Yasmeen Altaji gives a round-up of today's trends
Trending Middle East
Rebels take control of Aleppo and Trump threatens Brics tariffs
This is trending your daily rundown of news from the Middle East and around the world brought to you by The National. From Abu Dhabi, I'm Yasmine Altaji, here are today's headlines. The governments of the US, UK, France and Germany said they're closely monitoring developments in Syria and called for de-escalations and a political solution after a shock rebel offensive reignited the country's civil war. Central Aleppo is now under rebel control after a surprise offensive captured the city last week. The statement from the four Western nations came as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan spoke about the "rapidly developing" conflict in Syria. The US President-elect Donald Trump has threatened 100% tariffs on BRICS nations. He wrote in a social media post warning the group that he would require commitments that they would not move to create a new currency. The UAE is among nine countries in BRICS, which stands for the names of its founding members – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. And a utility HUD or national day is being celebrated today in the UAE. Celebrations started over the weekend and will continue this week. Today, fireworks displays will take place across the country, visit our site for a breakdown of local festivities. That's all for this morning's headlines. You can get more at our site and visit the National News.com/podcasts for more like this. I'm your host, Haji, the National.