Town Hall News

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold talks by phone with his Turkish counterpart Tayyip Erdogan later on Thursday, the Kremlin said, before the two countries mark the inauguration of Turkey’s first nuclear power reactor. The Akkuyu nuclear power plant in Turkey’s southern Mersin province has been built by Russia’s state nuclear energy company Rosatom. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a regular news briefing that after their telephone […]

By Rowena Edwards LONDON (Reuters) -Oil prices edged higher on Thursday after a price drop the previous day reversed the supportive impact of a surprise OPEC production cut announced this month. Brent crude was trading at $77.99 a barrel, up 30 cents, or 0.39%, at 0947 GMT, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude rose 22 cents or 0.3% to trade at $74.52. Prices stabilised as Russian Deputy Prime Alexander Novak […]

ROTTERDAM (Reuters) – Millions of Dutch revellers took to the streets on Thursday to celebrate King’s Day festivities, dressing in orange and enjoying open-air markets – even as trust in the man at the centre of the nationwide party sinks to a low ebb. King Willem-Alexander, whose 56th birthday is the official reason for the holiday, isn’t nearly as popular as he once was, an annual poll by research company […]

ROTTERDAM (Reuters) – Millions of Dutch revellers took to the streets on Thursday to celebrate King’s Day festivities, dressing in orange and enjoying open-air markets – even as trust in the man at the centre of the nationwide party sinks to a low ebb. King Willem-Alexander, whose 56th birthday is the official reason for the holiday, isn’t nearly as popular as he once was, an annual poll by research company […]

By Chen Lin and Xinghui Kok SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Vera Liu, a Singapore property agent, was panicking in the wee hours of Thursday morning after new property taxes saw two of her deals fall through. Singapore raised levies on private property purchases in a surprise move late on Wednesday night to cool the market, including a doubling of stamp duties for foreigners to an eye-watering 60%. Liu’s foreign buyer pulled […]

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – NATO allies have delivered almost all their promised combat vehicles to Ukraine, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said on Thursday. “More than 98 percent of the combat vehicles promised to Ukraine have been delivered,” said Stoltenberg, as he spoke at a news briefing alongside Luxembourg Prime Minister Xavier Bettel. (Reporting by Bart Meijer; Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta) Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

By Elizabeth Piper and Vitalii Hnidyi VYSHNEVA, Ukraine (Reuters) – Doctor Oleg Marchenko never knows what he will find when he visits villages retaken by Ukrainian forces in the east of the country last autumn. Mines lie scattered around and often there are no medical facilities left. He can be certain of one thing, however: many patients he meets will be suffering from high blood pressure after living for months […]

By Martin Coulter LONDON (Reuters) -European chipmaker STMicroelectronics beat first-quarter results forecasts on Thursday, defying signs of a slowdown in the semiconductor industry. However, it shares fell around 4% in early trade as investors worried the slowdown would eventually catch up with the company, which counts iPhone maker Apple and carmaker Tesla among its customers. STMicro reported first-quarter earnings per share (EPS) of $1.10 on a 20% increase in revenues […]

BEIRUT (Reuters) – European investigators in Beirut questioned an assistant to Lebanon’s central bank governor on Thursday as part of a probe into whether the governor embezzled and laundered hundreds of millions of dollars in public funds, local media and a judicial source said. Governor Riad Salameh is being investigated in Lebanon and in at least five European countries over allegedly taking more than $300 million from the central bank […]