2014-05-21

And so much, much more, including the latest edition of Fukushimapocalypse Now! In today’s collection from the realms of political, law, economics, and the environment.

First up, a slowdown on the road to another skid-greasing for corporocrats and banksters from Kyodo News:

TPP ministers fail to set timeline for striking deal

Ministers in the 12-country Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade talks fell short of setting a clear timeline for ending their long-running negotiations as they wrapped up their two-day meeting Tuesday in Singapore, although they stressed that progress has been made on tariff issues.

“We cemented our shared views on what is needed to bring negotiations to a close,” the ministers said in a joint statement issued following the meeting, but it was unclear what outcome was yielded during their gathering.

The ministers did decide that the chief negotiators from the member countries will meet in July to further accelerate talks but they did not clarify where the meeting will be held.

Money launderers get the ticket, via  Reuters:

Credit Suisse fined $2.5 billion after pleading guilty to U.S. tax charge

Credit Suisse has agreed to pay a $2.5 billion fine to authorities in the United States for helping Americans evade taxes after becoming the largest bank in 20 years to plead guilty to a U.S. criminal charge.

The bank’s guilty plea resolves its long-running dispute with the United States over tax evasion, but could have implications for the clients and counterparties that do business with the group.

Credit Suisse said it had not seen a material impact in the past few weeks on its business, and that clients faced no legal obstacles from doing business with it despite the guilty plea.

Other banksters/other woes, from the Irish Times:

Drumm facing litany of fraud allegations at bankruptcy trial

Document detailing dozens of allegations against former Anglo boss submitted to US court

Former Anglo Irish Bank chief executive David Drum will face a litany of fraud and perjury allegations when his bankruptcy trial begins in Boston tomorrow.

A list of “itemised allegations” against the 47-year-old Dubliner, which include accusations of fraud, concealment and lying under oath, has been submitted to the court where he filed for bankruptcy in 2010.

The document was submitted by the plaintiffs in the trial, bankruptcy trustee Kathleen Dwyer, and the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, his former employer.

From iMediaEthic, without comment:

Nat’l Journal dumps comments section after ‘worst kind of abusive, racist, and sexist name-calling imaginable’

The National Journal is getting rid of most online comments because it has been filled with “the worst kind of abusive, racist, and sexist name-calling imaginable.”

National Journal’s editor-in-chief Tim Grieve announced the decision in a May 16 post,  explaining that there was no civil discussion on topics and it was getting worse.

“The debate isn’t joined. It’s cheapened, it’s debased, and, as National Journal’s Brian Resnick has written, research suggests that the experience leaves readers feeling more polarized and less willing to listen to opposing views,” Grieve wrote.

From China Daily, a float from abroad:

More Chinese companies choose US as destination to go public

A senior vice president with NYSE Euronex says that more and more Chinese enterprises are attracted to do initial public offering (IPO) in the United States and predicts that around 15 to 20 of them could go public in the States this year.

“What I’ve seen is a nice building process from two years ago when we only had two IPOs. One of them, VIP (Vipshop Holdings Limited), was listed here and did extremely well,” said David A. Ethridge, senior vice president and head of the Capital Markets Group at NYSE Euronext, in a recent interview with Xinhua.

Shares of Vipshop, an online discount retailer, were traded at around $165 per share Monday, compared to $6.50 per share since it announced its IPO in March 2012. China’s social gaming portal YY Inc, which was listed on Nasdaq in November 2012, also saw its shares surge to around $56 per share from its IPO price of $10.50 apiece.

From the Asbury Park Press via USA TODAY, maybe retirees will have to get a bridge loan:

Gov. Christie cuts N.J. pension payments

Gov. Chris Christie is slashing the contributions scheduled to be made to New Jersey public workers’ pension funds by nearly $2.5 billion over the next 14 months to deal with a revenue shortfall facing the state budget.

Christie announced today at the Statehouse that he will make a $696 million payment into the pension funds this year, rather than $1.58 billion. He said he will put in $681 million next June, instead of the $2.25 billion that would have been made if the terms of the pension reforms he signed into law in 2011 were followed.

Christie said the payments cover the costs accrued during his administration for active employees but exclude the unfunded liability accrued under past governors and legislatures. He said that means the unfunded liability for active workers will not increase.

From Network World, corporations benefits, public services lose. Call it a neoliberal wet dream:

Driverless cars could cripple law enforcement budgets

Local government have long looked to speeding tickets to increase revenue. What will they do when autonomous cars stick to the speed limit?

Shortly after the state of Washington voted to legalize recreational marijuana late last year, opponents made a very interesting, if somewhat counterintuitive, argument against legalized pot – law enforcement would miss out on the huge revenue stream of seized assets, property, and cash from pot dealers in the state.

Justice Department data shows that seizures in marijuana-related cases nationwide totaled $1 billion from 2002 to 2012, out of the $6.5 billion total seized in all drug busts over that period. This money often goes directly into the budgets of the law enforcement agencies that seized it. One drug task force in Snohomish County, Washington, reduced its budget forecast by 15% after the state voted to legalize marijuana, the Wall Street Journal reported in January. In its most fruitful years, that lone task force had seen more than $1 million in additional funding through seizures from marijuana cases alone, according to the report.

Naturally, this dynamic is something law enforcement either is or should already be preparing for as driverless cars make their way onto the roads. Just as drug cops will lose the income they had seized from pot dealers, state and local governments will need to account for a drastic reduction in fines from traffic violations as autonomous cars stick to the speed limit.

From the Associated Press, gladiator-doping alleged:

Ex-players: NFL illegally used drugs

A group of retired NFL players says in a lawsuit filed Tuesday that the league, thirsty for profits, illegally supplied them with risky narcotics and other painkillers that numbed their injuries for games and led to medical complications down the road.

The league obtained and administered the drugs illegally, without prescriptions and without warning players of their potential side effects, to speed the return of injured players to the field and maximize profits, the lawsuit alleges. Players say they were never told about broken legs and ankles and instead were fed pills to mask the pain. One says that instead of surgery, he was given anti-inflammatories and skipped practices so he could play in money-making games. And others say that after years of free pills from the NFL, they retired from the league addicted to the painkillers.

Steven Silverman, attorney for the players, said the complaint was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, and a copy was shared with The Associated Press ahead of the filing.

The complaint names eight players, including three members of the Super Bowl champion 1985 Chicago Bears: Hall of Fame defensive end Richard Dent, offensive lineman Keith Van Horne, and quarterback Jim McMahon. Lawyers seek class-action status, and they say in the filing that more than 400 other former players have signed on to the lawsuit.

From the San Francisco Chronicle, both a story and a metaphor for our times:

Train hits, kills woman wearing earphones in San Leandro

An 18-year-old woman using earphones while talking on her cell phone was struck and killed Monday by an Amtrak train in San Leandro after a witness tried unsuccessfully to warn her of its approach, police said.

On a similar vein, from north of the border via CBC News:

Physical inactivity of Canadian kids blamed on ‘culture of convenience’

Parents encouraged to weave opportunities to move and play with their kids into daily life

Canada’s “culture of convenience” means children and youth sit too much and move too little, in gym class, on the playground, and while travelling to and from school, according to a new global comparison.

Tuesday’s report, “Is Canada in the running?”, from Active Healthy Kids Canada grades kids from 15 countries on their physical activity levels in various areas.

Europe next, and the usual suspects, doing the usual via BBC News:

JPMorgan, HSBC and Credit Agricole accused of euro rate-fixes

The European Commission has accuses JPMorgan, HSBC and Credit Agricole of colluding to fix a key euro benchmark borrowing rate – Euribor.

JP Morgan and HSBC will fight the charges. Credit Agricole will study the European Commission’s findings. Penalties for the guilty are up to 10% of annual revenue.

Euribor is a cousin to Libor, which is used to set trillions of dollars of financial contracts from complex financial transactions to car loans.

And the electoral divide, with more to come next weekend, via EUbusiness:

Conservatives narrowly lead Socialists in EU vote: poll

Conservatives across Europe hold a narrow lead over their Socialist rivals in the upcoming European Parliament elections but eurosceptics and more radical parties will make significant gains, a poll showed Tuesday.

The PollWatch2014 survey issued as EU citizens prepare for the May 22-25 ballot put the conservative European People’s Party (EPP) on 217 seats against 201 for the Socialists and Democrats (S&D).

While that would leave them still the two biggest parties in the new 751-seat assembly, the EPP would be down from 274 seats and the S&D up only marginally from the previous 196.

In third place, the centrist Liberals (ALDE) would fare especially badly, falling to 59 seats from the current 83, PollWatch2014 said.

A predictable alarm, via Greek Reporter:

Credit Agricole: SYRIZA’s Victory May Cause Shock to EU markets

According to Bloomberg news agency, Mark McCormick, a currency strategist at the French Credit Agricole, sent a to the bank’s clients, stating that a possible victory of SYRIZA in the euro elections might cause a shock to the European markets.

McCormick claimed that a possible victory by SYRIZA can cause a  shock to Europe’s assets (bonds, equities, interest bearing securities, etc.) at a time when Greece is trying to implement reforms.

McCormick, according to Bloomberg, stated that the European elections should not be underestimated given that their results will have an impact on the above-mentioned assets.The increasing popularity of anti-European parties constitutes a threat to the progress that has been achieved in financial reforms. The greatest danger lies in Greece, which could be led to early elections if the Greek main opposition party wins a majority in the European elections.

And the lobbying will commence, via EurActiv:

Google cannot be broken up without new legislation, says EU Competition Commissioner

Google cannot be broken up into smaller companies without new EU legislation, the European Commission said today (20 May), after detailing two potential new antitrust investigations into the internet giant.

Competition Commissioner Joaquín Almunia was responding to comments made earlier this week by German’s Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel,  who said Google may have such a dominant market position that a break-up had to be “seriously considered.” Existing competition law was not powerful enough to split up the business, Almunia said.

The California-based company may yet face a separate antitrust investigation to the one ongoing since November 2012. Open Internet Project, a group of 400 European digital market members, made a different complaint [PDF] on Friday.

Britain next, and the bubble continues with BBC News:

UK house prices up 8% in a year, says ONS

UK house prices rose by 8% in the year to the end of March, official figures show, as the prime minister says he will consider changes to Help to Buy.

The annual increase slowed compared with a 9.2% year-on-year price rise to the end of February.

However, the latest data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed that the annual property price increase in London stood at 17%. Excluding London and the South East of England, prices were up by 4.7%.

On a related front, via the London Telegraph:

Lloyds acts to curb ‘inflationary’ London housing

UK’s biggest mortgage provider, which also owns Halifax, will not lend any more than four times those of incomes on properties over £500,000

The UK’s biggest mortgage provider, Lloyds Banking Group, has taken radical action in the face of what it called “inflationary pressures” in London’s housing market, tightening up the requirements for high-value property purchases.

The state-backed lender said that on lending of over £500,000, it would not approve mortgages in which consumers are borrowing more than four times their incomes.

The announcement is the first major step taken by lenders to cool rapidly-rising house prices in the capital, where prices have risen by 17pc in the last year – more than double the national average. Lloyds said the policy would be applied nationally, but was deliberately targeted at London.

On to Germany and the predictable, via TheLocal.de:

‘Germany can deny foreigners benefits’

Germany can refuse to give unemployment benefit to EU citizens it believes are “welfare tourists”, according to a European ruling on Tuesday.

The advocate general of the European Court of Justice said the state could reject applications for German unemployment benefit Hartz IV from foreigners from other EU countries to prevent abuse of the system and “welfare tourism”.

The Luxembourg court will make its ruling over the next few months, but normally follows the advocate general’s advice.

The decision was made in a high-profile case of a 24-year-old Romanian woman and her son who have lived in Germany since 2010. The woman’s local job centre in Leipzig refused to give her Hartz IV, prompting her to take legal action.

And from Deutsche Welle:

Migration to Germany skyrockets

The sovereign debt crisis is driving a surge in migration to Germany. New figures reveal hundreds of thousands of foreign workers flocked to Europe’s largest economy in 2012 – a nearly 40 percent jump in just a year.

The number of people migrating to Germany jumped nearly 40 percent in a year, according to data released Tuesday by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a coalition of mostly developed nations.

Driven mainly by economic uncertainty in the euro zone’s periphery, which includes weaker nations that are still recovering from the global financial crisis, some 400,000 people flocked to Germany in 2012, the latest year for which figures were available.

“We can clearly speak about a boom of migration to Germany without exaggeration,” Thomas Liebig, an OECD migration expert, said as the group released its latest migration outlook just days ahead of European elections in which immigration has been hotly debated.

More from Reuters:

Germany becomes world’s top migration spot after U.S.: OECD

Germany has become the world’s second most popular destination for immigrants after the United States, attracting many southern Europeans driven from the ravages of the euro zone financial crisis to overtake Canada and Australia.

Germany soared to second place in the 2012 in a survey of permanent migration published by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) on Tuesday. It ranked eighth in 2009.

“This really is a boom – without any exaggeration … no other OECD country experienced such a rise,” said Thomas Liebig, an expert on international migration at the Paris-based OECD.

Vienna next, and just say Nein!?, From TheLocal.at:

Vienna mayor wants right wing group banned

Vienna’s Mayor Michael Häupl (SPÖ) has called for a ban on a right wing group calling themselves Die Identitaere Bewegung (The Identity Movement).

Last Saturday a march by the group in central Vienna resulted in clashes between protesters and police after it was obstructed several times by a left-wing counter-demonstration.

“A group like this should have been banned a long time ago,” Häupl said at his weekly press conference. “This is a neo-fascist organization that quite clearly falls under the prohibition act,” he added.

The Verbotsgesetz (Prohibition Act) is an Austrian law which banned the Nazi Party and aimed to suppress any potential revival of Nazism.

While parts of Spain face unparalleled drought, at the other end of Europe with euronews:

Bosnia flood destruction ‘as bad as the war’

The government in Bosnia says more than 1 million people, or a quarter of the population, has been affected by flooding and landslides, comparing the destruction to that of the country’s war in the 1990s.

Some reports speak of around 50 deaths in Bosnia and in neighbouring Serbia and Croatia amid the worst rainfall to hit the Balkans in living memory.

Having survived the war and built a new life, many have lost everything.

Spain next, whipping up the religious for a neoliberal advantage with El País:

Abortion clinics report spike in vandalism

Anti-abortion activists step up pressure ahead of government changes to legislation

Anti-abortion groups are getting more radical in their rhetoric and in their actions.

In the face of government delays, these groups have been making increasingly vocal demands for legislative reform to curtail access to pregnancy terminations.

But now, abortion clinics are also reporting several instances of vandalism against their premises, according to formal complaints to which EL PAÍS has had access.

El País again, this time weith another outburst of that hard times intolerance:

Racist gestures at soccer game cost Barcelona employee her job

Llagostera fan also barred from her team’s stadium for performing monkey actions at black player

A woman has lost her job and been barred from a soccer stadium for life after she was caught on camera making racist gestures at a Spanish second division game between Llagostera and Racing Santander on Sunday.

Video footage of the match clearly shows the Llagostera fan making monkey actions at Mamadou Koné, a black player from the Ivory Coast who plays for Racing.

The images immediately spread around the social networks, and the consequences soon followed. Llagostera president Isabel Tarragó has barred the woman, who is not a club member, from ever returning to its stadium.

El País again, with more:

Jewish community to file complaint after anti-Semitic tweets posted from Spain

Offensive comments appeared on Twitter after basketball team Maccabi Tel Aviv beat Real Madrid

The victory on Sunday saw the Israeli side win the Euroleague title

The Jewish community in the northeastern Spanish region of Catalonia has taken action over anti-Semitic messages posted on social networking sites after Israeli basketball team Maccabi Tel Aviv beat Real Madrid to win the Euroleague title on Sunday.

After the game in Tel Aviv was over, nearly 18,000 offensive messages appeared on Twitter, according to Jewish associations, which have announced they are planning to file a complaint with the state attorney on Tuesday. According to sources from the Jewish community, the complaint will include tweets from five users of the micro-blogging site – along with their full names – which, the complainants will argue, constitute incitement of hatred against Jews.

Portugal next, and a Troikarch release from ANSAmed:

Portugal officially out of Troika bailout plan

Without seeking precautionary credit line, premier says

Portugal officially exited on Monday the bailout programme drafted by the Troika (EU-ECB-IMF) under which it obtained in 2011 a loan worth 79 billion euros provided it implemented a number of austerity measures to cut expenditure.

Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho announced the country will ‘’not seek further security measures, although the road ahead is still long to get out of the crisis’‘.

The premier added that ‘’the government’s priorities are economic and employment recovery’‘.

Italy next, starting with Bunga Bunga bloviation from TheLocal.it:

‘Did you call Merkel an ‘unf**kable lard-arse’?’

Jeremy Paxman, the BBC’s hard-nosed interviewer, asked Italy’s gaffe-prone former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi whether he called German Chancellor Angela Merkel an “unf**kable lard-arse” in an interview that will be aired on Tuesday night.

Berlusconi, who is currently undertaking community service at a home for Alzheimer’s patients for his tax fraud conviction, reportedly said Merkel was a “culona inchiavabile” (unf**kable lard-arse) during a wiretapped conversation with a man accused of supplying prostitutes to the former prime minister’s “bunga bunga” parties in July 2011.

More bloviatin’ from the Bunga Bunghole via ANSA:

Berlusconi calls Grillo a ‘killer’

Vitriol escalates with reference to manslaughter conviction

Ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi on Tuesday called Beppe Grillo, the leader of the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement (M5S), a “killer” as the political venom ahead of Sunday’s European elections reached a new high. Berlusconi was referring to Grillo’s 1980 manslaughter conviction for a car accident in which he was the driver and three people died.

Grillo has never stood personally in elections because he says people with criminal records should not be in parliament, although he is still the undisputed leader of the M5S from outside the buildings of power.

The comedian-turned-politician has been brutally critical of three-time premier Berlusconi, who was ejected from parliament last year and is currently doing community after a definitive tax-fraud conviction last year, over his many judicial problems.

After the jump, it’s on to Greece and more electoral mayhem, a Ukrainian pullback, Brazilian jitters and an Argentine memory hole, a case of Thai anxiety, Chinese real estate woes, environmental alarms, and Fukushuimapocalypse Now!. . .

To Vima covers the latest electoral news on the neoNazi front:

Golden Dawn to appoint councilors in 12 of 13 electoral districts

Neo-Nazi party increased its influence in Athens, Saronic Gulf islands, northern Greece and Peloponnesus

The neo-Nazi party saw its ratings soar in the Sunday elections, after it nearly tripled its ratings in Athens and managed to elect councilors in 12 of the country’s 13 electoral districts.

In Athens, the party spokesman Ilias Kasidiaris may have failed to make it to the second round, finishing in fourth place behind Aris Spiliotopoulos, but his 16.92% of the vote translates into 35,949 voters, about three times as many the detained party leader Nikos Michaloliakos received in the 2010 municipal race (5.29% – 10,222 votes).

While the neo-Nazi party saw its ratings in Athens increase, particularly in western and central neighborhoods such as Kolonos, Votanikos, Sepolia, Patisia and Kypseli, support for the Golden Dawn in Piraeus was nearly halved since the general elections of 2012. This may be attributed to the appearance of Yannis Moralis.

Looking for friends, with EUobserver:

Greece’s Golden Dawn seeks allies in EP

Politicians from Greece’s extreme-right Golden Dawn party are likely to be voted into the European Parliament amid high approval ratings despite the jailing of a third of its leaders.

None of Europe’s popular far-right parties has backed or sought to make an alliance with Greece’s extremists, who are often labelled “neo-fascists” – something the party denies.

Golden Dawn’s salutes, symbols and anthems are similar to those of the Third Reich and its supporters have violently enforced its anti-immigrant policies.

While Kathimerini English covers the inconvenient:

Ex-Golden Dawn MPs to face magistrates

The magistrates leading a criminal investigation into the neofascist Golden Dawn are to summon two former MPs, Stathis Boukouras and Chrysovalantis Alexopoulos, this week.

Boukouras, who is in pretrial custody on charges of belonging to a criminal organization, is being called to respond to additional accusations of illegal weapons ownership. He is to be transferred from Nafplio Prison to the Athens offices of magistrates Ioanna Klapa and Maria Dimitropoulou on Wednesday but is expected to seek an extension.

Alexopoulos, who is to be called on Thursday to answer to charges of belonging to a criminal organization, is also likely to seek an extension.

To Vima covers the total vote leader and a partnership proposal:

SYRIZA “flirting” with KKE for the second round of local elections

Party leader Alexis Tsipras is expected to offer his support to the Communist Party’s candidate in Patra

One of SYRIZA’s slogans in its election campaigns is that “the Left never governed in Greece”, with which it hopes to galvanize support from the Communist Party and fringe parties.

As part of this flirtation with KKE, SYRIZA president Alexis Tsipras is scheduled to give a speech in Patra on Tuesday evening, where KKE’s candidate Kostas Peletidis is the favorite in the second round.

The SYRIZA leader is expected to support the Communist Party candidate in Patra, in hopes of KKE reciprocating in Athens and Attica, where Gabriel Sakellaridis and Rena Dourou  are gearing up for the second round of elections.

To Vima hits the hustings:

Prime Minister Samaras to present new growth plan on Tuesday

Ambitious plans claim that up to 550,000 new jobs can be created over the next four years

The Prime Minister Antonis Samaras will present his ambitious new growth plan on Tuesday, according to which the new production model will create some 550,000 jobs will be created over the next four years.

The new plan involves taking small and medium-sized enterprises taking advantage of NSRF funds, while further funding is made available through the European Investment Bank and the newly-formed Greek Institution for Growth.

At the forefront of the new plan are tax cuts for businesses and taxpayers alike, as well as a reduction of social security contribution and indirect taxes on production (such as energy). The plan reportedly has provision for supporting social cohesion.

More from Capital.gr:

Government spokesman: Stability should be ensured next Sunday

“Next Sunday is very important. Each ballot box is different,” government spokesman Simos Kedikoglou said.

According to AMNA, speaking on private TV station STAR, Kedikoglou said that “the picture in the province, even in a very small percentage, is different from that of Attica. In many cities and regions of the province, we will have good results.”

“Stability should be ensured next Sunday,” Kedikoglou added.

While Greek Reporter forks over the tab:

European Commission: Greeks Pay for Parties Debts

European-CommissionThe European Commission confirmed that the Greek citizens are repaying the loans of the Greek parties but refuses to provide information on which parties have taken loans.

The figures come from the answer of the EU Commissioner Joaquin Almunia to a relevant question by the MEP of SYRIZA, Nikos Chountis and Theodoros Skylakakis a MEP with the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats in Europe and leader of the small centrist party “Drasi.” Almunia said that the loans of the Greek parties were already non-performing since 2013.

Nikos Chountis asked Almunia about the exact amount of loans given by banks to political parties while he claimed that the non-performing loans are paid by the Greek citizens. Skylakakis claimed that the debts of the ruling New Democracy amount to 145 million euros. He asked if there were any arrangements for New Democracy’s debt, such as reduction of interest rates, which would boost the party’s finances before the euro elections.

To Vima withholds:

Markets are waiting on the European elections before investing

International investors are concerned about the possibility of early general elections in Greece

Even though the first round of local government elections that took place on Sunday did not trigger any dramatic political developments or upheaval, the markets and investors remain cautious, waiting for the second round and European elections on Sunday. Monday morning at the Athens Stock Market Exchange was euphoric, with the main index up by 3.47%, by the end of the day it marked losses of up to 2.4%.

The Wall Street Journal has pointed out that even though the general consensus is that the European elections will not have any real impact on the markets, the outcome of the elections could well determine the future of the coalition government in Greece, by prompting general elections.

The Foundation for Economic and Industrial Research (IOVE) and BCG argue that despite the fact that the economy is starting to find its balance after six years of recession, there is not enough momentum to implement true reforms, as the repeated delays and political reactions to truly necessary reforms suggest.

While MacroPolis declines:

Apartment prices fell 7.5 pct in Q1, down for the 21st successive quarter

Apartment prices in Greece fell by 7.5 percent year on year (YoY) in the first quarter (Q1) of 2014, according to the Bank of Greece (BoG). Although at a slightly slower pace over the past four quarters, this is the twenty-first successive negative reading since Q1 2009.

In addition, apartment prices dropped by 1.5 percent quarter on quarter (QoQ) in Q1 2014, which corresponds to the twelfth consecutive negative QoQ reading.

At the same time, the nosedive in the appraisals continued unabated showing a 63.3 percent drop YoY. The volume and value of appraisals showed a similar move slumping by 63.4 and 66.2 percent respectively.

The apartment declines mirrored national trends. From Greek Reporter:

Greek Property Prices 2014 Continue to Drop

The Bank of Greece data showed that Greek housing prices are dropping during the first quarter of 2014, compared to the same period of last year.

It is estimated that prices have decreased by 7.5 percent in 2014. According to revised data, housing prices dropped with an average annual rate of 10.3 percent in 2013 ( 11.5 percent, 11.7 percent, 9.2 percent and 8.6 percent in the first, second, third and fourth quarter of 2013 respectively). In 2012, price drops amounted to 11.7 percent compared to 2013.

More specifically, in the first quarter of 2014, prices of newly built homes (up to 5 years old) fell 7.6 percent while older ones saw a drop of 7.5 percent, compared to 2013. The correspondent annual decline rate in 2013 came to 10.4 percent for newly built homes and 10.2 percent for older housing.

Off to the Ukraine with Channel NewsAsia Singapore:

Ukraine says Russia pulls back forces ahead of vote

Ukraine confirmed on Tuesday that Russia had pulled its troops back from the border for the first time in a move that could ease spiralling tensions five days ahead of a make-or-break presidential poll.

The state border service’s surprise announcement that none of the estimated 40,000 soldiers were now stationed within 10 kilometres (six miles) of Ukraine has the potential to deflate the bloody Kremlin-backed insurgency that threatens to tear the ex-Soviet nation apart.

The provisional Western-backed leaders in Kiev won another boost on Tuesday when Ukraine’s richest tycoon Rinat Akhmetov denounced the armed rebels who have overrun a dozen cities in his eastern industrial power base as bandits who might create “genocide”.

Latin America next and an Argentine controversy from MercoPress:

Catholic Church and Cristina Fernandez downplay impact of recent document on ‘violence in Argentina’

One of the Pope’s closest collaborators, Argentine Monsignor Guillermo Karcher, said “there is no reason to look for causes for conflict” in the Episcopal Conference document released last week about “violence” in Argentina.

“We immediately talked about it [with Pope Francis], we analyzed the Episcopal document,” Karcher said and highlighted “the need to understand the language within its context”.

“I think there is no reason to look for a cause for conflict,” he said in an interview with a Buenos Aires radio. He also underlines that the document “is an invitation to national reconciliation” and “a call from Church to live together in a better way”.

The text, which states that Argentina is “sick with violence”, was analyzed by President Cristina Fernández last week, who criticized it for “wanting to reignite old battles”.

Brazilian woes ahead? From the Independent:

Rio 2016 Olympics: Sailors warned over sewage-infested waters, dog carcasses and even ‘human corpses’ in Guanabara Bay

Five years after Brazil won its Olympic bid, athletes have condemned the site of the Olympic sailing and windsurfing events as a ‘dump’

Olympic sailors looking to compete in the 2016 Summer Games have voiced concerns over sewage-infested waters swamped with rubbish and human waste in Rio de Janeiro’s Guanabara Bay, where the Olympic sailing and windsurfing events will take place.

Athletes have described having to dodge a deluge of rubbish including floating mattresses, car tyres, submerged sofas, dog carcasses and even human corpses, as former Olympian medallist Lars Grael claimed, when sailing in the water – five years after Brazil won its Olympic bid.

The Bay was condemned as a “dump” in March by Germany’s sailing team because of the garbage-filled waters, where they questioned how the sailing regattas would be organised there.

And other woes hitting hard, via MercoPress:

Pele admits tourists are cancelling trips to Brazil because of protests and delays

Protests in Brazil and delays in building stadiums are putting the World Cup next month at risk and prompting tourists to stay away, soccer great Pele said on Monday. Brazil’s tournament organizers have faced headwinds since the country was tapped to host the World Cup in 2007.

Hundreds of thousands of Brazilian protesters took to the streets during the Confederations Cup last year over the high cost of the sporting extravaganza, as well as against taxes, inflation, corruption and poor public services.

Pele, a triple World Cup winner and special advisor of the World Cup organizing committee, was in Mexico City giving a news conference when he was asked if the protests in Brazil could jeopardize the tournament.

On to Asia and signs of more Thai turmoil to come from Channel NewsAsia Singapore:

Thai protest leader vows to ‘keep fighting’

Thailand’s opposition demonstrators vowed Tuesday to keep up their campaign to topple the government, despite the imposition of martial law by the military to quell political violence.

“We will still keep fighting — we have not won at all,” protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban said in a speech to supporters.

“The announcement of martial law has no effect and is in no way an obstacle to our fight,” added the firebrand former opposition MP, who is wanted by police on a charge of insurrection.

While Tokyo worries, via the Japan Daily Press:

Japan expresses ‘grave concerns’ regarding Thailand’s martial law declaration

Japan has expressed “grave concerns” regarding the surprise declaration of martial law in Thailand. The Southeast Asian nation has been undergoing violent political unrest, which saw the former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra and some members of her Cabinet forcibly removed from their posts on charges of abuse of power.

Speaking to reporters, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said, “We have grave concerns about the situation in Thailand. We once again strongly urge all parties concerned to act in a self-restrained manner without using violence.”

And Deutsche Welle warns:

Thailand ‘at risk of sliding into recession’

The Thai army declared martial law to restore “order” in the country. But investors are concerned, especially as the economy is already set to show the worst performance of all ASEAN nations, says analyst Rajiv Biswas.

Thailand’s biggest investor Japan expressed on Tuesday, May 20, “grave concerns” after the army imposed martial law, while the United States said it must only be “temporary” as multinational firms monitored events nervously. After months of deadly anti-government protests, the Thai army deployed armed troops in central Bangkok and censored the media, but insisted the move was “not a coup.” The country has been plunged in a political crisis over the past seven months, pitting the Bangkok-based middle-class and establishment, as well as staunchly royalist south against the north and northeastern rural support base of the Shinawatra clan.

While the new caretaker government is still in office, there are already indications that Southeast Asia’s second-biggest economy is hurtling towards recession given the prolonged political crisis, says, Rajiv Biswas, the chief Asia economist of the analytics firm IHS, in a DW interview.

Off to China and an existential question from China Daily:

China’s real estate market: collapse or managed slowdown?

Is China’s real-estate market headed for a collapse or will it be a managed slowdown?

In the middle of the previous decade, when large numbers of newly built properties remained vacant as housing prices tripled, predictions that the market was on the verge of collapse abounded. The bubble did not burst, however, as government policies aimed at stopping overseas speculators and limiting purchases of second homes seemed to control the threat.

But many observers now see new danger signs in the real-estate sector, making the possibility of a crash seem more certain to them.

“We are convinced that the property sector has passed a turning point and that there is a rising risk of a sharp correction,” Nomura Securities analysts Zhang Zhiwei wrote investors this month. Behind the comment were Chinese government statistics showing that the amount of unsold commercial and residential property in the country hit an all-time record in March. China’s national growth rate is now seen as possibly dropping below the 6 percent mark in 2014 amid a glut of housing supply and tight project-development funds.

And with that, off to Japan and straight into Fukushimapocalypse Now!

First up, with no volunteers, Tokyo asserts via NHK WORLD:

Govt. decides final disposal of Fukushima waste

Japan’s government has decided that a state-owned company will be responsible for the disposal of contaminated soil and other radioactive waste outside Fukushima Prefecture.

The government plans to purchase land plots in Futaba and Okuma towns in Fukushima Prefecture in order to build interim storage facilities there.

The interim facilities will store soil and other waste from cleanup work in areas contaminated by the Fukushima nuclear accident in March 2011. But local people fear the facilities will become final disposal sites.

And from Jiji Press, the latest in an ongoing series of watery woes:

Fukushima Water Cleanup System Stops Operating

A radioactive water cleanup system at Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in northeastern Japan was taken offline on Tuesday due to a glitch.

TEPCO found cloudy processed water in one of the three Advanced Liquid Processing System units on Tuesday morning.

Calcium levels in the water were higher than normal, company officials explained. TEPCO suspended operations of the unit at 9 a.m. (midnight Monday GMT). It was the only one of the three units in operation at the time.

Water again, this time from NHK WORLD:

Groundwater release to begin at Fukushima Daiichi

The operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant plans to start pumping groundwater at the site and releasing it into the sea on Wednesday.

The operator hopes to prevent the water from reaching tainted reactor and turbine buildings and becoming contaminated.

The plan is aimed at reducing the volume of contaminated water accumulating at the site.

From the Asahi Shimbun, grim reality:

90% of TEPCO workers defied orders, fled Fukushima plant in 2011

Almost all workers, including managers required to deal with accidents, defied orders and fled the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant at a critical juncture when the disaster was unfolding in March 2011, documents showed.

Amid fears that a reactor containment vessel had been destroyed, around 650, or 90 percent, of the approximately 720 workers at the plant left the premises despite being told to remain at the site by the plant’s manager, Masao Yoshida.

Tokyo Electric Power Co., the operator of the No. 1 plant, has never mentioned the orders Yoshida issued on March 15, 2011, four days after the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami caused the meltdowns of three reactors. The company now says Yoshida’s orders were flexible, and that no breaches of company rules occurred.

More from the Japan Times:

Government silent on report Fukushima No. 1 workers fled during crisis

Suga refuses comment on report that 90% of Fukushima workers left after chief’s order to stay

The government on Tuesday refused to comment on a media report that Masao Yoshida, the now-deceased chief of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant at the time of the meltdowns, was quoted as saying most of the plant’s workers evacuated in spite of his order to remain.

At a news conference Tuesday, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga declined to comment on the Asahi report. The interview, he said, was conducted on condition that it not be publicized, and is kept under wraps by the Cabinet.

“We don’t know what the Asahi Shimbun has obtained and we can’t say its contents are identical to those the government has,” Suga said.

Meanwhile, the rush to get back online continues, via the Mainichi:

Japan Atomic Power applies for safety checks on Tokai No. 2 power plant

The Japan Atomic Power Co. (JAPC) applied for safety checks on the Tokai No. 2 Power Station in the village of Tokai, Ibaraki Prefecture, on May 20 in a bid to restart the 35-year-old reactor there.

The reactor at the Tokai No. 2 Power Station is the oldest among those reactors being under safety screening by the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA). Attention, therefore, will be focused on the NRA’s decision after screening as the revised Nuclear Reactor Regulation Law limits the life of a reactor to 40 years in principle.

The reactor at the Tokai No. 2 Power Station is a light water reactor of the boiling water type — the same type of reactors at the troubled Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant. The JAPC has been preparing to build a breakwater which is over 18 meters above sea level and install venting equipment with filters as it seeks to restart the reactor. The company plans to finish work to put measures against severe accidents in place by 2016.

From the Dept. Of Other Fuels/Other Problems via BBC News:

BP court appeal over Deepwater compensation rejected

Oil giant BP has suffered a setback in its attempt to limit payouts over the 2010 Gulf of Mexico spill.

A US court has refused to reconsider its decision that firms do not have to prove they were directly harmed by the oil spill to get settlement payouts. It means the compensation claims process, which has been suspended since a separate court ruling in December, should now be able to resume.

BP said it was “disappointed” by the decision and mulling its legal options. It had argued at an earlier court hearing that some firms had filed fictitious spill claims.

And for our final item, from University of California- Irvine via ScienceDaily, grooved for a climactic climax:

Greenland will be far greater contributor to sea rise than expected: Work reveals long, deep valleys connecting ice cap to ocean

Greenland’s icy reaches are far more vulnerable to warm ocean waters from climate change than had been thought, according to new research by UC Irvine and NASA glaciologists. The work, published today in Nature Geoscience, shows previously uncharted deep valleys stretching for dozens of miles under the Greenland Ice Sheet.

The bedrock canyons sit well below sea level, meaning that as subtropical Atlantic waters hit the fronts of hundreds of glaciers, those edges will erode much further than had been assumed and release far greater amounts of water.

Ice melt from the subcontinent has already accelerated as warmer marine currents have migrated north, but older models predicted that once higher ground was reached in a few years, the ocean-induced melting would halt. Greenland’s frozen mass would stop shrinking, and its effect on higher sea waters would be curtailed.

“That turns out to be incorrect. The glaciers of Greenland are likely to retreat faster and farther inland than anticipated — and for much longer — according to this very different topography we’ve discovered beneath the ice,” said lead author Mathieu Morlighem, a UCI associate project scientist. “This has major implications, because the glacier melt will contribute much more to rising seas around the globe.”

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