Talking Points
Our editors will be looking ahead today to these developing stories ...
Peace talks between Colombia's FARC rebels, whose delegation includes Dutch national Tanja Nijmeijer, and the government recommence with a five-point agenda. The eagerly awaited discussions are taking place in Cuba and follow the start of a dialogue in Norway one month ago, which has raised hopes of breaking a decades-long cycle of conflict responsible for killing hundreds of thousands of people. But there is also a level of scepticism about the peace effort - the first in a decade - as no ceasefire has been declared and hostilities have continued to kill.
The Chinese Communist Party publishes all key documents from the 18th party congress. While most are already posted on government websites, it is standard for the state publisher to print important papers as booklets and distribute them in government offices.
Economists expect jobless figures for Hong Kong to show the unemployment rate stood at 3.3 per cent in the August-October period. The rate is low by international standards, with unemployment in the United States hovering at 7.9 per cent.
Former top executives at Japanese camera and medical equipment maker Olympus are sentenced, having earlier pleaded guilty to covering up US$1.7 billion of losses. The scandal was exposed in October last year by then chief executive Michael Woodford, who was sacked by the Olympus board after querying dubious deals later found to have been used to conceal the losses.
Thailand is expected to report a sharp slowdown in economic growth on the heels of slowing growth in China and a fresh revision of Japanese growth projections. Economists polled by Reuters expect the Thai economy to grow by 3.1 per cent, down from 4.2 per cent.
Victims of the Lehman Brother's minibond scandal meet Consumer Council lawyers to see if they can apply to the government's Legal Action Fund to recoup losses. Some 43,000 Hongkongers who bought HK$20.2 billion of the bank's risky products incurred huge losses when the bank went under during the 2008 financial crisis. Some recovered a portion through deals with banks, but thousands of cases remain unresolved. Staff at the 16 banks involved might not have adequately explained the risky nature of the products to investors, some of whom had little education or were illiterate. A report by the Legislative Council earlier this year found some investors were convinced to buy even though their risk profiles did not match the products' risk ratings.
