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MELBOURNE, Aug 2 - Rio Tinto Ltd (RIO.AX) is set to ship a pilot lithium processing plant to Serbia from Melbourne in the coming weeks, the culmination of a decade's research to catapult the world's largest iron ore miner into battery minerals. The work, undertaken at a science hub on the outskirts of Melbourne, has found a way to economically extract lithium from jadarite, a mineral that has only been found in a Serbian valley. Rio last week hit the go button on the $2.4 billion project that will diversify the producer of iron ore, copper, aluminium and speciality minerals into a top ten lithium producer, just as demand from electric vehicle makers booms. "It’s not a huge mine but from a lithium perspective, it’s going to be the largest producer in Europe for at least ten years and bring lithium to the market at scale," Sinead Kaufman, Chief Executive of Rio's Minerals division, told reporters. Four 40-foot shipping containers of equipment will leave in coming weeks before …

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Aug 2 (Reuters) - Australia's Santos Ltd (STO.AX) said on Monday it hiked its buyout proposal offer to buy Oil Search (OSH.AX) to A$9.40 billion ($6.90 billion) in a deal that would create a top-20 global oil and gas company. Santos, the country's second-largest independent gas producer, hiked its offer to 0.6275 new Santos shares for each Oil Search share from previous offer of 0.589 new Santos shares. Based on Santos' closing share price on June 24, the deal values Oil Search at A$4.52 per share, up from earlier value of A$4.25 apiece, which the Papua New Guinea-focused oil and gas producer rejected. read more Oil Search in a separate exchange filing said it agreed to open its books to Santos, adding that it intends to recommend its shareholders to vote in favour of the proposal. ($1 = 1.3615 Australian dollars) Reporting by Sameer Manekar in Bengaluru; Editing by Daniel Wallis and Diane Craft Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. …

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TUNIS, Aug 1 (Reuters) - Tunisia's parliament speaker Rached Ghannouchi, head of the moderate Islamist Ennahda party that has had an influential national role for a decade, left the hospital hours after he was admitted on Sunday, two advisers said, in the midst of a major political crisis. Ghannouchi, 80, has led opposition to last week's move by President Kais Saied to seize governing powers, dismiss the prime minister and freeze parliament, steps that the Ennahda leader quickly branded a coup. His advisers did not say what was wrong with Ghannouchi, who was hospitalised for a week last month with COVID-19. "After a few hours in the military hospital, Ghannouchi returned home and he is finenow", an advisor said. Suppressed before the 2011 revolution that introduced democracy, Ennahda has since then been the most consistently powerful political party, backing successive coalition governments and helping to agree the 2014 constitution. However, economic stagnation, declining …

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