International

• Tuesday, May 22nd 2012 - 18:55 UTC

  NATO aggress to leave Afghanistan end of 2014: what happens later is anybody’s guess

  

  NATO leaders sealed a landmark agreement to hand control of Afghanistan over to its own security forces by the middle of next year, putting the Western alliance on an “irreversible” path out of an unpopular, decade-long war.

• Tuesday, May 22nd 2012 - 18:43 UTC

  Women commanders take over HMS Portland and Patrol Boat Squadron

  

  Two Royal Navy commanders have accomplished two major achievements: Commander Sarah West, aged 40, joins Type 23 frigate HMS Portland in Rosyth on Tuesday becoming the first woman in the Royal Navy's history to be selected to command a major warship.

• Tuesday, May 22nd 2012 - 18:39 UTC

  US and Japan leading economic recovery but still fragile says latest OECD report

  

  The United States and Japan are leading a fragile economic recovery among developed countries that could yet be blown off course if the Euro zone fails to contain its flaring growth crisis, the OECD said on Tuesday.

• Tuesday, May 22nd 2012 - 06:09 UTC

  Argentina proposal to increase Mercosur common external tariff from 22% to 35%

  

  Argentina is planning to propose its fellow Mercosur members to increase the common external tariff, CET from the current 22% to 35%, when they meet at the next summit in Mendoza. Argentina currently holds the pro tempore chair of the group and at the coming summit the helm will be transferred to Brazil.

• Tuesday, May 22nd 2012 - 06:05 UTC

  Exports of heifers booming as China build ‘factory-modelled” dairy farms

  

  Agribusiness company Elders says it can't get enough dairy heifers from Australia to supply China's growing demand and for the second consecutive year, a record shipment of 100,000 cattle will sail from dairies in Australia, New Zealand and Uruguay.

• Tuesday, May 22nd 2012 - 05:52 UTC

  Price of oil picks up after China announces it will bolster economic growth

  

  The price of oil rose for the first time in seven days in New York after China pledged to boost the nation’s economy and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said the balance between supply and demand of crude is tightening.

• Tuesday, May 22nd 2012 - 03:11 UTC

  Banker launches another challenging controversial book with Germany as the “Euro-zone hostage”

  

  Former German central banker Thilo Sarrazin, whose musings on Muslim immigrants sparked outrage in 2010 has triggered fresh controversy with a book that paints Germany as the Euro zone's hostage, forced to pay out vast sums to atone for the Holocaust.

• Tuesday, May 22nd 2012 - 03:07 UTC

  German oil company ignores YPF seizure and keeps expanding activities in Argentina

  

  Germany's Wintershall, the oil and gas arm of chemicals group BASF, said on Monday it was unperturbed by the enforced nationalisation of Argentine oil company YPF, having just been awarded another oil and gas licence there.

• Monday, May 21st 2012 - 06:39 UTC

  Taiwan demands from Latam allies “fair, legal and effective” cooperation relation

  

  Taiwan will continue to cooperate with Latin America as long as the relation is fair, legal and effective, said re-elected president Ma Ying Jeou who also described that links with Beijing will continue to be: “no unification, no independence and no arms”.

• Monday, May 21st 2012 - 06:26 UTC

  Nato discusses how to leave Afghanistan without causing the collapse of Kabul

  

  US President Barack Obama has warned of “hard days ahead” at a Nato summit in Chicago dominated by the issue of withdrawal from Afghanistan. France's new President Francois Hollande has again said he will pull French troops out by the end of 2012, nearly two years ahead of schedule.