While You Were Sleeping: 5 stories you might have missed, Nov 28 edition

Opec holds oil output level, triggering price collapse

Opec on Thursday decided against cutting the amount of oil it produces despite a glut in global supplies, triggering a fresh collapse in crude prices.

The cartel pumping out one-third of the world's oil opted to stick by its output target, even after prices have plunged by more than a third in value since June.

Its powerful Gulf members rejected calls by poorer members to cut output unless they are guaranteed market share in the highly competitive arena, particularly in the United States, where a flood of cheaper oil from shale rock has contributed to the global oversupply.

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WTO clinches first global trade deal in its history

The World Trade Organisation adopted the first worldwide trade reform in its history on Thursday, after years of stalemate, months of deadlock and a final day's delay following an eleventh-hour objection.

The agreement means the WTO will introduce new standards for customs checks and border procedures.

Proponents say that will streamline the flow of trade around the world, adding as much as US$1 trillion (S$1.3 trillion) and 21 million jobs to the world economy.

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London financier Chris Hohn ordered to pay wife $690 million in divorce case

Billionaire hedge fund manager Chris Hohn has been ordered to pay his estranged wife Jamie Cooper-Hohn £337 million (S$690 million) in one of the largest divorce settlements in British legal history, the BBC reported on Thursday.

The pair, whose Children's Investment Fund Foundation is one of the top private charities in the world, have been feuding over a family fortune judges say tops US$1.3 billion (S$1.7 billion).

American-born Cooper-Hohn, 49, had sought half the assets.

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Thirteen men guilty of child sex abuse in western England

Thirteen men have been convicted of being part of gangs that carried out a string of sex crimes including rape against girls in western England, police said on Thursday, in the latest case of organised child abuse in Britain.

The men, of Somali origin and aged between 20 and 24, took advantage of vulnerable young girls in Bristol using hotels and guests houses to carry out abuse, detectives said.

In addition to rape, Bristol Crown Court was told teenage girls were paid or given drugs, alcohol or gifts to perform sex acts on older men from the city's Somali community, the BBC reported.

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Football: Pele in 'special care' as condition worsens - hospital

Brazil great Pele, 74, was on Thursday taken into a "special care" unit in a Sao Paulo hospital after his health worsened, three days after being admitted with a urinary infection, the hospital confirmed.

The unit to which the three-time World Cup winner has been admitted is strictly speaking a step before intensive care and will allow him to be monitored more closely than in a regular ward.

"The patient has been transferred to a room where he will be more closely monitored, but it is not intensive care, it is an intermediate stage," a hospital spokesman explained to AFP.

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