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California lawmakers passed a $96.3 billion budget on Friday that would spend more on education, health care and other services while setting aside $1.1 billion for the state's first rainy day fund in years. The spending plan makes changes to the way the state funds education, increasing the base amount spent on all students while funneling more money to districts with children who live in poverty or who do not speak fluent English.   It also restores funds that had been cut from dental programs for the poor, mental health services and assistance for veterans. The $1.1 billion reserve was part of a deal negotiated with Governor Jerry Brown, who pressed fiscal restraint on the Democratic legislature. It marks a dramatic turnaround from four years ago, when the state was in the red by $16 billion. "This was the first year in many that we weren't negotiating how deep to cut and what to cut," Darrell Steinberg, president pro tem of the state senate, said in an interv

California lawmakers passed a $96.3 billion budget on Friday that would spend more on education, health care and other services while setting aside $1.1 billion from the first surplus in years for a rainy day fund. The spending plan makes changes to the way the state funds education, increasing the base amount spent on all students while funneling more money to districts with children who live in poverty or who do not speak fluent English. It also restores funds that had been cut from dental programs for the poor in the most populous U.S. state, and for mental health services and assistance for veterans.   The $1.1 billion reserve was part of a deal negotiated with Governor Jerry Brown, who pressed fiscal restraint on the Democratic legislature. It marks a dramatic turnaround from four years ago, when the state was in the red by $16 billion. "This was the first year in many that we weren't negotiating how deep to cut and what to cut," Darrell Steinberg, president pro

Colombia revised its 2013 fiscal accounts and financing plans for next year, lowering the amount of domestic bond sales this year and stepping up both local and overseas debt next year, Finance Minister Mauricio Cardenas said on Friday.   Colombia plans to raise external debt in 2014 worth $5 billion, with $3 billion of that issued in overseas bonds and the remainder from multilateral lenders, Cardenas said during the annual revision of accounts. That is more than the government aims for overseas debt this year. Cardenas maintained the level of international debt for this year at $2.6 billion, with $1.6 billion in global bond sales. Another $1 billion will come from multilateral lenders this year, he said. In the local market, Colombia will issue a total of 30.5 trillion pesos ($16.1 billion) of Treasury bonds, known as TES, next year with 22.5 trillion sold at auction. Cardenas lowered the total sale of TES bonds this year to 29 trillion pesos from an earlier goal of 30 trillion

Brazil's Banco BTG Pactual SA agreed to buy 50 percent of the African operations of Petroleo Brasileiro SA, the state-run oil giant said on Friday, expanding the high-flying investment bank's role as a backer of cash-squeezed Brazilian companies.   BTG Pactual agreed to pay $1.53 billion for 50 percent of Petrobras' African unit, Petrobras Oil & Gas BV, which has offices in Angola, Benin, Gabon and Namibia and operations in Nigeria and Tanzania, the statement said. Petrobras is trying to sell oil fields, exploration rights, refineries and other assets in the United States, Japan, Argentina , Peru and other countries to help finance a $237 billion, five-year investment plan, the world's largest corporate spending program. It tried to sell the Nigerian assets alone for as much as $5 billion, Reuters reported on March 13. "The operations represent an important step for Petrobras in its asset-sale program, allowing it to increase its activities in Africa and t

Czech President Milos Zeman said on Saturday that abuse of power and corruption charges against a close aide of Prime Minister Petr Necas and other officials were "very serious" and seemed well founded. _0"> When asked whether he thought the centre-right cabinet should stay in office, he said: "I consider the charges that have been brought to be very serious."   "After hearing from the police president and the supreme state attorney, I am coming to the conclusion that they are based on sufficient evidence," he added in his first remarks on the political turmoil. "This is an indirect but clear answer to your question."

When the heads of the World Bank and the United Nations flew into the violence-wracked African city of Goma on a cloudy day last month, it was the first time the giants of international development had joined forces in the struggle to help the world's most fragile regions. World Bank President Jim Yong Kim and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon traveled to three countries in the Great Lakes region in East Africa to cement a new partnership, tying $1 billion in bank money to the U.N. peacekeeping efforts in the region.   They announced the funding in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), even as mortar shells were falling in the country's eastern edge in Goma. But the men, both born in South Korea, pledged to continue their trip. "We're going there because our belief is that peace, security and economic development are intertwined," Kim said in Kinshasa. "We're going with a very specific purpose in mind: there must be a peac

Both junior partners in Greece's fragile coalition government have turned down a compromise proposal by the prime minister to avert a government crisis over the shutdown of public broadcaster ERT. _0"> Prime Minister Antonis Samaras offered on Friday to rehire a smaller number of staff to resume news broadcasts, in an attempt to defuse an outcry over Monday's shock closure of ERT - part of savings under the terms of Greece's international bailout.   If no compromise is reached, the government might fall and new elections would be called, meaning almost certain derailment of the country's bailout programme. "Our position remains the same. Any restructuring of ERT has to take place with the broadcaster open, as it was before," Andreas Papadopoulos, spokesman of the Democratic Left party, told Reuters on Saturday. The proposal was also dismissed as inadequate late on Friday by the Socialist PASOK party, which is demanding the immediate reopening of