Baghdad / AFP A group of Iraqi lawmakers said they would not take part in a Saturday parliament session to select a replacement for the speaker, apparently leaving it without the necessary quorum. Iraq was on course to have two rival claimants to the speakership, further increasing chaos in parliament, which has already seen a vote to sack speaker Salim Al ...

  United Nations / AFP The UN Security Council strongly condemned North Korea’s test-firing of a missile on Friday, saying that the launch violated UN resolutions even if it was a failure. The council demanded that North Korea refrain from further actions in violation of resolutions barring Pyongyang from developing ballistic missile technology. In a unanimous statement, the council said ...

SEOUL / AP Thousands of South Koreans participated in memorial events on Saturday for the more than 300 people who died in a ferry disaster two years ago that deeply rattled the country. Hundreds of people, carrying umbrellas in light evening rain, created long lines at a square in the capital, Seoul, waiting to place flowers on a makeshift altar ...

  Kuala Lumpur / AFP Gunmen have abducted four Indonesian sailors and shot and wounded one crew member on the high seas off the east coast of Malaysia’s Sabah state, waters where Abu Sayyaf militants are known to operate, a senior police official said on Saturday. If the Philippines-based Abu Sayyaf is confirmed to be behind the kidnapping off Borneo, ...

Bloomberg Ferrari NV’s ambition to compete with luxury-goods brands like Hermes or Prada has failed to make headway in the six months since its initial public offering, raising pressure on the new board to reset the sports-car maker’s strategy. Scepticism over the company’s prospects has caused the stock to tumble about 20 percent since its October listing. The new board ...

  Madrid / AFP Spanish judicial authorities revealed that the ‘ghost airport’ of Ciudad Real, a symbol of the country’s financial excess in the boom years, had been sold off for 56 million euros ($62 million). Spain’s construction and property sectors boomed until the downturn hit seven years ago and one victim was the airport, initially touted as an alternative ...

  Copenhagen / AFP Bang & Olufsen, the Danish maker of upmarket consumer electronics, said that it had ended takeover talks with a Hong Kong investor after the expiry of a deadline for a bid. The Danish group said its board of directors had been given several deadlines, the last of which was on Friday, during its takeover talks with ...

  Bloomberg Allegiant Airlines, which came under special scrutiny by federal safety regulators last year, said operations are improving after it increased spending on safety management, training facilities and younger aircraft. “We’re investing in everything we know to invest in,” Chief Operating Officer Jude Bricker told reporters. “Most of the indicators we watch are positive. Everything is moving in the ...

  WARSAW / Reuters Poland’s CCC, Eastern Europe’s largest shoe retailer, swung to a net loss in the first quarter of 2016 due to poor weather and an earlier Easter than last year, but still expects a big rise in 2016 sales, its deputy chief said. “March was indeed very weak and there will be a net loss in the ...

  Bloomberg China’s economy stabilized last quarter and gathered pace in March as a surge in new credit spurred a property sector rebound while raising fresh questions over the sustainability of the debt-fueled expansion. Gross domestic product rose 6.7 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier, meeting the median projection of economists surveyed by Bloomberg and in line ...