By Marja Novak | LJUBLJANA LJUBLJANA The Slovenian government on Wednesday agreed to raise doctors’ wages by a total of as much as 50 million euros per year, and the move prompted other public-sector trade unions to seek wage increases, as well. The move was agreed in talks with the doctors’ trade union, Fides, which followed a partial two-week strike by doctors in November. Finance Minister Mateja […]
The award judges noted that the project “exposed offshore hideaways tied to mega-banks, corporate bribery scandals, drug kingpins, arms traffickers and a network of people close to Russian President Vladimir Putin that shuffled as much as $2 billion around the world.” Judges also noted that since the probe, “governments and corporations in 79 countries have opened at least 150 inquiries, audits or investigations.” Along with the recognition […]
Poisoned. Stabbed. Driven to suicide. These are just some of the unpleasant ways women in 19th-century opera meet their demise. Mimi, from La Bohème, is no different. Giacomo Puccini’s masterpiece – which comes to Dubai Opera for three performances from today until Saturday – sees the opera’s heroine end her days in poverty, coughing up blood, too poor to buy medicine, and estranged from her one true […]
By Ginger Gibson and David Shepardson | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON When the bosses of some of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies headed to Washington in January to meet U.S. President Donald Trump, it had all the makings of a potentially hostile meeting. Just weeks before, Trump had sent drug stock prices plummeting after accusing the companies of “getting away with murder” by charging too much for medicines. But […]
As CEO of ExxonMobil, Rex Tillerson was accustomed to going where he wanted, when he wanted, with whomever he wanted. It comes with being the CEO of one of the most valuable companies in the world. He doesn’t seem compelled to act much differently as Secretary of State — at least in the early going. It’s why news bureau chiefs will hold a conference call this morning to […]
For many, South Korea’s decision to host a missile shield to defend against its hostile northern neighbour should not be controversial. In the past month alone, North Korea has fired six ballistic missiles, with a barrage of four successful launches on Monday trumpeted by Pyongyang as being a drill targeting US bases in Japan. But in a region riven by simmering historical grievances, Seoul’s move has sparked a bitter […]
By Tim Kelly and Nobuhiro Kubo | TOKYO TOKYO Rattled by North Korean military advances, influential Japanese lawmakers are pushing harder for Japan to develop the ability to strike preemptively at the missile facilities of its nuclear-armed neighbour. Japan has so far avoided taking the controversial and costly step of acquiring bombers or weapons such as cruise missiles with enough range to strike other countries, relying instead […]
Via Soeren Kern of The Gatestone Institute, “The threat to the UK remains from homegrown terrorism, and is heavily youth- and male-oriented with British nationals prevalent among offenders.” — Islamist Terrorism: Analysis of Offenses and Attacks in the UK (1998–2015). “The increased prevalence of smaller cells and individualistic offending, suggests a rise in terrorism cases that feature shorter lead times to offending and fewer opportunities for identification.” […]
SYDNEY Climate change was responsible for breaking more than 200 Australian weather records over the past three months, researchers said on Wednesday, a glimpse of conditions to come that will likely threaten energy security and agriculture. Much of Australia’s east coast endured its hottest summer on record, the independent Climate Council said, while torrential rain in Western Australia caused flash flooding. The sort of unseasonable conditions seen […]
Here are the big questions set to frame a new trading week for markets. How frothy are equity and junk bond valuations looking?Another record-breaking week for equities and a red hot reception for the Snap initial public offering is not the only sign of investor optimism running wild. Junk bond spreads — the premium investors demand to hold the bonds over Treasury yields — are heading towards […]
Hey, it’s boss week here at Local Edition. This week, we’re going to spend a little time with a Florida editor who doesn’t fit many molds (started as a designer, doesn’t care for sandy beaches, etc.) As a reminder, this is week three in our four-week conversation about why we’re still in journalism. (You can subscribe here.) Hang around after the boss talk for a peek at […]
By Matt Spetalnick and David Brunnstrom | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON Faced with a growing test of resolve for a new U.S. president who vowed while campaigning to get tough on North Korea, Donald Trump’s aides are pressing to complete a strategy review on how to counter Pyongyang’s missile and nuclear threats. Pyongyang’s latest missile launches and the assassination in Malaysia of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s estranged […]
Muneera Al Hubail is one of the first women from Abu Dhabi to compete internationally at CrossFit, having reached the finals in the Battle of the East international competition in Kuwait in November. The 28-year-old Emirati passed another important milestone last month when she managed to lift the equivalent of her own body weight over her head. Al Hubail’s ultimate goal is to be a grandmother who […]
The Panama Papers investigation has this week received its fourth major American journalism prize, the William Brewster Styles Award for Business/Economics Reporting from the Scripps Howard Foundation. The series, which illuminated offshore tax havens and shook up politicians around the world, was coordinated by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, at the time a project of the Center for Public Integrity. The two organizations have since separated. […]
Now fitness lovers can further tap into the power of having a personal trainer in their pockets that provides customized workouts thanks the latest update to Sworkit. The popular fitness app announced a new feature on Tuesday that provides flexible workout plans that are tailored to each its users. Called the Sworkit Workout Builder, this first-of-its-kind feature allows users to build the ideal workout plan that best […]
VIENNA U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration pledged on Tuesday to show “great strictness” over restrictions on Iran’s nuclear activities imposed by a deal with major powers, but gave little indication of what that might mean for the agreement. The 2015 deal between Iran and six major powers restricts Tehran’s nuclear programme in exchange for the lifting of international economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic. Trump has called […]
A ground-breaking research in the field of neuroscience offers an in-depth analysis of the brain’s reward system, highlighting its influence on the decision-making process. The study encompasses three decades of investigation into the role of dopamine in everyday life choices and shows how the brain perceives different options, prioritizing those which prompt a better reward. For their outstanding merits, Professors Wolfram Schultz, Peter Dayan, and Ray Dolan received […]
The inner workings of the CIA’s cyber-espionage operations were at risk of being laid bare on Tuesday, after WikiLeaks published what it claimed was the first part of a large trove of documents detailing the US agency’s techniques for hacking into smartphones, internet-connected TVs and other devices. The documents purported to reveal a stockpile of malware used by the CIA to break into some of today’s most […]
The biggest impact investing deal to ever see the light of day — that is how a fascinating new hedge fund deal is being touted. Impact investing is the practice of trying to make a measurable, positive societal impact as well as making a financial return on your money. The US hedge fund Mariner Investment Group reckons it has found a way to turn an investment of about $150m into […]
Mozilla has released the latest version of Firefox, which it says will allow complex apps to run much faster in the browser. Firefox 52 adds support for WebAssembly, which Mozilla said allows for “near-native performance for games and apps”. It said WebAssembly – a low-level assembly-like language designed to run alongside JavaScript – will enable applications that have historically been too complex to run in browsers – […]
Snap Inc’s shares fell as much as 10.4 percent on Tuesday, opening at their lowest since a blockbuster market debut last week. Snap’s shares hit a low of $21.30 in early trading on Tuesday, wiping out more than $9 billion of the company’s market capitalization from Friday’s high. Shares surged 44 percent in a hotly anticipated listing on Thursday, valuing the parent of Snapchat, an app popular […]
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. When it comes to Russian hacking and other subterfuge, the obvious and unavoidable media and political talk involves either the Clinton presidential campaign or the Trump White House. As Bloomberg’s Michael Riley discloses, there’s more for the press to obsess […]
A new system from CSAIL uses EEG brain signals to detect if a person notices robots making a mistake. Credit: Jason Dorfman/MIT CSAIL For robots to do what we want, they need to understand us. Too often, this means having to meet them halfway: teaching them the intricacies of human language, for example, or giving them explicit commands for very specific tasks. But what if we could […]
GoldenEye ransomware targets human resources departments because they’re used to opening emails and attachments from unknown sources. Image: Ali Donzanti What is a ransomware attack? Cybercriminals didn’t use to be so obvious. If hackers infiltrated your corporate network, they would do everything possible to avoid detection. It was in their best interests not to alert a victim that they’d fallen victim to cybercrime. But now, if you […]
