Yahoo Inc Chairman Roy Bostock and three other directors will step down as the struggling company ploughs ahead with an internal overhaul, including discussions on dealing with its stakes in China's Alibaba Group and Yahoo Japan. The corporation - once a Web powerhouse but now agonizing over a range of options to revive flagging growth - on Tuesday said it appointed former Rovi Corp CEO and International Business Machines Corp veteran Alfred Amoroso and ex-eBay COO Maynard Webb as independent directors. Yahoo's board has come under fire from investors impatient with the company's persistent inability to effect a turnaround, and frustrated with the apparent indecisiveness of stakeholders over ...
Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne has vowed to fight an "anti-business culture" in Britain, warning that a row overexecutive pay and bonuses threatens the country's fragile economic recovery. "Let me say something about the row over bonuses and pay," Osborne said in a speech to the Federation of Small Businesses. "Of course rewards for failure are unacceptable -- and those who believe in the free market are the first to say so. But a strong, free market economy must be built on rewards for success." The Labour Party has heaped pressure on the ruling coalition to curb excessive pay for top executives, using a House of Commons debate to demand the return ...
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said on Tuesday he is resolved to settle a longstanding territorial dispute with Russia at an annual rally calling for the return of all four Russian-held islands off Hokkaido in northern Japan, the Kyodo news agency reported. "We'll continue to make steady and determined efforts to move ahead with negotiations," Noda said, stressing the need to sign a peace treaty with Russia. The four islands - which Russia calls the Southern Kurils and Japan calls the Northern Territories - has been the subject of a territorial dispute between the two nations since the end of World War ...
Amanda Knox's Italian lawyer has filed an appeal of her slander conviction in Italy, a Knox family spokesman inSeattle said Monday. In October, an Italian appeals court overturned the young Seattle woman's murder conviction in the 2007 death of her British roommate in Perugia. But the same court upheld Knox's conviction for slander — for falsely accusing bar owner Diya "Patrick" Lumumba of involvement in the slaying. Lumumba was freed after two weeks in prison for lack of evidence. Knox later said she was "manipulated" during her lengthy police interrogation. An appeal of the slander conviction was filed Monday, Knox family spokesman Dave Marriott confirmed. He doesn't know when the Italian ...
The Dutch railway will remain 'vulnerable' during wintry weather but Dutch Rail (NS) and track operator ProRail did not help matters during the current cold snap by the late introduction of schedule adjustments to cope with the conditions, transport minister Melanie Schultz van Haegen told parliament in a briefing on Tuesday. The NS and ProRail assumed on Thursday of last week that there would be three to five centimetres of snow. When the forecast was increased on Friday morning to between 10 and 15 centimetres, it was too late to change the timetables automatically, Schultz van Haegen told parliament. Drivers and conductors ...
Greece can leave the eurozone without damaging monetary union, European digital affairs commissioner Neelie Kroes says in an interview with the Volkskrant on Tuesday. Kroes, a member of the Dutch ruling right-wing Liberal party VVD, is not a supporter of Greece exchanging the euro for the drachma, but says: 'It is absolutely not a case of man overboard if someone leaves the eurozone.' The commissioner is very critical of the new Greek government and says they are not fulfilling their promises. 'Too few spending cuts, too little restructuring,' she says. She says the Greeks should follow the example of Italy where the new ...
Mitt Romney hopes his presidential campaign hasn't ignored Rick Santorum's aggressive attacks for too long, as caucuses in Colorado and Minnesota on Tuesday could reshuffle the race for the Republican presidential nomination. Santorum largely bypassed Florida and Nevada to blanket the two caucus states with criticism of Romney and lay the groundwork among conservatives who have great sway in the process. RivalNewt Gingrich praised Santorum's strategy as shrewd even as he signaled he had no interest in exiting the four-way race, which also includes Ron Paul. "I think that Santorum's going to have a pretty good day," Gingrich told reporters on the eve of the caucuses. "He targeted differently than I ...
Glencore and Xstrata agreed an all-share merger worth $90 billion (56 billion pounds) on Tuesday in the industry's largest ever deal, creating a commodities powerhouse spanning mining, agriculture and trading. Glencore, the world's largest diversified commodities tradinghouse, will issue 2.8 new shares for each Xstrata share in a deal they said was a "merger of equals." The ratio is a 15.2 percent premium to Xstrata shareholders compared with its share price last Wednesday before word leaked out about the merger talks, a joint statement said. "A merger between Glencore and Xstrata offers a unique opportunity to create a new business model in our industry to respond to ...
US White House hopeful Mitt Romney aims for another big caucus win in Colorado on Tuesday, as his well-oiled campaign machine works to cement his position as the Republican front runner in the US presidential race. Polls suggest he should triumph easily in the western US state -- where he scored 60 percent in 2008 -- although there is a tighter race in Minnesota, where last-placed Rick Santorum is hoping to snatch a win. Romney's main rival, former House speaker Newt Gingrich, is battling to stay in the race after two heavy losses in a row to the former Massachusetts governor, who ...
As President Christian Wulff remains mired in allegations of impropriety, anti-corruption group Transparency International (TI) has called for politicians to use the case as a chance to open up German politics. “We are very concerned that people seem to be starting to think that all politicians behave like Wulff, and that would be fatal,” Christian Humborg, TI Germany’s managing director told The Local. “I think the Wulff affair is a wonderful opportunity for German politicians to react to the cynical attitude that this is normal, and improve things,” he said. He said the fact that the authorities were investigating whether Wulff and his ...
Australia’s decision to temporarily block asylum-seekers from Afghanistan and Sri Lanka could face a legal challenge, lawyers said Saturday. On Friday, Canberra announced it would immediately stop taking fresh applications from asylum-seekers from those two countries, as it attempts to thwart people smuggling operations. But the Australian Lawyers Alliance said the policy, which means new arrivals from those countries cannot apply... [more]
President Hamid Karzai has met delegates from Afghanistan’s second-biggest militant group and is studying their peace proposals, his spokesman said Monday, boosting hopes for reconciliation. Hezb-e-Islami is headed by warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who is blacklisted as a terrorist by the United Nations and United States. Both accuse him of carrying out attacks alongside the Taliban and of being allied to Al-Qaeda. Karzai has been pursuing... [more]
A strike by British Airways cabin crew cost over 7 million pounds a day, the airline said Monday, as Prime Minister Gordon Brown sought to limit pre-election fallout from the industrial dispute. The loss-making airline ran 78 percent of its long-haul flights and 50 per cent of its short-haul flights over the first two days of the strike over planned changes to pay and conditions, it said. “Contingency plans for the three days... [more]
Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende met Queen Beatrix on Monday for consulations after the collapse of his government over the Netherlands’s role in Afghanistan, a government spokesman said. Balkenende arrived at the head of state’s working palace in The Hague around 9:30 am (0830 GMT), spokesman Frady van Hapert told. Ninety minutes have been set aside for the talks, after which Queen Beatrix will meet the leaders of the two... [more]
A NATO airstrike in southern Afghanistan has killed at least 21 civilians, the Afghan Interior Ministry said Monday. NATO forces confirmed in a statement that its planes fired Sunday on a group of vehicles that it believed contained insurgents who were about to attack its forces, only to discover later that women and children were in the cars. NATO did not provide a figure of how many died or say if all those in the vehicles were civilians.... [more]
Dutch troops are likely to leave Afghanistan this year as planned, Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende said on Sunday, as early polls showed his rivals benefiting from the government’s collapse over the mission. Balkenende’s fourth cabinet in the last eight years fell apart on Saturday morning after the Labour Party pulled out of government, insisting it could not support a NATO request to extend the Dutch mission past this... [more]
NATO has reiterated its calls for Dutch troops to say in Afghanistan despite the government’s collapse over Labour’s refusal to extend the military mission there. A spokesperson for NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen stressed that it is for the Netherlands itself to make a decision. But he added that the Secretary General “continues to believe that the best way forward for the overall mission could be a new smaller... [more]
The Dutch coalition government collapsed Saturday over whether to extend the country’s military mission in Afghanistan, leaving uncertain the future of its 1,600 soldiers fighting there. Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende announced that the second largest party in his three-party alliance is quitting, in a breakdown of trust in what had always been an uneasy partnership. Balkenende made no mention of elections as he spoke to reporters... [more]
The future of the coalition government is in doubt on Thursday morning, after Labour leader and deputy prime minister Wouter Bos said he would definitely not support a continuation of the Dutch mission in Afghanistan, despite a Nato request. Newspapers are united that the government is in trouble. ‘The cabinet is in crisis, the collapse nears’ is the headline in the Telegraaf following yesterday’s ministerial meeting at... [more]
Western powers are not seeking an “unconditional surrender” of Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan because many could form part of a settlement, Britain’s defence minister said on Saturday. Secretary of Defence Bob Ainsworth said recent Western pledges to send more troops and aid would show rebels that NATO forces were determined to stay in Afghanistan until control could start being ceded to local authorities. “But... [more]
