Reuters World News Summary

Following is a summary of current world news briefs.

Saudi foreign minister calls claim that Crown Prince hacked Bezos phone 'absurd'

Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud said on Wednesday that an allegation the kingdom's crown prince had been involved in a plot to hack the phone of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos was "absurd". "I think absurd is exactly the right word," Prince Faisal told Reuters in an interview at the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos. "The idea that the crown prince would hack Jeff Bezos' phone is absolutely silly."

Trump says he would have loved to have seen Greta Thunberg speak

U.S. President Donald Trump said he doesn't think climate change is a hoax and would have loved to have seen Greta Thunberg speak while he was at Davos. Trump, who has sparred back and forth with the teenage climate activist, made the comments in a press briefing just before he was about to depart the annual World Economic Forum meeting in the Swiss ski resort.

Facing economic crisis, Lebanon's government meets for first time

Lebanon ushered in a new government that will need to walk a political tightrope, as President Michel Aoun said its main task was to win back international confidence that could unlock the funding the crisis-hit country badly needs. Prime Minister Hassan Diab's government met for the first time on Wednesday.

Iraqi president meets Trump in Davos, discuss foreign troops cut: Iraqi statement

Iraqi President Barham Salih met U.S. President Donald Trump in Davos on Wednesday and discussed reducing foreign troops in the country, the Iraqi presidency said, after Washington spurned an Iraqi request earlier this month to pull out its troops. "During the meeting, reducing foreign troops and the importance of respecting the demands of Iraqi people to preserve the country's sovereignty were discussed," the statement said.

Trump says U.S. to add more countries to travel ban soon

The United States is moving to add more countries to its travel ban list, U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday, but gave no other details, saying the changes would be announced soon. The Trump administration is planning to add seven countries - Belarus, Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, Myanmar, Nigeria, Sudan and Tanzania - to the list, U.S. media reported on Tuesday.

Rohingya refugees pray for justice as court to rule in genocide case

Rohingya refugees who fled persecution and violence in Myanmar are praying for justice as the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague prepares to deliver an initial verdict on Thursday in a genocide case filed against Myanmar. More than 730,000 Muslim Rohingya fled an army offensive in Myanmar's Rakhine state in 2017. The United Nations says gang rapes and mass killings were carried out with "genocidal intent". Hundreds of villages were burned to the ground and later razed. Myanmar denies the charges of genocide.

Exclusive: Giuliani told U.S. his client deserves leniency for financing Venezuela's opposition - Parnas

At a lavish August gathering at a private estate in Spain, a wealthy Venezuelan businessman under criminal investigation in the United States introduced Rudy Giuliani, President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, to the father of Venezuela’s opposition leader, Juan Guaido. The affair was part of a campaign for leniency for the businessman, Alejandro Betancourt, who sought to demonstrate his close ties to opposition figures looking to oust Venezuela's socialist President Nicolas Maduro - a key objective of the Trump administration.

U.S. environmental reporter arrested in Indonesia for visa violation

An American journalist who has covered stories exposing environmental destruction in Indonesia has been arrested on Borneo island for alleged visa violations, his lawyer and the environmental news outlet he works for said on Wednesday. Philip Jacobson, 30, was first detained in Palangkaraya, the provincial capital of Central Kalimantan in Borneo, on Dec. 17 last year, according to a statement from environmental news provider Mongabay.

Pandemic fears grow as China virus toll rises to nine

Authorities in China and beyond stepped up efforts to control an outbreak of a new flu-like coronavirus on Wednesday as the death toll rose to nine with 440 confirmed cases, while suspicion grew that the virus crossed to humans from animals. China discouraged public gatherings in Hubei province, where the virus emerged last month, and tightened containment measures in hospitals, while the World Health Organization (WHO) was due to hold an emergency meeting to determine whether the outbreak constituted a global health emergency.

Some Kenyans say Chinese-built railway leaves them in the dust

The soporific buzz of bees fills the abandoned train station at Kiu, a two-hour drive from Kenya's capital Nairobi. Rusting rail sleepers lay on the grass outside; a slender snake slithers away after footsteps disturb his sunbaked snooze. A new Chinese-built rail track lies about 500 meters away from the old colonial-era railway station, which closed down in 2012. But the new high-speed trains thunder through without stopping; Kiu is just a dusty blur glimpsed through the window.