GENEVA A United Nations peace envoy said a militant attack in Syria on Saturday was a deliberate attempt to wreck peace talks in Geneva, while the warring sides traded blame and appeared no closer to actual negotiations. Suicide bombers stormed two Syrian security offices in Homs, killing dozens with gunfire and explosions including the head of military security, prompting airstrikes against the last rebel-held enclave in the […]
Back pain affects about 700 million people and is the leading cause of disability worldwide. Now, a new study shows that it is not just uncomfortable and debilitating, but also a potential indicator of early death. Examining the health and death records of 4,390 older Danish twins, a team of researchers from the University of Sydney in Australia found that those who reported lower back pain had a […]
By Tom Miles and Yara Abi Nader | GENEVA GENEVA Syria’s opposition is impatient for face-to-face peace talks in Geneva, but things could fall apart if Russia does not pressure President Bashar al-Assad on holding talks and push it to abide by a ceasefire, an opposition member said on Saturday. The United Nations opened the peace talks with a symbolic ceremony on Thursday, attended by representatives of […]
Appearing on TV is nerve-wracking enough, but would you be willing to try breastfeeding while you were on the air? One brave mom gave it a try, and the result is fantastic. Rachel Sklar, feminist media figure and founder of The Li.st, appeared a few weeks back as a guest on CBC news to talk about Barbie’s recent makeover. At first glance, you’d think she was just […]
Akamai has published its Q4 2016 State of the Internet/Security report As always, an interesting read and an opportunity to look at trends in attacks. Not all trends are up and to the right. As the report states, Q4 2016 was “the third consecutive quarter where we noticed a decrease in the number of attack triggers”. Still, “the overall 2016 attack count was up 4% as compared […]
Saudi Arabia’s economy is forecast to continue slowing this year, dragged down by negative growth in the oil sector, according to Jadwa Investment. Its latest report said growth in the oil sector will turn negative due to the kingdom’s compliance with OPEC production cuts, while non-oil sector growth should rebound but “remain subdued” during 2017. Jadwa forecast that growth in the non-oil private sector will accelerate from […]
Donald Trump delivered a vehement and sometimes contradictory screed against the press during his appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference Friday, calling media reports “fake news” while expressing his support for the First Amendment. During the speech, which came on the penultimate day of the CPAC conference, Trump was especially critical of news organizations that use anonymous sources, saying that reporters “shouldn’t be allowed to use […]
North Korea is evading international sanctions with a sophisticated network of overseas companies, enabled partly by its continued access to the international banking system, says a forthcoming United Nations report seen by Reuters. North Korea is under heavy U.N. sanctions and a strict arms embargo designed to impede the development of its banned nuclear and missile programmes. The U.N. panel of experts, which produced the 100-page draft […]
By Venus Wu and Greg Torode | HONG KONG HONG KONG Developments in Hong Kong have affected confidence in a system of government intended to ensure the Chinese-ruled city’s autonomy, though its rule of law remained robust “despite challenges”, former colonial power Britain said on Friday. Britain handed Hong Kong back to China in 1997 with guarantees it would retain extensive autonomy, an independent legal system and […]
DUBAI // “It’s New Year’s Eve all over again … but the real way we should have celebrated,” declared Mariah Carey, launching into Emotions at Dubai Jazz Festival — and tackling the elephant in the room head-on. Thursday’s concert was Carey’s first public gig since that over-reported, televised “meltdown” on Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve, in which she embarrassingly struggled through the same song, and was […]
SoFi, the biggest and the brashest of a new breed of online lenders in the US, has sealed a $500m funding round, giving it firepower to push into new products and markets including Canada and Australia. The private San Francisco-based company last received a big shot of funds — its fifth — in September 2015, when SoftBank of Japan led a $1bn round, the biggest in the […]
Sign up to receive Authers’ Note daily by email here Despite appearances to the contrary, the Trump trade may be moving into reverse as the president’s maiden State of the Union address approaches. The overall level of the stock market is, of course, at fresh records. But the pattern within it is shifting again. The end of the week saw sharp falls for almost all equity markets […]
BEIJING A youth named by China as the second-highest figure in Tibetan Buddhism, but reviled as a fake by many Tibetans, has pledged to uphold the “glorious tradition” of patriotism that holders of his position have followed, state news agency Xinhua said. Although officially atheist, China selected Gyaltsen Norbu as the 11th Panchen Lama in 1995 in a drive to win the hearts and minds of Tibetans. […]
Credit: shatterered.io Today, researchers at the Dutch research institute CWI and Google jointly announce that they have broken the SHA-1 internet security standard in practice. This industry standard is used for digital signatures and file integrity verification, which secure credit card transactions, electronic documents, GIT open-source software repositories and software distribution. CWI cryptanalyst Marc Stevens says: “Many applications still use SHA-1, although it was officially deprecated by […]
By By Rozanna Latiff and Emily Chow, Reuters Feb 24, 2017 at 7:56 pm | Print View KUALA LUMPUR — VX nerve agent, a chemical the United Nations classifies as a weapon of mass destruction, was used to kill the estranged half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in a bizarre murder in Malaysia last week, police said on Friday. Kim Jong Nam was killed on […]
24 February 2017 MARC has assigned long-term ratings of AAA, AA and A to Kinabalu Capital Sdn Bhd’s (Kinabalu Capital) medium-term notes (MTN) RM130 million Class A, RM25 million Class B and RM15 million Class C respectively. Concurrently, MARC has assigned a MARC-1 rating to Kinabalu Capital’s issue of up to RM170 million commercial papers (CP). The issuance of the rated MTN and/or CP with a combined […]
By Arshad Mohammed | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON The longest-serving U.S. diplomat warned against isolationism, protectionism and Russian aggression on Friday in a retirement speech implicitly criticizing some of U.S. President Donald Trump’s policies even as he urged officials to serve the White House loyally. Ambassador Dan Fried argued that since becoming a world power over a century ago, the United States had largely pursued an open, rules-based world, […]
sharjah A four day festival of marine life has opened at the Sharjah Aquarium to help educate and inform about the importance of preserving marine ecosystems around the UAE. Families have been enjoying free sea themed entertainment shows including life-size models of mermaids, octopus, sharks and seahorses in a setting to reinforce the virtual marine environment. The aquarium has been complemented by a fun beach, theatre, hand […]
Two years after Donald Trump was booed at an influential conservative event, the US president returned to the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday for a victory lap. But his rambling address, at an event that was more campaign rally than detailed presentation of policy, struck a jarring note at the end of a week that saw a semblance of orthodoxy from the new administration. While his […]
Prime Minister awaiting PANA committee conclusions, says it’s up to Police Commissioner to decide whether an investigation should be launched Muscat says decision to investigate Konrad Mizzi lies with Police Commissioner Muscat says decision to investigate Konrad Mizzi lies with Police Commissioner Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said he would wait for the conclusions of the European Parliament’s PANA Committee investigation into the Panama Papers scandal and not […]
ROME Doctors and nurses are among 94 hospital workers from Naples who have been placed under investigation on suspicion of repeatedly skipping work, police said on Friday. One supervisor at the Loreto Mare hospital was instead found working as a chef in a hotel, while an on-duty doctor was spotted playing tennis and going shopping. Two health workers were caught clocking in 20 colleagues each day to […]
PARIS French prosecutors on Friday appointed a magistrate to investigate allegations concerning presidential candidate Francois Fillon and his wife, over charges that his wife got large sums of money for work she may not have done. The prosecutor’s decision to open up a new stage in the case marks a blow for Fillon, whose status as favourite to win the presidency has faded since a newspaper broke […]
By Mica Rosenberg | NEW YORK NEW YORK A U.S. Department of Homeland Security plan to add more than 5,000 border enforcement agents will present logistical challenges and might be unnecessary, according to former government officials familiar with earlier pushes to accelerate border hiring. Three former top officials at U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) told Reuters in interviews that ramping up hiring at the agency, as […]
Primary dealers have warned of obstacles to the US Treasury introducing very long-dated bonds, despite some early support for the plans. This week Steven Mnuchin, Treasury secretary, said his staff had begun to look into issuing US government debt with maturities of as long as 50 or 100 years. Such a move would be a historic shift in policy for the $14tn Treasury market, which has resisted […]
