* An exhibition highlighting Cuba's advances in science, technology and innovation was inaugurated on Thursday at the Havana Convention Center, where the Group of 77 (G77) plus China Summit will kick off Friday.
* Latvian lawmakers on Friday approved the country's new government formed by three coalition partners - the New Unity party, the Union of Greens and Farmers, and the Progressives. The three-party coalition has a narrow majority of three votes in Latvia's 100-seat parliament.
* Kim Jong Un, top leader of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), visited on Friday a major aviation plant upon his arrival in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, an industrial center in the Russian Far East, during his ongoing visit to the country, the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported Saturday.
* Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday said that Turkey may "part ways with the European Union (EU)," suggesting that his country may end the bid to join the European bloc.
* Poland, Slovakia and Hungary announced their own restrictions on Ukrainian grain imports on Friday after the European Commission decided not to extend its ban on imports into Ukraine's five EU neighbours.
* U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Friday that the normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel remains "difficult," and that any agreement between the two should address issues with Palestine.
* Germany has decided to keep taking in migrants and refugees arriving in Italy, the interior minister said late on Friday, two days after it announced the suspension of a voluntary agreement with Rome to receive new arrivals.
* The U.S. State Department on Friday welcomed Saudi Arabia's invitation to a Houthi-led delegation from Yemen for talks in Riyadh and described it as an "important step towards peace."
* Albania and the European Union (EU) signed on Friday a new agreement on operational cooperation in border management with the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex), aiming to combat cross-border crime, address irregular migration, as well as to enhance security at the EU's external borders.
* The International Monetary Fund and World Bank will decide on Monday whether to proceed with Oct. 9-15 annual meetings in earthquake-hit Morocco after completing a "thorough review" of the country's ability to host the meetings, IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva told Reuters.
* Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni called on Friday for the European Union to act jointly "with a naval mission if necessary" to prevent migrants crossing the Mediterranean from North Africa.
* European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will travel to Lampedusa on Sunday, an official said, as dozens of the Italian island's citizens protested over a recent surge in migrant arrivals.
* The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said Thursday that it is expecting the European Union (EU) to lift all restrictions on the imports of Ukrainian grain and other agricultural products after Friday.
* As of midnight, Finland will close its borders to passenger cars registered in Russia, the country's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a press release on Friday.
* The Yemeni government announced on Friday it welcomed all initiatives aimed at putting an end to the country's eight-year civil war, after a delegation of Houthi rebels arrived in Saudi Arabia for a new round of peace talks.
* Iran's ambassador to the United Nations (UN) has warned that his country will respond "decisively" to any threat or unlawful act against it by Israel, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported Friday.
* Ghana is committed to launching Eco, the common currency proposed by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), by 2027, said Ghanaian Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia on Friday.
* Russia's Central Bank raised the key interest rate by 100 basis points from 12 to 13 percent, it said in a statement Friday.
* Indonesia recorded a deep export decline of 21.21 percent year on year to 22.00 billion USD in August, according to Statistics Indonesia (BPS) on Friday.
* Domestic tourism in Malaysia experienced a significant surge to record 54.5 million visitors for the second quarter of 2023, increasing 20 percent as compared to the same quarter of the previous year, official data showed Friday.
* Prices in Italy rose 5.4 percent in August over the same month last year, according to Italy's National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT) on Friday. August's 5.4 percent rate was down from an annualized 5.9 percent rate the previous month.
* Progress towards the goal of ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 has been too slow in Europe and Central Asia, with most countries likely to miss the interim targets set by the United Nations AIDS program (UNAIDS) for 2025, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) said Friday.
* A UN spokesman said on Friday 60 UN agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) seek unhindered access to all communities in Yemen, where 21.6 million people need aid.
* The Russian Soyuz MS-24 spacecraft, carrying two Russians and one U.S. citizen, took off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to the International Space Station (ISS) on Friday, Russian State Space Corporation Roscosmos said.
* The South African government declared free access to the selected national parks owned by the government for a week to encourage the people to know and protect them.
* Residents of Derna in eastern Libya were counting their losses from a flood that devastated swathes of the coastal city as the search for the missing continued on Saturday for a sixth day and more bodies were pulled from the sea.
* The death toll from last month's wildfires on the Hawaiian island of Maui has dropped to 97 and the number of people missing is now 31, Hawaii Governor Josh Green told CNN in an interview on Friday. Green said last week the death toll was 115 and 66 people were missing.
* Ten days after a severe storm ravaged central Greece, claiming 15 lives and causing destructive flooding, villages around Lake Karla were put on alert on Friday for possible further inundation, Greek national news agency AMNA reported.
