Reuters World News Summary

China, Russia hold off on congratulating Biden; U.S. allies rally round China and Russia held off congratulating U.S. President-elect Joe Biden on Monday, with Beijing saying it would follow usual custom in its response and the Kremlin noting incumbent Donald Trump's vow to pursue legal challenges.

Following is a summary of current world news briefs. Armenia, Azerbaijan, Russia say sign deal to end Nagorno-Karabakh conflict

Armenia, Azerbaijan and Russia said they have signed a deal with to end the military conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region after more than a month of bloodshed. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan first announced the signing on social media in the early hours of Tuesday and the Kremlin and Azerbaijan's president Ilham Aliyev later confirmed the news. China, Russia hold off on congratulating Biden; U.S. allies rally round

China and Russia held off congratulating U.S. President-elect Joe Biden on Monday, with Beijing saying it would follow usual custom in its response and the Kremlin noting incumbent Donald Trump's vow to pursue legal challenges. Democrat Biden clinched enough states to win the presidency on Saturday and has begun making plans for when he takes office on Jan. 20. Trump has not conceded defeat and plans rallies to build support for legal challenges. Ethiopians including soldiers flee escalating conflict to Sudan

Several Ethiopians, including army soldiers, fled the escalating conflict in the restive Tigray region to neighbouring Sudan on Monday, Sudanese state media and residents said. The flare-up in the northern region bordering Eritrea and Sudan has killed hundreds of people, Ethiopian sources on the government side said, even as the prime minister sought on Monday to reassure the world his nation was not sliding into civil war. U.S. criticized for police brutality, racism at U.N. rights review

Major powers, including allies, criticised the United States for its human rights record on Monday during a U.N. review, citing the use of the death penalty, police violence against African Americans and the separation of migrant children from their families. Activists also said that the Human Rights Council's examination of the United States, the first since May 2015, amounted to an indictment of the Trump administration's policies and called for President-elect Joe Biden to usher in reforms. Another U.S. facility demolished at Cambodia base: U.S. think-tank

Another U.S.-built facility at a naval base in Cambodia has been demolished, U.S. researchers said on Monday, citing recent satellite imagery. The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) published images showing a Rigid-Hulled Inflatable Boat maintenance facility at Cambodia's Ream Naval Base still standing on Oct. 1 and the same site without it on Nov. 4. UK PM Johnson defeated in parliament on treaty-breaking Brexit laws

Prime Minister Boris Johnson suffered a heavy defeat in parliament's upper chamber on Monday over proposed laws which would allow him to breach Britain's EU exit treaty - a plan that has been criticised by U.S. president elect Joe Biden. The Internal Market Bill is designed to protect trade between Britain's four nations after Brexit. It contains clauses ministers say are needed to protect Northern Ireland's delicate status as part of the United Kingdom, but would also break international law in a "specific and limited" way. U.S. plans sanctions on Iranians for violence against protesters: sources

The United States is expected to impose sanctions as early as next week on Iranians involved in a violent crackdown against anti-government demonstrations in Iran a year ago, three sources familiar with the matter said on Monday. The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the sanctions announcement was timed to the one-year anniversary of what may have been the bloodiest repression of protesters in Iran since the Islamic Revolution in 1979. U.S. imposes sanctions on four Chinese officials over Hong Kong crackdown

The United States on Monday imposed sanctions on four more Chinese officials in Hong Kong's governing and security establishment over their alleged role in crushing dissent in the former British colony. The U.S. Treasury and State Department identified the four as Deng Zhonghua, deputy director of the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office; Edwina Lau, deputy commissioner of police in Hong Kong, and Li Jiangzhou and Li Kwai-wah, two officials at the newly established national security office in Hong Kong. Leaders of Latin America's biggest countries hold off on congratulating Biden

The presidents of Latin America's two largest countries have held back from congratulating Joe Biden for winning the U.S. presidential election, even as other leaders of allied countries around the globe sent their best wishes. Biden, a Democrat, cleared the threshold of 270 Electoral College votes needed to win the presidency on Saturday, after four days of ballot counting following the Nov. 3 election. Incumbent Republican President Donald Trump has yet to concede. China wildlife crime prosecutions up sharply after COVID-19 outbreak

China prosecuted more than 15,000 people for wildlife-related crimes in the first nine months of the year, up 66% from 2019, state prosecutors said, as authorities moved to enforce a trafficking ban imposed after the COVID-19 outbreak. The Supreme People's Procuratorate said in a statement published on its website on Monday that nearly 7,000 of the total arrests involved the violation of fishing restrictions. Around 4,000 people were prosecuted for illegal hunting and 3,000 for illegally purchasing, transporting and selling endangered wild animal products.