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  Almaty / AFP Uzbekistan’s acting President Shavkat Mirziyoyev has carried out his first reshuffle, the authorities said Wednesday, in a sign of his growing authority following the death of long-reigning strongman Islam Karimov. Mirziyoyev was boosted from prime minister to acting leader of the Central Asian nation last week after Karimov died aged 78, following 27 years of ruthless ...

  Colombo / AFP Sri Lanka on Wednesday announced it was planning to relocate farmers living on the edges of forests inhabited by elephants to reduce the numbers killed on both sides. Wildlife minister Gamini Jayawickrama Perera said the island’s elephant population had dropped to 6,000, from 7,379 counted five years ago, as deadly encounters between animals and humans increase. ...

  Bloomberg Congolese former rebel leader Bosco Ntaganda on Wednesday again refused to attend his war crimes trial on the seventh day of a hunger strike which is posing a legal dilemma for international judges. Ntaganda is protesting his treatment in detention and has said he is “ready to die”, accusing the International Criminal Court of failing to give him ...

  Bloomberg Samsung Electronics Co. will push out a software update for South Korea that caps the capacity of Galaxy Note 7 smartphone batteries at 60 percent, a stop-gap measure to prevent overheating as the device’s global recall proceeds. The unusual move, announced on the first day of a major national holiday, reinforces the urgency with which Samsung’s trying to ...

  Beijing / AFP China’s rice, wheat and corn subsidies are in line with WTO rules, Beijing’s commerce ministry said after Washington launched legal action against what it says are “unfair” trade incentives worth $100 billion. The United States alleges China, the world’s largest producer of wheat and rice, doled out “market price support” for the grains above levels agreed ...

  BLOOMBERG Thailand’s central bank kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged for an 11th consecutive meeting, the longest streak on record, as an economic recovery continues to gain momentum. The Bank of Thailand held its one-day bond repurchase rate at 1.5 percent, with monetary policy committee members voting unanimously in favor, it said in Bangkok on Wednesday. All but one ...

  BLOOMBERG Jindal Steel & Power Ltd. has ramped up output at the 100-year-old Wongawilli coking coal mine in Australia and is set to resume operations at another in Mozambique as prices more than doubled this year. The New Delhi-based company is producing about 100,000 metric tons a month at the mine in Australia’s New South Wales, which it started ...

  Bloomberg Japan’s government plans to privatize Kyushu Railway Co. through a share sale that may fetch about 500 billion yen ($5 billion), according to people with direct knowledge of the matter, in what would be the rail industry’s biggest initial public offering in more than two decades. The Japan Railway Construction, Transport and Technology Agency, which fully owns the ...

  Strasbourg / AFP European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker on Wednesday issued a rallying cry for unity after Brexit, saying the EU is not in danger of splitting up but must fight back against “galloping populism”. In his annual State of the Union speech, Juncker unveiled a raft of economic and security proposals to find common ground after a year ...

  Frankfurt/ AFP German chemicals giant Bayer said on Wednesday it had agreed to buy the controversial US seeds and pesticides firm Monsanto for $66 billion, in a deal that triggered immediate criticism from environmentalists. After a months-long pursuit, Bayer said its US peer had accepted an improved offer of $128 per share for Monsanto in an all-cash transaction, avoiding ...