The Nikkei 225 in Tokyo nosedived 7.3 per cent to close at 14,483.98, its worst drop since the 2011 tsunami.

Japan’s 10-year government bond yield rose above one per cent for the first time in a year, unnerving financial markets at a time when Japan’s already overburdened government finances are vulnerable to rises in interest rates. It later slipped back to about 0.9 per cent.

The spike in long-term debt comes despite the Bank of Japan’s aggressive efforts to keep interest rates down. It followed overnight news that some officials of the U.S. Federal Reserve are willing to scale back the American central bank’s stimulus effort as soon as June if the economy perks up.

Chris Weston, chief market strategist at IG Markets in Melbourne, said the Nikkei has been on such a tear this year that all it took was the convergence of a few negative events to spark a sharp correction. The Nikkei, even after Thursday’s fall, is up 39 per cent so far this year.

“If everyone is standing on one side of the ship, it doesn’t take too much to make it tip. All we needed was a cluster of negative events,” he said.

Still, the sell-off is a reminder of Japan’s vulnerability as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe tries to end two decades of stagnation with unprecedented monetary easing, increased government spending and reforms to make the world’s No. 3 economy more competitive.

The level of Japan’s debt is higher, relative to its economy, than even some of the crisis-stricken European countries. But because it is mostly owned by domestic investors, especially huge banks and insurance companies, the country’s credit rating has remained steady. About a quarter of the national budget is interest payments on government debt.

Shinichi Ichikawa, chief market strategist at Credit Suisse in Tokyo, said he thought the Nikkei’s drop, its sharpest since a massive earthquake shook Japan and sparked a devastating tsunami on March 11, 2011, was temporary.

“I do think Japanese stocks will continue to rise amid a growing global economy and recovery in Japanese corporate profits,” Ichikawa said. “But with the strong recovery in the stock market, the incentive to carry out structural reforms is weakening. There might be a sense that nothing more has to be done.”

Markets elsewhere in Asia sank sharply after a survey showed China’s manufacturing contracted in May.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng slumped 2.5 per cent to 22,669.68. South Korea’s Kospi lost 1.2 per cent to 1,969.19. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 dropped 2 per cent to 5,062.40. Benchmarks in Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines all fell sharply.

HSBC Corp. said its preliminary Purchasing Managers Index fell to a seven-month low of 49.6 in May from April’s 50.4. Numbers below 50 indicate that activity is contracting. Analysts had expected a slight decline to 50.3 for the most recent month.

Recession in Europe, growth-robbing deflation in Japan and economic anemia in the U.S. have finally caught up with export-hooked China despite the government’s attempts at bolstering consumption at home.

“It’s no secret. The true picture is that China’s export sector is slowing down and its manufacturing sector is also slowing down. That means the trade surplus is almost gone,” said Francis Lun, chief economist at GE Oriental Financial Group in Hong Kong.

“The Chinese government really failed in their goal to shift the focus of the economy to consumption. It is still too heavily dependent on property and infrastructure investment,” Lun said, with the country continuing to invest in big-ticket buildings and projects that stand empty while artificially boosting GDP growth.

Investors also recoiled from stocks after mixed messages by the U.S. Federal Reserve on the future of its massive bond-buying program sent Wall Street on a rollercoaster ride.

U.S. stocks shot up early Wednesday after Fed chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress that it was too soon for the central bank to pull back on its monetary stimulus. The Fed has been buying massive amounts of government bonds and keeping short-term interest rates near zero to encourage people and businesses to borrow and spend more.

The Dow ended the day lower, however, after minutes released from the Fed’s latest policy meeting showed some Fed officials are willing to scale back the stimulus effort, dubbed quantitative easing or QE, as early as June if the economy picks up.

Investors have flocked to stocks because returns on bonds have dwindled due to the Fed’s efforts to keep rates down. Bu the Fed minutes sowed doubt whether massive gains in stock markets will continue. There are also fears about how the economy will perform once monetary stimulus is withdrawn, another negative for stocks.

“Bernanke wants to wait and see how the data unfold before tapering back on QE. Three or four more hawkish members think they’ve seen enough and, absent surprises, want to get started as early as June,” said analysts at DBS Bank Ltd. in Singapore.

On Wednesday, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 0.5 per cent to close at 15,307.17. The Standard & Poor’s 500 fell 0.8 per cent to 1,655.35. The Nasdaq composite index fell 1 per cent to 3,463.30.

Benchmark oil for July delivery was down 95 cents to $93.33 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract lost $1.90 to close at $94.28 a barrel on the Nymex on Wednesday.

In currencies, the euro rose to $1.2874 from $1.2845 late Wednesday in New York. The dollar fell to 101.79 yen from 103.15 yen.

The mayor’s brother, Councillor Doug Ford, has called on the media to back off.

However, 680News political affairs specialist John Stall said that is unlikely to happen until the mayor confronts the situation more directly than he did last week by dismissing the allegations as “ridiculous.”

According to Stall, the news cycle doesn’t change until there is something new, like an explanation, a statement, an apology, or an admission — something that moves the attention from silence and the speculation triggered by that silence.

So, is it time for the mayor to say or do something more about the drug abuse allegations? Stall offers his view. Click here to read his blog post.

Interview

680News political affairs specialist John Stall spoke with Toronto Star reporter Kevin Donovan about the alleged video. Listen to it below:

Your reaction: Media madness or mandatory coverage?

]]> http://www.680news.com/2013/05/23/pressure-mounts-on-mayor-ford-to-address-drug-use-allegations/feed/ 0 http://www.680news.com/2013/05/23/uk-emergency-response-committee-meets-after-man-killed-in-daylight-attack-in-london/ http://www.680news.com/2013/05/23/uk-emergency-response-committee-meets-after-man-killed-in-daylight-attack-in-london/#comments Thu, 23 May 2013 07:34:29 -0400 The Associated Press 1427687 LONDON – The British government’s emergency committee met Thursday after two attackers butchered a British soldier in a daylight attack in London that raised fears terrorism had returned to the capital.

Prime Minister David Cameron says there are strong indications it was an act of terrorism, and his top advisers will be examining the potential security implications of the attack, which took place near a military barracks in the Woolwich area of the city.

Cameron said Britain will be absolutely resolute in its stand against violent extremism and terror.

“This was not just an attack on Britain. It was also a betrayal of Islam and of the Muslim communities who give so much to our country. There is nothing in Islam that justifies this truly dreadful act,” Cameron said.

Police Thursday confirmed the dead man was a serving soldier and said his identity will not be released yet at his family’s request. They said a post-mortem examination will be conducted later Thursday.

One of the attackers went on video to explain the crime — shouting political statements, gesturing with bloodied hands and waving a meat cleaver. Police shot and wounded the unidentified assailants and took them into custody.

British media say the victim was wearing a shirt in support of troops when he was killed.

Security has been tightened at military barracks and authorities say they are updating their guidance for military personnel.

Police in the county of Lincolnshire in eastern England said a property was being searched in connection to the attack in Woolwich. Police said a search warrant had been obtained but would not provide details about the search. Police were also scouring the attack site for further clues.

London Mayor Boris Johnson urged the people of the city to remain calm. Leaving the meeting of the emergency committee, Johnson appeared to indicate the attack was being seen as a one-off incident.

“Everything I am hearing leads me to think that Londoners can go about their business in the normal way and we are going to bring the killers to justice,” he said.

Calling it “an appalling murder,” Cameron earlier said there were “strong indications” it was an act of terrorism, and two other officials said there were signs the attack was motivated by radical Islam.

The incident unfolded Wednesday afternoon when officers responded to reports of an assault just a few blocks from the Royal Artillery Barracks in the neighbourhood of Woolwich.

Images from the scene showed a blue car that appeared to have been used in the attack, its hood crushed and rammed into a signpost on a sidewalk that was smeared with blood. A number of weapons — including butchers’ knives, a machete and a meat cleaver — were strewn on the street.

While there were moments of chaos — one local primary school went into lockdown when a teacher saw the victim’s body — the scene was striking in its normalcy. Pedestrians milled about with grocery bags and shopping carts as a body lay motionless in the street — and the attackers remained on the scene, wielding long knives.

Passers-by filmed what appeared to be one of the attackers, his hands covered in blood, making political statements about “an eye for an eye” as a body lay behind him.

Footage — obtained by ITV news and The Sun newspaper — showed a man in a dark jacket and knit cap walking toward a camera, clutching a meat cleaver and a knife. Speaking in English with a British accent, he apologized that women passers-by “have had to witness this” barbarity, saying that “in our land our women have to see the same.”

He gave no indication what that land was as he urged people to tell the government to “bring our troops back.” British troops are deployed in Afghanistan and recently supported the French-led intervention in Mali.

“We swear by almighty Allah we will never stop fighting you,” the man declared. “We must fight them as they fight us.” The camera then panned away to show a body lying on the ground.

The Associated Press examined the footage to verify its authenticity, cross-referencing images from the scene, aerial shots, the location of a car behind the alleged attacker and the appearance of a body and a car in the background. There was no immediate way for the AP to verify who the cameraman was.

Other images showed the second suspect clutching a long knife as he engaged in conversation with a woman who British media said tried to intervene to prevent further bloodshed.

The Daily Telegraph identified the woman as Ingrid Loyau-Kennett, 48, and said she confronted the attackers, telling them: “It is only you versus many people. You are going to lose.”

Saying she wanted to stop the suspect from attacking anyone else, she asked him if he “did it” and what he wanted.

“He said: ‘I killed him because he killed Muslims and I am fed up with people killing Muslims in Afghanistan. They have nothing to do there,’” she told the newspaper.

Britain has been at the heart of several terror attacks or plots in recent years, the most deadly being the 2005 rush-hour suicide bombings when 52 commuters were killed. More recently, Parviz Khan was convicted in 2008 of plotting to kidnap and behead a British Muslim soldier in Birmingham.

Some extremists have lashed out at Britain’s involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq. Recently, groups have also criticized Britain’s assistance in the French-led mission to Mali to root out Islamic extremists in the north.

Britain’s prime minister said there were “strong indications” Wednesday’s attack was a terrorist incident.

“We have suffered these attacks before, we have always beaten them back,” Cameron said. “We will not be cowed, we will never buckle.”

Two U.K. government officials said the attack seemed to have been ideologically motivated by radical Islam, adding that the assessment was not based solely on video footage of one suspect making political statements against the British government. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about the ongoing investigation.

Scotland Yard confirmed that counterterrorism officers were leading an investigation into the attack. Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe said the two men had been arrested and urged Londoners to remain calm. Both men were hospitalized, one in serious condition.

Late Wednesday, riot police fanned out in Woolwich as about 50 men waving the flag of the far-right English Defence League gathered, singing nationalistic songs and shouting obscenities about the Qur’an.

Muslim religious groups and charities were quick to condemn the attack and urged police to calm tensions. The Muslim Council of Britain called it a “barbaric act that has no basis in Islam,” adding that “no cause justifies this murder.”

The barracks near where the attack took place houses a number of the King’s Troop Royal Horse Artillery and independent companies of the Grenadier and Coldstream Guards. They were the site of shooting events during the 2012 London Olympics.

Fred Oyat, 44, who lives in a high-rise nearby, said he heard four gun shots and went straight to the window.

“I saw one man lying there bleeding, another lying on the pavement being disarmed. A policeman was pointing a gun at him. A third man was lying further up the street. … He was bleeding profusely,” Oyat said. “There were four knives on the ground — big kitchen knives. The knives were very bloody.”

David Dixon, headmaster at a nearby primary school, said he saw a body lying in the road outside. After making sure all students were inside, he quickly put the school into lockdown. He then heard shots fired, he told the BBC.

Witnesses recounted seeing the suspects — armed with meat cleavers and possibly a firearm — rushing toward police when officers arrived on the scene.

“He ran towards police before they could even get out of the car,” Julia Wilders told Britain’s Press Association.

Graham Wilders said he saw one of the suspects pull out a handgun.

“He didn’t fire the gun,” Wilders told the BBC. “They went for the police with a handgun. The police were the only ones who did any shooting.”
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Associated Press writers Cassandra Vinograd, Paisley Dodds, Sylvia Hui and Danica Kirka contributed to this report.

Please note: Gas prices have become very volatile because of a change in the way oil companies set their prices, thus making it more challenging to predict gasoline prices.