Central European nations set up contingency plans on Friday for a possible disruption in gas imports due to Russia's dispute with Ukraine but said there was no indication that supplies will be interrupted. Russia's Gazprom

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France's unemployment rate should ease further in 2006 after falling to 9.6 percent in November, the French employment minister said on Friday, but economists cautioned that strong job creation was still lacking. The November figures,

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Britain's housing market suffered its worst year in a decade in 2005 but signs are growing that conditions are picking up after a sharp slowdown, data from the Nation-wide building society showed on Friday. The

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Oil giant Royal Dutch Shell Plc and China's top offshore producer CNOOC said on Friday construction of their petrochemicals complex at Daya Bay, Guangdong, is complete. "Final preparations are being made for start-up," CNOOC and

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Sri Lanka's economy grew by a better than expected 6.4 percent in the third quarter of this year, just before the latest upsurge in violence between the army and suspected Tamil rebels, officials said Friday.

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Malaysia's top mobile operator Maxis Communications announced Friday that it would buy Indian mobile company Aircel Limited for 1.08 billion dollars in a joint venture with an Indian partner. "We are delighted to make this

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Intel Inside is out. The world's biggest chipmaker said on Thursday it will scrap its 37-year-old logo and well-known tagline as part of a major rebranding that will emphasise its shift away from its core

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A Citigroup-led consortium has won the right to buy 85 percent of China's Guangdong Development Bank for $3.2 billion, beating rival groups led by ABN Amro and Societe Generale, three sources close to the deal

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China and the United States should increase co-operation on energy issues ranging from crude oil production overseas to civilian nuclear programmes, China's top economic planning body said in a statement on its Web site. Co-operation

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Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Chalabi has assumed direct control of the powerful oil ministry as crude exports grind to a halt due to sabotage attacks and logistics problems, officials said on Friday. Chalabi, who

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