President Trump accused the media on Monday of straining to find ways to blame him for last week's massacre in two New Zealand mosques that left 50 people dead.
“The Fake News Media is working overtime to blame me for the horrible attack in New Zealand. They will have to work very hard to prove that one,” Trump tweeted. “So Ridiculous!”
A 28-year-old Australian-born citizen live streamed the horrific killings when he mowed down Muslim worshippers at Friday prayer in Christchurch. The gunman claimed responsibility and allegedly posted a white nationalist manifesto immediately before the murder spree.
A variety of news originations were quick to tie Trump to the horrific mass shooting.
The Los Angeles Times published an opinion piece headlined, “Trump’s rhetoric didn’t cause the New Zealand attack, but it isn’t helping.”
Piers Morgan penned a column for the Daily Mail headlined, “49 massacred innocent Muslims prove words can have lethal consequences, Mr. President. If you don’t ferociously disown the racist lunatics claiming to be inspired by you, you’ll be damned by your silence.”
“CBS This Morning” reporter Nikki Battiste cited a portion of the killer’s manifesto expressing support for Trump as a symbol of "white identity" (but not for his policies), while “Morning Joe” regular Donny Deutsch speculated that the president wouldn’t issue a strong enough statement because the victims were Muslim.
"I'm going to be curious to see President Trump's reaction. Obviously he'll condemn it. But his reactions when it's a hate crime against Muslims or some of the groups he has exploited with his dog whistles. I certainly hope it's a full-hearted, angry condemnation, and not in any way a pulled-back condemnation because Muslims were a target," Deutsch said before Trump spoke out against the shooting.
Salon’s Chauncey Devega asked, “Does anyone doubt that Donald Trump inspired the New Zealand massacre?”
Devega added that “Trump didn't pull the trigger in Christchurch,” but “the man who did praised him as a symbol of ‘white identity.’"
“During the second hour of ‘CNN Tonight’ and with almost no information [on] the shooter or shooters, Intercept columnist Mehdi Hasan claimed that ‘far-right terrorism’ was on the rise in the United States and blamed President Trump for attacks both here and abroad,” NewsBusters analyst Nicholas Fondacaro observed.
CNN chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta also tied language in the killer’s manifesto to things Trump has said in the past, while Don Lemon called Trump “ignorant” for saying white supremacists are a small group of people, adding “the racists think he’s racist, and they support him. He doesn’t want to lose that support.”
CNN, MSNBC and other mainstream media outlets have been filled with pundits either tying the killer’s rhetoric to Trump or slamming Trump for not doing enough to condemn the massacre. A CNN on-screen graphic on Monday morning mocked the president for tweeting about a variety of issues over the weekend without tweeting about the attack.
Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney pushed back, saying Sunday that Trump was not a white supremacist and it was unfair to characterize the New Zealand gunman as a supporter of Trump.
Mulvaney comments came during a discussion on “Fox News Sunday” about the killer’s rambling 74-page manifesto in which he describes himself as a supporter of Trump “as a symbol of renewed identity and common purpose.”
“I'm a little disappointed, you didn't put up the next sentence [about whether he supports Trump's policies and leadership] and he said, ‘dear god no,’” Mulvaney said. “I don't think it's fair to cast this person as a supporter of Donald Trump.”
Fox News’ Greg Norman and Rob Gearty contributed to this report.
President Trump on Wednesday doubled down on his threats to close the southern border, calling the situation “a National Emergency!”
“Congress must get together and immediately eliminate the loopholes at the Border! If no action, Border, or large sections of Border, will close. This is a National Emergency!” Trump tweeted.
The president’s latest threat comes as immigration officials deal with historic levels of border crossers, including families. Officials predicted more than 100,000 apprehensions and encounters last month, the highest in over a decade.
In Washington, the administration is weighing what course to take, amid concerns that a border shutdown would cause economic problems. White House staffers suggested closing the border was just one of a number of options being explored to tackle the growing crisis.
White House Deputy Press Secretary Hogan Gidley said that they were considering shutting down certain entry ports or parts of all of them.
“Everything is on the table,” Gidley said on MSNBC this week.
Meanwhile, Homeland Security officials have said that even though the border has not been shut down, there have been delays at the ports of entry as nearly 2,000 border officers have been reassigned to address the incoming migrants.
Trump first threatened to close the border last week, blaming Mexico for not doing enough to stop the flows of illegal immigration into the U.S. He also demanded that congressional Democrats agree to tighten current immigration laws.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Kevin McAleenan said the border was at its “breaking point.”
Trump, this week, said Mexico had “made a big difference” since increasing its efforts to reduce the number of migrants traveling north. But the president maintained that if Mexico doesn’t continue its efforts, he would close the border.
"If we don't make a deal with Congress...or if Mexico doesn't do what they should be doing...then we're going to close the border, that's going to be it, or we're going to close large sections of the border, maybe not all of it," he said.
"We're going to have a strong border or we're going to have a closed border," he said. "We're going to see what happens."
Fox News’ Adam Shaw and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
The Supreme Court is taking an interest in a case challenging New Jersey’s strict concealed carry restrictions.
The nation’s highest court has asked New Jersey officials to respond to a legal challenge by concealed carry applicant who police say “does not have a justifiable need to carry a gun” despite managing an ATM business, according to court documents.
“While the move is not a guarantee that the Supreme Court will agree to hear the appeal, the fact that the court is requiring NJ to take a position on ANJRPC’s request is significant, and signals that the court is not willing to take any action without first hearing from both sides,” announced the Association of New Jersey Rifle & Pistol Clubs.
According to the filings, the applicant, Thomas Rogers, meets all the requirements under New Jersey state law to obtain a permit, but police are claiming he “cannot show evidence of a direct or specific threat to his life” even though Rogers makes a living servicing ATMs in high-crime areas and has been robbed at gunpoint in the past.
Other states have also taken an interest in the case; Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich, joined by 22 other states, filed a a supporting brief last month urging the high court to take up the case.
“The 26-page amicus brief filed by Brnovich argues that the vast majority of the country — some 42 states — use ‘shall-issue’ permitting standards while New Jersey’s more restrictive practice subjectively restricts law-abiding citizens from carrying a gun outside their home, even if they meet the eligibility requirements to do so,” reported Guns.com.
Carpe Donktum was recently retweeted by President Trump, however that tweet was banned due to a musical copyright violation. Carpe Donktum joins Owen to discuss making meme magic about America in 2019.
BEIRUT – Violence in northwestern Syria has killed dozens over the past three weeks and displaced tens of thousands, raising concerns a truce reached six months ago between Turkey and Russia is in danger.
The violence in Idlib comes as the world is focused on eastern Syria, where U.S.-backed Kurdish-led fighters are on the verge of defeating the Islamic State group in the last area they control.
Idlib has been in the hands of opposition forces for years, even as Syrian President Bashar Assad's military retook other rebel enclaves, one after the other.
The province is now home to some 3 million people, many of them displaced from other former opposition territory. Earlier this year, al-Qaida-linked militants took over the province, squeezing out most other factions after clashes with Turkey-backed opposition fighters.
Tennis - Australian Open - Second Round - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia, January 16, 2019. Mackenzie McDonald of the U.S. reacts during the match against Croatia's Marin Cilic. REUTERS/Aly Song
February 22, 2019
Two Americans charged into the quarterfinals of the Delray Beach (Fla.) Open with straight-set wins Thursday.
Fourth-seeded Steve Johnson defeated Italy’s Paolo Lorenzi 7-5, 7-5, and Mackenzie McDonald beat Spain’s Guillermo Garcia-Lopez 7-5, 6-4.
Moldova’s Radu Albot endured a tougher second-round match, getting past Australia’s Nick Krygios 6-2, 3-6, 6-3.
Johnson and Albot will meet in the quarterfinals. Other Friday matches include sixth-seeded Italian Andreas Seppi vs. British qualifier Daniel Evans, and eighth-seeded Frenchman Adrian Mannarino vs. second-seeded John Isner.
McDonald’s quarterfinal foe will be the winner of the Thursday night match featuring top-seeded Juan Martin del Potro of Argentina and American Reilly Opelka.
Rio Open
No seeds will take part in the quarterfinals at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, after the last remaining seeded player fell in the second round.
Norway’s Casper Ruud knocked out fifth-seeded Joao Sousa of Portugal 6-3, 3-6, 6-4 despite serving nine double faults and just five aces. Ruud particularly struggled with his serve in the final set, putting just 48 percent of his first serves in play, but he closed out the win with a service break in the last game.
Spain’s Albert Ramos-Vinolas advanced with a 3-6, 7-5, 6-3 win over Argentina’s Federico Delbonis, and Uruguay’s Pablo Cuevas got past Argentinian qualifier Juan Ignacio Londero 6-1, 6-4. Serbia’s Laslo Djere topped Japan’s Taro Daniel 6-4, 6-2.
Open 13 Provence
France’s Ugo Humbert gave the home-nation fans a reason for enthusiasm with a 6-3, 6-3 upset of second-seeded Borna Coric of Croatia in Marseille.
Humbert, ranked 75th in the world, saved both of the break points in the 1-hour, 21-minute match.
Third-seeded David Goffin of Belgium defeated France’s Benoit Paire 6-2, 6-3, but fifth-seeded Fernando Verdasco of Spain fell 6-4, 6-3 to Germany’s Matthias Bachinger.
Also moving into the quarterfinals were Ukraine’s Sergiy Stakhovsky and Russia’s Andrey Rublev.
In some of his sharpest language yet attacking President Trump, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders accused the Republican president of being racist and sexist and much more during a speech before Al Sharpton's National Action Network.
“It gives me no pleasure to tell you that we have a president today who is a racist, who is a sexist, who is a homophobe, who is a xenophobe, and who is a religious bigot. I wish I did not have to say that. But that is the damn truth,” the independent senator from Vermont said on Friday.
Sanders, who’s running for a second straight time for the Democratic presidential nomination, made his comments during an appearance in New York before the civil rights organization founded by Sharpton. A slew of other 2020 candidates joined him at the conference.
“During Donald Trump’s presidency we have seen a sharp rise in hate crimes and that rise comes as this country continues to be plagued by institutional racism and racial inequality,” Sanders stressed.
Running through a litany of differences between himself and the president, Sanders argued that “when Trump and his real estate empire were discriminating against African Americans here in New York, I and others in the civil rights movement were protesting that kind of housing discrimination in Chicago and marching on Washington with Dr. (Martin Luther) King.”
And he charged that “when Donald Trump and his allies were trying to suppress the black vote in the 2016 election, I was running around this country campaigning for Hillary Clinton and pressing for automatic voter registration to expand the vote.”
At the end of his appearance, Sanders voiced support for studying the possibility of reparations for descendants of slaves.
Asked if he as president he would sign into law a bill currently in the House of Representatives that would study and consider reparation payments, Sanders answered, “of course I would sign it.”
“There needs to be a study,” he added.
But Sanders quickly highlighted that “what I think we need to do… is to pay real attention to the most distressed communities in America. We’ve got to use ten percent of all federal funds to make sure that kids who need it get the education, get the jobs, get the environmental protection that they need.
Sanders rejected the idea of financial reparations during his 2016 White House bid, and last month again pushed back against the proposal.
“I think that right now, our job is to address the crises facing the American people and our communities, and I think there are better ways to do that than just writing out a check,” Sanders said during an appearance on “The View.”
The idea of slavery reparations for black Americans is at least partially backed by at least seven other Democratic presidential candidates so far – Harris, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Beto O’Rourke, former San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro, South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, businessman Andrew Yang, and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who has co-sponsored the House bill.
Pope Francis leads the Easter vigil Mass in Saint Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, April 20, 2019. REUTERS/Remo Casilli
April 20, 2019
By Philip Pullella
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Pope Francis led the world’s Roman Catholics into Easter at a vigil Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica on Saturday night, urging the faithful to live not for transient things like wealth and success but for God.
The largest church in Christendom was dark at the start of the long service as the pope carved into a candle the numbers of the year 2019 and the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet – Alpha and Omega – signifying that God is the beginning and end of all things.
Easter, the most important day in the Church’s liturgical calendar, commemorates the day Christians believe Jesus rose from the dead.
Francis, marking his seventh Easter season as pope, wove his homily around the Bible account of the women who went to Jesus’ tomb only to find it empty and the large stone that had sealed it had been cast away.
“God takes away even the hardest stones against which our hopes and expectations crash: death, sin, fear, worldliness,” he said.
“There is another stone that often seals the heart shut: the stone of sin. Sin seduces; it promises things easy and quick, prosperity and success, but then leaves behind only solitude and death. Sin is looking for life among the dead, for the meaning of life in things that pass away,” he said.
During the Mass, Francis welcomed eight adult converts into the Church, conferring on them the sacraments of baptism and confirmation. They were from Italy, Albania, Ecuador, Indonesia and Peru.
On Sunday, the 82-year-old leader of the world’s 1.3 billion Roman Catholics is due to say a Mass in St. Peter’s Square and read the traditional “Urbi et Orbi” (To The City and The World) message.
(Reporting by Philip Pullella; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
Members of The Cranberries, bassist Mike Hogan, drummer Fergal Lawler and guitarist Noel Hogan speak to Reuters during an interview in London, Britain, April 24, 2019. REUTERS/Gerhard Mey
April 26, 2019
By Hanna Rantala
LONDON (Reuters) – Irish rockers The Cranberries are saying goodbye with their final album released on Friday, a poignant tribute to lead singer Dolores O’Riordan who died last year.
“In the End” is the eighth studio album from the band that rose to fame in the early 1990s with hits likes “Zombie” and “Linger”, and includes the final recordings by O’Riordan, who drowned in a London hotel bath in January 2018 due to alcohol intoxication.
Work on the album began during a 2017 tour and by that winter, O’Riordan and guitarist Neil Hogan had penned and demoed 11 tracks.
With O’Riordan’s vocals recorded, Hogan, bassist Mike Hogan and drummer Fergal Lawler completed the album in tribute to her.
“When we realized how strong the songs were, that was the deciding factor really… There was no point… trying to ruin the legacy of the band,” Noel Hogan said in an interview.
“It was obvious that Dolores wanted this album done because when you hear the album, you hear the songs and how strong they are, and she was very, very excited to get in and record this.”
The Cranberries formed in Limerick in 1989 with another singer. O’Riordan replaced him a year later and the group went on to become Ireland’s best-selling rock band after U2, selling more than 40 million records.
O’Riordan, known for her strong distinctive voice singing about relationships or political violence, was 46 when she died.
“She was actually in quite a good place mentally. She was feeling quite content and strong and looking forward to a new phase of her life,” Lawler said.
“A lot of the lyrics in this album are about things ending… people might read into it differently but it was a phase of her personal life that she was talking about.”
The group previously announced their intention to split after the release of “In The End”.
“We are absolutely gutted we can’t play (the songs) live because that’s something that’s been a massive part of this band from day one,” Noel Hogan said.
“A few people have said to us about maybe even doing a one off where you have different vocalists… as kind of guests of ours. A year ago that’s definitely something we weren’t going to entertain but I don’t know, I think it’s something we need to go away and take time off for the summer and have a think about.”
Critics have generally given positive reviews of the album; NME described it as “(seeing) the band’s career go full-circle” while the Irish Times called it “an unexpected late career high and a remarkable swan song for O’Riordan”.
Their early songs still play on the radio. This week, “Dreams” was performed at the funeral of journalist Lyra McKee, who was shot dead in Londonderry last week as she watched Irish nationalist youths attack police following a raid.
“We wrote them as kids, as a hobby and 30 years later they are on radio and on TV, like all the time… That’s far more than any of us ever thought we would have,” Noel Hogan said.
“That would make Dolores really happy because she was very precious about those songs. Her babies, she called them and to have that hopefully long after we’re gone… that’s all any band can wish for.”
(Reporting by Hanna Rantala; additoinal reporting by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Writing by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Editing by Susan Fenton)
2020 Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren participates in the She the People Presidential Forum in Houston, Texas, U.S. April 24, 2019. REUTERS/Loren Elliott
April 26, 2019
By Joshua Schneyer and M.B. Pell
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Senator Elizabeth Warren will introduce a bill Friday that offers new protections for U.S. military families facing unsafe housing, following a series of Reuters reports revealing squalid conditions in privately managed base homes.
The Reuters reports and later Congressional hearings detailed widespread hazards including lead paint exposure, vermin infestations, collapsing ceilings, mold and maintenance lapses in privatized base housing communities that serve some 700,000 U.S. military family members.
(View Warren’s military housing bill here. https://tmsnrt.rs/2Dy5aht)
(Read Reuters’ Ambushed at Home series on military housing here. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/section/usa-military)
The Massachusetts Democrat’s bill would mandate both regular and unannounced spot inspections of base homes by certified, independent inspectors, holding landlords accountable for quickly fixing hazards. The military’s privatization program for years allowed real estate firms to operate base housing with scant oversight, Reuters found, leaving some tenants in unsafe homes with little recourse against landlords.
The bill would also require the Department of Defense and its private housing operators to publish reports annually detailing housing conditions, tenant complaints, maintenance response times and the financial incentives companies receive at each base. The provisions aim to enhance transparency of housing deals whose finances and operations the military had allowed to remain largely confidential under a privatization program since the late 1990s.
The measure would also require private landlords to cover moving costs for at-risk families, and healthcare costs for people with medical conditions resulting from unsafe base housing, ensuring they receive continuing coverage even after they leave the homes or the military.
“This bill will eliminate the kind of corner-cutting and neglect the Defense Department should never have let these private housing partners get away with in the first place,” Warren said in a statement Friday.
The proposed legislation comes after February Senate hearings where Warren, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee who is seeking the Democratic nomination for the 2020 U.S. presidential election, slammed private real estate firms for endangering service families, and sought answers about why military branches weren’t providing more oversight.
Her legislation would direct the Defense Department to allow local housing code enforcers onto federal bases, following concerns they were sometimes denied access. Warren’s office said a companion bill in the House of Representatives would be introduced by Rep. Deb Haaland, Democrat of New Mexico.
In response to the housing crisis, military branches are developing a tenant bill of rights and hiring hundreds of new housing staff. The branches recently dispatched commanders to survey base housing worldwide for safety hazards, resulting in thousands of work orders and hundreds of tenants being moved. The Defense Department has pledged to renegotiate its 50-year contracts with private real estate firms.
Congress has been quick to take its own measures. Earlier legislation proposed by senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris of California, along with Mark Warner and Tim Kaine of Virginia, would compel base commanders to withhold rent payments and incentive fees from the private ventures if they allow home hazards to persist.
FILE PHOTO: Offices of Deloitte are seen in London, Britain, September 25, 2017. REUTERS/Hannah McKay/File Photo
April 26, 2019
By Noor Zainab Hussain and Tanishaa Nadkar
(Reuters) – Deloitte quit as Ferrexpo’s auditor on Friday, knocking its shares by more than 20 percent, days after saying it was unable to conclude whether the iron ore miner’s CEO controlled a charity being investigated over its use of company donations.
Blooming Land, which coordinates Ferrexpo’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) program, came under scrutiny after auditors found holes in the charity’s statements.
Ferrexpo on Tuesday said findings of an ongoing independent investigation launched in February indicated some Blooming Land funds could have been “misappropriated”. It did not provide any details or publish its findings.
Shares in Ferrexpo, the third largest exporter of pellets to the global steel industry, were 23.4 percent lower at 206.1 pence at 1022 GMT following news of Deloitte’s resignation.
“Ferrexpo’s shares are deeply discounted vs peers … following the resignation of Deloitte, we expect downside risks to dominate Ferrexpo’s shares near term.” JP Morgan analyst Dominic O’Kane said in a note on Friday.
Swiss-headquartered Ferrexpo did not provide a reason for the resignation of Deloitte, which declined to comment, while Blooming Land did not respond to a request for comment.
Funding for Blooming Land’s CSR activities is provided by one of Ferrexpo’s units in Ukraine and Khimreaktiv LLC, an entity ultimately controlled by Ferrexpo’s CEO and majority owner Kostyantin Zhevago, Ferrexpo said on Tuesday.
Ferrexpo’s board has found that Zhevago did not have significant influence or control over the charity, but Deloitte said it was unable reach a conclusion on this.
Reuters was not immediately able to contact Zhevago.
In a qualified opinion, a statement addressing an incomplete audit, Deloitte said it had been unable to conclude whether $33.5 million of CSR donations to Blooming Land between 2017 and 2018 was used for “legitimate business payments for charitable purposes”.
Deloitte said on Tuesday that total CSR payments made to Blooming Land by Ferrexpo since 2013 total about $110 million.
Ferrexpo, whose major mines are in Ukraine, has said that the investigation was ongoing and new evidence pointed to potential discrepancies.
Zhevago, 45, who ranked 1,511 on Forbes magazine’s list of billionaires for 2019 with a net worth of $1.4 billion, owns the FC Vorskla soccer club and has been a member of Ukraine’s parliament since 1998.
(Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain and Tanishaa Nadkar in Bengaluru and additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kiev; editing by Gopakumar Warrier, Bernard Orr)
Children walk past a damaged building in the aftermath of the Cyclone Kenneth in Pemba, Mozambique April 26, 2019 in this still image obtained from social media. SolidarMed via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS – THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. MANDATORY CREDIT. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES
April 26, 2019
By Emma Rumney and Stephen Eisenhammer
JOHANNESBURG/LUANDA (Reuters) – Cyclone Kenneth killed at least one person and left a trail of destruction in northern Mozambique, destroying houses, ripping up trees and knocking out power, authorities said on Friday.
The cyclone brought storm surges and wind gusts of up to 280 km per hour (174 mph) when it made landfall on Thursday evening, after killing three people in the island nation of Comoros.
It was the most powerful storm on record to hit Mozambique’s northern coast and came just six weeks after Cyclone Idai battered the impoverished nation, causing devastating floods and killing more than 1,000 people across a swathe of southern Africa.
The World Food Programme warned that Kenneth could dump as much as 600 millimeters of rain on the region over the next 10 days – twice that brought by Cyclone Idai.
One woman in the port town of Pemba died after being hit by a falling tree, the Emergency Operations Committee for Cabo Delgado (COE) said in a statement, while another person was injured.
In rural areas outside Pemba, many homes are made of mud. In the main town on the island of Ibo, 90 percent of the houses were destroyed, officials said. Around 15,000 people were out in the open or in “overcrowded” shelters and there was a need for tents, food and water, they said.
There were also reports of a large number of homes and some infrastructure destroyed in Macomia district, a mainland district adjacent to Ibo.
A local group, the Friends of Pemba Association, had earlier reported that they could not reach people in Muidumbe, a district further inland.
Mark Lowcock, United Nations under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, warned the storm could require another major humanitarian operation in Mozambique.
“Cyclone Kenneth marks the first time two cyclones have made landfall in Mozambique during the same season, further stressing the government’s limited resources,” he said in a statement.
FLOOD WARNINGS
Shaquila Alberto, owner of the beach-front Messano Flower Lodge in Macomia, said there were many fallen trees there, and in rural areas people’s homes had been damaged. Some areas of nearby Pemba had no power.
“Even my workers, they said the roof and all the things fell down,” she said by phone.
Further south, in Pemba, Elton Ernesto, a receptionist at Raphael’s Hotel, said there were fallen trees but not too much damage. The hotel had power and water, he said, while phones rang in the background. “The rain has stopped,” he added.
However Michael Charles, an official for the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), said heavy rains over the next few days were likely to bring a “second wave of destruction” in the form of flooding.
“The houses are not all solid, and the topography is very sandy,” Charles said.
In the days after Cyclone Idai, heavy inland rains prompted rivers to burst their banks, submerging entire villages, cutting areas off from aid and ruining crops. There were concerns the same could happen again in northern Mozambique.
Before Kenneth hit, the government and aid workers moved around 30,000 people to safer buildings such as schools, however authorities said that around 680,000 people were in the path of the storm.
(Reporting by Emma Rumney and Stephen Eisenhammer; Writing by Emma Rumney; Editing by Janet Lawrence and Alexandra Zavis)
FILE PHOTO: A worker holds a nozzle to pump petrol into a vehicle at a fuel station in Mumbai, India, May 21, 2018. REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas
April 26, 2019
By Manoj Kumar and Nidhi Verma
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Surging global oil prices will pose a first big challenge to India’s new government, whoever wins an election now under way, especially as domestic prices have been allowed to lag, meaning consumers are in for a painful surge as they catch up.
For oil-import dependent India, higher global prices could lead to a weaker rupee, higher inflation, the ruling out of interest rate cuts and could further weigh on twin current account and budget deficits, economists warned.
But compounding the future pain, state-run fuel suppliers and retailers have held off passing on to consumers the higher prices during a staggered general election, which began on April 11 and ends on May 23, according to sources familiar with the situation.
That delay is expected to be unwound once the election is over. And there could be additional price increases to make up for losses or profits missed during the period of delayed increases, the sources said.
In some major Asian countries, such as Japan and South Korea, pump prices are adjusted periodically so they move largely in tandem with international crude prices.
That was what was supposed to happen in India but the election means there have been many days when pump prices have been unchanged.
In New Delhi, for example, while crude oil prices have gone up by nearly $9 a barrel, or about 12 percent, in the past six weeks, gasoline prices have only risen by 0.47 rupees a liter, or 0.6 percent.
State-controlled fuel suppliers and retailers declined to say why they had delayed price increases, or discuss whether there has been any pressure from the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
A government spokesman declined to comment.
The opposition Congress party said Modi’s government was violating its own policy of daily price revision by advising the state oil companies to hold prices steady.
“The government should cut fuel taxes otherwise consumers will have to pay much higher oil prices once the elections are over,” said Akhilesh Pratap Singh, a senior leader of the Congress party.
Nitin Goyal, treasurer at the All India Petroleum Dealers Association, representing fuel stations in 25 states, said prices were similarly held down for 19 days in the southern state of Karnataka last year, when it held state assembly elections.
Only for them to surge after the vote.
“Consumers should be ready for a rude shock of a massive jump in retail prices, similar to the level we have seen in the Karnataka state election,” Goyal said.
‘CREDIT NEGATIVE’
Sri Paravaikkarasu, director for Asia oil at Singapore-based consultancy FGE, said retail prices of gasoline and gasoil prices would have been up to 6 percent, or about 4 rupee, higher if they had been allowed to rise in line with global prices.
“Indian pump prices have failed to keep up with the recent uptrend in crude prices,” Paravaikkarasu said.
“With the country’s general elections underway, the incumbent government has been keeping pump prices relatively unchanged.”
India had switched to a daily price revision in June 2017 from a revision every two weeks, as the government allowed retailers to set prices.
But the government faced protests last October when retailers raised prices by up to 10 rupees a liter after the crude oil price went above $80 a barrel, forcing it to cut fuel taxes.
Global prices rose to their highest level in 2019 on Thursday, days after the United States announced all Iran sanction waivers would end by May, pressuring importers including India to stop buying Tehran’s oil. [O/R]
Higher oil prices will mean Asia’s third largest economy is likely to see growth of less than 7 percent rate this fiscal year, economists said. Growth slowed to 6.6 percent in the October-December quarter, the slowest in five quarters.
Rating agency CARE has warned that a 10 percent rise in global oil prices could increase demand for dollars, putting pressure on the rupee and widening the current account deficit.
India’s oil import bill rose by nearly one-third in the fiscal year ending March 31 to $140.5 billion, against $108 billion the previous year.
“The increase in international oil prices is a credit negative for the Indian economy,” ICRA, the Indian arm of the Fitch rating agency, said in a note.
“Every $10/ bbl increase in crude oil prices increases the fiscal deficit by about 0.1 percent of GDP.”
Any big price rise would also build a case for the central bank to keep rates steady, or even raise them.
The Reserve Bank of India’s Monetary Policy Committee, which cut the benchmark policy repo rate by 25 basis points this month, warned that rising oil and food prices could push up inflation.
Policymakers are worried that a sustained increase in the oil price in the range of $70-75/barrel or higher can move the rupee down by 3-4 percent on an annual basis.
The rupee has depreciated by 1.24 percent against the dollar since a year high in mid-March.
($1 = 70.1800 Indian rupees)
(Reporting by Manoj Kumar and Nidhi Verma; Editing by Martin Howell and Rob Birsel)
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