Haque Specialized Group's News

US stocks edged higher on Friday, with the Dow extending its streak of record-setting gains to 11 days, as increases in utilities and other safety plays outweighed declines in financials. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 11.44 points, or 0.05 per cent, to end at 20,821.76, the S&P 500 gained 3.53 points, or 0.15 per cent, to 2,367.34 and the Nasdaq Composite added 9.80 points, or 0.17 per cent, to 5,845.31. Utilities, up 1.4 per cent were the best performing of the 11 major S&P sectors, lifted by a 3.1 gain in Public Service Enterprise Group after its quarterly results. Financials, the best performing S&P sector since the election, weighed on both the Dow and S&P 500 with a decline of 0.75 per cent as Treasury yields weakened.  The Dow extended its run of record-setting gains to 11, the longest streak since 1987. Shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise fell 6.9 per cent to $22.96 after the company cut its full-year profit forecast. JC Penney fell 5.8 per cent to $6.46 after the department store operator reported a bigger-than-expected drop in same-store sales for the holiday quarter. Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by a 1.11-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.16-to-1 ratio favoured decliners. The S&P 500 posted 41 new 52-week highs and two new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 88 new highs and 54 new lows. About 6.75 billion shares changed hands in U.S. exchanges, compared with the 6.8 billion daily average over the last 20 sessions, according to Reuters.....

Published at: 2017-02-25 00:00:05

Philippine police arrested Senator Leila de, Lima who is the leading critic of President Rodrigo Duterte's deadly crackdown, on drug charges.  Leila de Lima said the accusations against her were part of an attempt by Duterte to muzzle critics of the clampdown that has left more than 7,000 suspected dealers and small-time users dead.  She questioned why the court suddenly issued the arrest order when it was scheduled Friday to hear her petition to throw out the charges of receiving bribes from detained drug lords. "If they think they can silence me, if they think I will no longer fight for my advocacies, especially on the truth on the daily killings and other intimidations of this Duterte regime. It's my honour to be jailed for what I've been fighting for," she said before police took her into custody at the Senate. Vice President Leni Robredo and other political allies expressed support to de Lima, saying she was being persecuted for criticizing the president.  Archbishop Socrates Villegas, the head of bishops in the predominantly Roman Catholic country, said the senators and others charged should be accorded "their fair day in the court of laws." Presidential spokesman Ernesto Abella said de Lima will be treated fairly and should not fear for her safety where she was detained. Duterte expanded the crackdown nationwide after becoming president in June and de Lima continued to criticize him after winning a Senate seat last year, according to AP.....

Published at: 2017-02-25 00:00:05

The White House excluded several major US news organisations, including some it has criticised, from an off-camera briefing held by the White House press secretary on Friday. Reporters for CNN, The New York Times, Politico, The Los Angeles Times and BuzzFeed were not allowed into the session in the office of press secretary Sean Spicer, reports Reuters. Spicer's off-camera briefing, or "gaggle," replaced the usual televised daily news briefing in the White House briefing room. He did not say why those particular news organisations were excluded, a decision which drew strong protests. Reuters was included in the session, along with about 10 other news organisations, including Bloomberg and CBS. President Donald Trump has regularly attacked the media and at a gathering of conservative activists on Friday he criticized news organizations that he said provide "fake news", calling them the "enemy" of the American people. Spicer said his team decided to have a gaggle in his office on Friday instead of a full briefing in the larger White House briefing room and argued that “we don't need to do everything on camera every day.” Reporters at the Associated Press and Time magazine walked out of the briefing when hearing that others had been barred from the session. Off-camera gaggles are not unusual. The White House often invites handpicked outlets in for briefings, typically for specific topics. But briefings and gaggles in the White House are usually open to all outlets and they are free to ask anything. A pool reporter from Hearst Newspapers was included in the gaggle on Friday and gave full details to the entire press corps. Media outlets allowed into the gaggle also shared their audio with others. PROTESTS Spicer's decision drew a sharp response from some of the media outlets that were excluded. "Nothing like this has ever happened at the White House in our long history of covering multiple administrations of different parties," Dean Baquet, executive editor of The New York Times, said in a statement. "We strongly protest the exclusion of The New York Times and the other news organizations. Free media access to a transparent government is obviously of crucial national interest." The White House Correspondents Association, or WHCA, also protested. "The WHCA board is protesting strongly against how today's gaggle is being handled by the White House," said Jeff Mason, president of the association and a Reuters reporter. During the election campaign last year, Trump's team banned a few news organizations, including The Washington Post and BuzzFeed, from covering his campaign rallies for a period of time to protest their coverage. CNN posted a Twitter message on Friday afternoon saying: "This is an unacceptable development by the Trump White House. Apparently this is how they retaliate when you report facts they don’t like. We’ll keep reporting regardless.” Ben Smith, editor-in-chief of BuzzFeed News, said in a statement: "While we strongly object to the White House's apparent attempt to punish news outlets whose coverage it does not like, we won't let these latest antics distract us from continuing to cover this administration fairly and aggressively." On Friday, Spicer said the White House plans to fight against what it says is unfair coverage. "I think we’re going to aggressively push back," he said. "We’re just not going to sit back and let false narratives, false stories, inaccurate facts get out there."  ....

Published at: 2017-02-25 00:00:05

At least five people were killed and 20 others injured in two separate road accidents in Cox's Bazar district on Saturday. Police said the accidents have been reported on Saturday morning from the coastal district Sadar and Chakoria Upazilas. Chakoria police camp chief Sub Inspector Abul Hashem said a road crash around 9:00am at Harbang Dayal area has killed four passengers of a car on the spot.  Another accident on the highway near the district town has left one person killed. Chiringa Highway Police OC Md Abul Kalam Azad said a pick-up truck met with an accident on the Cox's Bazar-Chittagong Highway at Rashidnagar around 7:00am.  One of the victims died after being taken to the local hospital, said the police officer, reports bdnews24.com.....

Published at: 2017-02-25 00:00:04

A young man was electrocuted at Roufbad in Chittagong city on Thursday. The victim was identified as Pappu, 22, son of Nur Alam, a resident of the area, reports UNB. Sub-inspector Jahirul Islam, in-charge of Chittagong Medical College and Hospital police camp, said Pappu was electrocuted at the house of Khalil Sawdager in the area under Bayezid Police Station while he was repairing a damaged electric line in the evening.  ....

Published at: 2017-02-24 00:00:05