Bloomberg Donald Trump and Angela Merkel got off to a prickly start at a NATO summit as the US president blasted Germany over its support for a gas pipeline from Russia, prompting a tart response from the chancellor. “It’s very sad when Germany makes a massive oil and gas deal with Russia where we’re supposed to be guarding against Russia ...

Bloomberg While there’s little prospect that Japanese consumers will ever buy enough American cars to please Donald Trump, the Abe government’s record spending on defense is shaping up as a bright spot in bilateral trade for the US president. Japan’s purchases through the US Foreign Military Sales programme represent 16 percent of all non-personnel costs for the nation’s self-defense forces ...

Bloomberg The Pakistan Peoples Party said a money-laundering probe by the government’s Federal Investigation Agency that has named its co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari and his sister as beneficiaries amounts to “pre-poll rigging” and “political victimisation,” joining other politicians raising concern about the fairness of national elections. The former ruling party, which held the second-largest amount of national seats before parliament ...