Day: September 4, 2019

Lebanese Premier Vows to Keep Currency Pegged to Dollar

Lebanon’s prime minister is pledging to keep the national currency pegged to the dollar and says the government won’t consider an International Monetary Fund program that would leave it to the markets to decide the price of the Lebanese pound.

Saad Hariri told CNBC late on Tuesday: “We believe that keeping the Lebanese pound at 1,500 (to the dollar) is the only stable way to move forward with these reforms.”

The Lebanese pound has been pegged to the dollar since 1997.

Hariri’s comments came a day after Lebanese leaders declared “an economic state of emergency” to resolve the country’s economic crisis.

Lebanon has one of the world’s highest public debts, standing at 150% of gross domestic product. Growth has plummeted and the budget deficit has reached 11% of GDP.

 

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Kurdish Official: Syria’s ‘Safe Zone’ Off to Good Start

The creation of a so-called “safe zone” in northeastern Syria has gotten off to good start, with U.S.-backed Kurdish-led forces pulling back from a small, initial area along the Turkish border, a Syrian Kurdish official said — but calm can only prevail if Turkey also removes its troops.

Ilham Ahmed, co-chair of the executive committee of the U.S-backed Syrian Democratic Council, said the understanding reached between Washington and Ankara last month, and in coordination with the Syrian Kurdish-led forces, constitutes a step toward starting a dialogue over mutual security concerns.
 
 “We seek to find a way to dialogue, and starting to implement this plan expresses our readiness and seriousness,” Ahmed said in an interview Tuesday with The Associated Press.
 
 “We want to tell the world and the coalition that we are ready to take serious steps to get to dialogue,” she added.
 
Turkey views the U.S-backed Kurdish People’s Protection Units, or YPG, in Syria as an extension of a Kurdish insurgency within Turkey.
 
Ankara has already carried out military offensives inside Syria to push the group away from the western end of the border. Over the last weeks, Turkish officials threatened a similar offensive in northeastern Syria, where troops from the U.S.-led coalition are deployed to help the Syrian Kurdish-led forces in combatting remnants of the Islamic State group.
 
The Syrian Kurds have been America’s only partners on the ground in Syria’s chaotic civil war. With U.S. backing, they proved to be the most effective fighting force against the Islamic State group and announced its territorial defeat earlier this year. The Kurds now worry about being abandoned by the U.S. amid Turkish threats to invade Syria, and are keen to work out an agreement with both parties that would safeguard their gains.
 
Ankara and Washington announced last month that they would begin measures to implement a border “safe zone” to address Turkish security concerns. The Kurdish-led forces are expected to pull out of the zone, but details must still be worked out _ including who then would patrol and administer it.
 

FILE – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan attends a news conference in Moscow, Russia, Aug. 27, 2019.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan over the weekend repeated threats of an offensive if Turkey’s demands on the zone are not satisfied, including that its soldiers control the area.
 
Ahmed said more U.S. troops will probably be needed to implement the zone, though the Americans have not said whether they will deploy any.
 
 “In the coming days, and because of the needs of the formation and implementation of the security mechanism, they may need more forces. It is not yet clear what the U.S. administration would decide,” she said.
 
There was no immediate comment from the U.S.-led coalition.
 
There are around 1,000 U.S. troops in Syria on a mission to combat IS militants. President Donald Trump had said he wants to bring the troops home, but military officials have advocated a phased approach.
 
Ahmed said initial steps have been positive but for calm to prevail Turkish troops must also retreat from the Syrian borders. She said while Turkey expresses concerns about the Kurdish-led forces, it is Ankara that has been a source of threat to Syria with the various military operations and its military posts in western Syria.
 

The Kurdish-led forces have begun removing fortifications along the border and have moved some troops away from the border. At least two U.S-Turkish joint reconnaissance flights have flown over the area, and on Tuesday, joint patrols between U.S. troops and Kurdish-led forces also examined the area where fortifications have been removed.
 
The deal envisions an area five to 14 kilometers deep (three to eight miles) with no YPG presence, as well as removal of heavy weapons from a 20-kilometer-deep zone (12 miles), she said. Turkey wants a deeper zone. The length of the zone has not yet been agreed on, but will likely stretch hundreds of kilometers (miles).
 
Ahmed said discussions over other details of the security mechanism will open the way for Syrians who had been displaced from those areas, many of them fled to Turkey, to return. Turkey is home to 3.6 million Syrian refugees and Ankara said it wants the safe zone to provide an opportunity for many to return home.
 
Ahmed said only those originally from eastern Syria would be allowed to return. Kurdish officials worry Turkey wants to bring back large numbers of Syrians to the areas, which were previously controlled by IS militants, changing the demographic balance in the area. Syria’s Kurds are predominantly from the country’s northeast, living in mixed or Kurdish-dominated villages and towns there. She said no residents will be displaced because of the implementation of the safe zone.
 
“Calm must bring with it sustainable dialogue. Calm alone is not enough,” Ahmed said. “If Turkish troops don’t pull away from the borders, it will always be considered a threat.”
 
Another top Kurdish official, Aldar Khalil, said the Kurdish-led administration and forces would not accept Turkish forces or permanent bases in the so-called safe zone or a free hand for Turkish flights over the area.
 
He said while an understanding has been reached, a final deal would constitute an indirect Turkish recognition of the Kurdish-led administration in northeastern Syria. He said, however, a final deal is not imminent.

 

 

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Judge to Discuss Unsealing New Trove of Epstein Court Papers

A federal judge will discuss plans Wednesday for unsealing a new trove of court records involving sexual abuse allegations against Jeffrey Epstein, the financier who took his own life last month while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.

U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska scheduled the hearing after an appeals court in New York ordered her to carefully review the records and release “all documents for which the presumption of public access outweighs any countervailing privacy interests.”

While it’s not clear who is named in the records, an attorney for a John Doe warned in court papers Tuesday that the documents may contain “life-changing” disclosures against third parties not directly involved in the litigation. The attorney, Nicholas Lewin, requested the opportunity to be heard on the matter, citing his unnamed client’s “reputational rights.”

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has already made public more than 2,000 pages in the since-settled defamation lawsuit. Virginia Roberts Giuffre, one of Epstein’s accusers, filed the case against Ghislaine Maxwell , a former Epstein girlfriend. Giuffre has accused Maxwell of recruiting young women for Epstein’s sexual pleasure and taking part in the abuse— allegations Maxwell has vehemently denied.

The first release of court records— unsealed the day before Epstein’s jailhouse suicide in Manhattan— contained graphic claims against Epstein and several of his former associates. Giuffre alleges she was trafficked internationally to have sex with prominent American politicians, business executives and world leaders.

Giuffre filed the lawsuit in 2015, alleging Maxwell subjected her to “public ridicule, contempt and disgrace” by calling her a liar in published statements “with the malicious intent of discrediting and further damaging Giuffre worldwide.” The lawsuit sought unspecified damages.

About one-fifth of all documents filed in the case were done so under seal— a level of secrecy the 2nd Circuit ruled was unjustified. However, the appellate court, in unsealing the records, issued an unusual warning to the public and the media “to exercise restraint” regarding potentially defamatory allegations contained in the depositions and other court filings.

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Democrats Propose Spending Trillions to Fight Climate Change

WASHINGTON (AP) _ Democratic presidential candidates are releasing their plans to address climate change ahead of a series of town halls on the issue as the party’s base increasingly demands aggressive action.

New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and former Obama Cabinet member Julián Castro laid out their plans Tuesday. Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar released hers over the weekend.

The release of the competing plans comes as issues of climate and the environment have become a central focus of the Democratic primary. On Wednesday, 10 Democrats seeking the White House will participate in back-to-back climate town halls hosted by CNN in New York. A second set of climate-focused town halls will be televised by MSNBC later in the month. Liberals had demanded that the Democratic Party focus at least one debate on climate change, but a climate debate resolution was defeated at the Democratic National Committee’s summer meeting last month.

The issue is so urgent among Democratic voters that Washington Gov. Jay Inslee made action to limit the worst extremes of climate change the core of his presidential bid. But Inslee dropped out of the presidential race in August after failing to earn a spot in the September primary debate. Warren says Inslee’s ideas “should remain at the center of the agenda,” and she met with him in Seattle when she visited the state for a rally before Labor Day, according to two people familiar with the meeting who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a private meeting.

Warren’s clean energy proposal builds on Inslee’s 10-year clean energy plan in seeking to implement 100% clean energy standards in three key sectors of the American economy. Warren says she will increase her planned spending on research and investment to cut carbon emissions to $3 trillion. She embraces tough deadlines for sharply cutting or eliminating the use of fossil fuels by the U.S. electrical grid, highways and air transit systems, and by cities and towns. That includes making sure that new cars, buses and many trucks run on clean energy _ instead of gasoline or diesel _ by 2030 and that all the country’s electricity comes from solar, wind and other renewable, carbon-free sources by 2035.

Booker’s $3 trillion plan includes nearly a dozen executive actions to reverse Trump administration moves. He says that by no later than 2045, he wants to get the U.S. economy to carbon neutral _ a point at which carbon emissions are supposedly canceled out by carbon-cutting measures, such as planting new forests to suck up carbon from the atmosphere. Booker also urges massive restoration of forests and coastal wetlands as carbon sponges and as buffers against rising seas. He sets a 2030 deadline for getting natural gas and coal out of the electrical grid. He would get there partly by scrapping all subsidies for fossil fuels, banning new oil and gas leases, phasing out fracking and introducing a carbon fee.

If elected, Booker says, he will propose legislation creating a “United States Environmental Justice Fund,” which, among its areas of focus, will replace all home, school and day care drinking water lines by the end of his second term.

Castro’s $10 trillion plan aims to have all electricity in the United States be clean and renewable by 2035. He wants to achieve net-zero emissions by 2045 and at least a 50% reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. And, like Booker, he focuses on environmental racism, in which people of color are disproportionately affected by environmental hazards. Castro says that within the first 100 days of his presidency he would propose new legislation to address the impact of environmental discrimination.

Among Democrats seeking the presidency, there is little disagreement that climate change is a building disaster. Candidates’ primary differences are over how aggressively the U.S. should move now to cut fossil fuel emissions to stave off the worst of the coming climate extremes.

Last month, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders toured a California mobile home park ravaged by wildfires as he introduced his $16 trillion plan to fight global warming, the costliest among the Democratic field. His plan declares climate change a national emergency, calls for the United States to eliminate fossil fuel use by 2050 and commits $200 billion to help poorer nations reckon with climate change.

Former Vice President Joe Biden has proposed $1.7 trillion in spending over 10 years, on clean energy and other initiatives with the goal of eliminating the country’s net carbon emissions by 2050. Biden has been less absolute than some other Democratic candidates on stamping out consumption of oil, natural gas and coal, calling for eliminating subsidies for the fossil fuels rather than pledging to eliminate all use of them.

The relatively minor differences among Democrats on climate change come in sharp contrast to President Donald Trump, who has dismissed and mocked the science of climate change and has reversed course on U.S. climate policy. Trump made pulling the country out of the Paris climate accord one of his administration’s first priorities, and his wholehearted support of the petroleum and coal industries has been one of the enduring themes of his presidency
Nationally, 72% of Democratic midterm voters said they were very concerned about the effects of climate change, and 20% were somewhat concerned. That’s according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 115,000 midterm voters nationwide.

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Oprah Winfrey Launching Wellness Arena Tour in Early 2020

Oprah Winfrey is taking her motivational spirit on the road early next year with an arena tour to promote a healthier lifestyle.

The talk-show host and chief of OWN television network said Wednesday that she will launch the “Oprah’s 2020 Vision: Your Life in Focus” tour starting Jan. 4 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. She is working with Weight Watchers Reimagined to offer a full-day of wellness conversations during the nine-city tour.
 
It’s her first speaking tour in five years.
 
Winfrey says she wants to empower audiences to “support a stronger, healthier, abundant life.” She will be joined by high-profile guests. The names will be released at a later date.
 
Winfrey’s previous speaking tours include “Oprah’s Life Class” and “Oprah’s The Life You Want Weekend” in 2014.

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