* UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Sunday welcomed the formation of a new government in Lebanon and reaffirmed his support for the country's territorial integrity, sovereignty and political independence.
* Colombian President Gustavo Petro announced on social platform X on Sunday his call for the resignation of his government ministers as part of an effort to fully comply with the national development plan.
* China released on Monday a new visa relaxation policy, allowing tour groups from ASEAN countries to visit Xishuangbanna, a popular tourist destination in the country's southwestern Yunnan Province, visa free for up to six days.
* U.S. President Donald Trump said on Sunday that he is "committed to buying and owning Gaza", and that the United States may let other nations in the Middle East rebuild the war-torn enclave.
* New Zealand will hold a global investment summit in March to attract about 100 of the world's high-profile investors, business leaders, and construction companies to boost the country's economic growth.
* Egypt announced on Sunday that Cairo will host an emergency Arab summit on Feb. 27 to address the latest developments concerning the Palestinian issue and the Gaza Strip, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
* U.S. President Donald Trump said in an interview aired on Sunday that he would instruct Elon Musk, head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), to find "hundreds of billions of dollars of fraud and abuse" across Washington.
* Australian targets to reduce the disadvantages faced by the country's Indigenous population are mostly not on track, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has said.
* French President Emmanuel Macron announced on Sunday night that France is set to receive a total investment of 109 billion euros (113 billion USD) in artificial intelligence (AI) in the coming years.
* U.S. President Donald Trump said on Sunday that he will announce new 25-percent tariffs on all steel and aluminum imports into the United States, with the official statement to be made on Monday.
* France and the European Union will respond to U.S. President Donald Trump's latest tariff announcement, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said Monday.
* The Australian government has said it is making the case for an exemption from U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum imports.
* Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia synchronized their power grids with Western Europe on Sunday afternoon, the Baltic News Service (BNS) reported.
* Israel is discussing U.S. President Donald Trump's "revolutionary, creative vision" on the Gaza Strip, the one that Trump is "very determined to implement," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday.
* German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Sunday evening criticized U.S. President Donald Trump's plan to relocate Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, calling it "a scandal."
* Egypt condemned on Sunday recent remarks on Gaza by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to U.S. media, describing them as deliberate "misinformation" that contradicts the efforts Egypt has been making.
* Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Sunday that no one has the power to displace Palestinians from their homeland.
* Israeli forces have begun withdrawing from a key area in Gaza as part of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire agreement that took effect last month, an Israeli government official said on Sunday.
* A top Iranian military commander said on Sunday the country is militarily capable of closing the strategic Strait of Hormuz, but will not resort to that option for now, according to the semi-official Tasnim news agency.
* The Israeli military said Sunday that it has launched airstrikes on Hezbollah targets in eastern and southern Lebanon.
* The Libyan Attorney General's office announced on Sunday that security services in the southeastern city of Kufra had freed 76 migrants detained by a criminal gang, and recovered 28 bodies of migrants buried near the detention site.
* A total of 569 people from 155 Iraqi families left the al-Hol refugee camp in northeastern Syria on Sunday, in the latest repatriation effort coordinated between the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the Iraqi government.
* An explosion occurred in the engine room of an oil tanker at the Ust-Luga port in Russia's Leningrad Oblast on Sunday, but there is no threat of an oil spill, regional authorities said.
* Braving the cold, rescuers are making all-out efforts to find survivors after a landslide in southwest China's Sichuan Province left one dead, 28 missing and two injured. So far, 360 people from 95 households have been evacuated, with temporary shelters set up.
* Republic of Korea's jobless claims fell last month due to lower demand in the business service, the health and welfare, and the public administration industries, government data showed Monday.
* Malaysia's unemployment rate fell by 0.1 percentage points to 3.3 percent in 2024, compared to 3.4 percent recorded in the previous year, official data showed Monday.
* International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva has praised Ethiopia's "strong progress" in its homegrown economic reform program.
* Sri Lanka's Coconut Cultivation Board has set a target of planting 2.5 million coconut plants in 2025, said an official on Sunday.
* Afghanistan's cotton harvest reached 159,000 tons in 2024, indicating a year-on-year growth of 30 percent, an official from the National Statistics and Information Authority (NSIA) said Monday.
* Dubai welcomed 18.72 million international overnight visitors in 2024, setting a new record with a 9-percent increase from last year's 17.15 million, according to the Dubai Department of Economy and Tourism (DET) on Sunday.
