BREAKING WORLDWIDE

Brazil's problems cannot be solved merely by a change at the top. Even with Dilma Rousseff out as President, the road ahead for Brazil won't be easy. She leaves behind an economy in its second straight year of recession, an unemployment rate of nearly 11% and a multimillion-dollar looming statewide corruption scandal that leaves almost no politician unscathed. Here's a deeper look at the major obstacles ahead for the world's ninth largest economy: New president inherits problems Rousseff faced...Financial crisis in Brazil 02:18 By conservative estimates, new President Michel Temer inherits about $72.5 billion, or 250 billion Brazilian real, debt, Sen. Waldemir Moka said. As Brazil continues to wade through the longest recession since the 1930s, its once burgeoning middle class is feeling the pinch. More than 11.6 million people in Brazil are unemployed, or about 11%, between April and June. There are signs the market is picking back up since Temer took office in May, ...

Early in my teenage years, I was a miserable nerd. One great joy in my life, and in the life of my small nerd circle, was Dungeons & Dragons. This was the early 1980s, and I was aware of the D&D panic in some Christian circles. But those weren’t my circles, and my parents had no idea what I was doing. It was a heck of a lot of fun, and became the center of my social life for a year or two. I remember being so ticked off at the scare stories about teenagers supposedly freaking out over the game, and losing their minds. There was a 1982 TV movie, Mazes and Monsters, starring a young Tom Hanks ( see this clip ), exploiting this fear. Yet I remember one night lying in bed, trying to fall asleep, thinking about the adventure my character was having in the game. I did this a lot, and that night was no different from any other. For some reason, it struck me that the life of this fictional character whose story line I was narrating was far more engaging to me than the actual life I wa...

Hundreds of kilos of cocaine were found in a Coca-Cola plant in France last Friday, making the seizure of the drug one of the largest ever on French soil. French officials say the cocaine was discovered in backpacks among a shipment of orange juice concentrate that originated in Costa Rica. The 370 kg of literal coke uncovered at the factory is reported to have a street value of €50 million Euros ($55m) and was referred to as a “very bad surprise” by a local prosecutor. Authorities are currently unaware of who was behind the cocaine, but an investigation is now underway in Signes, a village in the south of France. Employees of the plant have already been ruled out as suspects.“The first elements of the investigation have shown that employees are in no way involved,” according to Jean-Denis Malgras, the regional president of Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola was originally called Pemberton’s French Wine Coca and contained a mixture of Peruvian coca leaves, kola nut, damiana, and c...

Overnight the debate over the fate of the OPEC oil production freeze got a new and unexpected entrant when Russian president, Vladimir Putin said he’d like OPEC and Russia, producers of half of the world’s oil, to reach a deal to freeze supply and expects the dispute over Iran’s participation can be resolved. As Bloomberg first reported, Putin said that “from the viewpoint of economic sense and logic, then it would be correct to find some sort of compromise,” speaking in an interview in Vladivostok. “I am confident that everyone understands that. We believe that this is the right decision for world energy.” Just as surprisingly, Putin sided with Iran saying that oil producers recognize that the middle-eastern nation, which has mostly restored the output halted during three years of trade restrictions, deserves to complete its return to world markets.While talks collapsed in April over whether Iran should join in, countries now recognize the nation - freed just months ago from in...

US fighter planes will conduct patrols with the Bulgarian air force in September. The mission will begin on September 9 and last until September 16. US Air Force officials said the F-15Cs would operate out of Graf Ignatievo Air Base in Bulgaria to fly alongside Bulgarian MiG 29s. It was a controversial decision for Bulgaria. General Rumen Radev, the Air Force commander, resigned in protest against the Defence Ministry’s plans to have foreign aircraft share in air policing missions. At the recent summit in Warsaw NATO approved further efforts to strengthen the Alliance’s might, including a tailored presence in the south-east, based on a multinational brigade in Romania and steps to improve cyber-defence, civil preparedness and the ability to defend against ballistic missile attacks.