Author Archives: Reuters News Agency

Exclusive: Sudan cut off from $650 million of international funding after coup

By Aidan Lewis, Khalid Abdelaziz and Nafisa Eltahir

KHARTOUM (Reuters) – Sudan was unable to access $650 million in international funding in November when assistance was paused after a coup, the finance minister of the dissolved government said – a freeze that puts in doubt basic import payments and the fate of economic reforms.

The financing included $500 million in budget support from the World Bank and $150 million in special drawing rights from the International Monetary Fund, said Jibril Ibrahim, who was appointed to a civilian transitional government in February.

Foreign funding was seen as crucial in helping Sudan emerge from decades of isolation and supporting a transition towards democracy that began with the 2019 overthrow of Omar al-Bashir.

The Oct. 25 coup upended that transition. The United States has put on hold $700 million in economic assistance since the coup and the World Bank, which had promised $2 billion in grants, has paused disbursements.

After mass protests, the military on Nov. 21 announced a deal to reinstate Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok. He is tasked with forming a government of technocrats but faces political opposition to the deal.

“Sudan had tremendous international support. Now donors will be much more cautious,” said one former official from the dissolved government.

The onus will now be on the military and the government to show they are not returning to the very Bashir-era model that was being restructured and reformed, the former official said.

The U.S. Treasury declined to comment. The IMF, which approved a $2.5 billion, 39-month loan program in June that is subject to periodic review, said it continued to “closely monitor developments”.

Before the coup the inflation rate, one of the highest in the world, had begun to fall, and the exchange rate had stabilized following a sharp devaluation in February.

Western diplomats and bankers say those reforms are now at risk and it is unclear how Sudan can fund imports without printing banknotes, a policy that fueled a long-running economic crisis but stopped during the transition.

Around the time of the coup, Sudan had enough reserves to cover just two months of strategic imports, a second former official said.

GOLD REVENUES

Ibrahim, a former rebel leader who secured his ministerial role through a peace deal and expects to retain it, said he hoped international support would return gradually over the next three to six months and that meanwhile bills could be paid and reforms would continue.

“Basically we depend on tax, customs and gold revenues and on different (state) companies working in various fields,” Ibrahim said in an interview at the Finance Ministry in Khartoum. For imported basic goods, such as flour, fuel and medicine, “we cannot cover it completely, but the majority of the strategic commodities we can cover with our exports,” he said.

The government had begun to reduce its trade deficit through tax and customs reforms, but those revenues were interrupted by a blockade by a tribal group at Port Sudan before the coup. A further blockade has been threatened.

Ibrahim said the main impact of the freeze in international support would be on development projects covering areas including water supply, electricity, agriculture, health and transport. An internationally funded basic income program to lessen the impact of subsidy reform has also been frozen.

Sudan’s 2022 budget was being planned with no allowance for international assistance, Ibrahim said, but with a target of sticking to a 1.5% deficit limit defined under an IMF financing program. Projected growth for 2022 could fall from 3% to 1.5-2%, he said.

Ibrahim said Sudan would seek investment rather than grants from wealthy Gulf Arab states that now face their own economic challenges.

“Up till now there have not been any big promises of support from any country, Arab or non-Arab, but contacts with all friendly states continue,” he said.

(Additional reporting by Andrea Shalal, Writing by Aidan Lewis, Editing by William Maclean)

Austria allows broad lifting of lockdown, but many provinces hold off

VIENNA (Reuters) – Austria will let a wide range of businesses, from non-essential shops to theatres, restaurants and hairdressers reopen when its COVID-19 lockdown ends on Sunday, the government said on Wednesday, but many regions will open up more cautiously.

The move means switching from a single set of rules for the whole country to a patchwork varying between nine provinces. Adding to the confusion, those opening up the fastest included the western provinces of Vorarlberg and Tyrol, which have the highest and fourth-highest infection rates in the country.

“Some (provinces) will act gradually over time, and Burgenlend, Vorarlberg and Tyrol will (immediately) adopt this federal arrangement,” Tyrol’s governor, Guenther Platter, told a joint news conference with Chancellor Karl Nehammer and Health Minister Wolfgang Mueckstein.

Vorarlberg and Tyrol are Alpine provinces that rely heavily on winter tourism. Hotels across Austria have been closed to tourists during lockdown, though ski lifts are open.

Austria went into lockdown two weeks ago to counter a surge in daily coronavirus infections to record levels. Infections have plunged but intensive-care bed occupancy is still rising. The government pledged when the lockdown was introduced that it would last no longer than 20 days, until this Sunday.

The list of businesses that can reopen from Sunday applies provided the local province is not keeping tighter restrictions. The province of Upper Austria, which long had Austria’s highest infection rate and borders both Germany and the Czech Republic, plans to stay in lockdown until Dec. 17.

Vienna will only let cafes and restaurants fully reopen a week after the national lockdown lifts, while non-essential shops and Christmas markets will reopen from Monday. Austrian media said three other provinces would take a similar approach, only letting hotels and restaurants reopen on Friday, Dec. 17.

(Reporting by Francois Murphy; Editing by Catherine Evans and Alex Richardson)

Factbox: Latest on the worldwide spread of the coronavirus

(Reuters) – A federal judge on Tuesday blocked the last of the Biden administration’s COVID-19 vaccine mandates for businesses, saying the government exceeded it authority with a requirement that millions of employees of federal contractors be inoculated.

EUROPE

* EU health ministers discussed measures to try to halt the spread of the Omicron variant, with the Netherlands calling for negative tests for incoming travelers from outside the bloc and France urging tests even for those arriving from EU states.

* Britain reported 45,691 new COVID-19 cases and 180 deaths within 28 days of a positive coronavirus test, government statistics showed.

* France on Tuesday registered a surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations as a rise in new infections in mid-November led to an increase in patient numbers.

* Portugal’s health authority DGS gave the green light for the use of the Pfizer-BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine for children between the ages of five and 11.

* The party is over for Poles this holiday season with nightclubs set to close in the face of high COVID-19 case numbers, the government said, with the exceptions of, New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day.

* The Norwegian government introduced stricter rules on Tuesday to limit the spread of COVID-19, including a cap on the number of visitors in private homes and shortening the hours bars and restaurants can serve alcohol.

AMERICAS

* Canada will soon crack down on COVID-19 mandates, forcing banks, telecommunications companies and all other federally regulated workspaces to ensure their employees are inoculated.

* President Jair Bolsonaro criticized Brazil’s health regulator Anvisa for proposing a vaccination requirement for travelers arriving in the country to help prevent the spread of new coronavirus variants.

* Mexico City officials will begin offering a third vaccine dose to residents over the age of 60, officials said.

ASIA-PACIFIC

* The Philippines economy is likely to grow faster than previously thought this year, but downside risks caused by the pandemic persist, the World Bank said.

* A nascent recovery in Asia-Pacific international travel demand has been set back by the Omicron variant as governments tighten rules, but airline bosses say they hope any backward moves will be short-lived.

MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA

* Up to one million COVID-19 vaccines are estimated to have expired in Nigeria last month without being used, two sources told Reuters, one of the biggest single losses of doses that shows the difficulty African nations have getting shots in arms.

* The African Union on Tuesday called for an urgent end to travel restrictions imposed on some of its member states, saying the measures effectively penalize governments for timely data sharing in line with international health regulations.

MEDICAL DEVELOPMENTS

* Preliminary evidence indicates that the Omicron variant likely has a higher degree of transmissibility but is less severe, top U.S. infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci said.

* The head of the European Medicines Agency said it could soon approve the vaccine developed by U.S. biotech company Novavax.

ECONOMIC IMPACT

* New travel restrictions prompted by the Omicron variant have dealt a setback to the nascent recovery in international flights, creating delays and headaches in some regions, according to airline and airport officials.

(Compiled by Juliette Portala, Federico Maccioni and Shailesh Kuber; Editing by Robert Birsel, Mark Heinrich and Shounak Dasgupta)

 

Trump ex-chief of staff Meadows ends cooperation with Capitol riot panel

By Patricia Zengerle

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Mark Meadows, who served as former President Donald Trump’s White House chief of staff, has decided not to cooperate with the congressional committee investigating the deadly Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot, and the panel said on Tuesday it is prepared to pursue contempt charges against him.

Representative Bennie Thompson, chairman of the House of Representatives Select Committee, said in a statement that the panel would take action if Meadows fails to show up for a deposition scheduled for Wednesday.

“If indeed Mr. Meadows refuses to appear, the Select Committee will be left no choice but to advance contempt proceedings and recommend that the body in which Mr. Meadows once served refer him for criminal prosecution,” Thompson said in a statement.

Fox News first reported Meadows’ decision not to cooperate earlier on Tuesday. The Democratic-led committee last week said Meadows had provided records and agreed to appear “soon” for a deposition after failing to show up for a previously scheduled one.

Meadows served as a Republican House member until he joined Trump’s administration last year. His refusal to honor a subpoena from the committee could lead it to pursue contempt of Congress charges against Meadows, as it has against Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon and former Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark.

On Jan. 6, Trump supporters stormed the Capitol in a bid to prevent formal congressional certification of his 2020 presidential election loss to Democrat Joe Biden. Before the riot, Trump gave a speech to his supporters repeating his false claims that the election was stolen from him through widespread voting fraud and urging them to go to the Capitol and “fight like hell” to “stop the steal.”

Trump has urged associates not to cooperate with the committee, calling the investigation politically motivated and arguing that his communications are protected by executive privilege, although many legal experts have said that legal principle does not apply to former presidents.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle, additional reporting by Eric Beech; Editing by Will Dunham)

U.S. has ‘understanding’ with Germany to shut Nord Stream 2 pipeline if Russia invades Ukraine -congressional aide

By Andrea Shalal

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. officials have told members of Congress they have an understanding with Germany about shutting down the Nord Stream 2 pipeline if Russia invades Ukraine, a senior congressional aide told Reuters on Tuesday.

The aide said U.S. officials told Congress they have been in contact with their German counterparts in the event of an invasion, given the massing of Russian troops on the border with Ukraine.

U.S. officials say they have received assurances from Germany the pipeline would be turned off, the aide said. But it was unclear if the two sides had agreed on a definition of invasion, the aide said.

A European diplomat told Reuters U.S. officials had made it clear to allies that they would act to sanction the pipeline in the event of an invasion, which could make any German action a moot point.

“If the U.S. imposes (additional) sanctions, it’s an academic point, because no one will be able to do business with Nord Stream 2 for fear of running afoul of U.S. sanctions.”

German officials told reporters on Tuesday that there was still a process to complete before the pipeline would even start operations.

President Joe Biden has long opposed the Russian-German pipeline. The U.S. State Department has sanctioned Russian entities related to it, but not the company behind it, as it has tried to rebuild ties with Germany that deteriorated under Donald Trump’s administration.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Writing by Doina Chiacu; Editing by Tim Ahmann, Heather Timmons and Mark Heinrich)

Kellogg to permanently replace striking employees as workers reject new contract

By Praveen Paramasivam

(Reuters) – Kellogg Co said on Tuesday a majority of its U.S. cereal plant workers have voted against a new five-year contract, forcing it to hire permanent replacements as employees extend a strike that started more than two months ago.

Temporary replacements have already been working at the company’s cereal plants in Michigan, Nebraska, Pennsylvania and Tennessee where 1,400 union members went on strike on Oct. 5 as their contracts expired and talks over payment and benefits stalled.

“Interest in the (permanent replacement) roles has been strong at all four plants, as expected. We expect some of the new hires to start with the company very soon,” Kellogg spokesperson Kris Bahner said.

Kellogg also said there was no further bargaining scheduled and it had no plans to meet with the union.

The company said “unrealistic expectations” created by the union meant none of its six offers, including the latest one that was put to vote, which proposed wage increases and allowed all transitional employees with four or more years of service to move to legacy positions, came to fruition.

“They have made a ‘clear path’ – but while it is clear – it is too long and not fair to many,” union member Jeffrey Jens said.

Union members have said the proposed two-tier system, in which transitional employees get lesser pay and benefits compared to longer-tenured workers, would take power away from the union by removing the cap on the number of lower-tier employees.

Several politicians including Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have backed the union, while many customers have said they are boycotting Kellogg’s products.

Kellogg is among several U.S. firms, including Deere & Co, that has faced worker strikes in recent months as the labor market tightens.

(Reporting by Praveen Paramasivam in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur and Shounak Dasgupta)

U.S. judge blocks last remaining Biden admin COVID-19 vaccine rule

By Tom Hals

(Reuters) -A federal judge on Tuesday blocked the last of the Biden administration’s COVID-19 vaccine mandates for businesses, saying the government exceeded it authority with a requirement that millions of employees of federal contractors be inoculated.

The ruling was the latest setback for President Joe Biden, a Democrat, who announced a series of measures in September aimed at increasing vaccination rates to fight the pandemic that continues to kill more than 1,000 Americans daily.

“Abuse of power by the Biden administration has been stopped cold again,” Republican South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson, who joined the lawsuit, said in a statement.

U.S. District Judge Stan Baker in Savannah, Georgia, said Congress did not clearly authorize the president to use procurement to impose a vaccine requirement on contractors that will have “vast economic and political significance.”

The lawsuit was filed by the states of Georgia, Alabama, Indiana, Kansas, South Carolina, Utah and West Virginia as well as a trade group for building contractors.

The rule required contractors to have employees fully vaccinated by Jan. 18. Biden’s executive order applied to newly awarded contracts, although the government has been asking suppliers to agree to amend existing contracts to insert the vaccine requirement.

The contractor requirement was meant to improve efficiency among government suppliers by reducing outbreaks and was far-reaching, applying even to those working remotely.

Tuesday’s ruling by Baker, an appointee of President Donald Trump, shut down temporarily the last remaining business mandates that Biden had announced, as courts have found the government overstepped its authority in imposing the rules.

Those mandates were challenged by Republican governors, business associations and conservative civil liberty groups.

The litigation will likely continue for months and could revive the rules, which covered nearly 100 million workers, although some 83% of U.S. adults have received at least one shot, according to government data.

A federal appeals court in New Orleans last month shut down a requirement that businesses with at least 100 employees get workers vaccinated or have them tested weekly.

A requirement that most healthcare workers get vaccinated was blocked last week.

The pandemic has killed more than 780,000 Americans and slowed economic growth and snarled supply chains.

Mandatory vaccination has become an increasingly popular tool in fighting the pandemic and has boosted U.S. vaccination rates.

Although the Biden administration’s plans have been frustrated in court, judges have upheld mandates by private employers, universities and state and local governments.

The Biden administration’s requirement for military and civilian government employees survived court challenges.

(Reporting by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Delaware, additional reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Franklin Paul and Bill Berkrot)

U.S. Congress includes $300 million for Ukraine, addresses China in massive defense bill

By Patricia Zengerle

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. lawmakers included efforts to push back against Russia and China in a massive annual defense bill released on Tuesday, proposing $300 million for Ukraine’s military and a statement of support for the defense of Taiwan.

But they omitted a few measures that had had strong support from some members of Congress, including a proposal to impose mandatory sanctions over the Russian Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline and a proposal to subject women to the military draft.

The fiscal 2022 National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA, authorizes $770 billion in military spending, including a 2.7% pay increase for the troops, and authorization for a range of defense programs as well as strategies for dealing with geopolitical threats.

The NDAA normally passes with strong bipartisan support. It is closely watched by a broad swath of industry and other interests because of its wide scope and because it is one of the only major pieces of legislation that becomes law every year.

This year’s bill was released shortly after U.S. President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin held two hours of virtual talks on Ukraine and other disputes.

The 2022 NDAA includes $300 million for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, which provides support to Ukraine’s armed forces, includes $4 billion for the European Defense Initiative and proposes $150 million for Baltic security cooperation.

It does not include a provision that would force Biden to impose sanctions over the $11 billion Nord Stream 2 pipeline to bring Russian gas directly to Germany. The measure’s supporters argue that the pipeline would be harmful to European allies.

Lawmakers also omitted an amendment that would have banned Americans from purchasing Russian sovereign debt.

Biden’s fellow Democrats control both the House of Representatives and Senate, and the White House had said administration officials support sanctions if Russia invades Ukraine, but not provisions that could threaten trans-Atlantic ties.

EYES ON CHINA

On China, the bill includes $7.1 billion for the Pacific Deterrence Initiative and a statement of congressional support for the defense of Taiwan, as well as a ban on the Department of Defense procuring products produced with forced labor from China’s Xinjiang region.

The United States has labeled China’s treatment of its Uyghur Muslim minority in Xinjiang as genocide, and lawmakers have been pushing a ban on imports of products that may have been made with forced labor from Uyghurs. China dismisses the genocide charge as part of slanderous assertions about conditions in Xinjiang.

The compromise text omits a proposal to subject women to the military draft that was included in earlier versions. The proposal faced stiff opposition from socially conservative lawmakers that threatened to block the entire NDAA.

The compromise bill includes a significant overhaul of the military justice system to take decisions on whether to prosecute cases of rape, sexual assault and some other major crimes out of the hands of military commanders.

The change is the result of a years-long push, led by Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, in response to the thousands of cases of sexual assault and related crimes among service members every year, many of which are never prosecuted.

To become law for the 61st straight year, the NDAA must pass the House and Senate and be signed into law by Biden.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle; Editing by Mark Potter, William Maclean)

 

Belarus denies aggravating migrant situation at Polish border

KYIV (Reuters) – Belarus on Tuesday said its security services did not aggravate the migrant situation at the border by throwing firecrackers or taking other actions as Poland claimed the previous day.

The Belarus State Border Committee rejected the allegation by Polish Border Guard Captain Krystyna Jakimik-Jarosz and accused the Polish government of avoiding scrutiny of its own activities.

“Poland deliberately spreads fake information in order to hide from the public the real picture of the events taking place on the border,” the spokesman for the border committee Anton Bychkovsky said in a statement to Reuters.

Poland’s government maintains all of the allegations it has presented against the Belarusian authorities, special services spokesperson Stanislaw Zaryn told Reuters.

Thousands of people mostly from the Middle East have crossed the Polish border from Belarus since the summer, with the European Union accusing Minsk of flying them in and pushing them to cross into the bloc via neighboring Poland.

International organizations have said Poland was breaching humanitarian standards in forcing some migrants back into Belarus, a charge the Warsaw government denies.

On Monday, there were 116 attempts to cross the border. By contrast, on Nov. 17, 501 attempts were reported.

(Reporting by Kacper Pempel; additional reporting by Matthias Williams and Natalia Zinets and Joanna Plucinska in Warsaw; Writing by Alan Charlish; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

Israel announces completion of underground Gaza border barrier

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel on Tuesday announced the completion of a sensor-equipped underground wall on its side of the Gaza border, a counter-measure developed after Hamas militants used tunnels to blindside its troops in a 2014 war.

Israel went public with the project, which also includes an above-ground fence, a naval barrier, radar systems and command and control rooms, in 2016.

“The barrier, which is an innovative and technologically advanced project, deprives Hamas of one of the capabilities it tried to develop,” Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz said, according to a defense ministry statement.

“(It) places an ‘iron wall,’ sensors and concrete between the terror organization and the residents of Israel’s south,” he said of the project, which beefs up an existing border fence.

The ministry said the barrier, which includes hundreds of cameras, radars and other sensors, spans 65 kilometers (40 miles) and that 140,000 tonnes of iron and steel were used in its construction, which took 3.5 years to complete.

It said the project’s “smart fence” is more than 6 meters (20 feet) high and its maritime barrier includes means to detect infiltration by sea and a remote-controlled weapons system. The ministry did not disclose the depth of the underground wall.

Gaza also has a 14-kilometre-(8.7-mile)-long border with Egypt, which has also clamped down on crossings, citing security concerns. Since 2013, Egyptian forces have demolished smuggling tunnels while Hamas, on its side, has stepped up patrols.

Israel and Hamas have fought four wars since the Islamist group seized control the coastal Gaza Strip in 2007 from forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

In the latest conflict, last May, Hamas and other militant groups fired more than 4,300 rockets at Israel, which deployed Iron Dome interceptors against them and carried out extensive air strikes in Gaza.

(Reporting by Jeffrey Heller and Dan Williams, editing by Mark Heinrich)