World

European policymakers are suggesting a new tax on tech giants such as Facebook Inc. and Alphabet Inc.'s Google in a measure that could raise $6.2 billion through what advocates say would be a fairer way of taxing how the companies make their money.

The proposal, unveiled Wednesday, would tap into digital titans' revenues in countries where they have the bulk of their users and customers, imposing a 3% tax on income from online advertising, the sale of user data and the connecting of users to one another.

The initiative, which would need several rounds of approvals, comes amid a rapidly heating trade conflict between Europe and the United States. Absent action by President Trump, new U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum imports are set to go into effect Friday, and EU leaders have threatened countermeasures to follow shortly after.

It also comes as Facebook's actions are under a microscope, following revelations that the Cambridge Analytica data firm misused the data of 50 million U.S. Facebook users to help Trump win the presidency and that Russians also targeted U.S. voters on the social network.

The action by the executive arm of the 28-nation European Union would seek to impose common tax rules across the EU's vast market of 500 million consumers.

But the measure is likely to run into skepticism from the countries that serve as the legal homes to the companies, as well as small tech-savvy nations such as Estonia, where the technology behind Skype was born. Any EU-wide tax measure would require unanimity.

The goal, advocates say, is fairness. In Europe, companies with digital business models pay an effective tax rate of 9.5%, compared with 23.2% for companies with traditional business models, the European Commission said.

"The digital revolution has overturned economies, and it has profoundly affected the way businesses create value today," said Pierre Moscovici, the top EU economy and tax official, as he announced the proposal in Brussels.

"Your click triggers a whole chain of commercial transactions and therefore generates substantial profits" that are not taxed by most countries, he said. "This legal loophole is no longer acceptable."

European leaders also are concerned that the U.S. tax overhaul passed in December will divert tax revenue away from Europe and toward the United States. The tax law slashed corporate rates to 21% and offered incentives for companies such as Apple Inc., which had accumulated billions of dollars in its European subsidiary in Ireland, to bring home their profits. Moscovici has said that the European measures are not connected to actions by any other government, but French leaders advocated similar national plans in reaction to the U.S. policy changes.

The proposed EU tax would only hit businesses with annual worldwide turnover above $923 billion that also make more than $62 billion of their revenue inside the European Union. That would give small tech start-ups room to grow, European policymakers said. At least 120 global firms fit the criteria, Moscovici said.

Trump administration officials have raised sharp objections to the tax plan, which Moscovici outlined in a preliminary form Tuesday at a meeting of finance ministers of the Group of 20 major world economies in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

"The U.S. firmly opposes proposals by any country to single out digital companies," U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin said in a statement last week that did not specifically mention the EU tax plans. "Some of these companies are among the greatest contributors to U.S. job creation and economic growth."

Advocates of the measure said they are not targeting U.S. companies. But the U.S.-centered reality of the modern technology industry puts many U.S. companies in the crosshairs, and the tax could hit Amazon.com Inc., Uber Technologies Inc. and others. (The Washington Post is owned by Jeff Bezos, the founder and chief executive of Amazon.)

The EU plan is intended as a temporary measure until a permanent plan is devised that would overhaul the taxation of the profits of digital companies. But because of the difficulty of reaching tax compromises, temporary measures have sometimes remained in place for decades.

Rwanda has banned mosques in the capital, Kigali, from using loudspeakers during the call to prayer.

They say the calls, made five times a day, have been disturbing residents of the Nyarugenge district, home to the capital's biggest mosques.

But an official from a Muslim association criticised it, saying they could instead keep the volume down.

Some 1,500 churches have been closed for not complying with building regulations and noise pollution.

The majority of Rwandans are Christian. Muslims make up around 5% of the population.

The government says the Muslim community has complied with the ban.

Analysis: Rwanda's open secret

Ally Yusuf Mugenzi: Editor of BBC Great Lakes service

To understand the latest round of regulations imposed by Rwandan authorities on religious groups, we have to look back to the 1994 genocide, in which some 800,000 people were killed.

A number of the Roman Catholic churches, where thousands of Tutsis had taken refuge, became killing grounds during the 100-day rampage.

Rwandans lost faith in the powerful institution and gravitated towards Pentecostalism and Islam.

Today's noise pollution concerns have silenced the loudspeakers on Kigali's mosques. But it would be wrong to say that Muslims are being targeted. They can still go to mosques and pray five times a day.

The same cannot be said for the Pentecostals.

About 1,500 Pentecostal churches across the country have been closed over the past month, leaving worshippers with nowhere to pray.

This might have something to do with Rwanda's open secret: the country's religious denominations are expected to pledge loyalty to the government of long-time President Paul Kagame.

Pentecostal leaders might not be toeing the line.

But the authorities are right to focus on those churches' disregard for building regulations. Many of them hold noisy services, are badly constructed, situated in residential homes, and are a legitimate health and safety concern.

"I have found that they have begun to respect it and it has not stopped their followers from going to pray according to their praying time," Havuguziga Charles, a local official from Nyarugenge told the BBC's Great Lakes service.

This comes as the government continues its clampdown on substandard churches across the East African country.

Most of them were small Pentecostal churches, and one mosque was also closed.

The government says the reason is that some preachers "deceive their congregation with misleading sermons", AFP reports.

But some preachers have accused the government of trying to control their message to congregants in a country accused by human rights groups of stifling free speech.

(BBC)

Chinese President Xi Jinping has told the National People's Congress (NPC) that China must not become complacent about its development.

Speaking at the closing session of the annual parliament, Xi said China was at a critical stage in its history and only socialism could save it.

He also warned against Taiwanese separatism or attempts to split China. Xi is now set up to be China's president for life, after the NPC removed a two-term limit.

The motion was overwhelmingly approved by the roughly 3,000 delegates at the start of the session. The parliamentary session meets once a year. It essentially rubber stamps changes already decided by the leadership.

In his speech in the Great Hall of the People, Xi laid out his grand vision for China, re confirming his ambition to "rejuvenate" the country and continue China's "great contributions to civilisation".

"History has already proven and will continue to prove that only socialism can save China," he said.

He said he saw the people as "the real heroes" of China and that he and all fellow politicians "must work hard for the people's interests".

The president also highlighted major achievements of Chinese history from the invention of paper and gunpowder to building the Great Wall or the writings of Confucius.

Pointing at China's global ambitions, Xi said his country would be strong but not aggressive and would not develop itself at the expense of the rest of the world.

President Xi also said China had to be united to prosper and, in a reference to Taiwan, said Beijing would thwart any separatist attempts.

"The Chinese people share a common belief that it is never allowed and it is absolutely impossible to separate any inch of our great country's territory from China."

Self-ruling Taiwan is considered by Beijing to be a separatist province which will one day be reunited with the mainland. It remains a major potential flashpoint in the region.

Xi is now considered the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong, and the NPC saw his position further strengthened. It confirmed Xi Jinping's second term as president and ratified the inclusion of his political philosophy - "Xi Jinping Thought" - in to the constitution.

Lawmakers also appointed key positions including the central bank head and chief economic advisor and ratified a law to set up a new powerful anti-corruption agency.

The continued push against corruption, a key campaign of Xi Jinping's, is seen by some observers as potentially a tool to sideline his political rivals. The decision to lift the term limitations has, however, been criticised both abroad and within China.

Source : BBC

Stephen Hawking, the legendary physicist and author of popular science books such as A Brief History of Time, passed away in the early hours of Wednesday morning at his home in the U.K. The Guardian reports that his children, Lucy, Robert and Tim, put out a statement that includes:

“We are deeply saddened that our beloved father passed away today. He was a great scientist and an extraordinary man whose work and legacy will live on for many years."

He was 76.

Hawking was probably the best-known scientist in the world. He was a theoretical physicist whose early work on black holes transformed how scientists think about the nature of the universe.

Hawking famously suffered from motor neuron disease, with which he was diagnosed at age 21. The condition confined him to a wheelchair and necessitated the use of his famous computerized speaking device, but, despite a grim early prognosis, it did not stop him from living another 55 years and making numerous discoveries (and sometimes wild statements) about the cosmos. He will be missed.

Vladimir Putin will lead Russia for another six years, after securing an expected victory in Sunday's presidential election.

Mr Putin, who has ruled the country as either president or prime minister since 1999, got more than 76% of the vote, official results show.

The main opposition leader, Alexei Navalny, was barred from the race.

Addressing a rally in Moscow, Mr Putin said voters had "recognised the achievements of the last few years".

Speaking to reporters after the results were announced, he laughed off a question about running again in another six years.

"What you are saying is a bit funny. Do you think that I will stay here until I'm 100 years old? No!" he said.

The scale of victory - which had been widely predicted - appears to be a marked increase in his share of the vote from 2012, when he won 64%.

Mr Putin's nearest competitor, millionaire communist Pavel Grudinin, received about 12%.

The race also included Ksenia Sobchak, a former reality TV host, and veteran nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky - they got less than 2% and about 6% respectively.

Mr Putin's campaign team said it was an "incredible victory".

"The percentage that we have just seen speaks for itself. It's a mandate which Putin needs for future decisions, and he has a lot of them to make," a spokesman told Russia's Interfax.

(BBC)

US President Donald Trump has sacked Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, replacing him with the director of the CIA, Mike Pompeo.

Thanking Tillerson for his service on Twitter, Trump said the new state secretary would do "a fantastic job". Tillerson, a former chief executive of ExxonMobil, was only appointed to the job just over a year ago.

The president also nominated Gina Haspel to become the first woman director of the CIA.

A senior White House official told the BBC about the timing of the announcement: "The president wanted to make sure to have his new team in place in advance of the upcoming talks with North Korea and various ongoing trade negotiations."

Speaking to reporters outside the White House on Tuesday, Trump said his differences with Tillerson came down to personal "chemistry".

 Source : BBC

There is an ongoing cyberattack on Russia’s Central Election Commission, targeting its information center, the body’s secretary has said. The commission’s website earlier came under a DDoS attack from 15 countries.

“We are registering what is in fact a cyberattack on our information center,” the commission’s secretary, Maya Grishina, said.

The Civic Chamber’s website observing the election was down after a DDoS attack, RIA reported, adding the problem is now over.

The commission’s website was also attacked soon after voting began. A distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack peaked between 2am and 5am on Sunday, chairperson Ella Pamfilova said.

The attack originated from 15 countries, according to Pamfilova.

The State Automated System Vybory (‘Elections’) cannot, however, be exposed to any cyber attacks, since it’s not connected to the global network, Pamfilova said. “It’s impossible to reach it,” she added. When all the ballots have been counted after polling stations close, the data will be punched into the system, along with the information from the ballot boxes with scanners and fully electronic voting devices.

The head of the state corporation Rostelecom, Mikhail Oseyevsky, earlier said that cyberattacks on various Russian websites surged in the days prior to the election. On Saturday, Russian media watchdog Roskomnadzor and online news outlet Lenta were attacked.

Source : rt.com

38 people are confirmed killed and 23 injured, 10 still missing after US-Bangla Airlines aircraft crashed in Kathmandu today.

The US-Bangla airlines aircraft had crashed at Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) in Kathmandu during take off.

The plane, operated by Bangladeshi airline US-Bangla, veered off the runway at Kathmandu airport. 67 people had been on board at the time of incident.

Former South African President Jacob Zuma will be charged with 16 counts of corruption, money laundering and racketeering, the country's national prosecuting authority announced Friday.

The charges relate to 783 questionable payments Zuma allegedly received in connection with a controversial multibillion-rand arms deal.

On Friday, National Director of Public Prosecutions Shaun Abrahams said that there are "reasonable prospects of a successful prosecution" in Zuma's case.

The charges were previously dropped in 2009 just before Zuma was sworn in as President.

Source : CNN

China has approved the removal of the two-term limit on the presidency, effectively allowing Xi Jinping to remain in power for life.

The constitutional changes were passed by the annual sitting of parliament, the National People's Congress.

The vote was widely regarded as a rubber-stamping exercise. Two delegates voted against the change and three abstained, out of 2,964 votes.

China had imposed a two-term limit on its president since the 1990s.

But Mr Xi, who would have been due to step down in 2023, defied the tradition of presenting a potential successor during October's Communist Party Congress.

Instead, he consolidated his political power as the party voted to enshrine his name and political ideology in the party's constitution - elevating his status to the level of its founder, Chairman Mao.

On paper, the congress is the most powerful legislative body in China - similar to the parliament in other nations. But it was widely believed that it would approve what it was told to.

Xi forever?

Analysis by Stephen McDonell, BBC China correspondent in Beijing.

It is now hard to see Xi Jinping being challenged in any way whatsoever.

He has amassed power the likes of which has not been seen since Chairman Mao Zedong.

Mr. Xi applauded after the amendment was passed (Reuters).

 Only five years ago Beijing was being ruled by a collective leadership. Under ex-President Hu Jintao you could imagine differing views being expressed in the then nine-member Politburo Standing Committee.

There was a feeling that Mr Hu needed to please various factions within the Communist Party and it seemed that every 10 years a new leader would come along with their own people in a process of smooth transition.

From today all this has gone.

The constitution has been altered to allow Xi Jinping to remain as president beyond two terms and they would not have gone to this much trouble if that was not exactly what he intended to do.

There has been no national debate as to whether a leader should be allowed to stay on for as long as they choose. Quietly but surely Xi Jinping has changed the way his country is governed, with himself well and truly at the core.

Rare dissent

The issue is not, however, without controversy.

Online censors in China have been blocking discussion around the topic, including images of Winnie the Pooh. Social media users have taken to using the cartoon character to represent Mr Xi.

Social media users create "Winnie the Pooh" memes to avoid being seen as making derogatory posts against Mr. Xi (r). WEIBO/AFP

 One government critic described the proposal in an open letter last month as a "farce", in a rare show of public dissent.

Former state newspaper editor Li Datong wrote that scrapping term limits for the president and vice-president would sow the seeds of chaos - in a message sent to some members of the national congress.

"I couldn't bear it any more. I was discussing with my friends and we were enraged. We have to voice our opposition," he told BBC Chinese.

State media, however, have portrayed the changes as much-needed reform.

US President Donald Trump was criticised by some commentators for seeming to approve of Mr Xi's unlimited rule, saying on Monday: "President for life... I think it's great. Maybe we'll have to give that a shot some day."

At a political rally on Saturday, Mr Trump insisted he had merely been joking during a fundraiser, and that his comments were represented unfairly by some media.

Xi Jinping thought

Mr Xi's possible third term is not the only item the National People's Congress is likely to approve. It was also expected to:

confirm China's new government line-up for the next five years, kicking off Xi Jinping's second term as president
ratify a law to set up a new powerful anti-corruption agency
ratify the inclusion of the president's political philosophy - "Xi Jinping thought" - in the constitution
Xi Jinping thought is the ideology approved by the Communist Party last October. Officially, it is "Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for the New Era".

Schoolchildren, college students and staff at state factories will have to study the political ideology, which the Communist Party is trying to portray as a new chapter for modern China.

Mr Xi became president in 2013, and quickly consolidated personal power while cementing China as the regional superpower.

He also fought corruption, punishing more than a million party members - which has helped his popularity among some.

At the same time, however, China has clamped down on many emerging freedoms, increasing its state surveillance and censorship programs. Critics also say Mr Xi has used the anti-corruption purge to sideline political rivals.

(BBC)

UK police have launched a murder investigation after the death of Russian businessman Nikolai Glushkov in south-west London.

Glushkov was found dead at his home in New Malden on 12 March.

A post-mortem examination revealed Glushkov, who was 68, died from "compression to the neck".

There is, at this stage, no evidence linking the death to the attempted murder of a former Russian spy and his daughter in Salisbury, police say.

Detectives are retaining an open mind and are appealing for any information that will assist the investigation.

In particular, they are appealing for anyone who may have seen or heard anything suspicious at or near his home in Clarence Avenue, New Malden, between Sunday 11 March and Monday 12 March to contact them.

Glushkov is the former deputy director of Russian state airline Aeroflot. He was jailed in 1999 for five years after being charged with money laundering and fraud.

After being given a suspended sentence for another count of fraud in 2006, he fled to the UK to seek political asylum and became a critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Source : BBC

A man who is critically ill after being exposed to an unknown substance in Wiltshire is a Russian national convicted of spying for Britain.

Sergei Skripal, 66, was granted refuge in the UK following a "spy swap" between the US and Russia in 2010.

He and a woman, 33, were found unconscious on a bench at a shopping centre in Salisbury on Sunday.

Zizzi restaurant in Salisbury has been closed by police "as a precaution".

The substance has not been identified, but Public Health England said there was no known risk to the public's health.

Wiltshire Police are investigating whether a crime has been committed. They said the pair had no visible injuries but had been found unconscious at the Maltings shopping centre.

They have declared a "major incident" and multiple agencies are investigating. They said it had not been declared as a counter-terrorism incident, but they were keeping an "open mind".

Col Skripal, who is a retired Russian military intelligence officer, was jailed for 13 years by Russia in 2006 for spying for Britain.

He was convicted of passing the identities of Russian intelligence agents working undercover in Europe to the UK's Secret Intelligence Service, MI6.

Russia said Col Skripal had been paid $100,000 for the information, which he had been supplying from the 1990s.

He was one of four prisoners released by Moscow in exchange for 10 US spies in 2010, as part of a swap. Col Skripal was later flown to the UK.

He and the woman, who police said were known to each other, are both in intensive care at Salisbury District Hospital.

A number of locations in the city centre were cordoned off and teams in full protective gear used hoses to decontaminate the street.

The hospital advised people to attend routine operations and outpatient appointments unless they were contacted. It said its A&E department was open but busy because of the weather.

On the restaurant closure, police said Public Health England had reiterated the advice that there was no known risk to the wider public, but as a precaution advised that if people felt ill they should contact the NHS on 111.

"If you feel your own or another's health is significantly deteriorating, ring 999," police said.

Neighbours at Sergei Skripal's home in Salisbury say police arrived around 17:00 GMT on Sunday and have been there ever since.

They said he was friendly and in recent years had lost his wife.

The possibility of an unexplained substance being involved has drawn comparisons with the 2006 poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko.

The Russian dissident died in London in 2006 after drinking tea laced with a radioactive substance.

A public inquiry concluded that his killing had probably been carried out with the approval of the Russian President, Vladimir Putin.