Damascus signed an oil and gas deal with a Russian company Wednesday which will allow for the first-ever exploration off Syria's coast.

The agreement was signed by Syrian Oil Minister Suleiman Abbas, Syria's General Petroleum Company and the Russian Soyuzneftegaz company, according to an Agence France Presse reporter present at the signing.

Brazilian tycoon Eike Batista's debt-laden oil company, currently under bankruptcy protection, has agreed with foreign creditors to renegotiate $5.8 billion in debt into a 90 percent stake in the firm.

Oleo e Gas Participacoes (OGP), formerly known as OGX, informed Brazil's Securities and Exchange Commission of the accord, the G1 news website reported Wednesday.

Leading Japanese automakers saw their best November sales ever last month, in stark contrast to a year ago when shipments plunged amid a deep territorial row between Tokyo and Beijing.

Industry leader Toyota said its sales in China for the month reached 90,000 units, up 40.7 percent from a year ago, driven by popularity of its flagship models, including Camry, Corolla and Rav4.

Chinese smugglers dug a "professional" concrete tunnel into Hong Kong equipped with lights, vents, steel reinforcements and even rails to transport goods, domestic media reported on Wednesday.

The underground path had "one end in a rented garage in Shenzhen and another in a thicket of reeds in Hong Kong, totally concealed", said a report posted on the official website china.com.cn.

BlackBerry co-founder Michael Lazaridis has trimmed his stake in the troubled smartphone pioneer to just below 5 percent after selling 3.5 million shares during the past two days.

The sales disclosed in a Tuesday regulatory filing came after BlackBerry Ltd. announced a third-quarter loss of $4.4 billion last week.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday the final pieces were in place for the 2015 launch of an economic union with Belarus and Kazakhstan that Moscow hopes can also be joined by Ukraine.

Putin promised following talks with Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev and Belarussian leader Alexander Lukashenko that the so-called Eurasian Economic Union would turn into a new source of growth for all involved.

Indonesia said Tuesday it will allow increased overseas investment in a range of sectors, as it seeks to boost slowing growth and lure back foreigners who fled during recent market turmoil.

Foreign investors in Southeast Asia's top economy will be given increased access in areas including power plants, ports and airports, and the pharmaceuticals industry.

The Dutch economy grew by an estimated 0.2 percent in the third quarter, the CBS statistics office said Tuesday, confirming a slow emergence from recession.

The figure was slightly higher than the forecast of 0.1 percent issued by the central statistics office last month.

France's economy contracted 0.1 percent in the third quarter of 2013, the statistics body INSEE confirmed Tuesday, but it is expected to post 0.4-percent growth for the fourth quarter.

GDP growth in the second quarter was slightly higher than forecast, at 0.6 percent instead of 0.5 percent.

Japan approved its biggest ever budget Tuesday, as an improving economy and a sales tax hike made room for more defense spending and the first step towards achieving a balanced budget.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's cabinet rubber-stamped a plan that will see the government spend 95.88 trillion yen ($922 billion) in the year from April 2014, up from 92.61 trillion yen the previous year.