After a 30% increase in fixed asset investment in the first quarter of this year, the Chinese Government is taking steps to slow economic growth. To discourage a rapid rise in investments, the National Development and Reform Commission is encouraging local governments to monitor and tighten control on land use and lending.
Jail sentences imposed on Belarusian opposition leaders after Wednesday's demonstration in Minsk drew sharp international criticism. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice condemned what she called the "reprehensible" arrest and jailing of opposition leader and former presidential candidate Aleksandr Milinkevich. Speaking on the sidelines of a NATO meeting in Sofia, she called on the Belarusian authorities to "act within accepted international principles when it comes to the treatment of political opposition."
Credit ratings agency Moody's has upgraded the financial strength ratings on Colombia's largest bank, Bancolombia, to D+ from D while maintaining a stable outlook. The move reflects Bancolombia's strengthened franchise after a three-way merger with home loan provider Conavi and investment bank Corfinsura last year, Moody's said. Medellín-based Bancolombia commands 20% and 19% market shares in assets and deposits respectively.
Bolivia's regulatory agencies must be reformed and in some cases eliminated, President Evo Morales said. Regulators - including those of the telecommunications, water, electricity, railway, aviation and hydrocarbons sectors - are not the best mechanism to ensure service quality or defend the economic interests of the country's poor, Morales said. Bolivia's regulatory agencies were created in 1997 as state-owned companies were partially or totally privatized.
In the first quarter of 2006 about 363,600 people were jobless in Hungary, resulting in an unemployment rate of 7.7%, the Central Statistical Office said on Thursday. The jobless rate rose from 7.1% in the first quarter of last year. In February 2006 Hungary's harmonised unemployment rate was 7.9% against the EU average of 8.8% and the EU-15 average of 8%. The proportion of unemployed people who have been looking for a job for over a year is 44.1%, the average time spent out of work is 15.8 months and 19.3% of the jobless are aged 15 to 24 years.
Minister Delegate at the German Foreign Ministry, Guenter Gloser, announced that Germany is planning to invest $2.5 billion in Algeria 's energy sector. Gloser, in an interview with Algerian radio , said the investment would be made over up to 2012.