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Author: BBC News

  • TerraUSD: South Korea ‘cryptocrash king’ Do Kwon jailed

    TerraUSD: South Korea ‘cryptocrash king’ Do Kwon jailed

    Do Kwon, the cryptocurrency boss behind the $40bn (£31.3bn) collapse of the terraUSD and Luna tokens, has been sentenced to four months of jail in Montenegro.

    Mr Kwon was found guilty of forging official documents.

    He was arrested in March as he tried to board a flight to Dubai at Podgorica Airport, in the country’s capital.

    Mr Kwon also faces charges in the US and South Korea over the collapse of the two digital tokens last year.

    The former finance officer of Mr Kwon’s company Terraform Labs, Han Chang-joon, was also sentenced to four months in prison after being found guilty of the same charges.

    Mr Kwon and Mr Han pleaded not guilty at their first court hearing in May.

    The sentences will include the time that Mr Kwon and Mr Han have already spent in detention after being arrested in March, the court said in a statement.

    They will also be able to appeal the verdict within eight days of receiving written notification from the court.

    In February, US regulators charged Mr Kwon and his company Terraform Labs with “orchestrating a multi-billion dollar crypto asset securities fraud”.

    “We allege that Terraform and Do Kwon failed to provide the public with full, fair, and truthful disclosure as required for a host of crypto asset securities, most notably for Luna and TerraUSD,” US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) chairman Gary Gensler said in a statement.

    Last year, a South Korean court issued arrest warrants for Mr Kwon and five other individuals connected to the case.

    Prosecutors said they believed that Terraform Labs, which is registered in Singapore, had violated capital market rules.

    Montenegro does not have extradition treaties with the US or South Korea.

    The collapse of the terraUSD stablecoin and the associated Luna token rocked cryptocurrency markets in May 2022.

  • Pirelli: Italy blocks Chinese control of tyre giant

    Pirelli: Italy blocks Chinese control of tyre giant

    Italy has moved to block a Chinese state-owned company from taking control of tyre making giant Pirelli.

    The decision is part of measures announced by Italy’s government to protect Pirelli’s independence.

    Beijing-controlled chemical giant Sinochem is Pirelli’s biggest shareholder, with a 37% stake in the 151-year-old Milan-based firm.

    It comes as tensions between Beijing and the West are in focus as the US secretary of state visits China.

    On Sunday, Pirelli said in a statement to investors that the Italian government had ruled that only Camfin – a company controlled by Pirelli’s boss Marco Tronchetti Provera – could nominate candidates to be its chief executive.

    Pirelli also said the government had decided that any changes to the company’s corporate governance should be subject to official scrutiny.

    It came after Sinochem told the Italian government in March that it planned to renew and update an existing shareholder pact.

    Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s administration examined the agreement under the so-called “Golden Power Procedure” rules, which are aimed at protecting businesses that are viewed as strategically important to the nation.

    In 2015, Pirelli was sold for €7.1bn (£6.1bn; $7.8bn) to a group of investors including ChemChina and Camfin.

    Six years later ChemChina merged with state-owned Sinochem. The Chinese government’s Silk Road investment fund also owns a 9% stake in Pirelli.

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in Beijing, on his final day of a rare visit to China by such a high-ranking Washington official.

    Mr Blinken’s trip comes as the relationships between China and many Western nations have deteriorated in recent years over issues including trade, Taiwan and security.

    Before his visit officials saw little chance of any breakthrough on the many disputes between the world’s two biggest economies, which include Washington’s attempts to slow the development of China’s computer chip industry.

  • Antony Blinken begins talks in Beijing during high-stakes visit to China

    Antony Blinken begins talks in Beijing during high-stakes visit to China

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is meeting with China’s Foreign Minister Qin Gang in Beijing at the start of two days of talks with Chinese officials.

    The visit is the first by an American diplomat to China in almost five years.

    US officials say the main goal of the talks is to stabilise a relationship that has become extremely tense.

    It comes nearly five months after an earlier Blinken visit was postponed, following the flight of a suspected Chinese spy balloon in US airspace.

    Mr Qin greeted Mr Blinken on Sunday at the Diaoyutai State Guest House, a lavish estate that typically hosts visiting dignitaries.

    The two shook hands as they stood before their respective flags, then sat down with their delegations at long tables to begin their meetings.

    The greeting was business-like, underscoring the chilly relations that have developed between the two superpowers in recent years.

    The US has been lowering expectations for the trip and both sides have made clear they do not expect any major breakthrough.

    The goal, US officials say, is to reopen lines of high-level communication and stabilise relations that have become strained since the balloon incident.

    China has staged military exercises near Taiwan, which Beijing views as an integral part of China. The US maintains close ties with Taiwan’s democratically-elected government.

    There is a full agenda, including meetings with Qin Gang and senior Chinese foreign policy official Wang Yi.

    The war in Ukraine, trade disputes over advanced computer technologies, the fentanyl drug epidemic in the US and Chinese human rights conduct are all topics the Americans expect to be discussed.

    Chinese officials have reacted coolly to Mr Blinken’s visit, questioning whether the US is sincere in its efforts to mend relations.

    It is not clear whether he will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping.

    Mr Blinken is the highest-ranking US government official to visit China since President Joe Biden took office in January 2021.

    “If we want to make sure, as we do, that the competition that we have with China doesn’t veer into conflict, the place you start is with communicating,” Mr Blinken told reporters on Friday.

    Later he said he hoped to meet President Xi in the next few months.

    A meeting between President Biden and Xi Jinping in Bali in November briefly eased fears of a new Cold War, but since the balloon incident high-level communication between the two leaders has been rare.

  • Blinken arrives in Beijing for high-stakes visit to China

    Blinken arrives in Beijing for high-stakes visit to China

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has arrived in Beijing for two days of meetings with Chinese officials.

    The trip marks the first visit by an American diplomat to China in almost five years.

    US officials say the main goal of the talks is to stabilise a relationship that has become extremely tense.

    It comes nearly five months after an earlier Blinken visit was postponed, following the flight of a suspected Chinese spy balloon in US airspace.

    The US has been lowering expectations for the visit and both sides have made clear they do not expect any major breakthrough.

    The goal, US officials say, is to reopen lines of high-level communication and stabilise relations that have become strained since the balloon incident.

    China has staged military exercises near Taiwan, which Beijing views as an integral part of China. The US maintains close ties with Taiwan’s democratically-elected government.

    There is a full agenda, including meetings with Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang and senior Chinese foreign policy official Wang Yi.

    The war in Ukraine, trade disputes over advanced computer technologies, the fentanyl drug epidemic in the US and Chinese human rights conduct are all topics the Americans expect to be discussed.

    Chinese officials have reacted coolly to Mr Blinken’s visit, questioning whether the US is sincere in its efforts to mend relations.

    It is not clear whether he will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping.

    Mr Blinken is the highest-ranking US government official to visit China since President Joe Biden took office in January 2021.

    “If we want to make sure, as we do, that the competition that we have with China doesn’t veer into conflict, the place you start is with communicating,” Mr Blinken told reporters on Friday.

    Later he said he hoped to meet President Xi in the next few months.

    A meeting between President Biden and Xi Jinping in Bali in November briefly eased fears of a new Cold War, but since the balloon incident high-level communication between the two leaders has been rare.

  • Uganda school attack: 40 killed by militants linked to Islamic State group

    Uganda school attack: 40 killed by militants linked to Islamic State group

    At least 40 people, mostly students, have been killed at a school in western Uganda by rebels linked to the Islamic State group.

    A further eight people remain in a critical condition after the attack on Lhubiriha secondary school in Mpondwe.

    Boys who were staying in dormitories at the school are among the dead.

    The Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) – a Ugandan group based in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) – have been blamed for Friday’s attack.

    • Warning: Some people may find details in this story distressing.

    Many of the bodies were transferred to Bwera Hospital, national police spokesperson Fred Enanga said.

    The attack happened at around 23:30 local time (20:30 GMT) on Friday at the school in the Kasese district in western Uganda.

    Over 60 people are educated at the school, most of whom live there.

    ADF rebels burnt a dormitory and a food store was also looted during the incident, Mr Enanga said.

    Some of the boys were burnt or hacked to death, Major General Dick Olum from the Ugandan army told the media.

    Others at the school, mostly girls, have been abducted by the group, he added.

    Some of the bodies are said to have been badly burnt and DNA tests will need to be carried out to identify them.

    The attackers are said to have torched the students’ mattresses and are also thought to have detonated bombs in the region.

    Members of the wider community are possibly among the dead. A number of students remain unaccounted for.

    Soldiers are pursuing ADF insurgents towards the DRC’s Virunga National park – Africa’s oldest and largest national park which is home to rare species, including mountain gorillas.

    Militias including the ADF also use the vast expanse, which borders Uganda and Rwanda, as a hideout.

    “Our forces are pursuing the enemy to rescue those abducted and destroy this group,” defence spokesperson Felix Kulayigye said on Twitter.

    The Ugandan army has also deployed planes to help track the rebel group.

    Uganda and the DRC have held joint military operations in the east Congo to prevent attacks by the ADF.

    Security forces had intelligence that rebels were in the border area on the DRC side for at least two days before Friday night’s attack, Major General Olum said.

    The deadly episode follows last week’s attack by suspected ADF fighters in a village in the DRC near to the Ugandan border. Over 100 villagers fled to Uganda but have since returned.

    The attack on the school, located less than two kilometres (1.25 miles) from the DRC border, is the first such attack on a Ugandan school in 25 years.

    In June 1998, 80 students were burnt to death in their dormitories in an ADF attack on Kichwamba Technical Institute near the border of DRC. More than 100 students were abducted.

    The ADF was created in eastern Uganda in the 1990s and took up arms against long-serving President, Yoweri Museveni, alleging government persecution of Muslims.

    After its defeat by the Ugandan army in 2001, it relocated to North Kivu province in the DRC.

    The group’s principal founder, Jamil Makulu, was arrested in Tanzania in 2015 and is in custody in a Ugandan prison.

    ADF rebels have been operating from inside the DRC for the past two decades.

    Makulu’s successor, Musa Seka Baluku, reportedly first pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group in 2016, but it was not until April 2019 that IS first acknowledged its activity in the area.

    In 2021, suicide bombings in Uganda’s capital Kampala and other parts of the country were blamed on the ADF.

  • Bill Gates meets Xi Jinping as US-China tensions simmer

    Bill Gates meets Xi Jinping as US-China tensions simmer

    Microsoft’s co-founder Bill Gates met China’s President Xi Jinping on Friday as tensions remain high between Washington and Beijing.

    Mr Xi told Mr Gates that he was “the first American friend” he had met in Beijing this year, according to Chinese state media.

    Mr Gates is the latest high-profile US business leader to visit China since it reopened its borders.

    This weekend, the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will also visit China.

    “I often say that the foundation of Sino-US relations is among the people, and we always look to the American people and hope that the two peoples will continue to be friendly,” Mr Xi was reported to have said to Mr Gates.

    It was Mr Xi’s first meeting with a foreign business figure in recent years. He stopped travelling abroad in 2020, when China shut its borders during the pandemic. Mr Xi and Mr Gates are last known to have met in 2015.

    This year, Tesla’s Elon Musk, Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan and Apple’s Tim Cook have all travelled to the country.

    While they held meetings with senior Chinese officials, they did not meet Mr Xi.

    Mr Gates is in China in his role as the co-chairman of the The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation he started with his former wife.

    In 2020, Mr Gates stepped down from Microsoft’s board to focus on the foundation, which focuses on global health, education and climate change.

    He had quit his full-time executive role at the technology giant 12 years earlier.

    Mr Blinken – who is the first US cabinet official to visit China since 2019 – is scheduled to arrive in Beijing this weekend. However expectations are low that any serious headway will be made on the growing list of disputes between the US and China.

  • Microsoft $69bn gaming deal temporarily blocked in US

    Microsoft $69bn gaming deal temporarily blocked in US

    A judge has granted a request by regulators in the US to temporarily block Microsoft’s $69bn (£56bn) purchase of Activision Blizzard.

    The court says the temporary restraining order “is necessary to maintain the status quo while the complaint is pending”.

    The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) says the deal could “substantially lessen competition” in the sector.

    A two-day hearing is now due to take place from 22 June in San Francisco.

    The deal to buy the Call of Duty publisher would be the largest in the history of the video games industry.

    The FTC said that without a court order the deal could have been completed as early as the end of this week, despite the UK blocking the takeover in April.

    Microsoft and Activision now have until 16 June to submit legal arguments to oppose a preliminary injunction and the FTC, which enforces competition law in the US, will have to reply on 20 June.

    The FTC has argued that the deal would give Microsoft’s Xbox exclusive access to Activision games, leaving Nintendo consoles and Sony’s PlayStation out in the cold.

    Microsoft has said the deal would benefit gamers and gaming companies, and has offered to sign a legally binding agreement with the FTC to provide Call of Duty games to rivals including Sony for a decade.

    The move comes after the UK blocked the deal over concerns it would hurt competition, but the EU approved it.

    Microsoft’s proposed takeover of Activision has split global regulators, and in order for the deal to go through the parties need approval from regulatory bodies in the UK, the EU and the US.

    The European Commission has approved the acquisition, saying that Microsoft’s offer of 10-year free licensing deals – which promise European consumers and cloud game streaming services access to Activision’s PC and console games – mean there would be fair competition in the market.

    But the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) blocked the deal in April, saying it was concerned the takeover would offer reduced innovation and less choice for gamers.

    Microsoft and Activision hit out at the CMA’s decision and said they would appeal.

    Microsoft president Brad Smith said it marked the company’s “darkest day” in its four decades of working in Britain.

    In response to the announcement by the FTC on Monday, Mr Smith said Microsoft welcomed the “opportunity to present our case in federal court” in its attempt to persuade US regulators to allow the deal to be completed.

    “We believe accelerating the legal process in the US will ultimately bring more choice and competition to the market,” he added.

    The purchase of Activision, which also makes Candy Crush, is seen to be important for Microsoft, which is trying to catch up with its main competitor Sony.

    However, this attempted investment from Microsoft could be seen as a play for the future of video games, with the firm betting big on its Xbox Game Pass service, which has been described as the “Netflix of games”.

    Microsoft believes the future lies in players having subscriptions to libraries and streaming games through “cloud gaming”, rather than making one-off purchases – which is the main way of accessing games at the moment.

  • Twitter to be ‘most accurate real-time info source’ – news boss

    Twitter to be ‘most accurate real-time info source’ – news boss

    The new boss of social media firm Twitter, Linda Yaccarino, has outlined her plans for “Twitter 2.0.”, after taking over from Elon Musk a week ago.

    She says the company is “on a mission to become the world’s most accurate real-time information source”.

    Since Mr Musk bought Twitter last year, it has faced criticism over its approach to tackling disinformation.

    In the last month, the company lost its head of trust and safety and pulled out of the EU’s disinformation code.

    In a series of tweets, which was also emailed to employees, Ms Yaccarino echoed Mr Musk’s goal, that Twitter must transform the “global town square”.

    She said this would help “drive civilisation forward through the unfiltered exchange of information and open dialogue about the things that matter most to us.”

    “Users need to know that the town square is not biased,” Ray Wang, the chief executive of Silicon Valley-based research firm Constellation told the BBC.

    Mr Musk, who is a self-described “free speech absolutist”, has criticised Twitter’s policies on moderating content, arguing that it needed to be a genuine forum for free speech.

    But his moves to reinstate right-wing accounts, whose views he has shared, and loosen moderation have driven away advertisers. In December, revenue reportedly fell by 40% to a year earlier.

    For advertisers to return, they need to know what to expect in terms of user content and engagement, Mr Wang said.

    “She is definitely someone who can balance out Elon and go toe-to-toe with him as he respects her,” he added.

    Since buying Twitter last year for $44bn (£35.1bn), Mr Musk had been under pressure to find someone to lead the firm so that he could focus on his other businesses, which include electric carmaker Tesla and rocket firm SpaceX.

    On 12 May, Mr Musk, who recently reclaimed the title of the world’s richest person, announced that Ms Yaccarino would succeed him as the chief executive of Twitter in six weeks time.

    However, she started the role earlier than expected, just days after the resignation of the firm’s head of trust and safety.

    Ms Yaccarino is credited with helping to steer media giant NBCUniversal through upheaval in the industry caused by changing technology.

    In her former role, she overhauled the company’s advertising sales business and was behind the 2020 launch of its advert-supported streaming platform Peacock.

    She now oversees business operations at Twitter, which has been struggling to make money, while Mr Musk continues as the company’s executive chairman and chief technology officer.

    “We believe Linda has a solid vision for Twitter with a lot of wood to chop that can be turned around,” Daniel Ives from Wedbush Securities said.

    “This is a great first step and she knows the task ahead for Twitter to monetise the platform which remains the golden goose.”

    Story by BBC.

  • Colombia plane crash: Mum told children to leave her and get help

    Colombia plane crash: Mum told children to leave her and get help

     

    The mother of four children rescued after 40 days in the Amazon jungle was alive for four days after their plane crashed.

    Magdalena Mucutuy told her children to leave and find help as she lay dying.

    Speaking to reporters, the children’s father, Manuel Ranoque, said his eldest daughter told him their mother urged them to “get out” and save themselves.

    The siblings, aged 13, nine, five, and one, were rescued and airlifted out of the jungle on Friday.

    They were moved to a military hospital in the nation’s capital Bogota.

    “The one thing that [13-year-old Lesly] has cleared up for me is that, in fact, her mother was alive for four days,” Ranoque told reporters outside the hospital.

    “Before she died, their mum told them something like, ‘You guys get out of here. You guys are going to see the kind of man your dad is, and he’s going to show you the same kind of great love that I have shown you,” he said.

    Details have been emerging about the children’s time in the jungle and their miraculous rescue – including the first things the children said when they were found.

    Rescue worker Nicolas Ordonez Gomes recalled the moment they discovered the children.

    “The eldest daughter, Lesly, with the little one in her arms, ran towards me. Lesly said: ‘I’m hungry,’” he told public broadcast channel RTVC.

    “One of the two boys was lying down. He got up and said to me: ‘My mum is dead.’” He said rescuers responded with “positive words, saying that we were friends that we were sent by the family”.

    Ordonez Gomes said the boy replied: “I want some bread and sausage.”

    In footage released on Sunday of the children’s rescue, the four siblings appeared to be emaciated from the weeks they spent fending for themselves in the wilderness.

    Ms Mucutuy and her children had been travelling on the Cessna 206 aircraft to Araracuara, in Amazonas province, to San José del Guaviare, on 1 May when it issued a mayday alert due to engine failure.

    The bodies of the mother and the two pilots were found at the crash site by the army, but it appeared that the children had wandered into the rainforest to find help.

    The missing children became the focus of a huge rescue operation involving dozens of soldiers and local people.

    Rescuers tracked the children down after spotting signs in the jungle, including footprints and fruit that had been bitten into.

    Members of the children’s community had hoped that their knowledge of fruits and jungle survival skills would give them a better chance of remaining alive.

    Astrid Cáceres, head of the Colombian Institute of Family Welfare, said the timing of their ordeal meant the “the jungle was in harvest” and they could eat fruit that was in bloom.