WASHINGTON, March 18 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. Department of Defense said Monday it had requested 22.95 billion U.S. dollars to fund its military intelligence program (MIP) in fiscal year 2020.

"The total, which includes both the base budget and Overseas Contingency Operations funding, is 22.95 billion and is aligned to support the national defense strategy," the Pentagon said in a statement.

The statement said it will not release any detailed figures regarding this part of the budget for security reasons.

BEIJING, March 18 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping will pay state visits to Italy, Monaco and France from March 21 to 26, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lu Kang announced Monday.

Xi was invited by Italian President Sergio Mattarella, Head of State of the Principality of Monaco Albert II and French President Emmanuel Macron, Lu said.

ROME, March 19. /TASS/. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov will hold consultations in Rome with US Special Envoy for Venezuela Elliott Abrams on the situation in the Latin American country.

19 Mar 2019; DW: Envoys of Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido on Monday took control of several diplomatic properties in the US.

Venezuela's acting president, Nicolas Maduro, has cut ties diplomatic ties with the US, accusing it of attempting to oust him from power. Guaido, who invoked Venezuela's constitution and declared himself interim president, has pushed Western countries to isolate Maduro's regime.

What happened:

19 Mar 2019; AFP: The bodies of six of the Christchurch massacre victims have been released to their families, New Zealand police said Tuesday, but they warned only a fraction of the 50 people killed had been fully identified, with the delay angering anguished relatives.

MOSCOW, March 18. /TASS/. The Russian Foreign Ministry has expressed indignation at the Western sanctions imposed on Russian citizens over the Kerch Strait incident.

"An attempt was made once again to score political points by means of the November 2018 Kerch Strait incident provoked by Ukraine. The EU made an outrageous decision a few days ago, blacklisting a number of Russian citizens, including our border guards who took part in the operation to foil the Ukrainian provocation," the ministry said in a commentary posted on its website on Monday.

MAPUTO, March 19 (Xinhua) -- Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi said on Monday that the death toll from Tropical Cyclone Idai could exceed 1,000.

The National Institute for Disaster Management said Monday more than 84 deaths have officially been recorded since the landfall of Idai on Thursday night, bringing torrential rains and devastating winds.

However, Nyusi said the situation could be much more serious in his speech addressed to the nation, after flying over the disaster-hit areas to conduct inspection on Sunday.

19 Mar 2019; AFP: Germany launches its auction Tuesday for the construction of an ultra-fast 5G mobile network as a transatlantic dispute rages over security concerns surrounding giant Chinese telecoms equipment maker Huawei.

The United States has warned it could scale back the sharing of sensitive information with Berlin if it does not exclude hardware made by Huawei from the infrastructure, arguing that Chinese equipment could help Beijing spy on Western companies and governments.

PARIS, March 18 (Xinhua) -- France's Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety (BEA), which is investigating the recent crash of an Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 MAX plane, announced on Monday that it had found similarities between the doomed jet and Indonesia's Lion Air flight of the same model that crashed into the sea in October last year.

MOSCOW, March 19. /TASS/. Russia is ready to help the US in case trials of manned spacecraft are delayed, head of Russia's state space corporation Roscosmos Dmitry Rogozin said on Tuesday.

"We are ready to help American partners in case trials of their new manned spacecraft are delayed. We agree with NASA's proposal to use both US (after their qualification) and Russian spacecraft for delivering mixed international crews to the ISS [International Space Station] in the future," Rogozin wrote on his official Twitter account.

WASHINGTON, March 18 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan on Monday met with French Defense Minister Florence Parly amidst Paris' increasing questions over the U.S. commitment to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

DAMASCUS, March 18 (Xinhua) -- The military commanders of Syria, Iran and Iraq discussed in the capital Damascus on Monday issues, including the coordination to counter terrorism, opening borders, and restoring all Syrian areas.

The meeting was attended by Ali Abdullah Ayyoub, the Syrian defense minister, Othman al-Ghanmi, chief of staff of the Iraqi military, and Mohammad Bagheri, chief of staff of the Iranian Armed Forces.