The Trump administration announced Monday that it is tightening the six-decade trade embargo on Cuba by allowing lawsuits against Cuban companies using properties confiscated after its 1959 revolution.
The UK will not lower food standards to secure a post-Brexit trade deal with the US, the government says. It comes after Washington published its objectives for a US-UK trade pact. The US wants comprehensive market access for its farmers' products that would see more US-made food on British supermarket shelves.
The United States on Friday welcomed the blocking of a proposal to add a group of countries, including four American territories, to the EU money-laundering blacklist after almost all member states opposed it. The US ambassador to the European Union, Gordon Sondland, hit out at the dogmatic posturing of the European Commission, the bloc's executive arm.
The United States and Russia clashed on Friday over how to assist ailing Venezuela, with Moscow pledging new relief channelled through President Nicolas Maduro and Washington slapping sanctions over the blocking of US aid it tried to force through the border.
Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodriguez announced at a press conference with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that the central office of state oil company PDVSA in Europe, located in Lisbon, will move to Moscow to guarantee the security of the country's assets abroad, which were delivered to the Venezuelan Parliament in other countries.
President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un abruptly cut short their two-day summit on Thursday after the two leaders failed to reach an agreement to dismantle that country’s nuclear weapons. Although Kim said he was ready in principle to denuclearize, he and Trump ended their meetings without sitting for a planned lunch and without participating in a joint signing ceremony.
The US trade deficit widened sharply in December as slowing global demand and a strong dollar weighed on exports, another sign that economic growth slowed in the fourth quarter. Other data from the Commerce Department on Wednesday showed new orders for US-made goods barely rose in December and business spending on equipment was much weaker than previously thought, pointing to a softening in manufacturing activity.
China's manufacturing activity shrank for a third straight month in February, sinking to its worst performance in three years as the economy slows and the US trade war bites, official data showed on Thursday. The Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI), a gauge of factory conditions, came in at 49.2 for the month, down from 49.5 in January, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
The US House of Representatives has voted to revoke President Donald Trump's emergency declaration over building a US-Mexico border wall. The bid to overturn the declaration now goes to the Republican-majority Senate, where some conservatives have said they will vote with Democrats.
Brazilian Vice President Hamilton Mourao said on Monday that under no circumstances would his country allow the United States to intervene militarily in Venezuela from Brazilian territory.