14/04/2014 World Business Report

tourists in Yemen. Those are the latest headlines from

BBC World News. Now for the latest financial news in

World Business Report. Jobs for the boys? PM Renzi appoints

Italy's new captains of industry. Commodities giant Glencore sells its

stake in a major copper mine for nearly $6 billion.

Welcome to World Business Report. I'm Maryam Moshiri In a minute we'll

have more on Ukraine. Hundreds of the top jobs in Italian

industry are up for grabs. PM Matteo Renzi will appoint executives to

major state`owned companies. They include oil giant Eni, energy

suppliers Enel and defence group Finmeccanica. Traditionally the

three`year posts were often seen as rewards for political friends. But,

Mr Renzi hopes to usher in a new era of professionalism and meritocracy

in Italian industry. Our correspondent Alan Johnston joins us

from our bureau in Rome. Tell us more about these jobs.

We are talking about a very Italian tradition and a certain point in the

governing cycle, the PM can appoint people to a great raft of senior

positions in state`controlled enterprises. CEOs, Ward members,

some 500 jobs are going to be handed out to date `` board members. Some

of them are very important companies. It is a chance to put in

place and echelon of senior management and change the managerial

`` managerial climate of this very important area of the economy. This

coming together of the worlds of politics and business can be

problematic. Always the danger that political judgements will override

sound commercial judgement. Friends of the PM 's party might be awarded

and favours might be done for other parties, and the whole process is

fraught with the possibilities of cronyism. Mr midtier Ramzi's

supporters will expect more of him than that `` Mastteo Renzi. He talks

about breaking with the murky practices of the past and liberating

the entrepreneurial talent. He has pulled in a headhunting company to

make this round of the recruitment more transparent and less political

and that see if he can do that in the course of today when he

announcements are made. White what else has he been doing to reform

business in Italy press yellow `` what else. They are staggering out

of the longest deep recession since the war. He wants to shock them out

of what he calls the quagmire. He has set about the task in economic

terms. The poorest Italians are enjoying quite a substantial tax cut

this year, finding themselves with something like 1000 euros more in

their pockets this year. Obviously, this is an attempt to stimulate

domestic spending, which is very much needed. Companies will find

themselves also paying less tax and paying less for their energy as well

and all this is being funded by a war on wasteful spending, which

includes a substantial reduction in the pay of top state firm

executives, bureaucrats. There is a popular war of the privileges of fat

cats and Matteo Renzi is also speaking about rearranging the

labour market, making it easier to hire and fire and retreat young

people. 40% unemployment among young Italians. He has a job on his hand.

As we've been hearing, EU Foreign ministers are meeting in Luxembourg

on Monday to discuss responses to the escalating crisis in Ukraine.

Measures could include a new list of people to be targeted for sanctions.

Jeremy Howell looks at their options.

As EU foreign ministers gather for their talks, chaos reigns in eastern

Ukraine. It's widely thought the Kremlin is orchestrating it.

Europe, along with the US, has already imposed travel bans and

asset freezes on named Russian officials. That is in response to

the earlier seizure to Crimea `` of Crimea. A senior EU official said

this week foreign ministers will plan further measures. If Russian

forces were to invade Ukraine, options would include banning

Russian banks and businesses from Europe's financial market, banning

the import of Russian oil and banning the export of defence and

technical equipment to Russia. For now, however, sanctions are likely

to be much softer. We are talking about a block of 28 different

countries, all of which have different than political, economic

relations to Russia. It is difficult to come to consensus. The only thing

they will be realistically is potentially, that is the key word,

adding to the list of individual sanctions. It is unlikely such

sanctions will change the Kremlin's strategy. Since the start of the

crisis in Ukraine, share values have crunched on Moscow's stock exchanges

and 100 within dollars of assets have been shifted out of Russia.

But, and an analyst has said they are oblivious to the past. The

economic pain is there and is coming and they have not reversed course

which indicates that these kind of nationalist sentiment and

ideologically based regathering of Russian land is kind of campaigning

and is taking precedence over more practical ambitions. If any new EU

sanctions are agreed, they are likely to be symbolic ones, to

register a protest against Russia's continuing involvement in Ukraine.

Later this week, EU officials will meet counterparts from the US,

Russia and Ukraine to try and negotiate a diplomatic solution to

the crisis. In other news: Pharmaceutical giant

GlaxoSmithKline is facing a criminal investigation in Poland for

allegedly bribing doctors, BBC Panorama has discovered. Eleven

doctors and a GSK regional manager have been charged over alleged

corruption between 2010 and 2012. A former sales rep said doctors were

paid to promote GSK's asthma drug Seretide. The company said one

employee had been disciplined and it was co`operating with the

investigation. The European Central Bank is poised

to start pumping money into the region's economy according to one

board member. Benoit Coeure said the bank was looking at a US`style asset

purchase scheme to prevent a prolonged economic slowdown across

the euro area. ECB President made similar hints last week. Prices are

rising at just 0.5%, well below the Bank's target level for a healthy

economy. Alitalia looks set to announce a

deal with Emirati airline Etihad. The Italian flag carrier could agree

to sell up to 49% to its Abu Dhabi based rival. Alitalia is currently

being kept afloat by a half billion dollar rescue package from the

Italian government. Etihad boss Brent Hogan met Italy's PM on

Thursday. But, it's feared thousands more jobs could go as a condition of

any deal. China's appetite for raw materials

shows no signs of abating. Sharanjit Leyl has news of another big deal

from our Asia business hub in Singapore.

A huge deal, isn't it? It is essentially one of China's biggest

mining acquisitions ever. It is a consortium buying of the copper mine

in Peru for six billion dollars. It will be an all`cash deal. The

consortium is led by MMG Limited and includes companies like China said

it metal and is expected to produce 450 thousand pounds of copper each

year in its first five years. We know that China relies heavily on

the metal and uses it in its electronics production. The

acquisition is subject to all the usual regulatory approvals, but all

parties expect the deal to be done by the end of set timbre. Analysts X

act Glenn Ford to use the proceeds from the sale to try and reduce its

debt `` analysts expect. That was only after the agreed to sell their

stake in the project in Peru to a buyer approved by Chinese

authorities, which is essentially what has happened. Now, the mining

giant have agreed to fight a minimum amount of cough up `` copper to

China for a period of eight years. The Nikkei down in the Hang Seng is

up `` and the Hang Seng is up. That's it from me.

Thank you Marianne for that. Patients will find out