Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the West Asia peace conference in Paris rigged, with his government refusing to play any role in the meeting.
Israel rejects the conference and calls for bilateral talks. The Palestinians have welcomed the multilateral approach, saying years of negotiations have not ended Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.
Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts have been at a standstill since a U.S.-led initiative collapsed in April 2014.
Picked Giuliani for Cyber Security
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump tapped Thursday former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani to advise his administration on cyber security.
Mr. Giuliani was last year a candidate for Secretary of State but subsequently came under scrutiny in the U.S. media over business dealings that posed potential conflicts of interest.
Results of a new study suggest that temperatures across the northeastern United States will increase much faster than the global average, so that the 2-degrees Celsius warming target adopted in the recent Paris Agreement on climate change will be reached about 20 years earlier for this part of the U.S. compared to the world as a whole.
Almost 75% of Japan's Biggest Coral Reef Has Died
Almost 75% of Japan’s biggest coral reef has died, according to a report that blames its demise on rising sea temperatures caused by global warming.
As per the Japanese environment ministry 70% of the Sekisei lagoon in Okinawa had been killed by a phenomenon known as bleaching.
The plight of the reef, located in Japan’s southernmost reaches, has become extremely serious in recent years.
A survey of 35 locations in the lagoon last November and December found that 70.1% percent of the coral had died.
As per government data, industrial output expanded by 5.7%, the fastest pace in more than four years, largely on account of a low base effect.
The index of industrial production grew by 5.7% on-year in November, on account of a weak base.
Penalty on Airtel, Vodafone and Idea
Paving the way for Rs. 3,050 crore cumulative penal action on telecom operators Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular, the Attorney General is learnt to have opined that the Department of Telecom has power to impose penalty on grounds of poor quality of service.
AG has opined that DoT can impose penalty on telecom operators for violating quality of service rules.
The board of Tata Sons has picked N. Chandrasekaran, CEO of the group’s most-profitable company, Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. (TCS), as his successor.
He will become only the third non-Tata Chairman of the $103 billion salt-to-software conglomerate’s holding company and will take the helm of the group in February.