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RIYADH British Prime Minister Theresa May said on Tuesday she would raise “hard issues” with Saudi Arabia’s leaders during her visit, as critics urged her to pressure Riyadh over its war in Yemen and human rights record. May was expected to explore ways of boosting trade ties with the kingdom during her two-day visit, her second to a Gulf Arab state since Britain decided to leave the […]

By Foo Yun Chee | BRUSSELS BRUSSELS French, German and Italian groups urged their national antitrust enforcers on Tuesday to look into alleged anti-competitive practices by McDonald’s (MCD.N), potentially putting the U.S. fast-food chain on course for multiple investigations in Europe. The three complaints share similar concerns about McDonald’s franchising terms and conditions, including prices set for products sold at franchises, saying consumers are charged more than […]

JOHANNESBURG President Jacob Zuma said South Africa’s fiscal policies will not change and that people should remain calm after its credit rating was cut to junk following a political reshuffle that he defended as bringing new blood into the cabinet. But moments later, the ANC-allied Cosatu, South Africa’s largest trade union, said Zuma must step down after his change of finance ministers triggered the credit rating downgrade. […]

MANILA China and Southeast Asian countries have made progress in talks on a code of conduct for the disputed South China Sea, the Philippine acting foreign minister said on Tuesday. China claims almost the entire waterway, through which about $5 trillion in sea-borne goods pass every year. Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam also have claims. “We have made good progress on coming up with a […]

BAGHDAD: US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner visited Iraq on Monday with the top US military officer to meet Iraqi leaders and review the fight against Daesh, officials said.The visit comes as Iraqi forces battle to retake Mosul from Daesh with support from US-led air strikes that have recently been criticized for causing civilian deaths in the city’s west.Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the joint chiefs […]

Imagination Technologies lost more than half its market value in a single day this week when the chip designer revealed that Apple, its largest customer, was developing its own version of the graphical processing units in which the UK-based group has specialised. Apple’s initiative to make a GPU, however, should not have come as such as surprise to investors. It follows several months of intensive recruitment by […]

By Robin Emmott and Gabriela Baczynska | BRUSSELS BRUSSELS International donors are set to pledge billions more dollars for Syrian refugees at a two-day conference from Tuesday that the European Union says must also help prepare for an eventual end to more than six years of war in Syria. With millions displaced within Syria and in neighbouring countries, the United Nations has appealed for $8 billion this […]

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The annual Cesco Week gathering for the global copper industry starts Monday in Santiago. For the first time in five years, attendees arriving in the Chilean capital can reflect on a copper price that is higher than at the previous year’s event. However, optimism that 2017 represents a turning point in the market should be tempered by the realisation that any sustained recovery in the copper price […]

Journalism has a trust problem. In the run-up to the 2016 election, a Gallup poll revealed Americans’ trust in the press had sunk to an all-time low, with just 32 percent surveyed they felt “a great deal” or “a fair amount” of trust in the mainstream media. Whether it’s criticism from the Trump administration, the failure of the media to correctly forecast the outcome of the 2016 […]

OTTAWA Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau faces his first real test with voters on Monday, with five by-elections across the country shaping up as a barometer for the strength of his Liberals since being elected to a shock majority in 2015. The regional votes to elect two members of parliament in Calgary and one member each in Ottawa, Toronto and Montreal are considered safe seats – three […]

ZDNet ST. MAARTEN: The cybercriminals allegedly responsible for an attack on Bangladesh’s central bank which left the country’s wallet millions of dollars lighter is showing “no signs of stopping,” according to security experts. The group, dubbed Lazarus, managed to dupe banking staff into transferring $80 million from the Central Bank of Bangladesh’s New York Federal Reserve account after spending several months studying how the financial institutions communicated […]

To Jeremy Grantham, co-founder and chief investment strategist of the Boston asset manager GMO, the earth’s changing temperature is an investment imperative as well as a question of ethics.  “The climate is moving much faster than people think, and the responses are going to move much faster as well”, he says, arguing that measures to help polluters announced last week by the administration of Donald Trump may […]

By Ulf Laessing | MOSUL, Iraq MOSUL, Iraq Sitting in a wheelchair and wearing sunglasses, pensioner Abdelraziq Abdelkarim enjoys the afternoon sun outside his house in Mosul after a day of rain. He does not flinch when a mortar opens fire just around the corner. His home is on the busiest frontline in the northern Iraqi city just 200 m (yards) from Islamic State positions. Outside his […]

To Jeremy Grantham, co-founder and chief investment strategist of the Boston asset manager GMO, the earth’s changing temperature is an investment imperative as well as a question of ethics.  “The climate is moving much faster than people think, and the responses are going to move much faster as well”, he says, arguing that measures to help polluters announced last week by the administration of Donald Trump may […]

By Alexandra Ulmer | QUITO, Ecuador QUITO, Ecuador The Venezuelan Supreme Court may have amended part of its explosive decision to take over the opposition-led congress, but it still gives embattled leftist President Nicolas Maduro broad new powers over the OPEC nation’s vast oil wealth. The reversal on Saturday came after political leaders worldwide and street protestors at home accused the pro-government court of effectively making Maduro […]

NEW YORK Tesla Inc (TSLA.O), the U.S. luxury electric car maker, said on Sunday first-quarter vehicle deliveries jumped 69 percent from a year ago to a quarterly record of 25,000 vehicles, bouncing back from delays in the previous quarter. The company said of the total vehicles delivered, about 13,450 were Model S sedan and about 11,550 were Model X sports utility vehicle. Tesla has said it expects […]

Huaqiangbei electronics market in downtown Shenzhen is a gadget geek’s paradise, selling everything from individual semiconductor chips to roll-up drum kits to hoverboards. For some, it is also the culprit for the declining fortunes of US wearable tech companies such as GoPro and Fitbit. “[Their] problem essentially is Shenzhen,” says Richard Windsor, founder of independent research company Radio Free Mobile. “It makes much cheaper cameras that are […]

By Wa Lone and Simon Lewis | YANGON YANGON Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s party won nearly half of the seats contested in by-elections on Sunday, the first vote since it swept to power a year ago and an early indication of support for her administration amid increased fighting with ethnic armed groups and slower economic growth. Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) won nine […]

Samsung Galaxy S8. Photo by Michael Krigsman. Samsung’s Unpacked launch party this week for the long-awaited Galaxy S8 phone was a gadget lover’s dream. From the bright screen to its waterproof body, the phone is exciting. Although the Galaxy S8 and its larger brother/sister, the S8+, have received a lot of attention, one enterprise showpiece is a new docking station called the DeX Station , which is […]

Image: Vicky Leta/Mashable By Damon Beres2017-04-02 05:26:43 UTC Facebook’s new “Stories” update is here, and it ruins the best part about the entire social network: Mindlessly plumbing your friends’ lives without fear of getting caught. When you watch a friend’s Story — which exists for 24 hours and is comprised of one or more photos or short videos — that friend will know you’re creeping. This is […]

This story is a collaboration between Kaiser Health News and the Center for Public Integrity.  The Justice Department has joined a California whistleblower’s lawsuit that accuses insurance giant UnitedHealth Group of fraud in its popular Medicare Advantage health plans. Justice officials filed legal papers to intervene in the suit, first brought by whistleblower James Swoben in 2009, on Friday in federal court in Los Angeles. On Monday, they sought a […]

DUBAI // The price of items such as cars, televisions and restaurant bills will rise once value-added tax is introduced in the region early next year. But as the tax will be at a modest 5 per cent, experts say it is unlikely to affect overall spending. Details about goods and services to be subject to VAT will probably be released over the next few months, and […]

Didi Chuxing may have defeated Uber, but China’s dominant ride-hailing platform is no match for the country’s local governments after being forced to gut its urban fleet to comply with regulations. Didi’s core business of cheap ride-hailing now faces a tough fight in the big urban markets, which it built after a bruising battle with local and foreign rivals. Uber ceded the Chinese market — its largest — […]

By Aye Win Myint | YANGON YANGON Myanmar is training up hundreds of midwives in an effort to reduce the number of women who die in childbirth, one of many social policy reforms launched by the country as it emerges from decades of military rule. Statistics show childbirth and pregnancy-related complications are the leading causes of death among women in Myanmar, mainly due to delays in reaching […]

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