The National:

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AROUND 1220 people were taken into custody during the latest yellow vest protests in France, the biggest round-up in the country in years.

Finance minister Bruno Le Maire said the situation was “a crisis” for both society and democracy.

“It’s a catastrophe for commerce, it’s a catastrophe for our economy,” he said during a visit to Paris where shops and monuments were reopening after Saturday’s riots which left 71 people injured and caused widespread damage.

Some 125,000 took to the streets on Saturday around France with a bevy of demands.

Police frisked protesters at railway stations around the country, confiscating everything from heavy metal petanque balls to tennis rackets, anything that could remotely be used as a weapon.

President Emmanuel Macron broke his silence to tweet appreciation for the police, but pressure is mounting on him to calm the anger dividing France.

MEANWHILE delegates at the UN climate summit in Poland have urged cities to help achieve the goals of the 2015 Paris Agreement, which include limiting the increase in the planet’s temperature to 2C (3.6F) this century.

Experts say cities can help by extending the tree canopy in urban areas, with Milan in Italy recently announcing plans to plant three million trees by 2030.

Some ad-hoc projects in the city have already begun to offer relief from the city’s muggy, sometimes tropical weather, such as architect Stefano Boeri’s striking Vertical Forest residential towers. Completed in 2014 near the Garibaldi train station, Boeri’s pair of high-rises brim with shrubs and trees that absorb carbon dioxide and pollutants linked to illness.

“Forestation is one of the most effective ways we have to fight climate change, because it is like fighting the enemy on its own field,” Boeri said.”It is effective and it is also democratic, because everyone can plant trees.”

The National:

                        Meng Wanzhou

RELATIONS between China and the United States have been shaken up by the detention of a top executive of leading tech giant Huawei.

Vice foreign minister Le Yucheng summoned Canadian ambassador John McCallum over the holding of Meng Wanzhou, who is suspected of trying to evade US trade curbs on Iran. Le told McCallum that Meng’s detention at the request of the US was a “severe violation” of her “legitimate rights and warned of “grave consequences” if she is not let go.

The National:

Andrea Gaylord is reunited with Madison, the Anatolian shepherd dog 

AND finally, a dog that survived the wildfire in California protected the ruins of his home for almost a month until his owner returned.

Madison was waiting when Andrea Gaylord was allowed back to her burned property in Paradise after the November 8 fire broke out.

“Imagine the loyalty of hanging in in the worst of circumstances and being here waiting,” said Gaylord.