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The Latest: Vatican editor denies interfering in women's mag

The Latest on the resignation of the editorial board at the Vatican's women's magazine (all times local):

12 p.m.

The editor of the Vatican newspaper has denied accusations that he sought to discredit the female editors of a monthly magazine that was distributed by his daily.

Andrea Monda, editor of L'Osservatore Romano, said in a statement that he fully respected the autonomy of the women's insert in the wake of the resignation of its editorial board.

He said at most that he suggested ideas and people to contribute to "Women Church World."

The magazine founder and the all-female board announced they were leaving, writing a planned editorial and open letter to Pope Francis. They cited what they said was a climate of distrust and claimed there was an attempt to impose male leadership on their publication.

___

9:10 a.m.

The founder and all-female editorial board of the Vatican's women's magazine have quit after coming under what they say was a Vatican campaign to discredit them and put them "under the direct control of men" that increased after they denounced the sexual abuse of nuns by clergy.

The editorial committee of "Women Church World," a monthly glossy published alongside the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, made the announcement in the planned April 1 editorial and in an open letter to Pope Francis that was provided Tuesday to The Associated Press.

In the editorial, which went to the printer last week but hasn't been published, magazine founder Lucetta Scaraffia wrote: "We are throwing in the towel because we feel surrounded by a climate of distrust and progressive de-legitimization."

Source: Fox News World

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George Clooney urges boycott of Brunei-owned hotels over nation’s gay sex penalties

FILE PHOTO - Actor, executive producer, and director George Clooney speaks on a panel for the Hulu series
FILE PHOTO - Actor, executive producer, and director George Clooney speaks on a panel for the Hulu series "Catch-22", during the Television Critics Association (TCA) Winter Press Tour in Pasadena, California, U.S., February 11, 2019. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

March 29, 2019

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Oscar-winning actor George Clooney has called for a boycott of luxury hotels, including the Beverly Hills Hotel, owned by Brunei because of the Southeast Asian nation’s plans to impose the death penalty for people having gay sex or committing adultery.

Brunei, a former British protectorate, has stated it will roll out new Sharia law punishments from April 3 that include death by stoning or whipping for sodomy, adultery, or rape.

In an opinion piece for Hollywood entertainment website Deadline.com on Thursday, Clooney wrote that “every single time we stay at or take meetings at or dine at any of these nine hotels we are putting money directly into the pockets of men who choose to stone and whip to death their own citizens for being gay or accused of adultery.”

The Brunei Investment Company owns nine hotels in the United States and Europe, including the Beverly Hills Hotel, The Dorchester in London, and the Plaza Athenee in Paris.

The Brunei Investment Company and the Brunei Prime Minister’s Office did not respond to emailed requests for comment on Friday.

Clooney, who is also a political activist and one of the most influential names in Hollywood, said he had stayed at many of the hotels himself “because I hadn’t done my homework and didn’t know who owned them.”

The “Gravity” actor acknowledged that any boycott would likely have “little effect on changing these laws.”

But, he, added “You can shame the banks, the financiers and the institutions that do business with them and choose to look the other way.”

Clooney’s call was supported by movie director Dustin Lance Black, and American singers Rufus Wainwright and Belinda Carlile under the Twitter hashtag #BoycottBrunei.

Politicians in Britain and Europe, Amnesty International and human rights groups in Asia have attacked the plans and raised concerns with Brunei.

(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; editing by Diane Craft)

Source: OANN

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Heart over head, Chinese retail investors rush into municipal bonds

Customers use smart machines inside a branch of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) in Beijing
Customers use smart machines inside a branch of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) in Beijing, China April 1, 2019. REUTERS/Florence Lo

April 4, 2019

By Shu Zhang and Samuel Shen

SINGAPORE/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – When the major port and industrial hub of Ningbo sold China’s first municipal bonds to retail investors, an amount of $43 million was snapped up in just five hours.

One buyer was Mrs Yan, an accountant from the city in the eastern province of Zhejiang, who bought 100,000 yuan ($14,900) of the bonds, impressed by a call from a local bank to “love Ningbo forever by holding Ningbo bonds”. She believes the money will be used to improve lives and the local government will not defraud her, she said.

China piloted the first batch of local government bonds targeting retail investors in recent weeks at bank outlets in six regions including Beijing and Ningbo, raising a billion dollars.

The bonds sold like hot cakes, illustrating a potentially lucrative outlet for local governments who analysts estimate have been given permission by the central government to raise between 4.5 trillion yuan to five trillion yuan ($672 billion to$746 billion) via bond sales this year alone.

While it is not clear how many of the bonds will be sold to retail investors, the debt is not without risk.

Local governments and their financing vehicles already have a mountain of debt and analysts question if many municipal authorities can generate the revenues to meet their debt obligations, especially as the central government has flagged tightening budget pressures.

Chinese credit rating agencies also give the local government bonds top-notch AAA ratings, providing no distinction for investors between the issuers and their ability to service and ultimately pay off the debt.

Still, many retail investors believe the bonds are effectively guaranteed by the central government, which has called on local authorities to finance new infrastructure projects to support an economy growing at its slowest pace in three decades.

Local governments and central governments are seen as inseparable apparatus in the Communist Party-controlled political system, even though Beijing wants regional municipalities to be accountable for their borrowings.

Local governments have more than 50 trillion yuan in debt outstanding, including through the use of off balance-sheet financing vehicles, according to Goldman Sachs, and they have been the country’s fastest-growing borrowers of recent years.

For a graphic on Shifting debt structure, see – https://tmsnrt.rs/2VaRzU4

UNDERWRITTEN BY BEIJING

Lu Ming, economics professor at Antai College of Economics & Management in Shanghai, said many local governments are making capital of the implicit guarantee of debt by the central government. “Without such a backing, no one would lend you money.”

Indeed,  Mrs. Yan, who declined to provide her given name, said she didn’t read the bond prospectus when she bought five-year Ningbo municipal bonds yielding 3.32 percent a year to maturity.

In Beijing, 65-year-old retired teacher Guo Xiulan, who pulled 50,000 yuan out of wealth management products yielding 5 percent to buy local government bonds yielding 3.25 percent, said she did not understand credit ratings and had not looked into the city’s fiscal health.

“I was born in Beijing; I live in Beijing. I feel Beijing’s construction needs the support of the ordinary people,” said Guo, who says she doesn’t understand credit ratings. The prospectus said the bond would fund shantytown redevelopment and land purchases.

Still, their expectations may not be misplaced if institutional buyers, who have also snapped up local government bonds, are anything to go by.

“At the moment, you don’t even see defaults by bonds issued by local government financing vehicles,” said Wang Ming, a manager at the trading department of Hua Chuang Securities in Shanghai. “I cannot imagine the central government would tolerate defaults in municipal bonds.”

Amanda Du, senior analyst at Moody’s Investors Service, reckons that borrowing from retail investors could potentially make local governments more accountable. Residents are generally more familiar than investors from elsewhere with local projects since they sit on their doorstep.”An individual investor in a bond that finances a shanty town redevelopment project could be living just several blocks away. This kind of supervision can pressure the government to improve governance as well as information disclosure on that project,” Du said.

MORAL HAZARD?

Investment bank CICC said investors should take a closer look at an issuer’s ability to pay off debt. The bank estimates the 23 most-indebted Chinese provinces have total debt exceeding 300 percent of their annual revenues.

Indeed, China’s finance minister, Liu Kun, warned local governments last month they would be subject to more budget pressure as the economy slows down and Beijing pushes through with tax cuts. He noted at a press conference that some regions were having difficulty paying salaries and maintaining operations and social security.

In some ways, the Chinese debt landscape is like the European Union, said economics professor Lu. Both have economic imbalances and the risk is that bailouts of weak borrowers will encourage them to simply borrow more.

“Developed countries in the EU are worried that if they help pay off debts for less developed nations such as Greece, there would be moral hazards. Greece would continue to borrow … Economically speaking, the situation is similar in China.”

(Reporting by Shu Zhang and Sam Shen; Editing by Vidya Ranganathan and Neil Fullick)

Source: OANN

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Roger Stone to judge: Let my lawyers see full Mueller report

President Trump's longtime confidant, Roger Stone, asked a federal judge Friday to compel the Justice Department to turn over a full copy of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's report on the Russia investigation as part of discovery in his criminal case.

STONE INVOKES FIFTH AMENDMENT

Stone has pleaded not guilty to charges he lied to Congress, engaged in witness tampering and obstructed a congressional investigation into possible coordination between Russia and Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign. In a court filing late Friday night, his lawyers said Stone is entitled to see the confidential report — which was submitted to the attorney general late last month — because it would help prove their allegation that there are constitutional issues with the investigation.

In a separate action, a former aide to Stone who was subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury asked a federal appeals court to determine whether he still needs to testify now that the Russia probe has concluded.

Stone's team also filed motions Friday night arguing he was selectively prosecuted, challenging the constitutionality of Mueller's appointment and that the special counsel didn't have the ability to prosecute him for lying to Congress. They allege that Congress did not formally make a referral to the Justice Department about Stone's testimony and because of that, Mueller's investigation was "a violation of the separation of powers."

In court documents, the lawyers argue they are entitled to a private disclosure of the nearly 400-page report that Mueller submitted to Attorney General William Barr late last month and said they "must be allowed to review the Report in its entirety because it contains the government's evidence and conclusions on matters essential to Stone's defense."

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"To be clear, Stone is not requesting the Report be disclosed to the world - only to his counsel so that it may aid in preparing his defense," the lawyers wrote.

Stone, who is set to go on trial in November, has maintained his innocence and blasted the special counsel's investigation as politically motivated. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges, which stem from conversations he had during the campaign about WikiLeaks, the anti-secrecy group that released material stolen from Democratic groups, including Hillary Clinton's campaign.

In a four-page letter to Congress that detailed Mueller's "principal conclusions," Barr said the special counsel did not find a criminal conspiracy between Russia and Trump associates during the campaign, but did not reach a definitive conclusion on whether Trump obstructed justice. Instead, Mueller presented evidence on both sides of the obstruction question, but Barr said he did not believe the evidence was sufficient to prove that Trump had obstructed justice.

Barr has said he expects to release a redacted version of Mueller's report next week that will be sent to Congress and made public.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Comcast in talks to sell its stake in Hulu to Disney: CNBC

FILE PHOTO: The NBC and Comcast logo are displayed on top of 30 Rockefeller Plaza, formerly known as the GE building, in midtown Manhattan in New York
FILE PHOTO: The NBC and Comcast logo are displayed on top of 30 Rockefeller Plaza, formerly known as the GE building, in midtown Manhattan in New York July 1, 2015. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

April 25, 2019

(Reuters) – Comcast Corp is in talks to sell its stake in Hulu to Walt Disney Co, CNBC reported on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.

The report comes 10 days after Hulu bought back wireless carrier AT&T Inc’s stake in the U.S. entertainment streaming service for $1.43 billion.

With Comcast’s stake, Disney will now have a 90 percent share in Hulu.

Comcast, Hulu and Disney did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

(Reporting by Vibhuti Sharma in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)

Source: OANN

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Brexit fallout on UK finance intensifies: think tank

FILE PHOTO: Rain clouds pass over Canary Wharf financial financial district in London
FILE PHOTO: Rain clouds pass over Canary Wharf financial financial district in London, Britain July 1, 2016. REUTERS/Reinhard Krause/File Photo

March 11, 2019

By Huw Jones

LONDON (Reuters) – More than 275 financial firms are moving a combined $1.2 trillion in assets and funds and thousands of staff from Britain to the European Union in readiness for Brexit at a cost of up to $4 billion, a report from a think tank said on Monday.

UK lawmakers are due to vote on Tuesday on an EU divorce settlement. But with less than three weeks to go before Brexit day on March 29, it is still unclear whether the deal will be approved, whether departure from the EU will be delayed, or whether it will happen without agreement.

The report by the New Financial think tank, one of the most detailed yet on the impact of Brexit on financial services, said Dublin alone accounted for 100 relocations, ahead of Luxembourg with 60, Paris 41, Frankfurt 40, and Amsterdam 32.

The independent think tank said half of the affected asset management firms, such as Goldman Sachs Investment Management, Morgan Stanley Investment Management and Vanguard, had chosen Dublin, with Luxembourg the next port of call, attracting firms like Schroders, JP Morgan Wealth Management and Aviva Investors.

Nearly 90 percent of all firms moving to Frankfurt are banks, while two-thirds of those going to Amsterdam are trading platforms or brokers. Paris is carving out a niche for markets and trading operations of banks and attracting a broad spread of firms.

New Financial identified 5,000 expected staff moves or local hires, a figure that is expected to rise in coming years.

A better measure of Brexit’s impact is the scale of assets and funds being transferred, it said.

Ten large banks and investment banks are together moving 800 billion pounds of assets from Britain – or 10 percent of banking assets in the country. A small selection of insurers have shifted a combined 35 billion pounds in assets, and a handful of asset managers have moved a total of 65 billion pounds in funds.

William Wright, founder and managing director of New Financial, said the hit to London was bigger than expected and would get worse.

“Business will continue to leak from London to the EU, with more activity being booked through local subsidiaries,” Wright said.

“This will reduce the UK’s influence in European banking and finance, reduce tax receipts from the industry, and reduce financial services exports to the EU.”

A 10 percent shift in banking and finance activity would cut UK tax receipts by about 1 percent, the report said.

Relocations have cost firms $3 billion to $4 billion, which will be passed on to customers and shareholders, the report said.

But the breadth and depth of relocations so far, combined with pacts between regulators in Britain and the EU, mean the industry is well prepared for whatever form Brexit takes, New Financial said.

London will remain the dominant financial center for the foreseeable future, but other European cities will chip away at London’s lead over time, it added.

New Financial chart: https://tmsnrt.rs/2NMO9DS

(Reporting by Huw Jones; Editing by Mark Potter)

Source: OANN

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Security Council members urge Yemen parties to implement peace deal

FILE PHOTO: Houthi allied police troopers secure a street in Hodeidah
FILE PHOTO: Houthi allied police troopers secure a street in Hodeidah, Yemen December 31, 2018. REUTERS/Abduljabbar Zeyad/File Photo

March 12, 2019

ADEN (Reuters) – The five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council urged Yemen’s warring parties on Tuesday to implement a peace deal in the port city of Hodeidah, a move they hope will lead to an end of the four-year-old conflict.

The Chinese, French, Russian, British and U.S. ambassadors to Yemen said in a statement they were “extremely concerned” that the agreement reached in Stockholm in December had not been implemented.

The Houthi group and the Saudi-backed government agreed on a ceasefire and troop withdrawal in Hodeidah, an exchange of prisoners, and the reopening of humanitarian corridors to help millions of starving Yemenis, with international monitors to oversee things.

“We … urge both parties to begin implementation of the proposal in good faith without further delay and without seeking to exploit the redeployments by the other side,” they said.

“We call on all sides to ensure the U.N. monitoring mission can carry out its work safely and without interference.”

The Stockholm agreement stalled with each side worrying the other would take advantage of the withdrawal to gain ground.

The formation of a local authority to take control of Hodeidah after the troop withdrawal, agreed in the truce deal, also remains a sticking point.

The truce in Hodeidah came into force on Dec. 18 and has largely held but violence has escalated in other regions.

Air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition killed at least 22 civilians, including women and children, in a village in northern Yemen this week, the United Nations said.

Saudi Arabia is leading the Western-backed Sunni Muslim coalition that first intervened in Yemen in 2015 to try to restore Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi’s ousted government.

Western nations have pressed for an end to the war following increased scrutiny after the murder of prominent Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The conflict is widely seen as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran. The Houthis deny receiving help from Tehran and say their revolution is against corruption.

(Reporting By Mohamed Ghobari, writing by Aziz El Yaakoubi, editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Source: OANN

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

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

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

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

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

School authorities instituted a similar measure in 2016.

Source: Fox News World

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

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

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

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

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

Source: Fox News World

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

April 26, 2019

By Ryan Woo

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

NEED FOR CASH

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

STATE COMPETITION

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Source: OANN

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

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

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

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

Source: Fox News World

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

April 26, 2019

By Patricia Weiss and Ludwig Burger

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Bayer is appealing or plans to appeal the verdicts.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Source: OANN

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