Tribune news service A 35 percent increase in customer complaints against banks has been witnessed in Bahrain over the past three years, it has emerged. The Central Bank of Bahrain has received an average of 31 such complaints every month this year, compared with 28 last year, 26 in 2014 and 23 in 2013. Four complaints last month were ...

  Tribune news service Bahrain’s decade-long national award for women empowerment has received global recognition. The new award is named after Her Royal Highness Princess Sabeeka bint Ibrahim Al Khalifa, wife of His Majesty King Hamad and Supreme Council for Women (SCW) president, and will now come under UN Women. The council has been tasked by UN Women to come ...

  Emirates Business CFA Society Emirates, the association for financial and investment professionals in the UAE, has unveiled the results of a survey which assessed the impact of introducing Value Added Tax (VAT) across the GCC. The survey provided market insights from CFA members and charterholders in the United Arab Emirates. With the UAE set to become the first country ...

  Geneva / AFP The number of unaccompanied children making the notoriously dangerous Mediterranean crossing aboard unseaworthy boats has more than doubled this year, the UN children’s agency said in a new report on Tuesday. Entitled “Danger every step of the way”, the UNICEF report said nine out of every 10 children arriving in Italy were unaccompanied minors, noting that more ...

  Thessaloniki / AFP Greek police on Tuesday cleared two more improvised migrant camps near its border with Macedonia, moving occupants to state-run facilities, officials said. Police in Greece’s second largest city Thessaloniki said the operation was ongoing in the makeshift camps, which had formed around a highway motel and a nearby petrol station. Many of the migrants are from ...

  ISTANBUL / AP The European Union’s envoy to Turkey has resigned less than a year into the job, according to his office. The EU delegation in Ankara confirmed that Hansjoerg Haber was leaving his post, without giving any reason. Turkey was Haber’s first assignment as a German diplomat, between 1993 and 1996. He returned as European Union ambassador to ...

  YANGON / AP An official says a military helicopter has crashed in the jungle in northern Myanmar, killing three officers on board. The aircraft went down Tuesday in the jungle near Daik U town in Bago division, some 150 kilometers (120 miles) northeast of Yangon. Khin Lay Si, an official in the Daik U administration office, says the rescue ...

  Jerusalem / AFP Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said a long-dormant Arab peace initiative with the Palestinians that he has spoken of reviving must be changed before Israel can support it. Netanyahu made the comments to members of his Likud party, Israeli media reported, after facing pressure from right-wing members of his cabinet over his recent comments on the Arab ...

  Dhaka / AFP Bangladeshi clerics said they have issued a fatwa against the killings of minorities and secular campaigners in the mainly Muslim country, where police have arrested over 10,000 people in a crackdown on militancy. Nearly 50 people have been killed over the last three years in a wave of gruesome attacks targeting Hindus, Christians, Sufi Muslims and ...

  Manila / AFP Philippine authorities on Tuesday confirmed that extremist guerrillas had beheaded a second Canadian hostage, as they defended their inability to save him despite months of pursuit. ” We strongly condemn the brutal and senseless murder of MrRobert Hall, a Canadian national, after being held captive by the Abu Sayyaf group in Sulu for the past nine ...