Russia plans to buy Turkish treasury bonds via Akkuyu nuclear plant $6bn loan deal

State-owned Rosatom plans to use loan partly to invest in the bonds as Ankara seeks to replenish its coffers

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan with workers at the Akkuyu nuclear plant on 17 September 2021 (Handout)

By Ragip Soylu in Ankara
Published date: 30 July 2022 

A Russian state-owned company sought a $6.1bn loan deal this week to fund the construction and development of Turkey's Akkuyu nuclear power plant, including plans to deposit some of the money with the Turkish Ministry of Treasury and Finance, according to official documents.

In a public announcement on Monday, Rosatom Corp collected bids from potential creditors to provide a $6.1bn credit line to finance Akkuyu Nuclear JSC, its subsidiary in Turkey.

The initial credit would be $3.3bn with an option of $2.8bn of additional funds.

The official documents suggest the money would be used for four projects, including the purchase of equipment, payment for construction and installation works, and operation of the nuclear plant and four power units with VVER-1200 reactors.

The money will also be also used for the acquisition and development of a uranium deposit in Kazakhstan, and for acquiring lithium assets abroad.

Turkey embarks on nuclear future with Russian help

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The official notice and the memorandum for the loan says one of the "intended uses" of the credit line would be for "temporary placement in deposits, purchase of dollar bonds of the Ministry of Treasury and Finance of the Republic of Turkey". The intended amount is not clear.

Rosatom’s Akkuyu Nuclear JSC also plans to use its subsidiary Atomenergoprom as the guarantor for the loan, and pledge some Turkish dollar bonds to secure the credit line if the lender agrees.

On Friday, Bloomberg reported that Rosatom had decided to wire $15bn to Turkey for the construction of the $20bn Akkuyu nuclear power plant, citing officials who said that an initial $5bn had already been received last week.

The officials suggested the move was a goodwill gesture by Russian President Vladimir Putin to thank Turkey for the breakthrough Ukraine grain deal brokered by Ankara this month.
Rapidly evaporating foreign currency reserves

The Turkish government is in dire need of foreign funding as a result of its rapidly evaporating foreign currency reserves.

Rosatom is expected to spend up to $2bn quickly on overdue payments to subcontractors.

The company told Bloomberg that it would indeed transfer some funds to Turkey, but an amount much lower than that declared by Turkish officials.

The power plant will satisfy 10 percent of Turkey's energy needs when fully operational in 2026.

Since last year, the Turkish treasury has introduced a number of tools to help provide a lifeline to its coffers by promoting Turkish lira assets.

In December, the treasury introduced "foreign exchange protected Turkish lira deposits" under a scheme to encourage investors to use the local currency.

The accounts, which are open to foreign investors, compensate savers if the exchange-rate depreciation exceeds the official interest rate.
Mere procedure

Middle East Eye reached out to Rosatom for comment on the credit line but the company had not replied at time of publication.

One source with knowledge of the matter pointed out that the bid was open for only two days, Monday and Tuesday, with the evaluation to be completed on Friday, raising the possibility that a creditor might already have been chosen and the notice was a mere procedure.

Middle Eastern rush to a nuclear powered future

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The timing of the bid roused interest in Turkey as Rosatom decided to pursue the credit line just one day before its subsidiary, Akkuyu Nuclear JSC, cancelled its contract with the Turkish-Russian contractor Titan2 Ic Ictas, citing several violations, ranging from security to insurance.

In a statement, Ictas reminded the public that the company was a joint venture, including a party associated with Rosatom.

"The attempt to cancel the contract is resulting in the removal of the Turkish partnership from the project as the contractor," Ictas said.

"There are steps to assign a Russian company as the sole alternative contractor. It is very clear that the aim is to reduce the participation of the Turkish companies within the management of the project and degrade them to subcontractor level."
'Turks are completely out'

An official document signed by Akkuyu Nuclear JSC indicates that the company will replace Titan2 Ic Ictas with TSM Enerji Insaat Limited Sirketi.

The main shareholder of TSM Eneji is Titan2 JSC, with 49 percent, which makes the company a subsidiary of Rosatom.

One Turkish source with knowledge of the matter told MEE that Turkish workers were not allowed onto the construction site on Friday, while Russian workers associated with Titan2 Ic Ictas were granted access.

"Turks are completely out," the source said. "That's about it."

BIN LADEN INC.

Prince Charles accepted $1.6m from family of Osama bin Laden: Report

Heir to UK throne took money for his charity even as advisers warned it would cause 'national outrage,' says UK newspaper

Prince Charles allegedly brokered the payment from Bakr bin Laden, half-brother of the former al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, at a private meeting at Clarence House in October 2013 (AFP)

By MEE staff
Published date: 31 July 2022 

The Prince of Wales accepted £1m from the family of Osama bin Laden, the former al-Qaeda leader, according to a report published in the Sunday Times.

Prince Charles personally secured the money, worth $1.6m at the then exchange rate, from Bakr bin Laden, the head of the wealthy Saudi family, and his brother Shafiq, the UK newspaper said on Saturday.

Both men are half-brothers of Osama bin Laden, the founder of al-Qaeda who masterminded the 11 September, 2001, attacks against the US.

According to the Sunday Times, Prince Charles brokered the payment after a private meeting with Bakr, now 76, at Clarence House, the prince's personal residence in London, on 30 October 2013, two years after Osama bin Laden had been killed by US special forces in Pakistan.

'The fact that [he] was choosing to broker deals with a name and a family that not only rang alarm bells, but [aroused] abject horror around the world... why would you do this?'

- Source close to Prince Charles

The heir to the British throne agreed to the donation despite objections from advisers at Clarence House and the Prince of Wales's Charitable Fund, where the money was deposited, the newspaper said.

According to sources, several of the prince's advisers pleaded with him to return the money.


One of his household staff said it would cause national outrage if the news leaked to the press. They reportedly told the prince that "it would not be good for anybody" if it emerged that he had accepted money from the family of the perpetrator of the 9/11 attacks, which resulted in the murder of 67 Britons alongside thousands of Americans.

According to the newspaper, one source said: "The fact that a member of the highest level of the British establishment was choosing to broker deals with a name and a family that not only rang alarm bells, but [aroused] abject horror around the world... why would you do this? What good reason is there to do this?"

Charles was said to have felt it would be too embarrassing to hand the money back and feared the brothers would suspect the reason.

One household staff member believes they were "very vociferous" with the prince but were "shouted down". Another adviser to Charles is said to have implored the prince to return the money, but was apparently ignored.
Out of favour

According to the Sunday Times, a Clarence House source insisted that Prince Charles's aides were not dismayed by the bin Laden donation, and that the decisions about whether to accept money fell within the remit of trustees.

A statement from the Prince of Wales's Charitable Foundation said the decision to accept the donation was taken wholly by the trustees and "any attempt to suggest otherwise is misleading and inaccurate," according to a report in the Guardian.

There is no suggestion that either Bakr or Shafiq bin Laden has sponsored or been involved in acts of "terrorism".

As half-brothers they are related to Osama bin Laden through their father, Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden, a Yemeni-born billionaire who became the wealthiest non-royal Saudi after founding the BinLadin Group, a Jeddah-based construction firm.

He died in a plane crash aged 59 in 1967, when Osama was 10 years old.

UK police investigating bid by Prince Charles' charity to give honours to Saudi businessman

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Bakr took over the company, but fell out of favour with the Saudi monarchy in 2015 after an accident at one of his projects resulted in the deaths of 100 people.

Two years later, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman rounded up Bakr and two of his other brothers, Saad and Salah, during an "anti-corruption drive" and held them in detention. Bakr was released last year.

The bin Laden family's relationship with the prince's charities has never previously been disclosed and does not appear in public documents. Charities are not required to disclose their supporters.

However, it is not the first time the prince has been embroiled with the bin Laden family. He dined with Bakr to discuss the Islamic faith in October 2001, just two weeks after the September 11 attacks.

According to an account of their initial meeting in 2000, the pair were introduced by Prince Khalid Al-Faisal Al Saud, the third of eight sons of the late King Faisal bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, during a fundraising dinner for the Oxford Centre of Islamic Studies, of which Charles is patron.

The prince is widely reported to have asked Bakr: "What's your brother up to these days?"

The bin Laden family formally disavowed Osama decades ago, but has long been dogged by their association. On 19 September 2001, eight days after the attacks, 13 members of the family left the US aboard a privately chartered plane of Saudi nationals.
Police investigation

In February this year, UK police launched an investigation into a bid to give honours and British citizenship to a Saudi national linked to the charity of the Prince of Wales.

London's Metropolitan Police Service said it was investigating allegations of offences under the Honours (Prevention of Abuses) Act 1925.
Prince Charles aide pushed for Saudi tycoon knighthood in 'cash for favours' case: ReportRead More »

The police force said in a statement: "The decision follows an assessment of a September 2021 letter.

"This related to media reporting alleging offers of help were made to secure honours and citizenship for a Saudi national.

"The Special Enquiry Team has conducted the assessment process which has included contacting those believed to hold relevant information.

"Officers liaised with the Prince's Foundation about the findings of an independent investigation into fundraising practices. The foundation provided a number of relevant documents."

Prince Charles's former closest aide, Michael Fawcett, stepped down from his role as chief executive of the Prince's Foundation in late 2021 amid claims he promised to help secure a CBE and British citizenship for Saudi national Mahfouz Marei Mubarak bin Mahfouz, a donor to the foundation.

According to a report in the Times, businessman Mahfouz had been seeking to obtain citizenship through a so-called "golden investment" visa, paying intermediaries tens of thousands of pounds to put him in contact with the prince after being advised that awards would help his application.

Prince Charles's office stressed that he had "no knowledge" of allegations relating to the offer of honours "on the basis of donation to his charities".
Qatari cash

Last month, the Sunday Times revealed that Prince Charles had accepted a suitcase containing €1m ($1.05m) in cash from a former Qatari prime minister.

The handover was one of three lots of cash, totalling $3.15m, which the prince personally received from Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber Al Thani, between 2011 and 2015, the newspaper said.

The handovers are alleged to have occurred during meetings between the two men, including a private one-to-one meeting at Clarence House in 2015.

Prince Charles accepted €1m cash in suitcase from ex-Qatar prime minister: Report

Read More »

In a statement, a spokesperson for Clarence House said the money given during the 2015 meeting was "passed immediately to one of the prince's charities who carried out the appropriate covenants and assured us that all the correct processes were followed".

The suitcase containing the $1.05m was given to two of Charles' advisers, who are said to have hand-counted the money, which comprised of now discontinued €500 notes.

Coutts, the private bank that acts for the royal family, was then asked to collect the cash. Each payment was deposited into the accounts of the Prince of Wales's Charitable Fund.

The Sunday Times said there was no suggestion the payments were illegal. The newspaper said the prince's meetings with Sheikh Hamad do not appear in the Court Circular, the list of official engagements undertaken by working royals.

The royal gift policy states that members of the royal family are allowed to accept a "cheque" as a patron of, or on behalf of, a charity. It does not reference what should happen regarding cash payments.

Sir Alistair Graham, the former chairman of the committee on standards in public life, told the Sunday Times the revelations were "truly shocking" and would be "inconceivable" to most people.

Graham, 79, said: "I wouldn't make a distinction between a politician and a member of the royal family.

"If the Qatari government wants to make a gift to his foundation, then there are proper ways to do these things rather than handling large sums of cash."

With Roe v. Wade out, we need male contraception more than ever

THE MALE PILL IS LIKE FUSION ENERGY

STILL WAITING AFTER SIXTY YEARS


Getty Images

CONTRACEPTION SINCE ANCIENT TIMES

Akash Bakshi
Fri, July 29, 2022

Roe v. Wade has been overturned, resulting in reduced access to safe and effective abortions. It’s a devastating moment for the health and well-being of American women and individuals who can become pregnant.

We should consider why women need abortions in the first place. For many (but not all–some women require abortions for medical reasons), it’s unintended pregnancy. For every two pregnant women in America, one of their pregnancies is unintended. About 40% of those women choose to have an abortion, which is now outlawed in as many as 28 states in America.

But unplanned isn’t a synonym for unprotected. As many as 50% of couples observed in a study by the Guttmacher Institute were actively using a contraceptive when they became pregnant. It won’t be a surprise to learn that condoms are behind many well-intentioned yet failed efforts to prevent pregnancy. The pill, too, can fail: 12% of women who seek an abortion were on the pill.

Of course, the protections previously granted by Roe must be codified into law. But we also need better contraceptives. We always have. We need to empower people to prevent unwanted pregnancy and the need for abortion. We can also increase access to highly effective contraceptives and bring men into the conversation. After all, women don’t get pregnant alone.


Efficacy aside, nearly every woman who is on a hormonal contraceptive weighs side effects that include mood changes, depression, an increased risk of breast and cervical cancer, and blood clots.

Male birth control doesn’t exist today beyond the technologies developed in the 1800s: condoms, which come with high failure rates, or vasectomies, which aren’t yet reliably reversible. But if it did, we could decrease unintended pregnancies and, in today’s America, unsafe abortions.

We need men to claim their full equal responsibility for reproductive health–and it’s not an unrealistic notion. Nearly 75% of women and about 72% of men believe both sexual partners should be equally responsible for birth control. There is a massive untapped market for novel male contraceptives that are highly effective, reversible, and convenient to use. There is also a glaring gap in interest, research, and funding in the field of male reproduction. Biologically, it’s challenging: successful contraception requires us to stop millions of sperm from reaching an egg, and it’s difficult to target human sperm cells.

To suggest that men aren’t looking beyond the condom simply doesn’t reflect the current mood: A recent survey showed that 17 million American men are seeking better contraceptive methods for themselves.

This wasn’t always the case, of course: It's widely believed that demand for male contraceptive methods didn’t exist until after paternity tests were developed, putting men on the hook for raising their own offspring.

Regardless, it's a whole new era for heterosexual women and their relationship with male partners. The #MeToo movement and the 2017 Women’s March on Washington come to mind as flashpoints for modern feminism which aim to hold the country’s most powerful men to account and include a focus on sexual empowerment centered on women's pleasure.

Still, many assumed men would be turned off by the possibility of side effects, which suggests a gross double standard in which side effects are acceptable for women but unacceptable for men–a notion that also does not align with the values that younger generations are striving for.

Let’s empower men to step up during a moment when women’s access to safe and effective abortions is now in grave danger.

An affordable, reversible contraceptive for men is possible. Private companies are commercializing therapeutics and devices that non-hormonally bring sperm counts below fertile limits in men, essentially offering the benefits of a highly effective contraceptive to men. Other institutions are trialing hormonal methods with tentatively promising efficacy.

These developments give me hope that someday we can decrease the hormonal burden we put on women in the name of preventing pregnancy. It’s a burden that has compelled so many women to share their stories with me about the effects of birth control on their lives. It’s personal and real. The development of male contraceptives covered by insurance and widely adopted by men can radically change that.

Attacks on reproductive autonomy and a lack of male birth control have put women in devastating positions. But if we’re to decrease the need for abortion, we’ll need men to take on a fair share of responsibility in preventing unwanted pregnancies–and a whole lot of research, funding, and awareness to get us there.

Akash Bakshi is the CEO and co-founder of YourChoice Therapeutics, a company that is developing a birth control pill for men. Akash holds degrees in Biochemistry and Cell Biology from UC San Diego and University of Queensland.

Abortion foes downplay complex post-Roe v. Wade realities


Luke Howard, of Avon, Ind., holds a crucifix aloft as anti-abortion supporters rally as the Indiana Senate Rules Committee met a Republican proposal to ban nearly all abortions in the state during a hearing at the Statehouse in Indianapolis, July 26, 2022. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy, File) 

AMANDA SEITZ and JOSH KELETY
Fri, July 29, 2022 

WASHINGTON (AP) — When a 10-year-old Ohio girl traveled to Indiana last month to end a pregnancy forced onto her by a rapist, several conservative politicians and TV pundits called the report a hoax.

After horrific details confirmed the case was real, some tried a new tack: claiming, without evidence, that the child could have still legally obtained an abortion in Ohio under a near-total abortion ban that exempts only mothers whose lives or major bodily functions are at risk once fetal cardiac activity is detected.

Catherine Glenn Foster, president of the anti-abortion Americans United for Life, added another defense for young rape victims: She told the House Judiciary Committee that a 10-year-old's pregnancy “would probably impact her life and so, therefore, it would fall under any exception and would not be an abortion.”

In televised statements and interviews, anti-abortion advocates have used misleading rhetoric about abortion access to downplay fallout and complications from restrictive abortion laws as doctors, struggling to interpret laws that have largely been untested in courts, turn away pregnant patients for care.

Those efforts have had an immediate impact, casting a narrative about a post-Roe v. Wade world that overlooks how abortion laws enacted in recent weeks have complicated the way doctors treat rape victims, miscarriages and ectopic pregnancies.

More than half a dozen doctors interviewed by The Associated Press said they feel compromised and uncertain operating in an abortion landscape fundamentally changed by a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that rejected nearly 50 years of precedent that abortion was a protected constitutional right.

“It’s a horrible position for health care providers to be in, to be unsure about what’s legal and what's not legal, and to be questioning the care that they know that they should provide,” said Dr. Jennifer Kerns, an associate professor in the department of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences at the University of California, San Francisco.

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, who initially questioned reporting of the 10-year-old girl's rape case, said in a Fox News Channel interview that she did not have to leave Ohio for abortion treatment, citing the state’s exemptions. Last week, Ohio Right to Life President Mike Gonidakis repeated the claim during a public forum: “She could have had that abortion here.” The law’s Republican sponsor said the same in a newspaper column published Thursday.

But it’s not as clear cut as they’ve suggested.

The state’s nonpartisan Legislative Service Commission confirmed in an analysis that the age of a mother, alone, would not allow a girl to legally access the procedure in the state. Doctors in Ohio are required to document a medical condition and rationale if they administer an abortion to provide life-saving treatment.

Yost’s office did not return a request for additional comment. Gonidakis laid out “different scenarios” to the AP under which the girl might have been able to access the abortion in Ohio, such as if a doctor agreed her life was at risk because of her age, while noting that he had not reviewed her medical records.

Across social media, some conservatives have also minimized concerns about access to treatment for ectopic pregnancies, calling it “still legal in every state.” An ectopic pregnancy is defined as one in which a fertilized egg grows outside the uterus, where it has no chance of survival.

Earlier this month, abortion opponent Erin Morrow Hawley told the House Reform and Oversight Committee that ectopic pregnancies had become the subject of “misinformation.”

“There have been social media posts suggesting that women won’t get treated for an ectopic pregnancy because doctors might be afraid of performing the procedure, but that’s absolutely false,” said Hawley, an attorney at the religious nonprofit Alliance Defending Freedom. “Treatment for an ectopic pregnancy is not, in fact, an abortion.”

State abortion laws, however, have fueled confusion.

Doctors generally agree that the procedure to an end an ectopic pregnancy, which typically includes medication or surgery to remove the pregnancy, is not the same as an abortion.

But women reportedly have been declined care in states that have severely restricted abortion access, like Ohio, where an abortion is banned once fetal cardiac activity is detected. Fetal heartbeats can still be present in ectopic pregnancies. In one case, a central Texas hospital told a physician not to treat an ectopic pregnancy until it ruptured, per a letter from the Texas Medical Association.

In an email to the AP, Hawley said that doctors who have turned away ectopic pregnancy patients because of abortion bans are misinterpreting the laws.

Still, before Roe v. Wade was even overturned by the Supreme Court in June, some religious hospitals had policies against treating women for ectopic pregnancies.

And many states have not specified in their newly enacted abortion bans that an ectopic pregnancy can be treated as an exception. That's left doctors in some states leery of ending the pregnancy, said Dr. Kate White, an associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Boston University School of Medicine. Lawmakers in West Virginia, for example, are considering an abortion ban that would carve out an exception for ectopic pregnancies.

“Clinicians may be afraid to treat it if the abortion law in their state does not explicitly carve out ectopic pregnancy. You can see their worry, ‘Hey, growing pregnancy, can’t interrupt it ever,'” White said. “They are afraid that the law is too broad.”

___

Kelety reported from Phoenix. Associated Press writer Julie Carr Smyth in Columbus, Ohio contributed.

China's pledge to give green lights to more technology deals points to an easing of restrictions on Big Tech, analysts say


Sat, July 30, 2022 


Beijing's pledge to give "green lights" to technology deals will likely lead to more targeted measures to regulate Big Tech's investment activities, as China's top leadership seeks to have internet platforms play bigger roles in helping prop up a slowing economy, according to analysts.

During the Politburo meeting chaired by President Xi Jinping on Thursday, the Chinese leadership concluded that the government should give "green lights" to a batch of investment deals in the tech sector, sending a signal that Beijing will be less restrictive on the activities of the country's Big Tech firms after imposing many "red lights" on deals in the sector since late 2020.

The meeting's suggestions around "green lights" means that Beijing could "set the boundary" for investment and merger and acquisition (M&A) activities by internet and platform companies, said Bruce Pang, JLL's Greater China head of research and chief economist.

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Beijing had earlier proposed the "red light" and "green light" mechanism for the country's Big Tech firms as part of a campaign to curb "disorderly expansion of capital". Pang said that the Chinese authorities had focused on "red lights" by setting up rules and drawing up bottom lines, but it has now shifted its stance amid rising unemployment and weak demand.

"Green lighting" investment cases by the country's Big Tech firms will be a wise choice to help address economic problems and enable platforms to create jobs and boost consumption, he said.

Regulators could potentially put out several examples of successful M&A cases, and give approval for some internet companies to become licensed financial holding companies based on rules released in 2020, Pang said.

The "green light" statement also suggests that authorities may promulgate an "investment list" for platform companies, and give them clearer guidance on areas they can invest in, Fu Tianzi, an analyst at Everbright Securities, wrote in a research note.

"Green lighted" investment cases may likely occur in areas that help boost the development of the real economy, Fu wrote. That could include courier services and food delivery, which help create jobs, and those that help ensure the supply of goods or support disadvantaged groups.

Internet platform deals that help the digital transformation of companies and push for technological breakthroughs, and those that promote Chinese culture overseas, could also be among areas that receive green lights, Fu added.

In April, Beijing indicated that it wanted China's internet firms to play a more important role in helping to bolster the faltering national economy, which has been battered by massive lockdowns and other stringent Covid-19-related measures.

Earlier this week, the Chinese government also established an interministerial meeting mechanism focused on the country's digital economy, a small step towards aligning different regulators in supervising Chinese Big Tech companies.

The statement on green lights is also a response to growing calls for clearer guidelines from industry observers.

Wang Yiming, a former deputy at the Development Research Center of the State Council, suggested at an economic summit earlier this month that there should be plans for how the red and green light mechanism works so that the market has clear expectations.

Zhang Jianhua, director of the Research Center for Financial Development and Regtech at Tsinghua University, also made comments at a forum in April that there should soon be clear standards for capital green lights.


Copyright (c) 2022. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

Alibaba added to watch list of Chinese firms facing expulsion from US exchanges, days after primary listing bid in Hong Kong

Sat, July 30, 2022

Alibaba Group Holding has been added to a growing list of Chinese companies that face potential delisting from US stock exchanges, days after the e-commerce giant announced plans to seek a primary listing on Hong Kong's bourse with the aim to diversify its investor base.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Friday included Alibaba, owner of the South China Morning Post, to its watch list of US-listed Chinese firms that face removal from American exchanges under a 2020 law, the Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act (HFCAA).

Under that law, foreign companies may be delisted if they fail to submit their audit papers to a US accounting oversight body for three consecutive years. This means the three-year countdown for Alibaba to comply with the requirement has started.

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Alibaba could end up being the biggest Chinese firm to be delisted in the US if it does not meet that legal requirement. The Hangzhou-based company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Saturday.

Visitors are seen outside the New York Stock Exchange building on September 19, 2014, when the Chinese e-commerce giant started its first day of trading after raising US$25 billion from its initial public offering. Photo: Shutterstock alt=Visitors are seen outside the New York Stock Exchange building on September 19, 2014, when the Chinese e-commerce giant started its first day of trading after raising US$25 billion from its initial public offering. Photo: Shutterstock>

The SEC's move sent Alibaba's American depositary shares down 11 per cent on Friday to close at US$89.37. The company has lost nearly two-thirds of its valuation since its peak in late 2020 amid regulatory pressures in both China and the US, and a weakening global macroeconomic environment.

Apart from Alibaba, three other mainland Chinese internet companies - Mogu, Cheetah Mobile and Boqii Holding - and one Hong Kong entity, metal stamping firm Highway Holdings, were added by the SEC to its watch list on Friday.

More than 150 Chinese companies are now on the SEC's provisional line-up of firms to be delisted, including e-commerce services providers JD.com and Pinduoduo, video-sharing platform operator Bilibili and electric carmaker Nio. They were added to the SEC's watch list of companies "deemed to be liable to HFCAA" as each one filed their annual report. Alibaba filed its report last Tuesday.

There were 261 Chinese companies, with a total valuation of US$1.3 trillion, that were listed on major US stock exchanges at the end of March, according to a report by the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission.

With its inclusion to the SEC's delisting watch list, Alibaba's plan to upgrade its Hong Kong stock exchange presence from a secondary to a primary listing before the end of this year proved prescient.

A primary listing in the city could mitigate the risks and uncertainty involving the US audit requirement, enabling Alibaba to continue being a publicly traded company in case it gets removed from the New York Stock Exchange.

More importantly, that plan is expected to foster "a wider and more diversified investor base to share in Alibaba's growth and future, especially from China and other markets in Asia", company chairman and chief executive Daniel Zhang Yong said in a statement last Tuesday.

SEC chair Gary Gensler recently indicated that it was unclear whether a deal with China on the US audit requirement could be reached. "I just really don't know right now," he said. "It's going to be a choice made by the authorities there."

US and Chinese regulators have been engaged in discussions to resolve their accounting spat. The China Securities Regulatory Commission said that it has presented proposals to collaborate with the US accounting oversight board since 2019 to reconcile local auditing rules with global bookkeeping standards.

Last November, the SEC approved a framework to determine which US-listed Chinese companies fail to fully allow auditing inspection and, therefore, will be delisted from American capital markets. It allows the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, a non-profit entity that deals with accounting issues of public companies, to determine whether a delisting process needs to be triggered.

Alibaba, meanwhile, said on Tuesday that all top executives of Ant Group have resigned from its partnership structure, as the financial technology affiliate awaits Beijing's nod to transform into a financial holding group.

This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP's Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright © 2022 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

Copyright (c) 2022. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

Julius Malema: South Africa opposition leader warns of impending uprising

BBC
Fri, July 29, 2022 

The controversial South African opposition figure, Julius Malema, has warned of an impending uprising similar to the "Arab Spring" that will target white people and "black elites".

"When the unled revolution comes... the first target is going to be white people," Mr Malema told the BBC's Hardtalk programme.

He demanded an "intervention" to boost the quality of life to avoid unrest.

The MP, known for strident views, has twice been convicted of hate speech.

He has also faced fraud and corruption charges, which were later dropped. Mr Malema said they were politically motivated.

The Arab Spring was a series of pro-democracy uprisings which began at the end of 2010 in Tunisia, where the president was toppled, and spread to several other countries in the region.

In the BBC interview, Mr Malema accused rich black people of committing "class suicide".

"The violence that is going to happen in South Africa is because the elite is disappearing and the poor are becoming more poorer," he told the BBC's Stephen Sakur.

"Therefore there's going to be something that looks like an Arab Spring. That, we are guaranteed."

Former President Thabo Mbeki issued a similar warning about a possible uprising last week. He criticised his own party, the governing African National Congress (ANC), saying it has no plan to deal with the problems of poverty, unemployment and inequality.
'Difficult time for South Africa'

With high levels of joblessness, inflation hitting a 13-year high, complaints about corruption and a troubled energy sector, South Africa is facing many challenges.

Current President Cyril Ramaphosa, in a recent statement to the nation, acknowledged a "difficult time for our country". But in a separate speech, he responded to Mr Mbeki's criticism, saying the ANC has a plan to fix things.

Mr Malema, who leads the opposition Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), has long courted controversy and has previously been found guilty of using hate speech, in 2010 and 2011 for comments he made about the woman that accused former President Jacob Zuma of rape and then for singing the song "Shoot the Boer (Afrikaner)".

In the 2019 general election the EFF won nearly 11% of the vote and has 44 seats in parliament.

Mr Malema's message that the ANC is not working for the poor has gained popularity

Mr Malema is currently facing allegations of hate speech against white people, but has denied that he is causing tensions between different races and says the violence in South African cannot be pinned on his following.

"I've engaged in democratic ways of trying to resolve problems in South Africa, and therefore those who are scared of our ideas try and create an impression of very violent people. We are not."

The opposition leader used to be a member of the ANC, but was kicked out for fomenting divisions and bringing the party into disrepute. He denied the accusations, saying he was being persecuted.

Mr Malema also wants a national shutdown to protest against the ruling ANC.

"We are going to bring our bodies to the streets and demand that [President] Ramaphosa must resign.

As for his own party, the EFF, Mr Malema believes they would govern the country much better than the ANC.

"There's going to be the EFF that is going to take over South Africa and run it for the better."

UN body says violence against Syrians in Lebanon on the rise


KAREEM CHEHAYEB
Fri, July 29, 2022 

BEIRUT (AP) — Discrimination and violence against Syrian refugees in Lebanon has soared in recent weeks as the country grapples with high food prices and shortages, the U.N. refugee agency told the Associated Press on Friday.

“We have seen tensions between Lebanese and Syrians at bakeries across the country,” United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees spokesperson Paula Barrachina told the AP. “In some cases even involving shooting and using sticks against refugees.”

The U.N.'s World Food Program says Lebanon is facing a food security crisis, with about half the population food insecure. People are also grappling with high food inflation and a currency that's tanked over the past three years.

Barranchina said some parts of Lebanon have issued curfews for refugees or asked bakeries to prioritize Lebanese citizens.

According to a notice obtained by the AP, bakeries in Baalbek were ordered to prioritize Lebanese citizens for subsidized Arabic flatbread.

One Syrian refugee told the AP earlier this month that he was forced to wait several hours at a bakery as they prioritized giving bread bundles to Lebanese first.

In one video shared on social media, a group of men in Lebanon's Bourj Hammoud neighborhood near the capital beat a Syrian adolescent boy with sticks and kicked him the face near a bakery. Sounds of gunshots ring out in the background.

Lebanese authorities last week announced the formation of a security committee to stifle fights and scuffles at bakeries.

The UNHCR called on Lebanese authorities to “ensure the rule of law and the protection of all persons in the country”, while urging the international community to shore up aid to the country.

Lebanese lawmakers voted to spend a $150 million World Bank loan on importing more wheat in the hopes of bringing down the price domestically.

About 1 million Syrian refugees who fled their country's civil war reside in neighboring Lebanon. Most live in extreme poverty.

Since 2019, poverty has deepened for across the country for all its residents. A growing number of Lebanese, Syrians, and Palestinians living in the country are embarking almost weekly on a dangerous voyage across the Mediterranean to seek refuge in Europe.

Lebanese officials have increasingly called for the forcible return of Syrian refugees to areas in their country they deem safe from the conflict, and have accused them overwhelming the country’s already crumbling infrastructure.

While armed conflict has subsided in much of Syria, human rights organizations and the UNHCR say conditions are not safe for many people to return. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International say they have documented cases of arbitrary detention, torture, and a host of human rights abuses to returnees.

The Lebanese government has dismissed these concerns. They are coordinating with the Syrian government in Damascus on a plan that could see up to 15,000 refugees sent back to the country each month.

Analysis: A world changed, maybe permanently, by Ukraine war





JOHN LEICESTER
Sat, July 30, 2022 at 12:25 AM·5 min read

PARIS (AP) — July 16, 1945: An incandescent mushroom cloud in New Mexico heralds the dawn of the nuclear age. July 20, 1969: Neil Armstrong takes a small step and a giant leap in the dust of the Moon.

Feb. 24, 2022: Russian President Vladimir Putin chews up the world order and 77 years of almost uninterrupted peace in Europe by invading Ukraine, disrupting the supplies of food it produces for many of the planet's 8 billion people.

All were watersheds in world history, turning points that will be taught in schools for decades to come. All changed not just lives but also trajectories for mankind, with repercussions felt across continents and for the foreseeable future.

Russia's invasion, the killing and maiming, have quickly added Mariupol, Bucha and other Ukrainian names to Europe's long list of cities and towns associated with the abuses of war: Dresden, Srebrenica, the Nazi massacre in France’s Oradour-sur-Glane, to name only a few.

And after nearly a half-year of fighting, with tens of thousands of dead and wounded on both sides, massive disruptions to supplies of energy, food and financial stability, the world is no longer as it was.

The air raid sirens that howl with regularity over Ukraine’s cities can’t be heard in Paris or Berlin, yet generations of Europeans who had grown up knowing only peace have been brutally awakened to both its value and its fragility.

Renewed war in Europe and the need to take sides — for self-preservation and to stand for right against wrong — have also shifted the world’s geo-political tectonics and relationships between nations.

Some now barely talk to Russia. Some have banded together. Others, notably in Africa, want to avoid being sucked into the breakdown between Russia and the West. Some don’t want to jeopardize supplies of food, energy, security and income. Russia and Western nations are working — notably, again, in Africa — on fence-sitters, lobbying them to take sides.

The war in Ukraine has held a mirror to mankind, too, reflecting, yet again, its propensity to live on the razor's edge of folly, to take steps back even as it pursues progress.

And there had been progress, with speedy vaccines against the COVID-19 global pandemic and deals on climate change, before Russia's all-powerful Putin made it his historical mission to force independent, Western-looking Ukraine at gunpoint back into the Kremlin's orbit, as it had been during Soviet times, when he served as an intelligence officer for the feared KGB.

With its united stance against the invasion, NATO has found renewed reason for being. Just three years ago in 2019 — before the double shock of COVID-19 followed by the Ukraine war made that seem a lifetime away — the world's biggest military alliance had appeared at risk of slowly sinking into disrepair.

French President Emmanuel Macron said it was suffering “brain death.” And then-U.S. President Donald Trump didn't have much patience for the alliance that has been a cornerstone of U.S. security policy for more than half a century, grumbling that the U.S. was unfairly shouldering too much of the defense burden and other NATO members too little.

Now NATO is clubbing together increasingly heavy weapons for use by Ukraine on its front lines and relentlessly bombed trenches horribly reminiscent of World War I. It speed-dated Finland and Sweden when those Nordic countries decided that continuing to be nonaligned was too risky in the wake of the Russian invasion and that they needed the shield of the NATO umbrella against whatever Putin might do next.

Their becoming the 31st and 32nd members of NATO will add to the ways in which Europe has been changed permanently, or at least for the foreseeable future, by the war.

Further away, in Asia, the ripples are consequential, too.

China is scrutinizing the Russian campaign for military lessons that could be applied in any eventual invasion of the self-governed island of Taiwan. India, China and other energy-hungry Asian nations are boosting the Kremlin's war chest and undercutting Western sanctions by buying growing amounts of Russian oil.

And then there's Putin himself. In Ukraine, long before the invasion, many already felt that their country was engaged in a battle of survival against the Kremlin leader's designs. Since 2014, thousands of people had already been killed in fighting with Russia-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.

The faces of Ukrainian dead from that conflict stare out from a memorial wall in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, bearing silent testimony to what is now, in the invasion's wake, recognized as fact in Western capitals: Putin cannot and should not be trusted.

Soaring prices for food, energy and just about everything — causing pain across continents and largely driven by the war's disruption to supplies — are another change, although perhaps less permanent. High inflation, an agony disturbingly familiar to those who lived through energy shocks of the 1970s, is back as a household term. Some economists warn that “stagflation" — a noxious combo of high inflation and slumping economic growth — could make a comeback, too.

So what's next?

With no end in sight to the war, there are too many ifs and buts to hazard a solid guess. But with each additional day of fighting, the body count and the war's ripples across the globe grow, and peace recedes.

Mankind became inured to the bomb, learning to live with it. Manned spaceflight became routine. All we can hope is that war in Europe will not.

—-

Paris-based correspondent John Leicester has reported from Europe since 2002 and from Ukraine this June.

U.N. nuclear conference on tap, with Ukraine plant in "alarming" state


DON EMMERT/AFP via Getty Images

Pamela Falk
Fri, July 29, 2022 

United Nations — On Monday, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Rafael Grossi, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres will be among those expected to gather at United Nations headquarters in New York for the tenth annual review of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The meeting comes as the IAEA is being denied U.N. help to access Ukraine's Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant, the largest nuclear plant in Europe, which has been occupied by Russia since the early days of the war, and which the watchdog agency says is in an "alarming" state.

"It is urgent," Grossi said in the latest IAEA report. "I'm continuing my determined efforts to agree and lead a safety, security and safeguards mission to the site as soon as possible."

Ukraine's nuclear power facilities at risk

Alarm bells went off, figuratively, in early March at the Vienna offices of the International Atomic Energy Agency, an autonomous agency within the U.N. system, when Russian forces took control of the Zaporizhzhya plant and Ukraine informed the agency that Ukrainian staff was operating the plant under Russian command.

At the time, Grossi "expressed grave concern" that the takeover violated one of the seven pillars of nuclear safety and security, namely that the operating staff "must be able to fulfill their safety and security duties and have the capacity to make decisions free of undue pressure."

Russian forces switched off some of the mobile networks and the internet at the site to prevent information about its operation being transmitted, Ukraine said.

In March, Ukraine's ambassador to the U.S. Oksana Markarova told "Face the Nation" that the international community should step in and help Ukraine regain control of the nuclear sites from Russia, saying that the first nuclear plant the Russians seized was the Chernobyl plant, which is not operational, but still poses a risk because it still have waste and nuclear materials. Since that time, in June, the IAEA was able to send a delegation into the Chernobyl plant, but, as of July 22, it is "still experiencing a partial loss of safeguards data transfer" from the plant, Grossi said.

Since March, Russian troops have continued to occupy the Zaporizhzhya plant with Ukrainian staff operating it, but with Russian nuclear experts monitoring their work. Their goal, Russia's deputy prime minister Marat Khusnullin said, is to sell power generated by the plant to Ukraine, or supply energy to Russia if Ukraine refuses to pay.

Russia is planning a referendum on the Zaporizhzhya region to incorporate it into Russia, a move that would nationalize the plant — as far as Russia is concerned — and would complicate negotiations to monitor it.

On July 22, Grossi said he received reports about the plant that indicated "an increasingly alarming situation" there, and he called for "maximum restraint to avoid any accident that could threaten public health in Ukraine and elsewhere."

"These reports are very disturbing," Grossi said.

Several weeks ago, according to a U.S. government source familiar with the facility and a U.N. source familiar with the work of the agency, Grossi asked Guterres to help the IAEA gain access to Zaporizhzhya.

U.S. and U.N. sources tell CBS News that the U.N. has been denying the IAEA's requests for help, delaying assistance due to sensitivities surrounding negotiations to get vital grain out of Ukraine.

Although the agency usually organizes visits to plants on its own, over 20 U.N. agencies continue to operate in Ukraine and have established safety protocols with Ukraine and Russia. The U.N. has helped facilitate other IAEA visits to nuclear plants in Ukraine, including to Chernobyl.

A senior UN official told CBS News that the watchdog agency does not routinely ask for help from the U.N. but when it has — in the case of the IAEA visit to Chernobyl — the U.N. has been able to help with logistics. "We have always supported the IAEA in whatever way we can," the U.N. official said, not answering the question directly about Zaporizhzhya. Grossi's office did not respond to questions.

Opportunity to map out a plan

"Reducing risks of nuclear war and expanding peaceful nuclear sharing" is the aim of the conference opening at U.N. headquarters on Monday, Ambassador Adam M. Scheinman, U.S. Special Representative of the President for Nuclear Nonproliferation, told a briefing with reporters.

"Russia's provocative nuclear rhetoric, I believe, is out of step with the treaty's aims toward nuclear arms control and eventual nuclear disarmament," he said.

Most of the Russian delegation has received their visas to attend the conference, and a Ukrainian delegation will be present. Analysts say it will be an ideal time to map out a safety plan.

Ukraine's nuclear power plants are a priority and "the range of bad scenarios is unnerving," Richard Gowan, U.N. director for the International Crisis Group think-tank, told CBS News.

"Nuclear plants getting hit by missiles or artillery, nuclear material going missing, key workers unable to service the plants, it's a long list," Gowan said. "The fact that you have nuclear power stations right in the middle of a large-scale conventional war of attrition is unprecedented."

On Monday, Grossi will be at U.N. Headquarters for two days to open the month-long conference, which will also deal with North Korea's nuclear ambitions and the stalled Iran nuclear deal.

Guterres will be at the U.N. for three days, and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will be at the conference on Monday — an ideal time, analysts say, for the parties to map out a safety plan.

"Nobody thinks this will be an easy few weeks of diplomacy. We must hope that a nuclear accident in Ukraine does not overshadow all the diplomatic wrangling," Gowan said.