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McCarthy: House GOP didn't let Trump down on border wall

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., defended party actions in the House that ultimately led to President Trump declaring a national emergency, and blamed Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., for forcing Trump's hand to get a wall built on the U.S.-Mexico border.

“It was the House that passed the appropriation bill with $5 billion,” McCarthy told Fox News Radio's "Brian Kilmeade Show." “It takes 218 to pass, but what I think the American public and your listeners have to understand, in the Senate it takes 60 votes.

"It wasn't the president who shut down the government, it's Schumer.”

“It was the House that passed repeal and replace of ObamaCare,” McCarthy added. “It was the Senate that came one vote short, it was the House that wrote the tax bill that passed and went over, it was the House that produced the appropriation bills. So I mean when you sit down and look at history, this is probably one of the most productive Houses we've found.”

Last week Trump decided to avoid a second shutdown by signing compromise spending legislation to fund the government. But he also declared a national emergency in order to get the funds to continue to build the wall -- causing controversy on Capitol Hill.

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McCarthy also blamed the Senate Democrats for delaying appointments to Trump’s administration.

“Everybody sits back there and the Democrats say, 'Oh, you had the White House, you had Congress and you had the Senate,'" McCarthy said. “Yes we did, but we don't have the rule, why wouldn't the president have all of his appointments yet? Because in the Senate, they hold all that time up, it is the Democrats that are making this impossible."

Source: Fox News Politics

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Activist Behind Anti-abortion Heartbeat Bill Was Excluded From Signing

One of the nation's fiercest advocates for banning abortions at the first detectable heartbeat was missing when Republican Gov. Mike DeWine signed the bill into Ohio law.

Legislative leaders, bill sponsors, pastors, pregnancy center operators and members of Ohio Right to Life — the state's leading anti-abortion group — attended Thursday's bill signing.

Absent was anti-abortion activist Janet Folger Porter, founder and president of Faith2Action, the group she used to originate and champion the heartbeat legislation for a decade.

"Being disinvited to the bill signing by the governor, it stung. But I'm keeping my eye on the big picture," Porter said. "And the whole point of the last 10 years of my life was to bring the killing to an end."

DeWine invited nearly 30 others into the room for the signing — and used and handed out nearly as many souvenir pens. At a distance from what should have been her crowning moment, Porter declared "VICTORY!" in one of her signature hyperbolic emails.

DeWine spokesman Dan Tierney declined to directly address why Porter wasn't there.

Some say the Faith2Action founder and president should not have been surprised.

For years, Porter has been a polarizing figure. She alienated plenty of ruling Republicans with her lobbying stunts, controversial positions and even a candidacy to unseat the Ohio Senate's GOP president.

Porter crowded lawmaker's offices with heart-shaped balloons and teddy bears, staged Statehouse demonstrations and flyovers and arranged "testimony" via ultrasound by an in utero fetus and appearances by grown "abortion survivors." Porter also questions Barack Obama's citizenship and more recently served as spokeswoman for Senate candidate Roy Moore as he faced pedophile allegations.

All that helps explain why DeWine and other more moderate Republicans would want to steer clear, said Case Western Reserve University law professor Jessie Hill.

"Maybe it's an attempt to make this look like a mainstream piece of legislation," Hill said. "But I don't think they're fooling anybody. It's still pretty much the most extreme law anywhere on the books, or as extreme, as anywhere in the country."

Mike Gonidakis is president of Ohio Right to Life, where Porter once served as a legislative director. He said his organization had always said the heartbeat bill was "the right bill at the wrong time." And the time is now right.

Asked about Porter's absence from the bill-signing, Gonidakis said the appropriate people were invited "bar none."

"I would say that the right people were in the room," he said. "It was to thank the governor and to celebrate a huge pro-life victory. It was a very diverse group, from pregnancy centers to local groups to pastors to legislative officials. I think it was a great cross-section of those who support life in the state of Ohio."

The organization remained neutral on the heartbeat bill for the past 10 years, standing by former Gov. John Kasich, a Republican, as he vetoed it twice. Kasich argued it would prompt an expensive, and ultimately unwinnable, constitutional challenge to the landmark Roe vs. Wade ruling legalizing abortion.

The group changed its stance to support in a Dec. 27 statement, as Kasich was leaving office and Brett Kavanaugh was ascending to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Porter said Ohio Right to Life's presence in the room was an affront, noting the group finally came out in support of the legislation only when it was clear it would pass.

Porter's chief rival at NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio, executive director Kellie Copeland, asserted that Porter's gender adds an ironic twist to being left off DeWine's guest list.

"As a woman who espouses policy that says no woman should have bodily autonomy, when you get iced out by your old-white-man partners in that endeavor, if she was surprised by that treatment, she shouldn't be," Copeland said.

Non-whites, and women other than Porter, were present for the signing.

Porter said she can live with being shunned.

"I mean, we passed the strongest bill possible after 10 years of waiting and we're going to protect babies whose heartbeats can be heard," she said. "I couldn't be more happy about that."

Source: NewsMax America

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UN says fighting for Libya’s capital displaces 2,800 people

The U.N. humanitarian coordinator in Libya says 2,800 people have been displaced by fighting between rival militias over the capital, Tripoli.

Maria do Valle Ribeiro said Monday that clashes have prevented emergency services from reaching casualties and civilians, and have damaged electricity lines.

She warned that the increased violence is worsening the situation for migrants held in Tripoli's detention centers.

Fighting was underway Monday at the international airport, some 24 kilometers (15 miles) from central Tripoli.

The self-styled Libyan National Army, led by Khalifa Hifter, began an offensive against the capital last week.

Rival militias that support the U.N.-backed government in Tripoli have vowed to recapture all the areas recently seized by Hifter's forces.

The two sides reported that at least 41 people, including civilians, had been killed since Thursday.

Source: Fox News World

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Discarded napkin points police to Minnesota businessman as suspect in 1993 cold-case murder

The murder suspect eluded police for decades, until he got a hankering for a hot dog at a hockey game.

Jerry Westrom, 52, ate the hot dog while watching his daughter play hockey, then he wiped his face with a napkin and threw it away.

Westrom did not know that while he watched the hockey game, police were watching him.

Police retrieved the napkin Westrom discarded, and found its DNA a match to that found at the scene of the 1993 cold-case murder of 35-year-old Jeanne Ann "Jeanie" Childs. Westrom, who was charged with second-degree murder last week, posted $500,000 bail and was released from jail following a court hearing where his wife, children and 20 other supporters looked on from the gallery.

Westrom, who denies involvement in the murder, got onto the radar of investigators after they took advantage of advances in DNA technology in 2015 to take another look at the unsolved murder.

A search on an online ancestry website turned up Westrom as a possible suspect. The FBI assisted in the case.

After he was arrested last week, police got more DNA, and found further evidence – sperm matching that found on a comforter and towel in the victim’s bathroom -- tying him to the murder scene, according to the New York Times.

MURDERED MEMPHIS MOTHER MAY BE SUBJECT IN SERIAL KILLER'S SKETCHES

Several members of Childs' family were at the hearing in Hennepin County District Court.

“We all hope Jeanne’s family can finally find peace as a result of this tenacious effort by officers and agents,” Jill Sanborn, the special agent in charge of the Minneapolis division of the F.B.I., said in a statement.

Westrom's lawyer, Steven Meshbesher, told the court that his client, a businessman, had lived in Minnesota his entire life and wasn't a flight risk.

"What we've got is a very unsolved case and it was charged, in my opinion, prematurely," Meshbesher said.

According to court documents, Childs' naked body was found in her apartment in an area known for prostitution. She had been stabbed multiple times all over her body, and blood covered the walls of her bedroom, living room and bathroom, according to a warrant.

The bathroom was flooding because the shower had been left turned on. Finger, palm and foot prints were discovered at the scene, investigators said.

After scoring a DNA match on the ancestry website, investigators looked at Westrom’s social media accounts and learned that he would be at the hockey game last week.

Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman told reporters last week that investigators used “a genealogy company you see advertised on TV.”

It is unclear if a relative of Westrom or the businessman himself put the genetic data on the site.

Westrom’s next court is scheduled for March 13.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News National

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Baltimore mayor's $500G deal for 'Healthy Holly' children's books draws scrutiny

Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh is under fire over “Healthy Holly,” a children’s book series she authored, for which she has reportedly received $500,000 from the University of Maryland Medical System (UMMS) since 2011.

The university paid Pugh for 100,000 copies of her books between 2011 and 2018, the Associated Press reported Tuesday. The series of healthy lifestyle books for children was intended to go to schools and day care centers. However, the Baltimore Sun reported that some 50,000 copies remain unaccounted for and may never have been printed.

OFF-DUTY MARYLAND STATE TROOPER CHARGED IN ALLEGED ROAD RAGE INCIDENT 

Pugh, who sat on the UMMS board of directors since 2011, resigned from the position and returned her most recent $100,000 payment after the Baltimore Sun exposed the arrangement in early March.

Six fellow members of the UMMS board either resigned or went on voluntary leave over the revelation that one-third of the board members have received financial compensation for their businesses from UMMS and the president and CEO of UMMS is on a leave of absence, according to the AP.

Maryland Comptroller Peter Franchot called UMMS’s arrangements with board members “self-dealing” and said there needs to be an independent audit. Franchot told the Associated Press there were “no receipts, no contracts, no procurement” regarding Pugh’s book deal. He referred to it as a “gift” from the university.

Pugh has called questions about the deal a “witch hunt.”

The mayor did not properly disclose the deal on state ethics forms, the Sun reported and Monday a complaint was filed with the Office of the State Prosecutor, accusing Pugh of perjury over her omissions. She claims it was an oversight.

Her office says she plans to hold a news conference regarding “Healthy Holly” “as soon as possible following her release from the hospital” for pneumonia.

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Pugh was elected in 2016 and faces a primary in 2020.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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FY20 Budget or Re-election Platform? Both.

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Russ Vought, acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, was ready to give his first official press conference. The soft-spoken policy wonk with the thick-rimmed glasses stepped to the podium in the White House briefing room Monday and wished the press corps “Happy Budget Day.”

The occasion was the presentation of the president’s fiscal 2020 budget blueprint, an aspirational document that proposes $4.7 trillion in spending and recommends $2.7 trillion in cuts.

“Our national debt nearly doubled under the previous administration and now stands at more than $22 trillion,” Vought told reporters. This budget, he continued, “shows that we can return to fiscal sanity without halting our economic resurgence while continuing to invest in critical priorities.”

The White House calls it “A Budget for a Better America.” Congress calls it dead on arrival. This is because everyone in Washington knows the document is essentially a wish list, and the unveiling is part of a longstanding D.C. ritual whereby opposition party lawmakers dismiss presidential budgets as quickly as administrations deliver them.

This was not, however, an empty exercise in wonkery. Vought was outlining the president’s 2020 re-election platform as much as he was laying out Trump spending priorities. Congress may axe the document entirely in the coming months. At least on paper, though, voters will know where he stands when they enter the voting booth.

The top lines reflect two major promises Trump made on the campaign trail in 2016. First, rebuilding the armed forces. The budget ask Congress to boost military spending to $750 billion, a 5 percent increase from the current $716 billion, more than even the Pentagon requested. Second, border security. The budget seeks $8.6 billion -- $5 billion from the Department of Homeland Security and $3.6 billion from the Pentagon’s military construction budget.

Both are obvious base-pleasers. Trump regularly brings the conservative faithful to their feet at his rallies when he mentions the military and the border wall. He might not get the sought-after funding for either, but he will get the political credit he needs by fighting for them.

And with this budget proposal, the White House has set the stage for another border brawl.

The president lost the last round when Congress wouldn’t sign off on $5.7 billion to continue building his wall. The government went dark for 35 days, the longest shutdown in history. The White House walked away with a fraction of its initial ask: just $1.37 billion for 55 miles of border barriers. Trump then declared a national emergency, redirecting $7 billion in already appropriated funds.

Now, by seeking additional money, he all but guarantees another showdown come September. Federal funding will run out at the end of that month and campaigning will be approaching full swing. Whatever the outcome, Trump can credibly tell his base that he still fights.

The spending proposal, however, would not eliminate budget deficits, another Trump campaign promise. In fact, according to the administration’s own numbers, the federal government would spend trillions more than it takes in over the next four years. But here the administration has opened up another political front.

The White House is betting that the economy will keep revving enough to bring in increased tax revenues that will balance the budget in 15 years. In the meantime, officials plan on slashing $2.7 trillion in non-defense spending from the budgets of agencies like the EPA. The proposed cuts, the White House brags, are higher than those made by any other administration in history.

Vought told reporters that this kind of fiscal responsibility is possible if Congress swallows the prescribed medicine.  The president has called for spending reductions in each of his budget requests; the difference this time, the OMB official argued, is that Democrats now want “a conversation about the national debt.” That’s a discussion the White House is willing to have, and it is a decidedly anti-establishment conversation that will likely dovetail with the president’s campaign rhetoric.

“What has happened for far too long is that Congress has blamed mandatory spending and then increased discretionary spending, which they have a vote on every single year, by large degrees,” Vought said.

“They continue to let a paradigm exist in this country that says: For every dollar in defense spending, we're going to increase non-defense spending by a dollar.  We think we need to break that paradigm,” he concluded.

Vought stepped away from the podium after about 15 minutes’ worth of detailed questions and even more intricate answers. The 150-page outline he unveiled will be followed by more in-depth numbers. Combined, they amount to a GOP battle plan.

Trump is staying the course with his promise to build the wall and continue rebooting the military, the White House argued. And the president will attack Congress, officials signaled, if lawmakers don’t abide by his prescribed spending cuts.

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Shooting jury clears officer on 1 count, deadlocks on others

A Florida police officer accused of shooting and wounding a severely autistic man's caretaker, was acquitted on one misdemeanor negligence count Friday and a jury deadlocked on three other charges, including two felonies. A mistrial was declared on those three charges.

The six-person jury found North Miami police officer Jonathan Aledda not guilty Friday of culpable negligence, The Miami Herald reported. A second negligence charge and two counts of attempted manslaughter, a felony, resulted in a hung jury.

The jury foreperson said the vote was 5-1 to acquit Aledda of the other charges. The judge scheduled a March 27 hearing to discuss whether the state will retry Aledda on those counts.

Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle released a statement saying she would discuss the case with her prosecutors.

Aledda testified this week that he thought Arnaldo Rios Soto had a gun and was holding his caretaker, Charles Kinsey, hostage. It turned out Rios was holding a toy truck. Aledda insisted he never heard another message on police radio that it wasn't a gun.

The incident gained national attention after it was partially captured on a bystander's video.

Authorities said Kinsey was lying in the street with his arms upraised, begging police not to shoot.

"With a lot of power and authority also comes a lot of responsibility," Miami-Dade Chief Assistant State Attorney Don Horn told jurors during closing arguments Thursday. "The shots that Jonathan Aledda fired were not a misfire. Each shot was intentional while he was trying to kill Arnoldo Rios Soto. Each shot was unnecessary and unreasonable."

Prosecutors say Rios had left his nearby group home and sat down in the road to play with his toy. A motorist called 911, saying the man was holding what may be a gun and appeared suicidal. Kinsey was trying to coax him back into the home when police arrived and surrounded them.

Aledda, a trained SWAT member, fired, striking Kinsey in the leg.

Aledda's defense lawyer, Douglas Hartman, blamed faulty radios and poor supervision by the North Miami Police Department for the miscommunications that led to the shooting.

"He had a life-and-death situation. He thought without question that Mr. Kinsey was going to die, be shot and murdered," Hartman told the jury of five men and one woman.

Aledda is the first police officer charged with an on-duty shooting by Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle, who took office in 1994.

Source: Fox News National

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Members of The Cranberries, bassist Mike Hogan, drummer Fergal Lawler and guitarist Noel Hogan speak to Reuters during an interview in London
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)

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2020 Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren participates in the She the People Presidential Forum in Houston
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.

(Editing by Ronnie Greene)

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FILE PHOTO: Offices of Deloitte are seen in London
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)

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Children walk past a damaged building in the aftermath of the Cyclone Kenneth in Pemba
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)

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A worker holds a nozzle to pump petrol into a vehicle at a fuel station in Mumbai
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.

(GRAPHIC: India Polls: Fuel price hike lags crude surge – https://tmsnrt.rs/2XLlxik)

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)

Source: OANN

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