Vince Cable calls for criminal investigation into Barclays bankers

Business secretary backs demand for police inquiry into bank fined £290m for role in manipulating City interest rates

Andrew Sparrow, political correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 1 July 2012 13.28 BST

Vince Cable said the public 'can’t understand why people are thrown into jail for petty theft and these guys just walk away'. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/PA

Vince Cable has called for a criminal investigation into the conduct of the Barclays bankers responsible for rigging key interest rates.
The business secretary said the public would not understand why people were jailed for petty theft while bankers were getting off, "having perpetrated what looks like conspiracy".
And he said he agreed with Lord Blair, the former Metropolitan police commissioner, who said there appeared to be evidence that Barclays employees were engaged in conspiracy to defraud.
In an interview with Sky's Dermot Murnaghan, Blair said: "There have to be police inquiries into this.
"Anybody, the youngest detective, would say this is conspiracy to defraud. It can mean nothing else. And therefore someone has to launch a criminal inquiry into this behaviour."
Speaking on the same programme, Cable said "his instincts" were to agree with Blair, and that members of the public would expect a criminal investigation too.
"They just can't understand why people are thrown into jail for petty theft and these guys just walk away having perpetrated what looks like conspiracy," Cable said.
Barclays has been fined £290m in the UK and the US for its "serious, widespread" role in manipulating two City interest rates used to determine the cost of borrowing. Investigations into other banks are continuing.
In a statement to the Commons on Thursday, the chancellor, George Osborne, played down the prospects of any of those involved facing criminal prosecution because rigging Libor [the London interbank offered rate] is not a criminal offence under the City's regulatory regime.
As well as expressing his personal support for a criminal investigation, Cable said he had been told that the Serious Fraud Office was having "a fresh look" at the evidence produced by the Financial Services Authority (FSA) investigation into Barclays.
He also said there was "an awful lot of cleaning up still be be done" in the City.
In a separate interview on Sunday, on the BBC's The Andrew Marr Show, Lord Turner, the chairman of the FSA, said regulation needed to be tightened "considerably" in this field.
"If you go back over 20 years, we started with, in these sort of areas, a very light-touch, self-regulatory approach. And slowly over the last 15 years or so we have toughened our approach," Turner said.
"The 1997 act was a toughening. Further steps were made a few years ago to give us the ability to bring criminal charges in particular areas of market abuse. But they did not cover the Libor market.
"I think we now have to look further and see whether we should strengthen these powers considerably on top of what we have now got at the moment."
Osborne told MPs last week the government would consider creating new criminal sanctions "for the directors of failed banks where there is proven criminal negligence".
Turner said he also understood the government would accept an FSA proposal saying that in future, if a bank fails, there should be a presumption against the directors being allowed to carry on working in the industry again.

Controversy hits France's crackdown on drink driving

A new French law that came into force on Sunday July 1 demands all motorists in France, including tourists, to carry a breathalyser kit in their vehicle. Opponents of the ruling say it is more about lining pockets than saving lives.

By FRANCE 24 (text)

A new French law came into force Sunday forcing drivers to carry a breathalyser kit in the car at all times.
But just days before the new law came into force, a road safety group was accused of trying to profit from the law.
It has emerged that the chief of the road safety group that persuaded Nicolas Sarkozy’s government to adopt the ruling is also a senior executive with the leading manufacturer of the blow-in-the-bag test kits.
French daily Sud Ouest revealed on Wednesday that Daniel Orgeval, the president of the anti-drink driving lobby group I-Test, also works for Contralco, the leading manufacturer of the equipment.
I-Test was formed just eight months before Sarkozy’s government adopted the new law in March last year.
Contralco, one of only two companies who produce a test-kit of the required standard, was reportedly in financial difficulties until the law was approved. But since then it has taken on over 100 staff, thanks in no small part to a demand for five million test kits a month.
Sud Ouest’s exposure of Orgeval’s double role has led to an angry response from other motorist groups.
“Everyone is a winner except the road user,” said Chantal Perrichon of the French League against Road Violence.
Perrichon told Europe 1 radio station the breathalyser only serves to “make the manufacturers rich”.
“They used their address book and they achieved their goal and you can only congratulate them,” Perrichon said sarcastically. “But the 37 million drivers who are forced to buy the chemical breath tests can only lament the government’s inability to make the right choice.”
€11 fine
Former President Sarkozy had vowed to cut the number of deaths on France’s roads, nearly a third of which are due to drink-driving, according to France’s road safety authority. In the UK the number stands at 17 percent and in Germany at 12 percent.
Orgeval hit back at his critics on Wednesday, claiming he had acted completely within the law.
“We play a proactive role,” Orgeval told Europe 1. “If this is lobbying then I say yes, because we lobbied for road safety and for road users. And if it helps create jobs for a French company then so much the better.”
The law is aimed at encouraging drivers to test themselves before driving. The drink-driving limit in France is set at 50mg of alcohol in 100ml of blood, which is lower than the legal limit in Britain (80mg/100ml).
Critics of the scheme say the test kits do not give accurate readings and are worthless because most drivers who pose a risk will know they are over the limit without blowing into a bag.
Anyone caught without a breathalyser kit in their car will be liable for an €11 on-the-spot fine, although a period of grace means those motorists who flout the law will not be forced to pay the penalty until November.
Tourists visiting France from Britain have been warned to purchase the kits before they arrive in France as police have threatened to crack down on the major routes leading to and from France’s ports.

Date created : 27/06/2012 

Anti-poverty candidate leads as presidential poll kicks off

Mexico

Mexico votes Sunday to elect a new president, with the Institutional Revolutionary Party candidate leading on an anti-poverty platform that makes little mention of the drug violence that has plagued the tenure of outgoing President Felipe Calderon.

 

By News Wires (text)

 

AFP - Voters in Mexico, tired of rampant drug violence and 12 years of conservative leaders, go to the polls Sunday to elect a new president -- likely the candidate from the party that ruled for decades.
Pre-vote surveys show Enrique Pena Nieto -- the well-coiffed, dapper-dressed candidate for the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) -- heading for a slam-dunk victory in the country of 112 million people.
"My priority will be to battle the poverty in our country at its roots," Pena Nieto, a former state governor, told a cheering crowd at his final campaign stop Wednesday in Toluca, just west of Mexico City.

Mexico elections 2012 MEXICO-USA Can twin elections spell change along Rio Grande? MEXICO Critics fear PRI party revival in Mexico MEXICO Mexico student protests trip up presidential frontrunner

Hundreds of party candidates are likely to benefit from Pena Nieto's predicted electoral tidal wave.
The candidate did not mention the violence plaguing the country, which has left more than 50,000 dead since outgoing President Felipe Calderon deployed the military to crack down on drug cartels in late 2006.
Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador from the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) still believes he can pull an upset by attracting voters who want to prevent the PRI from returning to power.
For decades synonymous with the Mexican state, the PRI governed through a mix of lavish patronage and selective repression, and by isolating political foes through rigged elections and skewed media coverage.
Peru's Mario Vargas Llosa once dubbed it "the perfect dictatorship."
Lopez Obrador would know: he is one of the prominent left-wing PRI members who split with the party after the controversial 1988 election and co-founded the PRD.
The PRI was in power for 71 years until 2000, when Vicente Fox from the conservative National Action Party was elected president. Fox was followed by Calderon, a fellow PAN member.
Lopez Obrador, often referred to by his initials AMLO, lost the 2006 presidential vote by less than one percentage point.
Outraged at perceived voter fraud, he closed down Mexico City with street protests for more than a month.

MEXICO Female candidate stirs up Mexican presidency battle

This year a kinder, gentler Lopez Obrador, now 58, talked about leading a "republic of love" on the campaign trail. Critics laughed, but in the last weeks support among voters for AMLO began to rise.
In order to win, Lopez Obrador will need to peel votes away from PAN candidate Josefina Vazquez Mota -- an unlikely task, given their divergent political philosophies.
Vazquez Mota, 51, is the first female presidential candidate of a major Mexican party, but her campaign failed to excite voters, in part because she lacked bold proposals and in part due to her association with the unpopular Calderon, who by law cannot run for re-election.
It is hard for Pena Nieto, 45, not to shine with his glamorous TV star wife on his arm and three gorgeous children in tow when compared to his older, lackluster rivals.
Pena Nieto is a former governor of the densely populated state of Mexico. He is married to Angelica Rivera, star of the hit telenovela "Distilled Love," and ran a model campaign with tightly-staged photo ops and slick ads.
Neither his bland performance in two televised presidential debates, nor a student movement prematurely dubbed the "Mexican Spring," nor leaked documents alleging that he paid for years of glowing media coverage dented Pena Nieto's lead in the polls.
Even though security is a top concern in Mexico -- where in vast regions kidnappings are rampant, drug hits are common and gang warfare has left a grisly trail of dismembered bodies -- the candidates have only proposed slight modifications to Calderon's disliked policies.

Kenya church attacks 'kill 16' in Garissa

1 July 2012 Last updated at 11:41 GMT

 

Police say gunmen used grenades and guns to carry out the attacks

Sixteen people have been killed in attacks on churches in the Kenyan town of Garissa near Somalia, say the Kenyan Red Cross and a medical official.

Regional deputy police chief Philip Ndolo said balaclava-clad "goons" attacked the town's Catholic church and the African Inland Church (AIC).
A combination of grenades and gunfire was used, police said.
Kenya's border region has been tense since it sent troops into Somalia to pursue al-Shabab Islamic militants.
Kenya said the operations, launched last October, were designed to bring an end to kidnappings on Kenyan soil and other violence which it blamed on al-Shabab.
But since then, al-Shabab has been blamed for a further string of grenade and bomb blasts across Kenya - though it has never admitted to carrying out any such attack on Kenyan territory.
No group has yet said it carried out these latest attacks, but the finger of blame will once again undoubtedly be pointed at al-Shabab or sympathisers, says the BBC's Kevin Mwachiro in Nairobi.
"We condemn this act in the strongest terms possible," Mr Ndolo said.
The Supreme Council of Kenya Muslims also condemned Sunday's church attacks, saying that "all places of worship must be respected", reported the AFP news agency.
'Terrible scene' Sunday's attacks took place during morning sermons at the churches in the garrison town.
Police say 10 people died, but the Kenyan Red Cross later said the death toll had risen to 16, a figure confirmed by the provincial medical officer who covers Garissa.
About 40 were thought to be wounded, several in serious condition.
The first and most serious attack took place at the AIC, police told our correspondent.

Gunmen shot two policemen outside one of the churches, and grenades were then thrown inside. As the panicked congregation rushed to escape, gunmen fired on them, police said. At least 10 people died.
In the second - apparently co-ordinated - attack at a Catholic church, two grenades were thrown inside the church. One failed to go off, but police say three people were injured by the other one.
Police said up to seven gunmen were involved in the attacks, but none had been apprehended.
Witnesses told AFP that bodies lay scattered in the blood-spattered churches as scores of wounded were rushed to hospital.
"It is a terrible scene, you can see bodies lying in the churches," regional police chief Leo Nyongesa told the agency.
"You can imagine for such a small town how the police and medical services have been stretched trying to deal with this," Mr Ndolo told Reuters news agency.
Garissa is the capital of North Eastern province, about 140km (90 miles) from the Somali border.
It is close to the Dadaab refugee camp, where gunmen kidnapped four aid workers and killed a driver on Friday in an attack Mr Ndolo said he suspected al-Shabab sympathisers of carrying out.
These two incidents have not painted a good picture of the efficacy of Kenyan security forces, our correspondent says.
Troops are supposed to have secured the Kenya-Somali border and frontier towns, but this does not seem to be happening, he adds.

Mass protests as Hong Kong marks 15 years under China

Correspondents say confidence in the Beijing government is at a new low

Thousands of pro-democracy marchers are on the streets of Hong Kong as the former British colony marks 15 years since the return to Chinese rule.

The rally takes place annually in support of human rights, but has been bolstered by anger towards Beijing.
Earlier, China's visiting President Hu Jintao swore in businessman CY Leung as the territory's new leader.
During the ceremony, a lone heckler tried to interrupt Mr Hu's speech.
On the streets outside, massive crowds beat drums and waved flags as they marched though the city to call for full democracy and express their frustration with the mainland.

At the scene

Juliana Liu BBC News, Hong Kong

There was a carnival atmosphere, with pro-democracy political parties chanting slogans. Members of civic groups showed off their singing and dancing skills. And supporters of the Falun Gong spiritual group, which is banned in mainland China, sat peacefully in the lotus position, before joining in the protest with their marching band.

Elaine Mok, a demonstrator who took part with her extended family, told me she marches nearly every year in order to fight for justice and the rule of law, and to oppose mainland interference in Hong Kong affairs. They were there, she said, to remind their Chinese overlords that Hong Kong people want the right to vote, as promised when this city returned to mainland rule.

Most of the protesters were professionals like Ms Mok. Some families brought their young children. A broad cross-section of Hong Kong society gathered to agitate against one-party rule in China and to demand the right to universal suffrage, which people here increasingly believe is their natural birthright.

One of the main complaints is that the system used to choose Hong Kong's leader is designed to install Beijing's choice.

A so-called electoral college of 1,200 business leaders and other influential citizens, mostly loyal to Beijing, selects the leader.
"China's way of thinking is totally different from ours," 46-year-old protester Bono Lay told the Associated Press.
Choreographed visit At the swearing-in ceremony, Mr Hu offered "warm congratulations" to the 57-year-old Mr Leung and his team and described the 15th anniversary as a "joyous occasion".
He reiterated Beijing's commitment to the "one country, two systems" policy whereby Hong Kongers are allowed many more political freedoms than Chinese people on the mainland.
Mr Hu continued the address despite an interruption by a member of the crowd, who was heard calling for a condemnation of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre and an end to one-party rule in China.
The man, who was a guest at the inauguration ceremony, was quickly bundled out of the harbourfront building by security.
The BBC's Juliana Liu, in Hong Kong, says Mr Hu's visit has been carefully choreographed.

Hu Jintao offered greetings to the people of Hong Kong

But on Saturday police had to shield the president from demonstrators, and officers used pepper spray to disperse crowds who were demanding an investigation into the death in China of a Tiananmen activist, Li Wangyang, last month.
Our correspondent says the expression of discontent is a far cry from Mr Hu's last visit five years ago, when he toured Hong Kong in a blaze of pre-Olympic glory.
His visit comes as public confidence in the Beijing government has fallen to a new low.
People are unhappy with record property prices, an increasing wealth gap, a lack of democracy and a string of political scandals, our correspondent says.
Hong Kong, a British colony until 1997, has a comparatively high degree of autonomy from Beijing.
But China's leaders in Beijing have resisted public pressure for full democracy in the city.
Mr Leung replaces Donald Tsang, who took office in 2005.

Pro-SCAF protesters continue sit-in, block traffic

MENA

Sun, 01/07/2012 - 12:58

Photographed by Virginie Nguyen

Supporters of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces and former presidential candidate Ahmed Shafiq continued their sit-in before the Memorial of the Unknown Soldier in Nasr City on Sunday.

The sit-in started on Friday following a demonstration that expressed recognition of the supplementary constitutional declaration issued by the SCAF on 17 June.
Policemen diverted traffic to bypass the area as protesters blocked the road.
Protesters said they will not end their sit-in until their demands are fulfilled.
They called for a civil constitution, a law to ensure that all social groups will be represented in the People’s Assembly, and judicial independence. They also demanded that the majority of parliamentary seats not be controlled by one faction and that the public prosecutor consider all suspects innocent until proven guilty in court, especially with regard to complaints filed against Shafiq.
Edited translation from MENA

Morsy strikes a power-sharing deal to shore up presidency

Rana Khazbak

Mohamed Elmeshad

Sun, 01/07/2012 - 10:32

Photographed by other

Many Egyptians have not yet sobered from the ecstasy of finally getting a civilian president, for the first time in the history of the 60-year-old republic.

But only a few days after the announcement of Muslim Brotherhood presidential candidate Mohamed Morsy’s victory, signs point to a less-than-perfect picture, in which the old regime’s rules still persist.

Despite the showdown between the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces and the Brotherhood in the months preceding the election, Morsy’s victory reveals a new phase of political arrangements between the two. For one, they have already come to a decision on how to split control over government institutions, said Essam Haddad, a Morsy aide.

According to Haddad, an initial agreement entails that the army will maintain control over its budget and internal affairs but will not intervene in the assembly charged with drafting the country’s new constitution.

An anonymous source told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the Brotherhood will be in charge of the ministries of Finance and Foreign Affairs but will be required to keep away from the Defense, Interior and Justice ministries.

The amicable agreement between the military council and the Brotherhood would confine the Islamist group’s authority to these institutions, and safeguard the SCAF from being sidelined by a non-allied president.

“We are indeed in negotiations with the military council,” said Sobhi Saleh, a leading Brotherhood figure.

However, the arrangement plants a ticking time bomb that could jeopardize Morsy’s presidency, once he and his group seek to expand their powers.

Bahey el-Din Hassan, director of the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, said the two sides had clearly come to an agreement.

“Morsy’s victory is not just based on getting the majority of votes, but also on a power-sharing agreement that took place with the SCAF, in which the military will maintain its control over the national security ministries and institutions, including defense, police, intelligence and justice,” Hassan said.

But Morsy may have had few other options. “At least for now, Morsy has little choice but to agree to these conditions or he might lose everything, especially with the existence of the supplementary constitutional declaration,” Hassan said.

Only a few days before the election, the ruling military council added an addendum to the Constitutional Declaration that has governed Egypt since March 2011. The declaration limits the powers of the president and adds to those of the military council, with respect to the state budget, constitution-writing assembly and the ability to declare war, for which the president must first obtain approval from the military council. The document also takes away from Morsy the title of commander-in-chief of the armed forces.

But a power-sharing agreement with the military would be a de facto continuation of the old regime which, since 1952, has seen a clear split between so-called service and sovereign ministries. Sovereign ministries are usually related to national security, and they are the ones the Brotherhood is expected to cede.

Morsy and his group have changed their rhetoric toward the SCAF since his victory and after vehement criticism over the last few weeks. In his first national address on Sunday, Morsy thanked the armed forces for their efforts during the transition. Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, the head of the military council, met with Morsy on Tuesday and said the military would stand with the incoming president.

“Morsy and his campaign are pragmatic. They don’t want a showdown at this moment — it’s not part of their makeup. They want gradual change and they want to be true to the revolution at the same time,” said Maha Azzam, an associate fellow with the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Chatham House and an expert on Islamist groups in Egypt.

Security

Since winning the election, Morsy has been making the rounds of government institutions, looking to iron out differences and shore up his presidency by building working partnerships with government institutions that may have been loath to the idea of working under an Islamist.

On Monday, he met with the High Council of Police to discuss public security and assure senior officials that he would not take revenge against them for past transgressions against his fellow Brothers. He shook hands with a member of the High Council of Police, once his jailer in 2006.

Morsy, a longtime leading Brotherhood figure, was twice imprisoned for participating in protests, first over judiciary independence in 2006, and on 28 January last year, during the 18-day uprising.

The Brotherhood itself spent the majority of its 84-year existence as a banned group, subject to an array of security clampdowns and mass arrests by a police force that was taught to treat the group with suspicion and often resorted to brutal tactics to suppress its members. The desire for revenge is not inconceivable for some.

Yet the Brotherhood and its Freedom and Justice Party have been displaying a strong tendency toward political pragmatism instead of dogmatic ideology, observers said.

“There’s a general agreement in the FJP and the Morsy campaign to open a new page with all groups and institutions. We understand why some may have a misconception of us, our history and our work on the ground, and we will work on changing that,” Ali Batteekh, another leading Brotherhood figure and a former MP, told Egypt Independent.

But while no significant clashes are expected to ensue between Morsy and the security apparatus, obtaining full control over it would require an element of purging.

“He will have to get rid of some of the Interior Ministry figureheads to get a better grip on the police,” said Mohamed Mahfouz, a former police officer and a founding member of the Honorable Police Officers Coalition. Mahfouz believes garnering loyalty from the rest of the police will not pose a significant problem.

“The Police Academy teaches obedience to power. Even if you put a monkey on the throne, they would obey him,” said Mahfouz. He said cadets in the Police Academy were also taught to look at all political groups with disdain, not just the Brotherhood.

Media

Other institutions, such as the state media, have traditionally been anti-Brotherhood. Yet their modus operandi is to pay allegiance to whoever is in power, a fact demonstrated by how quickly they changed their long reverence to Hosni Mubarak once the ruling military council took his position in February 2011.

Today, questions still loom over whether the state-owned media is ideologically opposed to Islamists in a way that could entail a Mubarak-style grip over them.

“There was a vicious media campaign to tarnish the image of Islamists. They played a big part in political polarization in the recent period by propagating the failure of the Brotherhood in Parliament,” said Shahira Amin, a state TV presenter.

State media has been under the control of the military authorities, which will seek to maintain it, Amin said. “The state media loyalty will probably remain to the SCAF. It’s in their interest to maintain the status quo, which might jeopardize Morsy’s presidency,” she added.

The future

While the current word is on Morsy ceding “sovereign” powers to the ruling generals, this doesn’t necessarily reflect the ultimate ambitions of the Brotherhood, said Mohamed Menza, an associate professor of political science at the American University in Cairo.

“They have been [splitting power] in their favor since before the election,” said Menza, referring to what he said was negotiations by the Brotherhood to secure a quota for its members in the police force.

Menza said the SCAF would not relinquish its control over these institutions, and that if Morsy and the Brotherhood attempted to control them, the council would use its control of the Defense and Interior ministries to suppress them.

“If Morsy ruled with the goal of maximizing the Brotherhood’s members in state institutions, and not seeking genuine reform based on meritocracy and democratic principles, it would lead to the failure of his Renaissance Project and the end of the Brotherhood,” he added, referring to Morsy’s electoral platform.

For others, like the Brotherhood’s Batteekh, controlling government institutions is not the main priority. “I think our main issue is the process of bringing forward a new Parliament or settling a new constitution. I see that as the biggest impediment to Morsy having a successful presidency,” he said.