FILE PHOTO: Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro touches a gold bar as he speaks during a meeting with the ministers responsible for the economic sector at Miraflores Palace in Caracas, Venezuela March 22, 2018. REUTERS/Marco Bello/File Photo
April 9, 2019
By Mayela Armas
CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela removed eight tonnes of gold from the central bank’s vaults last week, and the cash-strapped socialist state is expected to sell the bullion abroad as it seeks to raise hard currency in the face of U.S. sanctions, a lawmaker and one government source said.
With sanctions imposed by Washington choking off revenues from exports by state oil company PDVSA, President Nicolas Maduro’s increasingly isolated administration has turned to sales of Venezuela’s substantial gold reserves as one of the only sources of foreign currency.
The government source said the Central Bank’s reserves had fallen by 30 tonnes since the start of the year before U.S. President Donald Trump tightened sanctions, leaving the bank with around 100 tonnes in its vaults, worth more than $4 billion.
At that rate of decline, the central bank’s reserves would nearly disappear by the end of the year, leaving Maduro’s government struggling to pay for imports of basic goods.
Neither Venezuela’s central bank nor its information ministry responded to requests for comment.
Trump’s administration has declared Venezuela part of a “troika of tyranny” in Latin America, including left-leaning governments in Cuba and Nicaragua. It is seeking to cut off cash flow to Maduro’s government, foster dissent in the armed forces and oust him from power in the OPEC nation.
The United States and 50 other Western nations have recognized opposition leader Juan Guaido as Venezuela’s legitimate president.
Guaido invoked the Constitution in January to assume an interim presidency, saying Maduro’s May 2018 re-election vote was a sham. Maduro has branded Guaido a U.S. puppet and accused him of collaborating with Washington to sabotage the economy.
Opposition lawmakers have blasted companies buying Venezuelan gold or holding it as collateral for loans, saying they are giving Maduro a financial lifeline during an economic and humanitarian crisis.
Aside from the reserves held by the Central Bank in Caracas, Guaido is attempting to freeze bank accounts and gold owned by Venezuela abroad. This includes 31 tonnes in the Bank of England worth an estimated $1.3 billion.
BLACKOUTS AND WATER SHORTAGES
Venezuela’s economy is in a sixth year of recession, suffering hyperinflation and shortages of basic goods like food and medicine. Maduro eased restrictions on foreign exchange this year, but the economy remains desperately short of hard currency needed to import goods.
Last week’s operation took place while only high-level officials were present at the central bank’s offices, given that most rank-and-file employees stayed home due to blackouts and water shortages that have plagued Venezuela in the past month, the government source said.
“They moved gold out while the central bank was in contingency mode,” opposition lawmaker Angel Alvarado said, adding that the bars would be sold abroad, though he did not know the destination.
A similar quantity of gold was removed from the central bank’s vaults in February.
Washington in January asked foreign gold buyers to stop doing business with the Venezuelan government. This prompted Venezuela to cancel a planned sale of 29 tonnes of gold to the United Arab Emirates.
But in February and March the central bank continued to authorize the movement of gold, the government source said, adding that it was aiming to sell small quantities.
Earlier this year, Abu Dhabi investment firm Noor Capital said it bought 3 tonnes of gold from Venezuela on Jan. 21, but would not buy more until the situation in the country stabilized.
And in March, Ugandan authorities said they were investigating the country’s biggest gold refinery over imports of an estimated 7.4 tonnes of gold – valued at around $300 million – after state-run media reported it could have originated from Venezuela.
(Reporting by Mayela Armas; Writing by Luc Cohen; Editing by Daniel Flynn and David Gregorio)
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President Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen said Tuesday that the American people can decide "exactly who is telling the truth" when he testifies Wednesday before the House Oversight and Reform Committee -- but in a remarkable social media post on the eve of the hearing, a top Republican suggested that lurid details of Cohen's private life may take center stage.
Cohen, once Trump's loyal attorney and fixer, has turned on his former boss and has cooperated with Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation.
"I look forward to tomorrow, to be able to in my voice to tell the American people my story," Cohen told reporters Tuesday.
He made the comments after meeting with the Senate Intelligence Committee for more than nine hours behind closed doors. Cohen said he appreciated the opportunity to "clear the record and tell the truth" to the Senate committee, after acknowledging he'd lied to the panel in 2017.
Tuesday was the first of three consecutive days of congressional appearances scheduled for Cohen. After the public hearing Wednesday, he will appear before the House intelligence panel Thursday, again speaking in private.
Cohen's public testimony is likely to be a spectacle, in part because of the accusations he plans to level against the president. He'll give lawmakers a behind-the-scenes account of what he will claim is Trump's lying, racism and cheating, and possibly even criminal conduct, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. He is expected to provide what he will claim is evidence, in the form of documents, said the person, who requested anonymity to discuss the confidential testimony.
Republicans are expected to aggressively attempt to discredit Cohen, given that he has acknowledged lying previously. White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said in a statement Tuesday it was "laughable that anyone would take a convicted liar like Cohen at his word, and pathetic to see him given yet another opportunity to spread his lies."
It appeared unlikely Cohen would directly implicate Trump in instructing his subordinates to lie. Buzzfeed News last month published a bombshell, discredited report, citing two law enforcement officials, who said Cohen acknowledged to Mueller’s office that Trump told him to lie to Congress about a potential real estate deal in Moscow, and claim that the negotiations ended months before they did so as to conceal Trump’s involvement.
But Mueller issued his first public statement in more than a year to repudiate the BuzzFeed report just 24 hours after its publication, flatly asserting that the story was "not accurate." The Washington Post has since reported that Mueller intended his rare denial to mean that the story was "almost entirely incorrect," and that the Special Counsel's Office immediately "reviewed evidence to determine if there were any documents or witness interviews like those described, reaching out to those they thought might have a stake in the case. They found none."
One Republican House member, meanwhile, did more than just question Cohen's credibility in the run-up to the hearing on Wednesday. Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz tweeted Tuesday that the world is "about to learn a lot" about Cohen and suggested he knew of disparaging information that could come out during his testimony.
Gaetz, a Trump ally who talks to the president frequently, is not a member of the committee that will question Cohen. He did not offer any evidence. Still, the tweet was extraordinary because his remarks appeared to some Democrats to constitute threatening or intimidating a witness.
Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz defended a tweet he sent Tuesday about Michael Cohen, suggesting that President Trump’s former attorney had been unfaithful to his wife. (Getty/AP)
In a tweet, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wrote, "I encourage all Members to be mindful that comments made on social media or in the press can adversely affect the ability of House Committees to obtain the truthful and complete information necessary to fulfill their duties."
Pelosi went on to suggest that Gaetz may have even opened himself to legal liability, warning that the Constitution's Speech or Debate Clause -- which provides virtually absolute legal immunity to statements made by senators and representatives during congressional debates -- might not protect Gaetz, who made his comments away from the House floor.
"We're witness testing, not witness tampering," Gaetz countered in an interview with reporters. "When witnesses come before Congress, their truthfulness and veracity are in question and we have the opportunity to test them."
Lanny Davis, one of Cohen's lawyers, said in a statement that he wouldn't respond to Gaetz's "despicable lies and personal smears, except to say we trust that his colleagues in the House, both Republicans and Democrats, will repudiate his words and his conduct."
Democrats have been alternately suspicious of Cohen and eager to hear what he has to say. Sen. Mark Warner, the intelligence panel's top Democrat, suggested in a brief statement to reporters outside Tuesday's interview that Cohen had provided important information.
"Two years ago when this investigation started I said it may be the most important thing I am involved in in my public life in the Senate, and nothing I've heard today dissuades me from that view," Warner said.
Senators on the intelligence panel attended Tuesday's private meeting, a departure from the committee's usual practice, where witness interviews are conducted by staff only. The Senate intel panel's chairman, Richard Burr, suggested to The Associated Press before the meeting that his committee would take steps to ensure that Cohen was telling the truth.
"I'm sure there will be some questions we know the answers to, so we'll test him to see whether in fact he'll be truthful this time," Burr said.
At least one Republican member of the intelligence panel refused to go to the meeting. "I don't have any desire to go listen to a lying lawyer," said Texas Sen. John Cornyn.
In addition to lying to Congress, Cohen pleaded guilty last year to campaign finance violations for his involvement in payments to two women who allege they had affairs with Trump.
Federal prosecutors in New York have said Trump directed Cohen to arrange the payments to buy the silence of adult film star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal in the run-up to the 2016 campaign. Cohen told a judge that he agreed to cover up Trump's "dirty deeds" out of "blind loyalty."
Trump denies the allegations and says Cohen lied to get a lighter sentence.
The person with knowledge of what Cohen intends to tell Congress said he will provide information about Trump's financial statements that he will claim shows Trump deflated assets to pay lower taxes on golf courses; will provide details of the Daniels payment and claim that Trump organized a cover-up by pretending Cohen would be repaid; and claim that Trump talked to him and asked him questions about the Trump Moscow project throughout 2016.
He is also expected to discuss what he knows about a meeting between Trump campaign associates and a Russian lawyer in Trump Tower before the 2016 election, a matter that is of particular interest to Mueller and congressional investigators.
Cohen is not expected to discuss matters related to Russia in the public hearing, saving that information for the closed-door interviews with the intelligence committees. House Oversight and Reform Chairman Elijah Cummings has said he doesn't want to interfere with Mueller's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and links to Trump's campaign.
Members of the oversight panel are expected to ask questions about the campaign finance violations, Trump's business practices and compliance with tax laws and "the accuracy of the president's public statements," according to a memo laying out the scope of the hearing.
Fox News' Chad Pergram and Elizabeth Zwirz and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
A Senegalese migrant set a bus full of children on fire in Italy as part of a pro-refugee protest against the deaths of asylum seekers attempting to reach Europe.
The bus was taking a group of school children home after outdoor activities in Crema before the driver, 47-year-old Ousseynou Sy, decided to change course.
After the migrant threatened passengers with a knife, one of the children managed to call their parents, who in turn alerted the police.
Authorities then set up road blocks in an effort to stop the driver, who then proceeded to ram the bus into them.
After losing control of the bus, Sy stopped the vehicle, poured gasoline on it and set it ablaze.
Un senegalese è stato arrestato dopo aver sequestrato uno scuolabus con 51 studenti e dato fuoco al mezzo. L’uomo, italiano dal 2004 e con precedenti per ubriachezza e violenza sessuale, voleva uccidersi.“La faccio finita, vanno fermate le morti in mare". Nessun ragazzo ferito pic.twitter.com/i1adiwNXJn
All the passengers were able to escape through the back door and windows, although 12 children subsequently had to be taken to hospital for smoke inhalation.
The migrant said that he wanted to kill himself and potentially others as a protest to “stop deaths in the Mediterranean Sea,” referring to asylum seekers who have drowned in an attempt to illegally enter Europe. He also reportedly threatened to “carry out a massacre”.
Having once been one of the primary entrance points for illegal immigrants entering the continent, Italy has drastically reduced the number of migrants arriving on its shores thanks to populist leader Matteo Salvini’s strong border policy.
At its peak, Italy was receiving around 120,000 illegal immigrants via boat from Libya a year. This number has been slashed to around 23,000, a number that is likely to shrink further as a result of Salvini’s actions.
Rep. Cedric Richmond, D-La., who represents much of New Orleans, labeled Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, a “white supremacist” for comments about Hurricane Katrina victims.
Richmond made his remarks in a Thursday tweet and referred to Iowans, who are facing floods.
He wrote: “My heart goes out to all Iowans. Though it unsettles me that @SteveKingIA would dare compare them to the countless victims of Katrina, many of whom lost their lives. When people show you who they are, believe them. Steve King is a white supremacist and I won’t stand for it.”
King, in a town hall meeting in Iowa on Thursday, said that an unnamed Federal Emergency Management Agency official told him that Katrina victims only ever asked for government help, as opposed to those in Iowa who “take care of each other,” HuffPost reported.
The Advocate newspaper reported that King’s district in Iowa is about 95 percent white. It said about 67 percent of the population of New Orleans was black when Katrina hit
King was stripped of his committee assignments in January after making offensive remarks that embraced white supremacy.
A Tencent sign is seen during the China Digital Entertainment Expo and Conference (ChinaJoy) in Shanghai, China August 3, 2018. REUTERS/Aly Song
April 2, 2019
By Julia Fioretti
HONG KONG (Reuters) – Chinese social media and gaming giant Tencent Holdings is planning to raise about $5 billion in U.S. dollar-denominated bonds this week, two people with knowledge of the matter said.
The deal could be Asia’s largest so far this year, Refinitiv data shows. Chinese property developer Evergrande sold $2.8 billion in bonds in January, currently the biggest issue.
Bloomberg first reported Tencent’s plan for the bond issue earlier in the day.
Tencent last tapped the bond market in January last year, in which it raised $5 billion. It plans to launch the latest sale on Wednesday, the people said.
Tencent said it does not comment on market speculation.
The tech giant has a $6 billion offshore issuance quota from China’s state planner, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the people said.
Tencent said in an exchange filing on Monday it had increased its Global Medium Term Note Programme limit to $20 billion from $10 billion and that it planned to conduct an “international offering”, without specifying any size.
The company has hired Deutsche Bank, HSBC, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley as joint global coordinators for the bond issue, Tencent said in the exchange filing.
Tencent suffered a rough 2018, as a nine-month hiatus in new game approvals in China prevented it from making money out of some of its most popular games.
Its net profit for the last quarter of 2018 dropped 32 percent, the biggest decline since Tencent went public in 2004, to 14.2 billion yuan ($2.11 billion), in part due to one-off losses from its portfolio companies.
(Additional reporting by Julie Zhu; Editing by Himani Sarkar)
The finding, along with the pictures themselves, has been subjected to an extensive peer review, and the majority of researchers appear to support the hypothesis.
An array of new snapshots purporting to sport “Martian mushrooms” have assured scientists that there is life on the Red Planet, with the 15 images by NASA’s Curiosity Rover becoming central in a new study published in the Journal of Astrobiology.
The photos from the two-year mission are said to show the potential life forms in the making, as they emerge from Mars’s red sand dunes – from what looks like algae to mushroom and lichen.
According to Dr. Regina Dass, a microbiologist from Pondicherry University in India, no non-living force, known to humans, could have shown the obvious growth in size and volume “in just three days”.
“There are no geological or other abiogenic forces on Earth which can produce sedimentary structures, by the hundreds, which have mushroom shapes, stems, stalks and shed what looks like spores on the surrounding surface”, she was quoted by The Express as saying.
Meanwhile, NASA hasn’t yet commented on the research, although the majority of experts that engaged in a peer review tend to agree with the hypothesis. Three of six independent scientists and eight senior editors, who subjected the report to scrutiny, rejected the evidence outright, saying the specimens featured in the images are not biological ones, but more likely hematite, a form of iron oxide.
The journal’s official position reads that “evidence is not proof and there is no proof of life on Mars”, adding that “abiogenic explanations for this evidence can’t be ruled out.”
(Photo by NASA)
The speculation arrived against the backdrop of Exomars, a joint mission by the European Space Agency and Russian space corporation Roscosmos, seeking to find evidence of life on Mars. First launched in 2003, it earlier unveiled images that showed “clear signs” of past water activity on the surface of our smaller, redder neighbor.
In a study published in the Journal “Geophysical Research: Planets, Mars Express” researchers explored 24 deep, enclosed craters in Mars’ northern hemisphere and claim to have found the first geological evidence of an intertwined water system, apparently former lakes, deep beneath the Martian surface. In five of the 24 craters, scientists detected an array of clays, carbonates, and silicates, which are closely linked to the emergence of life on Earth and which essentially prop up the theory that Mars, similarly, had the necessary components for life at some point in the past.
The bombshell news that charges have been dropped against Jussie Smollett now leads many to suspect involvement by former president Obama in orchestrating a cover-up. Alex gives his take on who he believes may benefit from this hoax hate crime.
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia – Cambodian authorities have ordered a one-hour reduction in the length of school days because of concerns that students and teachers may fall ill from a prolonged heat wave.
Education Minister Hang Chuon Naron said in an announcement seen Friday that the shortened hours will remain in effect until the rainy season starts, which usually occurs in May. The current heat wave, in which temperatures are regularly reaching as high as 41 Celsius (106 Fahrenheit), is one of the longest in memory.
Most schools in Cambodia lack air conditioning, prompting concern that temperatures inside classrooms could rise to unhealthy levels.
School authorities were instructed to watch for symptoms of heat stroke and urge pupils to drink more water.
The new hours cut 30 minutes off the beginning of the school day and 30 minutes off the end.
School authorities instituted a similar measure in 2016.
LinkSpace’s reusable rocket RLV-T5, also known as NewLine Baby, is carried to a vacant plot of land for a test launch in Longkou, Shandong province, China, April 19, 2019. REUTERS/Jason Lee
April 26, 2019
By Ryan Woo
LONGKOU, China (Reuters) – During initial tests of their 8.1-metre (27-foot) tall reusable rocket, Chinese engineers from LinkSpace, a start-up led by China’s youngest space entrepreneur, used a Kevlar tether to ensure its safe return. Just in case.
But when the Beijing-based company’s prototype, called NewLine Baby, successfully took off and landed last week for the second time in two months, no tether was needed.
The 1.5-tonne rocket hovered 40 meters above the ground before descending back to its concrete launch pad after 30 seconds, to the relief of 26-year-old chief executive Hu Zhenyu and his engineers – one of whom cartwheeled his way to the launch pad in delight.
LinkSpace, one of China’s 15-plus private rocket manufacturers, sees these short hops as the first steps towards a new business model: sending tiny, inexpensive satellites into orbit at affordable prices.
Demand for these so-called nanosatellites – which weigh less than 10 kilograms (22 pounds) and are in some cases as small as a shoebox – is expected to explode in the next few years. And China’s rocket entrepreneurs reckon there is no better place to develop inexpensive launch vehicles than their home country.
“For suborbital clients, their focus will be on scientific research and some commercial uses. After entering orbit, the near-term focus (of clients) will certainly be on satellites,” Hu said.
In the near term, China envisions massive constellations of commercial satellites that can offer services ranging from high-speed internet for aircraft to tracking coal shipments. Universities conducting experiments and companies looking to offer remote-sensing and communication services are among the potential domestic customers for nanosatellites.
A handful of U.S. small-rocket companies are also developing launchers ahead of the expected boom. One of the biggest, Rocket Lab, has already put 25 satellites in orbit.
No private company in China has done that yet. Since October, two – LandSpace and OneSpace – have tried but failed, illustrating the difficulties facing space start-ups everywhere.
The Chinese companies are approaching inexpensive launches in different ways. Some, like OneSpace, are designing cheap, disposable boosters. LinkSpace’s Hu aspires to build reusable rockets that return to Earth after delivering their payload, much like the Falcon 9 rockets of Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
“If you’re a small company and you can only build a very, very small rocket because that’s all you have money for, then your profit margins are going to be narrower,” said Macro Caceres, analyst at U.S. aerospace consultancy Teal Group.
“But if you can take that small rocket and make it reusable, and you can launch it once a week, four times a month, 50 times a year, then with more volume, your profit increases,” Caceres added.
Eventually LinkSpace hopes to charge no more than 30 million yuan ($4.48 million) per launch, Hu told Reuters.
That is a fraction of the $25 million to $30 million needed for a launch on a Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems Pegasus, a commonly used small rocket. The Pegasus is launched from a high-flying aircraft and is not reusable.
(Click https://reut.rs/2UVBjKs to see a picture package of China’s rocket start-ups. Click https://tmsnrt.rs/2GIy9Bc for an interactive look at the nascent industry.)
NEED FOR CASH
LinkSpace plans to conduct suborbital launch tests using a bigger recoverable rocket in the first half of 2020, reaching altitudes of at least 100 kilometers, then an orbital launch in 2021, Hu told Reuters.
The company is in its third round of fundraising and wants to raise up to 100 million yuan, Hu said. It had secured tens of millions of yuan in previous rounds.
After a surge in fresh funding in 2018, firms like LinkSpace are pushing out prototypes, planning more tests and even proposing operational launches this year.
Last year, equity investment in China’s space start-ups reached 3.57 billion yuan ($533 million), a report by Beijing-based investor FutureAerospace shows, with a burst of financing in late 2018.
That accounted for about 18 percent of global space start-up investments in 2018, a historic high, according to Reuters calculations based on a global estimate by Space Angels. The New York-based venture capital firm said global space start-up investments totaled $2.97 billion last year.
“Costs for rocket companies are relatively high, but as to how much funding they need, be it in the hundreds of millions, or tens of millions, or even just a few million yuan, depends on the company’s stage of development,” said Niu Min, founder of FutureAerospace.
FutureAerospace has invested tens of millions of yuan in LandSpace, based in Beijing.
Like space-launch startups elsewhere in the world, the immediate challenge for Chinese entrepreneurs is developing a safe and reliable rocket.
Proven talent to develop such hardware can be found in China’s state research institutes or the military; the government directly supports private firms by allowing them to launch from military-controlled facilities.
But it’s still a high-risk business, and one unsuccessful launch might kill a company.
“The biggest problem facing all commercial space companies, especially early-stage entrepreneurs, is failure” of an attempted flight, Liang Jianjun, chief executive of rocket company Space Trek, told Reuters. That can affect financing, research, manufacturing and the team’s morale, he added.
Space Trek is planning its first suborbital launch by the end of June and an orbital launch next year, said Liang, who founded the company in late 2017 with three other former military technical officers.
Despite LandSpace’s failed Zhuque-1 orbital launch in October, the Beijing-based firm secured 300 million yuan in additional funding for the development of its Zhuque-2 rocket a month later.
In December, the company started operating China’s first private rocket production facility in Zhejiang province, in anticipation of large-scale manufacturing of its Zhuque-2, which it expects to unveil next year.
STATE COMPETITION
China’s state defense contractors are also trying to get into the low-cost market.
In December, the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp (CASIC) successfully launched a low-orbit communication satellite, the first of 156 that CASIC aims to deploy by 2022 to provide more stable broadband connectivity to rural China and eventually developing countries.
The satellite, Hongyun-1, was launched on a rocket supplied by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp (CASC), the nation’s main space contractor.
In early April, the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALVT), a subsidiary of CASC, completed engine tests for its Dragon, China’s first rocket meant solely for commercial use, clearing the path for a maiden flight before July.
The Dragon, much bigger than the rockets being developed by private firms, is designed to carry multiple commercial satellites.
At least 35 private Chinese companies are working to produce more satellites.
Spacety, a satellite maker based in southern Hunan province, plans to put 20 satellites in orbit this year, including its first for a foreign client, chief executive Yang Feng told Reuters.
The company has only launched 12 on state-produced rockets since the company started operating in early 2016.
“When it comes to rocket launches, what we care about would be cost, reliability and time,” Yang said.
(Reporting by Ryan Woo; Additional reporting by Beijing newsroom; Editing by Gerry Doyle)
Werner Baumann, CEO of German pharmaceutical and chemical maker Bayer AG, attends the annual general shareholders meeting in Bonn, Germany, April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay
April 26, 2019
By Patricia Weiss and Ludwig Burger
BONN (Reuters) – Bayer shareholders vented their anger over its stock price slump on Friday as litigation risks mount from the German drugmaker’s $63 billion takeover of seed maker Monsanto.
Several large investors said they will not support aspirin investor Bayer’s management in a key vote scheduled for the end of its annual general meeting.
Bayer’s management, led by chief executive Werner Baumann, could see an embarrassing plunge in approval ratings, down from 97 percent at last year’s AGM, which was held shortly before the Monsanto takeover closed in June.
A vote to ratify the board’s actions features prominently at every German AGM. Although it has no bearing on management’s liability, it is seen as a key gauge of shareholder sentiment.
“Due to the continued negative development at Bayer, high legal risks and a massive share price slump, we refuse to ratify the management board and supervisory board’s actions during the business year,” Janne Werning, representing Germany’s Union Investment, a top-20 shareholder, said in prepared remarks.
About 30 billion euros ($34 billion) have been wiped off Bayer’s market value since August, when a U.S. jury found the pesticide and drugs group liable because Monsanto had not warned of alleged cancer risks linked to its weedkiller Roundup.
Bayer suffered a similar defeat last month and more than 13,000 plaintiffs are claiming damages.
Bayer is appealing or plans to appeal the verdicts.
Deutsche Bank’s asset managing arm DWS said shareholders should have been consulted before the takeover, which was agreed in 2016 and closed in June last year.
“You are pointing out that the lawsuits have not been lost yet. We and our customers, however, have already lost something – money and trust,” Nicolas Huber, head of corporate governance at DWS, said in prepared remarks for the AGM.
He said DWS would abstain from the shareholder vote of confidence in the executive and non-executive boards.
Two people familiar with the situation told Reuters this week that Bayer’s largest shareholder, BlackRock, plans to either abstain from or vote against ratifying the management board’s actions.
Asset management firm Deka, among Bayer’s largest German investors, has also said it would cast a no vote.
Baumann said Bayer’s true value was not reflected in the current share price.
“There’s no way to make this look good. The lawsuits and the first verdicts weigh heavily on our company and it’s a concern for many people,” he said, adding it was the right decision to buy Monsanto and that Bayer was vigorously defending itself.
This month, shareholder advisory firms Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) and Glass Lewis recommended investors not to give the executive board their seal of approval.
(Reporting by Patricia Weiss and Ludwig Burger; Editing by Alexander Smith)
KHARTOUM, Sudan – Sudan’s military, which ousted President Omar al-Bashir after months of protests against his 30-year rule, says it intends to keep the upper hand during the country’s transitional period to civilian rule.
The announcement is expected to raise tensions with the protesters, who demand immediate handover of power.
The Sudanese Professionals Association, which is spearheading the protests, said Friday the crowds will stay in the streets until all their demands are met.
Shams al-Deen al-Kabashi, the spokesman for the military council, said late Thursday that the military will “maintain sovereign powers” while the Cabinet would be in the hands of civilians.
The protesters insist the country should be led by a “civilian sovereign” council with “limited military representation” during the transitional period.
The army toppled and arrested al-Bashir on April 11.
FILE PHOTO: Small toy figures are seen in front of a displayed Huawei and 5G network logo in this illustration picture, March 30, 2019. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic
April 26, 2019
By Charlotte Greenfield
WELLINGTON (Reuters) – China’s Huawei Technologies said Britain’s decision to allow the firm a restricted role in building parts of its next-generation telecoms network was the kind of solution it was hoping for in New Zealand, where it has been blocked from 5G plans.
Britain will ban Huawei from all core parts of 5G network but give it some access to non-core parts, sources have told Reuters, as it seeks a middle way in a bitter U.S.-China dispute stemming from American allegations that Huawei’s equipment could be used by Beijing for espionage.
Washington has also urged its allies to ban Huawei from building 5G networks, even as the Chinese company, the world’s top producer of telecoms equipment, has repeatedly said the spying concerns are unfounded.
In New Zealand, a member of the Five Eyes intelligence sharing network that includes the United States, the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) in November turned down an initial request from local telecommunication firm Spark to include Huawei equipment in its 5G network, but later gave the operator options to mitigate national security concerns.
“The proposed solution in the UK to restrict Huawei from bidding for the core is exactly the type of solution we have been looking at in New Zealand,” Andrew Bowater, deputy CEO of Huawei’s New Zealand arm, said in an emailed statement.
Spark said it has noted the developments in Britain and would raise it with the GCSB.
The reports “suggest the UK is following other European jurisdictions in taking a considered and balanced approach to managing supplier-related security risks in 5G”, Andrew Pirie, Spark’s corporate relations lead, said in an email.
“Our discussions with the GCSB are ongoing and we expect that the UK developments will be a further item of discussion between us,” Pirie added.
New Zealand’s minister for intelligence services, Andrew Little, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
British culture minister Jeremy Wright said on Thursday that he would report to parliament the conclusions of a government review of the 5G supply chain once they had been taken.
He added that the disclosure of confidential discussions on the role of Huawei was “unacceptable” and that he could not rule out a criminal investigation into the leak.
The decisions by Britain and Germany to use Huawei gear in non-core parts of 5G network makes it harder to prove Huawei should be kept out of New Zealand telecommunication networks, said Syed Faraz Hasan, an expert in communication engineering and networks at New Zealand’s Massey University
He pointed out Huawei gear was already part of the non-core 4G networks that 5G infrastructure would be built on.
“Unless there is a convincing argument against the Huawei devices … it is difficult to keep them away,” Hasan said.
(Reporting by Charlotte Greenfield; Editing by Himani Sarkar)
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