A fiber optic undersea link connecting Angola’s capital Luanda to the Brazilian city of Fortaleza is reported to be about 50 percent complete, with operations set to begin later this year. With more than 6,200 kilometers in length, SACS (South Atlantic Cable System) system will be the first fiber optic cable to connect Africa to the Americas via the South Atlantic sea. According to Angola Cables, the […]
KUALA LUMPUR Malaysia has arrested six foreigners and one Malaysian for suspected links to militant groups including Islamic State, the police chief said on Sunday. The Southeast Asian nation has been on high alert since suicide bombers and gunmen linked to Islamic State launched multiple attacks in Jakarta, the capital of neighbouring Indonesia, in January 2016. A grenade attack on a bar on the outskirts of the […]
ISTANBUL A Syrian air force pilot who bailed out as his warplane crashed on Turkish territory has been found by a Turkish rescue team and is being treated at a hospital in the Hatay region, a hospital spokeswoman said on Sunday. Dogan news agency said the pilot, who crashed his plane on Sunday, had been found around 40 km (25 miles) from the wreckage. He was first […]
The first images from the Solar Ultraviolet Imager or SUVI instrument aboard NOAA’s GOES-16 satellite have been successful, capturing a large coronal hole on Jan. 29, 2017. (via WSJ)
By Firas Maqdisi | PALMYRA, Syria PALMYRA, Syria Islamic State militants have severely damaged a major Roman monument in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, an antiquities official said after visiting the site on Saturday. Under heavy Russian air cover, the Syrian army and allied militias drove the jihadist group out of the UNESCO world heritage site on Thursday, two months after it had seized it in […]
By Ernest Scheyder | HOUSTON HOUSTON The biggest names in the oil world come together this week for the largest industry gathering since the end of a two-year price war that pitted Middle East exporters against the firms that drove the shale energy revolution in the United States. When OPEC in November joined with several non-OPEC producers to agree to a historic cut in output, the group […]
By David Shepardson | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON The White House budget director confirmed Saturday that the Trump administration will propose “fairly dramatic reductions” in the U.S. foreign aid budget later this month. Reuters and other news outlets reported earlier this week that the administration plans to propose to Congress cuts in the budgets for the U.S. State Department and Agency for International Development by about one third. “We […]
Award-winning British artist and designer Zoe Bradley is not your average couturier. She rarely meets her clients for fittings of their gowns, her pieces are commonly only worn once, and some have been “thrown away” after use. This is because Bradley works exclusively in paper. Such is her pedigree that her clients for one-off commissions have included the likes of enigmatic Icelandic pop singer Björk and late […]
China has lowered its annual economic growth target to “around” 6.5 per cent, as Beijing plans to focus on risk control in the final year of President Xi Jinping’s first term. The figure, down from the government’s target growth range of 6.5 to 7 per cent for 2016, was revealed on Sunday morning by Premier Li Keqiang in his annual “work report” to China’s parliament, the National […]
Poynter’s Ren LaForme has spent a lot of time with digital tools (the things you use to create new things, not the online know-it-alls). (OK, Maybe both.) As we look at the big ideas that explain what local journalism needs to evolve, we want to look at the small ideas, too. Tools seem like a good place to start. So, beginning this week, LaForme and I are […]
By Christian Shepherd and Philip Wen | BEIJING BEIJING China pledged more support to its military on Sunday including strengthening maritime and air defences amid efforts to safeguard sovereignty, but in a highly unusual move did not give spending figures for 2017 despite promises of transparency. Parliament’s spokeswoman Fu Ying said on Saturday defence spending for this year would rise about 7 percent, accounting for around 1.3 […]
Ras Al Khaimah has continued to outperform the wider UAE and regional tourism markets, according to real estate consultancy firm CBRE. Its latest Ras Al Khaimah MarketView report noted that the emirate’s hospitality market soared last year by recording a 10.9 percent increase in full year visitor arrivals and a 9.8 percent growth in the average occupancy rate, taking the annual occupancy to 71 percent. According to […]
MANILA Philippine soldiers have found the remains of a German man who was beheaded by Islamic State-linked Abu Sayyaf militants last week, a military official said late on Saturday, Both the head and body of Jurgen Kantner were recovered while the troops were conducting combat, search and retrieval operations in Indanan town in the remote southern province of Sulu, Colonel Cirilito Sobejana told reporters. Kantner’s remains would […]
HP Inc’s new Customer Welcome Centre in London. Image: HP Inc/Jonny Back Photography George Brasher is a 26-year HP veteran who has worked in a variety of roles in the company’s printer and PC divisions over the years and is now HP Inc’s managing director for the UK and Ireland. ZDNet caught up with him at the company’s brand-new million-pound Customer Welcome Centre (CWC) in London, to […]
Via Nicholas Eberstadt of CommentaryMagazine.com, On the morning of November 9, 2016, America’s elite—its talking and deciding classes—woke up to a country they did not know. To most privileged and well-educated Americans, especially those living in its bicoastal bastions, the election of Donald Trump had been a thing almost impossible even to imagine. What sort of country would go and elect someone like Trump as president? Certainly not […]
By Abdi Sheikh | MOGADISHU MOGADISHU Some 110 people have died in southern Somalia in the last two days from famine and diarrhoea resulting from a drought, the prime minister said on Saturday, as the area braces itself for widespread shortages of food. In February, United Nations children’s agency UNICEF said the drought in Somalia could lead to up to 270,000 children suffering from severe acute malnutrition […]
By Kevin Yao and Xiaochong Zhang | BEIJING BEIJING China has cut its growth target this year as the world’s second-largest economy pushes through painful reforms to address a build-up in debt and strives to keep a lid on risks in its financial sector. China aims to expand its economy by around 6.5 percent in 2017, Premier Li Keqiang said at the opening of the annual meeting […]
Well, that didn’t take long at all. The Nintendo Switch, Nintendo’s first true foray into hybrid gaming, has hit shelves on March 3, sending faithful anticipants into a frenzy, especially considering Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild was concurrently released. Here Comes The Dreaded Drop Tests For The Nintendo Switch But like any new gadget, there’s the inevitable crash test, and the first one for the Switch […]
In the 19th century, English poet and artist William Blake saw the factories of the industrial revolution as dark, satanic mills churning up the countryside and signalling a new, ominous era of human existence. Fast forward 200 years and Sophia Al Maria, a Qatari-American artist and writer, believes those dark mills have been replaced by the bright, fluorescent lights of shopping malls. Both places, she says, “are […]
Standard Life is in late-stage discussions to acquire Aberdeen Asset Management in an all-stock deal that would create the UK’s largest money manager with £660bn of assets and be worth around £11bn. The companies confirmed the talks on Saturday evening in a joint statement that said a deal would “leverage Standard Life and Aberdeen’s combined strengths to create a world class investment company”. They added that Standard Life […]
Qatar Airways has confirmed plans to launch services to Yanbu and Tabuk in Saudi Arabia with three-weekly flights beginning in May and June respectively. The additional destinations take Qatar Airways’ total network connectivity within the Gulf kingdom to 10 destinations, the airline said in a statement. Qatar Airways Group chief executive Akbar Al Baker said: “We have been steadily growing our presence and services to Saudi Arabia […]
Surabaya, E Java (ANTARA News) – The National Mandate Party (PAN) said it has yet to decide who to vote for among the two pairs of candidates to contest the Jakarta gubernatorial election. PAN General Chairman Zulkifli Hasan said his party was still grieving for the loss of the pair of Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono (AHY) – Sylviana Murni, the candidates for governor and vice governor in the […]
PARIS The political committee of French party The Republicans will meet on Monday to discuss the situation of its presidential candidate Francois Fillon, the party said in a statement on Saturday. “Given the evolution of the political situation just seven weeks from the presidential election … the political committee, which includes notably the candidates of the (party) primaries, has been brought forward by 24 hours to Monday […]
BERLIN Deutsche Boerse (DB1Gn.DE) Chairman Joachim Faber has put the blame for a failed tie-up with the London Stock Exchange (LSE.L) on Britain and its vote to leave the European Union. The London Stock Exchange last week effectively scuppered a planned merger with Deutsche Boerse to create Europe’s biggest exchange, by rejecting an EU demand to sell a trading platform in Italy. Faber, who chairs Deutsche Boerse’s […]
