International

• Friday, May 3rd 2013 - 02:27 UTC

  Bank of Canada names long term bureaucrat and economist as new head

  

  The Bank of Canada has named long-term bureaucrat and economist Stephen Poloz as its new head, replacing Mark Carney who is going to run the Bank of England. Mr Poloz was a surprise choice as many observers expected Mr Carney's senior deputy, Tiff Macklem, to succeed him.

• Friday, May 3rd 2013 - 02:24 UTC

  EU “nightmare of unemployment” debate reaches ECB, which cuts rates to record low 0.5%

  

  The European Central Bank cut interest rates to a new record low on Thursday amid a chorus of calls for the Euro zone to focus on growth to end a “nightmare of unemployment” in the bloc. It was the first cut in ten months.

• Thursday, May 2nd 2013 - 07:56 UTC

  British tax havens will have to open their banking systems to UK and EU scrutiny

  

  Tax havens such as Bermuda and the Cayman Islands will work more closely with Britain and other European countries to fight tax evasion, British finance minister George Osborne said.

• Thursday, May 2nd 2013 - 07:37 UTC

  Falkland Islands’ economy ‘strangling’ and intimidation by Argentina reported in British media

  

  Argentina’s ongoing attempts to strangle the Falkland Islands economy by intimidating cruise vessels from calling at Stanley and other islands has been picked up by the Daily Mail in an article written by Ian Drury.

• Thursday, May 2nd 2013 - 07:23 UTC

  Israel defense supplier to establish an aerospace research hub in south Brazil

  

  Israeli defense giant Elbit Systems Ltd. plans to create a hub of aerospace research in the southern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul, company officials said.

• Thursday, May 2nd 2013 - 07:18 UTC

  Foreign Office and Parliament plan strategy ahead of Scotland’s independence referendum

  

  Britain’s Foreign Secretary William Hague welcomed the publication of the Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee Report on foreign policy considerations for an independent Scotland. The Foreign Affairs Committee announced its inquiry into ‘the foreign policy implications of and for a separate Scotland’ on 18 July 2012.

• Thursday, May 2nd 2013 - 06:12 UTC

  Falkland Island’s: Argentina reclaims “absolute and exclusive sovereignty over the Islands”

  

  Defence minister Arturo Puricelli said that Argentines “are not prepared to tolerate the usurpation” of the Malvinas Islands ‘for the rest of our lives’ and the honour and glory for those who fought in the South Atlantic “is going to be recalled until we obtain absolute and exclusive sovereignty over our Islands”.

• Wednesday, May 1st 2013 - 06:14 UTC

  Argentina openly clashes with UN over the judicial reform; calls Rapporteur ‘ignorant’

  

  Argentina expressed on Tuesday its “discomfort” over the “unheard of” attitude displayed by the UN Special Rapporteur, Gabriela Knaul, who urged the Cristina Fernández administration to reconsider the Council of Magistrates reform and injunction regulation bills.

• Wednesday, May 1st 2013 - 02:13 UTC

  South American FIFA officials took “bribes”; European Blatter ‘was clumsy’

  

  Joao Havelange has quit as FIFA honorary president while Sepp Blatter has been cleared of misconduct in the ISL bribery case, a report by FIFA ethics committee said. The report described the behaviour of Havelange as “morally and ethically reproachable” in his dealings with ISL, FIFA former marketing partner which went bankrupt in 2001.

• Tuesday, April 30th 2013 - 21:00 UTC

  UK Ministry of Defence deems wind towers a national security threat

  

  By John C.K. Daly of Oilprice.com - Twenty-plus years on, the collapse of the USSR in 1991 threatened massive Western defence budgets, bereft of a major enemy like the “Evil Empire.”