World Briefs

CHINA’s central bank yesterday announced it will inject at least 600 billion yuan (USD91.46 billion) to provide liquidity for the impending Spring Festival holiday, the state-run agency Xinhua reported. The liquidity will be added through tools such as the standing lending facility (SLF), the medium-term lending facility (MLF) and pledged supplementary lending (PSL), the People’s Bank of China said in a statement on its website. The central bank vowed to ensure liquidity in the banking system is “reasonable and adequate” around the Spring Festival, which will fall on Feb 8.

MIDDLE EAST Chinese President Xi Jinping has arrived in Saudi Arabia for a two-day visit as part of a Mideast tour that will include stops in Egypt and Iran. The official Saudi Press Agency reported that Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman greeted the Chinese delegation upon their arrival yesterday. Xi will be meeting with King Salman, as well as the chiefs of the Gulf Cooperation Council and the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation.

IRAN has successfully transferred some of its formerly frozen assets in order to ensure that financial sanctions have been fully lifted in accordance with a historic nuclear deal, the head of the central bank said yesterday.

SOUTH KOREA toughened its aviation security law in the aftermath of the notorious nut rage incident involving a top airline executive. The transport ministry said the revised law went into effect yesterday, more than a year after a Korean Airlines vice president’s tantrum over macadamia nuts delayed a flight.

MYANMAR Members of the Kachin ethnic group have called for justice for two young volunteer teachers who were raped and murdered in a case they believe highlights sexual violence by government soldiers. A report on the assault was released yesterday as a memorial service was held in Yangon for Tangbau Hkawn Nan Tsin and Maran Lu Ra, who were attacked a year ago.

INDIA Shouting slogans and holding placards, hundreds of students yesterday angrily protested the death of an Indian student who, along with four others, was barred from using some facilities at his university in the southern tech-hub of Hyderabad.

INTERNET Some Twitter users had to do without early yesterday after sporadic outages knocked the social media site offline in Europe. Reports of malfunctions began to appear in the US as well, but it was unclear how widespread the outages were. Twitter Inc. which has 320 million active users, tweeted that it is aware of the issue and is trying to fix it. Users said the service was not accessible on desktop computers.