CHINA: Beijing said today that European medical device companies will be barred from selling to the Chinese government as a countermeasure for the European Union’s restrictions on the sale of similar products from China.

European companies will be excluded if the budget for procurement is above 45 million yuan (£4.62 million), according to a notice from the Finance Ministry today with the restrictions in place the same day. The move will not apply to European companies that have invested in China and that manufacture goods in the country.

UNITED STATES: Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, said on Saturday that he is launching a new political party.

The move comes weeks after Mr Musk had a dramatic falling out with US President Donald Trump. Mr Musk announced on his X social media platform that he had set up the America Party, billing it as a challenge to the Republican and Democratic two-party system.

RED SEA: A ship came under attack today in the Red Sea off the coast of Yemen by armed men firing guns and launching rocket-propelled grenades, the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations centre said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

COLOMBIA: The alleged mastermind behind the shooting of a right-wing Colombian senator and presidential candidate was taken into custody on Saturday, almost a month after the attack, law enforcement authorities said.

Elder Jose Arteaga Hernandez, alias “Chipi” or “Costeno,” was arrested in a neighbourhood in the north-western part of the capital, Bogota, National Police Director Major General Carlos Fernando Triana told reporters.