News archive of August 2023

Australia left its key interest rate unchanged yesterday, with central bank governor Philip Lowe saying previous hikes were "working" but the outlook was uncertain.

The pause is the second in a row that the rate has been kept on hold at 4.1 percent, following a string of rises aimed at taming runaway prices.

Japan's Toyota said yesterday that net profit in its first quarter surged 78 percent as global production rebounded after severe supply disruptions a year ago.

The world's biggest automaker by sales said net profit in the three months to June was 1.31 trillion yen ($9.1 billion) on sales of 10.55 trillion yen, up 24.2 percent from a year ago.

On the sunny quay of the picturesque Greek island of Poros, veteran fisherman Spiros Papaioannou makes no bones about imminent plans to expand fish farming.

"We don't want them on our island," the rubber-booted man in his seventies grumbled while cleaning his nets.

"We fishermen are going to be chased away, that's for sure," he said.

Madonna over the weekend praised the support of friends and family one month after she was hospitalized with a bacterial infection that forced her to postpone her tour.

"Love from family and friends is the best Medicine," the 64-year-old wrote on Instagram.

Internet memes referencing the films "Barbie" and "Oppenheimer" have sparked anger online in Japan, the only country to ever have been attacked in wartime with nuclear weapons.

One film is about a wildly popular children's doll and the other is a biopic about J. Robert Oppenheimer, one of the creators of atomic weapons.

The U.N.'s cultural agency UNESCO on July 31 recommended that Venice be added to its list of world heritage in danger, saying the Italian authorities needed to step up efforts to secure the historic city and its surrounding lagoon.

The Trade Ministry will support local firms with an aim to increase the share of e-exports in the country's total exports from 1.5 percent to 10 percent.

A total of 39 migrant smugglers have been caught in extensive operations conducted in the provinces of Sakarya and Hatay, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya announced on Aug. 1.

The Turkish and Italian narcotics teams have seized a record 5.3 tons of drugs in a joint operation on a Palau-flagged cargo ship off the coast of Sicily.

Angus Cloud, the actor who starred as the drug dealer Fezco "Fez" O'Neill on the HBO series "Euphoria," has died. He was 25.

Cloud's publicist, Cait Bailey, said Cloud died on July 31 at his family home in Oakland, California. No cause of death was given.

In a statement, Cloud's family said goodbye to "an artist, a friend, a brother and a son.