personal friendship to the prime minister. stephen, i believe this is the 11th time that we ve sat down and worked together, not including our many summits around the world. and on occasions like this, unfortunately, i only speak one language. stephen moves effortlessly between two. no matter we speak, we always understand each other. and stephen, i ve got a trusted partner and i think he ll agree that perhaps no two nations match up more closely together. or are woven together more deeply economically, culturally, than the united states and canada. that deep sense of interconnection know our shared values, our shared interests, infuse the work that we have done today. from supporting a resolution to the euro zone crisis to moving ahead with the transition in afghanistan, from deepening security cooperation here in the americas to the supporting reform and democratic
shia compound where many gather on this important holiday and the photographer we spoke to describes how the explosion inside this crowded compound, bodies fanned out and were decimated. the death toll we re hearing could be in one to two dozen but given the scene where we heard from witnesses we are expecting it to rise in the coming hours. zain? nick paton walsh. i m zain verjee. world business today starts now. hello, i m andrew stevens in hong kong. and from cnn london, i m charles hodson. this is world business today and these are our top stories much there had a cautious mood on the markets after a downgrade warning in europe. a change of tact by china breathes new life into climate change talks. and a trickle of tourists return as thailand recovers from devastating floods. the timing could hardly have been worse. just as leaders of the euro-zone s biggest economies put on a united front standard & poor s threw a big spanner into the works and put 15 eur
i m christine romans along with my friend, carol costello. happy day before friday. up first this hour, iraqi officials honoring the service and sacrifice of u.s. and coalition troops as well as their own. special ceremony at camp victory overnight. vice president biden was on hand. the event coming just weeks before american troops complete their withdrawal from iraq. cnn s martin savidge live in baghdad. we were hoping you could attend that ceremony but you could not. reporter: good morning to you, carol. you are right. we were told about 12 hours before that ceremony was to begin that members of the media were not allowed to attend. even though the buildup a week and a half we were told absolutely we would be there. the explanation that was given was security. does not appear we were the primary security threat but the concern was that they honl limited space. this is going to be held indoors for security reasons at a palace out there at camp victory because they neede
investigation at this point. the team plays for the first time tonight after the firing of bernie fine. they have been leaving an open seat on the bench honor iing hi. that will likely go away tonight. he will have to face the cameras after the game. it will be interesting to see what he has to say. jay gray, thank you for that. this afternoon, president obama is dealing with the euro zone crisis. he has a meeting with the prime minister of the netherlands. tomorrow he will push for the payroll tax cut. he s faced tough challenges. is he getting the credit he deserves? it s the subject of a column. president as pinata. so you give this long list of achievements. let s go through them. rescued the auto industry, signed the fair pay act, controlled the credit card industry, took out osama bin laden. where are his cheerleaders?
most important trading partners, we spend a lot of time focussing on how we can continue to grow economies and create good jobs on both sides of the atlantic. a large part of the conversation revolved around the euro zone crisis and they have been actively engaged with the heads of government and heads of state in europe to try to resolve this prisz. i communicated to them that the united states stands ready to do our part to help them resolve this issue. this is of huge importance to our economy. if europe is contracting and having difficulties, it is great to create jobs here at home because we send to europe and it is such an important trading partner for us. we have a stake in their success and we will work to try to