
-
Tanzanian opposition leader Lissu charged with treason
-
TikTok fuels ByteDance revenue as US ban looms: report
-
Iran hands directors suspended jail terms over acclaimed film
-
Ferrari duo counting on change of fortune in Bahrain
-
Dominican Republic starts burying 200+ victims of nightclub disaster
-
Policeman's killer to be executed by firing squad in South Carolina
-
Census shows high number of brown bears in Romania
-
Prada to buy Versace for 1.25 bn euros to create new force in Italian fashion
-
US-China trade war surges, overshadowing Trump climbdown
-
Slippery business: France jails men over eel smuggling
-
Sudan tells top court UAE 'driving force' behind 'genocide'
-
When Kimi met Kimi: Antonelli's first meeting with F1's 'Iceman'
-
Charles and Camilla visit Dante's tomb, Byzantine mosaics
-
Mbappe moves closer to recouping 55mn euros from PSG
-
OpenAI countersues Musk as feud deepens
-
Global plastic recycling rates 'stagnant' at under 10%: study
-
Mumbai attacks suspect extradited from US lands in India
-
Scheffler launches quest for Masters repeat
-
Nicklaus, Player and Watson pick McIlroy to win Masters
-
Lebanon's civil war fighters working for reconciliation, 50 years on
-
Miuccia Prada's path from activist to top designer
-
Pope in surprise St Peter's visit a day after meeting King Charles
-
Forest will ignore top five cushion: Nuno
-
Wall Street rally fizzles as tariff worries resurface
-
Cantona claims Ratcliffe is destroying Man Utd
-
FIA deputy president resigns, attacks Ben Sulayem
-
Russia, US swap prisoners in push for closer ties
-
Alcaraz eases into Monte Carlo quarter-finals, Draper out
-
Italy's Prada agrees to buy rival Versace for 1.25 bn euros
-
Five things to know about Versace
-
US consumer inflation cools in March on falling gas prices
-
Liam Lawson on 'crazy' season after Red Bull sacking
-
Cannes Festival: Films in competition
-
Cartier exhibition to bedazzle London crowds
-
Former France star Chabal says he has 'no memories' of rugby career
-
Shanghai finance workers worry after front-row seat to tariff turmoil
-
Death toll in Dominican nightclub disaster rises to 218
-
Charles and Camilla visit tomb of Dante, Italy's greatest poet
-
Draper dumped out of Monte Carlo Masters by Davidovich Fokina
-
Scheffler, McIlroy seek fast start as 89th Masters tees off
-
EU halts counter-tariffs but no pause in US-China trade war
-
Australian schoolboy Gout Gout runs sub-10 second 100m --- twice
-
Scarlett Johansson to star at Cannes as festival unveils line-up
-
Stock markets soar as Trump delays painful tariffs
-
Trump tariffs weigh on Germany as institutes cut forecasts
-
US and Russia exchange prisoners
-
Japan top yakuza group promises 'no more trouble'
-
Champion Martin eyes Qatar return as 'bitter' Marc Marquez seeks redemption
-
The US citizens still held in Russian prisons
-
US-Russian ballet dancer Ksenia Karelina freed by Moscow: Rubio
RBGPF | -12.83% | 60.27 | $ | |
CMSC | -2.62% | 22.023 | $ | |
BCC | -4.53% | 94.17 | $ | |
NGG | -0.28% | 65.03 | $ | |
SCS | -4.53% | 10.15 | $ | |
CMSD | -2.38% | 22.221 | $ | |
GSK | -3.3% | 33.38 | $ | |
BCE | -0.82% | 20.83 | $ | |
RIO | -1.96% | 54.54 | $ | |
JRI | -2.39% | 11.71 | $ | |
RYCEF | -3.84% | 8.86 | $ | |
RELX | -0.5% | 48.3 | $ | |
VOD | -2.02% | 8.41 | $ | |
AZN | -4.07% | 64.15 | $ | |
BTI | -0.24% | 40.115 | $ | |
BP | -6% | 26.32 | $ |

Portugal PM prepares to govern after surprise win
Portugal's Prime Minister Antonio Costa prepared Monday to govern solo after his Socialist party scored a surprise landslide win, with economic recovery from the pandemic among his top priorities.
His party secured a parliamentary majority in Sunday's snap elections, which also saw the far-right Chega party make significant gains.
The Socialists received 41.7 percent of the vote in Sunday's snap polls, giving it 117 seats in the 230-seat parliament, up from 108 in the outgoing assembly.
Four seats still need to be attributed in the coming days from the results of votes cast abroad, but in 2019 the Socialists obtained two.
The results defied final polls which had suggested that the Socialist were in a statistical tie with the main opposition centre-right PSD, which finished second with 76 seats.
President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa was expected to formally invite Costa, who has headed two minority governments since 2015, later this week to form a new government.
"The conditions have been created to carry out investments and reforms for Portugal to be more prosperous, fairer, more innovative," Costa said in his victory speech.
The prospect of a stable government is crucial for Portugal to make the most of a 16.6 billion euro ($18.7 billion) package of EU recovery funds it is due to receive by 2026.
Portugal's economy is starting to recover after shrinking 8.4 percent in 2020 as the Covid-19 pandemic hurt its key tourism sector and other businesses.
It rose by 4.9 percent in 2021, its fastest pace since 1990, boosted by growing exports and investment, national statistics institute INE said Monday.
- 'Improbable majority' -
Costa has said he would like to use the bulk of the EU funds to modernise Portugal's infrastructure to make it more competitive.
Until now the former Lisbon mayor had to rely on support from two far-left parties -- the anti-capitalist Left Bloc and the Communist Party -- to govern.
"Without being tied down to the radical left, the Socialists and Costa have the opportunity to apply a more centrist and European recipes," daily newspaper Publico wrote in an editorial.
This is only the second time that Portugal has a Socialist government without an outright majority in parliament since the country returned to democracy in 1974 following the end of a decades-long dictatorship.
Sunday's polls were called after the two far-left parties that had propped up Costa's minority government sided with right-wing parties to reject his 2022 draft budget in October.
The radical left had pushed for more social spending and wanted a faster rise in the minimum wage than what was promised by Costa, but lost seats.
Voters have "punished" the far-left for sparking the early polls, said Antonio Costa Pinto, a professor at Lisbon University's Institute of Social Sciences.
"Part of the leftist electorate without a doubt concentrated their votes in the Socialist party giving it an improbable absolute majority," he told national public radio.
- 'Coming for you' -
The joy in the Socialist camp was tempered by the the rise of far-right Chega party, which won 12 seats up from just one, making it the third largest party in parliament.
Chega's leader Andre Ventura, a tough-talking former TV sports commentator, has vowed to fiercely oppose Costa in the new parliament.
"Antonio Costa, I am coming for you," he told supporters at his party's campaign headquarters after the vote.
Under Costa's watch, Portugal has rolled back austerity measures, maintained fiscal discipline, increased the minimum wage significantly and slashed unemployment to pre-pandemic levels.
But the PSD's Rio has argued that tax cuts and privatisations were needed to boost growth.
P.Hernandez--AT