Pistorius moved to ‘special needs’ prison

  Johannesburg / AFP Jailed Paralympic athlete Oscar Pistorius has been transferred to a prison adapted for disabled inmates to serve the rest of his sentence for murdering his girlfriend, a South African official said on Monday. The Department of Correctional Services said the double amputee was moved from Kgosi Mampuru II prison in the capital Pretoria to Atteridgeville Correctional ...

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German coalition backs FM Steinmeier as president

  Berlin /AFP Germany’s ruling coalition has backed Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier as the country’s next president, party sources said on Monday, paving the way for a sharp critic of Donald Trump to become head of state. Party leaders have been wrangling for months over whom to nominate as a potential successor to President Joachim Gauck, a 76-year-old former pastor ...

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2 former aides to S Korea’s Park quizzed over scandal

  Seoul / AFP South Korean prosecutors on Monday questioned two former key presidential aides over allegations they helped a shadowy confidant of President Park Geun-Hye meddle in state affairs and secretly visit her office. Park has been engulfed by a scandal that centres on Choi Soon-Sil, who is accused of using her personal ties with the president to coerce ...

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Italy’s chance to buck the Brexit-Trump trend

  The politician who ought to be most immune to the populist rage sweeping the world’s democracies should be Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi. A former mayor who won election in Florence at the age of 29 as the radical alternative to an establishment candidate, Renzi has solid populist credentials. Moreover, Italians have already had their Donald Trump. Billionaire businessman ...

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What Trump will mean for interest rates

For more than two years, markets have priced in a lot less monetary tightening than was signalled by the Federal Reserve’s “blue dots,” which represent the expectations of individual members of the Open Market Committee for the future path of interest rates. The surprise election of Donald Trump is likely to affect this divergence for two distinct reasons, and the ...

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Why a strong UK economy could mean a bad Brexit

  In the wake of the U.S. presidential election result, EU leaders are placing an even greater premium on solidarity. So in this topsy-turvy year, here’s another sobering thought to consider: Robust growth of the U.K. economy since the Brexit vote could be bad news for both the country and the continent. Let me explain. The economic picture in Britain ...

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Ramp up efforts to fight climate change

  First, the good news. Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions have stayed nearly the same for three years till 2015 at 36.3 billion tonnes. It will rise only by 0.2 percent by this year-end. Now, the bad news. Despite the levelling off of CO2 emission, it is not enough to check global warming and tackle climate change. The annual Global Carbon ...

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Asia’s two giants still have the best growth stories

  With globalization receding and China’s economy slowing down, there’s speculation that the Asia boom is over. It isn’t. The ascension of China and India continues to be the most important economic story in the world. To get a picture of how important these countries are, it helps to look at how much they’ve mattered in recent years. Here is ...

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Can $300 billion make companies behave?

  Are U.S. authorities being overzealous in their efforts to extract money from corporate miscreants? Actually, the right question might be why, despite the advent of multi-billion-dollar penalties, companies keep breaking the law. A new batch of fines — most notably the Justice Department’s $14 billion opening bid to settle the mortgage-related transgressions of Germany’s Deutsche Bank AG — has ...

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Americans finally are receiving bigger paycheques

  Noah Smith Earlier this year, the U.S. Census Bureau delivered some good news. Finally, after years of what seemed like a sluggish and uncertain recovery, American incomes were rising strongly again. Median household income jumped by more than 5 percent in 2015, and the lion’s share of the gains went to middle-class and lower-income folks. Employment rose strongly, and ...

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