Month: September 2018

Non-EU businesses will be able to use the UK’s ‘mini one stop shop’ (MOSS) scheme to account for VAT on sales of digital services to consumers in EU member states from 1 January 2019, provided they are registered for UK VAT for other purposes.

Japan is preparing to accept more foreign workers as its own population is on the brink of a steep decline, Foreign Minister Taro Kono said on Thursday.
Kono told a World Economic Forum meeting in Hanoi that Japan gains “value added” by accepting foreigners, especially since its ageing population and low birth rate mean the country is shrinking by half a million people a year.
Why Japan’s ageing population is dying alone
“We cannot sustain our society like that,”…

Malaysia may hope to drive a hard bargain as it reviews the terms of a controversial Beijing-backed US$20 billion rail project, but it’s finding it tricky because Chinese negotiators are “so nice” and professional, Malaysian finance minister Lim Guan Eng said on Thursday.
“They have been very understanding and cooperative and we want to record our appreciation. And they have behaved really professionally and not like those, what do you call, arrogant superpowers,”…

Businesses can help shape the way a new testbed for “innovative products and services using personal data in innovative ways” is designed, according to the UK’s data protection authority.

Malaysian democracy icon Anwar Ibrahim has announced he will contest the Port Dickson parliamentary seat in the state of Negeri Sembilan in a move that, assuming he is successful, will pave the way for him to take over from Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.
The news caps a remarkable turnaround in Anwar’s fortunes – it was not until after the general elections in May that he was granted a full royal pardon for his convictions of sodomy and corruption, charges he says were trumped up…

A Singapore DJ has filed a court challenge against a colonial-era law that bans gay sex in the conservative city state, his lawyers said on Wednesday, following India’s scrapping of similar legislation.
Johnson Ong Ming, 43, also known as DJ Big Kid, filed his challenge with the High Court on Monday, his lawyers said, just four days after India’s landmark ruling.
Under Section 377A of Singapore’s Penal Code, a man found to have committed an act of “gross indecency…

The growth of automation in financial advice has been slower than anticipated and risks identified earlier have not materialised, according to a new report from the three European supervisory authorities.

Indian Catholic sisters have broken ranks with the church by openly protesting in the streets of the Kerala state capital against a bishop accused of raping a nun.
The demonstrations started on Saturday and continued throughout the weekend in Thiruvananthapuram, fuelled by an incendiary press conference in which a politician questioned the account of the bishops’s alleged victim, a 46-year-old nun, and described her as a prostitute.
The nun lodged a complaint against bishop Franco…

Should the Philippine government withdraw tax concessions enjoyed by Japanese companies, many may go bankrupt or close their operations there, a top official of the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry in the Philippines has warned.
“They do not want to expand operations here. It’s the first step for them,” Nobuo Fujii, vice-president of the organisation with 650 companies as members, told Kyodo News on Monday.
“Then the second step is to gradually withdraw,”…

Businesses promoting claims management services over the phone will need to ensure that recipients of their calls have opted in to receive them to avoid potential fines of up to £500,000 being imposed on them under new UK rules that have taken effect.