1.2. Paraphrase or explain the italicised parts of the following sentences.

1. Thailand, where Asia’s slump started in 1997, announced tax cuts and other economy-boosting measures worth $3.5 billion. The finance minister said that, as a result, the Thai economy could grow by between 0,4% and1,4%. Much depends, though, on whether export growth recovers this year.

2. President Hugo Chavaz of Venezuela launched a $935m plan to create jobs in a bid to revive his country’s flagging economy.

3. The battle for Britain’s Rolls-Royce seems to have been won by BMW with an offer of £340m ($569m). This will leave only Volkswagen of the three German car makers (Daimler-Benz being the other one) without the luxury marque, unless it comes back with a winning higher bid.

4. Facing a widespread strike be transport workers triggered by a rise in fuel prices, President Jamil Mahuad of Ecuador reimposed a 60-day national state of emergency, and cancelled a fuel price hike, which had prompted the protests.

5. The oil producers’ cartel, OPEC, held an emergency meeting together with several non-OPEC members including Mexico, and approved its first production cuts (as opposed to cuts in quotas) in ten years in an effort to bolster prices.

6. America continues to drive the world economy alone. That was the message that emerged after the spring meeting of the Group of Seven rich countries.

7. It was a good week for Germany’s Deutsche Bank, which reported first-quarter net profits up 37% from last year, while its planned purchase of Bankers Trust cleared another hurdle. Alan Hevesi, New York city’s comptroller, said he was dropping his objections to the deal.

8. The Canadian government sued R.J. Reynolds Tobacco for $1 billion alleging that they had conspired to smuggle cigarettes into Canada after the government tried to deter smoking by imposing big taxes in the early 1990s.

9. Oracle, the biggest supplier of database software, is discussing with Boeing the creation of an electronic marketplace for aircraft parts. Two car companies, Ford and GM, are already moving procurement online.

10. Qwest Communications, an American telecoms company in the throes of a merger with US West, signalled its switch to the big league by announcing that it will move its listing from Nasdaq’s high-tech exchange to the New York Stock Exchange from the beginning of 2000; and will be known simply as Q.

11. America’s Securities and Exchange Commission filed a lawsuit accusing 25 people of insider trading when IBM took over Lotus Development in 1995.

1.3. Translate the following from English into Russian/Belarusian paying attention to the word combinations in italics.

1. If Lebed succeeds in turning around Krasnoyarsk by revamping its lumbering heavy industries, cracking down on spiralling crime and paying off mounting wage and pension arrears, he will make the region a powerful springboard for a presidential bid.

2. Zenith Electronics, an American consumer-electronics firm, announced its biggest loss to date: $299m for 1997. With bankruptcy looming, the company said it was exploring asset sales.

3. Canada avoided a trade war with America by agreeing to ease its restrictions on foreign magazines.

4. Creditors in Guangdong Enterprises will “suffer some economic losses”, said the Guangdong government, in announcing a restructuring of the insolvent company’s $3.9 billion-worth of debt.

5. A transatlantic law-firm merger: Roger&Wells of New York and Clifford Chance of London each voted to press on with a merger that would create a combined firm with 2,400 lawyers around the world. Similar mergers are likely to follow.

6. Vehicle output in Japan was 6.5% lower in April than a year earlier, the fifth month in the past six to see an output decline. Lower domestic and Asian demand was the cause. That news came as several Japanese vehicle makers all reported disappointing results.

7. Five weeks after breaking through 10,000, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above 11,000 for the first time.

8. The Paris Club of creditor nations agreed to a reorganisation of $4.2 billion-worth of Indonesia’ sovereign debt – a rare piece of news for the troubled Asian economy.

9. America’s Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged and maintained a neutral “bias” towards future rate changes, citing uncertainties about millennium bugs and the like. Most observers now expect a rate hike in February, however, and 30-year bond yields rose to a 27-month high.