England

LONDON, June 25 (Reuters) - The world's central bank umbrella body, the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), called on Sunday for more interest rate hikes, warning the world economy was now at a crucial point as countries struggle to rein in inflation.

Despite the relentless rise in rates over the last 18 months, inflation in many top economies remains stubbornly high, while the jump in borrowing costs triggered the most serious banking collapses since the financial crisis 15 years ago.

BAMBER BRIDGE, England (AP) — The village of Bamber Bridge in northwestern England is proud of the blow it struck against racism in the U.S. military during World War II.

When an all-Black truck regiment was stationed in the village, residents refused to accept the segregation ingrained in the U.S. Army. Ignoring pressure from British and American authorities, pubs welcomed the GIs, local women chatted and danced with them, and English soldiers drank alongside men they saw as allies in the war against fascism.

LONDON (AP) — A man was convicted of murder on Friday for shooting a British police officer with an antique handgun while the suspect was handcuffed in a cell nearly three years ago.

A jury deliberated for just over five hours before finding 25-year-old Louis De Zoysa guilty of killing Sgt. Matiu Ratana in September 2020.

LONDON (AP) — “Titanic” director James Cameron says the search operation for a deep-sea tourist sub turned into a “nightmarish charade” that prolonged the agony of the families of the passengers.

Cameron told the BBC in an interview broadcast on Friday that he “felt in my bones” that the Titan submersible had been lost soon after he heard it had lost contact with the surface during its descent to the wreckage of the ocean liner at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.

LONDON, June 22 (Reuters) - The Bank of England raised interest rates by a bigger-than-expected half a percentage point on Thursday after it said there had been "significant" news suggesting British inflation would take longer to fall.

The BoE's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted 7-2 to raise its main interest rate to 5% from 4.5%, its highest since 2008 and its largest rate increase since February, following stickier inflation and wage growth since its policymakers met last in May.

LONDON, June 21. /TASS/: Ukraine will be ready to begin talks on joining the EU in the near future, Polish Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau said in London on Wednesday, speaking at the Ukraine Recovery Conference 2023.

"Ukraine should become a ember of the European Union as soon as possible," he said, stressing that in spite of the conflict with Russia, Ukraine had made progress on all criteria.

LONDON (AP) — Ukraine’s allies pledged several billion dollars in non-military aid on Wednesday to rebuild its war-ravaged infrastructure, fight corruption and help pave the country’s road to membership in the European Union.

Stressing the vast scale of the task, diplomats and political leaders at the Ukraine Recovery Conference in London urged private-sector companies to invest and revive an economy battered by almost a year and a half of war.

LONDON (AP) — European Union consumer protection groups urged regulators on Tuesday to investigate the type of artificial intelligence underpinning systems like ChatGPT, citing risks that leave people vulnerable and the delay before the bloc’s groundbreaking AI regulations take effect.

In a coordinated effort, 13 watchdog groups wrote to their national consumer, data protection, competition and product safety authorities warning them about a range of concerns around generative artificial intelligence.

LONDON (AP) — Britain made a mistake in focusing too much on preparations for a flu pandemic rather than considering other types of pandemic in the years before the COVID-19 outbreak, former Prime Minister David Cameron told a public inquiry Monday.

Cameron, who led Britain’s Conservative government from 2010 to 2016, was the first politician to be questioned by the wide-ranging inquiry into the U.K.’s preparedness for the coronavirus pandemic, how the government responded and what lessons can be learned for the future.

LONDON (AP) — Multinational companies including Amazon, Marriott and Hilton pledged Monday to hire more than 13,000 refugees, including Ukrainian women who have fled the war with Russia, over the next three years in Europe.

Just ahead of World Refugee Day on Tuesday, more than 40 corporations say they will hire, connect to work or train a total of 250,000 refugees, with 13,680 of them getting jobs directly in those companies.