New Delhi, Dec 21 (PTI) Media firm NDTV group's digital arm NDTV Convergence Friday said it has signed a five-year deal worth over Rs 300 crore with content recommendations engine Taboola.

"The five-year deal ties NDTV Convergence exclusively to Taboola and involves a minimum guarantee of more than Rs 300 crore for NDTV Convergence, making it one of the largest deals, not just for digital content, but for the media space in its entirety," NDTV said in a BSE filing.

BEIJING (AP) — Global stocks fell further Friday after Wall Street slid on recession fears, putting markets in London, Frankfurt, Shanghai and Tokyo on track to end 2018 down more than 10 percent.

In early trading, Germany’s DAX lost 0.5 percent and France’s CAC 40 retreated 0.4 percent. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index fell 1.6 percent and the Shanghai Composite Index ended down 0.8 percent.

The Chinese market is 2018′s worst performer, down nearly 25 percent for the year.

Noida (UP), Dec 21 (PTI) The Noida Police has busted a fake call centre here which was being used to dupe US citizens, officials said Friday.

A raid was conducted at the call centre, located in Sector 63, late Thursday night on a tip-off that dubious operations were being carried out from there, Senior Superintendent of Police Ajay Pal Sharma said.

He said "several" operators and callers were detained from the scene and were being interrogated.

Muzaffarnagar, Dec 21 (PTI) A 24-year-old woman was allegedly raped by a man who recorded the act and tried to blackmail her, police said Friday.

They said the accused befriended the woman through phone and called her at a hotel room here to meet her on Thursday. He allegedly gave her intoxicant and sexually assaulted her under its influence, they added.

A case has been registered against the accused, who has been absconding since the incident, police said.

Ballia (UP), Dec 21 (PTI) Four persons have been arrested for allegedly raping a teenage girl in Sikandarpur area here, police said Friday.

The police arrested four of the five accused on Thursday for raping the 13-year-old on November 29, they added.

"The arrested were identified as Manish, Arjun, Acchelal and Krishna. The fifth accused is on the run," a senior official said.

KANPUR: Emboldened with the spirit of victory in recently held Bar Association’s poll, a few advocates were hanging about in a fit of intoxicating drink on the road in Saket Nagar here on Wednesday late night.

Just then the police jeep taking the Circle officer happened to pass by the way, a drunk advocate suddenly came in front of the vehicle. He was saved as the driver applied brake immediately. This was enough to show how much he was influenced by the drink. 

KANPUR: A very exceptional scene came up when the city’s mayor Pramilla Pandey sat on a simple rickshaw to attend a programme organised at Green Park here on Thursday. It became a talk of the town. Not only the Kanpur Municipal Corporation officials but Kanpur Development Authority officials were also discussed over this interesting ride.

Dressed in her saffron sari and sweater with an indigenous scarf she was feeling quite at ease in common man’s traditional means of transportation.

20 Dec 2018; AFP: China has arrested a third Canadian national, Ottawa said Wednesday -- a move that comes amid an already tense diplomatic spat with Beijing over the arrest of a Chinese telecom executive.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau however emphasized that the arrest did not seem to be linked to a former diplomat and an entrepreneur held for allegedly endangering China's national security.

20 Dec 2018; DW: The White House announced the move on Wednesday after President Trump tweeted that the US had defeated IS. He had been looking for a way out of Syria for a while; Turkey seems to have given him a good reason.

Washington, Dec 20 (AFP) The United States does not want to be the "Policeman" of the Middle East, US President Donald Trump tweeted Thursday, as he defended his controversial decision to pull US forces out of Syria.

"Does the USA want to be the Policeman of the Middle East, getting NOTHING but spending precious lives and trillions of dollars protecting others who, in almost all cases, do not appreciate what we are doing? Do we want to be there forever? Time for others to finally fight....," he tweeted.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea said Thursday it will never unilaterally give up its nuclear weapons unless the United States first removes what Pyongyang called a nuclear threat. The surprisingly blunt statement jars with Seoul’s rosier presentation of the North Korean position and could rattle the fragile trilateral diplomacy to defuse a nuclear crisis that last year had many fearing war.

MOSCOW, December 20. /TASS/. It is up to Russia, Syria and Iran to fight the Islamic State terror group (IS or ISIS, outlawed in Russia), US President Donald Trump wrote on Twitter, commenting on his decision to withdraw US troops from Syria.

"Getting out of Syria was no surprise. I’ve been campaigning on it for years, and six months ago, when I very publicly wanted to do it, I agreed to stay longer. Russia, Iran, Syria and others are the local enemy of ISIS. We were doing there work. Time to come home and rebuild," the tweet reads.