Month after results, Uddhav Thackeray takes oath as Maharashtra CM

Election News
The notable Shivaji Park in Mumbai is the origination of Shiv Sena and the play area of ages of cricket players, including Sachin Tendulkar. On Thursday evening, Shiv Sena boss Uddhav Thackeray started his innings here as boss pastor of Maharashtra, solidifying another non-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) alliance government in the nation.
Over a month after aftereffects of the Assembly decisions were proclaimed on October 24, Thackeray was confirmed in the midst of euphoric triumph drones by party supporters and sound of tutari (a conventional melodic instrument) on an uncommonly made stage with a post like stylistic theme and a statue of Maratha warrior ruler Chhatrapati Shivaji.
Six different pastors (Eknath Desai and Subhash Desai from the Sena, Jayant Patil and Chhagan Bhujbal from the Nationalist Congress Party and Balasaheb Thorat and Nitin Raut from the Congress) were likewise sworn in by Governor B S Koshiyari. Thackeray, who isn't an individual from either House of state assembly and the first from his family to accept a place of intensity, framed an impossible partnership, the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi, with the Congress and the NCP to expect control.
Afterward, Thackeray held his first Cabinet meeting at Sahyadri Guest House. After the gathering, the new boss priest said his administration will declare a critical choice for offering alleviation to ranchers in the state in two days. He said the main choice of the Cabinet was to endorse Rs 20 crore for preserving Raigad Fort, which was the capital of Shivaji. "We can paint a superior picture in the event that we know the truth. We have looked for inputs. Ranchers lack anything, however just confirmations. We need to give solid assistance to ranchers," he told columnists after the gathering.

"We need to guarantee a climate in the state wherein no one will feel threatened," he said. The swearing-in service was graced by focal pioneers of the two partners....READ MORE

China fumes over US law backing Hong Kong, says retaliation inevitable

Election News
Terms of Trade is a day by day bulletin that unravels a world entangled in exchange wars. China is making a propensity for giving obscure counter dangers. Up until now, be that as it may, it hasn't really done a lot. The outside service gave another admonition on Thursday after President Donald Trump marked bills backing Hong Kong's nonconformists, utilizing language that reflected an announcement a week ago.
China gave comparative dangers not long ago after the U.S. affirmed arms deals to Taiwan, authorized organizations over human-rights maltreatment in Xinjiang and put Huawei Technologies Co. on a boycott. "We recommend that the U.S. quits adhering determinedly to its course or China will take fearless countermeasures," the outside service said. "The U.S. side will bear all duty regarding the outcomes." Later, outside service representative Geng Shuang evaded inquiries on when China would answer or whether it would affect exchange talks, advising journalists to "stay tuned."
"What will come will come," he said. The inability to tissue out the subtleties regardless of having a long time to get ready shows the challenges China faces in hitting the U.S. without additionally harming its own economy, which is developing at the slowest pace in right around three decades. Aside from actualizing retaliatory levies against the U.S., China has to a great extent adhered to an approach of "vital poise" with regards to different parts of the relationship.
Exchange Talks Impact

Mei Xinyu, a specialist at a research organization under China's Commerce Ministry, said that the Hong Kong issue will be talked about at the exchange arrangement table and China will probably ask the U.S. side to explain its position, or even make a few guarantees on ceasing from utilizing the bill. He included that China will set up certain countermeasures simultaneously, resounding the Foreign Ministry's comments prior, without expounding on what explicit estimates will be taken......READ MORE

Amit Shah: The architect of India's rightward turn may succeed Modi one day

Election News
New off a reverberating re-appointment triumph, Prime Minister Narendra Modi joined different legislators in India's frontier period parliament to extol the man on his right side.
There stood Amit Shah, Modi's go-to person for over three decades, who at that point continued to make one of the most critical declarations in contemporary Indian history: The legislature would quickly end about seven many years of self-rule in the Muslim-lion's share locale of Kashmir.
"Allow us five years, we will make it the nation's most created state," Shah announced.
The memorable discourse toward the beginning of August stamped to some degree a turning out gathering for Shah. Since quite a while ago known as one of India's best political strategists in the background, he's currently taking a more prominent in propelling a motivation since quite a while ago held by Modi's decision Bharatiya Janata Party to raise the interests of Hindus who involve around 80 percent of the nation's 1.3 billion individuals.
The moves are intended to keep the BJP in control for quite a long time to stop by endeavoring to make a brought together Hindu personality in a country customarily partitioned by rank—an advancement that dangers on a very basic level adjusting the character of India's mainstream popular government. In the event that fruitful, they could make ready for the 55-year-old Shah to one day take over from Modi, 69, as India's head administrator.

"When Modi is at last prepared to step down, Shah will obviously be a top contender to be his successor," said Michael Kugelman, senior partner for South Asia at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington who has intently looked into India's governmental issues over the previous decade. "He is profoundly faithful to the gathering, happens to be near it most dominant figure, and harbors sees that are in close arrangement with the BJP's present zeitgeist.".....READ MORE

Uddhav set to take charge of Maharashtra with a deputy from NCP

Election News
Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray will make vow as boss clergyman of Maharashtra on Thursday evening at the Shivaji Park here.
With the swearing-in of 59-year-old Thackeray, the state will have a main pastor from the Sena following 20 years.
The promise taking function will be held at the rambling Shivaji Park, where his dad and Sena organizer Bal Thackeray tended to his celebrated Dussehra rallies. The last Sena man to involve the central priest's seat was Narayan Rane in 1999, after Manohar Joshi, who in 1995 turned into the principal CM from the gathering.
The swearing-in function pursues long stretches of emotional political advancements, which incorporated a three-day government shaped by a sudden help from NCP pioneer Ajit Pawar, who has since come back to the Sharad Pawar-drove party overlay. The Sena, alongside the NCP and Congress comprised the 'Maha Vikas Aghadi' to frame a non-BJP government in the state. There is theory that Ajit Pawar might be accepted into the new Cabinet.
NCP pioneer Praful Patel on Wednesday said his gathering will get the vice president clergyman's post in the new Shiv Sena-drove government. The Congress will get the Assembly Speaker's post while the NCP will get representative Speaker's post, he said after a gathering of the 'Maha Vikas Aghadi'.
He likewise said that alongwith Sena boss Uddhav Thackeray, a couple of individuals from every one of the three gatherings will make vow as pastors.

There will be just a single representative CM's post in the administration, he included. An extraordinary session of the fourteenth state Assembly was held here on Wednesday where vow was managed to 285 recently chose individuals by professional tem Speaker Kalidas Kolambkar.....READ MORE

Maha Vikas Aghadi govt in Maharashtra could focus on farm debt waivers

Election News
The difference in monitor in Maharashtra could prompt enormous ranch obligation waivers and tasks getting slowed down, cautioned Macquarie.
Homestead pain and obligation waivers were a piece of the political decision battle by the Opposition parties in Maharashtra against the decision Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government. Presently, a union of the Shiv Sena, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Congress, is set to frame the legislature and expected to address the ranch trouble. What's more, they will have sufficient financial space to do as such, Macquarie evaluated.
"Ranch advance waiver can conceivably be the main request of the matter of the new government," the financier said. Maharashtra's GDP of Rs 26.603 trillion had a financial shortfall of 2.1 percent in monetary year 2018-19 (FY19) and targets were set to keep it at a similar level for FY20.
"The Maharashtra government can do a waiver of Rs 500 billion (Rs 50,000 crore) spread over several years without rupturing farthest point of 3 percent set under FRBM Act," the financier stated, including that the vast majority of the open area banks would have introduction to Maharashtra's farming part. Indeed, even as there were no huge miniaturized scale fund foundations, littler helpful banks rule the horticulture credit advertise.
Maha Vikas Aghadi govt in Maharashtra could concentrate on ranch obligation waivers

Undertakings at high danger of getting slowed down incorporates the Mumbai-Ahmedabad fast rail alongside the Mumbai Nagpur Expressway. L&T was the leader in getting the rapid rail contract, however that may get nullified at this point. The Mumbai-Nagpur Expressway is part into 16 bundles, all of which have just been granted. In any case, the metro and air terminal ventures would almost certainly proceed as they are in cutting edge phases of fulfillment, yet the pace of execution could get influenced, Macquarie cautioned. Subsidizing for these undertakings are basically originating from multilateral organizations.....READ MORE

Counting of votes underway for bypolls in West Bengal, Uttarakhand

Election News
Checking of decisions in favor of the West Bengal and Uttarakhand by-races started at 8 a.m. on Thursday in the midst of tight security in surveying focuses. The conclusive outcomes are required to be pronounced by 5 p.m. The Karimpur, Kharagpur Sadar and Kaliaganj Assembly situates in West Bengal and Uttarakhand's Pithoragarh seat went to surveys on Monday.
Around 78 percent of more than 700,000 electorate had thrown their votes in the by-surveys to Kaliaganj, Karimpur and Kharagpur Sadar Assembly situates in West Bengal where 18 up-and-comers were in the fight.
BJP state VP and the gathering's up-and-comer in Karimpur, Jay Prakash Majumdar, was ambushed during surveying in the voting demographic.
The Kharagpur Sadar and Karimpur seats fell empty after the general decisions as the sitting MLAs of the two seats Dilip Ghosh (BJP) and Mahua Moitra (TMC) had challenged and won Lok Sabha seats.
The by-survey at Kaliaganj was required after the demise of Congress MLA Parmathanath Roy.
Congress candidate Dhitashree Roy, upheld by the CPI(M), is hollowed against TMC's Tapan Deb Sinha and BJP's Kamal Chandra Sarkar at Kaliaganj.
In Karimpur the CPI(M)- Congress applicant Gholam Rabbi is in the retribution against Majumdar and the decision TMC's Bimalendu Singha Roy.

In Kharagpur Sadar the challengers are Prem Chandra Jha of BJP, Chittaranjan Mandal of the Congress-CPI(M) collusion and Pradip Sarkar of the TMC......READ MORE

Privacy risk: Report says India among 75 nations with AI surveillance tools

Election News
India is bit by bit opening up to the danger of mass observation and digital snooping by the state just as maverick on-screen characters, as current innovation advances into the nation in a scene of frail security laws.
A report by international strategy think tank Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (CEIP) has said India is among 75 nations on the planet with access to present day AI reconnaissance innovation—placing it in a similar rundown as China, Russia and Saudi Arabia. The investigation was distributed in September.
"Numerous administrations in the Gulf, East Asia, and South/Central Asia are obtaining progressed investigative frameworks, facial acknowledgment cameras, and advanced checking abilities," said Steven Feldstein, a Carnegie Endowment individual and the creator of the report.
These frameworks are utilized to surveil residents "to achieve a scope of arrangement goals—some legal, others that abuse human rights, and a large number of which fall into a dinky center ground," he stated, without specifying their utilization in explicit nations.
Governments in despotic and semi-totalitarian nations are more inclined to manhandle AI observation than governments in liberal popular governments, the report noted. Some totalitarian governments like those in China, Russia, Saudi Arabia are abusing AI innovation for mass observation, while others with inauspicious human rights records are utilizing it to fortify suppression.

On the innovation front, the capacities are solid. Present day frameworks can make 360-degree profiles of residents by sewing together information from road cameras, card exchanges and web based life profiles. These frameworks can snoop on private connections on the cell phone and screen constant area of the objective. As indicated by the report, the greatest provider of AI reconnaissance arrangements is China with Huawei being the greatest exporter. (See graph).....READ MORE

Men dominate investment management despite women being equally good: Survey

Election News
Portfolio the board remains to a great extent a band of siblings, new research by Goldman Sachs finds.
An examination of 528 huge top shared assets demonstrated 409, or 77 percent, had all-male portfolio supervisory groups, strategists drove by David Kostin wrote in a note on Nov. 25. Those assets represented 64 percent of household value common reserve resources.
Just 15 assets, or 3 percent, had every female group, overseeing 1 percent of absolute resources. Only 73 assets, or 14 percent, with $196 billion in resources under administration, have ladies in at any rate 33% of portfolio director positions.
In spite of their little numbers, ladies get comparative returns as their male friends.
Since the beginning of 2017, 39 percent of female-oversaw reserves have outflanked benchmarks every year contrasted and 41 percent for every other store, while return instability and Sharpe proportions have "additionally been practically indistinguishable over all-male, all-female, and blended sexual orientation groups," Kostin and his co-creators composed.
One contrast between the two sexes is the segments they support. Ladies put more cash into data innovation, utilities and purchaser staples; men like money related administrations organizations.

At the stock-level, ladies have higher relative introduction to Amazon.com Inc., Apple Inc., Nike Inc., Microsoft Corp. what's more, Merck and Co., however lower presentation to Berkshire Hathaway Inc., Comcast Corp., UnitedHealth Group, JPMorgan Chase and Co., and Booking Holdings Inc.....READ MORE

Isro PSLV-C47 launched: All you need to know about Cartosat-3 and its uses

Election News
India's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, PSLV-C47 has propelled Cartosat-3 and 13 business nanosatellites into Sun Synchronous circle from Satish Dhawan Space Center (SDSC) SHAR, Sriharikota. This is the primary business request to place into space 13 American nanosatellites for NewSpace India, which was shaped distinctly in March 2019.
What is Cartosat-3
Cartosat-3 is a third-age light-footed propelled earth perception satellite with high-goals imaging capacity. Created by the Indian Space Research Organization (Isro), it will supplant the IRS arrangement. Cartosat-3 has a panchromatic goals of 0.25 meters making it the imaging satellite with most elevated goals and Mx of 1 meter with a top notch goals, which is a significant improvement from the past payloads in the Cartosat arrangement.
What is PSLV
PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) is an indigenously-created extra dispatch arrangement of the ISRO. It comes in the classification of medium-lift launchers with a scope up to different circles, including the Geo Synchronous Transfer Orbit, Lower Earth Orbit, and Polar Sun Synchronous Orbit. Every one of the activities of PSLV are controlled from the Satish Dhawan Space Center, Sriharikota.
5 things you should think about PSLV-C47 and Cartosat-3 dispatch
1. PSLV-C47 is the 21st trip of PSLV in 'XL' setup (with 6 strong lash on engines).
2. This will be the 74th dispatch vehicle strategic SDSC SHAR, Sriharikota.

3. Cartosat-3 was initially wanted to be propelled on-board PSLV in 2014.....READ MORE

Who will be Maharashtra CM? Uddhav says can't be accommodating always

Election News
Demonstrating that he would drive a hard deal in converses with the partner BJP during government arrangement, Shiv Sena boss Uddhav Thackeray said on Thursday that the time had come to actualize "fifty-fifty" equation for control sharing.
The BJP had won or was driving on 101 seats and Sena on 57 seats out of the all out 288 Assembly situates in Maharashtra as tallying was in progress for the state surveys.
While the two gatherings can frame the administration serenely, the BJP missed the mark regarding its objective of coming to approach the midway imprint alone, giving more influence to the Sena.
Asked by journalists which gathering will get the main pastor's post, Thackeray stated, "The time has come to remind the BJP about the equation landed at when BJP boss Amit Shah visited my home....we had settled on fifty-fifty recipe for the coalition."
"We consented to challenge less seats (than the BJP), however I can't suit the BJP inevitably. I ought to enable my gathering to develop," Thackeray said.
The Sena boss included that he will talk about the outcomes with his gathering chiefs and BJP pioneers and land at the power-sharing recipe in a tranquil and straightforward way before the partnership stakes guarantee to shape the following government.
Portraying the order as an "eye-opener for some", Thackeray said the individuals of the state had kept vote based system alive.

"Presently no one will address EVMs," he stated, in reference to restriction Congress-NCP faring superior to expected in the decisions. "Ideological groups need to keep their feet on the ground. Something else, individuals show them their place," the Sena boss included......READ MORE

Sonia Gandhi forms panel to discuss Maharashtra, Haryana post-poll scenario

Election News
To examine the post-survey situation and other key political issues, Congress president Sonia Gandhi has set up a 17-part bunch which will meet on October 25.
The gathering will occur after the Maharashtra and Haryana get together political race results are proclaimed on Thursday.
The gathering would be driven by Sonia Gandhi, and top Congress pioneers including previous PM Manmohan Singh, Rahul Gandhi, Ahmed Patel, Ghulam Nabi Azad, A K Antony, Mallikarjun Kharge, Anand Sharma, Jairam Ramesh, Ambika Soni, Kapil Sibal, K C Venugopal and Adhir Ranjan Chaudhary are a piece of it.
Be that as it may, AICC general secretary for East Uttar Pradesh Priyanka Gandhi Vadra isn't on the key gathering, the sources said.
The gathering will likewise hold thoughts on the National Register of Citizens (NRC), which is a key issue in Assam after an enormous number of its residents have been let well enough alone.
A portion of the youthful pioneers who are likewise part of the key gathering incorporates Randeep Singh Surjewala, Jyotiraditya Scindia, Rajeev Satav and Sushmita Dev.
Other than talking about the survey results result, the board would examine key issues to be taken up in the Winter Session of Parliament beginning November 18 and other political issues to take on the Modi government.

The issue of joblessness, monetary log jam and misery closeout of open division endeavors would likewise be taken up and talked about during the gathering. The techniques would be examined to "uncover the administration's disappointment" in taking care of the nation's economy, the sources said......READ MORE

Govt lists activities that will not qualify for lower corporate tax scheme

Election News
The legislature has recorded the things whose assembling won't enable units to fit the bill for the 15 percent corporate duty conspire. Further, the elements picking the decreased expense pace of 22 percent can't guarantee any exception or motivating forces, including collected Minimum Alternate Tax (MAT) credit.
Programming improvement, book printing, mining, change of marble squares and packaging of gas into chambers are barred from the meaning of assembling.
This is a piece of the Taxation Laws (Amendment) Bill presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman (imagined) on Monday in the Lok Sabha, to supplant the mandate on a lower corporate duty rate, planned to invigorate development in an easing back economy. The statute was given on September 20, cutting the base corporate assessment rate to 22 percent, from 30 percent.
Under the corrected guidelines, misfortunes/unabsorbed deterioration gathering to an organization because of merger will not be offered impact to for benefiting of the 22 percent rate. Transient capital misfortunes on non-depreciable resources will be burdened at 22 percent. Where any conditions are abused, the decreased rate will not be permitted in that year and any resulting year. In addition, the administration has saved the power to indicate any industry that can be prevented the concessional rate from claiming 15 percent.

Another arrangement is being embedded in the Income Tax Act to give that impact from the current money related year (2019-20), a household organization may select to pay charge at 22 percent in addition to extra charge at 10 percent and cess at 4 percent in the event that it doesn't guarantee any motivating force/derivation. The successful rate for these organizations comes to 25.17 percent and they are not liable to MAT.....READ MORE

Record turnout in Hong Kong vote after months of protests, rising violence

International News
Hong Kong's master majority rule government camp was cruising towards a devastating triumph in network level races on Monday, sending the Beijing-sponsored government a reasonable message of open help for the requests of a dissent development that has grasped the domain for quite a long time.
Checking was still under way following record turnout in Sunday's surveys, however fractional outcomes demonstrated that competitors favoring more prominent popular government were on course to hold onto a stun greater part of the regularly foundation commanded 18 area committees.
The dazzling outcome was a mortifying reprimand to Beijing and ran any waiting any expectations of Hong Kong pioneer Carrie Lam that the undeniably forceful strategies sent by radical dissidents would urge a quiet greater part to turn out on the side of her organization. Change-chasing government officials seized on the outcome as confirmation that residents need more state in running the city. "Regardless of how solid Carrie Lam is I trust she can agree to the desires of the individuals, satisfy the five requests (and) give the adolescents a possibility," political extremist Jimmy Sham told journalists in the wake of winning an area board seat.
The dissent development has made five key requests, including direct famous races and a test into supposed police mercilessness. Lam has rejected the possibility of government concessions as "unrealistic reasoning". Hong Kong has suffered a long time of mass meetings and vicious conflicts, at first ignited by outrage regarding a bill supported by Lam that would have enabled removals to China's dark legal framework.

Region committees handle network level concerns, for example, transport courses and trash assortment and the surveys normally produce little fervor. However, Sunday's challenge for 452 seats took on new political centrality on account of the general population discontent. The outcome was "out and out an insurgency," Hong Kong political examiner Willy Lam said. "It's a sound disavowal of the (Hong Kong).....READ MORE

Doctors fear Assange 'could die' in UK prison, say he needs hospital care

International News
Hong Kong's master majority rule government camp was cruising towards a devastating triumph in network level races on Monday, sending the Beijing-sponsored government a reasonable message of open help for the requests of a dissent development that has grasped the domain for quite a long time.
Checking was still under way following record turnout in Sunday's surveys, however fractional outcomes demonstrated that competitors favoring more prominent popular government were on course to hold onto a stun greater part of the regularly foundation commanded 18 area committees.
The dazzling outcome was a mortifying reprimand to Beijing and ran any waiting any expectations of Hong Kong pioneer Carrie Lam that the undeniably forceful strategies sent by radical dissidents would urge a quiet greater part to turn out on the side of her organization. Change-chasing government officials seized on the outcome as confirmation that residents need more state in running the city.
"Regardless of how solid Carrie Lam is I trust she can agree to the desires of the individuals, satisfy the five requests (and) give the adolescents a possibility," political extremist Jimmy Sham told journalists in the wake of winning an area board seat. The dissent development has made five key requests, including direct famous races and a test into supposed police mercilessness. Lam has rejected the possibility of government concessions as "unrealistic reasoning".

Hong Kong has suffered a long time of mass meetings and vicious conflicts, at first ignited by outrage regarding a bill supported by Lam that would have enabled removals to China's dark legal framework. Region committees handle network level concerns, for example, transport courses and trash assortment and the surveys normally produce little fervor. However, Sunday's challenge for 452 seats took on new political centrality on account of the general population discontent.....READ MORE

Doctors fear Assange 'could die' in UK prison, say he needs hospital care

International News
In excess of 60 specialists composed an open letter distributed Monday saying they dreaded Julian Assange's wellbeing was awful to such an extent that the WikiLeaks author could bite the dust inside a top-security British prison.
The 48-year-old Australian is as yet battling a US offer to remove him from Britain on charges recorded under the Espionage Act that could see him surrendered a sentence of to 175 years in a US jail. In the letter to Home Secretary Priti Patel, Britain's inside priest, the specialists call for Assange to be moved from Belmarsh jail in southeast London to a college instructing emergency clinic.
They put together their evaluation with respect to "nerve racking onlooker accounts" of his October 21 court appearance in London and a November 1 report by Nils Melzer, the United Nations extraordinary rapporteur on torment. The free UN rights master said Assange's "proceeded with introduction to discretion and misuse may before long wind up costing his life". Assange utilized WikiLeaks to distribute grouped military and discretionary documents in 2010 about US shelling efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq that demonstrated profoundly humiliating to the US government.
"We compose this open letter, as medicinal specialists, to express our genuine worries about the physical and psychological wellness of Julian Assange," the specialists said in their 16-page open letter. They said they had "worries about Mr Assange's wellness" to experience the full removal hearing, which is set for February.

"Mr Assange requires critical master medicinal evaluation of the two his physical and mental condition of wellbeing," the composed. "Any restorative treatment showed ought to be controlled in an appropriately prepared and expertly staffed college showing medical clinic (tertiary consideration).....READ MORE

US Fed minutes show rates on hold until economy shows 'material change'

International News
An increasingly divided Federal Reserve that decided to hit pause in its easing cycle following a rate cut at its October meeting offered little guidance on what would cause policymakers to change their minds on the outlook, minutes of the central bank's last policy meeting showed.
The readout released on Wednesday of the October 29-30 policy discussion, at which the Fed voted 8-2 to lower interest rates by a quarter percentage point, also showed policymakers further discussed the possibility of setting up a standing repo facility in the wake of recent ructions in short-term money markets.
"Most participants judged that the stance of policy, after a 25 basis point reduction at this meeting, would be well calibrated to support the outlook of moderate growth, a strong labor market and inflation near the committee's symmetric 2 per cent objective," the Fed said in the minutes.Following the meeting, Fed Chair Jerome Powell signaled the Fed was effectively on hold with interest rates and said that would only change if there was a "material" change in the U.S. economic outlook.
That phrasing, absent from the policy statement at the time, indicated that October's reduction in borrowing costs to a target range of between 1.50 per cent and 1.75 per cent, would be the last rate move over the short term.The Fed has cut interest rates three times this year. The cuts have been positioned as "a mid-cycle adjustment" to help shield the U.S. economy from the effects of the U.S.-China trade war and slowing global growth, which have hurt manufacturing, business investment and exports.

In the minutes, there was little discussion of what a "material" reassessment would involve, bar two policymakers who wanted the Fed to make plain that another rate cut would be unlikely in the near term unless there was a significant slowdown in the pace of economic growth. Dallas Fed President Robert Kaplan has since said the price of his support was such a statement being made.....READ MORE

Google restricts targeted political ads, bans misleading information

International News
Google is severely limiting how political advertisers can target people online, a decision made after weeks of furious debate over how online platforms handle campaign messages.
The Alphabet Inc. unit said in a blog post on Wednesday it will no longer allow election ads to be targeted based on political affiliation on Google Search, YouTube and across the web. The company is also restricting misinformation and banning doctored media known as deepfakes in ads following criticism that Google and rival Facebook Inc. ran ads from US President Donald Trump that were intentionally misleading.
Google’s steps could curtail campaigns just as they are escalating spending for the 2020 US presidential elections. The internet search giant also said it is removing access to a valuable tool called Customer Match for political ads. This technology lets advertisers combine their own data, such as email lists, with Google’s massive corpus of digital information, to target audiences even more accurately.Still, Google isn’t limiting political targeting altogether. Election ads will still be able to target users based on age, gender and location by postal code. Nonprofits that register as political advertisers will be affected by the new policies, a Google spokeswoman said.
Additionally, Google said it’s updating its overall ads policy to prohibit “misleading claims about the census process, and ads or destinations making demonstrably false claims that could significantly undermine participation or trust in an electoral or democratic process.”

Online platforms’ handling of political ad spending has become a lightning rod in recent weeks. Twitter Inc.’s decision to ban campaign advertising in October was met with both praise and scorn from politicians and advocacy groups. Facebook has taken a different stance, with top executives repeating several times that the social network won’t fact-check ads from politicians, saying it’s not the place of technology companies to become arbiters of truth.....READ MORE

Followed Trump's orders on pressuring Ukraine, says senior US diplomat

International News
A senior US diplomat told lawmakers on Wednesday that President Donald Trump expressly ordered him and others to help pressure Ukraine into investigating a political rival of the president, providing some of the most significant testimony to date in the House of Representatives impeachment inquiry.
In remarks that also put Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at the center of the Ukraine controversy, US Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland said Pompeo was “fully supportive” of the efforts to push Ukraine into carrying out two investigations that would benefit Trump politically at home.
Sondland, a wealthy hotel entrepreneur and Trump donor, said he worked with Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani on Ukraine issues on “the president’s orders,” further detailing Trump’s active participation in a controversy that threatens his presidency.Giuliani’s efforts earlier this year to get Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and his son “were a quid pro quo for arranging a White House visit” for the Ukrainian leader, Sondland said, using a Latin term meaning to exchange a favour for another favour.
The ambassador testified that he told Vice President Mike Pence in September that US security aid to Ukraine had been stalled apparently because of Trump’s demand for the investigations.

Trump has said he did nothing wrong and specifically denied any quid pro quo. On Wednesday, Trump said he does not know Sondland well but he seems like a “nice guy.” Sondland described Trump in May telling him along with Energy Secretary Rick Perry and then-U.S. special envoy to Ukraine Kurt Volker to work with Giuliani on Ukraine policy at a time when the former New York mayor was working to get the Ukrainians to do the politically motivated investigations.....READ MORE

US safety board chair criticises Uber for 2018 fatal self-driving crash

International News
The chairman of the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) offered a harsh critique of Uber Technologies Inc's overall approach to safety in draft findings released on Tuesday of a fatal self-driving car crash in Arizona in March 2018.
"The inappropriate actions of both the automatic driving system as implemented and the vehicle's human operator were symptoms of a deeper problem," NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt said, citing the "ineffective safety culture that existed at the time of Uber."The NTSB submitted draft findings in Sumwalt's written testimony Congress ahead of a Senate hearing Wednesday as a probable cause in the crash was ongoing. Reuters reviewed the draft testimony.
According to Sumwalt's draft testimony, the probable cause of the Uber crash was the failure of the vehicle operator to monitor the driving environment "because she was visually distracted throughout the trip by her personal cell phone."Cited as contributing factors were Uber's inadequate safety risk-assessment procedures and ineffective oversight of the vehicle operator. The testimony said the findings were "subject to change pending the board's adoption of the final report."
A spokeswoman for Uber's self-driving car effort, Sarah Abboud, did not comment immediately Tuesday, said before the hearing the company has "adopted critical program improvements to further prioritize safety."
The testimony also cited the pedestrian's crossing outside a crosswalk and the Arizona Department of Transportation's insufficient oversight of autonomous vehicle testing.

Sumwalt's testimony also said the board was recommending the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration require entities testing self-driving vehicles submit a safety self-assessment report to the agency and for the agency to determine if plans include appropriate safeguards.....READ MORE

From India to Brazil, emerging markets can shore up global economy

International News
Emerging-economy central banks from India to Brazil still enjoy the firepower to shore up the global economy as their peers from developed markets take to the sidelines.
While policy makers at the Federal Reserve and European Central Bank are seemingly set to keep interest rates on hold, many of their developing nation counterparts have room to cut further. That should help support the world economy amid its weakest expansion in a decade.
“In most cases, emerging markets are now in the comfortable position to be able to cushion an economic downturn with monetary easing,” Ulrich Leuchtmann, head of currency strategy at Commerzbank AG in Frankfurt, said in a report this month. “This easing of monetary policy is likely to give a lift to EM economies, and this would also be positive for developed countries.”
Faster Growth
That outlook was underscored this week by Morgan Stanley economists, who predicted emerging markets will grow 4.4% next year, more than three times the 1.3% rate anticipated in the Group of 10 economies.
After 20 of the 32 central banks monitored by the bank eased policy in 2019, its economists forecast 13 will do so in 2020 with the cuts concentrated in emerging markets helping to reduce the global weighted average policy rate to a seven-year low by March. India, Brazil, Indonesia and Turkey can all strike if they need to.

With some hints of growth stabilization on signs that the U.S. and China are warming ties on the trade-war front, fund managers see more reasons to park their cash back in emerging markets. The International Monetary Fund also sees them as the primary drivers of the global economy while advanced economies linger in sub-3% territory.....READ MORE

Amazon, in the habit of winning, has suffered some humbling defeats lately

International News
Amazon.com Inc. is a company that is accustomed to winning, but the $869 billion e-commerce giant has spent the last few weeks suffering through humbling defeats. On Oct. 25, the Pentagon announced it was awarding a $10 billion cloud computing contract to Microsoft Corp. Amazon had been seen as such a prohibitive favorite for the contract, called JEDI, that the Department of Defense was actually facing a lawsuit for setting up a process that only the company could win. Then Amazon’s preferred candidates failed to capture control of the Seattle City Council in local elections less than two weeks later, even after the company had spent $1.5 million on the campaign.
The setbacks are not directly connected, but they follow a familiar pattern. Amazon gets into an interaction with government officials with supreme confidence—critics invariably call it arrogance—only to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. The results don’t reflect a lack of resources. Amazon spent $4 million on federal lobbying last quarter, the most it has ever spent in a single three-month span; last year it lobbied more government entities than any other tech company.
Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos hasn’t always made things easy for his policy team. President Donald Trump regularly singles out Bezos and Amazon for ridicule, a grudge that people within the company attribute to the president’s hostility to the Washington Post, which Bezos bought in 2013. Last summer Trump told Bloomberg News that Amazon may be in a “very antitrust situation.” Around the same time he directed James Mattis, then Secretary of Defense, to “screw Amazon” out of the JEDI contract, according to a book by Mattis’s former speechwriter. The company is planning to file a lawsuit challenging the decision, accusing the government of “unmistakable bias.” (The Pentagon has said its procurement process is insulated from politics.)

The victories that Amazon does claim—better terms for tech on trade deals, job-creating deals to build fulfillment centers—draw less attention than its setbacks.....READ MORE

TikTok's chief Alex Zhu is on a mission to prove it is not a menace

International News
Like nearly everyone who runs a major tech organization nowadays, Alex Zhu, the leader of the existing apart from everything else video application TikTok, is stressed over a picture issue.
To him — and to a large number of TikTok's clients — the application is an asylum for imagination, sincere self-articulation and senseless move recordings. In the blink of an eye, TikTok has developed as the invigorating weirdo upstart of the American web based life scene, reconfiguring the way of life in its blissful, abnormal wake.
However, to certain individuals in the United States government, TikTok is a threat. What's more, one main explanation is the nationality of its proprietor, a seven-year-old Chinese web based life organization called ByteDance. The dread is that TikTok is presenting America's childhood to Communist Party teaching and sneaking their information to Beijing's servers.
The craving to fix this recognition hole is the thing that brought Mr. Zhu a week ago to a WeWork in Manhattan, where a bunch of his partners are based. Mr. Zhu, a trim 40-year-old who talks familiar if delicately highlighted English, helped found Musical.ly, a Shanghai-based lip-synchronizing application that ByteDance obtained in 2017 and collapsed into TikTok.
In a meeting — his first since steering at TikTok this year — Mr. Zhu denied, in unambiguous terms, a few key allegations. No, TikTok doesn't blue pencil recordings that disappoint China, he said. Also, no, it doesn't impart client information to China, or even with its Beijing-based parent organization. All information on TikTok clients worldwide is put away in Virginia, he stated, with a reinforcement server in Singapore.

Yet, China is a cloudy spot for organizations. Regardless of whether TikTok's strategies are sure about paper, imagine a scenario in which Chinese specialists chose they didn't care for them and compelled ByteDance...READ MORE

Three, including gunman, killed in shooting outside Oklahoma Walmart store

International News
Three individuals were killed in a shooting early Monday outside a Walmart store in Oklahoma, including the aggressor, police said - the most recent in a string of dangerous weapon assaults at the prevalent grocery store chain.
Danny Ford, the police boss in the town of Duncan, said the shooting - an obvious local debate - occurred in the blink of an eye before 10:00 am (1600 GMT) in a parking garage before the store.
"We have three people that are expired. We have two white guys and a white female. Two of the exploited people are inside the vehicle, one is outside the vehicle," said Ford.
A handgun was likewise found at the scene, police said.
Witnesses told nearby news channels that the shooter moved toward his exploited people while they were inside the vehicle, starting to shoot at them.
He at that point turned his weapon on himself when a fourth man allegedly hauled out a gun and tested the shooter, they said.
Relatives at the scene said the shooting was a local contest between a spouse and his significant other, a nearby Fox news subsidiary detailed.
A Walmart representative revealed to Fox that no staff individuals were engaged with the episode in Duncan, a town of 22,000 occupants somewhere in the range of 75 miles (120 kilometers) south of Oklahoma City, the state capital.

Schools in the territory had been set on lockdown incidentally before being given an "all reasonable" by nearby police, the neighborhood school region said in an announcement. Toward the beginning of this current month, another permitless convey law became effective in the focal US state, permitting anybody more than 21 and without a lawful offense conviction to convey a weapon without a grant or a permit.....READ MORE

Ford Motor likely to make its new electric Mustang Mach-E in China

International News
Passage Motor is thinking about making its new electric Mustang Mach-E in China, contingent upon how the exchange war among Washington and Beijing plays out, CEO Jim Hackett said.
"We have to decide if the duties are settled. What's more, it would be extraordinary" on the off chance that they were settled, Hackett told Bloomberg after a dispatch occasion for the vehicle in Los Angeles.
"We have an arrangement to work there in the event that we need to." In a prior meeting with Bloomberg TV, Hackett said he accepted there would be great interest for the vehicle in China. "I'm grinning since China has a command for jolt, so the Mach-E has a job in that," he said.

While Ford is building the Mach-E in Mexico, Hackett said the organization utilizes a greater number of laborers in the US than its rivals....READ MORE

Softbank's Yahoo Japan, chat app Line announce October 2020 merger plan

International News
Japanese telco SoftBank Corp announced on Monday plans to merge its internet unit Yahoo Japan with messaging app operator Line Corp, as it scoops up struggling internet companies to bulk up against rivals such as Rakuten.
SoftBank said in a statement that Yahoo Japan, which last month changed its name to Z Holdings, will merge with Line, owned by South Korea's Naver Corp, in a deal to be completed by October 2020.
The companies aim for a definitive agreement by next month in a transaction that will see SoftBank Corp and Naver form a 50:50 venture that will control Z Holdings, which will in turn operate Line and Yahoo.
SoftBank Corp is a unit of investment behemoth SoftBank Group Corp.
SoftBank Corp and Naver, which owns 73 per cent of money-losing Line, plan to launch a tender offer for Line's remaining shares at 5,200 yen per share, a 13.4 per cent premium to the share price before news of the merger broke. Line's shares were up 2.6 per cent at 5,180 yen in early trading on Monday.

Z Holdings will continue to be a consolidated subsidiary of SoftBank...READ MORE

Hong Kong police seal off university, protesters set main entrance ablaze

International News
Pro-democracy demonstrators holed up in a Hong Kong university campus set the main entrance ablaze Monday to prevent surrounding police moving in, after officers warned they may use live rounds if confronted by deadly weapons.
The police warning, which came after one officer was struck by an arrow, marked a further escalation of the near six-month crisis engulfing the city.
China has repeatedly warned that it will not tolerate dissent, and there are growing concerns that Beijing could intervene directly to end the spiralling unrest.
Several loud blasts were heard around dawn on Monday before a wall of fire lit up an entrance to the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU), AFP reporters said, as what appeared to be a police attempt to enter the campus was repelled by protesters determined to hold their ground.
Police said they had fired three live rounds in the early hours of Monday at a protest site near the university but that no one appeared to have been hit.
Intense clashes throughout Sunday, which saw a police officer hit in the leg by an arrow and protesters meet police tear gas with volleys of petrol bombs, rolled overnight across the Kowloon district, as a call went out to defend the besieged campus.
There, protesters had hunkered down under umbrellas from occasional fire from police water cannon and hurled Molotov cocktails at an armoured vehicle, leaving it ablaze on a flyover near the campus.

Police declared the campus a "riot" scene -- rioting is punishable by up to 10 years in jail -- and blocked exits as spokesman Louis Lau issued a stark warning in a Facebook live broadcast."I hereby warn rioters not to use petrol bombs, arrows, cars or any deadly weapons to attack police officers," he said....READ MORE

Amazon doing extremely well in India; hope for regulatory stability: Bezos

International News
E-commerce giant Amazon is doing "extremely well" in India, its founder and CEO Jeff Bezos has said while expressing hope for regulatory stability in the country.
Bezos' remarks came in response to a question on Amazon's concerns over some Indian policies with regard to digitization.
"Regulatory stability is the thing that we would always hope for India. Whatever the regulations are ... they are stable in time and that's one of the things we're hoping will now be true. We'll see," Bezos, 55, told reporters on the sidelines of his induction into the National Portrait Gallery here on Sunday.
He said Amazon was doing very well in India.
"Our business in India is doing extremely well. It's growing very rapidly," Bezos said.
He said the head of his India operations Amit Agarwal, with whom he has worked for 20 years, was an extraordinary leader and is doing really well.
Responding to another question, the Amazon head said he "definitely" wants to go to space, asserting that he is having a great deal of fun doing everything that he does.
Ruling out a 2020 White House run, Bezos said he has a lot of other things that he wants to accomplish and is currently focused on them."Governing and running are two different skill sets," he said.The US-based Amazon is pumping in over Rs 4,400 crore (more than $600 million) in its various units in India including marketplace and food retail to provide them more ammunition to compete against arch-rival Flipkart.

Amazon, which is locked in a battle against Flipkart, had registered cumulative losses of over Rs 7,000 crore across various units in 2018-19...READ MORE

Rajapaksas eye return to power as Sri Lanka readies for prez poll tomorrow

International News
A family of strongmen are eyeing a return to power in Sri Lanka’s presidential election on Saturday, an outcome that could also shift the island nation back toward China.
The Rajapaksas, once a powerful force in the island nation’s politics who lost the presidency in 2015, are staging a comeback. This time Gotabaya Rajapaksa, 70, is running for the top job, backed by family members including his brother Mahinda, who enjoyed warm ties with Beijing during his 10-year rule.His main opponent is Sajith Premadasa, 52, a member of the ruling alliance that took power four years ago vowing to push for greater democracy, more transparent finances and an independent foreign policy that improved ties with India and the U.S. He also hails from a prominent political dynasty: His father served as president for four years until he was killed by a suicide bomber in 1993.
While there are no reliable polls on who will come out on top, the two men represent a stark choice for voters. A Rajapaksa victory could mean a throwback to the old authoritarian ways where opposing the government could have dangerous consequences. Premadasa focuses on national reconciliation in a country still recovering from a prolonged civil war and also promises greater market-based economic reforms.
At stake is the stability of a nation that has increasing strategic importance due in part to its proximity to some of the world’s most important sea lines. The winner will inherit an economy where growth has slowed to a more than five-year low of 1.6% in the quarter ended June, a debt level hovering at 83 per cent of gross domestic product and minority communities still reeling from the aftermath of deadly Easter bombings on churches and hotels.

There are fears that a Rajapaksa win “will return Sri Lanka to an era of impunity for human rights abuses and corruption,” said Paul Staniland, assistant professor of political science at the University of Chicago who specializes in researching political violence and international security in South Asia.....READ MORE

Huawei, ZTE corp threaten our national security, says US attorney general

International News
Huawei Technologies Co and ZTE Corp "cannot be trusted," US Attorney General William Barr said, labelling the Chinese firms a security threat as he backed a proposal to bar US rural wireless carriers from tapping an $8.5 billion (£6.64 billion) government fund to purchase equipment or services from them.
The Federal Communications Commission will vote on Nov. 22 and is proposing requiring the carriers to remove and replace equipment from the companies. Barr said in a letter to the FCC released on Thursday that "their own track record, as well as the practices of the Chinese government, demonstrate that Huawei and ZTE cannot be trusted."He added that "we should not signal that Huawei and ZTE are anything other than a threat to our collective security, for that is exactly what they, through their actions, have shown themselves to be."
Huawei and ZTE did not immediately comment.
Barr noted that federal prosecutors charged Huawei with violations of the US embargo on Iran, bank fraud, obstruction of justice and trade secret theft. ZTE pleaded guilty in 2017 to illegally sending approximately $32 million in US goods to Iran.FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said the commission "cannot ignore the risk that the Chinese government will seek to exploit network vulnerabilities in order to engage in espionage, insert malware and viruses, and otherwise compromise our critical communications networks."
The move is the latest US action aimed at barring US companies from purchasing Huawei and ZTE equipment. Huawei said last week that "in 30 years of business, Huawei has never had a major security-related incident in the 170 countries where we operate."

The US government added Huawei to its economic blacklist in May, saying the Chinese company was involved in activities contrary to US national security....READ MORE

Amazon challenges Pentagon's $10-billion cloud deal with Microsoft

International News
Amazon has challenged the awarding of a USD 10 billion Pentagon cloud computing contract to Microsoft, alleging "unmistakable bias" in the process.
The 10-year contract for the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure program, better known as JEDI, ultimately will see all military branches sharing information in a system boosted by artificial intelligence.
"It's critical for our country that the government and its elected leaders administer procurements objectively and in a manner that is free from political influence," a spokesperson for Amazon Web Services said on Thursday.
"Numerous aspects of the JEDI evaluation process contained clear deficiencies, errors, and unmistakable bias." Amazon said it filed a notice in US court last week signaling its intent to protest the handling of the bidding process.US President Donald Trump has repeatedly lashed out at Amazon and company founder Jeff Bezos, who also owns The Washington Post. The newspaper is among US media outlets most critical in its coverage of Trump and his administration.
The president told reporters during a news conference in July that he had asked aides to investigate the JEDI contract, citing complaints from companies that compete with Amazon.
"I'm getting tremendous complaints about the contract with the Pentagon and with Amazon. ... They're saying it wasn't competitively bid," Trump said."Some of the greatest companies in the world are complaining about it, having to do with Amazon and the Department of Defense, and I will be asking them to look at it very closely to see what's going on."

Amazon was considered the lead contender to provide technology for JEDI, with its Amazon Web Services (AWS) dominating the cloud computing arena and the company already providing classified servers for other government outfits including the CIA....READ MORE

SoftBank's Yahoo Japan confirms merger talks with messaging app Line

International News
SoftBank's Yahoo Japan, one of Japan's top internet firms, confirmed it is in talks to merge with Line Corp, a $27 billion union that would bring the messaging app operator under the SoftBank umbrella in a major tech shake-up.
Yahoo Japan, which last month changed its name to Z Holdings , said on Thursday discussions were underway with Line but nothing had been decided. SoftBank Corp, which owns almost half of Z Holdings, also acknowledged the talks.
Shares in Z Holdings, which had a stock market value of about $17 billion at Wednesday's close, jumped 14.8 per cent.
Shares in Line, which is valued at about $10 billion, were untraded with a glut of buy orders.
Sources told Reuters the previous day a deal was likely by month-end and could see SoftBank Corp and Line's parent Naver Corp form a 50/50 venture that would control Z Holdings, which would in turn operate Line and Yahoo.
Line said in a statement it was true it is considering ways to improve its corporate value but nothing had been decided.
A deal would bring together the operators of two of Japan's biggest QR code payment apps as the country belatedly shifts to cashless payments. SoftBank's PayPay recently hit 19 million users through aggressive marketing, while Line Pay can tap the 82 million Japanese users of the Line app.
Line, which last year sold a majority stake in its mobile unit to SoftBank, has reported three consecutive quarters of operating losses as the company tries to jump-start growth.

Z Holdings made a move in September to take control of fashion e-tailer Zozo Inc in a $3.7 billion deal, as it bulks up against rivals such as Amazon.com. ...READ MORE

How Alibaba founder Jack Ma is ripping a $12 trillion stock market

International News
Jack Ma is riding high this week. Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., the company he founded, has won approval to forge ahead with a Hong Kong share sale that could raise at least $10 billion. On Monday, China’s largest e-commerce company logged more than $38.3 billion of purchases during its annual Singles’ Day shopping event, a new record.
The rest of China’s retail sector hasn't been so lucky. Just as shoppers were placing gadgets in their carts, investors were selling their consumer stocks. In two days, Gree Electric Appliances Inc. of Zhuhai and peer Midea Group Co. tumbled 7.4% and 6.2%. That’s despite electronics companies notching a 30% rise in sales this Singles’ Day.
What explains the selloff?
Blame Jack the Ripper. He’s killing the most beloved trade in China’s $12 trillion stock market: a bet on consumers. The retail sector, excluding cars, has been remarkably resilient this year.
Now Alibaba’s Singles’ Day has kicked off a price war. Over the weekend, Gree announced it would forgo 3 billion yuan ($427.5 million) in profit just to please China’s lonesome hearts. Its air conditioners sold for as little as 1,399 yuan, a 42% discount, both online and at the company’s thousands of retail outlets. China’s biggest electronics makers have been caught in a three-way race, so it’s little surprise that rivals from Midea to Haier Electronics Group Co. quickly followed suit.
Investors were already looking at Monday’s stellar statistics with suspicion, after an alarming report over the weekend that producer prices fell again in October. Call it bad timing — blockbuster sales on the heels of dour economic data. It’s also a stern reminder that deflation still grips broad swathes of the economy.

There are good reasons to like consumer stocks. They are a bet on China’s rising middle class. Companies like Gree and Midea are also highly profitable, both notching a return on equity of more than 25%. This may not last much longer, however, with falling prices spreading through China’s manufacturing sector. A full-blown price war that erodes these companies’ profitability seems inevitable. ...READ MORE

Chinese students flee Hong Kong as campuses turn into battlegrounds

International News
Having fled Hong Kong universities they had thought were a ticket to success, Chinese students from the mainland sit in hostels and noodle shops in the neighbouring city of Shenzhen wondering how they'll complete their studies.
With campuses turned into blazing battlegrounds, courses cancelled and anti-China sentiment growing more virulent, students from mainland China are getting out of Hong Kong with little idea if they will ever go back.
"It's really just not safe any more and I don't see it getting any better," said one twentysomething student leaning on a suitcase outside a restaurant in Shenzhen, which abuts Hong Kong.
Fears intensified this week because of a widely circulated video of a mainland student being beaten by protesters at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Anger boiled over there following after the death of a student who fell from a car park as police used teargas against protesters.
"The discrimination towards mainlanders is growing worse," said 22-year-old Frank, a postgraduate student who had just left the university for Shenzhen. "They're so prejudiced towards us mainlanders and that's not going to change, so why go back?" Before anti-government protests erupted in Hong Kong more than five months ago, there were some 12,000 students among more than one million mainland Chinese living in Hong Kong, according to official figures.
The pace of departures accelerated this week as intensifying violence turned campuses into nightmarish scenes of blazing petrol bombs and swirling teargas.

Dozens of mainland students from the Chinese University of Hong Kong were so fearful they called police and fled by police boat from a dock near the Sha Tin campus on Wednesday to avoid having to use roads blockaded by black clad protesters....READ MORE

Sharif rejects Pak govt's conditional permission to travel UK for treatment

International News
Pakistan's ailing former prime minister Nawaz Sharif on Wednesday refused to meet Imran Khan government's demand to submit indemnity bonds worth Rs 700 crores for travel to the UK for medical treatment, saying it was "illegal" and denounced attempts to politicise his health.
On Tuesday, Pakistan Cabinet decided to allow 69-year-old Sharif to go to the UK for medical treatment if the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supremo agrees to sign surety bonds making a commitment that he would return after the treatment and face corruption cases against him.
The Cabinet meeting, chaired by Prime Minister Khan, approved removal of Sharif's name from the no-fly list (Exit Control List-ECL).
"We have categorically told the government that Sharif would not submit any indemnity bonds worth Rs 7 billion (Rs 700 crores) to the government for removing his name from the no-fly list enabling his departure for London for his treatment," a PML-N leader quoted Sharif as saying.
"Nawaz Sharif said the government demand is illegal and can't be met in the presence of the court guarantees." Nawaz also showed his annoyance over the government's 'tactics' to politicise the issue of his health.
"The government cannot hold another court of its own on the earlier decision of the Islamabad High Court that granted Sharif eight weeks bail on medical grounds," the PML-N leader told PTI, adding the Sharif family may move the court for removal of his name from the ECL if the government did not decide in his favour on Wednesday.
"If something happens to Sharif , Imran Khan and company will be responsible as he is critical and government is using the opportunity for their dirty politics," he said.

According to his party an air ambulance is arriving in Lahore on Wednesday to shift him to London if the government removes his name from the ECL.....READ MORE

Nita Ambani named to the board of New York-based Metropolitan Museum of Art

International News
Nita Ambani, philanthropist and wife of Asia’s richest person, was named to the board of the largest U.S. art museum after years of supporting exhibitions at the New York City institution.
Ambani’s backing “has had an enormous impact on the museum’s ability to study and display art from every corner of the world,” Daniel Brodsky, the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s chairman, said Tuesday in a statement.
The wife of Mukesh Ambani, chairman of refining-to-telecom giant Reliance Industries Ltd, has been promoting Indian art and culture around the world along with sports and development programs inside the country as the head of the conglomerate’s foundation. Nita Ambani, 57, was elected to become an honorary trustee of the museum, according to the statement.
The 149-year-old Metropolitan museum draws billionaires, celebrities and millions of visitors a year to see art spanning 5,000 years from around the world. The not-for-profit institution reported revenue, support and transfers of $384.7 million in 2018 at the operating level, down from $385.3 million the previous year, according to its annual report.
“The Met enables Indian art to be shown at an iconic institution and further encourages us to continue our work in the art world,” Nita Ambani said in a 2017 statement from the museum.
Bloomberg Philanthropies, which along with Bloomberg LP is owned by Michael Bloomberg, helps fund the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Mukesh Ambani, the world’s 14th-richest person and Asia’s wealthiest, had a net worth of about $55 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.....READ MORE