BBC在线收听下载:美国决定退出《中导条约》

Hello, this is David Austin with the BBC News.

President Putin has responded to a decision by the United States to suspend its participation in a key Cold War era nuclear weapons treaty by saying Russia will do the same. Our response will be a mirror one. Our American partners have announced they're suspending their participation in the treaty, and we are suspending ours, too. They have announced that they are engaged in research and development work, and we will do the same. At a meeting with his foreign and defense ministers, Mr. Putin said Russia would start to develop a new mid-range hypersonic missile. Steve Rosenberg in Moscow has more details. The Kremlin leader said Moscow mustn't and wouldn't get dragged into an expensive arms race. And Russia, he said, would not deploy short-and medium-range weapons in Europe or any other region unless US weapons were deployed there first. He instructed his ministers not to initiate further disarmament talks with Washington, although he made it clear that Russia's proposals on this issue remained on the table. The United States and NATO have accused Moscow of violating the terms of the INF Treaty. Russia has made similar allegations against the United States.

Venezuela's self-proclaimed interim President Juan Guaido is attempting to mobilize tens of thousands of his supporters for a day of demonstrations. It's intended to increase pressure on Nicolas Maduro to relinquish the presidency. Orla Guerin in Caracas. However large the protest maybe, the sense here is that it will take a lot more than that to unseat Mr. Maduro. But the opposition believed that a process of change has begun. So far, it seems the president still has the backing of the military leadership, but he is under growing pressure, especially since the US imposed sanctions on the state-owned oil firm this week. That will starve him of revenue and could quickly paralyze the country, which is already stricken by shortages and hyperinflation.

Thousands of yellow vest protesters are congregating in Paris and elsewhere in France in the latest round of demonstrations against the cost of living and the policies of President Emmanuel Macron. This week they are also focusing their anger on the police's use of crowd control guns built as nonlethal that shoot large rubber balls. The projectiles known as flash balls have injured many protesters, resulting in some losing an eye.

And that's the latest BBC News.