Myanmar's junta has approved the sale of Norwegian telecoms giant Telenor's Myanmar subsidiary to Lebanese conglomerate M1 Group, both companies said on Friday, in a move activist groups warn could put sensitive customer data in the hands of Myanmar's military.

Canada on Thursday unveiled fresh sanctions against 22 Belarus defense department officials for allowing Russia to launch attacks on Ukraine from its territory.

The announcement, Canada's foreign ministry said in a statement, "sends a clear message to President Putin's accomplices: those who support violations of Ukraine's sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence will be held accountable."

President Joe Biden will speak Friday with Chinese President Xi Jinping to discuss ongoing economic competition between the two countries and Russia's war against Ukraine.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki announced the upcoming phone call in a Thursday statement that said it's "part of our ongoing efforts to maintain open lines of communication" between the United States and China.

Turkey's central bank kept interest rates unchanged for a third straight month Thursday as consumer prices surge at an eye-popping pace, coming after a series of rate cuts last year triggered a currency crisis that has made it difficult for people to buy basic goods.

The latest official statistics showed inflation above 54.4%. The bank said in a statement that inflation has been driven by "rising energy costs resulting from the heightened regional conflict," referring to Russia's war in Ukraine, and supply side factors affecting food prices.

Mount Lebanon Prosecutor Judge Ghada Aoun on Thursday ordered the detention of the businessman Raja Salameh, the brother of Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh, after questioning him for several hours.

"Raja Salameh was detained during his interrogation at the Justice Palace and Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh will be summoned," the lawyers of the People Want to Reform the Regime group told al-Jadeed TV.

President Joe Biden set out to finally complete the "pivot to Asia," a long sought adjustment of U.S. foreign policy to better reflect the rise of America's most significant military and economic competitor: China.

But Russia's brutal invasion of Ukraine has made that vexing move even more complicated. China's government has vacillated between full embrace and more measured responses as Russian President Vladimir Putin prosecutes his war, making the decisions for Biden far more layered.

A senior banking official has warned that Lebanon will likely plunge into a dire LBP liquidity crisis, amid the current unusual escalation between banks and some judges that has involved the freezing and seizure of assets belonging to some banks.

This might push banks’ administrations to “hold emergency meetings amid calls for escalating the confrontation, all the way to taking a decision to shut down collectively as a warning move, and demanding that the government and the central bank intervene in an urgent manner to address the growing crises in a fair way,” the official told Ashraq al-Awsat newspaper in remarks published Thursday.

Judge Ghada Aoun froze on Thursday the assets of the Creditbank and its director Tarek Khalifeh.

She also imposed a travel ban on Khalifeh, al-Jadeed TV said, after having imposed last week travel bans on the directors of five other banks as auditors look into transfers by the banks worth $5 billion.

The assets of Fransabank were seized and all monetary operations were suspended and safes and registers were sealed with red wax, after a depositor filed a lawsuit against the bank.

Earlier this week, Judge Ghada Aoun had also frozen the assets of five of Lebanon’s largest banks and those of their board of directors as she investigates possible transfers of billions of dollars aboard during the country’s economic meltdown.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has accused Germany of putting its economy before his country’s security in the run-up to the Russian invasion.

In an address to Germany’s parliament Thursday, Zelenskyy criticized the German government’s support for the Nord Stream 2 pipeline project meant to bring natural gas from Russia. Ukraine and others had opposed the project, warning that it endangered Ukrainian and European security.