Eastern Mediterranean countries including Egypt and Israel agreed on Monday to boost energy ties through the creation of a body to strengthen the gas market.

Poland "must pay" for arresting an employee of Chinese telecom giant Huawei for alleged espionage, state-run tabloid Global Times said on Monday.

The EU's Economic Affairs commissioner said Monday that it will be "difficult" for the bloc to agree unanimously on an EU-wide tax on high-tech giants by a self-imposed March deadline.

China's trade surplus with the United States hit a record high last year but the country's imports and exports fell in December as the long-running trade war begins to bite in the world's number two economy, data showed Monday.

China's trade with North Korea plummeted last year, data showed Monday, as harsh UN sanctions batter the nuclear-armed country's economy.

Beijing is a key ally of the isolated state and its main source of trade and aid -- but in 2017 it backed United Nations measures to punish Pyongyang over its nuclear and ballistic missile activities.

The issue of restructuring Lebanon’s public debt is not on the table and is “totally out of the question,” caretaker Finance Minister Ali Hassan Khalil reiterated on Sunday after senior-level talks at the Baabda Palace.

He was speaking after a financial meeting presided over by President Michel Aoun and attended by Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri, caretaker Economy Minister Raed Khoury, the head of the parliamentary finance committee MP Ibrahim Kanaan, Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh and the head of the Association of Banks in Lebanon, Joseph Torbey.

The Spanish government's bid to pass a national budget is doomed unless it bends to the demands of Catalonia's separatists for a referendum on secession, the leader of the wealthy northeastern region says.

Catalan regional president Quim Torra told The Associated Press in a recent interview that the representatives of Catalonia's separatist parties in Madrid's national parliament "have made it very clear that they will vote against the budget because there has been no movement by the Spanish national government toward what we are demanding."

The upbeat tone that characterised this week helped Asian markets to fresh gains on Friday, with Hong Kong chalking up a sixth straight day of rises.

Tokyo prosecutors on Friday filed two new charges of financial misconduct against former Nissan chief Carlos Ghosn, meaning the auto tycoon is unlikely to be leaving his jail cell soon. 

Lawyers for the former jet-setting executive filed a bail application hours later, but have acknowledged that he will probably be detained until a trial.

The EU on Thursday launched an in-depth probe into Nike's tax affairs in the Netherlands, following revelations in the "Paradise Papers" scandal that exposed low tax deals for multinationals.