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Oil giant Saudi Aramco’s 1st quarter profit down 20% to $31B

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Oil giant Saudi Aramco reported a first-quarter profit on Tuesday of $31.88 billion, down nearly 20% from the same period last year as energy prices have sunk over global recession concerns. The firm known formally as the Saudi Arabian Oil Co. blamed the drop — compared to $39.47 billion in the same quarter last year — on the lower crude oil prices. Aramco made a $30.73 billion profit in the fourth quarter of last year.“The results reflect Aramco’s continued high reliability, focus on cost and our ability to react to market conditions as we generate strong cash flows and further strengthen the balance sheet,” Aramco President and CEO Amin H. Nasser said in a statement. Aramco separately said that it “believes it is well positioned to withstand fluctuating commodity prices through its low-cost upstream production.” Benchmark Brent crude traded early on Tuesday around $76 a barrel, down from a high of $125 in the last year. Saudi Arabia’s vast oil re...

Boris vs. Charles? Johnson ‘squared up’ to future king over Rwanda plan, aide claims

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

LONDON — Boris Johnson confronted then-Prince Charles over criticism of a controversial plan to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda, Johnson’s former communications chief claimed Tuesday.Guto Harri, who served as director of communications at No. 10 Downing Street, said the former prime minister had “squared up” to the future king at a Commonwealth meeting in Rwanda last June. Johnson’s allies branded the account “inaccurate.”Britain has signed a deal to deport asylum seekers to the East African country — a move criticized by human rights campaigners and challenged in the courts.Johnson and Charles’ meeting took place in the wake of media reports — not explicitly denied by Clarence House at the time — that the then-prince of Wales had branded the proposal “appalling.” Johnson has previously described the meeting between the two men as “a good old chinwag.”But, writing in the Daily Mail Tuesday as he promotes a new podcast...

OBF: Doc has outcoached Mazzulla

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

“What’s up, Doc?”The Celtics enter Game 5 of their series against the Philadelphia 76ers coming off an Elmer Fudd-like performance Sunday at the end of regulation and overtime.The Celtics were hunting “wabbits” and Doc Rivers had all the angles covered. What was daffy about the end of Game 4 was not the lack of a timeout call at the end of regulation or overtime. No, that is the norm. Inexplicably somehow.No, what really bugs us about the end of Game 4 was this troubling fact pattern: Jayson Tatum had the ball in the lane at the end of regulation with 4 seconds to play and did not shoot it. He had the ball and was headed for the rim at the end of overtime with less than 3 seconds to play and, once again, chose not to shoot.Part of this was by design on Tatum’s part. He saw Marcus Smart open for uncontested threes. He gave up the contested shot. He went by the book.It might be time to turn the page.As a rule, coaches preach “unselfishness” at every level starting at the Fidelity Hous...

Putin tells Red Square parade ‘real war’ unleashed on Russia

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday told his country’s Victory Day parade on Moscow’s Red Square that “a real war” has been unleashed against Russia by the West’s “untamed ambitions,” shortly after the Kremlin’s forces rained cruise missiles on Ukrainian targets.“Today civilization is once again at a decisive turning point,” Putin said at Moscow’s annual commemorations celebrating the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. “A real war has been unleashed against our Motherland.”Since Russia invaded its neighbor more than 14 months ago, Putin has repeatedly framed the war in Ukraine as a proxy conflict with the West. The Kremlin’s official narrative of the war has painted a picture of an existential conflict with the West, which in Moscow’s view is merely using Ukraine as a tool to destroy Russia, re-write its history and crush its traditional values. That version of events has dominated Russian state media coverage of the war.In his speech, Putin insi...

China exports up 8.5% in April despite weak global demand

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

BEIJING (AP) — Chinese exports grew 8.5% in April, customs data showed Tuesday, displaying unexpected strength despite weakening global demand. Exports grew to $295.4 billion compared with a year earlier, although at a slower pace, building on momentum seen in the March data when exports rose 14.8%.But imports shrank at a faster pace, with the total slumping 7.9% to $205.2 billion compared to the same time last year, according to data Tuesday from the General Administration of Customs. It was down 1.4% in March. Trade with the U.S. and European Union showed a contraction in comparison with last year. China’s trade surplus in April widened, growing 82.3% compared to the same period last year.In the first four months of the year, exports edged up 2.5% over the same period of 2022 to $1.12 trillion, the General Administration of Customs of China reported. Total imports contracted 7.3% to $822 billion.Despite that, forecasters say exports should weaken this year.Citing the slower pace o...

In The News for May 8 : China expels Canadian diplomat in tit-for-tat retaliation

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

In The News is a roundup of stories from The Canadian Press designed to kickstart your day. Here is what’s on the radar of our editors for the morning of May 8 …What we are watching in Canada …China has declared a Canadian diplomat as “persona non grata” in retaliation for Ottawa’s expulsion of a Chinese consular official who Canada’s spy agency alleged was involved in a plot to intimidate Conservative MP Michael Chong and his relatives in Hong Kong.On Tuesday, China’s Foreign Ministry posted a statement on its English website saying China was deploying a “reciprocal countermeasure to Canada’s unscrupulous move,” which it said it “strongly condemns and firmly opposes.”The statement said Jennifer Lynn Lalonde, consul of the Consulate General of Canada in Shanghai, has been asked to leave before May 13, and that China reserves the right to further react.On Monday, Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly issued...

Canadian diplomat expelled from China in retaliation for similar move by Ottawa

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

China has declared a Canadian diplomat as “persona non grata” in retaliation for Ottawa’s expulsion of a Chinese consular official, who Canada’s spy agency alleged was involved in a plot to intimidate Conservative MP Michael Chong and his relatives in Hong Kong.On Tuesday, China’s Foreign Ministry posted a statement on its English website saying China was deploying a “reciprocal countermeasure to Canada’s unscrupulous move,” which it said it “strongly condemns and firmly opposes.”The statement said Jennifer Lynn Lalonde, consul of the Consulate General of Canada in Shanghai, has been asked to leave before May 13, and that China reserves the right to further react.On Monday, Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly issued a statement that Canada had declared Toronto-based diplomat Zhao Wei as “persona non grata.”Calls for Zhao to be expelled began last week after a report in the Globe and Mail that CSIS had informat...

Joly to announce Canada’s bid for a seat on the UN Human Rights Council

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

OTTAWA — Canada is throwing its hat in the ring for a seat on the United Nations Human Rights Council, pledging to advance issues from online speech to access to abortion.Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly will announce this afternoon Canada’s candidacy to sit on the council for 2028 to 2030, through an election that will likely take place in 2026.Two government sources familiar with the matter, who were not authorized to speak publicly before the official announcement, say Canada is running on a bid that will highlight six main priorities, including holding states accountable for locking up human-rights activists.Advancing gender equality, LGBTQ rights, sexual health and reproductive rights will be another focus of Canada’s candidacy.Canada plans to echo the Harper government’s focus on freedom of religious beliefs, while tying it to anti-racism programs and advancing reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples worldwide.So far, Greece has announced a run for one of...

A year later, Ukrainian hopes to stay in rural Newfoundland but work is hard to find

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

ST. JOHN’S, N.L. — Stanislav Vasylchuk is more than 6,000 kilometres from home, and he’s the only Ukrainian in the remote Newfoundland mining town of Baie Verte, a community of about 1,300 people surrounded by scrubby northern woods and towering rocky slopes. There are no hip cafés where the 29-year-old engineer might meet people. There isn’t even a set of stoplights.But he loves it. He hikes, he goes to barbecues, he does yoga at the gym and he lives next to the ocean. “I don’t know how to explain it,” he said in a recent interview over Zoom. “It’s beautiful. It’s just beautiful.”Vasylchuk arrived in Newfoundland a year ago Tuesday, part of a provincial government-led effort to bring Ukrainians fleeing the war to a province with a dwindling rural population. But after the company running the Baie Verte gold and copper mine where he worked declared insolvency last month, he’s in the same boat as so many rural Newfound...

Firefighters question Alberta cuts to aerial attack teams as province battles blazes

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 20:14:54 GMT

EDMONTON — Former members of an elite Alberta wildfire-fighting crew say government budget cuts have left the province battling its current blazes short-handed. “We could have been difference-makers,” said Jordan Erlandson, a former member of Alberta’s Rapattack team.Those firefighters were trained to rappel from helicopters to get at wildfires while they still only covered a few hectares. When one storm sparked several fires, they could extinguish them before they merged. They also cleared landing spaces for other helicopters to bring in crews and gear. That program once had 63 firefighters stationed around the province, including at Edson, Fox Creek and Lac La Biche — communities now threatened by one of the busiest early fire seasons in provincial history. But that program was cut in 2019 by the United Conservatives. “They told us the program had been eliminated,” said former member Adam Clyne. “They just said budget.”The saving was...