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Amazon workers strike at four German warehouses

FILE PHOTO: The logo of Amazon is seen on the door of an Amazon Books retail store in New York
FILE PHOTO: The logo of Amazon is seen on the door of an Amazon Books retail store in New York City, U.S., February 14, 2019. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

April 15, 2019

BERLIN (Reuters) – Workers at four Amazon logistic centers in Germany went on strike on Monday, the latest action in a long-running campaign for better pay and conditions.

Trade union Verdi said workers at warehouses in Rheinberg, Werne, Bad Hersfeld and Koblenz had stopped work, with the strike set to last until Thursday in some centers, and others potentially joining over the Easter holiday period.

An Amazon spokeswoman said the company saw very limited participation in the strike across Germany, adding there was no operational impact so customer deliveries would not be delayed.

Verdi has organized frequent strikes at Amazon in Germany since 2013 to press demands for the retailer to raise pay for warehouse workers in accordance with collective bargaining agreements in Germany’s mail order and retail industry.

Amazon has repeatedly rejected Verdi’s demands and the spokeswoman said the company is a fair and responsible employer without a collective agreement, with wages at the upper end of what is paid in comparable jobs.

Amazon runs 12 fulfillment centers in Germany, its second-biggest market after the United States.

“The employees are not giving up,” Verdi board member Stefanie Nutzenberger said in a statement. “They want to put an end to the arbitrariness of a company that puts pressure on its employees with stressful work and controls.”

(Reporting by Emma Thomasson, editing by Ed Osmond)

Source: OANN

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Trump Announces Major Offensive Against Deep State Coup

President Trump, in an exclusive wide-ranging interview Wednesday night with Fox News’ “Hannity,” vowed to release the full and unredacted Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants and related documents used by the FBI to probe his campaign, saying he wants to “get to the bottom” of how the long-running Russia collusion narrative began.

Trump told anchor Sean Hannity that his lawyers previously had advised him not to take that dramatic step out of fear that it could be considered obstruction of justice.

“I do, I have plans to declassify and release. I have plans to absolutely release,” Trump said. “I have some very talented people working for me, lawyers, they really didn’t want me to do it early on.”

Trump also accused FBI officials of committing “treason” — slamming former FBI Director James Comey as a “terrible guy,” former CIA Director John Brennan as potentially mentally ill, and Democrat House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff as a criminal.

Redacted versions of FISA documents already released have revealed that the FBI extensively relied on documents produced by Christopher Steele, an anti-Trump British ex-spy working for a firm funded by the Hillary Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee, to surveil Trump aide Carter Page. At least one senior DOJ official had apparent concerns Steele was unreliable, according to text messages exclusively obtained last week by Fox News.

The leaked dossier, and related FBI surveillance, kickstarted a media frenzy on alleged Russia-Trump collusion that ended with a whimper on Sunday, when it was revealed Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe concluded finding no evidence of such a conspiracy, despite several offers by Russians to help the Trump campaign. Page was never charged with wrongdoing.

Citing a high-level source, Kentucky GOP Sen. Rand Paul late Wednesday tweeted that anti-Trump ex-CIA Director John Brennan had internally pushed the dossier. Fox News has not independently verified Paul’s source.

“I think Brennan’s a sick person, really I do,” Trump said, sharply criticizing Brennan’s “horrible” claims in recent weeks that Trump had committed treason himself. “I think there’s something wrong with him.”

Brennan was one of the loudest and most virulent voices to trumpet the Russian collusion theory over the past two years, asserting falsely just weeks ago that Special Counsel Robert Mueller was likely planning to indict members of the Trump administration’s family in a scene reminiscent of the “ides of March” and the assassination of Julius Caesar. He since implied he had “bad information.”

“When I said there could be somebody spying on my campaign, it went wild out there,” Trump told Hannity. “They couldn’t believe I could say such a thing. As it turned out, that was small potatoes compared to what went on. … Millions and millions [spent] on the phony dossier, and then they used the dossier to start things. It was a fraud, paid for by Hillary Clinton and the Democrats.”

Just hours earlier Wednesday, Trump made clear he was enthusiastic about the idea of appointing a second special counsel to review the origins of the Russia investigation when it came up during a meeting Tuesday with Republican senators, a source familiar with the discussions told Fox News.

In an apparent shot at former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Trump also told Hannity “this all would not have happened” if Attorney General William Barr had been with his administration from the beginning.

“If you wrote this as a novel, nobody would buy it; it would be a failure, because it would be too unbelievable,” Trump said. “We’re getting to the bottom of it. This can never, ever happen to a president again. That was a disgrace and an embarrassment to our country. … Hopefully they won’t get away with it.”

“We’ll have to see how it all started, but I’m going to leave that to other people, including the attorney general and others, to make that determination,” Trump continued. “Fifty years, 100 years from now — if someone tries the same thing, they have to know the penalty will be very very great if and when they get caught.”

Trump also lashed out at Schiff, D-Calif., who has pushed strongly for investigations into possible Trump-Russia links. “Schiff is a bad guy, he knew he was lying — he’s not a dummy. For a year and a half he would just leak and call up CNN and others. You know, I watch him, so sanctimonious … He knew it was a lie, and he’d get in the back room with his friends in the Democrat Party, and they would laugh like hell. In one way, you could say it’s a crime what he did — he was making statements he knew were false. He’s a disgrace to our country.”

The president insisted the U.S. should have a “great relationship” with Russia and China, but that the “fake news” and “nonsense” distorted his intentions into something more sinister.


(Win McNamee / Getty)

Trump also criticized Comey, whom he’d fired in 2017, as a “terrible guy.” He insisted he did not fire him to obstruct justice, telling Hannity he knew that firing Comey would only increase scrutiny on the White House.

“It was treason, it was really treason,” Trump said, referring to texts between former FBI Special Agent Peter Strzok and former FBI lawyer Lisa Page that discussed an “insurance policy” in the event of Trump’s election.

“You had dirty cops, you had people who are bad FBI folks … At the top, they were not clean, to put it mildly.” He said later, “We can never allow these treasonous acts to happen to another president.”

Separately, Trump also said he hopes Democrats continue pushing the Green New Deal, which flamed out in a test vote on Tuesday, as most Democrats voted “present” instead of going on record supporting the sweeping transformation of the entire U.S. economy.

Trump’s interview came as multiple GOP lawmakers have claimed the president trampled all over what may have been the best week of his presidency by backing the complete overturn of ObamaCare.

On Monday, the Justice Department asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans to affirm last year’s ruling by a Texas federal judge stating that the Affordable Care Act was no longer constitutional because the 2017 tax reform legislation eliminated the health care law’s penalty for not having health insurance.

Multiple congressional Republicans told Fox News they were bothered by the timing of the Trump administration’s intervention in the matter, which came on the heels of the Mueller report findings, the House sustaining the president’s veto of a bill to halt the national emergency for the border wall and a Senate vote that shined a spotlight on what conservatives described as problems with the Green New Deal, championed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y.

Fox News’ Sean Hannity and Catherine Herridge contributed to this report.


A flashback look at the Deep State and establishment media hype over the now “debunked” Trump, Russia collusion narrative.

Source: InfoWars

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LGBT Criminalization of Sex and Families

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Source: InfoWars

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Kraft Heinz’ problems shine light on controversial budget tool

FILE PHOTO: Heinz tomato Ketchup is show on display during a preview of a new Walmart Super Center prior to its opening in Compton, California
FILE PHOTO: Heinz tomato Ketchup is show on display during a preview of a new Walmart Super Center prior to its opening in Compton, California, U.S., January 10, 2017. REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo

February 22, 2019

By Martinne Geller and Richa Naidu

LONDON/BOCA RATON, Fla. (Reuters) – Mounting troubles at Kraft Heinz, revealed late on Thursday with a triple-punch of bad news, call into question its reliance on cost-cutting as a way to generate profit growth.

Shares of Kraft Heinz fell 27 percent on Friday to their lowest level since the 2015 merger of the eponymous cheese and ketchup makers that formed the world’s fifth-largest food and drinks company.

Late on Thursday, it revealed a $15.4 billion write-down tied to its Kraft and Oscar Mayer brands, slashed its dividend by about a third and disclosed an SEC investigation of its procurement accounting practices.

The news validated investors’ concerns about the health of the company’s brands and its pricing power in an environment of rising commodity and transportation costs and more competition.

Half of the group’s market value vanished over the last two years even before Friday, dampening enthusiasm for its backers, private equity firm 3G Capital, and its notorious embrace of a tool called zero-based budgeting (ZBB), used to keep costs low and profit margins high.

“At some point, having best-in-class margins doesn’t matter if the sales growth doesn’t eventually come,” said Guggenheim analyst Laurent Grandet.

A Kraft Heinz spokesman said the company’s ZBB efforts continued to drive savings that can be invested in growing the business.

“In 2019, we will increase brand support, go-to-market with a more innovation than ever and invest in talent… and this will be partially funded by ZBB savings,” spokesman Michael Mullen said. 3G could not immediately be reached for comment.

ZBB FIT FOR EVERYONE?

Zero-based budgeting is an approach requiring corporate managers to justify each item of spending every year, or even build their budgets from scratch, rather than the more common process of using the prior year’s budget as a starting point.

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter wanted to apply it to federal spending, but it never took off and was abandoned.

It came back into fashion among corporations over the last decade, after 3G Capital used it to great margin effect at brewing giant Anheuser-Busch InBev, whose creation it orchestrated, and then at Kraft Heinz.

Both clocked industry-leading profit margins, and that led more consumer companies to adopt it in recent years as investors’ focus shifted to profits from sales, which were slowing amid a slowdown in once-hot emerging markets, new competition from independent challenger brands and weak pricing power due to e-commerce and discounters like Aldi and Lidl.

At the same time, high-profile activist investors set their sights on the sector, prompting many CEOs to squeeze out costs.

“The cuts can be impressive, and that’s a big win,” said consultants BCG in a report from 2017. They noted, however, that faster growth was not a guaranteed result. “When it’s applied clumsily, ZBB can have a demoralizing impact that distracts the organization from growth and value creation.”

Kraft on Thursday missed fourth-quarter earnings estimates and forecast a decline in operating earnings for 2019.

“KHC’s EBITDA has not grown over the last five years, its revenue has declined, and its balance sheet has ballooned,” said analysts at JP Morgan. “This is not an ideal progression of financial metrics.”

Unilever, Mondelez International, Diageo and Kellogg are among companies that have used ZBB, though none has seen as bad results as Kraft’s.

“I think it’s a black eye for Kraft Heinz management for not implementing it in as a sophisticated way as might be necessary, or maybe they just implemented it too hard, too fast,” Investec analyst Eddy Hargreaves said. “I don’t think ZBB per se is the problem.”

Others said it was not just cost-cuts that led to the write-down of the Kraft and Oscar Mayer brands.

“Are these the kinds of things people are buying these days? Are they fresh? Novel? Healthy? They don’t tick any of the boxes,” said Liberum analyst Robert Waldschmidt.

The head of investment at a European consulting firm said ZBB was not the answer for problems ailing Kraft and its packaged food peers, which are suffering as consumers eschew traditional staples like macaroni-and-cheese and bologna for fresher, less-processed or healthier options.

“To catch up with the shift of consumer demand for better-for-you and sustainable food, you have to innovate. And to innovate you simply can’t use ZBB,” he said.

(Additional reporting by Melissa Fares in New York and Siddarth Cavale in Bengaluru; Editing by Dan Grebler)

Source: OANN

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Moroccans protest prison sentences of anti-poverty activists

Thousands of demonstrators in Morocco are condemning prison sentences given to the leader of the Hirak Rif anti-poverty movement and dozens of other activists.

The demonstration brought one of the main avenues of the Moroccan capital, Rabat, to a standstill on Sunday. Security forces kept watch as participants sang, "The people want the detainees released" and "Long live Rif."

Hirak leader Nasser Zefzafi was sentenced to the maximum prison term of 20 years for threatening state security. An appeals court upheld his sentence and those of other activists this month.

Rif is the struggling region in northern Morocco where the Hirak movement was born in 2016. The movement demands development and job creation for the region.

Families, human rights organizations and left-wing parties are demanding the imprisoned activists' immediate release.

Source: Fox News World

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China’s January home price growth slips to nine-month low

FILE PHOTO - Apartment blocks are pictured during sunset on the outskirts of Tianjin
FILE PHOTO - Apartment blocks are pictured during sunset on the outskirts of Tianjin, China February 2, 2018. REUTERS/Jason Lee/File Photo

February 22, 2019

By Yawen Chen and Philip Wen

ZHENGZHOU, China (Reuters) – Growth in China’s new home prices eased slightly in January from December, in initial signs the property market is cooling as the economy slows, but price gains in annual terms accelerated.

Weaker economic momentum and the government’s drive to dampen speculation have hurt buyer sentiment but price growth has stayed relatively resilient as policymakers avoid triggering financial risks with a sharp slowdown in the key sector.

Average new home prices in China’s 70 major cities rose 0.6 percent in January, the weakest pace since April 2018, according to Reuters calculations based on data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on Friday.

That was slower than December’s 0.8 percent monthly growth but marked 45 straight months of price increases, Reuters calculations showed.

Still, on an annual basis, home prices increased 10 percent in January, accelerating from a 9.7 percent pace in December. Fifty-eight of the total 70 cities surveyed by the NBS reported higher prices in January, down from 59 in December.

China’s economy grew at its weakest pace in 28 years last year due to trade frictions and Beijing’s multi-year campaign to crack down on debt risks, weighing on consumer sentiment and the outlook for the country’s residential property market.

Some smaller cities have quietly loosened property policies to stabilize market sentiment. In December, Heze, a city in eastern China, reversed a rule designed to curb real estate flipping.

Price growth in China’s tier-1 cities – Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Guangzhou – rose 0.4 percent from a month earlier, compared with an increase of 1.3 percent in December, the statistics bureau said in a statement accompanying the data.

For tier-2 provincial capitals and smaller tier-3 cities, the official survey showed monthly price gains of 0.7 percent and 0.6 percent, respectively.

China’s biggest developer by sales, Country Garden, China Vanke and China Evergrande all posted lower contract sales in January compared with a year earlier.

New household loans, mostly mortgages, increased by 989.8 billion yuan in January, accounting for 30.6 percent of total new loans in January, central bank data showed last week.

Cooling China’s property market: https://tmsnrt.rs/2rL5vat

(Reporting by Yawen Chen and Philip Wen in ZHENGZHOU; Min Zhang in BEIJING; Editing by Jacqueline Wong)

Source: OANN

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Democrat Joe Manchin Endorses GOP’s Collins in Maine Senate Race

Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin endorsed GOP Sen. Susan Collins for reelection on Thursday, an increasingly rare instance of abandoing partisan politics as an election approaches.

Manchin, a moderate West Virginia senator, even said he would campaign for the vulnerable Maine incumbent.

That was a huge gift to Collins, who Democrats likely need to beat if they hope to take the Senate majority in 2020.

Manchin made his comments in an interview with C-SPAN’s “Newsmakers” program that will air beginning on Friday night, Politico first reported.

Collins has out-raised a liberal crowdfunding effort to unseat her, thanks to out-of-state donors, according to campaign finance reports recently filed with the Federal Election Commission.

Collins' federal campaign finance reports filed Friday show she's raised $4 million for her 2020 re-election campaign. She's raised more than her three last re-election races combined and reports a $3.8 million war chest through March.

Collins has raised less than 1% of her funds this year from donors who say they're from Maine.

Much of her donors are based in New York, Virginia, Florida, Texas, Washington, D.C. and California, according to her reports.

Collins' biggest reported donors include political action committees tied to congressional Republicans, insurance company UNUM and consulting firm Deloitte. Her biggest individual donors include conservative billionaires Robert and Diana Mercer, who are also among President Trump's biggest backers.

The AP analysis of her campaign finance report shows about a third of Collins' donors gave $250 or less this year.

Such donors gave about 6% of Collins' $1.5 million haul from January through March.

No Democrats have formally announced they're running against Collins, who typically wins re-election by wide margins.

Progressives have raised over $3.5 million for a candidate to unseat Collins after she cast a key vote to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Kavanaugh was confirmed following contentious Senate Judiciary Committee hearings over claims from Christine Blasey Ford that he had sexually assaulted her while they were teenagers. Kavanaugh denied the allegations.

In the wake of the vote, a Burlington, Maine woman is facing federal charges of mailing a threatening letter to Collins' home in October. It was unsigned and accused Collins of having "betrayed the people of Maine."

Suzanne Muscara mailed starch to the Republican senator's husband, Thomas Daffron, with a letter that claimed to have been coated with "ricin residue," according to the affidavit filed in U.S. District Court in Bangor.

Muscara, who was arrested Friday, faces up to 10 years in prison. It's unclear whether she has an attorney to comment on her behalf.

Material from the Associated Press was used in this story.

Source: NewsMax America

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Logo of the Exxon Mobil Corp is seen at the Rio Oil and Gas Expo and Conference in Rio de Janeiro
FILE PHOTO: A logo of the Exxon Mobil Corp is seen at the Rio Oil and Gas Expo and Conference in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil September 24, 2018. REUTERS/Sergio Moraes

April 26, 2019

(Reuters) – Exxon Mobil Corp on Friday reported first-quarter profit fell sharply on lower oil and gas prices and weakness in its refining and chemicals businesses that offset modest production gains.

The largest U.S. oil producer’s first quarter earnings fell to $2.35 billion, or 55 cents a share, from $4.65 billion, or $1.09 a share, a year ago.

Analysts had expected Exxon to earn 70 cents per share, according to Refinitiv Eikon estimates.

Shares were trading down about 2.7 percent in premarket trading on Friday.

Exxon’s oil equivalent production rose 2 percent to 4 million barrels per day, up from 3.9 million bpd in the same period the year prior. The company said its output in the Permian Basin, the largest U.S. shale basin, rose 140 percent over a year ago.

(Reporting by Jennifer Hiller; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

Source: OANN

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A Baha’i advocacy group has expressed concerns over the fate of minority Baha’is at the hands of Yemen’s Houthi rebels ahead of the appeals hearing for one of the community leaders sentenced to death.

The Baha’i International Community said in a statement Friday that the hearing for Hamed bin Haydara, detained in 2013 and sentenced to death last year on espionage and apostasy charges, is due on Tuesday.

The statement quotes Bani Dugal, the Baha’i community representative at the United Nations, as saying the prosecution hasn’t addressed Haydara’s appeal but is instead making “absurd, wide-ranging accusations.”

International rights groups have decried the prosecution of Yemeni Baha’is by the Iran-backed Houthis.

Iran has banned the Baha’i religion, which was founded in 1844 by a Persian nobleman considered a prophet by followers.

Source: Fox News World

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Afghan President Ashraf Ghani speaks during the inauguration of the newly-elected parliament in Kabul
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani speaks during the inauguration of the newly-elected parliament in Kabul, Afghanistan April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Omar Sobhani

April 26, 2019

By Rupam Jain and Hameed Farzad

KABUL (Reuters) – Afghan President Ashraf Ghani encouraged newly-elected lawmakers to participate in the peace process with the Taliban as he opened on Friday the first session of parliament since a controversial election.

Ghani has invited thousands of politicians, religious scholars and rights activists to an assembly known as a loya jirga next week to discuss ways to end the 17-year war.

Several opposition leaders have said they will boycott the four-day assembly in Kabul, saying it was pulled together without their input and is being used by Ghani as he seeks a second term in a September presidential election.

“We have presented the peace plan on a regular basis and we are committed to it,” Ghani said in the first session since parliamentary elections marred by technical problems, militant attacks and accusations of voting fraud last year.

“Based on this plan, there will be no peace deal and negotiation that does not have the green card of the parliament,” he added.

Officials from the United States and the Taliban have held several rounds of talks to end the Afghan war.

U.S. negotiator, Zalmay Khalilzad, has reported some progress toward an accord on a U.S. troop withdrawal and on how the Taliban would prevent extremists from using Afghanistan to launch attacks as al Qaeda did on Sept. 11, 2001.

The insurgents have so far rejected U.S. demands for a ceasefire and talks on the country’s political future that would include Afghan government officials.

The loya jirga, a centuries-old institution used to build consensus among competing tribes, factions and ethnic groups, is an attempt by Ghani to influence the peace talks and cement his position for a second term, Afghan politicians and Western diplomats say.

Amid growing political divisions in Kabul, opposition politicians have demanded that Ghani step down when his mandate ends next month, and give way to an interim government to oversee peace talks with the Taliban. Ghani has ruled that out.

The country’s top court said last week Ghani can stay in office until the presidential election in September.

(Reporting by Hameed Farzad, Rupam Jain, Editing by Darren Schuettler)

Source: OANN

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Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein Thursday defended special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation while slamming former President Barack Obama’s administration for being slow to take action on Russian interference in U.S. elections and ex-FBI Director James Comey for telling Congress the agency was investigating collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

“Our nation is safer, elections are more secure, and citizens are better informed about covert foreign influence schemes,” Rosenstein said in a speech to the Armenian Bar Association, marking his first public remarks after the Mueller report was released, reports CBS News.

He also pointed out that the investigation revealed a pattern of computer hacking and the use of social media to undermine elections as “only the tip of the iceberg of a comprehensive Russian strategy to influence elections, promote social discord, and undermine America, just like they do in many other countries,” reports The Wall Street Journal.

The Obama administration also made “critical decisions,” including choosing not to publicize the full story about Russian hackers and social media trolling, “and how they relate to a broader strategy to undermine America,” said Rosenstein.

He noted that the Mueller probe began after Comey disclosed during a hearing before Congress that President Donald Trump “pressured him to close the investigation and the president denied that the conversation occurred.”

Rosenstein said two years ago, when he was confirmed, he was told by a Republican senator that he would be in charge of the probe and that he’d report the results to the American people.

However, he said he didn’t promise to do that, because it is “not our job to render conclusive factual findings. We just decide whether it is appropriate to file criminal charges.”

Source: NewsMax Politics

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FILE PHOTO: The Huawei logo is pictured outside its Huawei's factory campus in Dongguan, Guangdong province
FILE PHOTO: The Huawei logo is pictured outside its Huawei’s factory campus in Dongguan, Guangdong province, China, March 25, 2019. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Ben Blanchard

BEIJING (Reuters) – Britain must get to the bottom of the leak of confidential discussions during a top-level security meeting about the role of China’s Huawei Technologies in 5G network supply chains, British finance minister Philip Hammond said on Friday.

News that Britain’s National Security Council, attended by senior ministers and spy chiefs, had agreed on Tuesday to bar Huawei from all core parts of the country’s 5G network and restrict its access to non-core elements was leaked to a national newspaper.

The leak of secret discussions has sparked anger in parliament and amongst Britain’s intelligence community. Britain’s most senior civil servant Mark Sedwill has launched an inquiry and written to ministers who were at the meeting.

“My understanding from London (is) that an investigation has been announced into apparent leaks from the NSC meeting earlier this week,” said Hammond, speaking on the sidelines of a summit on China’s Belt and Road initiative in Beijing.

“To my knowledge there has never been a leak from a National Security Council meeting before and therefore I think it is very important that we get to the bottom of what happened here,” he told Reuters in a pooled interview.

British culture minister Jeremy Wright said on Thursday he could not rule out a criminal investigation. The majority of the ministers at the NSC meeting have said they were not involved, according to media reports.

Hammond said he was unaware of any previous leak from a meeting of the NSC.

“It’s not about the substance of what was apparently leaked. It’s not earth-shattering information. But it is important that we protect the principle that nothing that goes on in national security council meetings must ever be repeated outside the room.”

Allowing Huawei a reduced role in building its 5G network puts Britain at odds with the United States which has told allies not to use its technology at all because of fears it could be a vehicle for Chinese spying. Huawei has categorically denied this.

There have been concerns that the NSC’s conclusion, which sources confirmed to Reuters, could upset other allies in the world’s leading intelligence-sharing network – the Five Eyes alliance of the United States, Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

However, British ministers and intelligence officials have said any final decision on 5G would not put critical national infrastructure at risk. Ciaran Martin, head of the cyber center of Britain’s main eavesdropping agency, GCHQ, played down any threat of a rift in the Five Eyes alliance.

(Writing by Michael Holden; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Source: OANN

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