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Lara Trump: Timing of Joe Biden accusations seems ‘very convenient’

Trump 2020 senior campaign advisor Lara Trump expressed some suspicions that accusations of inappropriate touching against former Vice President Joe Biden happened to emerge on the cusp of his expected 2020 presidential announcement.

“I don't know Joe Biden personally I've never met him. I don't really know his character but he's been in the public eye, Sandra, for so long that for all of a sudden the timing of this, it just seems very convenient,” Trump said on “America’s Newsroom.”

"If I were already in the race for the 2020 Democratic nomination I probably would not like to run against Joe Biden.”

A number of women have accused Biden in recent weeks of inappropriate, unwanted touching.

BIDEN SAYS HE'LL BE 'MORE MINDFUL ABOUT RESPECTING PERSONAL SPACE' 

SANDERS TEAM DENIES PUSHING BIDEN ACCUSER ALLEGATIONS

Biden attempted to tamp down the controversy with a video in which he vowed to be "more mindful about respecting personal space in the future."

Trump told "America's Newsroom" she feels Biden needs to do a little more explaining but believes the former VP should receive the benefit of the doubt.

“I take everything with a grain of salt these days because I know what it's like and our family knows what it's like better than anyone to have things said about you and you be accused of things and maybe it's not the full truth,” Trump said.

She also addressed the president’s tweet featuring an edited video that poked fun of accusations against Biden.

“We can always count on the president for a little comic relief and a little humor. I think he's having fun with it,” Trump said.

When asked by co-host Sandra Smith if the accusations should disqualify Biden from running Trump left that up to Democratic voters.

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“I'll leave that up to the Democrat voters and they can decide,” Trump said.

Fox News’ Paul Steinhauser contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Nigeria tribunal bans high court’s chief justice from office

A tribunal in Nigeria has ordered the country's chief justice removed from the bench and banned him from holding public office for 10 years.

Chief Justice Walter Onnoghen already had been suspended from the Supreme Court. Prosecutors charged him in January with failing to obey laws requiring public officials to declare financial assets.

The tribunal found Onnoghen guilty. He had argued the allegations were without merit.

The tribunal's chairman, Judge Danladi Umar, also ordered Onnoghen to forfeit money to the Nigerian government.

Critics alleged the justice's suspension, just weeks before a February election, was an effort by President Muhammadu Buhari to weaken the judiciary. Defense lawyer Okan Nkanu accused the tribunal that removed Onnoghen from office of bias.

Onnoghen is the first chief justice of Nigeria's top court to stand trial.

Source: Fox News World

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New cyclone set to make landfall in northern Mozambique

A powerful tropical cyclone is expected to make landfall by early Friday in northern Mozambique, just six weeks after Cyclone Idai devastated the central part of the country and left hundreds dead.

Mozambique is one of the world's poorest countries and Cyclone Idai wiped out crops in the southern African nation's breadbasket on the eve of harvest. Hundreds of thousands of people could face hunger in the months ahead, and a new storm bringing fresh flooding will further complicate efforts to recover.

Cyclone Kenneth could bring heavy rains and flooding to northeastern Mozambique, which was not hit by the earlier storm, and southern Tanzania, which told coastal residents to flee. The Pacific Disaster Center has forecast that landfall will occur north of the Mozambican city of Pemba.

The new cyclone threatens an area of Mozambique where residents are not used to such strong storms, the United Nations humanitarian agency said. That includes Cabo Delgado province, which has seen a rise in deadly militant attacks in recent months.

An overnight arrival of the new cyclone could catch some residents by surprise despite warnings to seek higher ground. Cyclone Idai also roared in overnight, and some residents later said they either had not been aware of authorities' warnings or didn't expect the dramatic flooding that followed.

A video posted by Mozambique's disaster management office showed director Augusta Maita warning residents that the new storm could be as strong as Cyclone Idai.

The U.N. called Idai "one of the deadliest storms on record in the southern hemisphere," and the arrival of another major storm will again raise concerns about climate change. Low-lying Mozambique's 2,400-kilometer (1,500-mile) Indian Ocean coastline makes the country one of the world's most vulnerable to global warming's rising waters.

As it approached Mozambique, Cyclone Kenneth left people in the Indian Ocean island nation of Comoros without power, with some losing their homes. There was no immediate report of any casualties.

In Tanzania, the government told students and workers in the southern regions of Lindi, Mtwara and Ruvuma to stay home but said people living near the coast should evacuate.

The U.N., the Red Cross and other aid organizations were already bracing for what could be another large relief operation, again in mostly rural areas. The U.N. already had expressed concern that its $342 million aid appeal for what will be months of Cyclone Idai relief work in Mozambique and neighboring Zimbabwe is just 24% funded .

"Although floodwaters have receded in most areas affected by Cyclone Idai, access is still a challenge as infrastructure was severely compromised," U.N. World Food Program spokesman Herve Verhoosel said in a statement. "Another storm would be an additional blow for the people of Mozambique and further complicate the response in all areas."

He said the agency has 300 metric tons of "food commodities" already positioned in Mozambique's northern coastal towns of Palma and Mocimboa da Praia and that its local partner has been told to protect the warehouses to "weather the storm."

___

Associated Press writers Anziza M'Changama in Moroni, Comoros contributed.

Source: Fox News World

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Labour MP Who Said ISIS Bride Should “Come Back” to UK Wants to Ban President Trump From State Visit

Left-wing Labour MP Rupa Huq, who said that ISIS bride Shamima Begum should “come back” to the UK, is now calling for President Donald Trump to be banned from entering the country on a state visit because of “racism”.

During a radio interview in February, Huq said Begum, who had her citizenship revoked, had suffered “trial by media” and should have been allowed to return to the UK from Syria.

This despite the fact that Begum literally stitched bombs into suicide vests to ensure they exploded when taken off during her time alongside ISIS jihadists in Syria.

Begum was also a member of the “hisba” enforcement group, which handed out brutal punishments to those found flouting ISIS laws on how to dress and behave. She also pointed an automatic weapon at women in Syria for “wearing brightly colored shoes”.

She also said during interviews that seeing decapitated heads in trash cans didn’t faze her because the victims were “enemies of Islam”.

While Huq is happy to see Begum return to the UK, she doesn’t want the leader of the free world and the UK’s number one ally to enter the country.

Huq is one of several Labour MPs who have put their name to a parliamentary motion that “calls on the Prime Minister and the Government to rescind the advice to offer a full state visit to President Trump.”

The reasons given include Trump not believing in man-made climate change, him being mean to London Mayor Sadiq Khan and general accusations of “racism” and “misogynism”.

Huq also said that Trump’s visit would not be “conducive to good race relations in this country” and said granting him a parliamentary address would also send out “all the wrong messages”.

Maybe if Trump had run off to Syria and joined ISIS, he’d get a fairer hearing from the left.

Some of the same people who openly advocate letting ISIS jihadists return to the UK want Trump to be banned from entering the country ‘because racism’.

Let that sink in.

Source: InfoWars

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Suspect in killing of 4 hostages during standoff has died

Authorities say a man who killed four people during a hostage situation inside a Mississippi home has died at a hospital.

Mississippi Public Safety Department spokesman Capt. John Poulos said the suspect was shot during the 12-hour standoff at a home in Clinton.

Authorities say the standoff started around 2:30 a.m. Saturday when officers checking on a domestic call at the house were fired on. The suspect went back inside and refused to come out.

Clinton city spokesman Mark Jones says four people were found dead in the home when the standoff ended.

TV footage showed two small children released from the home during the standoff and a barrage of gunfire not long before it was over.

The names of the people killed or the suspect have not been released.

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Belgian man arrested on terror charges

Belgian authorities say they have arrested a man on suspicion that he was part of a terrorist group and might have been planning an attack.

Federal prosecutors said Monday the 22-year-old Belgian man, identified as Jimmy K., is charged with "taking part in the activities of a terrorist group."

Searches were conducted in three Belgian towns in connection with the arrest but no weapons or explosives were found. No other details were provided.

State broadcaster RTBF says the man was detained early Sunday at his grandmother's house in Wavre, 30 kilometers (19 miles) southeast of the capital, Brussels. It said he had converted to Islam and become radicalized and was in the early stages of preparing an attack. RTBF did not identify the source of its information.

Source: Fox News World

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‘Golden cross’ for stocks doesn’t always glitter

Traders work on the floor at the NYSE in New York
FILE PHOTO: Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., March 20, 2019. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

March 20, 2019

By Chuck Mikolajczak

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The Dow Jones Industrial Average triggered a technical signal on Tuesday that many investors believe could portend more gains for stocks in the short term, known as the golden cross.

The chart pattern comes about when a short-term moving average moves above a longer-term moving average. Moving averages are popular trend indicators used by technical analysts.

In the case of the Dow on Tuesday, the 50-day moving average crossed above the index’s 200-day moving average, which is the most widely watched combination among technicians. Some analysts employ additional criteria in determining whether a cross is triggered, for example, if both moving averages are sloping upward, which the Dow’s currently are.

Even with the Dow’s slightly lower close on Tuesday on trade concerns, the 50-day managed to end the session above the 200-day moving average.

Other major indexes, such as the S&P 500 and Nasdaq, have moved closer to a golden cross as stocks continue to rally off their late December lows, buoyed by a Federal Reserve pause in interest rate hikes and building investor optimism for a trade deal between the U.S. and China.

“All signs are pointing towards continued good performance, and the golden cross just accentuates that because that is another positive story,” said Ken Polcari, managing principal at Butcher Joseph Asset Management in New York.

Polcari said the cross should not be looked at in a vacuum, however, and pointed to gains in the S&P 500 and Nasdaq that have lifted those indexes above their highs from early March as further evidence the market is strengthening.

“You have to look at it in the context of some of the other indicators,” Polcari said.

On Dec. 7, the S&P 500 triggered a bearish counterpart, known as a “death cross,” when the 50-day moving average fell below the 200-day. The benchmark index went down another nearly 11 percent before bottoming on Dec. 24.

The Dow last triggered a golden cross on April 19, 2016 and closed out the year 9.5 percent higher from there.

(Graphic: Dow Golden Cross link: https://tmsnrt.rs/2ULiKEu).

Still, the golden cross is far from a bulletproof signal. According to Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research in New York, using a “golden cross” strategy yielded a lower return than the compound annual growth rates for the Dow and smallcap Russell 2000 index since 1990.

The results were different for the S&P 500, however, with the “golden cross” strategy yielding returns similar to the index while also enabling investors to avoid major sell-offs and bouts of volatility.

Since 2000, the biggest drop yearly using a cross strategy would be 6 percent versus 38 percent for the index. In addition, the strategy topped the performance of the index 55 percent of the time.

(Dow triggers golden cross link: https://tmsnrt.rs/2HvPWNE).

As a result, Stovall thinks the strategy could be feasible for an investor depending on what their goal is.

“In many ways (technical analysis) is an interpretive science. I think it is a good one, but not everybody interprets the pattern the same way,” he said.

(Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Alden Bentley and Phil Berlowitz)

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Members of The Cranberries, bassist Mike Hogan, drummer Fergal Lawler and guitarist Noel Hogan speak to Reuters during an interview in London
Members of The Cranberries, bassist Mike Hogan, drummer Fergal Lawler and guitarist Noel Hogan speak to Reuters during an interview in London, Britain, April 24, 2019. REUTERS/Gerhard Mey

April 26, 2019

By Hanna Rantala

LONDON (Reuters) – Irish rockers The Cranberries are saying goodbye with their final album released on Friday, a poignant tribute to lead singer Dolores O’Riordan who died last year.

“In the End” is the eighth studio album from the band that rose to fame in the early 1990s with hits likes “Zombie” and “Linger”, and includes the final recordings by O’Riordan, who drowned in a London hotel bath in January 2018 due to alcohol intoxication.

Work on the album began during a 2017 tour and by that winter, O’Riordan and guitarist Neil Hogan had penned and demoed 11 tracks.

With O’Riordan’s vocals recorded, Hogan, bassist Mike Hogan and drummer Fergal Lawler completed the album in tribute to her.

“When we realized how strong the songs were, that was the deciding factor really… There was no point… trying to ruin the legacy of the band,” Noel Hogan said in an interview.

“It was obvious that Dolores wanted this album done because when you hear the album, you hear the songs and how strong they are, and she was very, very excited to get in and record this.”

The Cranberries formed in Limerick in 1989 with another singer. O’Riordan replaced him a year later and the group went on to become Ireland’s best-selling rock band after U2, selling more than 40 million records.

O’Riordan, known for her strong distinctive voice singing about relationships or political violence, was 46 when she died.

“She was actually in quite a good place mentally. She was feeling quite content and strong and looking forward to a new phase of her life,” Lawler said.

“A lot of the lyrics in this album are about things ending… people might read into it differently but it was a phase of her personal life that she was talking about.”

The group previously announced their intention to split after the release of “In The End”.

“We are absolutely gutted we can’t play (the songs) live because that’s something that’s been a massive part of this band from day one,” Noel Hogan said.

“A few people have said to us about maybe even doing a one off where you have different vocalists… as kind of guests of ours. A year ago that’s definitely something we weren’t going to entertain but I don’t know, I think it’s something we need to go away and take time off for the summer and have a think about.”

Critics have generally given positive reviews of the album; NME described it as “(seeing) the band’s career go full-circle” while the Irish Times called it “an unexpected late career high and a remarkable swan song for O’Riordan”.

Their early songs still play on the radio. This week, “Dreams” was performed at the funeral of journalist Lyra McKee, who was shot dead in Londonderry last week as she watched Irish nationalist youths attack police following a raid.

“We wrote them as kids, as a hobby and 30 years later they are on radio and on TV, like all the time… That’s far more than any of us ever thought we would have,” Noel Hogan said.

“That would make Dolores really happy because she was very precious about those songs. Her babies, she called them and to have that hopefully long after we’re gone… that’s all any band can wish for.”

(Reporting by Hanna Rantala; additoinal reporting by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Writing by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Editing by Susan Fenton)

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2020 Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren participates in the She the People Presidential Forum in Houston
2020 Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren participates in the She the People Presidential Forum in Houston, Texas, U.S. April 24, 2019. REUTERS/Loren Elliott

April 26, 2019

By Joshua Schneyer and M.B. Pell

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Senator Elizabeth Warren will introduce a bill Friday that offers new protections for U.S. military families facing unsafe housing, following a series of Reuters reports revealing squalid conditions in privately managed base homes.

The Reuters reports and later Congressional hearings detailed widespread hazards including lead paint exposure, vermin infestations, collapsing ceilings, mold and maintenance lapses in privatized base housing communities that serve some 700,000 U.S. military family members.

(View Warren’s military housing bill here. https://tmsnrt.rs/2Dy5aht)

(Read Reuters’ Ambushed at Home series on military housing here. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/section/usa-military)

The Massachusetts Democrat’s bill would mandate both regular and unannounced spot inspections of base homes by certified, independent inspectors, holding landlords accountable for quickly fixing hazards. The military’s privatization program for years allowed real estate firms to operate base housing with scant oversight, Reuters found, leaving some tenants in unsafe homes with little recourse against landlords.

The bill would also require the Department of Defense and its private housing operators to publish reports annually detailing housing conditions, tenant complaints, maintenance response times and the financial incentives companies receive at each base. The provisions aim to enhance transparency of housing deals whose finances and operations the military had allowed to remain largely confidential under a privatization program since the late 1990s.

The measure would also require private landlords to cover moving costs for at-risk families, and healthcare costs for people with medical conditions resulting from unsafe base housing, ensuring they receive continuing coverage even after they leave the homes or the military.

“This bill will eliminate the kind of corner-cutting and neglect the Defense Department should never have let these private housing partners get away with in the first place,” Warren said in a statement Friday.

The proposed legislation comes after February Senate hearings where Warren, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee who is seeking the Democratic nomination for the 2020 U.S. presidential election, slammed private real estate firms for endangering service families, and sought answers about why military branches weren’t providing more oversight.

Her legislation would direct the Defense Department to allow local housing code enforcers onto federal bases, following concerns they were sometimes denied access. Warren’s office said a companion bill in the House of Representatives would be introduced by Rep. Deb Haaland, Democrat of New Mexico.

In response to the housing crisis, military branches are developing a tenant bill of rights and hiring hundreds of new housing staff. The branches recently dispatched commanders to survey base housing worldwide for safety hazards, resulting in thousands of work orders and hundreds of tenants being moved. The Defense Department has pledged to renegotiate its 50-year contracts with private real estate firms.

Congress has been quick to take its own measures. Earlier legislation proposed by senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris of California, along with Mark Warner and Tim Kaine of Virginia, would compel base commanders to withhold rent payments and incentive fees from the private ventures if they allow home hazards to persist.

(Editing by Ronnie Greene)

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FILE PHOTO: Offices of Deloitte are seen in London
FILE PHOTO: Offices of Deloitte are seen in London, Britain, September 25, 2017. REUTERS/Hannah McKay/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Noor Zainab Hussain and Tanishaa Nadkar

(Reuters) – Deloitte quit as Ferrexpo’s auditor on Friday, knocking its shares by more than 20 percent, days after saying it was unable to conclude whether the iron ore miner’s CEO controlled a charity being investigated over its use of company donations.

Blooming Land, which coordinates Ferrexpo’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) program, came under scrutiny after auditors found holes in the charity’s statements.

Ferrexpo on Tuesday said findings of an ongoing independent investigation launched in February indicated some Blooming Land funds could have been “misappropriated”. It did not provide any details or publish its findings.

Shares in Ferrexpo, the third largest exporter of pellets to the global steel industry, were 23.4 percent lower at 206.1 pence at 1022 GMT following news of Deloitte’s resignation.

“Ferrexpo’s shares are deeply discounted vs peers … following the resignation of Deloitte, we expect downside risks to dominate Ferrexpo’s shares near term.” JP Morgan analyst Dominic O’Kane said in a note on Friday.

Swiss-headquartered Ferrexpo did not provide a reason for the resignation of Deloitte, which declined to comment, while Blooming Land did not respond to a request for comment.

Funding for Blooming Land’s CSR activities is provided by one of Ferrexpo’s units in Ukraine and Khimreaktiv LLC, an entity ultimately controlled by Ferrexpo’s CEO and majority owner Kostyantin Zhevago, Ferrexpo said on Tuesday.

Ferrexpo’s board has found that Zhevago did not have significant influence or control over the charity, but Deloitte said it was unable reach a conclusion on this.

Reuters was not immediately able to contact Zhevago.

In a qualified opinion, a statement addressing an incomplete audit, Deloitte said it had been unable to conclude whether $33.5 million of CSR donations to Blooming Land between 2017 and 2018 was used for “legitimate business payments for charitable purposes”.

Deloitte said on Tuesday that total CSR payments made to Blooming Land by Ferrexpo since 2013 total about $110 million.

Ferrexpo, whose major mines are in Ukraine, has said that the investigation was ongoing and new evidence pointed to potential discrepancies.

Zhevago, 45, who ranked 1,511 on Forbes magazine’s list of billionaires for 2019 with a net worth of $1.4 billion, owns the FC Vorskla soccer club and has been a member of Ukraine’s parliament since 1998.

(Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain and Tanishaa Nadkar in Bengaluru and additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kiev; editing by Gopakumar Warrier, Bernard Orr)

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Children walk past a damaged building in the aftermath of the Cyclone Kenneth in Pemba
Children walk past a damaged building in the aftermath of the Cyclone Kenneth in Pemba, Mozambique April 26, 2019 in this still image obtained from social media. SolidarMed via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS – THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. MANDATORY CREDIT. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES

April 26, 2019

By Emma Rumney and Stephen Eisenhammer

JOHANNESBURG/LUANDA (Reuters) – Cyclone Kenneth killed at least one person and left a trail of destruction in northern Mozambique, destroying houses, ripping up trees and knocking out power, authorities said on Friday.

The cyclone brought storm surges and wind gusts of up to 280 km per hour (174 mph) when it made landfall on Thursday evening, after killing three people in the island nation of Comoros.

It was the most powerful storm on record to hit Mozambique’s northern coast and came just six weeks after Cyclone Idai battered the impoverished nation, causing devastating floods and killing more than 1,000 people across a swathe of southern Africa.

The World Food Programme warned that Kenneth could dump as much as 600 millimeters of rain on the region over the next 10 days – twice that brought by Cyclone Idai.

One woman in the port town of Pemba died after being hit by a falling tree, the Emergency Operations Committee for Cabo Delgado (COE) said in a statement, while another person was injured.

In rural areas outside Pemba, many homes are made of mud. In the main town on the island of Ibo, 90 percent of the houses were destroyed, officials said. Around 15,000 people were out in the open or in “overcrowded” shelters and there was a need for tents, food and water, they said.

There were also reports of a large number of homes and some infrastructure destroyed in Macomia district, a mainland district adjacent to Ibo.

A local group, the Friends of Pemba Association, had earlier reported that they could not reach people in Muidumbe, a district further inland.

Mark Lowcock, United Nations under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, warned the storm could require another major humanitarian operation in Mozambique.

“Cyclone Kenneth marks the first time two cyclones have made landfall in Mozambique during the same season, further stressing the government’s limited resources,” he said in a statement.

FLOOD WARNINGS

Shaquila Alberto, owner of the beach-front Messano Flower Lodge in Macomia, said there were many fallen trees there, and in rural areas people’s homes had been damaged. Some areas of nearby Pemba had no power.

“Even my workers, they said the roof and all the things fell down,” she said by phone.

Further south, in Pemba, Elton Ernesto, a receptionist at Raphael’s Hotel, said there were fallen trees but not too much damage. The hotel had power and water, he said, while phones rang in the background. “The rain has stopped,” he added.

However Michael Charles, an official for the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), said heavy rains over the next few days were likely to bring a “second wave of destruction” in the form of flooding.

“The houses are not all solid, and the topography is very sandy,” Charles said.

In the days after Cyclone Idai, heavy inland rains prompted rivers to burst their banks, submerging entire villages, cutting areas off from aid and ruining crops. There were concerns the same could happen again in northern Mozambique.

Before Kenneth hit, the government and aid workers moved around 30,000 people to safer buildings such as schools, however authorities said that around 680,000 people were in the path of the storm.

(Reporting by Emma Rumney and Stephen Eisenhammer; Writing by Emma Rumney; Editing by Janet Lawrence and Alexandra Zavis)

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A worker holds a nozzle to pump petrol into a vehicle at a fuel station in Mumbai
FILE PHOTO: A worker holds a nozzle to pump petrol into a vehicle at a fuel station in Mumbai, India, May 21, 2018. REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas

April 26, 2019

By Manoj Kumar and Nidhi Verma

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Surging global oil prices will pose a first big challenge to India’s new government, whoever wins an election now under way, especially as domestic prices have been allowed to lag, meaning consumers are in for a painful surge as they catch up.

For oil-import dependent India, higher global prices could lead to a weaker rupee, higher inflation, the ruling out of interest rate cuts and could further weigh on twin current account and budget deficits, economists warned.

But compounding the future pain, state-run fuel suppliers and retailers have held off passing on to consumers the higher prices during a staggered general election, which began on April 11 and ends on May 23, according to sources familiar with the situation.

That delay is expected to be unwound once the election is over. And there could be additional price increases to make up for losses or profits missed during the period of delayed increases, the sources said.

In some major Asian countries, such as Japan and South Korea, pump prices are adjusted periodically so they move largely in tandem with international crude prices.

That was what was supposed to happen in India but the election means there have been many days when pump prices have been unchanged.

In New Delhi, for example, while crude oil prices have gone up by nearly $9 a barrel, or about 12 percent, in the past six weeks, gasoline prices have only risen by 0.47 rupees a liter, or 0.6 percent.

State-controlled fuel suppliers and retailers declined to say why they had delayed price increases, or discuss whether there has been any pressure from the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

A government spokesman declined to comment.

The opposition Congress party said Modi’s government was violating its own policy of daily price revision by advising the state oil companies to hold prices steady.

“The government should cut fuel taxes otherwise consumers will have to pay much higher oil prices once the elections are over,” said Akhilesh Pratap Singh, a senior leader of the Congress party.

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

Nitin Goyal, treasurer at the All India Petroleum Dealers Association, representing fuel stations in 25 states, said prices were similarly held down for 19 days in the southern state of Karnataka last year, when it held state assembly elections.

Only for them to surge after the vote.

“Consumers should be ready for a rude shock of a massive jump in retail prices, similar to the level we have seen in the Karnataka state election,” Goyal said.

‘CREDIT NEGATIVE’

Sri Paravaikkarasu, director for Asia oil at Singapore-based consultancy FGE, said retail prices of gasoline and gasoil prices would have been up to 6 percent, or about 4 rupee, higher if they had been allowed to rise in line with global prices.

“Indian pump prices have failed to keep up with the recent uptrend in crude prices,” Paravaikkarasu said.

“With the country’s general elections underway, the incumbent government has been keeping pump prices relatively unchanged.”

India had switched to a daily price revision in June 2017 from a revision every two weeks, as the government allowed retailers to set prices.

But the government faced protests last October when retailers raised prices by up to 10 rupees a liter after the crude oil price went above $80 a barrel, forcing it to cut fuel taxes.

Global prices rose to their highest level in 2019 on Thursday, days after the United States announced all Iran sanction waivers would end by May, pressuring importers including India to stop buying Tehran’s oil. [O/R]

Higher oil prices will mean Asia’s third largest economy is likely to see growth of less than 7 percent rate this fiscal year, economists said. Growth slowed to 6.6 percent in the October-December quarter, the slowest in five quarters.

Rating agency CARE has warned that a 10 percent rise in global oil prices could increase demand for dollars, putting pressure on the rupee and widening the current account deficit.

India’s oil import bill rose by nearly one-third in the fiscal year ending March 31 to $140.5 billion, against $108 billion the previous year.

“The increase in international oil prices is a credit negative for the Indian economy,” ICRA, the Indian arm of the Fitch rating agency, said in a note.

“Every $10/ bbl increase in crude oil prices increases the fiscal deficit by about 0.1 percent of GDP.”

Any big price rise would also build a case for the central bank to keep rates steady, or even raise them.

The Reserve Bank of India’s Monetary Policy Committee, which cut the benchmark policy repo rate by 25 basis points this month, warned that rising oil and food prices could push up inflation.

Policymakers are worried that a sustained increase in the oil price in the range of $70-75/barrel or higher can move the rupee down by 3-4 percent on an annual basis.

The rupee has depreciated by 1.24 percent against the dollar since a year high in mid-March.

($1 = 70.1800 Indian rupees)

(Reporting by Manoj Kumar and Nidhi Verma; Editing by Martin Howell and Rob Birsel)

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