EUROPE - Confiscating the customer deposits in Cyprus banks, it seems, was not a one-off, desperate idea of a few Eurozone “troika” officials scrambling to salvage their balance sheets.
LUXEMBOURG - The debate over this week's "bail in" of bank account holders in Cyprus as part of the country's debt crisis bailout is continuing to simmer in Europe.
VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis has won over many hearts and minds with his simple style and focus on serving the world's poorest, but he has devastated traditionalist Catholics who adored his predecessor, Benedict XVI, for restoring much of the traditional pomp to the papacy.
BOCA RATON, USA - The professor embroiled in a educational firestorm over his classroom practices has been placed on administrative leave.
NORTH KOREA - Analysis Charles Scanlon BBC News: Bluff has long played a fundamental role in North Korean strategy. The regime in Pyongyang needs its much more powerful neighbours and antagonists to take its threats seriously.
BERLIN, GERMANY - If Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany is bothered by images of her wearing a mustache like Hitler’s, which are being waved in streets from Cyprus to Spain, she has yet to show it, choosing instead to stress the importance of the protesters’ freedom of expression.
BRUSSELS, EUROPE - EU lawmakers are divided on whether holders of large bank deposits should face compulsory levies if their bank hits difficulties.
EUROPE - Twice in eight days Dutch finance minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem has made unguarded comments that moved markets. And he's only been in the job since taking over from Jean-Claude "Mr Euro" Juncker as head of the Eurogroup in late January.
SLOVENIA - Slovenia’s borrowing costs have rocketed over recent days as it grapples with a festering financial crisis, becoming the first victim of contagion from Cyprus. “Banks are under severe distress,” said International Monetary Fund in its annual health check on the country. Non-performing loans of the Slovenia’s three largest banks reached 20.5 per cent last year, with a third of all corporate loans turning bad. “The country has lost competitiveness since joining the euro and it’s led to slow economic collapse. Markets have been very complacent, but it has been clear for a long time that the banks need recapitalisation, and it is not easy to raise money in this climate,” said Lars Christensen from Danske Bank.
USA - United States President Barack Obama has signed a bill into law that was written in part by the very billion-dollar corporation that will benefit directly from the legislation.
USA - Now that voters in Colorado and Washington have legalized recreational marijuana use, dope smokers there can light up without the usual paranoid fear that the cops are at the door. The taxman is another matter. Cash-starved legislators are seeing dollar signs in dime bags — with talk that a tax on marijuana could pump hundreds of millions or even billions into budgets still reeling from the recession. And even lawmakers looking to cash in know they’ve got to be careful. Tax marijuana too much and it drives users right back to illegal dealers. Nobody knows what that price point is.
USA - Janet Napolitano has ignored a letter written by New Jersey Congressman Leonard Lance calling for the Department of Homeland Security chief to attend a congressional briefing and provide an explanation as to why the DHS has committed to purchasing more than 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition over the last year.
USA - One of the reasons the crisis in Cyprus has had limited market effects is that something like that would be unlikely to be repeated in the US. That's not to say it could never happen. The truth is, there have been bank runs pretty much as long as there have been banks, so a liquidity crisis certainly could hit American financial institutions and cause substantial damage. But as a matter of scale, the problems in Cyprus are far worse than anything likely to wash up on US shores. That's the good news. The bad news is that a financial crisis that in any way resembled the subprime meltdown in the last decade or the debt crisis still making it's way through Europe can still cause substantial damage in the US.
ROME, ITALY - Pope Francis has washed the feet of prisoners in a youth detention centre near Rome as part of the Maundy Thursday service. The new leader of the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics has brought a new sense of simplicity to the Vatican, reports the BBC's David Willey in Rome. He has broken with tradition for the foot-washing ceremony, which is normally performed on lay people in one of Rome's basilicas.
During his inaugural general audience on Wednesday, Pope Francis called for an immediate political solution to the conflict in the Central African Republic after last weekend's coup.
UK - The UK government says it will fight an EU demand for an extra 11.2 billion euros (£9.5 billion; $14.4 billion) from member states to settle unpaid EU bills this year. The UK contribution to that would be about 1.2 billion euros. "You can be very clear we will fight it," a Downing Street spokeswoman said, reacting to the proposal from EU Budget Commissioner Janusz Lewandowski.
“Just what is an APOSTLE?”
Today we find the Church of God in a “wilderness of religious confusion!”
The confusion is not merely around the Church – within the religions of the world outside – but WITHIN the very heart of The True Church itself!
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