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Trump to tour new southern border fence in California

President Donald Trump is visiting the border on Friday to tour a recently built portion of fence that he is holding up as the answer to stop a surge of migrant families coming to the U.S. in recent months.

The White House says it's the first section of his proposed border wall to be built, commemorated with a plaque bearing his name and those of top immigration and homeland security officials.

The new fence that Trump is touring is a two-mile section that was a long-planned replacement for an older barrier. It is one of a handful of current projects that total $1 billion to replace existing barriers and build new ones across the border.

Here are questions and answers about the various barriers along the border and those that are in the works as Trump attempts to carry out his signature campaign promise.

WHAT'S ALREADY THERE?

The southern border is nearly 2,000 miles long and already has about 650 miles of different types of barriers, including short vehicle barricades and tall, steel fences that go up to 30 feet high. Most of the fencing was built during the administration of George W. Bush, and there have been updates and maintenance throughout other administrations.

WHAT HAS TRUMP DONE?

Trump has yet to complete any new mileage of fencing or other barriers anywhere on the border. His administration has only replaced existing fencing, including the section he is touring Friday.

Construction for that small chunk of fencing cost about $18 million, began in February 2018 and was completed in October. Plans to replace that fence date back to 2009, during the beginning of former President Barack Obama's tenure.

Contractors have been doing site and preparation work for 13 miles of barriers in the Rio Grande Valley that will be Trump's first new fencing. The administration said construction could begin as early as this week. The administration is also in the process of replacing 14 miles of fencing around San Diego.

"The wall is under construction, by the way, large sections. We're going to be meeting, I think on Friday, at a piece of the wall that we've completed, a big piece, a lot of it's being built right now," he told reporters Thursday. "It's moving along very nicely. But we need the wall."

WHAT ABOUT THOSE PROTOTYPES?

Early in his term, Trump called for prototypes of border walls that were built in the San Diego area at a cost of about $300,000 to $500,000 each. Eight prototypes went up, and Trump traveled to the border to inspect them last year.

But they were demolished in February. The nearly $3 billion that Congress provided for barriers during the first half of Trump's term requires the money be spent on designs that were in place before May 2017, which meant the prototypes couldn't be used.

The prototypes became a spectacle at various times since Trump took office, drawing tourists, protesters and artists who projected light shows on the walls from Mexico.

WHAT ABOUT THE NATIONAL EMERGENCY?

Trump shut down the federal government for more than a month — the longest shutdown in U.S. history — and later declared a national emergency to free up billions of dollars to build his wall. Congress had voted to block the emergency declaration but Trump vetoed the measure.

Several organizations brought lawsuits over the declaration, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday that Democrats also planned on suing to prevent Trump from "stealing" money from federal programs and diverting the money to build a wall.

But the national emergency money has not yet been spent in part because the government has to first spend existing border wall funding. A lawsuit could eventually derail the plan.

Still, various plans for more border barriers are moving along.

Last month, the Department of Homeland Security requested that the defense department build 57 miles of 18-foot fencing near Yuma, Arizona and El Paso, Texas, which have seen enormous increases in the number of border crossers, especially families.

Source: Fox News National

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Mnuchin vows to follow law on request for Trump’s tax returns

FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Trump declares a national emergency at the southern border during remarks at the White House in Washington
FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump pauses during his declaration of a national emergency at the U.S.-Mexico border during remarks about border security in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, U.S., February 15, 2019. REUTERS/Carlos Barria/File Photo

April 15, 2019

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Monday said he would follow the law regarding Congress’ request for U.S. President Donald Trump’s tax returns but reiterated his concerns about lawmakers’ demands.

“We’re analyzing the law, we’re consulting with the Department of Justice,” Mnuchin said in an interview on Fox Business Network ahead of an April 23 deadline imposed by Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives. “I will follow the law.”

(Reporting by Susan Heavey and Makini Brice)

Source: OANN

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Supreme Court rejects appeal from mystery corporation subpoenaed by Mueller

The Supreme Court on Monday rejected an appeal from a company owned by an unidentified foreign government that has refused to turn over information subpoenaed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

The company, whose identity remains a mystery with details filed under seal, is facing a $50,000 per day court-imposed fine for failure to turn over documents responsive to a grand jury subpoena. Fines for the company have been accruing since January and could total nearly $3.5 million.

MYSTERY COMPANY MUST COMPLY WITH SUBPOENA LINKED TO MUELLER PROBE, APPELLATE COURT RULES

Federal prosecutors have been trying to get the information from the unnamed company since as early as the summer of 2018.

The company has challenged the subpoena from the federal grand jury in Washington and refused to turn over requested documents to Mueller’s team. The corporation argued that complying with the subpoena would violate the laws of its country and constitute an undue hardship. In December, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected their argument.

The high court’s decision comes after Mueller turned over his final report to Attorney General William Barr. Barr, in a summary sent to Congress, said that Mueller found no evidence of collusion between Trump campaign associates and Russia during the 2016 presidential election.

MUELLER SEEKING SUBPOENA, CONTEMPT CITATION AGAINST FOREIGN CORPORATION

Despite the fact that the investigation is complete, the status of the grand jury impaneled in the case remains unclear. The fines on the company will continue to accrue until the grand jury is discharged.

The special counsel issued more than 2,800 subpoenas, executed nearly 500 search warrants, obtained more than 230 orders for communication records and interviewed approximately 500 witnesses, according to Barr's summary.

Fox News' Gregg Re and The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Source: Fox News Politics

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Fitch may cut UK’s ‘AA’ rating on Brexit uncertainty

FILE PHOTO: British and EU flags flutter outside the Houses of Parliament in London
FILE PHOTO: British and EU flags flutter outside the Houses of Parliament in London, Britain January 30, 2019. REUTERS/Toby Melville/File Photo

February 20, 2019

(Reuters) – Fitch Ratings said on Wednesday it may downgrade the United Kingdom’s ‘AA’ debt rating based on growing uncertainty about the negotiations between Britain and the European Union over the nation’s departure from the economic bloc next month.

“Fitch believes that a ‘no-deal’ Brexit would lead to substantial disruption to UK economic and trade prospects, at least in the near term,” the rating agency said in a statement.

Fitch also said it may lower its ‘AA’ rating on the Bank of England if it cuts the UK’s sovereign rating.

Earlier on Wednesday, British Prime Minister Theresa May held “constructive” talks in Brussels as she sought concessions on Brexit from a skeptical EU and her strategy came under strain after the defection of three lawmakers.

In late U.S. trading, sterling extended losses briefly against the dollar following Fitch’s statement on the UK’s rating. It ended down 0.1 percent at $1.3051.

Time is running out for May to gain approval from UK lawmakers ahead of the March 29 Brexit deadline.

“For the withdrawal agreement to be approved by the UK by the deadline, the government would need to substantially widen its support,” Fitch said.

UK’s economic growth will be affected by the Brexit outcome, Fitch said. Growth slowed to 0.2 percent in the fourth quarter in 2018 from 0.6 percent the quarter before. That left real growth at 1.4 percent for 2018, Fitch said.

If Britain leaves the EU with no deal on trade, border and other issues, it faces risks of a recession that may reach the scale it experienced in the early 1990s when Britain’s gross domestic product fell by 2 percent over six quarters, the rating agency said.

Fitch said it currently assumes a “no-deal” Brexit will be avoided, with GDP growth picking up to 1.6 percent this year and 1.8 percent in 2020.

(Reporting by Richard Leong in New York; Editing by James Dalgleish and Meredith Mazzilli)

Source: OANN

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Despite It All, Joe Biden Should Run

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WASHINGTON -- It will be good for the country and the Democratic Party for Joe Biden to run for president. But it could be hell on him.

If Biden backed off from running, he would be cast as a martyr to "political correctness" and "the new multiculturalism" by many of the same conservatives who would do everything they could to defeat him if he won the nomination. Faux sympathy of this sort is starting to appear on the right. It's designed precisely to undercut further advances toward gender and racial equality.

Moreover, as a noncandidate, Biden would hang over the rest of the field like an absent giant who makes everyone else look small. The heart often longs for what it can't have. Instead of being "too old to run," Biden would become the missing and longed for "elder statesman." Cries of "Where is Biden?" would rise up whenever a major candidate stumbled. And, God forbid, if Trump were reelected, we would again live through the "If only Joe had run" lamentations.

All of this would be disastrous for Democrats and progressives. The only way to know for certain if Biden is, in fact, the best candidate to beat Trump is for him to get in the race -- to prove that he can appeal to young voters despite his age; to demonstrate that he can navigate a party that has changed dramatically since he first entered the Senate in 1973; and to show he can absorb all the blows that will come his way courtesy of opposition research into his astonishingly long career on the public stage.

If he can pass these tests, he will be more formidable for it. But, to put it gently, the experience will not be pleasant. And, yes, it's entirely fair to ask whether a 76-year-old can successfully navigate our changing mores and win over the younger voters Democrats need.

As Paul Starr, a professor at Princeton, argued shrewdly last week in The American Prospect, "norms and beliefs about race, gender and related issues have shifted dramatically among Democrats in recent decades." As a result, "the very means by which Democrats won elections in the past are now seen as disqualifying by many in the party, though not necessarily by the public at large."

Meaning, for example, that Biden's support for the 1994 crime bill, which he could once wave proudly as a banner of toughness, is now a liability. Most on the left (and many on the right) see overincarceration, especially of African Americans, as both a problem and an injustice.

And behavior patterns once seen by many as signs of Biden's warm humanity are now condemned as "handsiness," or much worse. These complaints are not new, but women are less willing than ever to stay silent about behavior most of them disliked in the first place. Last week, Biden released a video pledging to be "more mindful and respectful of people's personal space."

Affection for him is sufficiently widespread among Democrats that he seems to have weathered the latest challenge. But he didn't help himself by joking about the issue (twice) on Friday before a union crowd. And he will be further criticized about how he dealt with Anita Hill's accusations against then-Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas, and about his support for a regressive bankruptcy bill.

These are real problems, but they will be stacked against Biden's authentic contributions. In June 2008, I made a case for Biden as Barack Obama's running mate. I argued he was a "happy warrior" who would reinforce Obama's upbeat appeal. As a Catholic from a blue-collar world, the son of Scranton, Pennsylvania, would strengthen Obama with constituencies where he needed help. Biden's background on foreign policy, I said then, would enhance Obama's ability to handle national security issues.

Since opinion writers often get things very wrong, I am grateful that subsequent events ratified my instincts: Biden was an asset in the campaign and throughout Obama's time in office. This still matters to a lot of Democrats.

The bottom line is that Biden belongs in this fight. He represents important components of the coalition that will have to come together to defeat the president. He could help Democrats solve a strategic dilemma: How to be tough as nails on Trump while still promising the more harmonious political future that middle-of-the-road voters long for. And if he fails, the ultimate nominee will be far better off for having faced down Biden and not be haunted by the ghost of a candidacy that never was.

(c) 2019, Washington Post Writers Group

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Sri Lanka wakes to emergency law after Easter bombing attacks

FILE PHOTO: Sri Lanka's President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe look on during a Parliament session marking the 70th anniversary of Sri LankaÕs Government, in Colombo
FILE PHOTO: Sri Lanka's President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe look on during a Parliament session marking the 70th anniversary of Sri Lanka's Government, in Colombo, Sri Lanka October 3, 2017. REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte/File Photo

April 23, 2019

By Sanjeev Miglani

COLOMBO (Reuters) – Sri Lankans woke to emergency law on Tuesday as authorities searched for those behind suicide bomb attacks on churches and luxury hotels that killed 290 people at the weekend, with the focus turning to militants with links to foreign groups.

No group has yet to claim responsibility for Easter Sunday’s attacks on three churches and four luxury hotels that also wounded about 500 people.

Police spokesman Ruwan Gunasekera said the number of people arrested since Sunday had risen from 24 to 40. They are mainly Sri Lankans, although Gunasekera said police were investigating whether foreigners were involved in the attacks carried out by seven suicide bombers.

The president’s office declared that emergency law would come into effect from midnight, giving police extensive powers to detain and interrogate suspects without court orders. An overnight curfew was also put into effect.

The declaration came after nerves were frayed even further in the seaside capital Colombo when explosives went off on Monday near one of the churches hit in Sunday’s attacks while bomb squad officers were working to defuse a device.

CNN reported the blast was a controlled detonation.

Tuesday was also declared a national day of mourning.

The attacks brought a shattering end to a relative calm that had existed in the Indian Ocean island since a bitter civil war fought by Tamil separatists ended 10 years ago and raised fears of a return to sectarian violence.

It also underlined concerns over fractures in the Sri Lankan government, with questions raised over whether an intelligence tip-off was shared at the appropriate levels.

A government spokesman has said an international network was involved in the bombings but suspicion has focused on Islamist militants in the Buddhist-majority South Asian country. The nation of about 22 million people also has significant numbers of Hindus, Muslims and Christians.

The Washington Post quoted an unidentified law enforcement official as saying Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents were being sent to Sri Lanka to assist in the investigation.

The FBI has also offered laboratory expertise to test evidence and analysts were scouring databases for information that might shed light on tea attacks, the Post said.

U.S. intelligence sources said the attacks carried some of the hallmarks of the Islamic State extremist group, although they were cautious because the group had not claimed responsibility.

Islamic State is usually quick to claim responsibility for, or links to, attacks against foreign targets or religious groups whether they were involved or not.

INTERNAL FEUD

A document seen by Reuters showed that police had received a tip-off of a possible attack on churches by a little-known domestic Islamist group this month.

The intelligence report, dated April 11, said a foreign intelligence agency had warned authorities of possible attacks on churches by the National Thawheed Jama’ut group. It was not immediately clear what action, if any, was taken in response.

Questions over why the intelligence warning was not acted upon could feed into a feud between Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and President Maithripala Sirisena.

Sirisena fired Wickremesinghe last year only to be forced to reinstate him under pressure from the Supreme Court and their relationship is reported to be fraught.

International experts said, even if a Sri Lankan group had carried out the attacks, it was likely that al Qaeda or Islamic State were involved given the level of sophistication of the apparently coordinated bombings.

Footage on CNN showed what it said was one of the bombers wearing a heavy backpack. The man patted a young child on the head before entering the Gothic-style St. Sebastian church in Katuwapitiya, north of Colombo. Dozens were killed there.

Most of the dead and wounded were Sri Lankans, although government officials said 32 foreigners were killed. That included British, U.S., Australian, Turkish, Indian, Chinese, Danish, Dutch and Portuguese nationals.

China’s embassy in Sri Lanka warned Chinese nationals on Tuesday against traveling to Sri Lanka in the near term because of “huge security risks”.

China is a major investor in Sri Lanka. The embassy said one Chinese national was killed, five were wounded and another five were missing.

Among the victims were three of the four children of Anders Holch Povlsen, Denmark’s richest man.

Eight Britons were also killed, including Anita Nicholson, her 14-year-old son and her 11-year-old daughter. Nicholson’s husband survived the attack on the Shangri-La Hotel in Colombo.

(GRAPHIC: Sri Lanka bombings – https://tmsnrt.rs/2Xy02BA)

(GRAPHIC: A decade of peace shattered – https://tmsnrt.rs/2W4wZoU)

(Reporting by Sanjeev Miglani; Additional reporting by Mark Hosenball and Kieran Murray in WASHINGTON, and Stella Qiu and Ryan Woo in BEIJING; Editing by Paul Tait and Michael Perry)

Source: OANN

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Body recovered amid hunt for missing North Carolina woman: authorities

Days after a missing North Carolina woman was last seen, officials discovered the body of an unidentified female, authorities said Wednesday.

The search for Diana Alejandra Keel, 38, unfolded Saturday when Nash County Sheriff’s deputies responded to a missing person report in Nashville, N.C., the department said in a news release on Facebook.

The woman was reportedly last spotted a day earlier by her husband, Rexford Lynn Keel. Her employer said she hadn’t come into work for a few days, according to the sheriff’s office.

NORTH CAROLINA MAN BUYS CHICK-FIL-A FOR SERVICEMEN IN HONOR OF LATE VETERAN BROTHER

On Tuesday, North Carolina Department of Transportation employees came across a female’s body while working near Leggett, roughly 30 minutes away from Nashville, the news release said.

A forensic autopsy – witnessed by a Nash County Sheriff’s Office detective – was performed on Wednesday but at this point, “there is no positive identification of the female body,” the department said.

Detectives working the case also followed up on a separate 2006 incident, which was deemed “a death investigation,” that pertained to the missing woman’s husband and his previous wife, Elizabeth Edward Keel, according to the sheriff’s office.

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“The 2006 incident was also reported to have occurred at the same address as the current missing person with regards to Diana Alejandra Keel,” the news release said. “Dr. Dourty of the medical examiner's office conducted the forensic autopsy. Dr. Dourty declared the death of Elizabeth Edward Keel as an accidental death based on the blunt trauma to the head from falling and striking her forehead on the corner of the Keel’s front concrete steps of their home.”

Authorities provided a description of the woman, saying she is five-foot-two-inches tall, weighs roughly 150 pounds and has brown hair and hazel eyes. Her car is also “still parked at the residence,” they said.

Source: Fox News National

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Cambodian authorities have ordered a one-hour reduction in the length of school days because of concerns that students and teachers may fall ill from a prolonged heat wave.

Education Minister Hang Chuon Naron said in an announcement seen Friday that the shortened hours will remain in effect until the rainy season starts, which usually occurs in May. The current heat wave, in which temperatures are regularly reaching as high as 41 Celsius (106 Fahrenheit), is one of the longest in memory.

Most schools in Cambodia lack air conditioning, prompting concern that temperatures inside classrooms could rise to unhealthy levels.

School authorities were instructed to watch for symptoms of heat stroke and urge pupils to drink more water.

The new hours cut 30 minutes off the beginning of the school day and 30 minutes off the end.

School authorities instituted a similar measure in 2016.

Source: Fox News World

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Explosions have rocked Britain’s largest steel plant, injuring two people and shaking nearby homes.

South Wales Police say the incident at the Tata Steel plant in Port Talbot was reported at about 3:35 a.m. Friday (22:35 EDT Thursday). The explosions touched off small fires, which are under control. Two workers suffered minor injuries and all staff members have been accounted for.

Police say early indications are that the explosions were caused by a train used to carry molten metal into the plant. Tata Steel says its personnel are working with emergency services at the scene.

Local lawmaker Stephen Kinnock says the incident raises concerns about safety.

He tweeted: “It could have been a lot worse … @TataSteelEurope must conduct a full review, to improve safety.”

Source: Fox News World

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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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At least one person is reported dead and homes have been destroyed by a powerful cyclone that struck northern Mozambique and continues to dump rain on the region, with the United Nations warning of “massive flooding.”

Cyclone Kenneth arrived just six weeks after Cyclone Idai tore into central Mozambique, killing more than 600 people and displacing scores of thousands. The U.N. says this is the first time in known history that the southern African nation has been hit by two cyclones in one season.

Forecasters say the new cyclone made landfall Thursday night in a part of Mozambique that has not seen such a storm in at least 60 years.

Mozambique’s local emergency operations center says a woman in the city of Pemba was killed by a falling tree.

Source: Fox News World

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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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