* European Union leaders are set to press ahead with measures to shield consumers from record-high energy prices that have curtailed industrial production and hiked consumer bills.
* Norway's trade surplus rose last month to a record level thanks to soaring revenues from selling gas from its offshore fields, national statistics agency (SSB) data showed on Friday.
* Asian shares advanced on Friday, warmed by the embers of a strong day on Wall Street which also supported risk-friendly currencies and hurt the safe-haven yen, though worries about the Chinese economy capped gains.
* Federal COVID-19 relief funds provided to states and localities have prevented severe budget cuts and layoffs, bolstered pandemic response efforts and facilitated more longer-term investments across the country, the US Treasury Department said.
* Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud met US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington and exchanged views on Iran's nuclear program and international talks on the matter, Saudi Arabia's foreign ministry said in a statement on Friday.
* The current inflationary trend gripping Spain - and many countries worldwide - is dangerous, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said on Thursday during a televised interview.
* Russia on Friday reported a record 999 coronavirus-related deaths in the last 24 hours as well as 32,196 new infections, its highest single-day case tally since the start of the pandemic.
* Brazil registered 14,288 new coronavirus cases and 525 additional COVID-19 deaths in the last 24 hours, the country's Health Ministry said on Thursday.
* Fully vaccinated passengers arriving in England from low-risk countries from Oct. 24 will no longer have to take expensive COVID-19 tests, the British government said.
* The United States has donated 3.6 million doses of the Pfizer Inc/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine to Nigeria, two months after it shipped Moderna vaccines to Africa's most-populous nation, a local television station reported.
* COVID-19 cases in Australia's Victoria hovered near record levels, even as authorities look set to lift lockdown restrictions next week in Melbourne.
* New Zealand reported 65 new locally acquired cases of COVID-19, with all in locked-down Auckland, as the country readies for a mass immunisation drive on Saturday when it hopes to administer a record 100,000 vaccine doses.
* COVID-19 health passes became mandatory for all workers in Italy from Friday, with the measure being applied mostly peacefully across the country despite some scattered protests.
* Nigeria has received 501,600 doses of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine from the French government through the COVAX vaccine-sharing facility, a senior health official said on Thursday.
* South Africa will start vaccinating children between the ages of 12 and 17 next week using the Pfizer vaccine, the health minister said on Friday, as the country looks to ratchet up inoculations ahead of final year examinations.
* Saudi Arabia has followed current events in Lebanon with interest and hopes the situation stabilises as soon as possible, its foreign ministry said in a statement on Friday.
* Qatar's assistant foreign minister Lolwah Alkhater said around 100 Afghan soccer players and their families were among the passengers to arrive on a recent flight from Kabul.
