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The European Central Bank (ECB) says it is “ready to take appropriate and targeted measures” to deal with the risks the coronavirus outbreak might have for the global economy and financial markets.

“The coronavirus outbreak is a fast developing situation, which creates risks for the economic outlook and the functioning of financial markets,” the ECB said in a Monday statement.

The ECB is closely monitoring developments and their implications for the economy, medium-term inflation and the transmission of our monetary policy.”

“We stand ready to take appropriate and targeted measures, as necessary and commensurate with the underlying risks,” the statement read.

Source: http://www.cnn.com

Turkey deployed swarms of killer drones to strike Russian-backed Syrian government forces, in what a senior official said was a military innovation that demonstrated Ankara’s technological prowess on the battlefield.

The retaliation for the killing last week of 33 Turkish soldiers by Syrian forces involved an unprecedented number of drones in coordinated action, said the senior official in Turkey with direct knowledge of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Syria policy. It was the first time a country had commanded the air space over such a large area using drone swarms, according to the official.

The series of strikes since Thursday by dozens of the remotely-controlled aircraft targeted Syrian bases and chemical warfare depots, the Turkish military said. But Turkey also located and destroyed some Syrian missile-defense systems, raising questions about the effectiveness of the Russian-made equipment intended to deter such air attacks.

“That’s something only Israel had been recorded publicly to have done until now,” Charles Lister, director of the Extremism and Counterterrorism Program at the Middle East Institute, said on Twitter, in reference to video footage taken by a Turkish drone allegedly showing the destruction of a Syrian army air-defense system. Turkey was waging an “air campaign run entirely by armed drones backed up” by heavy rocket artillery, he said.

The tactic threatens to bring NATO member Turkey into direct confrontation with Russia, adding to strains in relations between Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin as they prepare to meet this week in an effort to ease tensions over Syria. The two leaders have worked together to try to end the Syrian civil war, despite backing opposing sides, but have repeatedly stumbled over who should control the northwestern Syrian province of Idlib that borders Turkey.

Russia dominates the skies over Syria as part of Putin’s military support of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, deploying advanced S-400 missile-defense systems to secure the air space while its warplanes aid Syrian forces battling to take the last rebel stronghold in Idlib. Turkish forces back the rebels and Ankara says it fears a fresh exodus of refugees flocking into Turkey if Idlib falls to Assad.

Syria reacted to the Turkish drone campaign by declaring the air space in Idlib closed, the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency reported Sunday. “Any aircraft that violates the Syrian airspace will be dealt with as a hostile aircraft that must be downed,” SANA reported, citing an unnamed military official.

Turkey announced Sunday that its forces had shot down two Syrian Su-24 warplanes and destroyed three more Syrian air defense systems, while confirming that one armed Turkish drone was hit.

Turkey wants to carve out a zone that it controls in northern Syria as part of efforts to resettle millions of Syrian refugees currently in Turkey. Putin has said Assad’s forces should control all of Syria’s territory as the best way to guarantee Turkey’s border security.

Russia denied involvement in the Feb. 27 air strike that inflicted the biggest single-day loss of Turkish troops for decades, though Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Moscow can’t prevent Syrian forces striking at “terrorists” on their soil. Turkish officials accuse Moscow of doing too little to rein in Assad.

Turkey has long hosted the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s Anatolian Eagle military exercises, which simulate attacks on similar Russian missile-defense systems including with electronic warfare. Israeli forces also participated in the drills once. Turkey deployed an array of electronic jammers in Syria before it launched the drone strikes as part of its “Spring Shield” campaign.

Ankara appeared eager to show off its aerial firepower. The Defense Ministry posted a series of videos on Twitter showing Syrian tanks and artillery being destroyed in apparent drone attacks.

Source: http://www.bloomberg.com

ccording to a poll conducted by 5W Public Relations, 38% of 737 American beer drinkers are actively avoiding and will not purchase Corona beer because of the coronavirus.

Among regular Corona drinkers, only 4% said they will no longer drink their fave, but 14% said they would not order their fave in public, ostensibly because they don’t wanna freak people out. Another 16% of U.S. residents are confused about the connection between Corona beef and coronavirus.

Source: http://www.bossip.com

From stocks to bonds and currencies, the coronavirus outbreak is rocking all corners of financial markets. For oil producers, the pain has been particularly acute.

With demand dissipating, oil has plunged into a bear market, putting pressure on OPEC to step in and attempt to stabilize prices. But as the coronavirus continues to spread around the world can the cartel really play the savior?

That’s the question this week, as OPEC members and allied producers gather in Vienna for meetings on Thursday and Friday

The backdrop: Brent crude futures, the global benchmark, finished Friday at $50.52 per barrel, down 13.6% for the week. US oil was trading at $44.76, a 16.2% weekly decline. Prices haven’t been that low since late 2018

Why OPEC needs to act: The economies of some OPEC members are reliant on crude production, and the coronavirus has sharply reduced demand for products such as gasoline and jet fuel. To keep prices from dropping further, OPEC may turn to what has become its preferred strategy in recent years: coordinated production cuts.

The Financial Times has reported that Saudi Arabia is pushing for a cut in production of 1 million barrels per day, much more than first expected. The kingdom would shoulder the brunt of the reduction, while Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Russia would split the rest, according to the FT. Russia is not a member of OPEC, but it has coordinated production levels with the cartel in recent years.

Source: http://www.cnn.com

Satellite images released by NASA and the European Space Agency reveal that air pollution over China has gone down since the coronavirus outbreak. 

Production in many factories has been halted and transportation has been restricted in order to prevent spreading the virus. In mainland China, tens of thousands of cases have been confirmed with more than 2,700 dead.

From January 1-20 the images show higher levels of nitrogen dioxide over China, but from February 10-25, traces of the gas are hardly visible. Nitrogen dioxide is a yellow-brown gas emitted by motor vehicles, power plants, and industrial facilities. It can cause respiratory problems like coughing, asthma, and difficulty breathing.

NASA scientists say the drop was initially most visible over Wuhan, where the outbreak began.

“This is the first time I have seen such a dramatic drop-off over such a wide area for a specific event,” said Fei Liu, an air quality researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, said in a statement.

Pollution does tend to go down around the Lunar New Year as many businesses close for celebrations, however, researchers believe this decrease is more than just a holiday or weather-related effect. 

“This year, the reduction rate is more significant than in past years and it has lasted longer,” Liu said.

Source: http://www.cnn.com

At least 29 Turkish soldiers have been killed and several others injured in an airstrike by Syrian government forces in Idlib, a Turkish governor has said.

Turkish forces “responded in kind” almost immediately, retaliating with artillery fire on “all known” Syrian government targets, Turkey’s Anadolou news agency reported the state’s communications director Fahrettin Altun as saying.

The dangerous escalation marks the largest number of Turkish casualties in a single day since it sent thousands of troops to aid those resisting Bashar al-Assad‘s Russian-backed offensive, which began in December.

Idlib is the last major city held by opposition forces, and nearly 1 million residents have been forced to flee since the Syrian government’s aggressive bombing campaign began.

In anticipation of the imminent arrival of refugees from Idlib, Turkish border officials have been ordered to stand down and allow them to pass into Europe, a Turkish official told Reuters on Thursday

This has not been confirmed by the government in Turkey, which hosts some 3.7 million Syrian refugees and in 2016 struck a multibillion-euro deal with the European Union to stem the influx of migrants into the bloc.

More than 900,000 people in Idlib have fled their homes since December, with some 500,000 estimated to be children.

Most are homeless and sleeping in freezing conditions at camps and makeshift shelters in the region. Many have resorted to burning spare clothes and garbage to stay warm.

Offensives by Syrian government forces are shifting the front lines closer to these densely populated areas, leading the UN deputy regional humanitarian coordinator for Syria to warn last week that there will be “a bloodbath” if Mr Assad’s forces push further into the province.

Mr Assad’s forces, supported by relentless Russian airstrikes, have pushed hard in recent months to retake the last large rebel-held region in northwest Syria after nine years of war that has displaced millions and killed hundreds of thousands.

Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdogan has threatened to mount a major counter-offensive against Mr Assad’s forces unless they pull back within the next two days to ceasefire lines agreed in 2018.

Two Turkish officials said he held an emergency meeting in Ankara with staff after the airstrike on Thursday, but the presidency would not release any details. Turkey previously suffered 21 casualties in February.

The airstrike came after Turkey-backed Syrian opposition fighters retook a strategic northwestern town from government forces on Thursday, opposition activists said, cutting a key highway just days after the government reopened it for the first time since 2012.

Despite losing the town of Saraqeb, Mr Assad’s forces now control almost the entire southern part of Idlib province after capturing more than 20 villages on Thursday, state media and opposition activists said.

While the fighting raged, Turkish and Russian officials concluded two days of talks in Ankara. Two previous rounds of negotiations in Ankara and Moscow have not yielded a sought ceasefire deal.

Hours earlier, Russian state television claimed Turkish military specialists were using shoulder-fired missiles to try to shoot down Russian and Syrian military aircraft over Idlib, a development that, if confirmed, would mark another serious escalation of the conflict.

Source: http://www.independent.co.uk

At least 33 Turkish soldiers were killed in Syria’s Idlib province on Thursday in an aerial attack by Syrian regime forces, according to Gov. Rahmi Dogan of Turkey’s Hatay province.

Thirty-five soldiers injured in the attack have been evacuated to hospitals in Turkey, Dogan said.

A security meeting is being held at the presidential palace after the “nefarious attack against heroic soldiers in Idlib who were there to ensure our national security,” according to a statement from Turkish director of communications Fahrettin Altun.

Turkey has retaliated in an effort to “revenge our martyred heroic soldiers,” the statement said.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu spoke to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg following the Syrian attack, according to a statement released by the ministry. There were no further details about the content of the call.

The Syrian government has not commented on the Turkish claim. The Russian Defense Ministry denied that its air force carried out strikes in the area of Idlib where the Turkish soldiers were located. Moscow said Turkish forces were “located near the areas where terrorist groups were situated” and then “came under fire from Syrian forces.”

Turkish soldiers are in the last rebel-held area of Syria as part of a 2018 de-escalation agreement between Ankara and Moscow. The Syrian government, backed by Russia, has mounted an aggressive air campaign against rebels in Idlib in recent weeks.

Hundreds of thousands of people have fled the last opposition-held territory in Syria in the last two months, per Unite Nations figures, in the wake of an air campaign and swift ground offensive by the Syrian regime and its Russian backers.

Tens of thousands are still on the move, and nearly 700,000 of the displaced are women and children, the UN said.

A spokesperson for the State Department said the United States is “very concerned.”

“We are in contact with Turkish authorities to confirm these developments and to have more clarity on the current situation on the ground,” the spokesperson said.

“We stand by our NATO Ally Turkey and continue to call for an immediate end to this despicable offensive by the Assad regime, Russia and Iranian-backed forces.”

Source: http://www.cnn.com

Facebook is paying people to record phrases to improve its voice recognition tools. Completing each task nets 200 points in the app and it can only be completed five times, for a total of 1,000 points. That amounts to $5 sent to the user through PayPal