U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday called for a pre-Christmas deal with Republicans to avert a year-end tax and deficit crunch, as pressure mounted from the business world and stock markets fluttered.

U.S. lawmakers demanded urgent action to keep America from tumbling off the so-called "fiscal cliff," and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was to drive the point home Thursday when he meets members of Congress to discuss "a balanced approach to reduce our deficit," his office said.

Japanese industrial firms Hitachi and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries said Thursday they would merge their thermal power businesses by 2014 as they take on global giants Siemens and General Electric.

The pair said they would set up a joint venture company that was 65 percent owned by Mitsubishi with the remaining 35 percent held by Hitachi, creating a combined firm with about 1.1 trillion yen ($13 billion) in annual sales.

Spain pushed forward on Wednesday with a major overhaul of the country's stricken banking sector after Brussels approved EU-funded restructuring plans, and with nationalised Bankia saying it will slash 6,000 jobs and is set for a huge loss.

Meanwhile the Bank of Spain delivered more bad news on the overall economy, saying country appears stuck in a job-killing recession in the fourth quarter.

An inquiry into the theft of some $900 million which led to the near-collapse of Afghanistan's largest bank has found there was high-level political interference over who should face prosecution.

The scandal touched a brother of President Hamid Karzai and a brother of his vice president Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim, who were shareholders in the bank, but they have not been charged with any wrongdoing.

Qantas Airways on Wednesday severed a lucrative marketing deal with Tourism Australia after claiming its boss was leading a consortium trying to unseat the airline's management and buy out the company.

The carrier said it had advised the country's official tourism agency it was halting the Aus$50 million (U.S.$52 million) deal "due to a potential conflict of interest of the agency's chairman", former Qantas chief Geoff Dixon.

The World Bank on Tuesday approved a $6.4 million grant to improve water and sewage services in the Gaza Strip in the wake of an eight-day firefight between Israel and the territory's Hamas rulers.

The infrastructure in the impoverished Palestinian enclave -- with a population of more than 1.5 million people -- has been deteriorating in recent years and the area is now "choked with untreated sewage," the Bank said.

The International Monetary Fund on Tuesday said Egypt can still get its $4.8 billion loan agreed last week despite fresh political turmoil as long as there is "no major change" in its reform commitments.

The IMF also said that the funding, provisionally agreed on November 20, would also hinge on whether other bilateral lenders stick to their loan promises after President Mohamed Morsi issued a decree that granted himself sweeping powers.

More than half of the people in South Africa -- the continent's wealthiest country -- live in poverty, a government study released on Tuesday showed.

The country, which ranks 29th in the world in terms of GDP, ahead of Denmark, is among the most unequal nations in the world.

The eurozone and IMF saved Greece from bankruptcy with a re-drawn rescue on Tuesday which Greek leaders said marked a new beginning for their people facing further austerity in the midst of recession.

The deal marked a compromise by the IMF, an admission that Greece will need help with its debt for years, removes the risk of default around the end of the year, and minimizes the chances that the country might have to leave the eurozone.

Iraq says it is giving neighboring Jordan 100,000 barrels of oil as a gift to help overcome its economic difficulties.

The decision by the Cabinet Tuesday could be seen as an attempt by the Shiite-led Iraqi government to offer support to one of its Sunni neighbors. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have fled to Jordan because of violence that followed the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of their country.