Sharjah / Emirates Business A delegation from Knowledge without Borders (KwB), the Sharjah based cultural project, recently visited the Department of Punitive and Reformatory Establishments in Sharjah. On the agenda for the meeting was the effective rehabilitation of criminals through the habit of reading, with the aim being to successfully reintroduce them into society as model citizens. Headed by ...

  Reuters Middle East fund managers have grown more cautious about building positions in both equities and fixed income, partly because of the risk of a U.S. interest rate hike as soon as June, a monthly Reuters poll showed. The poll of 14 leading fund managers, conducted over the last 10 days, shows 21 percent anticipate reducing allocations to Middle ...

  New Delhi / Bloomberg India may spend as much as $16 billion — over $1 billion more than initially estimated — on the nation’s first bullet train to elevate the entire railroad, a person with direct knowledge of the matter said. Land acquisition hurdles, as well as people and animals potentially wandering in front of carriages speeding at 350 ...

  Tokyo / AFP Japan’s industrial production edged up in April, data showed on Tuesday, despite factory shutdowns sparked by a pair of deadly earthquakes that rocked southern Kyushu. Official figures also showed household spending remained tepid, as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe mulls whether to delay a sales tax hike over fears it could damage the fragile economy. Inflation data ...

  Tokyo / Bloomberg Suzuki Motor Corp.’s minicar sales fell 18 percent in Japan this month, after the automaker disclosed using improper methods to test the fuel economy of more than 2.1 million vehicles. Dealers heard both encouragement and criticism from customers after Suzuki said May 19 that it didn’t use a test method required by Japanese law, Chairman Osamu ...

  Yangon / AFP Myanmar’s growth rate, once one of the world’s most impressive, has dipped following heavy floods and an investment slowdown sparked by uncertainty over its political transition, the World Bank (WB) said on Tuesday. A civilian government led by veteran democracy campaigner Aung San Suu Kyi took power in March after clinching a clear majority in elections late ...

  Beijing / Bloomberg China’s jobs market, which has weathered the economy’s slowdown so far this year, faces fresh challenges as the government plans to shut inefficient companies, according to a top official at the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security. The nation created 4.43 million new jobs in the first four months of the year, hitting 44 percent ...

  Bloomberg Euro-area consumer prices failed to increase for a fourth consecutive month, highlighting policy makers’ struggle to stoke inflation despite multiple rounds of stimulus. Prices fell 0.1 percent in May from a year earlier, the European Union’s statistics office in Luxembourg said on Tuesday. That’s in line with the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists and follows ...

  Bloomberg The pound weakened amid signs that support for the campaign for Britain to leave the European Union had increased. Sterling fell against most of its major peers as Bookmaker William Hill Plc said 85 percent of all EU referendum bets taken over Monday’s public holiday in the U.K. were in favor of Britain exiting the bloc, and that ...

  Bloomberg Profit at Volkswagen AG’s namesake brand crumbled 86 percent in the first quarter, highlighting the challenge the carmaker faces in emerging from the nearly nine-month-old emissions cheating scandal. Operating profit at the VW nameplate dropped to 73 million euros ($81 million) from 514 million euros last year, Europe’s biggest carmaker said in a statement. That gave the marque ...