By Angus McDowall and Tom Perry | BEIRUT BEIRUT Syrian rebels on Wednesday vowed to fight on in east Aleppo in the face of sudden government advances that have cut the area held by the opposition by a third in recent days and brought insurgents in the city to the brink of a catastrophic defeat. Gains by the Syrian army and its allies since last week have […]
Just as horror movies can spook fright nerds more than they expect, so political risk is sparking heightened levels of anxiety among seasoned investors. Investors caught out by Brexit and Donald Trump are making better preparations for political risk in Europe, plotting a route to the exit door if the unfolding story of French, German and Dutch elections poses a serious test for markets. One key measure […]
Photo Khalid al-Falih, center, the Saudi energy minister, at the OPEC meeting in Vienna on Wednesday. Credit Christian Bruna/European Pressphoto Agency VIENNA — After years of trying fruitlessly to prop up energy markets, OPEC on Wednesday finally reached a consensus on production cuts, sending oil prices soaring. The problem is, the euphoria may not last. With prices still at less than half the levels of two years […]
Thanks to mysteriously escalating prices, channels you don’t want, and a lack of competitive options, cable TV and Internet companies are widely hated in the US. Cord cutting is supposed to save us from at least some of that. But AT&T’s new DirecTV Now plan just transplants the cable model into the cord-cutter world. It’s full of traps and pitfalls for consumers, the biggest of […]
Ulster Bank Parent RBS Fails Bank of England Stress Test “Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS)(RBS.L) will cut costs and sell assets to boost capital levels, it said on Wednesday after failing this year’s Bank of England stress test, which warned of a “challenging” outlook for Britain’s financial system. The state-backed lender rushed out a statement following the announcement to say it would take a range of actions, including […]
SHARJAH // Soldiers, students, police and taxi drivers were just some of those calling into the Sharjah Blood Transfusion and Research Centre in the build up to National Day celebrations to give blood to those who need it most. The centre extended its opening hours from 8am to 8pm for the public holiday to encourage more people to visit the clinic and top up the nation’s blood […]
By Samihullah Paiwand | GARDEZ, Afghanistan GARDEZ, Afghanistan Afghanistan’s worsening security has forced about 1,000 schools to close this year, more than double last year’s total, adding to problems that children face in getting an education, officials said. Education officials fear next year could be even worse if Taliban insurgents seize more territory. “Our students are the first victims of the war,” said Mujib Mehrdad, education ministry […]
Credit: Concordia University In the age of WikiLeaks, Russian hacks and increased government surveillance, many computer users are feeling increasingly worried about how best to protect their personal information—even if they aren’t guarding state secrets. Luckily, there’s a solution: Hypnoguard, powerful new software developed by Concordia University researchers to safeguard data even when computer is in sleep mode. Sweet dreams are made of this “Protecting […]
November 30, 2016 by: Anjli Raval and David Sheppard — Vienna What is happening?Opec oil ministers from the 14-member producer group start their official meeting around 10am (GMT) on Wednesday in Vienna as they attempt to secure the first supply deal in eight years. Meetings traditionally last for between two and eight hours, but trying to predict the duration of such a gathering is near impossible. Oil […]
Submitted by Kelli Sladick via Tenth Amendment Center, During the last eight years, the Obama administration failed to live up to its promise reverse the Bush era’s mass surveillance of American citizens. In fact, it was expanded and justified. If you were silent, the sweeping power controlled by the president may not be on your radar for the right reasons. While there is a deep fear resonating, […]
Wednesday 06:00 GMT Overview Markets across Asia were treading cautiously on Wednesday, following mild overnight gains for Wall Street, a weakening of the US dollar and as investors turned their attention to a meeting between Opec members later today. European bourses are expected to open with only meagre moves, with spreadbetters predicting the UK’s FTSE 100 will slip 10 points to 6,762 and Germany’s Dax to be […]
Photo Mahmoud Abbas, third from right, the Palestinian Authority president, at a Fatah party conference on Tuesday in Ramallah, West Bank. Credit Presidential Office, via Reuters RAMALLAH, West Bank — Under fire at home and abroad, President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority moved on Tuesday to solidify his decade-long hold on power with a party conference that had already been purged of most of his opponents. […]
Commercial Bank of Qatar will cut its exposure to the property market and lend more to the public sector as it set out a turnaround plan under its new chief executive aimed at stemming a dismal earnings run as more loans soured. The Gulf Arab state’s third-largest lender by assets, like other banks in the region, has seen bad loans rise steeply due to the fallout of […]
November 30, 2016 by: FT Confidential Research The FTCR China Business Activity Index, a composite reading of the month-on-month change in activity in the real estate, export and freight sectors, fell to a 10-month low in November. The index dropped to 47.8 from 50 in October, below last November’s 48.6. Our BAI readings have always fallen sequentially in November but this is the weakest reading for the […]
Beijing is launching an investigation into alleged corrupt dealings by the spouses and children of officials in the city’s municipal government, in a pointed reminder to more powerful residents of the city to rein in their relatives’ behaviour. An audit of their assets would take place next year and on a rotating basis in subsequent years, the official Xinhua news agency said on Monday night. Like London […]
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon addresses the Annual Conference of Swiss Developement Cooperation in Zurich, Switzerland January 22, 2016. On the screen behind are displayed the 17 goals of UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (Reuters/Arnd Wiegmann). Emerging Voices highlights new research, thinking, and approaches to development challenges from contributing scholars and practitioners. This post is from Niklas Kossow, communications officer for the European Union FP7 ANTICORRP […]
LONDON Britain’s new plastic five-pound notes, bearing the portrait of wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill, have fallen foul of thousands of people who object to the use of animal fats in their manufacture. An online petition against the notes, started by campaigner Doug Maw, was signed by more than 13,000 supporters in less than 24 hours. “This is unacceptable to millions of vegans and vegetarians in the […]
This Christmas, tuck into the turkey but go easy on the pudding. Britons are facing a jump in prices for traditional pudding ingredients as the Brexit vote has sharply weakened the pound. However, the cost of Christmas dinners is almost unchanged from a year ago despite a rise in pork and vegetables. The slumping pound has helped push up the cost of key ingredients for Christmas pudding […]
Al Wadei: The rules of the E-Commerce game have changed after the introduction of “noon.com” 29 November 2016 E commerce expert, Dr Sadeq Al-Wadei, revealed that after the inauguration of noon.com in January 2017, it would utterly change E-Commerce platforms as we know them whilst emphasizing on the fact that it would entirely change this trade in Saudi Arabia over the coming few years. In addition, it […]
5836 25 by Shannon K. O’Neil November 11, 2016 A man displays a new 2000 Indian rupee banknote after withdrawing from a bank (Reuters/Mukesh Gupta). France’s Anticorruption ReformsAfter years of criticism for failing to prosecute foreign bribery, France adopted a new anticorruption law that will force companies doing business on its soil to take more aggressive preventative measures, and also gives the government stronger tools to fight […]
In the wake of Donald Trump’s surreal ascension to POTUS, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg publicly defended his company’s culpability in Trump’s win. Critics have pointed to Facebook’s propagation of fake news via the site’s algorithmically curated “Trending Topics” module and—perhaps even most dastardly—within users’ News Feed as directly responsible for the rise of America’s first potentially authoritarian-ish leader. Zuck’s public refutation exists within a larger […]
People have a general idea of how much a rocket-propelled grenade costs. What about a cyber weapon? (Baz Ratner/Reuters), Max Smeets is a D.Phil candidate and research affiliate of the Cyber Studies Programme at the University of Oxford. His work analyzes the proliferation of cyber weapons. Can a non-state actor take down critical infrastructure with a cyberattack? If it is not possible today, will it be possible […]
The coolest vehicle I saw at AutoMobilityLA (aka, the LA Auto Show) this week wasn’t even real, at least initially. To debut its new I-PACE all-electric crossover, Jaguar herded media into a Hollywood studio with a dozen or so tables in a large room, each topped with HTC Vive VR headsets, Dell Precision workstations, stereo headphones, and a joystick controller. Keep in mind that automotive […]
(Image: file photo) Nearly a million users across Europe were thrown off the internet during the weekend into Monday after criminals tried to hijack home routers as part of a coordinated cyber attack. Security researchers said that routers provided to customers in Germany by their internet providers were at risk of attack from the notorious Mirai malware, most notable for its large-scale botnet that brought parts of […]
