PAKISTAN

BP Plc said on Tuesday it reached a deal to sell $7 billion in assets to Apache Corp as the British oil company raises money to cover costs related to the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

BP said it is to sell gas fields and an associated pipeline and terminal in Vietnam, worth an estimated $1 billion, as the oil giant builds up a cash pile to pay for its Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Al Qaeda's No. 2 leader mocked President Barack Obama for voicing confidence over victory in Afghanistan, in an Internet message posted on Monday.

An Al Qaeda magazine posted online with articles such as make a bomb in the kitchen of your mom is a bid to recruit Americans to launch attacks in the United States, a senior U.S. lawmaker said on Monday.

World Bank studies the business environment for FDI in various nations

Global rice ending stocks for 2009-10 are expected to be 90.4 million tons against the early estimation due to the lower export by the major growers, said International Grain Council. However, the global rice production is projected to decline in 2009-10 owing to poor output in countries such as India, where worst drought impacted the production, IGC noted.

Pakistani authorities on Friday put seven major websites, including Google and YouTube, under watch for containing material deemed offensive to Muslims, officials said.

Will Ahmedabad replace London as the location for clearing houses for the world bullion trade. If noted expert on bullion market Bhargava N Vaidya's words are of any value, Mumbai and Ahmedabad are better suited for the location for bullion trade clearing houses rather than Loddon.

Bangladesh has lifted a ban on social networking site Facebook after it removed objectionable content about the Prophet Mohammad and the country's political leaders, the telecoms regulatory agency said on Sunday. Facebook was blocked last week after publication of caricatures of the Prophet that hurt the religious sentiments of the country's majority Muslim population.

Pakistan's central bank governor said on Thursday he has stepped down for personal reasons, increasing concerns about political instability as the country faces IMF pressure to reform its economy. Salim Raza was the second senior policy-maker to quit in Pakistan this year following Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin's resignation in February.

A Pakistani court on Monday lifted a ban on social networking website Facebook which had carried a competition to draw the Prophet Mohammad, but access to any blasphemous material will remain blocked, officials said.

A Pakistani court on Monday lifted a ban on social networking website Facebook which had carried a competition to draw the Prophet Mohammad, but access to any blasphemous material will remain blocked, a lawyer said.

Bangladesh has blocked the Facebook social networking site because of objectionable materials it contained about the Prophet Mohammad and the country's political leaders, a telecoms regulatory official said on Sunday. The government move followed publication of caricatures of the Prophet deemed hurtful to the religious sentiments of the country's majority Muslim population, the official said...

Pakistan has partially unblocked the popular video sharing website YouTube, but links to sacrilegious or profane material will remain restricted, a top government official said on Thursday.

Josephine Jimenez has a chunk of money to invest and she is hunting for opportunities in the usual places -- Zimbabwe, Tunisia, Sri Lanka, among others. Jimenez is a specialist in so-called frontier markets. She stacked up a million air miles long ago.

After Pakistan banned Facebook in a bid to stop it hosting blasphemous pictures of Prophet Mohammad, the country's interior minister found a new way to get his online fix. He jumped on Twitter.

In an attempt to bypass the dangerous routes in Pakistan, India and Iran are discussing building a gas pipeline between the two countries along the bed of the Arabian Sea. According to South Asia Gas Enterprise Private Ltd (SAGE), The carrying capacity of the gas pipeline's first leg will total 31 billion cu m annually, with the cost of construction estimated at $4 billion

Pakistan has blocked the popular video sharing website YouTube indefinitely in a bid to contain blasphemous material, officials said on Thursday.

The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority directed Internet service providers to block Facebook indefinitely on Wednesday because of an online competition to draw the Prophet Mohammad.

A Pakistani court ordered the government on Wednesday to block Facebook after press reports of a competition being held to draw the Prophet Mohammad, a lawyer said.

(Reuters) - More than two thirds of the estimated 8.8 million deaths in children under five worldwide in 2008 were caused by infectious diseases like pneumonia, diarrhea and malaria, according to a study on behalf of the World Health Organization and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).