Of the many quandaries investors must grapple with this year, high on their list is Donald Trump’s relationship with Vladimir Putin. Not far behind is this — should they throw off their instinctive caution about Russia and its president, and push the rouble a lot higher? The turnround in the Russian rouble’s fortunes largely reflects the recovery in the price of oil, the country’s biggest export. That […]
Donald Trump is now president. This challenges many of us, not least members of the press. Countless reporters are still shaken and stunned by how he singled out a CNN reporter, one of the most respected news outlets in the world, to attack and humiliate him during his first press conference since winning the elections. Worryingly, none of his fellow journalists in the room stood up for […]
Good morning. Here’s our morning roundup of all the media news you need to know. Want to get this briefing in your inbox every morning? Subscribe here. A fashionista friend in the White House press corps answered this lingering question after Sean Spicer’s much-anticipated first briefing: What exactly was the glaring color of that jacket worn by Kellyanne Conway? “Tomato?” she guessed. Well, it was especially vivid […]
A wave of about 25 African, European and South American countries is set to join the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank this year, reinforcing Beijing’s determination to push a global agenda even as US President Donald Trump rails against the ills of economic globalisation. Jin Liqun, president of the AIIB, said on Monday that an expanded membership would help boost lending by the $100bn multilateral organisation, which […]
BERLIN German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Monday that openness, not populism, polarisation or isolation, was the answer to the world’s challenges of globalisation and digitalisation. “I think that, a quarter of a century after German unification, after the end of the Cold War, a new historical era will perhaps be replaced by another one,” Merkel said in a speech to church leaders in Wuerzburg. Even though […]
The proliferation of fake news on social media, particularly Facebook, and some websites on the internet is a growing concern. In an attempt to solve this problem, researchers developed a “vaccine” that can immunize people against fake news. Inspired By Vaccines Vaccinating a person against a virus exposes the body to a weakened version of the threat. The exposure is just enough to help build the body’s […]
Now: The Best of Indie Arabia Various artists (Universal Music Mena) Five stars To expats of a certain age, the “Now..!” brand of music compilation albums are synonymous with the kind of plastic pop wheeled out at social gatherings in the days before iPods or YouTube. Since 1983, the brand has shifted more than 100 million copies across five continents. Compiling the biggest hits of the day […]
Three of the world’s largest textbook publishers have subpoenaed Amazon to reveal the names and financial accounts of online vendors who allegedly sell counterfeit books at “too good to be true” prices. Pearson Education, Cengage Learning and McGraw Hill Education are suing 100 unnamed Amazon marketplace sellers for copyright infringement. In a complaint filed in New York federal court earlier this month, the publishers accused the sellers […]
“It’s really, really hard for me to look at myself in the context of the people that are in the Hall of Fame; I feel like they are Michael and I’m Tito,” Roddick said, referring to the singer Michael Jackson and one of his older brothers. “Tito got to play some pretty cool venues, too, but it’s weird for me.” Continue reading the main story At a […]
Online media use such as social networking and gaming could be strongly influenced by our genes, according to a new study by researchers from King’s College London. Access to and engagement with online media continues to grow at an unprecedented speed, and it plays an increasingly important role in the development and experience of people across all age groups. Nonetheless, people differ substantially in their use of […]
By Roberta Rampton and Steve Holland U.S. President Donald Trump formally withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal on Monday, distancing America from its Asian allies as China’s influence in the region rises. Fulfilling a campaign pledge to end American involvement in the 2015 pact, Trump signed an executive order in the Oval Office pulling the United States from the 12-nation TPP. “Great thing […]
By Roberta Rampton | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON U.S. President Donald Trump met with a dozen American manufacturers at the White House on Monday, pledging to slash regulations and cut corporate taxes, but warning them he would impose taxes on imports if they move production outside the country. Trump, who took office on Friday, promised to bring manufacturing plants back to the United States – an issue he said […]
By most mainstream media accounts, the first weekend of the Trump Administration wasn’t good. Characterized as rocky, erratic, terrible, and full of false claims, the ‘not ready for prime time’ transition team is now the ‘not ready for prime-time administration.’ However, as Bespoke details, by at least one measure, though, the Trump Administration’s transition has been pretty smooth… the smoothest ever for markets. The table below was […]
By Amanda Ferguson | BELFAST BELFAST Sinn Fein named Michelle O’Neill to succeed Martin McGuinness and lead the Irish nationalist party into Northern Irish elections in March, marking a shift towards a generation not directly involved in decades of conflict. McGuinness, a former Irish Republican Army (IRA) commander turned peacemaker, bowed out of frontline politics last week, saying illness and Northern Ireland’s current political crisis had led […]
BERLIN European Union sanctions on Russia are pointless, the frontrunner in France’s presidential election Francois Fillon said on Monday during a visit to Berlin, warning of a risk that Russia and the United States forge links that exclude the EU. Fillon said a gesture from Russia would be needed before sanctions could be lifted, adding that Ukraine was also not doing what it needed to do to […]
BERLIN The right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) will discipline one of its state leaders over remarks he made criticising Berlin’s Holocaust Memorial, the party’s co-leader said on Monday. Bjoern Hoecke, AfD head in eastern Thuringia state, triggered anger across Germany with a comment about the memorial. He told party members in a speech in Dresden last week: “Germans are the only people in the world who plant […]
By Jean Paul Arouff | PORT LOUIS PORT LOUIS The son of the outgoing Mauritius prime minister was appointed as the new premier on Monday, prompting accusations of nepotism and calls for a referendum from opponents. Anerood Jugnauth, 86, who has been in his post since 2014, the latest of several terms at the helm, announced on Saturday he would step down in favour of his son […]
Jan 23, 2017 11:59 am IST When Donald Trump was inaugurated Friday, people tuned in from across the world to watch. In India, Devita Saraf, CEO of Vu Televisions, celebrated the event with a full-page advertisement in the Times of India—the country’s biggest English-language newspaper. “Congratulations, Mr. President,” said the ad which was a photo of Mr. Trump and Ms. Saraf when they met at an event in […]
File this under Justice Porn… A miserable seething bitch and her browbeaten husband are the stars of a new video making it’s way around the internet after the woman, a horrible human being, decided to berate a Trump supporter on an airplane. First, here’s what happened from the guy it happened to: The first flight attendant to deal with his bigot isn’t having any of her shit: Attendant #1: “Is […]
January 23, 2017 by: Michael Peel in Manila Business from the US has driven a long boom in the Philippines’ flagship outsourcing industry, but potential political threats to ambitious growth plans now loom in both countries. Global companies are scrambling to work out whether tough talk from Rodrigo Duterte and Donald Trump, the Philippine and US presidents, will mean trouble if they run operations in the Philippines. […]
By Scott Malone and Ginger Gibson | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON Hundreds of thousands of women filled the streets of major American cities to lead an unprecedented wave of international protests against President Donald Trump, mocking and denouncing the new U.S. leader the day after his inauguration. Women activists, outraged by Trump’s campaign rhetoric and behavior they found to be especially misogynistic, spearheaded scores of marches in the United […]
More than a decade after An Inconvenient Truth, former Vice President Al Gore and husband-and-wife duo Bonni Cohen and Jon Shenk have released a sequel to the Academy Award-winning documentary. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Gore discussed the long road to the sequel, the continuing threats of climate change, and his hope for the new administration. The original documentary 11 years ago set a high bar for […]
By Carmel Crimmins and Pamela Barbaglia | DAVOS, Switzerland DAVOS, Switzerland U.S. bankers, buoyed by a resurgence in profits, are advising their counterparts in Europe to think positively about the new administration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump. But many Europeans still need convincing. At the annual gathering of the world’s political and business elites in the Swiss resort of Davos, U.S. financiers told investors and overseas’ rivals […]
By Diadie Ba and Tim Cocks | DAKAR/BANJUL DAKAR/BANJUL West African leaders did not agree to immunity for Yahya Jammeh during negotiations that convinced Gambia’s longtime ruler to flee into exile, Senegal’s foreign minister said on Sunday. Jammeh, who is accused of serious rights violations, led his country for 22 years but refused to accept defeat in a December election. He flew out of the capital Banjul […]
