Washington (CNN)The US Navy sailed a warship through the Taiwan Strait Wednesday, a move that came on the same day Beijing warned that it would not rule out using force against self-governed Taiwan to block any move toward formal independence.
The "USS Antietam conducted a routine Taiwan Strait transit July 24-25 (local time) in accordance with international law," Cdr. Clay Doss, a spokesman for the US Navy's Seventh Fleet, told CNN in a statement
"The ships' transit through the Taiwan Strait demonstrates the US commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific," he added, saying "The US Navy will continue to fly, sail and operate anywhere international law allows."
San Juan (AFP) - Puerto Ricans waved flags and danced to thumping drum beats Thursday as they celebrated the resignation of the US territory's governor, who is embroiled in a scandal over homophobic and misogynistic messages he and his aides exchanged.
After staying up to welcome Ricardo Rossello's midnight announcement on Facebook that he would step down on August 2, hundreds headed into the streets of San Juan to express their jubilation.
The announcement -- which Rossello put into writing Thursday -- capped two weeks of popular anger against the 40-year old leader.
Rossello is to be replaced by justice secretary Wanda Vazquez, who is considered close to the governor.
U.S. Army Gen. Mark Milley testifies before a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on his nomination to be chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, July 11, 2019. Reuters
* Four-star Army Gen. Mark Milley was confirmed on Thursday as the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. * Milley will take over the new post, which is President Donald Trump's senior uniformed military adviser, on October 1.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The US Senate voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to confirm four-star Army General Mark Milley as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, President Donald Trump's most senior uniformed military adviser.
The vote was 89-1 for Milley, now the Army Chief of Staff, to replace Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford. Democratic Senator Jeff Merkley was the only dissenting vote.
Milley, 61, served in Iraq, Afghanistan and in other countries before becoming the Army's top officer in August 2015.
An unarmed Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile launches during an operational test at 2:42 A.M. Pacific Time May 1, 2019, at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. (U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Aubree Milks)
WASHINGTON — Boeing has announced its withdrawal from the $85 billion Ground Based Strategic Deterrent competition, potentially leaving Northrop Grumman as the only contender vying to replace the Air Force's Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles.
"After numerous attempts to resolve concerns within the procurement process, Boeing has informed the Air Force that it will not bid Ground Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD) Engineering and Manufacturing Development (EMD) under the current acquisition approach," reads a Boeing statement. "We've evaluated these issues extensively, and determined that the current acquisition approach does not provide a level playing field for fair competition."
The service is hoping to move very quickly after that to reach initial operational capability with the new bombers in the mid-2020s.
The U.S. Air Force's new B-21 Raider stealth bomber, which Northrop Grumman has been developing in extreme secrecy, is set to make its first flight on or about Dec. 3, 2021. The service had already previously revealed that the bombers would undergo their initial testing at Edwards Air Force Base in California and that it will base the first operational examples at Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota in the mid-2020s.
Air Force Magazine was first to announce the date on Twitter, citing U.S. Air Force Vice Chief of Staff General Stephen Wilson, who was speaking at an event that the Air Force Association's Mitchell Institute was hosting in Washington, D.C., on July 24, 2019. Wilson says he has a countdown feature on his wristwatch that says there are around 863 days left before the first flight, which gives the December 2021 date.
GERMANY is veering towards a full-blown recession, with a leading German think-tank warning the confidence in the country's economy went into "freefall" in July amid concerns about the impact of global trade conflict and US President Donald Trump's protectionist approach.
FRANCE is ready to fight Boris Johnson to maintain access to UK waters as the threat of no deal Brexit rises. French Agriculture Minister Didier Guillaume said there was no reason French fishermen should be blocked from UK waters, and laid the foundations for a battle with Mr Johnson.
YANIS VAROUFAKIS shockingly claimed the break up of the eurozone will not be because of crisis-hit Greece or Italy but because of Germany, as Berlin will be the first country to drop out the bloc and print Deutsche Marks.
NEW Prime Minister Boris Johnson must quickly get to grips with the crisis in the Gulf after the seizure by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard of the UK-flagged Stena Impero - and that is likely to mean entering into a partnership with European nations, even though Brexit is looming, former diplomat Lord David Hannay has said.
SPAIN is heading for its fourth general election in as many years after the country's parliament rejected Pedro Sanchez's bid to be confirmed as prime minister.
A SOVIET submarine sneaked into NATO waters and was hiding deep below enemy territory when it suffered a shocking event that saw nuclear radiation proliferate the hull – threatening a World War 3 scenario.
Standing at the top of a staircase, a young man addresses a couple of thousand anti-government demonstrators.
“Our protest today is peaceful and elegant, right?” he asks. His voice reverberates across the park where the protesters are gathered and prompts a resounding chorus of agreement: “We are the most elegant protestors in the world!”
The street protests that have rocked Hong Kong in recent weeks have been mostly leaderless. Protestors don masks and use online aliases to conceal their identities. They organize themselves via the encrypted messaging app Telegram and exchange information via mass Airdrops. But Ventus Lau is slowly rising from the sea of black-shirted anonymity.
The 25-year-old is quick to disavow any sort of leadership role — “I just see myself as a coordinator,” he tells TIME. He emphasizes that he is no different to other protesters, who are united by their youth and opposition to what they see as China’s encroachment on the former British colony’s political freedoms. But he has organized two major rallies and thanks to television, he’s becoming a recognizable face.
Lau was born in Hong Kong to working class parents and raised in a public housing project. The furthest he traveled during his childhood was by train to the southern Chinese city of Guilin, a little over 500 kilometers away. He didn’t set foot on a plane until he turned 18. Culturally, he was raised on a diet of movies and pop music in Cantonese — the language spoken in Hong Kong, which is mutually incomprehensible with the Mandarin spoken in mainland China. In short, his youth was typical of Hongkongers of his age and background.
So is his mistrust of Beijing, which developed early. He recalls taking part in protests while still in high school — against a high-speed rail link connecting the enclave with the rest of China. Proponents of the link argued that it was beneficial to the local economy to put Beijing within nine hours of Hong Kong via bullet train. Detractors saw the project as tying semi-autonomous Hong Kong too closely to China and argued that the $10.8 billion spent building the link would have been better spent locally.
“I discovered then that the Hong Kong political system is an unjust system,” he says. “There are representatives [of the elite in the legislature] who oppose all the good suggestions from the public. It’s necessary to change our political system, otherwise Hong Kong people will never be the owners of this city.”
Lau’s political sensibilities were honed in university, where he read Chinese literature and headed up a so-called “localist” organization, dedicated to the promotion of greater autonomy for Hong Kong. But it wasn’t long before politics became more important than his studies. He dropped out to become an assistant to local councilors, organizing events, drafting letters to government departments, and fielding queries from residents. He also became the convenor of a grassroots community organization. Lau took to the work — so much so that he ran for a seat in Hong Kong’s legislature in 2018, hoping to replace the ousted candidate of a localist party.
The outcome of his candidacy was a political reality check. A month into the campaign, he was disqualified on the grounds that he had previously showed support for an independent Hong Kong on his Facebook page. Authorities said his separatist views counter to Hong Kong’s Basic Law, the mini constitution that has governed the territory since it was retroceded to China in 1997.
Dejected, Lau moved back home to live with his parents, who told him it was “time he found a real job.” He got work as a freelance debate tutor to high school students, training the next generation in the rhetorical skills they would need to navigate an increasingly politicized and polarized society.
“As a debate tutor, you encourage students to contribute their own strengths to the team,” he says, adding that when the current round of Hong Kong protests began in June, he brought exactly these skills to coordinating demonstrators, among them skilled designers, translators and lawyers who volunteered their time for the movement.
Kyle Lam/Bloomberg via Getty Images Ventus Lau (C) leads a march to deliver letters to local G-20 consulates urging global intervention against a proposed extradition bill in Hong Kong, China, on Wednesday, June 26, 2019.
‘Young people have a feeling of hopelessness’
The government’s attempt, earlier this year, to introduce a bill that would have allowed extradition to China for the first time sparked massive demonstrations — and Lau’s return to politics after a brief hiatus. Like many in Hong Kong, he feared that the bill would be used by Beijing to apprehend not fugitive criminals but dissidents and political opponents. He took to the streets and was in his element.
When several large scale demonstrations failed to persuade the government to formally withdraw the bill — organizers claim that as many as two million people participated in a march on June 16 — Lau took it upon himself to organize different kinds of protests to keep the momentum going. The first was a march on the consulates of G20 nations in Hong Kong, ahead of the G20 summit on Osaka in June. At each consulate, protesters handed over a letter soliciting foreign support in their push for greater freedoms. The second, on July 7, was a march through a shopping district popular with visitors from mainland China, when he addressed a crowd that numbered in the tens of thousands. The idea behind the march was to make the tourists aware of Hong Kong’s plight — the first time that protesters had tried to reach out to their mainland compatriots.
Lau hoped to mobilize higher participation through this different approach. Protesters, he says, “might think, ‘Oh, this is something we haven’t tried before, so I should come out this time because maybe it will work.'”
Over the past month, Hong Kong’s protests have evolved beyond the issue of extradition into demands for wider political reform. Echoing the core demand of the the 2014 pro-democracy push known as the Umbrella Revolution, demonstrators are demanding for the city’s top official to be elected by universal suffrage instead of the present electoral college of mostly pro-Beijing figures. Some demonstrators are calling for self-determination for Hong Kong — even independence.
Wong Yiu Ching, an adjunct professor at Lingnan University, says Lau’s generation of activists has a “natural sense of justice” and has come to the “conclusion that China is a totalitarian regime, compared with Hong Kong which is at least a partial democracy.”
Antony Dapiran, a Hong Kong-based lawyer and author of City of Protest: A Recent History of Dissent in Hong Kong, believes the protests are emblematic of people’s deep-seated frustrations at their political system. “The underlying issue in the city is the lack of democracy. Until that’s addressed, this cycle of protests will continue,” he says.
Others point out that discontent will persist so long as economic opportunities remain limited for many of Hong Kong’s people. The city consistently tops lists of the world’s most expensive places to live in. Soaring property prices, alongside stagnant salaries, mean that young people cannot avail themselves of what previous generations considered a birthright: the chance to buy a small flat, flip it, and move up the social ladder.
“Young people have a feeling of hopelessness about the city and the future,” Ip Iam-chong, an assistant professor at Lingnan University, says. “It’s much harder now to achieve upward social mobility, to own an apartment or to have a middle class way of life than before.”
Lau currently spends a lot of time at his girlfriend’s tiny, 250 sq. ft. home, which costs about $1,700 a month to rent in the gentrifying neighborhood of Prince Edward. They plan to move into a bigger place together, “but first, we’d need money,” he says. On the way, he passes dozens of street food stalls and hawkers touting everything from handbags to smartphone accessories, and takes a couple of wrong turns before confessing he’s not good with directions. “I can say that of my life, too” he says with a rueful chuckle.
When it comes to politics, however, he is anything but directionless. Over a lunch of leftover noodles in his girlfriend’s apartment, he ceaselessly trawls messages from protesters, while Kiwi, his favorite cat of the seven that his girlfriend owns, purrs at his feet. There is plenty to do before a protest at the weekend.
TIME joins him for the rally, which takes place in Sheung Shui — a northern town that localists say has been overrun by mainland Chinese traders and needs to be “reclaimed” for Hongkongers. Plenty of people recognize him. University friends come up to chat, as do his political contacts and his high school English teacher. “I’ve seen you on TV!” she says, before offering words of encouragement.
Then, a local reporter grabs him for an interview. Lau is his usual modest self and after offering some thoughts on what the next steps of the movement might be, falls right back in line with the crowd with evident relief. He would rather be just another face in a sea of protestors.
“The power of the collective will always be stronger than of one person,” Lau says. “That’s what we all believe.”
And that may be true. But sometimes one person can help the collective realize just how powerful it can be.
—Additional reporting by Aria Hangyu Chen / Hong Kong
Clutching binoculars and clad in a periwinkle suit, North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un watched the launch of two new missiles into the Sea of Japan Thursday, the latest display of military might that threatens to derail the Trump Administration’s much-vaunted rapprochement with the secretive state.
Described by Pyongyang as a “solemn warning” against “South Korean warmongers,” the short-range missiles appear to have been launched from mobile platforms off North Korea’s eastern coastal city of Wonsan, and come just days after Kim was seen inspecting a new submarine that experts say could represent a significant advancement of the rogue regime’s military clout.
Kim said Seoul should “not make a mistake of ignoring the warning” of the missile tests, which appear to be prompted by the resumption of—albeit scaled back—joint military drills between the U.S. and South Korea next month. One of the missiles traveled 428 miles (690 km), according to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The launches were the first since Kim and President Donald Trump met for the third time, on June 30, at the demilitarized zone (DMZ) that separates the Korean peninsula’s communist North from its democratic South.
The State Department urged Pyongyang to refrain from further provocations. But the tests highlight the lack of meaningful progress on reining in North Korea’s nuclear and missile program despite the bromance that’s blossomed between Trump and Kim since their first meeting in Singapore in June 2018.
Despite a flurry of obsequious letters and platitudes from both sides—Trump even bragged that the two leaders “fell in love”—the “underlying positions are in some ways exactly the same as they were back in 2017,” says Scott Snyder, a Korea expert at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Although the latest tests do not breach North Korea’ self-declared moratorium on testing nuclear weapons or intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs)—a red line the Trump administration says would derail negations—they do demonstrate the regime’s upward trajectory regarding technological advancement and building stockpiles.
Kim said the latest test involved a new tactical guided weapons system. Its “low-altitude gliding and leaping flight” made it “hard to intercept.” Trump has yet to comment on the latest test, though said earlier launches in May were not “anything major,” despite the same mobile launch technology easing the regime’s ability to hide such rockets, which could carry a nuclear payload, in secret tunnels and armories away from weapons inspectors. New satellite imagery also indicates continued uranium enrichment at the Yongbyon nuclear plant.
“This is the big problem with having a showman, reality TV star running the American side, because he doesn’t actually know anything about what’s negotiated,” says Robert Kelly, professor of political science and diplomacy at Pusan National University. “Every couple of months, whenever Trump had some meeting, it’s like, where’s the beef?”
Analysts have also expressed concern that Kim is upping pressure on Trump to grant concessions, mindful that a denuclearization deal would boost the real estate mogul’s 2020 reelection campaign. The DMZ meeting, for example, “was driven by near-term transactional needs on both sides,” says Snyder. “But Kim Jong Un is operating on a different timeline from Trump, which gives Kim a potential serious advantage in terms of an outcome.”
While the relationship between Trump and Kim remains rosy, North Korea has not followed through when negotiators, like Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, take over to handle the detail of denuclearization. The latest tests also coincided with national security adviser John Bolton, the most hawkish member of the Trump Administration regarding Pyonygang, meeting with South Korean officials in Seoul to discuss strengthening their alliance.
In addition, and aside from the looming joint drills, Seoul has in recent months begun taking ownership of some the 40 F-35A stealth jets ordered from U.S. weapons firm Lockheed Martin.
Kim Dong-yub, director of research at Kyungnam University’s Institute for Far Eastern Studies, told NK News that Pyongyang probably saw justification for “tit-for-tat measures” in light of these actions. “North Korea can furtively put pressure on the U.S. without spoiling the atmosphere for dialogue,” he said.
There is, of course, a flipside. Kelly suggests that Kim risks overreaching if he continues to dial up provocations. The famously capricious Trump has offered more concessions than any U.S. President in living memory, agreeing to the first summit between the sitting leaders of these long-time adversaries, talking of signing a peace deal and reestablishing diplomatic relations, as well as postponing joint military drills for a time. It’s unlikely Kim will ever face so good an opportunity to seal a historic deal with Washington.
“Trump’s given away the farm, right?” says Kelly. “Whoever comes in after him is almost certainly going to be more hawkish on North Korea.”
Google and Facebook Inc. are facing a regulatory crackdown in Australia after an inquiry highlighted concerns about their market power and impact on the media industry, adding to a barrage of global action against the technology giants.
A final report from Australia’s competition watchdog released on Friday called for greater anti-trust scrutiny of the dominant U.S. tech companies, recommending penalties and deterrents be imposed for inappropriate storage and use of personal data and breaches of consumer and competition laws.
“The world has never before seen so much commercially sensitive and personal data collected and aggregated in just two companies,” Treasurer Josh Frydenberg told reporters in Sydney. The government will announce what recommendations in the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission report that it will support through new regulation by the end of the year, he said.
The recommendations continue years-long attempts by regulators worldwide to loosen the companies’ grip on everything from advertising and search engines, to news, data and elections. The European Union has fined Google 8.2 billion euros ($9.1 billion) over the past two years for antitrust violations, while on Wednesday Facebook agreed to a $5 billion settlement in the U.S. over privacy concerns.
Facebook faces a slew of regulatory investigations and potential antitrust scrutiny in its home country, and on Thursday the Federal Trade Commission said it’s investigating whether the company violated antitrust laws through social media, digital advertising and mobile applications.
The ACCC’s report released Friday lays bare the control that Alphabet Inc.-owned Google and Facebook, the country’s most-visited websites, exert over Australia’s 25 million-strong population.
The 23 recommendations delivered in the ACCC’s final report include making unfair contract terms illegal, updating merger laws to recognize the importance of data and creating code-of-conduct laws for media companies.
“Our legislative and regulatory framework could not and did not anticipate such a new paradigm,” Frydenberg said, adding that the government accepts the report’s conclusion on the need of industry reform and will hold a 12-week consultation process before announcing its response.
The watchdog said in a preliminary version of the report in December that at least 94% of online searches in Australia go through Google. And each month, 17 million locals access Facebook, 17 million watch Google-owned YouTube, and 11 million access Instagram, which is owned by Facebook.
Facebook and Instagram together draw about 46% of Australian display advertising revenue. No other website or application has more than 5%, according to the ACCC.
The watchdog has expressed concern about a lack of transparency in how key algorithms function at Google and Facebook, and said a new or existing watchdog should investigate how large digital platforms rank and display adverts and news. The regulator said the companies’ advertising dominance had led to cuts at traditional publishers, and fewer journalists working to expose corruption and hold governments and institutions to account.
U.S. lawmakers have lambasted Facebook for failing to stop a flood of Russian propaganda during the 2016 election, while President Donald Trump has repeatedly complained about supposed bias against conservatives at social media companies and has said the U.S. government should sue Google and Facebook for unspecified wrongdoing.
Social media companies have also come under fire for allowing violent and extremist material to spread too easily after the New Zealand mosque massacres in March were live-streamed on Facebook. G-20 leaders meeting in Osaka in June called for online platforms to do more to prevent and detect such content.
(SEOUL, South Korea) — A day after two North Korean missile launches rattled Asia, the nation announced Friday that its leader Kim Jong Un supervised a test of a new-type tactical guided weapon that was meant to be a “solemn warning” about South Korean weapons introduction and its rival’s plans to hold military exercises with the United States.
The message in the country’s state media quoted Kim and was directed at “South Korean military warmongers.” It comes as U.S. and North Korean officials struggle to set up talks after a recent meeting on the Korean border between Kim and President Donald Trump seemed to provide a step forward in stalled nuclear negotiations.
Although the North had harsh words for South Korea, the statement stayed away from the kind of belligerent attacks on the United States that have marked past announcements, a possible signal that it’s interested in keeping diplomacy alive.
It made clear, however, that North Korea is infuriated over Seoul’s purchase of U.S.-made high-tech fighter jets and U.S.-South Korean plans to hold military drills this summer that the North says are rehearsals for an invasion and proof of the allies’ hostility to Pyongyang.
After watching the weapons’ launches, Kim said they are “hard to intercept” because of the “low-altitude gliding and leaping flight orbit of the tactical guided missile,” according to the Korean Central News Agency. He was quoted as saying the possession of “such a state-of-the-art weaponry system” is of “huge eventful significance” in bolstering his country’s armed forces and guaranteeing national security.
South Korean officials said Thursday the weapons North Korea fired were a new type of a short-range ballistic missile and that a detailed analysis is necessary to find out more about the missiles. But many civilian experts say the weapons are likely a North Korean version of the Russian-made Iskander, a short-range, nuclear-capable ballistic missile that has been in the Russian arsenal for more than a decade.
That missile is designed to fly at a flattened-out altitude of around 40 kilometers (25 miles) and make in-flight guidance adjustments. Both capabilities exploit weaknesses in the U.S. and South Korean missile defenses that are now in place, primarily Patriot missile batteries and the THAAD anti-missile defense system. The Iskander is also quicker to launch and harder to destroy on the ground, because of its solid fuel engine. It advanced guidance system also makes it more accurate.
The launches were the first known weapons tests by North Korea in more than two months. When North Korea fired three missiles into the sea in early May, many outside experts also said at the time those weapons strongly resembled the Iskander.
The North Korean message Friday was gloating at times, saying the test “must have given uneasiness and agony to some targeted forces enough as it intended.”
KCNA accused South Korea of “running high fever in their moves to introduce the ultramodern offensive weapons.”
North Korea likely referred to South Korea’s purchase and ongoing deployment of U.S.-made F-35 fighter jets. Earlier this month, North Korea said it would develop and test “special weapons” to destroy the aircraft. Under its biggest weapons purchase, South Korea is to buy 40 F-35 fighter jets from Lockheed Martin by 2021. The first two arrived in March and two others are to be delivered in coming weeks.
South Korea’s presidential office and the Defense Ministry condemned the North Korean launches, saying they are not “helpful to efforts to ease military tensions on the Korean Peninsula.”
North Korea is banned by U.N. Security Council resolutions from engaging in any launch using ballistic technology. While the North could face international condemnation over the latest launches, it’s unlikely that the nation, already under 11 rounds of U.N. sanctions, will be hit with fresh punitive measures. The U.N. council has typically imposed new sanctions only when the North conducted long-range ballistic launches.
North Korea has been urging the U.S. and South Korea to scrap their military drills. Last week, it said it may lift its 20-month suspension of nuclear and long-range missile tests in response. Seoul said Wednesday that North Korea was protesting the drills by refusing to accept its offer to send 50,000 tons of rice through an international agency.
North Korea also may be trying to get an upper hand ahead of a possible resumption of nuclear talks. Pyongyang wants widespread sanctions relief so it can revive its dilapidated economy. U.S. officials demand North Korea first take significant steps toward disarmament before they will relinquish the leverage provided by the sanctions.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for the swift resumption of talks between the United States and North Korea following the new missile launches.
China, the North’s last major ally and biggest aid provider, said both Washington and Pyongyang should restart their nuclear diplomacy as soon as possible.
“North Korea appears to be thinking its diplomacy with the U.S. isn’t proceeding in a way that they want. So they’ve fired missiles to get the table to turn in their favor,” said analyst Kim Dae-young at the Korea Research Institute for National Strategy.
Swedish authorities formally charged A$AP Rocky with assault on Thursday, meaning the American rapper now awaits trial for a crime that could land him in prison for up to two years. The charge comes despite efforts by President Donald Trump to “#FreeRocky,” which included calling Sweden’s Prime Minister to intervene on the musician’s behalf.
Trump quickly signaled his disappointment in a tweet Thursday, saying that “Sweden has let our African American Community down in the United States.”
Very disappointed in Prime Minister Stefan Löfven for being unable to act. Sweden has let our African American Community down in the United States. I watched the tapes of A$AP Rocky, and he was being followed and harassed by troublemakers. Treat Americans fairly! #FreeRocky
Give A$AP Rocky his FREEDOM. We do so much for Sweden but it doesn’t seem to work the other way around. Sweden should focus on its real crime problem! #FreeRocky
The U.S. State Department said Thursday that it was “following the case closely.”
The rapper, whose real name is Rakim Mayers, was first detained about three weeks ago, and was charged alongside two other individuals after a fight broke out in Stockholm. The two other people were described as part of his entourage, the Associated Press reported. The Grammy-nominated artist was in Sweden to perform at a music festival. An alleged victim in the case was also charged initially, but an investigation into him has since been dropped. Prosecutors had originally listed two individuals as victims, but later said they only had sufficient evidence to pursue charges for one victim.
Snippets of the incident were captured on camera and posted online.
A defense attorney representing A$AP Rocky has said the incident was an act of self-defense, the Associated Press reported. The rapper also posted a video on his Instagram that appears to show two men trailing him and one of them hitting his security person with his headphones.
A$AP Rocky had told the two men in the video: “We don’t want to fight you all, we’re not trying to go to jail.” He later addressed the camera, saying, “We don’t want no problems with these boys. They keep following us.”
Prosecutors say there is more to the story.
“It is worth noting that I have had access to a greater amount of material than that which has previously been available on the internet,” Daniel Suneson, a public prosecutor working on the A$AP Rocky case, said in an online statement Thursday. “In addition to video material, the injured party’s statements have been supported by witness statements.”
Suneson added that he would press charges “despite claims of self-defense and provocation.”
A$AP Rocky is expected to be in court next Tuesday for what is scheduled to be a three-day hearing ending on Friday.
If convicted, the rapper will likely face a prison sentence that lasts closer to three to five months, Dennis Martinsson, a senior law lecturer at Stockholm University who has frequently spoken about the case for Swedish media, tells TIME. “That’s what would be in line with other similar cases,” he also says, adding that he would be shocked if the prison terms were anywhere close to or more than a year.
It is highly unlikely that the judge would deliver a final verdict by the end of next week. The court has within three weeks from the last day of the hearing to weigh in on a defendant’s guilt, Martinsson explains.
During this time, the rapper will probably remain in a detention center.
But even before a formal judgment is made, the court may choose to release Rocky. That usually only happens in cases in which the court is already leaning toward a not guilty verdict or the charge is minor in nature, according to Martinsson.
Sweden does not have a bail system, which is why the rapper was detained with no way to get out even before he was formally charged. However, Sweden does have a parole system. Prisoners typically get parole after completing two-thirds of their sentence, Martinsson says.
Last week, Trump tweeted that “he would personally vouch for his bail,” despite Sweden having no bail system. Martinsson also says he considers Trump’s tweets on the situation “misinformation and misunderstanding.”
Just had a very good call with @SwedishPM Stefan Löfven who assured me that American citizen A$AP Rocky will be treated fairly. Likewise, I assured him that A$AP was not a flight risk and offered to personally vouch for his bail, or an alternative….
“For one, we don’t have a bail system. Secondly, it seems from the tweet that he wanted to try and convince the Swedish Prime Minister to intervene with the case. But according to our constitution, all of our ministers — even the Prime Minister — cannot even comment or state anything about an individual case,” Martinsson says. “If they would do so, it would be grounds for impeachment.”
Martinsson says he believes a big reason for the disconnect between how Swedes and Americans have interpreted the A$AP Rocky case is that politicians in the U.S. assume that their Swedish counterparts can intervene.
“They can’t. They’re strictly forbidden,” Martinsson says. “The constitution clearly states that.”
That may explain why Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven was quick to resist Trump’s earlier pleas. Löfven said through a spokesperson after speaking with Trump that “everyone is equal before the law and that the government cannot and will not attempt to influence the legal proceedings,” the Associated Press previously reported.
Even Anne Ramberg, secretary-general of the Swedish Bar Association, tells TIME it would be completely “out of line” for the Prime Minister to interfere.
Ramberg adds that when Swedish prosecutors decide to prosecute, about 90 to 95 percent of those cases end in a conviction.
“That’s because even the prosecutors have to be not only independent but objective before they go to court,” Ramberg says. “They have to take into account all the circumstances, even those in favor of the accused.”
The A$AP Rocky case has sparked a broader discussion in Sweden about the detention system. The Swedish Bar Association has been “very critical” in the past against detaining prisoners for long periods of time — sometimes years — without any formal charge. Sweden has also been criticized by the U.N. and the European Union for its policy.
Still, both Ramberg and Martinsson say this is a legitimate but separate issue to the A$AP Rocky case. They say he received “standard” treatment for a person who does not live in Sweden, and could therefore be considered a flight risk. They also dismiss any notion that this was about racism.
The scuffle in Stockholm had quickly turned into an international incident, drawing the attention of high-level politicians and celebrities, including Kim Kardashian West, who indicated that she lobbied the White House to secure the musician’s release.
Thank you @realDonaldTrump , @SecPompeo, Jared Kushner & everyone involved with the efforts to Free ASAP Rocky & his two friends. Your commitment to justice reform is so appreciated 🙏🏼🤞🏼 https://t.co/Ym1Rzo5Z6c
— Kim Kardashian West (@KimKardashian) July 18, 2019
Even Justin Bieber made his voice heard with a bold tweet, commenting on both A$AP Rocky and the border crisis.
I want my friend out.. I appreciate you trying to help him. But while your at it @realDonaldTrump can you also let those kids out of cages?
“We are observing weather since 1833 and we never experienced these kind of temperatures,” David Dehenauw, chief forecaster at the Royal Meteorological Institute of Belgium, told the BBC.
The Netherlands experienced record high temperatures of 39.4ºC (102.9ºF) on Thursday. Germany’s weather service said temperatures there had also risen to a new record high on Thursday, with the mercury hitting 41.5ºC (106.7ºF) in the northern town of Lingen, breaching the previous high set earlier in the day. Belgium, too, recorded its highest-ever temperature this week, hitting 40.2ºC (104.4ºF) close to the city of Liege on Wednesday.
Paris also broke its all-time record temperatures on Thursday, when national meteorological service Meteo France recorded 41ºC (105.8ºF) at 1:42 p.m. local time. Other French cities, including Lille, Rouen, and Dijon, were also expected to break their temperature records on Thursday. France recorded its all-time highest temperature — 45.9ºC (114.6ºF) — in June in Gallargues-le-Montueux, a town in the southeastern part of the country.
Thursday was the hottest July day on record in the United Kingdom, where temperatures reached 38.1ºC (100.5ºF) in Cambridge at 3:37 p.m. local time, according to the Met Office, the United Kingdom’s national weather service. That was just short of the U.K.’s all-time high temperature of 38.5ºC (101.3ºF). Similarly high temperatures were also recorded in west London, where the thermometer reached 37.9ºC (100.2ºF).
More record temperatures were expected to be hit later in the day in cities across Europe.
It’s difficult to scientifically link any specific weather event to climate change, experts say. But meteorologists and others generally agree that climate change is causing more extreme weather events of all kinds across the world.
“High pressure over Europe has brought a lot of sunny weather which, combined with hot air coming up from North Africa, has led to the heat wave across Europe,” Alex Burkill, a meteorologist at the Met Office, tells TIME about Europe’s latest heat wave.
“It is not possible to link any spell of hot weather to man-made climate change, categorically,” he adds. “However, the average U.K. summer temperature between 2008-2017 has risen by 0.7ºC when compared with the period 1961-1990. This rise makes the possibility of extreme heat events more likely than before.”
On a recent Tuesday, Neal Fachan walked down a dock in Seattle’s Lake Union and boarded a blue and yellow Harbour Air seaplane, alongside six other tech executives. He was bound for Vancouver to check on the Canadian office of Qumulo, the Seattle-based cloud storage company he co-founded in 2012. With no security lines, it was an easy 50-minute flight past snow-capped peaks. Later that day, Fachan caught a return flight back to Seattle.
Fachan began making his monthly Instagram-worthy commute when Qumulo opened its Vancouver office in January. Other passengers on the seaplanes go back and forth multiple times a week. Fachan says his company expanded across the border because Canada’s immigration policies have made it far easier to hire skilled foreign workers there compared to the United States. “We require a very specific subset of skills, and it’s hard to find the people with the right skills,” Fachan says as he gets off the plane. “Having access to a global employment market is useful.”
In the fractious battle over immigration policy, most of the attention has been directed at apprehending migrants at the southern border. Some tech executives and economists, however, believe that growing delays and backlogs for permits for skilled workers at America’s other borders pose a more significant challenge to the U.S.’s standing as a wealth-creating start-up mecca. The risk of losing out on the fruits of innovation to Canada and other countries that are more welcoming to immigrants might be a bigger problem for our economic future than a flood of refugees. Half of America’s annual GDP growth is attributed to rising innovation.
“Increasingly, talented international professionals choose destinations other than the United States to avoid the uncertain working environment that has resulted directly from the agency’s processing delays and inconsistent adjudications,” testified Marketa Lindt, president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, at a House hearing last week about processing delays at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). Lindt’s organization finds that USCIS processing time for some work permits has doubled since 2014, a fact cited in a May letter signed by 38 U.S. Senators on both sides of the aisle asking USCIS to explain the processing delays.
The backlogs in processing have particularly benefited our neighbor to the north. Canada has adopted an open-armed embrace of skilled programmers, engineers and entrepreneurs at the same time the U.S. is tightening its stance. Research shows that high-skilled foreign workers are highly productive and innovative, and tend to create more new businesses, generating jobs for locals. So each one who winds up in Canada instead of America is a win for the former, and a loss for the latter. “Really smart people can drive economic growth,” says Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a think tank in Washington, D.C. funded in part by cable, pharmaceutical, television, and tech companies. “There are not that many people in the world with an IQ of 130, and to the extent that we’re attracting those people rather than the Canadians doing so, we’re better off.”
With the unemployment rate hovering below at or below four percent for the past 18 months, tech companies are long used to battling for talent by offering $100,000-plus starting salaries and perks like onsite gyms and all the kombucha you can drink. Recruiting foreign talent is one way for them to find new hires. There are a number of ways companies can hire skilled workers from India, China, and other countries, including applying for L-1 and H-1B visas, which allow foreigners to temporarily work in the United States. Demand for these visas, which are awarded by lottery, is intense. Since 2004, 65,000 H-1B visas are issued annually: this year’s ceiling was hit in only four days. (The government allows 20,000 additional visas for workers who have a master’s degree or PhD from a U.S. university.)
Amid the wider crackdown on immigration under the Trump Administration, the application process for employment-based visas appears to have gotten even tougher. The government denied 24% of all initial H-1B applications in 2018, up from six percent in 2015, according to an analysis of data from the National Foundation for American Policy, a pro-immigration think tank. It’s not just H-1B applicants who are experiencing delays. Applicants for all employment-based green cards now have to appear in person at a field office, a new policy that has created long delays, according to the American Immigration Lawyers Association, which says immigration officials under Trump are focusing more on enforcement than on processing legal applications for benefits. And despite a backlog of 5.7 million cases in 2018, USCIS has been providing surge resources to Immigration and Customs Enforcement field offices across the country, diverting more staff away from processing visa applications.
Canada’s policies, in contrast, offer an alluring alternative. Canada permits companies with offices in the country to hire skilled foreign workers in positions such as computer engineers, software designers, and mathematicians, and have their visas processed within two weeks. These workers can soon after apply to be permanent residents and, within three years, become full-fledged citizens. (The path to permanent residency for foreign workers in the U.S., by contrast, can take decades.) Officials at the Canadian consulate in Seattle work with two to three companies a week trying to set up offices in Canada.
“The visa process is just completely unpredictable for us, and we were wrestling with it for so long, we decided we needed to have some certainty,” says Thor Kallestad, the CEO of DataCloud, which uses technology to help mining companies better assess land potential. He already had offices in Silicon Valley and Seattle, but decided to open up shop in Vancouver and close his Silicon Valley office so he could more easily hire foreign workers. “In the U.S., we just couldn’t get clear answers about what the process looked like, what we as a company needed to do to rectify it.”
The Canadian option offers workers more certainty — and a near-guaranteed path to citizenship — while many U.S. skilled workers have no idea when and if they will get approved to stay in the United States. Given the choice, talented entrepreneurs with cutting-edge companies are choosing Canada. “They really make it easy to come in and start a business,” said Nat Cartwright, one of the founders of Finn.AI, an artificial intelligence company that powers virtual assistants for banks around the world. Cartwright and her two business partners, who are from Australia and India, met in business school in Spain. When they graduated, they considered locating their new company in Silicon Valley, but ultimately chose Vancouver because they knew they would qualify for a start-up visa there, and that they would be able to quickly hire AI experts from around the world. Of the company’s 60 workers, 60% were born outside Canada. Seven of Cartwright’s business school classmates from Spain have since relocated to Canada.
Ian Allen for TIMEA Harbour Air crew member prepares for take-off on a seaplane flying from Seattle to Vancouver on July 11. When the Vancouver-Seattle route launched last year, tech companies bought tickets in bulk so their employees could go back and forth between Canada and the United States easily.
Canadian officials have deftly responded to the changing climate in the U.S. In 2017, the Trudeau government announced Global Skills Strategy, the program that allows companies to get work permits for foreign talent in less than two weeks. Their spouses can also receive work permits; the U.S. Department of Homeland Security this year proposed revoking work permits of the spouses of skilled foreign workers in the U.S. In 2018, the Trudeau government also made permanent the Start-Up Visa program, which allows immigrant entrepreneurs to live and work in the country provided their start-up has secured funding from venture capitalists or angel investors. A similar start-up visa program in the United States was approved in the last days of the Obama administration, but the Trump administration is in the process of ending it. “By helping Canadian companies grow, this strategy is creating more jobs for Canada’s middle class and a stronger Canadian economy,” said Ahmed Hussen, Canada’s Somali-born Minister of Immigration, earlier this year.
Even the biggest American tech companies are expanding their Canadian operations in a quest for high-skilled labor. Software engineer Janko Jerinic moved to Canada after attending an Amazon recruiting fair in his home country of Serbia. He wanted a job in New York or Seattle, but his wife hoped to work as well, and an Amazon recruiter said it would be hard for her to get a visa. The recruiter steered the couple to Vancouver, where Jerinic has worked for Amazon since 2015. The office, which opened in 2013, rapidly grew from about 500 people when he started to triple that now. A map in Jerinic’s Vancouver office shows employees’ places of birth. There are hundreds of pins from places like India, Russia, Brazil, and Belgium. But “you have to use a flashlight to find people from Canada,” he jokes. Amazon said in April 2018 that it was building a 416,000 square foot office in downtown Vancouver that will open in 2022; it plans to hire 3,000 more people there.
That technology companies are growing across America’s border has big implications for the U.S. economy. Since World War II, the U.S. has been the epicenter of the entrepreneurial universe. But America’s entrepreneurial dominance is waning. While 95% of global start-up and venture capital activity took place in the United States in the mid-1990s, today it’s about half, according to a report from the Center for American Entrepreneurship (CAE), a nonprofit that advocates for start-ups and is funded by banks and financial institutions. And the number of start-ups still paying employees a year after their founding fell 42% between 2005 and 2015, the most recent year for which there is data available.
The innovation economy creates jobs outside of tech, too. Research by the Berkeley economist Enrico Moretti suggests that every high-paying tech job created in an economy results in five more openings, including positions like lawyers, nurses, and hairdressers. The United States allows about 140,000 immigrant skilled workers to become permanent residents annually; Canada, a company with one-tenth of the population, welcomed 160,000 skilled workers on the track to permanent residency in 2017 and hopes to get that number to nearly 200,000 by 2021. Its goal of making immigrants 1% of its population by 2021 would increase annual GDP growth by 0.6%, with immigrants driving one-third of that expansion, according to a report by the Conference Board of Canada.
Making it easier for high-skilled immigrants in the United States could help jump-start America’s innovation economy, said Ian Hathaway, a Brookings Institution fellow who studies entrepreneurialism and technology. Immigrants are twice as likely as native-born Americans to start businesses. Immigrants or children of immigrants founded almost half of America’s Fortune 500 companies. More immigration could also bring benefits beyond the country’s traditional tech hubs, boosting businesses in the countryside and suburbia that are short on skilled tech talent. Most of the start-up activity that has occurred since the Great Recession has been concentrated in only 20 counties, a startling contrast to the economic recovery of the 1990s, when new businesses were sprinkled across the country.
VannTech, a recruiting platform, recently brought 126 Brazilian workers to a company in the Canadian prairies whose native workers kept moving to Toronto and Vancouver. The platform has 70,000 skilled tech workers looking to relocate to Canada and Europe; it does not help these people go to the United States because the process is too difficult, said Ilya Brotzky, VannHack’s CEO. “If U.S. companies are putting 5,000 tech jobs in Canada, when they could be putting them in places like St. Louis or Indianapolis, that’s a huge deal to those local economies,” says Atkinson.
At the same time, Trump himself has advocated for rethinking the system. In 2017, he backed the Raise Act, a bill introduced by Senate Republicans that would have cut legal immigration in half, while also establishing a points system designed to give priority to skilled workers and investors. While the bill would not have dramatically increased the number of visas available to in-demand workers, it did signal a preference for skilled workers over other migrants. The bill stalled out after opposition from politicians whose constituencies include agriculture and tourism companies, which rely heavily on unskilled immigrants. Trump reintroduced the merit-based immigration idea this year in a Rose Garden speech, and his staff is considering a new immigration plan that would revamp the current system to prioritize skills over family ties. “We want immigrants coming in,” he said in May. “We cherish the open door that we want to create for our country, but a big proportion of those immigrants must come in through merit and skill.”
Harbour Air, the seaplane company, used to fly buyers in and out of remote log booms across the Pacific Northwest. As that business waned, the company pivoted to tourism. Now, pilot Reggie Morisset says that tech industry demand is filling up planes once again. When the Vancouver-Seattle route launched last year, tech companies bought tickets in bulk so their employees could easily go back and forth between Canada and the United States, he said. “It’s catching fire,” he said. “If anything, it is just going to get busier.”
As Sarah Ewart watched from her home in Belfast while U.K. lawmakers voted for a final time to decriminalize abortion in Northern Ireland, she broke down. The news came after a long, difficult struggle for Ewart, and for Northern Ireland where abortion was illegal for over 150 years. Although Northern Ireland is part of the U.K., where abortion is widely available, it has had its own laws on abortion. The Republic of Ireland legalized abortion last year but women north of the border have still been forced to travel in order to access the procedure.
Six years ago when Ewart was 23, she and her partner were told that her pregnancy had a fatal fetal diagnosis, and that her baby would not survive outside the womb. “Once I realized what [the diagnosis] meant, I couldn’t face continuing with the pregnancy knowing that I wouldn’t hold my daughter at the end of it,” Ewart says via email. Deciding to terminate the pregnancy, she says she was shocked to discover that she would not be able to have the procedure in her own hospital because of Northern Ireland’s laws on abortion, which are some of the most restrictive in the world.
Abortion in virtually all circumstances, as well as the purchase of abortion pills and performing an abortion, are criminal offenses and carry a maximum sentence of life imprisonment. (An ongoing high-profile case involves a mother facing a criminal trial for buying abortion pills online for her 15-year-old daughter.) Like Ewart, who currently has a case before Belfast High Court, many Northern Irish women and pregnant people seeking abortions are forced to travel abroad or to other parts of the U.K. for the procedure; government statistics showed 1,053 women travelled in 2018. The latest statistics from 2017/2018 show that over the same time period, only 12 abortions were carried out in Northern Ireland. “I had no option but to board a plane and travel to London,” Ewart says.
That changed this week. On July 24, a bill was signed into law in the U.K. parliament on maintaining public services in Northern Ireland, as it currently does not have a functioning government. Two amendments were tabled to the bill by Labour M.P.s Conor McGinn and Stella Creasy, one to legalize same-sex marriage and the other to liberalize abortion laws. In the weeks leading up to the bill’s passage, M.P.s argued that it was Westminster’s responsibility to intervene to protect the rights of women and pregnant people in Northern Ireland given the absence of a functioning power-staring government in the region.
Northern Ireland has not had a functioning government for more than two years, because of a bitter division between the region’s two elected parties. Just last year the U.K. supreme court and the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women ruled that Northern Ireland’s abortion laws contravened the rights of women. Parliament signed the bill into law containing the amendments, in a victory for campaigners, although what that means in terms of how women in Northern Ireland will be able to access abortions is not yet clear.
“It’s hugely significant and it hopefully will be a message of hope for other countries where there are similarly restrictive abortion bans, particularly in the U.S. where we are seeing a very concerning and rapid rollback on abortion rights,” Grainne Teggart, Amnesty International’s Northern Ireland campaigns manager, says. “In many ways, it’s something ridiculous that in 2019, we are still having to fight for. Finally now we are getting to a place where we will have laws that respect women’s choices and give them the space and the privacy to make their own decisions about their own bodies.”
There are still elements of the law that will need to be ironed out. Abortion will be decriminalized starting October 22, putting an end to prosecutions and cases currently facing trial. But a consultative period will take place until the end of March as authorities establish specific regulations around abortion access and services in Northern Ireland.
For abortion rights campaigners, it’s a significant win that the consultation will focus on “how” services will operate, as opposed to “whether,” given the previous near total ban on abortion. “The fact is that a huge impediment to healthcare has been removed,” says Cara Sanquest, an organizer of the London-Irish Abortion Rights Campaign. “The threat of criminalization is no longer there; the stigma, the silence, the shame, the fear. It will take a while, but it’s a huge barrier that’s been removed.”
Paul Faith —AFP via Getty ImagesNorthern Ireland resident and campaigner Sarah Ewart (C), who after having been diagnosed with a fatal foetal abnormality in 2013 travelled to England for a termination, with her mother stands with her mother Jane Christie (L) and Amnesty International’s Grainne Teggart, as she speaks to members of the media after arriving at Belfast High court in Belfast, on January 30, 2019.
The next few months are crucial. “It is a relief, but the true relief will come when there is provision,” says Sanquest. “Until the system is up and running, we’ll still be holding our breath.” Her London-based group campaigns for free, safe, legal and local access to abortion across the island of Ireland, and led the #HomeToVote campaign in the run-up to the 2018 referendum on abortion in Ireland. That referendum resulted in a landslide result to overturn the Republic’s ban on abortion, by 66%, and Sanquest has been closely monitoring the experience in Ireland since. “Until the system [in Northern Ireland] is up and running, we’ll still be holding our breath. We know from the experience in Ireland that provision is not perfect straightaway, and there are hospitals in Ireland who are still not holding abortions.”
The outlook could also be complicated given Northern Ireland’s current political situation. Under the 1998 Good Friday agreement, which brought peace to the region, Northern Ireland is governed by a power-sharing arrangement intended to unite republicans and unionists. In January 2017, a dispute between the two governing parties, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and the Republican party Sinn Fein, led to the dissolution of Northern Ireland’s government. If that government manages to form an agreement and functions again before October 21, that could place the new law in jeopardy.
The DUP is currently in a deal that keeps the U.K.’s Conservative Party in power, and have taken a consistently anti-LGBT and anti-abortion stance. Over the weekend, DUP leader Arlene Foster called the efforts to legalize abortion in Northern Ireland through Westminster “insidious,” saying that the issue should remain under Northern Ireland’s control. She said she didn’t believe a majority of people in Northern Ireland would support legalizing abortion up to 28 weeks. On Tuesday, Sinn Fein tentatively came out in support of the new law, having argued in favor of limited abortion reform for some time.
“For those who try to put forward an argument that Westminster is imposing something that the Northern Ireland public don’t want is simply not borne out in reality. All the available evidence demonstrates that the Northern Ireland public wants this,” Teggart says. In 2018, an Amnesty International poll found that 65% of the Northern Irish public believed that having an abortion should not be a crime. Although campaigners say they would have liked to see a regional government repeal the abortion legislation, they had to act on their own. “The fact is that [the Northern Ireland Executive] had ample opportunity and failed. Women can’t wait, so we turned to Westminster for that and they delivered,” Teggart says.
Sarah Ewart too chose to take matters into her own hands. She chose to speak publicly about her traumatic experience, and has been challenging Northern Ireland’s strict abortion laws in Belfast’s High Court, aiming to have the strict abortion laws declared incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights. She’s due to receive a judgment in September, and is hoping for a favorable judgment to legally back up what campaigners have been saying for decades.
“We need the court to agree with us that the law violates rights,” she says. But this week, she’s felt a sense of relief and is counting down until October 21. “The past six years have been extremely difficult for me. I shouldn’t have had to speak about my personal experience to help push for change, but ultimately it became necessary. Politicians and the courts needed to realize that we weren’t going away until the law changed.”
Two sex assault cases have prompted demonstrations in Spain about the treatment of rape in the country’s judicial system. In the town of Manresa, in north-west of Barcelona, last week four men between the ages of 18 and 25 were arrested in connection with the suspected rape of a 17 year-old girl. It came just two weeks after six men accused of gang raping a 14-year old in the same town in 2016 went on trial in Barcelona.
In Spain, the legal distinction between sexual abuse and rape comes down to wether an attack was violent or included intimidation. This is problematic because it often requires the victim to fight back in order to be recognized as rape. “If you resist they kill you, if you don’t resist you consent. What to do?” read one sign at a protest. Though some lawyers have been campaigning to change the law for decades, it didn’t became a national debate until the #MeToo movement took off.
The “Wolf Pack” case was at the centre of feminist protests in the past few years, and the six men on trial in Barcelona are now being called the “La Manada de Manresa”, or “the Wolf Pack of Manresa”. They are accused of taking turns to assault the teenager while she was drunk, and since she did not fight back, prosecutors have argued they should face the lesser charge of sexual abuse instead of rape. This sparked protests against what many see as “patriarchal justice”. On the first day of the trial, July 2, the six men walked out of the courthouse covering their faces from a crowd of demonstrators chanting “it’s not abuse, it’s rape” – words that have echoed across the country and have come to define Spain’s #MeToo movement.
The original court decision of the “Wolf Pack” case in 2017 triggered huge feminist protests all over the country when judges found the men guilty of sexual abuse but not of rape. However, three years later, on June 21, campaigners celebrated a huge victory when the Supreme Court overturned the ruling. ‘Victims should not be required to show “heroic behavior” to show lack of consent,’ the Supreme court judges declared after they recognized the attack as rape and increased the attackers’ sentences from nine years to 15. The move was seen as decisive victory by women’s rights campaigners.
According to the UN, 154 countries worldwide have laws on sexual harassment. But even when laws exist, they are not always compliant with international standards. According to the Spanish online newspapereldiario.es, the UN’s Working Group on Discrimination against Women in Law has recently called on Spain to explain measures it is taking to fight against discrimination in its justice system. In a letter sent on June 20 it expressed “concern” that cases like the Wolf Pack case “show that the legislation is interpreted by discriminatory justice system based on prejudices and gender stereotypes”. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has until August 19 to respond.
WhenPedro Sanchez’s socialist government came into power in June 2018, a reform of the criminal code was proposed almost immediately to adopt the “only yes means yes” rule. It came after feminist lawyers in Spain had been campaigning for years for the treatment of sexual crimes to be aligned with the Convention of Istanbul, a treaty signed by most European countries that requires rape to be based on lack of consent rather than evidence. Still, only 10 countries in Europe (Iceland, UK, Ireland, Sweden, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, Portugal, Greece and Cyprus) define rape as “sex without consent”.
Despite the current government’s willingness to improve women’s rights, the political climate has perhaps never been more complicated. The rise of the far-right party Vox, which won 10.3% of the vote in the last election, threatens to undo the work feminists have been doing for decades. The party is openly misogynistic, and has campaigned to scrap tough laws against gender violence which it argues “criminalizes” men.
When it comes to sexist culture, a survey carried out in five EU countries and the U.S. in November 2018 rated Spain as the worst country for street harassment against women, but for physical assault and rape, the statistics were similar or lower than those in other countries. According to the Geoviolencia sexual project, there has been a stark rise in group sex attacks in Spain, with more than 100 recorded since 2016. There were 14 sexual assaults carried out by multiple attackers in 2017. This rose to 59 in 2018, and there have already been 34 this year.
But to understand the context of these laws we have to go back to the 40-year long dictatorship under Francisco Franco, which ended with his death in 1975. Women’s rights were severely restricted under a legal system where, for example, only women could commit adultery. The transition to democracy was a period of profound change where feminism played a big role. “Spain has had a very strong feminist movement since 1975, when it was confronted with a grotesquely misogynistic country,” says Nuria Varela, author ofFeminism for beginners, who was involved in the creation of the country’s first Ministry of Equality in 2008. “Not only did we have to change the culture, but we also had to dismantle the legal framework of a fundamentally misogynistic dictatorship.This is why Spanish feminism is so political, because Spanish women are very aware of their legal rights.”
The Wolf Pack case also came after a conservative government in 2011 attempted to curtailwomen’s abortion rights. “It was the idea that we were going back to the old Francoist Spain that it took us so long to get out of,” says Varela. “I think that was the pivotal moment where feminism in Spain really woke up.”
In July 2016, during theRunning of the Bulls festival, an 18-year old woman was led into a building lobby by five men, who took turns having sex with her and recording it on their mobile phones. The perpetrators came to be known as the Wolf Pack after the name of the WhatsApp group they used to boast about their sexual exploits. “The trial became emblematic because it symbolised a clash between two different models,” says criminal defense lawyer Laia Serra. “On the one hand an obsolete judicial model that is guided by gender stereotypes, minimizes sexist violence and does not give credibility to women. And on the other hand a judicial model that is committed to women’s rights, attaches importance to violence, and defines sexual offenses according to whether or not the woman gives consent.”
In April 2018, regional court judges found the perpetrators guilty of ‘sexual abuse’, stating it could not be considered rape because there had been no violence or intimidation. The sentence, which came just a few months after the hashtag#MeToo began to spread virally on social media, immediately sparked nationwide protests, with women gathering on the streets of several cities on the same day.
While changing the criminal code would be useful, some argue it is only part of the solution. “The appropriate judicial response depends, above all, on a paradigm shift: the strengthening of a respectful legal culture towards women that understands that violence is a symptom of a patriarchal society,” says Serra. This is evident in the prosecutor’s position in the Manresa Wolf Pack case.
The emergence of Vox as an increasingly loud opposition to the feminist movement has somewhat diluted the Supreme Court’s recognition of rape in the Wolf Pack case. “On the one hand there’s increasing awareness, social mobilization and a rejection of violence. But on the other there is this old sexist discourse that we thought had been banished,” says Varela. “This is the debate we currently find ourselves in, and the “wolf pack case” is part of it. It’s a fundamental debate not just for women but for democracy.”
(WARSAW, Poland) — Officials at the Auschwitz Memorial say Kazimierz Albin, the last surviving inmate from the initial transport of Poles to the German Nazi camp, has died. He was 96.
Auschwitz’s press office said Wednesday that Albin died Monday. The information came from Albin’s family.
The Germans caught Albin in 1940 as he fled occupied Poland to join Polish armed forces abroad.
He was imprisoned and in June of that year put on the first transport to Auschwitz, where he became inmate number 118.
He fled in 1943 and served as head of the resistance Home Army’s small sabotage actions division in Krakow.
From 1998 he was a member of the advisory International Auschwitz Council of former inmates and historians.
The Nazis killed some 1.1 million people, mostly Jews, in Auschwitz.
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Railway Group D Admit Card 2019 for level 1 vacancies can be downloaded here. Aspirants who applied for RRC level 1 vacancy under group d can find the direct link to download the admit card online. Interested aspirants can also visit the official website of indianrailways.gov.in for more details.
Railway Group D Exam Admit Card
Railway Group D Admit Card for RRB Group D Recruitment can download on our page. As the railway recruitment cell allows its applicants to download the call letter online, we provide you a direct link. As the official railway website will be busy on the day of release of the call letter. It will be easy for the applicants to download the admit card from our page.
Railway Recruitment Cell is going to announce the call letter a month before the date of examination. As the RRC is yet to announce the exam date for the group d level 1 vacancy. Keep checking our page for updates on exam dates and admit card. However, aspirants also check the official website for regular updates. As the vacancy count is high there will be huge traffic to the official website. Hence, we advise going through our page for easy download of your admit card.
Railway Recruitment Cell/Board is yet to announce the official exam dates for group d vacancies. However, aspirants who applied for the level 1 posts need to wait few more days for updates regarding the exam date 2019. As per the notification, the RRB is going to conduct the CBT in the month of Sep or Oct 2019. Hence, we can expect the admit card to be released in the month of August 2019. However, the board may make changes in the exam date hence, keep checking our page for regular updates.
Check the exam pattern in the section below and start your preparation. Aspirants can download the call letter from the link at the end of the page when the board starts allowing the applicants. However, for any queries comment in the section below and find the individual links for the regions wise RRC pages in the section following.
Railway Group D Exam Pattern 2019
S. No
Name of the Subjects
No of Marks
Time Duration
1
Mathematics
100 Marks
90 Minutes
2
General Intelligence & Reasoning
3
General Science
4
General Awareness on Current Affairs
The RRC Group D Exam Pattern provides information like the topics that had to be covered before appearing for the Examination. Also, it helps in scoring better marks in the RRC Examinations. So, we have provided the Exam Pattern for the RRC Group D Posts. Moreover, without satisfying the minimum cut off marks it is not possible to go for the next rounds. Furthermore, the test will be based on objective type questions.
{Railway RRC Application Status 2019 – Check Here}
Railway Group D Admit Card 2019 – Mock Test, Exam Centers Details
Railway Recruitment Cell Group D Recruitment 2019 Exam Center Details are now available. The Applicants of RRC Group D Exam 2019 can check their Exam Centre Details from the link given below. Also, Practice the RRB Group D Examination by Clicking on the Official Mock Test Link given in the link below. Later Don’t forget to download the RRB Group D Admit Card 2019. All the best and check the details of how to download Railway Group D Hall Ticket and check the Exam Centres and Mock Test from the links below.
RRC Group D Admit Card Download Details
The Railway Group D Admit Card 2019 is issued by the RRB Authority only to those who applied for RRC Group D Vacancies. Also, the RRC Group D Hall Ticket consists of detailed information such as Candidates register number, Date of Birth, Date, Time and Place of the Examination. However, check all the details immediately once after downloading the Railway Group D Call Letter 2019. Moreover, we try to provide the direct links to download the Railway Group D Hall Ticket State Wise. Such as Railway Group D Admit Card Delhi, Railway Group D Admit Card Jaipur etc.
Steps required to download the RRB Group D admit card 2019
Mainly, the candidates must open the Railway Recruitment Cell, Indian Railways official website – www.indianrailways.gov.in.
Then, on the home page click on Railway Group D RRC 2019 Call Letter link.
Instead, applicants can just click on the direct link that will be provided to download the Railway Group D Hall Ticket 2019.
After downloading take the print out of your Railway Group D Exam Call Letter.
And do not forget to take the printout of the Railway RRB Group D Admit Card and carry it to the venue of the Examination.
Assam Rifles Result 2019 – Assam Rifles Final Result Pdf download here| assamrifles.gov.in. AssamRifles officials have declared the Rifleman (General Duty) Final result on 25th July 2019. Applicants those who have applied for the Assam Rifles Recruitment 2019 and appeared the Examination can check your Assam Rifles Results from the below link. Candidates those who are interested to know their status can click the below mentioned quick link to download the Assam Rifles Result pdf. However, applicants can check and view your Assam Rifles Results 2019 Merit List from the official website www.assamrifles.gov.in 2019.
Assam Rifles Results | Assam Rifles 2019 Final Result
Assam Rifles has published the notification for the recruitment of Rifleman (General Duty). Totally Assam Rifles has planned to recruit the (Rifleman (General Duty)) Assam Rifles Meritorious Sportsperson Quota of 116 candidates. Applicants those who have appeared for the above post Recruitment exam can check your result from the below link. Here we have provided a direct link to download your Assam rifles result.in. Also apart from this, we have given some steps to download Assam Rifles Final Results 2018-19.
Here on this page, we have dedicated to providing the latest news regarding Assam Rifles 2019. Also, applicants can get an overview from the above table. From the above table, candidates can find the Assam Rifles Result date, Assam Rifles Result 2019 Sports quota link and others. We advise the applicants to keep track on this page to get the additional information of Assam Rifles Result 2019 Merit List. Also, this is the final results of Assam Rifles Recruitment 2019.
Applicants are advised to just by clicking the direct link to download Assam Rifles Result 2018-19. We have provided a direct link of Assam Rifles Results 2019 Sports quota from the below table. Also, this is very important for the applicants to get the Assam Rifles 2019 Cut off marks. If the candidates will get the high Cut off marks, then the name will attain into the top Cut off marks list. All those candidates will eagerly check the Assam Rifles Results 2019 Merit List and Cut off marks.
Assam Rifles Cut off Marks| Assam Rifles Result 2019 Merit List
Candidates will get the Assam Rifles Cut off Marks after the announcement of the Assam Rifles Results 2019. Because Assam Rifles officials will announce the Assam Rifles Cut off Marks based on some categories. Based on the Assam Rifles Cut off Marks the applicants will get a higher priority at the time of Interview. Those who get qualified from the Assam Rifles Cut off Marks will attain in the top Merit List. Assam Rifles Result 2019 Merit List will declare soon and the Merit list will help the applicants while attending the Interview Process.
How to check the Assam Rifles Result 2018-19?
First, visit the official website of the Assam Rifles i.e, www.assamrifles.gov.in
On the home page, view the What’s new section
In the What’s new section, Assam Rifles Results 2019 Sports quota link will be available
Click on the result link, and the pdf file will be open
Check the Assam Rifles Results 2019 Merit List carefully
NCSCM Recruitment 2019 – Walk in for 33 Vacancies. National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management has released a notification to fill up Project Associate, Research Assistant, and Other Vacancies. Candidates looking for TamilNadu Government jobs can use this chance. Interested candidates can apply for NCSCM Chennai Recruitment. The Notification for the Selection of Project Staff is published on 21st July 2019.
The selected candidates will be placed in the Head Office in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Job Seekers grab the opportunity to secure your future in NCSCM Jobs 2019. Candidates will be recruited on Contacual basis. For more details like Educational Qualification, Selection Process, Age Limit for NCSCM Recruitment candidates can check the below sections of this page.
NCSCM Chennai Recruitment 2019 Details
Name of the organization
National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management (NCSCM)
Applicants willing to apply for NCSCM Recruitment 2019 can check the Eligibility Criteria, Educational Qualification, Age limit, Selection Process, Official Notification, Official Website link and so on in the below article. Applicants should make sure about the fulfillment of these eligibility conditions before appearing for the Walk-in-Interview at Chennai National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management Campus.
Educational Qualification:
First Class in Engineering/ Diploma in Engineering/ Graduate Degree/ Equivalent from any recognized university/institution.
Age limit:
Minimum Age Limit – 20 Years
Maximum Age Limit – 50 Years
Age Relaxation:
As per TamilNadu Government Rules.
Selection Process:
Walk-in-Interview
Salary Details:
Post Name
Salary
Project Associate I
Rs. 25000/- + HRA
Project Associate II
Rs. 29000/- + HRA
Project Associate III
Rs. 35000/- + HRA
Research Assistant
Rs. 20000/- + HRA
Project Scientist I
Rs. 45000/- + HRA
Technical Engineer I
Rs. 29000/- + HRA
Technical Engineer III
Rs. 45000/- + HRA
Technical Assistant V
Rs. 25000/- + HRA
Technical Assistant III
Rs. 18000/- + HRA
Technical Assistant I
Rs. 16000/- + HRA
Technical Assistant I
Rs. 16000/- + HRA
Finance Assistant V
Rs. 25000/- + HRA
Administrative Assistant I
Rs. 16000/- + HRA
Application Fee:
Candidates applying for NCSCM Chennai Recruitment 2019 can check the Official Notification PDF for Application Fee Details.
How to Apply for NCSCM Recruitment 2019?
Download the NCSCM Official Notification PDF.
Go through all the given details completely.
Check the eligibility criteria to apply for the post.
Make sure about you fulfill the eligibility conditions.
And then, Eligible Aspirants can attend the Walk-in-Interview.
Appear with CV and essential documents required for the post.
Interview Venue
National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management Anna University Campus Chennai – 600025
Important dates for NCSCM Recruitment 2019
Notification Published Date
21st July 2019
Date of Interview
6th, 9th, & 10th August 2019
Refer to the Official Notification to get the respective post’s Interview Date.
Important Links for NCSCM Recruitment Notification 2019
About National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management (NCSCM):
National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management (NCSCM) follows a vision and a mission that would aid in better protection, conservation, rehabilitation, management and policy design of the coast. It is under the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change. The main vision is to promote sustainable coasts through increased partnerships, conservation practices for the better benefit of our future generation. It follows a mission to enhance knowledge, research and advisory support, partnerships and network and other.
It has Fourteen institutions from coastal states that have formed a consortium with NCSCM and signed the Anna University Declaration on 21 June 2010. Know more about NCSCM @ www.ncscm.res.in.
Why Recruitment.Guru for NCSCM Recruitment 2019?
Recruitment.guru is India's No. 1 Job Search Engine that provides every job notifications released by NCSCM Recruitment 2019. Recruitment. Guru helps you to stay notified with every job releases of National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management (NCSCM). We ensure that you will never miss any updates released by NCSCM Chennai Recruitment 2019. Applicants just need to visit our website www.recruitment.guru and get notified with NCSCM Jobs 2019. Grab your opportunity for NCSCM 2019 Recruitment Notification here.
Punjab Haryana High Court Admit Card 2019 is now available on our webpage. Candidates who applied for the post of Clerk in Haryana Punjab High Court. The Punjab and Haryana High Court Clerk Admit Card has been avail from 25th July 2019. Hence, the Haryana Punjab High Court Clerk Exam will be held on 04th August 2019. The direct accessing link was uploaded at the end of the segment in this page. Download by providing the Login details.
SSSC Punjab Haryana High Court Admit Card
There are throughout 352 Vacancies in both the states. Here for your easy convenience, we have provided you the direct link for Haryana Punjab High Court Clerk Admit Card Download. Candidates who applied for this Competitive Exam should download their E-admit Card or Hall Ticket to enter in prescribed Exam Centre of this written exam conducting by Punjab & Haryana High Court. For the sake of the Registered persons only we have uploaded entire details on this webpage.
Punjab Haryana High Court Admit Card 2019 – Overview
Punjab and Haryana HC Subordinate Clerk Admit Card Details
To download the Punjab and Haryana High Court Admit Card 2019, Participants have to keep the Application Form on one side. Because all the candidate’s details should be entered in the admit card as in the application form. If the details of the aspirants vary from that then the admit card will not be valid for Haryana Punjab High Court Clerk Exam.
Candidate’s Name
Date of Birth
Exam Venue and Address
Exam Timing
Date of examinations
Haryana Punjab High Court Clerk Exam 2019
The High Court has scheduled the exam date on 04th August 2019. Hence, Download the Punjab and Haryana High Court Clerk Exam Date 2019 Admit Card to participate in the exam. Moreover, Aspirants can get the exam pattern of the written exam from the below section. Make use of this better opportunity to get placed in the Haryana Punjab High Court. Written Examination will be based on Multiple Choice Questions. There will be negative marking in objective type question of 1/4th Marks for each wrong answer. There will also be a Computer Typing Test. Qualifying Marks will be of 33% in each subject but no candidate shall be considered to have qualified the written examination unless he/she obtains 40% marks in the aggregate of both subjects
Subject
Marks
English Composition
50
General Knowledge
50
TOTAL
100
Things to Download Haryana Punjab High Court Admit Card
Carry the required documents to take down the Written Examination. Hence, Candidates have to download the SSSC Punjab Haryana High Court Admit Card prior to avoid the last time rush. Aspirants can take any of the original document to participate in the Haryana Punjab High Court Clerk Examination.
Original Photograph
Voter Card
Pan Card
Employee ID
College ID
PAN Card
Passport
Driving License
Any other ID proof issued by a Gazetted Officer
Bank Pass Book with the photograph
Haryana Punjab High Court Clerk Admit Card Download Steps 2019
Visit the “Punjab Haryana High Court Admit Card”
Enter the Registration ID and Password.
Click on to the Login option to get the hall ticket.
Punjab and Haryana High Court Subordinate Clerk Admit Card Page will appear on the screen.
Enter all the valid credentials in the admit card.
Check to the entered details in the admit card.
Now get to the Download option.
Download the Punjab Haryana High Court Admit Card.
Take a photocopy of the Admit Card and carry for the selection rounds.
Direct Links to Download Punjab Haryana High Court Hall Ticket
RSMSSB Result 2019 Announced – Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board has recently uploaded results for various Posts. Now RSMSSB has declared the Lab Assistant, Informatics Assistant and Aganwadi Supervisor Result & Cut off Marks in the official website. Here on this page applicants can get all Results regarding the RSMSSB. We have dedicated this page to upload all the Recent results released from the Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board. Aspirants who are looking for RSMSSB recruitment 2019-20 exam result can find on our page. Moreover, aspirants can visit the official website of Rajasthan SMSSB for checking the result.
RSMSSB Supervisor (Women Empowerment) Revised Result 2019 – Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board have recently declared the Revised Result, Cutoff Marks for The Post of Supervisor in Women Empowerment Department Recruitment 2018 on 25th July 2019. Applicants those who have applied for this Recruitment Exam can download Revised result and Cutoff marks from the below table. As we know all those candidates are waiting for the RSMSSB Supervisor (Women Empowerment) Revised Result & Cut off marks. Everyone can check and download your results from the below links.
RSMSSB Supervisor (Women Empowerment) Revised Result 2019
Organization Name
Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board
RSMSSB Supervisor (Women Empowerment) Revised Result, Cutoff Marks 2019 – Click Here
RSMSSB Informatics Assistant Final Result 2019 – Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board have recently uploaded the Final Result for the Post of Informatics Assistant (Suchna Sahayak) Recruitment 2018 on 23rd July 2019. All registered Candidates those who have appeared in this Exam can download Final Result from the below link. Check your results via the link mentioned below. Hence, all those might be looking for the RSMSSB Informatics Assistant Final Result 2019 now!
RSMSSB Informatics Assistant Final Result 2019
Organization Name
Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board
RSMSSB Informatics Assistant Final Result 2019 – Click Here
RSMSSB Aganwadi Supervisor Result & Cutoff Marks 2019 – Rajasthan Staff Selection Board (RSMSSB) has recently uploaded final Answer Key, Result, Cutoff Marks for the Post of Aganwadi for Women Recruitment 2018 on 23rd July 2019. Those Candidates who have appeared in this Recruitment Exam Can Download Final Answer Key, Result and Cutoff Marks here. Check your results via the link mentioned below. Hence, all those might be looking for the RSMSSB Aganwadi Supervisor Result & Cutoff Marks 2019 now!
RSMSSB Aganwadi Supervisor Result & Cutoff Marks 2019
Organization Name
Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board
RSMSSB Aganwadi Supervisor Result & Cutoff Marks 2019 – Click Here RSMSSB Aganwadi Supervisor Final Answer Key – Click Here
RSMSSB Lab Assistant Result & Cutoff Marks 2019 – Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board (RSMSSB) are recently uploaded Result, Cutoff Marks for the Post of Laboratory Assistant Recruitment 2018 on 23rd July 2019. Those candidates who have appeared in this recruitment exam can download Result, Cutoff Marks from the below link. Check your results via the link mentioned below. Hence, all those might be looking for the RSMSSB Lab Assistant Result & Cutoff Marks 2019 now!
RSMSSB Lab Assistant Result & Cutoff Marks 2019
Organization Name
Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board
RSMSSB Lab Assistant Result & Cutoff Marks 2019 – Server 1 | Server 2
RSMSSB Result – Industry Inspector 2019
RSMSSB Result – for the post of Industry Inspector is out now. The board is now allowing the applicants to check the Result. Hence, the applicants can check the RSMSSB Result for Industry Inspector post in the link given below.
RSMSSB Result for Sanganak (Computer) 2019 is available now. The Candidates those who are waiting for the RSMSSB Computer Result 2019 can check from the link given below. The Board has given the RSMSSB Sanganak Document Verification Schedule on 6th July 2019. The candidates who cleared the Written Exam Can check the Schedule and be prepared for a Verification. However, download the RSMSSB Sanganak Doc Verification Schedule 2019 from the link below.
RSMSSB Result – Sanganak (Computer) Recruitment 2019
Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Commission announces the result for agriculture supervisor. Aspirants can find the result online here. Just click on the link given below to check agriculture supervisor result 2019.
Post Name
Agriculture Supervisor
No of Vacancies
1832
Category
Sarkari Results
Exam Date
Update Soon
Result Date
Update Soon
Official Website
www.rsmssb.rajasthan.gov.in
RSMSSB Result for Agriculture Supervisor
RSMSSB Information Assistant Exam Result 2019
RSMSSB Lab Technician, Radiographer Assistant, Ophthalmic Assistant & other recruitment exam result. A huge number of contenders had applied for the post and have been attended the examination. Candidates are selected based on their performance in written examination and personal interview. Hence, aspirants can check the result for written examination from the link in the table below.
Officials of Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board releases the RSMSSB Exam Results 2019 online. The board allows the applicants to check the result online. Hence, aspirants can find the direct link to check exam result on our page.
To make it easy for the visitors of our page, we have given the different links to check the result respective of the vacancies. Hence, find the link you looking for and check the RSMSSB exam result 2019-20 below. Aspirants can download the RSMSSB result pdf online for respective vacancies. Check the merit list, the provisional selection list, and the final selection list given by the RSMSSB.
RSMSSB Cut Off Details
Every year the officials of Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board releases the notification and conducts its examination. The board decides the cut off mark and hence there is no ambiguity. Candidates who meet the qualifying mark are only eligible for further rounds. Failing to meet the qualifying marks is not eligible for upcoming rounds. Hence it is important for contenders to meet the required marks and prepare well for the examination to be part of Rajasthan Subordinate and Ministerial Service Selection Board.
RSMSSB Exam Merit List 2019
Merit list is given by the officials on the official website. The resulting sheet consists of the name of applicants qualify and only those contenders are allowed to attend further rounds. However, click on direct links and steps to help applicants easily acquire their results.
Steps to Download RSMSSB Results 2019
Click on the link below
Find the respective result link in the page and click on the link.
Enter the login details if required and check the results
Candidates can also download the result pdf for respective vacancies.
In case of the merit list, check your name or roll number to find the result.
Finally, take the printout of the RSMSSB Result for further reference.
Dredging Corporation of India Ltd Recruitment 2019
Dredging Corporation of India Ltd Recruitment 2019 Visakhapatnam – Apply Online for 42 Vacancies. Dredging Corporation of India has made an announcement to recruit candidates for 42 Dredge Cadets, NCV and Other Posts. Candidates looking for Central Government Jobs can check with the DCIL Career Notification and apply online to fill up these vacancies. Dredging Corporation of India Recruitment Online Registration link will be active from 25th July 2019. Interested and eligible can begin to fill up dredging Vacancies @ dredge-india.nic.in.
Candidates selected for the DCIL Vizag Jobs will have contract basis work. Online Application link would close on 07th August 2019. Therefore, individuals meeting the eligibility parameters must complete your application procedure before the deadline. Refer to the below section and get detailed information about the Dredging Corporation of India Ltd Careers.
Dredging Corporation of India Limited Vacancy 2019 Details
Name of Post
Number of Vacancies
Dredge Cadets
10
Trainee Marine Engineer
10
Trainee Electrical Officer
10
NCV (Trainee)
10
Instrument Engineer(Flying Squad)
02
Total
42
DCIL Jobs 2019 – Category Wise Vacancy Details
Name of the Post
Number of Vacancies
Dredge Cadets
UR
02
EWS
01
OBC
03
SC
03
ST
01
Trainee Marine Engineer
UR
05
OBC
03
SC
01
EWS
01
Trainee Electrical Officer
UR
04
OBC
03
SC
01
ST
02
NCV (Trainee)
UR
04
EWS
01
OBC
02
SC
02
ST
01
Instrument Engineer
UR
02
Total
42
Eligibility Criteria for Dredging Corporation of India Limited Jobs 2019
Complete list of Dredging Corporation of India Ltd Recruitment eligibility conditions is provided below. Applicants should make sure about the fulfillment of these eligibility conditions before applying.
Educational Qualification:
For Dredge Cadets
Diploma in Nautical Science (DNS) from the institution recognized by D.G. Shipping
For Trainee Marine Engineer
Completed Marine Engineering Degree (4 years) from an IMU affiliated college/ institution recognized by DG Shipping
For Trainee Electrical Officer
Possess B.E degree in Electrical/ Electronics/ Instrumentation/ Telecommunication Engineering from an institution recognized by any State or Central Government or AICTE.
About Dredging Corporation of India Limited (DCIL)
Digging Corporation of India Limited, or DCI, is unit occupied with the matter of dredging. DCI does digging for Indian seaports solely. It every so often digs at outside seaports in nations, for example, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, and Dubai. It is, for the most part, engaged with support digging. Practically all the upkeep digging in Indian seaports is done by DCI because of government regulations. DCI is additionally engaged with capital digging, shoreline sustenance, and land reclamation.
The fundamental seaports wherein DCI works together are Visakhapatnam Port, Haldia, Kandla, Cochin Port, and Ennore Port.DCI was fused as an open segment association in March 1976. Organizations Act of 1956. It was recorded on CSE and DSE stock trades in October 1992 and appeared on BSE on 28 February 2000. It went for an Initial open offering in March 2004. DCI drew in IHC Dredgers BV, the Netherlands for plan, development, and conveyance of 5500 cu. m TSHD in 2011. It changed methodology to raise assets for buying extra dredgers by approaching the seaports for investments. The capital along these lines raised was utilized to renew its old armada. The Government of India decreased current stake in the organization by 5 percent.
UP Police Result 2019 | UP Police SI, ASI, Computer Operator, Jail Warder & Other Results @ uppbpb.gov.in. The Candidates those who have been appeared for the UP Police Exam can check their result. The UP Police Recruitment generally used to release the vacancies for both Male and Female Candidates. However, we help you find your UP Police Result more easily. Applicants can check the results from the direct link provided below from the table. Also, we provide you a direct link to check your Result for UP Police SI Recruitment & other in the tables below. Furthermore, get other information like Cut Off and Merit List details of UP Police Recruitment in the sections below. Also, Aspirants can visit the Official website of UP police i.e., uppbpb.gov.in for more details on UP Police Result.
UP Police SI, ASI Result 2019 – Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment & Promotion Board is going to declare the Typing & Stenography Test Result for Sub Inspector, SI (Confidential), ASI (Ministerial) & Assistant Sub Inspector ASI (Accounts) Male/Female. Applicants those who have appeared for the SI, ASI Examination on 11th February 2017 can check your results from the below link. Check your results via the link mentioned below. Hence, all those might be looking for the UP Police Jail Warder Result now!
UP Police SI, ASI Result 2019
Organization Name
Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment and Promotion Board
Post Name
Sub Inspector SI (Confidential), Assistant Sub Inspector ASI (Ministerial) & Assistant Sub Inspector ASI (Accounts) Male/Female Posts
UP Police Jail Warder Result 2019 – Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment & Promotion Board is going to declare the Jail Warder, Fireman & Constable Horse Rider Result 2019. UPPRPB had recently declared the Recruitment of 3638 Jail Warder & 2065 Fireman and 102 Constable Horse Rider Posts. Applicants those who have appeared for the Jail Warder Recruitment can check your results from the below link. Check your results via the link mentioned below. Hence, all those might be looking for the UP Police Jail Warder Result now!
UP Police Jail Warder Result 2019
Organization Name
Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment and Promotion Board
UP Police Computer Operator Result 2019 – Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment and Promotion Board (UPPBPB) Will Soon Declare the Result of Computer Operator Typing Test. An online written test was conducted for Computer Operator by UP PRPB on 21st December 2018. Applicants those who have appeared for this Examination can check your results from the below link. Here we have provided a direct link to download your Typing Test Result. Check your results via the link mentioned below. Hence, all those might be looking for the UP Police Computer Operator Result now!
UP Police Computer Operator Result 2019
Organization Name
Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment and Promotion Board
UP Police Computer Operator Result 2019 – Click Here
UP Police Sub Inspector Result 2019 – Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment and Promotion Board has released the Sub Inspector Result on 29th May 2019. Applicants those who have appeared for the UP Police SI Posts Written Examination can check your results from the below link. However, applicants can check and view your results from the official website i.e, uppbpb.gov.in. Check your results via the link mentioned below. Hence, all those might be looking for the UP Police SI Result now!
UP Police Sub Inspector Result 2019
Organization Name
Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment and Promotion Board
UP Police Sub Inspector Result 2019 – Male | Female
Candidates can check their UP Police Result 2019 here. The result plays an important role for those applicants who had appeared for the examination. However, by checking UP Police Result 2019 candidates can evaluate their performance in the examination. To help candidates easily check their results we have provided direct links and steps. However, the UP Police Merit List 2019 consists of the name of shortlisted applicants and only such contenders can take up further rounds.
UP SI Cut Off 2019
The Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment and Promotion Board (UPPRPB) decides the UP Police Cut off marks for the various board. However, the Police SI Exam Cut Off Marks is the minimum qualifying marks applicants must score to get qualified for further rounds. Those aspirants failing to meet the required marks will not be allowed to take up further rounds. Hence reaching the minimum qualifying marks is important for contenders. To be part of the board prepare well for the examination and meet the expecting marks.
UP Police Merit List 2019 @ uppbpb.gov.in
Every year the official members conduct its examination for various boards. The UP Police Results 2019 is released by the officials. The UP SI Results 2019 consists the name of shortlisted applicants and only such contenders can take up further rounds. However to help individuals easily get their results we have provided direct links and steps. Only those contenders name mentioned in the result sheet can attend for further rounds. However, get ready with your hall ticket and follow the steps to check your results.
Steps to check the UP Police SI Results
Go to the official website of the Uttar Pradesh Police Recruitment and Promotion Board i.e, uppbpb.gov.in
In the home page in the center of the page, the UP Police Results link will be available
Applicants can click the appropriate result link
A new page will be open with Pdf file
Candidates can check the list and download the file
SSB Constable Admit Card 2019: Sashastra Seema Bal is yet to release the admit card for 150 Constable GD Officers. Hence, the Physical Exam Date will also be announced on its Official Website. Moreover, Candidates can get the admit card through the direct link provided below. Hence, the direct link will get activated at the end of the section once the board releases the admit card on the Official Website.
SSB Constable Admit Card 2019
Candidates will be issued by the SSB Constable GD Call Letter to take down the examination. Moreover, Aspirants have to download the hall ticket before the exam date. Hence, to download the SSB Constable GD Admit Card candidates have to enter the valid Login details. Aspirants can check out the SSB official portal to know the status of SSB Constable GD Admit Card and Exam Date. Get the required information from the overview table tabulated below.
Aspirants who have applied for the Constable GD Physical Exam Test should download the admit card to participate in the exam. Download by providing the valid details in the admit card. Candidates can get the direct link at the end of the segment to download the hall ticket. Hence, the listed contents should be given clearly as in the application form.
Candidate’s Name
Date of Birth
Exam Venue and Address
Exam Timing
Date of examinations
SSB Constable GD Physical Exam 2019
The Board will declare the exam date in soon. Thus, Participants have to download the admit card before the exam. Hence, get the exam pattern of SSB Constable GD Physical Examination. The exam pattern has been given in this section. Make use of it to prepare well for the examination.
The Physical Exam Will Consist Of two Steps Of 100 Marks.
S.No.
Exam Type
Maximum Marks
1
Checking Of Sports Achievements
50 Marks
2
Field Trial
50 Marks
Total
100 Marks
Important Things to Download SSB Constable GD Call Letter 2019
Participants must download the SSB Constable Admit Card without making mistakes. If any mistakes found with the hall ticket aspirants must inform to the board immediately. Therefore, Aspirants can get the corrected admit card from the officials. Takedown the SSB Constable Admit Card along with the original documents.
Original Photograph
Voter Card
Pan Card
Employee ID
College ID
PAN Card
Passport
Driving License
Any other ID proof issued by a Gazetted Officer
Bank Pass Book with the photograph
How to Download SSB Constable Admit Card 2019?
Visit the “SSB Constable GD Admit Card”
Enter the Login details
Click on to the Submit Button.
A Call Letter page will arise on the screen.
Enter all the valid details in that.
Check once for the clear view of the details you entered.
Now go to the Download option to get the Admit Card.
Take a photocopy of it.
Direct Links to Download SSB Constable Call Letter 2019
MPPGCL Recruitment 2019 – Apply Online for 100 Vacancies. The Job Notification for the Plant Assistant Post has released under Madhya Pradesh Power Generating Company Limited. ITI candidates seeking for Madhya Pradesh government jobs can apply for this vacancies. MP Power Generating Company Limited Online Link will be available from 01st August 2019.
Selected Candidates will have a job on a regular basis. The last date to the drop the Online application form for is 3oth August 2019. Eligible individuals have to apply before the closing dates. Scroll down to get information about the Plant Assistant Job. or more details refer to the MPPGCL Notification 2019.
Eligibility Criteria for MP Power Generating Company Careers 2019
Educational Qualification
Hold a ITI Trade Certificate in Machinist/ Fitter/ Welder/ HP Welder / Mechanic Pump/ Mechanic Vehicle / Electrician/ Wireman/ Motor Mechanic/Diesel Mechanic / Electronics/ Instrumentation from institution recognized by State Government/ Government of India.
Age Limit
Minimum Age Limit – 18 Years
Maximum Age Limit:
Category
MP Domicile
Other State Candidates
UR
40 Years
25 Years
SC/ ST/ OBC
45 Years
25 Years
Application Fee
General/OBC Candidates – Rs. 1000/-
SC/ ST Candidates – Rs. 600/-
NOTE: Applicants can pay the fee through Online Mode or At E-Kiosk.
Salary Details
Candidates selected for Plant Assistant job through MPPGCL Recruitment will get a salary as per Pay Matrix Level 6
Rs. 25,300 to Rs. 80,500/-
Selection Process
Written examination
How to Apply Online for MPPGCL Recruitment 2019?
Click on Apply Online Link.
If you are a new user go for new registration.
Fill in the basic details and get your Login ID
Enter your Login ID and Password.
Get into the application page
Complete the application process.
Pay the Application Fee
Hit on the Submit button.
Take a print out of the completed application for future use.
MPPGCL Recruitment 2019 – Apply Offline for 29 Apprentice Post. Madhya Pradesh Power Generating Company Limited proposed a Vacancies for Apprentice posts. The candidates seeking for latest Madhya Pradesh government jobs can apply for MPPGCL Jobs. Interested can Check out with the Notification and apply for the MP Power Generation Apprentice Jobs. Applications are invited from 26th June 2019 through Postal mode. Apprentice posts are allocated for Graduate and Technician Trade.
Diploma/ Engineering Graduates can apply for the Apprentice vacancies. The last date to the receipt of application form for the Apprentice job is 31st July 2019. All the necessary information regarding the Apprentice jobs in Power Generation Company, Madhya Pradesh here. Eligible individuals have to apply before the closing dates. For more information, refer the MPPGCL Notification 2019 below.
About Madhya Pradesh Power Generating Company Limited
M.P. Power Generation Company Limited (MPPGCL) is the electricity generation company of the Government of Madhya Pradesh state in India. Madhya Pradesh Power Generating Co. Ltd (MPPGCL) is a wholly-owned company of Government of Madhya Pradesh engaged in the generation of electricity in the state of Madhya Pradesh. It is a successor entity of erstwhile Madhya Pradesh State Electricity Board (MPSEB). The Company, while operating and maintaining its existing units, is also constructing new Power Plants for increasing capacity in the State of Madhya Pradesh. The Company has been incorporated as a part of the implementation of the power sector reform in Madhya Pradesh initiated by the Government of Madhya Pradesh. The installed capacity of MPPGCL as on 01.01.2015 is 4995 MW out of which Madhya Pradesh share is about 4997.5 MW.
UP NEET Merit List2019 – Directorate General of Medical Education and Training, UP has announced the UP NEET Merit List and Counselling Second round result. The candidates those who appeared for the UP NEET 2019 Exam can download the Merit list. However, we provide you a direct link below to download the Uttar Pradesh Pre Medical Exam Merit List 2019. Also, check other details like UP NEET Online Counselling Details, document Verification schedule and Other in the sections below. Furthermore, an aspirant can visit the Official Website for more details about the UP NEET Merit list 2019.
UP NEET Merit List2019
Exam Name
Result Release Date
UP NEET Merit List Link
UP NEET Counselling Second Round
24th July 2019
UP NEET Counselling Second Round Result
UP NEET Merit list
25th June 2019
UP NEET Merit list
UP NEET Counselling Second Round Result 2019 – Uttar Pradesh State NEET/ UPDGME has Recently Uploaded Second Round Counselling Result Link For the Admission for MBBS/ BDS 2019 through UP Medical College. Those Candidates Who have Registered to this Exam Can Download Allotment Result now from the below link. Here we have provided a direct link to download your UP NEET Counselling Second Round Result 2019. Also from this article, applicants can get complete information about Online Counselling, Registration and Choice Filling 2019.
UP NEET Counselling Second Round Result 2019
Organization Name
Directorate General of Medical Education and Training, UP
UP NEET Counselling Second Round Result 2019 – Click Here
UP NEET Merit list 2019 – The Directorate General of Medical Education and Training, UP have declared the UP NEET Merit list 2019 on 25th June 2019. Applicants those who have appeared for the UP State NEET Examination 2019 can check your Merit list from the below link. Here we have provided a direct link to download your results. By clicking one direct link applicants can get the complete details of the UP NEET Merit list 2019. Moreover, candidates can check your result from the official website i.e, upneet.gov.in.
UP NEET Merit list 2019
Organization Name
Directorate General of Medical Education and Training, UP
UP NEET Merit list 2019 is available on the official website of Directorate General of Medical Education and Training, UP and here. It is recommended to all the applicants who have successfully registered themselves for UP NEET State quota MBBS/BDS Counselling 2019. NEET MBBS UP rank list will have the important information like candidate's state rank, roll number, NEET marks, NEET percentile, category, sub-category, NEET rank and status of the fee payment. Only those candidates will get the admission in UP medical colleges who will have their name in the merit list.
The counseling process will be conducted for admission into 3920 MBBS and 2251 BDS seats offered by government and private medical colleges of the state. You will get all the essential information about the UP NEET merit list from this post. UP Counselling Board has announced the State Merit list for NEET UG 2019 Exam. The candidates those who belongs to the Uttar Pradesh State can download the UP NEET UG 2019 Exam Merit List form the link given above. Also, check the Online Counselling Dates, Schedule, and the Documents for Verification in the sections below.
UP NEET 2019 Online Counselling Details 2019
The Candidate those who qualified in the Written Examination can attend the Online Counselling for UP NEET UG Medical Pre Examination 2019. The Aspirants need to given fill their options online. The Board will release the Counselling Results or Seat Allotment Result online. Keep visiting we give you a direct link for UP NEET Counselling Result here. The first round of counseling will take place in July and once the seats after the first counseling round will be completed then the process for the second counseling round will be initiated. The selected candidates will have to report to the assigned colleges on the given date.
Documents Verification & Counselling Schedule @UP NEET UG 2019
The Candidates need to attend the Documents verification process before attending the Online Counselling, the Schedule for Document Verification with the list of important documents need to carry for verification is given below. However, just click on the link given below and download the Document Verification Schedule for UP NEET 2019. As we stated above that the Merit list for admission in MBBS and BDS will be released online. Candidates can download the merit list to find out their name in it by following the below-given steps.
Steps to Download the UP NEET Merit List PDF 2019
Click on the link given below.
The Merit list for UP NEET UG 2019 is shown on a new page.
Download the UP NEET Merit list 2019 for easy Verification.
This is UP State NEET UG Merit List 2019.
Later, check the Counselling and Document Verification Schedules given below.
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MUMBAI: Ravi Jhunjhunwala, CEO of HEG, zoomed to the top of the remuneration rankings in FY19 with an almost threefold jump in compensation from the previous year, based on data that's available so far. He took home Rs 121.27 crore in the last financial year, 180% more than in the previous fiscal, after the company posted record profit following a surge in graphite prices. However, corporate governance watchdogs have cited the sharp decline in the company's share value.HEG makes graphite electrodes that are a key component for electric arc furnaces that turn scrap into steel.As all companies have not published their annual reports, Jhunjhunwala could be dislodged from the top ranking once more numbers are available. For instance, Tech Mahindra CEO CP Gurnani was the highest paid chief executive officer in FY18 at Rs 146 crore. Sun TV chairman Kalanithi Maran was second in that year at Rs 87.5 crore.Jhunjhunwala's remuneration includes commissions of Rs 118.81 crore, which is 2.5% of HEG's net profit as computed in accordance with Section 198 of the Companies Act, 2013, said company in its annual report. The ratio of his compensation and the median remuneration at HEG was 4045:1. The total staff cost of the company, excluding commissions, was Rs 198 crore in FY19. Jhunjhunwala's salary was Rs 43.33 crore in FY18 and Rs 2.34 crore in FY17.HEG didn't respond to queries. 70388379 As per the Companies Act, 2013, a single manager can get remuneration of up to 5% of net profit or 10% of net profit if there is more than one.Among Indian-origin global CEOs, the outgoing Indra Nooyi of PepsiCo received about ?133 crore last year while Francisco D'Souza of Cognizant, which is listed overseas, got Rs 77 crore.'Promoters' Salary Should be Moderate'The total salary package of Ajaypal Singh Banga, CEO of Master-Card, was Rs 84 crore while that of Ivan Manuel Menezes, CEO of Diageo, was Rs 42 crore, according to Bloomberg data.For FY19 so far, Jhunjhunwala is followed by Pawan Munjal, CMD of Hero MotoCorp, with Rs 81.41 crore remuneration. Umesh Asaikar, executive director of Deepak Nitrite, is next at nearly Rs 59 crore.For the year ended March, HEG reported a 140% jump in net sales from Rs 2,750 crore to Rs 6,593 crore while its net profit surged 175% from Rs 1,099 crore to Rs 3,026 crore. However, market value has dropped 81% since the share hit its all-time high of Rs 4,950 on October 16 last year. The removal of anti-dumping duty in September 2018 and higher imports from China have hurt the company, according Macquarie.Further, Indian graphite electrode producers have stopped exporting to Iran since the third quarter of FY19, pending clarification on exemption from US sanctions.The remuneration to the HEG boss has raised eyebrows among corporate governance firms."Promoters or shareholders' salary should be moderate and they should distribute the profits to all shareholders equally through dividends," said Shriram Subramanian, CEO, InGovern Research Services.Shares of HEG jumped 27-fold in the two years between October 2016 and October 2018, from Rs 175 to Rs 4,950. Indian graphite manufacturers were in demand following China's policy of curbing pollution that was introduced in late 2016. The surge in demand from China led to a spike in price realisations."Promoters cannot become wealthy by taking huge salary; their wealth is tied with shareholding of the company," said Amit Tandon, managing director, Institutional Investor Advisory Services. "This will shake investor confidence in the stock and he will lose far more than he is hoping to gain through this payout."
MUMBAI | NEW DELHI: Blackstone, the world's largest private equity firm, has stitched up a $250 million investment in Kishore Biyani's Future Lifestyle Fashions (FLFL), owner of retail chains Central and Brand Factory as well as several clothing brands, said people aware of the transaction.The primary infusion of capital will be through a combination of equity and structured debt that will fund the capital expansion of Biyani's deep-discount retail format Brand Factory, which is modelled on US retailer TJ Maxx, besides improving his promoter-level leverage. The company's board is meeting on Friday to finalise terms, following which an announcement is expected.The structured credit line will be for five years with a fixed coupon while the equity upside is expected to accrue through Blackstone's stake in FLFL's operating company. Blackstone will pick up a 6-7% holding, joining investors such as L Catterton and PremjiInvest, which together own around 17%. Other key equity investors include L&T Mutual Fund (4%) and LIC (6.5%).Biyani and family own 53.43% of the listed FLFL through entities such as Ryka Commercial Ventures, Central Departmental Stores and Future Enterprises among others.70388249 CLOSER RELATIONSHIPAbout 26.4% of the promoter holding has been pledged to financial institutions. Biyani had begun consolidating the family ownership into a few holding companies in 2010 to avoid crossholdings among group companies and help streamline the operating firms for the next generation, apart from raising fresh capital from large private equity funds.The current market capitalisation of the company is Rs 9,008.92 crore.Existing investor Aion is getting a partial payout and is likely to roll over $50 million of its $110 million exposure. In 2017, Aion, a joint venture between ICICI Bank and Apollo Global Management, had backed Biyani's family office and promoter firms with funding for the holding companies.Future Group CEO Biyani was unavailable for comment. Spokespersons of Blackstone and Aion declined to comment.This association with Blackstone will likely be the basis of a closer relationship that may span Biyani's retail and real estate empire, experts said. Blackstone also runs one of the largest real-estate focussed funds in the world and is the largest owner of office space in the country.FLFL is Future Group's flagship fashion business. It operates more than 300 stores in more than 90 cities, occupying 5.7 million sq ft of retail space. It owns and markets leading brands, through Central and Brand Factory, exclusive brand outlets (EBOs) and other multi-brand outlets (MBOs). The company was created after the demerger of the lifestyle fashion businesses of Future Retail and Future Ventures.FLFL also markets domestic and foreign brands including Scullers, BARE, Lee Cooper, Indigo Nation, Clarks, Giovani and Mineral.In FY19, the company's net profit rose 50% to Rs 189 crore while revenue rose 27% to Rs 5,728 crore. Brand Factory, which sells off-season branded garments at discounted prices, had same-store sales growth of 14% in the last financial year.The company acquired a 33% stake in Koovs.com last year and has since used it to develop an ecommerce platform for Brand Factory. In early July, the company softlaunched BrandFactoryOnline-.com for employees and select loyalty programme customers. The company's other ecommerce platforms are aLLOnlineStore.in, Clarks.in and CoverStory.co.in "FLFL is targeting to more than double Brand Factory stores over the next five years with (more than) 30 store additions per annum, while expansion of Central stores will be in a calibrated manner with 4-5 stores annually," said Krupar Maniar of ICICI Securities. "We believe capex intensity is likely to remain high in the near term given expectations of acceleration in BF (Brand Factory) store additions, which may impact return ratios."There are 97 Brand Factory stores and 47 Central stores across the country.Analysts estimate Central and Brand Factory reported samestore sales growth of 5.7% and 8.7%, respectively, in FY19. This combined with aggressive expansion at Brand Factory drove the 27% revenue growth in FY19. Ebitda margins remained flat in FY19 despite a 6.3% increase in the Brand Factory share in the overall revenue mix. Improving Brand Factory store maturity will drive overall margins going ahead. FLFL continues to rationalise its brands store network and closed a net 27 outlets in the year, taking the count to 202."We see strong growth visibility for FLFL with Brand Factory's monopolistic position, steady samestore sales growth reported by Central and incremental focus on 'power' brands," said Chirag Shah, analyst at CLSA. "We also see value unlocking potential from the 'investee' brands with past investments generating strong returns."This will be the second such special situations transaction by the New York-based private equity group in India. It had earlier acquired Mumbai-based distressed asset buyer International Asset Reconstruction Co (IARC), which also includes Tata Group, HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank as key shareholders. Blackstone has also agreed to back Manipal's Ranjan Pai with a Rs 3,200 crore ($450 million) financing line to help acquire Naresh Trehan's Medanta Hospital for Rs 6,000 by capitalising the Pai family's privately held, wholly owned umbrella entity Manipal Education & Medical Group (MEMG). Pai owns 60% of Manipal Hospitals through the promoter holding company, with TPG and Temasek owning the rest."Biyani had taken loans from several NBFCs. In one shot he's cleaning them out and also capitalising Brand Factory's expansion," said an executive. "This is the best time to clean up your balance sheet and capitalise oneself."Blackstone, though not as large as peer Bain Capital when it comes to retail investments, has taken marquee bets worldwide. Its most high-profile and visible trade has been to back fashion label Versace. Similarly, it had also backed Michaels in the US along with Bain Capital and Jack Wolfskin, a German outdoor brand.
NEW DELHI: Indian authorities are concerned that WhatsApp's payment service might share user data with group companies Facebook and Instagram, compromising the security, privacy and non-commercial information of its subscribers.The government has asked the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) to look into the matter and ensure that user data collected through payment services such as WhatsApp and Google Pay is not shared, top officials said. NPCI is the agency that operates retail payment and settlement systems in India.WhatsApp's proposed payment service is based on Unified Payments Interface (UPI), a system that enables real-time transfer of funds between bank accounts. "WhatsApp so far has said that Facebook and its non-WhatsApp subsidiaries do not use WhatsApp UPI transaction data for any commercial purposes," one official said.70388295 However, WhatsApp's cloud service provider is Facebook, its parent company, the official said, adding that when the country is debating the Personal Data Protection Bill, it was important that even "non-commercial information" or information about a user collected on the WhatsApp payment platform must not be shared with Facebook or its other subsidiaries.The popular chat app plans to roll out its payment service in India by the year end, said Will Cathcart, WhatsApp's new global head who is currently on his maiden visit to the country.Bill to Protect Personal DataHe is meeting officials in the Prime Minister's Office and telecom and IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad this week, where the privacy concerns are being raised, the officials said. WhatsApp said in October it had developed a system to store payment-related data in India to comply with policy. While the Reserve Bank of India and NPCI have mandated local storage of commercial data, India is also looking to protect and secure personal data through the PDP Bill, which will shortly be introduced in Parliament.Data on the use of the payment service for online purchases may automatically go to Facebook and even Instagram without the user knowing about it, another official said. If the two companies keep using the data collected by WhatsApp payment, that is a violation of the individual's privacy and must not be allowed, the official said.India is WhatsApp's largest market, with estimates of users ranging from 200 million to 400 million. Its payment service would pit it against Paytm, PhonePe and Google Pay in a market that grew 51% to 31.34 billion digital transactions in FY19 and is expected to touch 40 billion by FY20 end.Company officials said WhatsApp expects its user base to surge after starting the payment service. "WhatsApp is already ubiquitous in India and payments will just be a default option on the app, unlike other apps which people will have to download separately," they said."We built payments based on the UPI standard, partnered with banks here in India... We believe that if we did this right, it will accelerate financial inclusion and bring more people in India's fastgrowing digital economy," Cathcart said on Thursday.However, he did not clarify whether the company had received the go-ahead from the regulator and policymakers to start the service.WhatsApp officials told ET on condition of anonymity that the social media platform had asked its support partners to be on 'high alert' for the past one month, indicating an "anytime launch."In a response to ET's queries, WhatsApp said there is no timeline that can be shared and that an audit is under way. The messaging app needs a third-party auditor to validate that all its data involving payments will be stored only on Indian servers.WhatsApp began testing the payment service in India more than a year ago and has since been awaiting regulatory approvals. Its payment service blueprint in India has been caught in a bind over concerns related to authentication and data storage practices. In the past, local rivals have alleged that WhatsApp's payment platform has security risks for consumers and is not in compliance with the guidelines.
BENGALURU: Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said beta testing of WhatsApp payments in India had gone better than expected, even as the social media giant awaits regulatory approval for a full fledged rollout in the country.Zuckerberg made the comments during an earnings conference call with analysts on Wednesday.India is WhatsApp's biggest market with about 400 million users. The encrypted messaging service is in the process of storing payments data in India, as mandated by the Reserve Bank of India last year. Facebook sees payments as an important part of its long-term strategy as it shifts focus to private conversations and transactions."It's a regulatory approval question in India at this point, and we had a licence to roll it out as part of an initial test. The test went better than we even expected it would for a product you would expect needs to be widely available to be useful," said Zuckerberg. The feedback on the limited test was positive, and the company was confident that a broader rollout would be meaningfully valuable to users, he said."Payments is the part I'm particularly excited about. When I look at the kinds of private interactions we can make easier, payments may be the most important for the long term. We're continuing to test payments on WhatsApp in India and are close to launching in other countries as well," he said.The payments offering has been in beta mode in India since early 2018 for a million users, but the nationwide debut has been delayed, partly because WhatsApp initially resisted storing payments data exclusively in India, before it relented in April.In the future, Facebook will help people use the same payments account to send money to friends and businesses on WhatsApp, shop on Instagram, or make transactions on Facebook. Zuckerberg believes the ability to send money as easily as a photograph will open up new opportunities for businesses."We're also working beyond India in a number of other countries and hope to have this rolled out to a large percent of the people who use WhatsApp within the next year. So, that's the goal. We're pushing forward on all of these issues and we should have more to talk about soon." WhatsApp payments will become a formidable competitor to other UPI-based payment services such as Google Pay, PayTM, Phone-Pe, Bhim, and PayU.India's epayments business is set to grow fivefold by 2023 to $1trillion, according to multinational financial services company Credit Suisse.
NEW DELHI | MUMBAI: Promoters of Hotel Leelaventure said a Sebi order has held that its proposed transaction with Brookfield was not a 'related party transaction' as the latter is simultaneously entering into a separate contract with the promoters for a transfer of the brand. However, the promoters stated that they are disappointed that they have to now go back to shareholders for another round of approval, as it will take more time. "We are happy that the order makes it clear that we can proceed with the transaction," Vivek Nair, CMD of Hotel Leelaventure, told ET. As per the Sebi order, the proposed asset sale transaction/additional IP transaction between Leelaventure and Brookfield does not qualify as a related party transaction, except for the 'limb of the transaction' provided by Leelaventure, along with its promoters/affiliates, with respect to the transfer of the Jamavar trademark to Brookfield. Sebi on Tuesday asked Hotel Leelaventure to put to vote afresh the asset sale transaction before the shareholders, besides providing additional disclosures in its postal ballot notice like details of valuation and additional intellectual property transaction, including the methods adopted by the company. Tobacco-to-hotels conglomerate ITC had challenged the transaction in the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) in April, claiming mismanagement and oppression of minority shareholders and had also complained to Sebi about the same. Following the Sebi order, Leelaventure sought more time from NCLT to complete the sale of four hotels to Brookfield Asset Management. On Thursday, Ashish Pyasi of Dhir and Dhir Associates, appearing for Leelaventure, told the court that the process of giving notice to shareholders and conducting a postal ballot was lengthy and sought eight weeks' time from the tribunal. As per the Sebi order, promoters and the promoter group of Hotel Leelaventure are allowed to participate in the voting process. "Ultimately, the proceeds from the asset sale will go to JM Financial ARC and other lenders, and hence, they should not have any objection when we are seeking time," Pyasi argued.
MUMBAI | NEW DELHI: Blackstone, the world's largest private equity firm, has stitched up a $250 million investment in Kishore Biyani's Future Lifestyle Fashions (FLFL), owner of retail chains Central and Brand Factory as well as several clothing brands, said people aware of the transaction.The primary infusion of capital will be through a combination of equity and structured debt that will fund the capital expansion of Biyani's deep-discount retail format Brand Factory, which is modelled on US retailer TJ Maxx, besides improving his promoter-level leverage. The company's board is meeting on Friday to finalise terms, following which an announcement is expected.The structured credit line will be for five years with a fixed coupon while the equity upside is expected to accrue through Blackstone's stake in FLFL's operating company. Blackstone will pick up a 6-7% holding, joining investors such as L Catterton and PremjiInvest, which together own around 17%. Other key equity investors include L&T Mutual Fund (4%) and LIC (6.5%).Biyani and family own 53.43% of the listed FLFL through entities such as Ryka Commercial Ventures, Central Departmental Stores and Future Enterprises among others.70388249 CLOSER RELATIONSHIPAbout 26.4% of the promoter holding has been pledged to financial institutions. Biyani had begun consolidating the family ownership into a few holding companies in 2010 to avoid crossholdings among group companies and help streamline the operating firms for the next generation, apart from raising fresh capital from large private equity funds.The current market capitalisation of the company is Rs 9,008.92 crore.Existing investor Aion is getting a partial payout and is likely to roll over $50 million of its $110 million exposure. In 2017, Aion, a joint venture between ICICI Bank and Apollo Global Management, had backed Biyani's family office and promoter firms with funding for the holding companies.Future Group CEO Biyani was unavailable for comment. Spokespersons of Blackstone and Aion declined to comment.This association with Blackstone will likely be the basis of a closer relationship that may span Biyani's retail and real estate empire, experts said. Blackstone also runs one of the largest real-estate focussed funds in the world and is the largest owner of office space in the country.FLFL is Future Group's flagship fashion business. It operates more than 300 stores in more than 90 cities, occupying 5.7 million sq ft of retail space. It owns and markets leading brands, through Central and Brand Factory, exclusive brand outlets (EBOs) and other multi-brand outlets (MBOs). The company was created after the demerger of the lifestyle fashion businesses of Future Retail and Future Ventures.FLFL also markets domestic and foreign brands including Scullers, BARE, Lee Cooper, Indigo Nation, Clarks, Giovani and Mineral.In FY19, the company's net profit rose 50% to Rs 189 crore while revenue rose 27% to Rs 5,728 crore. Brand Factory, which sells off-season branded garments at discounted prices, had same-store sales growth of 14% in the last financial year.The company acquired a 33% stake in Koovs.com last year and has since used it to develop an ecommerce platform for Brand Factory. In early July, the company softlaunched BrandFactoryOnline-.com for employees and select loyalty programme customers. The company's other ecommerce platforms are aLLOnlineStore.in, Clarks.in and CoverStory.co.in "FLFL is targeting to more than double Brand Factory stores over the next five years with (more than) 30 store additions per annum, while expansion of Central stores will be in a calibrated manner with 4-5 stores annually," said Krupar Maniar of ICICI Securities. "We believe capex intensity is likely to remain high in the near term given expectations of acceleration in BF (Brand Factory) store additions, which may impact return ratios."There are 97 Brand Factory stores and 47 Central stores across the country.Analysts estimate Central and Brand Factory reported samestore sales growth of 5.7% and 8.7%, respectively, in FY19. This combined with aggressive expansion at Brand Factory drove the 27% revenue growth in FY19. Ebitda margins remained flat in FY19 despite a 6.3% increase in the Brand Factory share in the overall revenue mix. Improving Brand Factory store maturity will drive overall margins going ahead. FLFL continues to rationalise its brands store network and closed a net 27 outlets in the year, taking the count to 202."We see strong growth visibility for FLFL with Brand Factory's monopolistic position, steady samestore sales growth reported by Central and incremental focus on 'power' brands," said Chirag Shah, analyst at CLSA. "We also see value unlocking potential from the 'investee' brands with past investments generating strong returns."This will be the second such special situations transaction by the New York-based private equity group in India. It had earlier acquired Mumbai-based distressed asset buyer International Asset Reconstruction Co (IARC), which also includes Tata Group, HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank as key shareholders. Blackstone has also agreed to back Manipal's Ranjan Pai with a Rs 3,200 crore ($450 million) financing line to help acquire Naresh Trehan's Medanta Hospital for Rs 6,000 by capitalising the Pai family's privately held, wholly owned umbrella entity Manipal Education & Medical Group (MEMG). Pai owns 60% of Manipal Hospitals through the promoter holding company, with TPG and Temasek owning the rest."Biyani had taken loans from several NBFCs. In one shot he's cleaning them out and also capitalising Brand Factory's expansion," said an executive. "This is the best time to clean up your balance sheet and capitalise oneself."Blackstone, though not as large as peer Bain Capital when it comes to retail investments, has taken marquee bets worldwide. Its most high-profile and visible trade has been to back fashion label Versace. Similarly, it had also backed Michaels in the US along with Bain Capital and Jack Wolfskin, a German outdoor brand.
By Olga KharifChinese cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun, who cited health issues in postponing his charity lunch with Warren Buffett this week, issued a broad apology to just about everyone for touting the plan to dine with one of America's richest people, noting it raised concerns among authorities.In a lengthy post on Weibo, Sun, who turns 29 this month, said he acted immaturely and set a bad example for the public while "excessively" promoting the event. "It has produced a lot of consequences that I completely did not expect," he said, without elaborating on what they were.Sun's announcement Monday that he was delaying a lunch he'd won with a $4.57 million bid at auction fueled speculation he or his company had come under pressure. The move was surrounded by a flurry of posts and articles claiming he was denied an exit visa from China and that his venture and its cryptocurrency, Tron, faced investigation. The digital coin's price fell even after he posted a video that showed him in San Francisco.One person with knowledge of the matter said several Tron executives were briefly detained by Chinese authorities, and then released once Sun agreed to put off the lunch. The person asked not to be identified discussing the private developments.Nicole Wood, a spokeswoman for Tron, declined to comment. Buffett's assistant didn't immediately respond to a message seeking comment outside normal business hours. The Beijing police communications office didn't immediately respond to faxed questions. 70388833 Buffett's annual charity auction has rarely been so dramatic in recent years, with many winners choosing to remain anonymous. In contrast, Sun announced in June that he was hoping to educate Buffett, a self-professed cryptocurrency critic, on the benefits of digital currencies and their underlying technology, blockchain. Just hours before the entrepreneur abruptly canceled the meeting, he tweeted invitations to fellow crypto boosters.Tron, in the meantime, has lost about 16% of value this week, according to prices on data provider CoinMarketCap.com.--With assistance from Huang Zhe, Katherine Chiglinsky and Dan Reichl.
Mumbai: Auto major Maruti Suzuki is likely to witness a significant drop in June quarter net profit on Friday due to weakness in volumes across the sector. Kotak Institutional Equities expects the company's adjusted profit to drop 26.2 per cent year-on-year. It expects revenues to decline 14 per cent due to 18 per cent fall in volumes. The weakness will be partially offset by 4 per cent increase in average selling prices (ASPs) of vehicles sold. The brokerage expects Ebitda to decline 42 per cent led by rise in commodity costs, negative operating leverage and high fixed costs in Gujarat plant due to low volumes. Reliance Securities expects the carmaker to post a 48 per cent drop in profit, and pointed that volumes may decline 12.5 per cent and realisation is expected to fall 1 per cent due to product mix, which would pull down revenue by 13.5 per cent. "Higher discounts and industry-wide slowdown would take a toll on margins," Reliance Securities said in a note. ICICI Securities said it expects Maruti Suzuki to post the steepest Ebitda decline of around 47 per cent due to negative operating leverage, weak product mix and higher discounts. It expects profit decline to be around 43 per cent, even as higher other income supports. It sees revenue declining 16 per cent as volumes were down around 18 per cent while discounts are expected to remain high.The key moniterables are discounting trends, updated on dealer delinquencies, demand outlook and guidance for FY20, colour on agreement details with Toyota Kirloskar Motor," ICICI Securities said in a note.
BENGALURU: Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said beta testing of WhatsApp payments in India had gone better than expected, even as the social media giant awaits regulatory approval for a full fledged rollout in the country.Zuckerberg made the comments during an earnings conference call with analysts on Wednesday.India is WhatsApp's biggest market with about 400 million users. The encrypted messaging service is in the process of storing payments data in India, as mandated by the Reserve Bank of India last year. Facebook sees payments as an important part of its long-term strategy as it shifts focus to private conversations and transactions."It's a regulatory approval question in India at this point, and we had a licence to roll it out as part of an initial test. The test went better than we even expected it would for a product you would expect needs to be widely available to be useful," said Zuckerberg. The feedback on the limited test was positive, and the company was confident that a broader rollout would be meaningfully valuable to users, he said."Payments is the part I'm particularly excited about. When I look at the kinds of private interactions we can make easier, payments may be the most important for the long term. We're continuing to test payments on WhatsApp in India and are close to launching in other countries as well," he said.The payments offering has been in beta mode in India since early 2018 for a million users, but the nationwide debut has been delayed, partly because WhatsApp initially resisted storing payments data exclusively in India, before it relented in April.In the future, Facebook will help people use the same payments account to send money to friends and businesses on WhatsApp, shop on Instagram, or make transactions on Facebook. Zuckerberg believes the ability to send money as easily as a photograph will open up new opportunities for businesses."We're also working beyond India in a number of other countries and hope to have this rolled out to a large percent of the people who use WhatsApp within the next year. So, that's the goal. We're pushing forward on all of these issues and we should have more to talk about soon." WhatsApp payments will become a formidable competitor to other UPI-based payment services such as Google Pay, PayTM, Phone-Pe, Bhim, and PayU.India's epayments business is set to grow fivefold by 2023 to $1trillion, according to multinational financial services company Credit Suisse.
NEW DELHI: The BPO Promotion Scheme started by the government in 2014 has created over 30,000 jobs, of which nearly a third have gone to women. The maximum number of jobs under this scheme have been created in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, data accessed by ET shows. According to a senior official, the government is planning an assessment of the scheme for analysing the employment generation aspect and the "sense of empowerment" of employees at the units, which were set up across the country with government subsidy. The scheme envisions incentivising setting up of 53,300 seats across the country by giving Rs 1 lakh per seat as viability gap funding to companies bidding to set up the BPOs. As per details available with ET, 30,321 jobs had been created by July 16 at 226 business process outsourcing (BPO) units operationalised across the country in 28 states. Of these, 10,072 jobs went to women. The maximum number of jobs — 9,100 — were created in Andhra Pradesh, followed by 5,878 in Tamil Nadu, 3,265 in Punjab, 1,781 in Odisha, 1,668 in Bihar, and 1,665 in Maharashtra. 70388312 Among the cities, maximum 5,006 jobs have been created in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh; 3,416 in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu; 3,254 in Mohali, Punjab; 1,988 in Guntupalli, Andhra Pradesh; 1,498 in Patna, Bihar; 1,193 in Ranchi, Jharkhand; and 1,183 jobs in Bhubaneswar, Odisha. Among the big states, West Bengal fared the worst under the scheme with only 141 jobs added under the BPO Promotion Scheme in the six cities identified for BPO units. The biggest state, Uttar Pradesh, could add only 949 jobs. According to the official cited earlier, the government has decided to ask a third party to do an evaluation of the scheme to look into the creation of the IT ecosystem in tier-2 and 3 cities and study the impact of the BPO promotion scheme on the IT sector. The evaluation is also aimed at reporting the gap areas and bottlenecks across states and to look into the potential of the scheme. A major objective is to get a "sense of the empowerment of employees of the BPO units", as per a document seen by ET. The study will also look into the current outreach to the industry, the level of promptness extended to the BPO units, and the coordination between the Centre and states on this. The study will involve speaking to government functionaries, representatives of BPO companies as well as employees with senior, middle and junior management roles in these BPOs to assess their experience. Interviews and field surveys, too, will be carried out.
Within budget constraints, India has to respond to China's Navy expansion: Admiral Karambir Singh The Navy chief was on the sidelines of a seminar in New Delhi on 'Nation Building Through Shipbuilding'.
Trinamool Congress says sorry to Professor after he was beaten up This was not the first time that teachers professors were assaulted in Bengal. Interestingly, this is the first time when a party took the onus and apologised
President Ram Nath Kovind to join the Kargil Vijay Diwas celebrations According to official sources, the President, supreme commander of the armed forces, will arrive in Drass town on Friday to attend the 20th anniversary of the Kargil victory
RTI Bill passed after govt clears Rajya Sabha hurdle Till Wednesday, the opposition was upbeat that it will be able to force the government's hand to send the bill to a Parliament select committee and crease out the anomalies.
New CEA Atanu Chakraborty's experience with global investors to come in handy Indeed his stunning success at DIPAM — the government surpassed the divestment target of Rs 80,000 crore in 2018-19 by a handsome Rs 5,000 crore — is proof of his capability to deliver quietly and efficiently.
Andhra Pradesh HC stays state government's move to renovate PPAs Renewable power producers had moved the high court challenging the government's attempt to renegotiate PPAs and revise tariff.
GST council meet postponed, to be held tomorrow The 36th GST Council meeting, which was to be held through video conferencing, was called to specifically consider the proposal to slash the GST rate to 5% from 12% on EVs.
Dredging Corporation of India Ltd Recruitment 2019 Visakhapatnam – Apply Online for 42 Vacancies. Dredging Corporation of India has made an announcement to recruit candidates for 42 Dredge Cadets, NCV and Other Posts. Candidates looking for Central Government Jobs can check with the DCIL Career Notification and apply online to fill up these vacancies. Dredging Corporation of India Recruitment Online Registration link will be active from 25th July 2019. Interested and eligible can begin to fill up dredging Vacancies @ dredge-india.nic.in.
MPPGCL Recruitment 2019 – Apply Online for 100 Vacancies. The Job Notification for the Plant Assistant Post has released under Madhya Pradesh Power Generating Company Limited. ITI candidates seeking for Madhya Pradesh government jobs can apply for this vacancies. MP Power Generating Company Limited Online Link will be available from 01st August 2019.
