Europe

12 September 2019; AFP: Leonardo da Vinci's famous mechanical lion on Wednesday went on display in Paris for a month, in a tribute to the Renaissance master 500 years after his death.

The lion, which is two metres (six feet, seven inches) high and three metres long and made of wood with a metal mechanism, is a reconstruction based on a rudimentary sketch left by da Vinci.

PARIS (Reuters) - French National Assembly President Richard Ferrand was determined to stay in his job after investigating judges placed the close ally of President Emmanuel Macron under formal investigation in a financial impropriety case, his office said.

Judges in the northern city of Lille questioned Ferrand all day Wednesday in a case that could bring renewed scrutiny to Macron’s promise to clean up French politics.

Ferrand’s office said he denied any wrongdoing, adding he would use the investigation to defend himself and was confident the case would be dropped.

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain will make a decision soon about whether to allow Huawei equipment to be used in its 5G networks but China must play by the rules if it gets access to Western markets, Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said.

Asked when a decision would be made by the United Kingdom on Huawei, Wallace said on Wednesday: “The government will come to its position soon. We will get to a decision pretty soon.

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian Deputy Finance Minister Vladimir Kolychev said on Thursday that there was no question of the economy going into recession despite a slowdown in economic growth.

The central bank last week lowered its 2019 economic growth projection to 0.8%-1.3% from an earlier forecast of 1.0%-1.5%.

LONDON (Reuters) - Global oil demand is weathering economic headwinds, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Thursday, buoyed by lower prices brought on by abundant supply as the United States briefly dethroned Saudi Arabia as the world’s top exporter.

“With oil prices currently about 20% lower than a year ago, there will be support for consumers,” the IEA said in its monthly report.

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Google won a victory on Thursday after Europe’s top court said Germany has to notify the European Commission of a rule allowing publishers to demand a copyright fee from the U.S. tech giant for using news snippets.

The case underlines the battle between publishers and Alphabet unit Google over the share of revenues from distributing news.

PARIS, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- France on Wednesday warned against any project that would undermine diplomatic efforts to reach lasting peace in the Middle East, reiterating that the two-state solution was crucial to end the years-long conflict.

"France calls on the parties to refrain from any measure likely to undermine the two-state solution, the only way to satisfy the legitimate aspirations of the Israelis and the Palestinians," said the French Foreign Ministry in a statement.

GENEVA, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- A dysfunctional dispute settlement system of the World Trade Organization (WTO) is worrisome and will open door to more unilateral actions, WTO spokesperson Keith Rockwell has said.

In a recent exclusive interview with Xinhua, Rockwell reiterated that "the dispute settlement system has been an integral part of the success of the WTO."

"If you take away this important multilateral component, you open the door to more unilateral actions," warned the spokesperson.

Scotland’s highest civil court has ruled that British PM Boris Johnson’s suspension of the UK Parliament ahead of Brexit is unlawful. A panel of three judges at the Court of Session found in favour of a cross-party group of politicians who were challenging the prime minister's move.

Five week suspension of Parliament, a process known as proroguing, started on Tuesday. MPs are not scheduled to return to Parliament until 14 October, and UK is due to leave the EU on 31 October.

MOSCOW, September 11. /TASS/: Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov has not confirmed media reports that a former staff member of the Kremlin administration named Oleg Smolenkov, who has been alleged to be a CIA agent in media reports, had access to sensitive Russian information.