Archives for May 2019

Sixty-nine containers holding some 2,500 tons of household waste (including plastic bottles, bags, newspapers and diapers) were loaded overnight onto a vessel at the port of Subic, northwest of Manila. The containers left on Friday for a month-long journey to the Canadian city of Vancouver.

“Baaaaaaaaa bye, as we say it… The garbage is gone, good riddance,” Philippines Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin wrote on Twitter, posting images of the leaving vessel.

Three years ago a Philippines court declared the import of 2,400 tons of Canadian waste illegal. It had been mislabeled as plastics for recycling. Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte then ordered that the waste be shipped back, threatening to dump it in front of Canada’s embassy in Manila, or personally sail with the waste and leave it in Canadian waters. “Let’s fight Canada. I will declare war against them,” he said.

READ MORE: Too slow: Philippines rejects Canada plan to return garbage after dump threat, wants it over NOW

Ottawa explained that the waste, exported to the Philippines between 2013 and 2014, was a private commercial transaction done without the government’s consent.

The country took the responsibility of shipping trash back, but failed to meet the deadline. The Philippines then recalled its envoys in Ottawa.

“The government of Canada is taking all the necessary measures to ensure safe and environmentally sound transport, handling and disposal of the waste in Canada,” Mark Johnson, spokesman for Canada’s environment and climate change ministry, told Reuters.

President Duterte’s spokesman Salvador Panelo said he hoped ties with Canada would now return to normal. Philippines Foreign Secretary Teodoro Locsin said diplomats whom he had ordered to leave Canada had now been told to return.

“Get your flights back. Thanks, and sorry for the trouble you went through to drive home a point … This is the end of the matter … There’s more to garbage between us,” Locsin tweeted.

Earlier this year, the Philippines shipped back 6,500 tons of garbage to South Korea, misdeclared as plastic flakes.

The row between developing and developed nations over garbage imports has intensified over recent years. The latter are being forced to rely mostly on themselves in their future waste treatment.

China which had for years received the bulk of scrap plastic from around the world closed its doors to foreign refuse in 2018. Huge quantities of waste plastic have since been redirected to Southeast Asia, including Malaysia, Indonesia and, to a lesser degree, the Philippines. Washington rushed to blame Beijing while urging it to reconsider its “catastrophic” ban on foreign garbage imports.

Also on rt.com ‘Upset’ Duterte orders Canadian trash to be returned or DUMPED in territorial waters

The situation got worse when India – another major waste importer – followed China’s example and banned the import of solid plastic waste as well.

Malaysia, the world’s main destination for plastic waste after China, said on Tuesday it would return as much as 3,000 tons of waste back to the countries of origin, including Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, China, Japan, Saudi Arabia and the United States.

READ MORE: Buried in waste? Developed nations live in shadow of looming garbage crisis

According to statistics from the Worldwide Fund for Nature, around 300 million tons of plastic are produced every year. Much of it is ending up in landfills or polluting the seas, in what has become a growing international crisis.

For more stories on economy finance visit RT’s business section

Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/460731-philippines-returns-trash-canada/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

The 2,209-meter-long (1.4 miles) bridge, connecting the Russian city of Blagoveshchensk with the Chinese city of Heihe, in the country’s northern-most Heilongjiang province, will provide citizens of the neighboring countries with a two-lane highway.

The cable-braced bridge will be brought into service as soon as April next year, according to Alexander Kozlov, the Russian Minister for the Development of the Far East.

The ambitious project, which has been implemented under the terms of the concessionaire agreement between Beijing and Moscow, was started in December 2016, when the countries launched a Chinese-Russian joint venture on a parity basis.

The length of the Russian part of the bridge totals 540 meters with overall length of access roads reaching 13 kilometers (8 miles). The Chinese part of the bridge totals six kilometers (3.7 miles). The carrying capacity of the bridge is expected to top 630 trucks, 164 buses and 68 passenger cars a day, and will provide cross-border transportation for 5,500 people.

Speaking to RT and Chinese reporters, China’s Ambassador to Russia Li Hui said that the two countries have been actively creating cross-border infrastructure. Another train bridge between Tongjiang and Nizhneleninskoye has been recently linked, he noted.

“The construction of the infrastructure goes on steadily. The transport infrastructure projects are developing well, including international transport corridors in Russia’s Far East and creation of cargo expresses between China and Europe,” Li said.

The new connection is set to boost the export potential of Russia’s Amur region, according to Vasily Orlov, who heads the federal district. The agriculture and derived products are reportedly the region’s competitive advantage. The governor highlighted that 40 percent of soy grown in the region in 2018 was exported to China.

For more stories on economy finance visit RT’s business section

Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/460728-russia-china-bridge-complete/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

Hong Kong is strictly enforcing United Nations sanctions which don’t have “any restrictions on the export of petroleum from Iran,” a spokesperson for Hong Kong’s Commerce and Economic Development Bureau told Bloomberg, answering a question about the US warning.  

Earlier this week, the United States urged Hong Kong to be on the lookout for an oil tanker carrying Iranian oil presumably that may be on its way to China, in violation of US sanctions against the Middle Eastern country.

Also on rt.com China rebuffs US penalties threat for allowing ship with Iranian oil to enter Hong Kong

Dismissing the US warning, the spokesperson told Bloomberg on Wednesday:  

“Certain countries may impose unilateral sanctions against certain places on the basis of their own considerations.”

“Those sanctions are outside the scope of the UN Security Council sanctions” that Hong Kong is abiding by, according to the Hong Kong official.

The oil tanker, known as the Pacific Bravo (formerly Silver Glory), was originally headed to Indonesia, Refinitive Eikon data showed, according to Reuters, but changed course on Monday to head toward Sri Lanka.

Also on rt.com China ramps up crude oil imports despite Washington’s clampdown on Iran

The Pacific Bravo flies under the Liberian flag, but a senior US official claims the oil tanker is owned by China’s Bank of Kunlun, which is the official handler of money between China and Iran. Bank of Kunlun is owned by CNPC’s (China National Petroleum Corporation’s) financial arm, CNPC capital.

“Anyone who does business with this ship, the Pacific Bravo, would be exposing themselves to US sanctions,” the senior official said, adding that the US will “enforce our Iran sanctions quite aggressively and quite consistently.”

China has historically been Iran’s largest crude oil customer, although Beijing has significantly increased its crude oil purchases from Saudi Arabia since the onset of US sanctions on Iran.

This article was originally published on Oilprice.com

Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/460714-china-us-iran-sanctions/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

“The figure of $500 billion is not the goal, that’s just a preliminary ranging mark that should be reached for the reserves to provide an adequate margin of safety for the country’s economy,” Nabiullina told journalists on Thursday.

According to the central bank chief, such volume of gold bullion and foreign currency holdings is enough to tackle crisis-like episodes.

Also on rt.com Russia boosting gold dumping dollar from foreign currency reserves

“We have almost reached that level, and we’ll surpass it in the near future,” the top official said, stressing that the regulator would keep stockpiling as part of its budget strategy.

Earlier this month, the central bank reported that holdings amounted to nearly $492 billion against $487.8 billion seen at the end of March.

State international reserves represent highly-liquid foreign assets comprising stocks of monetary gold, foreign currencies and Special Drawing Right (SDR) assets, which are at the disposal of the Central Bank of Russia and the government.

Russia has been significantly boosting its international reserves in recent years to protect the economy against external and internal shocks, such as leaps in the price of oil, one of the country’s key export earners, currency exchange fluctuations, and further economic sanctions.

Also on rt.com Russia boosting gold reserves at a time of impending US dollar crisis – Peter Schiff

As part of the broader strategy, the central bank opted to gradually diversify international holdings via decreasing its share of US dollars and stockpiling gold bullion to lessen reliance of the economy on the greenback.

At the beginning of May, the World Gold Council (WSG) said that Russia secured the top position among the biggest global purchasers of the yellow metal in the first quarter of the current year. According to the report, the country added 55.3 tons to its vaults, bringing its vast gold reserves to 2,168.3 tons.

For more stories on economy finance visit RT’s business section

Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/460710-russia-reserves-five-hundred-billion/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

“In the Far East, if you want to come together, we should start with a common trading currency, not to be used locally but for the purpose of settling of trade,” Mahathir said at the Nikkei Future of Asia conference in Japan, suggesting the currency be “based on gold because gold is much more stable” and warning that promoting any one country’s currency over others would result in conflict. Exchange rates would be based on the country’s economic performance and not subject to the volatility of forex markets. 

Also on rt.com Dollar beware: Serbia Philippines join global gold hunt

“Currency trading is not something that is healthy because it is not about the performance of countries but about manipulation,” Mahathir added. The gold-backed currency would not be used within any one country, but would help protect regional trading from predatory speculators – and from the vicissitudes of the dollar, which he said unfairly held the rest of the world hostage.

“You [the US] are not democratic. That is not for any single power to decide. If you want to live in a united world, a stable world, we must resort to sustainability through agreement between all nations that have a stake in that problem.” Eventually, he said, the currency could be extended to other countries outside Asia.

Also on rt.com Russia boosting gold dumping dollar from foreign currency reserves

Earlier this week, US President Donald Trump warned Malaysia that it could be placed on the US Treasury’s list of “currency manipulators” and required close scrutiny, though Malaysia’s central bank retorted that it maintains a floating exchange rate and strong external balance. During the 1997 financial crisis, the bank pegged the ringgit to the dollar and imposed capital controls, but those measures were discontinued in 2005.

Mahathir is a long-time critic of the status quo in currency trading. He blames billionaire financier George Soros for triggering the 1997 Asian financial crisis by betting against the ringgit and baht and has accused the financier of attempting to “colonize” Malaysia through his network of NGOs, claiming his end goal is “regime change.” 

Also on rt.com Global gold fever: India follows Russia China by boosting bullion reserves

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi proposed a pan-African gold dinar that would be used to sell the country’s oil on the world market in 2009, less than two years before his government fell to a NATO-backed regime change operation that has left the once-prosperous nation a conflict-ridden warzone. One of the ‘moderate’ rebels’ first actions upon brutally murdering Gaddafi was to create a central bank to replace the state-owned monetary authority that had previously managed Libya’s wealth. The US has historically not taken kindly to countries that attempted to trade oil in non-dollar currencies, as Iraq’s Saddam Hussein can attest – or could, if he hadn’t been regime-changed as well. Syria, too, dropped its peg to the dollar in 2007, not long before the West went from awarding Bashar al-Assad the French medal of honor to declaring him a bloodthirsty monster.

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Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/460698-malaysia-proposes-gold-forex-currency/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

Calling India a “high tariff nation” and repeatedly accusing the South Asian country of failing to provide the US with unlimited access to its markets, Washington announced its intention to terminate India’s Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) designation in March. Though the 60-day notice period for New Delhi ended on May 3, the US has yet to issue a statement on the fate of India’s status.

“There is every reason to believe that GSP suspension will move forward,” a State Department official told Reuters.

Also on rt.com ‘No knee-jerk reaction’: India says impact of US withdrawal of trade benefits will be limited

“I think that suspension was a done deal,” another source told AFP. “Now the task is how do we look ahead, how do we work under the second Modi administration to identify a path forward.”

The US-Indian tensions escalated in June last year when Washington slapped the country with 25 percent tariffs on steel and 10 percent levies on aluminum. In response, New Delhi accused Washington of unfair trade practices and prepared its own retaliatory measures against the US, the introduction of which has been deferred a number of times pending the outcome of trade negotiations with Washington. For now, implementation of import duties on 29 American products, including almonds, walnuts and pulses, will not be considered until June 16.

Also on rt.com 4 ways India is putting its own interests before Washington’s

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Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/460695-india-preferential-treatment-will-end/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS

Mexico will respond “vigorously” to the promised punitive tariff, Deputy Foreign Minister Jesus Seade said, adding that the country will not stand by idly with its “arms folded” to see if Trump’s threat – issued in a tweet on Thursday afternoon – is serious, though he did acknowledge that only some of Trump’s government-by-Twitter is ever reflected in policy.

Also on rt.com Trump slaps Mexico with 5% tariffs on EVERYTHING until it solves US immigration problem

The news sent the peso trading down 2 percent, while futures on the SP500 index declined 0.8 percent, suggesting the markets took Trump’ threats seriously. The US imported nearly $350 billion in goods from Mexico in 2018, and the two countries were on the verge of ratifying the USCMA trade deal – a replacement for NAFTA, which Trump has harshly criticized for pushing American companies south of the border.

Just hours before Trump dropped his tariff bombshell, Mexican President Andre Manuel Lopez Obrador had said “there is collective spirit in favor of approving the accord,” promising it would happen “soon,” and Canada presented the deal to parliament on Wednesday for ratification. A new tariff could derail the process, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

Also on rt.com ‘Naked economic terrorism’: China rails against trade war provocateurs bullies

Trump threatened Mexico with a 5 percent tariff on all Mexican goods to be imposed starting on June 10 “until such time as illegal migrants coming through Mexico and into our Country STOP,” and promised to increase the tariff gradually until the “Illegal Immigration problem” is “remedied.” By October 1, he warned, tariffs will be at 25 percent. While the lion’s share of those illegally crossing into the US are not Mexican citizens, hailing instead from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, the US president blames Mexico for not doing more to halt their movement northward.

In a statement on the tariff, Trump slammed Mexico’s “passive cooperation in allowing this mass incursion,” calling it “an emergency and extraordinary threat to the national security and economy of the United States” and claiming the country’s “strong immigration laws” should make it a bulwark against illegal immigration into the US.

Also on rt.com Washington’s Huawei hypocrisy… US government is instrument of American corporations

Trump has wielded tariffs as an economic weapon to bludgeon competitors on the world economic stage before, with China being the most recent example. Illegal immigration has actually been declining since the mid-2000s, and to hold up a video – as Trump did on Thursday – of over 1,000 migrants being detained in El Paso as proof that there is, in fact, a border “emergency” justifying a retaliatory tariff is somewhat disingenuous.

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Article source: https://www.rt.com/business/460693-mexico-trump-disastrous-tariffs/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=RSS