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The British empire was built in the age of coal, a fuel the UK had in spades. The US became a superpower in the era of oil, of which it had plenty. China’s rise has come as the world starts switching to a greener energy system needing minerals and metals for battery and solar industries

The two men going head to head to become Kenya’s next president agree on one thing: China is at the heart of next week’s election. For deputy president William Ruto, it is the spread of Chinese nationals in cities, many of whom are trying to earn a living selling local street food dishes. And former

Bain & Co, the Boston-based global management consultant, was on Tuesday hit with a three-year ban from tendering for British government contracts because of its “grave professional misconduct” in a major corruption scandal in South Africa. Jacob Rees-Mogg, Cabinet Office minister, told Bain that the affair had rendered the company’s integrity “questionable” and that he

As the fiscal bulwark of a young democracy, South Africa’s revenue service was renowned as one of the continent’s most effective tax gatherers. Yet after several meetings with then-president Jacob Zuma, management consultant Bain & Co won major work to restructure it from the ground up. As a result, it has this month been criticised

Accountants should stop complaining about extra scrutiny and fines for audit failures and improve the quality of their work, said the head of the sector’s UK watchdog, which imposed record financial sanctions on the industry last year. Auditors have faced heavy criticism in recent years after failing to raise the alarm in a series of

One of the leading contenders to succeed Boris Johnson as prime minister has said he will not stand in the forthcoming leadership contest, as other Conservative MPs prepare to launch their campaigns. Defence secretary Ben Wallace was the favourite among the Tory grassroots, with a net approval rating of +86 among party members according to

Rishi Sunak, who quit as Boris Johnson’s chancellor this week, launched his bid to lead the Conservative party on Friday with a pledge that he will avoid “comforting fairy tales”. His video to launch his campaign appeared a coded attack on what many MPs have seen as the prime minister’s Panglossian approach to policy. “Someone

Boris Johnson has announced his “painful” resignation but defied pressure to step down immediately as prime minister, insisting he would remain in office until a new Conservative party leader is chosen. In an address in front of No 10 Downing Street, after days of turmoil and mass resignations from his government, he accused his party

Boris Johnson’s turbulent three-year premiership was nearing its end on Wednesday night after he was urged to quit by a delegation of his closest cabinet allies. The UK prime minister was warned that unless he stepped down there would be further cabinet resignations, followed by an inevitable humiliating defeat by Tory MPs in a no-confidence

Boris Johnson’s premiership was teetering on the brink on Tuesday night, after chancellor Rishi Sunak and health secretary Sajid Javid dramatically resigned from the cabinet. Downing Street was braced for more ministers quitting with many Tory MPs believing the dual resignation of two senior ministers could signal the beginning of the end for Johnson. Sunak

Protesters brought parts of the UK’s motorway network to a standstill on Monday in a demonstration over high fuel prices. Police warned drivers that a “slow-moving rolling roadblock” was causing delays on parts of the M4 motorway near the border between England and Wales and on the M5 near Bristol. There were also “significant delays”

Sir Keir Starmer will on Monday signal that Labour is willing to fight Boris Johnson over his Brexit legacy at the next election, setting out a five-point plan to tackle the economic pain caused by Britain’s EU exit. In a big tactical shift, Starmer will use a speech to denounce the “mess” created by the

Hackers with suspected links to China’s intelligence agencies were still advertising for new recruits to work on cyber espionage, even after the FBI indicted the perpetrators in an effort to disrupt their activities. Hainan Tengyuan, a Chinese technology company, was actively recruiting English language translators in March according to job adverts seen by the Financial

Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary, the pioneer of low-cost travel in Europe, has warned fares will rise for the next five years because flying has become “too cheap” to make profits as industry costs spiral. His warning comes as ticket prices have risen in Europe and the US this summer as passengers return and some airlines

The UK’s trade performance fell to its worst level since records began in the first quarter of 2022, heaping more pressure on sterling in international currency markets. Although the Office for National Statistics warned that the figures it published were “subject to higher levels of uncertainty than normal”, the new system it used to collect

The governor of the Bank of England warned on Wednesday that Britain’s economy is suffering more from the energy crisis than other countries with UK inflation likely to stay higher for longer. Speaking with other central bankers at a European Central Bank conference in Sintra, Portugal, Andrew Bailey said the BoE needed the option of

Turkey has dropped its opposition to Finland and Sweden becoming members of Nato, paving the way for the Nordic countries to join the alliance in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The three countries have signed a joint memorandum after hours of talks on Tuesday brokered by Nato, ending a six-week veto by Ankara linked

Emmanuel Macron wants to see a drive for higher oil production around the world as the French president seeks ways of bringing down the cost of energy and alleviating the pressure being felt by energy-importing economies. Macron made the proposal to fellow G7 leaders as they seek to hammer out the details of a price

G7 leaders meeting for a summit in the Bavarian Alps on Sunday are seeking a deal to impose a “price cap” on Russian oil as the group works to curb Russia’s ability to finance its four-month war in Ukraine. The goal would be for a broad range of countries going beyond the G7 to impose

The battle over abortion rights in the US shifted rapidly to Congress and the midterm elections after the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs Wade and gutted the decades-old constitutional protection for women seeking to end a pregnancy. As conservative states began to implement new abortion restrictions across the country in the wake of Friday’s ruling,