South Wales Echo

Hong Kong as thousands march against security laws

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apart and wearing masks, according to France-Info radio. Traditiona­l embraces were not allowed.

France is allowing religious services to resume for the first time since March, but France’s leading Muslim organisati­on, CFCM, advised mosques to stay closed on Sunday.

Iran, which is battling the deadliest outbreak in the Middle East, allowed communal prayers at some mosques but cancelled the annual mass Eid prayers in Tehran led by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Iran annual session of China’s ceremonial parliament in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Sunday that Hong Kong affairs were an internal matter for China, and that “no external interferen­ce will be tolerated”.

“Excessive unlawful foreign meddling in Hong Kong affairs has placed China’s national security in serious jeopardy,” Mr Wang said, adding that the proposed legislatio­n “does not affect the high degree of autonomy in Hong Kong”.

“It does not affect the rights and freedoms enjoyed by Hong Kong residents. And it does not affect the legitimate has reported over 130,000 cases and more than 7,000 deaths.

In Dubai, authoritie­s set up barricades and police checkpoint­s around an industrial area housing foreign labourers. The Emirates is trying to reopen its hard-hit economy, but cases continue to rise. The UAE has reported over 28,000 confirmed cases and 244 deaths.

Virus restrictio­ns also remain in place in Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovin­a and Kosovo.

Naim Ternava, the mufti of Kosovo’s rights and interests of foreign investors in Hong Kong,” he said.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has called the move “a death knell for the high degree of autonomy” that Beijing had promised Hong Kong.

Chris Patten, the last British governor of Hong Kong prior to its handover to China in 1997, condemned what he called “a new Chinese dictatorsh­ip”.

“I think the Hong Kong people have been betrayed by China, which has proved once again that you can’t trust it further than you can throw it,” he said in an interview with The Times.

US President Donald Trump’s

Islamic community, led prayers in a mosque in front of a small group of imams sitting 1.5 metres apart, with the sermon broadcast outside on loudspeake­rs.

“I invite you to be patient a little bit more until we overcome the danger from Covid-19,” he said.

In the Bosnian capital, Sarajevo, mosques reopened on May 6 after seven weeks of lockdown. Worshipper­s must wear masks and practice social distancing, and older individual­s are urged to continue praying at national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, said it appeared China was violating the 1984 treaty.

“And I can’t see how Hong Kong remains the Asian financial centre if the Chinese Communist Party goes through and implements this national security law and takes over Hong Kong,” Mr O’Brien said on CBS’s Face The Nation programme.

“That would be a tragedy for the people of Hong Kong, but it will also be very bad for China.”

Bernard Chan, a top-level Hong Kong politician and delegate to the National People’s Congress in Beijing, home. In Jerusalem, Israeli police said they broke up an “illegal demonstrat­ion” and arrested two people outside the Al-Aqsa mosque, which Muslim authoritie­s have closed for prayers since mid-March and will not reopen until after the holiday. An Associated Press reporter at the scene said worshipper­s had tried to enter the compound.

Al-Aqsa is the third holiest site in Islam and would ordinarily welcome tens of thousands of worshipper­s during the Eid. defended national security legislatio­n pushed by China, saying it was written into Hong Kong’s Basic Law – the city’s mini-constituti­on – but never enacted.

Mr Chan expressed concern that Hong Kong will inevitably face economic hardship given trade frictions between the US and China.

“I think we are definitely the collateral damage being dragged into this thing. But then, I don’t think there’s any alternativ­es,” Mr Chan said.

“But with or without this law, honestly, the US and China will always going to be continuing this loggerhead for quite some time to come,” he said.

 ?? MARWAN ALI ?? Worshipper­s gather for Eid al-Fitr prayers in Khartoum, Sudan, yesterday
MARWAN ALI Worshipper­s gather for Eid al-Fitr prayers in Khartoum, Sudan, yesterday

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