Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn faces being fired this week after being arrested in Japan over allegations of financial misconduct, the firm said Monday, in a stunning fall from grace for one of the world's best-known businessmen.Ghosn's arrest and his likely dismissal from Nissan, as well as possibly from Mitsubishi and Renault, sent shockwaves through the auto industry, where he is a towering figure, credited with turning around several major manufacturers.Besides being chairman of Nissan, the 64

The North Korean soldier who defected to the South in a hail of bullets last year is a general's son but says most Northerners of his age have no loyalty to Kim Jong-un, according to a Japanese newspaper.Oh Chong-song's dramatic dash across the border at the Panmunjom truce village in the Demilitarized Zone -- under fire from his comrades -- made global headlines last year, and saw him hospitalised with serious injuries.It is very rare for the North's troops to defect at Panmunjom, a major touri

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) -- Saudi King Salman stood by the crown prince and heaped praise on the judiciary Monday, in his first public remarks since critic Jamal Khashoggi's murder tipped the country into one of its worst crises.The public prosecutor last week exonerated Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the king's son, of involvement in the murder in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2, but the CIA reportedly concluded he had ordered the assassination.The prosecutor called for the de

TOKYO, Japan (AFP) - Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn was reportedly under arrest in Tokyo on Monday, as his firm accused him of “significant acts of misconduct” and said it would seek to oust him.　Japan's public broadcaster NHK and other media outlets said Ghosn had been arrested after being questioned by Japanese prosecutors for various improprieties including underreporting his income.　“The Tokyo District Public Prosecutor’s Office arrested Nissan chairman Ghosn on suspicion of violation of the F

US President Donald Trump says he has been fully briefed on an audio recording of journalist Jamal Khashoggi's murder but does not want to listen to it himself."Because it's a suffering tape. It's a terrible tape," he said in an interview with "Fox News Sunday.""It was very violent, very vicious and terrible."Trump refrained from blaming Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, even though the CIA reportedly concluded that he ordered the October 2 assassination in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

A swimmer died after a rare suspected stingray attack off an Australian beach while another two people were mauled in separate shark encounters this weekend.The 42-year-old's death came more than a decade after world-renowned "Crocodile Hunter" Steve Irwin was killed when a stingray barb punctured his chest while he was filming on the famed Great Barrier Reef.The man was in waters off Lauderdale Beach some 23 kilometres (14 miles) from Hobart in the southern island state of Tasmania Saturday whe

As the winners of the biggest corporate prize in decades -- the new Amazon headquarters -- relished their victory, debate was still raging over the billions of dollars in incentives offered to attract the fast-growing US technology colossus.The new Amazon "HQ2" with an estimated $5 billion investment creating 50,000 new jobs will be split between the Long Island City district in New York and Crystal City, a Virginia community across the Potomac River from the US capital Washington.Officials in b

The crushed wreckage of an Argentine submarine has been located one year after it vanished into the depths of the Atlantic Ocean with 44 crew members, in the country's worst naval disaster in decades.There has been "positive identification of the ARA San Juan," at a depth of more than 800 meters (2,600 feet), the navy tweeted, confirming the vessel had imploded. Argentine navy submarine ARA San Juan docked in Buenos Aires in 2014 (AFP)Experts say raising the submarine would be an enormous undert

British Prime Minister Theresa May battled to salvage a draft Brexit deal and her political future on Thursday, as ministers resigned and members of her own party plotted to oust her.The Conservative leader said she believed with "every fibre of my being" in the Brexit course she had set, hours after facing a hostile parliament and seeing four ministers, including Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab, quit the government.Members of parliament on all sides warned her there was no way the plan could win

A pearl and diamond pendant owned by Marie Antoinette before she was beheaded during the French Revolution sold for $36 million at an auction on Wednesday, shattering its pre-sale estimate of up to $2 million.The Sotheby's auction at an ultra-luxurious hotel on the banks of Lake Geneva saw feverish bidding for a 10-piece collection owned by the ill-fated queen, featuring jewels unseen in public for two centuries. (AFP)The 10 items, which had been estimated to fetch a total of roughly $3 million,

Thais have reacted with shock and anger after a 13-year-old boxer died during a charity bout, reviving calls for a ban on fights between children in the brutal Muay Thai martial art.Thai boxing is hugely popular in the country and many fighters enter the sport at a young age in search of fame and fortune.But the involvement of kids who sometimes start under 10 years of age in bouts that use kicks and elbows to the head -- often without headguards -- has stirred frequent criticism.The involvement

MUNSTER, Germany (AFP) -- A former Nazi concentration camp guard said at his trial Tuesday that he was ashamed at having been part of the SS and that he was unaware of the systematic killings there.Johann Rehbogen is accused of complicity in mass murder at the Stutthof camp near what was then Danzig, now Gdansk in Poland.Dressed in a dark grey suit, the white-haired 94-year-old was wheeled into the German court, holding a walking stick in his right hand.In rare testimony in one of the last cases

ROME (AFP) -- Italy's populist government defied the European Commission Tuesday by sticking to its big-spending budget plan, risking financial sanctions in a high-stakes standoff with Brussels.Despite pressure from the European Commission, which rejected Rome’s budget outright last month in a first for the EU, Italian Deputy Prime Minister Luigi Di Maio vowed to stand firm on the country's anti-austerity plans.“The budget will not change, neither in its balance sheet nor in its growth forecast.

Deadly radiation from the cosmos, potential vision loss, and atrophying bones are just some of the challenges scientists must overcome before any future astronaut can set foot on Mars, experts and top NASA officials said Tuesday.The US space agency believes it can put humans on the Red Planet within 25 years, but the technological and medical hurdles are immense."The cost of solving those means that under current budgets, or slightly expanded budgets, it's going to take about 25 years to solve t

Amazon's "second headquarters" is being split between New York City and the Washington suburbs, the US tech giant announced Tuesday, capping a yearlong contest that saw dozens of cities fight it out for a promised $5 billion investment and 50,000 expected jobs.The chosen locations are Long Island City neighborhood in the New York borough of Queens, across the East River from Manhattan, and the Crystal City section of Arlington, Virginia, across the Potomac from the US capital.Both districts offe

Drug baron Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman's defense told his New York trial Tuesday that his cartel bribed Mexican presidents, painting the absent co-defendant as a ruthless criminal who murdered in cold blood.Opening statements finally got underway after two jurors were dismissed from the lineup, forcing lawyers and the judge to re-interview potential candidates before the full panel could be sworn in. Drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, one of the world`s most notorious criminals, is on trial i

Prince Charles turns 70 Wednesday and is still heir to the throne _ a role he has served since he was a young child.He's not lacking in things to do and shows few signs of slowing down _ he is wealthy, extremely active in matters of great importance to him, and preparing to welcome his third grandchild into the world when Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, gives birth next spring.His destiny, however, is to be king, a position he will automatically assume with the death of his 92-year-old mother, Qu

LONDON (AFP) - Amnesty International on Monday stripped Aung San Suu Kyi of its highest honour over the de facto Myanmar leader's "indifference" to the atrocities committed by the military against Rohingya Muslims.It was the latest in a string of awards the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner lost since Myanmar's military drove 720,000 Rohingya out of the Buddhist majority country in what the United Nations has called an act of genocide. (AFP)The London-based global human rights organisation said it w

GREENBELT (AFP) -- Some 126 million kilometers from Earth, alone on the immense and frigid Red Planet, a robot the size of a small 4x4 wakes up just after sunrise. And just as it has every day for the past six years, it awaits its instructions.Around 9:30 Mars time, a message arrives from California, where it was sent 15 minutes earlier.“Drive forward 10 meters, turn to an azimuth of 45 degrees, now turn on your autonomous capabilities and drive.”The Curiosity rover executes the commands, moving

IRBIL, Iraq (AFP) -- When Iraq’s female cycling team snatched bronze and silver medals at a landmark pan-Arab race, it was thanks to athletes from the autonomous Kurdish region.The country’s toughest female competitors, its best-equipped facilities and most experienced coaches are not in the capital Baghdad, but in the Kurdish-majority northern region.And the three medals won by the Iraqi female cyclists in September at the tournament in Algeria were seen as proof of this sporting prowess in a r