Beirut/ AP IS group extremists have seized a string of opposition-held villages in Syria’s Aleppo province near the Turkish border, a monitoring group said on Thursday. Areas around Aleppo have seen a spike in violence on several fronts in recent days, sparking concern over a fragile six-week truce as a new round of peace talks gets under way in Geneva. ...

  ATHENS / AP Greece’s military is carrying out unscheduled exercises along the country’s northern borders, with fighter jets flying over an informal tent city of 11,000 migrants next to the border with Macedonia. Greek military officials say the drills, which foresee activation of rapid-response ground units and aircraft, as well as air defense units in parts of the eastern Aegean ...

  MANILA / AP In a military buildup certain to inflame tensions with China, the United States said on Thursday it will be conducting joint South China Sea patrols — and eventually air patrols — with the Philippines, while dispatching US troops and combat aircraft there on more frequent rotations. The announcement by Defense Secretary Ash Carter was the first ...

  RIO DE JANEIRO / AP President Dilma Rousseff’s chances of surviving impeachment are growing slimmer now that three parties have decamped from her governing coalition in 24 hours and Brazilian legislators begin preparing for a crucial vote on the question expected this weekend. The pullouts of the mid-size centrist parties caused despondency among members of Rousseff’ left-leaning Workers’ Party ...

Seoul / AFP South Korean President Park Geun-hye’s ruling conservative party was reeling on Thursday from a shock electoral defeat that broke its 16-year parliamentary majority and threatened its chances of retaining the presidential Blue House in 2017. Voters punished the party for its economic record, analysts said, with high levels of youth unemployment accounting for particularly high dissatisfaction among ...

Bloomberg Bank of England officials said the U.K.’s European Union referendum may already be weighing on growth as they kept their key interest rate at a record low. The nine-member Monetary Policy Committee, led by Governor Mark Carney, unanimously agreed to maintain the benchmark at 0.5 percent — where it’s been for more than seven years. In a ramping up ...

  London / AP The latest bout of falling prices across the 19-country eurozone has ended — after just a single month. Revised figures on Thursday from the European Union’s statistics agency showed that inflation was flat in the year to March. That’s up from the initial estimate of a 0.1 percent fall and February’s 0.2 percent annual drop. The biggest ...

Bloomberg Lawsuits filed by hundreds of Porsche SE investors over the company’s use of complex financial instruments in 2008 before its failed takeover of Volkswagen AG will be combined under a special procedure to handle some large civil cases in Germany. A court in Hanover ruled that it will send the cases to appellate judges in the northern city of ...

  Bloomberg Elections are approaching in Norway, accompanied by the familiar sound of oil executives and politicians arguing over the environmentally sensitive Lofoten islands in the Arctic. Oil prices may have plunged in a global economy awash with oversupply, but producers in Norway say they’re thinking much longer term. Statoil ASA, which has been lobbying for years to open the ...

Bloomberg President Vladimir Putin told Russians that the economy will resume growth next year in his annual call-in show on Thursday, aiming to shore up his support as the country’s longest economic downturn in two decades pushes more people into poverty. “The situation hasn’t been resolved yet but the trend is positive,” Putin said, pointing to forecasts that the economy ...