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France’s Macron says fuel taxes cannot rise in the same way as before

FILE PHOTO: French President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech at the opening of the International Agriculture Fair (Salon de l'Agriculture) in Paris
FILE PHOTO: French President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech at the opening of the International Agriculture Fair (Salon de l'Agriculture) in Paris, France, February 23, 2019. REUTERS/Charles Platiau/Pool/File Photo

February 26, 2019

PARIS (Reuters) – French President Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday that his government would not pursue hikes in fuel taxes in the same manner as had been contemplated before waves of protests erupted in France in mid-November over the high cost of living.

“It is obvious one cannot act as if nothing has happened and go back to the same hike trajectories,” he said during a debate with mayors in Paris.

Macron said he was more in favor of a variable model that would track oil prices globally, and be capped at a certain level.

(Reporting by Jean-Baptiste Vey; Writing by Matthias Blamont; Editing by Sarah White)

Source: OANN

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Mexico president says Slim wants to retire during his term

FILE PHOTO: Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim smiles as he attends a ceremony to place the first stone of the new U.S. Embassy in Mexico City
FILE PHOTO: Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim smiles as he attends a ceremony to place the first stone of the new U.S. Embassy in Mexico City, Mexico, February 13, 2018. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido/File Photo

March 26, 2019

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Tuesday that billionaire Carlos Slim, the country’s richest man, has told him he aims to retire during his administration, and has committed to helping the economy in the process.

Slim, who for a time was listed by Forbes as the world’s richest man, has long been a dominant figure in the Mexican economy. However, the president’s announcement was at odds with the businessman’s typically low-key approach to public life.

“He wants to end his business life helping economic growth and public welfare during this government,” Lopez Obrador told a regular morning news conference. “That’s what he offered me. He wants to retire and he wants to do it in this government.”

Arturo Elias, a spokesman and son-in-law of the 79-year-old Slim, later issued a brief statement on Twitter.

“Slim remarked to the president that the two have almost six years of intense work (ahead) for the country, the president due to his electoral mandate, and (Slim) due to his age,” Elias said.

Day-to-day management of Slim’s business empire, which ranges from telecommunications and construction to retail and banking, is in the hands of his sons and sons-in-law, though he is widely held to maintain a powerful influence over decisions.

The leftist Lopez Obrador took office in December and has canceled a partly-built $13 billion new Mexico City airport in which Slim and his family had major interests. He did not specify when Slim told him he wanted to retire.

Lopez Obrador, who worked with Slim to redevelop parts of Mexico City when he was mayor of the capital between 2000 and 2005, argued that the airport was tainted by corruption and being built in an area that was geologically unsuitable.

The cancellation angered business leaders and the government spent its first few weeks paying off investors in the project.

The president said he planned to meet Slim soon to discuss plans for investment in Mexico. He did not go into detail.

Slim’s companies include telecoms giant America Movil <AMXL.MX> and bank Grupo Financiero Inbursa <GFINBURO.MX>.

By law, Mexican presidents can serve only a single six-year term. Lopez Obrador’s term is due to end in 2024.

(Reporting by Dave Graham; Editing by Susan Thomas and Dan Grebler)

Source: OANN

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Crystal meth and crowded jails: problems mount in Iraqi oil city

A police officer leads an Iraqi suspect who was arrested for drug-related crimes at a police station in Basra
A police officer leads an Iraqi suspect who was arrested for drug-related crimes at a police station in Basra, Iraq February 25, 2019. Picture taken February 25, 2019. REUTERS/Essam al-Sudani

April 9, 2019

By Ahmed Aboulenein

BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) – The southern Iraqi city of Basra is struggling to cope with a growing drug problem that has overcrowded prisons and strained police resources, only months after violent protests over poor municipal services.

Basra’s prison system is clogged up and creaking. On a recent day in one police station, Reuters reporters saw about 150 men, their heads shaved, squatting in two small, cramped holding cells.

Arrests of drug users and dealers have shot up in the past year, further stretching prison services and police in a sign that the problems with municipal resources that prompted protests in Basra last summer have not gone away.

“Drugs spread because the youth are lost, they have no money, they are sick of life. It’s escapism,” Major Shaker Aziz, a senior member of Basra police narcotics unit, told Reuters.

“Prison authorities tell us: ‘Ninety percent of inmates are convicted on drug charges, stop sending them.’ So we keep them here,” Aziz said of the holding cells.

The situation in prisons, worsened by a lack of treatment centers for recovering addicts, highlights the contrast between the wealth Basra province produces – its oil contributes over 90 percent of state revenues – and its poor living conditions.

Once known as the Venice of the East, Basra city, which has a population of 4 million, lacks clean water and does not have enough electricity to power air conditioners in the scorching summer heat. Unemployment is widespread, especially among youth.

Thousands protested against the conditions, unemployment and corruption last summer, when searing heat made matters worse and hundreds were treated in hospital after drinking unclean water. Protesters set ablaze government buildings and political groups’ headquarters, and clashed with police.

Officials fear a repeat of the violence this year, and while the drug problem is a concern in several areas of Iraq, Basra suffers from it the most.

STEADY RISE

Basra is struggling even though Iraq declared victory in the four-year war against Islamic State in 2017, and the city never fell to the militant Sunni Islamist group.

The number of drug arrests has risen year-on-year since 2015, Aziz said. By March, police had picked up 15 kilograms (33 lb) of illegal drugs this year, half of 2018’s entire haul. Some 50 to 60 people are arrested each week on drugs-related offences, compared to more than 1,000 all last year, he said.

Methamphetamine, known popularly as crystal meth, is the most widespread drug, said a police spokesman, Colonel Bassem Ghanem. Opium, cannabis and pill abuse are also common.

Basra’s police department says 97 percent of drug users arrested in 2018 were unemployed, and more than two thirds were 25 or younger.

All the drugs come from abroad, said Colonel Ismail al-Maliki, who heads the Basra police narcotics unit.

Basra Police Chief Rashid Fleih said in November that 80 percent of drugs entering the city come from Iran. Tehran denied this but officials still point the finger indirectly at Iran, using euphemisms such as “neighboring countries”.

Preventing drug trafficking is a serious challenge for Iran which borders Afghanistan, the world’s largest opium producer, and Pakistan, a major transit country for drugs.

Iraq once had the death penalty for users and dealers but passed new legislation in 2017 under which judges can order rehabilitation for users or sentence them to jail for up to three years. In the absence of rehab centers, they are jailed. Under the new law, the health ministry was given two years to provide rehab centers.

Local health officials pledged to reopen and upgrade a 44-bed rehabilitation center this month but the police say 44 beds is not enough.

“All of Basra’s oil and we can’t afford rehab?” said Aziz.

Asked about the situation, the state-owned Basra Oil Company said it has pledged $5 million for a rehab center.

‘SMOKING FOR FREE’

Inside a training complex on the edge of Basra province, police have re-purposed a building as a makeshift rehab center for users nearing release.

About 40 men live in comparatively comfortable conditions, sleeping six per room with access to television, a gym and books. Clerics, officers and teachers lecture on the sinfulness and dangers of drug use.

Experts say recovering users need treatment and rehabilitation when they first stop using, not towards the end of sentences. Prisoners say they suffer the worst withdrawal symptoms during the first 20 days, unable to eat or sleep.

“This is just a model, to get the health ministry to build real centers,” said Ghanem, the spokesman.

Prisoners interviewed by Reuters were chosen by police, who sat in on interviews. Some were handcuffed.

One user-turned-dealer said he was recruited a year after he started buying, wooed by the idea of free crystal meth.

“I paid 50,000 dinars ($40) per gram as a user. I only paid 20,000 ($16) as a dealer. I would sell some and smoke some. I was smoking for free,” he said.

He described a network of dealers that went up to a “big boss” whom he would not identify to police out of fear for his life. He faces a minimum of five years in jail.

Some said they were falsely arrested. Asked if the police offered suspects lighter sentences if the provided them with information, one police officer said they rarely needed to.

“They always cooperate,” he said, asking not to be named as he was not authorized to discuss the matter.

(Additional reporting by Dubai newsroom; Editing by Timothy Heritage)

Source: OANN

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Mueller Verdict Is In, But Dems Say They'll Keep Investigating

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After nearly two years of alternating White House angst and Democratic anticipation, Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation and final report set off a frenzy in Washington over the weekend but provided neither closure nor solace for a divided nation.

Indeed, it seemed to cement America’s dueling split-screen political realities in place for years to come.

In anticipation of the “big reveal,” Fox News’ Sean Hannity ran a banner headline Friday night: “Collusion Delusion.” Meanwhile, Neal Katyal, the acting solicitor general under President Obama, promised on MSNBC that Democrats would sink their teeth in further.

“Today what happened was the end of the beginning,” Katyal predicted.

He was one of the first in a long line of Democrats to vigorously denounce the findings as inconclusive and promise to use their House majority status to launch a long series of overlapping investigations to re-litigate the probe.

The report’s mixed messages – finding no actionable evidence of collusion but leaving the decision of pursuing obstruction of justice charges to the attorney general – left the door wide open for wildly divergent partisan interpretation.

“While this report does not conclude that the president committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him,” Mueller said in the report, according to a four-page summary released by Attorney General William Barr.

Rep. Jerry Nadler, the House Judiciary Committee chairman, on Sunday took issue with the report’s ambiguity regarding whether President Trump and his team worked to obstruct justice during the investigation.

Citing “very concerning discrepancies and final decision-making at the Justice Department,” Nadler announced on Twitter plans to haul Barr before Congress “in the near future” to look into every detail of Mueller’s investigation.

“There must be full transparency in what Special Counsel Mueller uncovered to not exonerate the President from wrongdoing,” he tweeted. “DOJ owed the public more than just a brief synopsis and decision not to go any further in their work.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told fellow Democrats on a conference call Saturday she wouldn’t accept a private, classified briefing on Mueller’s report. Instead, she said she would demand that Mueller and his team provide the information to Congress in a way that allows them to discuss all the details publicly.

Six Democratic committee chairs and senior members of the delegation also reiterated their push to force Mueller to release the full report and all the underlying documents used to reach his conclusions.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat and member of the Judiciary Committee, rejected the five-page summary from Barr, arguing that it didn’t reveal enough about Mueller’s deliberations. “The American people deserve the Mueller report, not just the Barr report. Indeed, this set of summary conclusions hardly constitutes a report,” he said.

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, went even further, calling the summary from Barr “crib notes” that desperately need fleshing out.

“We don’t want to see simply crib notes, we don’t want to see an outline, we don’t want to see an executive summary,” he told CBS’s “Face the Nation” before the Sunday afternoon release of the Barr summary. “We need to see everything so that the American people can draw conclusions on their own.”

Trump was clearly relieved and reinvigorated after Barr concluded that the special counsel’s evidence of obstruction of justice was “not sufficient” to pursue charges against the president or any current or former members of his team.

Speaking to reporters in Florida, he labeled the report “a total exoneration.”

“There was no collusion with Russia. There was no obstruction,” he said.

When returning to the White House later Sunday, Trump was even more ebullient. “I just want to tell you, America is the greatest place on earth – the greatest place on earth,” he told reporters before proceeding into the White House’s South Portico without taking questions.

Fellow Republicans backed him up, blasting Democrats’ plans to pore over every detail of the probe in open hearings. GOP leaders argued that two years of investigations hanging over Trump’s presidency was enough, and that it’s time to move on. They pointed to the probe’s 2,800 subpoenas, 500 search warrants, nearly 50 wiretaps and 500 interviews.

“Now that this investigation is over, Democrats need to finally end their baseless investigations and political crusade against President Trump for the good of the country,” Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said in a statement.

Still, it was clear that Republicans, too, weren’t ready to let the issue go and miss the opportunity to investigate the investigators.

Top Republicans promised to resurrect the probe into Hillary Clinton’s emails and launch their own aggressive investigations into allegations that the FBI and Obama Justice Department colluded to change the narrative and take down Trump.

Former FBI Director James Comey reacted to the Mueller report Sunday evening by tersely tweeting, “So many questions.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham, the Judiciary Committee chairman and Trump’s most powerful ally in the Senate, fired back: “I could not agree with you more. See you soon.”

On Friday night, one of the most pivotal moments for Trump as he awaited the results of the Mueller probe, Graham was at Mar-a-Lago for a Florida GOP fundraiser. He vowed to fully investigate the alleged anti-Trump biases of Comey and other Justice Department officials and whether they concocted a plot to force him from office.

The earlier news of no indictments was enough to buoy Trump supporters. During remarks to the crowd, Graham called for an investigation into Hillary Clinton and the origins of the infamous dossier that served as the basis for the FBI’s Russia collusion investigation.

“Lock her up!” the Trump supporters chanted cheerfully, as Trump looked on from a side table in the ballroom. That echo of the 2016 campaign seemed to underscore the “Groundhog Day” nature of national politics, a permanent state in which acrimony and distrust circle back in an endless feedback loop.

Susan Crabtree is a veteran Washington reporter who has spent two decades covering the White House and Congress.

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Tennessee man who intervened in shooting honored again

A Tennessee man who has been called a hero for his intervention in a Waffle House shooting has been honored again.

The U.S. Justice Department says in a news release that James Shaw Jr. received the Special Courage Award at the National Crime Victims' Service Awards in Washington on Friday.

Shaw was dining at a Waffle House in Nashville on April 22, 2018, when a gunman wearing only a jacket opened fire outside with an AR-15 rifle before storming the restaurant. Four people were killed. Shaw and three others were injured.

Shaw has been hailed as a hero for wrestling the rifle away and throwing it over a counter.

He was honored at a Nashville Predators game, spoke with President Donald Trump, and was praised by Vice President Mike Pence.

Source: Fox News National

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Euro pressured by German growth worries, dollar holds firm tone

Illustration photo of U.S. Dollar and Euro notes
FILE PHOTO: U.S. Dollar and Euro notes are seen in this June 22, 2017 illustration photo. REUTERS/Thomas White/Illustration

April 25, 2019

By Daniel Leussink

TOKYO (Reuters) – The euro nursed losses against the dollar on Thursday after dipping to a 22-month low on a surprise drop in a leading indicator for economic activity in Germany, amplifying worries of a growth slowdown in Europe’s largest economy.

German business morale deteriorated in April, bucking expectations for a small improvement, a business index by the Munich-based Ifo economic institute showed on Wednesday, as trade tensions weighed on the German economy, leaving domestic demand to support slowing growth.

The greenback rallied to a 23-month high of 98.189 against a basket of key rivals overnight after gaining more than half a percent, largely propelled by the euro’s weakness. The index last traded slightly lower at 98.096.

“Yesterday’s strength of the dollar was exaggerated by the weakness in countries other than the U.S.,” said Masafumi Yamamoto, chief currency strategist at Mizuho Securities.

“A big question is if the weakness in Australia and the euro area are temporary or not,” he said. “The main scenario is (for) a recovery in the second half of this year in the euro area and other regions.”

The euro sat at $1.1153, having suffered its biggest one-day loss against the dollar since early March when the European Central Bank pushed back plans for its first post-crisis interest rate hike.

The single currency also shed nearly 0.4 percent against the yen overnight and was last trading at 125.125 yen.

The Japanese currency slipped to a 2019 low of 112.40 yen per dollar on its own during the previous session, with traders eyeing a Bank of Japan policy decision later on Thursday for trading cues.

The BOJ is expected to keep monetary policy steady on Thursday and predict that inflation will fall short of its 2 percent target for three more years, signaling that its massive stimulus will stay in place for the foreseeable future.

The dollar was last a shade lower on the yen, changing hands at 112.12 yen.

The Australian dollar was largely unchanged at $0.7017.

The Aussie had given up nearly 1.3 percent during the previous session after weaker-than-expected Australian inflation numbers heightened the prospect of an interest rate cut.

The Canadian dollar was flat at $1.3495 after hitting a four-month low overnight, as investors raised bets on a Bank of Canada interest rate cut this year after the central bank slashed its economic growth outlook.

Market participants awaited policy decisions by the Swedish and Turkish central banks later on Thursday.

Sweden’s Riksbank is likely to keep its benchmark rate unchanged and may be forced to delay plans to tighten policy later in 2019, a Reuters poll of analysts published on Tuesday showed.

“The Riksbank may push further out the timing of the next rate hike, and also the market may speculate it’s too early for a rate cut by the Turkish central bank,” said Mizuho’s Yamamoto.

“That could be a negative for these currencies and positive for the dollar.”

(Editing by Jacqueline Wong)

Source: OANN

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Samsung C&T, Samsung Electronics almost double cost of finishing new chip line

FILE PHOTO: Attendees at Samsung Electronics Co LtdÕs Unpacked event test out the companyÕs new devices in in San Francisco
FILE PHOTO: Attendees at Samsung Electronics Co Ltd's Unpacked event test out the company's new devices in San Francisco, California, U.S., February 20, 2019 REUTERS/Stephen Nellis/File Photo

April 1, 2019

SEOUL (Reuters) – Samsung C&T Corp and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd have almost doubled the size of a contract related to the construction of a semiconductor production line, taking the project’s total cost to 1.46 trillion won ($1.29 billion).

The contract covers finishing work on the line at Samsung Electronics’ Hwaseong plant on South Korea’s west coast, Samsung C&T said in a stock exchange filing after market close on Friday.

Samsung C&T is the construction arm and defacto holding company of the Samsung Group.

The two companies added 739 billion won to the 723 billion won of the finishing work contract initially signed in September, Samsung C&T said. The work is due for completion by the end of April 2020, it said.

(Reporting by Ju-min Park; Editing by Christopher Cushing)

Source: OANN

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The Wider Image: China's start-ups go small in age of 'shoebox' satellites
LinkSpace’s reusable rocket RLV-T5, also known as NewLine Baby, is carried to a vacant plot of land for a test launch in Longkou, Shandong province, China, April 19, 2019. REUTERS/Jason Lee

April 26, 2019

By Ryan Woo

LONGKOU, China (Reuters) – During initial tests of their 8.1-metre (27-foot) tall reusable rocket, Chinese engineers from LinkSpace, a start-up led by China’s youngest space entrepreneur, used a Kevlar tether to ensure its safe return. Just in case.

But when the Beijing-based company’s prototype, called NewLine Baby, successfully took off and landed last week for the second time in two months, no tether was needed.

The 1.5-tonne rocket hovered 40 meters above the ground before descending back to its concrete launch pad after 30 seconds, to the relief of 26-year-old chief executive Hu Zhenyu and his engineers – one of whom cartwheeled his way to the launch pad in delight.

LinkSpace, one of China’s 15-plus private rocket manufacturers, sees these short hops as the first steps towards a new business model: sending tiny, inexpensive satellites into orbit at affordable prices.

Demand for these so-called nanosatellites – which weigh less than 10 kilograms (22 pounds) and are in some cases as small as a shoebox – is expected to explode in the next few years. And China’s rocket entrepreneurs reckon there is no better place to develop inexpensive launch vehicles than their home country.

“For suborbital clients, their focus will be on scientific research and some commercial uses. After entering orbit, the near-term focus (of clients) will certainly be on satellites,” Hu said.

In the near term, China envisions massive constellations of commercial satellites that can offer services ranging from high-speed internet for aircraft to tracking coal shipments. Universities conducting experiments and companies looking to offer remote-sensing and communication services are among the potential domestic customers for nanosatellites.

A handful of U.S. small-rocket companies are also developing launchers ahead of the expected boom. One of the biggest, Rocket Lab, has already put 25 satellites in orbit.

No private company in China has done that yet. Since October, two – LandSpace and OneSpace – have tried but failed, illustrating the difficulties facing space start-ups everywhere.

The Chinese companies are approaching inexpensive launches in different ways. Some, like OneSpace, are designing cheap, disposable boosters. LinkSpace’s Hu aspires to build reusable rockets that return to Earth after delivering their payload, much like the Falcon 9 rockets of Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

“If you’re a small company and you can only build a very, very small rocket because that’s all you have money for, then your profit margins are going to be narrower,” said Macro Caceres, analyst at U.S. aerospace consultancy Teal Group.

“But if you can take that small rocket and make it reusable, and you can launch it once a week, four times a month, 50 times a year, then with more volume, your profit increases,” Caceres added.

Eventually LinkSpace hopes to charge no more than 30 million yuan ($4.48 million) per launch, Hu told Reuters.

That is a fraction of the $25 million to $30 million needed for a launch on a Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems Pegasus, a commonly used small rocket. The Pegasus is launched from a high-flying aircraft and is not reusable.

(Click https://reut.rs/2UVBjKs to see a picture package of China’s rocket start-ups. Click https://tmsnrt.rs/2GIy9Bc for an interactive look at the nascent industry.)

NEED FOR CASH

LinkSpace plans to conduct suborbital launch tests using a bigger recoverable rocket in the first half of 2020, reaching altitudes of at least 100 kilometers, then an orbital launch in 2021, Hu told Reuters.

The company is in its third round of fundraising and wants to raise up to 100 million yuan, Hu said. It had secured tens of millions of yuan in previous rounds.

After a surge in fresh funding in 2018, firms like LinkSpace are pushing out prototypes, planning more tests and even proposing operational launches this year.

Last year, equity investment in China’s space start-ups reached 3.57 billion yuan ($533 million), a report by Beijing-based investor FutureAerospace shows, with a burst of financing in late 2018.

That accounted for about 18 percent of global space start-up investments in 2018, a historic high, according to Reuters calculations based on a global estimate by Space Angels. The New York-based venture capital firm said global space start-up investments totaled $2.97 billion last year.

“Costs for rocket companies are relatively high, but as to how much funding they need, be it in the hundreds of millions, or tens of millions, or even just a few million yuan, depends on the company’s stage of development,” said Niu Min, founder of FutureAerospace.

FutureAerospace has invested tens of millions of yuan in LandSpace, based in Beijing.

Like space-launch startups elsewhere in the world, the immediate challenge for Chinese entrepreneurs is developing a safe and reliable rocket.

Proven talent to develop such hardware can be found in China’s state research institutes or the military; the government directly supports private firms by allowing them to launch from military-controlled facilities.

But it’s still a high-risk business, and one unsuccessful launch might kill a company.

“The biggest problem facing all commercial space companies, especially early-stage entrepreneurs, is failure” of an attempted flight, Liang Jianjun, chief executive of rocket company Space Trek, told Reuters. That can affect financing, research, manufacturing and the team’s morale, he added.

Space Trek is planning its first suborbital launch by the end of June and an orbital launch next year, said Liang, who founded the company in late 2017 with three other former military technical officers.

Despite LandSpace’s failed Zhuque-1 orbital launch in October, the Beijing-based firm secured 300 million yuan in additional funding for the development of its Zhuque-2 rocket a month later.

In December, the company started operating China’s first private rocket production facility in Zhejiang province, in anticipation of large-scale manufacturing of its Zhuque-2, which it expects to unveil next year.

STATE COMPETITION

China’s state defense contractors are also trying to get into the low-cost market.

In December, the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp (CASIC) successfully launched a low-orbit communication satellite, the first of 156 that CASIC aims to deploy by 2022 to provide more stable broadband connectivity to rural China and eventually developing countries.

The satellite, Hongyun-1, was launched on a rocket supplied by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp (CASC), the nation’s main space contractor.

In early April, the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALVT), a subsidiary of CASC, completed engine tests for its Dragon, China’s first rocket meant solely for commercial use, clearing the path for a maiden flight before July.

The Dragon, much bigger than the rockets being developed by private firms, is designed to carry multiple commercial satellites.

At least 35 private Chinese companies are working to produce more satellites.

Spacety, a satellite maker based in southern Hunan province, plans to put 20 satellites in orbit this year, including its first for a foreign client, chief executive Yang Feng told Reuters.

The company has only launched 12 on state-produced rockets since the company started operating in early 2016.

“When it comes to rocket launches, what we care about would be cost, reliability and time,” Yang said.

(Reporting by Ryan Woo; Additional reporting by Beijing newsroom; Editing by Gerry Doyle)

Source: OANN

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German drug and crop chemical maker Bayer holds annual general meeting
Werner Baumann, CEO of German pharmaceutical and chemical maker Bayer AG, attends the annual general shareholders meeting in Bonn, Germany, April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

April 26, 2019

By Patricia Weiss and Ludwig Burger

BONN (Reuters) – Bayer shareholders vented their anger over its stock price slump on Friday as litigation risks mount from the German drugmaker’s $63 billion takeover of seed maker Monsanto.

Several large investors said they will not support aspirin investor Bayer’s management in a key vote scheduled for the end of its annual general meeting.

Bayer’s management, led by chief executive Werner Baumann, could see an embarrassing plunge in approval ratings, down from 97 percent at last year’s AGM, which was held shortly before the Monsanto takeover closed in June.

A vote to ratify the board’s actions features prominently at every German AGM. Although it has no bearing on management’s liability, it is seen as a key gauge of shareholder sentiment.

“Due to the continued negative development at Bayer, high legal risks and a massive share price slump, we refuse to ratify the management board and supervisory board’s actions during the business year,” Janne Werning, representing Germany’s Union Investment, a top-20 shareholder, said in prepared remarks.

About 30 billion euros ($34 billion) have been wiped off Bayer’s market value since August, when a U.S. jury found the pesticide and drugs group liable because Monsanto had not warned of alleged cancer risks linked to its weedkiller Roundup.

Bayer suffered a similar defeat last month and more than 13,000 plaintiffs are claiming damages.

Bayer is appealing or plans to appeal the verdicts.

Deutsche Bank’s asset managing arm DWS said shareholders should have been consulted before the takeover, which was agreed in 2016 and closed in June last year.

“You are pointing out that the lawsuits have not been lost yet. We and our customers, however, have already lost something – money and trust,” Nicolas Huber, head of corporate governance at DWS, said in prepared remarks for the AGM.

He said DWS would abstain from the shareholder vote of confidence in the executive and non-executive boards.

Two people familiar with the situation told Reuters this week that Bayer’s largest shareholder, BlackRock, plans to either abstain from or vote against ratifying the management board’s actions.

Asset management firm Deka, among Bayer’s largest German investors, has also said it would cast a no vote.

Baumann said Bayer’s true value was not reflected in the current share price.

“There’s no way to make this look good. The lawsuits and the first verdicts weigh heavily on our company and it’s a concern for many people,” he said, adding it was the right decision to buy Monsanto and that Bayer was vigorously defending itself.

This month, shareholder advisory firms Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) and Glass Lewis recommended investors not to give the executive board their seal of approval.

(Reporting by Patricia Weiss and Ludwig Burger; Editing by Alexander Smith)

Source: OANN

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Sudan’s military, which ousted President Omar al-Bashir after months of protests against his 30-year rule, says it intends to keep the upper hand during the country’s transitional period to civilian rule.

The announcement is expected to raise tensions with the protesters, who demand immediate handover of power.

The Sudanese Professionals Association, which is spearheading the protests, said Friday the crowds will stay in the streets until all their demands are met.

Shams al-Deen al-Kabashi, the spokesman for the military council, said late Thursday that the military will “maintain sovereign powers” while the Cabinet would be in the hands of civilians.

The protesters insist the country should be led by a “civilian sovereign” council with “limited military representation” during the transitional period.

The army toppled and arrested al-Bashir on April 11.

Source: Fox News World

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FILE PHOTO: Small toy figures are seen in front of a displayed Huawei and 5G network logo in this illustration picture
FILE PHOTO: Small toy figures are seen in front of a displayed Huawei and 5G network logo in this illustration picture, March 30, 2019. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic

April 26, 2019

By Charlotte Greenfield

WELLINGTON (Reuters) – China’s Huawei Technologies said Britain’s decision to allow the firm a restricted role in building parts of its next-generation telecoms network was the kind of solution it was hoping for in New Zealand, where it has been blocked from 5G plans.

Britain will ban Huawei from all core parts of 5G network but give it some access to non-core parts, sources have told Reuters, as it seeks a middle way in a bitter U.S.-China dispute stemming from American allegations that Huawei’s equipment could be used by Beijing for espionage.

Washington has also urged its allies to ban Huawei from building 5G networks, even as the Chinese company, the world’s top producer of telecoms equipment, has repeatedly said the spying concerns are unfounded.

In New Zealand, a member of the Five Eyes intelligence sharing network that includes the United States, the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) in November turned down an initial request from local telecommunication firm Spark to include Huawei equipment in its 5G network, but later gave the operator options to mitigate national security concerns.

“The proposed solution in the UK to restrict Huawei from bidding for the core is exactly the type of solution we have been looking at in New Zealand,” Andrew Bowater, deputy CEO of Huawei’s New Zealand arm, said in an emailed statement.

Spark said it has noted the developments in Britain and would raise it with the GCSB.

The reports “suggest the UK is following other European jurisdictions in taking a considered and balanced approach to managing supplier-related security risks in 5G”, Andrew Pirie, Spark’s corporate relations lead, said in an email.

“Our discussions with the GCSB are ongoing and we expect that the UK developments will be a further item of discussion between us,” Pirie added.

New Zealand’s minister for intelligence services, Andrew Little, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

British culture minister Jeremy Wright said on Thursday that he would report to parliament the conclusions of a government review of the 5G supply chain once they had been taken.

He added that the disclosure of confidential discussions on the role of Huawei was “unacceptable” and that he could not rule out a criminal investigation into the leak.

The decisions by Britain and Germany to use Huawei gear in non-core parts of 5G network makes it harder to prove Huawei should be kept out of New Zealand telecommunication networks, said Syed Faraz Hasan, an expert in communication engineering and networks at New Zealand’s Massey University

He pointed out Huawei gear was already part of the non-core 4G networks that 5G infrastructure would be built on.

“Unless there is a convincing argument against the Huawei devices … it is difficult to keep them away,” Hasan said.

(Reporting by Charlotte Greenfield; Editing by Himani Sarkar)

Source: OANN

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FILE PHOTO: The logo commodities trader Glencore is pictured in Baar
FILE PHOTO: The logo of commodities trader Glencore is pictured in front of the company’s headquarters in Baar, Switzerland, July 18, 2017. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann

April 26, 2019

(Reuters) – Glencore shares plunged the most in nearly four months on Friday after news overnight that U.S. regulators were investigating whether the miner broke some rules through “corrupt practices”.

Shares of the FTSE 100 company fell as much as 4.2 percent in early deals, and were down 3.5 percent at 310.25 pence by 0728 GMT.

On Thursday, Glencore said the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission is investigating whether the company and its units have violated some provisions of the Commodity ExchangeAct and/or CFTC Regulations.

(Reporting by Muvija M in Bengaluru)

Source: OANN

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