Former CIA officer Gina Haspel has become the first woman to head the U.S. spy agency after a swearing-in ceremony Monday. Haspel has overcome the criticism by lawmakers of both parties for her involvement in the torture of terror suspects after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. U.S. President Donald Trump praised her ability to overcome what he called “a lot of very negative politics” and said no one was more qualified the job. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports.
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Category Archives: News
Worldwide news. News is information about current events. This may be provided through many different media: word of mouth, printing, postal systems, broadcasting, electronic communication, or through the testimony of observers and witnesses to events. News is sometimes called “hard news” to differentiate it from soft media
Trump Praises New, Berates Former CIA Director
Former CIA officer Gina Haspel has become the first woman to head the U.S. spy agency after a swearing-in ceremony Monday. Haspel has overcome the criticism by lawmakers of both parties for her involvement in the torture of terror suspects after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. U.S. President Donald Trump praised her ability to overcome what he called “a lot of very negative politics” and said no one was more qualified the job. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports.
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Commemorative Coin Struck for Trump-Kim Summit
A commemorative coin featuring U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un has been struck by the White House Communications Agency ahead of their planned summit next month.
In a statement, deputy spokesman Raj Shah insisted that “the White House did not have any input into the design and manufacture of the coin.”
The coin depicts Trump and Kim, described as North Korea’s “Supreme Leader,” in profile facing each other in front of a background of U.S. and North Korean flags.
At the top of the front, the words “Peace Talks” are emblazoned, with the date “2018” beneath.
The back of the coin features a picture of the White House, Air Force One and the presidential seal.
Trump is scheduled to hold a landmark summit with the North Korean leader in Singapore on June 12, but Pyongyang has recently threatened to pull out over U.S. demands for “unilateral nuclear abandonment.”
The White House Communications Agency regularly issues commemorative or challenge coins to present to foreign guests, diplomats and members of the military.
A number of the coins are available for sale through the White House Gift Office.
“Since 2003, White House Communications Agency members have ordered a limited number of commercially designed and manufactured souvenir travel coins for purchase,” Shah explained.
“These coins are designed, manufactured and made by an American coin manufacturer. These souvenir coins are only ordered after a trip has been publicly announced.”
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Commemorative Coin Struck for Trump-Kim Summit
A commemorative coin featuring U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un has been struck by the White House Communications Agency ahead of their planned summit next month.
In a statement, deputy spokesman Raj Shah insisted that “the White House did not have any input into the design and manufacture of the coin.”
The coin depicts Trump and Kim, described as North Korea’s “Supreme Leader,” in profile facing each other in front of a background of U.S. and North Korean flags.
At the top of the front, the words “Peace Talks” are emblazoned, with the date “2018” beneath.
The back of the coin features a picture of the White House, Air Force One and the presidential seal.
Trump is scheduled to hold a landmark summit with the North Korean leader in Singapore on June 12, but Pyongyang has recently threatened to pull out over U.S. demands for “unilateral nuclear abandonment.”
The White House Communications Agency regularly issues commemorative or challenge coins to present to foreign guests, diplomats and members of the military.
A number of the coins are available for sale through the White House Gift Office.
“Since 2003, White House Communications Agency members have ordered a limited number of commercially designed and manufactured souvenir travel coins for purchase,” Shah explained.
“These coins are designed, manufactured and made by an American coin manufacturer. These souvenir coins are only ordered after a trip has been publicly announced.”
…
Robots Taking Over Grocery Warehouses
Grocery stores in the U.S. are locked in a fierce battle for customers who often demand the convenience of home deliveries. Automation is increasingly becoming part of the competitive equation. When U.S. mail-order retail giant Amazon shook up the supermarket industry with its purchase of Whole Foods, America’s second biggest food retailer, Kroger, responded by partnering with a British online supermarket known for its advanced warehouse technology. VOA’s George Putic reports.
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Watchdog Report to Fault FBI for Clinton Probe Delay
An upcoming report from the Justice Department’s internal watchdog is expected to criticize senior FBI leaders for not moving quickly enough to review a trove of Hillary Clinton emails discovered late in the 2016 campaign, according to people familiar with the findings.
The FBI’s timing has been a sore point for Clinton supporters, who say then-director James Comey’s announcement of the new review less than two weeks before the Nov. 8, 2016, election contributed to her loss. The agency’s findings affirming its decision not to pursue criminal charges against Clinton were disclosed two days before the vote — too late, her supporters say, to undo the damage.
Some FBI officials knew in September 2016 of the emails on former Rep. Anthony Weiner’s laptop but the bureau did not obtain a warrant to review them until the following month. Clinton allies say the candidate’s name could have been cleared much faster if the FBI acted on the emails as soon as they knew of their existence.
An inspector general report examining a broad range of FBI actions during the Clinton email investigation will criticize officials, including Comey, for not moving fast enough to examine the email trove and for a weekslong delay in getting a warrant, according to people familiar with the matter who were not authorized to discuss it publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press.
A lawyer for Comey and spokespeople for the inspector general and the FBI all declined to comment Monday.
The report will likely revive scrutiny of the FBI’s handling of the Clinton case and the extent to which it helped shape the outcome of the presidential election. Its conclusions may cut against President Donald Trump’s repeated assertions that the FBI was working against him during the campaign and instead revive allegations that the bureau broke from protocol in ways that ultimately harmed Clinton.
The nonpolitical watchdog has been repeatedly pulled into the partisan arena amid demands to investigate FBI actions in the early stages of its probe of possible coordination between Russia and the Trump campaign.
On Sunday, the Justice Department asked the inspector general, Michael Horowitz, to expand his existing investigation to look into whether Trump associates were improperly monitored during the campaign for political reasons.
The report dealing with the Clinton emails arises from a wide-ranging investigation launched in January 2017. It has been examining actions including Comey’s decision to announce his recommendation against criminal charges at an FBI headquarters news conference and his decision months later to alert Congress that the probe had been reopened because of the discovery of email messages on Weiner’s laptop.
The report is also expected to criticize two FBI officials who exchanged derogatory text messages about Trump during the course of the Clinton investigation.
A draft of the report has been completed, and officials whose actions are scrutinized in it have been permitted with their lawyers to review it and respond to the findings. The final version is expected out next month.
A separate inspector general report from last month faulted former Deputy Director Andrew McCabe for misleading investigators about his role in a 2016 news media disclosure about an investigation into the Clinton Foundation.
McCabe, who has denied wrongdoing, was fired because of those findings, and the inspector general has referred the matter to the U.S. Attorney’s office in Washington for possible criminal prosecution.
Weiner is the former husband of top Clinton aide Huma Abedin. His laptop was being analyzed by FBI investigators as part of a separate sexting investigation involving a teenage girl. Weiner, a former Democratic congressman from New York, is serving a 21-month prison sentence after pleading guilty to sending obscene material to a 15-year-old girl.
In his book released last month, “A Higher Loyalty,” Comey writes that he learned in early October — probably from McCabe — that Weiner’s laptop might hold a connection to the Clinton email investigation. He said he did not recall the conversation clearly and that it seemed like a “passing comment and the notion that Anthony Weiner’s computer might connect to … Hillary Clinton made no sense to me.”
Comey said it wasn’t until the morning of Oct. 27 when FBI officials asked his permission to seek a warrant for the Clinton emails, having determined that “hundreds of thousands of emails” from Clinton’s personal email domain existed on the computer and that there was no way Weiner would consent to a search of his entire laptop given the legal trouble he was in.
Some of the emails on the laptop had been forwarded by Abedin to Weiner to be printed out while others had been stored there after being backed up from personal electronic devices.
The FBI subsequently obtained a warrant, and though Comey said he was told there was no chance the email review would be done before the election, he announced on Nov. 6 that, “Based on our review, we have not changed our conclusions that we expressed in July with respect to Secretary Clinton.”
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Watchdog Report to Fault FBI for Clinton Probe Delay
An upcoming report from the Justice Department’s internal watchdog is expected to criticize senior FBI leaders for not moving quickly enough to review a trove of Hillary Clinton emails discovered late in the 2016 campaign, according to people familiar with the findings.
The FBI’s timing has been a sore point for Clinton supporters, who say then-director James Comey’s announcement of the new review less than two weeks before the Nov. 8, 2016, election contributed to her loss. The agency’s findings affirming its decision not to pursue criminal charges against Clinton were disclosed two days before the vote — too late, her supporters say, to undo the damage.
Some FBI officials knew in September 2016 of the emails on former Rep. Anthony Weiner’s laptop but the bureau did not obtain a warrant to review them until the following month. Clinton allies say the candidate’s name could have been cleared much faster if the FBI acted on the emails as soon as they knew of their existence.
An inspector general report examining a broad range of FBI actions during the Clinton email investigation will criticize officials, including Comey, for not moving fast enough to examine the email trove and for a weekslong delay in getting a warrant, according to people familiar with the matter who were not authorized to discuss it publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press.
A lawyer for Comey and spokespeople for the inspector general and the FBI all declined to comment Monday.
The report will likely revive scrutiny of the FBI’s handling of the Clinton case and the extent to which it helped shape the outcome of the presidential election. Its conclusions may cut against President Donald Trump’s repeated assertions that the FBI was working against him during the campaign and instead revive allegations that the bureau broke from protocol in ways that ultimately harmed Clinton.
The nonpolitical watchdog has been repeatedly pulled into the partisan arena amid demands to investigate FBI actions in the early stages of its probe of possible coordination between Russia and the Trump campaign.
On Sunday, the Justice Department asked the inspector general, Michael Horowitz, to expand his existing investigation to look into whether Trump associates were improperly monitored during the campaign for political reasons.
The report dealing with the Clinton emails arises from a wide-ranging investigation launched in January 2017. It has been examining actions including Comey’s decision to announce his recommendation against criminal charges at an FBI headquarters news conference and his decision months later to alert Congress that the probe had been reopened because of the discovery of email messages on Weiner’s laptop.
The report is also expected to criticize two FBI officials who exchanged derogatory text messages about Trump during the course of the Clinton investigation.
A draft of the report has been completed, and officials whose actions are scrutinized in it have been permitted with their lawyers to review it and respond to the findings. The final version is expected out next month.
A separate inspector general report from last month faulted former Deputy Director Andrew McCabe for misleading investigators about his role in a 2016 news media disclosure about an investigation into the Clinton Foundation.
McCabe, who has denied wrongdoing, was fired because of those findings, and the inspector general has referred the matter to the U.S. Attorney’s office in Washington for possible criminal prosecution.
Weiner is the former husband of top Clinton aide Huma Abedin. His laptop was being analyzed by FBI investigators as part of a separate sexting investigation involving a teenage girl. Weiner, a former Democratic congressman from New York, is serving a 21-month prison sentence after pleading guilty to sending obscene material to a 15-year-old girl.
In his book released last month, “A Higher Loyalty,” Comey writes that he learned in early October — probably from McCabe — that Weiner’s laptop might hold a connection to the Clinton email investigation. He said he did not recall the conversation clearly and that it seemed like a “passing comment and the notion that Anthony Weiner’s computer might connect to … Hillary Clinton made no sense to me.”
Comey said it wasn’t until the morning of Oct. 27 when FBI officials asked his permission to seek a warrant for the Clinton emails, having determined that “hundreds of thousands of emails” from Clinton’s personal email domain existed on the computer and that there was no way Weiner would consent to a search of his entire laptop given the legal trouble he was in.
Some of the emails on the laptop had been forwarded by Abedin to Weiner to be printed out while others had been stored there after being backed up from personal electronic devices.
The FBI subsequently obtained a warrant, and though Comey said he was told there was no chance the email review would be done before the election, he announced on Nov. 6 that, “Based on our review, we have not changed our conclusions that we expressed in July with respect to Secretary Clinton.”
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US, South Korea Presidents to Discuss Threat to Scrap Trump-Kim Summit
Amid increasing skepticism of the chances for success for a summit between the leaders of the United States and North Korea and doubts the meeting will take place as planned, President Donald Trump on Tuesday is to meet South Korea’s leader at the White House.
Moon Jae-in, during Tuesday’s scheduled two hours of talks, is to try to reassure Trump that next month’s encounter with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un can lead to a historic breakthrough.
“I suspect President Trump has some tough questions for President Moon that he’d prefer to ask privately, given the lack of clarity on what the North Koreans will agree to — and the latest chess move by the North Koreans to threaten to cancel the June 12 summit,” said Jean Lee, the Korea Center program director at the Wilson Center.
Trump, according to officials in the U.S. and abroad, has been questioning his aides and foreign leaders about whether he should proceed with going to Singapore to meet Kim.
Some officials in Washington, speaking on condition of not being named, also blame South Korean officials for initially overselling to Trump the willingness of the North Korean leader to denuclearize.
It is a view shared by some outsiders, as well.
“Moon likely exaggerated this to tie Trump to a diplomatic track to prevent him from backsliding into last year’s war threats, which scared the daylights out of South Koreans,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University.
Lee, a former Pyongyang bureau chief for the Associated Press, sees Moon as desiring to “jump in again to play the role of mediator, and to show that Seoul and Washington are in close coordination at the highest level, at least outwardly. But it will be a difficult conversation, I suspect.”
Eager for U.S. involvement
In the view of some analysts, such as Institute for Corean-American Studies Fellow Tara O, Moon appears anxious to persuade Trump to go ahead with the Kim summit and to get the U.S. president to grant sanctions relief so planned joint South-North projects would be able to proceed.
As a result of last month’s Panmunjom meeting between Moon and Kim, the two Koreas “provided a deadline for the signing of the peace treaty by this year, so Moon would also discuss that with Trump,” O, the author of a book “The Collapse of North Korea: Challenges, Planning, and Geopolitics of Unification,” tells VOA.
In her view, however, some in Washington may take a dim view of that, seeing the requests as premature “rewards for North Korea, which has not done anything to reduce the threat on the Korean Peninsula.”
O, a retired U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel who served on the Korean peninsula, contends “the North Koreans have skillfully played the situation by manufacturing an awkward moment between Moon and Trump just before their May 22 meeting. It’s all part of the classic North Korean strategy of divide and conquer.”
Another key geopolitical player is China, whom Trump recently surmised influenced the statements coming out of Pyongyang casting doubt on the Singapore summit.
The president, on Twitter on Monday morning, called on China to keep its border tight with North Korea amid sanctions until he is able to reach an agreement with Kim.
The North Koreans have threatened to pull out of the talks with Trump, blaming what they term are demands by the United States for “unilateral nuclear abandonment.”
Since that threat, Trump and others in the White House have denied they are demanding a so-called “Libya model” for disarmament, while still insisting North Korea must give up its nuclear weapons for which it would be richly rewarded.
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US, South Korea Presidents to Discuss Threat to Scrap Trump-Kim Summit
Amid increasing skepticism of the chances for success for a summit between the leaders of the United States and North Korea and doubts the meeting will take place as planned, President Donald Trump on Tuesday is to meet South Korea’s leader at the White House.
Moon Jae-in, during Tuesday’s scheduled two hours of talks, is to try to reassure Trump that next month’s encounter with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un can lead to a historic breakthrough.
“I suspect President Trump has some tough questions for President Moon that he’d prefer to ask privately, given the lack of clarity on what the North Koreans will agree to — and the latest chess move by the North Koreans to threaten to cancel the June 12 summit,” said Jean Lee, the Korea Center program director at the Wilson Center.
Trump, according to officials in the U.S. and abroad, has been questioning his aides and foreign leaders about whether he should proceed with going to Singapore to meet Kim.
Some officials in Washington, speaking on condition of not being named, also blame South Korean officials for initially overselling to Trump the willingness of the North Korean leader to denuclearize.
It is a view shared by some outsiders, as well.
“Moon likely exaggerated this to tie Trump to a diplomatic track to prevent him from backsliding into last year’s war threats, which scared the daylights out of South Koreans,” said Robert Kelly, a political science professor at Pusan National University.
Lee, a former Pyongyang bureau chief for the Associated Press, sees Moon as desiring to “jump in again to play the role of mediator, and to show that Seoul and Washington are in close coordination at the highest level, at least outwardly. But it will be a difficult conversation, I suspect.”
Eager for U.S. involvement
In the view of some analysts, such as Institute for Corean-American Studies Fellow Tara O, Moon appears anxious to persuade Trump to go ahead with the Kim summit and to get the U.S. president to grant sanctions relief so planned joint South-North projects would be able to proceed.
As a result of last month’s Panmunjom meeting between Moon and Kim, the two Koreas “provided a deadline for the signing of the peace treaty by this year, so Moon would also discuss that with Trump,” O, the author of a book “The Collapse of North Korea: Challenges, Planning, and Geopolitics of Unification,” tells VOA.
In her view, however, some in Washington may take a dim view of that, seeing the requests as premature “rewards for North Korea, which has not done anything to reduce the threat on the Korean Peninsula.”
O, a retired U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel who served on the Korean peninsula, contends “the North Koreans have skillfully played the situation by manufacturing an awkward moment between Moon and Trump just before their May 22 meeting. It’s all part of the classic North Korean strategy of divide and conquer.”
Another key geopolitical player is China, whom Trump recently surmised influenced the statements coming out of Pyongyang casting doubt on the Singapore summit.
The president, on Twitter on Monday morning, called on China to keep its border tight with North Korea amid sanctions until he is able to reach an agreement with Kim.
The North Koreans have threatened to pull out of the talks with Trump, blaming what they term are demands by the United States for “unilateral nuclear abandonment.”
Since that threat, Trump and others in the White House have denied they are demanding a so-called “Libya model” for disarmament, while still insisting North Korea must give up its nuclear weapons for which it would be richly rewarded.
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Man Dies After Tesla Crashes into San Francisco-Area Pond
A man was killed when the Tesla automobile he was driving veered off a road, crashed through a fence and plunged into a pond, authorities said Monday.
California Highway Patrol spokesman Daniel Jacowitz said rescuers pulled the Tesla Model S from the pond early Monday and found the man’s body inside.
The driver was identified as Keith Leung, 34, of Danville, California, said Sgt. Ray Kelly, spokesman for the Alameda County Sheriff’s office.
Kelly said it was too soon to know if the vehicle’s semi-autonomous Autopilot mode was engaged when the crash occurred or whether the driver may have been speeding or intoxicated.
Photographs of the car show that its backend was destroyed, its hood crumpled and windows shattered.
The crash occurred near the cities of San Ramon and Danville on Sunday evening, Jacowitz said. A property owner contacted authorities after hearing a noise and seeing damage to his fence and tire tracks.
The car was traveling at a speed “great enough to leave the roadway, hit a fence, keep going down an embankment and into a pond on the property,” Jacowitz said.
Federal transportation authorities have been investigating if the Tesla’s Autopilot mode has played a role in other recent crashes.
In March, the driver of a Tesla Model X was killed in California when his SUV hit a barrier while traveling at “freeway speed.” The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating that case, in which the Autopilot system was engaged.
Autopilot was also engaged in a crash earlier this month in Utah, according to data from the car.
Also this month, the NTSB opened a probe into an accident in which a Model S caught fire after crashing into a wall at a high speed in Florida. Two 18-year-olds were trapped in the vehicle and died in the flames. The agency has said it does not expect Autopilot to be a focus in that investigation.
Autopilot is the most well-known semi-autonomous system. It uses cameras and sensors on the front, sides and rear of the car to observe lane markings and to “see” other cars that are nearby. It’s simple to engage, requiring only two quick taps of a stalk. There are no limitations on where Autopilot can be used. Drivers can enable it on the freeway, side streets, or anywhere with distinct lane markings.
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Man Dies After Tesla Crashes into San Francisco-Area Pond
A man was killed when the Tesla automobile he was driving veered off a road, crashed through a fence and plunged into a pond, authorities said Monday.
California Highway Patrol spokesman Daniel Jacowitz said rescuers pulled the Tesla Model S from the pond early Monday and found the man’s body inside.
The driver was identified as Keith Leung, 34, of Danville, California, said Sgt. Ray Kelly, spokesman for the Alameda County Sheriff’s office.
Kelly said it was too soon to know if the vehicle’s semi-autonomous Autopilot mode was engaged when the crash occurred or whether the driver may have been speeding or intoxicated.
Photographs of the car show that its backend was destroyed, its hood crumpled and windows shattered.
The crash occurred near the cities of San Ramon and Danville on Sunday evening, Jacowitz said. A property owner contacted authorities after hearing a noise and seeing damage to his fence and tire tracks.
The car was traveling at a speed “great enough to leave the roadway, hit a fence, keep going down an embankment and into a pond on the property,” Jacowitz said.
Federal transportation authorities have been investigating if the Tesla’s Autopilot mode has played a role in other recent crashes.
In March, the driver of a Tesla Model X was killed in California when his SUV hit a barrier while traveling at “freeway speed.” The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating that case, in which the Autopilot system was engaged.
Autopilot was also engaged in a crash earlier this month in Utah, according to data from the car.
Also this month, the NTSB opened a probe into an accident in which a Model S caught fire after crashing into a wall at a high speed in Florida. Two 18-year-olds were trapped in the vehicle and died in the flames. The agency has said it does not expect Autopilot to be a focus in that investigation.
Autopilot is the most well-known semi-autonomous system. It uses cameras and sensors on the front, sides and rear of the car to observe lane markings and to “see” other cars that are nearby. It’s simple to engage, requiring only two quick taps of a stalk. There are no limitations on where Autopilot can be used. Drivers can enable it on the freeway, side streets, or anywhere with distinct lane markings.
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DOJ to Investigate Trump Claim of FBI Campaign Spy
The Justice Department will expand its investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election to include President Donald Trump’s claims that the FBI planted an informant to spy on his campaign, the White House said Monday.
The announcement came after Trump’s demand for a probe and his meeting Monday with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray.
The White House also said the Justice Department will work with congressional leaders to review “highly classified” documents related to Trump’s claim that someone spied on his campaign.
“If anyone did infiltrate or surveil participants in a presidential campaign for inappropriate purposes, we need to know about it and take appropriate action,” Rosenstein said before Monday’s meeting with Trump.
Trump has alleged the FBI, under former President Barack Obama, planted a spy in his campaign “for political purposes,” calling it the “all-time biggest political scandal.”
The informant’s actual role was to talk with two Trump campaign advisers suspected of having contacts with Russia. There is no evidence the FBI acted illegally.
Several news agencies have identified the informant as Stefan Halper, a 73-year-old American-born professor at Britain’s University of Cambridge, who had worked decades ago in three other Republican administrations.
Ned Price, who served on Obama’s National Security Council, told VOA that Trump’s charge of spying on his campaign is dangerous to American democracy.
Price said the president is “officially knocking down the firewall between policy and law enforcement — an indispensable element of the rule of law. And he’s doing so for his own personal ends.”
Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Alene tweeted that “Trump is a subject of the investigation he will apparently succeed in obtaining evidence in and that no subject is entitled to during a criminal investigation. This is unprecedented.”
Special counsel Robert Mueller is investigating whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia in interfering in the 2016 campaign and whether Trump himself obstructed justice by firing former FBI Director James Comey, who had been investigating the charges.
Trump has denied those charges. In a tweet Sunday, he contended investigators have “found no Collussion [sic] with Russia, No Obstruction, but they aren’t looking at the corruption” in the campaign of his Democratic challenger two years ago, former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
“Things are really getting ridiculous,” Trump said in another Twitter remark, asking at what point the investigation will end, calling it a “soon to be $20,000,000 Witch Hunt,” although the cost appears to be much less.
Mueller has already indicted numerous Russian individuals and entities for interference in the U.S. election, along with guilty pleas from three Trump campaign associates who are cooperating with prosecutors in the investigation.
Trump has expressed fears the Mueller probe could last long enough to hurt Republicans in the November congressional elections.
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DOJ to Investigate Trump Claim of FBI Campaign Spy
The Justice Department will expand its investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election to include President Donald Trump’s claims that the FBI planted an informant to spy on his campaign, the White House said Monday.
The announcement came after Trump’s demand for a probe and his meeting Monday with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray.
The White House also said the Justice Department will work with congressional leaders to review “highly classified” documents related to Trump’s claim that someone spied on his campaign.
“If anyone did infiltrate or surveil participants in a presidential campaign for inappropriate purposes, we need to know about it and take appropriate action,” Rosenstein said before Monday’s meeting with Trump.
Trump has alleged the FBI, under former President Barack Obama, planted a spy in his campaign “for political purposes,” calling it the “all-time biggest political scandal.”
The informant’s actual role was to talk with two Trump campaign advisers suspected of having contacts with Russia. There is no evidence the FBI acted illegally.
Several news agencies have identified the informant as Stefan Halper, a 73-year-old American-born professor at Britain’s University of Cambridge, who had worked decades ago in three other Republican administrations.
Ned Price, who served on Obama’s National Security Council, told VOA that Trump’s charge of spying on his campaign is dangerous to American democracy.
Price said the president is “officially knocking down the firewall between policy and law enforcement — an indispensable element of the rule of law. And he’s doing so for his own personal ends.”
Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Alene tweeted that “Trump is a subject of the investigation he will apparently succeed in obtaining evidence in and that no subject is entitled to during a criminal investigation. This is unprecedented.”
Special counsel Robert Mueller is investigating whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia in interfering in the 2016 campaign and whether Trump himself obstructed justice by firing former FBI Director James Comey, who had been investigating the charges.
Trump has denied those charges. In a tweet Sunday, he contended investigators have “found no Collussion [sic] with Russia, No Obstruction, but they aren’t looking at the corruption” in the campaign of his Democratic challenger two years ago, former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
“Things are really getting ridiculous,” Trump said in another Twitter remark, asking at what point the investigation will end, calling it a “soon to be $20,000,000 Witch Hunt,” although the cost appears to be much less.
Mueller has already indicted numerous Russian individuals and entities for interference in the U.S. election, along with guilty pleas from three Trump campaign associates who are cooperating with prosecutors in the investigation.
Trump has expressed fears the Mueller probe could last long enough to hurt Republicans in the November congressional elections.
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Trump Claims New Accord with China on Trade Negotiations
U.S. President Donald Trump says American farmers will be big beneficiaries of more trade with China.
“Under our potential deal with China, they will purchase from our Great American Farmers practically as much as our Farmers can produce,” Trump said Monday on Twitter.
In another comment, he said China “has agreed to buy massive amounts of ADDITIONAL Farm/Agricultural Products – would be one of the best things to happen to our farmers in many years!”
The U.S. leader said one result of talks with China last week in Washington is barriers to U.S.-Chinese trade and tariffs on each country’s exports will “come down for (the) first time.”
President Trump’s tweets come a day after U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin announced the two nations have agreed to back away from imposing tough new tariffs on each other’s exports, after reaching a deal Saturday for Beijing to buy more American goods to “substantially reduce” the huge trade deficit with the United States.
Mnuchin told Fox News the world’s two biggest economic powers “made very meaningful progress and we agreed on a framework” to resolve trade issues. “So right now we have agreed to put the tariffs on hold while we try to execute the framework,” he said.
China’s state-run news agency Xinhua quoted Vice Premier Liu He, who led Chinese negotiators in trade talks in Washington this past week, as saying, “The two sides reached a consensus, will not fight a trade war, and will stop increasing tariffs on each other.”
China’s state-run news agency Xinhua quoted Vice Premier Liu He, who led Chinese negotiators in trade talks in Washington, as saying, “The two sides reached a consensus, will not fight a trade war, and will stop increasing tariffs on each other.”
Explainer: What is a Trade War?
Negotiations to continue
Liu said the agreement was a “necessity;” but, he added, “At the same time, it must be realized that unfreezing the ice cannot be done in a day; solving the structural problems of the economic and trade relations between the two countries will take time.”
Trump had threatened to impose new tariffs on $150 billion worth of Chinese imports and Beijing had responded that it would do the same on American goods.
Mnuchin and White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross would soon go to Beijing to negotiate on how China might buy more American goods to reduce the huge U.S. trade deficit with Beijing, which last year totaled $375 billion. The United States has signaled it wants to trim the deficit by $200 billion annually, but no figure was mentioned in the agreement reached over the weekend.
Philip Levy, senior fellow on the global economy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, tells VOA that while the U.S. and China have for now avoided a tariff war, the outcome of the trade talks remains unclear.
“I think the Trump administration will crow about the fact that they arranged for some additional sales. That really wasn’t the issue. It may have been in their minds, but in terms of what is in the national interest, it wasn’t,” he said.
Levy says the result is a managed trade solution that still does not answer the fundamental question of how a state-dominated economy the size of giant China fits into the global system.
But Kudlow said there has been a lot of progress.
“You can see where we’re going next. As tariffs come down, the barriers come down, there will be more American exports,” he told ABC television, saying any agreement reached will be “good for American exports and good for Chinese growth.”
ZTE
One contentious point of conflict between the U.S. and China is the fate of ZTE, the giant technology Chinese company that has bought American-made components to build its consumer electronic devices.
The U.S. fined ZTE $1.2 billion last year for violating American bans on trade with Iran and North Korea. ZTE, however, said recently it was shutting down its manufacturing operations because it could no longer buy the American parts after the U.S. imposed a seven-year ban on the sale of the components.
Trump, at the behest of Chinese President Xi Jinping, a week ago “instructed” Commerce Secretary Ross to intervene to save the company and prevent the loss of Chinese jobs.
Even so, Kudlow said, “Do not expect ZTE to get off scot free. Ain’t going to happen.”
Ira Mellman and Kenneth Schwartz contributed to this article.
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Trump Claims New Accord with China on Trade Negotiations
U.S. President Donald Trump says American farmers will be big beneficiaries of more trade with China.
“Under our potential deal with China, they will purchase from our Great American Farmers practically as much as our Farmers can produce,” Trump said Monday on Twitter.
In another comment, he said China “has agreed to buy massive amounts of ADDITIONAL Farm/Agricultural Products – would be one of the best things to happen to our farmers in many years!”
The U.S. leader said one result of talks with China last week in Washington is barriers to U.S.-Chinese trade and tariffs on each country’s exports will “come down for (the) first time.”
President Trump’s tweets come a day after U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin announced the two nations have agreed to back away from imposing tough new tariffs on each other’s exports, after reaching a deal Saturday for Beijing to buy more American goods to “substantially reduce” the huge trade deficit with the United States.
Mnuchin told Fox News the world’s two biggest economic powers “made very meaningful progress and we agreed on a framework” to resolve trade issues. “So right now we have agreed to put the tariffs on hold while we try to execute the framework,” he said.
China’s state-run news agency Xinhua quoted Vice Premier Liu He, who led Chinese negotiators in trade talks in Washington this past week, as saying, “The two sides reached a consensus, will not fight a trade war, and will stop increasing tariffs on each other.”
China’s state-run news agency Xinhua quoted Vice Premier Liu He, who led Chinese negotiators in trade talks in Washington, as saying, “The two sides reached a consensus, will not fight a trade war, and will stop increasing tariffs on each other.”
Explainer: What is a Trade War?
Negotiations to continue
Liu said the agreement was a “necessity;” but, he added, “At the same time, it must be realized that unfreezing the ice cannot be done in a day; solving the structural problems of the economic and trade relations between the two countries will take time.”
Trump had threatened to impose new tariffs on $150 billion worth of Chinese imports and Beijing had responded that it would do the same on American goods.
Mnuchin and White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross would soon go to Beijing to negotiate on how China might buy more American goods to reduce the huge U.S. trade deficit with Beijing, which last year totaled $375 billion. The United States has signaled it wants to trim the deficit by $200 billion annually, but no figure was mentioned in the agreement reached over the weekend.
Philip Levy, senior fellow on the global economy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, tells VOA that while the U.S. and China have for now avoided a tariff war, the outcome of the trade talks remains unclear.
“I think the Trump administration will crow about the fact that they arranged for some additional sales. That really wasn’t the issue. It may have been in their minds, but in terms of what is in the national interest, it wasn’t,” he said.
Levy says the result is a managed trade solution that still does not answer the fundamental question of how a state-dominated economy the size of giant China fits into the global system.
But Kudlow said there has been a lot of progress.
“You can see where we’re going next. As tariffs come down, the barriers come down, there will be more American exports,” he told ABC television, saying any agreement reached will be “good for American exports and good for Chinese growth.”
ZTE
One contentious point of conflict between the U.S. and China is the fate of ZTE, the giant technology Chinese company that has bought American-made components to build its consumer electronic devices.
The U.S. fined ZTE $1.2 billion last year for violating American bans on trade with Iran and North Korea. ZTE, however, said recently it was shutting down its manufacturing operations because it could no longer buy the American parts after the U.S. imposed a seven-year ban on the sale of the components.
Trump, at the behest of Chinese President Xi Jinping, a week ago “instructed” Commerce Secretary Ross to intervene to save the company and prevent the loss of Chinese jobs.
Even so, Kudlow said, “Do not expect ZTE to get off scot free. Ain’t going to happen.”
Ira Mellman and Kenneth Schwartz contributed to this article.
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From Airlines to Pizza Parlors, EU Businesses Adopt Data Law
Lisa Meyer’s hair salon is a cozy place where her mother serves homemade macaroons, children climb on chairs and customers chat above the whirr of hairdryers.
Most of the time Meyer is focused on hairstyles, color trends and keeping up with appointments. But now she’s worried about how the European Union’s new data protection law will affect her business as she contacts customers to seek permission to store their details. Even though she supports the law, Meyer fears it may cut her mailing list by 90 percent as people choose to withhold their data or simply overlook her emails.
“It will be difficult to market upcoming events,” she said at her shop, Lisa Hauck Hair & Beauty in London.
Businesses from pizza parlors to airlines across the EU’s 28 countries are bombarding customers with emails seeking consent to use personal data as they rush to comply with the bloc’s General Data Protection Regulation, which takes effect May 25. While much of the attention has focused on how technology giants like Facebook and Google will comply with the rules, consumers are learning firsthand that they apply to any firm, large or small, that stores personal data.
The new rules , called GDPR for short, are designed to make it easier for EU residents to give and withdraw permission for companies to use personal information, requiring consent forms that are written in simple language and no more than one-page long. Companies that already hold such data have to reach out to customers and ask for permission to retain it. Authorities can fine companies up to 4 percent of annual revenue or 20 million euros ($23.6 million), whichever is higher, for breaching the rules.
As a result, email boxes all over the continent are being swamped with messages from opticians, hotels, greeting card companies and even charities that fear stiff penalties for non-compliance.
In an effort to rise above the clutter, some companies are trying to spice up their approach as they try to ensure continued access to information vital to their businesses.
The St. Pancras Hotels Group promises that “only nominated people have access to your details, and they are kept really safe, guarded by our very own British Bulldogs. And a rude punk rocker.” Britain’s Channel 4 television offered up a video featuring one of the country’s best-known comedians explaining GDPR and how it will affect viewers. Many are using animations, like this one from like France’s mobile operator Bouygues, to explain the rules.
Regulators say the law applies to anyone who collects, uses or stores personal data. That can be a burden for small businesses that are forced to hire outside lawyers or consultants because they don’t have the staff or expertise to deal with the law.
The EU’s one-size-fits-all approach is one of the flaws in the law, according to Max Schrems, an Austrian privacy advocate who has formed a non-profit to take action against big companies that deliberately violate the new rules.
When the rules were being discussed, industry lobbyists sought to weaken the law by creating uncertainty, and as a result there are no clear guidelines that exempt small companies, Schrems told the BBC recently.
“GDPR is a prime example of corporate law gone wrong, because it’s helpful for big companies,” he said. “They have to do all of this anyways and they can use the uncertainty in the law to kind of get around things. But it leaves small companies that don’t … have a law department, or something like that, in a situation with a lot of uncertainty.”
Meyer falls under the new rules’ jurisdiction because she keeps data. Like many hair colorists, she keeps a card on each of her clients that notes whether they are allergic to any chemicals used in the dyes. That’s considered personal medical information that must be protected.
She took a data protection course to learn about her obligations and avoid legal bills.
“I find it actually quite scary how data is being used so carelessly,” Meyer said. “It’s a good wake-up call. It’s made me more aware.”
But many others have been caught off guard.
A survey by French consultancy Capgemini says that 85 percent of European firms will not have completed their preparations for GDPR this week. It finds that British businesses are the most advanced and Swedish ones have the most work to do still.
A survey conducted by Britain’s Federation of Small Businesses estimates that complying with the rules will cost an average of 1,030 pounds ($1,390) per company.
“For a small business, it’s hugely onerous,” said Mark Elliott, who runs the digital marketing company, Sparks4Growth Ltd. He knows other small business owners who are worried about the extra red tape and costs of complying with the law. “I think, quite simply, they left us open to the lions,” he said of regulators.
EU officials say GDPR is necessary to catch up with all the technological advances since 1995, when the last comprehensive European rules on data privacy were put in place.
As technology advances, data becomes more important. The ability to analyze everything from medical records to the weather holds enormous potential, with suggestions it will make us healthier, improve traffic flows and help scientists learn more about the movements of endangered species, to name but a few items.
But with that potential comes concern about privacy.
The threat was vividly illustrated earlier this year when allegations surfaced that a little known campaign consultancy, Cambridge Analytica, misused data from millions of Facebook accounts to help Donald Trump win the 2016 U.S. presidential election. That touched off a global debate over internet privacy and triggered speculation other jurisdictions will soon follow the EU in tightening data protection laws.
That is just fine with Meyer, who thinks society needs a new etiquette for dealing with personal data.
“It’s like sitting up straight at the table. It’s like not talking too loud on the bus,” she said. Respect for data “has to get into our culture.”
From Airlines to Pizza Parlors, EU Businesses Adopt Data Law
Lisa Meyer’s hair salon is a cozy place where her mother serves homemade macaroons, children climb on chairs and customers chat above the whirr of hairdryers.
Most of the time Meyer is focused on hairstyles, color trends and keeping up with appointments. But now she’s worried about how the European Union’s new data protection law will affect her business as she contacts customers to seek permission to store their details. Even though she supports the law, Meyer fears it may cut her mailing list by 90 percent as people choose to withhold their data or simply overlook her emails.
“It will be difficult to market upcoming events,” she said at her shop, Lisa Hauck Hair & Beauty in London.
Businesses from pizza parlors to airlines across the EU’s 28 countries are bombarding customers with emails seeking consent to use personal data as they rush to comply with the bloc’s General Data Protection Regulation, which takes effect May 25. While much of the attention has focused on how technology giants like Facebook and Google will comply with the rules, consumers are learning firsthand that they apply to any firm, large or small, that stores personal data.
The new rules , called GDPR for short, are designed to make it easier for EU residents to give and withdraw permission for companies to use personal information, requiring consent forms that are written in simple language and no more than one-page long. Companies that already hold such data have to reach out to customers and ask for permission to retain it. Authorities can fine companies up to 4 percent of annual revenue or 20 million euros ($23.6 million), whichever is higher, for breaching the rules.
As a result, email boxes all over the continent are being swamped with messages from opticians, hotels, greeting card companies and even charities that fear stiff penalties for non-compliance.
In an effort to rise above the clutter, some companies are trying to spice up their approach as they try to ensure continued access to information vital to their businesses.
The St. Pancras Hotels Group promises that “only nominated people have access to your details, and they are kept really safe, guarded by our very own British Bulldogs. And a rude punk rocker.” Britain’s Channel 4 television offered up a video featuring one of the country’s best-known comedians explaining GDPR and how it will affect viewers. Many are using animations, like this one from like France’s mobile operator Bouygues, to explain the rules.
Regulators say the law applies to anyone who collects, uses or stores personal data. That can be a burden for small businesses that are forced to hire outside lawyers or consultants because they don’t have the staff or expertise to deal with the law.
The EU’s one-size-fits-all approach is one of the flaws in the law, according to Max Schrems, an Austrian privacy advocate who has formed a non-profit to take action against big companies that deliberately violate the new rules.
When the rules were being discussed, industry lobbyists sought to weaken the law by creating uncertainty, and as a result there are no clear guidelines that exempt small companies, Schrems told the BBC recently.
“GDPR is a prime example of corporate law gone wrong, because it’s helpful for big companies,” he said. “They have to do all of this anyways and they can use the uncertainty in the law to kind of get around things. But it leaves small companies that don’t … have a law department, or something like that, in a situation with a lot of uncertainty.”
Meyer falls under the new rules’ jurisdiction because she keeps data. Like many hair colorists, she keeps a card on each of her clients that notes whether they are allergic to any chemicals used in the dyes. That’s considered personal medical information that must be protected.
She took a data protection course to learn about her obligations and avoid legal bills.
“I find it actually quite scary how data is being used so carelessly,” Meyer said. “It’s a good wake-up call. It’s made me more aware.”
But many others have been caught off guard.
A survey by French consultancy Capgemini says that 85 percent of European firms will not have completed their preparations for GDPR this week. It finds that British businesses are the most advanced and Swedish ones have the most work to do still.
A survey conducted by Britain’s Federation of Small Businesses estimates that complying with the rules will cost an average of 1,030 pounds ($1,390) per company.
“For a small business, it’s hugely onerous,” said Mark Elliott, who runs the digital marketing company, Sparks4Growth Ltd. He knows other small business owners who are worried about the extra red tape and costs of complying with the law. “I think, quite simply, they left us open to the lions,” he said of regulators.
EU officials say GDPR is necessary to catch up with all the technological advances since 1995, when the last comprehensive European rules on data privacy were put in place.
As technology advances, data becomes more important. The ability to analyze everything from medical records to the weather holds enormous potential, with suggestions it will make us healthier, improve traffic flows and help scientists learn more about the movements of endangered species, to name but a few items.
But with that potential comes concern about privacy.
The threat was vividly illustrated earlier this year when allegations surfaced that a little known campaign consultancy, Cambridge Analytica, misused data from millions of Facebook accounts to help Donald Trump win the 2016 U.S. presidential election. That touched off a global debate over internet privacy and triggered speculation other jurisdictions will soon follow the EU in tightening data protection laws.
That is just fine with Meyer, who thinks society needs a new etiquette for dealing with personal data.
“It’s like sitting up straight at the table. It’s like not talking too loud on the bus,” she said. Respect for data “has to get into our culture.”
EU Parliament to Broadcast Zuckerberg Hearing
A European Parliament meeting on Tuesday with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg will be broadcast live, parliamentary officials and the company said on Monday after controversy over plans for a closed-door hearing.
Parliament President Antonio Tajani, who was criticized by legislators and some senior EU officials over arrangements for the discussion on public privacy concerns, tweeted that it was “great news” that Zuckerberg had agreed to a live web stream.
A Facebook spokeswoman said: “We’re looking forward to the meeting and happy for it to be live streamed.”
Zuckerberg, who founded the U.S. social media giant, will be in Europe to defend the company after scandal over its sale of personal data to a British political consultancy which worked on U.S. President Donald Trump’s election campaign, among others.
He will meet Tajani and leaders of parties in the European Parliament in Brussels from 6:15 p.m. (1615 GMT) on Tuesday.
He is also due to meet French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday.
…
China Puts its Own Spin on Agreement to Reduce Trade Deficit
China’s state media are playing up what it says is a trade war truce and de-escalation in tensions after negotiators from Washington and Beijing agreed to hold off on tariffs and “substantially reduce” the U.S. trade deficit. However, economists and business leaders argue that there is more to managing the relationship than balancing imports and exports.
State media in China are focusing heavily on the argument that Beijing did not give any ground and adopting their own take on the deficit question — focusing instead the country’s pledge to boost imports from the United States.
An editorial in the China Daily entitled “Sino-US agreement benefits both countries and the world” said that: “For China, ‘significantly increasing’ imports of U.S. goods and services, such as agricultural and energy products, will help meet its development needs and the desires of Chinese consumers.”
The editorial added that, “despite all the pressure, China didn’t “fold” as U.S. President Donald Trump observed. Instead, it stood firm and expressed its willingness to talk.”
An editorial in the party-backed Global Times said that while many may have noted what the joint statement said about reducing the U.S. deficit, that does not mean that the U.S. has won the trade talks. Instead, the piece said it was more a matter of learning to right an imbalance in the two countries’ trade systems.
The editorial called the now averted trade war a “historic period of difficult adjustment,” adding that “as one of the largest trade surplus countries in the world, China has learned from this dispute with the US.”
On news commentary boards, online response to agreement was mixed. Some argued the agreement was a sign that China had won. One commentator said: “America is just a paper tiger, there’s no need to be afraid.” Another: “Washington is weak in the knees.”
Many were pleased to see the two countries cooperating, agreeing that the decision was a “win-win.”
Others were not as certain. “Be careful, Trump will go back on his word,” wrote one person.
Despite state media’s rosy outlook about the agreement and confidence China had won online, huge differences between the two economies remain.
Lu Suiqi, an associate professor in economics at Peking University noted the agreement is just an incremental one and follow through will be key.
He said the focus on talks instead of brinkmanship was a positive development but not a guarantee of smooth sailing ahead.
“If any party fails to make good on its implementation, there may be renewed differences. And if these differences are hard to resolve, there’s still the possibility of putting the trade war back on,” Liu said.
Explainer: What is a Trade War?
Philip Levy, senior fellow on the global economy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs told VOA the deal is not the worst outcome we could have had, it’s sort of the mediocre outcome many feared.
“This looks like they’re opting for some sort of managed trade solution that I don’t thing is good for either country, but it is better than a tariff war,” Levy said.
Much of what the statement said about longstanding trade differences was vague at best, some analysts note.
The joint statement said both sides agreed to encourage two-way investment and committed to creating a business environment for fair competition.
Since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, it has been promising and pledging to open up and many are growing tired of the talk. Over the past few years, a shift backwards toward a more central state-led economy has become more prominent.
And even as Chinese President Xi Jinping pledges to open up China’s economy further, he is asserting the party and state’s control and dominance over everything — including business.
Foreign companies’ frustration with rules in China that force the handover of sensitive technology and concerns about intellectual property persist. There is also concern about government subsidies in cutting edge industries and support for state-owned enterprises.
“There are fundamental questions about how a state dominated economy of that size fits into the global trading system. And I don’t think we’ve answered those questions,” said Levy.
Speaking at a gathering of former officials and business leaders in Beijing last week, Jeremie Waterman, the president of the China Center at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said that for businesses, market access is a bigger concern than trade imbalances.
“The focus of U.S Chamber of Commerce and our members really is on resolving the systemic issues, not on near term efforts to address the trade deficit,” Waterman said.
He added that focusing on opening markets and not closing them is best because it would address longstanding concerns about access in China. It could also help with the deficit.
Joyce Huang and Ira Mellman contributed to this report.
…
China Puts its Own Spin on Agreement to Reduce Trade Deficit
China’s state media are playing up what it says is a trade war truce and de-escalation in tensions after negotiators from Washington and Beijing agreed to hold off on tariffs and “substantially reduce” the U.S. trade deficit. However, economists and business leaders argue that there is more to managing the relationship than balancing imports and exports.
State media in China are focusing heavily on the argument that Beijing did not give any ground and adopting their own take on the deficit question — focusing instead the country’s pledge to boost imports from the United States.
An editorial in the China Daily entitled “Sino-US agreement benefits both countries and the world” said that: “For China, ‘significantly increasing’ imports of U.S. goods and services, such as agricultural and energy products, will help meet its development needs and the desires of Chinese consumers.”
The editorial added that, “despite all the pressure, China didn’t “fold” as U.S. President Donald Trump observed. Instead, it stood firm and expressed its willingness to talk.”
An editorial in the party-backed Global Times said that while many may have noted what the joint statement said about reducing the U.S. deficit, that does not mean that the U.S. has won the trade talks. Instead, the piece said it was more a matter of learning to right an imbalance in the two countries’ trade systems.
The editorial called the now averted trade war a “historic period of difficult adjustment,” adding that “as one of the largest trade surplus countries in the world, China has learned from this dispute with the US.”
On news commentary boards, online response to agreement was mixed. Some argued the agreement was a sign that China had won. One commentator said: “America is just a paper tiger, there’s no need to be afraid.” Another: “Washington is weak in the knees.”
Many were pleased to see the two countries cooperating, agreeing that the decision was a “win-win.”
Others were not as certain. “Be careful, Trump will go back on his word,” wrote one person.
Despite state media’s rosy outlook about the agreement and confidence China had won online, huge differences between the two economies remain.
Lu Suiqi, an associate professor in economics at Peking University noted the agreement is just an incremental one and follow through will be key.
He said the focus on talks instead of brinkmanship was a positive development but not a guarantee of smooth sailing ahead.
“If any party fails to make good on its implementation, there may be renewed differences. And if these differences are hard to resolve, there’s still the possibility of putting the trade war back on,” Liu said.
Explainer: What is a Trade War?
Philip Levy, senior fellow on the global economy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs told VOA the deal is not the worst outcome we could have had, it’s sort of the mediocre outcome many feared.
“This looks like they’re opting for some sort of managed trade solution that I don’t thing is good for either country, but it is better than a tariff war,” Levy said.
Much of what the statement said about longstanding trade differences was vague at best, some analysts note.
The joint statement said both sides agreed to encourage two-way investment and committed to creating a business environment for fair competition.
Since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, it has been promising and pledging to open up and many are growing tired of the talk. Over the past few years, a shift backwards toward a more central state-led economy has become more prominent.
And even as Chinese President Xi Jinping pledges to open up China’s economy further, he is asserting the party and state’s control and dominance over everything — including business.
Foreign companies’ frustration with rules in China that force the handover of sensitive technology and concerns about intellectual property persist. There is also concern about government subsidies in cutting edge industries and support for state-owned enterprises.
“There are fundamental questions about how a state dominated economy of that size fits into the global trading system. And I don’t think we’ve answered those questions,” said Levy.
Speaking at a gathering of former officials and business leaders in Beijing last week, Jeremie Waterman, the president of the China Center at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said that for businesses, market access is a bigger concern than trade imbalances.
“The focus of U.S Chamber of Commerce and our members really is on resolving the systemic issues, not on near term efforts to address the trade deficit,” Waterman said.
He added that focusing on opening markets and not closing them is best because it would address longstanding concerns about access in China. It could also help with the deficit.
Joyce Huang and Ira Mellman contributed to this report.
…
Xinhau: China Launches Satellite to Explore Dark Side of Moon
China launched a relay satellite early on Monday designed to establish a communication link between earth and a planned lunar probe that will explore the dark side of the moon, the official Xinhua news agency said.
Citing the China National Space Administration, Xinhua said the satellite was launched at 5:28 a.m. (2128 GMT Sunday) on a Long March-4C rocket from the Xichang launch center in the southwest of the country.
“The launch is a key step for China to realize its goal of being the first country to send a probe to soft-land on and rove the far side of the moon,” Xinhua quoted Zhang Lihua, manager of the relay satellite project, as saying.
It said the satellite, known as Queqiao, or Magpie Bridge, will settle in an orbit about 455,000 km (282,555 miles) from Earth and will be the world’s first communication satellite operating there.
China aims to catch up with Russia and the United States to become a major space power by 2030. It is planning to launch construction of its own manned space station next year.
However, while China has insisted its ambitions are purely peaceful, the U.S. Defense Department has accused it of pursuing activities aimed at preventing other nations from using space-based assets during a crisis.
…
Xinhau: China Launches Satellite to Explore Dark Side of Moon
China launched a relay satellite early on Monday designed to establish a communication link between earth and a planned lunar probe that will explore the dark side of the moon, the official Xinhua news agency said.
Citing the China National Space Administration, Xinhua said the satellite was launched at 5:28 a.m. (2128 GMT Sunday) on a Long March-4C rocket from the Xichang launch center in the southwest of the country.
“The launch is a key step for China to realize its goal of being the first country to send a probe to soft-land on and rove the far side of the moon,” Xinhua quoted Zhang Lihua, manager of the relay satellite project, as saying.
It said the satellite, known as Queqiao, or Magpie Bridge, will settle in an orbit about 455,000 km (282,555 miles) from Earth and will be the world’s first communication satellite operating there.
China aims to catch up with Russia and the United States to become a major space power by 2030. It is planning to launch construction of its own manned space station next year.
However, while China has insisted its ambitions are purely peaceful, the U.S. Defense Department has accused it of pursuing activities aimed at preventing other nations from using space-based assets during a crisis.
…
New GPS Technology Offers Help For Old School Transportation
Drivers can choose from several GPS apps that can alert them to accidents or slow traffic so they can avoid them. But bike riders – who travel the same roadways as cars – are on their own. So an English university student designed an app to help cyclists report dangerous hot spots to other cyclists, and local governments. Faith Lapidus reports.
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New GPS Technology Offers Help For Old School Transportation
Drivers can choose from several GPS apps that can alert them to accidents or slow traffic so they can avoid them. But bike riders – who travel the same roadways as cars – are on their own. So an English university student designed an app to help cyclists report dangerous hot spots to other cyclists, and local governments. Faith Lapidus reports.
…