TAIPEI, Taiwan - Taiwan has lowered its economic growth forecast for 2013 to a muted 2.4 per cent as global demand for the island's electronics exports remained subdued.
In February, the government predicted 3.6 per cent growth this year. The economy grew 1.3 per cent in 2012.
BANGKOK - Asian shares traded erratically Friday but European markets found their footing, a day after global stocks were routed by unexpectedly weak Chinese manufacturing and fears the Federal Reserve will start withdrawing its monetary stimulus.
Japan's Nikkei 225 index, which plummeted more than 7 per cent Thursday, posted a big morning gain and then took investors on a dizzying ride into negative territory before closing 0.9 per cent higher at 14,612.45. The benchmark swung more than 1,000 points between the day's high and low.
PARIS - France's finance minister says the government is no longer planning to cap executives' salaries in the private sector, amid concerns it is antagonizing the big businesses needed to reinvigorate the economy.
The Socialist government imposed limits last year on executive pay at state-run companies, and pledged to do the same in the private sector.
BERLIN - German business confidence rebounded this month in an unexpectedly strong showing that sends a hopeful signal for more robust growth in Europe's biggest economy, a closely watched survey found Friday.
The Ifo think-tank 's confidence index rose to 105.7 points for May from 104.4 last month. The upturn followed two consecutive declines and beat economists' expectations of a very slight increase to 104.5.
WASHINGTON - When President Barack Obama pushed his health care overhaul plan through Congress, he counted labour unions among his strongest supporters.
But some unions leaders have grown frustrated and angry about what they say are unexpected consequences of the new law — problems that they say could jeopardize the health benefits offered to millions of their members.
TOKYO - Japan's top leaders are defending the economic strategies championed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, though the central bank chief acknowledged a need for better communication with financial markets, a day after Tokyo shares suffered their worst loss since the 2011 tsunami disaster.
Bank of Japan Gov. Haruhiko Kuroda acknowledged Friday the need for careful handling of aggressive monetary policies aimed at breaking the world's third-largest economy free of deflation, or falling prices, that has hobbled growth by slowing investment and consumer spending.
TOKYO - Japan's All Nippon Airways, the launch customer for Boeing's 787 "Dreamliner," will resume commercial flights of the aircraft on Sunday, just over four months after the jets were grounded due to smouldering batteries.
ANA said in a statement that it will run five commercial 787 flights in May, before regular, scheduled services begin on June 1. The first will be a commercial flight late Sunday from Chitose, on the northern island of Hokkaido, to Tokyo's Haneda Airport.
BANGKOK - The price of oil was knocked lower Friday by a combination of ample supplies and lukewarm demand.
Benchmark oil for July delivery was down 40 cents to US$93.85 per barrel at midday Bangkok time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
NEW YORK, N.Y. - Household products giant Procter & Gamble Co. is hoping its former CEO can work his magic once again.
The Cincinnati company said late Thursday that former CEO A.G. Lafley, a 33-year industry veteran, is returning its top post. The surprise move comes as the world's largest consumer-products maker tries to spur growth in the face of stiff global competition.
EAST HARTFORD, Conn. - An 11-year study of the incidence of brain cancer at jet engine manufacturer Pratt & Whitney in the state ended Thursday with university researchers saying they found no statistically significant elevations in the rate of cancer among workers.
Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Illinois at Chicago said they identified 723 workers diagnosed with tumors between 1976 and 2004 at the United Technologies Corp. subsidiary. The tumors were malignant, benign or unspecified and included 277 cases of brain cancer.
BANGKOK - Asian stock markets staged a mild recovery Friday, a day after being routed by unexpectedly weak Chinese manufacturing and fears the Federal Reserve will start withdrawing its monetary stimulus.
Japan's Nikkei 225 index, which plummeted more than 7 per cent Thursday, bounced back a sizeable 2.8 per cent to 14,892.57. South Korea's Kospi gained 0.1 per cent to 1,971.46. Benchmarks in Indonesia, Taiwan and mainland China also rose.
NEW YORK, N.Y. - Procter & Gamble Co. is bringing back its former CEO, as the world's largest consumer-products maker tries to spur global growth.
In a surprise move, P&G said Thursday that former CEO A.G. Lafley, a 33-year industry veteran, is returning to the Cincinnati company's helm.
NEW YORK, N.Y. - It was another ugly quarter for Sears Holdings Corp.
The beleaguered department-store chain reported a steeper-than-expected loss for its first quarter on slumping sales.
WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama plans to give the Jersey Shore a boost with a post-Memorial Day visit to showcase recovery efforts in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy.
The White House says the president will tour the coastline with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie on Tuesday and speak about the need to expand economic opportunities for middle-class families hit by the storm. He plans to meet with business and home owners who have benefitted from the recovery.
CHICAGO - An 87-year-old grandmother took on billionaire Donald Trump. And on Thursday, she lost.
Jurors sided with the real estate mogul-turned-TV showman in a weeklong civil trial focused on Jacqueline Goldberg's claim that Trump cheated her in a bait-and-switch scheme connected to condos in a Chicago skyscraper he built.
The run-up in stock prices this year could tempt even the most hands-off investor to wade into their 401(k) and make some changes.
The Dow Jones industrial average, Nasdaq and Standard & Poor's 500 indexes are each up more than 20 per cent over the past 12 months. But experts suggest investors tread cautiously and avoid major changes aimed at timing the market.
CALI, Colombia - Prime Minister Stephen Harper says it is too soon to decide whether Canada should join the Pacific Alliance trade bloc in its mission to deepen economic integration.
After a day spent meeting with Latin American leaders and looking into their plans to form a European Union-like bloc to compete with Asia, Harper said he was not ready to make the call.
MONTREAL - Genivar has unveiled a strategic plan to more than double its size even as the big consulting engineering firm acknowledged that ethical lapses have undermined employee morale.
"Unfortunately, we can't change the past but we can learn and come out of it stronger," CEO Pierre Shoiry told shareholders Thursday at the company's annual meeting.
MILWAUKEE - Shoppers in the U.S. will soon have more information about where their meat comes from after new federal labeling rules went into effect Thursday.
The rules require labels on steaks, ribs and other cuts of meat to say where the animal was born, raised and slaughtered. Earlier U.S. Department of Agriculture rules only required that countries of origin to be noted, so a package might say "Produce of U.S. and Canada." Now, the label will specify "Born in Canada, raised and slaughtered in the United States."
TORONTO - Canada said Thursday that it is considering retaliatory measures against the United States in a dispute over meat-labeling rules that Ottawa and the World Trade Organization consider discriminatory.
The Canadian government said that new U.S. country of origin labeling regulations announced Thursday that require tracking beef, chicken and hogs from livestock through the meat processing and distribution systems are unduly burdensome.
OTTAWA - Fraud was definitely a factor in the rash of misleading robocalls that bedevilled voters in six federal ridings in the 2011 election, but not enough of one to justify overturning the results, a Federal Court judge has decided.
The ruling, released late Thursday, left both sides in the dispute — the Conservative party in one corner, the voters who fielded the calls in the other — claiming victory of a sort.
MONTREAL - A huge boil-water advisory affecting 1.3 million people in Montreal, described by local officials as unprecedented in the recorded history of the city, was lifted late Thursday.
City officials ended the two-day-old advisory at 10:15 p.m., after tests concluded the water quality was fine.
EDMONTON - Alberta's Opposition Wildrose Party says it has paid a $90,000 penalty imposed by federal regulators for violating automated phone call rules.
The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission says Wildrose broke the rules in 2011 and before, during and after the April 2012 provincial election.
OTTAWA - Prime Minister Stephen Harper acknowledged for the first time Thursday that "perhaps" he could have responded more quickly to the news that his trusted chief of staff had footed the $90,000 bill for Sen. Mike Duffy's disallowed housing expenses.
Harper conceded that he could have accepted the resignation of former right-hand man Nigel Wright earlier than he ultimately did — four days after Harper and the rest of Canada learned the stunning news about the personal cheque Wright wrote the senator.
TORONTO - The chief of staff to embattled Mayor Rob Ford was escorted by security from city hall premises Thursday amid swirling allegations the mayor had been caught on videotape smoking crack cocaine.
Mark Towhey, one of Ford's closest advisers whose background is in crisis management, refused to explain his sudden departure after more than a year in the position.
VANCOUVER - Scientists at the Vancouver Aquarium have sprung into action, as part of an effort to prevent an endangered frog population from becoming extinct in eastern British Columbia.
The Rocky Mountain population of northern leopard frogs plummeted by the millions in the 1970s, and only two populations are now known to exist near Creston, in B.C.'s West Kootenay region.
VANCOUVER - A massive landslide that ripped through a small hamlet in southeastern British Columbia last year, killing four people, was caused by a deluge of rain and a late spring snowmelt that triggered the largest slide to hit the region in at least 12,000 years, a report into the disaster concludes.
The report, released Thursday by the Regional District of Central Kootenay, also warns more than a dozen properties in Johnsons Landing are still at risk of another deadly slide, meaning some residents will never be able to return to their homes.
VANCOUVER - Passing a balanced budget, going on a trade mission to Asia, and establishing labour peace with teachers are among B.C. Premier Christy Clark's top priorities as she announced she will recall the legislature this summer.
Speaking to her newly elected caucus members as well as defeated candidates for the first time since the Liberals' come-from-behind election win last week, Clark said the party must now make good on its campaign promises.
CALI, Colombia - Prime Minister Stephen Harper says it is too soon to decide whether Canada should join the Pacific Alliance trade bloc in its mission to deepen economic integration.
After a day spent meeting with Latin American leaders and looking into their plans to form a European Union-like bloc to compete with Asia, Harper said he was not ready to make the call.
CALGARY - A senior TransCanada Corp. executive says the resistance to the approval of the proposed Keystone XL oilsands pipeline has made the company more cautious about future cross-border endeavours.
Alex Pourbaix, president of energy and oil pipelines at the Calgary-based pipeline and utility company (TSX:TRP), said the long delays getting Keystone approved in the U.S. has been an education.
TROIS-RIVIERES, Que. - A woman is recovering following a bizarre accident in which she was run over three times by her own car.
Trois-Rivieres, Que., police say the newspaper delivery woman was making her rounds this week and jumping in and out of her car frequently to drop copies of Le Nouvelliste on subscribers' doorsteps.
TORONTO - Maybe offering straight cash for a blood donation is a no-no, but research suggests that other incentives like free T-shirts and gift cards can boost donor rates without compromising the safety of the blood supply.
Writing Thursday in the journal Science, an international team of economists says countries that prohibit material rewards for blood donors may want to rethink that position, based on recent research.
Note to readers: This is a corrected story. A previous version incorrectly stated the car prize was offered by Canadian Blood Services.
CALGARY - An agency offering support to young sex abuse victims and named after a former NHL player who himself was molested as a teenager was busy even before it officially opened its doors Thursday.
The Sheldon Kennedy Child Advocacy Centre, named for the hockey player who brought to light sex crimes by one-time junior coach Graham James, began seeing children a couple of months ago and 200 kids have already visited the facility, Kennedy said.
MONTREAL - Quebec's corruption inquiry has heard its fair share of explosive allegations. The latest one is about an actual explosion.
A witness Thursday described the frightening methods used to keep an asphalt cartel in place, including the one time his car was blown up when he ran afoul of his fellow schemers.
OTTAWA - Mike Duffy is blowing off any talk of his voluntary resignation from the Senate amid an expense scandal that has reached all the way to the Prime Minister's Office.
Duffy spoke out Thursday, his first public comments since resigning last week after it was revealed he had made inappropriate expense claims and then paid them off with a $90,000 "gift" from Stephen Harper's chief of staff.
ST. JOHN'S, N.L. - Survivors of abuse at the Mount Cashel Orphanage in St. John's, N.L. have reached a settlement with the Christian Brothers of Ireland worth more than $16.5 million.
The settlement with the Catholic religious order includes cash plus other assets that must still be approved in court.
WASHINGTON - A Canada-U.S. trade war is apparently looming as Ottawa threatens "retaliatory measures" against the United States in a continuing dispute over meat labelling.
The U.S. government announced new regulations Thursday on "country-of-origin labelling" (COOL) that would track cattle and hogs right from the farm to meat processing and distribution systems.
OTTAWA - Importers of popular electronics such as big-screen TVs and MP3 players are ramping up their fight against federal tariff changes, accusing the government of misleading them by offering tariff breaks that it planned to claw back later.
Importers of televisions are already on the hook for about $16 million in retroactive duties from 2011 after last year's crackdown on a particular tariff exemption that has become a political football.
BRIDGEWATER, N.S. - The mother of a teenage boy who was kidnapped and sexually assaulted for days says she was overwhelmed to see her son's abuser in court, admitting she wanted him to suffer after hearing him plead guilty to the charges.
With her hands shaking and emotion straining her voice, the woman said outside court that her 16-year-old son is trying to put behind him the days of captivity and abuse inflicted on him last September in a home in rural Nova Scotia.
TORONTO - A man charged in an alleged plot to attack a Via Rail passenger train says he wants to be represented by a lawyer who agrees the Qu'ran should be used as a "reference" in his case.
Chiheb Esseghaier appeared in a Toronto court by video link from jail Thursday morning and said he has made an application for representation by legal aid, but is seeking a lawyer who can co-operate with his need to use the Muslim religious text in his defence.
Note to readers: This is a corrected story. An earlier version indicated the allegations specified a plot involving a bomb, but police have not provided such specific details of the alleged plot.
PONTE DI LEGNO, Italy - Former Giro d'Italia winner Danilo Di Luca tested positive for EPO in a surprise test at his home before this year's race, organizers announced Friday.
If confirmed in a backup "B'' sample, Di Luca risks a lifetime ban since this is his third offence.
PONTE DI LEGNO, Italy - Race organizers say former Giro d'Italia winner Danilo Di Luca has tested positive for EPO.
More coming.
LOS ANGELES, Calif. - Jonathan Quick saved his best save for the final minute, sliding deftly across his crease and snagging Joe Pavelski's shot from point-blank range to the grateful gasps of the Los Angeles Kings' sellout crowd.
Quick's imposing post-season presence only appears to be growing, and the San Jose Sharks are running out of time to figure him out.
DETROIT - Jimmy Howard kept Jonathan Toews in his misery, making three saves against the struggling star to help the Detroit Red Wings beat the Chicago Blackhawks 2-0 on Thursday night in Game 4 of the second round series to put the NHL's best team during the regular season on the brink of elimination.
When Howard wasn't using his glove or pads to deny Toews, Detroit's skaters were rattling him and his teammates with a physical presence that is clearly making them uncomfortable.
SASKATOON - With disappointment etched on his face, Saskatoon Blades overage forward Josh Nicholls was unable to contain his emotions Thursday after the host team crashed out of the MasterCard Memorial Cup.
"It's a tough moment obviously there leaving the ice, especially the way that it happened," said Nicholls, his voice cracking following his final junior game, a London Knights' 6-1 blowout victory in the tournament's tiebreaker game. "Saskatoon's been a great city for myself and for my family and for my hockey career.
DENVER - The Colorado Avalanche are rounding up the old crew to restore the downtrodden franchise.
First, Joe Sakic was given more responsibility in the front office.
TORONTO - Plenty of star power and promising pitching by the Baltimore Orioles gave the Toronto Blue Jays every reason to resign themselves to a long night.
Through three innings, that is.
NEW YORK, N.Y. - Chris Kreider proudly wore the Broadway Hat in the victorious New York Rangers dressing room as he tried to describe the feeling of saving his team's season.
Kreider deftly steered in a pass from Rick Nash 7:03 into overtime, and the Rangers stayed alive in the Stanley Cup playoffs with a 4-3 victory over the Boston Bruins on Thursday night.
VANCOUVER - Former Vancouver Canucks coach Alain Vigneault appears to have some interesting opportunities as he pursues a new job.
Given his experience and success with the Canucks, Vigneault should get some consideration for the vacant Dallas Stars job. Dallas has a strong core of young, emerging talent, but missed the playoffs the past two seasons under former first-time NHL coach Glen Gulutzan.
INDIANAPOLIS - Fuzzy Zoeller says he's "paid his dues" after his infamous remarks about Tiger Woods ordering fried chicken for the Masters champions dinner, and believes similar comments made by Sergio Garcia will eventually blow over.
Garcia has apologized to Woods after saying at a recent awards dinner in London that he would serve fried chicken if the two rivals had dinner at the U.S. Open. Garcia called it a "silly remark," adding that "in no way was the comment meant in a racist manner."
Star Calgary running back Jon Cornish may get odd looks when he stands on one foot ordering lunch or spins through a doorway.
But he says he can't stop working on ways to improve his game, after setting a new CFL record last season for a Canadian with 1,457 rushing yards.
VANCOUVER - Ryan Lochte did many things after dominating at the 2012 London Olympics — except swim.
The U.S. swimming star, who won five gold medals in London, was featured in his own reality show called "What Would Ryan Lochte Do?" He also appeared on talk shows and made TV cameo appearances.
OTTAWA - Daniel Alfredsson has no doubt that he and the Ottawa Senators will bring their best game to Pittsburgh and doesn’t care if anyone thinks otherwise.
Down 3-1 to the Penguins, the Senators face the prospect of elimination when their best-of-seven Eastern Conference semifinal resume Friday night.
TORONTO - Prior to training camp this season, young midfielder Jonathan Osorio was just hoping to catch on with Toronto FC.
The 20-year-old from Toronto has gone well beyond just hanging around. Osorio earned a starting assignment in the MLS club's first pre-season game against Columbus in Orlando in February, has seen action in 10 of TFC's first 11 league games, scored twice and been singled out for praise by manager Ryan Nelsen, who has used him as an impact substitute.
SASKATOON - Saskatoon Blades defenceman Dalton Thrower has played his last game at the MasterCard Memorial Cup.
The Canadian Hockey League has suspended Thrower for the rest of the tournament for his check to the head on Portland Winterhawks forward Taylor Leier.
MONTREAL - Having Alessandro Nesta back on the field this week was a welcome sight for the Montreal Impact.
The former Italian international defender has battled a nagging adductor injury since the third game of the Major League Soccer season, but looks ready to play again.
POLSA, Italy - Vincenzo Nibali won the individual mountain time trial in the 18th stage of the Giro d'Italia on Thursday to extend his overall lead.
The Italian finished in 44 minutes, 29 seconds on the 20.6-kilometre (12.8-mile) uphill route from Mori to Polsa in northern Italy for his first stage victory in this year's race. Samuel Sanchez was 58 seconds behind, while Damiano Caruso was third, 1:20 behind Nibali.
PARIS - Used to be the French Open was the scene for clay-court specialists and surprise champions.
Scan the list of past winners and runners-up. There's Gaston Gaudio and Albert Costa, Guillermo Coria and Martin Verkerk, Andres Gomez and Mariano Puerta. Not so much a "Who's Who." More like a "Who's He?"
TORONTO - Toronto FC is hurting ahead of Saturday's away game with the New England Revolution.
Manager Ryan Nelsen says the injured list includes Justin Braun, Danny Califf, Bobby Convey, Richard Eckersley, Stefan Frei and Darel Russell.
