Category: World

PARIS, Jan 27, 2008 (AFP) – French investigators on Sunday extended the detention of accused rogue trader Jerome Kerviel over a seven-billion-dollar fraud as Societe Generale revealed he had been gambling with more than 73 billion dollars in deals when caught.“What happened at Societe Generale is certainly not a disaster that resulted from our strategy. […]

JAKARTA, Jan 28, 2008 (AFP) – An airliner with 141 passengers hit a calf while landing at an airport in Indonesia’s easternmost province of Papua, the state Antara news agency reported Monday.The Merpati Nusantara Airlines Boeing 737 was landing at Merauke airport in southwest Papua when the calf ran across the runway, the agency said. […]

Jan 28, 2008 (AFP) – Tamil Tiger rebels Monday shelled Sri Lanka’s main military base in the island’s north, defence officials said.There were no immediate reports of casualties. More than a dozen shells hit the Palaly military complex in the Jaffna peninsula on the northern edge of the Indian Ocean Island, officials said, adding that […]

COLUMBIA, South Carolina, Jan 26, 2008 (AFP) – Senator Barack Obama routed Hillary Clinton in South Carolina’s Democratic presidential primary on Saturday, riding massive African-American support to a critical win in his bid to become the first black US president. With 98 percent of precincts reporting, Obama led the former first lady 55 to 27 […]

DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan 27, 2008 (AFP) – Serious concerns were raised in Davos last week about the ability of the Chinese government to spy on the country’s 500 million mobile phone users.The head of China’s biggest mobile phone company, which has more than 300 million subscribers, stunned delegates by revealing that the company had unlimited […]

CLEVELAND, Ohio, Jan 27, 2008 (AFP) – Hit by America’s mortgage crisis, the midwestern city of Cleveland has launched a legal battle against major Wall Street banks it blames for the devastation of its housing market. Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson has accused a group of 21 big banks and financial firms of triggering local housing […]

SYDNEY, Jan 27, 2008 (AFP) – Turbulence on world stock markets has fuelled a new gold rush, sending high-tech traders in search of the same “barbaric” treasure mankind has lusted after for millennia. It was British economist John Maynard Keynes who called gold a “barbaric relic” early last century, but modern investors are showing the […]

PARIS, Jan 27, 2008 (AFP) – A week from hell when he had to admit that 7.1 billion dollars had gone missing and another 3.5 billion was lost on the US subprime market, has tested even the mettle of crisis veteran Societe Generale chief Daniel Bouton. Societe Generale’s market value has lost more than 40 […]

PARIS, Jan 25, 2008 (AFP) – Major world banks might need to raise a further 143 billion dollars in capital to confront the impact of ratings downgrades to bond insurers, a study by Barclays Capital warned Friday.A downgrade to the bond insurer would therefore force banks, which have already revalued billions of dollars in assets […]

DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan 26, 2008 (AFP) – World business leaders and political powerbrokers wrapped up their annual gathering in Davos on Saturday by revisiting the issue of global economic uncertainty that clouded this year’s event. “I would like to turn our moral compact into legally binding contracts. Then my advice to the developing world? Get […]

PARIS, Jan 24, 2008 (AFP) – The trader blamed for the near five-billion-euro fraud at French banking giant Societe Generale is “not on the run”, his lawyer said Thursday.The Paris prosecutor’s office opened a preliminary investigation into the scandal while scores of shareholders lodged suit against the bank for fraud and misconduct. “I can confirm […]

DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan 25, 2008 (AFP) – Corporate responsibility rather than profit was set to take centre stage in Davos on Friday, as the annual get-together of business chiefs turns its attention to issues of health, aid and development.“If every company here, if every country represented here would decide to divest from Iran, that can […]