By Martin Petty and Manuel Mogato | MANILA MANILA Across Asia, more and more countries are being pulled into Beijing’s orbit, with the timid stance adopted by Southeast Asian nations on the South China Sea at a weekend summit a clear sign this fundamental geostrategic shift is gathering momentum. U.S. President Donald Trump’s flurry of calls at the weekend to the leaders of the Philippines, Thailand and […]
Theresa May’s critics have attacked the British prime minister for having “no plan” over Brexit in the wake of a leaked account of a private dinner that heightened tensions between Brussels and London. A report published in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung portrayed last Wednesday’s dinner between Mrs May and European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker as a disaster. According to the FAZ, commission officials were astonished at Mrs […]
By Richard Cowan | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON Negotiators in the U.S. Congress reached a deal late on Sunday on around $1 trillion in federal funding that would avert a government shutdown later this week, while handing President Donald Trump a down payment on his promised military build-up. The full House of Representatives and Senate must still approve the bipartisan pact, which would be the first major legislation to […]
Besides the upcoming FOMC meeting on May 2-3, and French & Italian politics – the decisive runoff round of the French election takes place this Sunday – this week’s releases are dominated by US payrolls expected to come around 170k. The busy release calendar continues with Norges bank and RBA meetings as well as global manufacturing PMIs. The market’s focus during the week of 5/1 will begin […]
By Yesim Dikmen and Mehmet Emin Caliskan | ISTANBUL ISTANBUL Police in Istanbul fired tear gas and rubber bullets to break up a group of May Day demonstrators on Monday, a Reuters witness said, as authorities detained more than 200 people at protests around the city. Protests for May Day, the international workers’ holiday, are an annual occurrence in Turkey and have in the past been characterised […]
22 February 2016 – Journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia posted the first major hint that the biggest scandal in Maltese history was about to break. “It’s traditional to eat lamb on Easter Sunday, so Konrad Mizzi and his estranged wife Sai Mizzi Liang will be getting theirs from New Zealand, courtesy of their fixer Brian Tonna, who has a desk at the Auberge de Castille”. […]
By Matt Spetalnick | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON The White House on Sunday defended President Donald Trump’s decision to invite Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte to Washington, saying his cooperation was needed to counter North Korea, even as the administration faced human rights criticism for its overture to Manila. Trump issued the invitation on Saturday night in what the White House said was a “very friendly” phone conversation with Duterte, […]
DUBAI // Hundreds of displaced residents of Tamweel Tower, which was badly damaged by a blaze in 2012, may finally return this Ramadan after a key document confirming completion of cladding work was submitted to the authorities. The document signed by eight companies was submitted last week to Dubai Civil Defence stating that the installation of the new cladding complied with fire safety requirements. The 34-storey Jumeirah […]
When North Korea deployed hundreds of artillery units, submarines and soldiers to take part in its largest live-fire drill, it was intended as a chilling display of the reclusive regime’s military might. The country boasts the world’s fourth-largest standing army, with more than 1m troops as well as 7m reserves, and last week’s military exercise came as US President Donald Trump ramped up the pressure on Pyongyang […]
World sport power broker Sheikh Ahmad al Fahad al Sabah announced his resignation Sunday from the FIFA council, saying did not want to be a distraction while fighting corruption allegations. Aside from serving on FIFA’s top body, the Kuwaiti is also president of the Olympic Council of Asia and holds other senior roles in sport administration, including with the Asian Football Confederation (FIFA). Sheikh Ahmad has been […]
30 April 2017 COLOMBES, France–(BUSINESS WIRE/ME NewsWire)– OT (Oberthur Technologies), a leading global provider of embedded security software products, services and solutions and a forerunner in the payment sector, has been selected by Mashreq Bank to deploy Instant Card Issuance in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Mashreq Bank is one of the UAE’s leading financial institutions. Established in 1967 by the Al-Ghurair Group, it is the largest […]
President Donald Trump was a distracting entertainment from the moment he launched his campaign in June of 2015 — until he wasn’t. His opening speech, in which he called Mexican immigrants “rapists” and told the world he would be the best jobs president “God ever created,” was looked at as the ravings of a man whose outsized ego was too big to be anything but hilarious. News […]
Before comedian Hasan Minhaj got up to poke fun at the assembled White House press corps last night, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein got up to celebrate it. The legendary Watergate duo gave a speech evoking their investigative reporting of the Nixon administration and calling on the current generation of journalists to practice careful, thorough and relentless reporting on the current White House. Below are their remarks, […]
By Shinichi Saoshiro | TOKYO TOKYO Asian stocks struggled for traction on Monday after weaker-than-expected U.S. economic growth data, while the dollar dropped against the yen amid tensions over North Korea and slipped versus the euro on evidence of strong euro zone inflation. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan .MIAPJ0000PUS inched up 0.1 percent and Japan’s Nikkei .N225 added 0.1 percent. Many markets in Asia […]
Ibn Arabi, undoubtedly one of the world’s great spiritual teachers, provokes mixed reactions. There are those that consider the 12th century mystic, philosopher, Islamic scholar, poet and sage to be the foremost spiritual leader and Sufi master in Muslim history. Others regard him as a heretic or even an apostate. There is rarely much middle ground. Ibn Arabi – known as Muhyiddin (the Revivifier of Religion) and […]
Elon Musk went teased the audience with a photo of a self-driving truck that his company Tesla Motors is adding to its line of electric cars Elon Musk paused while chatting about his series of potentially world-changing endeavors to say he isn’t in it to provide salvation. It was during a talk on Friday at a prestigious TED Conference in Vancouver, where the tech entrepreneur was discussing […]
WASHINGTON The Trump administration’s push to overhaul tax laws might soon target a loophole used by some financial managers to lower their tax rates, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said on Sunday. President Donald Trump campaigned before the Nov. 8 election to eliminate the so-called “carried interest” loophole, which is used by many financial managers to lower tax obligations. But a rough outline for a […]
DUBAI // A new boarding school in the emirate will compete with some of the best and most exclusive in the world as it prepares to open its campus this year. The first of three planned boarding houses at the Swiss International Scientific School’s Al Jaddaf campus is being built and on track for completion before the academic year starts in September. Consisting of 50 en-suite rooms […]
When newspaper industry executives gather in New Orleans this evening for their annual three-day MediaXchange convention, the crowd will be thinner than at last year’s edition in Washington, D.C. “(That) just reflects industry conditions coming off a difficult end to 2016,” said David Chavern, CEO and president of the News Media Alliance, which organizes the convention. For those who do make it, Chavern promises plenty of practical […]
Mexico is urging Donald Trump to reuse agreements reached under the aborted Trans-Pacific Partnership to create a manufacturing powerhouse between the US, Mexico and Canada to compete with low-cost producers in China. Ildefonso Guajardo, Mexico’s economy minister, said in an interview with the Financial Times that elements of TPP could be used to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement between the three countries. His comments came […]
‘Burdensome new regulatory regime’ During the most recent fiscal year, the government entered into or modified contracts with nearly 70,000 companies or their subsidiaries to deliver hundreds of thousands of distinct goods and services. To figure out which companies to hire, agencies begin by posting solicitations, usually on FedBizOpps.gov, where registered contractors can sift through opportunities. When an agency puts out a solicitation, dozens of companies might […]
WASHINGTON President Donald Trump said China may have hacked the emails of Democratic officials to meddle with the 2016 presidential election, countering the view of U.S. intelligence officials who have said Moscow orchestrated the hacks. In an interview transcript published on Sunday, Trump gave no evidence backing his allegation, first made on the eve of the Nov. 8 presidential election, that China could have hacked the emails […]
A union representing 1,200 U.S. air maintenance workers at United Parcel Service Inc (UPS.N) turned up pressure on the company on Sunday to settle a three-year contract dispute, saying it would seek clearance to strike. The union is taking its grievances directly to UPS shareholders, running as an advertisement an open letter to David Abney, the company’s chief executive, ahead of a Thursday shareholders meeting. The letter, which has […]
The climate march was held last Saturday, exactly on President Donald J. Trump’s 100th day. People from all walks of life joined the massive protest in Washington, as well as the satellite marches across the country and the world. Though the march is a yearly event, perhaps this year’s march was more meaningful as the fight against climate change has turned into a full-on battle. As protesters marched on […]
