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NHL notebook: Wings legend Yzerman takes GM job

FILE PHOTO - Yzerman, general manager of Tampa Bay Lightning, speaks to media before Commissioner Bettman announces end of labor negotiations between the NHL and NHLPA in New York
FILE PHOTO - Steve Yzerman, general manager of the Tampa Bay Lightning, speaks to media before Commissioner Gary Bettman announces the end of labor negotiations between the NHL and the NHL Players Association (NHLPA) in New York, January 9, 2013. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

April 20, 2019

Steve Yzerman is coming home to become general manager of the Detroit Red Wings, the franchise announced on Friday.

The hiring of the former Detroit star also marked the end of Ken Holland’s 22-year stint as general manager. Holland signed a multiyear deal to become the club’s senior vice president.

Yzerman, 53, spent his entire 22-year Hall of Fame playing career with the Red Wings. He served 20 years as team captain and scored 692 goals and 1,063 assists (1,755 points) during a 1,514-game career that ended in 2006. He played on three Stanley Cup-winning teams in Detroit. Now he is taking over a team that has missed the playoffs in three straight seasons.

“I’m extremely excited to be back in Detroit with the Red Wings,” Yzerman said during a press conference. “This city, Red Wing fans, the state of Michigan were incredibly supportive of me throughout the ups and downs of my playing career. I am very excited to return to the organization and join the Red Wings again and with our goal of getting the team back in contention for Stanley Cups and the championship that has come to be expected in Detroit.”

–T.J. Oshie will be out indefinitely after suffering an upper-body injury in Thursday’s playoff game, Washington Capitals coach Todd Reirden announced.

A hit from Carolina Hurricanes forward Warren Foegele sent Oshie headfirst into the boards, and he left the ice holding his arm and shoulder.

Reirden said Oshie won’t play in Game 5 on Saturday and that the team would know more about a timetable for his return after Oshie saw the doctor on Friday. To take his place on the roster, the Capitals recalled right winger Devante Smith-Pelly from the AHL’s Hershey Bears.

–The New York Islanders will continue their quest for the Stanley Cup without defenseman Johnny Boychuk, who is expected to miss 3-4 weeks with a lower-body injury, the team announced.

Boychuk was injured Tuesday when he blocked a shot by Pittsburgh Penguins defenseman Marcus Pettersson in the second period of the Islanders’ Game 4 win to sweep the series.

Boychuk, 35, had 19 points (three goals, 16 assists) in 74 regular-season games during his fifth season with the Islanders.

–The Philadelphia Flyers joined the New York Yankees in choosing to no longer play the 1939 Kate Smith recording of “God Bless America” during home games, the team announced.

The team is also covering up a statue of the singer outside the arena.

“We have recently become aware that several songs performed by Kate Smith contain offensive lyrics that do not reflect our values as an organization,” the Flyers said in a statement, according to CNN. “As we continue to look into this serious matter, we are removing Kate Smith’s recording of ‘God Bless America’ from our library and covering up the statue that stands outside of our arena.”

–Field Level Media

Source: OANN

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Slovakia’s departing president plans to form a new political party

Slovakia's President Andrej Kiska speaks at the party headquarters of Slovakia's presidential candidate Zuzana Caputova in Bratislava
Slovakia's President Andrej Kiska speaks at the party headquarters of Slovakia's presidential candidate Zuzana Caputova in Bratislava, Slovakia, March 30, 2019. REUTERS/Radovan Stoklasa

April 3, 2019

BRATISLAVA (Reuters) – Slovakia’s outgoing president said on Wednesday he would form a new political party when his term expires in June, aiming to unite the country’s liberal, pro-European Union camps.

Andrej Kiska had not run for re-election but endorsed the eventual winner, Zuzana Caputova. A civic campaigner and anti-graft lawyer, her landslide victory last weekend encouraged the pro-EU liberals Kiska hopes to lead.

“Slovakia wants change. We won this election, now we have to win the general election,” Kiska said in a video posted on his official Facebook page. “I will start a political party, and I want to unite all decent and willing people and change our country for the better.”

The Slovakian presidency is largely ceremonial, but Kiska made it an influential office. He sided with protesters who mounted massive demonstrations after the killing last year of Jan Kuciak, a reporter covering corruption, and his fiancee, Martina Kusnirova.

The protests led to the resignation of Robert Fico as prime minister. Fico’s ruling party, Smer, saw its support plunge after Kuciak’s and Kusnirova’s murders.

Political analysts said it was not clear whether Kiska, the country’s most trusted politician, with an approval rating of 57 percent, can unify the disparate opposition or will further fragment the centrist pro-EU, anti-graft camp.

An AKO agency poll of 1,000 people last month showed 9 percent of voters would certainly and 31 percent would probably vote for his party if he set one up.

Its natural allies, Caputova’s Progressive Slovakia, which runs on a joint slate with Spolu (Together) party, saw their joint support double since February to 14.4 percent. Caputova will quit her party in the coming days in a nod to a tradition that the president is non-partisan.

The leftist but socially conservative Smer saw its support fall under 20 percent for the first time in more than a decade. Support for anti-European, far-right People’s Party-Our Slovakia rose to 11.5 percent in April from 9.5 percent in February.

(Reporting By Tatiana Jancarikova)

Source: OANN

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W.Va. suit accuses diocese of knowingly employing pedophiles

West Virginia's attorney general has sued a local Catholic diocese and its former bishop, claiming they knowingly employed pedophiles.

Attorney General Patrick Morrisey announced the suit against the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston and Bishop Michael Bransfield on Tuesday.

The suit alleges the diocese and Bransfield chose to cover up arguably criminal behavior and says the diocese employed admitted sexual abusers and priests credibly accused of child sexual abuse without adequate background checks.

A diocese spokesman didn't return a voicemail message, and no one responded immediately to a voicemail left with a phone number listed for Bransfield.

Earlier this month, Catholic Church officials announced they were imposing ministerial restrictions on Bransfield after an investigation into allegations that he sexually harassed adults and committed financial improprieties. He resigned last year.

Source: Fox News National

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Grizzlies fire coach Bickerstaff, shake up front office

NBA: Memphis Grizzlies at Detroit Pistons
Apr 9, 2019; Detroit, MI, USA; Memphis Grizzlies head coach J.B. Bickerstaff yells from the sidelines during the second quarter against the Detroit Pistons at Little Caesars Arena. Mandatory Credit: Raj Mehta-USA TODAY Sports

April 11, 2019

Speaking to local media around midday Thursday, Memphis Grizzlies general manager Chris Wallace said he hadn’t talked with team owner Robert Pera yet but he could make one declaration: head coach J.B. Bickerstaff would return for a second season.

Two hours later, that decision had changed, and several other moves were made.

The Grizzlies fired Bickerstaff and demoted Wallace to a scouting role.

Memphis also named Jason Wexler as team president with “oversight of both business and basketball operations,” the team said in a statement. The Grizzlies promoted Zach Kleiman to executive vice president of basketball operations, with former VP John Hollinger reassigned to a senior advisory position.

“In order to put our team on the path to sustainable success, it was necessary to change our approach to basketball operations,” Pera said in a statement. “I look forward to a reenergized front office and fresh approach to Memphis Grizzlies basketball under new leadership, while retaining the identity and values that have distinguished our team.”

After David Fizdale was fired, Bickerstaff was promoted to interim head coach in November 2017, then given the job permanently last May 1. The team went 15-48 under Bickerstaff in 2017-18 and 33-49 this season.

The Grizzlies traded franchise stalwart Marc Gasol at the February deadline, and their shake-ups might not be over.

Veteran point guard Mike Conley said this week he doesn’t want to stick around Memphis to endure a rebuild and is ready to turn the franchise over to youngster Jaren Jackson Jr.

Selected by the Grizzlies with the No. 4 overall pick of the 2007 draft, Conley has participated in the playoffs in seven seasons, with four of them resulting in a first-round ouster.

“I want to win a championship, No. 1,” he told reporters. “I love Jaren Jackson Jr. I’ve done a lot of that, been a part of it. At some point you have to pass that torch.”

Conley is due to make $32.5 million next season.

–Field Level Media

Source: OANN

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Man who dug secret tunnels faces trial over deadly fire

A trial opens this week for a wealthy stock trader charged with murder in the death of a man who was helping him dig a network of tunnels beneath his Maryland home when a fire erupted.

Jury selection is scheduled to start Monday for Daniel Beckwitt's trial in Montgomery County. The 27-year-old millionaire is charged with second-degree murder and involuntary manslaughter in the September 2017 death of 21-year-old Askia Khafra.

Prosecutors say Beckwitt recklessly endangered Khafra's life during his secretive campaign to build a bunker beneath his Bethesda home for protection from a nuclear attack.

Beckwitt's lawyers say Khafra's death was a tragic accident, not a crime.

Firefighters found Khafra's charred, naked body when they entered the burning home, which was littered with mounds of trash.

Source: Fox News National

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China vows to cut burden of social security costs for small firms

Woman works at a workshop of a textile manufacturer in Binzhou, Shandong
FILE PHOTO: A woman works at a workshop of a textile manufacturer in Binzhou, Shandong province, China February 11, 2019. China Daily via REUTERS

March 26, 2019

BEIJING (Reuters) – China will forbid action by local governments that boost the burden of social security costs for small and micro firms, state television said on Tuesday, citing a state cabinet meeting chaired by premier Li Keqiang.

China has vowed to reduce costs for SMEs in a move to boost the once vibrant private economy, cutting trillions in taxes and fees and directing banks to increase lending to smaller firms.

From May 1, China will cut to 16 percent the social security fees companies have to shoulder, from 20 percent.

Regional governments should not take the liberty of collecting “historically overdue taxes” without central permission, the cabinet said.

Companies’ fears had grown that China would soon introduce a tougher system of collecting social security payments to beef up tax receipts.

(Reporting by Beijing Monitoring Desk and Yawen Chen; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

Source: OANN

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Activists in Hong Kong and Taiwan feel heat as China fears ‘separatist’ collusion

Military honour guards attend a flag-lowering ceremony at Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei
Military honour guards attend a flag-lowering ceremony at Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei, Taiwan January 22, 2019. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu

March 15, 2019

By James Pomfret and Yimou Lee

HONG KONG/TAIPEI (Reuters) – As Beijing grows wary of pro-independence groups seeking to forge closer ties in Hong Kong and Taiwan, activists say they are coming under increased surveillance and harassment from pro-China media outlets and unofficial “operatives.”

Visits to Taiwan in January by several Hong Kong activists including Tony Chung generated heavy coverage by two pro-China newspapers, including detailed reports of their movements and meetings.

The coverage prompted Taiwan to investigate the activities of the Hong Kong-based Wen Wei Po and Ta Kung Pao newspapers on “national security” grounds.

The government found that the papers committed “unlawful” acts, including invasive surveillance, and spread “fake news.” Officials said journalists from those papers would be banned from traveling to Taiwan for up to three years if the media outlets did not provide a “reasonable explanation” for their activities there.

A Reuters examination of both papers’ articles show that at least 25 people linked to anti-China and independence causes have been the subject of intense coverage, including covert photography and the reporting of personal details, in Taiwan during the past three years.

Ta Kung Pao and Wen Wei Po did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Such papers, which typically take a pro-Beijing stance, would be expected to pay close attention to activists pursuing causes that upset the Chinese government.

But activists say their coverage stretches into the realm of harassment, including surveillance on overseas trips, and publishing details of their private lives, including homes, work and daily movements.

“It’s obvious that there’s intervention from outside forces with an aim to intimidate people,” Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council Deputy Minister Chiu Chui-cheng told Reuters, referring to the coverage from the pro-China papers.

The coverage raised concerns about the activities of “Chinese and Hong Kong intelligence operatives” on the island, Chiu added, including people working for pro-China media outlets.

Activists have also been physically attacked during trips to Taiwan.

In July 2018, two Taiwanese were convicted of assaulting Hong Kong activists meeting with independence advocates in Taiwan. Three Hong Kong men were later named in Taiwanese media coverage as helping facilitate the attack.

“I was followed until I almost left the airport,” Andy Chan, one of the Hong Kong activists, said of his time in Taiwan. “There are operatives for China everywhere.”

BEIJING WORRIED

China considers Hong Kong and Taiwan to be inalienable parts of its territory, and has branded pro-independence activists on both sides of the Taiwan Strait as “separatists.”

In an annual report to the U.S. Congress, the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission noted in November that since president Tsai Ing-wen took office in 2016, Beijing has feared “collusion between ‘separatist forces’ in Taiwan and Hong Kong.”

“Beijing is trying everything in its power to prevent this,” said a security source in the Taiwan government, who declined to be named given the sensitivity of the issue.

The source and a second Taiwanese security official involved in national security say China has been quietly ramping up the number of intelligence operatives in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Wu Jieh-min, a Taiwan scholar who has researched civil movements in Hong Kong and Taiwan, says he was barred from entering Hong Kong for an academic conference in late 2016.

Beijing is “very worried about the exchange of ideas. If the ideas of civil society are not hindered, their power will be greatly enhanced,” said Wu, a research fellow with the government-backed Academia Sinica.

Wu noted that mass, protracted protests in Taiwan and Hong Kong in 2014 that railed against Chinese interference were a catalyst for deepening activist ties on both sides.

China’s Taiwan Affairs Office and main representative body in Hong Kong, the Liaison Office, did not respond to requests for comment.

The Wen Wei Po has also paid close attention to foreigners in contact with Hong Kong activists.

In December, Wen Wei Pao reporters and photographers covered the daily activities of Kevin Carrico, an Australia-based political scientist, during a visit to Hong Kong in which he met with independence advocates, and featured him on the front page.

“I was a little creeped out by the fact that the article discussed my presentation. There were only 15 people there,” he said of a private meeting in the basement of a Hong Kong building.

He said there had been “a real escalation of Beijing’s political operations in Hong Kong.”

HOTEL ATTACK

Activists in Hong Kong and Taiwan describe an increase in unknown individuals shadowing their meetings and events, sometimes taking photographs or recording their conversations.

In some cases activists have been attacked, and the assailants identified.

Two Taiwanese, Zhang Xiuye and Jhang Jhih-min, were found guilty last July of a 2016 assault on two Hong Kong independence activists, Andy Chan and Jason Chow, at a Taipei hotel.

Zhang and Jhang were convicted of defamation and fined T$6,000 ($195) and T$8,000 ($260) respectively; Jhang was also found guilty of “intimidating and endangering the safety” of Chan.

Zhang and Jhang were among at least eight people who beat Chan and Chow and called them China “traitors” at the Caesar Park Hotel, according to Taipei court documents.

Chan told Reuters he was at the hotel to meet with Ouyang Jin, a journalist with a little-known Hong Kong publication called Pacific Magazine.

Zhang is a senior member of the Chinese Concentric Patriotism Party, which advocates unification of China and Taiwan, according to the group’s website.

“It was purely an accident” that they ran into Chan at the hotel, Zhang told Reuters.

($1 = 7.8484 Hong Kong dollars)

($1 = 30.7550 Taiwan dollars)

(Additional reporting by Jessie Pang in Hong Kong and Ben Blanchard in Beijing; Editing by Gerry Doyle)

Source: OANN

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A Chinese woman adjusts a Chinese national flag next to U.S. national flags before a Strategic Dialogue expanded meeting, part of the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue (S&ED) in Beijing
A Chinese woman adjusts a Chinese national flag next to U.S. national flags before a Strategic Dialogue expanded meeting, part of the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue (S&ED) held at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, July 10, 2014. REUTERS/Ng Han Guan/Pool (CHINA – Tags: POLITICS BUSINESS)

April 26, 2019

By April Joyner

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Even as the lift from optimism over prospects for U.S.-China trade detente shows signs of wearing off for the wider U.S. stock market, upbeat sentiment around China’s economy could bolster shares of materials companies.

Shares of S&P 500 industrial and technology companies, which were buffeted by last year’s tit-for-tat tariffs as well as slowing global demand, have been very responsive to progress in U.S.-China trade relations and a strengthening Chinese economy. This year, those sectors have outpaced the ascent in the S&P 500, which reached a record closing high on Tuesday.

Materials stocks have not been as sensitive, however, even though they also stand to benefit as a stronger Chinese economy lifts global consumption and industrial output. As China has taken measures to stimulate its economy, its economic data have turned more upbeat. That in turn could aid global growth, which has flagged as a result of China’s cooldown.

“What we’re seeing is China spending more on stimulus: fiscal stimulus and monetary stimulus,” said Kristina Hooper, chief global market strategist at Invesco in New York. “That’s likely to be a positive for materials.”

The People’s Bank of China has cut banks’ reserve requirement ratio five times over the past year and is widely expected to ease policy further to spur lending and reduce borrowing costs. The stimulus appears to have boosted Chinese economic data, with factory activity growing in March for the first time in four months.

Yet so far in 2019, the S&P 500 materials index has underperformed the S&P 500 at large, rising just 11.9% compared with 16.7% for the benchmark index. Moreover, it is among the biggest decliners in the period since the S&P’s previous record closing level on Sept. 20. The materials index has fallen 7% over those seven months, versus a 5.2% gain for technology and a 3% loss for industrials. Only the energy index has dropped more over that period.

A trade agreement could serve as a catalyst for a bump in materials shares as a drag on China’s economy is lifted, some market strategists say. Some commodity prices, including those for copper and oil, have ascended this year as the prospects for the global economy have somewhat brightened.

“It all goes back to the global growth outlook,” said Andrea DiCenso, portfolio manager for alpha strategies at Loomis Sayles in Boston. “With the front run in hard data, we’re beginning to see a pretty significant rally.”

Additionally, a trade agreement is expected to include commitments from China to purchase higher quantities of U.S. products such as soybeans, which could benefit companies that make agricultural chemicals, including DowDuPont Inc and CF Industries Holdings Inc.

CF Industries is scheduled to report quarterly results after the bell on Wednesday, and DowDuPont is scheduled to report before the market open on Thursday.

To be sure, even with a trade agreement, some materials companies could face price pressures. Shares of Freeport-McMoRan Inc fell 10.1% on Thursday after the copper mining company posted a lower-than-expected profit as its production slipped and its costs rose.

A rollback of tariffs on Chinese imports, particularly aluminum and steel, would likely prompt a fall in some commodity prices, which could hurt prospects for certain materials companies, said Gene Goldman, chief investment officer at Cetera Investment Management in El Segundo, California.

Even so, those drawbacks may be outweighed by the support for global demand fostered by a U.S.-China trade agreement.

“You could see a number of companies with lowered expectations bring them back up as they talk favorably about the impact that a trade deal would have on them,” said Tim Ghriskey, chief investment strategist at Inverness Counsel in New York.

(Reporting by April Joyner; additional reporting by Sinéad Carew; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Source: OANN

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Cyprus police on Friday widened their search for more victims of a suspected serial killer after the 35-year-old national guard captain told investigators he killed four more people that he previously admitted to on the small Mediterranean nation.

The count now has climbed to seven.

CYPRUS FEARS POSSIBLE SERIAL KILLER AFTER BODIES OF TWO WOMEN ARE DISCOVERED IN MINESHAFT

Authorities said they are focusing on a military firing range, a man-made lake and an abandoned mine about 20 miles west of the capital Nicosia.

Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades expressed “deep sorrow and concern” at the slayings and said he shared the public’s revulsion at “murders that appear to have selectively targeted foreign women who are in our country to work.”

“Such instincts are contrary to our culture’s traditions and values,” he said in a statement from China, where he was on an official visit. He urged calm so police can complete their investigation.

The scale of the alleged crimes by a Cypriot National Guard captain has horrified the small nation of over a million people, where multiple killings are rare. Five British law enforcement officials — including a coroner, a psychiatrist and investigators who specialize in multiple homicides — have been dispatched to help with the investigation.

On Thursday, the 35-year-old suspect, who can’t yet be named because he hasn’t been formally charged, told investigators that he had killed four more people than he had previously admitted to. Police said the suspect will appear in court Saturday for another custody hearing.

Cypriot investigators and police officers search a flooded mineshaft where two female bodies were found, outside of Mitsero village, near the capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Monday, April 22, 2019. Police on the east Mediterranean island nation, along with the help of the fire service, are conducting the search Monday in the wake of last week's discovery of the bodies in the abandoned mineshaft and the disappearance of the six-year-old daughter of one of the victims. 

Cypriot investigators and police officers search a flooded mineshaft where two female bodies were found, outside of Mitsero village, near the capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Monday, April 22, 2019. Police on the east Mediterranean island nation, along with the help of the fire service, are conducting the search Monday in the wake of last week’s discovery of the bodies in the abandoned mineshaft and the disappearance of the six-year-old daughter of one of the victims.  (AP)

The victims — all foreigners— include Marry Rose Tiburcio, 38, from the Philippines, whose bound body was found April 14 in a flooded mineshaft. She and her six-year-old daughter had been missing since May of last year.

The girl remains missing and authorities believe she was also slain by the suspect. Divers have entered the reservoir to search for her but have not found her body yet.

CYPRUS: GROUND NOT YET READY FOR PEACE TALKS RESUMPTION 

Authorities tracked down the officer last week by scouring Tiburcio’s online messages.

Six days later, police discovered another body April 20 in the same mineshaft, identified by Cypriot media as 28-year-old Arian Palanas Lozano, also from the Philippines.

A third alleged victim, also of Filipino descent, is 31-year-old Maricar Valtez Arquiola, who had been missing since December 2017. The suspect initially denied killing Arquiola but reversed himself after a court hearing Thursday, a police official said.

The suspect on Thursday also pointed investigators to a military firing range, where they discovered another unidentified body, which according to the suspect belongs to a woman of either Nepalese or Indian descent.

SERIAL KILLER WHO MAY HAVE COMMITTED 90 MURDERS IS LINKED TO YET ANOTHER KILLING 

Cypriot police are also looking for a Romanian mother and daughter. Cypriot media identified them as Livia Florentina Bunea, 36, and eight-year-old Elena Natalia Bunea, who are believed to have been missing since September 2016.

The man-made lake remains off-limits to a manned search because of high levels of toxic heavy metals from the copper pyrite mine, Fire Service Chief Marcos Trangolas said, adding that authorities will use other means to scour the lake.

Chief of Cypriot police Zacharias Chrysostomou, center, walks with Cypriot investigators and police officers at a flooded mineshaft where two female bodies were found, outside of Mitsero village, near the capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Monday, April 22, 2019.

Chief of Cypriot police Zacharias Chrysostomou, center, walks with Cypriot investigators and police officers at a flooded mineshaft where two female bodies were found, outside of Mitsero village, near the capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Monday, April 22, 2019. (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)

Cyprus police have faced criticism from immigrant activists who said they didn’t act fast enough to investigate the whereabouts of some of the victims, many of them domestic workers. The island nation has 80 unsolved missing persons cases, going back to 1990.

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Police chief Zacharias Chrysostomou said a three-member panel has been assigned to probe whether police followed all the correct protocol in recent missing persons cases.

According to the state-run Cyprus News Agency, an investigator had told the court at an earlier hearing that the suspect admitted to killing one woman he met online after having sex with her.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Source: Fox News World

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Venezuelan opposition lawmaker Gilber Caro is seen delivering a speech at a forum on human rights in Caracas
Venezuelan opposition lawmaker Gilber Caro is seen delivering a speech at a forum on human rights in Caracas, Venezuela June 12, 2018 in this still image taken from a video. REUTERS TV/ via REUTERS

April 26, 2019

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela’s opposition-run National Assembly said on Friday that opposition lawmaker Gilber Caro was detained, which it described in a Twitter post as a violation of diplomatic immunity.

Caro had previously spend a year and a half in jail, before being freed in June 2018. The arrest comes as Juan Guaido, the National Assembly’s leader, mounts a challenge to President Nicolas Maduro, arguing his 2018 re-election was illegitimate. Guaido in January invoked the country’s constitution to assume an interim presidency.

(Reporting by Caracas newsroom; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

Source: OANN

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FILE PHOTO: Customers shop in a Sainsbury's store in Redhill
FILE PHOTO: Customers shop in a Sainsbury’s store in Redhill, Britain, March 27, 2018. REUTERS/Peter Nicholls/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By James Davey

LONDON (Reuters) – With Sainsbury’s dream of creating Britain’s biggest supermarket group in tatters, its chastened CEO Mike Coupe needs to reassure investors he has the plan to arrest a sales decline when he presents annual results next week.

Britain’s competition regulator blocked Sainsbury’s 7.3 billion pound ($9.4 billion) takeover of Walmart’s Asda on Thursday, saying the deal would increase prices. Sainsbury’s shares fell 5 percent and are down 22 percent over the last three months.

For Sainsbury’s fourth quarter to March 9 analysts are on average forecasting a 1.6 percent fall in like-for-like sales, which would follow 1.1 percent decline over the Christmas period.

Monthly industry data from researcher Kantar has also shown Sainsbury’s as the weakest performer of the big four grocers this year and this month it lost its status as Britain’s No. 2 supermarket group by market share to Asda.

While Sainsbury’s has struggled, market leader Tesco has gained momentum, this month reporting a 34 percent jump in full year profit.

Prohibition of the deal was a major blow to Coupe, its architect and Sainsbury’s boss since 2014.

Martin Scicluna became Sainsbury’s chairman last month and when bedded-in may decide that if the group needs a major shake-up it is best carried out by a new leader.

Much will depend on the attitude of 22 percent shareholder the Qatar Investment Authority, which has so far declined to comment, as well as Coupe’s own appetite to continue after 15 years at the group.

THE RIGHT STRATEGY?

Coupe said on Thursday he was confident Sainsbury’s was pursuing the right strategy.

That was a clear indication that Wednesday’s results statement will not include radical changes to the group’s plans, such as a big margin reset — sacrificing profit to drive sales.

However, sources connected to Sainsbury’s said Coupe would likely acknowledge that more needs to be done on prices, so the supermarket business can better compete with its big four rivals – Tesco, Asda and No. 4 Morrisons – as well as German-owned discounters Aldi and Lidl.

Coupe’s strategy is based on differentiating Sainsbury’s food offer, growing its general merchandise, clothing business and bank, while investing in convenience and online channels.

Some analysts believe major change is needed.

HSBC analyst David McCarthy reckons Sainsbury’s needs a margin reset, should allocate more space for core lines and needs to drive better store standards. He said Sainsbury’s might consider closing down space in some of its larger stores and reducing its non-food offer.

For the full 2018-19 year analysts are on average forecasting a pretax profit of 626 million pounds, up from 589 million pounds in 2017-18 – a second straight year of profit growth. A full year dividend of 10.5 pence per share is forecast versus 10.2 pence last time.

Bank and lawyer fees related to the proposed combination with Asda were 17 million pounds in the first half and have reportedly jumped to around 50 million pounds.

(Reporting by James Davey; Editing by Keith Weir)

Source: OANN

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Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey rejected demands from a secular group to remove posts on social media where he sent Easter greetings and cited a Bible verse, offering to provide copies of the Constitution to his critics.

Ducey, who’s a practicing Catholic, has been bombarded with calls from Secular Communities for Arizona to remove the post, which included a cross, a Bible verse, and the phrase, “He is risen.”

ARIZONA’S GOP GOVERNOR WAGING WAR AGAINST OCCUPATIONAL LICENSING LAWS

The group argued the posts crossed a line into government sponsorship of religious messages and was unconstitutional.

The governor fired back at the group, saying in a tweet that he will never remove the posts or other religious ones.

“We won’t be removing this post. Ever. Nor will we be removing our posts for Christmas, Hanukkah, Rosh Hashanah, Palm Sunday, Passover or any other religious holiday,” he tweeted. “We support the First Amendment, and are happy to provide copies of the Constitution to anyone who hasn’t read it.”

Dianne Post, an attorney for the secular group, told the Arizona Republic “elected officials should not use their government position and government property to promote their religious views.”

LICENSE REQUIRED TO REPAIR DOORS? REGS SPARK HEATED DEBATE IN ARIZONA

She added the courts have repeatedly “struck down symbolism that unites government with religion,” adding that Ducey’s office must “represent and protect the rights of all residents of Arizona, including those who do not believe in a monotheistic God or any gods at all.”

Many congratulated Ducey for not backing down amid the pressure, though some Facebook users sided with the secular group and criticized the governor on his original post.

“Why do you use a government platform to bring up your personal religion?” asked one person. “Are there no citizens in your jurisdiction that believe differently from you?”

Another stipulated that the post was somewhat discriminatory. “Great sensitivity, Doug. That’s the last time this Jew votes for you,” one person wrote.

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Ducey wished in a statement Arizonans last week a “blessed and joyful Easter and Passover weekend.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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