An official audit of Agricultural Bank of China found irregularities involving billions of dollars of loans on its 2008 balance sheet. While the amounts are small compared to its total assets, it could increase scrutiny of its practices when it seeks a stock-market listing, possibly later this year.

U.K.-based Barclays has laid off about 250 employees in India in the final leg of reducing its work force as it shifts focus to wealthy clients from the mass market.

Australia and New Zealand Banking Group’s fiscal first-half net profit rose 36% from a year earlier, boosted by lower charges for bad loans and higher profit margins.

The Reserve Bank of New Zealand left the main interest rate unchanged at 2.5% as fully anticipated, with some economists forecasting the first rate hike in June.

After a decade of painstaking underwater searching, the wreck of a Soviet World War II submarine has been found in the Baltic Sea.

Spring and Labor Day is being celebrated with marches and rallies across Russia for and against the government, but the majority of people just want to rest up.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama on Friday, in a largely symbolic gesture, promised that no new offshore oil drilling leases will be issued unless rigs have new safeguards to prevent a repeat of the explosion that unleashed the massive spill threatening the Gulf Coast….

Emergency rescue drills are essential in the Arctic, as the training prepares the Russian border guard and Emergencies Ministry to protect and provide safety for people at its northwestern border.

It has been 50 years since U.S. pilot Francis Gary Powers was shot down over the Soviet Union, marking a turning point in the Cold War.

US president halts new rigs until current oil disaster is fully investigated.