Russia recognises Taiwan as an inalienable part of China and rejects the island's independence in any form, according to a joint Russian-Chinese declaration.
Japan's parliament adopted a resolution on the "serious human rights situation" in China and asked the Chinese Government to take steps to relieve the situation.
Veteran Nobel-winning virologist Luc Montagnier died in Paris recently. He won the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2008 for the discovery of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus that causes AIDS, along with his colleague Francoise Barr-Sinoussi.