The Syrian army captured Khan Sheikhun

The Syrian army recaptured the city of Khan Sheikhun in the province of Idlib — RIA NEWS reports while citing a Syrian military source. “This morning, the Syrian army took control over the city of Khan Sheikhun. At the moment the troops are engaged in demining and clearing operations” — the source specified. As it was previously reported — the Syrian army took control over the city. The army blocked the terrorist supply lines via the ‘Damascus-Aleppo’ highway, and also in Hama. The SANA agency reported that the Syrian authorities opened a humanitarian corridor in the village of Suran, in the province of Hama, for those wishing to leave the territories controlled by the armed Syrian opposition at the north of Hama province, and at the south of Idlib province.

The Syrian armed opposition began withdrawing their forces from the Syrian city of Han Sheikhun in the south of Idlib province, currently surrounded by the Syrian army — the ‘Al-Mayadeen’ reports. According to the ‘Al-Mayadeen’ — they began leaving their positions after the Syrian army managed to occupy the heights of Tellet Nimr, near the city. The army also cut off the terrorist supply lines that went through the ‘Hama-Aleppo’ highway. Earlier, the Syrian Air Force and the artillery began attacking the terrorists in the city of Khan Sheikhun, and in the surrounding settlements of Rakai, Kafr Sidzhna and Sheikh Mustafa. The Syrian forces managed to gain a foothold in the north-west of the city, 500 meters away from the ‘Hama-Aleppo’ highway. However, their attacks on the eastern edge were repelled.

Donald Trump proposed to make a naval blockade of Venezuela. Over the course of some time he has repeatedly proposed to deploy the U.S. Navy warships at the coastline of Venezuela, in order to halt the cargo circulation — the ‘Axios’ reports while citing the current and the former officials of the Donald Trump’s administration. The ‘Axios’ interlocutors claim that a year and a half ago, the US president proposed to make such blockade for the first time. A few weeks ago he returned to this idea. However, his advisors believe that the implementation of this idea will require huge funds that can hardly be provided to the US Navy. The Pentagon also didn’t take this idea seriously. According to the US military — this idea is impractical, and has no legal justification.

The Iranian tanker ‘Grace 1’, detained on the suspicion of violating the EU ban on oil supplies to Syria, left Gibraltar — Interfax reports with a reference to the GBC News. According to the GBC News — before sailing out, the tanker ‘Grace 1’ was renamed as ‘Adrian Darya’. It stood in Gibraltar for 46 days. The tanker was detained by a British request, on the suspicion of a violation of the EU ban on oil supplies to Syria. Soon the tanker was released, since Tehran assured in a written form that the cargo won’t be delivered to Syria. The US also sent a request to Gibraltar — they asked to detain the tanker as part of the US sanctions against Iran. On Sunday, the Gibraltar authorities rejected this request since the US sanctions are not applied by the EU countries.

The Pentagon has tested a new ground-based cruise missile, the specifications of which go against the expired »INF Treaty» — the CNN reports. According to the CNN — the missile is a new version of the ‘Tomahawk’ cruise missiles. It was launched from San Nicholas Island in the Pacific Ocean, near California. The Pentagon noted that the missile was launched from a «land-based mobile launcher, and it hit the target after more than 500 kilometers of flight». The Pentagon underlined that the missile was designed to deliver conventional warheads, not the nuclear ones. The Pentagon added that the test results will contribute to the development of the US medium-range missiles. The US officially left the INF Treaty on 2nd of August. The head of the Russian Federal Council Committee on the Foreign Affairs, Konstantin Kosachev, announced that the missile test confirms the fact of a direct violation of the INF Treaty during its operation, since it’s impossible to conduct the research and the development stages, and even produce a new missile in a span of 2nd to 19th of August.

The Chinese permanent representative in the UN, Zhang Jun, announced during a meeting of the UN Security Council that currently Beijing doesn’t intend to participate in trilateral arms control negotiations with Russia and the US. According to him, Beijing has stated its position on the arms control negotiations many times. “Currently China isn’t interested in the so-called ‘trilateral arms control negotiations’. China won’t take part in them» — he explained and added that China is calling for maintaining the existing arms control treaty. The Chinese representative also called on the US to refrain from deploying new medium and short range missiles in the Asia-Pacific region. Constantine Reztsov, specially for ANNA NEWS.