Russian fighter jet escorts Chinese President Xi's plane

A Russian fighter jet is seen from the cabin escorting Chinese President Xi Jinping's plane before it lands in Kazan, Russia for the BRICS Summit.

Xi is in Kazan, the capital city of Russia's Republic of Tatarstan, to attend the 16th BRICS Summit, at the invitation of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Xi is set to attend small- and large-group leaders' meetings and the BRICS Plus leaders' dialogue, and will deliver important speeches. Xi will also have in-depth exchanges with other state leaders on the current international situation, practical BRICS cooperation, the development of the BRICS mechanism and other important issues of common concern.

Xi's entourage, including Cai Qi, member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau and director of the General Office of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, and Wang Yi, member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and foreign minister, arrived on the same plane.

BRICS is an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. The upcoming summit is the first to be held after the BRICS expansion in January when Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were included into the bloc.

Russian fighter jet escorts Chinese President Xi's plane

Russian fighter jet escorts Chinese President Xi's plane

Russian fighter jet escorts Chinese President Xi's plane

Russian fighter jet escorts Chinese President Xi's plane

Russian fighter jet escorts Chinese President Xi's plane

Russian fighter jet escorts Chinese President Xi's plane

The rare footage of a family of three snow leopards, including a cub playing with a stick, was released recently after being captured by infrared cameras at the Helan Mountain National Nature Reserve in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.

The footage shows the three snow leopards briefly appeared together on a rocky hillside before the male walked off into the distance. In another clip, the cub played with a stick, walking around and occasionally lying down, while the female watched nearby.

"The cub is now almost the same size as an adult leopard. It is nearly one and a half years old and has adapted very well to the Helan Mountain environment. It is growing up very healthily," said a staff member of the administration bureau of the Helan Mountain National Nature Reserve.

The snow leopard is a first-class nationally protected wild animal in China, and its survival is an important indicator of the health of high-altitude ecosystems.

To protect its habitat, the reserve has continued to track individual snow leopards through field patrols and infrared camera inspections, accumulating rich data for species protection and scientific research.

To date, five individual snow leopards have been monitored in the reserve.

Infrared cameras capture snow leopard family at nature reserve in Inner Mongolia