Wednesday, February 22, 2012 9:12:56 PM

MUMBAI: India's civil aviation minister on Wednesday ruled out a government bailout of Kingfisher Airlines as the cash-strapped carrier submitted a new flight schedule after days of cancellations.
Kingfisher has scrapped scores of flights over the last four days, leaving passengers stranded at airports and the airline's owner, brewing magnate Vijay Mallya, battling to save the debt-laden company.
Among at least 20 flights cancelled on Wednesday were 14 from the financial hub Mumbai.
"We are not going to bail out Kingfisher but we hope it can mobilise resources," Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh told reporters in New Delhi.
The airline submitted a fresh flight schedule to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation after the regulator on Tuesday ordered it to come up with a "realistic" ...

Wednesday, February 22, 2012 9:11:18 PM

BEIGING: China's new export orders shrank in February the most in eight months, a preliminary HSBC business survey shows, defying expectations of a pick up after Lunar New Year holidays and a worrying sign of the impact of the euro area debt crisis.

Many analysts had expected some rebound in February after imports and exports fell the most in two years in January, when factories closed for several weeks for Lunar New Year holidays.

But HSBC's February flash PMI, which showed the overall manufacturing sector shrinking for the fourth-straight month, suggested overseas demand was sliding even further.

"This suggests trade may continue to be disappointing and we cannot see any improvement in the near term," said Kevin Lai, senior economist at Daiwa Capital Markets in Hong Kong.

HSB...

Wednesday, February 22, 2012 9:09:36 PM

LONDON: Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSa.L) has made an agreed 992.4 million pound bid for Mozambique-focused Cove Energy (COVE.L), offering a full price to open up a new gas frontier for the Anglo-Dutch oil major in East Africa.

Cove's main asset is an 8.5 percent stake in the Rovuma Offshore Area 1, in Mozambique, where operator Anadarko (APC.N) said recoverable reserves could top 30 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

The project partners plan to build plants to freeze the gas into liquefied natural gas (LNG) and ship it to Asian markets.

Analysts said the small size of the stake meant Shell would likely approach other parties in the project and offer to buy part of their stakes.

"As the number one LNG player, Shell absolutely must be in East Africa... we should assume that 8.5 p...

Tuesday, February 21, 2012 6:40:59 PM

MUMBAI: India's Kingfisher Airlines was struggling to avoid closure on Tuesday as regulators ordered it to prove its operational viability after mass cancellations of flights.
Scores of national and international flights have been scrapped over the past three days, leaving passengers stranded at airports and airline bosses fighting to save the debt-laden company.
Kingfisher executives were summoned before the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) over the cancellations, which the firm blamed on tax officials suddenly freezing its bank accounts.
Bharat Bhushan, head of the DGCA, told reporters after the meeting in New Delhi that only 28 of Kingfisher's fleet of 64 registered aircraft were in operation.
"We have directed Kingfisher to come up with a revised schedule with these air...

Monday, February 20, 2012 6:09:52 PM

TEHRAN: Iran is struggling to find new buyers for crude oil as Western sanctions start to bite, the Financial Times reported on Monday.

Tehran is offering to sell an extra 500,000 barrels per day of oil, which is nearly 23 percent of what it exported last year, to Chinese and Indian refiners, the report said citing two industry executives familiar with the talks.

The crude is for delivery from the start of April, it said.

Tehran is not offering any discount on the oil, the report said, citing one of the sources.

If Iran cannot find customers for the oil by mid-March, it would be forced to put unsold barrels into floating storage in tankers or reduce output, according to the report.

Iran, OPEC's second largest producer, ordered a halt to its oil sales to Britain and France on...

Friday, February 17, 2012 9:57:46 AM

PARIS: An international money-laundering watchdog added Pakistan, Indonesia, Ghana, Tanzania and Thailand on Thursday to its blacklist of nations that fail to meet international standards.

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has found that those five countries were flaunting recommendations made to them toward fighting money-laundering and financing terrorism, its executive secretary, Rick McDonell, told journalists.

No countries were taken off the blacklist, but Honduras and Paraguay were removed from an intermediary "grey-list" of countries found to be falling behind on international standards despite having committed to them.

"We are looking exclusively at the implementation of the standards," McDonell told journalists at a FATF meeting in Paris. "Countries that we look at w...

Friday, February 17, 2012 9:55:42 AM

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan's Reko Diq, an untapped copper and gold mine of fabulous potential, was meant to be the biggest foreign investment in the country's mining sector, but it's beginning to look more like fool's gold to the companies involved.
Set in one of the most godforsaken places on earth, in a Baluchistan desert at the foot of an extinct volcano, Reko Diq was expected to yield revenues of at least $60 billion over the 56-year life of the mine.
Tethyan Copper Company (TCC), a joint venture between Chile's Antofagasta and Canadian-based Barrick Gold , had sunk $220 million over the past five years into exploring the deposit in the ochre sand desert, where temperatures reach 130 degrees Fahrenheit in the summer. It was planning to invest a total of $3.3 billion when the provincial...

Thursday, February 16, 2012 5:40:45 PM

MOSCOW: Russia set an arms export record of $13.2 billion (10.1 billion euros) last year despite losing Arab clients and facing stiffer competition from China, a top official was quoted as saying Thursday.

A quarter of Russia's sales went to India and 15 percent to Algeria, with Vietnam responsible for 10 percent of the purchases, Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation chief Mikhail Dmitriyev was quoted as saying by Vedomosti.

"Russia's military-technical cooperation plan for 2012 stands at $13.5 billion," the Nezavisimaya Gazeta daily quoted Dmitriyev as saying.

Russia exported $10.4 billion in arms in 2010, in second place behind the United States.

Defence officials had earlier said they expected to lose some $4 billion in revenue from arms contracts a...

Wednesday, February 15, 2012 1:41:08 PM

SAN FRANCISCO: Apple chief executive Tim Cook said that ensuring safe working conditions at plants making its coveted gadgets is a priority, as an audit of a key supplier continued in China.

"Apple takes working conditions very seriously and we have for a very long time," Cook said during an on-stage interview at a Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference in San Francisco on Tuesday.

"We know people have a high expectation of Apple; we have an even higher expectation of ourselves."

Cook's comments came a day after a labor watchdog group began sanctioned checks of working conditions at a massive Foxconn plant in southern China that makes products for the California-based gadget-maker.

Apple agreed last month to allow inspections by the Fair Labor Association (FLA) follow...

Wednesday, February 15, 2012 1:37:39 PM

SINGAPORE: U.S. crude oil futures rose over $1 on Wednesday, with investors concerned about supplies as turmoil accelerated in Syria and Iran's dispute with the West over its nuclear program persisted.

On the New York Mercantile Exchange, crude for March delivery gained over $1 to trade as high as $101.76 a barrel, before slipping to $101.72 as of 0517 GMT.

Oil output was also halted from Yemen's Masila oilfield, the country's largest, after workers went on strike over pay issues. AGENCIES
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