Canning Town murder: Women's bodies in freezer in flat

Crime reporter(wp/bbc):::

A murder inquiry is under way after two women's bodies were found inside a freezer at a flat in east London.

The human remains were found by officers when they were called to Vandome Close in Canning Town.

The women have not been formally identified and post-mortem examinations have not yet taken place.

Two men, aged 50 and 34, have been arrested on suspicion of murder. Both remain in custody at London police stations.

An officer could be seen guarding the entrance to the block of six flats earlier.

Scenes of crime officers in protective clothing have also been inside the building, with a downstairs window covered.

I've managed to get inside an adjacent block next door to the flats that have been taped off by police.

In the back garden there is a blue tent and police cordons are in place.

It's a quiet residential area in east London - but one person has told me they are petrified to live here.

The Met have now confirmed the bodies were found in a freezer.

It comes after a witness said a fridge was carried out of the property on the Friday and into the back of a police van.

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So far in 2019, more than 40 murder investigations have been launched in London by the Metropolitan and British Transport police forces.

Det Ch Supt Richard Tucker said: "The launch of any murder investigation is naturally of concern to the local community.

"We have borough officers in the area supporting colleagues from the Homicide and Major Crime Command as they investigate the full circumstances."

Standard Chartered hails turnaround progress with $1 billion buyback plan

Banking&Finance reporter(wp/reuters):::
Standard Chartered PLC unveiled plans for an up to $1 billion (£773 million) share buyback, its first such in at least 20 years as quarterly profit rose 10 percent, signalling progress in its turnaround strategy.

The bank’s shares rose 4 percent on Tuesday against a 0.5 percent decline in the STOXX European banks index, as its long-suffering investors interpreted the buyback as a statement of confidence about its prospects of growing returns.

“They are good results, and about time too, it’s been a long wait,” said Hugh Young, managing director for Asia Pacific at Aberdeen Standard Investments, StanChart’s 15th biggest shareholder.

The share repurchase plan comes after StanChart Chief Executive Bill Winters unveiled in February ambitious plans to double return on tangible equity and dividends in three years by cutting $700 million in costs and boosting income.

Winters won plaudits from investors for his initial three-year plan that began in June 2015 with a focus on revamping the risk culture, slashing costs and purging bad loans that had accumulated in a post-2008 period of over-aggressive growth.

But the CEO then faced a tougher task, as StanChart battled to boost revenue at a time when slowing economic growth in core Asian markets, volatile commodities markets and the impact of the U.S. fines hammered profits.

The bank’s London shares have fallen 42 percent since the former JPMorgan banker took over as CEO.

StanChart said on Tuesday in its quarterly earnings filing that it had received regulatory approval to start buying back shares worth up to $1 billion.

“Hopefully the message is pretty clear — we are back on returning capital, something we have not done for 15 or 20 years which is good,” Chief Financial Officer Andy Halford told reporters.

Pretax profit for StanChart, which focuses on Asia, Africa and the Middle East, grew to $1.38 billion in the January-March period from $1.26 billion a year ago, the London-headquartered bank said.

StanChart announced this month a $1 billion settlement with the United States to bring to a close a long-running probe into whether the bank continued to violate sanctions after 2007, when it said it would no longer do business with Iran.

In addition to the $900 million provision the bank made in 2018, it took a “further and final charge” of $186 million in the first quarter, StanChart said.

The bank said its core capital ratio, a key measure of financial strength, fell by 30 basis points from end-December to 13.9 percent, with the cost related to resolution of the alleged sanctions violation shaving off 7 basis points.

The share buyback programme, which the bank said would start imminently, is likely to reduce its capital ratio in the second quarter by roughly 35 basis points, it said.

ENCOURAGING

Stanchart saw its underlying return on tangible equity (ROTE) hit 9.6 percent for the quarter, close to the 10 percent full year target it has said it will reach by 2021, but cautioned its overall 2019 return would be lower due to a tax hit in the final quarter.

“Full-year ROTE has typically been about 60 to 70 percent of Q1 so that’s a proxy you should have in your mind,” Halford said.

The bank’s performance in the January-March period was boosted by strong results in its financial markets businesses, with foreign exchange and interest rates trading revenues both up 20 percent from the same period a year ago.

The performance was especially notable in a quarter where most U.S. and European investment banks’ trading arms have suffered badly, hit by lower market volatility which cut commissions from clients’ trading.

Gosport hospital deaths: Police launch new inquiry

Crime watch,Follow up(wp/bbc):::

A new criminal investigation is to take place into the deaths of hundreds of patients who were given "dangerous" levels of painkillers at a hospital.

An inquiry found 456 patients died after being given opiate drugs at Gosport War Memorial Hospital between 1989 and 2000.

A review has since been carried out by Kent and Essex Police to assess if there was "sufficient new evidence".

Relatives have been told a "full investigation" will begin.

Three previous investigations into 92 of the deaths by Hampshire Constabulary resulted in no charges being brought.

Assistant Chief Constable Nick Downing, head of serious crime at Kent and Essex Police, met relatives at a meeting in Fareham.

He said he hoped the investigation would be "some comfort" to them.

He said: "This investigation is not about numbers, it is about people - specifically those who died at the hospital and the loved ones they have left behind.

"This is a highly complex and emotive case that some family members have been living with for more than 30 years, and I would like to thank them for their continuing patience and understanding during this process."

He said police would be meeting families individually to collect statements on their relatives' experiences of the hospital.

an Sandford, whose mother died in Gosport, was among relatives at the meeting.

He said: "Frustration doesn't even come near. They should have sorted this out a long time ago.

"All I want to hear is a good result."

The Gosport Independent Review Panel report, published in June 2018, found there was a "disregard for human life" at the hospital.

It also found an "institutionalised regime" of prescribing and administering amounts of opiate medication that were not clinically justified.

The report said the quality of previous police investigations had been "consistently poor".

It found whistleblowers and families were ignored as they attempted to raise concerns about the administration of medication on the wards, which was overseen by Dr Jane Barton.

Dr Barton retired after being found guilty by a medical panel of failings in her care of 12 patients at Gosport between 1996 and 1999.

Dr Jane Barton was found guilty of serious professional misconduct in 2010 but no prosecutions were brought

Police investigations into 92 deaths resulted in no charges

Vodafone found security flaws in Huawei equipment in 2011, 2012

Telecom reporter(wp/reuters):::
Telecoms group Vodafone found security flaws in equipment supplied by China’s Huawei to its Italian business in 2011 and 2012, the two companies said on Tuesday.

Vodafone, the world’s second-biggest mobile operator, said it had found security vulnerabilities in two products and that both incidents had been resolved quickly.

Huawei, the world’s biggest producer of telecoms equipment, is under intense scrutiny after the United States told allies not to use its technology because of fears it could be a vehicle for Chinese spying. Huawei has categorically denied such accusations.

Vodafone paused the deployment of Huawei equipment in its core networks in January as the British group waits for Western governments to give the Chinese company full security clearance.

Last week Britain sought to navigate its way through the bitter dispute, with two security sources telling Reuters that it had decided to block Huawei from all core parts of its 5G network and restrict access to non-core parts.

The British governement is still deliberating on the use of Huawei equipment in a future 5G network but aims to announce its decision in the next month.

A government report in March rebuked Huawei for failing to fix long-standing security issues and said that British security officials had found “several hundred vulnerabilities and issues” with the company’s equipment in 2018.

However, mobile operators such as Vodafone have warned that a complete ban on Huawei would delay 5G, which will offer much faster data speeds and underpin future development in many industries, such as self-driving cars.

The two companies said they had found software vulnerabilities in 2011 and 2012 that were fixed by Huawei.

Vodafone said it had found no evidence of any unauthorised access and that Huawei could not have accessed the fixed-line network in Italy without permission.

“The issues were identified by independent security testing, initiated by Vodafone as part of our routine security measures, and fixed at the time by Huawei,” a Vodafone spokesman said.

Huawei said it was made aware of historical vulnerabilities in 2011 and 2012 and that they had been addressed at the time.

“Software vulnerabilities are an industry-wide challenge,” it said. “Like every information and communications technology vendor we have a well-established public notification and patching process, and when a vulnerability is identified we work closely with our partners to take the appropriate corrective action.”

Vodafone said the vulnerability had stemmed from the use of Telnet, a protocol that was commonly used by many vendors for performing diagnostic functions. It allows equipment manufacturers to communicate with their products after they have been deployed.

“It would not have been accessible from the internet,” Vodafone said.

The news of the historical flaws was first reported by Bloomberg.

Spokesmen for the British government’s digital department and for the National Cyber Security Centre declined to comment.

BT, Britain’s biggest fixed and mobile operator, said that over the course of more than 10 years of working with Huawei it had not identified any security breaches or evidence of unsolicited communications.

Huawei competes with Sweden’s Ericsson and Finland’s Nokia.

Labour meets to decide stance on second Brexit referendum

Political reporter(wp/reuters):::

Britain’s main opposition Labour Party meets on Tuesday to hammer out its position on whether to demand a second referendum on any Brexit deal as part of its campaign for the European parliament election next month.

With Britain’s delayed departure from the European Union far from clear, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is under pressure from many lawmakers and party members to throw his support behind a second referendum, or confirmatory vote, on a Brexit deal.

So far, the party has stuck to its position that it would only back such a vote to prevent what it calls a “damaging Tory (Conservative) Brexit” or to prevent Britain leaving without a deal - a prospect that businesses increasingly fear.

A Labour source said Tuesday’s meeting of the party’s National Executive Committee was not likely to agree something beyond the current stance, which would mean Labour would not hold another vote if it secured its Brexit plan.

That could further infuriate Labour lawmakers, including deputy leader Tom Watson, who have been pushing for a second referendum, a rift that fuelled the breakaway of eight Labour politicians who have formed a new party called Change UK.

Nearly three years after voters backed exiting the EU by 52 to 48 percent, the main parties, like much of the country, are deeply divided over Brexit, leaving it unclear when, and even if, Britain will leave the bloc.

Prime Minister Theresa May’s deal has been rejected three times by parliament, forcing the Conservative leader to open talks with Labour to try to find common ground and win approval to avoid taking part in the European elections.

After nearly four weeks of the talks, Labour sources said Monday’s talks with the government were better in tone than before and that ministers had shown some willingness to move, declining to offer specifics.

But with time ticking down and a new Brexit deadline set for Oct. 31, parties are readying themselves for the May 23 elections, offering those wanting to remain in the EU and others supporting a clean break another potential battleground.