The Media Line Staff
Damascus, Syria David Rosenberg (The Medi – As the Arab League agreed to go to the United Nations Security Council early this week with a resolution calling for Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad to step down, Russia was reportedly doing a major arms deal with the beleaguered regime. The $550 million agreement to sell 36 Yak-130 combat aircraft will not do anything to tip the balance in favor of the Al-Assad regime, which has been engaged in a 10-month conflict with anti-government opposition. But Russia is almost certainly providing arms Damascus needs to hold back the rebels as well as mounting a diplomatic defense of its friend at the U.N. In a rare glimpse into [...] Continue Reading…

Linda Young – AHN News Writer
Washington, DC, United States (AHN) – Initial unemployment claims dropped to 352,000 during the week ending Jan. 14, their lowest level in nearly four years. First time claims for jobless benefits dropped by 50,000 from the previous week’s revised tally of 402,000, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. The less volatile four-week moving average was 379,000, a decrease of 3,500 from the previous week’s revised average of 382,500. However, the advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate also dropped. Only 2.7 percent of jobless workers were covered by unemployment insurance for the week ending Jan. 7, a decrease of 0.2 percentage point from the prior week’s unrevised rate. The total [...] Continue Reading…

Linda Young – AHN News Writer
Washington, DC, United States (AHN) – Initial unemployment claims dropped to 352,000 during the week ending Jan. 14, their lowest level in nearly four years. First time claims for jobless benefits dropped by 50,000 from the previous week’s revised tally of 402,000, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. The less volatile four-week moving average was 379,000, a decrease of 3,500 from the previous week’s revised average of 382,500. However, the advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate also dropped. Only 2.7 percent of jobless workers were covered by unemployment insurance for the week ending Jan. 7, a decrease of 0.2 percentage point from the prior week’s unrevised rate. The total [...] Continue Reading…

Anil Giri – AHN News Correspondent
Kathmandu, Nepal (AHN) – Hundreds of Nepalese Gurkha soldiers are expected to lose their jobs in the British army in the defense ministry’s latest round of reduction in military strength. “As part of further work on defense restructuring the British Army has announced today (17 January 2012) the arrangements for a second phase of Army redundancies,” a statement released by the British Embassy in Kathmandu said. Around 400 Gurkhas are expected to be made redundant out of the 2,900 positions to be cut. The Brigade of Gurkhas in the British Army has 3,740 soldiers. They have been the part of the British army for almost 200 years. The defense review, [...] Continue Reading…

The Media Line Staff
Tehran, Iran David Rosenberg / The Med – Can Europe – or for that matter, the world — live without Iranian oil? That’s the question as the continent’s leaders gear up to impose an embargo on oil from the Islamic Republic. While Iran accounts for less than 5 percent of the world’s petroleum production, for many key economies the Islamic Republic’s oil is critical to keeping vehicles and factories running and homes heated. It supplies 11 percent of China and India’s needs and 10 percent of Japan’s. Overall, Europe is far less reliant on Iranian oil, but Greece, Italy and Spain, three of Europe’s weakest economies, depend heavily on Iranian crude. Nevertheless, analysts [...] Continue Reading…

Linda Young – AHN News Writer
Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – First time claims for unemployment compensation benefits during the week ending Dec. 31 dropped by 15,000 from the previous week to 372,000, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. The less volatile 4-week moving average also fell, registering a decrease of 3,250 to 373,250 initial claims. However, the advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate also fell. It dropped by 0.1 percentage point to 2.8 percent for the week ending Dec. 24, the most recent week for which such data is available. Analysts say the decrease in filing for jobless benefits is a move in the right direction. The total number of people claiming benefits [...] Continue Reading…

Windsor Genova – AHN News News Writer
Manila, Philippines (AHN) – A second landslide occurred Thursday in the same southern Philippines mountainside where 13 gold panners were buried by mud in April last year. The latest disaster reportedly killed 25 people after tons of mud buried makeshift homes in a village in Pantukan town, Compostela Valley province. Rescuers dug up 15 survivors, who were sent to a hospital for treatment of their injuries. More than a hundred remain missing. Compostela Valley Gov. Arturo Uy told TV station TV Patrol Thursday evening that 18 bodies had been recovered so far. Inspectors from the military saw from a helicopter that a mudslide 164 foot wide and 492 foot swept [...] Continue Reading…

Diane Alter – AHN News Reporter
Washington, D.C, United States (AHN) – It appears that quite a few Americans got pink slips for Christmas. In the week before the holiday, the number of Americans filing for first-time unemployment benefits rose. Roughly 381,000 people filed initial jobless claims in the week ended Dec. 24, the Labor Department reported Thursday. That was more than forecast and marked an increase of 15,000 from the prior week when claims dropped to their lowest level since April 2008. Continuing claims, which include Americans filing for their second week of claims or more, increased 34,000 to 3,601,000 in the week ended Dec. 17, the most recent data shows. Initial claims tend to [...] Continue Reading…

The Media Line Staff
Nicosia, Cyprus David Rosenberg / The Med – The discovery of large quantities of natural gas offshore Cyprus could give a push for ending the decades-long dispute dividing the island. But it could also end up ratcheting up tensions with Turkey. Disputes over how to divide the spoils of the eastern Mediterranean Sea’s vast gas reserves have pitted the island state and nearby Israel against Turkey in a war characterized so far by harsh language and stepped up naval activity. But the stakes rose Wednesday after Cyprus announced that an exploration partnership had discovered as much as 8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in its waters. For Cyprus, the discovery is a bonanza [...] Continue Reading…

Diane Alter – AHN News Reporter
New York, NY, United States (AHN) – U.S. stocks rose Thursday following news that the number of Americans filing new claims for jobless benefits hit a 3 1/2-year low. Just after the opening bell on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 40 points, the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rose 6 points and the NASDAQ advanced 18 points. Initial jobless claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 4,000 to a seasonally adjusted 364,000, the Labor Department reported, reaching the lowest level since April 2008. The data shows that the labor market is showing strong signs of gains. The improving jobless situation softened the blow from a separate report from [...] Continue Reading…