TIANJIN, Dec. 27 (Xinhua) -- Haiyan, a Chinese underwater glider, has set a new endurance record after working for 141 days and sailing 3,619.6 km in the South China Sea, said the developer.

Codenamed Haiyan, which means storm petrel in Chinese, the long-distance glider completed the test in November, renewing its former record of continuously sailing 2,272.4 km over 119 days in the northern part of the South China Sea in the first half of the year, said the program team from the Tianjin University on Wednesday.

27 Dec 2018; AA: The U.S. had access to records of Saudi-led coalition’s airstrikes in Yemen, and Saudis “often ignored” no-strike lists provided by Washington, The New York Times reported.

“A former senior State Department official said that the United States had access to records of every airstrike over Yemen since the early days of the war, including the warplane and munitions used,” the NYT reported in an article, titled Arms Sales to Saudis Leave American Fingerprints on Yemen’s Carnage, published on Tuesday.

27 Dec 2018; DW: The idea, similar to Germany's church tax, would aim to make mosques independent of foreign donors. Germany's government and progressive Muslim leaders have supported the idea.

Lawmakers from Germany's grand coalition government said on Wednesday that they were considering introducing a "mosque tax" for German Muslims, similar to the church taxes that German Christians pay.

JERUSALEM; 27 Dec 2018; AA: Sheikh Ekrima Sabri, the imam at East Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque, has condemned criticisms of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan leveled recently by Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu.

Speaking to Anadolu Agency, Sabri -- who is also head of Jerusalem’s Supreme Muslim Council -- attributed Netanyahu’s remarks to the fact that Israel “doesn’t want any country to support the Palestinian cause”.

NEW DELHI (AP) — Indian authorities have ordered firefighters in the capital to sprinkle water from high-rise buildings to settle dust and stop garbage fires and have banned construction activity as hazardous air quality affects millions of people.

New Delhi recorded one of the highest pollution levels of the year on Sunday with the air quality index, measuring sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide and nitrogen dioxide, touching 450.

27 Dec 2018; DW: An estimated 800,000 people were killed during the 100 days of bloodshed following the 1994 assassination of former Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana. Kigali accuses Paris of complicity in the genocide.

French judges have reportedly dropped a long-running investigation into the killing of former Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana, which triggered countrywide violence and genocide in 1994.

MOSCOW, December 26. /TASS/. The United States is building up the number of carriers of cruise missiles - destroyers, cruisers and submarines - near Russia’s borders, the editor-in-chief of the military magazine Arsenal Otechestva (Arsenal of the Fatherland), Viktor Murakhovsky, said in the wake of a recent statement by the Russian Navy’s Commander-in-Chief Vladimir Korolyov.

BERLIN, December 26. /TASS/. German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas has spoken out against the deployment of US medium-range missiles with nuclear warheads in Europe in the event of Washington’s withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty.

"Europe should not turn into a platform for discussions on arms buildup under any circumstances," the minister said in an interview with the DPA news agency published on Wednesday.

"The deployment of new medium-range missiles in Germany would encounter huge dissatisfaction."

BEIJING, December 26. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin will become a key guest and participant of the second international Belt and Road Forum due in April 2019 in the Chinese capital of Beijing, Russia’s Ambassador to China Andrei Denisov said on Wednesday.

"We believe that a major event of the first half of 2019 will be the coordinated visit of Russian President Vladimir Putin to China, who will take part in the second summit of the Belt and Road Forum," Denisov said.

KIEV, December 26. /TASS/. Ukrainian forces have taken under control two thirds of the so-called "grey security zone" in Donbass, Ukrainian presidential advisor and aide to the defense minister Yury Biryukov told Pryamoy TV channel on Wednesday.

"From the situation that we began with in May 2014, two thirds of the territory were liberated. Almost the whole 'gray zone' was liberated and taken under control," Biryukov said.

26 Dec 2018; AFP: Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko on Wednesday announced the end of a martial law in the country's border regions, which was introduced last month after Russia's seizure of three of Kiev's navy vessels in the Sea of Azov.

"Today, right now, at 2:00 pm (1200 GMT) the martial law ends," Poroshenko said during a live streamed National Security and Defence Council meeting in Kiev.

The president said he had reached the decision "based on analysis of all the components of the security situation in the country".

27 Dec 2018; AFP: An Oregon man became the first person to traverse Antarctica alone without any assistance on Wednesday, trekking across the polar continent in an epic 54-day journey that was previously deemed impossible.

Colin O’Brady, of Portland, finished the bone-chilling, 930-mile (1,500-kilometer) journey as friends, family and fans tracked the endurance athlete’s progress in real time online.

“I did it!” a tearful O’Brady said on a call to his family gathered in Portland for the holidays, according to his wife, Jenna Besaw.