1 WTO fails to seal global trade deal (BBC) The
World Trade Organization says its 160 members have failed to agree a global
customs pact drawn up in meetings in Bali last December. The Trade Facilitation
Agreement would have streamlined global customs procedures, and should have
been finalised by Thursday. But it was blocked over a number of rifts, including
India's demands for concessions on the stockpiling of food.
US ambassador to the WTO, Michael Punke, said that
the failure to agree a deal had "put this institution on very uncertain
new ground". The WTO had seemed to be on the verge of reaching its first
comprehensive agreement since it was founded in 1995. India had said last year
that the planned deal could endanger domestic policies designed to help feed
its poor.
2 Argentina defaults, defiant (Angela Monaghan &
Uki Goni in The Guardian) Argentina's government was in a defiant mood on
Thursday after defaulting on its debt for the second time in 13 years. Economy
minister Axel Kicillof played down the impact it would have on the country's
citizens. "We're not going to sign an agreement that jeopardises the
future of all Argentinians," he said. "Argentinians can remain calm
because tomorrow will just be another day and the world will keep on
spinning."
Markets appeared to disagree, with Argentina's
Merval share index falling almost 7% on Thursday and the peso down more than 4%
against the dollar. Analysts said a fall in Argentina's currency would cause
further pain in the country, pushing up the price of imports and driving
inflation higher. Steen Jakobsen, chief economist at Saxo Bank, said the
fallout would be difficult for a country where inflation is already 12% on
official measures and 40% unofficially. "At a minimum we'll see a loss of
GDP of at least 1% if not 2%," he said.
Economists at the Washington-based Centre for
Economic and Policy Research called on the US Congress to intervene, warning in
a letter that Griesa's decision to uphold the holdout investors claim could
cause "unnecessary economic damage to the international financial system,
as well as to US economic interests". In Argentina, the government said
the country was the victim of a conspiracy of international financial agents.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/31/argentina-government-defiant-debt-default-axel-kicillof
3 Tesla, Panasonic in battery factory tie-up (BBC) Electric
carmaker Tesla is to team up with Japanese electronics firm Panasonic to build
a "gigafactory" battery manufacturing plant in the US. Tesla said the
plant would be built in Nevada, Arizona, Texas, New Mexico or California and
create 6,500 jobs.
The factory will produce cells, modules and packs
for Tesla's electric cars. California-based Tesla will prepare, provide and
manage the land and buildings, and Panasonic will make and supply the
lithium-ion battery cells. Tesla said the move would reduce its battery costs
by 30%.
"The 'gigafactory' represents a fundamental
change in the way large-scale battery production can be realized," said
Tesla chief technical Officer and co-founder J B Straubel, referring to the
cost reductions. Sales of zero-emission electric vehicles currently make up
less than 1% of the world's car market.
4 Why Turkish women are laughing more (Johannesburg
Times/Daily Telegraph) Turkish women are flooding social media with pictures of
themselves smiling to protest against the killjoy comments of their deputy
prime minister. During a speech this week to celebrate the end of Ramadan,
Bulent Arinc said women should not laugh out loud in public or speak of trivial
matters on their phones. "Women give each other meal recipes on the mobile
phone. 'What else is going on?' 'When is the wedding?'
"Talk about all this face to face," he
said. "A woman will know what is haram and not haram. She will not laugh
out loud in public. She will not be inviting in her attitudes and will protect
her chasteness." Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, the main opposition candidate
against Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said: "Our country needs
women's and everyone's laughter more than anything."
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