January, 2020

• 28 January

  Pentagon to test its hypersonic weapons

  

  Bloomberg The Pentagon plans a “very aggressive” expansion of its hypersonic weapons efforts this year, with at least four initial flight tests of prototypes for glide weapons that can fly five times the speed of sound and maneuver en route, officials said. A new Hypersonics Transition Office that Congress funded this year will also bankroll a university consortium to conduct ...

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• 28 January

  ‘Five million children at risk from Sahel violence’

  

  Bloomberg A surge in militant violence in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger has left as many as 5 million children needing humanitarian assistance this year as access to education, healthcare and drinking water shrinks, according to the United Nations. Children in the central Sahel region are increasingly under threat, with hundreds of thousands having suffered “traumatic experiences,” the UN Children’s ...

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• 28 January

  China to stop individual travel to HK to contain virus spread

  

  Bloomberg Governments, companies and international health organisations rushed to contain a Sars-like coronavirus that has claimed more than 100 lives, with Hong Kong the latest to announce travel restrictions on people moving in and out of the mainland. Hong Kong will close some border checkpoints and restrict flights and train services from the mainland, Chief Executive Carrie Lam said on ...

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• 28 January

  Beijing buys Australian and Canadian wheat as US waits for its turn

  

  Bloomberg China has purchased Australian, Canadian and French wheat as Beijing looks to fill import quotas set by the World Trade Organization (WTO), according to people familiar with the matter. In the past two months, China bought about 1 million metric tons of wheat from the three countries, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the transactions ...

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• 28 January

  Indonesia plans to rescue scandal-hit insurer

  

  Bloomberg Indonesian authorities are weighing the induction of a strategic investor into a unit of the nation’s oldest insurer that’s on the brink of collapse after alleged fund mismanagement left a $2 billion hole in its books. PT Asuransi Jiwasraya has submitted a restructuring proposal to the Financial Services Authority (FSA) that includes the stake sale in unit PT Jiwasraya ...

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• 28 January

  India’s first underwater metro nears completion

  

  Bloomberg Kolkata Metro Rail Corp expects to complete its East-West project, which runs partly under the city’s iconic Hooghly river, by March 2022 after a delay of several years doubled costs. The authority is awaiting 20 billion rupees ($280 million) over the next two years from the Indian Railway Board, said Manas Sarkar, managing director at KMRC. A soft loan ...

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• 28 January

  New Singapore law allows global crypto firms to expand locally

  

  Bloomberg Singapore introduced new payments legislation that offers global cryptocurrency firms a chance to expand their operations in the country by applying for operating licenses for the first time. The Payment Services Act, which comes into force Tuesday, is the first comprehensive regulation for companies handling activities ranging from digital payments to trading of tokens such as Bitcoin and Ether. ...

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• 28 January

  China seeks apology from Danish paper over cartoon

  Bloomberg The Chinese Embassy to Denmark wants the newspaper Jyllands-Posten to apologise for publishing a drawing that depicts China’s flag with virus symbols instead of five stars. “We express our strong indignation and demand that Jyllands-Posten and [cartoonist] Niels Bo Bojesen reproach themselves for their mistake and publicly apologise to the Chinese people,” the embassy said in a statement on ...

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• 28 January

  Exxon at a 10-year low shows trouble for oil’s biggest major

  

  Bloomberg It’s almost as if the last decade never happened for investors of Exxon Mobil Corp shares. Once the gold-standard of Big Oil, the stock closed on January 27 at its lowest since October 2010, amid a slump in oil prices due to concerns about weak demand coupled with a glut. The S&P 500 also posted its worst one-day decline ...

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• 28 January

  French cities sue Total over ‘carbon emission’

  

  Bloomberg Oil giant Total SA is being sued by 14 local governments and a handful of non-governmental organisations in France for not doing enough to reduce its carbon emissions and fight global warming. The legal challenge is the latest sign that the biggest oil companies are coming under increasing pressure from activists, investors and governments to cut emissions as the ...

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