June, 2016

• 21 June

  Taliban kidnaps two dozen people in Helmand province

    Kandahar / AFP Taliban on Tuesday kidnapped around two dozen people after pulling them off buses in southern Afghanistan, officials said, the latest in series of abductions on the country’s increasingly dangerous highways. The pre-dawn incident in Washer district of Helmand province comes a day after militants killed more than 20 people, including 14 Nepali security guards, in a ...

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• 21 June

  EU approves 6-month Russia sanctions rollover

  

    Brussels / AFP EU ambassadors agreed to roll over damaging economic sanctions against Russia for six months in the absence of any progress on resolving the Ukraine conflict, European sources said on Tuesday. The measures target the oil, financial and defence sectors of the Russian economy and were first imposed after the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 ...

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• 21 June

  Signs of possible fresh N Korea missile launch

  Seoul / AFP North Korea appears to be readying another test of a powerful, new medium-range missile, following a series of failures for a ballistic weapons programme that aspires to threaten the US mainland, multiple reports said on Tuesday. Japanese and South Korean media quoted official sources as saying North Korea looked to have deployed a so-called Musudan missile near ...

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• 21 June

  Brazil’s Supreme Court fights rot at the top

  

    Here’s something you probably already know about Latin America: In a region ravaged by graft and political payola, regard for elected authorities is dragging bottom. Serial corruption scandals are one of the main reasons why dissatisfaction with democracy is higher in this region than in any other. Here’s something you may not know: The long-flawed justice system is on ...

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• 21 June

  Solar Impulse set to propel clean technology

  History of aviation is being rewritten in our lifetime, as the Solar Impulse 2 project is getting closer to completing a world tour in an ultralight one-man aircraft intended to demonstrate how best technology may provide solutions to combat global warming and advance aviation industry. The sun-powered Solar Impulse 2 set off from New York’s JFK airport early Monday, embarking ...

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• 21 June

  With climate change, doing the math matters

    Mark Buchanan sometimes say that there’s no need to rush in addressing climate change — that our constantly increasing wealth will eventually make the problem relatively inexpensive to solve. Thanks to some careful mathematical research, that argument is looking increasingly wrong. Placing a value on something that may happen 50 or 100 years from now isn’t easy. Economists typically ...

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• 21 June

  International N-community should pressure China to accept India’s NSG membership

    Bhavani Castro SPECIAL TO EMIRATES BUSINESS Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently embarked on an impressive five-nation tour that included countries as diverse as Afghanistan and Mexico. Modi’s international travels have rendered fruitful results, bolstering diplomatic ties and giving India more visibility in the international community. The six-day tour included visits to Afghanistan, Qatar, Switzerland, the United States, and ...

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• 21 June

  ECB readies to gauge appeal of paying banks to lend money

  

    Bloomberg The European Central Bank is about to find out how attractive its offer to pay lenders to lend really is. Starting tomorrow, euro-area banks can bid for a four-year loan from the ECB at an interest rate that begins at zero and could ultimately be negative. The net take-up, after institutions repay their borrowings from an earlier and ...

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• 21 June

  Axa feels pain from low interest rates

  

    AFP France’s biggest insurer Axa has lowered its earnings target for the next few years and is seeking to cut costs as low interest rates take their toll on the industry’s profits. Axa, which is to unveil its new strategic plan Tuesday, said it now eyed an average annual increase in underlying earnings per share of between 3 and ...

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• 21 June

  PBOC discusses opening offshore yuan market

  

    Bloomberg China’s central bank said it has met with onshore lenders to discuss allowing them to trade in the offshore yuan market, a move that would accelerate convergence between the country’s two exchange rates. As the country increasingly opens up its currency market, Chinese commercial banks have a growing need for better integration between the onshore and offshore markets, ...

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