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Eurozone finance ministers agreed at a meeting in Copenhagen on Friday to increase the bailout lending limit to 700 billion euros ($930 billion), a move aimed at reassuring financial markets wary of a Eurozone default and dampening the crippling debt crisis of the past few years.

Japan's government approved on Friday a bill to double the nation's consumption tax by 2015, which is seen as an important step towards putting the public finances on a sustainable path.

Finance ministers from the 17-member currency area agreed to combine, for one year, a pair of rescue funds meant to help avert a default by Spain, Italy or Portugal, or a repeat by Greece, which warned that a third bailout might be necessary.

The heads of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, meeting in New Delhi on Thursday, drafted a joint statement attacking American and European aggressive policy actions and dominance of global institutions.

A general strike and looming deficit pushed Spanish bonds yields up Thursday, leading investors to question if the country will be the next weakest link in the euro zone.

Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa are meeting in Delhi to discuss a range of issues, including increased financial integration of the member countries.

Former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn is being investigated for aggravated pimping in connection with a French prostitution ring.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn's reputation was further damaged on Monday, this time by aggravated pimping charges handed out by a French court.

The euro zone's public debt crisis is not over despite calmer financial markets this year, the OECD said on Tuesday, with a warning that the bloc's banks remain weak, debt levels are still rising and fiscal targets are far from assured.

One of his attorneys, Richard Malka, said his client denies all the charges.

Greece's exit from the euro would be a catastrophic political and economic mistake that would severely weaken Europe's single currency bloc, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said in a BBC interview broadcast on Monday.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, previously reluctant to expand the size of euro zone bailout funds, agreed to support a €200 billion ($265 billion) increase of the firewall on Monday.

The group UltraViolet said it hoped Obama's nominee, a doctor with extensive experience in public health and now Dartmouth College's president, will be a champion for women and girls throughout the world.

Developments in the two weeks since the credit event confirmed that the world's first test of using credit default swaps as protection involving sovereign debt turned out fairly well. But broader concerns abound, such as the fragile Greek economy and what could be in store for fellow euro zone members Spain and Portugal.

President Barack Obama must nominate a new President of the World Bank soon, ahead of its June annual meeting in Washington. Two Third World candidates have been mentioned but another American is the likely winner.

Gold traded broadly steady on Wednesday, as a boost from a modestly stronger euro against the dollar partly offset slow consumer demand and an erosion in holdings of the metal in exchange-traded products.

Nigerian Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and former Colombian Finance Minister Jose Antonio Ocampo are set to be nominated to lead the World Bank, sources with knowledge of emerging market efforts to find candidates said on Tuesday.

Greece has received the first 7.5 billion euros ($ 9.9 billion) of aid from its new EU/IMF bailout, with the bulk of the payment going to repay bonds held by the euro zone's central banks, government officials said on Tuesday.

Ali al-Naimi says current crude prices not justified by global economic conditions

Critics of China's foreign exchange regime have shifted their focus from the value of the yuan to the mechanism in which its day-to-day level is set, the head of the OECD said on Tuesday, a fresh sign that currency may be near its equilibrium level.

An IMF team has arrived in Cairo Monday for talks, on a $3.2 billion loan facility for Egypt. This can be a crucial meeting especially as collapse in investor confidence since last year’s revolution has left Egypt on the brink of a balance of payments crisis according to Capital Economics.

Home prices in nearly half of China's major cities fell in February from the year-ago period, as Beijing showed its determination to tame the property market.

Speaking in Beijing Sunday, the IMF chief stopped short of saying the changes had eased the Fund's concern China was deliberately undervaluing its currency, a source of tension between the rising giant and Western policy makers.

Sostis, a 60-year-old ex-sailor, is the only human inhabitant of the volcanic islet of Palaia Kameni located in the caldera of Santorini, officially called as Thira, about 120 miles southeast from Greece's mainland.

Global economic growth will slow this year, with the United States looking much improved but risks still to the downside as Europe's financial markets remain fragile, the deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund said on Monday.

The global economy has stepped back from the brink of danger and signs of stabilization are emerging from the euro zone and the United States, but high debt levels in developed markets and rising oil prices are key risks ahead, the IMF said on Sunday.

Though there are signs of recovery, the debt crisis in the developed markets and rising oil prices add to the risk factors looming large over the global economy.

Greek banks hard-hit by the country's debt swap might not need all the aid earmarked by the EU and IMF to help them weather the crisis, central bank chief George Provopoulos was quoted as saying on Saturday.

The current, unprecedented level of global youth unemployment has raised the risk of creating a lost generation, Nemat Shafik, deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund, wrote in a blog post Thursday.