Troubled Toshiba flags deeper losses
Ailing electronics giant Toshiba has said its losses for 2016 may be greater than it had previously forecast.
It now predicts a net loss of 995bn yen (£7bn) for the year to March, up from its earlier estimate of 950bn yen.
The firm was demoted to the second tier of the Tokyo Exchange after confirming its liabilities outweighed its assets.
It also got regulatory approval to delay filing its annual earnings again, this time until 10 August, after a previous deadline extension to 30 June.
Failure to gain an extension would have put the troubled company's stock exchange listing in further jeopardy.
In April, Toshiba said its future may be in doubt after facing a series of difficulties.
An accounting scandal that was uncovered in 2015 led to the resignation of the chief executive and several senior managers. The company was found to have inflated the previous seven years' profits by $1.2bn.
The firm was dealt another blow in January when it became clear its US nuclear unit, Westinghouse, was in financial trouble.
Toshibas's dire financial position has forced it to try to sell off its highly prized chip unit.
The company has named a consortium of Bain Capital and Japanese government investors as the preferred bidder for the business
But US-based Western Digital, which jointly runs Toshiba's main chip operations in Japan, has filed a request with the International Court of Arbitration to stop the sale going ahead.
On Friday Toshiba chief executive Satoshi Tsunakawa said his firm was willing to talk.
"Western Digital used to be a good partner, so we want to continue talks. I'm disappointed with the current dispute," he said.
"We want Western Digital to jointly invest to fight against Samsung. It will be so disappointing if we can't do so because of the dispute."
He said Western Digital's offer had not been at the right price and that the US firm had wanted to take control of the unit, rather than keeping Toshiba executives in charge.
Toshiba is the world's second-largest chip manufacturer. Its products are used in data centres and consumer goods worldwide, including iPhones and iPads.
Source-
"Go Crazy" with Prince's Purple Rain Deluxe and Deluxe-Expanded Edition, in stores now
This Sunday marks the 33rd anniversary of the release of Prince's iconic 1984 album Purple Rain, and today sees the release of the deluxe edition and the deluxe expanded edition of the album.
As previously reported, the Purple Rain deluxe edition includes two CDs: the original album and a second CD of previously unreleased tracks.
As for the Purple Rain Deluxe -- Expanded Edition set, fans will get the two CDs that come with the deluxe version, plus a third CD of single edits and B-sides, and a DVD of Prince & The Revolution performing at the Carrier Dome in Syracuse, NY, on March 30, 1985 on the Purple Rain tour.
Purple Rain is the sixth best-selling movie soundtrack album in history, having sold more than 22 million units.
Here are the track lists for both editions:
Purple Rain Deluxe
Disc One: Original Album (2015 Paisley Park Remaster)
"Let's Go Crazy"
"Take Me With U"
"The Beautiful Ones"
"Computer Blue"
"Darling Nikki"
"When Doves Cry"
"I Would Die 4 U"
"Baby I'm A Star"
"Purple Rain"
Disc Two: From The Vault & Previously Unreleased
"The Dance Electric"
"Love and Sex"
"Computer Blue" ("Hallway Speech" version)
"Electric Intercourse" (studio)
"Our Destiny / Roadhouse Garden"
"Possessed" (1983 version)
"Wonderful A**"
"Velvet Kitty Cat"
"Katrina's Paper Dolls"
"We Can F***"
"Father's Song"
Purple Rain Deluxe - Expanded Edition
Includes Disc One and Disc Two as Listed Above, plus:
Disc Three: Single Edits & B-Sides
"When Doves Cry" (edit)
"17 Days"
"Let's Go Crazy" (edit)
"Let's Go Crazy" (Special Dance Mix)
"Erotic City"
"Erotic City" ("Make Love Not War Erotic City Come Alive")
"Purple Rain" (edit)
"God"
"God" (Love Theme From Purple Rain)
"Another Lonely Christmas"
"Another Lonely Christmas" (extended version)
"I Would Die 4 U" (edit)
"I Would Die 4 U" (extended version)
"Baby I'm A Star" (edit)
"Take Me With U" (edit)
DVD: Prince And The Revolution, Live at the Carrier Dome, Syracuse, NY, March 30, 1985
"Let's Go Crazy"
"Delirious"
"1999"
"Little Red Corvette"
"Take Me With U"
"Do Me, Baby"
"Irresistible B****"
"Possessed"
"How Come U Don't Call Me Anymore?"
"Let's Pretend We're Married"
"International Lover"
"God"
"Computer Blue"
"Darling Nikki"
"The Beautiful Ones"
"When Doves Cry"
"I Would Die 4 U"
"Baby I'm A Star"
"Purple Rain"
Johnny Depp says "assassination" comment about President Trump was a "bad joke"
Hours after actor Johnny Depp made it sound like he'd be interested in killing President Trump, he's saying he's sorry.
Depp seemingly referenced Abraham Lincoln's assassin, actor John Wilkes Booth, while introducing his new film The Libertine at England's Glastonbury Festival Thursday. Depp asked the crowd, "When was the last time an actor assassinated a president?"
He then added, "Maybe it's time."
Following a huge outcry, and a condemnation by the White House, Depp now tells People, "I apologize for the bad joke I attempted last night in poor taste about President Trump. It did not come out as intended...I intended no malice. I was only trying to amuse, not to harm anyone.”
In a statement, the White House said, "President Trump has condemned violence in all forms and it's sad that others like Johnny Depp have not followed his lead."
The statement added that the White House hoped that "some of Mr. Depp’s colleagues will speak out against this type of rhetoric as strongly as they would if his comments were directed to a Democratic elected official."
The actor is just the latest celebrity to level violent words against the president.
Back in January, Madonna told a crowd she "thought a lot about blowing up the White House." She later said she was taken out of context.
Weeks ago, comedienne Kathy Griffin apologized for a photo shoot in which she held a bloodied dummy head made to look like President Trump's.
The Central Park's Shakespeare in the Park retelling of Julius Caesar currently features the title character, dressed like Trump, getting stabbed to death nightly.
Depp's "assassination" message comes weeks after a disgruntled former Bernie Sanders campaign volunteer opened fire on a group of Republican legislators, critically wounding Rep. Steve Scalise.
Source-ABC
Hapilos Digital Music Awards on Aug 22
The seventh 21st Hapilos Digital Music Awards is scheduled for August 22 at Knutsford Court Hotel in Kingston.
It will be based on digital sales data provided by over 200 retail outlets for music released between April 1 and March 31.
Awards will be handed out in 21 categories, including: Top Selling Singles, Top Rhythms, Top Producers, and Gospel Recognition.
The event will be hosted by 21st Hapilos's vice-president of Client Projects, Nicole “Nikki Z” Duhaney.
The full list of nominees will be disclosed on July 1, a release from 21st Hapilos revealed. The inaugural 21st awards was held in May 2011.
Viking (Vybz Is King) by Vybz Kartel won Dancehall Album of The Year in 2016. It was co-produced by TJ Records and Adidjahiem.
Dancehall Single of The Year was On Fleek by Alkaline, produced by True Loyal Records.
The Intoxicated won Dancehall Riddim of The Year. It was produced by Troyton Music.
Hapilos Ent was launched in 2009. The company has distributed albums and songs by Mavado, Beenie Man, Sean Paul, Alkaline, Vybz Kartel, Shaggy, Damian Marley, J Boog, Elephant Man, and Collie Buddz.
Source-Jamaica Observer
Bravo, lawyer say CWI failed to follow due process
Estranged West Indies left-hander Darren Bravo has accused Cricket West Indies (CWI) of not affording him due process, in the decision to axe him from the Tri-Series tour of Zimbabwe last November and bar him from future selection.
Breaking his silence for the first time since the controversy erupted eight months ago, the 28-year-old said CWI's only communication with him was to indicate that his contract had been terminated and to inform him of flight details home.
He said no CWI official had sought to engage him on the matter and he found this particularly disappointing since in the past his future was to West Indies cricket.
“Even though you saw a tweet on my Twitter account, no one actually asked me if I did that,” Bravo told Massy United Insurance's Line & Length Network in an exclusive interview set to be aired this weekend.
“I went to sleep the day after the tweet, woke up at 6:30 am trying to get myself ready to head to Zimbabwe for the Tri-Series and all of a sudden I saw two e-mails – one from Roland Holder (CWI cricket operations manager) and one from Richard Pybus (former CWI director of cricket) stating that my contract has been terminated and I was being sent home.
“The other e-mail was from Roland Holder with my flight details but no one actually asked me anything.”
He continued: “I was also given an ultimatum, after being sent home, to take down the tweet by 4:00 pm and apologise on Twitter but at the end of the day no one can prove if Darren Bravo actually went on his Twitter account and tweeted that.
“There was no due process, there wasn't anything. No one asked me anything. Up to this day, no one called me and asked me, so it has been very disappointing.
“Yes, I want to play cricket for West Indies again but at the end of the day, when I step back onto the field, I want to be able to be happy, I want to be able to enjoy my cricket once more and that is probably something I have been lacking for the last year playing for West Indies.”
The impasse arose last November after Bravo rejected a downgraded central contract from CWI and president Dave Cameron subsequently said in a television interview that the player had not merited an enhanced retainer because of his “declining averages” and “poor performances”.
Cameron mistakenly inferred that Bravo had previously held a Grade A contract prompting a Twitter rant from the Trinidadian in which he labelled the Jamaican administrator “a big idiot”.
Barbadian lawyer Donna Symmonds, a member of Bravo's legal team, said her client's rights had been breached and said subsequent attempts to negotiate with CWI had ended in frustration.
Source-CMC
CIA knew in August that Putin sought to boost Trump
The CIA had top-level intelligence last August that Russian President Vladimir Putin personally ordered an operation to help Donald Trump win the US presidential race, the Washington Post reported Friday.
The intelligence shocked the White House and put US security chiefs on a top-secret crisis footing to figure out how to react.
But amid confidence that Democrat Hillary Clinton still had the election in the bag and worries over president Barack Obama himself being seen as manipulating the election, the administration delivered warnings to Moscow but left countermeasures until after the vote, the Post reported.
After Trump's shock victory, there were strong regrets among administration officials that they had shied from tough action.
"From national security people there was a sense of immediate introspection, of, 'Wow, did we mishandle this,'" a former administration official told the newspaper.
The Post said that as soon as the intelligence on Putin came in, the White House viewed it as a deep national security threat. A secret intelligence task force was created to firm up the information and come up with possible responses.
They couldn't do anything about embarrassing WikiLeaks revelations from hacked Clinton emails. The focus turned to whether Moscow could disrupt the November 8 vote itself by hacking voter registration lists or voting machines, undermining confidence in the vote tally itself.
Worried about making the situation worse, the administration put off retaliating, and instead delivered stiff warnings directly to the Russians not to go farther.
At least four direct warnings -- Obama to Putin, spy chief to spy chief, and via top diplomatic channels -- appeared to have an impact, officials told the Post. They believe that Moscow pulled back on any possible plans to sabotage US voting operations.
"We made the judgment that we had ample time after the election, regardless of outcome, for punitive measures," a senior administration official told the Post.
Options to retaliate were on the table early: more crippling sanctions on the Russian economy, leaking information that would embarrass Putin diplomatically, and launching cyberattacks on Russian infrastructure were high on the list.
But Trump's shock victory dampened the response.
Obama took modest measures at the end of December, expelling 35 Russians and adding to existing sanctions. He also, according to the Post, authorised a plan to place cyberattack implants in the systems of critical Russian infrastructure. But it remains unclear, the Post said, whether Trump has followed through with that.
Source-AFP
France marked its hottest June day since World War II
France marked its hottest June day since World War II on Wednesday as overheated residents across swathes of Europe coped with another day of sizzling temperatures.
A nationwide average of 26.4 degrees Celsius (79.5 Fahrenheit) made Wednesday the hottest day in France since 1945, the national weather agency said Thursday, with the thermometer hitting 37 C in some parts of the country.
Paris magistrates and lawyers were finally allowed to take off their heavy traditional robes as the French capital sweltered, while a peak in pollution linked to the heat forced regional authorities to restrict traffic in the city.
Relief was due in the form of cooling thunder storms in the western half of France on Friday, according to the weather agency.
Across the border in Switzerland, high temperatures forced the Muhlberg nuclear reactor to reduce its output to avoid heating an already hot Aar river, a spokeswoman for the BKW Energie company that runs the plant told the ATS news agency.
While the mercury was still hitting 35 C in parts of Europe, in Portugal cooler temperatures of below 30 C were helping firefighters to finally bring under control the forest fires that have ravaged the centre of the country since the weekend, killing 64 people.
But authorities warned that the risk of fire remained high in the tinder-dry Pedrogao Grande and Gois regions, and as far away as western Switzerland its weather agency reported a layer of ash from the Portuguese fires as having finally reached its skies.
In Spain, Agriculture Minister Isabel Garcia Tejerina described a "worrying" drought. The southeast in particular is in urgent need of rain, she said, with water reserves dropping to 50 percent as long as 10 days ago.
Belgium officially entered a heatwave overnight, while Italy has reported temperatures around eight degrees above the seasonal average -- up to 39 C in Milan.
T&T father sentenced to 20 years for incest
A High Court judge has sentenced a 50-year-old father of four to 20 years in jail after he was found guilty of having sex with one of his daughters.
The man, whose name is not being disclosed, had been found guilty in April after he pleaded not guilty to two counts of indecent assault, two counts of grievous sexual assault and attempted incest.
But Justice David Harris on Thursday said the sentence imposed on the man had to reflect the court's abhorrence and serve as a deterrent to people thinking about committing similar acts.
He said that the most serious of five offences against the father was attempted incest, which carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment. The judge said that the single parent had betrayed the trust between father and daughter.
The court heard that the father began sexually interfering with his daughter on March 31, 2008, when she was 15 and it continued until October 2009. Most of the acts took place on the child's bed when her sisters were not around. The children's mother did not live with them.
During the trial, however, the girl, now 24-years-old, refused to give evidence, saying that she was trying to rekindle her relationship with her father for the sake of her daughter.
However, in passing sentence Justice Harris said the victim's compassion for her bread-winning father, the passage of a mere 10 years nor the father's admirable traits cannot change the facts and gravity of the offences.
He noted that there were several aggravating factors in relation to the offences, noting the only mitigating factor, the judge said, was the absence of violence.
Defence attorney Ramesh Deena said that the father was working, took care of his children financially and had no previous convictions or pending matters. But the judge said the father showed no remorse.
After deducting two years each from the sentences, the judge ordered that he serve 16 years each on the grievous sexual assault charges, five years each of the indecent assault charges and 20 years on the attempted incest charge.
Justice Harris also ordered that six days be deducted from each of the sentences for the time he spent in custody awaiting trial.
Turks and Caicos Department of Statistics Conducting the Country's National Labour Force Survey
The Department of Statistics, is currently in the process of conducting a Labour Force Survey. This survey is being conducted during the period June 21st to July 21st 2017. Enumerators with IDs and special vests will visit selected households on each island. The department is asking for the support and cooperation of the general public with this exercise. A Labour Force Survey provides estimates of employment and unemployment. These are among the most important measures of economic performance of any economy. The Labour Force Survey will be conducted in the Turks and Caicos Islands twice yearly.
The data collection will be based on a sample of households throughout the Turks and Caicos Islands, drawn from an overall Listing of Households. The data is being collected through face–to–face interviews with members (or a member) of the sampled households. The information provided by these respondents will be used to produce a picture of the activities of the entire population.
The success of the Labour Force Survey in accurately capturing persons' employment status, depends on the full cooperation of the public. Persons are informed that the work of the Department of Statistics is conducted under the authority of the Statistics Act, 2012. The public is therefore assured that information provided to the department is strictly confidential and would only be disseminated at the aggregate level. The Oath of Secrecy which will be administered to each interviewer before commencement of duties also guarantees to the public that information given would not be revealed. Anyone violating this oath can be prosecuted.
The Department of Statistics is soliciting the full support and cooperation from the general public, especially the households selected for interviewing. The public's positive response to completing the questionnaire accurately and to the best of your knowledge is important to the overall success of the survey. The information provided can positively impact the development of the Turks and Caicos Islands.
C'bean hoteliers regret new US policy regarding Cuba
The Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association (CHTA) Friday said it regrets the recent United States reversal of its travel policies on Cuba and the likely effects on the socio-economic development of Cuba and the wider Caribbean region.
In a statement, the CHTA said that it would continue to support the ending of the US-Cuba embargo and its restrictions on trade and travel, and encourage Cuba's active engagement in regional economic development.
CHTA said that the announced policy changes could stall or altogether reverse the heartening progress made in recent years.
In an overhaul of one of his predecessor's signature legacies, President Donald Trump last Friday issued new guidelines on the US policy toward Cuba, tightening travel restrictions for Americans that were loosened under President Barack Obama and banning US business transactions with Cuba's vast military conglomerate.
Caribbean American legislators have described as “misguided” Trump's new policy on Cuba.
The CHTA warned that if restrictions are indeed re-imposed on Cuba, it expects adverse effects for US businesses, not only for import-export companies, but also for the US-based travel-related businesses that have made considerable investments in Cuba since normalisation began.
“Even before full normalisation, Cuba's hospitality industry's growth outpaced the rest of the region and most of the world. Major global hotel chains from outside the United States have been investing in Cuba and today they manage tens of thousands of rooms. As latecomers, US firms are already at a competitive disadvantage in Cuba. They risk becoming marginal players in the travel industry's growth in Cuba and throughout the region,” the Caribbean hoteliers said.
It said it is urging Washington and Havana “to accelerate cooperation and collaboration between their governments, based on their mutual acknowledgment that the growth of travel and trade presents the greatest opportunity for breaking the long-standing social, political and economic barriers that have historically divided the two countries.
“CHTA urges that any new regulations continue to encourage small and medium enterprise opportunities, both Cuban and US-sourced. It also urges Cuban authorities to accelerate adjusting their investment and business licensing regulations to foster the local enterprises so crucial for a growing travel industry.”
The CHTA said that a vibrant travel industry both in Cuba and throughout the Caribbean basin benefits both the region and the United States, helping to ensure the security of the United States' “Third Border” while stimulating employment, entrepreneurial activity, trade and government revenues in the region.
Source-CMC