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Financial Express October 22, 2019 The US said it was closely monitoring the situation in the state following India's August 5 decision. The Trump administration on Tuesday said while it supports India’s development agenda behind the abrogation of Jammu and Kashmir’s special status under Article 370, it was concerned over the current situation in the Valley. It said it was closely monitoring the situation in the state following India’s August 5 decision. The Indian government has argued that its decision on Article 370 was driven by a desire to increase economic development, reduce corruption and uniformly apply all national laws in Jammu and Kashmir, particularly in regard to women and minorities, Acting Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia Alice G Wells told Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific, and Nonproliferation of the US House Foreign Affairs Committee. While we support these objectives, the US State Department remains concerned about the ...

Reuters October 21, 2019 Reporting by Jack Stubbs; Additional reporting by Eliza Facebook Inc said on Monday it has suspended a network of Instagram accounts operated from Russia that targeted Americans with divisive political messages ahead of next year’s U.S. presidential election, with operators posing as people within the United States. Facebook said it also had suspended three separate networks operated from Iran. The Russian network “showed some links” to Russia’s Internet Research Agency (IRA), Facebook said, an organization Washington has said was used by Moscow to meddle in the 2016 U.S. election. “We see this operation targeting largely U.S. public debate and engaging in the sort of political issues that are challenging and sometimes divisive in the U.S. right now,” said Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s head of cybersecurity policy. “Whenever you do that, a piece of what you engage on are topics that are going to matter for the election. But I can’t say ex...

Foreign Policy  October 21, 2019 By Emile Dirks, Sarah Cook So-called key individuals, from drug addicts to religious believers, are singled out in police databases. One evening in the summer of 2017, local police in China made a surprise inspection of a small private language school, checking the visas of all non-Chinese attendees. Among those present was a foreign doctoral student, who had left his passport at his hotel. “Not to worry,” said the officer. “What’s your name?” The officer took out a handheld device and entered the student’s name. “Is this you?” Displayed on the screen was the researcher’s name, his passport number, and the address of his hotel. This kind of incident is common in Xinjiang, where China has extensively deployed technology against Muslim minorities. But this episode took place in Yunnan province, near China’s southern border with Myanmar. In fact, public security bureaus—the network of agencies in China that deal with domestic sec...

The Print  October 22, 2019 By Apoorva Mandhani  and  Aneesha Bedi National Crime Records Bureau’s report for 2017 says new Rs 2,000 note, released after demonetisation, accounted for more than half the seized currency. Fake Indian currency notes worth Rs 28.1 crore were seized in 2017, almost doubling from the previous year’s mark of Rs 15.9 crore, according to the Crime in India-2017 report put together by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). The report points out that the new Rs 2,000 note, released after the November 2016 demonetisation, accounted for Rs 14.97 crore of the currency seized in 2017. The total number of notes seized were 3,55,994, a 26 per cent rise from 2016, when 2,81,839 fake notes were seized. Of these, there were 65,731 old Rs 1,000 notes, 1,02,815 were old Rs 500 notes, 8,879 were new Rs 500 notes and 92,778 were Rs 100 notes. While announcing demonetisation on 8 November 2016, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had sa...

The Economic Times October 22, 2019 China will open sectors including telecommunications, internet and autos to foreign investment. Firms on the U.S. "entity list" are barred from buying U.S. parts and components without U.S. government approval due to national security concerns. China will take steps to safeguard its interests, but won't close its door to foreign investment and NSE -0.03 % the global industry despite trade frictions with the United States, a Chinese official said on Tuesday. Earlier this month, before key Sino-U.S. trade talks, Washington decided to widen its so-called "entities list" to include some top Chinese artificial intelligence startups such as Megvii Technology and SenseTime Group. Firms on the U.S. "entity list" are barred from buying U.S. parts and components without U.S. government approval due to national security concerns. "We will look at the trade friction between China and the United State...

The Print October 21, 2019 By Nayanima Basu Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal Monday said US and India could not announce a trade package during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the US last month because the US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer was busy in negotiations with Japan and China. “We couldn’t do a (trade) deal because when I met USTR (Lighthizer) he was busy with Japanese and Chinese negotiations. So the trade package got a little delayed. We’ve almost resolved the broad contours of what we’re going to announce,” Goyal said here at an event organised by the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF). Goyal, who was talking about his last meeting with Lighthizer in New York during Modi’s visit there, said he does not see “any great difficulty in closing the gap” as far as announcing a limited trade package is concerned. “We will hopefully come out with our first set of agreements soon … We both believe that India and US should ...

The Express Tribune October 22, 2019 By Hasaan Kawar There are three key messages that came out for Pakistan from the FATF’s recently concluded session. Firstly, there is not much time left for us and unless we make substantial changes in our anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) regime, we are facing a serious risk of being blacklisted. Secondly, there is a large disconnect between what we have been claiming in media versus what has actually been happening on the ground and lastly, the diplomatic space for Pakistan to dodge the blacklist is shrinking fast. The tone of FATF’s official statement couldn’t have been any clearer. It stated that “all deadlines in the action plan have now expired and Pakistan has only largely addressed five of 27 action items”. It also warned that without significant progress across the “full range of the agreed action plan”, Pakistan could be blacklisted. The next deadline is due in February, which gives Paki...

The Dawn October 22, 2019 Naveed Siddiqui A team of foreign diplomats posted in Pakistan were taken to the Neelum Valley in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) to witness firsthand whether the Indian army had "smashed four terror launch pads" there early Sunday, Foreign Office spokesperson Dr Mohammad Faisal said in a tweet on Tuesday. The diplomats were taken to the Nauseri, Shahkot and Jura sectors near the Line of Control (LoC), as well as the Nausada village, which has suffered severe damage in attacks by Indian troops. The trip was arranged so they can verify for themselves the claims made by Indian army chief Gen Bipin Rawat. DG ISPR said that in 2018, there were 3,038 Indian ceasefire violations and 58 civilians were martyred while 319 were injured. In 2019, so far there have been 2,608 ceasefire violations due to which 44 civilians have been martyred and 230 injured. He said the difference between the Pakistan Army and Indian army was that the former fo...

Hindustan Times October 22, 2019 By Imtiaz Ahmad Lashkar-e-Taiba founder Hafiz Saeed continues to run the affairs of the banned Jamat-ud-Dawah (JuD) and wield considerable influence in Pakistan’s legal and political circles despite being arrested on terror financing charges earlier this year. The latest instance of Saeed using his influence despite being behind bars is in the case of Salahuddin Ayubi, a mentally challenged man who died in police custody last month, according to a report by BBU Urdu. Ayubi’s father Muhammad Afzal said he had forgiven the three police officials charged with the murder of his son after Saeed intervened in the matter and brokered an agreement. Despite the fact that he had filed a police report against the three officials, Afzal made a public announcement at a mosque in Gujranwala in Pakistan’s Punjab province last week that he was forgiving the same officials. Afzal, a follower of Saeed, said he received a message from the JuD lea...

The Economic Times October 21, 2019 By Jonathan Tirone When the head of the world’s nuclear watchdog died in July, his death was kept secret for four days. Many people didn’t even know Yukiya Amano was sick. The process that will see his post finally filled this week is shrouded in just as much mystery. The ambassadors of the 35 nations on the International Atomic Energy Agency’s board will enter a sealed chamber at its headquarters in Vienna on Monday. Two lawyers acting as witnesses will stand guard as one-by-one each envoy slips a paper ballot into a wooden box. Votes are counted and if nobody receives two thirds, the process is repeated. It will be only the sixth time since the dawn of the nuclear age that the IAEA’s board of governors convenes for the odd ritual, which has been compared to the conclave, the gathering of Catholic cardinals who select the new pope. “It’s a somber occasion, almost like those meetings in the Sistine Chapel,” said former IAEA poli...

The Hindu October 22, 2019 Describing shrinking space for civil society and media freedom in Pakistan as “troubling”, the United States on Tuesday said it remains “deeply concerned” over reports of human rights abuses and discrimination faced by people in the country because of their faith. It urged the Pakistani government to uphold the rule of law and the freedoms enshrined in the country’s Constitution. Acting Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia Alice G Wells in a prepared statement to Subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific, and Nonproliferation of the House Foreign Affairs Committee hoped that the reforms Pakistan is undertaking under its current IMF plan will lay the foundation for better economic management and growth, leading to an improvement in the democratic system and human rights situation. “In recent years, we have observed some troubling trends within Pakistan, including shrinking space for civil society and media freedom. Pressur...

The Hindu October 21, 2019 By Suhasini Haidar The biggest challenge for the government in explaining its decision to dilute Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir to governments abroad was the negative western media narrative, said External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar here on Monday. “I think it was a more difficult challenge with the media, especially the English-speaking liberal media [in the West]. Partly because they were ideological about [Jammu and Kashmir], and they had strong preset views about it. My view was that they didn’t present a fair picture or absorb it,” Mr. Jaishankar said, speaking to an audience of American and Indian businessmen, at an event organised by the U.S. India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF), speaking about the questions the government faced during his visit to the U.S. in September. Mr. Jaishankar said that although the government believed its moves in Jammu and Kashmir is India’s “internal business”, it had sought to explain the issu...

First Post October 22, 2019 By    Greg Roumeliotis, Anirban Sen and Joshua Franklin SoftBank Group Corp <9984.T> offered close to $10 billion (£7.71 billion) to WeWork owner The We Company, its employees and its investors on Monday under a plan to keep the struggling U.S. office-space sharing start-up afloat that would lead to the exit of its co-founder and Chairman Adam Neumann, people familiar with the matter said on Monday. WeWork could run out of cash as early as next month without new financing, sources have said, after the company pulled plans in September for an initial public offering (IPO). It abandoned the IPO when investors questioned its large losses, the sustainability of its business model and the way WeWork was being run by Neumann, who gave up his CEO title last month and now serves as board chairman. SoftBank has offered $5 billion in new money to WeWork in the form of debt, the sources said. It is also proposing to accelerate a previou...

First Post October 21, 2019 New Delhi: Services in state-owned banks may be affected as some of the employee's unions have decided to observe nationwide strike on Tuesday to protest against bank mergers and fall in deposit rates. However, officers and private sector banks are not part of the strike call given by the All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA) and Bank Employees Federation of India (BEFI). Most of the banks, including the country's largest lender State Bank of India (SBI), has already informed customers about the strike and its impact on them.  Bank strike: Operations may be affected tomorrow; employees unions to protest against mergers, fall in deposit ratesRepresentational image. Reuters. "The membership of our bank employees in unions participating in the strike is very few, so the impact of the strike on Banks operation will be minimal," SBI said in a filing to stock exchanges last week. Another public sector lender Syndi...

The Hindu  October 19, 2019 Just over two decades after the office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) was created in India, former top intelligence officers assessed the efficacy of the office and concluded that there was a need to look again at the system in view of the current challenges and the security environment. Merely because India has a system like a national security council, a national security adviser, the process of better intelligence or better informing the political leadership has not happened. And therefore is it relevant to look at the system again. We have the Director of Intelligence Bureau (DIB) providing intelligence. It is communicated in various ways to the leadership. We now have several channels of communication,” said former DIB M.K. Narayanan, who later served as NSA to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. “When I was DIB, there was no NSA and we had direct access to the Prime Minister. Subsequently, many intervening channels were added. Has th...