* Azerbaijan on Friday concluded the Pre-COP29 climate conference in Baku, where officials from around the world gathered to push forward negotiations on key issues ahead of next month's 2024 UN Climate Change Conference (COP29).
* Indonesia, one of the countries in the world that bears constant risks of earthquakes and tsunamis, has been pushing efforts to strengthen its early warning system to monitor seismic activities and provide early detections for natural disasters.
* Sri Lankan president Anura Kumara Dissanayake has instructed officials to provide immediate relief to people affected by recent adverse weather conditions across the country, the President's Media Division (PMD) said on Saturday.
* China and the European Union (EU) have yet to reach a mutually acceptable solution on the EU's anti-subsidy case involving Chinese electric vehicles, despite important progress in certain areas, China's commerce ministry said Saturday.
* The Foreign Ministry of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on Friday accused South Korea of sending drones over Pyongyang, the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported, amid signs of heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula.
* Russia's Vladimir Putin held talks with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Friday in Turkmenistan, where the two leaders hailed their countries growing economic ties and similar views on world affairs, an entente viewed with concern by the United States.
* Russia lodged a strong protest with Japan over its military drill plans with the United States near Russia's borders, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement Friday.
* Serbia and Turkiye signed a series of agreements on Friday, aimed at expanding cooperation in both the economic and defense sectors during Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's official visit to Serbia.
* German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Friday announced that Germany, together with Belgium, Denmark, and Norway, would deliver another military aid package worth around 1.4 billion euros (1.53 billion USD) to Ukraine by the end of the year.
* Poland plans to temporarily suspend the right to asylum as part of a strategy to limit illegal migration amidst tensions with Belarus, which Warsaw accuses of channelling migrants across its border.
* The United Nations (UN) Security Council met in an emergency session on Lebanon on Thursday, following the firing of Israeli forces on UN peacekeepers in Lebanon earlier in the day.
* Two U.N. peacekeepers were wounded by an Israeli strike near their watchtower in south Lebanon on Friday, Israel's military said, while blasts shook the peacekeepers' main base in the area for the second time in 48 hours as Israeli forces battled Hezbollah.
* The French Foreign Ministry announced on Friday that it had summoned the Israeli ambassador to France to condemn the ongoing deliberate Israeli shootings against the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), which are considered serious violations of international law and must cease immediately.
* Israeli military strikes on Gaza overnight killed at least 19 Palestinians, medics said on Saturday, while forces continued to push deeper into the Jabalia area, where international relief agencies say thousands of people are trapped.
* Nicaragua is breaking off diplomatic relations with Israel, the Central American nation said on Friday, calling the Israeli government "fascist" and "genocidal." Nicaragua's government, in a statement, said the break in relations was due to Israel's attacks on Palestinian territories.
* Russia, Syria and Iran should take more effective measures to protect Syria's territorial integrity, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said, when asked about Israel's recent strike on Damascus.
* French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday reiterated his call for an end to arms exports to the Gaza Strip and Lebanon, adding it was the sole means at hand to end the two conflicts pitting Israel against Iran-backed Hamas and Hezbollah.
* Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty and his French counterpart Jean-Noel Barrot discussed on Friday the situation in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip during a phone conversation.
* Aid entering Gaza is at its lowest level in months, and no one in Gaza has received food parcels this month due to constrained access of aid supplies, a UN spokesman said on Friday.
* The United States announced Friday sanctions targeting Iran's energy trade in light of the Oct. 1 ballistic missile attack launched by the country against Israel.
* At least 42,175 Palestinians have been killed and 98,336 others injured in Israel's military offensive on Gaza since Oct. 7, 2023, Gaza's health ministry said on Saturday.
* African countries have been urged to intensify efforts to protect the rights and welfare of girls affected by conflict across the continent.
* India's factory activity growth, determined by the index of industrial production (IIP), witnessed a contraction of 0.1 percent in August, the government data showed Friday.
* Indonesia recorded 22.73 billion USD in deals at Southeast Asia's largest trade exhibition, Trade Expo Indonesia, in Tangerang on Oct. 9-12. The figure included 19.69 billion dollars in goods and services transactions and 3.04 billion dollars in investment transactions.
* The World Bank has lowered its 2024-25 fiscal year (July 2024-June 2025) economic growth outlook for Bangladesh mainly due to the South Asian country's political instability.
* Belarus is to export a record-high amount of timber of up to 1 million cubic meters in 2024, said the Forestry Minister of Belarus Aleksandr Kulik on Friday, when reporting to Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko during the head of state's working trip to Shklov District of Mogilev Region.
* Large areas of Brazil's forest were affected by fires, with 22.38 million hectares devastated in the first nine months of this year, according to the latest report released Friday by monitoring network MapBiomas.
* The number of people affected by flooding in the West and Central Africa region continues to grow, currently standing at 6.6 million people in 16 countries, UN humanitarians said on Friday.
