NEW YORK: United States President Donald Trump on Tuesday called for an immediate end to the ongoing war in Gaza.

Addressing the 80th United Nations General Assembly at UN headquarters in New York City, the US president said that Washington would continue playing its role in promoting peace worldwide.

He said that recognition of a Palestinian state would be too great a reward for Hamas, repeating his call for the release of hostages, dead or alive.

“Those who supported peace should united in demanding the release of the hostages, he added.

“As if to encourage continued conflict, some of this body is seeking to unilaterally recognise the Palestinian state. The rewards would be too great for Hamas,” he said.

During his address, Trump pledged that his administration will lead an international effort to enforce a biological weapons convention by pioneering an AI verification system

“I’m … calling on every nation to join us in ending the development of biological weapons once and for all,” he said.

Trump said that Iran can never be allowed to possess nuclear weapons.

“My position is very simple: The world’s number one sponsor of terror cannot be allowed to possess the most dangerous weapon,” Trump added.

This is a developing story and is being updated with more details.  

French President Emmanuel Macron was left waiting roadside to clear the way for United States President Donald Trump’s motorcade in New York City.

The French president announced the recognition of a Palestinian state at the 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on Monday — in defiance of the US.

In his speech at the UN, President Macron also outlined a framework that France is advancing in parallel.

However, he found himself stranded on the streets of New York City after his speech, as police stopped his vehicle and forced him to let Trump’s motorcade pass, British media outlets reported.

Videos showed the French president arguing with the police officials to let him pass through the barricades placed along the road.

However, officials refused to let Macron pass, saying: “I’m really sorry, Mr President, everything is frozen.”

At this moment, the French president took matters into his own hands and called the US president, asking him to “clear the road”.

Video footage showed the 47-year-old telling Trump over the phone, “I’m waiting in the street right now because everything is frozen for you.”

His phone call with Trump bore no fruit, and he was forced to walk down the streets as police officials initially opened the roads just for pedestrians.

The French president was then seen walking down the New York City streets, still talking to Trump over the phone.

Macron, however, made light of the situation and posed for photos with passersby and shared laughs with them.

The incident comes at a time when the US is at odds with its Western allies over recognition of a Palestinian state.

US President Trump criticised Western nations’ decision to recognise a Palestinian state as a “reward to Hamas”, said White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt.

“He feels this does not do anything to release the hostages, which is the primary goal right now in Gaza, does nothing to end this conflict and bring this war to a close,” Leavitt told reporters.

She added that Trump believed recognition of Palestinian statehood amounted to “more talk and not enough action” from US allies.

China’s top internet regulator said Tuesday it would take action against ByteDance-owned news app Jinri Toutiao and Alibaba’s internet browser company UCWeb for allegedly displaying harmful content, a day after announcing a two-month social media crackdown.

The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) vowed on Monday to combat content containing “malicious incitement of conflict” and “negative outlooks on life such as world-weariness”.

Beijing requires social media companies to moderate content on their platforms, with posts strictly controlled to avoid anything deemed to be too subversive, vulgar, pornographic or generally harmful.

The CAC had already announced penalties this month against three popular digital platforms— micro-blogging platform Weibo, short video app Kuaishou and Instagram-like Xiaohongshu—for allegedly neglecting content management duties.

Authorities have not specified what punitive actions are being taken against those platforms.

The CAC said on Tuesday that measures taken against news aggregator app Toutiao included “summoning the company for a meeting, ordering rectification within a specified time limit, issuing a warning, and strictly dealing with those responsible”.

The platform had failed to fulfil its primary responsibility of managing information content and allowed “harmful content” to appear on the main section of its trending search list, “thereby damaging the online ecosystem”, the statement said.

It gave no further details about the content type or punishments.

“Internet regulators will continue to focus on prominent illegal and non-compliant activities that undermine the online ecosystem,” the CAC added.

In a separate statement on Tuesday, the CAC said it would take similar measures against UCWeb after the Alibaba-owned platform displayed entries relating to “extremely sensitive and malicious” events and topics such as “online violence and the privacy of minors”.

The two-month campaign announced on Monday by the CAC aims “to regulate the malicious incitement of conflict and the promotion of violence and vicious currents”, the CAC said.

The statement then listed specific online issues authorities hope to tackle in the crackdown, including “exploiting social hot spots to forcibly associate identity, region or gender with other information, stigmatising and hyping them”.