Nearly 100 dead in northwest Syria fighting: Monitor
Beirut, Jun 28: Nearly 100 combatants were killed on Friday in clashes between fighters loyal to Syria's government, rebels and jihadists in northwestern Syria, a war monitor said.
Starting at dawn on Friday morning -- and after bombing by the regime -- fighting in northern Hama province killed 51 government loyalists and allied militiamen, and 45 among the rebels and jihadists, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The clashes continued in the afternoon, the Britain-based Observatory said.
Backed by its ally Moscow, Damascus has since late April intensified bombardment of much of Idlib province and the parts of neighbouring Hama, Aleppo and Latakia where Syria's former Al-Qaeda affiliate Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) holds sway.
Fighting has meanwhile taken place on the ground in parts of these anti-regime areas, particularly in northern Hama.
Syria's official SANA news agency also reported bombardment on Friday.
"Units of the army today carried out massive bombing at dawn.... on positions of the terrorist Al-Nusra Front in (and) around the villages of Jibine and Tal Maleh," SANA said, referring to positions held by HTS.
The bombardment led to "the destruction of the terrorists' fortifications and their lines of defence", it added.
They took place in response to attacks against the villages and cities in Hama, the news agency said.
Idlib and parts of neighbouring Hama, Aleppo and Latakia provinces were supposed to be protected by a buffer zone under an September agreement between Russia and Turkey.
But the region has come under increased bombardment by the regime and its Russian ally since HTS seized most of Idlib at the start of the year.
The Turkish defence ministry said Friday a Turkish soldier was killed and three others were wounded the day before by fire from Syrian government forces against a Turkish observation post in Idlib province.
Since late April, air strikes have killed 490 civilians, according to the Observatory, while fighting has killed 682 pro-regime forces and 821 rebels and jihadists.
The flare-up has also displaced 330,000 others, according to the United Nations, sparking fears of one of the worst humanitarian disasters in Syria's eight-year war.
The conflict in Syria has killed more than 370,000 people and displaced millions since it erupted in 2011 with the brutal repression of protests against President Bashar al-Assad.
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Wholesale price inflation rises to 8-month high of 0.83 pc in December
New Delhi (PTI): Wholesale price inflation increased for the second month in a row, rising 0.83 per cent in December 2025, driven by an uptick in prices of food, non-food articles, and manufactured items on a month-on-month basis, government data showed on Wednesday.
After witnessing a deflationary trend in the previous two months, the wholesale price index (WPI)-based inflation returned to positive in December. In November and October, the pace of price rise was negative at (-) 0.32 per cent and (-) 1.02 per cent, respectively.
In contrast, WPI inflation was 2.57 per cent in December 2024.
"Positive rate of inflation in December 2025 is primarily due to an increase in prices of other manufacturing, minerals, manufacture of machinery and equipment, manufacture of food products, and textiles, etc," the industry ministry said in a statement.
According to WPI data, deflation in food articles was 0.43 per cent in December, as against 4.16 per cent in November.
In vegetables, deflation was 3.50 per cent in December, compared to 20.23 per cent in November.
Barclays India Chief Economist Aastha Gudwani said narrowing deflation in "food articles" and a rise in inflation in "manufacturing products" drove the increase in the headline WPI inflation in December. "We expect modest increases in WPI inflation to continue".
In case of manufactured products, WPI inflation inched up to 1.82 per cent from 1.33 per cent in November 2025.
The non-food articles category showed an inflation of 2.95 per cent in December, against 2.27 per cent in November.
Negative inflation or deflation continued in the fuel and power sectors, at 2.31 per cent in December, against 2.27 per cent a month ago.
ICRA Senior Economist Rahul Agrawal said led by the hardening in YoY food inflation owing to an unfavourable base, rise in global commodity prices, and sustained pressure on the USD/INR pair over the past few months, ICRA expects the YoY WPI inflation to rise to 1.5 per cent in January, the highest level in 10 months.
Data released earlier this week showed the country's retail inflation inching up to 1.33 per cent in December, from 0.71 per cent in November, driven by rising food prices.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has reduced policy interest rates by 1.25 percentage points in the current fiscal year as inflation remained low.
The Reserve Bank, last month, significantly lowered the inflation projection for the current fiscal to 2 per cent from 2.6 per cent estimated earlier, as the economy continues to witness rapid disinflation.
The RBI mainly tracks retail inflation for deciding on benchmark interest rates.
Last month, the RBI cut key policy interest rates by 25 bps to 5.25 per cent, saying that the Indian economy is in a "rare Goldilocks period" marked by high growth and low inflation.
The Reserve Bank has raised its FY26 GDP growth projection to 7.3 per cent, from an earlier estimate of 6.8 per cent. India recorded an 8.2 per cent growth in the September quarter, and 7.8 per cent in the June quarter.
