* Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was sworn in for her fourth straight five-year term on Thursday. Hasina took the oath of office after her ruling Bangladesh Awami League (AL) party won a landslide victory in the country's 12th parliament elections held on Jan. 7.
* Russian Deputy Prime Minister Viktoria Abramchenko said that Russia sees no prospects for renewing the Black Sea Grain Initiative, local media reported on Thursday.
* Papua New Guinea's prime minister declared a state of emergency on Thursday, suspending government and police officials after 16 people were killed in rioting in the Pacific island nation.
* Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that Israel "has no intention" of maintaining the occupation of Gaza or displacing civilians.
* French naval forces are accompanying ships with French interests through the Red Sea region, the country's top naval commander in the area said on Thursday, adding that Paris' current mandate did not include striking Houthi rebels directly.
* China aims to reduce the national average concentration of fine particulate matter, a measure of air quality, to less than 28 micrograms per cubic metre by 2027. The country also aims for less than 25 micrograms by 2035, state news agency Xinhua reported on Thursday.
* The Finnish government has decided to continue the closure of border crossing points at the land border between Finland and Russia until Feb. 11.
* Italy's parliament on Wednesday approved a resolution reaffirming the country's support for Ukraine for another year in that country's conflict with Russia.
* Turkey, Romania and Bulgaria signed Thursday a memorandum of understanding on a joint plan to address the threat of floating mines in the Black Sea.
* Iran's navy said on Thursday that it has seized the U.S. oil tanker "St Nikolas" in the Sea of Oman, following a "court order," local media reported.
* A convoy of 50 tankers laden with illicitly obtained oil from fields in northeastern Syria exited through an unauthorized crossing, heading toward Iraqi territories on Wednesday, Syria's state news agency SANA reported.
* German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock vowed on Wednesday to offer 15 million euros (16.45 million USD) to support the Lebanese army amid growing fears of escalating tensions with Israel on Lebanon's southern border.
* Sweden has fulfilled an important part of demands by Türkiye for the Nordic country's NATO bid, Turkish parliament speaker Numan Kurtulmus said Wednesday.
* Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday stressed that Gaza was an integral part of the Palestinian state, and Israel's plans to separate it or cut off any part of it would not be accepted, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.
* The Security Council on Wednesday adopted a resolution to condemn the attacks by the Houthi militia on merchant and commercial vessels in the Red Sea.
* Egypt on Wednesday denied allegations that additional fees are collected at the Rafah border crossing from personnel coming from the besieged Palestinian enclave of the Gaza Strip.
* A high-level parliamentary meeting among the member states of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) was held Wednesday in Iran's capital Tehran to discuss the Palestine issue, according to the Iranian Students' News Agency (ISNA).
* Saudi state TV said on Thursday that the kingdom agreed with Canada on re-exchanging trade delegations after 5 years of suspension after the two countries restored full diplomatic ties last year.
* 23,469 Palestinians have been killed and 59,604 injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since Oct. 7, Gaza's health ministry said on Thursday.
* The chief negotiator for Yemen's Houthis said on Thursday the group's attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea do not threaten its peace talks with Saudi Arabia, blaming Israel's war in Gaza for dragging the Middle East into more regional conflict.
* Russia recorded a budget deficit of 1.9% of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2023, the finance ministry said on Thursday, a slight improvement on 2022 but below the government's original target.
* Bilateral trade between China and the Maldives reached nearly 700 million USD in the first 11 months of 2023, up 75.2 percent year on year, the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) said Thursday.
* France's economic growth is slowing but it is more robust than feared, backing a previous estimate of 0.9% for 2024, ECB policy maker and head of the French central bank Francois Villeroy de Galhau said on Thursday.
* Ukraine's gross domestic product (GDP) is likely to grow by 3.2 percent this year, the government-run Ukrinform news agency reported Wednesday, citing the latest forecast by the World Bank.
* Some European Union lawmakers are pushing to strengthen a planned law on microplastics pollution, after millions of plastic pellets washed up on the coast of Spain's northwestern Galicia region.
* The Republic of Korea's export rose in double digits in the first 10 days of this month due to solid demand for locally-made semiconductors and oil products, customs office data showed Thursday.
* Remittances sent by overseas Pakistani workers increased by 5.4 percent in December 2023 on a month-on-month basis, the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) said on Wednesday.
* Israel posted a budget deficit of 4.2% of gross domestic product in 2023, after a 0.6% surplus in 2022, due to a spike in state spending to finance the war against Palestinian Islamist group Hamas in Gaza, the finance ministry said on Thursday.
* Ecuador's national assembly late on Wednesday approved a bill proposed by President Daniel Noboa that is meant to increase electricity generation and attract foreign investment to the sector.
* Saudi Arabia's mineral wealth has surged by 90 percent to 9.375 trillion riyals (2.5 trillion USD), boosted by discoveries of rare earths and metals, the state news agency SPA reported Wednesday.
* A total of 5,464 people were displaced due to increasing volcanic activities at Mount Lewotobi Laki-laki in East Nusa Tenggara Province of Indonesia, according to the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) on Thursday.
* Over 15,000 families in Sri Lanka have been affected by the adverse weather in recent days, the head of the country's Disaster Management Center (DMC) said on Thursday.
