Bloomberg Nestle SA forecast the slowest full-year sales growth in more than a decade as food companies worldwide struggle against consumer resistance to price increases. Revenue will gain about 3.5 percent on an organic basis in 2016, the Vevey, Switzerland-based maker of Nespresso coffee said in a statement on Thursday, abandoning a goal for an increase of about 4.2 ...

  New York / AFP US apparel group Gap Inc. will close its Banana Republic stores in Britain as it streamlines its brick-and-mortar presence outside North America in response to weak sales. Gap will shut all eight Banana Republic stores in Britain, a Gap spokeswoman said. The majority of closures will take place by the end of January. The apparel ...

  Bloomberg UK retail sales stagnated for a second month in September as soaring prices and warm weather hit demand for clothing. The figures, from the Office for National Statistics Thursday, also showed that sales excluding auto fuel were unchanged from August. Small increases on both measures had been expected by economists. Clothing and footwear sales fell 2.8 percent after ...

  Aleppo / AFP A “humanitarian pause” began on Thursday in the Syrian army’s Russian-backed assault on rebel-held areas of Aleppo but clashes continued and there were no signs residents were heeding calls to leave. The unilateral ceasefire took effect at 8:00 am 0500 GMT) and was to last at least 11 hours, with the aim of allowing civilians and fighters ...

  Kabul / AFP The UN on Thursday warned anew of a deteriorating crisis of displacement in Afghanistan as the conflict escalates, imploring the government and international donors to step up support especially for a “lost generation” of children. More than 323,000 Afghans were internally displaced across the country in the first 10 months of this year, according to UN ...

  Celle / AFP A teenage girl went on trial in Germany on Thursday for stabbing a police officer, an assault allegedly “ordered” by the IS organisation but which was not claimed by the extremist group. The court in the northern city of Celle ruled at the start of the proceedings against Safia S., 16, that they would take place ...

  Nawaran/AFP Kurdish forces launched a major assault on Thursday on a town held by the IS group near Mosul, opening a new front in the offensive to wrest back the extremists’ last Iraqi bastion. Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi told an international meeting in Paris that the offensive was “advancing faster than expected” as it entered its fourth day. France ...

  Jakarta / AFP Indonesian police shot dead a man carrying knives and suspected pipe bombs after he launched a daylight assault on officers near Jakarta on Thursday, an official said, in an attack later claimed by the IS group. The man was shot three times as he stabbed wildly at officers on a busy intersection in Tangerang, a satellite ...

  Aden /AFP Scattered clashes between rebels and pro-government forces undermined a fragile ceasefire in Yemen on Thursday as global pressure intensified for a lasting truce in a country where millions are homeless and hungry. The ceasefire, for an initial period of three days, took effect shortly before midnight on Wednesday under a United Nations plan which aims to allow ...

  Tehran/ AFP Iran denied reports from Washington that it played a part in failed missile attacks on US naval vessels off Yemen, saying on Thursday that the claims were “false and paranoid”. “The vague and contradictory remarks by American officials these past days are false, paranoid and inappropriate,” foreign ministry spokesman Bahram Ghasemi told the official IRNA news agency. ...