The company started preparations for the telco spin-off early last year after clearing all regulatory approvals for a $19 billion tie-up of its UK assets with Vodafone, Reuters reported at the time

International News via Reuters:

Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchison Holdings is weighing listing its global telecommunications business in London and Hong Kong as early as the third quarter after spinning it off from the group, two sources with direct knowledge of the matter said.

The company started preparations for the telco spin-off early last year after clearing all regulatory approvals for a $19 billion tie-up of its UK assets with Vodafone, Reuters reported at the time.

CK Hutchison, founded by Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing, is eyeing London as a primary listing venue and Hong Kong as a secondary venue for its telecoms businesses in Europe, Hong Kong and Southeast Asia that could be valued at around $20 billion, said the people.

CK Hutchison declined to comment.

The telco unit would be on the fast track to be included in London’s FTSE100 index, said one of the people.  

However, a potential deal the company has also been exploring to merge its Italian telecom unit Wind Tre with the Italian operations of French telecoms group Iliad, reported by Reuters in October, could pause the spin-off, a third and fourth person said.

There are different views within the company about what direction to take, they said, with the third person adding that a decision could be made in the coming weeks. 

Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Deutsche Bank are working with CK Hutchison on the spin-off listing, two of the sources said, cautioning however that plans are still fluid and the listing time could change. 

The four sources spoke on condition of anonymity because the matter is private. 

Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank and Citi also declined to comment.  

CK Hutchison has been focusing on enhancing the group’s returns. Last year it announced a deal to sell most of its global ports business, including assets near the Panama Canal, for an equity value of $22.8 billion to a BlackRock-led consortium.

The sale however has been progressing slowly due to complex regulatory clearance and China’s request to include a Chinese investor in the buyer group.

Reporting by Kane Wu in Hong Kong, Hadeel Al Sayegh in Dubai, and Amy-Jo Crowley in London and Elvira Pollina in Milan. Editing by Anousha Sakoui and Jan Harvey

Britain’s transport minister Heidi Alexander approved the opening of a second runway in September

International News via Reuters:

A legal challenge to Britain’s plan to expand Gatwick Airport, the country’s second largest, began on Tuesday, as campaigners sought to block the project on climate change grounds.  

Britain’s transport minister Heidi Alexander approved the opening of a second runway in September, hoping that converting a back-up runway into one that is fully operational will allow thousands of extra flights and drive economic growth.

But campaign group Communities Against Gatwick Noise Emissions, or CAGNE, said officials who approved the expansion of the airport, situated 30 miles (48 km) south of London, had failed to properly assess its impact on Britain’s climate change goals. 

The government has said the increasing use of sustainable aviation fuel means airport enlargements are not incompatible with its net-zero targets. It has therefore backed a new runway at Heathrow, the country’s biggest hub, and at Gatwick. 

Airports have struggled to expand in the densely populated southeast England in recent decades, encountering opposition from communities worried about noise and pollution. An earlier plan to build a new runway at Heathrow was scrapped in 2010.  

The plan at Gatwick involves moving the backup runway by 12 metres (39 feet) to meet safety standards for both runways to operate and allow for millions of new passengers by the 2030s, boosting trade and tourism and creating 14,000 jobs.

CAGNE says that the harm the expansion will cause to local communities will far outweigh the economic benefits.

A judgment is expected at a later date. Gatwick is 50.01% owned by France’s VINCI Airports. 

Reporting by Sarah Young; editing by Barbara Lewis

China’s plans to build a new embassy on the site of the two-century-old Royal Mint Court near the Tower of London have stalled for three years

International News via Reuters:

Britain’s government gave approval on Tuesday for China to build its largest embassy in Europe in London, hoping to improve ties with Beijing despite British and U.S. politicians’ warnings that it could be used as a base for spying.

China’s plans to build a new embassy on the site of the two-century-old Royal Mint Court near the Tower of London have stalled for three years over opposition from local residents, lawmakers and Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigners in Britain.

The decision was announced before an expected visit to China by Prime Minister Keir Starmer this month, the first by a British leader since 2018. Some British and Chinese officials said the trip was dependent on the embassy being approved.

The government said after the decision that intelligence agencies were involved throughout the approval process and devised a range of protective security measures.

“National security is our first duty,” a government spokesperson said in a statement.

EMBASSY APPROVAL HIGHLIGHTS UK’S CHINA DILEMMA

The Chinese government purchased Royal Mint Court in 2018 but its requests for planning permission to build a new embassy on the site were rejected by the local council in 2022. Chinese President Xi Jinping asked Starmer last year to intervene.

The government took control of the planning decision last year and an inquiry was held last February to hear arguments about whether the embassy should be approved.

Some politicians in Britain and the United States have said China should be barred from building on the site near London’s historic financial district because it might enable Beijing to eavesdrop on fibre-optic cables that are used by finance firms and travel underneath the area.

The opposition Conservative Party called the decision “a disgraceful act of cowardice”.

The Chinese embassy in London did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

British security officials had warned that allowing China to build a much larger embassy would mean more Chinese spies in Britain as well as more diplomats, an assertion dismissed by the Chinese embassy in London.

The head of Britain’s MI5 domestic spy agency said in October his spy agency had more than a century of experience dealing with foreign embassies, suggesting any security risks could be managed.

But MI5 has also warned of a threat posed by attempts by China to recruit and cultivate people with access to the British government.

The agency issued a warning to lawmakers in November about Beijing trying to interfere in British politics, and the collapse of a trial of two British men charged with spying on members of parliament for China led to criticism the government was prioritising better relations over national security.

The government has approved the new embassy – after years of diplomatic pressure from China – as Starmer tries to reset relations with Beijing, which is one of his foreign policy priorities.

Britain has in the past decade moved from saying it wanted to be China’s biggest supporter in Europe to being one of its fiercest critics, and is now trying to improve relations again. Starmer said last month closer business ties were in the national interest.

DIPLOMATIC TENSIONS

Some local residents who oppose China building a large embassy in the area are considering whether to ask for a judicial review against the decision.

The new embassy would be one of the largest diplomatic outposts in the world with a footprint of about 55,000 square metres (600,000 square feet), according to the planning application.

That is almost 10 times the size of China’s current embassy in central London and considerably bigger than its embassy in the United States.

Before Tuesday’s decision, China had blocked plans by Britain to expand its embassy in Beijing, officials involved in the talks said.

The approval was subject to a number of technical conditions including construction methods, access and environmental impact.

Chinese officials say that when Beijing purchased the site for 255 million pounds ($343 million), it received assurances from the then Conservative government that it could build its embassy.

Royal Mint Court was from the early 19th century until 1967 the site of the Royal Mint, where coins are produced.

($1 = 0.7427 pounds)

Editing by Frances Kerry and Timothy Heritage

The British royal and six other claimants accuse the Mail’s publisher Associated Newspapers of unlawful behaviour violating their privacy from 1993 until 2011 and beyond

International News via Reuters:

Prince Harry, Elton John and other public figures were victims of systematic phone hacking and other unlawful acts by Britain’s powerful Daily Mail, their lawyer said on Monday as the trial of their high-profile privacy case against the publisher began.

The British royal and six other claimants accuse the Mail’s publisher Associated Newspapers of unlawful behaviour violating their privacy from 1993 until 2011 and beyond, in a civil case with high stakes for the claimants and media alike.

Harry, 41, who arrived smiling and waving, said in a witness statement quoted by lawyers that it was “disturbing to feel that my every move, thought or feeling was being tracked and monitored just for the Mail to make money out of it”.

Associated, however, calls the allegations “preposterous smears”, saying their journalists had legitimate sources for information, including celebrities’ “leaky” social circles.

The publisher also alleges the litigation is part of a coordinated conspiracy by a wealthy group driven by personal animosity towards the media.

The nine-week trial will not just put reputations on the line, in a case with legal costs running to tens of millions of pounds, but could open up a new front in long-running litigation over the practices of the British press.

HARRY’S MISSION AGAINST PRESS

Harry, singer John and the other claimants – John’s husband David Furnish, actors Liz Hurley and Sadie Frost, anti-racism campaigner Doreen Lawrence and former lawmaker Simon Hughes – will argue investigators routinely obtained material unlawfully.

Harry, Hurley, Frost and Hughes attended the trial’s first day on Monday, with John, Furnish and Lawrence following online.

Their lawyer David Sherborne said there was “clear, systematic and sustained use of unlawful information gathering”, including hacking voicemail messages, bugging landlines and obtaining private information by deception, known as “blagging”.

Harry, who has long blamed the press for the death of his mother in a Paris car crash in 1997 as her vehicle sped away from paparazzi, was quoted by his lawyers as saying the practices drove him “paranoid beyond belief”.

Examples cited included finding out precise travel plans of Harry’s former girlfriend Chelsy Davy and a report about “private and intimate conversations” between Harry and his elder brother Prince William about images of their dead mother.

ASSOCIATED SAYS SOURCES LEGITIMATE, BLAMES FRIENDS

Associated’s titles had not previously been embroiled in the phone hacking scandal, which has long dogged the British press, until this case was filed in 2022.

Current and former senior editors and journalists are among those allegedly involved in wrongdoing while at Associated, including Victoria Newton, the current editor of Rupert Murdoch’s tabloid the Sun.

Associated’s lawyers say articles written by Newton, who is not giving evidence, were “legitimately sourced”. News UK, a subsidiary of Murdoch’s News Corp, did not respond to a request for comment.

Given Associated’s long-standing denials, most notably by former Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre at a public inquiry a decade ago, any adverse findings would be a “catastrophe” for the publisher, Sherborne said.

But Associated says it had legitimate means of obtaining information, including through press officers or publicists and from the social circles of claimants including Harry and John regularly leaked to the press.

The publisher also says evidence from former private detectives is untrustworthy and some evidence was obtained “through financial inducements and threats”.

For Harry, the trial is the final instalment of his legal war on the British tabloids, having said it was his mission to clear up the press and hold those in senior positions to account.

He has already successfully sued Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN) for damages, while he won an apology and admission of some wrongdoing by Murdoch’s British newspaper arm which settled ahead of a trial a year ago.

The prince became the first British royal to appear in a witness box in 130 years in 2023 during the MGN trial. He is expected to give evidence against Associated on Thursday.

Reporting by Michael Holden; Editing by David Holmes, Andrew Cawthorne, William Maclean