Greece resumed talks Thursday with banks and insurers on an elusive deal for a major writedown of its debt in order to escape a looming default.

Greek Prime Minister Lucas Papademos and Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos met Thursday evening with the lead negotiators of the private creditors, Charles Dallara and Jean Lemierre, for what was described as "informal discussions".

Algeria said Thursday it will not boost crude oil exports in the event Iran suddenly cuts supplies to Europe after the EU imposed new sanctions on Tehran over its nuclear drive.

"We have a program in place that won't be modified," Energy Minister Youcef Yousfi told Algerian news service APS.

Leaders of the war against hunger said Thursday the financial crisis must not be used as an excuse by the richer world to renege on commitments, warning a failure to act would fuel unrest and immigration.

Ministers, business leaders and U.N. officials gathered at the annual Davos forum said that while the world was now producing more food than ever, there were also more mouths to feed and that a billion people were afflicted by hunger.

Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron launched a stinging attack on his European partners Thursday, slamming the Eurozone as uncompetitive and branding a planned transaction tax "madness".

The British premier took the stage on the second day of the World Economic Forum in Davos, the annual get-together for the global business elite, and revived his simmering feud with the ailing single-currency bloc.

The National Bank of Kuwait, the emirate's top lender, said Thursday it posted a record net profit of 302.4 million dinars ($1.087 billion) in 2011 despite difficult challenges and Middle East unrest.

NBK's net profit is only 0.2 percent higher than the 301.7 million dinars for 2010, the bank said in a statement.

Israel is putting together a plan for a national investment fund that would tap an anticipated natural gas bonanza to fuel both an export-geared economy and provide a nest egg of $10 billion in under a decade for future generations.

The proposed Israeli sovereign wealth fund is still in the planning phase, but officials have said some of the revenues would be invested in strategically critical targets such as education and health.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has approved an increase in bank interest rates in a bid to absorb liquidity in the market and supporting the Iranian currency.

Economy Minister Shamseddin Hosseini was quoted Wednesday by the official IRNA news agency as saying that Ahmadinejad approved a decision by Iran's Money and Credit Council to raise interest rates on deposits to 21 percent.

An investment company owned by Dubai's ruler says it will repay $500 million in bonds next week, distancing itself from other debt-laden firms in the Gulf emirate.

Dubai Holding Commercial Operations Group confirmed Wednesday it will repay the bonds on Feb. 1, using funds from its internal cash flow.

The U.S. defense budget to be proposed next month by President Barack Obama will cut military spending five percent to $525 million, Pentagon officials said Tuesday.

The fiscal 2013 budget proposal will show the first decline since the attacks of September 11, 2001 in the base Pentagon budget, which excludes operations in conflicts such as Iraq and Afghanistan.

Britain's state borrowing fell by more than expected last month but not by enough to prevent its net debt from reaching a record high £1.0 trillion ($1.55 trillion), official data showed Tuesday.

Public sector net borrowing excluding the government's interventions in the financial sector hit £13.7 billion in December, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said in a statement.