Japan makes exception; signs historic nuclear deal with India

November 11, 2016

Tokyo, Nov 11: Making an exception, Japan today signed a historic civil nuclear cooperation deal with India, opening the door for collaboration between their industries in the field even as the countries signed nine other agreements in various areas to bolster bilateral ties.Japan-India

The agreements, including the one for cooperation in peaceful uses of nuclear energy, marks a historic step in their engagement to build a clean energy partnership, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said after wide-ranging talks with his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe.

The nuclear agreement comes after tough negotiations for over six years between the two countries and Abe said at the joint media interaction with Modi that he was delighted over the signing of agreement on peaceful use of nuclear energy.

"This agreement is a legal framework that India will act responsibly in peaceful uses of nuclear energy and also in Non-Proliferation regime even though India is not a participant or signatory of NPT," he said.

"It (the agreement) is in line with Japan's ambition to create a world without nuclear weapons," said Abe, whose country has traditionally adopted a tough stand on proliferation issues having been the only victim of atomic bombings during World War II.

He noted that India in September 2008 had made its intention of peaceful uses of nuclear energy and also announced moratorium on nuclear tests.

"Today's signing of the Agreement for Cooperation in Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Energy marks a historic step in our engagement to build a clean energy partnership," Modi said.

"Our cooperation in this field will help us combat the challenge of Climate Change. I also acknowledge the special significance that such an agreement has for Japan," he said and thanked Abe, Japanese government and Parliament for their support to this agreement.

Other nations who have signed civil nuclear deal with India include the US, Russia, South Korea, Mongolia, France, Namibia, Argentina, Canada, Kazakhstan and Australia.

In his remarks, Prime Minister Modi said as democracies, the two countries "support openness, transparency and the rule of law".

"We are also united in our resolve to combat the menace of terrorism, especially cross-border terrorism," he said.
Later, speaking at a Banquet hosted by Abe in his honour, Modi said there is also a lot that the two sides can do together as close partners, not just for the benefit of their societies, but also for the region and the whole world.

"Our capacities could also combine to respond to both, the opportunities and challenges that we jointly face in present times. And, together with the global community we can, and we must, combat the rising threats of radicalisation, extremism and terrorism," he said.

Abe pushed for universalization of the NPT, entry into force of Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) and start of negotiations at the earliest on Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty (FMCT).

"The two Prime Ministers welcomed the signing of the Agreement between the Government of Japan and the Government of the Republic of India for Cooperation in the Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Energy which reflects a new level of mutual confidence and strategic partnership in the cause of clean energy, economic development and a peaceful and secure world," said a joint statement.

Modi said deeper economic engagement, growth of trade, manufacturing and investment ties, focus on clean energy, partnership to secure the citizens, and cooperation on infrastructure and skill development are among key priorities.

"India and its economy are pursuing many transformations. Our aim is to become a major centre for manufacturing, investments and for the 21st century knowledge industries.

"And, in this journey, we see Japan as a natural partner. We believe there is vast scope to combine our relative advantages, whether of capital, technology or human resources, to work for mutual benefit," he said in his joint interaction.

The Prime Minister said that the strategic partnership between the two countries also brings peace, stability and balance to the region. It is alive and responsive to emerging opportunities and challenges in Asia-Pacific, he said.

The successful Malabar naval exercise has underscored the convergence in the two sides' strategic interests in the broad expanse of the waters of the Indo-Pacific, Modi said.

On his part, Abe mentioned the high speed train corridor between Mumbai and Ahmedabad that is being built with the help of Japan, saying the project symbolizes a new dimension in the special relations.

Prime Minister Abe said the designing of the project will begin by the end of this year, construction will begin in 2018 and the high speed train will be in service from 2023.

He said Modi, who will travel by one such train to Kobe city tomorrow from here, will see for himself that it is the safest technology in the world.

The Japanese private sector also would be setting up an institute of manufacturing in India to train about 30,000 people in 10 years, particularly in rural areas, Abe said.

Abe said Japan will set up a tourism bureau in New Delhi to encourage people-to-people contacts. He said he wants to work with Modi in liberalizing the visa rules.

"India-Japan relations have the greatest potential in the world. Strong India is in the best interest of Japan and strong Japan is in the best interest of India," Abe said.

Noting that he had met Modi for the third time in one year, Abe praised him, saying he had a "global vision" and was a "decisive leader".

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News Network
June 25,2020

Jun 25: Tencent Holdings Ltd.'s $40 billion surge this week and the recent ascent of Pinduoduo Inc. have reshuffled the ranking of China's richest people.

The country's largest game developer has surpassed Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. as Asia's most-valuable company, with its shares rising above HK$500 in intraday trading Wednesday for the first time. Pinduoduo, a Groupon-like shopping app also known as PDD, has more than doubled this year.

The rallies have propelled the wealth of their founders, with an added twist: Tencent's Pony Ma, worth $50 billion, has surpassed Jack Ma's $48 billion fortune, becoming China's richest person. And Colin Huang of PDD, whose net worth stands at $43 billion, has squeezed real estate mogul Hui Ka Yan of China Evergrande Group out of the top three earlier this year, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

The coronavirus pandemic has accelerated the digitization of the workplace and changed consumers' habits, boosting shares of many internet companies. Now tech tycoons are dominating the ranks of China's richest people. They occupy four of the top five spots: Ding Lei of Tencent peer NetEase Inc. follows China Evergrande's Hui.

‘Perform Strongly'

Tencent has come a long way since hitting a low in 2018, when China froze the approval process for new games. Since then, the stock has almost doubled, and last month the tech giant reported a 26 per cent jump in first-quarter revenue.

“Tencent's online games segment will probably perform strongly through the Covid-19 pandemic, and most of its other businesses are relatively unscathed,” said Vey-Sern Ling, a Bloomberg Intelligence analyst.

That has been a boon for Pony Ma, 48, who owns a 7 per cent stake in the company and pocketed about $757 million from selling some 14.6 million of his Tencent shares this year, data complied by Bloomberg show.

The native of China's southern Guangdong province studied computer science at Shenzhen University and was a software developer at a supplier of telecom services and products before co-founding Tencent with four others in the late 1990s. At the time, the company focused on instant-messaging services.

It has been a long comeback for Pony Ma. He overtook real estate tycoon Wang Jianlin as China's second-richest person in 2013 and topped Baidu Inc.'s Robin Li as the wealthiest in early 2014. Later that year, Alibaba went public in the U.S., catapulting Jack Ma's fortune.

Bloomberg Intelligence's Ling notes, however, that Tencent's jump this year has lagged behind some internet peers, especially those in e-commerce, games and online entertainment. Just consider: Tencent shares have climbed 31 per cent in 2020, while PDD's American depositary receipts have more than doubled. Alibaba, meanwhile, has advanced just 6.9 per cent.

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Agencies
July 7,2020

Washington, Jul 7: The US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee will grill the CEOs of US tech giants Apple, Google, Facebook and Amazon during an antitrust hearing on July 27.

Apple's Tim Cook, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, Alphabet's Sundar Pichai and Amazon's Jeff Bezos will testify before the antitrust panel that is working on proposals to reform and regulate the digital market.

The hearing would mark the first time all four top executives testify together in front of Congress, virtually or in-person depending on the panel's call in the COVID-19 pandemic times.

"Since last June, the Subcommittee has been investigating the dominance of a small number of digital platforms and the adequacy of existing antitrust laws and enforcement," House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) and Antitrust Subcommittee Chairman David Cicilline (D-RI) said in a statement on Monday.

"Given the central role these corporations play in the lives of the American people, it is critical that their CEOs are forthcoming. As we have said from the start, their testimony is essential for us to complete this investigation.”

The House Judiciary Committee announced its antitrust probe into the four tech giants in June last year.

Last month, the committee sent letters to technology giants Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Alphabet (Google's parent company), asking them to confirm if their chief executives will testify as part of the committee's tech competition investigation.

Committee chair David Cicilline said the documents that the investigators sought were "essential" to the probe and that requests like this were part of the "appropriate process" to obtain them.

"The only CEO who has expressed reservation about appearing, through a representative, has been Amazon," Cicilline said. "No one in this country is above the law ... nobody is above answering a congressional subpoena".

The lawmakers want the tech giants to furnish documents that have been produced in relation to other competition probes and internal communications.

The letters that the committee sent also posed questions related to possible harms to competition in the market.

In addition to the antitrust probe, Apple's App Store policies are also facing scrutiny from the US Department of Justice.

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News Network
February 11,2020

Feb 11: China reported 108 new coronavirus deaths on February 10, the highest daily toll since the outbreak began in Wuhan late last year, as two senior officials in the hard-hit province of Hubei were removed from their jobs.

The total number of deaths on the mainland reached 1,016 in the 24 hours until midnight, the National Health Commission said on Tuesday.

Some 2,478 new cases were confirmed, bringing the total to 42,638.

Of the new deaths, 103 were in the province of Hubei, including 67 in the provincial capital of Wuhan. The virus is thought to have originated there in a market that sold seafood as well as wild animals.

Two senior health officials in the province - Zhang Jin who was Party Secretary of the health commission for Hubei and Ling Yingzi who was director of the Hubei Provincial Health Commission - were both removed from their posts, state media reported on Tuesday,  a day after Chinese President Xi Jinping visited health facilities in Beijing.

In his first public appearance since the outbreak began, Xi donned a face mask and had his temperature checked while visiting medical workers and patients in the capital.

"We have seen very little of Xi Jinping since the outbreak began but he was out and about in Beijing on Monday," Al Jazeera's Katrina Yu said from Beijing. "He has been trying to rally the troops saying: 'We can win this battle.' But it's also a sign that the battle is far from over."

The other fatalities on Monday were in the provinces of Heilongjiang, Anhui and Henan and the cities of Tianjin and Beijing, the National Health Commission said.

During a meeting chaired by Premier Li Keqiang on Monday, a group of leaders tasked with beating the virus said it would work to solve raw material and labour shortages and boost supplies of masks and protective clothing.

They said nearly 20,000 medical personnel from around the country had already been sent to Wuhan, and more medical teams were also on the way.

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