■ INFLATION
UAE feels inflation pain
United Arab Emirates (UAE) inflation accelerated to a record 10.9 percent last year, threatening growth in the second-largest Arab economy, the Abu Dhabi Department of Planning and Economy said yesterday. Consumer prices accelerated from 9.3 percent in 2006, the report said, citing estimates from the UAE Economy Ministry. The UAE reports inflation annually. The components of inflation were not reported. “The persistence of high rates of inflation may reflect negatively on the domestic business environment,” the report said. Inflation has accelerated to records across the Middle East as oil-fueled economic growth caused shortages of real estate and services.
■FOOD
Nestle to raise prices
Swiss food giant Nestle SA is unlikely to raise sales prices further in the near term as costs of many ingredients have already peaked, the company’s chairman said yesterday. “You are now seeing the impact of price increases which were done some months ago,” Peter Brabeck-Letmathe said in an interview with Dow Jones Newswires. “I would expect this to flatten out over the next several months and not increase anymore as our costs have come down,” he said. Brabeck-Letmathe, who recently stepped down as chief executive of the Switzerland-based food-product maker, said “the worst is probably past” for prices of raw materials such as coffee, cocoa and milk.
■INTERNET
Microsoft’s final offer shown
Microsoft Corp made a final proposal to Yahoo Inc before the Internet company forged an agreement with rival Google Inc, offering to buy US$8 billion in Yahoo shares at US$35 each and acquire its search-engine business. Microsoft, the world’s biggest software maker, would have paid US$1 billion for the search unit, president Kevin Johnson said on Friday in an e-mail to employees. The discussions were the most recent round of talks that began with an unsolicited bid for the whole company on Jan. 31. The deal would generate more revenue for three years than what Yahoo gets from its own ad system, Johnson said.
■POLLUTION
China No. 1 polluter
China tops the list of carbon-dioxide emitting countries, followed by the US, the 15 oldest EU members and India. China’s carbon dioxide emissions accounted for two-thirds of last year’s global increase of 3.1 percent, the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, based in Bilthoven, said in a statement on its Web site on Friday. China now accounts for almost a quarter of global emissions, followed by the US with 21 percent, the EU-15 countries (12 percent) and India (8 percent), preliminary estimates by the Dutch agency showed.
■COMPUTERS
Medica heads for Compal
Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶電腦), the world’s second-largest maker of notebook computers, named a former Dell Inc executive as vice chairman. John Medica, 49, will take up the newly created post as well as the position of corporate advisor, Taipei-based Compal said in a statement yesterday. His role will include product planning. Medica retired from Dell last year after 14 years at the Round Rock, Texas-based company, where he was senior vice president of products, Compal said. He also worked at Apple Inc for 10 years. Compal makes computers for Dell, the world’s third-largest branded notebook supplier, as well as Hewlett-Packard Co and Acer Inc.
RETHINK? The defense ministry and Navy Command Headquarters could take over the indigenous submarine project and change its production timeline, a source said Admiral Huang Shu-kuang’s (黃曙光) resignation as head of the Indigenous Submarine Program and as a member of the National Security Council could affect the production of submarines, a source said yesterday. Huang in a statement last night said he had decided to resign due to national security concerns while expressing the hope that it would put a stop to political wrangling that only undermines the advancement of the nation’s defense capabilities. Taiwan People’s Party Legislator Vivian Huang (黃珊珊) yesterday said that the admiral, her older brother, felt it was time for him to step down and that he had completed what he
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
CHINA REACTS: The patrol and reconnaissance plane ‘transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,’ the 7th Fleet said, while Taipei said it saw nothing unusual The US 7th Fleet yesterday said that a US Navy P-8A Poseidon flew through the Taiwan Strait, a day after US and Chinese defense heads held their first talks since November 2022 in an effort to reduce regional tensions. The patrol and reconnaissance plane “transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,” the 7th Fleet said in a news release. “By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations.” In a separate statement, the Ministry of National Defense said that it monitored nearby waters and airspace as the aircraft