* All candidates for the position of the next United Nations secretary-general have been invited to participate in a debate in the UN General Assembly (UNGA) Hall on July 23, La Neice Collins, spokeswoman for the UNGA president, announced Thursday. There are currently six candidates to be the next UN secretary-general, including four women from Latin America and the Caribbean.
* Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Thursday issued a decree setting Nov. 28 as the date for legislative elections, with presidential elections to be held in the first quarter of 2027, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.
* Pak Thae Song, premier of the Cabinet of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), will lead a party and government delegation to pay an official visit to China from July 10 to 12, the Chinese foreign ministry announced on Thursday.
* Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that Russia considers U.S. statements suggesting that an escalation of Ukrainian attacks on Russian infrastructure would help bring about a peaceful settlement as reflecting a "mistaken judgment."
* Italy has decided to expel two military attaches working at the Russian Embassy in Rome, who were allegedly involved in espionage activities, Italian Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said on Thursday.
* Germany will purchase Tomahawk cruise missiles from the United States and deploy them on its soil, Chancellor Friedrich Merz said on Thursday. In a statement at the Bundestag, Germany's lower house of parliament, Merz said the two countries' governments had agreed on the deal at the NATO summit in Ankara, Türkiye.
* Cambodian and Malaysian armed forces chiefs vowed Thursday to boost military cooperation to benefit both nations and the region, according to a Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) press release.
* Mongolia and the Republic of Korea signed 21 cooperation documents on Thursday to strengthen bilateral ties, according to the Mongolian presidential office website.
* Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a phone call with U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday, during which the two agreed to continue coordination between their countries "on various fronts," Netanyahu's office said in a statement.
* Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi on Thursday discussed the latest regional developments with his Omani and Turkish counterparts as well as Pakistan's army chief in separate phone calls following renewed U.S. strikes on Iran, the Iranian Foreign Ministry said.
* Saudi Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney met Thursday in Jeddah to review bilateral ties and regional developments, with both sides exchanging several memoranda of understanding (MoUs), the Saudi Press Agency reported.
* Syrian authorities said Thursday they have arrested all members of a cell linked to the Islamic State (IS) group that they say were responsible for this week's bombing in Damascus, following coordinated security operations in the capital and surrounding countryside.
* Iran on Thursday strongly condemned U.S. "military aggression" against Iranian ports, coastal areas and maritime infrastructure over the past two nights, saying the strikes had endangered maritime safety and security.
* Fourteen people were killed and 78 others wounded in U.S. overnight raids on Iran, with a bridge and a railway damaged, Iranian authorities said Thursday. Among the deaths, three were killed near the southwestern city of Ahvaz, said Valiollah Hayati, Khuzestan Province's deputy governor for security and law enforcement affairs, cited by the semi-official Fars news agency.
* Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Thursday that Israeli forces would remain in Lebanon until Hezbollah is fully disarmed, contradicting U.S. President Donald Trump's statement that Israeli troops would withdraw from southern Lebanon.
* Jordan's air defense systems shot down eight missiles launched from Iran toward Jordanian territory on Thursday, a military source said.
* Bahrain and Kuwait reported on Thursday that their air defense systems had intercepted and destroyed Iranian aerial attacks.
* China's border inspection agencies handled a record 369 million inbound and outbound crossings in the first half of 2026, up 10.8 percent year on year, official data showed on Friday. Visa-free entries by foreign nationals surged 30.6 percent year on year to surpass 17.8 million, accounting for 77.7 percent of all foreign arrivals, the National Immigration Administration said at a press briefing.
* Latvia's Finance Ministry on Thursday lowered the country's economic growth forecasts for 2026 and 2027 and raised its inflation projections, citing higher energy prices, supply chain disruptions and increased uncertainty following an escalation of conflict in the Persian Gulf.
* Singapore retained the top spot in the 2026 Xinhua-Baltic International Shipping Centre Development Index (ISCDI) rankings, marking its 13th consecutive year at the top, the Baltic Exchange said in a statement released on Friday.
* Bangladesh's gross domestic product (GDP) is forecast to grow by 4.5 percent in fiscal year 2026-27, according to the Asian Development Bank's (ADB) latest report released on Thursday.
* The unemployment rate in the Gaza Strip surpassed 80 percent in 2025, compared with 29 percent in the West Bank, the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) said Thursday in a statement marking the upcoming World Population Day.
* China has seen another bumper summer grain harvest in 2026, with total output topping 150 million tonnes for the first time, official data showed Friday. The country's summer grain output totaled 150.75 million tonnes this year, up 0.7 percent or 1 million tonnes year on year, according to a survey by the National Bureau of Statistics.
* Iraq's North Oil Company (NOC) on Thursday signed a contract with U.S.-based company HKN Energy to develop the Hamrin oil field in northern Iraq, the Iraqi Oil Ministry said. Under the contract, the field's peak production is expected to reach 140,000 barrels per day, with gas production averaging 40 million standard cubic feet per day, the ministry said in a statement.
* Australian authorities on Friday announced that local transmission of the H5N1 avian influenza has been detected after a coastal bird in South Australia (SA) tested positive for the deadly strain.
* At least 16 people have died from acute food shortages caused by prolonged drought in Uganda's semi-arid northeastern Karamoja region, the country's Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) said on Thursday.
* The Philippine Department of Education on Friday postponed the national safe schools summit and safety drill in Manila over concerns about the effects of Typhoon Bavi, according to official media reports.
* Four hundred police personnel have been deployed for flood disaster response in Mindanao, southern Philippines, official media reported on Friday.
