Thousands dressed in black blocked Hong Kong roadsand surrounded police headquarters in the latest wave of demonstrations over an extradition bill that has triggered violent protests and plunged the Chinese-ruled city into crisis. “We want to fight for our freedom,” said high school student Chan Pak-lam, 17, who was protesting in sweltering heat.
Indonesia plans to tighten vetting of senior public servantsamid fears that hardline Islamist ideology has permeated high levels of government, according to documents reviewed by Reuters and a senior official involved in the plan. Indonesia is officially secular, but there has been a rise in politicians demanding a larger role for Islam in the world’s biggest Muslim-majority country. The rise in conservatism was a major test for President Joko Widodo in the April election, with some Islamist groups accusing him of being anti-Islam and throwing their support behind political rivals, including challenger Prabowo Subianto.
Business
Exclusive: Exxon's $53 billion Iraq deal hit by contract snags, Iran tensions - sources.Just weeks ago, U.S. energy giant ExxonMobil looked poised to move ahead with a $53 billion project to boost Iraq’s oil output at its southern fields, a milestone in the company’s ambitions to expand in the country. But now a combination of contractual wrangling and security concerns, heightened by escalating tensions between Iraq’s bigger neighbor Iran and the U.S., has conspired to hold back a deal, according to Iraqi government officials.
Dollars in the detail:From sending special offers on restaurants to burger-loving current account holders to selling anonymised credit card records, banks are racing to monetize the huge troves of data they hold. Mining mountains of trading data to predict stock moves; partnering with retailers on marketing campaigns and using artificial intelligence tools to try and speed up credit decisions are some of the areas banks are focusing on. In the digital era, knowing how much people earn, where they spend it and what they buy is valuable.
Former White House Communications Director Hope Hicks told U.S. lawmakers that Donald Trump was not joking about his readiness to accept derogatory information on political opponents from a foreign government, a congressional interview transcript released on Thursday showed.
A Navy SEAL medic testified on Thursday that he was responsible for the death of an Islamic State fighter - not the Navy SEAL defendant undergoing a court martial for war crimes - describing it as a mercy killing.
Alabama Republican Roy Moore, whose 2017 U.S. Senate bid was derailed by allegations of decades-old sexual misconduct involving teenage girls, said he would run again for the seat next year, defying his party’s leadership.
