Reuters World News Summary

The open letter, reviewed by Reuters, was signed by lawmakers from at least 17 countries including France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Ireland, and is a sign of mounting concerns in Europe about the continuity of U.S. support to Ukraine. Trump increases polling lead in Iowa ahead of first Republican contest Donald Trump has a huge and expanded lead over his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination in a new poll in Iowa, the state that kicks off the party's nominating contest on Jan. 15.

Following is a summary of current world news briefs.

Red Cross elects US humanitarian to lead network after rocky meeting

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies elected a U.S. candidate on Monday as its new president after an acrimonious meeting that nearly saw the vote postponed amid a controversy involving a rival candidate. Kate Forbes, an existing IFRC board member, became the second woman to ever hold the top job at the world's largest humanitarian network after two rounds of votes.

Trump holds wide lead in Republican 2024 nominating contest - Reuters/Ipsos poll

Donald Trump maintains his dominant position in the 2024 Republican presidential nominating contest, drawing the support of more than half of the party's voters, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll completed on Monday. The poll found that 61% of self-identified Republicans said they would vote for the former U.S. president in the state-by-state nominating contest to pick a challenger to Democratic President Joe Biden.

Donald Tusk appointed Polish PM, setting stage for warmer EU ties

Poland's parliament backed Donald Tusk to become prime minister on Monday, ending eight years of nationalist rule and putting the country on track for a thawing of relations with the European Union. Poland has seen tens of billions of euros of European Union funds frozen due to a dispute with Brussels over democratic standards, but Tusk, a former European Council president, has vowed to mend relations and unblock the cash.

Explainer-Why Palestinian displacement in Gaza war alarms the UN and Arabs

Israel's orders to Gaza's residents to move ever further south towards the Egyptian border during its offensive and the dire humanitarian situation have sparked Arab and U.N. concerns that Palestinians may eventually be driven over the border. Israel denies having any plans to push Palestinians into Egypt's Sinai Peninsula as it pursues its goal of destroying Hamas following the group's devastating Oct. 7 attack on Israeli soil. It says it has told Gazans to move for their own safety.

Palestinians starve as Gaza war rages amid fears of exodus into Egypt

Israel on Monday denied it intended to push Palestinians seeking refuge from its bombardment of Gaza over the border into Egypt as international relief agencies said hunger was spreading among the besieged enclave's civilian population. Amid the worsening humanitarian crisis, Hamas fighters and Israeli troops fought across the territory, with the militants trying to block Israeli tanks from advancing through the shattered streets.

Navalny's team says he has vanished in Russia's prison system

Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny has been removed from the penal colony where he had been imprisoned since the middle of last year and his current whereabouts are unknown, his allies said on Monday. Navalny aides have been preparing for his expected transfer to a "special regime" colony, the harshest grade in Russia's prison system, after he was sentenced in August to an additional 19 years in prison on top of 11-1/2 years he was already serving.

Exclusive-European lawmakers send plea to Congress on Ukraine aid

More than a hundred senior European lawmakers will send a joint letter to their counterparts in the United States on Tuesday, pleading for Congress to unlock further military aid to Ukraine at a time U.S. lawmakers have struggled for a deal. The open letter, reviewed by Reuters, was signed by lawmakers from at least 17 countries including France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Ireland, and is a sign of mounting concerns in Europe about the continuity of U.S. support to Ukraine.

Trump increases polling lead in Iowa ahead of first Republican contest

Donald Trump has a huge and expanded lead over his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination in a new poll in Iowa, the state that kicks off the party's nominating contest on Jan. 15. The former president has 51% first-choice support from people likely to take part in the Iowa caucuses next month, according to a NBC News/Des Moines Register/Mediacom poll released on Monday, up from 43% in the same poll conducted in October.

French lower house rejects Macron's immigration bill

French lawmakers sent the government's immigration bill back to the drawing board on Monday in a surprise move that cut short debates at the lower house and dealt a blow to President Emmanuel Macron's attempts to pass laws without a majority. Lawmakers from Marine Le Pen's far-right party as well as many conservatives joined forces to reject the bill on its first day in the National Assembly, adopting a motion proposed by the Greens, which passed by just two votes.

'End fossil fuels' protester storms stage of COP28 summit

A 12-year-old protester burst on to the stage at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai on Monday, holding a sign above her head that read: "End fossil fuels. Save our planet and our future." Licypriya Kangujam, a child climate justice activist from India, was escorted away as the audience clapped.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)