Axios

President Biden will travel to Poland later this month to mark the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the White House said on Friday.

The big picture: During the visit, which is scheduled from Feb. 20-22, Biden will meet with Polish President Andrzej Duda and other NATO leaders, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters. He will also deliver remarks ahead of the anniversary of the war on Feb. 24.

Moldova's pro-Western Prime Minister Natalia Gavrilița unexpectedly resigned on Friday, citing a string of crises that have rocked her 18-month tenure.

Driving the news: Moldova, a country of about 2.5 million that borders Ukraine and EU and NATO member Romania, has struggled to cope with soaring inflation, an energy crisis and an influx of Ukrainian refugees who fled to the small Eastern European country after Russia began its invasion of Ukraine nearly a year ago.

Russia launched dozens of rocket, cruise missile and kamikaze drone attacks across Ukraine on Friday, including against Kyiv, Ukrainian officials said.

Driving the news: The strikes come just two weeks before the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Strengthening democracy could be a rallying point for President Biden and his Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, when they meet at the White House on Friday, experts say.

Driving the news: It's been a month since thousands of supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro attacked Brazil's Supreme Court, Congress and Presidential Palace.

Australian scientists announced Friday they've discovered a protein in the lung that sticks to the COVID-19 virus like Velcro and forms a natural protective barrier in a person's body to block infection.

Why it matters: The study, published in the journal PLOS Biology on Friday, "opens up an entirely new area of immunology research" around this receptor protein, LRRC15, and "offers a promising pathway to develop new drugs to prevent viral infection from coronaviruses like COVID-19 or deal with fibrosis in the lungs," per a statement from the University of Sydney announcing their findings.

The suspected Chinese surveillance balloon that traversed the U.S. last week before it was shot down was capable of collecting communications, a State Department spokesperson said Thursday.

Why it matters: The balloon was furnished with "multiple antennas" and other equipment that was "clearly for intelligence surveillance," the spokesperson said.

The Biden administration warned the Israeli government that it would consider any transfer of civilian authorities in the occupied West Bank to far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich as a step toward annexation, two Israeli and U.S. officials told me.

Driving the news: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu must decide in the coming weeks if and how to implement his government's coalition agreement that states Smotrich, a radical right-wing settler who supports annexation, should be given authority over two military units in charge of the civilian administration in the West Bank.

A steady stream of foreign delegations from around the world have been arriving in Taipei since the pandemic, demonstrating the increasing importance democratic governments place on the future of Taiwan.

Why it matters: Democratic stakeholders increasingly see Taiwan as playing a key role in the global struggle between democracy and authoritarianism.

Nicaragua has freed more than 200 inmates considered to be political prisoners and sent them to the U.S., a senior Biden administration official said Thursday.

Why it matters: Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega has for years cracked down on political dissent, which has included the arrest and detention of opposition leaders.

Editor's note: Follow latest coverage of the earthquake aftermath,

The first United Nations humanitarian aid convoy entered northwest Syria Thursday, three days after a devastating earthquake struck the region and flattened buildings in parts of both Turkey and Syria.

The big picture: The total death toll surpassed 19,350 Thursday, as search and rescue operations continued after a magnitude 7.8 quake struck Monday morning just north of Turkey's Gaziantep, near the Syrian border.

North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un and his young daughter watched a parade of Pyongyang's largest nuclear missiles and newest military hardware in the capital on Wednesday night.

Why it matters: The parade marking the 75th founding anniversary of the North Korean army featured Pyongyang's largest-ever intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM), per Reuters.