LONDON — Less than a day after the worst terrorist attack in Sri Lanka’s history, thousands of Sri Lankans were consumed with vitriol, outrage and fear. Their community was threatened, they believed. Something must be done. But some settled on a target who was not a perpetrator of the Easter bombings, not a sympathizer, not […]

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Three of Bayer’s largest German investors said the drugmaker’s embattled management needed to stay at the helm to avoid further upheaval, despite their unease over a share price slump in the wake of the $63 billion Monsanto takeover. The backing for Chief Executive Werner Baumann comes after an unprecedented rebuke at the […]

DUBAI (Reuters) – Algeria needs to focus on avoiding economic instability during its political transition after the resignation of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, a senior official at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said. Jihad Azour, IMF’s Middle East and Central Asia director, also told Reuters the OPEC member should carry out reforms to help cut deficit […]

BENGKULU, INDONESIA (AFP) – Floods sparked by torrential rains have killed 29 people in Indonesia with a dozen more still missing, officials said Monday (April 29), marking the latest calamity for a disaster-prone nation. Landslides and floods are common, especially during the monsoon season between October and April, when rains lash the vast Southeast Asian […]

A second disaster has unfolded in northern Mozambique in the wake of Cyclone Kenneth as raging flood waters killed one person and began to cut off the region’s main city from the outside world. About 160,000 people are at risk, with more torrential rain forecast for the days ahead. “Help us, we are losing everything!” […]

TOKYO (AFP) – For Emperor Akihito’s abdication on Tuesday (April 30), Japanese workers are enjoying an unprecedented 10-day holiday as a rash of special days off combine with the traditional “Golden Week” in May. But not everyone is popping the champagne corks in famously workaholic Japan. “To be honest, I don’t know how to spend the […]

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Calm settled over Asian currency markets on Monday as Japan kicked off a week of holidays, giving investors an extra excuse to sit on their hands ahead of a Federal Reserve policy meeting and U.S. jobs numbers. All eyes are on the Fed to see what they made of the first-quarter gross […]

TOKYO • Police will be on full alert in Tokyo ahead of the festive transition from the Heisei era to Reiwa, with several thousand officers to be dispatched on security duty over the coming days. The Metropolitan Police Department plans to take maximum security measures in the areas around the Imperial Palace to guard against […]

The father and two brothers of the alleged organiser of the Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka, Zahran Hashim, were killed in a security forces operation on Friday, police say. Hashim, who blew himself up at a hotel in the capital Colombo, founded an Islamist group, the NTJ, which has now been banned. Police have […]

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — As Sri Lanka marked a week since the bombings that killed more than 250 people on Easter Sunday, the Islamic State group said that three of its fighters had blown themselves up during a raid by security forces on their hide-out in the east of the country. Sri Lanka remained on […]