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6057c1beaeef1aa894774a831d73464c | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security-emergency/egypt-to-extend-state-of-emergency-for-three-months-official-gazette-idUSKBN1HK2ZO | Egypt to extend state of emergency for three months: official gazette | Egypt to extend state of emergency for three months: official gazette
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
A man carries breads on his head along a busy street near a banner for Egypt's President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi from the campaign titled “Alashan Tabneeha” (So You Can Build It) after election results in Cairo, Egypt April 3, 2018. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt is to extend its nationwide state of emergency for three months from April, the official gazette said early on Saturday.
Egypt first imposed the current state of emergency in April 2017 after two church bombings killed at least 45 people. It was extended in July and again in October then January.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi issued a decree on Saturday to extend a curfew already in place in a new declaration.
The latest extension was to allow security forces to “take (measures) necessary to confront the dangers and funding of terrorism and safeguard security in all parts of the country,” the official gazette said.
Egypt faces an Islamic State insurgency in the remote North Sinai region that has killed hundreds of soldiers and policemen in recent years and has expanded to include attacks on civilians.
Other Islamists operating in the western desert bordering Libya have also attacked security forces.
Egypt also extended a curfew on parts of North Sinai that included areas of the border town of Rafah near Gaza from 7 p.m. to 6 a.m. and around EL-Arish from 1.am. to 5 a.m., the official gazette said.
(This version of the story has been refiled to add dropped date in the first paragraph)
Reporting by Mohamed El-Sherif; Editing by Sandra MalerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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ebb50d0d4b9124cbd19064e7f0fb1c8d | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security-idUSKBN19S13G | At least 23 Egyptian soldiers killed in deadliest Sinai attack in years | At least 23 Egyptian soldiers killed in deadliest Sinai attack in years
By Ahmed Mohamed Hassan, Yusri Mohamed4 Min Read
CAIRO/ISMAILIA, Egypt (Reuters) - At least 23 Egyptian soldiers were killed when suicide car bombs tore through two military checkpoints in North Sinai on Friday, security sources said, an attack claimed by Islamic State that marks one of the bloodiest assaults on security forces in years.
Islamic State militants are waging an insurgency in the rugged, thinly populated Sinai Peninsula. They have killed hundreds of soldiers and police since 2013, when the military ousted Islamist President Mohamed Mursi after mass protests against his rule.
The two cars blew up at two checkpoints outside of a military compound just south of Rafah, on the border with the Gaza Strip, the security sources said.
In a statement Islamic State said its fighters targeted the compound because the military was preparing to launch operations against the Sunni Muslim militant group from there.
The security sources said another 26 soldiers were injured in Friday’s attacks. The military put the casualties lower, saying the attacks had killed and injured a total of 26 soldiers, without providing a breakdown of the figure.
The attack is the most severe in Sinai since at least July 2015, when Islamic State militants assaulted simultaneously a slew of checkpoints and military sites around North Sinai. At least 17 soldiers were killed, according to an official tally.
Friday’s bombings present a challenge for general-turned-president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who describes Islamist militancy as an existential threat and himself as a bulwark against extremism in a region beset by violence and war.
Related CoverageIslamic State claims car bomb attacks on military checkpoints in Egypt's Sinai: statement
COUNTER-STRIKE
Security sources described Friday’s attack as a coordinated strike, with car bombs blowing apart checkpoints as gunmen in four-wheel drive vehicles shot down soldiers running for cover.
Militants in armored vehicles meanwhile fired rocket propelled grenades at a military site just beyond the checkpoint, the sources said.
The military carried out a counter-attack almost immediately after, deploying fighter jets to kill over 40 militants suspected of involvement and destroying six of their vehicles, according to a video released by the military showing aerial footage of air strikes.
The military posted photos of five dead militants in blood-soaked fatigues lying in the sand. It did not name their affiliation.
“Law enforcement forces in North Sinai succeeded in thwarting a terrorist attack on some checkpoints south of Rafah,” a military statement said.
The bloody assault comes as militant attacks have increasingly shifted beyond the Sinai deep into Egypt’s heartland, often targeting minority Coptic Christians.
Separately on Friday, a homeland security officer was shot dead outside his home in Qalubiya, a province just north of Cairo, while on his way to Friday prayers, an Interior Ministry statement said.
That attack was later claimed by the Hasam Movement, a militant group that has claimed several attacks around Cairo targeting judges and policemen since last year.
Responding to the Sinai attack, Prime Minister Sherif Ismail stressed the need for countries to unite against those who support terrorism and to “dry up their sources of funding,” an allusion to Qatar.
Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain broke diplomatic relations with Qatar last month and are now boycotting the Gulf Arab state, which they accuse of supporting terrorism and allying with regional foe Iran. Qatar denies this.
Reporting by Ahmed Mohamed Hassan and Yusri Mohamed in Ismailia; Additional reporting by Omar Fahmy, Ali Abdelaty, and Ahmed Tolba in Cairo; Writing by Eric Knecht; Editing by Larry King and Chris ReeseOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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5f5d46cf969fb15309c5211ecca86985 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security-idUSKCN1UY2NI | Egypt identifies perpetrator behind Monday's hospital car bombing | Egypt identifies perpetrator behind Monday's hospital car bombing
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt’s interior ministry said on Thursday it has identified the perpetrator behind a car bombing outside Cairo’s main cancer hospital this week that killed more than 20 and injured dozens.
It also said security forces killed 17 suspected militants on Thursday morning during raids on their hideouts in three separate incidents in Helwan, Cairo and in the province of Fayoum, south of Cairo.
The ministry said the bomber was a member of the militant group Hasm and identified him as fugitive 24-year-old Abdel Rahman Khaled Mahmoud Abdel Rahman.
“This was confirmed following the DNA testing of the remains that were found at the site of the accident and based on the comparison with members of his family’s (DNA),” the statement said.
On Monday, a car packed with explosives was driving against traffic and blew up outside the hospital.
It said the militants targeted on Thursday were members of “Hasm’s terrorist cluster cell.”
Egypt accuses Hasm, which emerged in 2016 and has claimed several attacks, of being a wing of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood. Egypt’s oldest Islamist movement denies this and says it seeks change only through peaceful means.
The ministry said the suspects were killed in gun battles, but did not elaborate on their identity or whether there had been any casualties or injuries among the security forces.
Weapons and explosives were found at the scene of the shootouts, the ministry said.
A Reuters investigation in April found that Egyptian security forces had shot dead hundreds of suspected militants in what the Interior Ministry said were gun battles, but which bereaved families said were extrajudicial executions.
Human rights organizations have accused Egypt of carrying out extrajudicial executions and of trying civilians in military courts as part of the crackdown.
President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has said the matter of human rights should be treated in the context of regional turbulence and the struggle against terrorism. Strong security measures, he has said, are needed to stabilise Egypt after the turmoil that followed the country’s 2011 uprising.
Egypt’s military and police launched a major campaign against militant groups in 2018, focusing on the Sinai Peninsula as well as southern areas and the border with Libya.
Reporting by Haitham Ahmed, writing by Amina Ismail; Editing by Dan GreblerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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164dac9e47d720b257c986e02ffa7550 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security-israel/islamic-state-claims-two-rockets-fired-from-sinai-into-israel-idUSKBN1CL16J | Islamic State claims two rockets fired from Sinai into Israel | Islamic State claims two rockets fired from Sinai into Israel
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - Islamic state has claimed responsibility for two rockets fired on Sunday from Egypt’s Sinai peninsula into Israel, an official statement by the group said on Monday.
“The fighters confronted Israeli jets that flew above the state and targeted the Eshkol compound with two Grad rockets,” the statement said.
There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage and the group did not provide evidence for its claim.
Reporting by Omar Fahmy; Writing by Nadine Awadalla; Editing by Matthew Mpoke BiggOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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ec03c41ab4bae2c0609f0ce170830241 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security/at-least-three-killed-in-attack-on-church-south-of-cairo-security-sources-idUSKBN1EN0SX?il=0 | Gunman kills 11 in attacks on Coptic church, Christian-owned shop in Egypt | Gunman kills 11 in attacks on Coptic church, Christian-owned shop in Egypt
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - A gunman killed at least 11 people on Friday in attacks on a Coptic Orthodox church and a Christian-owned shop near Cairo before he was wounded and arrested, the Egyptian interior ministry and church officials said.
Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks, in a statement carried out by its Amaq news agency, though it provided no evidence for the claim.
Police have stepped up security measures around churches ahead of Coptic Christmas celebrations on Jan. 7, deploying officers outside Christian places of worship and setting up metal detectors at some of the bigger churches.
Islamist militants have claimed several attacks on Egypt’s large Christian minority in recent years, including two bombings on Palm Sunday in April and a blast at Cairo’s largest Coptic cathedral in December 2016 that killed 28 people.
Earlier reports by security sources and state media said at least two attackers were involved in Friday’s attack, and that one was shot dead and another fled the scene. The interior ministry did not explain the reason for the different accounts.
The Coptic Church said the gunman first shot at a Christian-owned shop 4 km (3 miles) away, killing two people, before proceeding to the Mar Mina church in the southern Cairo suburb of Helwan. The Interior Ministry said he opened fire at the entrance to the site and tried to throw an explosive device.
The gunman killed at least nine people, including a policeman, at the church, according to Interior Ministry and Coptic Church accounts. The Church said a young woman had died later from her wounds, bringing the civilian death toll at the church to eight.
Related CoverageTrump condemns attack near Cairo in call with Egypt's Sisi
The ministry said security forces had “immediately dealt with the (attacker) and arrested him after he was wounded.” It added, “Legal measures have been taken,” without elaborating.
GUNMAN IDENTIFIED
Investigators have identified the gunman, it said, adding that he had carried out several attacks since last year. Egypt is also grappling with a deadly Islamic State insurgency in the North Sinai region.
The health ministry said five people had been wounded, including two women who it said were in a serious condition.
A joint funeral for eight of those killed was held on Friday evening at the Virgin Mary church in Helwan.
The head of the Coptic Church, Pope Tawadros II, led mourning for the victims. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi also offered his condolences to the families and ordered security forces to increase safety measures at sensitive sites, his office said in a statement.
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Cairo’s state prosecutor said that an investigation had been launched into the incident.
“The shooting began at 10:30 a.m. and carried on for more than 15 minutes ... There was more than one attacker,” Mohammed Hussein Abdelhadi, who lives close to the church, told Reuters.
A witness who did not want to give his name said the policeman was killed while he was closing the church gate to stop the gunman getting in.
Reporting by Ahmed Mohamed Hassan, Amr Abdallah and Mostafa Hashem; Editing by Gareth JonesOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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45e6f1d9e0a7fa3fc442c63764248f0b | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security/egypt-launches-air-raids-on-libya-after-christians-killed-idUSKBN18M10P | Egypt launches air raids on Libya after Christians killed | Egypt launches air raids on Libya after Christians killed
By Ahmed Aboulenein6 Min Read
MINYA, Egypt (Reuters) - Egyptian fighter jets carried out strikes on Friday directed at camps in Libya which Cairo says have been training militants who killed dozens of Christians earlier in the day.
President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said he had ordered strikes against what he called terrorist camps, declaring in a televised address that states that sponsored terrorism would be punished.
Egyptian military sources said six strikes took place near Derna in eastern Libya at around sundown, hours after masked gunmen attacked a group of Coptic Christians traveling to a monastery in southern Egypt, killing 29 and wounding 24.
The Egyptian military said the operation was ongoing and had been undertaken once it had been ascertained that the camps had produced the gunmen behind the attack on the Coptic Christians in Minya, southern Egypt, on Friday morning.
“The terrorist incident that took place today will not pass unnoticed,” Sisi said. “We are currently targeting the camps where the terrorists are trained.”
He said Egypt would not hesitate to carry out further strikes against camps that trained people to carry out operations against Egypt, whether those camps were inside or outside the country.
Egyptian military footage of pilots being briefed and war planes taking off was shown on state television.
East Libyan forces said they participated in the air strikes, which had targeted forces linked to al-Qaeda at a number of sites, and would be followed by a ground operation.
A resident in Derna heard four powerful explosions, and told Reuters that the strikes had targeted camps used by fighters belonging to the Majlis al-Shura militant group.
Majlis al-Shura spokesman Mohamed al-Mansouri said in a video posted online that the Egyptian air strikes did not hit any of the group’s camps, but instead hit civilian areas.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack on the Christians, which followed a series of church bombings claimed by Islamic State in a campaign of violence against the Copts.
Related CoverageGrief, rage in Egyptian church after Copts attacked by gunmen
Islamic State supporters reposted videos from earlier this year urging violence against the Copts in Egypt.
At a nearby village, thousands later attended a funeral service that turned into an angry protest against the authorities’ failure to protect Christians.
“We will avenge them or die like them,” mourners said, while marching with a giant wooden cross.
GUNFIRE AND BLOOD
Eyewitnesses said masked men opened fire after stopping the Christians, who were in a bus and other vehicles on a desert road. Local TV channels showed a bus apparently raked by gunfire and smeared with blood.
Clothes and shoes could be seen lying in and around the bus, while the bodies of some of the victims lay in the sand nearby, covered with black sheets.
Eyewitnesses said three vehicles were attacked. First to be hit was a vehicle taking children to the monastery as part of a church-organized trip, and another vehicle taking families there.
The gunmen boarded the vehicles and shot all the men and took all the women’s gold jewelry. They then shot women and children in the legs.
When one of the gunmen’s vehicles got a flat tire they stopped a truck carrying Christian workers, shot them, and took the truck.
One of the gunmen recorded the attack on the Copts with a video camera, eyewitnesses said.
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The attack took place on a road leading to the monastery of Saint Samuel the Confessor in Minya province, which is home to a sizeable Christian minority.
Security forces launched a hunt for the attackers, setting up dozens of checkpoints and patrols on the desert road.
Police armed with assault rifles formed a security perimeter around the attack site while officials from the public prosecutor’s office gathered evidence. Heavily armed special forces arrived later wearing face masks and body armor.
The injured were taken to local hospitals and some were being transported to Cairo. The Health Ministry said that among those injured were two children aged two.
U.S. President Donald Trump, who has made a point of improving relations with Cairo, said his country stood with Sisi and the Egyptian people.
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“This merciless slaughter of Christians in Egypt tears at our hearts and grieves our souls,” Trump said.
The Grand Imam of al-Azhar, Egypt’s 1,000-year-old center of Islamic learning, said the attack was intended to destabilize the country.
“I call on Egyptians to unite in the face of this brutal terrorism,” Ahmed al-Tayeb said. The Grand Mufti of Egypt, Shawki Allam, condemned the perpetrators as traitors.
The head of the Coptic Christian church, Pope Tawadros, who spoke with Sisi after the attack, said it was “not directed at the Copts, but at Egypt and the heart of the Egyptians”.
Pope Francis, who visited Cairo a month ago, described the attack as a “senseless act of hatred”.
ONGOING PERSECUTION
Coptic Christians, whose church dates back nearly 2,000 years, make up about 10 percent of Egypt’s population of 92 million.
They say they have long suffered from persecution, but in recent months the frequency of deadly attacks against them has increased. About 70 have been killed since December in bombings claimed by Islamic State at churches in the cities of Cairo, Alexandria and Tanta.
An Islamic State campaign of murders in North Sinai prompted hundreds of Christians to flee in February and March.
Copts fear they will face the same fate as brethren in Iraq and Syria, where Christian communities have been decimated by wars and Islamic State persecution.
Egypt’s Copts are vocal supporters of Sisi, who has vowed to crush Islamist extremism and protect Christians. He declared a three-month state of emergency in the aftermath of the church bombings in April.
But many Christians feel the state either does not take their plight seriously enough or cannot protect them against determined fanatics.
The government is fighting insurgents affiliated with Islamic State who have killed hundreds of police and soldiers in the Sinai Peninsula, while also carrying out attacks elsewhere in the country.
Reporting by Ahmed Aboulenein; Additonal reporting by Eric Knecht, Mostafa Hashem, and Omar Fahmy in Cairo; Writing by Giles Elgood; Editing by John Stonestreet, Lisa Shumaker and Andrew HayOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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0b715735f2aa79cbce60e9e41ad7362f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security/egypt-military-says-53-militants-killed-in-week-long-offensive-idUSKCN1FZ1ZX | Egypt military says 53 militants killed in week-long offensive | Egypt military says 53 militants killed in week-long offensive
By Nadine Awadalla4 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt’s military and police forces have killed 53 Islamist militants and arrested 680 suspects in a week-long offensive to crush insurgents that is focused on the Sinai Peninsula, a military spokesman said on Thursday.
Egyptian Army's Armoured Vehicles are seen on a highway to North Sinai during a launch of a major assault against militants, in Ismailia, Egypt, in this undated handout picture made available by the Ministry of Defence February 9, 2018. Ministry of Defence/Handout via REUTERS
President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who is seeking re-election in March, ordered the armed forces in November to defeat militants within three months after an attack on a mosque in Sinai killed more than 300 people.
The attack was the deadliest of its kind in Egypt, which is the Arab world’s most populous country and a main regional ally of the United States.
The security operation, which involves the army, navy, air force and police, began last Friday and targeted “terrorist and criminal elements and organizations” in north and central Sinai, parts of the Nile delta and the western desert, Colonel Tamer al-Rifai told a news conference broadcast on state television on Thursday.
Rifai said forces have destroyed over 1,000 kg (2,205 lbs) of explosives, 378 militant hideouts and weapon storage facilities including a media center used by the militants.
He added that 680 people, some of them suspected militants or wanted criminals, were also detained in the operation.
The air force, which has carried out more than 100 airstrikes in northern and central Sinai since the operation began, has focused on militant hideouts outside residential areas to avoid hitting civilians, air force Brigadier General Alaa Dawara said.
Major General Yasser Abdel Aziz of the Military Operations Authority said the operation would end when Sinai was free of “terrorists”.
“It could be extended or shortened according to the situation and that is what will be determined in the coming days,” Abdel Aziz told journalists.
He said after the military operation, Egyptian authorities would push ahead with a comprehensive development plan for Sinai.
Outside the peninsula, the Egyptian military said the operation also covers parts of the Nile Delta and the Western Desert, where other militants have waged attacks, some believed to be staged out of neighboring Libya.
Islamist insurgents have been targeting security forces since 2013 when the army led by Sisi, then the army chief, ousted President Mohamed Mursi, of the Muslim Brotherhood, following mass protests against his rule.
Islamic State, in its weekly newspaper al-Naba, called for attacks inside Egypt to show the campaign was a failure.
“Any attack inside Egypt is bound to show ... Sisi’s allies that he is unable to control security in areas under his control,” a commentary article said.
Security forces foiled a planned attack on a police ambush in Minya province, some 250 km (150 miles) south of Cairo and arrested one assailant, state news agency MENA reported late on Thursday citing a security source, but gave no further details.
Some local residents have raised concerns over food and medicine shortages in the peninsula after the army blocked all access to the area.
Rifai said the armed forces has cooperated closely with local authorities to coordinate the delivery of food, medical assistance and other supplies in compliance with local and international laws and human rights norms.
Reporting by Nadine Awadalla and Ahmed Tolba; Editing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg and Alistair BellOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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50ea4f8fb5d5f853bc55c89b39f153d3 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security/egyptian-explosives-expert-killed-defusing-bomb-near-church-in-cairo-idUSKCN1OZ0M9 | Egyptian explosives expert killed defusing bomb near church in Cairo | Egyptian explosives expert killed defusing bomb near church in Cairo
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - An Egyptian police officer was killed on Saturday while attempting to defuse a bomb found near a church in an eastern Cairo suburb, state television reported, less than two days before Egypt’s Christians celebrate the Coptic Christmas.
The device was one of two found inside a bag on a nearby rooftop, three security sources and state media reported.
Two policemen and an onlooker were also injured when the device exploded, the security sources said.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility. Egyptian security forces have for years battled Islamist insurgents who have attacked Coptic Christians, tourists and security personnel.
Security forces have stepped up their presence outside churches and other places of worship ahead of New Year’s Eve and Coptic Christmas, which is celebrated on Jan. 7.
The Copts, who make up around 10 percent of the population, have long complained of discrimination. Authorities have placed armed guards outside churches and monasteries in an attempt to protect them from jihadist attacks.
In November, militants killed seven people returning from baptizing a child at a Coptic monastery about 260 km (160 miles) up the River Nile from Cairo.
Reporting by Hesham Hajali and Ahmed Mohamed Hassan; Writing by Nadine Awadalla; Editing by Kevin LiffeyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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734d95f01c5216c1e786486b3f8217c6 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security/islamic-state-announces-death-of-one-of-its-egypt-branch-leaders-idUSKBN1KC0VO | Islamic State announces death of one of its Egypt branch leaders | Islamic State announces death of one of its Egypt branch leaders
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - A local leader of Islamic State’s branch in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula has been killed, the group and a security source said on Sunday.
The group identified the leader as Abu Jaafar al-Maqdesi and released a poster-like mourning notice titled “Caravans of shuhada (martyrs)” with a photo of a smiling, bearded man wearing a coat and a cap.
“Brother Abu Jaafar al-Maqdesi, may God accept him,” a brief message posted on the group’s telegram channels read, without giving details on where, when or how he was killed.
An Egyptian security source identified the man as the head of Islamic State in the Mediterranean town of Sheikh Zuweid, located near the border with the Gaza Strip.
The Egyptian army, backed by security forces, has killed hundreds of suspected militants in a major operation that began in February targeting insurgents behind a series of attacks against military and civilian targets in the Sinai.
Reporting by Ali Abdelaty, writing by Sami Aboudi; Editing by Dale HudsonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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ecb3a04b980d6f1ef329af6f5b59aac8 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security/islamic-state-says-it-attacked-soldiers-captured-christian-in-sinai-idUSKCN1PJ1P4 | Islamic State says it attacked soldiers, captured Christian in Sinai | Islamic State says it attacked soldiers, captured Christian in Sinai
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - Islamic State carried out an attack on Egyptian security forces in Sinai a week ago and captured a Christian criminal research expert, the militant group said
The man was involved in the government’s campaign against militants, the group said in its weekly newspaper al-Naba, published on Thursday. It gave no further details.
The attack took place on Jan. 18, west of al-Arish, the capital of the North Sinai province, the group said. One Egyptian officer was killed and two soldiers injured, it said, adding several Egyptian soldiers had been killed or wounded in the past week.
Two security sources in northern Sinai confirmed the incident, saying three security personnel were killed. The Christian man was riding a bus when he was captured, they said.
On Tuesday, the military said Egyptian security forces had killed 59 militants in the Sinai peninsula recently and had lost seven of their own men.
The figures covered the “last period”, the military said without specifying dates or locations of operations. It did not give the identity of suspects or their affiliation.
Egypt’s military says several hundred militants have been killed since it launched a major campaign in February last year to defeat militants linked to Islamic State in Sinai.
Reporting by Ali Abdelaty and Ahmed Mohamed Hassan, writing by Lena Masri; editing by Larry KingOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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10d8278da4df36447e242823d0f6dd5a | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security/man-held-after-backpack-fire-near-u-s-embassy-in-cairo-statement-idUSKCN1LK1DF | Man held after backpack fire near U.S. embassy in Cairo: statement | Man held after backpack fire near U.S. embassy in Cairo: statement
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - A man who Egypt described as embracing “extremist ideas” was detained on Tuesday near the U.S. Embassy in central Cairo after a bottle containing flammable chemicals caught fire in his backpack.
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The incident caused no casualties and the embassy said on its Twitter account that it was resuming normal business after police finished their investigation at the scene.
A statement released by Egypt’s state information service named the suspect as 24-year-old Abdullah Ayman Abdesamea.
“Preliminary investigations suggest that he embraces some extremist ideas and was intending to use them to commit an act of aggression,” the statement said.
A witness said she heard a blast and then saw a man with a backpack that had caught on fire close to the Semiramis Hotel, across the road from the embassy premises.
The man was then thrown to the ground by security forces as the fire was extinguished, the witness said.
CCTV footage posted on social media appeared to show the man crossing the street before falling to the ground under a puff of smoke.
Another video circulating showed a man in a black T-shirt kneeling on the road amid a crowd of bystanders and police. He had his trousers removed before being led away, and further footage appeared to show him with the T-shirt tied round his head talking to police.
The incident happened in a road that is partly blocked off with large concrete cubes that prevent direct access to streets adjoining the embassy.
Shortly afterwards there was an unusually heavy police presence with dozens of officers in the area.
Egypt has been fighting an insurgency led by Islamic State and concentrated in the Sinai Peninsula since the Egyptian military overthrew President Mohamed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood in mid-2013.
Reporting by Ahmed Mohamed Hassan, Mohamed al Sherif, Mahmoud Mourad, Nadine Awadalla and Amina Ismail; Writing by Aidan Lewis; Editing by Angus MacSwan and Alison WilliamsOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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6675b52fa8e2d8cae6b8c2d16b08ad67 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-security/militants-kill-more-than-230-at-mosque-in-egypts-north-sinai-idUSKBN1DO1AN | Gunmen in Egypt mosque attack carried Islamic State flag, prosecutor says | Gunmen in Egypt mosque attack carried Islamic State flag, prosecutor says
By Omar Fahmy, Patrick Markey4 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - Gunmen who attacked a mosque on Friday in Egypt’s North Sinai brandished an Islamic State flag as they opened fire through doorways and windows, killing more than 300 worshippers, including two dozen children, officials said on Saturday.
No group has claimed responsibility, but Egyptian forces are battling a stubborn Islamic State affiliate in the region, one of the surviving branches of the militant group after it suffered defeats by U.S.-backed forces in Iraq and Syria.
The assault on a mosque has stunned Egyptians, prompting President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s government to tighten security at places of worship and key buildings, and call three days of mourning for the bloodiest attack in Egypt’s modern history.
State news agency MENA said the death toll had risen to 305, including 27 children, and 128 people were injured.
Egypt’s public prosecutor’s office, citing interviews with wounded survivors as part of its investigation, linked Islamic State militants, also known as Daesh, to the attack on the Al Rawdah mosque in Bir al-Abed, west of El-Arish city.
“The worshippers were taken by surprise by these elements,” the prosecutor said in a statement. “They numbered between 25 and 30, carrying the Daesh flag and took up positions in front of the mosque door and its 12 windows with automatic rifles.”
The gunmen, some wearing masks and military-style uniforms, had arrived in jeeps, surrounded the mosque and opened fire inside, sending panicked worshippers scrambling over each other to escape the carnage.
Related CoverageMilitant gunmen in Egypt mosque attack carried 'Islamic State' flag: prosecutorDeath toll in Egypt mosque attack rises to 305 killed: state news agency
Witnesses had said gunmen set off a bomb at the end of Friday prayers and then opened fire as people tried to flee, shooting at ambulances and setting fire to cars to block roads. Images on state media showed bloodied victims and bodies covered in blankets inside the mosque.
“When the shooting began everyone was running, and everyone was bumping into one another,” Magdy Rezk, a wounded survivor, said from his hospital bed. “But I was able to make out masked men wearing military clothing.”
UTMOST FORCE
Striking a mosque would be a shift in tactics for the Sinai militants, who have previously attacked troops and police and more recently tried to spread their insurgency to the mainland by hitting Christian churches and pilgrims.
Local sources said some of the worshippers were Sufis, whom groups such as Islamic State consider targets because they revere saints and shrines, which for Islamists is tantamount to idolatry. Islamic State has targeted Sufi and Shi’ite Muslims in other countries like Iraq.
The jihadists in Egypt’s Sinai have also attacked local tribes and their militias for working with the army and police.
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Sisi, a former armed forces commander who supporters see as a bulwark against Islamist militants, promised the “utmost force” against those responsible for Friday’s attack. Security has been a key reason for his supporters to back him, and he is expected to run for re-election next year.
Egypt’s military carried out air strikes and raids overnight to target hideouts and vehicles involved in the attack, the army said, without giving details on the number of militants.
“What is happening is an attempt to stop us from our efforts in the fight against terrorism,” Sisi said on Friday.
Slideshow ( 13 images )
The Sinai attack came as Sisi’s government looks to draw more foreign investment and finish an IMF reform program to help revive an economy that struggled through instability after the 2011 uprising ousted long-standing leader Hosni Mubarak.
North Sinai, a mostly desert area stretching from the Suez Canal eastwards to the Gaza Strip and Israel, has long been a security headache for Egypt and is a strategic region for Cairo because of its sensitive borders.
Local militant group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis, once allied to al Qaeda, split from it and declared allegiance to Islamic State in 2014. But attacks in the Sinai worsened after 2013 when Sisi led the overthrow of President Mohamed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood after mass protests against his rule.
Writing by Patrick Markey; editing by Alexander Smith and Jeremy GauntOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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6ee1038b957314e78d5646ca1aa6c0e2 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-sisi-usa/egypts-sisi-acknowledges-close-coordination-with-israel-in-sinai-idUSKCN1P101X | Egypt's Sisi acknowledges close coordination with Israel in Sinai | Egypt's Sisi acknowledges close coordination with Israel in Sinai
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi offered a rare acknowledgement of his close security cooperation with Israel in the Sinai peninsula during a U.S. television interview with CBS’ “60 Minutes” news program broadcast on Sunday.
FILE PHOTO - Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi speaks during presidential session at Africa 2018 Forum at the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt December 9, 2018. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
The program said Cairo had asked the network not to air the interview but did not give further details.
Under Sisi, Egypt has quietly cooperated with Israel on security in Egypt’s Sinai, a desert peninsula demilitarized as part of a U.S.-sponsored 1979 peace treaty between the two countries but where Cairo’s forces now operate freely.
Acknowledging such cooperation with Israel can be a sensitive topic in Egypt.
Asked whether the cooperation was the closest and deepest that he has had with Israel, Sisi responded: “That is correct.”
“The Air Force sometimes needs to cross to the Israeli side. And that’s why we have a wide range of coordination with the Israelis,” Sisi said, according to a transcript provided by CBS.
Defeating militants in the Sinai and restoring security after years of unrest has been a key promise of Sisi, who was re-elected in March last year in a landslide victory against no real opposition.
Islamist militants have been waging an insurgency for years in the north of the peninsula, which lacks basic infrastructure and job opportunities. In contrast, the region’s southern coast is peppered with Red Sea tourist resorts.
Egyptian security forces have battled Islamist militants in the mainly desert region, stretching from the Suez Canal eastwards to the Gaza Strip and Israel, since 2013.
Asked why he had not managed to wipe the militants out, Sisi responded by pointing to the difficulties that the United States has faced in Afghanistan against the Taliban insurgency.
“Why hasn’t the U.S. eliminated the terrorists in Afghanistan after 17 years and spending a trillion dollars?” he asked.
Sisi’s critics accuse him of cracking down on all dissent, but supporters say tough measures are needed to stabilize Egypt, which was rocked by years of unrest after protests toppled veteran leader Hosni Mubarak in 2011.
In his interview with “60 Minutes,” Sisi denied that Egypt was holding political prisoners. CBS cited one rights group’s estimate of 60,000 political prisoners.
“I don’t know where they got that figure. I said there are no political prisoners in Egypt,” Sisi said.
“Whenever there is a minority trying to impose their extremist ideology ... we have to intervene regardless of their numbers.”
Reporting by Phil Stewart and Pete Schroeder, Editing by Rosalba O’BrienOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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cb40dc9c923753f6c4dc9364bef798f7 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-solar-idUSKBN1YL1WS | Giant solar park in the desert jump starts Egypt's renewables push | Giant solar park in the desert jump starts Egypt's renewables push
By Aidan Lewis5 Min Read
ASWAN, Egypt (Reuters) - Near the southern Egyptian city of Aswan, a swathe of photovoltaic solar panels spreads over an area of desert so large it is clearly visible from space.
They are part of the Benban plant, one of the world’s largest solar parks following completion last month of a second phase of the estimated $2.1 billion project.
Designed to anchor a renewable energy sector by attracting foreign and domestic private-sector developers and financial backers, the plant now provides nearly 1.5 GW to Egypt’s national grid and has brought down the price of solar energy at a time when the government is phasing out electricity subsidies.
In 2013, Egypt was suffering rolling blackouts due to power shortages at aging power stations. Three gigantic gas-powered stations with a capacity of 14.4 GW procured from Siemens in 2015 turned the deficit into a surplus.
National installed electricity capacity is now around 50 GW and Egypt aims to increase the share of electricity provided by renewables from a fraction currently to 20% by 2022 and 42% by 2035.
“They have plans to bring out renewable energy, private sector invested, across the Red Sea in wind and throughout the deserts for solar power,” said Christopher Cantelmi of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a lead backer of Benban along with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
The Benban project’s 32 plots were developed by more than 30 companies from 12 countries, including Spain’s Acciona, UAE-based Alcazar Energy, Italy’s Enerray, France’s Total Eren and EDF, China’s Chint Solar and Norway’s Scatec. Developers of the plant, around 40 km (25 miles) northwest of Aswan, are guaranteed a feed-in tariff price for 25 years.
“It really introduced a lot of them to Egypt for the very first time, to project finance and to infrastructure finance,” said Cantelmi.
A third phase at Benban could add more than 300 MW, though nothing has been decided yet, while another large scale solar development is planned 45 km north of Aswan at Kom Ombo.
Slideshow ( 13 images )
Egypt has struggled to attract foreign investment outside the oil and gas sector, despite winning praise for an IMF-backed economic reform program since 2016.
At Benban, developers visited by an IFC team last month raised the issue of a stand-off over a government demand that they collectively pay an extra 1.9 billion Egyptian pounds ($118 million)in infrastructure costs. There had also been some curtailment of supplies to the grid as they waited for new transmission lines to be added.
But operations were generally going well, and the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company was paying on time, they said.
BRUSHING MACHINES
Solar irradiation is exceptionally good at Benban and running costs are low, developers say. Upkeep is largely limited to brushing the desert dust from the panels to maximize absorption.
“You don’t need a lot of manpower round here, you only need cleaning machines ... and maintenance, which is not a big amount of people,” said Mohamed Ossama, project head for Egypt’s Taqa Arabia, which has a 50 MW plot.
Benban has brought down the price of solar energy, drawn in dozens of companies, and given Egypt’s south an economic boost, said Mohamed Orabi, professor of power electronics at Aswan University.
However, the plant needed a storage system - still a key technological challenge for solar power that surges during the daytime - in order to stabilize supplies to the grid, he said.
Slideshow ( 13 images )
Last year a report from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) suggested Egypt could be more ambitious in its green energy goals and aim to supply 53% of its electricity from renewables by 2030.
But it said developers could be discouraged by complex administrative procedures, and urged Egypt to review its market framework and develop local manufacturing capacity for renewables.
“The (Benban) project showcases Egypt’s seriousness in doing renewable energy business, especially when most countries in the region have been stalling on this front, with the exception of Jordan and Morocco,” said Jessica Obeid, an energy expert at Chatham House.
“In the next stages, political and policy stability are important, reduction of the complex bureaucratic measures and clear assignments of institutions’ mandates and facilitation of the process will be much needed.”
(This story has been refiled to fix typo in Total Eren name in 7th paragraph)
Editing by Susan FentonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b1a4f1c29257ea9cfb1c1b0a9dd0b413 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-space-satellite-idINKBN1XV29M | Egypt to send its first communication satellite into orbit on Friday | Egypt to send its first communication satellite into orbit on Friday
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: A flag with a company logo is seen during satellite launch company Arianespace annual news conference in Paris, France, January 9, 2018. REUTERS/Christian Hartmann/File Photo
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt will launch its first communication satellite into orbit on Friday, a move it says will improve its communications infrastructure and internet services and attract investment.
Tiba-1 is due to launch at 2108 GMT on one of Europe’s Arianespace rockets from a space center in French Guiana, officials said.
It is named after Thebes or Tiba in Arabic, an ancient Egyptian capital the ruins of which lie within the modern southern city of Luxor.
The 5.6-tonne satellite made by Airbus and Thales Alenia Space (TAS) will remain in orbit for at least 15 years to provide “every inch” of Egypt with call and internet services, state officials said.
“The Satellite will provide Egypt with a parallel communications network alongside the current land network and a strong telecommunications infrastructure,” Mohamed Elkoosy, executive director of the Egyptian Space Agency, told Reuters.
“The growth of the economy depends on a strong communication network,” he added.
The Egyptian Space Agency will run the satellite from a control center in Cairo.
Egyptian communications minister Amr Talaat said in a statement the satellite “represents a significant qualitative leap in the field of communications and information technology (ICT)”.
Tiba-1’s coverage area includes some neighboring Arab and African countries and Egypt may sell them satellite services in future.
Reporting by Mahmoud Mourad and Momen Saeid Atallah; Editing by Alexandra HudsonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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39bd4bc82643766054ccf16a03cc14e9 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-telecoms-4g-idUSKCN0ZX0IB | Kuwaiti's Zain interested in Egypt 4G license: ministry official | Kuwaiti's Zain interested in Egypt 4G license: ministry official
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - Kuwaiti mobile operator Zain has expressed interest in applying for a fourth-generation license in Egypt, a senior telecommunications ministry official said on Sunday.
The sale of 4G licenses is part of Egypt’s long-awaited plan to reform the telecoms sector.
Its telecoms regulator has approached the three current mobile service providers, Orange Egypt, Vodafone Egypt, and Etisalat, about potentially buying 4G licences.
The current operators have until the first week of August to submit applications for a 4G license.
Communications Minister Yasser al-Kadi told Reuters in June that Egypt would offer 4G licences in an international auction if the existing carriers were not interested.
The senior telecoms ministry official said Zain, which operates in eight countries in the Middle East and Africa, had sent a letter expressing its interest.
“Zain sent us a letter showing desire to enter the Egyptian market through 4G licenses with the set conditions put forward by the government,” the official said, declining to be named.
Zain declined to comment.
Reporting by Ehab Farouk; writing by Ola Noureldin; editing by Lin Noueihed and Jason NeelyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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ffbcc87d10f7de22c351f65fb87763d1 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-telecoms/egypt-to-start-work-on-2-4-billion-telecom-network-for-first-phase-of-new-capital-city-idUSKCN1VW28A | Egypt to start work on $2.4-billion telecom network for first phase of new capital city | Egypt to start work on $2.4-billion telecom network for first phase of new capital city
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt’s communications ministry will begin work on a 40 billion Egyptian pound ($2.44 billion) telecommunications network in the first phase of a new capital city being built east of Cairo, a cabinet statement said on Wednesday.
The communications ministry signed a cooperation agreement with the Administrative Capital for Urban Development (ACUD,) the new capital’s owner and developer, to begin working on the network over a period of six months.
The new city, known for now as the New Administrative Capital, is eventually expected to cover about 700 square km.
The first phase, covering about 168 square km, will have ministries, residential neighborhoods, a diplomatic quarter and a financial district. A large mosque and cathedral, as well a hotel and conference center, have already been built.
Ahmed Zaki Abdeen, a retired general who heads the company building the new city, said that ACUD would provide the funding for the network.
Egypt’s government wants to start running the nation from the new capital in the desert from mid-2020.
Reporting by Momen Saeed Atallah; Writing Nadine Awadalla; Editing by Bernadette BaumOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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8bfed274fe5cd3367e9662c581403769 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-tourism-minister/new-egypt-tourism-minister-sets-out-2020-growth-plan-idUSKBN0MB0EX20150315 | New Egypt tourism minister sets out 2020 growth plan | New Egypt tourism minister sets out 2020 growth plan
By Stephen Kalin3 Min Read
SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt (Reuters) - Egypt hopes to generate $20 billion in revenue from tourism by 2020 by attracting 20 million visitors, new tourism minister Khaled Ramy said on Sunday at an international investment conference in the Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh.
Slideshow ( 2 images )
An uprising that toppled leader Hosni Mubarak four years ago hit the economy hard, discouraging investors and tourists and slashing economic growth. Egypt hopes the conference will project an image of stability and help attract billions of dollars.
Ramy told Reuters that goal was part of strategic plans that include creating two new resorts through nearly $1 billion of investment over five years and hiring a private company to run a three-year advertising campaign.
He said he wanted to counteract the negative news of the last few years which has hampered tourism, a major source of revenue and foreign reserves for Egypt.
More than 14.7 million tourists visited Egypt in 2010, dropping to 9.8 million in 2011. They rose the following year to 11.5 million but shrank back to about 10 million last year.
Ramy said he expected numbers to grow by 15 percent this year.
“The message is right on my face: it’s seven o’clock in the morning and we already have this beautiful sunshine here in Sharm El-Sheikh,” he said in a poolside interview at a luxury hotel.
Ramy, 56, was appointed minister this month in a cabinet reshuffle.
He said Egypt was on track to have enough hotel rooms to accommodate 20 million tourists, but needed investment in restaurants and shopping malls.
Egypt will seek investment for two new investment projects, Ramy said: an 8-million-square-metre resort on the Red Sea worth 5 billion Egyptian pounds and a 1-million-square-metre resort on the Mediterranean worth 2.5 billion pounds.
Ramy said the ministry would use its $40 million a year marketing budget to contract a global advertising campaign this summer.
Security is a concern for tourists in Egypt, which is facing an Islamist insurgency based in the northern Sinai that has launched small bombing attacks across the country. Blasts usually target security forces but more recently have hit civilian targets such as restaurants and stores.
Asked what the government was doing to secure tourists, Ramy pointed to heavy security for the weekend conference.
“As you have seen here in Sharm El-Sheikh, I don’t think even a rat from the desert could come in and do anything,” he said.
Security has been tight during the three-day event, attended by kings, heads of state and top officials including U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.
Checkpoints on major roads are manned by machine-gun wielding soldiers in combat gear, while military helicopters buzz overhead. Plainclothes police line more isolated desert roads.
Additional reporting by Ehab Farouk; writing by Shadi Bushra; editing by Yara Bayoumy and Jason NeelyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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96acdeb18200d2002cb5835af961841f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-transport-idUSKBN1EI0JR | Egypt to hike Cairo metro fares from next July: state newspaper | Egypt to hike Cairo metro fares from next July: state newspaper
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: People wait to board a train at Al Shohadaa "Martyrs" metro station, formerly know as "Mubarak", in Cairo, Egypt July 24, 2017. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt will raise the price of tickets on Cairo’s loss-making metro system from next July, tripling the present fare for many commuters, the state-owned newspaper al-Ahram said on Sunday.
Commuters will be charged a base fare of 2 Egyptian pounds (11 U.S. cents) for the first 9 stops, and an additional pound for 9 more stations, the newspaper, quoting Transport Minister Hisham Arafat, said.
A maximum fare of 6 Egyptian pounds will be charged for commuters who ride one line from start to finish, though discounted rates for government workers and students will be maintained.
Currently, commuters can cover an unlimited number of stops and can even switch lines for the same base fare of 2 Egyptian pounds.
The move comes as part of an effort by the transport authority to cover operational costs after the floatation of the Egyptian pound, the newspaper said.
The government angered Cairo residents, already hit by a sharp rise in living costs, when it doubled the price of metro tickets in March for millions of commuters, an increase which followed losses of 500 million Egyptian pounds which have put the network at risk, media reported in March.
Reporting by Omar Fahmy; Writing by Nadine Awadalla; Editing by Richard BalmforthOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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255dbb6bf4441507dd6a32f4fbc739ce | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-turkey-idUSTRE78C6DW20110914 | Turkish PM throws weight behind Arab cause | Turkish PM throws weight behind Arab cause
By Tulay Karadeniz, Yasmine Saleh6 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan told Arab states on Tuesday it was time to raise the Palestinian flag at the United Nations and accused Israel of obstructing peace in the Middle East.
Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a news conference with Egypt's Prime Minister Essam Sharaf at the Prime Minister's building in Cairo September 13, 2011. REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El-Ghany
Erdogan, addressing Arab foreign ministers in Cairo at the start of a Middle Eastern tour, said backing a bid for recognition of a Palestinian state at the United Nations later this month was “not an option but an obligation” for Arab states.
He accused the United States, a close ally of Israel whose relations with Turkey have been frayed in recent months, of demonstrating prejudice in opposing the move as a potential irritant in a volatile area.
“While Israel is trying to secure its legitimacy in our region on one hand, it is taking irresponsible steps which unsettle its legitimacy on the other,” Erdogan said.
Erdogan’s recent criticism of Israel has drawn strong support in the Arab world, buttressing his campaign to promote Ankara’s blend of Islam and democracy as a model for movements that have toppled several Arab autocrats, including Egypt’s former president Hosni Mubarak.
At a speech at a Cairo opera house later on Tuesday to set out Turkey’s vision for the Middle East, Erdogan said popular uprisings jolting Arab nations were a “light of hope” for the oppressed.
“Democracy and freedom is as basic a right as bread and water for you, my brothers,” Erdogan said in a speech interrupted several times with standing ovations and chants of “Erdogan, Erdogan! and “Allahu Akbar!” (God is Greatest)
In another swipe at Israel he said its government’s mentality was “inhumane and lacks all legal basis.”
“Every Jewish settlement is a wall that blocks peace. We hope that the Israeli people are aware of the walls of isolation their government builds around them,” he said.
Israel’s offensive against Gaza in 2008 largely spelt the end of a close alliance between Turkey and Israel, but ties nose-dived last year after nine Turks were killed in an Israeli raid on a ship heading for the Palestinian enclave, controlled by the Islamist group Hamas and under blockade by Israel.
Related CoverageTurkey's Erdogan hailed as a new champion for ArabsEgypt's Islamists warn Turkish PM over regional role
POPULIST TOUCH
Erdogan’s tour will include Tunisia and Libya, which have all witnessed the fall of entrenched leaders to grassroots revolts this year, challenging the old order across the region.
Displaying a populist touch, Erdogan stopped as he left the Arab League headquarters in Cairo where he had been speaking and shook the hands of demonstrators demanding change in Syria, whose military is trying to crush an uprising.
“It’s time to raise the Palestinian flag at the United Nations,” he told the Arab ministers. “Let’s raise the Palestinian flag and let that flag be the symbol of peace and justice in the Middle East.”
Palestinians will bid for full membership of the United Nations later this month, a move opposed by the United States, which has a veto. Arab states endorsed it at the Cairo meeting, where Erdogan accused the United States of bias.
“The United States should reconsider the statement it made in relation to the bid Palestine is going to make to the United Nations. This prejudice is not befitting to the foreign policy of a country like the United States,” he said.
Erdogan said Turkey offered help to Arab nations facing turmoil but, in an apparent reference to Syria, he said some had turned down the offer. “However, we continue to insist they meet their people’s demands.”
Arab League Secretary-General Nabil Elaraby introduced the Turkish prime minister saying: “All the Arab peoples appreciate what you are doing. We consider that there is a strong friendly state who is always standing on the side of justice.”
Outside the League, Syrian protester Samer Zaher, 30, said: “Erdogan has turned into an Arab hero ... We have not found a leader as powerful as him addressing (Syrian President Bashar al-Assad) and asking him to quit.”
Erdogan later addressed the Syrian issue directly, saying in a public speech before several thousand Cairenes that he like most Syrians had lost faith in Assad.
“As civilian deaths increase in Syria we see that reforms have not materialized and they did not speak honestly. It is not possible to believe this. And the Syrian people do not believe in Assad, nor do I. We also do not believe him,” he said in the grounds of the Cairo opera house.
WINNING OVER ARABS
While winning over ordinary Arabs, particularly with non-Arab Turkey’s tough line toward Israel, Erdogan’s growing popularity and clout could be a headache for more cautious Arab leaders who could see their own influence overshadowed.
“Turkey wants to play a regional role, especially when Egypt is busy with the revolution,” said Adel Soliman, head of Cairo’s International Center for Future and Strategic Studies.
Egypt has traditionally seen itself as the leading diplomatic player in the Arab region. But its position has been eroded by wealthy Gulf countries, such as Qatar, and lately overshadowed by Turkey, with its fast-expanding economy.
Erdogan met Egypt’s Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, who heads the military council that took over after Mubarak was ousted by mass street demonstrations in February.
Egypt’s generals have faced popular criticism for not taking a firmer line with Israel after it shot dead five Egyptian border guards in repelling cross-border raiders it said were Palestinian militants. Cairo said it would expel Israel’s ambassador but did not follow through with the threat.
Protesters attacked Israel’s embassy in Cairo last week, prompting the ambassador to fly home and an embarrassed Egyptian government to affirm to Washington, its major aid donor, that it remained committed to a 1979 peace treaty with Israel.
Additional reporting by Ibon Villelabeitia in Istanbul, Jon Burch in Ankara, Ori Lewis in Jerusalem and Dan Williams in Tel Aviv; writing by Andrew Hammond and Edmund Blair; editing by Giles Elgood and Philippa FletcherOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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7cd30572c1e8602c26b63aa3d6ee1558 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-uber/egyptian-court-allows-uber-and-careem-to-continue-operations-idUSKBN1HE0MX | Egyptian court allows Uber and Careem to continue operations | Egyptian court allows Uber and Careem to continue operations
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - An Egyptian court ruled on Saturday that a judicial decision to suspend the licenses of ride-hailing companies Uber and Careem should not be applied, allowing them to continue their work, judicial sources said.
FILE PHOTO - The Uber logo is seen on a screen in Singapore August 4, 2017. REUTERS/Thomas White/File Picture
Forty-two Egyptian taxi drivers filed a lawsuit in the administrative court a year ago against U.S.-based Uber and its Dubai-based competitor Careem, arguing they were illegally using private cars as taxis. They also claimed that the two firms were registered as a call center and an internet company, respectively.
In March, the administrative court ordered the government to suspend the licenses of the two companies.
However, the two companies applied to another court, the Cairo Court of Urgent Matters, which said on Saturday that the previous ruling should be suspended and the two firms should be allowed to continue work until a final decision from the Highest Administrative Court, the sources said.
The March decision had not yet been applied, according to judicial sources.
The government appealed against the March ruling before the Highest Administrative Court. Uber followed suit.
Careem said it had not received any official request to stop operations in Egypt, and continued to do business as normal.
The government has sent parliament a draft law to regulate web-based transport services. It is not clear when that will be passed.
Uber said Egypt is its largest market in the Middle East, with 157,000 drivers in 2017 and 4 million users since its launch there in 2014.
The San Francisco-based company said last year it was committed to Egypt despite challenges presented by sweeping economic reforms and record inflation. In October Uber announced a $20 million investment in its new support center in Cairo.
It has had to make deals with local car dealerships to provide its drivers with affordable vehicles and adjust its ride prices to ensure its workers were not hit too hard by inflation.
Egypt is one of Uber’s fastest-growing markets, its general manager in the country, Abdellatif Waked, has said, according to state news agency MENA.
Uber has faced regulatory and legal setbacks around the world amid opposition from traditional taxi services. It has been forced to quit countries such as Denmark and Hungary.
Last year, London deemed Uber unfit to run a taxi service and stripped it of its license to operate. Uber is appealing against the decision.
Reporting by Haitham Ahmed; Writing by Mahmoud Mourad; Editing by Giles Elgood and Dale HudsonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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0d778ce8a2bd2c7e9020832d73887eca | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-usa/trump-and-egypts-sisi-discuss-middle-east-in-phone-call-idUSKCN1OV1R8 | Trump and Egypt's Sisi discuss Middle East in phone call | Trump and Egypt's Sisi discuss Middle East in phone call
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi speaks during presidential session at Africa 2018 Forum at the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt December 9, 2018. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi discussed the stability of the Middle East with U.S. President Donald Trump in a phone call on Tuesday night, a spokesman for the Egyptian presidency said.
They discussed Egypt’s efforts in fighting terrorism, and the importance of continuing coordination and cooperation with the United States to support these efforts, the spokesman added.
Reporting by Nayera Abdallah; Editing by Kevin LiffeyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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c03d6c63bd785e49a5548775ff775ef6 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-violence-idUSKBN17C1AV?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=Social | Families gather after Egypt church attack, state of emergency approved | Families gather after Egypt church attack, state of emergency approved
By Amina Ismail, Arwa Gaballa6 Min Read
ALEXANDRIA/TANTA, Egypt (Reuters) - Families of victims of Sunday’s bombing at Alexandria’s Coptic cathedral gathered at the Monastery of Saint Mina under heavy security on Monday as Egypt’s cabinet approved a three-month state of emergency ahead of a scheduled trip by Pope Francis.
Hundreds of mourners, many outraged by what they said was the state’s failure to keep them safe on one of their holiest days, carried wooden coffins to the beat of drums interrupted by the wails of those dressed in all black.
“Where should we go pray? They are attacking us in our churches. They don’t want us to pray but we will pray,” said Samira Adly, 53, whose neighbors were killed in the attack.
“Everyone is falling short...the government, the people... nothing is good.”
The blast in Egypt’s second largest city, which killed 17 including 7 police officers, came hours after a bomb struck a Coptic church in Tanta, a nearby city in the Nile Delta, that took the lives of 28 and wounded nearly 80.
The twin attacks marked one of the bloodiest days in recent memory for Egypt’s Christian minority,the largest in the Middle East.
Both attacks were claimed by the Islamic State, which has waged a campaign against Egypt’s Christian minority. The Copts, whose presence in Egypt dates to the Roman era, have long complained of religious persecution and accused the state of not doing enough to protect them.
Coming on Palm Sunday, when Christians mark the arrival of Jesus in Jerusalem, the bombings appeared designed to spread fear among the Coptic minority.
“We shouldn’t stay quiet at all...it is a security failure..how did the bomb enter when there’s security outside the church? They’re saying now the metal detector wasn’t working,” Beshoy Asham, a cousin of a Tanta victim told Reuters.
Related CoveragePope visit to Egypt to go ahead despite blasts but security big concern
The attacks also raised security fears ahead of a visit to Cairo by Roman Catholic Pope Francis planned for April 28-29 intended to promote interfaith dialogue between Muslims and Christians.
Coptic Pope Tawadros, who was leading the mass in Alexandria’s Saint Mark’s Cathedral when the bomb exploded, was not harmed, the Interior Ministry said.
The nationwide state of emergency declared by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and agreed by the cabinet on Monday is expected to be approved by parliament within seven days in order to remain in place.
“The armed forces and police will do what is necessary to confront the threats of terrorism and its financing,” the cabinet said in a statement. Measures would be taken to “maintain security across the country, protect public and private property and the lives of citizens,” it said.
But anger at the state’s failure to secure the religious holiday appeared to be on the rise.
Youth gathered at the Alexandria funeral shouted chants rarely heard in a country where protesting has effectively been outlawed and rights activists say they face the worst crackdown in their history.
“Down with any president as long as Egyptian blood is cheap,” and “down with military rule!” they yelled.
Slideshow ( 19 images )
SOFTER CHRISTIAN TARGET
In Tanta, where many families buried their dead on Sunday, members of the Coptic community expressed anger at the lack of security, saying that despite warnings of an attack, police had not stepped up efforts to protect them.
A senior police official told Reuters a bomb was discovered and disabled near the Tanta church about a week ago.
“That should have been an alarm or a warning that this place is targeted,” said 38-year-old Amira Maher. “Especially Palm Sunday, a day when many people gather, more than any other time in the year.”
At Tanta University hospital morgue, desperate families were trying to get inside to search for loved ones. Security forces held them back to stop overcrowding, enraging the crowd.
Slideshow ( 19 images )
“Why are you preventing us from entering now? Where were you when all this happened?” shouted one women looking for a relative. Some appeared in total shock, their faces pale and unmoving. Others wept openly as women wailed in mourning.
Though Islamic State has long waged a low-level war against soldiers and police in Egypt’s Sinai peninsula for years, its stepped up assault on Christians in the mainland could turn a provincial insurgency into wider sectarian conflict.
On Sunday, the group warned of more attacks and boasted it had killed 80 people in three church bombings since December.
“They want to use Islam to tear us apart. We are brothers and sisters and religion for God is Islam, but Christians are our brothers and sisters,” said Nematalla from Cairo.
A Muslim pedestrian in Cairo wept over the church victims.
“These people are Egyptian....These people are our brothers and sisters and we love them,” said Mohamed Zeinhom.
Security analysts said it appeared that Islamic State, under pressure in Iraq and Syria, was trying to widen its threat and had identified Christian communities as an easier target.
“ISIS are deeply sectarian, that’s nothing new, but they have decided to re-emphasize that aspect in Egypt over the past few months,” said H.A. Hellyer, senior non-resident fellow at the Atlantic Council and the Royal United Services Institute.
“Christian targets are easier -- churches are far more difficult to fortify than say an army barracks or a police station. It’s a disturbing development because it indicates we have the possibility of repeated and continued attacks against soft targets.”
additional reporting by Osama Naguib and Mostafa Salem; writing by Asma Alsharif; editing by Luke Baker, Sonya Hepinstall, Anna WillardOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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f59a783a0573ae38360edb4443ae4516 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-water-usa-idUSKBN1XG35U | Egypt, Ethiopia, Sudan to try to resolve dam dispute by January 15: Treasury | Egypt, Ethiopia, Sudan to try to resolve dam dispute by January 15: Treasury
By David Lawder3 Min Read
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The foreign ministers of Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan agreed on Wednesday to work toward resolving their dispute over the filling and operation of a massive dam project in Ethiopia by Jan. 15, 2020, the U.S. Treasury said.
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In a joint statement released after U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin hosted talks to work out differences over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, the ministers said they would attend further meetings in Washington on Dec. 9 and Jan. 13 to assess progress in their negotiations.
“The ministers reaffirmed their joint commitment to reach a comprehensive, cooperative, adaptive, sustainable, and mutually beneficial agreement on the filling and operation of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam and to establish a clear process for fulfilling that commitment in accordance with the 2015 Declaration of Principles,” the ministers, Mnuchin and World Bank President David Malpass said in the statement.
Egypt fears the filling of the dam reservoir on the Blue Nile tributary will restrict already scarce supplies of water from the Nile, on which the country is almost entirely dependent. Sudan is also downriver from the project.
Ethiopia says the hydroelectric dam, which will be Africa’s largest, is crucial to its economic development.
Water ministers of the three countries will hold four meetings in Washington, attended by the Treasury and World Bank, according to the joint statement.
“If an agreement is not reached by January 15, 2020, the foreign ministers agree that Article 10 of the 2015 Declaration of Principles will be invoked,” the statement said.
Such a move would require an international mediator to help resolve the dispute.
Earlier, U.S. President Donald Trump said a meeting that he held with the Egyptian, Ethiopian and Sudanese delegations “went well.”.
In their joint statement, the foreign ministers of the three African countries “reaffirmed the significance of the Nile to the development of the people of Egypt, Ethiopia, and Sudan, the importance of transboundary cooperation, and their shared interest in concluding an agreement.”
Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Chris Reese, Richard Chang and Sonya HepinstallOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b433cbe2eaa6c43466430cc316f63ec1 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-women-crime/doctor-parents-face-trial-in-egypt-for-girls-death-after-genital-cutting-idUSKCN20I0MT | Doctor, parents face trial in Egypt for girl's death after genital cutting | Doctor, parents face trial in Egypt for girl's death after genital cutting
By Menna A. Farouk3 Min Read
CAIRO (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - A retired doctor and the parents of a 12-year-old girl who died after female genital mutilation (FGM) surgery are to stand trial in Egypt, with child rights campaigners calling for jail terms to deter others from the illegal practice.
Egypt’s Prosecutor General Hamada El-Sawy this weekend ordered the referral of the trio to the criminal court.
Doctor Abdel Fadeel Rashwan and the parents of Nada Hassan Abdel-Maqsoud were arrested last month after her death at a private clinic in Manfalout, close to Assiut in southern Egypt, but then released on bail, causing public outrage.
“It is a serious step towards putting the defendants behind bars,” said Randa Fakhr El Deen, executive director of the NGOs’ Union Against Harmful Practices on Women and Children, hoping a tough punishment would discourage other cases of FGM.
Genital cutting of girls was banned in Egypt in 2008 but a 2016 survey by the U.N. Children’s Fund found 87% of women and girls aged 15-49 had undergone the ritual, which typically involves the partial or total removal of the external genitalia.
In 2016 the practice was made a felony, meaning doctors who perform the procedure can be jailed for up to seven years and anyone requesting the operation jailed for up to three years.
Activists, however, say the law has not been strictly enforced and the few found guilty tend to get light penalties.
World leaders have pledged by 2030 to eradicate FGM which can cause long-lasting mental and physical health problems, but campaigners say the ancient ritual remains deeply entrenched in many places.
An investigation after the arrests last month revealed that the child’s parents wanted their daughter cut and the doctor, aged about 70, conducted the surgery on their request.
Prosecutors said the operation lasted about 30 minutes and left the girl unconscious. Efforts to revive her failed.
Most genital cutting in Egypt is carried out by doctors and nurses at private clinics, with the rest done at home, according to the Egypt Demographic and Health Survey of 2014.
But prosecutors said the hospital where the girl died had not had a license since August 2016, was ill equipped, and its operations room did not meet the terms for combating infection.
Egypt’s Prosecutor General Hamada El-Sawy called on parents not to expose their daughters to dangerous processes linked to obsolete customs and traditions.
“Be aware that their purity and chastity will not exist but through their good upbringing, embracing them and their enlightenment,” he said in a statement.
Reporting by Menna A. Farouk, Editing by Belinda Goldsmith @BeeGoldsmith. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers the lives of people around the world who struggle to live freely or fairly. Visit news.trust.orgOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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9232bde28dbc0e9b36d1e8d531dced86 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egyptair-airplane-search-technology-idUSKCN0YE1SH | Slow response to past crashes could hinder EgyptAir search, experts say | Slow response to past crashes could hinder EgyptAir search, experts say
By Tim Hepher, Ahmed Aboulenein7 Min Read
PARIS/CAIRO (Reuters) - Teams searching for the black box flight recorders of a missing EgyptAir jet that crashed with 66 people aboard face technical constraints that aviation experts increasingly blame on a slow regulatory response to earlier disasters.
FIle photo shows the Cockpit Voice recorder from the crash of Continental Connection flight 3407 near Buffalo, New York that is displayed at the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) headquarters in Washington, February 13, 2009. Teams searching for the black box flight recorders of a missing EgyptAir jet that crashed with 66 people aboard face technical constraints that aviation experts increasingly blame on a slow regulatory response to earlier disasters. REUTERS/Hyungwon Kang/File Photo
As a three-year deep-sea search for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 draws toward a close in the Indian Ocean without finding the airplane, another is starting in the Mediterranean Sea where the lessons of previous crashes have yet to be applied.
Rescuers have barely 30 days until the batteries die on two underwater beacons designed to guide them to the black box flight recorders as they scour 17,000 square kilometers of sea north of the Egyptian port city of Alexandria.
After previous crashes at sea, regulators agreed to increase the transmission time and range of such beacons to increase the chances of finding evidence and preventing future accidents.
The changes, trebling the life of the ‘pingers’ to 90 days, were first recommended by French investigators in late 2009, six months after the crash of an Air France plane in the Atlantic.
But they do not come into effect until 2018: too late to help find EgyptAir 804.
French investigators say the Egyptian jet sent warnings indicating that smoke was detected on board. The signals did not indicate what caused the smoke, and aviation experts have not ruled out deliberate sabotage or a technical fault. Egypt has sent a robot submarine to join the hunt.
It is the second time in little more than a year that sea search operations have been forced to rely on decades-old black-box technology after an AirAsia plane crashed into the Java Sea.
Delays in implementing the changes to the beacons to extend their battery life and improve the chances of finding the black boxes have been criticized by a number of experts including the former head of the French BEA agency, which is helping the search for Egyptair.
“PRETTY SCANDALOUS”
“The battery situation is pretty scandalous,” Jean-Paul Troadec, who headed the French government BEA air accident investigative agency during much of the Air France probe, told Reuters.
Related CoverageEgypt will analyze EgyptAir jet's black box if found intact: officialEgypt prosecutor seeks data from France, Greece on crashed plane
“It hardly costs anything to install new batteries. There was no reason to wait until 2018.”
In the first days after a crash at sea, the priority is to use passive devices capable of listening for the pinger’s clicking pulse. Once these die, searchers must use sonar devices and robots, which are costly and time-consuming. It took two years to find Air France 447 in the Atlantic this way.
“You can imagine the pressure this 30-day deadline creates,” Troadec said.
Manufacturers say that implementing the recommendations to extend the life of a beacon is not just a simple switch.
“Industry does not develop technology overnight and for the aircraft manufacturers to be ready, two years seems reasonable,” a spokesman for the European Aviation Safety Agency said.
The search for EgyptAir’s Airbus A320 is especially challenging because its wreckage lies in one of the deepest parts of the Mediterranean, at a depth of 2,000-3,000 meters which is on the edge of the range for hearing pinger signals.
That may mean towing hydrophones more than a mile below the surface, using specialist devices that are in short supply.
This task could have been made easier by other still-pending safety proposals. In 2009, the BEA suggested black-box makers add a new, lower frequency that carries further and is easier for military vessels - typically first on the scene - to spot.
European regulator EASA has ordered airlines to fit the longer-range devices from the start of 2019, almost a decade after the crash that first inspired the change.
To many, such slow progress highlights the regulatory problems facing the aviation industry which is struggling to adapt to a series of accidents including the loss of MH370 with 239 people on board, the shooting down of another Malaysian aircraft over Ukraine in 2014 and last year’s crash by a Germanwings pilot who flew his plane into the French Alps.
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Despite the high-profile plane crashes, regulators say flying remains exceptionally safe, thanks in part to a unique system of standardized rules overseen by the United Nations.
LENGTHY APPROVALS
But the task of maintaining global standards by consensus requires lengthy approvals.
And critics say reforms have been held up before by bureaucracy and a lack of resources at the United Nations’ aviation agency, where a special panel on black boxes did not meet between 1998 and 2006 because it had no secretary.
A spokesman for the United Nations’ International Civil Aviation Organization declined further comment beyond a statement in March announcing improvements to flight recorders and better ways of tracking jetliners over remote areas.
Experts say the delays also reflect a tussle between regulators, airlines and manufacturers over how safety dollars should be spent. Planemakers, airlines and pilot unions are represented at ICAO because of the industry’s complexity.
“The people who pay for searches are governments and the people who pay for the equipment are companies,” Troadec said, asked to explain the time it takes to apply BEA recommendations.
French recommendations on black boxes and proposals for tracking were discussed at ICAO after the crash of Air France’s AF447 but were only fully embraced after the loss of MH370 made it a global issue, according to people involved in the talks.
“After MH370 there was momentum,” the head of ICAO’s special panel, Philippe Plantin de Hugues, said in a recent interview.
Still, some airlines, including Air France, have installed the longer batteries without waiting for the 2018 changeover.
“Airlines are not pushing back. They are as eager as anybody to quickly have access to the black box data after an accident,” said a spokesman for the International Air Transport Association, which represents most airlines.
“But we need to be sure that any change is fully thought through ... and capable of being supported by reliable technology.”
(Removes reference to MH370 in paragraph 6, making clear the 90-day clause was adopted before the Malaysian jet’s disappearance.)
Additional reporting by Allison Lampert, editing by Peter MillershipOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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c98d4621f2f76618ff48c99d209d4cc3 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egyptair-airplane-usa-imagery-idUSKCN0YA2UL | U.S. review of EgyptAir imagery shows no signs of blast: officials | U.S. review of EgyptAir imagery shows no signs of blast: officials
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. review of satellite imagery so far has not produced any signs of an explosion aboard the EgyptAir flight that crashed on Thursday en route from Paris to Cairo, officials from multiple U.S. agencies told Reuters.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters, said the conclusion was the result of a preliminary examination of imagery and cautioned against media reports suggesting the United States believed a bomb was responsible for the crash.
The United States has not ruled out any possible causes for the crash, including mechanical failure, terrorism or a deliberate act by the pilot or crew, they said.
Reporting by Phil StewartOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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34dd11be20fe452042c46cf4ceb1f7cb | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egyptian-avastin/egyptian-middleman-bought-fake-avastin-from-turkey-idUSTRE81R24120120228 | Egyptian middleman bought fake Avastin from Turkey | Egyptian middleman bought fake Avastin from Turkey
By Edmund Blair5 Min Read
CAIRO (Reuters) - Fake versions of the multibillion-dollar cancer drug Avastin were purchased in Turkey before being traded by middlemen across the Middle East and Europe to the United States, an Egyptian businessman involved said on Tuesday.
Milad Kamal Ayad, who works on commission for Egyptian firm SAWA, told Reuters he sourced 167 packets of Avastin from Turkey, via a Syrian businessman also based in Egypt, for Swiss-based Hadicon AG.
The drug, found to be counterfeit, eventually reached clinics in California, Texas and Illinois. It contained no life extending medicine or any other biotech drug, Roche said on Monday, but instead contained salt, starch and a variety of chemicals.
The case involving Roche’s top-selling cancer treatments has underscored how even expensive injectable medicines, not just pills like Viagra and Lipitor, are at risk from criminal counterfeiters.
It also shows how difficult it is to trace the source of such counterfeits as they pass from one supplier to another.
“Via SAWA, I bought these items from a Syrian. Of course, I didn’t know they were counterfeit copies,” Ayad said, speaking in a meeting at the Reuters bureau in Cairo where he described the deal.
He said that a sample packet of the drug he was shown by the Syrian appeared to be original.
Phony Avastin has been found in the region previously. Roche said on Friday that fake versions of Avastin were discovered in Syria in 2009.
In the latest case, the U.S. distributor, known as Montana Healthcare Solutions, listed Avastin along with its Turkish name Altuzan on an order form obtained by Reuters.
Zug-based Hadicon said it had dealt with SAWA to source the drug. The Swiss firm provided Reuters an address in Cairo, although no company by SAWA’s name was based there. It also supplied a mobile number without a name. The phone belonged to Ayad.
Ayad, who said SAWA was owned and run by another Egyptian businessman now abroad, said he sourced the drug for Hadicon via Syrian businessman Mohamed Fakkas el-Beid, who he said is based in the Egyptian Mediterranean port city of Alexandria. Ayad provided a copy of the Syrian’s national identification card.
FINGERPRINT DOCUMENT
Ayad showed a handwritten document bearing Fakkas el-Beid’s name as the seller and Ayad as the buyer of the Avastin in a deal last year. The document said the drug was sourced from Istanbul, Turkey, though no company or other agent was named.
It bore a fingerprint of Fakkas el-Beid in place of a signature because Kamal said the Syrian could not write. Ayad said he drew up the document with Fakkas el-Beid after learning the drug was fake. He said he did not have original invoices.
Ayad said his Syrian contact had not given him any details about the Turkish source. During the meeting with Reuters, Ayad telephoned Fakkas el-Beid to request further details but his counterpart did not give him any. Calls by Reuters made separately to the Syrian’s mobile were not answered.
It was not clear if the fake drug originated in Turkey.
Roche said there had been a number of other “individual cases” of counterfeit Avastin in the past few years, including a previously reported incident in Shanghai in 2010.
Ayad said he paid half the cost upfront for the consignment to the Syrian and the rest when Hadicon confirmed receipt. Subsequently, Hadicon called Ayad requesting their money be returned after the drug was found to be fake. Ayad said he was still pushing Fakkas el-Beid for the cash.
The phony Avastin was sold by Hadicon to Danish drug distributor CareMed, which shipped it on directly to Britain’s River East Supplies, according to Danish and British regulators.
An Egyptian Health Ministry official earlier said no company by the name SAWA was registered with the ministry to import or export drugs. Ayad said SAWA had a more general license to trade and said the shipment of drugs never entered Egypt.
Roche in Egypt said there was only one official distributor for Avastin, Egydrug, a unit of a state-owned holding company.
Every shipment of Avastin or any other drug entering Egypt needs a Health Ministry license and is then subject to analysis before release, Yousef Ehab, Roche general manager in Egypt, told Reuters. Batches are also tracked after that, he added.
In addition, Ehab said contracts to import the drug include a clause preventing re-export, unless there are exceptional circumstances with a good reason. Even then, approval is needed from both Roche and the ministry, Ehab added.
Ehab said Roche was working with its customers and hospitals to ensure no counterfeit Avastin drugs were in use in Egypt.
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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32fc61b46f5f5768a01375a0112a45ef | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eig-divestment-fluxys-belgium/eig-sells-stake-in-brazil-bolivia-pipeline-eyes-petrobras-assets-idUKKBN29A23W?edition-redirect=uk | EIG sells stake in Brazil-Bolivia pipeline, eyes Petrobras assets | EIG sells stake in Brazil-Bolivia pipeline, eyes Petrobras assets
By Sabrina Valle, Gram Slattery4 Min Read
RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) -EIG Global Energy Partners has sold to Fluxys Belgium a portion of South America’s biggest natural gas pipeline, clearing a regulatory obstacle to buying a bigger share of the Brazil-Bolivia duct, EIG’s CEO said on Tuesday.
Blair Thomas, CEO of EIG, poses in an undated handout photo obtained January 5, 2021. Danthi Comunicacoes/via REUTERS THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY.
U.S.-based EIG wants to bid for the 51% stake in the pipeline owned by Brazil’s state-run oil company Petrobras, Chief Executive Blair Thomas told Reuters, as part of a wider move to into the country’s growing natural gas industry.
He said antitrust issues blocking an EIG bid for a stake in Petrobras are settled by the sale for an undisclosed amount of EIG’s 27.5% stake in the Brazilian part of a pipeline known as Gasbol, which connects Bolivian reserves to Brazil.
“This is about liberating us for a wider strategy,” Thomas said in an interview via videoconference.
He said EIG, which manages funds focused on energy assets, aims to create a private-sector alternative for processing and transporting gas from oil majors as the country develops this century’s largest offshore finds, known as the pre-salt.
EIG stands ready to spend billions to join partners in acquiring pipelines, processing plants and eventually production of natural gas in Brazil, Thomas said, as supply and demand for the fuel grows in Latin America’s largest economy.
“We believe in the energy transition and natural gas has a key role to play in that,” Thomas said.
EIG’s bet in Brazil comes while Petroleo Brasileiro SA, as the state firm is known, speeds up asset sales, ending what was nearly a state-held monopoly in natural gas five years ago.
He said EIG is also looking into mid-life offshore oil fields from Petrobras producing from 150,000-200,000 barrels a day, including legacy fields Albacora and Marlim.
SHIFTING AWAY FROM BOLIVIA
Gasbol connects natural gas reserves in the Andean nation to Brazil via two separate entities: Gas TransBoliviano SA (GTB) which owns and runs the Bolivian section and Transportadora Brasileira Gasoduto Bolívia-Brasil SA (TBG), its counterpart for Brazil.
The EIG fund holding the Brazil-Bolivia pipeline investment will be closed, Thomas said. The Bolivian side of the 2,600-kilometer (1,600-mile) pipeline, in which EIG has a 38% stake, will eventually be sold too, he said, without giving details.
Brazil has been importing most of its natural gas from Bolivia in recent decades. But new oil and gas discoveries are slowly decreasing this dependence and may turn Brazil into a gas exporter someday, Thomas said.
Together with the cheap liquefied natural gas (LNG) imported by ships, Thomas said, the offshore finds are likely to feed a growing consumer market driven by industrial use.
On Monday, EIG-backed natural gas company GNA received its first imported LNG cargo in Brazil. The super-chilled fuel will be used in a power plant expected to start commercial operations in the first half of 2021.
Brazil will now be a regular importer of LNG, said Thomas, and in 10-15 years the country may be ready for its first export plant, another EIG investment target.
“We absolutely want to be first in that,” he said.
Reporting by Sabrina Valle and Gram SlatteryEditing by Brad Haynes, Paul Simao, Grant McCool and David GregorioOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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8faace6448f80c6d2e2078dfd36bd8b6 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-einride-autonomous-sweden/driverless-electric-truck-starts-deliveries-on-swedish-public-road-idUSKCN1SL0NC?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axiosautonomousvehicles&stream=autonomous-vehicles | Driverless electric truck starts deliveries on Swedish public road | Driverless electric truck starts deliveries on Swedish public road
By Esha Vaish3 Min Read
JONKOPING, Sweden (Reuters) - Resembling the helmet of a Star Wars stormtrooper, a driverless electric truck began daily freight deliveries on a public road in Sweden on Wednesday, in what developer Einride and logistics customer DB Schenker described as a world first.
Robert Falck, the CEO of Swedish start-up Einride, said the company was in partnership talks with major suppliers to help scale production and deliver orders, and the firm did not rule out future tie-ups with large truckmakers.
“This public road permit is a major milestone ... and it is a step to commercializing autonomous technology on roads,” the former Volvo executive told Reuters.
“Since we’re a software and operational first company, a partnership with a manufacturing company is something that we see as a core moving forward,” he said, adding he hoped to seal a deal by next year.
Falck said Einride, whose investors include ex-Daimler Asia trucks head Marc Llistosella, is also courting investors for an ongoing Series A fundraising, often a company’s first sizable one. It previously raised $10 million.
Auto alliances are on the rise to share the cost of electric and autonomous technology. Ford has vowed to invest $500 million in U.S. electric utility truck startup Rivian.
Einride’s T-Pod is 26 tonnes when full and does not have a driver cabin, which it estimates reduces road freight operating costs by around 60 percent versus a diesel truck with a driver.
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Besides Schenker, Einride has orders from German grocer Lidl, Swedish delivery company Svenska Retursystem and five Fortune 500 retail companies, underpinning its ambition to have 200 vehicles in operation by the end of 2020.
Freight operators are under pressure to reduce delivery times, cut emissions and face a growing shortage of drivers.
Schenker picked Einride over established truckmakers as the T-Pod straddles the two biggest sector transformations: digitization and electrification, CEO Jochen Thewes said.
“We believe that Einride is the best concept out there for now,” he said.
The T-Pod is level 4 autonomous, the second highest category, and uses a Nvidia Drive platform to process visual data in real time. An operator, sitting miles away, can supervise and control up to 10 vehicles at once.
Thewes said the rollout of 5G technology, vital for electrification, was lagging. For Schenker’s pilot with Einride, Ericsson and Telia had to construct two new towers.
The T-Pod has permission to make short trips - between a warehouse and a terminal - on a public road in an industrial area in Jonkoping, central Sweden, at up to 5 km/hr, documents from the transport authority show.
Falck said Einride would apply next year for more public route permits and was planning to expand in the United States.
“Ground zero for autonomous vehicles is the United States. I think it will be the first market to scale when it comes to autonomous vehicles,” he said.
Reporting by Esha Vaish and Ilze Filks, additional reporting by Anna Ringstrom; Editing by Mark PotterOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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0721fe73ff37bd9d0dacffb14b327d7a | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eis-aircraft-group-m-a-qinetiq/britains-qinetiq-buys-german-air-training-unit-for-70-million-euros-idUSKBN1HV167 | Britain's QinetiQ buys German air training unit for 70 million euros | Britain's QinetiQ buys German air training unit for 70 million euros
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
LONDON (Reuters) - British defense company QinetiQ QQ.L said it agreed to acquire a Germany-based air training company for 70 million euros ($85.48 million), providing it with exposure to a new and growing European market, and boosting its shares.
The acquired unit, bought from E.I.S. Aircraft Group, provides aerial training services to the German armed forces and the United States Air Force in Europe.
QinetiQ said it was attracted to the unit’s fast growth -- it has reported compound annual revenue growth of 17 percent over the past three years -- and that the deal would be completed on a cash-free, debt-free basis.
Shares in the QinetiQ climbed 5 percent to 237.5 pence to their highest level since December.
“The acquisition enhances international exposure and provides an entry point into the German defense market as that country starts to increase defense spending,” Liberum analyst Rory Smith said.
QinetiQ’s chief executive Steve Wadey said that the company planned to use the business to drive further growth by taking its services and selling them into other markets such as Britain and the Middle East.
QinetiQ’s biggest customer is the UK Ministry of Defence. According to its website, Germany is a new market for the company, which also has operations in Canada, Australia, the U.S., Sweden and Belgium.
($1 = 0.8189 euros)
Reporting by Sarah Young, editing by Louise HeavensOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b2ac4281d987874e83028915beacbb63 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-el-salvador-china/china-signs-on-for-gigantic-investment-in-el-salvador-infrastructure-idUSKBN1Y7266 | China signs on for 'gigantic' investment in El Salvador infrastructure | China signs on for 'gigantic' investment in El Salvador infrastructure
By Nelson Renteria2 Min Read
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SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - China will help build several major infrastructure projects in El Salvador including a stadium and water treatment plant, the two countries said on Tuesday, signaling China’s growing role in the region after El Salvador cut ties with Taiwan.
Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, who met with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in China this week, said the investment represented a “gigantic, non-refundable cooperation” for the small Central American nation.
He did not disclose the planned investment amount.
Under the agreement, China will help build a large sports stadium, multi-story library and water treatment plant.
China, the world’s second biggest economy, will also assist at coastal tourist sites, including building streets, parks and a water system along the beaches known as Surf City, and restaurants and shops on the Puerto de la Libertad pier.
The projects offer the strongest signal yet of El Salvador’s embrace of close relations with China.
El Salvador “adheres to the principle of one China, categorically rejects any act that goes against this principle and any form of ‘independence of Taiwan,’” El Salvador and China said in a joint statement.
El Salvador broke off diplomatic relations with Taiwan in August last year, following the Dominican Republic and Panama in switching sides to China.
(This story corrects last paragraph to show El Salvador broke ties with Taiwan in August last year)
Reporting by Nelson Renteria, Writing by Daina Beth Solomon; Editing by Steve OrlofskyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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6387ac74c162c603c5a528a03e2654da | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-el-salvador-corruption/salvadoran-court-orders-ex-president-to-return-4-4-million-in-stolen-funds-idUSKBN29B05W | Salvadoran court orders ex-president to return $4.4 million in stolen funds | Salvadoran court orders ex-president to return $4.4 million in stolen funds
By Nelson Renteria2 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: El Salvador's former President Elias Antonio Saca talks with his lawyers before his hearing on corruption charges in San Salvador, El Salvador, September 12, 2018. REUTERS/Jose Cabezas
SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - A civil court in El Salvador on Tuesday found former President Elias Antonio Saca and his wife Ana Mixco guilty of “illicit enrichment” and ordered them to return $4.4 million to state coffers, authorities said.
Prosecutors had found irregularities in the couple’s wealth declaration and accused both of transferring public money to their personal bank accounts and to those of broadcasting companies they owned during Saca’s presidency, said Gerver Montoya, an attorney from the prosecutor’s office.
Along with the order to return stolen funds, Saca was banned from public office for 10 years.
The ruling adds to a 10-year prison term Saca received in September 2018 after pleading guilty to money laundering and embezzlement of $300 million during his administration from 2004 and 2009.
Reuters could not immediately reach attorneys for the former president and his wife.
“It’s known that past officials and presidents stole,” Attorney General Raul Melara said in a tweet. “We’re working so that they pay for their crimes, and this money is used for the benefit of Salvadorans.”
Reporting by Nelson Renteria; Writing by Stefanie Eschenbacher; Editing by Michael PerryOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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e57357a4dfbb1c87fcd8d83d19aafd96 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-el-salvador-extortion/deadly-gang-extortion-rackets-drive-emigration-from-el-salvador-idUSKCN0Y71QW | Deadly gang extortion rackets drive emigration from El Salvador | Deadly gang extortion rackets drive emigration from El Salvador
By Anastasia Moloney, Thomson Reuters Foundation8 Min Read
SAN SALVADOR (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Children travelling alone and mothers with infants in arms look forlorn and weary as they step off buses at the end of a 17-hour journey from Mexico to El Salvador - the very country they had tried to escape.
An employee of a bus company counts money in San Salvador, El Salvador April 21, 2016. REUTERS/Jose Cabezas
Up to eight buses arrive daily at the main migration centre in El Salvador’s capital, carrying scores of Salvadorans who have been deported by the Mexican authorities as they tried to make their way north to the United States.
At a newly-built reception centre, children draw pictures in a cozy play area, and free maize pancakes, phone calls and medical check-ups are on offer.
But no one wants to be here. Clutching plastic bags with their meagre belongings, families wait to be interviewed by officials and ponder their next move. Many will rest briefly before attempting the journey all over again.
Salvadorans have always emigrated north in search of better paid jobs. But as the country struggles to contain ferocious gang violence, it is the threat of attack and the burden of extortion rackets that are pushing more of its citizens to flee, and their businesses to close.
“El Salvador and also Guatemala and Honduras present conflict-like levels of violence and criminality,” said Francesca Fontanini, a spokeswoman for the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR.
“People in these areas live in fear of violent death, becoming the victims of a crime, or suffering persecution and abuse, and this is causing increasing numbers of people to flee their homes.”
A February report by the Technological University of San Salvador showed that of 747 Salvadaron migrants surveyed, 42 percent said they left their homes because of violence - compared to just five percent who cited that reason in 2013.
Among the different forms of gang intimidation and violence, extortion is largely invisible and the most poorly documented.
Gangs prey on both rich and poor with demands backed by death threats. Many business owners, from hawkers to tycoons, must hand over a slice of revenues, pushing them to the brink.
One deported woman, who got off a bus with her young son, said her decision to leave home started with a phone call she received in January. The caller, a gang member, demanded up to $400 every month in extortion payments.
“Where we will get that kind of money from? I can’t pay that,” said the woman who did not give her name for fear of reprisals.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” she said, adding this had been her third attempt to reach the United States.
SOURCE OF INCOME
There are an estimated 70,000 gang members in El Salvador. The country is one of the world’s deadliest nations, largely due to their turf wars and shoot-outs with police.
Both of the two most powerful armed gangs - Calle 18 and their rivals the Mara Salvatrucha - run extortion rackets worth hundreds of millions of dollars a year.
Experts say racketeering is a leading source of income for the gangs, known as maras, and jailed gang members control a chunk of it from behind bars.
Slideshow ( 6 images )
Extortion money is used by the maras to run their criminal organisations, buy weapons and support the families of jailed gang members.
According to a 2015 poll by the University Institute of Public Opinion in San Salvador, nearly one in every four Salvadorans said they had been a direct victim of extortion.
No one, even a schoolchild, is exempt from the protection tax, known locally as “la renta”.
Joaquin Orellana, a teacher and secretary of the teacher’s union, SIMEDUCO, said children working for gangs have to collect a daily “renta” of 10 to 25 cents from each of their classmates.
BUSINESSES CRIPPLED
And it’s not just the poor and vulnerable who are targeted. The middle classes, in gated communities in San Salvador’s affluent neighourhoods, are also victims of the crime.
Fed up with the cost and violence extortion brings, some business leaders have decided to stand up to the gangs.
“Extortion is like life insurance,” Catalino Miranda, a straight-talking bus company owner, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation at his office overlooking a bus terminal in a grubby neighbourhood. Outside two men stand guard with AK-47s.
He estimates El Salvador’s bus drivers and fare collectors are forced to pay gangs from $18 to $26 million a year.
“If you don’t pay up you get killed,” he said, a handgun on the table in front of him and a rifle on the floor.
Around 1,000 drivers and conductors have been murdered in gang-related killings over the last decade, he said.
Next to his office, staff monitor television screens showing real-time footage from cameras installed inside his buses as part of a $1.2 million security system he set up four years ago.
Yet despite phone calls demanding payments, and three attempts on his life, Miranda said he has never paid the gangs.
“The calls have now stopped. The only thing that’s going to sound here is my 7mm handgun,” he said.
MENACING CALLS
An hour’s drive from the capital towards the volcanic sand beaches of El Salvador’s Pacific coast, another businessman, hotel owner Ernesto Vilanova, is also speaking out.
“Extortion is the biggest blow that we small businesses have received,” said Vilanova, who heads the National Council for Small Businesses (CONAPES).
“It has forced some businesses to close, others to go bankrupt. Owners have left the country and people have been killed. The sector is in crisis,” he said.
Nearly 80 percent of all informal and small businesses, like family-owned stores and supermarkets, pay extortion fees to the maras, Vilanova said. Such demands force up to three small businesses to close every month, shoring the emigration wave.
Payments range from $5 a week for a street seller to $30,000 a month for big businesses, with an extra “Christmas bonus”.
Vilanova says he received a menacing phone call last month, with the caller demanding a one-off payment of $20,000.
“When I got the call I was alone and I was afraid as anyone would be,” he said. “The guy kept saying you have to protect your family, right?”
Vilanova said he phoned the national police chief to report the crime and within days a suspect was arrested and jailed.
“I don’t carry around a gun anymore to defend myself. My weapon is to denounce the crime,” he said.
EXTORTION FROM PRISON
Police authorities say around half of all extortion payments are ordered from behind bars.
Vilanova said a common tactic is for a teenage mara to enter a shop and tell the owner he found a phone on the floor.
“The mara will say: I’ll leave it with you and maybe someone will come for it. Shortly afterwards, the phone will ring and the shopkeeper will answer. Often the call comes from a prison and the caller demands an extortion payment,” he said.
To cut them off from their networks, 300 jailed gang leaders were transferred in April to maximum security prisons where the government said they would be held in isolation.
But despite the government’s crackdown and the efforts of a few brave citizens to counter gang crime, the demands for cash keep coming, and the exodus continues.
Back at the migration centre, the deported woman who fled gang extortion is fearful about returning home.
“We’ll go back to our neighbourhood and maybe they will kill us,” she said.
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461ec977737aee8a1e63eebd8db0a0b5 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-el-salvador-romero/el-salvador-issues-arrest-order-for-archbishop-romeros-killer-idUSKCN1MY03P | El Salvador issues arrest order for Archbishop Romero's killer | El Salvador issues arrest order for Archbishop Romero's killer
By Nelson Renteria2 Min Read
Pilgrims from El Salvador hold the portrait of saint Oscar Romero during the special audience with Pope Francis at Paul VI Hall at the Vatican, October 15, 2018. REUTERS/Tony Gentile
SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - A Salvadoran judge on Tuesday ordered the arrest of a former military officer suspected of ordering the 1980 killing of Archbishop Oscar Romero, a Latin American human rights icon recently named a Roman Catholic saint.
The order called for the arrest of Alvaro Rafael Saravia, a 78-year-old former soldier who has been a major suspect for years. His case was dismissed in 1993 after an amnesty law banned criminal trials connected to the Central American nation’s bloody civil war.
Some 75,000 people died in the conflict that lasted from 1980 to 1992 during a military dictatorship. Romero, shot dead while celebrating Mass in a hospital chapel, is thought to have been killed by a right-wing death squad.
The murder was one of the most shocking of the long conflict between a series of U.S.-backed governments and leftist rebels in which thousands were killed by military death squads.
No one was brought to justice in Romero’s case.
It was reopened in May 2017, a year after the controversial amnesty law was overturned.
Judge Rigoberto Chicas said there is sufficient evidence to charge Saravia for participating in Romero’s killing, and ordered the police and Interpol to search for him, a court spokesman said. Saravia’s wherabouts are unknown.
Romero’s homilies had blasted the U.S.-backed military dictatorship while voicing solidarity with the poor. Pope Francis declared him a martyr who had been killed for hatred of the faith. He was made a saint in October.
Reporting by Nelson Renteria; Writing by Daina Beth Solomon; Editing by Sandra MalerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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7485153d031318b68970169dcf4a68d2 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elbit-systems-results-expense/elbit-systems-to-post-55-million-acquisition-related-expense-in-fourth-quarter-idUSKBN2000QM | Elbit Systems to post $55 million acquisition-related expense in fourth-quarter | Elbit Systems to post $55 million acquisition-related expense in fourth-quarter
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: Logo of Israeli defence electronics firm Elbit Systems is seen at their offices in Haifa, Israel February 26, 2017. REUTERS/Baz Ratner/File Photo
TEL AVIV (Reuters) - Israeli defense contractor Elbit Systems ESLT.TA said on Thursday it expects to record an expense of about $55 million in the fourth quarter related to the acquisition by its U.S. subsidiary of the night vision business of L3Harris Technologies LHX.N.
This expense will be recorded mainly in the “cost of revenues” line item and will be eliminated in the non-GAAP results due to the non-recurring nature of the expense.
Elbit ESLT.O will report fourth quarter results in March.
The incorporation of the night vision business “is expected to produce synergies that will enhance the company’s ability to address various market requirements and customer support activities,” Elbit said in a statement.
The company also said it won a six-year, $43 million contract from South Korea's Hanwha Systems 272210.KS to equip next generation Korean fighter jets with terrain avoidance systems.
Reporting by Tova Cohen; Editing by Steven ScheerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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e6daf5bfa9f9d42db6baa39602105f4e | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elbitsystems-arizona-contract/elbit-systems-wins-homeland-security-contract-idUSBREA2104K20140302 | Elbit Systems wins homeland security contract | Elbit Systems wins homeland security contract
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
Trucks are seen reflected making their way through the Advanced Spectroscopic Portal (ASP) at the New York Container Terminal in New York April 11, 2007. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
TEL AVIV (Reuters) - Israeli defense electronics company Elbit Systems said the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Customs and Border Protection (CBP) awarded its subsidiary a contract to deploy border surveillance technology in southern Arizona.
Known as the Integrated Fixed Tower contract, it includes a base period quantity and options that CBP may exercise over several years. Currently, CBP awarded the base period quantity for a portion of the $145 million total contract amount, to be implemented over one year, Elbit said on Sunday.
“Arizonans have been waiting more than a decade for the Department of Homeland Security to place the needed technology along our border to support the Border Patrol and fully secure our southern border,” U.S. Senator John McCain of Arizona said in a separate statement.
“If this technology is developed, integrated and fielded correctly, these Integrated Fixed Towers in southern Arizona, coupled with the tremendous work of the Border Patrol, will give our agents the ability to detect, evaluate, and respond to all illegal entries crossing our border.”
Reporting by Tova CohenOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b2013073520cf74f40c999b31c35f5c1 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elderly-health-walking-aids/canes-walkers-linked-to-higher-risk-of-falls-idUSKBN0LA21G20150206 | Canes, walkers linked to higher risk of falls | Canes, walkers linked to higher risk of falls
By Janice Neumann4 Min Read
Walkers and canes can be lifesavers for older people, but a new study highlights the downside of using them without training.
“A lot of older adults seem to struggle with their walking aids . . . they often drag along their walking aids like a burden with a difficult gait pattern as a result, possibly increasing the risk of falling,” said the study’s lead author, Tine Roman de Mettelinge of Ghent University in Belgium.
Older people need to be able to function independently, but gait problems can undermine that, even leading to nursing home admission, Roman de Mettelinge and her coauthor point out in the Journal of Geriatric Physical Therapy.
The study followed 43 adults, ages 63 to 94, in a residential care facility in Belgium. Twenty-two used walking aids (most used a four-wheeled walker, two used a two-wheeled walker, one used a walker without wheels and one used a cane).
Researchers tracked their falls, as well as factors that might have contributed to the accidents, such as cognitive problems, fear of falling, use of psychotropic drugs or age.
They also measured residents’ muscle strength, walking speed, and how much their arms were swinging as they moved.
Altogether, 22 residents (15 using walking aids and seven not using walking aids) had at least one fall.
After accounting for psychotropic drug use, falls in the previous years, older age, slower walking, longer periods spent standing still and less arm swinging, people who used walking aids were still nearly four times more likely to fall than those who did not.
Those who fell walked much more slowly and took smaller steps than those who did not fall.
“A substantial proportion of the relationship between using walking aids and future falls” could be explained by altered gait, older age and use of psychotropic drugs, Roman de Mettelinge said in an email. The factors with the greatest effect seemed to be cadence, stance and swing percentage, she added.
Such results are “common knowledge to many researchers,” said Thurmon E. Lockhart, a professor in the School of Biological and Health Systems Engineering at Arizona State University, who called the study “very, very important.”
But the take-home message isn’t as simple as avoiding walking aids, said Lockhart, who was not involved in the study.
“It gives kind of a mixed message but the bottom line is the device in itself may not cause future accidents, but at the same time since there’s a relationship between fall risk and the device use, we need to watch out for that a little in the future,” he said.
While a cane might help with mobility, it could also make it more difficult for people to stabilize themselves during a fall, Lockhart noted.
“It’s almost all about how we recover” from loss of balance, he said.
Lockhart has developed a “slip simulator,” where an individual walks on a shifting linoleum floor controlled by a computer. The person wears a harness and learns to regain a sense of balance as the floor shifts.
“They’re learning about themselves, about their limits of balance and stability . . . the only way to train that is to slip and fall,” Lockhart said.
Roman de Mettelinge said doctors and therapists should consider an individual’s physical and mental abilities and living conditions before prescribing a walking aid.
Someone who needs a walking aid should be given balance and gait exercises and then be trained to safely use a walker or cane, including proper gait patterns and ways to avoid falls, she said. The training should also include complicated maneuvers like opening and closing doors with the aid.
Roman de Mettelinge cautioned that the results of the study applied to individuals in assisted care facilities, who tend to be older and in poorer health than people still living at home.
SOURCE: bit.ly/1DFzuhD Journal of Geriatric Physical Therapy, online January 15, 2015.
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ec7ce1b6865d9c098005039643472fed | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-election-china-stocks-factbox-idCAKBN27L0NU | Factbox: China new energy shares, Apple suppliers lead gains as U.S. election result awaited | Factbox: China new energy shares, Apple suppliers lead gains as U.S. election result awaited
By Reuters Staff4 Min Read
SHANGHAI/HONG KONG (Reuters) - China’s new energy shares and Apple suppliers led the gains in the A-share market on Thursday, while defence companies lost ground, as early returns from the U.S. election pointed to a win for Democratic challenger Joe Biden.
FILE PHOTO: People wearing a protective face mask walks past a screen displaying Hang Seng Index, in Hong Kong, China November 4, 2020. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu
While analysts expect little change in U.S. policy toward China whatever the outcome, a Biden administration is expected to bring a more nuanced, multilateral approach to trade and a less hawkish foreign policy toward developments in the Taiwan Strait.
Democrat Joe Biden on Wednesday predicted a U.S. election win over President Donald Trump after pivotal victories in Michigan and Wisconsin, while the Republican incumbent sought to offset a narrowing path to re-election with lawsuits and demands for a recount.
APPLE SUPPLIERS
China’s Apple suppliers have been sensitive to the ups and downs in the Sino-U.S. trade war, reflecting concerns of possible Chinese restrictions on U.S. tech firms including the Cupertino, California-based giant.
Shares of those suppliers gained on Thursday, with acoustic component maker AAC Technologies, BYD Electronic International and Sunny Optical Technology rising between 3.3% and 6%.
On the mainland, Shenzhen Desay Battery Technology, Shennan Circuits Co Ltd, Goertek Inc and Foxconn Industrial Internet firmed between 2.7% and 8.9%.
NEW ENERGY
China’s new energy firms are expected to benefit from a Biden presidency, given his pledge to invest more in renewable energy.
Sales of electric, plug-in hybrid and hydrogen-powered vehicles in China, the world’s biggest auto market, are forecast to rise to 20% of overall new car sales by 2025 from just 5% now, according to State Council.
The CSI300 new energy index climbed as much as 4.4% on Thursday, having gained nearly 70% this year.
Battery giant Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL) surged about 150% this year, while solar panel components maker LONGi Green nearly tripled in value.
DEFENCE
Simmering geopolitical tensions around the Sino-Indian border, the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea have boosted defence companies as Beijing intensifies its military build-up, including preparations to challenge American power further afield.
A second Trump administration is likely to exacerbate those tensions, a potential boon for defence contractors.
A Biden White House is widely expected to take a less confrontational approach in its trans-Pacific diplomacy, though the previous Democratic administration of Barack Obama, in which Joe Biden served as vice president, also clashed with China over its claims to the South China Sea.
The CSI defense index shed as much as 1.6% on Thursday, bucking a broad rally in the market. The index has gained over 50% so far this year.
TECH
U.S. restrictions on exports to China’s tech and semiconductor industries have marked the sector as a key battleground in the Sino-U.S. trade war as China drives for self-sufficiency.
It is not immediately clear whether Biden would ease restrictions on China’s tech industry if elected.
China has been pushing forward with reforms in its capital markets, including a registration-based IPO system for the tech-focused STAR Market and Shenzhen’s start-up board, to help better finance its tech industry and foster new growth drivers.
The tech-heavy start-up board ChiNext added 1.3% on Thursday, while the STAR50 index was up 1.1%. Both indexes gained 55% and 47%, respectively, this year.
China’s top chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp rose as much as 7.6%, having rallied nearly 100% this year.
For Reuters live coverage of the U.S. election, please visit here
Reporting by Donny Kwok, Luoyan Liu and Andrew Galbraith; Editing by Vidya Ranganathan and Devika SyamnathOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b6f9f8d435beb843c4af76c94d342885 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-election-polls-change-commentary-idUSKBN12V0AP | Commentary: It's not only Trumpers who believe voting is rigged | Commentary: It's not only Trumpers who believe voting is rigged
By Shibley Telhami, Stella Rouse, Commentary7 Min Read
Trends in American public attitudes have seemed to be breaking Hillary Clinton’s way, with a majority of polls indicating her lead over Donald Trump widening. But even before FBI Director James Comey announced Friday that additional emails that might be connected to Clinton have been found, there were signs of potential wild cards that could add greater uncertainty to the election outcome, as well as volatility to the next four years.
Supporters cheer as Donald Trump speaks at an airport campaign rally in Albuquerque, New Mexico, October 30, 2016. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri
Throughout his campaign, Trump has advanced the idea that the political system is “rigged” against the American public. More recently, he expanded his claim to include the election process itself. This dovetails with his refusal, at the final presidential debate, to say he would accept the election results on November 8.
A substantial majority of Americans agree with Trump that “the system is rigged.”
More than 70 percent of both Republicans and independents concur, according to our University of Maryland Critical Issues Poll (fielded by Nielsen Scarborough from October 5-14; 2.5 percent margin of error). Even a majority of Democrats said they believe this.
A recent Reuters/Ipsos poll also found that close to 80 percent of Republicans were concerned about the accuracy of the final vote. Only 60 percent were confident their votes will be counted accurately.
Our poll agrees with the Reuters/Ipsos poll, and most national polls, in showing that Clinton is leading. It showed her ahead by 9 percentage points nationally, and more than 60 percent of respondents expected her to be the next president. The Trump video scandal may have turned as many as 6 percent of registered voters away from potentially supporting him.
Still in Trump’s favor, however, is that most Americans expressed a desire for “significant” economic and political change. And more people saw Trump as the agent of system change. If the hunch of a majority of Americans across the political spectrum is right, and many voters who may vote for Trump are not saying so publicly, there remains a degree of uncertainty about how some will ultimately vote. (The recent Reuters/Ipsos showed this as well.)
Let’s begin with the poll results that favor Clinton. “If elections were held today,” 43 percent said they would vote for Clinton, 34 percent for Trump, 6 percent for Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson and 2 percent for Jill Stein of the Green Party. When asked who they think will be the next U.S. president, 63 percent — including 34 percent of Republicans and 47 percent of independents — said Clinton, compared to 31 percent for Trump.
However, our poll also found signs that may hearten Trump’s supporters.
Slideshow ( 2 images )
First, two-thirds of Americans reported that they somewhat agree or strongly agree that “our system is rigged against people like me,” including a majority of Democrats.
There is little difference between younger (18 to 34 years old) and older adults (35 and up) in their sentiments about a rigged system. Some 64 percent of younger Americans said they somewhat or strongly agree with the statement, compared to 66 percent of older adults.
Trump’s strongest constituency has been the non-college educated, and opinions about a rigged system resonate more with them than college-educated Americans. Almost three-fourths of Americans without a college education either somewhat or strongly agreed with the statement. Still, more than half (59 percent) of those with at least some college shared that opinion.
Second, about three-quarters of Americans care “a great deal” that their vote sends a message to the political establishment, including 63 percent of Democrats.
Third, practically all Americans want to see “significant change” to the American political and economic system (98 percent and 97 percent, respectively) — and a majority see Trump as more an agent of change.
Americans see Trump as more likely to bring about change to the political system: 52 percent said he is the candidate most likely to bring change, compared with 31 percent for Clinton. In addition, only 8 percent said he would not bring any fundamental change, compared to 35 percent for Clinton. Twenty-four percent said they can’t tell if the change promised by Trump would be positive or negative (compared to 13 percent for Clinton). These potential voters may be critical to the race’s outcome: Do they want change bad enough to roll the dice?
Fourth, an overwhelming majority, 87 percent, agreed that there are people who will vote for Trump even though they are not prepared to state their preference openly (47 percent “strongly agree” and 40 percent “somewhat agree”), compared with 59 percent for Clinton (23 percent “strongly agree” and 36 percent “somewhat agree”).
Fifth, motivation to vote remains a key unknown. Turnout could be critical in contested states. Our poll found that 84 percent of Trump supporters are “very motivated” to vote, compared to 72 percent of Clinton’s. Only 6 percent of Trump supporters said they are not motivated or motivated a little, compared with 13 percent of Clinton’s.
Although this election doesn’t seem to turn on specific issues, some do matter, particularly the U.S. Supreme Court. Two-thirds of respondents in our poll said who the next president will choose to fill the vacancy on the Supreme Court is very important or extremely important to their choice for president. This included 73 percent of Republicans, 62 percent of Democrats and 45 percent of independents.
But if there is something that best characterizes the 2016 mood of the electorate across the political spectrum, it is the belief that the system is rigged, which both independent Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Trump tapped into early in their campaigns. Even if Trump loses on Election Day, this mood will likely carry over beyond the presidential contest and may affect the ability of elected officials to govern.
It may be too late for Trump to turn the tide. If he has a shot, it is in Americans’ strong desire for major political and economic change and the pervasive sense that the system in rigged. And in the degree to which some who see Trump as deeply flawed are prepared to roll the dice.
About the Author Shibley Telhami is professor and director of the University of Maryland Critical Issues Poll, and non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Stella Rouse is associate professor and director of the Center for American Politics and Citizenship and associate director of the University of Maryland Critical Issues Poll. The views expressed in this article are not those of Reuters News.
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2b3e2fc58d1847b3740835db5a74bf59 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-election-trump-habtoor-idINKCN0US1D920160114?edition-redirect=in | UAE billionaire says Gulf money would quit U.S. if Trump wins | UAE billionaire says Gulf money would quit U.S. if Trump wins
By Hadeel Al Sayegh3 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - Gulf Arabs could pull billions in investment money from the United States if Donald Trump wins the presidency later this year, billionaire UAE businessman Khalaf Al Habtoor told Reuters.
Slideshow ( 4 images )
Trump, front-runner to be the Republican presidential candidate, triggered outrage around the world when he advocated a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States.
The United States “will lose their businesses, people will cancel any plans of investment there, I am sure of that,” said Habtoor, the head of United Arab Emirates-based conglomerate Al Habtoor Group (AHG), who once supported Trump’s candidacy.
“Because if you don’t want me in your country, how can I invest and put my money there. Therefore people will divest, and this will result in unemployment in the United States.”
Habtoor is Chairman of AHG, one of the biggest family businesses in the UAE, with a range of interests including automotives, hospitality and construction. It plans 2 billion dirhams ($544.6 million) of acquisitions in the hospitality sector in the United States and Europe this year.
If other Gulf investors take a similar view, billions of dollars of Gulf Arab money slated for investment in the United States could be at risk.
The UAE was the United States’ largest trading partner in the Middle East in 2014, with $25 billion in bilateral trade, according to data from the U.S.-UAE Business Council’s website.
That includes multi-billion-dollar aircraft orders for Boeing from Emirates and Etihad Airways as well as defence contracts.
Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund set up an office in New York in April last year and plans to invest $35 billion in the country over the next five years.
Habtoor is not the first Gulf businessman to express anger at statements by Trump, who has also suggested refugees fleeing violence in Syria are affiliated with Islamic State militants.
Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal called Trump a disgrace in a Twitter spat on Dec. 12, although he not threaten to pull out his U.S. investments. His company Kingdom Holding has a substantial portfolio of U.S. holdings including Citigroup, Twitter, and Newscorp.
Habtoor says Trump should not have stereotypically identified Muslims as terrorists.
“ISIS are not Muslims, Al Qaeda are not Muslims, Hezbollah are not Muslims, they are criminals, they are terrorists,” said Habtoor, who said he had written a letter to Trump asking him to reconsider his views and public statements.
Habtoor had initially backed Trump for the presidency, writing an op-ed in the UAE daily newspaper The National on Aug. 9 in which he said he was “convinced that he was the right man for the job”.
“I was supporting Mr. Trump because he is a very successful businessman, he is very shrewd, and I thought the United States now needs a successful businessman rather than a politician,” Habtoor said, adding he had been surprised by Trump’s comments.
($1 = 3.6726 UAE dirham)
Editing by David French and Catherine EvansOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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7cff104fd361b383e5cc61d27713febe | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-election-warren-healthcare-exclusive/exclusive-economist-who-backed-warren-healthcare-plan-has-doubts-about-her-wealth-tax-idUSKBN1XI01T | Exclusive: Economist who backed Warren healthcare plan has doubts about her wealth tax | Exclusive: Economist who backed Warren healthcare plan has doubts about her wealth tax
By Tim Reid5 Min Read
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A leading economist who vouched for Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren’s healthcare reform plan told Reuters on Thursday he doubts its staggering cost can be fully covered alongside her other government programs.
FILE PHOTO: Democratic 2020 U.S. presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren speaks at a Democratic Party fundraising dinner, the Liberty and Justice Celebration, in Des Moines, Iowa, U.S. November 1, 2019. REUTERS/Eric Thayer/File Photo
Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, also voiced skepticism that the wealth tax provision in Warren’s plan - a key funding mechanism - will produce predicted levels of revenue because those targeted by the tax will seek to dodge it.
“It’s not hard to believe billionaires are going to use every resource to avoid paying the tax,” Zandi said.
Taken in isolation, Zandi said, Warren would be able to find the revenue necessary to cover the massive cost of reform. “I stand by the funding estimates, as a standalone plan,” Zandi said.
Even if the wealth tax projections fall short, Zandi believes Warren may still be able to make up the difference through other taxes in her plan, including those on corporations and employers.
Yet Zandi warned the wealth tax revenue predictions may not hold up if she also simultaneously tries to fund her proposed expansion of government programs, including free child-care and student debt forgiveness.
“I’m skeptical the wealth tax will generate the same amount of revenue after considering all her plans together,” he said.
Warren, a U.S. senator from Massachusetts, estimates her healthcare overhaul will cost an additional $20.5 trillion in federal spending over 10 years without the need to raise middle-class taxes, a claim questioned by some of her rivals in the 2020 White House race.
Zandi said despite signing a highly touted letter last week backing the calculations for Warren’s Medicare for All plan, he does not support shifting Americans off the private health insurance they have in favor of a single-payer, government-run regime.
“I am not a fan of Medicare for All,” said Zandi, who is not affiliated with any Democratic presidential campaign and does not speak for the Warren campaign. “We have 160 million people who have private insurance and are pretty happy with what they have. Why change that?”
A Warren campaign official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said other leading economists who did not sign last week’s letter have defended the wealth tax’s revenue estimates and its enforcement mechanisms.
The official said the wealth tax will be straightforward to administer because it applies to only 75,000 ultra-wealthy families who typically already keep careful track of their wealth.
The wealth tax revenue estimates factored in significant discounts for evasion, and the plan includes measures to sharply strengthen IRS enforcement, the official said.
At a campaign stop in North Carolina on Thursday, Warren was asked to respond to criticism that her Medicare for All plan is a “pipe dream” and “fairy dust.”
Warren replied: “You don’t get what you don’t fight for.”
Zandi said he prefers the less far-reaching healthcare plan being pushed by Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and one of Warren’s chief competitors for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Buttigieg’s plan is similar to other moderate Democrats’ healthcare proposals, because it does not eliminate private insurance. Instead, it seeks to set up competition between a public, government-run option and private plans to lower costs and potentially move Americans onto a Medicare for All system over time.
WEALTH TAX
A key part of Warren’s revenue calculations to pay for her healthcare overhaul comes from a new tax on the wealthiest 1% of U.S. individuals, or a “wealth tax”.
Warren initially proposed a tax that would impose a 2% federal tax on every dollar of a person’s net worth over $50 million and an additional 1% tax on every dollar in net worth over $1 billion. She upped the “billionaire’ s surcharge” to a total of 6% when she released her plan to pay for Medicare for All.
Zandi, and the other economists who signed the letter, estimated the tax would generate an extra $3 trillion in revenue between 2020 and 2029, part of $20.5 trillion they say can be generated overall through additional taxes, but without raising middle-class taxes.
Zandi said a wealth tax would be hard for the government to enforce. “There will be more avoidance and IRS enforcement may not be up to the task,” he said.
Wealth taxes have been tried in many European countries, with limited success. Many affluent people moved assets abroad and the tax resulted in far less revenues than predicted.
Betsey Stevenson, an economics professor at the University of Michigan and another of the signatories on the Warren funding letter, said Warren’s plan shows it is possible to pay for Medicare for All without raising middle class taxes.
“The point of the letter was to show whether it is possible, rather than if it is desirable,” Stevenson said.
Reporting by Tim Reid; additional reporting by Colleen Jenkins in Greensboro, North Carolina; Editing by James Oliphant & Shri NavaratnamOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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5023b9a344b4604180abb7e1738fef3f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electric-batteries-amnesty-idUSKCN1R200B | Amnesty faults electric vehicle batteries as carbon intensive | Amnesty faults electric vehicle batteries as carbon intensive
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
The reflection of a worker is seen at the production line of lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles (EV) at a factory in Huzhou, Zhejiang province, China August 28, 2018. REUTERS/Stringer
LONDON (Reuters) - Amnesty International attacked the electric vehicle (EV) industry on Thursday for selling itself as environmentally friendly while producing many of its batteries using polluting fossil fuels and unethically sourced minerals.
Manufacturing batteries can be carbon intensive, while the extraction of minerals used in them has been linked to human rights violations such as child labor, a statement from the rights group said.
“Electric vehicles are key to shifting the motor industry away from fossil fuels, but they are currently not as ethical as some retailers would like us to believe,” it said, announcing the initiative at the Nordic Electric Vehicle Summit in Oslo.
Production of lithium-ion batteries for EVs is power intensive, and factories are concentrated in China, South Korea and Japan, where power generation is largely dependent on coal or other fossil fuels, Amnesty said.
Global automakers are investing billions of dollars to ramp up electric vehicle production. German giant Volkswagen for one plans to raise annual production of electric cars to 3 million by 2025, from 40,000 in 2018.
Amnesty demanded the EV industry come up with an ethical and clean battery within five years and in the meantime that carbon footprints be disclosed and supply chains of key minerals identified.
Last month, a letter seen by Reuters showed that 14 non-governmental organizations including Amnesty and Global Witness had opposed plans by the London Metal Exchange to ban cobalt tainted by human rights abuses.
Instead of banning the cobalt brands, the LME should work with firms that produce them to ensure responsible sourcing, they said.
Reporting by Eric Onstad; Editing by Jan HarveyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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8bfc057700e4ba90b4060e4f6b599223 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electric-car-commodities-insight-idUSKCN1250HK | Electric car revolution brightens outlook for a medley of metals | Electric car revolution brightens outlook for a medley of metals
By Jan Harvey8 Min Read
LONDON (Reuters) - Electric cars such as the Nissan Leaf may look no different from the standard family runaround. But the new materials that go into them could revolutionize the market for metals used in the industry, opening up a new field for commodities investors.
Dieter Zetsche, CEO of Daimler and Head of Mercedes-Benz, poses in front of a Mercedes EQ Electric car at the Mondial de l'Automobile, the Paris auto show, in Paris, France, September 29, 2016. REUTERS/Jacky Naegelen/File Photo
“We identified electric vehicles as an area where we are at an inflection point for demand,” said Duncan Goodwin, portfolio manager of the Baring Global Resources Fund.
Around 12 percent of the fund’s $378.2 million in assets is exposed to materials that are used in electric vehicles. It has investments in New York-listed Albemarle and Australia’s Orocobre, two companies producing lithium, a key element in electric car batteries. Shares in both companies have risen sharply this year.
Governments, keen to push growth in electric cars in a bid to meet their carbon emissions targets, are tempting consumers with perks like subsidies, free parking and tax breaks. Growth in the market is in turn creating an opportunity for commodities investments currently estimated at $235 billion.
But it is not a simple one-way bet.
Predicting how much of any metal will be needed to meet demand for electric vehicles in the longer term is tough and advances in battery technology could alter the mixture.
Getting drivers to adopt electric cars remains a challenge - the need to charge them up frequently and time taken to do so have put off many potential buyers.
Still, concerns over the pollution created by diesel-powered vehicles mean that electric car prototypes dominated the Paris car show last week.
The number of electric and hybrid vehicles on the road worldwide surpassed 1 million last year, according to the International Energy Agency.
While estimates vary, IHS Automotive expects electric vehicles to represent nearly 4 percent of all light vehicles worldwide by 2020, equivalent to 3.9 million cars, up from just over 14,000 in 2010.
So what sits below the bonnet in these vehicles?
Most electric car batteries use lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide (NMC) cathodes and graphite anodes. “Rare earth” metals dysprosium, neodymium and terbium, chiefly mined in China by companies including Xiamen Tungsten and China Minmetals Rare Earth Co, are used in some electronic components of the motor.
“It’s clear that electric cars from today’s point of view will have lithium ion-based batteries,” said Horst Friedrich, director of Germany’s Institute of Vehicle Concepts.
“We’re talking about lithium, and... metals like cobalt, iron phosphate, rare earth elements.”
Slideshow ( 6 images )
LITHIUM TRIANGLE
Much of the world’s lithium comes from an area called the “Lithium triangle” in Chile, Argentina and Bolivia. Mining it is an increasingly lucrative business.
Prices of battery grade lithium in China, the biggest lithium ion battery producer, surged to above $20,000 a tonne this summer, nearly three times higher than a year earlier, as demand grew.
“The lithium industry is going from 160,000 tonnes of LCE (lithium carbonate equivalent) today to at least 260,000 tonnes by 2020,” said Simon Moores, managing director of Benchmark Mineral Intelligence.
Albemarle is investing an undisclosed sum to boost its production of battery-grade lithium salts to try to supply half of that projected demand growth, said John Mitchell, the president of Albemarle’s lithium unit.
Australia’s Lithium Power International is preparing its Maricunga Salar project in northern Chile to be able to ship lithium directly to China for use in electric vehicles, and aims to be in production by 2019-2020.
Australian rival Orocobre, whose share price has risen by more than 50 percent this year, has nearly completed a scoping study with the aim of at least doubling production capacity over the next two years at a facility in Argentina.
Among South American companies, Chile’s SQM announced this month that it was investing $30 million to boost its lithium hydroxide capacity by 7,500 tonnes.
“The market penetration of electric vehicles in the automotive market will have a significant impact on lithium demand,” it said.
“BUYER BEWARE”
Critics caution against expecting shortages of lithium as there is an abundance of it in the earth’s crust. Others warn against jumping too quickly into smaller companies that may not produce the high grade lithium needed for the batteries.
“It’s very much buyer beware, it’s a fast-moving market, and there is a large degree of ignorance about it,” Finntech analyst Martin Potts said, adding that graphite could be more interesting for investors.
China dominates the sector for graphite, used in anodes. Benchmark Mineral Intelligence expects 150,000-170,000 tonnes of extra anode grade graphite will be needed by 2020, worth an extra $1.125-1.275 billion.
Canada’s Eagle Graphite said while the impact of electric vehicles on its business is still to be felt, when global production hits around 1 million cars per year, the draw on graphite supplies will become significant.
“The more forward-looking manufacturers are rightly becoming concerned about long term supply,” its CEO Jamie Deith said. “Not only is there the question of producing enough graphite, but the fact that China accounts for 100 percent of natural graphite anodes today is an additional concern.”
“The battery industry has to diversify sources.”
Meanwhile cobalt prices, up 16 percent this year, are expected to rise another 45 percent by 2020. The U.S. Defense Logistics Agency starting to stockpile cobalt compounds highlights their importance.
Sherritt International, one of the largest cobalt producers, said it is set to increase cobalt production at its Ambatovy mine in Madagascar in line with nickel output.
As cobalt is mined largely as a by-product of other metals such as nickel and copper, it is hard for producers to crank up output in response to higher demand, it said. That lack of supply elasticity could push prices higher.
Not all metals used in car batteries have a rosy future. Demand for manganese, a common component in steel, is expected to remain weak in the near term as the steel sector suffers.
“NICE DRIVE”
Predicting how much of any given metal would be needed to meet demand for electric vehicles in the longer term is tough and advances in battery technology could alter the amounts.
Metals such as nickel, cobalt and manganese may not be needed in batteries such as the lithium sulfur battery being developed by Oxis Energy, based in the English city of Oxford.
Also in the background are green vehicle technologies, most notably hydrogen fuel cells, being mooted as possible rivals to batteries. But developing new technology to the point where it can be commercialized takes time.
“We consider the risk of substitution of lithium to be very low,” said CRU Group’s Julia Ralph.
Guiding the silent, top-of-the-range Leaf around a showroom complex at Nissan London West, salesman Keith Almansury says education is the key to driving growth in the segment.
“If people don’t love electric cars, it’s because they don’t know about electric cars,” he said, flagging up benefits including environmental friendliness, savings on fuel and servicing, and free parking. “But above all, it’s just a really nice drive.”
Reporting by Jan Harvey; Additional reporting by Rosalba O’Brien in Santiago, Jim Regan in Sydney; Editing by Pratima Desai, Keith Weir, Janet McBrideOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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bfdd46fc2a62cdc47631f80c3efb0412 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electric-rimac-spac/electric-hypercar-maker-rimac-says-spac-funding-hype-could-damage-industry-idUSKBN28D1QO | Electric hypercar maker Rimac says SPAC funding hype could damage industry | Electric hypercar maker Rimac says SPAC funding hype could damage industry
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
FRANKFURT (Reuters) - A surge in the use of special purpose acquisition companies (SPAC) for raising money for electric vehicle start-ups could harm the long-term prospects of the industry, Mate Rimac, founder of electric hypercar maker Rimac, said on Thursday.
FILE PHOTO: A 2019 Rimac C2 Hyper car, valued at $2.1million, is seen on display at the New York Auto Show in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, U.S., March 29, 2018. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
Managers of SPAC companies are not held to the same level of liability about potential growth prospects as managers who raise cash via an initial public offering (IPO) on equity markets, spurring concerns about an investor bubble.
“You can get so much money now for companies that do not have a product. Personally I am scared a little bit,” Rimac told the Financial Times Future of the Car summit on Thursday.
“When we go public, I want to show the numbers, to go public on reality, and not on hype,” Rimac said.
“I hope that these SPACs will be successful. A lot of them won’t. I hope it won’t hurt the industry too much.
SPACs are small companies with an established track record of filings at the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) which are then used to buy up promising companies in high-growth sectors.
Wall Street has used SPACs to sidestep the IPO process, with their shorter preparation time and fewer legal hurdles making it easier to tap the investor optimism towards electric vehicles that helped Tesla reach a $554 billion valuation.
“We were profitable last year, and we want to be profitable this year as well,” Rimac said, adding that he built up his company, which was founded in Croatia in 2009 and now employs 900 people, by focussing on profitability rather than growth.
“For a start-up, we have built up steam the hard way,” he told the FT’s web based conference, adding that sometimes he feels like he is missing out by not pursuing the SPAC path.
Rimac had a hard time raising money in 2011 after electric car maker Fisker went bankrupt and with Tesla yet to establish itself as a high growth company.
Rimac was thus forced to raise money by taking on development contracts for other carmakers. Today Porsche, Kia and Hyundai are shareholders and Rimac makes electric powertrains for supercars built by Aston Martin, Koenigsegg and others.
“We started with hypercars and we are now working with more mainstream vehicles,” Rimac said. “Want to be the leader in high performance electric vehicle components. Want to be the intel inside.”
Rimac declined to comment on speculation that he would buy Bugatti, but added cryptically “maybe soon”.
Reporting by Edward Taylor; Editing by Kirsten DonovanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b4f28ed823e186cefe8a27da6a2b8d08 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electric-vehicles-canoo/electric-vehicle-startup-canoo-will-offer-cars-by-subscription-only-idUSKCN1R62GO | Electric vehicle startup Canoo will offer cars by subscription only | Electric vehicle startup Canoo will offer cars by subscription only
By Paul Lienert3 Min Read
(Reuters) - Evelozcity, the U.S. electric vehicle startup, has changed its name to Canoo and said on Monday that it will offer a range of EVs to private and commercial customers by subscription only.
Canoo is positioning itself as a “boutique California EV brand” and said it will start sales in the United States in 2021, eventually expanding to China.
The company, one of dozens of EV startups in the United States and China, has not disclosed its investors but has raised about $1 billion, according to a source familiar with the process.
Canoo said it plans to market a four-model range that will include personal commuter and “lifestyle” vehicles, as well as commercial vehicles for ride and delivery services. The so-called lifestyle vehicle is meant to provide the space and functionality of an SUV, the company said.
Canoo did not provide any details on pricing but said it would not have a dealer network. It will offer a variety of subscriptions of different duration, some bundled with insurance and related services.
Founded in late 2017 and based in a Los Angeles suburb, Canoo said it is planning a “lean” operation that will rely on a contract manufacturer to assemble its vehicles.
In mid-March, German publication Automobilwoche reported the company was in talks with Canadian supplier Magna International and its unit Magna-Steyr to assemble the startup’s vehicles in the United States.
Canoo said it is “evaluating partners for manufacturing but no contracts are signed yet.” Magna declined to comment.
Canoo said it plans to partner with a provider of self-driving technology for future automated versions of its vehicles.
The startup said its vehicle designs will be non-traditional, with “a minimalist design that maximizes interior space.”
Canoo said it has 350 employees and announced several key hires, including former executives of Uber, SAIC Motor and STMicroelectronics.
The company was founded by Stefan Krause, Ulrich Kranz and Richard Kim, all of whom worked previously at another California-based EV startup, Faraday Future. Krause is a former top executive at Deutsche Bank. Kranz was a senior vice president at BMW’s electric vehicle unit. Kim previously led the exterior design of the BMW i3.
The founding team was joined last year by another industry veteran, Karl-Thomas Neumann, former chief executive of German automaker Opel and head of Volkswagen AG’s China operation.
Reporting by Paul Lienert in Detroit; Editing by Bill TrottOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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6436f8017ed8d0ae9461d8ab36ae99fe | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electric-vehicles-ruesselsheim-analys-idUSKCN1T80F6 | Germany's Opel town shows struggle for Europe to plug in electric cars | Germany's Opel town shows struggle for Europe to plug in electric cars
By Vera Eckert7 Min Read
RUESSELSHEIM, Germany (Reuters) - Carmakers and policymakers in Europe are staking their futures on a race to electric vehicles. But the vast charging network needed to sustain their vision is patchy, and it’s not clear who’ll pay for it.
An electric vehicle charging station of municipal utilities "Stadtwerke Ruesselsheim" is pictured at their headquarters in Ruesselsheim, Germany, May 23, 2019. REUTERS/Ralph Orlowski
The central German city of Ruesselsheim, home to carmaker Opel, wants to build 1,300 electric car charging points by 2020, plans that would make it a frontrunner on the continent.
It has advantages enjoyed by few in Europe, including a powerful local car industry player and wealthy national economy. In Germany itself the city has an edge, having won a government grant of 12.8 million euros ($14.4 million) to fund the rollout.
Yet, even here, red tape, shortages of qualified staff and the requisite hardware are likely to delay the installation by around two years, local officials told Reuters.
The project will also need more money, said the officials who are running up against the complexity of civil engineering, potential power grid overloads and unwieldy payment processes, illustrating some of the difficulties facing cities and nations across Europe.
“We are not doing this for profit,” said Marianne Floersheimer, Ruesselsheim council’s mobility chief. “But we cannot afford to top up the government money.”
The number of electric cars on German roads grew fivefold between 2015 and 2018, and have risen strongly across Europe. However the growth in electric cars is outpacing the charging infrastructure.
The ratio of electric cars to each charging point in Europe deteriorated to 7.0 from 6.1 in the same period, consultants AlixPartners found, although Europe is still better equipped than the United States at 19.7 per car, and China’s 7.6.
Some analysts say a lag in infrastructure could drag on sales as customers hold off until electric becomes a convenient option.
Any logjam could prove a problem for carmakers which, faced with emissions penalties, are pumping tens of billions of euros into electric technology in an industry-wide charge. German champion Volkswagen, for example, aims for electric vehicles to account for about a quarter of its sales by 2025.
Obstacles to electrification could also strain the European Union’s plan to become “carbon neutral” by 2050 to combat climate change. A quarter of climate-harming emissions come from transport and, within that, most from passenger cars.
However some campaigners, including Transport & Environment, a group that promotes clean transport, say good progress is being made in rolling out charging points in many countries of western and northern Europe, although central and eastern Europe are further behind.
They say limited infrastructure is not having a significant effect on Europe’s electric car sales, which still represent a fraction of the vehicle market, and the ratio of cars to points is within the EU recommendation of 10. Given most charging will be done at home, they add, a lack of off-street parking in some areas could deter drivers from switching to electric.
Slideshow ( 14 images )
‘NO OVERLOAD’
Like other German cities, Ruesselsheim is under pressure to roll out charging stations as environmental activists have started suing those municipalities that fail to comply with EU-wide rules for nitrogen dioxide emissions.
With just 67,000 people, it has only a few charging points at the moment, some way behind the likes of wealthy and populous Hamburg on about 880 and Berlin with some 780.
It is however aiming to provide one charging point per 72 people, the highest level in Europe, with the help of carmaker Opel, which will build around half of the points, plus the technical know-how of the local RheinMain University. Opel is owned by France’s PSA Group.
Ruesselsheim’s electric plan won one of the highest grants under the German transport ministry’s clean air program. But local officials described some of the complications in implementation.
The installation of every charging point needs to be agreed with authorities such as those in charge of water, monument protection and civil engineering, for example. Charging equipment makers, meanwhile, have long lead times.
“We are chasing the same charging points, employees and supply technology as all the other cities,” said city spokesman Asswin Zabel.
Hooking up inner-city charging points on low voltage lines will be relatively easy although some local people may object, said Matthias Schweitzer, head of technology at the local utility, Stadtwerke Ruesselsheim.
But laying 2 km of medium voltage lines and ordering new transformer substations could take up to nine months, he said.
The university aims to accompany the rollout with storage facilities to absorb green power and offer supply on demand. But it must measure whether inverters, which turn alternating current power from the grid into direct current used by car batteries, cause too much stress on the network.
“We must ensure there is no overload,” Schweitzer added.
Yet more snags await: There is still a hodge-podge of charging and paying processes across the country as vendors are not in sync with each other, meaning Ruesselsheimers may encounter payment difficulties on longer journeys.
“There is no obligation to provide free roaming. People have to carry around far too many different customer cards,” said Hanns Koenig of research firm Aurora, which has studied commercial car charging opportunities.
VICIOUS CIRCLE
Germany is doing relatively well in Europe in terms of public charging points, with 17,400 countrywide, according to data from energy industry association BDEW. That would roughly equate to a point for every five of its 83,000 electric cars, about 1 percent of the vehicles on its roads.
To keep up with sales, BDEW says thousands more public charging points are needed in coming years, as well as hundreds of thousands of private points at homes and workplaces.
However funding could be a central problem in Germany, as well as in Europe and beyond, particularly along motorways which do not fall under any particular municipality.
Carmakers are largely pouring much of their money into the development of electric vehicles, while energy providers hesitate to take on responsibility for the rollout as long as car sales remain too low to provide a profitable customer base.
In Germany, many of the roughly 1,500 local utility players simply cannot shoulder huge infrastructure costs, especially while commercial success is not assured.
The situation could become a vicious circle, some industry experts say, since without a large number of charging stations, customers may be reluctant to make the leap to electric.
“Today it is still largely unclear who will make the necessary investment in the charging infrastructure in cities, housing and along the motorways in the short term, and how these can refinance themselves in the medium and long term,” said Jens Haas, managing director automotive at AlixPartners.
“This results in lasting scepticism among German car customers and, in turn, hesitant buying.”
Reporting by Vera Eckert; Editing by Pravin CharOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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1c9332c281fbe29eec9eb49197f1531e | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electricity-autos-charging/energy-firms-battle-startups-to-wire-europes-highways-for-electric-cars-idUSKCN1BQ0JG | Energy firms battle startups to wire Europe's highways for electric cars | Energy firms battle startups to wire Europe's highways for electric cars
By Geert De Clercq, Christoph Steitz6 Min Read
PARIS/FRANKFURT (Reuters) - The battle over how and where Europeans charge their electric cars is expanding from the continent’s cities to its motorways.
An electric car is being charged in a Paris street, France, September 12, 2017. Picture taken September 12, 2017. REUTERS/Philippe Wojazer
Power utilities, tech start-ups and oil majors are fighting to establish themselves as the dominant players in the fast-growing business of charging stations – but advances in electric vehicles means where they build them is changing.
Refuelling conventional petrol and diesel cars on motorways has long been the domain of the oil companies, which typically have their own networks of filling stations. Several are now talking about setting up high-power charging networks, creating major competition for limited space at motorway service areas.
“It is a bit of a landgrab now to win this sector,” said Tim Payne, chief executive of British charging start-up InstaVolt, which has raised 12 million pounds to install 3,000 charge points across Britain by 2020.
While the range of electric vehicles (EVs) was less than 100 km (60 miles), Europe’s utilities were happy to help cities and companies install slow and inexpensive charging points at homes, offices and shops, often supported by state subsidies.
But Tesla TSLA.O, Porsche VOWG_p.DE and BMW BMWG.DE are now making battery-powered cars with enough range to drive across countries. Daimler DAIGn.DE and Volkswagen also announced plans on the eve of this week's Frankfurt motor show to accelerate their shift to electric cars.
Charging infrastructure remains nowhere near it needs to be. “Where is the network of charging points that will be required? Indeed where is the power and the grid?” Ralf Speth, boss of Britain’s Jaguar Land Rover, asked last week.
Experts including ChargePoint and Engie ENGIE.PA are, however, making plans to build pan-European networks of high-voltage fast-charging stations which can refill a battery in less than half an hour instead of overnight.
In Britain, InstaVolt is renting land from filling station operators, bringing them additional revenue from the lease as well as the increased traffic to their shops at the sites. It earns a margin by selling power through the chargers.
InstaVolt struck a deal in May with ChargePoint, which itself is on a $125 million expansion spree in Europe, to install about 200 of the U.S. group’s ultra-fast chargers close to popular roads across Britain.
Related CoverageFactbox: From refueling to recharging: filling up electric vehicles
UP FOR GRABS
Morgan Stanley estimates that 1-3 million public charging points could be needed in western Europe by 2030, adding that while utilities have natural skills in the new industry, it was too early to determine who will come put on top. “The winning business model is up for grabs,” it said.
Today, there are fewer than 100,000 public charging points available in Europe, with only about six percent of them fast, according to the International Energy Agency.
Almost none of these is super-fast, a term usually used for charging stations with an output of at least 150 kilowatts. More than three times faster than current-generation chargers, they are now being targeted by those trying to become market leaders.
Contenders include Dutch EV-Box, one of Europe's biggest makers of charging stations, which was snapped up by French utility Engie ENGIE.PA in March.
“We expect hundreds of millions of annual revenue from EV-Box in a few years,” Thierry Lepercq, head of innovation at Engie, told Reuters. He sees Engie’s EV charging revenue growing by a factor of 20 in three to five years. Last year, EV-Box had sales of 16 million euros ($19.1 million).
EV-Box Chief Executive Kristof Vereenooghe said that unlike most of its competitors EV-Box has been profitable from the start, a claim that makes it stand out in an industry where gaining scale is considered more important for now.
That's why German utility E.ON EONGn.DE, too, announced a strategic partnership with Danish startup CLEVER and said it had the ambition to roll out several hundred ultra-fast charging stations along European motorways.
CLEVER, which is owned by a group of Danish utilities and runs charging networks in Denmark, Sweden and Germany, wants to extend its network to France, Britain and Italy with E.ON.
The firm, which unlike EV-Box and ChargePoint does not make its own hardware, is also still looking for other partners. “We want to connect cities so that you can easily drive across Europe in an electric vehicle,” CLEVER Chief Executive Casper Kirketerp-Moeller said.
Slideshow ( 7 images )
TALK LESS, INSTALL MORE
Among the oil majors, BP BP.L, Shell RDSa.L and TOTF.PA have all either announced plans or launched pilot projects for EV charging. Few people, however, expect them to become serious contenders for a business that would effectively curb demand for their chief product: oil.
BP did not respond to repeated requests for comment. A spokeswoman for Shell said it did not make economic sense yet to equip petrol stations fully with EV charging points.
“People like Shell and Total talk a lot, but nothing happens. We are putting the grid connection in place,” said Michiel Langezaal, founder and chief executive of Fastned, which has 63 EV charging stations in the Netherlands.
Leasing plots of land, the group wants to raise 100 million euros over the next two years to branch out into Germany, Belgium, France and Britain. So far it gets the stations from Swiss ABB ABBN.S but is also in talks with ChargePoint.
Unlike utilities and charging station startups, electric vehicle makers see fast charging networks not as a profit center, but as a loss-leader needed to persuade customers that electric vehicles can drive across continents.
That seems to work for some.
Tesla, for example, operates a proprietary charging network throughout Europe, mainly in hotels, but it is stretched thinly - in the Ile de France region around Paris it has just a handful of “superchargers”.
This year, the group's market valuation surpassed that of General Motors GM.N, making it the biggest U.S. carmaker by that measure.
"Tesla has never been in the black, but had enormous growth," said Elke Temme, who co-heads the e-mobility unit of Germany's Innogy IGY.DE.
“Going forward, however, the business must pay off.”
For a graphic, click
editing by David StampOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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cae715c66481a46666a591d66db5f0d5 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electricity-texas-prices-idUSKBN2AF19A | Texas wholesale electric prices spike more than 10,000% amid outages | Texas wholesale electric prices spike more than 10,000% amid outages
By Tim McLaughlin2 Min Read
(Reuters) - The spot price of wholesale electricity on the Texas power grid spiked more than 10,000% on Monday amid a deep freeze across the state and rolling outages among power producers, according to data on the grid operator’s website.
Real-time wholesale market prices on the power grid operated by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) were more than $9,000 per megawatt hour late Monday morning, compared with pre-storm prices of less than $50 per megawatt hour, according to ERCOT data.
The surge reflects the real-time megawatt hour price of electricity and the cost of congestion and losses at different points across the grid. Early on Monday, ERCOT said extreme weather conditions forced many power generating units off the grid, upending the supply of electricity.
ERCOT did not respond to an email message about the spike in wholesale electricity prices.
On Feb. 10, well before inclement weather hit Texas, spot wholesale prices on ERCOT settled around $30 per megawatt hour at the end of the day, ERCOT data show. But on Sunday, the price per megawatt hour surged past $9,000 on the grid.
ERCOT can be more susceptible to wholesale price spikes because it does not have a capacity market, which pays power plants to be on standby during peak demand and weather emergencies, for example. ERCOT’s model means consumers are not paying for generation that may never be called into action.
But early on Monday, ERCOT said extreme weather conditions caused many generating units – across all fuel types – to trip offline and become unavailable. That forced more than 30,000 megawatts of power generation off the grid, ERCOT said in a news release.
Reporting by Tim McLaughlin; Editing by Andrea Ricci and Howard GollerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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7b28ada8e04cea84bcf82d97328930dd | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electronic-arts-apex-legends/eas-fortnite-rival-wins-10-million-gamers-in-three-days-idUSKCN1PX2GS | EA's 'Fortnite' rival wins 10 million gamers in three days | EA's 'Fortnite' rival wins 10 million gamers in three days
By Arjun Panchadar3 Min Read
(Reuters) - A game developed by Electronics Arts Inc as a competitor to the wildly popular “Fortnite” has signed up 10 million players within three days of its launch, the videogame maker said, driving its shares up 16 percent on Friday.
With “Apex Legends,” EA is hoping to reproduce the success of “Fortnite,” a sort of hybrid of “The Hunger Games” and “Minecraft” that drops 100 people onto an island to fight each other for survival.
The number of gamers playing “Apex Legends” had crossed 10 million and there were about 1 million gamers logged on at the same time, EA said late on Thursday. As of Friday, the game was the most viewed on gaming live-streaming network Twitch.
The figures come just days after EA lowered its yearly revenue projections following weak sales of its “Battlefield V” title, news that had sent its stock plunging 18 percent.
EA owns iconic gaming franchises such as “FIFA,” “Need for Speed” and “Battlefield,” but the rapid rise last year of free-to-play online games like “Fortnite” and “PUBG” are forcing the company and its industry peers Activision-Blizzard and Take-Two to sit up and take notice.
“Fortnite” and “PUBG,” each backed by Chinese internet giant Tencent, are credited with helping take gaming to new audiences and popularizing the battle royale format, where dozens of online players battle each other to the death.
EA said on Tuesday its decision not to release a battle royale version of “Battlefield V” was one reason why it sold some one million fewer units than expected in the final quarter of 2018.
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Videogame review website Eurogamer said it had taken Fortnite about two weeks to hit the 10-million-player mark.
Wall Street analysts covering EA were optimistic about “Apex Legends” but said it was too early to tell if it could become the next “Fortnite.”
“It’s an impressive number and a great start to a new cornerstone property for EA — something the company needs following a string of missteps with its non-sports franchises,” said Oppenheimer & Co analyst Andrew Uerkwitz.
Analysts also said posts by influential gamers such as “Ninja,” the most followed streamer on Twitch, had helped bring more attention to the game.
“Apex Legends” could add $100 million to EA’s revenue in the fiscal year ending March 2020, Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter said.
“That figure is based upon our rule of thumb that free-to-play games typically generate around $10 per monthly active user per year,” he said.
EA has forecast about $4.75 billion in adjusted revenue for fiscal year 2019.
Reporting by Arjun Panchadar in Bengaluru; Editing by Sai Sachin RavikumarOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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e5e719a23bbe2920f42e2fed31649a26 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electronic-arts-results-idUKKCN1UP2D3 | Core game franchises propel Electronic Arts revenue beat | Core game franchises propel Electronic Arts revenue beat
By Sayanti Chakraborty3 Min Read
(Reuters) - Video game publisher Electronic Arts Inc EA.O reported better-than-expected quarterly revenue on Tuesday, riding on the continued success of its battle royale game "Apex Legends", sending its shares up as much as 5% in extended trading.
FILE PHOTO: The Electronic Arts Inc., logo is displayed on a screen during a PlayStation 4 Pro launch event in New York City, U.S., September 7, 2016. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
The company’s live services led by Apex Legends, The Sims 4 and FIFA Ultimate Team spurred growth with net bookings jumping 12% to $504 million from a year ago.
Apex Legends is the fastest growing game in EA’s history.
“We have 8 million to 10 million people on a weekly basis playing the game,” said Chief Executive Officer Andrew Wilson on a conference call with analysts.
The formidable tournament title propped up the game publisher’s revenue.
“We did not have any brand new games in the quarter so most of the quarter is either our live services business as well as our catalogue titles,” Chief Operating Officer and CFO Blake Jorgensen told Reuters.
"Battlefield" and "FIFA" are also important game franchises, but the rise of mobile-based, free-to-play games with engaging formats are challenging the dominance of EA, Activision Blizzard ATVI.O and Take-Two Interactive Software Inc TTWO.O.
Battle royale games, which players fight to death until the last survivor, became wildly popular in 2018 thanks to “PUBG” and Epic Games’ “Fortnite”.
“Our plan to bring Apex Legends to China and a worldwide mobile launch are also on course,” said Wilson.
Season two of Apex Legends was launched on July 2. EA still forecasts net bookings from Apex Legends in the range of $300 million to $400 million in fiscal year 2020.
In addition, EA had stronger than expected FIFA and mobile game sales in the quarter.
On an adjusted basis, EA’s revenue was $743 million in the first quarter, beating the average analyst estimate of $719.2 million.
EA, however, expects second-quarter adjusted revenue of $1.23 billion, slightly below analysts’ estimates of $1.24 billion, according to Refinitiv data.
The company maintained its full-year adjusted revenue forecast of $5.10 billion, below estimates of $5.18 billion.
Net income rose to $1.42 billion, or $4.75 per share, in the quarter ended June 30, from $293 million, or 95 cents per share, a year earlier.
Net income was boosted by $1.08 billion of income tax benefits.
Shares of the company rose 5% to $92.57.
Reporting by Sayanti Chakraborty in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli, Bernard OrrOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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a803a477684b8205614671c7dbbbf5ef | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-electronicarts/electronic-arts-buying-popcap-games-for-up-to-1-3-billion-idUSTRE76B7FK20110713 | Electronic Arts buying PopCap Games for up to $1.3 billion | Electronic Arts buying PopCap Games for up to $1.3 billion
By Liana B. Baker4 Min Read
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Electronic Arts Inc, the video game publisher, is buying PopCap Games in a deal worth up to $1.3 billion as it tries to ramp up its social and casual games portfolio and better compete with Zynga Inc.
Visitors walk past the exhibition stand of Electronic Arts (EA) at the Gamescom 2010 fair in Cologne August 18, 2010. REUTERS/Ina Fassbender
As part of the deal, EA said it will pay about $650 million in cash and $100 million in common stock upfront for the maker of the popular video games “Bejeweled” and “Plants vs. Zombies.” EA could pay up to an additional $550 million if PopCap reaches certain performance targets in about two years.
EA is investing more in digital content as customers are buying fewer games on discs to play on consoles. Video game companies are now offering users options to play free or low-priced games on mobile devices, PCs and Facebook.
EA’s Chief Financial Officer Eric Brown said the deal would help EA better compete with Zynga. Zynga filed with regulators on July 1 for an initial public offering of up to $1 billion.
“This gives us a much stronger presence in social network games,” Brown said.
Shares fell following the announcement as investors balked at EA’s strategy of shifting toward digital games, which make less money than the packaged games it is best known for, such as “Madden NFL,” said Brean Murray analyst Todd Mitchell.
Mitchell added that EA, which acquired social-games maker Playfish in 2009 for a deal worth up to $400 million, has also been on a buying spree.
Related CoverageGlu Mobile shares gain on Electronic Arts' PopCap Games buy
“It seems to me they’ve been buying a lot of assets lately and paying a pretty high price for a lot of them,” Mitchell said.
But at least one shareholder was satisfied with the deal and said that once Facebook games publisher Zynga Inc goes public, EA shares will rise and the PopCap deal will pay off.
“Once Zynga comes out, this acquisition is going to look like the bargain of the century,” said Larry Haverty, associate portfolio manager of the Gabelli Global Multimedia Trust, which owns EA shares.
“Outside of Zynga, EA is going to be the only way for investors to play the casual gaming phenomenon,” Haverty added.
Zynga’s IPO plans along with the acquisition of PopCap has investors searching the landscape for other hot up-and-coming video game publishers, including CrowdStar, Wooga and Badoo, said Sterne Agee analyst Arvind Bhatia.
EA said the deal would be neutral to earnings per share this year and that it would add 10 cents per share to EA’s earnings per share in 2013.
EA’s CEO John Riccitiello said in an interview that PopCap will help the company reach its target to make $1 billion in revenue from its digital business.
The transaction is expected to close in August, EA said.
PopCap, which is based in Seattle, has been profitable for 10 years since its founding. It generated $100 million in revenue in 2010. It makes easy-to-play games for platforms such as Facebook, RenRen, Google Android, Apple iPhone and iPad.
For the deal, EA received $550 million in debt commitments from Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chasen and UBS AG. EA was also advised by Morgan Stanley and UBS.
EA shares fell 3.2 percent after the market closed on Tuesday. Shares closed at $24.17 earlier on the Nasdaq.
Reporting by Liana B. Baker; additional reporting by Nadia Damouni, editing by Carol Bishopric, Bernard OrrOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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ca20bcdc359682e611307f485cfb87d7 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elekta-divestiture-viewray/swedens-elekta-sells-its-stake-in-viewray-idUSKBN29R0P0 | Sweden's Elekta sells its stake in ViewRay | Sweden's Elekta sells its stake in ViewRay
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - Swedish radiation therapy equipment maker Elekta has sold its 7.3% stake in U.S. peer ViewRay, Elekta said in a statement on Friday.
Elekta said it made a gain of $17.5 million on the sale, to be booked in its third quarter results.
The Swedish company had initially bought the shares in a
public offering in December 2019.
Reporting by Johannes Hellstrom; Editing by Clarence FernandezOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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81aa10f2515c9bd5afe1f845efc6d83f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elementis-m-a-minerals-technologies-idINKBN27S10C | UK chemical maker Elementis rejects Minerals Technologies all-cash $819 million offer | UK chemical maker Elementis rejects Minerals Technologies all-cash $819 million offer
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
(Reuters) - British specialty chemicals firm Elementis said on Thursday it had rejected an all-cash buyout offer from larger rival Minerals Technologies, as the 621.5 million pounds ($819 million) valuation for the company was too low.
Shares in Elementis rose 7.7% to 105.5 pence by 1028 GMT, below the 107 pence per share offer.
Elementis’ board unanimously rejected the proposal, saying it significantly undervalued the company and its future prospects.
Founded in 1844, the British company makes additives that go into products in the consumer and industrial markets, including personal care, coatings, chromium, energy and talc.
It said last month earlier it had a robust order book for November and that it was on track to deliver a significant reduction in net debt by the end of the year.
New York-based Mineral Technologies, which approached Elementis earlier in the month, said it was currently considering its position on a possible proposal for the British firm.
The proposal highlighted the fact shares in Elementis, which have fallen around 47% so far this year, have been cheap, according to Jefferies analysts.
The offer represented a premium of 31% to Elementis’ closing share price of 81.70 pence on Nov. 4.
Elementis has 580.8 million shares in issue, according to its website.
Reporting by Samantha Machado and Tanishaa Nadkar in Bengaluru; Editing by Saumyadeb ChakrabartyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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c8156f53b13eb7ae43816adb6997e458 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eletrobras-privatization-idINKBN1YR1YP | Brazil lacks an alternative to criticized Eletrobras privatization plan: sources | Brazil lacks an alternative to criticized Eletrobras privatization plan: sources
By Rodrigo Viga Gaier, Luciano Costa2 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: The logo for Eletrobras, a Brazilian electric utilities company, is displayed on a screen on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., April 9, 2019. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid
RIO DE JANEIRO/SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazil's government does not have an alternative proposal for the privatization of power holding company Centrais Eletricas Brasileiras SA ELET6.SA which appears headed for rejection in the Senate, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.
Last week, Senate President Davi Alcolumbre said the bill proposed by the government for the privatization of Eletrobras, as the company is known, will not be approved by senators due to resistance from the Northeastern and Northern regions. The power holding company controls nearly a third of power generation and around half of all power transmission in Brazil.
The privatization bill was sent by President Jair Bolsonaro’s government to Congress last month. But Alcolumbre said senators from the Northeastern and Northern regions are against the privatization model. Brazil’s government proposes to privatize Eletrobras through a share issuance that would dilute the government’s controlling stake.
The vote on the Eletrobras bill is not yet scheduled.
The proceeds of the share issuance would be used by Eletrobras to pay the federal government to extend the licenses to operate most of its power generation assets.
Government sources said there is no alternative plan and that Bolsonaro’s government will try to convince Congress to approve the current version of the bill.
The privatization of Eletrobras has been under discussion since the government of former President Michel Temer, who left office at the end of last year. The impending privatization has contributed to a 51% rise of its preferred shares ELET6.SA over the last 12 months.
Reporting by Rodrigo Viga Gaier in Rio de Janeiro and Luciano Costa in Sao Paulo; Writing by Tatiana Bautzer; Editing by Matthew LewisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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1e04a35a042dc8a85bf6275c9c12509f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eleva-educacao-financing/lemann-backed-brazil-school-chain-eleva-to-raise-200-million-to-expand-sources-idUSKBN1WX21Q | Lemann-backed Brazil school chain Eleva to raise $200 million to expand: sources | Lemann-backed Brazil school chain Eleva to raise $200 million to expand: sources
By Carolina Mandl, Tatiana Bautzer2 Min Read
SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazilian K-12 school chain Eleva Educação SA is in talks with investors to raise around $200 million in a new financing round to fund expansion, two sources with knowledge of the matter said.
Eleva is backed by Brazilian billionaire Jorge Paulo Lemann, one of the three founders of private equity firm 3G Capital, a controlling shareholder at companies such as Anheuser Busch Inbev, Kraft Heinz co and Restaurant Brands International.
Eleva’s move comes as investors are targeting private K-12 school chains in Brazil, expecting strong growth, given the poor quality of public schools in Brazil.
The school network, which also has a learning system, has doubled its number of students to 70,000 in the last two years and expanded geographically through acquisitions, with 115 schools across eight states. Its revenue is expected to reach 1 billion reais ($240 million) this year.
Eleva was founded by Gera Capital, a Brazilian asset management firm focused on impact sectors.
Proceeds from the new round of financing will be used to fund acquisitions and organic growth. A small portion of the proceeds may also be raised by existing shareholders, although there has been no decision on it yet.
Other Brazilian education groups have been investing in expansion of K-12 private schools, such as Cogna Educacao, formerly known as Kroton Educacional, with its division Saber.
Businessman Chaim Zaher, founder of Yduqs , formerly known as Estacio Participacoes SA, is also investing in K-12 schools through his privately held holding.
Besides Lemann, Eleva has among its shareholders private equity firm Warburg Pincus LLC, which acquired a roughly 25% stake in Eleva for 300 million reais in 2017, in a round that valued the company at 1.3 billion reais.
Itau Unibanco Holding SA’s investment banking unit is advising Eleva in the capital raising. Eleva did not immediately comment on the matter.
($1 = 4.1451 reais)
Reporting by Carolina Mandl and Tatiana Bautzer; Editing by Steve OrlofskyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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60eee1ea1f074181ed36601a31ee2e51 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eli-lilly-fda-idUSKCN12J2BC?feedType=RSS&feedName=healthNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+reuters%2FhealthNews+%28Reuters+Health+News%29 | FDA grants accelerated approval to Lilly's soft tissue sarcoma drug | FDA grants accelerated approval to Lilly's soft tissue sarcoma drug
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
A view shows the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland August 14, 2012. REUTERS/Jason Reed/File Photo
(Reuters) - The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday granted accelerated approval to Eli Lilly and Co’s drug for treating adults with advanced soft tissue sarcoma (STS).
Lilly's drug, Lartruvo, is approved for use with FDA-approved chemotherapy doxorubicin in STS patients who cannot be cured with radiation or surgery or who have a type of STS for which chemotherapeutic agent anthracycline is an appropriate treatment. (bit.ly/2e6JNrz)
Soft tissue sarcoma refers to cancers that develop in muscles, fat, tendons or other soft tissues.
The National Cancer Institute estimates that 12,310 new cases of STS and nearly 5,000 related deaths are likely to occur in 2016.
The European Medicines Agency last month recommended conditional marketing approval for the drug in combination with doxorubicin in the European Union.
Lartruvo has already been granted orphan drug status and breakthrough therapy status by the U.S. health regulator.
Indianapolis, Indiana-based Lilly’s shares were up marginally in afternoon trading.
Reporting by Akankshita Mukhopadhyay and Dipika Jain in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju SamuelOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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93a97ffc8ab0b19380bec6a71a9f76e2 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elliott-hyundai-motor/hedge-fund-elliott-calls-for-fresh-revamp-at-hyundai-motor-group-idUSKCN1LM1N2 | Hedge fund Elliott calls for fresh revamp at Hyundai Motor Group | Hedge fund Elliott calls for fresh revamp at Hyundai Motor Group
By Hyunjoo Jin, Liana B. Baker5 Min Read
SEOUL/NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. activist hedge fund Elliott Management made fresh proposals to restructure Hyundai Motor Group on Friday, renewing pressure on the South Korean conglomerate months after forcing it to abandon its own plan.
FILE PHOTO: A car dealer stands in front of the logo of Hyundai Motor at its dealership in Seoul, South Korea, April 25, 2016. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji/File Photo
Elliott, which owns $1.5 billion worth of shares in three Hyundai group companies, called for a committee to review its proposals with other investors and experts, and said its attempts to discuss a new plan had been met with silence.
Hyundai rejected the committee idea and added that it hoped “to share our thoughts on how to improve shareholder value with all of our shareholders in due course”.
A person close to Hyundai Motor Group told Reuters “it’s difficult for Hyundai to accept Elliott’s proposal, as it primarily benefits Hyundai Motor”.
He said the company is listening to various opinions to come up with a new proposal, but no decision had been made.
In a rare victory for an activist shareholder in South Korea, Elliott and other shareholders in May forced Hyundai to scrap its own restructuring plan which would have prepared the group for a switch of management from father to son.
The setback for Hyundai, the country’s second-largest business group, came amid growing public scrutiny of families controlling large conglomerates in South Korea after a corruption scandal involving the Samsung Group last year.
Hyundai said in May that it would “supplement and improve” the plan, which it said aimed to address a government call for the company to streamline its ownership structure.
Hyundai has yet to make its revised plan public.
“We express our frustration as to HMC board’s silence towards our consistent attempts... to communicate and advance the restructuring and other projects,” Elliott said in a letter sent to Hyundai on August 14.
The letter, made public on Friday, proposed a committee to discuss restructuring, shareholder returns and a board makeup.
Hyundai rejected the proposal for the committee, saying it could violate “fair disclosure rules, which prevent us from sharing material confidential information about the company and its businesses to only a subset of our shareholders.”
The renewed pressure comes as Hyundai seeks to focus on operational issues after its quarterly profit halved to an almost six-year low, and South Korea’s trade tensions with the United States threaten to disrupt the firm’s production plans.
INVESTOR INTEREST
The latest proposals from the hedge fund controlled by billionaire Paul Singer call for auto-parts maker Hyundai Mobis Co to sell its after-sale service business to Hyundai Motor Co, and then merge what is left of Mobis with logistics affiliate Hyundai Glovis Co.
Then it proposed the merged Mobis-Glovis buy stakes in Hyundai Motor from the controlling family and affiliate Kia Motors to tighten its grip over the crown jewel of the group. The founding family would increase their stake in the combined Mobis-Glovis by purchasing Kia’s shares in the company.
Elliott also recommended changes to the board to improve governance and enhance shareholder returns.
The plan to sell Mobis’ profitable after-sales business to Hyundai Motor could draw opposition from Mobis shareholders, and increase regulatory risks, analysts said.
Yet the news raised investors’ expectations that the stalled restructuring of Hyundai may revive, sending shares in Hyundai Glovis 5.1 percent higher and Hyundai Mobis up 2.4 percent. Shares in Hyundai Motor fell 1 percent.
“It seems Elliott wants to rekindle investor interest in restructuring as Hyundai has been silent since it withdrew its plan,” said Park Sang-in, a professor at Seoul National University and expert on chaebol reform.
He said Elliott may have made the proposals to pressure Hyundai for concessions, such as higher shareholder returns and a buyout of Elliott’s stakes.
Hyundai’s original plan was to spin off Hyundai Mobis’ lucrative after-sales business and merge it with Hyundai Glovis, whose top shareholders are chairman Chung Mong-koo and his only son and heir apparent, Chung Eui-sun.
Elliott owns around 3.0 percent of Hyundai Motor, 2.1 percent of Kia Motors and 2.6 percent of Mobis.
Reporting by Hyunjoo Jin in Seoul and Liana B. Baker in New York; Additional reporting by Ankit Ajmera in Bengaluru and Heekyong Yang in SEOUL; Editing by Miyoung Kim and Darren SchuettlerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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fa366d76777bb3eff2e70000f3a3b2bd | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elon-musk-texas-idUSKBN28I2UB | Tesla's Musk relocates to Texas from California; compares himself to war general | Tesla's Musk relocates to Texas from California; compares himself to war general
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
(Reuters) -Silicon Valley billionaire Elon Musk said on Tuesday he had relocated to Texas from California as he wanted to focus more on Tesla Inc’s new electric car plant and his SpaceX venture in the Lone Star state.
Musk confirmed the move in an interview with Matt Murray, the Wall Street Journal’s editor in chief.
“The two biggest things that I got going on right now are the Starship development in South Texas ... and then the big new U.S. factory for Tesla,” the 49-year-old Tesla chief said.
“It wasn’t necessarily a great use of my time here (in California)”.
Texas might potentially offer some tax reprieve for the world’s second richest man. It does not collect personal income tax while California has some of the highest state tax rates in the United States.
An over 670% jump in Tesla shares this year has boosted Musk’s net worth from $27 billion to $155 billion, just behind Amazon.com Inc’s Jeff Bezos, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
In a conversation touching a wide range of topics including government intervention, technology companies and corporate policy, Musk criticized CEOs of other U.S. companies for not focusing enough on their products.
“If you find yourself spending a lot of time giving presentations and reviewing spreadsheets, you’re barking up the wrong tree,” Musk said.
The billionaire also compared himself to a war general and said, “If you think about war ... do you want the general in some like ivory tower or on the front lines? The troops are going to fight a lot harder if they see the general on the front lines.”
Musk said tech companies in Silicon Valley had too much influence on the world and predicted a decrease in their power.
On Tesla’s move to raise $5 billion in capital, he said: “We thought we can retire a lot of the debt and increase the security of the company ... have more of a war chest.”
Musk has earned Tesla stock options related to his 2018 pay package that are currently worth almost $20 billion.
Tesla shares were up 0.6% in trading after the bell.
Reporting by Tina Bellon and Munsif Vengattil; Additional reporting by Noel Randewich and Uday Sampath; Editing by Anil D’SilvaOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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2c3877895de3cda81037bbbc1ba6c173 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-abortion/u-n-appalled-at-30-year-sentence-for-woman-under-el-salvador-abortion-law-idUSKBN1E91T1 | U.N. appalled at 30-year sentence for woman under El Salvador abortion law | U.N. appalled at 30-year sentence for woman under El Salvador abortion law
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
Teodora del Carmen Vasquez arrives at a court of justice for a sentence review hearing in San Salvador, El Salvador, December 13, 2017. REUTERS/Jose Cabezas
GENEVA (Reuters) - A 30-year prison sentence for a woman in El Salvador who said her child was stillborn is appalling, U.N. human rights spokeswoman Liz Throssell said on Friday.
The Second Court of Appeal of San Salvador on Wednesday upheld the sentence for Teodora Vasquez, who was convicted in 2008 of aggravated homicide in the death of her child the previous year.
Prosecutors said Vasquez strangled the baby after birth. Her lawyers said she suffered health complications and the baby was stillborn.
Since 1997, El Salvador has had one of the world’s most severe laws against women who have abortions or are suspected of assisting them.
“It is absolutely astounding, astonishing, appalling that these women are in essence being convicted of having a miscarriage, having a child stillborn,” Throssell said.
“They are basically being convicted for being women, for losing a child and for being poor,” she said, adding that at least 41 other women have been similarly convicted over the past decade or so.
The U.N. was not aware of El Salvador jailing any women from wealthier backgrounds under the same law, Throssell said.
Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Matthew Mpoke BiggOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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9ee5a96301f1bcd7e5c4121909ec8b9a | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-election/el-salvador-vote-pits-ex-rebel-vs-gang-fighting-rightist-idUSBREA0S1L520140129 | El Salvador vote pits ex-rebel vs gang-fighting rightist | El Salvador vote pits ex-rebel vs gang-fighting rightist
By Nelson Renteria6 Min Read
SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - A former guerrilla commander hopes to keep his left-wing party in power in El Salvador’s presidential election on Sunday, but he faces a strong challenge from a right-wing rival who wants to use the army to battle powerful street gangs.
Supporters hold a poster of Salvador Sanchez Ceren, presidential candidate for the Farabundo Marti Front for National Liberation (FMLN), during his closing campaign rally in San Salvador January 25, 2014. REUTERS/Ulises Rodriguez
Polls give Vice President Salvador Sanchez Ceren of the leftist Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front, or FMLN, an edge over his conservative adversary Norman Quijano, who stepped down from a second term as mayor of San Salvador to run.
But with three main candidates competing, Sanchez Ceren is expected to fall short of the 50 percent support needed to win outright and so face Quijano in a run-off on March 9.
Antonio Saca, who was president from 2004 until 2009, lies a distant third in polls but his supporters votes will likely decide the winner if the election goes to a second round.
Saca broke away from the main right-wing party, the Nationalist Republican Alliance (Arena), which is backing Quijano. It is unclear if Saca’s supporters would vote for Sanchez Ceren or Quijano in a runoff.
The tight race reflects a deeply divided society, where a middle class living in gated communities fears the power of gang members running poor slums. Whoever wins will have to contend with a divided Congress and sluggish economic growth.
Some 75,000 people died in El Salvador’s 1980-1992 civil war, when the FMLN fought a string of right-wing governments that received military backing from the United States.
Sanchez Ceren has warned Quijano’s proposals to tackle violent gangs would lead to a return to the country’s dark days.
“We are going to bring peace to the people of El Salvador, but not by being a government that violates the constitution. We are not going to militarize the country,” Sanchez said in his last campaign speech.
At the end of the war, the FMLN became a political party and it won power five years ago. It had fielded former guerrilla leaders as candidates before but it finally won the presidency when it backed Mauricio Funes, a journalist without any blood on his hands. Sanchez Ceren was appointed as his vice president.
The 69-year-old Sanchez Ceren worked as a rural teacher before joining the leftist guerrillas, eventually becoming one of the leaders of the FMLN’s five main groups in the war.
Related CoverageFactbox: Ex-guerrilla faces tough-on-gangs rightist in El Salvador election
Arena’s election campaign has used images from when Sanchez was a guerrilla chief to stir up fears among voters.
A post-war Truth Commission laid most blame for wartime atrocities with the armed forces and right-wing death squads, but also found that the FMLN carried out executions and kidnappings, including Sanchez Ceren’s faction, the Popular Forces of Liberation.
Still, the FMLN has made a risky bet by backing Sanchez Ceren.
“I don’t trust him because he was a guerrilla commander,” said 62-year-old seamstress Emelina Hercules. “They want hold onto power like dictators.”
MORE WELFARE, LESS CRIME
Sanchez Ceren has vowed to reduce high levels of poverty, create jobs and lower the high crime rates attributed to the street gangs.
He also promises to expand welfare programs initiated by Funes’ government, such as free school supplies or students and pensions for the elderly, that are popular in a country with a stagnant economy that depends on cash sent home by Salvadorans living in the United States.
El Salvador’s debt has been rising and Wall Street agencies have warned they could cut its debt ratings this year amid weak growth and political gridlock.
Quijano wants to invoke presidential powers to use the army to fight gangs. He also wants to draft 18- to 30-year-olds who do not study or work into the army and subject them to military courts if they commit gang crimes.
Quijano has alleged a secret pact between the government and the two main gangs is behind a now two-year old truce, which was brokered by leaders in the country’s brutal prisons.
The deal between the Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and its rival, Barrio 18, is credited with cutting one of the world’s highest homicide rates down by half, with murders hitting a 10-year low in 2013.
The U.S. government underscored the gangs’ growing power when it added the MS-13 last year to its black list of global crime organizations.
Quijano, 67, is a former dentist who joined Arena and became
San Salvador’s mayor. He says he will be able to cut crime and entice more investment to lift economic growth.
“We have a country that has been overrun by criminals,” Quijano told Reuters. “The constitution gives you the power, when you are overwhelmed ... When you have lost peace, you can use the armed forces.”
Quijano said he was inspired by Honduras’ new president Juan Hernandez, who won on a pledge to use the military to fight drug gangs. Others are worried by Quijano’s plan in a country where many still remember the military-controlled death squads before and during the civil war.
Funes, the outgoing president, has had a major role in the campaign, using his position to publicize corruption allegations against Francisco Flores, a former president from the Arena party and an advisor to Quijano’s campaign.
Writing by Michael O’Boyle; Editing by Dave Graham, Kieran Murray and Marguerita ChoyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b00276cc528f5189471cc228688cfd4e | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-guatemala/guatemalan-president-offers-el-salvador-the-chance-to-build-a-port-in-guatemalan-waters-idUSKBN1ZR07O | Guatemalan president offers El Salvador the chance to build a port in Guatemalan waters | Guatemalan president offers El Salvador the chance to build a port in Guatemalan waters
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
Guatemala's President Alejandro Giammattei and El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele shake hands at a news conference in San Salvador, El Salvador January 27, 2020. REUTERS/Jose Cabezas
SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei on Monday offered his Salvadoran counterpart, Nayib Bukele, the opportunity to build and operate a port in Guatemalan waters in the Atlantic Ocean to promote commerce.
Giammattei, who took office in January, said the governments will work to develop a legal framework so that El Salvador can develop projects through a public-private partnership on the Guatemalan coast.
“We have offered El Salvador something unprecedented in the history of Central American integration, and today I want to announce it publicly because we are going to explore, as soon as possible, the possibility that El Salvador has a port in the Atlantic, in the Guatemalan Atlantic,” Giammattei said during a news conference at the Salvadoran presidential residence.
El Salvador, the smallest country in the isthmus, has a Pacific coast but no access to the Atlantic Ocean.
The two leaders met on Monday in the Salvadoran capital to announce that flight routes between the countries will be considered local in order to reduce costs and encourage tourism.
In addition, the presidents said that they are working to achieve the free movement of people across borders, harmonize customs and coordinate security plans to fight gangs and criminal groups operating in the region.
Salvadoran President Bukele said the governments will seek to invest in hotel construction and logistics centers in the Guatemalan Atlantic, in addition to boosting the flow of goods, without giving details.
“This is something historic, I can’t remember anything this great happening as far as Central American unity is concerned,” Bukele said.
Reporting by Nelson Renteria in San Salvador and Sofia Menchu in Guatemala City; Editing by Sandra MalerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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5845676078932e4b3dafc0b875b0c970 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-massacre/salvadoran-general-admits-army-carried-out-infamous-1981-massacre-idUSKBN1ZN2MJ | Salvadoran general admits army carried out infamous 1981 massacre | Salvadoran general admits army carried out infamous 1981 massacre
By Nelson Renteria3 Min Read
SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - A retired Salvadoran general on Friday acknowledged for the first time that the armed forces were responsible for a notorious 1981 massacre of more than 1,000 people during the country’s civil war.
FILE PHOTO: Former Salvadoran air force commander in chief during the civil war, general Juan Rafael Bustillo attends the court hearing in the case of El Mozote Massacre in San Francisco Gotera, El Salvador, October 19, 2017. REUTERS/Jose Cabezas
Juan Rafael Bustillo, a former commander of the Air Force, told a court the elite Atlacatl Battalion carried out the El Mozote massacre in eastern El Salvador in which unarmed villagers, most of them women and children, were slaughtered.
According to a U.N. report, soldiers tortured and executed over 1,000 residents of El Mozote and surrounding hamlets in the Morazan department, 180 km (110 miles) northeast of San Salvador, as they searched for guerrillas in December 1981.
At a court hearing in the eastern town of San Francisco Gotera in Morazan, Bustillo testified he had had no part in the operation which he said was conducted at the behest of Colonel Domingo Monterrosa, commander of the feared Atlacatl Battalion.
“War sometimes gives rise to something in the minds of people that attaches no value to the lives of others. I think it was on his initiative (Monterrosa’s),” Bustillo said.
“That’s my reasoning, it was on his initiative that he gave the order to kill the people of El Mozote, and the other surrounding cantons,” the retired general told the court.
“I almost feel it was like a moment, some instance of madness on the part of Colonel Monterrosa to have committed that offense, because it was an offense,” he added.
Monterrosa, a highly regarded officer in his day, died in 1984 during a helicopter explosion in the east of the country.
The 1980-1992 civil war, which pitted leftist guerrillas against the U.S.-backed Salvadoran army, lead to the deaths of an estimated 75,000 people and left 8,000 more missing.
In 2016, a judge ordered the case of the El Mozote massacre to be re-opened. Sixteen military officials including ex-defense minister Guillermo Garcia are being tried over the killings.
Representatives of the victims hailed Bustillo’s testimony.
“General Bustillo has confirmed many of the excesses demonstrated by evidence and which were denounced by victims,” David Morales, one of the victims’ lawyers, told reporters. “He fully accepts that this massacre was carried out.”
Reporting by Nelson Renteria; Editing by Alistair BellOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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2deff97f6196f5931d1b1517c9a460e9 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-politics-idCAKBN1XJ0H8 | Salvadoran massacre victims still hunting 'truth and justice' 38 years later | Salvadoran massacre victims still hunting 'truth and justice' 38 years later
By Nelson Renteria4 Min Read
CACAOPERA, El Salvador (Reuters) - Fidel Perez has abandoned his farm for the day to look on as investigators work in a remote cemetery in this Central American country, seeking answers to one of many tragedies in the Salvadoran civil war - and the remains of his mother and sister.
A detail of the memorial monument of El Mozote Massacre is seen in the village of El Mozote, Meanguera, El Salvador, November 6, 2019. REUTERS/Jose Cabezas
For Perez, now 43, the investigation marks a return to a dark day when he was seven years old, huddled in a cave with his family and neighbors. Then soldiers threw in a grenade.
It was December 1981, during a military operation in Morazan, at the dawn of the long and bloody civil war that claimed tens of thousands of lives.
Perez fainted in the explosion. When he regained consciousness, he saw that his mother and sister had been killed in the attack, along with 10 others.
Fearful of the soldiers’ return, the eight survivors fled after burying their loved ones on the spot. This week, the remains are being exhumed from a nearby cemetery on the orders of Salvadoran Judge Jorge Guzmán, who is looking for new evidence about the so-called El Mozote massacre.
According to a U.N. report, soldiers tortured and executed more than a thousand residents of El Mozote and surrounding hamlets in the Morazán department, 180 km (110 miles) northeast of San Salvador, as they searched for guerrillas in December 1981.
“Our struggle is to know the truth, for justice to be done,” said Pérez, who escaped the cave with his father and brother, as he watched the forensic experts work at the graves. “The hardest part is the imprint in the mind, in one’s heart, of leaving a relative behind.”
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Sixteen retired military personnel, including former Defense Minister Jose Guillermo Garcia, are accused of planning and ordering the massacre. Garcia did not immediately respond to a request for comment through his lawyer.
‘MOCKERY’
However, none of the accused would go to jail if Congress passes a new law giving amnesty to those responsible for crimes during the war.
The initiative is part of the so-called “Reconciliation Law,” which seeks to secure reparations for the victims and to put an end to the aftermath of the civil war, which left some 75,000 dead and 8,000 missing.
Human rights specialists say the law, expected to be passed in the next few days, would not prevent those responsible from being convicted, but they would face sentences such as community service or house arrest.
“It is a mockery for the thousands of crimes and specifically, in the case of El Mozote, a mockery after having killed more than a thousand peasants, mostly children,” Wilfredo Medrano, a lawyer representing 60 families of the victims, told reporters as the bodies were exhumed.
In 1994, relatives returned for the remains and buried them in Cacaopera, a predominantly indigenous community where they settled after the war.
“Hopefully justice will be done,” said Maria Nunez de Marquez, a 61-year-old housewife whose parents in-law and five of her husband’s brothers were killed in El Mozote.
Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, who took office in June, met with relatives of the victims this summer and reiterated his commitment not to support an amnesty law, according to his office.
(This story has been refiled to fix dateline.)
Reporting by Nelson Renteria; Writing by Julia Love; Editing by Daniel WallisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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c5cbddaf3934c4b522503574cbae80d3 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-politics/el-salvador-presidents-power-play-stokes-democracy-concerns-idUSKBN2042M4 | El Salvador president's power play stokes democracy concerns | El Salvador president's power play stokes democracy concerns
By Nelson Renteria4 Min Read
SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - President Nayib Bukele’s use of armed soldiers in El Salvador’s parliament over the weekend has alarmed political foes and rights groups, with growing fears about democratic backsliding in the crime-ravaged Central American nation.
Soldiers leave the National Congress as supporters of Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele protest outside the building to push for the approval of funds for a government security plan in San Salvador, El Salvador February 9, 2020. REUTERS/Jose Cabezas
Bukele, 38, on Sunday showed up in the National Assembly with a group of uniformed soldiers wielding automatic weapons for a special session he convened, amid attempts to pressure parliamentarians to pass his crime-fighting plan. He also warned lawmakers that the people have a right to “insurrection.”
The show of force inside the country’s parliament drew condemnation from across the political spectrum and some foreign nations, amid worries El Salvador’s young democracy may be harmed by presidential overreach.
Concerns that Bukele is using troops to intimidate lawmakers comes at a time when leaders of several nations in Latin America, where military rule was common in the 1970s and 80s, are leaning on armed forces to give them a helping hand in domestic politics.
“The Salvadoran military should not be used to resolve disputes between the president and congress. Civilian differences should be resolved by civilian institutions,” said Eliot Engel, chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee.
“The eyes of the world are on El Salvador and @nayibbukele at this critical moment,” he added, in a post on the committee’s Twitter account.
Both of El Salvador’s traditional parties, the right-wing ARENA and leftist FMLN, founded by former guerrillas, accused Bukele of attempting a type of “coup” against other branches of government.
Slideshow ( 5 images )
Oscar Ortiz, secretary general of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) party, said Bukele’s actions marked “the blackest day” for the country’s democracy.
The youthful president, who identified as a leftist at the start of his political career with the FMLN before changing parties, has sky-high popularity ratings after overturning the moribund two-party system in an election last year.
But he lacks a majority in parliament. Bukele’s right-wing Great National Alliance (GANA) party and allies control only 11 of the 84 seats in the National Assembly. Arena has 37 lawmakers.
The former one-term mayor of the capital, San Salvador, replied to critics of his move on Monday, saying it was evidence of a corrupt system protecting itself.
Bukele wants lawmakers to agree to a $109 million loan to help equip police and soldiers in the fight against crime in a nation racked by gang violence. He gave them a week-long deadline to pass the loan legislation, without specifying what action he would take if they failed to meet his demands.
El Salvador’s murder rate has plunged since Bukele took office in July but remains high.
Warnings about a democratic reversal have deep resonance in El Salvador, where about 75,000 were killed and 8,000 disappeared during a 12-year civil war between the military and FMLN, which became a political party at the end of the war in 1992.
On Sunday, the United Nations called for dialogue, while Costa Rica said it trusted the constitution would be respected in light of the events in parliament.
Bukele has been a strong U.S. ally on issues such as immigration and a critic of “anti-democratic” regional governments, especially in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Honduras.
Marvin Ponce, adviser to Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, said Bukele’s poll ratings had gone to his head and he was acting like a “dictator” who was “unhinged” by power.
“It’s a bad example for democracies in Latin America,” Ponce told Reuters.
Reporting by Nelson Renteria in San Salvador, additional reporting by Gustavo Palencia in Tegucigalpa; Writing by Drazen Jorgic in Mexico City; Editing by Tom Brown; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel and Tom BrownOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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a355a550ab74334b373eb127493d70bf | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-politics/salvadoran-presidents-supporters-pressure-lawmakers-to-approve-loan-to-boost-security-idUSKBN2030SI | Backed by soldiers, El Salvador's president briefly occupies Congress | Backed by soldiers, El Salvador's president briefly occupies Congress
By Nelson Renteria3 Min Read
SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - President Nayib Bukele and a group of soldiers armed with automatic weapons briefly occupied El Salvador’s Congress on Sunday, stepping up a pressure campaign to force lawmakers to back a crime-fighting plan.
Watched by soldiers in full battle uniform, Bukele, 38, sat in the seat reserved for the president of Congress and cupped his hands together to pray, he said, for patience with lawmakers, few of whom turned up at the special session.
“If those shameless people don’t approve the plan of territorial control, we’ll summon you here again (next) Sunday,” he told supporters in a fiery speech outside, as he left the building.
Lawmakers were due to meet on Monday to discuss the president’s proposals, Congress president Mario Ponce said, in a possible sign of de-escalation.
Critics warned of a looming constitutional crisis, however. Human Rights Watch, a U.S.-based group, called the event “an exhibition of brute force” and said the Organization of American States should urgently meet to discuss the situation.
Bukele won office last year after a savvy social media campaign feeding off popular discontent with two parties that had ruled the Central American country since the end of a civil war.
Channeling that same frustration with traditional parties, he attacked Congress for foot-dragging over approval of a $109 million multi-lateral loan he has sought to equip police and soldiers to fight crime.
His cabinet called Sunday’s special session after Bukele said on Friday that Salvadorans had a legal right to insurrection in such situations, calling for protests and briefly removing lawmakers’ security protection details.
The president’s move to pressure lawmakers was backed by defense minister René Merino Monroy and police director Mauricio Arriaza Chicas.
However, El Salvadoran think-tank FUSADES said there were no grounds for the executive branch to call such a session, since Congress was functioning normally.
On Sunday, hundreds of Salvadorans responded to Bukele’s call to demonstrate, waving banners and blowing whistles outside Congress, as soldiers and police officers stood by to protect them, a Reuters witness said.
“We are here because of the insecurity we have in our country, and the lawmakers do not want to recognize that,” said Adelma Campos, a 43-year-old housewife. “They do not want to work for the people who gave them their votes.”
Although the murder rate in El Salvador has declined steeply since Bukele took office, authorities continue to battle gangs that control vast territory in the Central American country.
In a statement, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights called on Sunday for “dialogue and full respect for democratic institutions to guarantee the rule of law, including the independence of the branches of public power.”
Reporting by Nelson Renteria; Writing by Julia Love; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel and Clarence FernandezOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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415f0b145a28c043d64b81cc88a0637d | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-quake-idINKBN1YS01G | Quake shakes buildings in El Salvador, no damage reported | Quake shakes buildings in El Salvador, no damage reported
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - Buildings swayed in El Salvador’s capital during an earthquake in the region on Monday evening, according to a Reuters witness.
There were no immediate reports of damage, according to El Salvador’s civil protection agency. El Salvador’s environment ministry registered a 4.7 magnitude quake, according to preliminary information.
Reporting by Nelson RenteriaOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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0e614fd541822a8a45db8e8e02be2dd0 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-un-selfie/just-a-second-please-el-salvador-presidents-u-n-selfie-eclipses-speech-idUSKBN1WB31P | 'Just a second, please': El Salvador president's U.N. selfie eclipses speech | 'Just a second, please': El Salvador president's U.N. selfie eclipses speech
By Luc Cohen2 Min Read
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Before starting his first address before the United Nations General Assembly on Thursday, 38-year-old El Salvador President Nayib Bukele asked the audience to hold on a second, took out his phone, and snapped a selfie.
“Believe me, many more people will see this selfie than will hear this speech,” Bukele quipped before delivering his address calling on the United Nations to change with the times and for world leaders to do more to connect with their countries’ youth.
The former mayor of the capital, San Salvador, who took office in June, is a prolific user of social media. In his speech, he attributed his election victory to his mastery of platforms like Facebook Live, which he said his political opponents did not fully grasp.
In another made-for-social-media moment, Bukele’s wife Gabriela brought their baby daughter Layla to hear the president’s address.
After finishing his speech, Bukele uploaded the photo to Twitter, where it received more than 7,000 likes in less than an hour. The picture showed him smiling in front of the U.N. logo - a map of the world surrounded by olive branches - and Argentine U.N. Ambassador Martin Garcia Moritan, one of several General Assembly vice presidents.
“Maybe in a few years, thousands of us will not have to travel to New York to meet in this building,” Bukele said. “A series of videoconferences would have cost several hundred million dollars less, and I’m sure it would have the same effect, if not greater.”
Reporting by Luc Cohen; Editing by Mary Milliken and Jonathan OatisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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1854ed6fb31762181c4385374a4b1fbe | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-violence-idUSBRE96P03X20130726 | Organization of America States backs fragile El Salvador gang truce | Organization of America States backs fragile El Salvador gang truce
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
Jose Miguel Insulza, Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS) attends as an official guest the speech of Mexico's new President Enrique Pena Nieto at the National Palace in Mexico City December 1, 2012 file photo. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido
SAN SALVADOR (Reuters) - Jose Miguel Insulza, the secretary general of the Organization of American States, gave his support to a fragile truce between El Salvador’s gangs on Thursday, despite a recent uptick in murders.
After meeting with El Salvador’s president, Mauricio Funes, Insulza backed the tentative peace treaty between the Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, and their rivals, Barrio 18, pointing to an overall decrease in the number of killings in the Central American country since the truce took hold in March 2012.
“It’s a process that will always have highs and lows, but for our organization, the most important thing is the substantial reduction we’ve seen in El Salvador’s murder rate,” Insulza told reporters.
The truce, which is backed by the Catholic Church, aims to reduce the number of homicides. According to the United Nations, El Salvador is the world’s most-violent nation, with a homicide rate of 66 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2011.
The unprecedented ceasefire helped bring murders down to an average of five per day from 12 before the agreement.
But killings have been rising since late May, with homicides averaging 16 per day in early July, with one week that month notching 103 murders.
Reporting by Nelson Renteria; Writing by Gabriel Stargardter; Editing by Eric BeechOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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c17ae1538ce551054c0479b2f35bd02b | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsayedali-hatespeech-commentary-idUSKCN1G72UU | Commentary: How to stop social media from supercharging hate speech | Commentary: How to stop social media from supercharging hate speech
By Sherif Elsayed-Ali, Commentary7 Min Read
Donald Trump’s retweets of anti-Muslim videos first circulated by an anti-immigrant, far-right British party were just the tip of the iceberg. From Myanmar to the United States, controversial posts by political leaders and public figures have sparked a growing and increasingly global debate about how social media may be facilitating the spread of hatred and discrimination.
Slideshow ( 2 images )
But this discussion is only the latest in a larger debate that is as old as the internet itself: who should decide the limits of freedom of expression online, and how should they do it?
We have come a long way from the days when Facebook, YouTube and Twitter were hailed as enablers of free speech and democracy. Such platforms have undeniably helped to democratize the public sphere. Individuals can amass tens of thousands of followers, and earn millions of views, without relying on the media, public relations agencies, or governments. Activists can organize, disseminate information and mobilize more effectively than ever before.
It is a testament to the power of social media that many countries are imposing stricter controls or even blocking their access entirely. We must bear the positive aspects of that power in mind when we consider how best to tackle its flip side: the way social platforms can be used to spread abuse, vitriol and hatred more rapidly than ever before.
In 2017, politicians in many countries deployed social media to spread hate-filled agendas. Amnesty International’s latest annual report on the state of the world’s human rights documents a global rise in state-sponsored hate, and chronicles the variety of ways governments and leaders are increasingly peddling hateful rhetoric and policies that seek to demonize already marginalized groups; President Trump’s transparently-hateful travel ban on citizens from half a dozen Muslim-majority countries was one of the most prominent examples.
As access to social media expands worldwide, it is increasingly being used by governments to promote hateful rhetoric, to control their citizens, and to silence any opposition. From xenophobic statements by politicians against LGBTI and Roma people in Bulgaria, anti-Rohingya propaganda posted on Facebook by senior military officers and government spokespeople in Myanmar, and the use of troll networks against government critics in the Philippines, those in power are learning how to use social media as yet another tool of repression.
These findings present many dilemmas. To what extent are social media companies such as Facebook and Twitter – who have responded only belatedly to the torrent of hate speech and “fake news”– at fault? Should governments take action? What can we do to preserve the good that social media can offer while countering its more corrosive effects?
There are no simple answers. The right to free expression protects ideas that many people find offensive, and there are many instances where racist, sexist, xenophobic or other hateful material is not prohibited under human rights law. Nevertheless, freedom of expression comes with responsibilities, and there are cases under human rights law – such as incitement to violence or child sex abuse imagery – where it can legitimately be restricted. Complexities tend to arise because the definition of “offense” is always subjective: one person’s free speech is another’s vicious diatribe.
Any attempt at regulation must also consider the fact that the right to be able to say things to which others – including those in positions of power – will vehemently object is one of the foundations of an open society. Take that away and you take away the free press and any kind of government accountability.
For all their potential for abuse, social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter provide a space for expression and access to information that is much freer than anything available in the past. Yet, this freedom is fragile – for example, Amnesty’s research has shown that online abuse can have a silencing effect on its targets.
So what’s the solution? There are three types of actions that can be taken to counter hate on social media and the internet more generally: legal enforcement, content moderation, and education.
States should have in place laws that prohibit advocacy of hatred, and take legal action only in the very clearly-defined cases allowed by international human rights law. Specifically this is when there is a clear show of intent to incite others to discrimination, hostility or violence against a particular group.
Nevertheless, many governments have threatened social media companies with strict rules on intermediary liability, which means that companies may be held liable for content posted on their platforms. The problem is that intermediary liability can easily be used to restrict freedom of expression and to force companies to censor their users for fear of legal consequences.
Regardless of government regulation, companies have a responsibility to avoid causing or contributing to human rights harms. Content moderation by social media companies is therefore an important part of the solution: it does not require legislation and therefore does not open the doors to unjustified restrictions on freedom of expression.
All major platforms have community standards and rules of conduct in place to deal with advocacy of hatred and discrimination, which would work well so long as they did not conflict with human rights law. Making them effective will require social media companies to consistently uphold these rules, and to devote sufficient resources to addressing violations. This means improving the tools available to users to report abusive content, employing and training content moderators, and measures to identify and restrict troll networks. It also requires transparency about the rate at which these rules and standards are violated, including information about types of abuse and actions taken.
Reducing the spread of hate on social media also requires education. This is perhaps the most important intervention: legal enforcement and content moderation can only treat the symptoms of online abuse. Whether it is through school programs, or campaigns on social media itself, the only viable long-term way to reduce racism, sexism and bigotry online is by understanding and addressing the roots of discrimination and hate in our societies.
About the Author Sherif Elsayed-Ali is the director of Global Issues at Amnesty International. @sherifea The views expressed in this article are not those of Reuters News.
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ac5c53b0932393a0566cdc199d7f091b | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ema-cyber-moderna/moderna-covid-19-vaccine-documents-accessed-in-ema-cyberattack-idUSKBN28P00E?web_view=true | Moderna COVID-19 vaccine documents accessed in EMA cyberattack | Moderna COVID-19 vaccine documents accessed in EMA cyberattack
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: Vials with a sticker reading, "COVID-19 / Coronavirus vaccine / Injection only" and a medical syringe are seen in front of a displayed Moderna logo in this illustration taken October 31, 2020. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
(Reuters) - Moderna Inc said on Monday it was informed by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) certain documents related to pre-submission talks of its COVID-19 vaccine candidate were unlawfully accessed in a cyberattack on the medicines regulator.
The EMA, which assesses medicines and vaccines for the European Union, said earlier this month that it had been targeted in a cyberattack, which also gave hackers access to documents related to the development of the Pfizer Inc and BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.
Moderna said its submission to the EMA did not include any information identifying individual study participants and there is no information at present that any participants had been identified in any way.
Reporting by Uday Sampath in Bengaluru; editing by Uttaresh.VOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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d338f6660d60561629aff4b248b0f3be | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-embraer-commercial/embraer-in-turboprop-talks-as-it-charts-future-without-boeing-idUSKBN2831ZV | Embraer in turboprop talks as it charts future without Boeing | Embraer in turboprop talks as it charts future without Boeing
By Tim Hepher4 Min Read
PARIS (Reuters) - Brazil’s Embraer is in active talks with potential partners to build a new regional turboprop and could opt for a combination of industrial and financial backing, the head of the planemaker’s commercial division told Reuters.
FILE PHOTO: A demonstration model of an Embraer E195-E2 aircraft of Brazilian manufacturer Embaer stands in a hangar during a presentation at Zurich Airport, Switzerland February 26, 2020. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann
In a bid to regain momentum after Boeing axed a $4 billion merger deal in April, the world’s No. 3 planemaker is also pitching its E2 regional jet as a compact solution for carriers trying to reduce risk after the COVID-19 crisis.
“We are actively in discussions with (turboprop) partnerships, but I can’t go into more details now,” Commercial Aviation Chief Executive Arjan Meijer said in an interview.
“Also the type of partnership, be it industrial or financial, is wide open. We are looking at all the options, or it could be a combination of the two ... We are not ruling anyone out at this point,” he added.
Analysts say such a development could cost $2 billion.
Such a move could shake up a profitable niche dominated by Europe’s ATR, which before the crisis forecast 20-year demand for 3,020 turboprops worth $80 billion.
Turboprops can be more efficient than jets on short trips.
But demand is in the doldrums due to a glut of used planes and the market’s exposure to small operators hard-hit by COVID-19.
ATR delivered just one plane in January-September.
Turboprops are also seen as among the first to face future competition from an alternative propulsion like hydrogen.
Meijer said Embraer’s design would be conventionally powered but reduce emissions and noise. But a launch decision would stretch “beyond 2021” as the industry focuses on recovery.
Countries whose industries have expressed interest in turboprops include South Korea, industry sources said.
Sweden’s Saab rejected speculation by some industry officials that it could look at the venture, having stopped building civil turboprops in 1999 to focus on defence.
“Saab has no plans to restart the development and production of civil aircraft,” a spokesman said, adding that its investment focus also remained defence, including strong ties with Brazil.
Embraer had previously sought to develop its turboprop as part of its tie-up with Boeing. It now says it wants only project-led alliances and the commercial unit is not for sale.
“We are a strong company and have a good cash position, so we are very confidently looking forward,” Meijer said.
‘SMALLER JETS, LESS RISK’
Still, analysts say Embraer has been left isolated while the rival to its flagship E2 regional jet, the Canadian-designed A220, enjoys a revival backed by new owner Airbus - a partnership Embraer had hoped to resist by teaming with Boeing.
Meijer blamed a recent E2 order slump on buyers waiting for the Boeing deal, followed swiftly by the pandemic. Longer term, however, he saw the pandemic’s fallout boosting Embraer.
While most forecasts suggest a full traffic recovery by 2024-25, “for our segment below 150 seats, we believe it will recover a lot sooner,” Meijer said.
“Airlines that have ability to fly smaller planes do so.”
When international travel recovers, airlines serving hubs will also use smaller feeder jets, Meijer said. That puts him at odds with low-cost airlines who see hubs as outdated and slash prices to fill their bigger Airbus and Boeing models.
“We strongly believe airlines will need to focus on profitability,” Meijer said.
He also said Embraer remained committed to the smallest E2, the delayed E175-E2, which is shut out of U.S. markets due to union rules on the size of jets used by some regional carriers.
Asked whether Embraer would encroach on the turf of Airbus and Boeing above 150 seats, he said, “Embraer’s focus is on expanding our leadership in the up-to-150-seat segment.”
Reporting by Tim Hepher; Editing by David Goodman, David Evans and Dan GreblerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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1e258f96d55fd27f32d4213aed2f5f41 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-embraer-m-a-boeing/brazil-antitrust-regulator-gives-nod-to-boeing-embraer-deal-idUSKBN1ZQ2DQ | Brazil antitrust regulator gives nod to Boeing-Embraer deal | Brazil antitrust regulator gives nod to Boeing-Embraer deal
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
Slideshow ( 2 images )
BRASILIA (Reuters) - Brazilian antitrust regulator Cade on Monday approved Boeing Co’s purchase of Embraer SA’s commercial aviation division without restrictions, according to a statement on the agency’s website.
Cade’s top administrative council could still call for a reconsideration of the case, putting the matter to a vote.
The companies welcomed the move on Monday, with Boeing saying it remained confident of getting approval from the European Commission, the last hurdle to the transaction.
The European Union has set an April 30 deadline to decide on the deal.
Boeing has offered to pay $4.2 billion for 80% of Embraer’s commercial jet division, which builds passenger jets in the 70- to 150-seat segment.
That puts it in direct competition with next-generation jets designed by Bombardier Inc and acquired by Europe’s Airbus SE, which rebranded them the A220 program.
Reporting by Ricardo Brito; additional reporting by Kanishka Singh; Writing by Jake Spring; Editing by Sandra Maler, Marguerita Choy and Aditya SoniOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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016d23c66e4105dd04cd3f7a22f6a09c | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-embraer-results/embraer-prepares-for-very-challenging-2021-as-new-covid-waves-hamper-travel-idINKBN27Q19J?edition-redirect=in | Embraer prepares for 'very challenging' 2021 as new COVID waves hamper travel | Embraer prepares for 'very challenging' 2021 as new COVID waves hamper travel
By Marcelo Rochabrun2 Min Read
(Reuters) - Brazil's Embraer SA EMBR3.SA is preparing for a "very challenging" 2021 as new coronavirus waves in the United States and Europe are appearing to delay a potential recovery in travel, Chief Executive Francisco Gomes Neto said on Tuesday.
The world’s No. 3 planemaker lost $121 million between June and September, the company said, as the pandemic’s first wave curbed travel, hitting demand for commercial jets and private planes.
Gomes Neto told analysts he did not expect sales in 2021 to be better than in 2020, with the company particularly weighed down by lagging commercial jet sales. So far this year, Embraer has already lost $728 million, and the company only expects growth to resume perhaps in 2022.
Shares fell 6% in Brazil on the news and the negative outlook, even as markets overall were up.
But Embraer said on Tuesday it had already delivered more planes in October than in all of the third quarter, a promising sign that could darken down the line if the resurging pandemic is not tamed.
Commercial jet revenue was the hardest hit, falling to $177 million in the quarter from $408 million a year ago as the pandemic ravaged commercial travel.
But the executive jets division, which some analysts believed would be a bright spot as the ultra rich would spend heavily to travel in isolation, also fell significantly. Executive jets revenue fell to $212 million from $363 million a year ago.
Its defense division, however, managed to grow its revenue on higher deliveries of military planes. Still, Embraer’s defense division remains a smaller business segment than the one making civilian planes.
The company said it burned through $567 million in cash during the quarter, which was offset by $750 million in new debt raised in the same period.
Reporting by Marcelo Rochabrun; Editing by Louise Heavens and David EvansOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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4c1dc116cd4b0e0556876591e2a85b49 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emerging-china-iif/china-net-2016-outflows-at-record-725-billion-iif-idUSKBN15H1FL | China net 2016 outflows at record $725 billion: IIF | China net 2016 outflows at record $725 billion: IIF
By Sujata Rao3 Min Read
LONDON (Reuters) - Capital outflows from China surged last year to a record $725 billion and could pick up further if U.S. firms face political pressure to repatriate profits, the Institute of International Finance said on Thursday.
The Washington DC-based group, one of the most authoritative trackers of capital movements in and out of the developing world, estimates net Chinese outflows last year were $50 billion higher than in 2015, dwarfing the inflows other emerging economies received.
Net outflows in 2014 had been just $160 billion from China, which has seen capital flight pick up in the past couple of years from local businesses and households, partly on expectations that the yuan would weaken against the dollar.
The outflows, which caused a $320 billion decline last year in Chinese foreign exchange reserves, have prompted authorities to strengthen capital curbs. The yuan fell 6.5 percent against the dollar last year, the biggest ever yearly fall.
The IIF estimated China outflows at a heavy $95 billion in December and noted that a rise in protectionism, especially in the United States after the election of President Donald Trump, could exacerbate the situation.
Trump and his top trade adviser this week criticised Germany, Japan and China, saying the three key U.S. trading partners were devaluing their currencies to the detriment of U.S. companies and consumers.
“If U.S.-based multinational corporates start to repatriate their profits from China, outflows could worsen further in 2017,” the IIF said, referring to pledges of tax breaks to U.S. firms that bring overseas profits back to the country.
But excluding China, the picture for emerging markets appeared brighter, the IIF said, noting net capital inflows last year had amounted to $192 billion, versus $123 billion in 2015.
In January, inflows into the stocks and bonds of a group of big emerging economies stood at a five-month high of $12.3 billion, the group added.
“January was a much better month for emerging markets but it is too early to tell if this reflects hope for a better outlook – or this is just the eye of the storm,” the IIF note added.
The capital exodus from China, however, dominates the picture - the IIF last November forecast the developing world would suffer net capital outflows of $206 billion in 2017, with the vast majority accounted for by China.
Reporting by Sujata Rao; editing by Karin StroheckerOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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8d420045cbbc39ce96e53d0254acfd1d | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emerging-flows-iif/foreign-investors-to-pour-nearly-1-trillion-into-emerging-markets-in-2017-iif-idUSKBN18X1NJ | Foreign investors to pour nearly $1 trillion into emerging markets in 2017: IIF | Foreign investors to pour nearly $1 trillion into emerging markets in 2017: IIF
By Dion Rabouin3 Min Read
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Non-resident capital inflows to emerging markets should reach $970 billion this year, a 35 percent increase from 2016, the Institute of International Finance said in a report released on Tuesday.
An investor looks at an electronic board showing stock information at a brokerage house in Nanjing, China May 24, 2017. REUTERS/Stringer
The projection follows a strong first quarter for emerging market investment that saw the strongest portfolio inflows since 2014. The IIF’s projection is $290 billion higher than its estimate just four months ago, shortly after Donald Trump took office as U.S. president and the organization listed possible American protectionism as its top threat to emerging market portfolio flow growth.
The risk of trade friction between the U.S. and Mexico and China, has waned significantly, said Hung Tran, IIF’s executive managing director, as has the risk of the U.S. Federal Reserve quickly tightening monetary policy.
“Looking back at the first five months of the year, it is clear that near-term threats of trade conflict have subsided significantly,” Tran said. “All the threat of naming China as currency manipulators, the increase in tariffs, abandonment of NAFTA did not come to pass.”
The IIF projects non-resident inflows to increase by $252 billion this year from 2016.
Non-resident portfolio inflows are expected to rise to more than $1 trillion in 2018, IIF also said, the first time inflows have breached that level since 2014.
Capital inflows from non-residents had fallen to a 12-year low in 2015.
Despite the rebound in capital inflows from foreigners, IIF anticipates overall net capital outflows from emerging markets, led by resident capital outflows from China.
The organization expects resident capital outflows to hit $892 billion this year, a decline by $141 billion from 2016, and for outflows to reduce further in 2018.
Outflows from China alone, which leads emerging market economies in capital leaving local markets, rose to a record $725 billion last year.
“All of this moderation is due to China, which has used capital controls to clamp down on outward investment with some degree of success,” said Scott Farnham, IIF’s senior research analyst, global macroeconomics, in the report.
All told, the institute is expecting to see overall net capital outflows, which includes resident and non-residents from emerging markets, of $130 billion. It had estimated outflows from its group of 25 emerging market economies would total $490 billion this year in its February report.
The total level of capital outflows is greater than the difference between resident and non-resident flows because of forex reserves and net errors and omissions, IIF said.
Reporting by Dion Rabouin; Editing by Bernard OrrOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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a7c51e5c67a47d17faf8b0d3eed74250 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emerging-markets-flows-idUSKBN1I31J8 | Ghosts of tantrums past trigger first emerging market outflows since 2016: IIF | Ghosts of tantrums past trigger first emerging market outflows since 2016: IIF
By Marc Jones3 Min Read
LONDON (Reuters) - The recent run up in the dollar and global borrowing costs has led to the first monthly outflow of foreign money from poorer “emerging” economies since 2016, estimates compiled by the Institute of International Finance show.
A man stands next to a board that shows the Real-U.S. dollar and several foreign currencies exchange rates in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, January 21, 2016. REUTERS/Pilar Olivares
A new IIF report said the rising pressure from the dollar and bond yields has exhumed “the ghost of tantrums past” and caused a $0.5 billion outflow when combining figures from EM stocks funds and bond funds.
It was referring to the “taper tantrum” of 2013 when the U.S. Federal Reserve first hinted that it was looked to wind in the stimulus used to combat the financial crisis.
The April retrenchment was mostly concentrated in Asia, with combined debt and equity outflows amounting to some $7.8 billion. In contrast, foreign demand for Latin American securities was robust at about $6.8 billion.
“The rise of 10-year U.S. Treasury yields -- in tandem with a stronger dollar -- have been the key drivers of this downturn,” the authors of the IIF study said.
“Indeed, foreign investors have withdrawn more than $5.5 billion from EM debt markets since April 16, a slightly faster pace than that seen during the taper tantrum in May 2013.”
After a fast start to the year, net capital inflows to emerging markets which are a broader measure of cross-border flows, amounted to $77 billion in the first three months of 2018 which was still the largest net gain in four years.
For now though the tide has turned. The dollar has surged over three percent in two weeks and U.S. Treasury yields US10YT=RR - a major driver of global borrowing costs - have broken above three percent for the first time in four years.
That has caused familiar jitters about the mountain of dollar-denominated debt that has been issued in the developing world in recent years.
They have borrowed at vastly cheaper rates by using dollars, but the rise in the U.S. currency now makes the repayments more costly unless they have been hedged.
The Bank for International Settlements this week said that a record 22 percent surge in debt sales last year pushed up the annual growth in EM dollar debt 10 percent to $3.7 trillion.
(This version of the story adds dropped word ‘billion’ in second paragraph.)
Reporting by Marc Jones, Editing by William MacleanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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ff1ad76b363605b3a40cee4d294dbf0f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emerging-markets-morganstanley-idUSKCN1M4163 | Morgan Stanley shifts emerging-market stance to Neutral from Negative | Morgan Stanley shifts emerging-market stance to Neutral from Negative
By Karin Strohecker3 Min Read
LONDON (Reuters) - Morgan Stanley said on Monday it had changed its stance on emerging-market bonds and currencies to neutral from negative following the recent selloff, although it warned the backdrop for developing markets remained difficult.
FILE PHOTO - The corporate logo of financial firm Morgan Stanley is pictured on the company's world headquarters in New York, U.S. April 17, 2017. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
“After a significant sell-off, we close our bearish view on EM and shift into neutral gear,” strategist Jaes Lord said in a note to clients. “We can see the case for some temporary stability after a six-month bear market.”
Emerging markets had a rough time over the summer after crises in Turkey and Argentina sparked a wider selloff in assets of developing economies.
Following a six-month bear market, Morgan Stanley predicted some temporary stability might occur, thanks to depressed valuations, investors adjusting their positioning and a weaker U.S. dollar.
Some idiosyncratic issues had become less concerning, while policy response to shore up investor confidence had picked up and a further escalation of trade looked built in, Morgan Stanley added.
“However, more material escalatory risks over the medium term mean that this issue should re-emerge as a strong headwind in time and so we do not see the case to move bullish.”
Across high-yielding currencies, Morgan Stanley said it “liked” Argentina, Indonesia and Russia and moved to a neutral stance on Brazil. Across local debt, its analysts took a positive view on Mexico and a neutral stance on Argentina, Brazil and Russia.
“Overall, we see the case for local markets as stronger than credit, considering better positioning, valuations that are more consistently cheap across countries and expected dollar weakness,” the bank added.
Across emerging-market hard currency debt, Morgan Stanley expected spreads to tighten with more debt issue supply possibly coming to market after a rocky summer, which would keep a lid on a potential rally.
Bond sales usually rebound in September after a quiet August, but this year’s currency crises in Turkey and Argentina and worries about rising U.S. sanctions risk for Russia have kept volumes dramatically lower so far.
Morgan Stanley is not the only major bank to take a more positive view on emerging markets. Goldman Sachs said investor sentiment for emerging market assets had been firming.
“Recent price action has likely helped buoy sentiment
for EM assets, but we have noticed a marked change over the past two weeks in investors’ focus on EM - from downside risks to valuation and ‘opportunities’,” Goldman analysts Caesar Maasry wrote in a note to clients.
Turkey’s interest rate increase in September, softer inflation data from the U.S. and valuations have rekindled “tepid optimism”, he said.
“We still prefer equity as the best-positioned asset class for a ‘bounce-back’ and find Brazil, Chile, Peru, Korea, and China offer a good combination of dislocation and supportive
macro growth dynamics,” Maasry added.
MSCI's emerging market equity benchmark .MSCIEF has fallen nearly 10 percent since the start of the year.
Reporting by Karin Strohecker; editing by Sujata Rao, Larry KingOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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360252cabdff70d8b0d41cbbf269f707 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emerging-markets-stocks-bear/emerging-market-stocks-in-bear-territory-after-20-percent-drop-since-january-idUSKBN1L01UZ | Emerging market stocks in bear territory after 20 percent drop since January | Emerging market stocks in bear territory after 20 percent drop since January
By Marc Jones3 Min Read
LONDON (Reuters) - A leading emerging market stock index extended its slump since January to 20 percent on Wednesday in a fresh wave of selling which took it into territory commonly regarded as a bear market.
The scale of the fall in MSCI's widely tracked 24-country emerging market index .MSCIEF is likely to be painful for many investors, given the index compiler estimates that more than $1.9 trillion of assets globally are benchmarked to the measure.
The sharp drop in the index comes as the threat of a full-blown trade war between China and the United States has scuttled Chinese markets. Political stress has brought heavy losses in countries like Brazil, Turkey and Argentina, while a strong dollar - partly due to rising U.S. interest rates - has hit virtually anyone who borrows in the currency.
“It is dollar strength, Trump’s trade wars and Fed tightening,” said Renaissance Capital’s global chief economist and head of macro-strategy Charles Robertson. “They are an ugly combination for emerging markets.”
MSCI’s latest data also shows the index has 830 stocks, with China making up 33 percent and other top countries like India, Brazil and Russia accounting for 9 percent, 6 percent and 4 percent respectively.
(Graphics: Submerging emerging market stocks: reut.rs/2KWIxEa)
Charting the fortunes of individual countries shows just how broad-based the selloff has been. In hard cash terms it has wiped nearly $900 billion off the index’s overall market capitalization.
Turkish and Argentinian markets have both lost roughly 50 percent of their value in dollar terms, largely due to the collapse in their respective currencies.
Beyond those extremes however there are also nine other countries including heavyweights like Brazil, South Africa, Indonesia and China that have all dropped between 20 and 30 percent.
Further down the list, India is down almost 8 percent, Mexico 6.5 percent and Russia has slumped more than 15 percent despite sharp rises in prices of oil and gas, its largest exports.
That commodity price jump has left Saudi Arabia and Qatar as the some of the only emerging markets in positive territory.
In terms of the overall EM index, there is also now one of the most extreme divergences compared with MSCI’s 47-country All Country world index on record.
The EM index has underperformed by just over 10 percent this year and by 45 percent over the last decade.
(Graphics: Emerging market shares savaged by bears: reut.rs/2KPYGv7)
Reporting by Marc Jones and Helen Reid; Editing by David HolmesOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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fe86f4321274375266477a5dbddd8426 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emerging-rates-graphic/over-and-out-em-central-bank-20-month-easing-cycle-grinds-to-a-halt-idUKKBN27J21E?edition-redirect=uk | Over and out: EM central bank 20-month easing cycle grinds to a halt | Over and out: EM central bank 20-month easing cycle grinds to a halt
By Karin Strohecker, Ritvik Carvalho1 Min Read
LONDON (Reuters) - Central bank interest rate cuts across emerging markets ground to a halt in October, bringing to an end an easing cycle that had exceeded the one sparked by the 2008 financial crisis and the 2010 euro crisis.
Central banks across a group of 37 developing economies stood pat in October after delivering a net four cuts in September which markets their 20th straight month of interest rate cuts, Reuters calculations showed.
At the peak of the cycle in March, 27 of the 37 central banks cut interest rates, trying to shore up their economies as the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic rippled through markets around the world.
Graphic: EM central banks pause rate cutting cycle -
For an interactive version of the graphic, click here tmsnrt.rs/3jSycdO.
Reporting by Karin Strohecker; graphic and data reporting by Ritvik gCarvalhonediting by Larry KiOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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018c1c8f8b9568d65147380599b4ed14 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-adnoc-strategy-factbox-idINKBN1ZE16Z | Factbox: Abu Dhabi's ADNOC attracts billions from foreign investors | Factbox: Abu Dhabi's ADNOC attracts billions from foreign investors
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - Over the past three years, Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) has expanded its oil and gas business and quietly raised more than $19 billion in a variety of ways. See main story:
BlackRock BLK.N, the world's largest fund manager, and other major financial institutions have invested in the company. ADNOC has also sold a stake in its pipeline infrastructure and refining businesses, listed its fuel distribution division and offered international oil companies long-term concession deals.
Below are some of the key deals the state oil company has announced since 2018, part of Abu Dhabi’s plans to reform and modernize the economy and ADNOC, the emirate’s crown jewel.
INFRASTRUCTURE DEAL
In 2019, U.S. investment firms BlackRock and KKR signed an agreement to invest $4 billion in ADNOC’s midstream pipeline assets for a 40% stake in the business, ADNOC Oil Pipelines.
Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC will invest $600 million in the crude pipeline infrastructure for a 6% stake.
REFINING AND TRADING:
In 2019, Italy's Eni ENI.MI and Austria's OMV OMVV.VI agreed to pay a combined $5.8 billion to take a stake in ADNOC's refining business and establish a new trading operation owned by the three partners. The deal, which expands ADNOC's access to European markets, furthers Eni's diversification away from Africa and gives OMV a downstream oil business outside Europe.
Under the agreement, Eni and OMV will respectively acquire a 20% and 15% share in ADNOC Refining, with ADNOC owning the remaining 65%.
ADNOC DISTRIBUTION IPO
IN 2017, ADNOC raised 3.1 billion dirhams ($851 million)through an initial public offering of its fuel distribution unit on the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange. ADNOC Distribution sold 1.25 billion shares, or 10% of its share capital.
CONCESSIONS:
ADNOC signed a series of 40-year agreements with international energy companies for concessions.
* France's Total TOTF.PA was awarded a 20% stake in the Umm Shaif and Nasr concession and a 5% interest in the Lower Zakum concession. Total paid participation fees totaling of 5.3 billion dirhams ($1.44 billion)
* PetroChina was granted 10% stakes in the two offshore concessions. It paid participation fees of 4.3 billion dirham ($1.17 billion) in total.
* Eni won a 10% stake in Umm Shaif and Nasr and a 5% stake in Lower Zakum. Participation fees: 3.2 billion dirhams ($871.27 million).
* Spain's Cepsa CPF.GQ was awarded a 20% stake in the SARB and Umm Lulu offshore concession. Cepsa's participation fee was 5.5 billion dirhams ($1.5 billion).
* A consortium led by India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp ONGC.NS took a 10% stake in Lower Zakum. Participation fee: 2.2 billion dirhams ($600 million).
* OMV won a 20% stake in the SARB and Umm Lulu concession. Participation fee: 5.5 billion dirhams ($1.5 billion).
* Japan's INPEX 1605.T was awarded a 10% stake in Lower Zakum, paying a 2.2 billion dirham ($600 million) participation fee. It also paid 920 million dirhams ($250 million) to extend its interests in the Satah and Umm Al Dalkh concession.
($1 = 3.6728 UAE dirham)
Reporting by Rania El Gamal; Editing by Pravin CharOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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ed63e24720197e0c7d8c863aeef97a43 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-airline-mexico/emirates-says-airline-can-still-fly-to-mexico-despite-court-ruling-idUSKBN1WS0NL | Emirates says airline can still fly to Mexico, despite court ruling | Emirates says airline can still fly to Mexico, despite court ruling
By Alexander Cornwell, Daina Beth Solomon2 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: An Emirates Airline Airbus A380-800 plane takes off from Dubai International Airport in Dubai, United Arab Emirates February 15, 2019. REUTERS/Christopher Pike/File Photo
DUBAI/MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Emirates still has the right to offer flights to Mexico City, the Dubai state-owned carrier said on Sunday, after Mexican airline Aeromexico disputed an agreement between the United Arab Emirates and Mexico.
Emirates said earlier this year it would start daily flights to Mexico City International Airport via Barcelona in December, the airline’s first service to Mexico.
But a Mexican federal judge ruled in October, responding to a complaint by Aeromexico, that a 2016 pact between Mexico and United Arab Emirates did not meet proper legal requirements, according to a court order seen by Reuters.
Emirates said that decision was being appealed.
“We firmly believe that the (memorandum of understanding) is valid and the ruling of the court will be the subject of an appeal by the Government of Mexico,” an Emirates spokeswoman said in a statement. “Pending the outcome of this appeal all our rights remain valid and in force.”
Aeromexico declined to comment.
Mexico’s Communications and Transport Minister, Javier Jimenez Espriu, said last week that Emirates could offer service to Mexico City without legal obstacles because the 2016 agreement remains valid.
“Emirates has no legal impediment to operating the flight,” he said in comments to reporters published in newspaper El Financiero on Wednesday.
Reporting by Daina Beth Solomon in Mexico City and Alexander Cornwell in Dubai; Editing by Nick ZieminskiOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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b4aa30ccaf26782845783be3881409a1 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-airline-premiumeconomy-idUSKBN13X1KR | Emirates expects to roll out premium economy within 18 months | Emirates expects to roll out premium economy within 18 months
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: Emirates Airlines aircraft are seen at Dubai International Airport, United Arab Emirates May 10, 2016. REUTERS/Ashraf Mohammad/File photo
DUBAI (Reuters) - Emirates [EMIRA.UL], the world’s biggest long-haul airline, expects to introduce “premium economy” tickets within the next 12 to 18 months, according to its president, Tim Clark.
The Dubai-based airline, faced with pressures on margins caused by a strong dollar and tougher competition, has recently added new revenue streams.
It introduced an advanced seat selection fee for economy passengers in October and has said it is considering other additional fees.
“We are at the stage of finding what form [premium economy] will take,” Clark told reporters in London on Wednesday in comments confirmed to Reuters by the airline.
“I would think within the next year to 18 months, we will have it in the airline, hopefully up and running.”
Clark first said on May 10 that the airline was considering adding premium economy, a class between economy and business that could prove attractive to corporate passengers affected by the decline in the oil price and tighter travel budgets.
Emirates reported on Nov. 9 a 75 percent fall in first-half profit to 786 million dirhams ($214 million).
The airline filled an average of 75.3 per cent of seats in the six months to Sept. 30, a decline of 3 percentage points.
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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64e034c1cb6a0671649c57d6b61a4d68 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-airshow-a380-buyback/airbus-to-buy-back-some-a380s-in-new-emirates-deal-sources-idUSKBN1DC05B | Airbus to buy back some A380s in new Emirates deal: sources | Airbus to buy back some A380s in new Emirates deal: sources
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - Airbus AIR.PA will have to buy back or find new homes for some of the older A380s currently operated by Dubai's Emirates as it finalises a deal to sell new superjumbos to the Gulf carrier, industry sources said on Sunday.
FILE PHOTO: An Airbus A380 aircraft takes off in Colomiers near Toulouse, France, October 19, 2017. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau/File Photo
The European planemaker is expected to announce an order for some 36-38 A380 superjumbos at the opening of the Dubai Airshow later on Sunday.
“A few trade-ins will be involved,” a person familiar with the matter said.
An Airbus spokesman said, “We do not comment on our contractual agreements”.
Asked at a news conference on the launch of a new first-class cabin whether Emirates would place an A380 order at the show, Emirates president Tim Clark said, “maybe, maybe not”.
The decision by Airbus to buy back aircraft to facilitate the anticipated deal comes as the aviation market struggles to absorb some of the first A380s, which entered service a decade ago.
A German asset manager is trying to place four aircraft being returned by Singapore Airlines SIAL.SI, which was the first to offer superjumbo services in 2007, financiers say.
Industry sources say at least one of the ex-Singapore jets will be operated by Portugal-based HiFly.
The company, which rents out aircraft on a ‘wet lease’ basis complete with crew, was not immediately available for comment.
Placing the rest of the aircraft is no easy task as demand for the double-decker aircraft remains thin, aircraft financiers say.
Airbus is seen as keen to support the second-hand market to avoid having to break up one of the planes, a potential public relations setback as it tries to breathe new life into the iconic European programme following recent production cuts.
Securing the new order from Emirates, which is by far the largest customer for the A380, clears a major hurdle to extending production towards the middle of next decade.
Reporting by Tim Hepher; Editing by Saeed Azhar, Alexander CornwellOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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81a5d3dd45d8f1f4bc5199149b8261d0 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-airshow-astana-idCAKBN1XT0ZB | Air Astana says signs letter of intent for 30 Boeing 737 MAX | Air Astana says signs letter of intent for 30 Boeing 737 MAX
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - Kazakhstan flag carrier Air Astana said on Tuesday it had signed a letter of intent to order 30 Boeing 737 MAX for its recently launched low-cost carrier subsidiary Fly Arystana.
The carrier, which operates Airbus and Embraer jets in its main network, said it was confident in Boeing’s ability to resolve problems over the grounding of the MAX in the wake of two accidents.
“We are making flying affordable for the people of Kazakhstan,” Chief Planning Officer Alma Aliguzhinova told reporters at the Dubai Airshow, adding the budget subsidiary would start taking the jets in late 2021.
The airline plans to hold 15 aircraft directly and may finance the rest through a lease transaction, she said, adding Air Astana would not change the composition of its main fleet.
Separately, another airline signed a firm order for 10 Boeing 737 MAX 7 and 10 Boeing MAX 10, a person familiar with the matter said. The airline’s name was not disclosed.
Reporting by Ankit Ajmera, Editing by Tim HepherOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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0579219da1a3c52dcc13e611debfa35f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-airshow-dassault-avi/demonstrator-contract-for-franco-german-fighter-jet-project-expected-by-january-idUSKBN1XS10D | Demonstrator contract for Franco-German fighter jet project expected by January | Demonstrator contract for Franco-German fighter jet project expected by January
By Alexander Cornwell3 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - France and Germany have reached an agreement on their joint fighter program and are expected to award a contract to demonstrate the validity of the planned technology by January, Dassault Aviation chief executive said on Monday.
FILE PHOTO: Dassault Aviation Chairman and CEO Eric Trappier attends a visit at the assembly line for Indian Air Force Rafale fighter jets before a ceremony at the factory of French aircraft manufacturer Dassault Aviation in Merignac near Bordeaux, France, October 8, 2019. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau/File Photo
The contract was initially expected to be awarded this year and the delay had sparked Dassault and Airbus, the leading industrial partners in the project, to pressure France and Germany to make progress.
“There is no more issue right now between the French and German (governments) as far as the FCAS (Future Combat Air System) is concerned,” Dassault CEO Eric Trappier told Reuters at the Dubai Airshow.
“There is an agreement at the top level and the next step should be the first contract for a demonstrator before the end of January 2020.”
He also said talks between France’s Safran and Germany’s MTU Aero Engines, which are making the engines, were progressing and that he hoped an agreement would be reached this year.
The project to build a new generation of manned and unmanned warplanes was announced by the leaders of France and Germany two years ago and expanded earlier this year to include Spain.
Dassault and Airbus won a 65 million euro ($72 million)contract in January to develop the concept.
The first test fight of the demonstrator remains on track for 2026, Trappier said, having earlier warned that date could be at risk from delays to the program.
The warplane system is expected to be operational from 2040, with a view to replacing Dassault’s Rafale and the four-nation Eurofighter, in which Airbus represents both Germany and Spain
“We are preparing not for the future of tomorrow but for the future of after tomorrow,” Trappier said.
The European joint project faces competition from a British new generation fighter jet project dubbed “Tempest,” which Italy joined last month.
Trappier said he did not mind that Britain was pursuing its own program and that it could still join the Franco-German project, but only after the first demonstrator flight.
“What is sure is if nobody does anything, that is a problem. If there are two teams it’s better than no team,” he said.
Trappier also said he expected India to buy additional Rafale warplanes following its initial 36 jet purchase.
Reporting by Alexander Cornwell; Editing by Mark PotterOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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cd4ac466e9ce1f4e67b09a537b856f49 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-airshow-defence/uae-in-weapons-making-push-as-allies-restrict-sales-idUSKBN1XW0TY | UAE in weapons making push as allies restrict sales | UAE in weapons making push as allies restrict sales
By Alexander Cornwell4 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is making a push to develop high-tech military hardware that would give it control over critical defense capabilities and lessen reliance on imports.
FILE PHOTO: Models of guided munitions at the Edge display during the fifth day of Dubai Air Show in Dubai, United Arab Emirates November 21, 2019. REUTERS/Christopher Pike/File Photo
Wary of threats from rival Iran, and concerned over moves by some allies to hold up arms sales, the UAE is reshaping a military industry already seen as the region’s most sophisticated.
State defense companies have been brought together to form EDGE, a $5-billion conglomerate to spearhead development of advanced weapons for the country’s military.
Those ambitions were put on display at this week’s Dubai Airshow where the military handed an EDGE company a $1 billion contract for guided missiles.
“Like many countries, on specific critical capabilities you want to have sovereignty,” EDGE Chief Executive Faisal al-Bannai told Reuters.
The UAE’s defense industry dates back two decades, built through joint ventures and technology transfer programs.
Much of it now sits under EDGE, manufacturing drones, small ammunitions and providing maintenance.
Despite close ties with the West, the oil-rich Gulf nation has had difficulty acquiring some sophisticated weapons.
The United States will not sell armed drones to the UAE under a longstanding export policy limiting their use. Recently, some European countries have blocked sales to the UAE over its involvement in the Yemen war.
Meanwhile, the UAE maintains close ties and continues to buy weapons from China and Russia.
Abdulla al-Hashimi, assistant undersecretary for support services at the UAE ministry of defense, said sovereign capabilities were a “necessity” for security and the economy.
EMERGING THREATS
A series of attacks in the Gulf over the summer, blamed on Iran by the United States, highlighted new threats to the security of Gulf states. Tehran denied involvement.
Oil tankers off the UAE coast were sabotaged and a swarm of missiles and drones temporarily wiped out half of Saudi Arabia’s oil production in a September attack.
EDGE could develop directed energy technology, Bannai said, which can be used to counter drone threats.
Directed energy weapons emit focused energy in the form of lasers, microwaves, electromagnetic radiation, radio waves, sound or particle beams.
“The Emiratis not only believe that they can make a profit in this sphere but also that they are well-equipped to understand and counter regional threats,” said Robert Mogielnicki, a resident scholar at the Washington-based Arab Gulf States Institute.
The UAE is expected to spend $17 billion on defense next year, according to U.S.-based defense analysis firm Teal, up from $14.4 billion in 2014 when last disclosed by the government. Today, just a fraction is spent domestically.
Abu Dhabi, the main petroleum producing emirate, is leading the development of the country’s industry.
There, the move is seen as a step not only toward more diversification of an oil-based economy but toward “greater strategic autonomy with regards to foreign and defense policies,” said Jean-Loup Samaan, associate professor at the UAE National Defense College.
EDGE, which wants to build on joint ventures that developed the country’s defense industry, also has eyes on exporting.
That could draw new scrutiny.
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs R. Clarke Cooper said Washington would like the UAE to establish greater oversight as it develops its military industry.
Reporting by Alexander Cornwell; Editing by Mark PotterOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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57773ba0cf054891ba1f0f6435b74f0a | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-airshow-emirates-airlines-idINKBN1XS1K3 | Emirates chairman warns of 'tough' second half | Emirates chairman warns of 'tough' second half
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, CEO and chairman of the Emirates Group speaks at news conference during the second day of Dubai Air Show in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, November 18, 2019. REUTERS/ Mahmoud Khaled
DUBAI (Reuters) - Dubai state-owned airline Emirates chairman Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed al-Maktoum said on Monday the airline will face a tough second half of the company’s financial year.
“There are headwinds, all the time changing... This year has been tough. It will be tough,” he said.
Reporting by Stanley Carvalho; writing by Tuqa Khalid; editing by Jason NeelyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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0680ea7c25258776a004421a105020cb | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-airshow-ethiopian/ethiopian-airlines-undecided-whether-to-take-more-boeing-737-max-jets-idUSKBN1XR0HW | Ethiopian Airlines undecided whether to take more Boeing 737 MAX jets | Ethiopian Airlines undecided whether to take more Boeing 737 MAX jets
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - Ethiopian Airlines has not decided yet whether to take more deliveries of the 737 MAX, the jet grounded worldwide in the wake of crashes in Ethiopia and Indonesia, the airline's CEO said on Sunday, as Boeing BA.N completes revisions to the aircraft's design.
FILE PHOTO: Aerial photos showing Boeing 737 Max airplanes parked at Boeing Field in Seattle, Washington, U.S. October 20, 2019. REUTERS/Gary He/File Photo
Asked at the Dubai Airshow whether he supported changes to software and training being finalised by Boeing, Tewolde Gebremariam said, “It is still work in progress... We will have to see it completed and the result of the further tests that are still to come.”
Reports into the March 10 crash in Ethiopia and a Lion Air accident in Indonesia, which killed a combined total of 346 people, have suggested an automated system erroneously pointed the planes’ noses down repeatedly after take-off.
Boeing says it has revised the software system to prevent repeated dives and is waiting for the approval of U.S. and global regulators before putting the plane back in service, expected early next year.
Asked whether Ethiopian Airlines would take any further deliveries of the aircraft, of which it has more than 20 on order, Tewolde told reporters, “We have not yet decided.”
He was speaking at the Dubai Airshow after signing an agreement with Boeing to retrofit internet connectivity on a feet of 787 Dreamliners that the airline already has in service.
He said the airline had no reservations about signing a new deal to enhance the 787 with Boeing, which was “more than 100 years old and a high-quality engineering company.”
But asked about overall relations with the U.S. planemaker, he said, “It is work in progress. Let’s wait patiently and see the final return to service.”
He also said Ethiopian Airlines might add further orders for the Airbus A350, a rival to the 787.
“We have an order of 24, so depending on the market need, we will increase.”
Tewolde played down past suggestions by the airline that it could take a stake in debt-strapped South African Airways.
“We are discussing commercial cooperation to work together and code-share, and training and maintenance cooperation,” he said.
The airline, which competes with large Middle East carriers to connect long-haul passengers, has a strategy of building a patchwork of African routes and to fly customers toward expanding Asian markets.
Reporting by Tim Hepher. Editing by Jane MerrimanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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3e60e6f0c42fdb65dd808bfec235a0db | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-china/china-shows-rising-interest-in-middle-east-during-xi-visit-to-uae-idUSKBN1KA26K | Xi's visit to UAE highlights China's rising interest in Middle East | Xi's visit to UAE highlights China's rising interest in Middle East
By Stanley Carvalho3 Min Read
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - China and the United Arab Emirates signed a raft of financial, business and trade agreements on Friday during a visit by President Xi Jinping to the UAE, underscoring energy-hungry Beijing’s rapidly growing interest in the Middle East.
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Xi made the first visit by a Chinese leader to the Gulf state in 29 years, meeting two of its most powerful leaders, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, ruler of Dubai, and Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, crown prince of Abu Dhabi.
They announced 13 agreements and memoranda of understanding, including approval for the first Chinese state-owned financial services firm to set up in Abu Dhabi Global Market, a financial center, while the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company and the China National Petroleum Corporation agreed to explore joint business opportunities.
As both a major energy exporter and a hub for international trade, the UAE is an important part of Xi’s “Belt and Road” initiative to invest in infrastructure linking China by both sea and land to markets in Asia and Europe.
“We have many areas of political and economic agreement and a solid base of projects in the energy, technology and infrastructure sectors. More importantly (we have) a strong political will to start a greater phase of cooperation and integration,” Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid wrote in a Twitter post in Arabic on Friday.
“Today, we have exemplary relations with China and a Chinese leadership that sees the UAE as main strategic partner in the region,” he added.
China is the UAE’s second largest trading partner and biggest source of imports. The UAE is the gateway for about 60 percent of China’s exports to the Middle East, and on its own accounts for around a quarter of total Arab trade with China.
UAE economy minister Sultan bin Saeed al-Mansouri said that total bilateral trade between his country and China is expected to reach $58 billion in 2018, up from $53.5 billion in 2017.
In 2013, Xi outlined the Belt and Road initiative which involves billions of dollars of infrastructure investment to reinvigorate the ancient overland silk road trade route and develop a new sea equivalent. The UAE sits close to both routes.
China’s commerce minister Zhong Shan said that his country was ready to cooperate with the UAE to promote globalization.
“This future of cooperation is broad as both UAE and China are advocates of the economies and multilateralism. On this we have mutual interest and a joint position,” he said.
China has traditionally played little role in Middle East conflicts or diplomacy despite its reliance on the region for oil, but has stepped up its involvement since Xi came to power six years ago. Beijing has had to tread carefully, though, with Gulf Arab states like Saudi Arabia and the UAE, as China also has close ties with their rival Iran.
Additional reporting by Marwa Rashad and Ghaida Ghantous; Writing by Marwa Rashad; Editing by Peter Graff and Susan FentonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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e739eaba83736c45c7db4165382ffb7f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-crash/small-plane-crashes-in-dubai-killing-three-britons-one-south-african-statement-idUSKCN1SM2EL?il=0 | Small plane crashes in Dubai killing three Britons, one South African: statement | Small plane crashes in Dubai killing three Britons, one South African: statement
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - A small plane crashed south of Dubai airport killing three Britons and one South African, the Dubai Civil Aviation Authority said in a statement on Thursday.
The four-seat plane, a DA42 registered in the United Kingdom, was on a mission to calibrate terrestrial navigation systems at the airport, the statement said.
An investigation is underway. Air traffic at the airport has returned to normal, it said.
Reporting By Ahmed Tolba, writing by Stephen Kalin; Editing by Janet LawrenceOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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8f490f410c0af2ae809adfaf0750c525 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-defence-airshow-airforce/uae-announces-2-billion-in-defence-contracts-confirms-saab-globaleye-deal-idUSKBN2AM1H9?edition-redirect=uk | UAE announces $2 billion in defence contracts, confirms Saab GlobalEye deal | UAE announces $2 billion in defence contracts, confirms Saab GlobalEye deal
By Reuters Staff1 Min Read
FILE PHOTO: A model of a helicopter is displayed at the Saudi Arabian Military Industries (SAMI) section of the International Defence Exhibition in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates February 22, 2021. REUTERS/Khushnum Bhandari
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - The United Arab Emirates armed forces on Monday announced at the Abu Dhabi defence exhibition it had signed defence contracts worth 7.293 billion dirhams ($2 billion) with local and international firms, state news agency WAM reported.
The deals included a 3.74 billion dirhams contract with Saab for GlobalEye surveillance systems that was disclosed by the manufacturer in January. It also included a 2.61 billion dirhams agreement for Patriot missiles from Raytheon.
A day earlier, the armed forces announced 5 billion dirhams in local and international deals on the first day of the week-long exhibition.
Writing by Alexander Cornwell, editing by Louise Heavens and Emelia Sithole-MatariseOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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2149c1d7566cf3d2ccbecff30a45947a | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-defence-companies/abu-dhabi-groups-uae-defense-firms-under-one-roof-to-cut-costs-idUSKBN1XF17H | Abu Dhabi groups UAE defense firms under one roof to cut costs | Abu Dhabi groups UAE defense firms under one roof to cut costs
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - Abu Dhabi plans to group more than 25 state-owned and private entities in the UAE defense sector, with combined annual revenues of $5 billion, into a single defense company.
The United Arab Emirates, of which Abu Dhabi is the oil-wealthy capital, is one of the top buyers of Western arms and defense systems, mostly from its key ally the United States, and to a lesser extent from Russia and China.
In a further consolidation after a 2014 merger of state-run defense firms, Abu Dhabi said on Tuesday it was forming EDGE to invest in technology, including artificial intelligence, as well as research and development.
“Established with a core mandate to disrupt an antiquated military industry generally stifled by red tape, EDGE is set to bring products to market faster and at more cost-effective price points,” EDGE CEO Faisal Al Bannai said in a statement.
The firm, launched at a ceremony attended by Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, said its core businesses include missiles and weapons, cyber defense, and electronic warfare and intelligence.
Bannai is the founder of UAE-based cybersecurity company DarkMatter, which said last month that he planned to sell his stake in the firm by the end of the year. DarkMatter will not be integrated into EDGE, Bannai told reporters.
EDGE said that Bannai was hired as CEO because of his background in start-ups and “proven track record in leveraging emerging technologies at home and abroad”.
Reporting Stanley Carvalho, Writing by Sylvia Westall, Editing by Alexander SmithOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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6398bbe5c95664e7cd0d9bab3e80cf16 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-defence-edge-idUSKBN2AN0T9 | UAE weapons maker EDGE wants in on F-35 supply chain | UAE weapons maker EDGE wants in on F-35 supply chain
By Alexander Cornwell4 Min Read
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - United Arab Emirates’ state-owned weapons maker EDGE expects to be involved in the supply chain of Lockheed Martin’s F-35 war plane if the sale of U.S. planes to the Gulf Arab state goes ahead, its chief executive said on Tuesday.
FILE PHOTO: Faisal Al Bannai, EDGE chief Executive is seen during an interview with Reuters in the International Defence Exhibition, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates February 22, 2021. REUTERS/Khushnum Bhandari/File Photo
U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration is re-examining the sale of 50 F-35 stealth jets, 18 armed drones and other military equipment approved by former President Donald Trump during his last days in office.
“Any platform that is coming to the country, we are now getting heavily involved in this supply chain in whatever component that makes sense for the client and for us,” EDGE CEO Faisal al-Bannai said at Abu Dhabi’s Idex defence exhibition.
EDGE, a $5 billion state defence conglomerate, could integrate subsystems, products and weapons, perform maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) work and also develop weapons such as missiles for the jet, he said.
EDGE and Lockheed later announced in a statement they had reached a preliminary agreement to jointly “explore industrial participation opportunities across the UAE’s aerospace and defence industry.”
The statement did not mention the F-35 or any other system.
The Gulf state, one of Washington’s closest Middle Eastern allies, was promised a chance to buy the war planes when it established formal ties with Israel last year.
EDGE was in “advanced discussion” with several Israeli defence companies about jointly funding and developing missiles and unmanned platforms, Bannai said without identifying the firms.
“Quite soon there will be announcements,” he said.
It is not clear when Washington will complete its review, though even if approved the first F-35 is not expected to be delivered for several years.
“Every country has their own process. I think they will go through their process and come to what is a right decision for them,” Bannai said of the U.S. review.
The UAE’s Ambassador to Washington Yousef al-Otaiba has said he is confident the sale would go through.
The jets are a major component of a $23 billion sale of high-tech armaments from General Atomics, Lockheed Martin Corp and Raytheon Technologies Corp to the UAE.
The F-35, the world’s most advanced war plane, would give the UAE a “huge deterrence capability” against regional foe Iran, an Arab diplomat in the Gulf told Reuters.
“The F-35 gives a lot of control over the Gulf skies. It’s a big thing. It’s a game changer for the UAE,” the diplomat said.
EDGE, tasked with supplying advanced weapons to the UAE armed forces, is focused on developing drones, unmanned vehicles, smart weapons and electronic warfare equipment rather than conventional weaponry.
“We are a small country in size and population ... we are extremely focused on deploying more smarter technology that can apply a ‘force multiplier’ to our army,” Bannai said.
EDGE is developing a directed energy system, to be unveiled next year, that can be used against aerial and land threats.
EDGE announced on Tuesday it would supply Rheinmetall’s Oerlikon Skynex air defence system with a short-range interceptor missile system known as SkyKnight.
Reporting by Alexander Cornwell; Editing by Susan FentonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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1e7c61b9ab4f869a18acb667506d7064 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-dubai-governance-idUKKBN1Z61FC | Dubai government splits CEO, chairman roles for state-backed companies: ruler | Dubai government splits CEO, chairman roles for state-backed companies: ruler
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - The roles of chief executive and chairman will be split in government and semi-government companies in Dubai as part of a corporate overhaul, the Dubai government said on Tuesday.
The decision was made by the newly formed Dubai Council, which also called on the boards of state-backed companies to form committees to evaluate investment and risk management, the emirate’s ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum said in a tweet.
The council was recently set up to oversee economic and social governance in Dubai and draw up a vision for the next 50 years.
Dubai, one of the seven territories of the United Arab Emirates, has a more diversified trade and tourism economy, but in recent years has suffered from stagnant growth in the real estate and retail sectors.
Listed companies face tough governance standards such as a division between the chief executive and chairman, similar to those applied in the United Kingdom.
The Dubai government and Sheikh Mohammed’s investment vehicle, Dubai Holding, own a large number of unlisted companies, especially in the real estate, hospitality and aviation sectors.
In late 2019, Dubai’s ruler appointed the chairman of Emirates airline to temporarily oversee his investment vehicle as well as property firm Meraas.
Reporting by Nafisa Eltahir and Saeed Azhar, editing by Ed OsmondOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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807063890e34839095eded39e74b18a2 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-economy-mubadala-exclusive/exclsuive-abu-dhabi-in-talks-with-dubai-for-support-through-state-fund-mubadala-sources-idUSKBN22R1UL | Exclsuive: Abu Dhabi in talks with Dubai for support through state fund Mubadala - sources | Exclsuive: Abu Dhabi in talks with Dubai for support through state fund Mubadala - sources
By Davide Barbuscia, Saeed Azhar, Pamela Barbaglia4 Min Read
DUBAI/LONDON (Reuters) - The governments of Abu Dhabi and Dubai are discussing ways to prop up Dubai’s economy by linking up assets in the two emirates, with Abu Dhabi’s state fund Mubadala likely to play a key role in any deal, three sources familiar with the matter said.
FILE PHOTO: A general view of Business Bay area, after a curfew was imposed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, March 28, 2020. REUTERS/Satish Kumar
Some economic sectors have come to a near standstill in Dubai during the coronavirus outbreak, and it faces its most severe downturn since a 2009 debt crisis. It lacks the oil wealth of Abu Dhabi to cushion the blow.
Abu Dhabi bailed out Dubai after the 2009 crisis with a $10 billion government loan, which was subsequently rolled over, and $10 billion in bonds that Dubai issued to the central bank.
One of the sources said any support from Abu Dhabi agreed now would be “orchestrated through mergers of assets where Abu Dhabi and Dubai compete directly or where they have joint ownerships”.
“The most likely deal to happen in the near term is a merger of the local stock markets,” the source said, adding that bank mergers were also possible.
A second source confirmed the talks and said Mubadala, which manages around $230 billion in assets, would make “a big move into Dubai”, but gave no details.
Mubadala declined comment. Abu Dhabi did not respond to requests for comment on the talks.
The Dubai media office said on its official Twitter account late on Friday that Dubai denied being in talks with Abu Dhabi for support from Mubadala.
The two emirates have a quiet rivalry. Dubai has developed quickly to become the Middle East’s tourism, trade and business hub, while Abu Dhabi is the UAE’s political capital because of its size and immense oil wealth. The consolidation of political power in Abu Dhabi began with the 2009 bailout.
Slideshow ( 2 images )
The first source said talks were happening in an “elegant way,” without the appearance of a direct bailout.
The UAE said on Wednesday it would review the structure and size of its government to make it “more agile and flexible”.
“We may merge ministries and alter bodies. We will make changes,” UAE Vice President Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, who is also ruler of Dubai, said following three days of virtual meetings on the country’s post-coronavirus strategy.
A third source said Mubadala was likely to be involved “at some stage” because the state fund was always involved whenever there was consolidation between the two emirates in the past.
STRATEGIC ASSETS
Mergers took place after Abu Dhabi bailed out Dubai following the 2009 crisis, during which Dubai’s property market crashed, almost forcing some state-linked firms to default on billions of dollars of debt.
The UAE merged Dubai and Abu Dhabi aluminium firms to create Emirates Global Aluminium, held jointly by Mubadala and the Investment Corporation of Dubai.
“You have already seen a pattern of mergers and this will now accelerate,” the first source said. “Essentially these bailouts will be engineered by having Abu Dhabi taking stakes in strategic assets owned by Dubai. It will happen over time.”
London-based Capital Economics has said Dubai is the most vulnerable of the economies in the Middle East and North Africa to the economic damage caused by measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus, and it has said Dubai’s economy could contract by at least 5-6% this year if the measures last into the summer.
Economic growth in Dubai was sluggish before the pandemic and hopes of benefiting from hosting the Expo world fair in October collapsed when the event was postponed to 2021.
Dubai has in recent weeks been in discussions with banks for several fundraising options including loans and privately placed bonds, sources familiar with the discussions have said.
It has also considered raising funds backed by road toll revenue, sources have said.
Reporting by Davide Barbuscia, Saeed Azhar, Pamela Barbaglia; Additional reporting by Hesham Abdul Khalek; Editing by Timothy HeritageOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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1d66600781de46c964263050c90329c4 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-energy-idINKBN1ZC0IB | UAE to double renewable energy portfolio in next ten years: ADNOC | UAE to double renewable energy portfolio in next ten years: ADNOC
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
Slideshow ( 4 images )
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - The United Arab Emirates grew its renewable energy portfolio by more than 400% in the last 10 years, and is on track to double that again in the coming decade, Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. chief executive Sultan al-Jaber said on Monday.
“We (ADNOC) will increase our carbon capture utilization and storage program by 500% ... to capture the same amount of C02 as 5 million acres of forest,” Jaber also told a sustainable energy event in the United Arab Emirates capital Abu Dhabi.
ADNOC will reduce greenhouse gas intensity by an additional 25%. In order to do this, ADNOC said in a statement it would expand the capacity of its Al Reyadah carbon capture, utilization and storage facility, aiming to reach 5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year by 2030.
ADNOC will also limit fresh water consumption to below 0.5% of total water use.
Indonesian President Joko Widodo, visiting Abu Dhabi for the sustainability event, called for more investments in clean energy in his country and said its new capital, currently under construction, would adopt a environmentally friendly and low carbon lifestyle.
“Climate change and environmental challenges will define this century,” he told the conference.
Indonesia signed 11 business deals with the United Arab Emirates worth a combined 314.9 trillion rupiah ($23 billion) covering investment in energy and other sectors, Widodo said via his Twitter account on Monday.
ADNOC signed agreements with Indonesia’s Pertamina and Chandra Asri in the petrochemical and gas sectors on Sunday.
Reporting by Dahlia Nehme; Writing by Maha El Dahan and Nafisa Eltahir; Editing by Alex Richardson and Giles ElgoodOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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52668e987f6cd0c5a56abf347736b159 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-energy-nigeria/nigeria-oil-output-16-17-million-bpd-in-line-with-opec-cut-nnpc-idUSKBN1XN13A | Nigeria oil output 1.6-1.7 million bpd, in line with OPEC cut: NNPC | Nigeria oil output 1.6-1.7 million bpd, in line with OPEC cut: NNPC
By Reuters Staff2 Min Read
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - Nigeria is producing 1.6 million-1.7 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil, the chief operating officer of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corp said on Wednesday, adding that the country would continue to comply with OPEC output cuts.
“The last quota put us at 1.7 million bpd and we are committed to that threshold ... our current production with the cuts is between 1.6 and 1.7 million barrels per day for November,” Roland Ewubare said on the margins of an oil conference in the United Arab Emirates.
Nigeria’s output of crude and condensate is at 2 million bpd, he said.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries had granted Nigeria a higher output target under an OPEC-led deal to limit supply following efforts by Africa’s largest exporter to tweak the agreement to accommodate its expanding oil industry.
Nigeria started participating in the deal this year, having been granted an exemption from previous OPEC cuts due to militant attacks that reduced the country’s output.
Reporting by Dahlia Nehme, Rania El Gamal and Stanley Carvalho; Editing by Susan Fenton and Dale HudsonOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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f9deb507ad9e53a34deb9fe6119c8f90 | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-france/france-says-abu-dhabi-to-host-hq-for-european-naval-mission-for-the-gulf-idUSKBN1XY0AO | France says Abu Dhabi to host HQ for European naval mission for the Gulf | France says Abu Dhabi to host HQ for European naval mission for the Gulf
By Reuters Staff3 Min Read
ABU DHABI (Reuters) - A French naval base in Abu Dhabi will serve as the headquarters for a European-led mission to protect Gulf waters that will be operational soon, France’s defense minister said on Sunday.
Slideshow ( 10 images )
France is the main proponent of a plan to build a European-led maritime force to ensure safe shipping in the Strait of Hormuz after tanker attacks earlier this year that Washington blamed on Iran.
Tehran has denied being behind the attacks on tankers and other vessels in major global shipping lanes off the coast of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in May and which increased tensions between the United States, Iran and Gulf Arab states.
“This morning we formalized that the command post will be based on Emirati territory,” Defence Minister Florence Parly told reporters at a French naval base in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the UAE.
The command center will host around a dozen officials representing the countries involved, she said. In a speech to French military personnel, she said the next time she visited the base she hoped the mission would be operational and thanked the UAE for supporting it.
The UAE has tempered its reaction to the attacks and has called for de-escalation and dialogue with Iran.
On Saturday, Parly said the initiative could start early next year and around 10 European and non-European governments would join, pending parliamentary approval.
First announced in July, the plan is independent of a U.S-led maritime initiative which some European countries feared would make U.S.-Iranian tensions worse.
Parly said the two missions would coordinate in order to ensure safety of navigation in an already tense area.
“We hope ... to contribute to a navigation that is as safe as possible in a zone which we know is disputed and where there has already been a certain number of serious incidents,” she said. She also condemned Iran’s latest violations of a 2015 nuclear deal.
On Saturday, Parly said Paris was sending Saudi Arabia defense equipment to confront low-altitude attacks after Riyadh requested help following a September assault on the kingdom’s oil facilities which Washington and Riyadh have also blamed on Iran. Tehran has denied involvement.
“We have not had an equivalent request from the UAE,” she said on Sunday.
Reporting by Sylvia Westall; Editing by Mark PotterOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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9412816ed5a098e26ac128e3eaf9559f | https://www.reuters.com/article/us-emirates-immigration/uae-halts-new-visas-to-citizens-of-13-mostly-muslim-states-document-idUSKBN2850OI | UAE halts new visas to citizens of 13 mostly Muslim states: document | UAE halts new visas to citizens of 13 mostly Muslim states: document
By Alexander Cornwell3 Min Read
DUBAI (Reuters) - The United Arab Emirates has stopped issuing new visas to citizens of 13 mostly Muslim-majority countries, including Iran, Syria, Afghanistan and Pakistan, according to a document issued by a state-owned business park.
FILE PHOTO: The skyline including the Burj Khalifa tower is seen as ships dock at Port Rashid in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, May 26, 2013. REUTERS/Ahmed Jadallah/File Photo
A source briefed on the matter told Reuters the visas had temporarily stopped being issued to Afghans, Pakistanis and citizens of several other countries over security concerns, but did not provide details of those concerns.
The document, sent to companies operating in the park and seen by Reuters, cited an immigration circular that came into effect on Nov. 18.
The document said applications for new employment and visit visas had been suspended for nationals - those outside the UAE - of 13 countries that also included Somalia, Libya and Yemen until further notice.
The ban also applies to citizens of Algeria, Kenya, Iraq, Lebanon, Tunisia and Turkey, it says.
It was not clear if there were any exceptions to the ban.
The UAE’s Federal Authority for Identity and Citizenship had no immediate comment when contacted by Reuters.
The circular took effect a week after the French Embassy in the UAE urged its citizens to maintain vigilance after a bomb attack in Saudi Arabia on diplomats claimed by Islamic State.
The explosion, which occurred during a World War One commemoration ceremony in Jeddah, was the first attack in years where explosives were used in an attempt to hit foreigners in the conservative kingdom.
The visa ban also comes two months after the Gulf state established formal ties with Israel, a move that broke with decades of Arab policy and angered some Muslim states and communities. Others welcomed it.
Still, the source familiar with the matter said the ban was unrelated to the UAE’s relationship with Israel and was expected to last only for a brief period.
A diplomat commented that the UAE had strained relations with some of the states listed, such as Turkey.
Last week, Pakistan’s foreign ministry said the UAE had stopped processing new visas for its citizens and those of some other countries, but that those already holding valid visas were not affected and could still enter the UAE.
Reporting by Alexander Cornwell; Editing by Mark HeinrichOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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