Iran began fuelling its first nuclear power plant on Saturday, a potent symbol of its growing regional sway and rejection of international sanctions designed to prevent it building a nuclear bomb. Iranian television showed live pictures of Iran's nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi and his Russian counterpart watching a fuel rod assembly being prepared for
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President Barack Obama revved up his effort on Saturday to curb corporate influence on U.S. political campaigns, chiding Republicans for keeping the public “in the dark” by opposing a reform bill. In his weekly radio and Internet address, Obama said Americans are seeing the ramifications of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that allowed companies and
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The Spanish football federation (RFEF) has dropped investigations into alleged match fixing by promoted La Liga club Hercules after being denied access to evidence from a separate judicial probe. Taped conversations, collected by a judge as part of an investigation in Hercules' hometown of Alicante, have been widely reported in local media, allegedly suggesting the
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The IMF said on Saturday it will review Pakistan's budget and economic prospects following catastrophic flooding during talks with senior Pakistani government officials starting on Monday. Pakistani Finance Minister Abdul Hafeez Shaikh and other senior Pakistani finance officials are traveling to Washington for the talks with the IMF, which will also be an opportunity to
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World number one Rafa Nadal fell to Cyprus's Marco Baghdatis 6-4 4-6 6-4 in the quarter-finals of the Cincinnati Masters Friday as three of the top four seeds lost out. Britain's Andy Murray and Serbian Novak Djokovic both suffered defeats to American opponents with Mardy Fish and Andy Roddick advancing to meet each other Saturday.
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A ship carrying women activists and aid will no longer head to Gaza via Cyprus from Lebanon on Sunday, the organisers said, after Nicosia announced it would not allow the vessel to sail from its ports. “We will not embark tomorrow,” Samar al-Hajj told Reuters. “We are working to find another place (port to sail
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Liverpool put Alberto Aquilani out of his Anfield misery on Saturday when they agreed to loan the Italian international to Juventus for the remainder of the season. Aquilani joined Liverpool from AS Roma a year ago for around 17 mln pounds ($26.43 mln) but barely featured under previous manager Rafa Benitez and subsequently missed out
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Greece is on track to meet its 2010 budget deficit reduction target and will reach it if the country sticks to its current commitment to keep budget spending 4 bln euros below plan, the European Commission said. "We are not asking Greece to make additional spending cuts," Commission spokesman Amadeu Altafaj said on Friday, clarifying
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Greek betting firm OPAP's profit is expected to have more than halved in the second quarter, hit by a windfall tax the government imposed on businesses to shore up its ailing finances. Analysts polled by Reuters forecast group net profit of 60.5 mln euros on average against 155.5 mln in the year ago period, a
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Greece wants to shore up its banking system against the backwash of the country's debt crisis and has commissioned a study on how to go about it, reviving speculation that some of its lenders could merge. While Athens has so far been meeting its fiscal commitments, slashing the deficit at a fast pace, its banks
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