The HCM City People’s Court has dismissed a suit by the Dutch-based ride-hailing company Uber International Services Holding B.V against the city tax department seeking remedy against a claim for back taxes.

VNExpress electronic newspaper reported the court said Uber Vietnam, a subsidiary of Uber International, “does not have the required legal status for such a case”.

In September, the department ordered Uber to pay VND66.68 billion (US$2.94 million) in tax arrears and penalties for tax evasion by December 23. But the company only paid up VNĐ13.3 billion ($586,000).

The department then asked five local banks to appropriate more than VND53.38 billion ($2.35 million) from Uber’s accounts by January 10.

Uber then filed the lawsuit against the department.

On December 29, the department received a notice from the court to put on hold its appropriation from Uber.

Now that the case has been dismissed, the tax authorities will proceed to collect the amount.

Minister of Transport Nguyen Van The said Vietnam should learn from the European Union (EU) to manage the operation of companies such as Uber and Grab to ensure fair competition for traditional taxi firms.

At a conference of the General Directorate for Road of Vietnam on Tuesday, The said the management of Uber and Grab remained controversial worldwide.

However, in December, the EU’s top court ruled that Uber should be classified as a transport service and regulated like other taxi operators despite Uber’s argument that it was simply a digital app acting as an intermediary between drivers and passengers.

“We should learn from the EU to manage this service,” The said, urging relevant management authorities to raise proposals to manage Uber and Grab following the established regulations and ensure a healthy competition environment.

HCM City Taxi Association recently proposed that the transport ministry regulate Uber and Grab as taxi operators.

The association also suggested that Uber and Grab be banned from using foreign capital sources to offer promotions aimed in getting a share of the taxi industry, and then reporting losses to avoid paying taxes.

In a related move, taxi firm Anh Duong Việt Nam Company (Vinasun) sent a document to the Ministry of Transport proposing that Grab and Uber should also be regulated as taxi operators.

Reuters reported that Uber has transformed the taxi industry since its launch in 2011 and currently operates in more than 600 cities globally.

The boom in Uber and Grab cars in major cities, including Hanoi and HCM City, during the past three years has pushed many taxi firms into difficulties.

But with less than five months to go until the May 19 wedding of her grandson Prince Harry and US actress Meghan Markle in the mediaeval castle’s chapel, the local authority’s bid to sweep the homeless off the streets has triggered indignation.

Simon Dudley, the Conservative leader of the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead council, has urged the local Thames Valley Police force to take action against their “aggressive begging and intimidation”.

“A large number of adults that are begging in Windsor are not in fact homeless,” he wrote in a letter, while those that were genuinely homeless had rejected secure accommodation in order to keep begging.

“This is creating a concerning and hostile atmosphere for our residents and the seven million tourists who come to Windsor each year.”

The level of interest in Windsor, some 20 miles (35 kilometres) west of London, is “set to multiply” ahead of the royal wedding, he added.

According to the business valuation consultancy Brand Finance, the event should draw hundreds of thousands of extra tourists to the town, normally home to just 30,000 people, in 2018.

The British economy could be set to benefit to the tune of £500 million ($680 million, 565 million euros), they claimed.

Homeless by ‘choice’

Dudley said the genuinely homeless, having rejected help, were on the streets by “voluntary choice”.

Sheltering from the wintry wind, Stephanie, who has been in the town centre for two years after suffering mental illness, insisted: “I don’t choose to sit here.”

“Whatever people give me, they give me. I don’t choose to ask for money to get given something to eat, like sandwiches,” she told AFP.

The council’s plans have been condemned by, among others, the Conservative MP for Maidenhead — Prime Minister Theresa May.

Murray James, the Windsor Homeless Project manager, was all the more shocked by the proposed clampdown as Harry and his brother Prince William have long been involved in work with the homeless — William having even slept rough by a bridge in London.

“I am pretty sure they’re as outraged by the comments that have been made as I am and many of the Windsor residents are,” James told AFP in the church where the project offers hot meals, clothes and a shower.

Regardless of the royal marriage, the authorities should pursue the reasons why people end up on the streets rather than the homeless themselves, he said.

“It’s a constant problem,” he said.

“We’ve always had between 12 and 15 people sleeping rough. The majority of those people don’t beg.”

He claimed there was a lack of emergency accommodation in the town and deplored the state of the housing provided by the local authority — often “infested with rats”, he said.

‘A lovely day’

Many passers-by in Windsor barely take notice of its homeless population.

Peggy Outhwaite said she was uncomfortable waiting for the bus while a homeless man took up residence in the bus shelter.

“I don’t think that they should be here,” she said of the homeless.

“This is a royal town and Harry should have his day — and a lovely day at that,” the pensioner told AFP.

Derek Prime, who runs a souvenir shop already selling mugs and trinkets with Harry and his fiancee’s faces on, doubted the council’s claims to have proper accommodation in place.

Dudley “really wants to come out here and spend a night on the street just to see what it’s like,” he said.

Thames Valley Police commissioner Anthony Stansfeld, an elected official, is preparing a response to Dudley’s letter.

Last month, Dudley complained on Twitter of the “epidemic of rough sleeping and vagrancy” in the royal town.

But the local police hit back on the social media network, saying: “Housing is the responsibility of the council but it is better that agencies work together so people don’t become homeless.”

The book quickly sold out in shops in the US capital, with some lining up at midnight to get their hands on the instant best-seller, dismissed by Trump as “phony” and “full of lies.”

Without addressing specifics, White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said there were things in the book that were “completely untrue,” while Trump denounced comments attributed to Steve Bannon, saying his former chief strategist had “lost his mind.”

Team Trump: running to lose

“‘We’re all losers,’ Trump would say. ‘All our guys are terrible, nobody knows what they’re doing.'”

“‘This thing,’ he told the Mercers, ‘is so fucked up'”.

Trump was reportedly addressing the family of Bob Mercer, the ultra-conservative billionaire sponsors who swung behind his campaign in its final months — and who reiterated their support in the wake of Wolff’s bombshell book.

The shock of election night

“When the unexpected trend — Trump might actually win — seemed confirmed, Don Jr. told a friend that his father, or DJT, as he called him, looked as if he had seen a ghost. Melania, to whom Donald Trump had made his solemn guarantee, was in tears — and not of joy.”

“There was, in the space of little more than an hour, in Steve Bannon’s not unamused observation, a befuddled Trump morphing into a disbelieving Trump and then into a horrified Trump. But still to come was the final transformation: Suddenly, Donald Trump became a man who believed that he deserved to be, and was wholly capable of being, the president of the United States.”

Bannon on meeting with Russians 

“‘The three senior guys in the campaign,’ an incredulous Bannon went on, ‘thought it was a good idea to meet with a foreign government inside Trump Tower in the conference room on the 25th floor — with no lawyers.

‘They didn’t have any lawyers. Even if you thought that this was not treasonous, or unpatriotic, or bad shit, and I happen to think it’s all of that, you should have called the FBI immediately.'”

Bannon was referring to Trump’s son Donald Jr, son-in-law Jared Kushner and campaign manager Paul Manafort.

Learning the constitution

“Early in the campaign, in a Producers-worthy scene, (campaign aide) Sam Nunberg was sent to explain the Constitution to the candidate: ‘I got as far as the Fourth Amendment before his finger is pulling down on his lip and his eyes are rolling back in his head.'”

George W. Bush on Trump’s inaugural address

“That’s some weird shit.”

Trump’s Putin obsession

“‘What has he gotten himself into with the Russians?’ pressed (the late Fox News chairman Roger) Ailes. ‘Mostly,’ said Bannon, ‘he went to Russia and he thought he was going to meet Putin. But Putin couldn’t give a shit about him. So he’s kept trying.'”

Trump’s Murdoch obsession

“‘I’ll call him,’ said Ailes. ‘But Trump would jump through hoops for Rupert. Like for Putin. Sucks up and shits down. I just worry about who’s jerking whose chain.'”

Murdoch on Trump?

“‘What a fucking idiot,’ said Murdoch, shrugging, as he got off the phone” after talking immigration issues with Trump.

Too much to think about

“‘I wouldn’t give Donald too much to think about,’ said an amused Ailes. Bannon snorted. ‘Too much, too little-doesn’t necessarily change things.'”

Trump fears being poisoned

“He had a longtime fear of being poisoned, one reason why he liked to eat at McDonald’s — nobody knew he was coming and the food was safely pre-made.”

Flattery and Egyptian shoes

“Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the Egyptian strongman, ably stroked the president and said, ‘You are a unique personality that is capable of doing the impossible.’ (To Sisi, Trump replied, ‘Love your shoes. Boy, those shoes. Man….’)”

‘Our man’ in Saudi

“Within weeks of (Trump’s Saudi) trip, MBS (Mohammed bin Salman), detaining MBN (Mohammed bin Nayef) quite in the dead of night, would force him to relinquish the Crown Prince title, which MBS would then assume for himself. Trump would tell friends that he and Jared had engineered a Saudi coup: ‘We’ve put our man on top!'”

Ivanka’s presidential ambitions

“Balancing risk against reward, both Jared and Ivanka decided to accept roles in the West Wing over the advice of almost everyone they knew. It was a joint decision by the couple, and, in some sense, a joint job. Between themselves, the two had made an earnest deal: If sometime in the future the opportunity arose, she’d be the one to run for president. The first woman president, Ivanka entertained, would not be Hillary Clinton; it would be Ivanka Trump.”

– Her brothers’ presidential nicknames –

“His sons, Don Jr. and Eric — behind their backs known to Trump insiders as Uday and Qusay, after the sons of Saddam Hussein.”

And the comb-over: explained by Ivanka

“She often described the mechanics behind it to friends: an absolutely clean pate — a contained island after scalp-reduction surgery — surrounded by a furry circle of hair around the sides and front, from which all ends are drawn up to meet in the center and then swept back and secured by a stiffening spray. The color, she would point out to comical effect, was from a product called Just for Men — the longer it was left on, the darker it got. Impatience resulted in Trump’s orange-blond hair color.”

A bluefin tuna, with a weight of 405 kg, was sold for about 36,500,000 yen (about 320,000 US dollar) in the year-opener auction. This year’s top per kilogram price, for a smaller tuna, was 1,419 US dollar per kilogram, paid by Kiyoshi Kimura, who runs the Sushi Zanmai chain sushi restaurant.

Tuna fish brokers check the quality of a bluefin tuna in the final year-opening auction at Tsukiji Market in Tokyo, Japan, 05 January 2018. A bluefin tuna, with a weight of 405 kg, was sold for about 36,500,000 yen (about 320,000 US dollar) in the year-opener auction. //EPA-EFE PHOTO

 Tuna fish brokers check the quality of bluefin tuna in the final year-opening auction at Tsukiji Market in Tokyo, Japan, 05 January 2018.//EPA-EFE PHOTO

A market official calls for bidding on frozen bluefin tuna in the final year-opening auction at Tsukiji Market in Tokyo, Japan, 05 January 2018. A bluefin tuna, with a weight of 405 kg, was sold for about 36,500,000 yen (about 320,000 US dollar) in the year-opener auction. // EPA-EFE PHOTO

Tuna fish brokers check the quality of frozen bluefin tuna in the final year-opening auction at Tsukiji Market in Tokyo, Japan, 05 January 2018. // EPA-EFE PHOTO

“Hopefully, ASITA [the Association of Indonesian Tour and Travel Agencies], travel agents and tourism players can display this guidebook in hotels and airports as well as other places [deemed appropriate],” said the consulate general’s deputy consul, Chen Wei in Denpasar, Bali, on Friday as quoted bytempo.co.

The 29-page Mandarin-language guidebook features more information than previous editions, including information on Bali, immigration, currency, accident prevention and insurance. It also includes the operating hours of banks and restaurants, transportation, hospitals, tips during a natural disaster emergency, regulations, customs and excise, important office contact numbers, languages, tourist attractions, as well as Bali’s cultures and customs.

The consulate has printed around 30,000 copies of the guidebook to be distributed for free at its office located on Jl. Tukad Badung in Renon, Denpasar.

Chen said the number of Chinese tourists to Bali continued to increase, from only 400,000 in 2014 to 600,000, 980,000 and 1.37 million in 2015, 2016 and by October 2017, respectively.

He added that the guidebook was expected to be able to boost tourism in Bali and prevent problems for Chinese tourists.

Bali Tourism Agency head Anak Agung Yuniarta Putra said Chinese tourists made up the majority of tourist arrivals to the island last year, followed by Australia, India, Japan and the United Kingdom.

“Hopefully this guidebook is useful to tourists from China,” said Yuniarta.

Publishers responded to a cease-and-desist letter from Trump by moving forward by four days the release of “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House” — an expose by author and political muckraker Michael Wolff that quotes key Trump aides expressing serious doubt about his fitness for office.

“I authorized Zero access to White House (actually turned him down many times) for author of phony book! I never spoke to him for book. Full of lies, misrepresentations and sources that don’t exist,” Trump tweeted Thursday.

“Look at this guy’s past and watch what happens to him and Sloppy Steve!” Trump wrote — a possible reference to Steve Bannon, his former chief strategist, or Steve Rubin, the publisher of Wolff’s book.

The book — which paints Trump as mentally unstable and far out of his depth — includes extensive quotes from Bannon, who also received a “cease and desist” order from Trump’s attorneys.

“Your publication of the false/baseless statements about Mr. Trump gives rise to, among other claims, defamation by libel, defamation by libel per se, false light invasion of privacy, tortious interference with contractual relations, and inducement of breach of contract,” Trump’s lawyers said in the letter to Wolff.

In the book, excerpts of which were published this week, Bannon is quoted accusing Trump’s eldest son Don Jr of “treasonous” contacts with a Kremlin-connected lawyer, and saying the president’s daughter Ivanka, who imagines running for president one day, is “dumb as a brick.”

– Criticism from aides –

But it is Trump himself who is cast in the most unfavorable light by a series of his top aides.

The book claims that for “Steve Mnuchin and Reince Priebus, the president was an ‘idiot.’ For Gary Cohn, he was ‘dumb as shit.’ For H.R. McMaster, he was a ‘dope.’ The list went on.”

White House issued a scorched-earth dismissal of the book, its author and his sources.

“I don’t think (Americans) really care about some trash that an author that no one had ever heard of until today, or a fired employee, wants to peddle,” said White House press secretary Sarah Sanders, calling the book “complete fantasy.”

Behind the scenes, though, Trump has been enraged by the betrayal by Bannon — a man who engineered the New York real estate mogul’s link to the nationalist far right and helped create a pro-Trump media ecosystem.

“He called me a great man last night. He obviously changed his tune pretty quick,” Trump said in the White House’s Roosevelt Room Thursday.

Sanders suggested that Bannon’s employer, Breitbart News, should consider firing him.

    – Russia allegations –

He wasn’t fired, but Bannon’s main financial backer is formally cutting ties with him, The Washington Post reported.

“I support President Trump and the platform upon which he was elected,” the newspaper quoted billionaire conservative donor Rebekah Mercer as saying.

Her family has had no contact with Bannon for months, nor has it given money to support his political agenda, “nor do we support his recent actions and statements,” she was quoted as saying.

Bannon, who left the White House in August, is also quoted in the book as saying that the investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller into Russian interference in the 2016 election will focus on money laundering.

The investigation by Mueller, a former FBI director, is looking into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to help get him elected — a charge the president has repeatedly and vehemently denied.

Russia-related allegations in the book also ensnare Don Junior, who took a meeting with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya in June 2016 after an intermediary promised material that would incriminate Trump’s Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.

Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and then campaign chairman Paul Manafort also attended the meeting at Trump Tower in New York.

– Disbelief over victory –

“The three senior guys in the campaign thought it was a good idea to meet with a foreign government inside Trump Tower in the conference room on the 25th floor — with no lawyers,” Bannon was quoted as saying in the book.

“Even if you thought that this was not treasonous, or unpatriotic, or bad shit, and I happen to think it’s all of that, you should have called the FBI immediately,” he said.

Wolff’s book — which he says is based on interviews with Trump, his senior aides and others — makes a litany of shocking claims, including Trump’s belief that he installed Mohammed bin Salman as Saudi Arabia’s crown prince.

“We’ve put our man on top,” Trump is said to have claimed to friends.

The book also claims that Trump considered appointing a friend to the Supreme Court vacancy filled by Neil Gorsuch, eats food from McDonald’s because he believes it to be safe from poison, and that his team did not believe he was capable of winning the election.

“Shortly after 8 p.m. on Election Night, when the unexpected trend — Trump might actually win — seemed confirmed, Don Jr. told a friend that his father, or DJT, as he calls him, looked as if he had seen a ghost. Melania was in tears — and not of joy,” it said.//AFP