the united states promises to form an international coalition to protect merchant shipping in the red sea from attacks by houthi rebels. why are consumers in the us will need to hurry if they want to get a new apple watch for christmas. hello and welcome to asia business report. i'm mariko oi. the united states plans to form an international coalition to protect commerce in the red sea. this comes after iranian—backed houthi rebels in yemen attacked a number of ships passing through the area. of course, many of the world's biggest container shipping companies have now decided to divert their vessels, having to go the longer way around africa and also playing havoc to global trade. speaking in bahrain, the us defense secretary lloyd austin said participating

countries will include the united kingdom, bahrain, canada, france, italy and spain, among others. this is notjust a us issue, this is an international problem and it deserves an international response. and that's why i'm convening a meeting tomorrow, a ministerial meeting, with fellow ministers in the region and beyond to address this threat. for exactly what this shipping disruption might mean for the global economy, i spoke to hung tran, who's a seniorfellow at the atlantic council and also former deputy director at the international monetary fund. this area of the red sea leading to the suez canal is quite important in terms of the volume of trade passing through it. about 12% of global trade passes through the red sea, including 30% of the container shipping. all together, it accounts for about us$1 trillion

per year of world trade, so it is quite significant, and a disruption there would cause damage to world trade. aside from avoiding this area, what can companies do — or is it about what the us has said, forming an international coalition? basically, several shipping lines have diverted their ships to go around africa's cape of good hope to get to europe. that will add significantly to the time needed to travel there by a week or two, and also, additional fuel costs and operating costs, also causing delays for importers, exporters and user. the formation of the maritime protection task force that the us is about to launch can be trying to protect the shipping in the red sea, but personally, i think it is difficult to see how such a task force can offer or guarantee complete safety for commercial

shipping in the red sea against missile attacks or threats of missile attacks. and we have been seeing some impact on oil and gas prices, but also, shipping insurance premiums? yes, we already have seen maritime shipping insurance premiums rising, basically doubling in the past week. we have seen oil and gas prices rising about 2% or so in the past few days. the issue is that we currently have plenty of supply compared with the demand, but if this goes on for a longer while and more shipping is being diverted or delayed, the impact on price will be more. in other news, huge deal in steel industry. japan's nippon steel will buy us steel for almost $15 billion. the american company, which is 122 years old, put itself up for sale

several months ago. us steel is expected to benefit from the spending and tax incentives in presidentjoe biden�*s infrastructure bill. its shares surged by more than a quarter after the deal was announced, but nippon steel's shares are down 3.5% in tokyo trade. to the us, where apple is halting sales of some of its newest apple watches before christmas. it's the result of a ruling after it lost a patent case against a medical device company. from new york, here's michelle fleury. if you're in america looking to buy an apple watch series 9 or ultra 2, you'd better move fast — starting this thursday, us shoppers will no longer be able to buy them online and sales at its retail locations, well, they'll stop a couple of days later. the tech giant is removing one of its most popular products right before christmas because of a ruling by the us international trade commission, or itc. it's the result of an ongoing dispute with medical device maker masimo over its blood oxygen feature. masimo, which also makes its own fitness tracking smartwatches, has accused apple

of hiring away its employees, of stealing its pulse oximetry technology and using it in its watches. in october, the itc ruled against apple, and that started the clock. president biden has 60 days to review the ruling before any ban goes into effect. the review period, well, that ends on december 25. apple is taking pre—emptive action to comply should the ruling stand, but it thinks the charge has no ground and should be dropped, and it said in its statement: the apple watch has routinely been touted as a life—saving device. its health claims have helped make it the most popular watch sold around the world. this clash, however,

threatens to undermine that. in the interest of national security. we are joined from delhi. aukus through the details of this bill than why it is important.— details of this bill than why it is important. that line you mentioned _ it is important. that line you mentioned while _ it is important. that line you mentioned while introducing j it is important. that line you - mentioned while introducing the story remains a big point, the dominating headline, that the government by way of this bill will be empowered to essentially stop or take over telecom services in the event of any kind of public emergency, so essentially they would be able to intercept messages or even stop transmission of messages in the event of a public water situation where they feel that it could risk and create a law and order concerns. this is a point that has been talked about because people say how do you define that, whether there is scope for misuse, and a member of parliament yesterday

from one of the opposition parties even asked that this bill be referred to a parliamentary committee for further perusal where they can talk out some of these larger concerns. that remains one part of the bill. another part talked about is there was a lot of talk about what happens to platforms like whatsapp, app telegram, which the judgement of other services will they fall and it rules or the newcomer telecom act. the proposal in this bill, it is now clear that those aspects will now fall under india's information technology act so they have nothing to do with india's new telecom rules which replaces an age—old act which has been in force for many years. the other aspect it also needs to be talked about in this, when we talk about the new telecom bill is what happens to spectrum allocation. the government says that continues to go ahead with the auction route but there are some aspects, when anything pertains to national security, the defence, disaster management, in those

situations, the government will go through the administrative route when it comes to allocating spectrum. these are some of the basic features we look at as the government introduced this new telecom bill in parliament yesterday. very interesting development there. thank you so much for that update. let's turn now to china. as we approach the end of the year, many analysts believe the world was a secondary of the economy is on track to reach its 5% growth target for the year. and that's despite the headwinds slowdown in exports, manufacturing and a crisis in its property sector. china is home to one of the worst performing stock markets. the csi 300 index is down by more than 14% this year and the country has also seen an outflow in foreign investment. hui shan is the chief china economist at goldman sachs, and she gave me her predictions for the year ahead. when we look at 2024, there are two sides to the story.

one side is all the headwinds in the economy are not really abating yet on the property front, on the local government debt issue, lack of confidence. but on the other hand, we are getting signals that they will have to provide more easing measures. i have questions about why we're seeing outflows or market underperformance. that's kind of related to — you know, we are at a juncture where investors see the headwinds but we haven't seen very concrete measures of policy support. a couple more stories before we go. a couple who have completed a ten month journey from the north pole to the south pole in an electric car, the british couple chris and julie were able to use electric power charging points on the route to charge their nissan vehicle,

but when they were in the polar regions and there was no electricity source, they used a wind turbine and solar device to power the car. mr ramsey said i have always had full confidence in the amazing capabilities of electric vehicles. what an incredible journey. the estate ofjr tolkien has sued an american writer who publishes own sequel to the lord of the rings. he released the fellowship of the king last year but a court in the united states ordered him to destroy all copies of the book and halted distribution. he filed his own lawsuit claiming the amazon tv show rings of power infringe the copyright of his work. it was thrown out by the judge who described it as unreasonable. that is it this edition of the programme. thank you so much for watching. programme. thank you so much forwatching. —— programme. thank you so much for watching. —— that is it for this addition. —— edition.

voiceover: bringing you different storiesl from across the uk. for 70% of the world's population, this is what doing the laundry looks like — women and children spending hours each week scrubbing by hand. and this is the solution — a flatpack manual washing machine being built in corby. british engineer nav was inspired by a visit to southern india. and they wash with cold water in buckets on the floor, causing back pain, joint pain and skin irritation. with our machine, it saves 75% of time and 50% of water compared to hand—washing clothes. and here it is, from flatpack to fully assembled. so you open the lid, put your clothes inside, you put your water and your laundry detergent in here, close the lid — and of course, the most important bit is how you operate it, using a handle. and once your clothes are clean, the dirty water comes out here.

over 100 staff from this component supplier have volunteered their time to build the machines. so far, 180 machines have been sent to 15 countries, giving thousands of women and girls their time back. for more stories from across the uk, head to the bbc news website. hey, i'm zof with the catch up! tonight: fear for those trapped in a church in gaza, xl bully owners apply for exemptions. and some exciting news from 0lly alexander! but first, a former conservative peer, michelle mone, has hit back at rishi sunak, saying she was honest with the government over contracts for ppe. she admits lying to the media about her links to a company that supplied millions of pounds' worth of ppe to the government during the covid pandemic. she said she regrets not being fully open about it. hindsight�*s a wonderful thing.

i wasn't trying to pull the wool over anyone's eyes and i regret and i'm sorry for not saying straight out, "yes, i am involved." some other stories now. people trapped in a church in gaza are living in a huge sense of fear. fibi sabasa's sister is trapped inside the holy family church and said people were scared to move out of fear of being shot. two women were killed inside the church on saturday. israel's army said it was reviewing the incident. next, around 4,000 xl bully owners have applied for exemption from an upcoming ban. they are being urged to do this before it becomes illegal to own one in the uk from february. and time now for ten seconds of some exciting news from 0lly alexander! i can exclusively reveal... ..i will be representing the uk at the eurovision song contest. cheering

the years and years singer will be doing that next year in sweden. he said he's beyond excited for this and he's been watching the show since he was a kid. you're all caught up now. see you later.

hello and welcome to sportsday. i'm katherine downes. coming up for you on the programme: holders manchester city will play copenhagen in the last 16 of the champions league. brazilian side fluminense have made the final of the fifa club world cup. and anthonyjoshua tells us how he's preparing for his next fight. i am focused on my opponent, focused on the bigger picture, using it as a source of motivation every time i'm in the gym. hello there. good evening. earlier today, we had the draw for the champions league last 16.

at this stage, teams from the same country