BURST Financial News

By Clare Jim and Liangping Gao

US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, and later in nan official statement from White House said that US President Joe Biden will visit Israel Wednesday in a show of "ironclad" support. The statement also noted that Washington is trying to prevent the escalating war against Hamas in Gaza from spilling into a wider West Asia conflict.

Teh national capital recorded a slight improvement in its air quality on Monday Morning. It stood at 195 at 9 am. However, it deteriorated to poor category as the 24-hour AQI at 4 pm was recorded at 207, said the Central Pollution Control Board data.

Japan's former top currency diplomat, recalls how Chinese policymakers eagerly studied ways to avert a Japan-style burst of an asset bubble that led to prolonged deflation and economic stagnation — until around 2015. «Then they stopped. In the past seven to eight years, they seem to be ignoring everything they learned,» said Watanabe, who retains close ties with incumbent policymakers.

Josep Borrell said Saturday that a plan by Israel to evacuate more than one million people out of northern Gaza in a single day was «utterly impossible to implement». Israel warned residents in the area to evacuate before an expected ground offensive against Palestinian Islamist organisation Hamas in retaliation for the deadliest attack in Israel's history. «I am saying that, representing the official position of the European Union… (the evacuation plan) is utterly, utterly impossible to implement,» Borrell told a press conference in Beijing on the final day of a three-day diplomatic visit to China. «To imagine that you could move one million people in 24 hours in a situation like Gaza can only be a humanitarian crisis,» he added. EU chief Ursula von der Leyen had expressed support to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday during a visit to the country. «Europe stands with Israel,» said von der Leyen, adding that the country had «a duty to defend its citizens». But Borrell's comments in Beijing showed the limits of that affirmation, saying that Israel was also obligated to follow international humanitarian law in the process of defending itself. «The position is clear,» said Borrell. «We certainly defend the right of Israel to defend itself.» «But, as any right, it has a limit.

Fletcher Building has accused Western Australia’s largest homebuilder BGC of blame-shifting and making unfounded allegations over plumbing pipe leaks in 11 per cent of new houses built in WA between 2017 and 2022 which used a specific Fletcher product.

By Tetsushi Kajimoto

By Rajesh Kumar Singh

Rena Sofer, known for her iconic portrayal of Lois Cerullo on ABC's "General Hospital" in the mid-'90s, is making a triumphant return to the beloved soap opera. This highly anticipated comeback is set to rekindle fond memories for fans who remember her memorable scenes and charismatic character. The unforgettable moment that still resonates with fans occurred in 1994 when Lois Cerullo, played by Rena Sofer, surprised her on-screen husband, Ned Ashton, in a classic scene.

By Lewis Krauskopf and Naomi Rovnick

By Steven Scheer and Ari Rabinovitch

(Reuters) — U.S. stock index futures slipped on Monday as a growing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas roiled global markets and pushed investors toward safe-haven assets, while crude prices jumped close to 3%.

Middle East for a new era. But the old Middle East, it turns out, still has something to say about it. The stunning Hamas assault on Israel on Saturday served as a gut-wrenching reminder that the decades-old conflict with Palestinians remains a cancer that has not gone away even as leaders in Washington, Jerusalem, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and other Arab capitals would prefer to focus on building a revamped region. U.S. officials said it was too early to say whether the attack was explicitly motivated by a desire by Hamas or its patron Iran to disrupt President Joe Biden's effort to broker a landmark deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia that would profoundly reorient the Middle East. But they acknowledged that it could complicate the already delicate negotiations and make it that much harder to reach an agreement akin to the Abraham Accords between Israel and smaller Arab nations. Also Read: Israel Palestine War Live Updates: At least 500 dead in Israel and Gaza after Hamas attack; Indian students get in touch with Embassy «This will slow considerably if not kill the Saudi Abraham Accords deal,» said Mara Rudman, a former Middle East peace diplomat under President Barack Obama. «It strikes at the heart of key elements for Saudi entry, a pathway forward for Palestinians in West Bank and Gaza,» she added. «And on the Israeli side, there will be zero appetite across a wide political spectrum for helping Palestinians, despite the fact that so doing could actually enhance, not detract from, Israeli security.»

Sikkim where more than 140 people are missing because the region is still experiencing bouts of heavy rain, said officials on Saturday. The Lhonak Lake burst its banks on Wednesday after a cloudburst triggered torrential rains and an apparent avalanche, causing major flooding in the Teesta River.

An unforeseen burst of hiring last month has lifted hopes that the economy will prove durable once again, even as an array of threats lie ahead

Sikkim and West Bengal. The death toll includes eight Indian Army soldiers in Sikkim, while 27 bodies were recovered in West Bengal over the last three days.

Sikkim Chief Minister Prem Singh Tamang on Saturday said that maximum damage in the flash floods in Teesta River took place after the 1200 MW dam in Chungthang in the State's Mangan district broke alleging substandard construction work by the previous government in the State. «The maximum damage took place after the Chungthang Dam broke. If the previous government had constructed the dam properly and if standard work had been done, the force of the water could have been controlled,» Chief Minister Tamang told ANI. The chief minister visited flood affected areas and relief camps at Naga Village in Mangan to assess the situation and interacted with people there this morning. Chief Minister Tamang said that a committee will be formed and an investigation will be undertaken.

ALSO READ: Sikkim flash floods Updates Scientists even noted that if fully operational, the warning system could have given people more time to evacuate, though the details of the Lhonak Lake warning system have not previously been reported. "It's quite absurd, really," Reuters quoted geoscientist Simon Allen of the University of Zurich who is involved with the project as saying, who added, "The fact it happened just two weeks after our team was there was completely bad luck". Adding more, he said that they planned to add a tripwire sensor that would trigger if the lake was about to burst.

Sikkim flash floods: As the death toll in the Sikkim floods climbed to 40, including 7 soldiers, Chief Minister Prem Singh Tamang spoke with news platform NDTV and blamed the "inferior construction" of Chungthang Dam for the tragedy. The 1200 MW hydroelectric project was destroyed on Wednesday intensifying the damage due to the flash floods in the state. Prem Singh Tamang said that the previous Sikkim Democratic Front government should be blamed for the tragedy due their "sub-standard" work.

Treasuries are beginning to rival some of the most notorious market meltdowns in US history. Bonds maturing in 10 years or more have slumped 46% since peaking in March 2020, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s just shy of the 49% plunge in US stocks in the aftermath of the dot-com bust at the turn of the century.

Tesla engineer in court on Wednesday rejected a lawyer's suggestion that the company named its driver-assistant feature «Full Self-Driving» because it wanted people to believe that its systems had more abilities than was really the case. The electric vehicle maker is defending itself at the first US trial over allegations that Tesla's Autopilot feature led to a death. The lawsuit, filed in a California state court, alleges the Autopilot system caused owner Micah Lee's Model 3 to suddenly veer off a highway east of Los Angeles at 65 miles per hour (105 kph), strike a palm tree and burst into flames, all in the span of seconds.