British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has announced that he's delaying by five years a ban on new gas and diesel cars that had been due to take effect in 2030, watering down climate goals that he said imposed "unacceptable costs" on ordinary people.
The move angered green groups, opposition politicians and large chunks of U.K. industry, but was welcomed by some in the governing Conservative Party who chafe at the expense of ending the country's reliance on fossil fuels.

It was already clear that Manchester City and Real Madrid are the best teams in Europe right now.
The first round of Champions League group games this week confirmed the fact, even if the standout performance was by an unheralded goalkeeper in Italy.

The bid by four South American countries to host football's 2030 World Cup will stay intact until next year regardless of political tensions in the region, a top team bid official says.
Michael Boys, the executive secretary of the bid of Uruguay, Argentina, Paraguay and Chile, said in an interview with The Associated Press on Thursday that he and his team will approach only politicians who are already in office to discuss plans to host the centennial World Cup in seven years.

A top official helping to oversee upcoming international climate negotiations hopes to prove critics wrong — and surprise them with a "course correction" for an ever-warming world.
But don't expect that big a turn.

European Union antitrust enforcers slapped Intel on Friday with a fresh $400 million fine in a long-running legal fight that the chipmaker appeared to have won last year.
The European Commission imposed the 376.4 million-euro fine after a court threw out an original 1.06 billion-euro penalty issued in 2009 over allegations that the Santa Clara, California-based company used illegal sales tactics to shut out smaller rival AMD.

British competition regulators gave preliminary approval Friday to Microsoft's restructured $69 billion deal to buy video game maker Activision Blizzard, easing a final global hurdle that paves the way for one of the largest tech transactions in history to go through.
The Competition and Markets Authority said the revamped proposal "substantially addresses previous concerns" about stifling competition in the fast-growing cloud gaming market, which frees players from buying expensive consoles and gaming computers by streaming to tablets, phones and other devices.

Shares in Europe were mostly lower Friday after mixed trading in Asia following a broad retreat on Wall Street driven by worries over interest rates.

Singapore police say they have uncovered more luxury watches, gold bars and other assets from a massive money laundering scheme that was busted last month, bringing the total amount of assets seized or frozen to 2.4 billion Singapore dollars ($1.75 billion).
The police had launched further operations related to a group of foreign nationals suspected to be involved in laundering the proceeds of their organized criminal activities, including scams and online gambling, police said in a statement on Wednesday.

Ukraine carried out a missile strike Friday on the headquarters of Russia's Black Sea Fleet, a Russian official said, and images on social media showed large plumes of smoke said to be coming from Sevastopol harbor in the annexed Crimea.
The Russian-installed governor of Sevastopol, Mikhail Razvozhayev, didn't offer any details, saying only that emergency services have been dispatched to the site of the strike and there was no information about casualties.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered unspecified steps to further develop relations with Russia after his recent visit to the country as his foreign rivals warn that any cooperation on military weapons would be dangerous and bring consequences.
Experts speculated North Korea and Russia likely discussed banned arms transfer deals and other cooperation measures during Kim's six-day trip last week. They say the two countries are serious about sharply boosting their ties while they are engaged in separate confrontations with the West.
