By Andrew MacAskill and Elizabeth Piper LONDON (Reuters) – British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s governing Conservatives lost two strategically important parliamentary seats on Friday but unexpectedly retained Boris Johnson’s old constituency in a setback for the opposition Labour Party. The Conservatives’ narrow victory in Johnson’s seat gave Sunak some breathing space to try to narrow…
By Maria Martinez, Gergely Szakacs and Karol Badohal BERLIN/WARSAW (Reuters) – European countries have not fully seized on the opportunity to plug workforce gaps presented by the arrival of millions of Ukrainian refugees, even though many of those fleeing the war are highly educated or have desperately needed skills. The flood of people over the…
MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russia’s Defence Ministry said on Friday that its Black Sea Fleet had practised firing rockets at surface targets in a live fire exercise, two days after it warned that ships heading to Ukraine’s Black Sea ports could be considered military targets. Russia issued its warning earlier this week after it quit the Black…
By Panu Wongcha-um and Chayut Setboonsarng BANGKOK (Reuters) – Thailand’s election-winning Move Forward party on Friday made way for runner-up and alliance partner Pheu Thai to try to form the next government, after its leader’s bid was twice thwarted this month by a military-backed Senate. The progressive Move Forward and populist Pheu Thai have the…
(This July 20 story has been corrected to change the attribution to senior Japan economist at UBS Securities, not economist at JPMorgan Chase in paragraph 5) By Leika Kihara TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan’s government on Thursday forecast inflation sharply exceeding the central bank’s 2% target this year, acknowledging broadening price rises that may keep alive…
MANILA (Reuters) – Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr said on Friday his government will not cooperate with the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) investigation into the thousands of killings committed during his predecessor’s ‘war on drugs’. Marcos maintained the ICC has no jurisdiction over the Southeast Asian country, which withdrew from the ICC in March 2019….
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Beijing-linked hackers accessed the email account of the U.S. ambassador to China in an espionage operation thought to have compromised at least hundreds of thousands of U.S. government emails, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on Thursday. Daniel Kritenbrink, the assistant secretary of state for East Asia, was also hacked in the wider…
By Brendan O’Brien (Reuters) – Alabama executed a man early on Friday for beating an elderly woman to death two decades ago, the state’s first execution since Governor Kay Ivey lifted a suspension on capital punishment in February following a review. James Barber, 64, was put to death by lethal injection at 1:56 a.m. U.S….
By Leika Kihara and Takahiko Wada TOKYO (Reuters) -The Bank of Japan is leaning towards keeping its yield control policy unchanged at next week’s meeting, five sources familiar with its thinking said, as policymakers prefer to scrutinise more data to ensure wages and inflation keep rising. But there is no consensus within the central bank…
By Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The United States on Thursday voiced mounting concern over Army Private Travis King, who dashed into North Korea two days ago, saying Pyongyang had a history of mistreating captured Americans. U.S. Army Secretary Christine Wormuth, in her first public comments on the case, said Washington was fully…
