News Archive - 27 August 2016

(Picture: Kazem Seddiqi performing Friday prayers in Tehran. Source: Arash Mirsepasi/YJC)   Three days before the start of the Government Week, commemoration of Mohammad-Ali Rajaei and Mohammad-Reza Bahonar, president and prime minister of the country who lost their lives in an explosion masterminded by Mojahedin-e Khalgh Organization (MKO), Friday...

On August 16, Tehran's attorney general, Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi, told a presser that a dual national has been arrested on charges of espionage. This immediately raised a myriad of speculations in principlist media outlets, which had already had their own suspicions. On August 23, unverified reports started to make...

Iran has detected and removed malicious software from two of its petrochemical complexes, a senior military official said on Saturday, after announcing last week it was investigating whether recent petrochemical fires were caused by cyber attacks.   The official said the malware at the two plants was inactive and...

>JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. Federal Reserve policymakers are signaling they could raise U.S. interest rates soon but they are already weighing new tools they may need to fight the next recession.A solid U.S. labor market "has strengthened" the case for the first rate increase since last December, Fed...

>Clinton, a former secretary of state, attended the meeting alone, according to a pool report. The meeting was held at the Federal Bureau of Investigation's field office in White Plains, New York, not far from the Chappaqua, New York, residence she shares with her husband, former President Bill Clinton. It...

>DES MOINES, Iowa U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump offered fresh details of how he would tackle illegal immigration on Saturday, saying he would crack down on those who overstay their visas as he sought to quiet criticism from conservatives.In a campaign speech in Des Moines, Iowa, Trump...

>JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. Central bankers in charge of the vast bulk of the world's economy delved deep into the weeds of money markets and interest rates over a three-day conference here, and emerged with a common plea to their colleagues in the rest of government: please help.Mired in a...

>ATHENS Greece said on Sunday the EU was "sleepwalking towards a cliff" by sticking to austerity rules that created huge inequalities among members, and it expected a debt relief deal for itself to be honored by end-2016 so that its economy could recover.Athens, facing a second bailout review entailing...

>A joint investigation by the United Nations and the global chemical weapons watchdog OPCW found that Syrian government troops were responsible for two toxic gas attacks and Islamic State militants used sulfur mustard gas."We are working with our partners in the U.N. Security Council, notably the United States...

>The proposal was one of several discussed at an international gathering of central bankers who are looking for ways to stimulate economies even after they have cut interest rates to near zero and flooded banks with money.In his paper, economist Ricardo Reis put forward a new way for the...

>"In the long run, the consequences of low interest rates or even negative interest rates are harmful, such as for retirement provisions," he told German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung in comments due to be published on Sunday. He said it was only possible to start putting an end to loose...

>The U.S. Federal Reserve should scrap a plan to shrink its massive bond holdings and instead keep them "indefinitely" as a new and little-recognized tool to protect against financial shocks, according to research presented on Saturday to some of the world's top central bankers. Former Fed Governor Jeremy Stein...

>FRANKFURT Activist investor Active Ownership Capital (AOC) succeeded in convincing shareholders of Stada (STAGn.DE) to remove the German drugmaker's supervisory board chairman in a voting marathon, but failed to install its candidate in the post.The supervisory board elected its former deputy Carl-Ferdinand Oetker as chairman early on Saturday,...

>Der Spiegel reported that Merkel had originally planned to announce in spring 2016 whether she would stand for election but cited CDU sources as saying the delay to next spring was needed as Horst Seehofer, leader of the Christian Social Union (CSU) - the CDU's Bavarian sister party - did...

>KARKAMIS, Turkey A group allied to Kurdish-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said it was bombarded by Turkish warplanes on Saturday, after Turkey's military launched an incursion this week into northern Syria against both Islamic State and Kurdish forces.Turkish officials had no immediate comment on the report which, if confirmed,...

>SEOUL South Korea and Japan said they will start talks on a new currency swap agreement after the countries' finance ministers met in Seoul on Saturday to bolster defenses against global financial uncertainties."South Korea offered to start talks on a currency swap agreement as part of boosting economic cooperation...

>"Sixteen bodies were found in a room, four injured were brought to hospitals in Moscow. The fire was completely put out by 0953 (0253 ET)," he said. The ministry said on its website that 12 people were rescued. The TV station said the people, who lived and worked at the...

>KUALA LUMPUR Nearly a thousand protesters marched in the heart of the Malaysian capital on Saturday calling for the arrest of an unnamed high-ranking government official who U.S. investigators say received $700 million skimmed from a sovereign fund.The student-led mass rally comes more than a month after U.

>NAIROBI Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told African leaders on Saturday that his country will commit $30 billion in public and private support for infrastructure development on the continent.Resource-poor Japan has long been interested in tapping Africa's vast natural resources, even more so since dependence on oil and natural...

>A further two bodies were found overnight in the worst-hit town, Amatrice, which was flattened by Wednesday's powerful quake causing the deaths of at least 224 residents and tourists. Although rescuers continued to scour the mounds of rubble -- all that remains of most buildings -- there was little hope...

>SYDNEY Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said on Saturday it was imperative for Australia to cut its high debt levels, urging newly elected opposition lawmakers to support his economic reform agenda when parliament resumes next week.Turnbull is dependent on their support to rein in a budget deficit projected to...