London - Steel giant Corus, Europe's second-largest steel company owned by India's Tata Steel, Friday announced plans to cut production by 30 per cent over the next six months.
The company, formerly British Steel, cited the global economic downturn for its decision to close two blast furnaces at its plants in Britain, and one in the Netherlands, until next March.
On Thursday, Corus said 400 jobs would be cut in its distribution business, which employs 2,400 people in Britain and Ireland.
Baghdad - Hungary, Bulgaria and South Korea will each withdraw their troops from Iraq by the end of 2008, a spokesman for Iraq's Ministry of Defence told the Voices of Iraq news agency on Friday.
The troops will leave after finishing their tour of duty, said spokesman Mohamed al-Askary adding that most of the soldiers duties were "humanitarian."
Bulgarian Minister of Defence Teodor Melescanu was quoted by US media as saying some Bulgarian personnel would stay in Iraq to work as advisors to the Iraqi national authorities.
Brussels - Lithuania and Poland should bow to the majority of European Union member states and approve the immediate relaunch of talks on a strategic deal with Russia, despite their own security concerns, top EU officials warned Friday.
The decision to restart talks "may not be 100 per cent what your feelings are, but it's better for you to be together with all the other (EU) states in expressing a view rather than having some countries making agreements with Russia and others not," European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said.
Tallinn - There was mixed news on the Estonian economy Friday with official statistics showing that inflation is falling, while a ratings agency downgraded the Baltic nation's outlook.
According to data released by Statistics Estonia, the percentage change of the consumer price index (CPI) in October 2008 was 9.8 per cent year-on-year, down from 10.5 per cent in September.
Moscow - General Motors, the world's largest automaker, on Friday opened a 300-million-dollar factory, its first fully-owned venture in Russia.
GM joins five other foreign carmakers with plants in the outskirts of St Petersburg, an area coming to be known as the new Detroit of the automotive industry, as firms hope to compensate for slumping sales in Europe and North America.
Washington - Unemployment in the United States rose to 6.5 per cent in October, after another 240,000 jobs were lost in a worsening sign for the economy, the US Labour Department reported Friday.
The jobless rate jumped from 6.1 per cent in the previous two months, and marked an increase of 1.7 per cent, or 2.8 million fewer jobs, over the last year. The total number of US unemployed now stands at 10.1 million, the department said.
"Today, we received monthly job report numbers that reflect the difficult challenges confronting our economy," President George W Bush said in a statement.
London - Steel giant Corus, Europe's second-largest steel company owned by India's Tata Steel, Friday announced plans to cut production by 30 per cent over the next six months.
Baghdad - Hungary, Bulgaria and South Korea will each withdraw their troops from Iraq by the end of 2008, a spokesman for Iraq's Ministry of Defence told the Voices of Iraq news agency on Friday.
Brussels - Lithuania and Poland should bow to the majority of European Union member states and approve the immediate relaunch of talks on a strategic deal with Russia, despite their own security concerns, top EU officials warned Friday.
Tallinn - There was mixed news on the Estonian economy Friday with official statistics showing that inflation is falling, while a ratings agency downgraded the Baltic nation's outlook.
Moscow - General Motors, the world's largest automaker, on Friday opened a 300-million-dollar factory, its first fully-owned venture in Russia.
Washington - Unemployment in the United States rose to 6.5 per cent in October, after another 240,000 jobs were lost in a worsening sign for the economy, the US Labour Department reported Friday.
