Search Results for: London

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has warned European Union (EU) legal professions it may act against tough entrance restrictions and rules limiting services offered by qualified lawyers. EU competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes’s speech at a British government seminar in London this week (21-11) comes as the Commission stages a competition review of professional services.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has fired a shot across the bows of European Union (EU) professions that have tough entrance restrictions and limit competition amongst qualified experts, from lawyers, pharmacists and accountants to notaries, engineers and architects. EU competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes’s speech at a British government-organised seminar in London this week (21-11) comes as the Commission is holding a competition review of professional services.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE CLEAR message from the first meeting of the Sustainable Energy Forum in Amsterdam last month (October) was that the higher the price of fossil fuels then the greater the need for national governments to support the introduction of renewable energy sources through subsidies, tax breaks, technical assistance and the like.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE INDEPENDENT Inquiry Committee into the United Nations’ Iraq Oil for Food programme scandal has claimed 14 British companies paid kickbacks to the Saddam Hussein regime to secure contracts to supply humanitarian supplies under the scheme. There were also four British companies that paid “surcharges” to secure contracts to lift oil from Iraq to help buy medicines, food and other supposed essentials.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE INDEPENDENT Inquiry Committee into the United Nations’ Iraq Oil for Food programme scandal has claimed 14 British companies paid kickbacks to the Saddam Hussein regime to secure contracts to supply humanitarian supplies. There were also four British companies that paid “surcharges” to secure contracts to lift oil from Iraq to help buy medicines, food and other essentials.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
LONDON-based oil and gas exploration and production company SOCO International will be lent up to US$45 million by the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation (IFC) to help finance its investments in emerging markets, particularly Vietnam and Yemen. SOCO wants to help stem Yemen’s declining oil production, and help Vietnam secure more market-based foreign direct investment.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE ROLE of the Caribbean as a staging point for ill-gotten gains goes back to the trans-Atlantic misadventures of the first European ships over 400 years ago. It would appear some habits die hard. Wesley Gibbings reports from Port of Spain, Trinidad.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
A REPORT issued this summer by the world’s top anti money laundering body, the Paris-based Financial Action Task Force (FATF), has highlighted the peculiarities of the insurance industry as a vehicle for money laundering. The FATF’s “Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Typologies 2004-5” analysed 94 reported cases of money laundering involving the insurance industry between 1999 and 2003.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
BRITAIN is not normally thought of being subject to landslides and avalanches in the way that Alpine countries are, but the coming of climate change has made these natural disasters a real and potentially very expensive threat to us.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A MARINE litter clean-up campaign involving Scottish fishermen has received a global United Nations award. Glasgow PR firm Weber Shandwick picked up the 2005 UN Grand Award for outstanding achievement in public relations for its Save the North Sea campaign.…