Europe

OSLO (Reuters) - Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg on Friday announced her biggest cabinet reshuffle since taking power in 2013, replacing or repositioning two-thirds of ministers in the hope of reviving the Conservative-led coalition’s prospects.

Solberg this week lost her majority in parliament following the shock exit from government by the right-wing Progress Party over a decision to bring a woman suspected of Islamic State affiliation home to Norway from Syria.

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain on Friday scolded the United States for refusing to extradite a U.S. diplomat’s wife who was involved in a car crash that killed a British teenager.

“I called the U.S. Ambassador earlier to express the government’s disappointment about this decision,” Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said.

“We feel this amounts to a denial of justice, and we believe Anne Sacoolas should return to the UK,” Raab said. “We are now urgently considering our options.”

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Seventeen WTO members, including the European Union and China, agreed on Friday to set up a temporary appeals mechanism to settle trade disputes after the United States paralyzed the WTO’s appeals body, the European Commission said.

Washington has paralyzed the WTO’s Appellate Body, which acts as a supreme court for international trade, by blocking appointments for over two years. Two of the body’s three members came to the end of their terms in December, leaving it unable to issue ruling.

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia said on Thursday it had missed a United Nations deadline to repatriate North Korean workers due to what it called objective difficulties, but said it was scrupulously complying with U.N. sanctions on Pyongyang.

A 2017 U.N. Security Council resolution demanded that all countries send home all North Korean workers by Dec. 22 last year to stop them earning foreign currency for North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

LONDON (Reuters) - The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere this year is likely to show one of the largest annual rises since measurements began in 1958, partly fueled by Australian bushfires, according to research by Britain’s Met Office.

The concentration of CO2 is expected to peak above 417 parts per million (ppm) this May, while the year’s average is expected to be around 414 ppm, up to nearly 3 ppm above the average for last year.

DAVOS, Jan 24 (NNN-AGENCIES) — US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said that the United States would consider imposing tariffs on cars made in the United Kingdom if the country moves ahead with a tax on digital services.

Mnuchin said at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland that the United States regards digital services taxes such as the one imposed by France, and being planned by the United Kingdom and Italy, as being unfair to American tech companies.

ATHENS, Jan 24 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Mayors of three Greek islands bearing the brunt of intensely overcrowded refugee and migrant camps demanded the transfer of thousands to the country’s mainland during a meeting with the new migration minister.

During a second day of protests over the plight of the camps and the conservative government’s plans to replace them with holding centres, the mayors of Lesbos, Samos and Chios pressed for a swift resolution to the problem.

DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan. 23 (Xinhua) -- United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said here on Thursday that the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which was adopted in 2015, should become a master plan for each country's development, as well as an important reference for businesses.

BARCELONA, Jan 24 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The death toll from a violent storm that has wrought havoc across huge swathes of Spain’s eastern and southern coastline rose to 11, with rescue workers still searching for four people.

The latest victim was a 50-year-old man who was fishing in coastal Ametlla de Mar, according to civil protection authorities in the northeast Catalonia region.

MOSCOW, Jan. 24 (Xinhua) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday signed decrees giving jobs in his administration to members of the former government.

Former Economic Development Minister Maxim Oreshkin and former Culture Minister Vladimir Medinsky were appointed as presidential aides, while former Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak became a deputy head of administration.

Putin increased the number of deputy heads of administration to three from the previous two by a separate decree.

The former government, headed by Dmitry Medvedev, resigned on Jan. 15.