World Briefs

CHINA Industrial output rose 4.4% from a year earlier in August, the lowest for a single month since 2002, while retail sales came in below expectations. Fixed-asset investment slowed to 5.5% in the first eight months, with the private sector lagging state investment for the 6th month. More on p12

INDIA Parliament member Farooq Abdullah, 81, who is a senior pro-India politician in Kashmir was arrested yesterday under a controversial law that allows authorities to imprison someone for up to two years without charge or trial. Abdullah is the first pro-India politician who has been arrested under the Public Safety Act.

INDIA Navy divers yesterday joined a massive search for 35 Indian tourists missing after a double-decker sightseeing boat capsized in a flooded river in southern India, drowning at least 12 people. Twenty-six people were rescued after the accident on Sunday.

FIJI’s prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama used a state visit yesterday to urge Australia to take more ambitious actions to slash greenhouse gas emissions, a month after differences on climate change policy created anger and frustration at a forum of Pacific island leaders.

ISRAEL’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed yesterday to annex “all the settlements” in the West Bank, including an enclave deep in the heart of the largest Palestinian city, in a last-ditch move that appeared aimed at shoring up nationalist support the day before a do-over election. Locked in a razor tight race and with legal woes hanging over him, Netanyahu is fighting for his political survival. More on p14

USA Purdue Pharma, the company that made billions selling the prescription painkiller OxyContin, filed for bankruptcy in New York, days after reaching a tentative settlement with many of the state and local governments suing it over the toll of opioids. The filing was anticipated before and after the tentative deal, which could be worth up to $12 billion over time, was struck.

EU The European Commission is investigating tax schemes that Belgium has set up with 39 multinational companies. The commission said yesterday the investigations aim to assess whether Belgian rulings issued between 2005 and 2014 gave an unfair advantage to the companies by allowing them to pay less tax. The companies include brewing giant Anheuser-Busch Inbev and British American Tobacco.

BREXIT British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker agreed to ramp up talks on securing an elusive Brexit deal, but the two sides gave starkly different assessments of how far apart they are. The two men held their first face-to-face talks over a two-hour lunch in Juncker’s native Luxembourg amid claims that an agreement is in sight.

FRANCE Lawyers, doctors, nurses, pilots and others are taking to the streets of Paris to protest planned pension changes by French President Emmanuel Macron’s government. Yesterday’s demonstration gathers people working in the private sector with professions regulated by the state, who currently benefit from a special pension regime.