WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Three congressional committees and the Department of Justice are investigating the Internal Revenue Service‘s scrutiny of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status as the scandal distracts from President Barack Obama‘s second-term agenda.

Below are some of the major players in the backlash over the IRS paying extra attention to advocacy groups whose names included terms such as “patriot” or “Tea Party” when considering applications for tax-exempt status.

* Steven Miller – The acting head of the Internal Revenue Service while the scandal unfolded. He was fired from the post on Wednesday after an internal IRS report found that poor management, and not partisan politics, led to an “inappropriate” focus on conservative groups starting in 2010. The IRS has acknowledged Miller knew about the targeting of conservative groups in 2012 but did not disclose the practice. He was the former deputy IRS commissioner for services and enforcement and had been at the agency for more than 25 years.

At a House of Representatives hearing on Friday, Miller apologized for “foolish mistakes” made at the IRS and said they resulted from a heavy workload. He leaves the agency in June.

* Douglas Shulman – IRS commissioner before Miller took over in the acting capacity in November 2012. A Democrat, he was appointed to the post under Republican President George W. Bush in 2008.

In March 2012, Shulman told lawmakers that IRS personnel applied no extra scrutiny to conservative groups, although the new report from the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) said that Miller knew of the targeting as early as March 8, 2012.

Congressional leaders sent letters to Shulman inquiring about IRS targeting as early as June 2011. According to the inspector general, the IRS’s Determinations Unit began targeting conservative groups in March or April of 2010.

* Danny Werfel – the White House budget official selected by Obama to replace Miller as acting IRS chief on May 22.

The Obama administration‘s point man in overseeing the “sequestration” budget cuts, he will now tackle the IRS scandal.

* Lois Lerner – director of the IRS’s tax-exempt division who broke the news of the scandal on May 10 at an American Bar Association function when she publicly apologized for the discriminatory practices. The admission came just days after she testified in Congress but did not mention it. According to the inspector general, Lerner learned about the targeting as early as June 29, 2011.

Lawmakers have called for her removal from the IRS.

Miller on Friday acknowledged that the scandal-exposing question-and-answer session had been planned.

* Joseph Grant – IRS acting commissioner of tax exempt/government entities division at the center of the scandal. On Thursday he announced plans to retire on June 3 after joining the IRS in 2005. He took over the reins of the tax exempt division in late 2010 and Lerner worked under him.

* Sarah Hall Ingram – Preceded Grant as head of the IRS’s tax-exempt division when the targeting of conservative groups began. Since December 2010, she has headed up the IRS division handling Obama administration’s healthcare reform.

* William Wilkins – IRS chief counsel who is an Obama political appointee. He is the top legal adviser and takes the lead on all litigation involving the IRS. His office, although not necessarily Wilkins personally, knew of the targeting as early as August 2011, according to TIGTA. The IRS said Wilkins did not participate in the August 2011 meeting, which the agency said involved “staff attorneys several layers below Wilkins.”

* J. Russell George – Treasury Department inspector general for tax administration. Investigated the complaints against the IRS and issued the public report on targeting of conservative groups. The IRS is an arm of the Treasury Department and lawmakers at the hearings are scrutinizing George for not issuing warnings about the practice earlier.

* IRS’s Cincinnati field office employees – oversaw the reviews of tax-exempt applications. According to TIGTA, the Ohio unit set its own criteria for checking tax-exempt groups in the absence of clear guidance from more senior officials.

Republican lawmakers have named five workers they hope to bring in for questioning: Holly Paz, Washington-based director of rulings and agreements for the tax exempt division; Greg Muthert, a veteran Cincinnati office worker; Joseph Herr and Elizabeth Hofacre, who were cited by some Tea Party groups as handling their tax-exempt applications; and John Shafer, whom lawmakers described as “screening group manager.”

A congressional aide said the five workers were chosen based on a timeline from the TIGTA report that listed the job roles involved in the activity. It was unclear whether these employees had any role in any wrongdoing.

* President Barack Obama – has said he was not aware of the ongoing practice, calling it intolerable and inexcusable. His Press Secretary Jay Carney said the White House Counsel was notified of the IRS’s targeting during the week of April 22.

Obama has appeared multiple times in public to condemn the IRS’s actions and has promised to cooperate with congressional investigations and a Justice Department probe, but he has not demanded a special prosecutor look into the allegations.

* Representative Dave Camp – Republican chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee that is investigating the matter. On June 3, 2011, he sent a letter to then-Commissioner Shulman, inquiring about IRS targeting of taxpayers who donated to conservative groups and audits of tax-exempt organizations. The IRS then halted reviews of any tax-exempt groups but never addressed targeting concerns.

* Representative Darrell Issa – Republican chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee also conducting an investigation. He is seeking interviews with five IRS employees to learn more about the tax-exempt reviews.

* Senator Max Baucus – Democratic chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, who said his tax code revamp will examine rules for nonprofit group’s political activities in hopes of preventing such scandals in the future.

(Reporting by Alina Selyukh; editing by Jackie Frank)

By Manash Goswami

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Brent futures slipped on Friday, staying below $104 as bleak U.S. economic data revived worries about demand growth in the world’s biggest oil consumer, while a stronger dollar also pressured prices.

Barring news on major supply disruption, the dollar will be a key driver for oil with investors increasingly expecting the greenback’s recent surge to peter out.

Brent slipped 5 cents to $103.73 a barrel by 0552 GMT. It is expected to end the week mostly unchanged. U.S. oil was up 18 cents at $95.34, after settling up 86 cents, but was on track to end a three-week winning run.

“The dollar will influence oil quite a bit over the next few sessions because at some point it will start to weaken as it has strengthened too much in recent days,” said Tetsu Emori, a commodities sales manager at Astmax Investments in Tokyo.

“All U.S. economic indications in the last few days have been weak and that is raising doubts about demand.”

The U.S. economy showed fresh signs of slowing in the second quarter, with factory activity slipping in the mid-Atlantic region while groundbreaking declined at home construction sites.

POLICY DOVE

The strong dollar and a weak outlook for demand will keep Brent trading in a $103 to $105 range next week, while the U.S. contract will swing between $95 and $98, Emori said.

The dollar held firm near a 10-month high against a basket of major currencies on Friday after a regional Fed chief, long seen as a policy dove, said the Fed could begin easing up on stimulus this summer and end it late this year.

A firm dollar pressures oil as its strength makes commodities more expensive for holders of other currencies.

Brent has risen about $7 from the low of under $97 for the year touched on April 18. The U.S. contract has gained nearly $10 since the 2013 low of $85.61 was touched on the same day.

The difference between the U.S. benchmark and Brent widened beyond $10 per barrel for the first time since May 7 in the previous session, and was at about $8 on Friday. It hit a 2013 low of $7.20 earlier this week.

However, uncertainty over political tensions in the Middle East cushioned oil prices, with Russia’s foreign minister saying Iran must take part in a proposed international conference to try to end Syria’s civil war.

Charts show that Brent is expected to drop to $102.42 as it failed to break a resistance at $104.13, while U.S. oil is expected to revisit its Thursday low of $93.23, said Reuters technical analyst Wang Tao.

By Ulf Laessing

KHARTOUM (Reuters) – In a cramped government office in Khartoum, engineer Ahmed Taha and dozens of other Sudanese, lured by local newspaper adverts for jobs in the Gulf, sit waiting to get a permit to leave the country and work abroad.

“I’ve had enough of Sudan and will go to Saudi Arabia,” said Taha. “I am so tired of this country, the (economic) crisis, the corruption.”

Taha, who has been working in an office accounts department for two years because he could not find a professional post, has just been hired as an engineer by a construction firm in Saudi Arabia – a move that will increase his salary sevenfold to 2,500 Saudi riyals ($670) a month.

“I also want to find my wife a job as a teacher in Saudi Arabia because she makes only 600 (Sudanese) pounds ($95) a month here. We cannot live on our salaries.”

Like thousands of other Sudanese, Taha is escaping a country gripped by economic crisis since losing 75 percent of its oil production, its lifeline, when South Sudan seceded in July 2011.

Analysts estimate unemployment is running at between 20 and 30 percent, although there is no official data.

Annual inflation topped 41 percent in April and the Sudanese pound has more than halved in value against the dollar since South Sudan’s independence, making life unbearable for many.

Nearly 95,000 Sudanese, from laborers to teachers, nurses and engineers, left the country last year compared to only 10,032 in 2008, according to official data. Some analysts say the number is even higher because travel movements are hard to monitor.

Net migration contrasts with some other African countries, including South Sudan, that are seeing skilled professionals return home as the continent’s economic development and increasing foreign investment create career opportunities.

For Sudan, struggling with a high budget deficit and a shortage of foreign currency needed to pay for imports, migration has economic benefits.

The World Bank estimates migrant workers remitted $1.13 billion to Sudan last year, up from $442 million in 2011. That helped to offset the country’s goods and services trade deficit, estimated at $6.7 billion by the International Monetary Fund.

The exodus of workers should also help reduce unemployment. A prolonged “brain drain” of professionals, however, would put further pressure on the country’s deteriorating public services, adding to the country’s economic problems.

“We are suffering under the economic hardship,” said Omar El Fadli, who left Sudan in 1974 to study in Britain and then worked in France and the United States before coming back in 2005 to buy a restaurant in central Khartoum.

“To be honest with you we have been trying to sell (the restaurant) for over two years … It’s not profitable anymore.”

At the visa office in Khartoum, women in dark blue robes, representatives from government-approved employment agencies, are on hand to help applicants fill in the required paperwork.

“We sort out the paperwork for doctors going to the Gulf, especially Saudi Arabia which is requesting a large number of Sudanese doctors to work there,” says Hamda Kassem, one of the employment agency staff.

While the Sudanese government allows labor agencies to arrange work contracts for doctors heading to the Gulf, a government-commissioned study published in January also expressed concern about the exodus of healthcare professionals.

DOCTORS LEAVING

More than 6,000 Sudanese doctors left for Saudi Arabia alone between 2009 and 2012, according to the government study, commissioned to assess the reasons for migration. Around another 1,000 doctors have gone to Libya since the ousting of ruler Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, it says.

That is leaving health services in Sudan vulnerable as countries in the Gulf and elsewhere snap up the country’s leading specialists. Newspaper reports of patients dying in Sudan hospitals after being misdiagnosed by ill-qualified doctors are not uncommon.

“There is a very bad effect on medical services,” the government study says. “The emigration to Saudi Arabia will result in the loss of specialists which will be felt directly … in the provinces.”

Sudanese medical colleges pump out up to 4,000 doctors annually but some colleges use textbooks that are more than 10 years old and have no surgical equipment.

The study forecasts that emigration from Sudan will continue to increase in the next few years due to economic, social, security and political reasons.

Sudan has for been plagued by insurgencies. Long confined to remote regions such as Darfur, rebels struck a central region last month, triggering fears they might attack Khartoum again like in 2008.

Few Western engineering firms operate in Sudan due to a U.S. embargo in place since 1997, making the country reliant on mostly Chinese companies to build infrastructure and they tend to import their own workers.

Sudanese government efforts to combat unemployment by hiring more young people for public sector jobs and starting infrastructure projects have been hampered by the budget crisis.

Young people complain that corruption also makes it hard to find work – jobs in the public sector, the biggest employer, often go to people with the right connections, known as wasta, they say.

“You cannot find a job without wasta,” said Hisham Hassan, who graduated in civil engineering from the Sudanese university of Atbara in 2008 but has yet to find work.

“I can’t afford to get married or anything,” he said after receiving his exit permit at the visa office.

He has landed a job at a Saudi builder paying him a monthly salary of 3,000 riyals – in Qassim, one of the most conservative regions of Saudi Arabia. “It will be fine. I have no choice anyway,” he said.

Concerns about personal freedom in Sudan are also encouraging emigration. Security agents have cracked down hard on small street protests organized mainly by students dreaming of an “Arab spring”. Divisions in the weak opposition and the army’s support for President Omar Hassan al-Bashir mean Sudan has avoided the uprisings seen in Egypt or Tunisia.

SUDANESE SKILLS

Sudanese professionals have a tradition of going overseas to gain experience and make money. In the 1960s and 70s, they flocked to the Gulf as those economies took off.

Opportunities dried up after the 1991 Gulf war when President Bashir failed to back the U.N.-led military operation to end Saddam Hussein’s occupation of Kuwait. In retaliation, Gulf countries deported thousands of Sudanese once Kuwait was liberated.

With governments in the Gulf spending billions of dollars on roads, schools and universities again, Sudanese are back in demand although prospects in Saudi are dampened by a crackdown on illegal workers and policies to replace foreigners with locals.

Sudanese are also looking further afield. At the Goethe Institute in Khartoum, run by the German government, there’s a waiting list of up to three months to enrol in German classes.

Ahmed Shamun is making a living from the rise in migration. Having worked in Abu Dhabi as an English translator for 13 years, he returned in 1993 and now runs an employment agency in Khartoum, fixing up Sudanese with jobs in the Gulf. Yet, he still laments the trend.

“It’s not just doctors or engineers leaving, most of them are workers,” he said, sitting in his small office next to a travel agent selling air tickets to Saudi Arabia.

“I don’t like it but what else can young people do? There are no jobs here.”

($1 = 3.7502 Saudi riyals)

(Editing by Susan Fenton)

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By Chikako Mogi

TOKYO (Reuters) – Oil and gold prices fell on Monday as the dollar strengthened, weighing on Asian shares, but Japanese equities outperformed on the back of the yen’s slide to a fresh 4-1/2-year low against the U.S. currency.

European stock markets are seen narrowly mixed after the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index closed at a five-year high on Friday, with financial spreadbetters predicting London’s FTSE 100, Paris’s CAC-40 and Frankfurt’s DAX would open between a 0.2 percent rise and a 0.1 percent drop.

U.S. stock futures were down 0.3 percent, pointing to a weak Wall Street open, after the Dow Jones industrial average and the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index ended at record highs on Friday.

“A strength in the dollar is weighing on commodities across the board,” said Ben Le Brun, analyst at OptionsXpress in Sydney. “For oil, worries of ample supplies is putting pressure. We have unprecedented levels of stockpiles in the United States, with uncertainty surrounding economic growth.”

U.S. crude futures slipped 0.8 percent to $95.23 a barrel and Brent dropped 0.7 percent to $103.16.

The dollar’s strong performance also took the shine off gold, which typically serves as an alternative to the U.S. currency. Spot gold fell as much as 1.5 percent to a session low of $1,426.40 an ounce.

Investors were cautious ahead of China’s data. China’s industrial output in April grew 9.3 percent from a year earlier and its fixed-asset investment grew 20.6 percent from a year ago, both slightly below expectations. Retail sales in April rose 12.8 percent from a year earlier, matching forecasts.

The yen slid to a fresh 4-1/2-year low against the dollar of 102.15 yen in Asia on Monday morning, having earlier hit its highest point since January 2010 against the euro at 132.385. The yen last traded at 101.70 against the dollar.

The drop in commodities prices weighed on the Australian dollar, which traded around $0.9987 after hitting an 11-month low of $0.9961 on Friday.

The dollar was also underpinned against the yen after Japan avoided criticism from its peers for pursuing bold reflationary policies which have resulted in a steady decline in the Japanese currency. A weaker yen improves earnings prospects for exporters and underpins the export-reliant Japanese economy.

Group of Seven finance officials agreed on Saturday to redouble efforts to deal with failing banks and gave a green light to Japan’s drive to galvanise its economy.

Having urged Tokyo for years to do something to revive its economy, other world powers are not in a position to complain now that it is doing so. Also, the Federal Reserve and Bank of England have printed money in the way the Bank of Japan is now.

“If international peers criticise the yen’s weakness, investors who are on the nervous side could stop chasing the market higher. Now, such concerns are receding,” said Kenichi Hirano, a strategist at Tachibana Securities.

The Nikkei stock average scaled a fresh peak since January 2008 of 14,849.01, rising as much as 1.7 percent.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan shed 0.8 percent. Hong Kong shares led the decline with a 1 percent drop as Ping An Insurance fell sharply after a three-month ban was imposed on its brokerage unit for helping list a fraudulent Chinese company.

Australian shares were down 0.3 percent after closing at a five-year high on Friday, while South Korean shares held in a tight range, capped by the yen’s weakness which erodes the competitiveness of Korean exporters.

U.S. labour market data has pointed to a steady recovery trend in the world’s largest economy, boosting the dollar and fuelling speculation that the Federal Reserve could scale back its aggressive monetary stimulus aimed at supporting growth.

Investors were keeping an eye on the U.S. retail sales due later on Monday.

“U.S. retail sales … is always going to be important as it highlights the health of the consumer and the potential to feed into expectations of inflation and also potential job creation,” Chris Weston, chief market strategist at IG markets, said in a note to clients.

U.S. Treasuries extended losses in Asia, with benchmark 10-year yields rising to 1.93 percent from around 1.895 percent on Friday.

Japanese government bond prices tumbled, hurt by the Nikkei’s rally and also tracking U.S. bonds lower, with the 10-year JGB yield hitting a three-month high of 0.750 percent and benchmark JGB futures shedding a full point to their lowest in a year.

Elsewhere, removing a potential source of political instability in the Asian region, Pakistan’s Nawaz Sharif, toppled in a 1999 military coup, has made a comeback over the weekend election, eyeing to form a government to implement reforms needed to rescue the fragile economy.

Asian shares ease, yen hits fresh lows against dollar

TOKYO (Reuters) – Asian shares eased on Monday with sentiment hit by selling in commodities triggered by a strong dollar, which rose to a fresh 4-1/2-year peak against the yen on the back of growing confidence in the U.S. economy. Losses in shares were likely to be limited after U.S. stocks rallied to record highs on Friday.

Analysis: Google+ struggles to attract brands, some neglect to update

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – To mark the Cinco de Mayo holiday this year, Domino’s Pizza festooned its Facebook page with a string of posts, including an image of a Mexican-themed guacamole pizza that garnered over 2,000 “likes”. But visitors to Domino’s companion Google+ page on that day found less festive fare: The most recent post was from October 2012. Two years after introducing its social network, Google Inc is struggling to win over the brands and businesses that have been its most loyal customers in the Internet search market.

For banks in cyber heist, how to get their money back?

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Because the sums were large and such attacks are relatively new, the two Middle East banks hit in a $45 million ATM heist face an uncertain path in trying to recover their losses, financial, insurance and legal experts say. Oman-based Bank of Muscat lost $40 million and United Arab Emirates-based National Bank of Ras Al Khaimah PSC (RAKBANK) lost $5 million in the global heist, U.S. prosecutors said on Thursday.

Western Union shares could rise in coming years – Barron’s

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Western Union Co. , which facilitates long-distance money transfers between consumers and businesses, could see its shares rise to the low $20 range in the next few years, according to a Barron’s report. In its May 13 edition, Barron’s cited a recent reduction in Western Union’s rates as a catalyst for growth. It also said that business could expand as unemployment levels fall around the world, citing Ariel Investment analyst James Kenney.

Deutsche Telekom says U.S. listing helps it “attack” rivals: paper

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Deutsche Telekom has given its U.S. operations more autonomy, positioning its business to compete better with bigger and smaller rivals, Chief Executive Rene Obermann told Germany’s Welt am Sonntag newspaper. In an effort to turnaround its U.S. business, which has lost customers to AT&T and Verizon , the German telecoms provider floated its operations there after merging its T-Mobile USA unit with MetroPCS Communications.

HSBC boss can do more to cut bank down to size

LONDON (Reuters) – HSBC’s sale of a stake in a Korean insurer last month was made with little fanfare, just one of 52 deals struck or businesses closed in the last two years by Chief Executive Stuart Gulliver, and analysts are expecting more. With less than a year left of his 3-year restructuring plan, Gulliver will report on how he is doing in meeting his targets on Wednesday.

Mixed signals for the global economy

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A flood of data this week will paint a mixed picture of the global economy, with belt-tightening continuing to dampen activity in the euro zone, but accommodative policies helping to stimulate growth in Japan. Reports from the United States are expected to show some slowdown in momentum early in the second quarter, and the Chinese economy’s prospects are unlikely to have changed much.

Analysis: Bullish yuan herd leaves China fundamentals in the dust

SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Investors convinced China’s currency is once again a one-way bet upward should think again: signs of slowing economic growth could cut short the yuan’s rally. Investors and companies have been pouring funds into China in recent months, helping send the yuan to a series of record highs.

Germany pushing for faster reform in euro zone: magazine

BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany wants further reforms and savings in crisis-hit euro zone states, according to a report obtained by German magazine Spiegel in which Berlin evaluates progress made under strengthened EU budget rules. The rules have managed to spur in all euro zone countries a “general political mobilization towards structural reforms and greater competitiveness”, Spiegel cited the report as saying in its edition published on Sunday.

India IT watchdog investigating breach in ATM heist

MUMBAI/BANGALORE (Reuters) – The Indian government’s cyber watchdog is investigating how security at two companies that are part of the country’s vast IT services industry was breached in a global ATM heist that saw $45 million stolen from two banks in the Middle East. EnStage Inc, which operates from Bangalore, and ElectraCard Services, based in the Indian city of Pune, processed card payments for the two banks that were hit in the theft, several people familiar with the situation said.