* Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said Friday that China will open its door wider, keep advancing high-level opening up, and steadily expand institutional opening up.
* Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Techo Hun Sen on Saturday called on countries to maintain the presence of permanent peace, saying that it is the "most significant element" for the development of all nations in the world.
* A program calling for Asian cases of "nature-based solutions" was launched in Montreal, Canada, on Friday at the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity.
* President Joe Biden next week will announce US support for the African Union's admission to the G20 group of the world's largest economies as a permanent member, a White House official said on Friday.
* French President Emmanuel Macron and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez will meet again in Spain on Jan. 19, Macron said in a tweet on Friday following a summit of nine Mediterranean countries in the Spanish city of Alicante.
* The Iranian nuclear chief said Friday that his country would uphold its commitments under the 2015 nuclear deal if the anti-Iran sanctions are removed.
* Belarus told the United Nations on Friday that it would allow, without preconditions, the transit of grain from Ukraine through its territory for export from Lithuanian ports, a U.N. spokesman said.
* Severe drought and conflict have caused more than 2.4 million displacements in Somalia since the start of 2021, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Friday.
* Italy, Britain, and Japan on Friday unveiled the Global Combat Air Program (GCAP), a joint initiative to develop a next-generation stealth fighter aircraft by 2035.
* Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Bulgarian President Rumen Georgiev Radev reaffirmed the need for stronger ties on Friday during a meeting in Istanbul.
* Hundreds of Tunisians protested on Saturday against President Kais Saied a week before elections to a new parliament created by his constitutional changes, accusing him of an undemocratic coup.
* Peruvian President Dina Boluarte on Friday said she was willing to discuss early elections with the country's political and civil organizations, but ruled out kick-starting constitutional changes for the time being.
* Italy agreed on Friday to take in over 500 migrants from two rescue ships at sea off its coast after another vessel carrying 33 migrants had docked overnight on the southern Italian island of Lampedusa.
* Iran announced the finalization of negotiations between the Islamic republic and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) on bilateral free trade of over more than 7,500 commodity items, Tasnim news agency reported on Friday.
* More than 20 million people in Pakistan continue to depend on humanitarian aid and the needs will grow as winter sets in, said UN humanitarians on Friday.
* The Dutch government announced on Friday a plan to build two new nuclear power plants by 2035, which will cover 9-13 percent of the country's total electricity needs by then.
* Uzbekistan's population has surpassed 36 million, increasing by a million over the past year, the Uzbek State Statistics committee said on Friday. In September 2021, the population of Uzbekistan exceeded 35 million.
* US consumer sentiment climbed to a preliminary reading of 59.1 in December, a jump from the prior month's 56.8, according to the widely-watched University of Michigan monthly survey.
* Gold futures on the COMEX division of the New York Mercantile Exchange rose on Friday as US inflation data is higher than expected. The most active gold contract for February delivery rose 9.2 USD, or 0.51 percent, to close at 1,810.7 dollars per ounce.
* Mongolia saw its foreign trade turnover grow 26.6 percent year on year to 19 billion USD in the first 11 months of this year, local media reported on Saturday, citing the Mongolian Customs General Administration (MCGA).
* Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif on Friday stressed the need for strengthening institutions to eradicate the menace of corruption to achieve development and prosperity of the country, said a statement from the Prime Minister's Office.
* Swedish households may occasionally have to go without electricity, the government said on Friday, urging the general public to use electricity sparingly.
* Malaysia's unemployment fell to the lowest level since the COVID-19 pandemic in October, reaching 602,000 persons, official data showed on Friday.
* A cyclonic storm killed at least four people in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu on Saturday, the top state official said, as heavy rain and strong winds buffeted several districts damaging property and causing power outages.
* Sri Lanka's Disaster Management Center (DMC) said on Friday that over 1,300 houses in various parts of the island country have been damaged by cyclonic storm Mandous.
* The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Friday expanded the use of COVID-19 vaccines that target both the original coronavirus and Omicron sub-variants to include children aged 6 months through 5 years.
* Health Canada on Friday authorized the Pfizer-BioNTech Comirnaty Omicron BA.4/BA.5 bivalent-adapted booster for use in children 5 to 11 years of age.
* More than 25,000 people were hospitalized due to flu in the United States in the week ending Dec. 3, according to data released Friday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
* The influenza season is in full force in Sweden and the number of new cases has increased dramatically in a week, local media reported on Friday.
