Asian Car News

In its third biggest worldwide recall ever, Nissan is “voluntarily” recalling 2.14 million vehicles around the globe for an engine stall defect. Around 15,000 cars in the UAE are also affected.

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The 2011 Kia Optima is hot. It is so hot that it is sold out wherever it has been launched so far. It is sold out in the UAE too, and it isn’t even out yet officially. The car will hit GCC roads by the first week of November, but Kia organised an all-day media test-drive in Dubai.

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Power is the No.1 intoxicant in the world. That’s why Bill Clinton was more powerful than Bill Gates a few years ago; Barack Obama is more powerful than Warren Buffet now. That’s why Sonia Gandhi is more in demand in India than Mukesh Ambani. In our history lessons, we read how several royals, in their quest to quench their thirst for power, slaughtered their own family members. Power is such a powerful intoxicant that Indian politicians do not hesitate to create rift and evoke hatred in their own families, caste, creed, religion, state or region to crawl towards it.

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In an interesting twist to Toyota’s latest recall, Honda has announced that it is recalling a total of 470,000 vehicles in the U.S. due to the same failing master cylinder problem that caused Toyota to recall 1.66 million vehicles worldwide a few days ago.

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So we finally put our money where our mouth is and bought a car that we recommended as an Editor’s Choice more than a year ago. That car happened to be the 2009 Renault Safrane V6, a midsize sedan that is badged as a French Renault, built by Korean Samsung, and designed by Japanese Nissan. That last bit was crucial in coming to our decision, for the Safrane shares a platform with the Altima and the Maxima, with various key components that are purely Nissan items. As luck would have it, the Safrane is not a resounding success, which means buyers can pick up brand new 2009 leftovers at nicely-reduced prices straight from the dealer.

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Toyota has announced yet another worldwide safety recall, now involving approximately 1.66 million vehicles around the globe, for leaky brakes.

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Anyone who visited the 2010 Sharjah Auto Show last week would’ve got a look at the gaudy bodykitted Lexus LX570 at the “Invader” stand. The so-called Invader is a tuning and customisation programme for the Lexus 4×4 by Japanese tuners ASI. Who else besides the Japanese can come up with something this cheesy.

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Mitsubishi held its GCC launch event for their all-new 2011 ASX sub-compact crossover at the Dubai Autodrome racetrack a couple of weeks ago. To make things interesting, they even had a few 2010 Nissan Qashqai crossovers at hand for comparison. Incidentally, the Qashqai has been facelifted for 2011, though changes are minimal.

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Fans of the Toyota Yaris have leaked Japanese brochure shots of the 2011-2012 model of the subcompact hatchback. And yes, there are fans of the Yaris.

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The 2011 Infiniti M was launched earlier last week in the UAE, and displayed for the first time at the 2010 Sharjah Auto Show. Just before its launch, we asked for a test-drive whenever possible, and surprisingly got an answer that we can have it that same weekend. And so, here is a look at the GCC-spec Infiniti M56 for the first time ever.

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