Business briefs

Labor strife stall car production

NEW YORK. Home prices posted their first quarterly increase in three years, signaling the housing market has turned a corner. The Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller's US National Home Price Index released Tuesday rose nearly 3 percent from the first quarter to 133, though that reading is still down almost 15 percent from the second quarter last year.

WASHINGTON. Car dealers will have a bit more time to get reimbursed for their Cash for Clunkers deals after the government extended the deadline for filing applications for the $3 billion government incentives into Tuesday. The Transportation Department said late Monday that dealers may have more time to submit pending claims, due to continued problems with its Website.

DHAKA. Bangladesh has awarded three offshore blocks to two global energy companies to explore for gas in the Bay of Bengal, a senior energy official said Tuesday. The US-based ConocoPhillips and Ireland's Tullow Oil could start exploration work by early next year, said Mohammad Muqtadir Ali, chairman of the state-owned Bangladesh Oil, Gas and Mineral Corporation, or Petrobangla.

CARACAS. The assembler of Mitsubishi and Hyundai vehicles in Venezuela has suspended production indefinitely due to labor disputes, adding to the problems of the automotive sector. Labor strife has cut production at the plant to 33 vehicles a day this year from an average of 59 a day in 2004.

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