Town Hall News

By Ariba Shahid KARACHI (Reuters) – Seven-year-old Saad Umer joined a crowd in a poor neighbourhood in the Pakistani city of Karachi rushing to get a handout of flour and a little cash from a charity trying to help the most vulnerable cope with runaway prices. But in the surge, a melee broke out and some people fell. Saad and 10 others, all women and children, were killed in the […]

By Karen Freifeld, Jody Godoy and Luc Cohen NEW YORK (Reuters) -Former President Donald Trump was charged on Tuesday with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in a historic case over allegations he orchestrated hush-money payments to two women before the 2016 U.S. election to suppress publication of their sexual encounters with him.     Prosecutors in Manhattan accused Trump, the first sitting or former U.S. president to face criminal […]

TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan’s economic output ran below full capacity for the 11th straight quarter in October-December, central bank data showed on Wednesday, suggesting that conditions for ending ultra-low interest rates have yet to fall into place. Japan’s output gap, which measures the difference between an economy’s actual and potential output, stood at -0.43% in the fourth quarter, widening from -0.08% in July-September, Bank of Japan (BOJ) data showed. A […]

By Jack Queen, Luc Cohen and Jacqueline Thomsen (Reuters) – The long-awaited charges against Donald Trump centering on hush money payments to suppress damaging news stories ahead of the 2016 election revealed few new details about a case that prosecutors have probed on-and-off for five years. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said on Tuesday that Trump made false records in his family real estate company’s books to conceal that he […]

(Reuters) – French catering and food services group Sodexo plans to spin-off and list its Benefits & Rewards Services (BRS) business during 2024, it said on Wednesday. The move will leave its two main businesses better placed to benefit from fast growing markets, the company added. Sodexo, which last May scrapped a plan to sell a minority stake in BRS, said it now plans to spin off and list BRS […]

By Sinead Cruise, Shankar Ramakrishnan and Valentina Za (Reuters) – European banks are increasingly turning to bespoke deals with investors such as hedge funds to offload some of the risk on multi-billion euro loan portfolios and improve their financial strength, several sources involved told Reuters. Banks supervised by the European Central Bank (ECB), the biggest ones in the euro zone, completed a record 174 billion euros ($189 billion) of such […]

TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan on Wednesday said it plans to offer friendly nations financial assistance to help them bolster their defences, marking Tokyo’s first unambiguous departure from rules that forbid using international aid for military purposes. Japan’s Overseas Security Assistance (OSA) will be operated separately from the Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) programme that for decades has funded roads, dams and other civilian infrastructure projects, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said […]

TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan on Wednesday said it plans to offer friendly nations financial assistance to help them bolster their defences, marking Tokyo’s first unambiguous departure from rules that forbid using international aid for military purposes. Japan’s Overseas Security Assistance (OSA) will be operated separately from the Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) programme that for decades has funded roads, dams and other civilian infrastructure projects, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said […]

(Reuters) – At least 389 kidnappings were registered in Haiti in the first three months of this year, rights group CARDH said on Tuesday, marking a three-fold increase from the last quarter of 2022 as gangs look to recoup losses from international sanctions. The kidnappings seen between January and March are more than triple the 127 CARDH recorded in the previous quarter, and a 72% increase from the same period […]