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China has warned western militaries to stay out of waters and airspace near its borders if they want to avoid dangerous run-ins with the People’s Liberation Army, putting on display the growing risks of unintended conflict as geopolitical competition grows. The blunt message from General Li Shangfu, China’s new defence minister, followed a near collision

How bad was your week? Well fear not. Rajesh Vishwas is here to make you feel better. The Indian government official was recently suspended after he ordered a reservoir to be drained so he could retrieve his mobile phone, which had fallen in when he tried to take a selfie while picnicking with friends. Taking

CIA director Bill Burns travelled to China last month, a clandestine visit by one of President Joe Biden’s most trusted officials that signals how concerned the White House had become about deteriorating relations between Beijing and Washington. Five people familiar with the situation said Burns, a former top diplomat who is frequently entrusted with delicate

Shares of petcare retailer Chewy surged as much as 13 per cent after it posted a surprise profit and a strong full-year outlook. The company earned $22.2mn in net income, a 20 per cent year-on-year increase and a shock to analysts, who expected a loss of $10.6mn. Its $2.78bn in sales was a 14 per

When the former US president Donald Trump was found liable of the sexual abuse of journalist E Jean Carroll last month, some observers might have hoped this would make him less appealing to American voters. Not so. If you look at a Quinnipiac poll released in late May, Trump now has the backing of 56

Moscow came under attack by several drones on Tuesday morning, Russian officials said, exposing the capital’s vulnerability to retaliation over President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. The barrage shortly after sunrise came as Russia launched another wave of air strikes on Kyiv, killing at least one person, hospitalising others and forcing the evacuation of a

India’s top investigative agency has filed a criminal complaint accusing Rolls-Royce and BAE Systems of engaging in corruption over historic deals to supply fighter jets to the country. The Central Bureau of Investigation alleged that the companies had between 2003 and 2012 engaged in a “criminal conspiracy” to “cheat the government of India” over deals

Joe Biden tried to make the best of the fiscal truce he negotiated with Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy late on Saturday, designed to prevent a potentially devastating default on US debt in little more than a week. “The agreement represents a compromise, which means not everyone gets what they want,” the US president said.

London is the European stock exchange most at risk of suffering big departures to the US, according to a ranking compiled by the Financial Times identifying large companies with the strongest business case to consider a New York listing. The FT assessed 111 European companies, each with a market capitalisation of at least $10bn and

Chinese shares erased their gains for the year and metals prices fell amid mounting concerns over the outlook for the country’s economy and the possibility of an unprecedented US debt default. China’s benchmark CSI 300 index of Shanghai- and Shenzhen-listed stocks fell as much as 1.1 per cent on Wednesday, pushing the index’s year-to-date losses

The UK will escape a recession this year, the IMF said on Tuesday, adding that the country’s economy had been “buoyed by resilient demand in the context of declining energy prices”. But the fund cautioned that Britain risked being stuck with persistent inflation unless interest rates stayed high for longer. “Economic activity has slowed significantly

Meta has been hit with a €1.2bn fine by the EU and ordered to suspend transfers of user data to the US, in the largest penalty to be imposed against a Big Tech company in the bloc over privacy violations. Ireland’s Data Protection Commission, which oversees the General Data Protection Regulation, on Monday handed down

China said that US chipmaker Micron Technology’s products posed “serious network security risks” as it banned operators of key infrastructure from buying them, in its first big measure against an American semiconductor group. The Cyberspace Administration of China on Sunday announced that the company, which is the biggest US maker of memory chips, “posed significant

European stocks rose on Friday, pushing Germany’s Dax close to a record high, as investors awaited speeches by central bankers later in the day for clues on the future direction of interest rates. The benchmark index in Frankfurt gained 0.3 per cent in early trade, putting it less than 100 points off the 16,290 high

European equities rose on Thursday, joining an overnight rally on Wall Street, as concerns over a potential US government default and the health of regional banks eased. Europe’s region-wide Stoxx 600 was up 0.4 per cent, recovering from two days of losses, while France’s Cac 40 rose 0.6 and Germany’s Dax rose 1 per cent. London’s

Brazilian oil and gas producer Petrobras has ditched a practice of selling diesel and petrol domestically in line with global market prices, in a significant shift for the state-controlled group under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. It fulfils a key campaign promise by the country’s leader, who has criticised the cost of fuel and

How is one to assess the possibility of a voluntary default by the world’s most important country? Is something as mad as this really likely to happen? What might be the consequences if it did? These questions are impossible to answer. This is not because it is a “black swan” — that is, unimaginable. A

European and Asian stocks rose on Monday as investors cheered German economic data that indicated inflation in Europe’s largest economy was slowing. Europe’s region-wide Stoxx 600 rose 0.2 per cent, extending its rally from last week, while France’s Cac 40 edged up 0.4 per cent and London’s FTSE 100 gained 0.3 per cent in the

Voters are heading to the polls in Turkey’s most consequential election in two decades as longtime leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan seeks to fend off a united opposition led by Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. Polls opened at 8am Ankara time on Sunday in presidential and parliamentary elections that offer two widely divergent paths for Turkey. Erdoğan, who first

China will send a special envoy to Ukraine, Russia and other countries to discuss a “political settlement to the Ukraine crisis”, the Chinese foreign ministry said on Friday. Li Hui, a former Chinese ambassador to Moscow, will visit Ukraine, Poland, France, Germany and Russia from Monday, spokesperson Wang Wenbin announced at a press conference. “Sending