* Russia's lower house of parliament voted on Wednesday to approve legislation formalising Moscow's withdrawal from the Open Skies treaty, a pact that allows unarmed surveillance flights over member countries, the Interfax news agency reported.
* The Bank of Japan will consider extending its pandemic-relief programme beyond the current September deadline if necessary.
* More than 435 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been administered in China as of Tuesday, the National Health Commission said on Wednesday. Recent reports of new locally transmitted COVID-19 cases on the Chinese mainland have served to boost the vaccination demand.
* The GAVI Vaccine Alliance hopes deliveries of vaccines from India can be resumed in the third quarter of this year, after the pandemic-battered country halted exports to focus on its own surge in infections.
* Russia hopes to decide soon about a potential summit between President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart Joe Biden, after considering the behaviour of the United States, the RIA news agency cited a Russian deputy foreign finister as saying on Wednesday.
* A Spanish study on mixing COVID-19 vaccines has found that giving a dose of Pfizer's vaccine to people who had already received a first shot of AstraZeneca is highly safe and effective.
* The COVID-19 vaccine of AstraZeneca Plc and Oxford University works well as a third booster dose, stepping up antibodies to the coronavirus spike protein among participants in a study, the Financial Times said.
* Russia is ready to cooperate with all states and form mutually beneficial partnerships, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a ceremony where the credentials of 23 countries' ambassadors were presented on Tuesday.
* French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday received some 30 African leaders and heads of global lenders for a one-day summit to discuss ways to raise more funds to help Africa kickstart its growth and address the sanitary crisis, as the continent was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic.
* The Canada-US border agreement restricting non-essential travel is expected to extend another month to June 21 amid the third wave of COVID-19, CTV reported Tuesday afternoon.
* Trade ministers from the United States, Canada and Mexico on Tuesday said they held "robust" talks on the new North American trade deal and agreed to focus on fighting climate change and ensuring the voices of underrepresented groups are heard.
* French President Emmanuel Macron said on Wednesday that the country's COVID-19 figures were moving in the right direction, although it was right to remain prudent, as many of the country's bars, restaurants and shops prepared to re-open.
* Indian navy ships and aircraft scoured waters off the financial capital Mumbai on Wednesday for 77 workers missing from a barge that sank after a powerful cyclone barrelled into the country's west coast this week.
* Indonesian President Joko Widodo said on Tuesday the construction progress of the Jakarta-Bandung High Speed Railway (HSR) has reached 73 percent, hoping the railway will operate by the end of 2022.
* Malaysian authorities on Wednesday reported 6,075 new coronavirus cases, a daily record as the country grapples with a surge in infections. The figure breaks the previous high recorded on Jan. 30, when the health ministry reported 5,728 daily cases.
* Spain has proposed that people under 60 who have already received a first dose of AstraZeneca's drug receive a second shot of the vaccine produced by Pfizer, El Pais newspaper reported.
* Texas Governor Greg Abbott ordered all government entities in the state, including school districts, to lift mask mandates by week's end, though existing guidelines for face-coverings in schools may remain in effect through June 4.
* Mexico aims to ensure its population has had at least one COVID-19 vaccine shot by October before the onset of colder weather.
* Cyprus expects its economy to grow by between 4.5% and 5% this year, the finance minister said, citing a stronger first quarter and the country's vaccination programme for the upward revision.
* Finland's parliament on Tuesday green-lighted the European Union's (EU) EUR750-billion (US$915-billion) recovery package, aimed at addressing the economic and social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
* The Spanish enclave of Ceuta is having to deal with an influx of immigrants after an estimated 6,000 people have entered the territory from Morocco, according to the central government's delegation in the city. The immigrants swam or walked around the frontier that stretches into the water between the enclave and Morocco from Monday to the early hours of Tuesday.
* Cyprus will invest an estimated EUR4.4 billion (US$5.38 billion), or close to 21 percent of its 2020 GDP, under its National Recovery and Resilience plan aimed at helping the economy recover from the effects of the coronavirus pandemic, Finance Minister Constantinos Petrides said on Tuesday.
* Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi pledged on Tuesday US$500 million for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip witnessing escalated tensions.
* Israel's gross domestic product (GDP) contracted by an annualized 6.5 percent in the first quarter of 2021 due to lockdown measures to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, the Central Bureau of Statistics on Tuesday.
