The annual festival, in China's north-east Heilongjiang province, is one of the biggest ice and snow festivals in the world.

Suleimani took command of the Quds Force fifteen years ago, and in that time he has sought to reshape the Middle East in Iran’s favor, working as a power broker and as a military force: assassinating rivals, arming allies, and, for most of a decade, directing a network of militant groups that killed hundreds of Americans in Iraq. The U.S. Department of the Treasury has sanctioned Suleimani for his role in supporting the Assad regime, and for abetting terrorism. And yet he has remained mostly invisible to the outside world, even as he runs agents and directs operations. “Suleimani is the single most powerful operative in the Middle East today,” John Maguire, a former C.I.A. officer in Iraq, told me, “and no one’s ever heard of him.”

When Suleimani appears in public—often to speak at veterans’ events or to meet with Khamenei—he carries himself inconspicuously and rarely raises his voice, exhibiting a trait that Arabs call khilib, or understated charisma. “He is so short, but he has this presence,” a former senior Iraqi official told me. “There will be ten people in a room, and when Suleimani walks in he doesn’t come and sit with you. He sits over there on the other side of room, by himself, in a very quiet way. Doesn’t speak, doesn’t comment, just sits and listens. And so of course everyone is thinking only about him.”

Unlucky drivers in Washington state saw in the new year trapped under a glut of 15ft tumbleweeds, after the desiccated but mobile plants forced authorities to close a highway in both directions.

The Washington state patrol announced via Twitter at around 6.30pm local time on New Year’s Eve that drivers on State Route 240 near West Richland should use alternative routes. Trooper Sarah Clasen told KAPP-KVEW vehicles were trapped in a pile of tumbleweeds that were up to 15ft (4.57m) tall.


The state department of transportation used snow plows to clear the scene, a process trooper Chris Thorson said took about 10 hours. The road opened again at around 4.30am, well into 2020. Thorson said five cars and one 18-wheel semi truck were trapped. No injuries were reported.

“People were still stuck at midnight and rung in the new year trapped under the weeds,” Thorson said, adding that troopers found one abandoned car trapped in the tumbleweeds at daylight. No one was inside.