Riyadh / Emirates Business Saudi Arabia’s non-oil private sector looked to be in good shape midway through the second quarter, as business conditions improved to the greatest extent since last November. Both output and new orders rose sharply in May, with the rate of expansion in the latter picking up to a five-month high. Companies raised their input buying ...

  Reuters Morocco is aiming to introduce a flexible exchange rate system in the early part of 2017, its central bank governor said on Sunday. “We are considering the move currently from fixed exchange rate to a flexible exchange rate,” Abdellatif Jouahri told reporters on the sidelines of an Arab finance ministers event. Jouahri said the country would work with ...

  Reuters Business activity in Egypt shrank for the eighth straight month in May but at a lesser extent than previous three months, a survey showed on Sunday. The Emirates NBD Egypt Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) for the non-oil private sector recorded 47.6 points in May after 46.9 points in April, remaining below the 50-point mark that separates growth from ...

  Hanoi / AFP Dozens of activists were detained in Vietnam’s two biggest cities on Sunday as they tried to hold protests calling for greater government transparency over a recent spate of mass fish deaths. Tonnes of dead fish and other marine life began washing up on central Vietnamese shores two months ago and continued to appear for two to ...

  DUBAI / AP Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid his first official visit to gas-rich Qatar, where he met the Gulf country’s leaders on Sunday to discuss economic ties. Qatar is one of the world’s largest suppliers of liquefied natural gas. Qatari media says it supplies India with more than 85 percent of its gas needs. The Indian Embassy ...

  Colombo / AFP A key military ammunition dump in Sri Lanka exploded Sunday showering shrapnel over a large area on the edge of the capital forcing thousands to flee to safety, officials said. There were no immediate reports of casualties at the Salawa military camp where security forces are known to store some of their heavy weaponry and ammunition, ...

  Mumbai / Reuters Tata Motors Inc.’s Jaguar Land Rover said it sued Jiangling Motors Co. over copyright and unfair competition. Reuters reported that the dispute is over the Chinese company’s Landwind X7 sport utility vehicle that looks like the Land Rover Evoque, citing a person with familiar with the matter. Stuart Schorr, a Jaguar Land Rover spokesman, confirmed a ...

  Gwalior / AFP In an intensive care unit, a nurse soothes a crying baby rescued in a raid on a private Indian hospital that police suspect was selling abandoned newborns on the black market. “She is too weak and needs special care,” the nurse said, patting the girl born underweight and premature and receiving treatment at another hospital, run by ...

  Bloomberg The Swiss probably rejected two popular initiatives that constituted the latest threat to the country’s business-friendly environment. Voters dismissed a measure that would have reduced the pay of Swisscom AG’s chief executive officer by three quarters and also shot down a proposal to establish a universal basic income, according to projections broadcast on Swiss television SRF on Sunday. ...

  Bloomberg It was the first country ever to venture into offshore wind power. Now, Denmark is scaring off potential investors by abandoning some of the policies that once helped make it an international poster child for green energy. The center-right government of Lars Loekke Rasmussen wants to scrap an electricity tax that has helped subsidize wind turbines since 1998. ...