World news in Brief: November 16

The 17th Group of 20 (G20) Summit in Bali, Indonesia, on Wednesday reaffirmed its commitment to cooperation to address global economic challenges.
The number of foreign visitors to Japan rose to nearly 500,000 in October, the first month it fully reopened to overseas visitors after more than two years of COVID restrictions, more than doubling the volume from September.
The number of foreign visitors to Japan rose to nearly 500,000 in October, the first month it fully reopened to overseas visitors after more than two years of COVID restrictions, more than doubling the volume from September.

* Indonesian President Joko Widodo on Wednesday officially handed over the G20 presidency to India at the end of a summit of the bloc's leaders in Bali.

* Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) member economies should embark on green structural reforms and promote a green recovery from the economic slowdown triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic, said an APEC report on Wednesday.

* China and Japan will properly handle differences and build a bilateral relationship in accordance with the new era, Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said on Wednesday.

* Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi met in Bali, Indonesia, on Tuesday with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov while Wang, as an entourage of Chinese President Xi Jinping, attended the Group of 20 summit.

* The president of Cuba, Miguel Diaz-Canel, is set to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin next week in Moscow, the RIA News agency reported on Wednesday, citing the Cuban ambassador.

* Former US President Donald Trump announced Tuesday night that he will run for the White House again. Trump, 76, also filed his paperwork establishing his candidacy to run for the US presidency in 2024 with the Federal Elections Commission on Tuesday.

* Israel's new parliament was sworn in on Tuesday after the right-wing bloc won the elections two weeks ago. The 120 elected lawmakers were sworn-in at a session of the parliament, or Knesset, hosted by President Isaac Herzog.

* Poland's national security council (BBN) said on Wednesday it will meet again at 1100 GMT amid concerns the Ukraine conflict could spill into neighbouring countries after Tuesday's missile strike that killed two people.

* NATO ambassadors will hold an emergency meeting at 1000 CET (0900 GMT) on Wednesday to discuss a missile strike in eastern Poland close to the Ukrainian border that killed two people on Tuesday, two NATO officials and a European diplomat said.

* A missile that killed two people in Poland was probably not fired from Russia, US President Joe Biden said on Wednesday after holding talks with leaders of Western allies amid concerns the Ukraine conflict could spill into neighbouring countries.

* Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday that he respects Russia's statement that Russian missiles had not hit Polish territory, adding that he believes Moscow had "nothing to do with it."

* There will be no losers from peace between Ukraine and Russia, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday, adding that a U.N-brokered export deal had allowed nearly 11 million tonnes of grain to enter global markets.

* The Russian Foreign Ministry on Monday barred an additional 100 Canadian citizens from entry in response to repeated anti-Russian sanctions imposed by Ottawa.

* The Council of the European Union (EU) on Tuesday announced the launch of a special military mission to support Ukraine in the ongoing conflict with Russia.

* Sweden said on Wednesday it would deliver military aid worth 3 billion Swedish crowns ($286.98 million) to Ukraine.

* Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said in Tehran on Tuesday that resistance is the only way to confront the "greed" of the West.

* Immigrant workers contributed 143.9 billion euros (about 148 billion USD) to Italy's economy, or 9 percent of the country's gross domestic product (GDP) last year, a new report showed on Monday.

* Israel said on Tuesday that it has signed an agreement with the two energy companies licensed by Lebanon to drill in a gas field on the maritime border between the two countries to secure its economic rights to the field.

* The Druzhba oil pipeline can likely be restarted within a short time as the pipeline itself had not been damaged, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said in a video on his Facebook page on Wednesday.

* Wall Street's major indexes climbed on Tuesday, following another milder than expected US inflation report.

* Argentina registered 88 percent year-on-year inflation in October, with prices rising 6.3 percent for an accumulated 76.6 percent spike in prices so far this year, the National Statistics and Census Institute (INDEC) said Tuesday.

* Brazilian financial analysts raised their inflation forecast for the end of this year from 5.63 to 5.82 percent, the third straight weekly uptick, keeping it at 4.94 percent for 2023, the Central Bank of Brazil said Monday.

* In October, widespread price increases continued in Sweden for products such as food - in particular vegetables - and non-alcoholic beverages as the country's CPIF (Consumer Price Index with fixed interest rate) 12-month inflation rate stood at 9.3 percent, down from 9.7 percent in September, Statistics Sweden said on Tuesday.

* Slovenian economic growth slowed in the third quarter (Q3) of 2022, the country's statistical office said on Tuesday. In the second quarter (Q2) of this year, growth was 8.2 percent, compared to 3.4 percent in Q3.

* For the first time since early 2021, business confidence in the Netherlands was in negative territory at the beginning of the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2022, Statistics Netherlands (CBS) said on Tuesday. The confidence indicator stood at -0.9, nine points lower than a quarter earlier.

* Surging household energy bills and food prices pushed British inflation to a new 41-year high in October, according to data published a day before finance minister Jeremy Hunt announces tax hikes and spending cuts to control price growth.

* Hungary's gross domestic product (GDP) increased by four percent year-on-year in the third quarter (Q3), based on preliminary unadjusted data, the country's Central Statistics Office (KSH) said on Tuesday.

* Bangladesh's per capita income reached 2,824 USD in fiscal year 2021-22 (July 2021-June 2022), showed the latest official data. The figure stood at 2,591 dollars in the previous 2020-2021 fiscal year (July 2020-June 2021) .

* The Australian government has announced it will sign up for an international commitment to build more offshore wind projects.

* NASA's towering next-generation moon rocket blasted off from Florida early on Wednesday on its debut flight, a crewless voyage inaugurating the US space agency's Artemis exploration program 50 years after the final Apollo moon mission.

* The Asian Development Bank (ADB) said Wednesday it has provided a 4 million USD emergency grant to Tuvalu to help fund drought relief efforts.

* The Asian Development Bank (ADB) said Wednesday it has approved a 7.5 million USD policy-based grant to help the Samoan economy rebound from the COVID-19 pandemic.

* An earthquake of magnitude 6 struck southwest of the Indonesian island of Sumatra on Wednesday, the European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC) said. The quake was at a depth of 10 km (6.2 miles), EMSC said.

* Haiti and the United Nations are seeking 145 million USD for humanitarian relief, including for a cholera outbreak that has killed 161 people, a UN spokesman said on Tuesday.

* Türkiye has detained 50 suspects over the deadly bomb attack in central Istanbul earlier this week, Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said Tuesday.

VNA, Reuters, Xinhua