Dozens of ‘major’ compliance breaches at Bank of England, NAO reports

Kalyeena Makortoff 

THE GUARDIAN

Banking correspondent
Sun, 3 March 2024 

The Bank of England had ‘made good progress’, the NAO said, but there had been an unacceptable level of compliance breaches of its own staff policies. 

Photograph: Yui Mok/PA

Dozens of “major” compliance breaches have been unearthed at the Bank of England, despite progress to fix shortcomings after misuse of the central bank’s audio feed by hedge funds four years ago.

The report by the National Audit Office (NAO), the public spending watchdog, reviewed the Bank’s actions to improve the handling of non-financial risks, and whether it had learned lessons from two high-profile scandals.

That included the 2017 resignation of deputy governor Charlotte Hogg, who failed to declare that her brother worked for Barclays, and an embarrassing security breach in December 2019 that gave hedge funds early access to audio feeds of the Banks press conferences.

While the NAO said the central bank had “made good progress” it warned there had been an unacceptable level of compliance breaches of the Bank’s own staff policies over the 12 months to August 2023.

These included 28 major breaches, which can be as serious as failing to disclose a conflict of interest that can affect a senior official’s independence, and can result in disciplinary action.

They also involved 628 minor breaches, which can refer to an employee’s failure to get advanced approval for personal transactions including mortgages or investments, or emails being sent to the wrong address.

It marked a rise from the 584 minor – and 19 major – breaches in the previous year.

While most of the breaches were self-reported, the NAO said the figures were “above what the Bank considers an acceptable level”. A 2023 staff survey also found that only 59% of the central bank’s staff felt they were free to speak up without fear of negative consequences.

The NAO’s comptroller and auditor general, Gareth Davies, said it was clear “the Bank of England has made good progress in developing new and improved systems to understand and manage compliance risks.

“As it takes forward this work, the Bank should ensure it continues to improve the quality and consistency of its risk information, and awareness and confidence among staff to raise concerns.”

David Roberts, the chair of the Court of the Bank of England, said he welcomed the NAO report and that the central bank was “committed to promoting the highest standards of integrity and ethics and will carefully consider the NAO’s recommendations”.

Four in 10 at Bank of England are afraid to speak out on issues, new study shows

Tim Wallace
Sun, 3 March 2024 

bank of england building

Around four in 10 staff at the Bank of England do not feel free to speak their mind without fear of “negative consequences”, according to a survey of workers.

Hesitancy among employees on Threadneedle Street has emerged as officials seek to improve compliance at the Bank, as a survey shows that openness among workers is lower than other public sector bodies.

A Whitehall survey of civil servants found that more than three-quarters of staff felt they could talk openly, according to the National Audit Office (NAO), well above the Bank’s 59pc.

A review by the NAO said “good progress” has been made in raising this from 51pc in 2021, but added that “there is more work to be done”.

The NAO is reviewing the Bank’s compliance practices after a series of high-profile controversies.

In 2017, Charlotte Hogg, a deputy governor, resigned less than a fortnight into the role after failing to properly declare her brother’s role at Barclays.

Two years later, the Bank found that a technology supplier was offering hedge fund clients an ultra-fast audio stream of official press conferences, potentially giving traders an advantage as they received information quicker than other viewers.

Since then, the Bank has sought to improve the way it manages compliance risks, including by improving training, the NAO said.

The Bank has offered more “training and workshops on risk awareness and speaking up” to create “a culture of risk awareness among staff”.

Bosses have “aimed to take a proportionate response to breaches, to create a healthy and open culture where staff are more likely to report incidents or concerns”.

However, creating a consistent culture of compliance poses a challenge as 1,400 of the Bank’s staff – around one-quarter – have been there for less than two years, the NAO found.

It also discovered 628 minor compliance breaches in the 12 months to August 2023 – such as sending emails to the wrong address.

There were also 28 major breaches, a category which can include “senior level conflicts that materially affect an official’s independence but have not been disclosed”.

Meg Hillier, chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, said: “The Bank of England relies on public trust and its reputation for integrity to carry out its role. However, past incidents at the Bank and other public bodies have shown how failure to demonstrate integrity can harm an organisation’s credibility and reputation.”

David Roberts, chair of the Court of the Bank of England, added: “We welcome the National Audit Office’s report on the Bank’s management of legal, ethical and staff compliance risks. The Bank is committed to promoting the highest standards of integrity and ethics and will carefully consider the NAO’s recommendations.”

HIP CAPITALI$M

Hipgnosis sees value of portfolio cut after new due diligence work

Rupert Hargreaves
Mon, 4 March 2024 

The board appointed the third-party advisor following disagreements between the company and its investment advisor Hipgnosis Song Management Limited, over the value of its assets.

The Hipgnosis Songs Fund has today reported an updated net asset value following the preliminary valuation report prepared by Shot Tower Capital.

The investment trust’s stock price is down over 10 per cent on the news.

Shot Tower was appointed by the company as part of its strategic review of the value of its portfolio of music streaming rights.

The board appointed the third-party advisor following disagreements between the company and its investment advisor Hipgnosis Song Management Limited, over the value of its assets.

Shot Tower has performed a detailed review of the company’s portfolio, using a “variety of factors and assumptions,” about royalty streams, rights and cash revenue generated from the value of assets.

Following the detailed analysis, the advisor has returned a “preliminary valuation report,” which pegged the fair value of the company’s portfolio at between $1.8bn (£1.4bn) and $2.1bn (£1.7bn) and $1.7bn (£1.3bn) and $2bn (£1.6bn) after “deducting contingent catalogue bonuses of $59.9m (£47.3). “

The Shot Tower valuation compared to the 30 September 2023 valuation of $2.6bn (£2.1bn).

Hipgnosis said: “The Shot Tower valuation midpoint of $1.9bn (£1.5bn) therefore reflects a multiple of 15.9x net royalty income prior to deducting contingent catalogue bonuses and a reduction in valuation of 26.3% to the valuation as at 30 September 2023.”

Adjusted solely for the Shot Tower Valuation, the company’s operative net asset value would be approximately $1.17 (92p) per share, compared to the last reported net asset value of $1.7392 (137p) per share at the end of September.

Robert Naylor, Chairman of Hipgnosis Songs Fund, said: “The newly constituted board is making good progress with the due diligence work that will underpin its strategic review. We are disclosing the valuation at this time given its material difference to valuations previously disclosed. The board will provide further detail on this when the due diligence is complete. The board remains focused on identifying all options to deliver shareholder value.”

GREEN CAPITALI$M

Green AI Carbon platform AIMs for London listing amid lack of confidence in market

Rhodri Morgan
Mon, 4 March 2024 

Carbon Done Right, formerly Klimat X, self-described as 'the world's first smallholder farmer carbon credit reforestation company, is seeking a dual listing of its shares on London's AIM market.

A tree-planting, carbon offsetting firm is eyeing up a London listing in hopes of turning around the bad smell surrounding carbon investments.

Carbon Done Right, formerly Klimat X, self-described as ‘the world’s first smallholder farmer carbon credit reforestation company, is seeking a dual listing of its shares on London’s AIM market.

The firm says its aim is to unlock the full potential of existing smallholder rainforest planting projects by leveraging proprietary technology to create high-value, best-in-class carbon credits that offer positive ecological and social outcomes.

Through the use of artificial intelligence and blockchain, the company monitors the health of trees it plants and tracks carbon sequestration data for farmers and customers.

Currently, Carbon Done Right‘s existing project footprint is across the forests of Sierra Leone and it intends to expand operations beyond the existing 57,000 hectares to at least 100,000 hectares.

The same model will then transfer to other countries across Africa, starting in Ghana and Liberia.

The firm said it recognises that confidence in the voluntary carbon markets has been “eroded due to the poor practices of others”, including low transparency levels and poor deals for governments of developing countries.

But if the approval process, set to conclude by early Q2, goes smoothly, the company believes a listing will open it up to a new pool of investors and future growth funding options.

Commenting on the news, James Tansey, chief executive, said: “We are committed to providing quality, transparent credits and simplifying the offset buying process and the incorporation of proprietary technology will see us become a vertically integrated business active in nature-based projects.

“This reflects our mission to provide our buyers extraordinary levels of trust and traceability along all aspects of the carbon offset supply chain and live by our name Carbon Done Right.”

CHINA GETS AROUND SANCTIONS

China's JCET to buy stake in flash memory facility from Western Digital

Reuters
Updated Mon, March 4, 2024 

The new SanDisk A1 microSD card is displayed at the SanDisk stand at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona


BEIJING (Reuters) -Chinese chip assembly and testing firm JCET Group said on Monday it plans to buy an 80% stake in a Shanghai flash memory facility owned by Western Digital Corporation for about $624 million in cash.

SanDisk Semiconductor Shanghai makes products such as iNAND flash memory modules as well as SD and MicroSD components used in areas such as telecommunications, automobiles and consumer devices, JCET said in a filing.

Western Digital said last year it would spin off its flash memory business that had been grappling with a supply glut, after talks of merging the unit with Japan's Kioxia stalled.

The deal, pending Chinese regulatory approvals, will expand JCET's market share in the data storage industry, JCET said in its filing to the Shenzhen Stock Exchange.

Buying the stake will allow JCET to enhance its partnership with Western Digital, which has been a long-term client and is expected to continue to place orders at SanDisk Semiconductor Shanghai after the transaction, JCET said.

(Reporting by Roxanne Liu, Ella Cao and Kane Wu; editing by Ed Osmond, Jason Neely and Louise Heavens)

China's Huawei and Amazon in patent licencing agreement


Reuters
Mon, March 4, 2024 

A Huawei logo is seen at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Shanghai


SHENZHEN, China (Reuters) - China's Huawei Technologies and U.S. tech giant Amazon said they had signed a multi-year patent licencing deal that resolves litigation between them.

Most terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Alan Fan, head of Huawei's intellectual property rights department, said the Chinese firm had ended lawsuits brought against Amazon in Germany over patented technology related to wifi and video playback.

The United States has barred Chinese telecom companies from its market citing concerns about data, and designated Huawei and ZTE as threats, requiring U.S. carriers to remove their equipment from U.S. networks.

It has also prevented U.S. firms from supplying Huawei with chips and other components, crippling its smartphone business.

Despite those tensions, the patent licence deal shows "American and Chinese companies and companies from other regions are cooperating without limitations in standards and patent licensing," Fan said.

Huawei also announced it had signed a cross-licencing patent deal with domestic smartphone maker Vivo covering communication technologies including 5G. Huawei has similar patent agreements with Chinese smartphone manufacturers Xiaomi and Oppo.

(Reporting by David Kirton; Editing by Edwina Gibbs)

CLIMATE CRIMINALS

Exclusive-Indian firms look to bet big on coal-fired power after long absence

Tue, March 5, 2024

A worker shovels coal in a supply truck at a yard on the outskirts of Ahmedabad

By Sudarshan Varadhan, Sarita Chaganti Singh and Sethuraman N R

SINGAPORE/NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Private Indian firms have expressed interest in building at least 10 gigawatts (GW) of coal-fired power capacity over a decade, four sources familiar with the matter said, ending a six-year drought in significant private involvement in the sector.

Adani Power, JSW Group and Essar Power are among the companies that have told India's power ministry they would be keen to expand old plants or develop stalled projects facing financial stress, according to the sources and a government presentation seen by Reuters.

The potential investments, which have not been previously reported, could cumulatively cost billions of dollars and demonstrate renewed appetite in an industry seen by many as financially unattractive. But they also threaten to undermine progress made by the world's No.3 greenhouse gas emitter in weaning its economy off carbon.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government, which has cited energy security concerns and low per-capita emissions to defend India's coal dependence, has been trying to attract private investment to boost its coal-fired capacity by 80 GW by 2032.

Coal-fired power plants currently account for half, or about 215 GW of India's total installed capacity of 430 GW, with renewables accounting for 135 GW and hydro making up 47 GW.

A spokesperson for the power ministry said the private sector had agreed to invest in the coal-fired power sector "in line with the energy requirements of the nation," adding that India was ahead of international commitments to cut emissions.

"The private sector is now expressing interest because of financial viability and assurance that payments will be made on time," he said.

The companies did not respond to requests seeking comment.

India's Association of Power Producers (APP), which represents coal-fired power developers, told Power Minister R K Singh its members were eager to boost capacity, according to a Dec 4 letter reviewed by Reuters.

Among the new proposals, Adani Power plans to add 4.8 GW and JSW 1 GW, according to three sources and a government presentation dated Nov 21 reviewed by Reuters.

Essar Power plans 1.6 GW of new domestic coal-based power generation in Gujarat state by 2029, one of the sources said. Another source said Vedanta will add 1.9 GW of capacity.

The sources - two government officials and two industry executives - declined to be named as the discussions are not public.

The presentation, made by an arm of the power ministry in November, estimates that the plants would be commissioned by 2032.

PRIVATE FUNDING DROUGHT

In the five years to March 2018, private sector investments drove 56 GW, or over 60% of new coal-fired power, government data shows. That dwindled to 1.5 GW, or 5% of additions, in the next five years as projects faced financial stress, shifting the investment burden onto state and federal governments.

A total of 24 private sector projects totalling over 23 GW, or over 10% of current Indian coal-fired capacity, are on hold or unlikely to be commissioned due to financial stress, according to power ministry data.

However, higher coal dependence in the last three years due to slower renewable installations, heavy power demand, and new emergency laws enabling higher tariffs have made coal-fired power attractive again, boosting profits and pushing shares of generators to record highs.

APP asked the government to provide more flexibility in coal and power supply agreements and expansion of existing power plants, ease clearances, and ensure domestic credit availability to expedite investments.

"It will be a big challenge for any private developer to raise funds," APP wrote in the Dec 4 letter, adding that state lenders Power Finance Corp (PFC) and Rural Electrification Corp (REC) should be asked to take the lead.

PFC and REC did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment.

A senior REC executive said it was keen to fund the planned additions with 70% debt as long as lending requirements are met.

"REC has made significant progress in reducing non-performing assets and we would like to keep it that way," the executive told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity as the matter was not public.

(Reporting by Sudarshan Varadhan in Singapore, Sarita Chaganti Singh in New Delhi and N R Sethuraman in Bengaluru; Editing by Tony Munroe and Raju Gopalakrishnan)

Closing gender gap could lift global GDP more than 20%, World Bank says

Mon, March 4, 2024
By Andrea Shalal

WASHINGTON, March 4 (Reuters) - Ending discriminatory laws and practices that prevent women from working or starting businesses could raise global gross domestic product by more than 20%, which would double the rate of global growth over the next decade, the World Bank said on Monday.

The bank's 10th annual Women, Business and the Law report showed women on average have just 64% of the legal protections that men do, not the 77% previously estimated, and no country - not even the wealthiest - provides true equal opportunity.

The lower number reflects major deficiencies revealed by the inclusion of two new indicators - safety and childcare - in addition to pay, marriage, parenthood, workplace, mobility, assets, entrepreneurship and pensions.

The report assessed for the first time how 190 countries are implementing existing laws to protect women, finding what it called a "shocking" gap between policy and practice.

"Women have the power to turbocharge the sputtering global economy," said World Bank chief economist Indermit Gill, noting that reforms to prevent discrimination have slowed to a crawl.

The report said obstacles that women face in entering the global workforce included barriers to starting businesses, persistent pay gaps and bans on working at night or in jobs deemed "dangerous".

Women have barely a third of needed legal protections against domestic violence, sexual harassment, child marriage and femicide in the 190 countries studied, the report found.

Sexual harassment is banned in the workplace in 151 countries, but only 40 have laws banning it in public places. "How can we expect women to prosper at work when it is dangerous for them just to travel to work," Gill said.

Women also spend an average of 2.4 more hours a day on unpaid care work than men, much of it caring for children, with only 78 countries having enacted quality standards governing childcare services.

On paper, women had roughly two-thirds the rights of men, but countries lacked the systems needed for full implementation and enforcement, the report also found.

For example, 98 economies have equal pay laws, but only 35 have pay-transparency measures or enforcement mechanisms to address the pay gap, which shows women earning just 77 cents for every dollar earned by men.

The report includes specific recommendations for governments, including improving laws relating to safety, childcare and business opportunities; enacting reforms that lift restrictions on women's work; expanding maternity and paternity leave provisions; and setting binding quotas for women on corporate boards of publicly traded companies.

Earlier retirement ages for women, despite women living longer than men, also limit their income.

"Because they receive lower pay while they work, take time off when they have children, and retire earlier, they end up with smaller pension benefits and greater financial insecurity in old age," it said.

Tea Trumbic, the report's lead author, said barely half of women participated in the global workforce, compared with nearly three out of every four men.

"This is not just unfair - it’s wasteful. Countries simply cannot afford to sideline half of their population.” (Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Edwina Gibbs)

Threatened in their homeland, feral Mexican parrots thrive on L.A.'s exotic landscaping

Louis Sahagún
Sun, March 3, 2024 

A ROUGH CREW

Seasonal parrots gather in a roost in Temple City in January 2023.

 (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)


During a walk through the Huntington Botanical Gardens with her mother one morning, Brenda Ramirez was alarmed by the sudden squawks, warbles, and screeches of troops of parrots flying overhead at great speed in tight, precise formations.

“I asked my mom what they were,” Ramirez recalled of that day 14 years ago. “She said, ‘Mija, they are just like the parrots from Mexico we’ve seen in zoos, except for one thing: They are free flying and breed in the trees along our city streets.”

Ramirez was entranced by this fleeting glimpse of adaptation by tropical species in one of the world’s greatest asphalt jungles.

Now, at 27, she leads a team of investigators at the Free Flying Los Angeles Parrot Project based in Occidental College’s Moore Laboratory of Zoology, which aims to resolve a biological puzzle: How did red-crowned and lilac-crowned parrots establish local urban breeding populations via the pet trade from Mexico, where both species are on the brink of extinction?

Brenda Ramirez, right, and John McCormack look for parrots along the road in Temple City. (Dania Maxwell / Los Angeles Times)

A potential answer is that Southern California cities have only in the last 100 years provided these sister species with a resource untapped by native birds: the fruits and flowers of exotic trees used for landscaping, according to the team’s new report in the journal Diversity and Distributions.

Their findings add to a growing body of evidence that some introduced species including these feral parrots can experience rapid niche shifts beyond what appears to be possible in the forested regions of northern Mexico they evolved in.

For example, the driest month in Southern California is significantly drier than any portion of their native habitats in the western and eastern coastal regions of Mexico, the study says. The timing of the precipitation here is also different, with a winter rainfall regime rather than summer rains.

Read more: Are L.A.’s parrots getting louder? We investigate

“Artificial irrigation may close the gap between native and introduced climates,” the study suggests, “allowing more year-round vegetation in Southern California cities than expected given its natural precipitation levels.”

That “urban oasis effect” created by sprinkler watering systems “could partly explain why introduced parrots do not seem to be spreading beyond urban centers,” it says. “Their intelligence and behavioral plasticity might further allow them to adapt to urban life.”

Seasonal parrots gather in a roost in Temple City in January 2023. 

(Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)

The look of Southern California’s green canopies has changed significantly since the 1950s and ’60s, when developers turned up their noses at native oaks and sycamores. They chose instead to landscape their subdivisions, apartment complexes, business parks, shopping centers and roadways with nonnative trees, including sweet gums, camphor, carrotwood, fig, and ficus trees — all favored by parrots.

For reasons that are not fully understood, several hundred parrots seek evening accommodations each night in the limbs of fig and London plane trees lining a bustling stretch of Rosemead Boulevard in Temple City. The odd locale is believed to be one of the most populous roosting sites for parrots in the Los Angeles area.

Read more: He wants L.A. to love macaws as much as it loves dogs. Will free flying do the trick?

“It’s just cultural memory: They spend all day feeding on the seeds, berries, and flowers of the surrounding tropical treescape,” said John McCormack, director and curator of the Moore Lab of Zoology, during a recent visit to the boulevard. “At sundown, they come together here to rest and sleep.”

The parrots are beloved overnighters here, and residents are on constant alert for poachers. A video of nets in the trees and an unidentified man slamming captured parrots against a concrete wall between Rosemead Boulevard and East Las Tunas Drive on Oct. 26 fueled angry calls and letters to the local Los Angeles County sheriff’s station, City Hall and other government agencies.

Birders photograph parrots in Temple City during an Audubon Society gathering in January 2023. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)

It remains unclear whether the man shown in the video was killing some of the parrots he trapped and taking others with him to sell on the illegal wildlife market.

Those birds and other introduced species of parrots and parakeets that have found niches in the clatter and commotion of Southern California city life are believed to be descendants of released pets, especially during the 1970s and ’80s, when the illegal importation of such wild birds reached its peak, according to the study.

Read more: This dirt parking lot in the San Gabriel Mountains is a magnet for migrating birds

Red-crowned parrots, whose home range is restricted to the lowlands of northeast Mexico, were first recorded in the Los Angeles area in 1963. Since then, the population has swelled to more than 3,000 birds, the study says.

The number of lilac-crowned parrots, which are endemic to tropical lowlands in west Mexico and became established locally in the 1980s, is about 800 birds.

Given that both species are considered endangered in their home ranges in Mexico due to habitat loss and trapping for the pet trade, local established flocks have become prized for their conservation potential.

Parrot specimens are seen inside the Moore Lab of Zoology at Occidental College in Los Angeles. According to a new scientific study, two species of parrots have established breeding populations in Southern California following their introduction via the pet trade from their home range in Mexico. 

(Dania Maxwell / Los Angeles Times)More

The two species are so similar in size and color that even experts have a tough time telling them apart. Both are crow-sized, chunky birds that establish lifelong pair bonds that usually produce one brood per breeding season.

However, both species have been seen together in the same flocks, underlining the importance of monitoring the birds for signs of hybridization that could undermine proposals to reintroduce urban parrots from Southern California to their native habitats in Mexico.

In the meantime, the Moore Lab Project aspires to become a hub for urban parrot ecology.

For her mother’s birthday on Nov. 12, Ramirez took her to Rosemead Boulevard to witness the unusual sundown spectacle of squawking parrots plunging into the trees.

“As the sun was setting, we could hear them flying in from all directions,” she recalled. “I turned to my mother and said, 'This is as good as it gets.'”



This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

UN agency accuses Israel of detaining, coercing staffers into false confessions about ties to Hamas

Jeremy Diamond, CNN
Mon, March 4, 2024



The UN agency for Palestinian refugees on Monday accused Israel of detaining and torturing some of its staffers, coercing them into making false confessions about the agency’s ties to Hamas.

“Some of our staff have conveyed to UNRWA teams that they were forced to (make) confessions under torture and ill-treatment. These false confessions were in response to questioning about relations between UNRWA and Hamas and involvement in the 7 October attack against Israel,” UNRWA spokeswoman Juliette Touma said in a statement.

Israel has accused at least 12 staffers from the UN Relief and Works Agency of being involved in the October 7 terrorist attacks and has alleged that about 12% of UNRWA’s 13,000 staffers are members of Hamas or other Palestinian militant groups. Israeli officials have said some of the information about the 12 staffers involved in October 7 was obtained through cell phone data and other sources. UNRWA says it has fired 10 of the 12 accused staffers and that the other two are dead. CNN cannot confirm the allegations.


Touma said that false confessions elicited “under torture” were being used “to further spread misinformation about the Agency as part of attempts to dismantle UNRWA,” but did not tie those confessions to the allegations against the 12 staffers accused of participating in the October 7 attacks.

The allegations are part of an as yet unpublished report compiled by UNRWA alleging Israel’s widespread physical and psychological abuse of Palestinians detained in Gaza during the war, including 21 UNRWA staff members, some of whom said they were beaten and threatened.

The unreleased report, a copy of which CNN obtained, is largely based on the testimony of Gazan detainees held in Israeli prisons and at military sites and released back into Gaza at the Kerem Shalom border crossing between mid-December and mid-February. An UNRWA spokesperson said that when the report was leaked, the agency had not yet decided whether to release it publicly.

The detainees cited in the report gave testimony of beatings, sleep deprivation, sexual abuse and threats of sexual violence against both men and women detained by the Israeli military. Some of the detainees are also reported to have died while in Israeli custody, at times allegedly as a result of the abuse they suffered in detention.

CNN cannot independently verify all of the accounts of abuse listed in the UNRWA report, but has previously documented similar allegations of abuse by Palestinian detainees.

The Israeli military did not immediately respond to the allegations about the torture and detention of UNRWA staffers, but said in a statement that “the mistreatment of detainees during their time in detention or whilst under interrogation violates IDF values and contravenes IDF orders and is therefore absolutely prohibited.” It said that investigations into the deaths of detainees are investigated by the military police and are currently pending.

The Israeli military forcefully denied claims of sexual abuse of detainees, calling them “another cynical attempt to create a false equivalency with the systematic use of rape as a weapon of war by Hamas.” It also denied that detainees are deprived of sleep and said detainees have access to medical care.

UNRWA estimates that at least 4,000 Gazans have been detained by the Israeli military since the start of the war. As of February 19, the agency had documented the detention of 29 children and 80 women, as well as elderly individuals with Alzheimer’s and people with intellectual disabilities.

“UNRWA received widespread reports from released detainees of ill-treatment across all stages of detention. According to individuals released from detention, ill-treatment was used in attempts to extract information or confessions, to intimidate and humiliate, and to punish,” says the UNRWA report, which was first reported by the New York Times.

The report also says that in each of the releases it monitored at Kerem Shalom, “ambulances were required to immediately transport some person due to their injuries or illness.”

The detainees reported being held and interrogated at military sites in Israel, sometimes for weeks on end, before being transferred into the Israeli prison system.

According to the UNRWA report, some detainees reported being stripped, handcuffed and held in the cold with no access to toilets, food or water for over 24 hours. Detainees interviewed by CNN in December also described similar treatment, saying they were held for days on end with little access to food or water.


Fresh Israeli claims against UN aid agency as US ups pressure

Adel Zaanoun with Rosie Scammell in Jerusalem
Mon, March 4, 2024 

US Vice President Kamala Harris demanded that Israel increase aid to Gaza

 (Elijah Nouvelage)

Israel and the main Palestinian aid agency traded accusations Monday of "terrorism" and torture, after the United States stepped up pressure for a halt in fighting between Israeli troops and Hamas militants.

While mediators in Cairo persisted with efforts toward a Gaza truce, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) came under renewed attack from Israel, whose military accused it of employing "over 450 terrorists" belonging to groups including Hamas.

UNRWA is at the centre of efforts to provide humanitarian relief in Gaza, where aid groups warn of looming famine after nearly five months of war between Israel and the Islamist group.

Israel previously accused about a dozen UNRWA employees of involvement in the October 7 Hamas attack that began the war.

That attack, in southern Israel, resulted in the deaths of around 1,160 people, an AFP tally of official figures shows.

Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed 30,534 people, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-ruled territory.

Phillipe Lazzarini, the head of UNRWA, has said that Israel provided no evidence against his former employees.

On Monday his agency, in a statement to AFP, said some UNRWA staff alleged "they were forced to confessions under torture and ill-treatment" while being asked about the October 7 attack.

Lazzarini also told the UN General Assembly on Monday that dismantling the UNRWA would sacrifice a "generation of children, sowing the seeds of hatred, resentment and future conflict".

US Vice President Kamala Harris expressed "deep concern" over the situation in Gaza during talks Monday with Israeli war cabinet member Benny Gantz at the White House, her office said.

Harris "expressed her deep concern about the humanitarian conditions in Gaza" and urged Israel to let in more aid, while calling on Palestinian militant group Hamas to "accept the terms on the table" for a ceasefire, her office said.

- Raped 'then killed' -

Qatari and Egyptian mediators were meeting with United States and Hamas envoys -- but no Israeli delegates so far -- in Cairo for a second day of talks. They are aiming for a halt in fighting before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan starts early next week.

According to Israeli media reports, Israel's government has refused to send its delegation to Cairo, stating they had not been given a list of living hostages by Hamas.

However, Bassem Naim, a senior Hamas leader, told AFP from Cairo that details on the status of the prisoners "were not mentioned in any documents or proposals circulated during the negotiation process".

The talks on securing a new ceasefire are set to continue Tuesday, an Egyptian TV broadcaster known for its links to Cairo's government said late Monday.

The plan under discussion is for a six-week truce, the exchange of dozens of remaining hostages for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, and for more aid to enter Gaza.

Israel has said it believes 130 of the original 250 captives taken by Hamas during their attack remain in Gaza, but that 31 have been killed.

A UN report on Monday said there are "reasonable grounds to believe" rapes were committed during Hamas's attack and that hostages subsequently taken to Gaza have also been raped.

"In most of these incidents, victims first subjected to rape were then killed, and at least two incidents relate to the rape of women's corpses," the report said.

Shortly before the report's release, Israel said it was calling in its UN ambassador over what it said was an attempt by the body to "silence" information of sexual violence by Hamas.

The spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres denied trying to suppress the report, saying it "is being presented publicly today".

Harris -- whose country provides billions of dollars in military aid to Israel -- called for the truce deal to be accepted and criticised Israel in unusually strong language over insufficient aid deliveries into Gaza.

Harris said Israel "must open new border crossings" and "must not impose any unnecessary restrictions" on aid delivery.

Belgium on Monday sent a military transport plane to join an international operation to airdrop aid into Gaza also involving the United States, France and Jordan, officials said.

- 'We want to eat' -

US President Joe Biden faces acute pressure in an election year over his support for Israel, as Gaza's civilian death toll continues to rise.

Itamar Ben Gvir, Netanyahu's national security minister, told members of his Jewish Power political party that Hamas was "deliberately delaying the talks".

He called for an end to the negotiations and movement instead to a "more powerful combat phase".

Gaza's health ministry on Monday said bombardments and combat killed 124 more people within 24 hours.

Witnesses reported clashes in Gaza City's Zeitun neighbourhood and the main southern city of Khan Yunis, which has seen heavy fighting.

Khan Yunis residents returned to find decomposing bodies lying in streets where homes and shops had been torn apart.

"We want to eat and live. Take a look at our homes. How am I to blame, a single, unarmed person without any income in this impoverished country?" said Nader Abu Shanab, pointing to the rubble with blackened hands.

The Gaza war has sparked violence across the region, including near-daily exchanges of fire between Israeli forces and Lebanon's Hezbollah movement.

- Indians wounded -

On Monday, a foreign worker in northern Israel was killed and seven Indian workers were wounded in a missile strike near the Lebanese border, Israeli medics said.

Later, Hezbollah said three paramedics affiliated with the group were killed in an Israeli strike.

Yemen's Iran-backed Huthi rebels, who since November have fired drones and missiles at numerous ships in the Red Sea area vital for world trade, claimed responsibility for another strike.

Their claim came after marine security firm Ambrey reported a Liberian-flagged vessel was targeted and reportedly struck off Yemen.

United Nations human rights chief Volker Turk cited Lebanon and Yemen as places where the Gaza war is having wider effect, expressing concern that "in this powder keg, any spark could lead to a much broader conflagration".

Israel escalates its criticism of a UN agency in Gaza. It says 450 of its workers are militants

TIA GOLDENBERG and RAVI NESSMAN
Updated Mon, March 4, 2024 




An Israeli Apache helicopter fires flares over the Gaza Strip as seen from southern Israel, Monday, March 4, 2024

(AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
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JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel ramped up its criticism of the embattled U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees Monday, saying 450 of its employees were members of militant groups in the Gaza Strip, though it provided no evidence to back up its accusation.

Major international funders have withheld hundreds of millions of dollars from the agency, known as UNRWA, since Israel accused 12 of its employees of participating in the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel that killed 1,200 people and left about 250 others held hostage in Gaza, according to Israeli authorities.

Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the agency known as UNRWA, told a press conference late Monday that he “has never been informed” or received any evidence of Israel’s claims, and this is not the first.

Every year, he said, UNRWA provides Israel and the Palestinian Authority with a list of its staff “and I never have received the slightest concern about the staff that we have been employing."

The only allegation communicated to him verbally was about 12 UNRWA staffers alleged to have participated in the Oct. 7 attacks, he said, and they appeared so serious that they were fired, and two U.N.-ordered investigations are underway.

The U.N. envoy focusing on sexual violence in conflict, Pramila Patten, said Monday there were “reasonable grounds” to believe Hamas committed rape, “sexualized torture,” and other cruel and inhuman treatment of women during the attack.

The attack sparked an Israeli invasion of the enclave of 2.3 million people that Gaza's Health Ministry says has killed more than 30,000 Palestinians. Aid groups say the fighting has displaced most of the territory’s population and sparked a humanitarian catastrophe.

UNRWA, which employs roughly 13,000 people in Gaza, is the biggest aid provider in the enclave.

The allegations Monday were a significant escalation in the accusations against the agency. Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, Israel’s chief military spokesperson, did not provide names or other evidence to back up the vastly increased number of UNRWA employees it said were militants.

“Over 450 UNRWA employees are military operatives in terror groups in Gaza — 450. This is no mere coincidence. This is systematic. There is no claiming, ‘we did not know,’” Hagari said.

UNRWA in a statement accused Israel of detaining several of its staffers and forcing them, using torture and ill treatment, into giving false confessions about the links between the agency, Hamas and the Oct. 7 attack on Israel.

“These forced confessions as a result of torture are being used by the Israeli Authorities to further spread misinformation about the agency as part of attempts to dismantle UNRWA," the statement said. "This is putting our staff in Gaza at risk and has serious implications on our operations in Gaza and around the region.’’

After Israel’s initial accusation against UNRWA, the agency fired the accused employees and more than a dozen countries suspended funding worth about $450 million, almost half its budget for the year.

Juliette Touma, director of communications for UNRWA, had no direct comment on the new Israeli allegations.

“UNRWA encourages any entity that has any information on the very serious allegations against UNRWA staff to share it with the ongoing U.N. investigation,” she said.

Two U.N. investigations into Israel’s allegations were already underway when the EU said Friday it will pay 50 million euros ($54 million) to UNRWA after the agency agreed to allow EU-appointed experts to audit the way it screens staff to identify extremists.

Hagari also released a recording of a call he said was of an UNRWA teacher describing his role in the Oct. 7 attack.

“We have female captives. I caught one,” the male voice is heard saying in Arabic. A man on a second call, alleged to be an Islamic Jihad militant who Israel also claimed was an UNRWA teacher, is heard saying “I’m inside with the Jews.”

The military named the men, though the man in the first call identified himself in the recording by a different name. The military said that name may have been a nickname. The military did not provide evidence as to their employment with UNRWA.

The accusations came as Benny Gantz, a top member of Israel’s wartime Cabinet, met with U.S. officials in Washington while talks were underway in Egypt to broker a cease-fire in Gaza before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan begins next week.

Meanwhile, violence flared between Israel and Lebanon, amid inflamed tensions across the region.

An anti-tank missile fired into northern Israel from Lebanon killed a foreign worker and wounded seven others Monday, Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service said. The Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon did not immediately claim responsibility for Monday’s strike.

Hours later an Israeli airstrike in southern Lebanon killed three paramedics from Hezbollah’s health arm, Lebanon’s state media said.

U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein arrived in Beirut on Monday to meet with Lebanese officials in an attempt to tamp down tensions.

The near-daily clashes between Hezbollah and Israeli forces have killed more than 200 Hezbollah fighters and at least 37 civilians in Lebanon. Around 20 people have been killed on the Israeli side, including civilians and soldiers.

___

Bassem Mroue in Beirut, Jack Jeffery in Jerusalem and Melanie Lidman in Kiryat Shmona, Israel, contributed to this report.

___

Find more of AP’s coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M
A Vietnamese property tycoon accused of embezzling $12.5 billion begins her trial

ANIRUDDHA GHOSAL
Mon, March 4, 2024 



Police guard the entrance to a courthouse in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam Tuesday, March 5, 2024, where Vietnamese businesswoman Truong My Lan stands trial. Lan faces the death penalty in a trial that began Tuesday over alleged fraud amounting to $12.5 billion, nearly 3% of the country’s 2022 GDP.

 (Hoang Anh Tuan/VNA via AP)
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HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — Real estate tycoon Truong My Lan faces the death penalty in a trial that began Tuesday over alleged fraud amounting to $12.5 billion — nearly 3% of the country’s 2022 GDP and Vietnam's largest financial fraud case on record.

The 66-year-old chair of the real estate company Van Thinh Phat allegedly used “thousands of ghost companies,” paid bribes to government officials and violated banking regulations, according to a government document. She is accused of illegally controlling the Saigon Joint Stock Commercial Bank between 2012 to 2022 and using it to embezzle $12.5 billion, the document adds.

Another 85 people are being prosecuted in connection, including a former State Bank of Vietnam official accused of accepting $5.2 million in bribes. Lan was arrested in October 2022 and could get a death sentence if found guilty.

She was escorted to the court by the authorities at around 7 a.m. Her husband Eric Chu Nap-kee, who works in real estate in Hong Kong, was also summoned, state media VN Express reported. VTP was among Vietnam’s richest real estate firms and its projects include luxury residential buildings, offices, hotels and shopping centers.

Lan's arrest is among the most high-profile in an ongoing anti-corruption drive in Vietnam that gained momentum since 2022. The so-called Blazing Furnace campaign has seen thousands of officials and business executives come under investigation. It reached the highest echelons of the Vietnamese government in January 2023 with the resignation of former President Nguyen Xuan Phuc and two deputy prime ministers for the “political responsibility” of corruption scandals during the pandemic.

But analysts added the anti-corruption drive has also dampened Vietnam’s economic outlook and made foreign investors jittery at a time when the southeast Asian nation has been positioning itself as the ideal home for businesses looking to shift their supply chains away from China.

It’s the scale of Lan's alleged scam that has been surprising, said Linh Nguyen, the lead analyst for consultancy Control Risks. Lan is accused of disbursing $44 billion in loans to herself and her allies between 2012 to 2022, and the documents related to the case weigh 6 tons, according to VN Express.

“More than 3% of the GDP is very large,” Nguyen said, adding that it also raised questions about whether other banks and businesses had “done the same (and) just haven’t been discovered.”

The anti-corruption drive has also resulted in Vietnam's bureaucracy slowing down with “public officials becoming anxious about being investigated and shirking their responsibilities,” according to a report from Singapore’s ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute. The most glaring evidence of this has been in the slow spending rates for public investment. As of October 2023, a little over 55% of the annual budget had been spent with $10.19 billion needing to be disbursed within 35 days, state media Vietnam News reported. These are funds necessary for development projects — ranging from bridges to highways to airports — and not spending it in time results in long delays.

Nguyen said that investors — especially in banking, finance and real estate — are much more cautious now. “It's a more 'let us wait and see' with investors at the moment,” she said.

The real estate sector in Vietnam has been hit particularly hard — an estimated 1,300 property firms withdrew from the market in 2023, developers have been offering discounts and gold as gifts to attract buyers, and despite rent for shophouses falling by a third in Ho Chi Minh City, many in the city center are still empty, according to state media.

Poor global demand and slowing public investment meant that Vietnam’s economic growth slowed down to 5.05% last year, compared to 8.02% in 2022, according to government data.

In November, Communist Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong, Vietnam's top politician, said that the anti-corruption fight would “continue for the long term.” Around that time, Vietnamese authorities said they were investigating two other cases linked to Lan's real estate companies that involved laundering money overseas through real estate

Trial begins in Vietnam's largest, multi-billion-dollar financial fraud

 A man rides a motorcycle past the People's Court in Ho Chi Minh city


By Francesco Guarascio
Updated Mon, March 4, 2024 

HANOI (Reuters) - The trial in Vietnam's largest financial fraud case on record began on Tuesday, with nearly 90 defendants accused of being part of a $12 billion scam, for which some of them risk the death penalty.

The trial, expected to last until the end of April at the People's Court of Ho Chi Minh City, is part of a much wider campaign against corruption in the country which the leader of the ruling Communist Party, Nguyen Phu Trong, has pledged for years to stamp out, with no tangible results yet.

The anti-graft drive has led in recent months to multiple high-profile arrests and the resignation of top figures, including the country's former president last year, but the trial for the chairwoman of real estate developer Van Thinh Phat Holdings Group is unprecedented for its scale, with thousands expected to be summoned and about two hundred lawyers participating in the proceedings, according to state media.

Real estate tycoon Truong My Lan and her accomplices are accused of siphoning off 304 trillion dong ($12.46 billion) from the country's largest bank by assets, Saigon Joint Stock Commercial Bank (SCB), which Lan effectively controlled through dozens of proxies, according to investigators.

A lawyer for Lan declined comment.

If proved, it could be one of the largest financial frauds in Asia. Malaysia's 1MDB corruption scandal involved for instance only about $4.5 billion.

The start of the trial featured prominently in state media which showed pictures and footage of Lan and other defendants in the courtroom surrounded by dozens of police officers.

From early 2018 through October 2022, when SCB was bailed out by the state after a run on its deposits, Lan appropriated large sums by arranging unlawful loans to shell companies, according to public investigators.

Another $1.2 billion was lost by holders of bonds issued by Van Thinh Phat, Lan's real estate firm, according to the investigators.

Lan has for years been a central figure in Vietnam's finance and orchestrated the merger of SCB with other two lenders in 2011 to salvage the troubled banks in a plan coordinated with the central bank.

She owns several properties in Ho Chi Minh City's richest district and has multiple assets abroad, according to investigators and public information.

Top international auditors, including Ernst & Young and KPMG, did not raise any concern about the bank in their audits, public documents show. They did not reply to requests for comment.

WIDESPREAD CORRUPTION

In addition to charges of embezzlement, Lan is also accused of giving bribes and of breaching banking regulations. She risks the death penalty.

Among the other defendants are Lan's husband, a Chinese national, and 15 central bank officials, including a senior inspector accused of taking bribes worth $5.2 million from Lan.

Despite years of the anti-graft campaign, known locally as "blazing furnace", corruption remains widespread in the Southeast Asian country, leading many to question motives behind any arrest.

In some provinces, up to 90% of applicants for land certificates paid a bribe, and kickbacks are also extremely common to receive medical services in public hospitals, according to a report published in March 2023 by the United Nations Development Programme and other organisations.

"Bribe-taking amounts that would trigger citizens' denouncements ranged between 20 million dong ($810) and 43 million dong ($1,742), indicating citizens' levels of tolerance of bribe-taking acts," said the report, with the upper value being five times the average monthly salary in the country.

($1 = 24,675.0000 dong)

(Reporting by Francesco Guarascio; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)

Fury after Exxon chief says public to blame for climate failures

Dharna Noor and Oliver Milman
Mon, March 4, 2024 

Darren Woods, the chief executive of Exxon Mobil, last year.

Photograph: Gavin John/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The world is off track to meet its climate goals and the public is to blame, Darren Woods, chief executive of oil giant ExxonMobil, has claimed – prompting a backlash from climate experts.

As the world’s largest investor-owned oil company, Exxon is among the top contributors to global planet-heating greenhouse gas emissions. But in an interview, published on Tuesday, Woods argued that big oil is not primarily responsible for the climate crisis.

Related: Colorado landowners sue oil company over clean-up of ‘orphaned’ well

The real issue, Woods said, is that the clean-energy transition may prove too expensive for consumers’ liking.

“The dirty secret nobody talks about is how much all this is going to cost and who’s willing to pay for it,” he told Fortune last week. “The people who are generating those emissions need to be aware of and pay the price for generating those emissions. That is ultimately how you solve the problem.”

Woods said the world was “not on the path” to cut its planet-heating emissions to net zero by 2050, which scientists say is imperative to avoid catastrophic impacts of global heating. “When are people going to willing to pay for carbon reduction?” said Woods, who has been Exxon’s chief executive since 2017.

“We have opportunities to make fuels with lower carbon in it, but people aren’t willing to spend the money to do that.”

Experts say Woods’s rhetoric is part of a larger attempt to skirt climate accountability. No new major oil and gas infrastructure can be built if the world is to avoid breaching agreed temperature limits but Exxon, along with other major oil companies currently basking in record profits, is pushing ahead with aggressive fossil-fuel expansion plans.

“It’s like a drug lord blaming everyone but himself for drug problems,” said Gernot Wagner, a climate economist at Columbia business school.

“I hate to tell you, but you’re the chief executive of the largest publicly traded oil company, you have influence, you make decisions that matter. Exxon are at the mercy of markets but they are also shaping them, they are shaping policy. So no, you can’t blame the public for the failure to fix climate change.”

Troves of internal documents and analyses have over the past decade established that Exxon knew of the dangers of global heating as far back as the 1970s, but forcefully and successfully worked to sow doubt about the climate crisis and stymie action to clamp down on fossil fuel usage. The revelations have inspired litigation against Exxon across the US.

“What they’re really trying to do is to whitewash their own history, to make it invisible,” said Robert Brulle, an environment policy expert at Brown University who has researched climate disinformation spread by the fossil-fuel industry.

A 2021 analysis also demonstrated that Exxon had downplayed its own role in the climate crisis for decades in public-facing messaging.

“The playbook is this: sell consumers a product that you know is dangerous, while publicly denying or downplaying those dangers. Then, when the dangers are no longer deniable, deny responsibility and blame the consumer,” said Naomi Oreskes, a Harvard historian of science and co-author of the 2021 paper.

Last year, another study co-authored by Oreskes found that Exxon’s own scientists “correctly and skillfully” predicted the trajectory of global warming, then spent decades sowing doubt about climate science and policies in order to protect its business model.

In the Tuesday interview, however, Woods says the world “waited too long” to develop carbon-free technologies. He said Exxon “recognized the need to decarbonize” and that a carbon tax would help achieve this, while also defending the oil giant’s comparatively meager investment in renewable energy, pointing to focus upon more nascent technologies, such as carbon capture and hydrogen fuels.

Exxon does not “see the ability to generate above-average returns for investors” from established clean energy generation such as wind and solar, Woods said.

“We recognize a need for that. We just don’t see that as an appropriate use of ExxonMobil’s capabilities,” he added.

Woods does not mention that his company lobbied to fend off provisions in an earlier version of the legislation that would have levied heavy taxes on polluting companies to pay for climate efforts, or that a top Exxon lobbyist was filmed saying that the firm’s support for a carbon tax was a public relations strategy meant to stall more serious climate policies.

“For decades, they told us that the science was too uncertain to justify action, that it was premature to act, and that we could and should wait and see how things developed,” said Oreskes. “Now the CEO says: oh dear, we’ve waited too long. If this isn’t gaslighting, I don’t know what is.”

Wagner said that Exxon was touting its ambition to slash the emissions of its own operations while also betting that the rest of the world won’t do the same, in order to continue selling oil.

“He can’t have it both ways in saying ‘we are an energy company’ but then basically ignoring the cheapest source of electricity in history as something Exxon should be investing in,” he said.

The video interview comes as Exxon is pursuing a lawsuit against activist shareholders who are aiming to push Exxon to take up stricter environmental standards. Those shareholders, Woods said, were trying to stop Exxon’s central business model of selling oil and gas, which it won’t accede to.

“We want to cater to the shareholders who are real investors, who have an interest in seeing this company succeed in generating return on their investments,” he said. “We don’t feel a responsibility to activists that hijack that process … and frankly, abuse it to advance an ideology.”

Exxon has received subsidies to build out its clean energy business from the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, Fortune chief exceutive Alan Murray pointed out in the interview. But Woods argued that “building a business on government subsidy is not a long-term sustainable strategy”.

“The way that the government is incentivized and trying to catalyze investments in this space is through subsidies,” he said. “Driving significant investments at a scale that even gets close to moving the needle is going to cost a lot of money.”

But the vast majority of Exxon’s own investments are still being put toward fossil fuel expansion, said Brulle.

“This is what they do: they’re going to basically blame the victim, the American public,” he said.

“They spend on fossil fuels and they spend billions trying to influence public opinion, but we’re supposed to foot the bill for the damage.”