* Climate change is driving changes in rainfall patterns across the world, scientists said in a paper published on Friday, which could also be intensifying typhoons and other tropical storms.
* General Secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday chaired a meeting of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee to study and arrange work related to flood control and disaster relief.
* Sri Lanka's Election Commission announced on Friday that the country's presidential election will be held on Sept. 21. The Election Commission also announced Aug. 15 as the date of nomination of candidates for the election of the president, according to the gazette notification issued in this regard.
* King Abdullah II of Jordan issued a royal decree on Thursday dissolving the House of Representatives with immediate effect, as stated by the Royal Hashemite Court.
* The leaders of Australia, New Zealand and Canada called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza in a joint statement on Friday.
* Indonesian President Joko Widodo launched the Golden Visa Indonesia program on Thursday, aimed at simplifying the process for foreigners seeking residence permits to invest and work in Indonesia.
* Terrorism threat to Singapore remains high despite no indication of an imminent attack, according to an official report Thursday.
* At the meeting on Thursday with Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov during an ASEAN summit in Laos, Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi said China and Russia should maintain communication and coordination on East Asian cooperation to promote regional peace and stability amid international turbulence.
* Vice President Kamala Harris took her presidential campaign blitz to the largest U.S. teachers' union on Thursday, promising a "fight for the future" as new opinion polls showed her narrowing the gap with Republican rival Donald Trump.
* British Finance Minister Rachel Reeves on Thursday vowed to "fix the mess" in the country's finances left by the prior Conservative government but said she would make no commitments on taxation until she is certain that fiscal rules can be met.
* Slovakia called on the European Commission on Thursday not to delay a decision in a request by it and Hungary for mediating a consultation procedure with Ukraine over disrupted oil flows from Russia.
* Mexican President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum said on Thursday that under her administration Mexico will have a good relationship with the United States regardless of who wins the U.S. presidential election.
* The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) Secretariat said Wednesday that it received compensation plans from Iraq, Kazakhstan and Russia for their overproduced oil volumes in the first half of 2024.
* U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris said she had a "frank and constructive meeting" with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday and reiterated her "unwavering commitment" to the U.S. ally's security.
* Italian Prime Minister Giorgio Meloni on Thursday reiterated commitment to de-escalation of the war on a regional level while expressing strong concern for the humanitarian situation in Gaza.
* EU's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Thursday urged Israel to revoke its decision to outlaw the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), calling it nonsense.
* Gaps in a Gaza ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas militants can be overcome, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said on Thursday. Kirby spoke as U.S. President Joe Biden met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to discuss prospects for a ceasefire.
* Algeria expressed “great regret and strong denunciation" on Thursday about the French government's decision to recognize an autonomy plan for the Western Sahara region "within Moroccan sovereignty”.
* Sudan's agriculture minister said there is no famine in the country and cast doubt on U.N.-backed data that 755,000 are experiencing catastrophic hunger, rejecting the idea of aid agencies overriding cross-border delivery restrictions.
* Iran on Thursday welcomed a statement by United Nations Special Envoy for Yemen Hans Grundberg on an agreement between Yemen's warring parties to resolve banking issues and resume flights from Sanaa.
* Yemen's Houthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi on Thursday said in a televised speech that his armed group would launch more attacks against the Israeli city of Tel Aviv.
* Turkey will send two naval ships and six F-16 jet fighters to Qatar as part of the military cooperation between the two countries, the country's Defense Ministry said Thursday.
* The Illegal Migration Control Department of Libya on Thursday deported more than 700 illegal migrants to their home countries of Niger and Egypt, an official told Xinhua.
* Japan on Thursday downgraded its assessment of exports for the first time in six months to "almost flat" in July, a government report showed.
* Russia's international reserves grew by 10 billion USD or 1.7 percent in the period from July 12 to July 19 over the previous week, reaching 611.3 billion USD, their highest since March 2022, according to the Russian Central Bank on Thursday.
* The U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate rose at an annual rate of 2.8 percent in the second quarter of this year, the U.S. Department of Commerce reported in an "advance" estimate released on Thursday.
* The National Bank of Ukraine on Thursday raised the country's gross domestic product (GDP) growth expectation for this year from 3 percent to 3.7 percent.
* Myanmar has attracted 147 million USD in foreign direct investment (FDI) in the first quarter of the fiscal year 2024-25, according to figures released by the Directorate of Investment and Company Administration (DICA) on Friday.
* More than 32.4 billion inter-regional trips were made in China during the first half (H1) of this year, up 7.4 percent from one year earlier, data from the Ministry of Transport showed on Friday.
* The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) on Thursday warned that the death toll of landslides in southern Ethiopia could reach as high as 500 amid ongoing emergency response and search operations.
* At least 16 people were killed and 48 others were injured, including six in serious condition, following a head-on collision between two buses in central Mali on Thursday, local authorities said.
* The United Kingdom (UK) has been seeing an increase in the frequency of temperature and rainfall extremes through the past decade, according to an annual analysis released Thursday by the Met Office.
* Japanese weather officials on Friday urged people to take measures to prevent heatstroke as scorching heat is expected again across wide areas of the Asian country.
* A total of 21 deaths were recorded at the Beni-Mellal Regional Hospital Center in central Morocco over the past 24 hours following the rise in temperatures, said the local Department of Health and Social Protection on Thursday.
* As of 6 a.m. Friday, about 628,600 people in east China's Fujian Province had been affected by Typhoon Gaemi, the third typhoon of this year, with some 290,000 residents relocated so far, said local authorities.
* Fire crews in California and Oregon on Thursday battled the largest active wildfires in their respective states this year as thousands of residents were under evacuation orders, while smoke from the blazes triggered health alerts across the western United States.
* A raging wildfire has devastated the western Canadian tourist town of Jasper, potentially destroying up to 50% of structures, and firefighters were trying Thursday to save as many buildings as possible, authorities said.
