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Turkish prosecutor seeks life sentences for 16 over 2013 Gezi protests: state media

FILE PHOTO: A protester wears a gas mask as riot police fire tear gas during clashes with riot police at Istiklal Street in central Istanbul
FILE PHOTO: A protester wears a gas mask as riot police fire tear gas during clashes with riot police at Istiklal Street in central Istanbul late July 13, 2013. REUTERS/Umit Bektas/File Photo

February 20, 2019

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – A Turkish prosecutor is seeking aggravated life sentences for 16 defendants including businessman Osman Kavala for financing widespread protests around Turkey in 2013 and attempting to overthrow the government, state media said on Wednesday.

Hundreds of thousands of people marched in Istanbul in 2013 to protest against a plan to build a replica of an Ottoman barracks on Gezi park in the city center. The protests turned into nationwide anti-government demonstrations and amounted to a direct challenge to President Tayyip Erdogan’s government.

Authorities recently renewed their efforts to investigate the protests, a move opposition figures said was designed to polarize public opinion and rally support for Erdogan ahead of local elections next month.

Erdogan says the protests were organized and financed by Kavala, a businessman, and rights activists. Kavala has been in pre-trial detention in connection with the investigation for more than 15 months. He has denied the claim against him.

The indictment against Kavala was delivered to the court on Wednesday, according to state broadcaster TRT, which added that the investigation into the Gezi protests had been completed.

TRT said the defendants included famous actor Mehmet Ali Alabora, who was vocal during the protests, and journalist Can Dundar, who fled abroad after being sentenced to jail for over espionage charges and is being tried in absentia in other cases.

In November, police detained more than a dozen people as part of the investigation into the Gezi protests, while George Soros’s Open Society Foundation said it would cease operations in Turkey after it became a target of the investigation.

(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu and Ece Toksabay Writing by Ali Kucukgocmen, Editing by William Maclean)

Source: OANN

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Trump slams Democrats for campaigning on 'seductive' socialist policies

President Trump, in a new interview, tore into Democrats for campaigning on what he called “seductive” socialist policies despite potentially dire consequences.

Trump offered up the stinging rebuke during a wide-ranging interview published Monday night.

He said socialist policies are “seductive” and “easy” for politicians to campaign on, but warned about what would happen if they are put in place.

SANDERS SAYS HIS IDEAS ARE NOW BEING INVOKED BY DEM CANDIDATES 'FROM SCHOOL BOARD TO PRESIDENT'

“You always have to be very careful, because socialism is easy to campaign on but tough to govern on, because the country goes down the tubes,” Trump told conservative website Breitbart.

“But when you tell people free medical, free education, no more student loans—all of the different things that you say—it’s a great thing to campaign on, but then ten years later the country is down the tubes. It’s gone.

“So, you always have to be careful with it, because you know you talk about single-payer, it sounds very seductive—single-payer—say what you want, but it’s a very seductive thing. But it means you’re not going to have good healthcare, it means the country is not going to be able to afford it.”

The president then suggested the 2020 election could come down to a “referendum on socialism versus capitalism,” according to the website.

'PAWN STARS' HOST RICK HARRISON SLAMS SOCIALISM: 'THERE'S NO POINT IN WORKING HARD'

Trump’s remarks come shortly after Vice President Pence accused Democrats of openly advocating for socialism with far-left policies such as "Medicare-for-all" and the Green New Deal -- a system he said had “impoverished millions of people around the world.”

Speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference earlier this month, Pence said: “Under the guise of Medicare-for-all and a Green New Deal, Democrats are embracing the same tired economic theories that have impoverished nations and stifled the liberties of millions over the past century.

“That system is socialism.”

He pointed in particular to the Democratic 2020 presidential candidates, many of whom have backed the Green New Deal and Medicare-for-all in some form, and accused them of having “papered over the failed policies of socialism with bumper-sticker slogans and slick social media campaigns.”

PELOSI SAYS SHE'S OPPOSED TO IMPEACHING TRUMP: 'HE'S JUST NOT WORTH IT'

The recent rise and dominance of a hard-left faction in the Democratic Party has opened the door for conservatives to again sound those warnings -- especially as figures such as Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., have openly embraced the label of “democratic socialism."

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The Green New Deal would seek to eliminate fossil fuels in favor of 100 percent renewable energy, as well as overhaul America’s economy with universal health care, job guarantee programs and other costly items. Meanwhile, a number have called for Medicare-for-all plans, with both Sens. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., and Sanders not backing away from the idea that their proposals would eliminate private insurance.

Fox News' Adam Shaw contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Exclusive: Indian antitrust watchdog raids Glencore business, others over pulse prices – sources

FILE PHOTO: The logo of commodities trader Glencore is pictured in Baar
FILE PHOTO: The logo of commodities trader Glencore is pictured in front of the company's headquarters in Baar, Switzerland, July 18, 2017. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann/File Photo

March 16, 2019

By Aditya Kalra and Mayank Bhardwaj

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India’s antitrust watchdog raided units of global commodities trader Glencore and two other firms in Mumbai on Saturday in an inquiry into alleged collusion on the price of pulses, four sources with knowledge of the raids told Reuters.

More than 25 antitrust officials carried out the raids at the offices of local units of Glencore and Africa’s Export Trading Group, and India’s Edelweiss group which previously had a commodities business, two government sources told Reuters.

The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has been investigating allegations that the companies formed a cartel to discuss the pricing of pulses while importing and selling them in the Indian market at higher prices in 2015 and 2016, when India faced an acute shortage, the sources said.

A spokesman for Switzerland-based Glencore, Charles Watenphul, declined to comment, while India’s Edelweiss, which sold its commodities trading business in November 2016, and the Export Trading Group did not respond to requests for comment.

Two years of drought pushed up prices of pulses such as chickpeas and black grams, which are a staple of Indian cuisine, in 2015 and forced New Delhi to offer duty-free imports, encouraging foreign and Indian traders who imported pulses to sell locally.

“The collusion by these companies led to higher prices of pulses,” one of the government sources said, adding that the CCI’s inquiry started three months ago.

The investigation will also assess whether the companies have continued their alleged collusion even after the prices of pulses stabilized in recent years, the source said.

IMPORT PRICES

The raids on five company offices in India’s financial capital began on Friday and were concluded on Saturday.

Antitrust officials collected evidence, including documents and e-mails, and questioned company officials during the raids, a second government source said.

Another source, an industry executive, told Reuters that CCI’s search involved going through company records at Glencore’s office in Mumbai, confirming it was part of the watchdog’s probe into accusations of fixing import prices.

The drought during 2015 wilted crops and exacerbated shortages of food such as protein-rich pulses and India, which consumes about 22 million tonnes of pulses annually, faced a shortfall of 7-8 million tonnes in 2015-16.

The CCI’s raids on commodities traders mark only its fourth such search operation in its near 10-year history. They can only be conducted with approval from a judge.

In October, the CCI raided the offices of global brewers such as Carlsberg and Anheuser Busch InBev and found e-mails which allegedly showed violations of Indian anti-trust laws. (https://reut.rs/2JeQKEs)

The brewing companies have pleaded leniency under a CCI program, Reuters has reported.

(Reporting by Aditya Kalra and Mayank Bhardwaj; Additional reporting by Rajendra Jadhav and Aditi Shah; Editing by Alexander Smith)

Source: OANN

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Reform the World Bank, IMF for changing world, Merkel says

German Chancellor Merkel attends a news conference following a meeting of the heads of international economy and finance organisations at the Chancellery in Berlin
FILE PHOTO: German Chancellor Angela Merkel attends a news conference following a meeting of the heads of international economy and finance organisations at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany, April 10, 2017. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke

March 28, 2019

BERLIN (Reuters) – German Chancellor Angela Merkel called on Thursday for reforms to the Washington-based international lending institutions that lie at the heart of the global financial system to adapt them to a rapidly changing world.

The World Bank needed a capital increase, she said, and the IMF a change to the quotas that allocate voting rights to members. Merkel has several times called in recent days for reforms to international organisations to accommodate the rapid rise of China.

“Things have to happen that we’ve been waiting for for years,” she said at a joint briefing she held with Klaus Schwab, head of the World Economic Forum.

(Reporting by Thomas Escritt; Editing by Michelle Martin)

Source: OANN

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Keystone Pipeline Opponents Ask Judge to Strike Down Trump’s Permit

Opponents of the long-stalled Keystone XL oil pipeline asked a federal court Friday in a lawsuit to declare President Donald Trump acted illegally when he issued a new permit for the project in a bid to get around an earlier court ruling.

In November, U.S. District Judge Brian Morris ruled that the Trump administration did not fully consider potential oil spills and other impacts when it approved the pipeline in 2017.

Trump's new permit, issued last week, is intended to circumvent that ruling and kick-start the proposal to ship crude oil from the tar sands of western Canada to U.S. refineries.

White House officials have said the presidential permit is immune from court review. But legal experts say that's an open question, and the case could further test the limits of Trump's use of presidential power to get his way.

Unlike previous orders from Trump involving immigration and other matters, his action on Keystone XL came after a court already had weighed in and blocked the administration's plans.

"This is somewhat dumbfounding, the idea that a president would claim he can just say, 'Never mind, I unilaterally call a do-over,'" said William Buzbee, a constitutional scholar and professor at Georgetown University Law Center.

The pipeline proposed by Calgary-based TransCanada has become a flashpoint in the debate over fossil fuel use and climate change.

Opponents say burning crude from the tar sands of Western Canada would make climate change worse. The $8 billion project's supporters say it would create thousands of jobs and could be operated safely.

The line would carry up to 830,000 barrels (35 million gallons) of crude daily along a 1,184-mile (1,900-kilometer) path from Canada to Nebraska.

Stephan Volker, an attorney for the environmental groups that filed Friday's lawsuit, said Trump was trying to "evade the rule of law" with the new permit.

"We have confidence that the federal courts_long the protectors of our civil liberties_will once again rise to the challenge and enforce the Constitution and the laws of this land," Volker said.

The White House said in a statement that under the new order, federal officials still would conduct environmental reviews of the project.

However, officials said those would be carried out by agencies other than the State Department, which under Morris' November order would have been forced to conduct another extensive study that could have taken months to complete.

TransCanada spokesman Matthew John said the administration's action "clearly demonstrates to the courts that the permit is (the) product of presidential decision-making and should not be subject to additional environmental review."

Friday's lawsuit was filed in Morris' court, meaning he's likely to get the first opportunity at addressing the legality of Trump's new order. Judges typically do not respond favorably to perceived end runs around their decisions, said Carl Tobias with the University of Richmond law school.

Another legal expert, Kathryn Watts at the University of Washington, said it's unclear where the case will lead. Trump's permit wades into "uncharted, unsettled" legal territory, she said.

The pipeline's route passes through the ancestral homelands of the Rosebud Sioux in central South Dakota and the Gros Ventre and Assiniboine Tribes in Montana.

Earlier this week, a court granted the tribes' request to intervene in an appeal of Morris' November ruling that was filed by TransCanada. That case is pending before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Tribal officials contend a spill from the line could damage a South Dakota water supply system that serves more than 51,000 people including on the Rosebud, Pine Ridge and Lower Brule Indian Reservations.

An existing TransCanada pipeline, also called Keystone, suffered a 2017 spill that released almost 10,000 barrels (407,000 gallons) of oil near Amherst, South Dakota.

Source: NewsMax Politics

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Yemen’s parties agree to start stalled troop withdrawal from main port

FILE PHOTO: Houthi militants ride on the back of a truck as they withdraw, part of a U.N.-sponsored peace agreement signed in Sweden earlier this month, from the Red Sea city of Hodeidah
FILE PHOTO: Houthi militants ride on the back of a truck as they withdraw, part of a U.N.-sponsored peace agreement signed in Sweden earlier this month, from the Red Sea city of Hodeidah, Yemen December 29, 2018. REUTERS/Abduljabbar Zeyad/File Photo

February 18, 2019

By Aziz El Yaakoubi and Michelle Nichols

RIYADH/UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Yemen’s warring parties have agreed to start withdrawing forces from the main port of Hodeidah under a U.N.-sponsored deal, the United Nations said, following weeks of diplomacy to salvage a pact that stalled over control of the Red Sea city.

The Iran-aligned Houthi movement and the Saudi-backed government agreed in talks in December to withdraw troops by Jan. 7 from Hodeidah – a lifeline for millions facing famine – under a truce accord aimed at averting a full-scale assault on the port and paving the way for negotiations to end the four-year-old war.

“The parties reached an agreement on Phase 1 of the mutual redeployment of forces,” the U.N. spokesman’s office said in a statement without giving details on what was agreed.

Under Phase 1, the Houthis would withdraw from the ports of Hodeidah, Saleef, used for grains, and Ras Isa, used for oil. This would be met by a retreat of Saudi-led coalition forces from the eastern outskirts of Hodeidah, where battles raged before a ceasefire went into effect on Dec. 18.

The Houthis control Hodeidah, the main entry point for the bulk of Yemen’s commercial and aid imports, while other Yemeni forces backed by the Saudi-led coalition loyal to ousted President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi are massed on the outskirts.

The U.N. statement said the two sides also agreed “in principle” on Phase 2, entailing full redeployment of both parties’ forces in Hodeidah province.

Two sources involved in the negotiations, who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of discussions, said both sides had yet to agree on a withdrawal timeline or on a mechanism for local forces to take over security at the ports and city.

“The U.N. is still discussing how to reduce the gap between the two sides on how to choose the forces that will control the city,” one source told Reuters.

The parties could decide within 7-10 days on where they would re-position forces, said the other source, adding that Houthi fighters could pull back as far as 20 km (15 miles) from the port.

HUMANITARIAN CORRIDORS

Disagreement on withdrawal had delayed opening humanitarian corridors needed to reach 10 million people on the brink of starvation in Yemen, the poorest country in the Arabian Peninsula.

Under the first phase, the two sides agreed to reopen main roads linking Hodeidah to the Houthi-held capital Sanaa and in Yemen’s third city of Taiz, a U.N. source told Reuters.

They also agreed to enable access to Red Sea Mills, which holds some 50,000 tonnes of World Food Programme grain, enough to feed 3.7 million people for a month, the source said. Access to the site has been cut off since September due to fighting.

“One of the problems with this process so far has been that there are political agreements on how to make progress, but then nothing happens on the ground,” said Elizabeth Dickinson, a senior analyst at International Crisis Group.

“Now we theoretically have this agreement to move forward, we need to see someone move on the ground,” she said.

The Hodeidah truce has largely been respected but there have been intermittent skirmishes in flashpoints on the city’s edges.

Hodeidah became the focus of the war last year when the coalition twice launched an offensive to seize the port and weaken the Houthis by cutting of their main supply line.

The Sunni Muslim alliance led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates intervened in 2015 to restore Hadi’s internationally recognized government that was ousted from power in Sanaa in late 2014.

The Houthis control most urban centers while Hadi’s government is based in the southern port of Aden and controls some coastal towns.

Western nations, some of which supply arms and intelligence to the coalition, have pressed for an end to the war that has killed tens of thousands of people.

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

(Additional reporting by Michelle Nichols at the United Nations and Lisa Barrington in Dubai; Writing by Arshad Mohammed and Aziz El Yaakoubi; Editing by Angus MacSwan)

Source: OANN

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Athletics: U.N.-backed Semenya optimistic of CAS success in battle with IAAF

Athletics - Diamond League - Monaco
FILE PHOTO: Athletics - Diamond League - Monaco - Stade Louis II, Monaco - July 20, 2018 South Africa's Caster Semenya wins the Women's 800m REUTERS/Eric Gaillard

March 22, 2019

CAPE TOWN (Reuters) – Double Olympic 800-metres champion Caster Semenya is “optimistic” of success in her appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) over eligibility regulations in athletics for female classification.

The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) contends that Semenya and other female athletes that are classed as having differences in sexual development (DSDs) gain an unfair advantage due to their higher testosterone levels, but only in races between 400 and 1,000-metres.

Under its new rules, which are currently suspended pending the outcome of the CAS case, athletes classed as having DSDs must medically reduce their blood testosterone level for a continuous period of six months before they can compete.

“Caster Semenya remains optimistic that CAS will declare the IAAF’s Regulations unlawful, invalid and of no effect,” Semenya’s lawyers said in a statement on Friday, confirming at the same time that the athlete had made additional submissions to CAS following “post-hearing communications from the IAAF”.

They did not go into detail as to what those submissions were in relation to.

Semenya received support from the United Nations this week as they adopted a resolution tabled by South Africa “aimed at eliminating discrimination against women and girls in sport, giving significant global weight from a human rights perspective to Caster Semenya’s case”, according to a media release from the South African government.

The resolution was co-sponsored by Eswatini (formerly known as Swaziland), Mozambique, Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Burundi, India, Iceland and Canada.

“The international campaign to preserve Caster’s right to participate in global sports is a struggle for all women in the world against discrimination, sexism, and patriarchy,” South Africa’s minister of international relations and cooperation, Lindiwe Sisulu, said.

CAS has called the hearing one of its most pivotal cases that could have a wide reaching consequence, not just for the future of athletics, but sport in general.

The court postponed its verdict from the five-day hearing in February, due to be delivered next week, until the end of April, with no fixed date set.

The IAAF has said that, given the delay, it would alter the six-month rule for the world championships in Qatar in September and introduce a “special transitional period” so that affected athletes could still compete.

It added that, assuming its new regulations were upheld, affected athletes who comply with the new limit from one week after the final CAS decision until the start of the world championships in September would be allowed to take part.

(Reporting by Nick Said; Editing by Toby Davis)

Source: OANN

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Joe Biden’s brain surgeon said his former patient is “totally in the clear” as speculation over the candidate’s health — with Biden possibly becoming the oldest president in U.S. history — is likely to become a campaign issue.

The former vice president, who had been perceived by many as the strongest potential contender for the Democratic Party’s 2020 presidential nomination, formally announced his candidacy Thursday.

But Biden’s age – 76 – is expected to become a source of attacks from a younger generation of Democrats not because of obvious generational differences, but possibly for actual health concerns if Biden gets into office.

WHY THE MEDIA ARE CONVINCED JOE BIDEN WILL IMPLODE

Biden himself agreed last year that “it’s totally legitimate” for people to ask questions about his health if he decides to run for president, given his medical history — which has included brain surgery in 1988.

“I think they’re gonna judge me on my vitality,” Biden told “CBS This Morning.” “Can I still run up the steps of Air Force Two? Am I still in good shape? Am I – do I have all my faculties? Am I energetic? I think it’s totally legitimate people ask those questions.”

“I think they’re gonna judge me on my vitality. …  I think it’s totally legitimate [that] people ask those questions.”

— Joe Biden

But Dr. Neal Kassell, the neurosurgeon who operated on Biden for an aneurysm three decades ago, told the Washington Examiner that Biden appears to be “totally in the clear” — and even joked that the operation made Biden “better than how he was.”

“Joe Biden of all of the politicians in Washington is the only one that I’m certain has a brain, because I have seen it,” Kassell said. “That’s more than I can say about all the other candidates or the incumbents.”

“Joe Biden of all of the politicians in Washington is the only one that I’m certain has a brain, because I have seen it.”

— Dr. Neal Kassell

BIDEN’S CLAIM HE DIDN’T WANT OBAMA TO ENDORSE TRIGGERS MOCKERY

At the same time, however, Biden hasn’t been forthcoming about his health at least since 2008 when he released his medical records as a vice presidential candidate. The disclosure that time revealed some fairly minor issues such as an irregular heartbeat in addition to detailing previous operations, including removing a benign polyp during a colonoscopy in 1996, the outlet reported.

It remains unclear if Biden had more aneurysms. Some medical experts say that people who have had an aneurysm can have another one.

An aneurysm, or a weakening of an artery wall, can lead to a rupture and internal bleeding, potentially placing a patient’s life in jeopardy.

Biden won’t be the only Democrat grappling with old age. Sen. Bernie Sanders, another 2020 frontrunner, is currently 77 years old and agreed with Biden last year that their ages will be an issue in the race.

“It’s part of a discussion, but it has to be part of an overall view of what somebody is and what somebody has accomplished,” Sanders told Politico.

“Look, you’ve got people who are 50 years of age who are not well, right? You’ve got people who are 90 years of age who are going to work every day, doing excellent work. And obviously, age is a factor. But it depends on the overall health and wellbeing of the individual.”

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Sanders released his medical records in 2016, with a Senate physician saying in a letter that the senator was “in overall very good health.”

Source: Fox News Politics

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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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