Reuters Bahrain Telecommunications Co (Batelco) posted a 33 percent fall in first-quarter profit as its subscriber base and revenue both declined. Batelco made a net profit of 9.6 million Bahraini dinars ($25.46 million) in the three months to March 31, it said in a statement. This compares with a profit of 14.2 million dinars a year earlier. SICO Bahrain …

  Yangon / AFP Hundreds of Myanmar villagers rallied on Saturday against a controversial Chinese-backed copper mine, activists said, reigniting a contentious issue that could pose an early challenge to Aung San Suu Kyi’s new government. The Letpadaung mine in the central town of Monywa has for years been dogged by complaints of land-grabbing, environmental damage and brutal police crackdowns on …

  Beijing / Bloomberg China’s foreign-exchange reserves increased for the second month in a row as market sentiment toward the yuan improved and a stronger yen and euro boosted the headline number. The world’s largest currency hoard rose by $7.089 billion to $3.22 trillion in April, the People’s Bank of China said in a statement on Saturday. That compares with …