Posts published in “Day: July 22, 2017”

AFP report in Dawn, July 21, 2017 The US Defense Department withheld $50 million in Pakistan military payments after Pentagon chief Jim Mattis accused Islamabad of not doing enough to counter the Taliban-affiliated Haqqani network, an official said Friday. “Secretary Mattis told congressional defense committees that he was not able to certify that Pakistan took sufficient actions against the Haqqani network to permit full reimbursement of the fiscal year 2016 Coalition Support Funds,” Pentagon Spokesman…

by Wendy Wu in South China Morning Post, July 21, 2017 at 11.26 pm Rising local government and state firm borrowings are stalling Beijing’s efforts to contain debt risks in the Chinese economy, according to a government-backed research institution. The national leadership, headed by President Xi Jinping, listed “deleveraging” as a top economic priority in late 2015, but local authorities and state-owned enterprises continued to rely on debt for economic expansion, amplifying financial risks for…

Xinhua report in Global Times, July 21, 2017 at 18:50:36 Zhang Yujun, former assistant chairperson of China Securities Regulatory Commission, has been expelled from the Communist Party of China (CPC) and dismissed from public office for “severe disciplinary violations,” the top anti-graft body said Friday. Zhang was found to have seriously violated political and organizational discipline and attended banquets that could influence the fairness of official duty, according to the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection…