Hong Kong is 'the only option' for China to connect with overseas markets for now, says expert - CNBC

Ten global partners of Alibaba beat the gong during the company's listing on the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Market on November 26, 2019.

VCG | Visual China Group | Getty Images

Hong Kong has been engulfed in anti-government protests for months, but the city's capital markets have remained an important gateway between China and the world, according to an industry association.

That's despite China ramping up efforts to open up its financial sector to foreign investors, said Mark Austen, chief executive at Asia Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, or Asifma. China has recently announced its plans to scrap limits on foreign stakes and quotas for foreign securities investment.

"China needs to move from an over reliance on bank lending to one where they have a dynamic, liquid capital market to fund their economic growth going forward," Austen told CNBC's "Squawk Box Asia" on Friday.

"But we still see Hong Kong as being that conduit to enter and exit China in the medium term because it's really the only option that exists for China to connect to the outside world," he added.

Hong Kong's edge over China lies in its openness to foreign investors and "strong rule of law," which are important to maintain, said Austen. That appeal is evident in Chinese tech giant Alibaba's recent Hong Kong listing, which attracted strong demand from investors, he noted.

Alibaba's secondary listing — the world's largest offering so far this year — came at a time when business sentiment in Hong Kong has taken a hit amid the protests, which at times involved violent clashes between protesters and the police.

"In spite of what's going on in Hong Kong at the moment, Alibaba has proven that the market (in Hong Kong) is still stable, it's still liquid," said Austen.

Still, China's opening up is a trend that looks set to continue, but the extent and pace depend on financial stability in the country, said Michael Taylor, chief credit officer for Asia Pacific at Moody's Investors Service.

"I think the commitment is very strong. The authorities have shown their willingness to open up markets," he told CNBC's "Street Signs Asia" on Friday.

"Obviously, that's subject to other policy constraints that they have. One of the overarching objectives is to maintain stability. So, any opening up is going to be subject to its impact in terms of overall financial stability."

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2019-11-29 07:20:00Z
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Seoul says North Korea has fired 2 short-range projectiles - Politico

A woman in Seoul watches a news program in reporting North Korea's firing unidentified projectiles Thursday, with a file image of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. | Lee Jin-man/AP Photo

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

11/28/2019 10:40 AM EST

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea on Thursday fired two short-range projectiles, likely from a “super-large” multiple rocket launcher, South Korea’s military said, adding to tensions three days after the North said its troops conducted artillery drills near its disputed sea boundary with South Korea.

The recent North Korea activities could indicate it wants to show what would happen if Washington fails to meet a year-end deadline set by its leader, Kim Jong Un, for the U.S. to offer a new proposal in their stalemated nuclear talks.

Story Continued Below

Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement that the projectiles were launched toward the North’s eastern waters from northeastern South Hamgyong province.

Maj. Gen. Jeon Dong Jin, a senior operations officer at the JCS, said the projectiles flew about 380 kilometers (235 miles) at a maximum altitude of 97 kilometers (60 miles). He said South Korean and U.S. intelligence authorities were continuing to analyze the details.

“Our military expresses its strong regret over (the launches) and urges (North Korea) to immediately stop acts that escalate military tensions,” Jeon said in a televised briefing. He said the military is monitoring possible additional launches by North Korea.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe condemned the launches as a “serious challenge” to both Japan and the international community, even though the projectiles did not land inside Japanese territorial waters.

He said his government will “do its utmost” to protect the lives and assets of Japanese people.

The reported launches were the 13th major public weapons test by North Korea this year and the first since it conducted what it called a test-firing of a new “super-large” multiple rocket launcher late last month. That launcher is apparently the same system that South Korea’s military said was likely used in Thursday’s launches.

Abe called the projectiles “ballistic missiles.” Some experts have said that projectiles fired from the “super-large” multiple rocket launcher are virtually missiles or missile-class weapons.

On Monday, North Korea said leader Kim visited a front-line islet and ordered artillery troops there to practice firing near the sea boundary, the scene of several bloody naval clashes between the Koreas in past years. South Korea protested the drills, saying they violated an agreement last year aimed at lowering military animosity.

Seoul’s Defense Ministry said the artillery firing occurred on Nov. 23, the 9th anniversary of the North Korean shelling of a South Korean border island that killed four South Koreans in 2010.

With nuclear diplomacy with the United States largely deadlocked, North Korea has test-fired a series of newly developed weapons to pressure the U.S. while using the standstill in negotiations to upgrade its military capabilities. In early October, it conducted its first underwater launch of a ballistic missile in three years.

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Attention is now focused on whether North Korea will resume long-range missile and nuclear tests which have been suspended since it conducted the third of three intercontinental ballistic missile tests in November 2017. President Donald Trump has called the suspension of those tests a major achievement of his North Korea policy.

Some experts say North Korea may restart those major weapons tests if the United States fails to meet the deadline. But others say North Korea is likely to begin with less serious provocations while attempting to improve cooperation with China and Russia, because ICBM and nuclear tests would completely derail diplomacy with the United States.

In recent weeks, high-level North Korean officials have issued statements via state media saying their country is not interested in diplomacy with the U.S. unless Washington abandons hostile policies toward the North.

North Korea says it wants the U.S. to lift international sanctions imposed on it and provide security guarantees before abandoning its advancing nuclear arsenal. But U.S. officials have said the sanctions on the North will remain in place until North Korea takes substantial steps toward denuclearization.

The nuclear negotiations broke down in February when Trump rejected Kim’s demands for major sanctions relief in return for partial disarmament steps during their second summit in Vietnam. They held a third, impromptu meeting in late June at the Korean border village of Panmunjom.

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2019-11-28 15:40:00Z
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North Korea Test-Fires Projectiles, Aims to Pressure U.S. on Sanctions Relief - The Wall Street Journal

Kim Jong Un’s regime has set a year-end deadline for the U.S. to comply with its demands, threatening to escalate its provocations in 2020. Photo: Associated Press

By

Andrew Jeong

Andrew Jeong
The Wall Street Journal
• Biography
• @hj257
• andrew.jeong@wsj.com

Updated Nov. 28, 2019 10:05 am ET

SEOUL—North Korea fired two unidentified projectiles toward the waters off its east coast, according to South Korea’s military, in another weapons test aimed at increasing pressure on the U.S. to provide sanctions relief amid stalled denuclearization talks.

Seoul’s Defense Ministry on Thursday said the North conducted the test at about 4:59 p.m. local time a few miles from the North Korean port city of Hamhung, near a town believed to host a military airfield.

The latest provocation marks the North’s 14th weapons test of this year, according to South and North Korean government announcements, and follows a visit by leader Kim Jong Un to a military base near the Yellow Sea days earlier to oversee the testing of coastal artillery.

Experts said the tests signal Pyongyang’s growing impatience with Washington, which has been reluctant to ease sanctions that have hurt North Korea’s economy. Mr. Kim has repeatedly said economic growth is a major policy goal this year.

“North Korea is trying to tell the U.S. these weapons tests can become much more frequent, if the Americans don’t yield concessions,” said Shin Beom-cheol, a former adviser to the South Korean government and now a senior researcher at the Seoul-based Asan Institute, a private think tank.

“They are also separately testing the reactions of the U.S. and South Korean militaries to these weapons tests,” he said.

Pyongyang has escalated its threats in recent weeks to cut off negotiations with the U.S., protesting scheduled U.S.-South Korea military exercises and attacking Washington’s “hostile” policy against the isolated regime. Last week it rejected President Trump’s latest invitation for another nuclear summit.

The Kim regime has set a year-end deadline for the U.S. to comply with its demands, threatening to escalate its provocations in 2020.

“Washington is too busy with the impeachment hearings, and appears to be ignoring Kim Jong Un’s year-end ultimatum,” said Nam Sung-wook, a professor of North Korean studies at Korea University. “Kim loses face the more Washington looks like it ignores him. Weapons tests give him an excuse to tell his people that he stood up to U.S. sanctions and bullying.”

Nuclear talks between Washington and Pyongyang haven’t made much progress since a summit between Messrs. Trump and Kim in February ended without a deal. In June, Mr. Trump made an impromptu visit to the demilitarized zone on the inter-Korean border to meet Mr. Kim and agreed to restart working-level negotiations. But talks collapsed almost as soon as they resumed in October, with North Korean diplomats walking out after accusing their American counterparts of not offering adequate economic and security concessions.

Despite test-firing short-range missiles and rockets since April, Pyongyang has refrained from testing long-range missiles or nuclear warheads since November 2017—something that Mr. Trump has claimed as a foreign-policy win and which North Korea has said that it expects to be rewarded for.

Write to Andrew Jeong at andrew.jeong@wsj.com

Copyright ©2019 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

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2019-11-28 15:05:00Z
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Iran calls for 'firm' response after Iraqi protesters storm and torch consulate - CNN

The Iranian statement comes amid ongoing demonstrations in Iraq against government corruption, and a rejection of Iranian involvement in the country's affairs.

On Thursday, 13 protesters were killed in the city of Nasariyah with 75 people injured, a security official and a medic told CNN on condition of anonymity, as they are not authorized to speak to the media. Authorities imposed a curfew on Nasariyah, which lies more than 200 miles southeast of Baghdad.

Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi expressed "hatred" for the rioters who stormed and torched the consulate on Wednesday. Mousavi called on the Iraqi government to deal with the "perpetrators of the attack responsibly, firmly and effectively," according to an Iranian foreign affairs ministry statement released on Thursday.

Iran's diplomatic staff evacuated the consulate before the attack, state-run Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) said Thursday. This is the second attack on an Iranian embassy in Iraq after its office in the Shia holy city of Karbala was attacked last month.

More than 300 people have been killed and 15,000 injured in Iraq since the start of anti-government protests on October 1.

Protests have erupted in Baghdad and in several Shiite provinces in the south over unemployment, alleged government corruption and a lack of basic services.

Following the deadly government crackdown, however, protesters have demanded the government to step down and hold early elections under direct supervision of the United Nations, activists told CNN.

Many Iraqis blame the current political parties in power for their economic hardship. The scale of the protests, believed to be the biggest since the fall of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in 2003, took the government by surprise.

Iraqi Prime Minister Adil Abdul Mahdi agreed to resign on October 31 after weeks of anti-government protests.

Besides using lethal force, officials have imposed curfews and internet blackouts in attempts to quash the protests. The government said it only shoots when attacked, but demonstrators have disputed that.

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2019-11-28 13:56:00Z
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North Korea launches short-range projectiles toward Japan, South Korea says - CBS This Morning

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2019-11-28 12:27:01Z
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Iraq security forces kill protesters in Nasiriya, army deploys - Al Jazeera English

Baghdad, Iraq - At least 14 people have been killed after security forces used live ammunition and tear gas canisters to disperse anti-government protesters in the southern city of Nasiriya, medical sources and witnesses told Al Jazeera.

Authorities in the capital Baghdad dispatched troops to southern Iraq, which has seen massive protests for weeks, to "restore order" there, the military said in a statement on Thursday.

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Security sources told Al Jazeera that at least 120 others were wounded in the crackdown on protests in Nasiriya on Thursday, a day after the Iranian consulate was set on fire in Shia holy city of Najaf.

Several of the wounded are believed to be in critical condition. Medical sources, however, have told Al Jazeera that the death toll has gone up to 18 but it has yet to be confirmed by officials.

The raid on the Iranian consulate was the strongest expression of anti-Iranian sentiment by Iraqi protesters, who have taken to the streets in Baghdad and Iraq's mainly Shia south since early October.

More than 360 people have been killed and more than 15,000 wounded so far, according to an AFP news agency tally.

Southern Iraq and Baghdad have been gripped by an escalating wave of anti-government demonstrations demanding an overhaul of the ruling system, seen as corrupt, sectarian and inefficient.

Iran demands action

Responding to the attack on its consulate in Najaf, Iran demanded that Iraq take decisive action against "aggressors" behind the arson attack.

The foreign ministry spokesperson, Abbas Mousavi, quoted by state news agency IRNA, condemned the attack and "demanded decisive, effective and responsible action... against destructive agents and aggressors".

"Iran has officially communicated its disgust to the Iraq ambassador in Tehran," he said.

The Najaf consulate was set ablaze late on Wednesday after anti-government protesters moved away from the centre of the city and into side streets near the consulate, two witnesses told Al Jazeera.

"The protesters were holding a demonstration in central Najaf when a group started to close off main roads and set the tires of police cars ablaze.

"The security forces responded using tear gas and sound bombs to disperse the protesters who ran towards the Iranian embassy," a witness told Al Jazeera.

"The protesters were angered by the security forces trying to disperse the demonstration. They started burning tires near the consulate and eventually set the consulate ablaze, minutes after the consulate staff evacuated the building," said the source.

As the consulate is near the home of the leading Iraqi Shia authority Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, locals moved to surround his home in an attempt to protect it from being targeted, witnesses told Al Jazeera.

Responding to the incidents, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, a commander in the Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces - Hashd al-Shaabi - an umbrella group of Iraq's mostly Shia militias, warned in a statement on Wednesday that the group would take action against any protesters who target al-Sistani.

"We will cut their hands off," he warned in a statement share in Iraqi media.

Message to Iran

The incident is the second of its kind this month, after Iraqi protesters attacked the Iranian consulate in the Iraqi holy city of Karbala on November 4.

Three people were shot dead after security forces opened fire on the demonstrators who tried to climb the consulate walls, demanding that Iran stop interfering in Iraq's internal affairs.

Commenting on the developments, Iraqi analyst Jasim Moussawi told Al Jazeera that protesters setting the consulate ablaze was an attempt to tarnish historical relations between Tehran and Baghdad.

"Those who are responsible for setting fire to the Iranian consulate in Najaf have the same message as those who did it in Karbala.

"Their message is a warning to against the intervention of Iran in Iraq's internal affairs, said Moussawi, adding that he expects the incidents will push the security forces and government to use more force to quell protests.

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2019-11-28 11:33:00Z
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North Korea launches two projectiles in Thanksgiving message to Trump - The Washington Post

AP AP In this undated photo released on Nov. 25 by the North Korean government, leader Kim Jong Un, center, inspects a military unit on Changrin Islet in North Korea.

SEOUL — North Korea fired two projectiles on Thursday, using the start of the Thanksgiving holiday in the United States to telegraph its frustration over Washington’s refusal to grant sanctions relief.

The short-range projectiles were launched from Ryonpo on the North’s east coast around 5 p.m. local time, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said. They added that the projectiles, presumed to have been fired from a super-large multiple rocket launcher, traveled a distance of about 235 miles and reached an altitude of 60 miles.

“This type of act from North Korea does not help efforts to alleviate tensions on the Korean Peninsula,” the JCS said.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe described Pyongyang’s actions as a threat to the region and the world.

“We will remain in close contact with the United States, South Korea and the international community to monitor the situation. We will increase our vigilance to preserve the safety and assets of the Japanese people,” he told reporters.

The launch continues a more aggressive posture by North Korea over recent months as talks with Washington hit a stalemate. Pyongyang has warned that its patience is running thin, and has given the United States until the end of the year to change its “hostile” policy and salvage the dialogue process.

Last month, North Korea test-fired what it said was a new “super-large” multiple rocket launcher. And earlier this week, North Korea said its troops carried out artillery drills near its disputed sea border with South Korea.

[North Korea threatens military escalation as clock ticks on year-end deadline]

Thursday’s launches appeared timed to coincide with the Thanksgiving break and the two-year anniversary of Pyongyang’s test of an intercontinental ballistic missile known as the Hwasong-15, emphasizing the message to President Trump, said Rachel Minyoung Lee, senior analyst at North Korea-focused website NK Pro.

“All in all, I think North Korea may be on a path toward more militaristic actions until the end of the year,” she said. The regime had not issued official pronouncements on the United States since Nov. 19 and appeared to be letting its weapons do the talking, Lee added.

Pyongyang has threatened to resume long-range missile and nuclear tests, which leader Kim Jong Un agreed to freeze after he met with Trump in Singapore last year. Relations deteriorated after a follow-up summit in February ended without an agreement on nuclear disarmament in exchange for sanctions relief.

[In South Korea, military cost dispute and Trump’s moves in Syria fuel doubts over U.S. commitment]

Earlier this month, North Korea accused the United States of “betrayal” for continuing to hold military exercises with South Korea, and said it no longer felt bound by its previous promises.

Pyongyang has conducted more than a dozen shorter-range ballistic missile tests since April, though Trump has repeatedly played down their significance.

Kim has called for relief from the international sanctions that hobble his economy, but the United States says North Korea has not taken sufficient disarmament steps to justify easing the pressure.

“The deadlock in nuclear talks with the United States is pushing North Korea to ramp up the level of provocation,” said Shin Beom-chul, a researcher at Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul.

North Korea has previously used U.S. holidays to send messages to Washington. It launched its first intercontinental ballistic missile on July 4, 2017.

Read more

North Korea threatens military escalation as clock ticks on year-end deadline

Kim Jong Un rides white horse on sacred mountain — and plans ‘great operation’

North Korea fires two rockets after warning it is losing patience with the U.S.

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2019-11-28 09:52:00Z
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