You're listening to the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service.

Hello, I'm Oliver Conway.

We're recording this at 13 hours GMT on Monday the 13th of May.

The European Commission condemns a police crackdown on protesters outside

parliament in Georgia. Russian troops are intensifying attacks in

northeastern Ukraine with battles reported in the

on Voph Chansk, and a journalist in China who reported on the COVID outbreak in

Wuhan is set to be released from prison.

Also in the podcast, as Israel steps up its operations in Gaza a warning that Hamas is far from being eliminated.

Even though Hamas has suffered major losses in terms of man and material.

Hamas is still functioning, it's alive, it's kicking, and it's really pushing back.

And this isn't to say that spending too much time on your phone doesn't make you

miserable it's more to say that when you zoom out and you look at the spread of the

internet on balance it might be a positive new research showing the internet can be good for you.

Several years before it first invaded Ukraine, Russia sent troops into Georgia to try to

reassert its influence over the former Soviet Republic, but many particularly young

people there want to escape from Moscow's orbit.

And overnight thousands of Georgians gathered outside parliament in the capital Tbilisi

to protest against a new Russia-style foreign agents bill they fear will block their hopes of joining the EU.

The government says the law will increase transparency and sent in riot police to disperse

the protesters. investors.

Around 20 people are reported to have been detained.

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