(MENAFN - AFP) US stocks resumed their upward push Friday with both the Dow and S&P 500 closing at new all-time highs following favorable US economic reports.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 121.18 (0.80 percent) to 15,354.40.

The broad-based S&P 500 rose 15.65 (0.95 percent) to 1,666.12, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index added 33.72 (0.97 ...

(MENAFN - AFP) Cyprus should return to growth in 2015 after three years of deep recession, the International Monetary Fund said on Friday, but will need to ensure that its sweeping austerity programme does not slip off the tracks.

The IMF agreed in March to provide Cyprus with some 1 billion euros in aid, along with another 9 billion euros from the European Union, to stave ...

(MENAFN - AFP) The European Central Bank is exploring ways to directly help small and medium-sized companies as a way to boost the recession-hit eurozone economy directly, said Benoit Coeure, a member of the bank's executive board.

Coeure, speaking at a conference south of Paris, did not say how exactly the policy would work and stressed that the ECB would not intervene ...

(MENAFN - AFP) The former head of Spanish bank Caja Madrid became the first top banker to spend time in jail over alleged mismanagement in the financial crisis, officials said on Friday.

Miguel Blesa, 65, who has links to senior members of Spain's governing Popular Party, was held overnight in a Madrid jail and came out on Friday after putting up 2.5 million euros ($3.2 ...

(MENAFN - AFP) Peru's president signed a new law Thursday designed to reduce child obesity by encouraging healthier eating habits in schools.

The law regulates advertising for fatty foods and fizzy soft drinks in schools, the first step in a plan to ban some junk food altogether.

Business groups, worried about their revenue, have reacted angrily to the plans.

But ...

(MENAFN - AFP) An Organization of American States report has called for taking a closer look at possibly legalizing marijuana in Latin America.

The report examined an issue that until recently was a taboo topic in the region. Politicians, desperate for measures to control drug-linked violence, are now open to legalization.

The report does not make specific proposals, ...

(MENAFN - AFP) The latest makeover to a massive psychiatric tome honored by some, reviled by others and even called the "Bible" of mental disorders is being released Saturday with a host of new changes.

The first major revamp in more than 20 years of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, or DSM-5, will be unveiled in San Francisco at the annual meeting ...

(MENAFN - AFP) Fourteen Muslim clerics from across the globe will visit the former Nazi German Auschwitz death camp in southern Poland next week as part of a Holocaust awareness and anti-genocide program, organisers said Friday.

"This is an opportunity for imams who are influential in their communities to look at the Holocaust first hand and to go to Auschwitz, to see ...

(MENAFN - AFP) France became the 14th country to legalise same-sex marriage Saturday after President Francois Hollande signed the measure into law following months of bitter political debate.

Hollande acted a day after the Constitutional Council threw out a legal challenge by the right-wing opposition, which had been the last obstacle to passing the bill into law. The ...

(MENAFN - AFP) Fans from around the world have descended on the Swedish city of Malmo for Saturday's final of the Eurovision Song Contest, with ABBA's Benny Andersson and Bjoern Ulvaeus expected to appear.

As betting sites tipped Denmark's entry as this year's favourite, rehearsals on Friday also showed a video of Paris Saint-Germain striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic welcoming ...