Reuters World News Summary

Both Henan province and Zhengzhou municipal meteorological bureaus raised the emergency response for the disaster to level 1, with forecasts predicting heavy rains in the province to last until Wednesday night, Xinhua reported. U.S. military carries out first air strike in Somalia under Biden The United States on Tuesday carried out an air strike against al Shabaab militants in Somalia, the first strike in the country since President Joe Biden came into office.

Following is a summary of current world news briefs.

Hong Kong begins talks on controversial 'anti-doxxing' privacy bill

Hong Kong's legislature, which has no opposition party, begins discussions on Wednesday on privacy laws tackling "doxxing behaviour" that some technology giants fear are so broad and vague that they could hamper operations in the city. Critics of the legislation, including human rights and tech industry groups, say the measures could be used to protect those in power and target civil society. Supporters say the legislation was long overdue to counter a problem festering since the city's 2019 mass pro-democracy protests.

'We lost': Some U.S. veterans say blood spilled in Afghanistan was wasted

Jason Lilley was a special operations forces Marine Raider who fought in multiple battles in Iraq and Afghanistan during America's longest war. As Lilley, 41, reflects on President Joe Biden's decision to end America's military mission in Afghanistan on Aug. 31, he expresses love for his country, but disgust at its politicians and dismay at the blood and money squandered. Comrades were killed and maimed in wars he says were unwinnable, making him rethink his country and his life.

Germany faces calls for mobile phone disaster alerts after floods

German authorities faced pressure on Tuesday to set aside longstanding privacy concerns and send mobile phone alerts directly to people in potential disaster zones following the devastation wrought by last week's catastrophic floods. Unlike many other countries, including Japan, Israel and New Zealand, Germany has no way of sending text messages en masse to citizens about extreme weather events, partly due to the experience of oppressive surveillance in the country's formerly Communist east and under Hitler's Nazi regime.

'Change is coming': Peru's Castillo faces a divided nation after election battle

Peru's Pedro Castillo has won a long and tense presidential election battle. Now he needs to heal the wounds of a starkly divided nation, split between support for his socialist reforms and fears he will upend the Andean nation's traditional politics and mining. Castillo, a wild card candidate for a Marxist party, was proclaimed the winner of the June 6 run-off on Monday night after six weeks of wrangling over the knife-edge result. He beat right-wing rival Keiko Fujimori by just 44,000 votes.

Heavy rainfall kills 12 in China's Henan province, authorities warn of dam collapse

Heavy rainfall in central China's Henan province has killed 12 people in its capital, Zhengzhou, and has led to the relocation of about 100,000 people to safe zones, state media Xinhua reported on Wednesday citing the local government. Both Henan province and Zhengzhou municipal meteorological bureaus raised the emergency response for the disaster to level 1, with forecasts predicting heavy rains in the province to last until Wednesday night, Xinhua reported.

U.S. military carries out first air strike in Somalia under Biden

The United States on Tuesday carried out an air strike against al Shabaab militants in Somalia, the first strike in the country since President Joe Biden came into office. Al Qaeda-linked insurgent group al Shabaab is seeking to topple the government and establish its own rule in Somalia based on its own strict interpretation of Islamic sharia law.

We discussed ousting Johnson, ex-adviser to UK prime minister says

The former top adviser to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he discussed the possibility of toppling Johnson shortly after an election triumph in 2019 because Brexit campaigners were being sidelined inside Downing Street. Dominic Cummings told the BBC that by January 2020, after the November 2019 election, Johnson did not "have a plan" and the prime minister's then-girlfriend Carrie Symonds - who is now his wife - wanted to edge Cummings and his former Vote Leave colleagues out of important government decisions.

France, Britain beef up patrols, crack down on illegal migration

France and the United Kingdom have agreed to deploy more police and invest in detection technology on the French coast to try to stop boats carrying illegal migrants from reaching British shores, they said in a joint statement on Tuesday. France will double police numbers on its northern coast, between the cities of Boulogne and Dunkirk and around the port of Dieppe, as well as reinforce air patrols, in a bid to target small boats attempting the dangerous Channel crossing.

France's Macron targeted in project Pegasus spyware case - Le Monde

The phone of French President Emmanuel Macron was on a list of potential targets for potential surveillance on behalf of Morocco in the Pegasus spyware case, French daily Le Monde reported on Tuesday. The French presidency said that if the revelations about Macron's phone were true, they would be very serious. The authorities would investigate them to shed all necessary light on the reports, it said.

Haiti appoints new prime minister in wake of president's assassination

Haiti's government on Tuesday formally appointed Ariel Henry as prime minister, nearly two weeks after President Jovenel Moise was gunned down in a murder plot that likely extends far beyond the Caribbean country's borders. Henry assumed the role of de-facto leader of the Western Hemisphere's poorest nation in a ceremony in the capital Port-au-Prince, where he began his inaugural speech with a minute of silence for the slain president.