PARIS / AP The two main left-leaning candidates in France’s presidential election won’t join forces after all. Socialist Benoit Hamon and far-left candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon, a former member of the Socialist Party who is supported by the Communists, both announced over the weekend that they are staying in the race, putting the Left at risk of disappearing after the ...

  BANDUNG / AP Indonesian police said they shot and killed a suspected militant in the West Java capital of Bandung on Monday after his bomb exploded in a vacant lot and he fled into a municipal building and set it alight. National police chief Tito Karnavian said the man was a member of Jemaah Ansharut Daulah, which was designated ...

  SEOUL / AP South Korea’s main opposition parties threatened on Monday to impeach the country’s acting leader after he refused to extend a special investigation into the huge corruption scandal that toppled conservative President Park Geun-hye. If successful, the impeachment of Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn would rile an already tumultuous political landscape, putting another interim leader in power while ...

  SEOUL / AP North Korea executed five senior security officials with anti-aircraft guns because they made false reports that “enraged” leader Kim Jong Un, South Korea’s spy agency said on Monday. The comments by the National Intelligence Service in a private briefing to lawmakers come as Malaysia investigates the poisoning death of Kim’s estranged elder half brother, Kim Jong ...

  Bloomberg US stocks fluctuated near all-time highs, while the dollar and Treasuries retreated as investors awaited clues on President Donald Trump’s spending priorities. Politics set the tone in Europe, with the pound retreating and French bonds gaining. The Dow Jones Industrial Average looked to add to its longest rally since 1992, while 10-year Treasury yields climbed for the first ...

  DUBAI / Reuters Profit-taking dragged stock markets in the Middle East down on Monday, with Egypt lagging after some quarterly earnings failed to inspire. Saudi Arabia’s index lost 1.1 percent to 6,969 points, heading back down towards technical support at the mid-February low of 6,942 points. A little under nine-tenths of traded shares declined and trading volume was above ...

  Bloomberg Oil has been bound to the tightest price range in more than a decade, and yet hedge funds have never been so confident it will eventually rally. Money managers boosted their bets on rising West Texas Intermediate prices to a record on speculation that the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its partners will manage to ease a ...

  Bloomberg Qatar Petroleum plans to merge two petrochemical units in its latest consolidation of businesses, as the world’s fourth-biggest oil and natural gas producer seeks to trim costs in its domestic operations and expand internationally. The state-run company will fold the operations of Qatar Vinyl Co., part of Mesaieed Petrochemical Holding Co., into Qatar Petrochemical Co., a unit of ...

  Bloomberg India’s central government will transfer its stake in state-run refiner Hindustan Petroleum Corp. to the country’s biggest oil explorer as part of its plans to create an integrated oil company, The Economic Times newspaper reported, citing people it didn’t identify. The government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi will issue a proposal for approval by the country’s cabinet to ...

  Bloomberg Oil will stabilize around $55 to $65 a barrel as OPEC fulfills its agreement to cut output, with stockpiles and shale production keeping prices from rising much more, the Middle East head of Lukoil PJSC said. Russia’s second-largest oil producer hasn’t had to reduce production in Iraq as a result of the curbs pledged by OPEC, Gati Al-Jebouri ...