top court denied bail on Tuesday to media tycoon and Beijing critic Jimmy Lai, the most high-profile person to be charged under the city's national security law. Lai had been in custody since Dec. 3, except when he was released on bail for about a week late last year. He was granted a HK$10 million ($1.3 million) bail by a lower court on Dec. 23 only for the Court of Final Appeal (CFA) to bring him back into custody on Dec. 31 for another hearing following an appeal by the government.

Myanmar police fire to disperse protest, four hurt, one critical

Myanmar police used force on Tuesday to disperse protests against military rule and one woman was in critical condition and not expected to survive after being shot in the head with a bullet, a doctor said. Police fired guns, mostly into the air, and used water cannon and rubber bullets to try to clear protesters in the capital Naypyitaw, and four people were taken to hospital with what doctors initially said they believed were wounds caused by rubber bullets.

Future of Poland's Holocaust research hangs on court case, academics say

The fate of future research into the actions of Poles during the Holocaust could be set on Tuesday, academics say, in a court ruling on a case that pits two leading historians against an elderly litigant. In a country where close to 3.2 million Jews are estimated to have died during more than five years of Nazi rule, the events of World War Two remain politically charged. TV journalists face three years in prison for reporting on Belarus protests

Two Belarusian journalists working for the Polish television channel Belsat went on trial in the capital Minsk on Tuesday on charges related to their coverage of mass protests in 2020, the Belarusian Association of Journalists said. Yekaterina Andreeva and Darya Chultsova, a reporter and a camerawoman for Belsat, were arrested in November after a demonstration. Two U.S. carrier groups conduct exercises in South China Sea

Two U.S. carrier groups conducted joint exercises in the South China Sea on Tuesday, days after a U.S. warship sailed near Chinese-controlled islands in the disputed waters, as China denounced the United States for damaging peace and stability. The Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group and the Nimitz Carrier Strike Group "conducted a multitude of exercises aimed at increasing interoperability between assets as well as command and control capabilities", the U.S. Navy said, marking the first dual carrier operations in the busy waterway since July 2020. Navalny ally urges Russians to light candles in Valentine's Day protest

An ally of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny urged Russians on Tuesday to gather near their homes for a brief Valentine's Day protest, shining their mobile phone torches and lighting candles in heart shapes to flood social media. Tens of thousands have taken to the streets in recent weeks to protest against the jailing of Navalny, a prominent critic of President Vladimir Putin, who says he is being persecuted for political reasons. UK mulls tougher testing for international arrivals as virus variants spread

Britain is looking at greater testing of all people who have arrived from abroad while they are self-isolating to defend against new variants of the virus that causes COVID-19, a minister said on Tuesday. Airlines have been brought to their knees by the pandemic, with travel restrictions forcing once fast-growing brands like Norwegian to fight for survival while established names like British Airways have raised cash and laid off thousands of staff. Dozens trapped in tunnel after Himalayan glacier's collapse, scores still missing

Rescuers raced to free around 35 Indian construction workers trapped in a tunnel, two days after the hydroelectric dam they were helping to build was swept away by a wall of water from a collapsed glacier that barrelled down a Himalayan river. The workers were among 197 people who officials said were still unaccounted for as the death toll from the disaster - which also broke apart bridges, cut off villages and scarred tracts of mountain landscape - rose to 28.