Strong winds, hailstorms batter Jiujiang in China's Jiangxi Province, no casualties reported

Strong winds and hailstorms triggered by severe convective weather battered Wuning County, Jiujiang City, in east China's Jiangxi Province on Sunday afternoon, causing varying degrees of damage to rice crops, trees, houses, and power facilities.

At around 15:30 on Sunday, Henglu Township in Wuning suffered from a rare autumn hailstorm after the heavy rain. 

Hailstones, with the size of broad beans, fell densely and lasted approximately 20 minutes.

As a result, numerous trees along the roads were knocked down, crops in the fields were flattened, and some houses and power facilities sustained damages. Fortunately, no casualties were reported.

After the storms, local town and village officials immediately went to the scene to assess the situation and organize production self-rescue.

Local power supply and transportation had been restored by Sunday night.

Strong winds, hailstorms batter Jiujiang in China's Jiangxi Province, no casualties reported

League of Arab States (LAS) Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul-Gheit said the Arab world remains committed to a non-aligned foreign policy amid shifting global power dynamics.

In an interview with China Media Group (CMG) that aired on Friday, Aboul-Gheit, who has visited China six times, said non-alignment has long guided the Arab League's diplomatic stance, tracing back to its early days.

"We adopted that the Arab League is composed of 22 countries. But not all of them were independent in 1945, only seven. The seven agreed on a certain path that was embracing non-alignment. And since the establishment of the movement, the non-aligned movement in 1961, or let's say, since the Bandung Summit in 1955 in Indonesia, the Arab League was following non-alignment between the Western world and the Soviet bloc," said the secretary-general.

Arab League committed to non-alignment since founding: chief