Tag: InternationalNews

{{A smaller than expected rise in German business sentiment in September and growing uncertainty over the strength of the global economy helped nudge world shares lower on Tuesday, while major currencies were trapped in tight ranges.}}

Germany’s Ifo think tank said that its latest reading on business morale showed that the euro zone’s biggest economy was on a sustainable growth path after weak start to the year, but that any recovery was likely to be modest.

“The further rise in German Ifo business sentiment confirms that the economy is recovering, but we continue to expect growth to be reasonably sluggish,” said Ben May, a European economist at Capital Economics.

The euro initially slipped when the Ifo fell short of expectations though soon recovered to be little changed against the dollar at $1.35.

European shares turned negative after the report, trading down 0.1% on the day, before edging higher again .FTEU3, while German government bond futures hit a session high, up 33 ticks on the day.

The MSCI global index of shares dipped 0.1 percent .MIWD00000PUS after MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan .MIAPJ0000PUS had earlier eased 0.6 percent, taking its cue from a softer Wall Street.

One bright spot was shares in iPhone suppliers, burnished by news that Apple Inc (AAPL.O) sold 9 million new iPhones during their first three days in stores with U.S. stock futures point to a steady start on Wall Street later in the day.

reuters

{{Three members of Venezuela’s security forces were arrested in connection with the 1.3 tonnes of cocaine French police found aboard an Air France flight that originated in Caracas, a top cabinet minister said Sunday.}}

Intelligence agents “have detained a first lieutenant from the anti-drug unit of the Bolivarian National Guard” along with two National Guard sergeants, Justice and Interior Minister Miguel Rodriguez told state network VTV. He said that further arrests were expected.

French officials had announced on Saturday the discovery of the narcotics, hidden in 30 suitcases on an Air France flight from Venezuela’s capital Caracas to Paris. The flight had arrived in Paris on September 10.

Police and legal sources said that the cocaine had a street value of some 200 million euros ($270 million).

{{Accomplices}}

According to Rodriguez, it was “almost obvious” that there were accomplices working with the airline.

“How can the cocaine shipment reach France and it gets taken out without going through the normal controls?” he asked.

The suitcases carrying the cocaine were registered under false names that did not correspond to passengers on the flight to Paris’s Charles de Gaulle airport, police said.

Air France said it was still trying to find out how the drugs were smuggled on board.

“Pending the results of these investigations, immediate measures have been taken to enhance our checks of baggage and goods on departure from certain sensitive destinations,” the airline said in a statement.

Over the coming days, agents will scrutinise footage taken from security cameras at the Simon Bolivar International Airport and interrogate personnel that work in the airport luggage area, he said.

Rodriguez said that he has assigned a special team of prosecutors to the probe.

{{Record haul}}

French Interior Minister Manuel Valls, who announced the haul on Saturday as “the biggest seizure of cocaine ever made in mainland France”, told reporters that “several members of a criminal organisation” had been arrested on Monday.

Police said that at least six people of several European nationalities were being held in relation to the case.

The seizure was the result of cooperation between security forces in France, the Netherlands, Spain and the UK, Valls said.

Cocaine comes from coca leaves grown in countries like Colombia, Peru and Bolivia. Venezuela does not produce cocaine, according to United Nations monitors, but has become a major transit point for US -and European-destined cocaine in recent years, with Washington accusing several senior Venezuelan military officials of involvement.

wirestory

Angry Pakistani Christians on Monday denounced the deadliest attack ever in this country against members of their faith as the death toll from the church bombings climbed overnight to 81.

A pair of suicide bombers blew themselves up amid hundreds of worshippers outside a historic church in northwestern Pakistan.

The attack on the All Saints Church in the city of Peshawar, which also wounded over 140 people, occurred as worshippers were leaving after services to get a free meal of rice offered on the front lawn.

A wing of the Pakistani Taliban quickly claimed responsibility for the bombing, saying they would continue to target non-Muslims until the U.S. stops drone attacks in the remote tribal region of Pakistan.

The bombings also raised new questions about the Pakistani government’s push to strike a peace deal with the militants to end a decade-long insurgency that has killed thousands of people.

“What dialogue are we talking about? Peace with those who are killing innocent people,” asked the head of the All Pakistan Minorities Alliance, Paul Bhatti, whose brother, a federal minister, was gunned down by an Islamic extremist in 2011.

“They don’t want dialogue,” said Bhatti. “They don’t want peace.”

The death toll on Monday climbed to 81, after three more of the wounded in Peshawar died overnight, according to police official Noor Khan.

“Our state and our intelligence agencies are so weak that anybody can kill anyone anytime. It is a shame,” said Bhatti.

Angry Christians blocked roads around the country to protest the bombings. On one of the main roads coming into the capital of Islamabad, demonstrators burned tires and demanded government protection for the members of the Christian minority.

Missionary schools around the country would be closed for three days, said Christian leader Nasir Gill.

Churches and other places important to the Christian community in Peshawar have been given extra security, said Khan, the police official.

But this has not been sufficient to appease angry Christians in Pakistan, who want the government to take even stronger steps to protect them.

Many churches, as well as mosques and other religious institutions, already receive some type of police protection although many Christians say that is too little. A police officer who was supposed to be protecting the church where the suicide bombers attacked Sunday was killed in the incident.

france24

{{A group of German hackers claimed to have cracked the iPhone fingerprint scanner on Sunday, just two days after Apple Inc launched the technology that it promises will better protect devices from criminals and snoopers seeking access.}}

If the claim is verified, it will be embarrassing for Apple which is betting on the scanner to set its smartphone apart from new models of Samsung Electronics Co Ltd and others running the Android operating system of Google Inc.

Two prominent iPhone security experts told Reuters that they believed the German group, known as the Chaos Computing Club, or CCC, had succeeded in defeating Apple’s Touch ID, though they had not personally replicated the work.

One of them, Charlie Miller, co-author of the iOS Hacker’s Handbook, described the work as “a complete break” of Touch ID security. “It certainly opens up a new possibility for attackers.”

Apple representatives did not respond to requests for comment.

CCC, one the world’s largest and most respected hacking groups, posted a video on its website that appeared to show somebody accessing an iPhone 5S with a fabricated print. The site described how members of its biometrics team had cracked the new fingerprint reader, one of the few major high-tech features added to the latest version of the iPhone.

The group said they targeted Touch ID to knock down reports about its “marvels,” which suggested it would be difficult to crack.

“Fingerprints should not be used to secure anything. You leave them everywhere, and it is far too easy to make fake fingers out of lifted prints,” a hacker named Starbug was quoted as saying on the CCC’s site.

The group said it defeated Touch ID by photographing the fingerprint of an iPhone’s user, then printing it on to a transparent sheet, which it used to create a mold for a “fake finger.”

CCC said similar processes have been used to crack “the vast majority” of fingerprint sensors on the market.

“I think it’s legit,” said Dino Dai Zovi,” another co-author of the iOS Hacker’s Handbook. “The CCC doesn’t fool around or over-hype, especially when they are trying to make a political point.”

Touch ID, which was only introduced on the top-of-the-line iPhone 5S, lets users unlock their devices or make purchases on iTunes by simply pressing their finger on the home button. It uses a sapphire crystal sensor embedded in the button.

Data used for verification is encrypted and stored in a secure enclave of the phone’s A7 processor chip.

{{A suicide bomb attack on a church in the Pakistani city of Peshawar has killed at least 60 people, police said.}}

The attack occurred as parishioners left the building after attending Sunday mass, police said.

“After the service ended, people started to come out and the suicide bomber rushed towards them,” said Najeeb Bogvi, a senior police officer in Peshawar.

A hospital spokesperson said that at least 120 people had been wounded in the attack.

Christians make up about four percent of Pakistan’s population of 180 million and tend to keep a low profile in a country where Islamist fighters frequently bomb targets they see as heretical, including Christians and Shias.

In 2009, 40 houses and a church were set ablaze by a mob of 1,000 Muslims in the town of Gojra in Punjab province. At least seven Christians were burnt to death.

The attacks were triggered by reports of the desecration of the Holy Quran.

Source: Agencies

{{Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has stated that Western governments must recognise his country’s right to enrich uranium in any deal to allay their concerns about its nuclear programme. }}

In a statement on Sunday, Rouhani said that the recognition should extend to “all rights of the Iranian nation, particularly nuclear rights and the right to enrich uranium on its territory within the framework of international rules”.

He was referring to the terms of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

His comments, at an annual military parade, came on the eve of his departure for the UN General Assembly in New York.

“If they (Western governments) accept these rights, the Iranian people are a rational people, peaceful and friendly. We stand ready to cooperate and together we can settle all the region’s problems and even global ones,” Rouhani said.

“The Iranian people want development and are not looking to make an atomic weapon.”

wirestory

{{El Salvador has banned 14 international footballers for life over match-fixing in the third such scandal to hit the sport this week.}}

One other player was given an 18-month ban, two were suspended for six months, one was acquitted while four more face further investigation, Carlos Mendez, the country’s football federation (FESFUT) president, told a news conference on Friday.

“The work of the disciplinary commission has been exhaustive,” Mendez said.

“We have used valuable information which has come from interviews, video accounts from people who have had the strength to declare and help us find those responsible.”

The bans come one day after a group of mostly British footballers appeared in a Melbourne court after Australian police arrested them in an operation to smash a multi-million-dollar match-fixing ring.

Police in Singapore said on Wednesday that they had arrested 14 people suspected of being members of an organised crime ring in a match-fixing bust there.

The 14 El Salvador players given life bans were goalkeepers Dagoberto Portillo and Miguel Montes, defenders Ramon Flores, Miguel Granadino, Luis Anaya, Mardoqueo Henriquez, Alfredo Pacheco, Marvin Gonzalez and Reynaldo Hernandez and midfielders Osael Romero, Darwin Bonilla, Dennis Alas, Ramon Sanchez and Christian Castillo.

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{{Germans voted on Sunday in an election expected to hand Chancellor Angela Merkel a third four-year term, but she may be forced into an awkward coalition with her leftist rivals following a surge in support for a new anti-euro party.}}

Europe is closely watching Germany’s first national election since the eruption of the euro zone debt crisis in 2009. Some hope Merkel will take a softer stance on struggling euro states such as Greece if she is pushed into a so-called grand coalition with the Social Democrats (SPD).

But major policy shifts seem unlikely because the center-left SPD, whose campaign stalled after a gaffe-prone start by its lead candidate Peer Steinbrueck, agrees with the thrust of Merkel’s approach even as it accuses her of weak leadership.

The most recent opinion polls show support for Merkel’s conservative bloc – her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU) – at around 39 percent, about 13 points ahead of the SPD, the second-biggest party.

That virtually guarantees that Merkel, whose staunch defense of German interests during the crisis has sent her approval ratings soaring over 60 percent, will stay on as chancellor.

“I voted for CDU because they’re a serious party and in the last eight years they’ve really moved the country forward,” said policeman Jochen Anders, 58, after casting his ballot in Berlin.

“They have reduced our debts significantly, brought us through the euro zone and financial crises successfully and the economy has recovered,” he said.

Merkel, who grew up in communist East Germany, has presided over a robust economy and booming labor market.

The 59-year-old’s “step by step” leadership style is criticized abroad as too timid but applauded by many at home, where she was cheered as “Mutti”, or Mum, on the campaign trail.

The SPD’s Steinbrueck, a 66-year-old former finance minister, voted in the former West German capital Bonn.

“I feel very good … Now it is finally time for the voters to decide,” he told reporters.

The first exit polls will be published at 6 p.m. (12 noon EDT). Of the 62 million Germans eligible to vote, out of a population of 80 million, about a third described themselves in the run-up to the election as undecided, adding to the uncertainty.

reuters