Believing it's a private conversation, French President Nicolas Sarkozy branded Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "a liar" in a private conversation with U.S. President Barack Obama, but he is  unaware that the microphones in their meeting room had been switched on, enabling reporters in a separate location to listen in to a simultaneous translation.

(Reuters) Nigeria's gasoline import allocations for the fourth quarter are being delayed as parliament debates the removal of subsidies and as gasoline held in offshore floating storage surges to record levels, trade sources said on Monday. Nigeria is Africa's top oil exporter but insufficient refining capacity means it relies on fuel imports, mostly gasoline, for up to 85 percent of its oil product needs.

(Dow Jones) Crude-oil futures were slightly higher in Asia Tuesday as violence in Nigeria and potentially tight Middle Eastern supply offset mixed cues from regional equity markets jittery over Europe's debt crisis. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in December traded at $95.75 a barrel at 0731 GMT, up $0.23 in the Globex electronic session. December Brent crude on London's ICE

A British woman working for a multinational oil company has revealed she was asked to recruit mercenaries to take part in an operation to rescue Muammar Gaddafi, it emerged today. Sarah Penfold, who is of Kenyan descent and works in security, claimed her brief was to round up a team of South African 'soldiers of fortune' as revolutionary forces closed in on the now-deceased Libyan tyrant, the Independent

(German Chencellor, Angela Merkel broods over Euro woes) Brazil to overtake UK as sixth-largest economy

[elombah.com] China has dashed hopes of a bailout of the euro by saying it was not the ‘saviour’ of  Europe.  Though it expressed confidence that the continent can survive its crisis, Beijing has made no public offer to buy more government debt from western states. And as further sign of a shift in the tectonic plates of world economy, Brazil's economy is set to overtake

The Inspector General of Police (IGP) has through the Director of the Legal Department of the Ghana Police Service promised an Accra Fast Track High Court that the 17 dismissed recruits would be reinstated in two weeks. The IGP was represented in court by the Director General of Legal Prosecution for the GPS, ACP Ken Yeboah, who made the announcement to the court. He told the Court of Appeals Judge Dennis Adjei of the

Rio Tinto, along with 10 other Australian companies, have been made part of an Australia-Nigeria Trade and Investment Council to look into possible investment opportunities in Nigeria's mining, agriculture and financial services sectors. Nigerian Minister of Trade and Investment Olusegun Aganga, during an Australian-Nigerian

Nigeria’s central bank may lower its official target for the naira to 155-156 per dollar and aim to keep it stable around that level over the next year, Governor Lamido Sanusi said. “We think at this point we might move to 155, 156 as a midpoint,” Sanusi said today at a conference in Abuja, the capital. The bank will make its stance

New York – Cabinet proposals to amend and implement Egypt’s 1952 “Law on Political Treachery” have negative implications for the country’s political freedoms and upcoming election, Human Rights Watch said today. In a televised interview on Dream TV on October 20, 2011, Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) Maj. Gen. Mohamed al-Assar said that the military was studying the draft law, renamed “The

MTN Group Ltd. (MTN), Africa’s largest mobile-phone company, said Nigeria’s communications regulator asked it to improve services or stop selling connections to new subscribers in that country by the end of November.

“We have indeed received the Nigerian Communications Commission’s demand and our operation there is dealing with it,” Rich Mkhondo, a spokesman for Johannesburg-based MTN, said by phone today. “We have a

Residents cook in knee-deep flood water and children wade past carrying roosters above their shoulders in this city on the outskirts of Lagos, where the rising tide poses a health risk by overwhelming sewage-filled outdoor toilets. In Ikorodu in southwestern Nigeria, wooden canoes sail in creeks newly formed over roads, forcing people to use gangplanks of scrap wood to stay out of the muddy current. And government assistance, despite

Wanted: A reliable overseas business partner to invest more than $1 billion presently trapped in Nigeria. This is not a scam. Nigeria, the West African nation that has gained notoriety for the illicit e-mail spammers aiming for Western bank accounts, is attracting attention for legitimate financial opportunities — investing its own savings. In an effort to preserve and increase its oil revenue, the country recently established a so-called sovereign

Libyans file past the bodies of Gaddafi and his son prior to their burial. Photograph: Thaier Al-Sudani/Reuters) Gaddafi sodomized: Video shows abuse frame by frame (GRAPHIC) [An analysis appears to confirm that a rebel fighter sodomized Gaddafi with a knife: See pictures of Ghadafi tortured and Sodomised below].

Libya's new government has confirmed that Muammar Gaddafi has finally been

An explosion at a bus station in downtown Nairobi, Kenya, killed at least one person and injured eight today, according to the Kenyan police and Red Cross. It happened just two or three blocks from the site of a separate blast that hurt 12 people at a nightclub earlier Monday. Charles Owino, a deputy police spokesman, confirmed the explosion and said he was awaiting more details. Initial reports say the blast killed one person and injured eight, said

Western scramble for Libya starts as British business executives was Friday told to "pack their suitcases" and fly to Libya to win contracts to rebuild the war-ravaged country. New Defence Secretary Philip Hammond said British firms should move quickly to secure lucrative work after the Gaddafi regime fell last week. "Now that campaign is over I would expect British companies to be, even today packing their suitcases and

(Reuters) -- Nigeria's new car imports jumped 40 percent in the first nine months of 2011 compared to the same period last year, although sales were expected to slow given rising interest rates and local currency weaknesses, import dealers said. Car sales in Africa's most populous nation are a proxy measure for private purchasing power, a leading economic indicator which is not formally available. Nigerian port figures showed new vehicle

Communique: Addis Ababa, 21 October 2011- The Chairperson of the Commission of the African Union (AU), Dr. Jean Ping, has followed closely the latest developments in Libya, including the death of Colonel Muammar Qaddafi and some of his sons and senior aides, in circumstances of armed violence. The Chairperson of the Commission recalls that, since the onset of the crisis in Libya, the AU has called for, and tirelessly worked towards, a

(AP) – The burial of slain leader Moammar Gadhafi has been delayed until his death can be further examined and a decision is made about where to inter the body, Libyan officials said Friday, as the U.N. human rights office called for an investigation into his death. The transitional leadership had said it would bury the dictator Friday in accordance with Islamic tradition. Bloody images of Gadhafi's last moments, however, have

(Reuters) - Muammar Gaddafi called the rebels who rose up against his 42-years of one-man rule "rats," but in the end it was he who was captured cowering in a drainage pipe full of rubbish and filth. "He called us rats, but look where we found him," said Ahmed Al Sahati, a 27-year-old government fighter, standing next to two stinking drainage pipes under a six-lane highway. Government fighters, video evidence and the scenes of

(Reuters) - The U.S. Export-Import Bank signed a deal with Nigeria's power minister on Tuesday to provide $1.5 billion for U.S. companies to work in the underperforming power sector, which is holding back growth in sub-Saharan Africa's second-largest economy. Nigeria has the world's seventh-largest natural gas reserves, yet is blighted by persistent electricity outages which force businesses and individuals who can