New Zealand has passed legislation banning 'zero hour' contracts, in what is thought to be one of the first laws in the developed world to end the use of deals criticized as exploitative.

Opposition Labor MP Iain Lees-Galloway was joined by his political opponents in supporting the Employment Standards Legislation Bill to end the use of the deals under which employees are required to be available for work but have no guaranteed minimum hours.

Oil prices rebounded in Asia Friday, but doubts over a planned meeting between producer giants including Russia and Saudi Arabia this month to discuss an output freeze held back gains.

Questions over the proposed March 20 meeting emerged after Iran declined to agree to any output cap as it ramps up production following the lifting of nuclear-linked sanctions in January.

Two units of a Cayman Islands financial institution have pleaded guilty to helping U.S. clients hide money as the U.S. crackdown on tax evasion reaches beyond Switzerland, officials said Wednesday.

Cayman National Securities and Cayman National Trust, affiliates of Cayman National Corporation, admitted in a U.S. federal court to conspiring with U.S. clients to hide more than $130 million in offshore accounts from the Internal Revenue Service and to evade taxes on income earned from those accounts, authorities said.

Iran's state TV is reporting that Iran and Britain have signed an agreement to establish a total of 42 weekly passenger flights between the two countries.

Thursday's report says the Iranian and the British civil aviation authorities will allow each country to maintain 21 weekly flights to various destinations in the other nation. The TV says there will also be unlimited cargo flights

The euro ticked lower against the dollar Thursday as investors focus on a meeting of the European Central Bank that is expected to see it unveil more stimulus to shore up the stumbling eurozone economy.

ECB boss Mario Draghi has come under pressure to deliver measures that will break years of weak inflation and sagging economic growth after his last attempts were criticised as falling short.

Thousands of French high school students and workers protested against labour reforms Wednesday, heaping pressure on President Francois Hollande's already unpopular and fractured Socialist government with presidential elections looming in 14 months.

Teenagers and students threw eggs and firecrackers as they marched in Paris chanting slogans such as "El Khomri, you're beat, the youth are in the street" in reference to Labor Minister Myriam El Khomri.

Unions shut down operations at Nigeria's state oil firm Wednesday in protest at restructuring plans, a spokesman said, in a move that could worsen fuel supplies in Africa's largest producer. 

"Operations at the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) have been grounded nationwide," said Babatunde Oke, of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association (PENGASSAN). 

Europe's main stock markets inched upward at the start of trading on Wednesday, with London, Frankfurt and Paris each gaining around 0.1 percent.

London's benchmark FTSE 100 index opened at 6,130.03 points compared with Tuesday's close.

German power giant E.ON on Wednesday said it booked a 7.0-billion-euro ($7.7-billion) net loss in 2015 and warned that "the course ahead will be tougher and longer than anticipated."

E.ON said in a statement that "impairment charges of 8.8 billion euros... primarily on generation assets resulted in a substantial net loss of 7.0 billion euros" last year.

French prosecutors have opened a serious fraud investigation into Volkswagen over devices the German automaker fitted into cars to cheat emissions tests, a judicial source told AFP on Tuesday.