* As agreed between China and Brazil, President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of the Federative Republic of Brazil will pay a state visit to China from April 12 to 15, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying announced on Tuesday.
* Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said on Monday he would invite his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping to Brazil, speaking on the eve of his departure the Asian country in a bid to tighten relations between the two countries.
* Australia has reached an agreement with China to resolve their dispute over barley imports, Foreign Minister Penny Wong said on Tuesday, in the latest sign of improving ties between the trade partners.
* Washington and Manila will need to discuss what the US may do with its access to certain military bases in the Philippines, Filipino Foreign Minister Enrique Manalo said on Monday.
* US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin held phone talks with his Republic of Korea counterpart on Tuesday and explained about recent media reports on the leak of confidential US documents, the RoK's defence ministry said.
* More than 17,000 Philippine and US soldiers began their largest ever joint military drills on Tuesday, as ties between the long-term allies warm over shared concerns in the Asia-Pacific region.
* Japan Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said on Tuesday that Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will visit Egypt, Ghana, Kenya and Mozambique in late April to early May. The visit will come just weeks before Japan hosts the Group of Seven nations summit.
* The UK government is planning an autumn 2024 general election, believing a vote later that year brings the best chance of a victory, the Telegraph reported on Monday.
* Austria plans to extend checks at its borders with Slovenia and Hungary by another six months from May 11, when the current six-month suspension of free travel over those boundaries expires, Interior Minister Gerhard Karner told ORF radio on Tuesday.
* A UN spokesperson said on Monday that talks between Saudi and Omani delegations and Houthi rebels in Yemen's capital Sana'a over the weekend were "a welcome step towards the de-escalation of tensions."
* The UN's senior disarmament official, Izumi Nakamitsu, stressed on Monday that the implementation of global tools for controlling the trade and transfer of weapons is critical to prevent arms from falling into the wrong hands.
* Signatories to the 2014 Algiers Peace Agreement have new proposals to consider on the eve of a UN Security Council meeting on Mali, a UN spokesman said on Monday.
* The United Nations' mission to Afghanistan has launched a review of its operations and asked all Afghan staff not to come to work at least until May after the Taliban administration barred its women staff from working, it said in a statement on Tuesday.
* Thousands of Israelis, including ministers in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing government, marched to an evacuated Jewish outpost in the West Bank on Monday in support of settlements viewed as illegal under international law.
* World Bank Group President David Malpass announced on Monday the lender has raised its global growth forecast for 2023 to 2 percent from 1.7 percent in January due to China's recovery.
* Forty-four countries have expressed interest in joining the International Monetary Fund (IMF)'s 40 billion-USD Resilience and Sustainability Trust (RST), said IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva on Monday.
* Vehicle production in Brazil, Latin America's largest economy, rose 20 percent year on year in March, the Brazilian National Association of Automotive Vehicle Manufacturers (Anfavea) said Monday.
* The unemployment rate in the Philippines remained at its previous month's rate of 4.8 percent in February, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said on Tuesday. PSA data showed 2.47 million Filipinos were out of work in February, higher than the 2.37 million recorded in January.
* More than 500 people evacuated from their homes in Republic of Korea's eastern coastal city of Gangneung as strong winds fanned a wildfire on Tuesday, officials said, but fears of a further spread eased as rain helped firefighters battle the blaze.
* The Shiveluch volcano in Russia's far eastern Kamchatka Peninsula erupted early Tuesday and spewed ash plume up to 15 km into the sky, posing threat to air traffic.
* India Meteorological Department (IMD) Tuesday forecasts a gradual rise in maximum temperature by 2 to 4 degree Celsius over many parts of the country in the next four days.
* At least 10 people were killed and another 25 injured in the predawn hours of Monday after a passenger bus skidded off the road and plunged into a river in Peru's department of Lima.
* At least 13 traders were killed on Sunday night and another two injured after a truck ferrying them from an auction plunged into a river in Ruvuma region in southern Tanzania, police said on Monday.
