Berlin - German Chancellor Angela Merkel opposes an expansion of the Group of Eight (G8) to embrace nations such as India and China, her spokesman said Wednesday in Berlin.

"She doesn't see an institutional expansion into a G9, a G12, a G15 and so on as the philosopher's stone," said deputy government spokesman Thomas Steg.

Khagaria (Bihar), Oct 22 : At least twenty-f

Singapore - Singapore Petroleum Company Limited and Eni International B V, equal joint venture partners in ItalSing Petroleum Company Pte Ltd, Wednesday sold a combined 55 per cent stake in ItalSing to Nippon Oil (Asia) Pte Ltd of Japan.

SPC and ENI will each continue to hold 22.5 per cent in ItalSing Petroleum, SPC said in a statement.

Nippon will continue to use the ItalSing facilities to manufacture and blend lube oils for the local and overseas markets.

"With Nippon Oil's global lubricant networks and markets, ENI and SPC look forward to working with Nippon Oil to create and enhance the value of our joint investment in ItalSing," SPC chief executive officer Koh Ban Heng said.

Manama, Bahrain - Iran's speaker of parliament Ali Larijani, in an interview published in Bahrain on Wednesday, criticized US policies on the Middle East conflict and the situation in Iraq.

"The West needs to reconsider what they say. The top US diplomat Condoleezza Rice, during the Israeli aggression against Lebanon which lasted 33 days, described the war as 'the birth pangs of a new Middle East'," Larijani was quoted as saying by Al Wasat.

"As a woman who did not try the experience of pregnancy she seems to not have known that a birth needs longer time than that."

Hanoi - Vietnam is isolated from losses linked to toxic US subprime mortgage loans but the global economic crisis they have unleashed is hitting its export markets, government officials said Wednesday.

The Trade and Industry Ministry projected the country would earn 15.7 billion dollars from exports in the fourth quarter, or roughly 5 billion dollars for each remaining month of the year. That figure represents a drop from the recent monthly average of more than 6 billion dollars as demand for key exports drops.

Producers and exporters are reporting that prices of exports such as rubber, coffee, pepper, rice and seafood are falling.

Cairo - The US will not review its policy of isolating Syria because Damascus has not moved far enough to allay US fears over its role in the Middle East, US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, David Welch, said in an interview Wednesday.

Syria's move to establish diplomatic relations with Lebanon is "a start" but is not enough to convince Washington to change its policy, Welch told the pan-Arab London-based Asharq al-Awsat newspaper.

In mid-October Syria initiated diplomatic ties with Lebanon for the first time since independence 60 years ago.