* Portugal's President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa on Thursday accepted the lineup of a new center-right minority government, the president's office said.
* Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Thursday approved the new government headed by Prime Minister-designate Mohammad Mustafa, the official news agency WAFA reported.
* At the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping, President-elect of the Republic of Indonesia and Great Indonesia Movement Party General Chairman Prabowo Subianto will visit China from March 31 to April 2, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying announced on Friday.
* The foreign ministers of India and Ukraine said on Friday they had agreed to restore trade and cooperation to levels before Ukraine-Russia's crisis, as Kyiv seeks to build support for its peace plan with an old friend of Moscow.
* Russia on Thursday vetoed a United Nations (UN) Security Council draft resolution extending the mandate of the Panel of Experts assisting the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) Sanctions Committee. The U.S.-drafted resolution won the support of 13 of the 15 members of the Security Council. Russia voted against it. China abstained.
* Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, in an interview published on Friday, said Ukraine's proposed peace plan was pointless as it was based on unacceptable notions like Moscow's withdrawal from areas it has captured.
* Russia's foreign ministry said on Friday it had summoned Moldova's ambassador in Moscow and declared one Moldovan embassy official 'persona non grata'. The ministry said it acted in response to what it said was the "unmotivated" designation of an employee of Russia's embassy in Moldova as 'persona non grata' on March 19.
* Energy infrastructure in six Ukrainian regions suffered damage from Russian missile and drone strikes on early Friday, said Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal.
* Japan has included a record high defense spending in its budget enacted for the fiscal year 2024 starting April.
* Tajikistan has detained nine people this week suspected of having links to a mass shooting at a Russian concert hall last Friday and also to the militant Islamist group that claimed responsibility, a Tajik security source told Reuters.
* France has asked about 45 foreign countries to contribute several thousand extra military, police and civilian personnel to help safeguard the Paris Olympics this summer, government sources said on Friday, amid a complex geopolitical and security outlook.
* U.S. President Joe Biden is set to host Tayyip Erdogan at the White House on May 9 in the Turkish leader's first bilateral visit to Washington since Donald Trump was president, U.S. and Turkish officials said on Friday.
* At least 32,623 Palestinians have been killed and 75,092 injured in Israel's military offensive on Gaza since Oct. 7, the Gaza health ministry said on Friday.
* Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has agreed to send delegations to Egypt and Qatar, where negotiators have been trying to secure the release of Israeli hostages as part of a possible Gaza ceasefire deal, his office said on Friday.
* Israel sustained its aerial and ground bombardment of the Gaza Strip on Friday, killing dozens of Palestinians, as fighting raged around Gaza City's main Al Shifa hospital, Palestinian officials and the Israeli military said.
* Israel carried out its deadliest strikes in months on northern Syria's Aleppo province early on Friday and said it killed a senior Hezbollah commander in Lebanon, stepping up its campaign against Iran's proxies in parallel with its war in Gaza.
* A bus crash in northern South Africa killed 45 pilgrims travelling from Botswana for Easter festivities on Thursday, authorities said, with the sole survivor an eight-year-old girl currently being treated in hospital.
* The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Thursday that more than 1.1 million people in the Gaza Strip are facing "an extreme level of food insecurity," as Israel prevents aid from entering the enclave.
* UN humanitarians said on Thursday they continue to deliver aid, with their partners, to Haitians despite the upsurge in deadly gang violence that even targets schools and health facilities.
* The Dutch government announced on Thursday to invest 2.5 billion euros (2.7 billion USD) in the microchip sector.
* U.S. prices increased less than expected in February, with the cost of services outside housing and energy slowing significantly, keeping a June interest rate cut from the Federal Reserve on the table.
* India's forex exchange (forex) reserves rose by 139 million USD to 642.631 billion dollars during the week ending on March 22, data released by the country's central bank, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), showed on Friday.
* Thailand's economy continued to recover at a slow pace in February, thanks to an expansion in the service sector on the back of rising tourism revenue and inbound foreign tourists, the central bank said on Friday.
* Ukraine's gross domestic product (GDP) expanded 5.3 percent in 2023, the country's statistical agency said Thursday. Last year, Ukraine's nominal GDP amounted to 6.537 trillion hryvnias (about 167 billion USD), said the State Statistics Service.
* Myanmar earned 695.023 million USD from the export of fishery products in over 11 months of the fiscal year 2023-24 through March, according to the Ministry of Commerce on Friday.
* Greece will raise its monthly minimum gross wage by 6.4% to 830 euros, the conservative government said on Friday, the fourth such increase in five years aimed at easing the burden on households squeezed by a higher cost of living.
* Births in Italy dropped to a record low in 2023, the 15th consecutive annual decline, national statistics bureau ISTAT said on Friday, as the population continued to shrink.
* Population growth in Egypt, the Arab world's most populous country, slowed to 1.4% in 2023, its lowest rate in decades, the planning ministry said on Thursday.
* The Bulgarian Food Safety Agency (BFSA) reported on Thursday an outbreak of the highly pathogenic bird flu at an industrial farm.
* An emergency situation declared on Thursday in Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan, due to strong winds. The corresponding resolution was signed by Bishkek Mayor Aibek Dzhunushaliev.
* A tropical cyclone that swept across the island of Madagascar this week killed at least 18 people and displaced thousands more, the country's disaster management office said on Friday.
