BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany suspended its military reconnaissance mission in Mali after local authorities again withheld a flight clearance, a spokesperson for the defense ministry in Berlin said on Friday. Berlin has deployed some 1,000 troops to Mali, most of them near the northern town of Gao where their main task is to gather reconnaissance for the U.N. peacekeeping mission MINUSMA. MINUSMA - the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali - was established in 2013 to support foreign and local troops battling terrorist militants, but in recent months there have been repeated instances of tensions between the Malian authorities and the mission.

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SEOUL (Al-Jazeera) -North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has declared “victory” in his country’s battle against COVID-19 and ordered pandemic restrictions, imposed in May, to be lifted. Presiding over a meeting with health workers and scientists, Kim announced a “victory … in the war against the malignant pandemic disease,” state news agency KCNA reported. His powerful sister Kim Yo Jong also spoke at the Pyongyang meeting, blaming the outbreak on anti-Pyongyang leaflets flown across the border by activists from South Korea. “We must counter it toughly,” she said. “We have already considered various counteraction plans, but our countermeasure must be a deadly retaliatory one.”

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BEIJING (Reuters) - China’s foreign ministry said on Friday it had imposed sanctions on Lithuanian Deputy Transport and Communications Minister Agne Vaiciukeviciute for visiting Taiwan, the latest development in a simmering diplomaticrow with the European Union country. The foreign ministry said Beijing would also suspend engagement with Vaiciukeviciute’s ministry and cooperation on transportation with Lithuania, a small Baltic republic.

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LUCKNOW, India (Reuters) - An overloaded boat carrying dozens of passengers capsized in northern India, killing three people, including one child, while another 17 were missing and feared dead, a senior police official in Uttar Pradesh state said on Friday. Rescue workers were still scouring the rain-swollen waters of the Yamuna river for survivors almost 24 hours after the calamity struck on Thursday, but prospects of finding anyone else alive were bleak, officials said.

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WARSAW (Reuters) - Tonnes of dead fish have been hauled out of the River Oder, which flows along part of Poland’s border with Germany, and officials warned people not to enter the water while the Polish government pledged to investigate possible contamination. Volunteers and anglers have removed at least 10 tonnes of dead fish from the 200-kilometer stretch of the river north of Olawa in southwest Poland, Przemyslaw Daca,head of State Water Holding , said on Thursday. Daca, whose agency manages Polish national waters, called the situation a gigantic ecological catastrophe. Environmental authorities said they notified prosecutors about potential contamination of the country’s second longest river. Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki vowed to punish those responsible.

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NEY YORK (Reuters) - The United Nations’ humanitarian projects face a record funding gap this year, with only a third of the required $48.7bn secured so far as global needs outpace pledges, according to the world body’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). The money is needed to help about 204 million people worldwide as armed conflict and climate change emerge as key drivers of “mega crises” that threaten the livelihoods of whole communities. So far, $15.2bn has been collected by the midyear mark, also a record, Laerke said, in a year of soaring humanitarian needs. According to OCHA’s website, the United States is the top donor, contributing just a little more than $8bn, while the World Food Program was the largest recipient.