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Iran announces joint border security force with Pakistan

Iran's president says a new joint security force will be formed with Pakistan to combat militants based along the two countries' shared border.

Hassan Rouhani said Tuesday that "a joint quick-reaction force for fighting against terrorism at the borders" was agreed to during his meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan a day earlier. Rouhani did not elaborate.

Both Pakistan and Iran say militant groups operate from bases on the other country's soil, occasionally carrying out deadly cross-border attacks.

The agreement comes after Pakistan's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that a group of militants crossed the border from Iran earlier that week and carried out a deadly attack against Pakistani armed forces in southwestern Baluchistan province, killing 14.

Rouhani also said he'll increase the volume of trade with Pakistan.

Source: Fox News World

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Group protests after deputy fatally shoots man in struggle

A group of people is protesting outside a West Virginia courthouse after a deputy fatally shot a man last week.

WCHS-TV reports the group of about 30 people held signs outside the Roane County Courthouse on Tuesday calling for "Justice for Timmy" and saying they don't trust the police investigation.

Roane County Sheriff Todd Cole says a deputy fatally shot 28-year-old Timothy Rhodes on Friday after Rhodes reached for the deputy's gun during a struggle. Cole said the deputy responded to a complaint of a disturbance and Rhodes became aggressive when approached, lunging at the deputy and taking him to the ground.

Cole didn't identify the deputy, but said he was placed on leave.

West Virginia State Police are investigating the shooting.

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Information from: WCHS-TV, http://www.wchstv.com

Source: Fox News National

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Use Your Cell Phone While Driving Safely With This Car Mount

The ExoMount CD Car Mount lets you safely use and secure your cell phone while driving, whether that be on the way to work or after picking up the kids from school. And with more states passing laws that prohibit holding your cell phone while driving, it’s now becoming more important than ever to install a car mount. This car mount easily installs with one touch mounting technology and hooks up through a car’s CD player for central access while driving. Plus, it rotates 360 degrees so you can orient the mount any way you prefer. Compatible with all iPhones, Samsung phones, and most other smartphones, this CD car mount makes navigating and taking calls while driving a breeze. Best of all, it’s over 20 percent off in The Daily Caller Shop.

Normally $30, this car mount is $22.50 for a limited time 

Normally $30, this car mount is $22.50 for a limited time

Source: The Daily Caller

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Mom pleads with Notre Dame female students to stop wearing leggings, sparks backlash

A mother-of-four is facing backlash after penning a letter pleading with female students at the University of Notre Dame to opt out of wearing leggings “and consider choosing jeans instead.”

The mother, who was identified as Maryann White, penned the letter titled, “The legging problem,” which was published in The Observer, Notre Dame’s student newspaper. She started her letter by saying she had been considering writing it for some time after she attended Mass last Fall and saw four young women in front of her “all wearing very snug-fitting leggings and all wearing short-waisted tops.”

“Some of them truly looked as though the leggings had been painted on them,” White wrote.

The mother said her sons “know better than to ogle a woman’s body – certainly when I’m around (and hopefully, also when I’m not).”

“But you couldn’t help but see those blackly naked rear ends,” White said of the women wearing leggings during Mass. “I didn’t want to see them — but they were unavoidable. How much more difficult for young guys to ignore them.”

SPRING BREAKER EARNS KUDS FOR HELPING CLEAN UP MIAMI BEACH

She added, “we want to be seen as a person, not a body.”

“For the Catholic mothers who want to find a blanket to lovingly cover your nakedness and protect you — and to find scarves to tie over the eyes of their sons to protect them from you!” she wrote.

White concluded her letter saying leggings are “so naked, so form fitting, so exposing.”

“Could you think of the mothers of sons the next time you go shopping and consider choosing jeans instead?” she asked. “Let Notre Dame girls be the first to turn their backs(ides) on leggings.”

The letter appeared to have the opposite effect on students at the Indiana campus.

Irish 4 Reproductive Health, a campus nonprofit group, dubbed Tuesday “Leggings Pride Day” and called on people to take part and post pictures of themselves wearing their favorite pair of leggings. Many students posted pictures of their favorite leggings with the hashtag #LeggingsDayND.

“We wanted … to remind people that leggings are absolutely OK and you’re allowed to dress your body in whatever way you see fit,” Anne Jarrett, 21, a student at Notre Dame, who helped organize the demonstration, told Today Style.

3 ARRESTED IN TULANE DORM ROOM ARSON FIRE OF YAL-MEMBER STUDENTS

Conrad Palor, a sophomore at the university, penned a response to White’s letter that was published in The Observer.

“While White’s comments were likely intended to be innocuous, they contribute to and further the narrative that women need to dress in order to not distract their male peers, which only furthers the sexualization and subsequent subjugation of women’s bodies,” he wrote.

A fellow Notre Dame mother, Heather Piccone, penned a letter to The Observer pointing out that “if nakedness is wrong, then this woman’s sons better have been fully clothed at the beach at all times.”

“They better never have played a game of “shirts versus skins” pick-up basketball or football in the park,” she wrote.

Leggings as pants have sparked debates since coming into popularity. Some schools banned students from wearing the clothing item altogether.

Source: Fox News National

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14-year-old Claims to Be Ill. Boy Who Vanished in 2011

In 2011, 6-year-old Timmothy Pitzen's mother picked him up at school in Illinois, took him to the zoo and a water park, and then killed herself at a hotel, leaving a note in which she said her son was fine but that no one would ever find him.

On Wednesday, a 14-year-old boy came forward to tell authorities he is Timmothy.

The boy claimed he escaped from two kidnappers in the Cincinnati area and then fled across a bridge into Kentucky.

Authorities from Timmothy's hometown of Aurora, Illinois, are now checking out the teenager's story.

"We've probably had thousands of tips of him popping up in different areas," Aurora police Sgt. Bill Rowley said. "We have no idea what we're driving down there for. It could be Pitzen. It could be a hoax."

Timmothy Pitzen's grandmother, Alana Anderson, told WISN-TV Wednesday that authorities have told the family "very little."

"We just know a 14-year-old boy was found and went to the police," Anderson said. "We don't want to get our hopes up and our family's hopes up until we know something. We just don't want to get our hopes up. We've had false reports and false hopes before."

Police in the Cincinnati suburb of Sharonville wrote in a short incident report that the boy said Wednesday morning that he had "just escaped from two kidnappers" he described as white men with body builder-type physiques. They were in a Ford SUV with Wisconsin license plates and had been staying at a Red Roof Inn.

Sharonville police said on the department's Facebook page that the information about the boy's reported escape was received by police in Campbell County, Kentucky.

"The City of Sharonville Police Department, like every other police agency in the greater Cincinnati area, was requested to check their Red Roof Inn hotels regarding this incident," the post read. "To the best of our knowledge, we have no information indicating that the missing juvenile was ever in the City of Sharonville."

The FBI said in a statement Wednesday afternoon that its offices in Cincinnati and in Louisville, Kentucky, were working on a missing child investigation with Aurora police and police departments in Cincinnati and Newport, Kentucky, and the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office in Ohio. The FBI offered no other details.

The body of 43-year-old Amy Fry-Pitzen was found on May 15, 2011. Her wrists were slit. Police believe she killed herself at a hotel in Rockford, Illinois, after taking Timmothy to the zoo and a Wisconsin water park.

A note she left said Timmothy was fine but that no would ever find him. Police investigating her death said she took steps that suggest she might have dropped her son off with a friend.

At the time, police searched for Timmothy in Illinois, Wisconsin, and Iowa.

Source: NewsMax America

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Sanders calls his taxes 'boring' but says he'll release returns 'soon'

Sen. Bernie Sanders says he’ll “soon” release a decade’s worth of his tax returns.

But the independent from Vermont who last week launched his second straight bid for the Democratic presidential nomination downplayed the public unveiling of his financial details, saying “they’re very boring tax returns.”

LIFESTYLES OF THE RICH AND SOCIALIST

A rival for the nomination – Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts – last August posted 10 years of her returns online.

Asked during a CNN town hall Monday night why the delay in releasing his returns, Sanders answered “well, you know, the delay is not -- it'll bore -- our tax returns will bore you to death. It's simply -- nothing special about them. It just was a mechanical issue. We don't have accountants at home. My wife does most of it. And we will get that stuff out.”

The populist firebrand and self-described democratic socialist owns two homes in Vermont and one in Washington, DC. Sanders has also earned more than $1 million annually in recent years, though he remains on the lower end of Senate Democrats in terms of net worth.

Sanders faced some criticism for not releasing his taxes during his marathon 2016 primary battle with eventual Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.

“I didn't end up doing it because I didn't win the nomination. If we had won the nomination, we would have done it,” Sanders explained on Monday.

But Clinton made eight years’ worth of tax returns available in July 2015, early in the primary campaign and a year before the general election.

HOUSE DEMS TARGET TRUMP TAX RETURNS

President Trump cast aside decades of tradition during the 2016 presidential campaign when he refused to voluntarily release his tax returns, which could give some transparency to his large real estate and entertainment empire that he touts is worth some $10 billion. Trump said at the time that his taxes couldn’t be released because he was under audit.

Democrats, who now control the House of Representatives, are taking steps to try to compel the president to release his returns. But Trump has repeatedly reiterated that he won’t release his personal tax returns or those for the Trump Organization until a review of the records is completed. And he’s argued that he wouldn’t release them because Americans elected him in 2016 without seeing his returns.

WARREN VOWS NO BIG FUNDRAISERS DURING PRIMARIES

Sanders announced his 2020 presidential bid last Tuesday. As of Monday, six days after his campaign launch, the senator had raised an eye-popping $10 million from over 359,914 donors. Those numbers put him far ahead of his rivals for the nomination in the race for campaign cash.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Tariff, enforcement issues still hurdles to U.S.-China trade deal: U.S. Chamber

FILE PHOTO - Chinese FM Wang Yi meets with U.S. executive vice president and head of International Affairs at the Chamber of Commerce in Beijing
FILE PHOTO - Myron Brilliant, executive vice president and head of International Affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce speaks during a meeting with Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi (not pictured) at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing, China February 19, 2019. Wu Hong/Pool via REUTERS

April 2, 2019

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A trade deal between the United States and China is now more likely to be achieved than not, a top U.S. Chamber of Commerce official said on Tuesday, adding that negotiators needed to show progress this week on an enforcement mechanism and a plan to lift U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods.

If the two sides did not get closer to a deal this week, the timing of an agreement could slip by a few weeks, said Myron Brilliant, the Chamber’s head of international affairs.

“We’re getting to the point where it’s clear that both governments want a deal. The presidents want a deal, and they need to get through the end-game issues. This is a critical week,” Brilliant told reporters ahead of another round of U.S.-China trade negotiations starting on Wednesday.

(Reporting by David Lawder and Chris Prentice; Editing by James Dalgleish)

Source: OANN

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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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