Mexico’s GDP on the rise
Mexico’s gross domestic product grew by 2.8 percent in the second quarter compared to the same period last year, boosted by a bustling service industry and a rebounding farm sector, according to government data released Thursday.
That was an improvement over the 2.6 percent economic growth rate posted in the first three months of the year. Still, it was lower than the 3.1 percent pace many analysts had expected.
A decelerating manufacturing sector suggests that Mexico is starting to feel the effects of the slowdown in the United States, its biggest export market. And the report contained worrying new evidence that Mexico’s troubled government-run oil industry is starting to weigh on the nation’s economic health.
Growth in the mining and minerals sector declined 9.1 percent during the second quarter, thanks largely to tumbling output at the state-owned oil giant Pemex.
Bangkok, Thailand
Gary Glitter headed for London
Disgraced rocker Gary Glitter left Thailand for London, a British Foreign Office spokesman confirmed, ending a two-day odyssey after his release from a Vietnamese prison where he served time for molesting children.
Glitter has twice been refused entry into Thailand and once turned away from Hong Kong since he was deported from Vietnam Tuesday.
The former rocker, a British citizen, had originally been booked to fly to London on a Thai Airways flight out of Ho Chi Minh City. But during a layover in Bangkok, he complained of an earache and refused to continue on.
Glitter, whose real name is Paul Francis Gadd, flew to Hong Kong on Wednesday night after Thai authorities barred him from entering the country. Hong Kong immigration officials then refused him entry after interviewing him, the British spokesman said. He spoke on condition of anonymity in line with official policy.
When Glitter arrived back in Bangkok on Thursday, he was again denied entry under a law that allows those convicted of child sex abuse in a foreign country to be barred, according to Lt. Gen. Chatchawal Suksomchit, chief of Thailand’s immigration police.
Glitter was finally on his way to London after two days of shuttling, the Foreign Office spokesman said. He refused to say when Glitter was expected to arrive.
Glitter, 64, was convicted in March 2006 of committing “obscene acts with children.” He served two years and nine months of a three-year sentence, which was reduced for good behavior.