U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan on Monday called on both the American and Chinese governments to exercise “true reciprocity” in relations, including trade and diplomacy. 

The Republican senator from Alaska, in a speech concerning Chinese outbound investment, and in an interview with VOA afterward, said China has been aggressively buying companies in key sectors such as robotics, biotech, advanced machineries, software, entertainment and media “throughout America and Western Europe. But if you’re an American firm, or a firm from Germany, and you want to go to China and buy Chinese companies in those same sectors, you would be told ‘no;’ you would be prohibited.”

Making “true reciprocity” US policy

Sullivan’s proposed “true reciprocity” is rather simple and straightforward: “If Chinese companies want to invest in America’s biotech sector, then American companies should be able to invest in China’s biotech sector. It’s simple, it’s fair, it’s what China has said it wants to do but it doesn’t do, and we need to be much more serious about implementing it.”

Should China continue to ignore Washington’s calls for equal treatment and a level playing field, Sullivan says he is prepared to introduce legislation aiming at closing what he identifies as China’s “credibility gap,” and making sure that “true reciprocity” becomes official U.S. policy.

The Alaska Republican, who serves on both the Senate’s Commerce and Armed Services Committees, called on the U.S. government to reject “Middle Kingdom diplomatic practices” that fail to grant U.S. diplomats the same level of access Chinese diplomats receive in Washington. 

“Middle kingdom” diplomatic practices

Quoting from a study done by the New York-based Asia Society, Sullivan said “for a number of years, the U.S. ambassador in Beijing was only getting deputy minister level access while we, of course, give higher access to Chinese ambassadors here in Washington.”He called the solution to such unequal diplomatic treatments “a no brainer.” 

“If our ambassador in Beijing only gets deputy minister level access, then that’s what we should provide China’s ambassador in Washington, period. Middle Kingdom diplomatic practices should be firmly and aggressively rejected by the U.S. government everywhere,” Sullivan said.

He agreed that his proposed “true reciprocity” ought to also include issues such as granting journalists visas and access in both countries.

Growing domestic consensus

Sullivan said “there’s growing domestic consensus” in the United States that America’s strategic interests, including strategic economic interests, outweigh the market price of individual transactions, while acknowledging that each individual American businessman or woman naturally want the highest return for their individual product.

“The broader strategic interest of having a strong U.S. economy, and signaling to the next biggest economy in the world, China, that you need to play by the rules we play by, is also very important; and in my view, that importance strategically overrides the interest of the ability of American firms to sell to Chinese investment funds.”

Senator Dan Sullivan: China needs to play by rules we play by

Geo-economics

Daniel Twining, counselor and director of the Asia Program at the German Marshall Fund of the United States and an associate of the U.S. National Intelligence Council, thinks the U.S. economic power so far has not been sufficiently utilized to advance the nation’s overall strategic, political and economic interests. 

“The U.S. is used to this traditional foreign policy tool kit that involves the armed forces, the diplomatic corps and development (foreign aid), but there’s really a fourth link here, which is our economic statecraft,” he told VOA.

Twining said other major powers, including China, appear to be much more adept at what he called “geo-economics,” using trade and investment “quite actively” and “quite smartly” to advance overall national interests.“It may be smart for us to think more about our economic strategies in the world,” including acknowledging and adopting strategies accordingly based on the fact that “market forces are not working everywhere, including in an economy like China that is still somewhat closed or controlled in some respects.”

Daniel Twining: Market forces are not working everywhere

​

Forgoing short-term profit

A newly released report by Baker McKenzie put Chinese worldwide outbound investment at $200 billion in 2016, nearly half of which targeted assets in North America and Europe. 

According to Robert Shapiro, chairman of Sonecon and former U.S. Undersecretary of Commerce for Economic Affairs, the primary goal of China’s overseas investments does not lie in short-term profit but rather in gaining strategic advantage, and that means not necessarily in gaining immediate economic return.

Robert Shapiro: China playing the long game

​
…

General Motors’ Venezuelan subsidiary has sent a message to almost 2,700 staff informing them that they are no longer employed by the company and had received severance pay in their bank accounts, according to two employees.

A Venezuelan court last week ordered the seizure of the company’s Valencia plant, ruling in favor of two dealers that had filed a case in 2000 against the subsidiary on grounds they had not complied with an agreed sale of 10,000 vehicles.

Workers say that before the seizure was announced, GM had been dismantling the plant, which has not produced a car since the beginning of 2016 because of shortages of parts and strict currency controls in the OPEC nation.

The seizure, which GM called “illegal,” comes amid a deepening economic and social crisis in leftist-led Venezuela that has already roiled many U.S. companies.

“We all received a payment and a text message,” said a worker who had worked for the company for more than a decade, adding that his corporate email account had been deactivated over the weekend.

“Our former bosses told us the executives left and we were all fired. There is no longer anyone in the country,” added another employee who received the same message on his personal cell phone and a payment to his account. He had been at GM for five years.

The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the layoffs or the worker allegations it had already been dismantling the plant.

GM said last week that it was halting operations and laying off workers due to the “illegal judicial seizure of its assets.”

‘Show Your Face’

The leftist government of Nicolas Maduro says it is not seeking to expropriate the plant, which has been operating for 35 years, and has called on GM to come back.

“To the current General Motors president of Venezuela, Jose Cavaileri: You come here, show your face and share with us the options to restore normality,” said Labor Minister Francisco Torrealba said Monday.

GM is not the first company to fire Venezuela employees by text message. Clorox did the same two years ago when announcing its exit from the crisis-struck country, after which workers took over the plant.

GM’s plant closure comes after Venezuela’s automobile production fell in 2016 to a record low of eight cars per day, according to a local automotive group.

Two union spokespeople said they had no official company information on the layoffs, but said that most workers received the messages along with a bank deposit.

Neither employee would reveal the amount they received but union leaders said it was too low.
…

Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk took many risks with the technology in his company’s cars on the way to surpassing Ford Motor Co.’s market value.

Now Musk is pushing boundaries in the factory that makes them.

Most automakers test a new model’s production line by building vehicles with relatively cheap, prototype tools designed to be scrapped once they deliver doors that fit, body panels with the right shape and dashboards that don’t have gaps or seams.

Tesla, however, is skipping that preliminary step and ordering permanent, more expensive equipment as it races to launch its Model 3 sedan by a self-imposed volume production deadline of September, Musk told investors last month.

Musk’s decision underscores his high-risk tolerance and willingness to forego long-held industry norms that has helped Tesla upend the traditional auto industry.

While Tesla is not the first automaker to try to accelerate production on the factory floor, no other rival is putting this much faith in the production strategy succeeding.

Musk expects the Model 3 rollout to help Telsa deliver five times its current annual sales volume, a key target in the automaker’s efforts to stop burning cash.

“He’s pushing the envelope to see how much time and cost he can take out of the process,” said Ron Harbour, a manufacturing consultant at Oliver Wyman.

Investors are already counting on Tesla’s factory floor success, with shares soaring 39 percent since January as it makes the leap from niche producer to mass producer in far less time than rivals.

There are caution signs, however. The production equipment designed to produce millions of cars is expensive to fix or replace if it doesn’t work, industry experts say. Tesla has encountered quality problems on its existing low-volume cars, and the Model 3 is designed to sell in numbers as high as 500,000 vehicles a year, raising the potential cost of recalls or warranty repairs.

“It’s an experiment, certainly,” said Consumer Reports’ Jake Fisher, who has done extensive testing of Tesla’s previous Models S and X. Tesla could possibly fix errors quicker, speeding up the process, “or it could be they have unsuspected problems they’ll have a hard time dealing with.”

Musk discussed the decision to skip what he referred to as “beta” production testing during a call last month with an invited group of investors. Details were published on Reddit by an investor on the call.

He also said that “advanced analytical techniques” — code word for computer simulations – would help Tesla in advancing straight to production tooling.

Tesla declined to confirm details of the call or comment on its production strategy.

The auto industry’s incumbents have not been standing still.

Volkswagen AG’s Audi division launched production of a new plant in Mexico using computer simulations of production tools — and indeed the entire assembly line and factory – that Audi said it

believed to be an industry first. That process allowed the plant to launch production 30 percent faster than usual, Audi said.

An Audi executive involved in the Mexican plant launch, Peter Hochholdinger, is now Tesla’s vice president of production.

Making Tools Faster

Typically, automakers test their design with limited production using lower grade equipment that can be modified slightly to address problems. When most of the kinks are worked out, they order the final equipment.

Tesla’s decision to move directly to the final tools is in part because lower grade, disposable equipment known as “soft tooling” ended up complicating the debut of the problem-plagued Model X SUV in 2015, according to a person familiar with the decision and Tesla’s assembly line planning.

Working on a tight deadline, Tesla had no time to incorporate lessons learned from soft tooling before having to order the permanent production tooling, making the former’s value negligible, the source said.

“Soft tooling did very little for the program and arguably hurt things,” said the person.

In addition, Tesla has learned to better modify final production tools, and its 2015 purchase of a Michigan tooling company means it can make major equipment 30 percent faster than before, and more cheaply as well, the source said.

Financial pressure is partly driving Tesla’s haste. The quicker Tesla can deliver the Model 3 with its estimated $35,000 base price to the 373,000 customers who have put down a $1,000 deposit, the closer it can log $13 billion.

Tesla has labored under financial pressure since it was founded in 2003. The company has yet to turn an annual profit, and earlier this year Musk said the company was “close to the edge” as it look toward capital spending of $2-2.5 billion in the first half of 2017.

Tesla has since gotten more breathing room by raising $1.2 billion in fresh capital in March and selling a five percent stake to Chinese internet company Tencent Holdings

Ltd.

Musk has spoken to investors about his vision of an “alien dreadnought” factory that uses artificial intelligence and robots to build cars at speeds faster than human assembly workers could manage.

But there are limits to what technology can do in the heavily regulated car business. For example, Tesla will still have to use real cars in crash tests required by the U.S. government, because federal rules do not allow simulated crash results to substitute for data from a real car.
…

Голова правління «Діамантбанку» Олег Ходачук пов’язує неплатоспроможність банку із затриманням акціонера цієї фінансової установи, колишнього депутата Верховної Ради Миколи Мартиненка. Про це Ходачук написав на своїй сторінці у «Фейсбуці».

«Останнім пострілом у нас став арешт акціонера банку Мартиненка Миколи Володимировича. Безвідповідальність в цьому плані регулюючих та правоохоронних органів призвела до паніки серед клієнтів і, як результат, введення тимчасової адміністрації», – зазначив він.

24 квітня Фонд гарантування вкладів фізичних осіб повідомив про запровадження тимчасової адміністрації в «Діамантбанку», основними кінцевими власниками якого вважають колишніх депутатів Давида Жванію і Миколу Мартиненка.

Микола Мартиненко наразі є одним із підозрюваних у справі про розтрату коштів державного підприємства «Східний гірничо-збагачувальний комбінат». Сам він свою провину заперечує. 22 квітня суд відпустив Мартиненка на поруки.
…

Національний банк України запровадив тимчасову адміністрацію у «Діамантбанку». Про це повідомляє прес-служба Фонду гарантування вкладів фізичних осіб.

За даними відомства, тимчасову адміністрацію запровадили з огляду на рішення Національного банку «Про віднесення ПАТ «Діамантбанк» до категорії неплатоспроможних» за 24 квітня.

«Згідно з даним рішенням, розпочато процедуру виведення публічного акціонерного товариства «Діамантбанк» з ринку шляхом запровадженням в ньому тимчасової адміністрації строком на один місяць, з 17:00 24 квітня 2017 року до 23 травня 2017 року включно», – йдеться у повідомленні.

Про час та порядок виплат вкладникам банку повідомлять додатково, зазначили у фонді.

Основними кінцевими власниками «Діамантбанку» вважають колишніх депутатів Давида Жванію і Миколу Мартиненка. 

Микола Мартиненко наразі є одним із підозрюваних у справі про розтрату коштів державного підприємства «Східний гірничо-збагачувальний комбінат». Сам він свою провину заперечує. 22 квітня суд відпустив Мартиненка на поруки.
…

European shares opened sharply higher and the euro briefly vaulted to five-month peaks on Monday after the market’s favored candidate won the first round of the French election, reducing the risk of another Brexit-like shock.

The victory for pro-EU centrist Emmanuel Macron, who is now expected to beat right-wing rival Marine Le Pen in a deciding vote next month, sent the pan-European STOXX 50 index up 3 percent, France’s CAC40 almost 4 percent and bank stocks more than 6 percent.

Traders top-sliced some of the euro’s overnight gains, but it was still up more than 1 percent on the dollar, more than 2 percent against the yen and 1.3 percent on the pound as the early flurry of deals subsided.

“It (the first round result) has come out in line with the market’s expectations so you have something of a risk rally as there was a bit of a risk-premium built into all markets,” said James Binny, head of currency at State Street Global Advisors.

There was also an unwinding of safe-haven trades.

Shorter-term German bonds saw their biggest sell-off since the end of 2015 as investors piled back into French as well as Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Greek debt.

The Japanese yen’s fall was widespread, the market’s so-called fear-guage, the VIX volatility index, plunged the most since November and gold saw its biggest tumble in more than a month.

E-mini futures for Wall Street’s S&P 500 climbed 0.9 percent in early trade, while yields on 10-year U.S. Treasury notes rose almost 8 basis points to 2.31 percent.
…

A fungus that causes “vomitoxin” has been found in some U.S. corn harvested last year, forcing poultry and pork farmers to test their grain, and giving headaches to grain growers wrestling with massive supplies and low prices.

The plant toxin sickens livestock and can also make humans and pets ill.

The appearance of vomitoxin and other toxins produced by fungi is affecting ethanol markets and prompting grain processors to seek alternative sources of feed supplies.

Researchers at the U.S. Department of Agriculture first isolated the toxin in 1973 after an unusually wet winter in the Midwest. The compound was given what researchers described as the trivial name vomitoxin because pigs refused to eat the infected corn or vomited after consuming it. The U.S. Corn Belt had earlier outbreaks of infection from the toxin in 1966 and 1928.

The spread of vomitoxin is concentrated in Indiana, Wisconsin, Ohio, and parts of Iowa and Michigan, and its full impact is not yet known, according to state officials and data gathered by food testing firm Neogen Corp. 

In Michigan, Wisconsin and Indiana, a considerable share of corn crops tested since last fall’s harvest have had vomitoxin levels high enough to be considered too toxic for humans, pets, hogs, chickens and dairy cattle, according to public and private data compiled by Neogen. The company did not state what percent of each state’s corn crop was tested.

Toxin levels

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration allows vomitoxin levels of up to 1 part per million (ppm) in human and pet foods and recommends levels under 5 ppm in grain for hogs, 10 ppm for chickens and dairy cattle. Beef cattle can withstand toxin levels up to 30 ppm.

Alltech Inc, a Kentucky-based feed supplement company, said 73 percent of feed samples it has tested this year have vomitoxin. The company analyzed samples sent by farmers whose animals have fallen ill.

“We know there is lots of bad corn out there, because corn byproducts keep getting worse,” said Max Hawkins, a nutritionist with Alltech.

Neogen, which sells grain testing supplies, reported a 29 percent jump in global sales for toxin tests, with strong demand for vomitoxin tests, in their fiscal third quarter, ending Feb. 28.

“We’re polling our customers and continually talking to them about the levels they’re seeing. Those levels are not going down,” said Pat Frasco, director of sales for Neogen’s milling, grain and pet food business.

The problem, stemming from heavy rain before and during the 2016 harvest, prompted farmers to store wet grain, said farmers, ethanol makers and grain inspectors.

The issue was compounded by farmers and grain elevators storing corn on the ground and other improvised spaces, sometimes covering the grain piles with plastic tarps. Grain buyers say they will have a clearer picture of the problem later this spring, as more farm-stored grain is moved to market.

Iowa State University grain quality expert Charles Hurburgh said the sheer size of the harvest in 2016 — the largest in U.S. history — complicates the job of managing toxins in grain, especially in the core Midwest.

“Mycotoxins are very hard to handle in high volume,” he said. “You can’t test every truckload, or if you do, you are only going to unload 20 trucks in a day.” By comparison, corn processors in Iowa unload 400 or more trucks a day.

Biofuel impact

Ethanol makers are feeling the impact. Turning corn into ethanol creates a byproduct called distillers dried grains (DDGs), which is sold as animal feed. With fuel prices low, the DDGs can boost profitability.

But the refining process triples the concentration of mycotoxins, making the feed byproduct less attractive. DDG prices in Indiana fell to $92.50 per ton in February, the lowest since 2009, and now are selling for $97.50 per ton, according to USDA.

Many ethanol plants are testing nearly every load of corn they receive for the presence of vomitoxin, said Indiana grain inspector Doug Titus, whose company has labs at The Andersons Inc., a grain handler, and energy company Valero Energy sites.

The Andersons in a February call with analysts said vomitoxin has hurt results at three of its refineries in the eastern U.S. 

“That will be with us for some time,” Andersons’ chief executive Pat Bowe said.

Mixing with clean grain

Missouri grain farmer Doug Roth, who put grain into storage after last year’s wet harvest, has seen a few loads of corn rejected by clients who make pet food after the grain tested positive for low levels of fumonisin, a type of mycotoxin.

Roth said he paid to reroute the grain to livestock producers in Arkansas, who planned to blend it with unaffected grain in order to mitigate the effect of the toxins.

U.S. farmers with clean corn are reaping a price bump. A Cardinal Ethanol plant in Union City, Indiana, is offering grain sellers a 10-cent per bushel premium for corn with less than one-part-per-million or less of vomitoxin in it, according to the company’s website.
…

Lawmakers from coal-mining states are pushing to extend health benefits for more than 22,000 retired miners and widows whose medical coverage is set to expire at the end of April.

West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin and other coal-state Democrats threatened to shut down the government over the issue in December, but they retreated after winning a four-month extension that preserves benefits through April 30.

As lawmakers return to the Capitol following a two-week recess, Manchin says the time for extensions is over.

“We will use every vehicle we can, every pathway we can, to make sure we do not leave here … until we have our miners protected,” he said in a speech on the Senate floor before the break.

“We’ve been very patient,” Manchin said. “I am not going to have another notice sent out to our retired miners, to their widows, saying we’ve given you 90 days or 120 days extension. That’s not going to happen this time.”

Deadline is Friday

But as a Friday deadline looms to keep the government open, lawmakers have not reached agreement on extending the benefits. A plan pushed by GOP leaders in the House would extend health benefits for 20 months, through the end of 2018.

Manchin said Senate Democrats are against that idea because it’s only a partial fix. At least a dozen Senate Republicans are willing to join Democrats in support of a more complete plan that addresses health benefits and a related issue over failing pension plans for nearly 100,000 unionized miners, Manchin said.

“This shouldn’t be a Republican or Democrat issue,” he said in an interview. “This is an issue of fairness.”

A spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said McConnell supports legislation to protect and permanently extend the health benefits, but had no word on the progress of talks related to the spending bill.

A spokesman for House Speaker Paul Ryan also offered no update.

Pieces and parts

President Donald Trump, who has vowed to revive the struggling coal industry, has given “verbal support” for the miners’ benefits, Manchin said, but needs to do more.

“I need him now to either tweet or call Senator McConnell and tell him it’s time to act,” Manchin said. “Mr. President, if you are listening, please tweet out: ‘Mitch, help us. We need you.’”

Trump and Republicans have decried what they describe as a “war on coal” waged by the Obama administration, and have taken a series of actions since Trump took office to boost coal production and reduce regulations, including a rule to protect streams from coal-mining debris.

Trump’s budget director, Mick Mulvaney, told reporters that the White House is “happy to talk … about pieces and parts of the miners’ programs” as part of negotiations on a bill to keep the government open.

“I don’t think we’re very interested in the pension component of that but more interested in talking about the health care component of that,” Mulvaney said.

Pension problem is bigger

Phil Smith, a spokesman for the United Mine Workers of America, said he is hopeful a compromise can be reached on health benefits, but he complained that Republicans appear unwilling to address the far more costly pension issue. Congress scrapped a $3 billion, 10-year measure to stabilize failing pension funds last year.

“The pension part is not going to go away. It only gets worse by the day,” he said.

Account balances have dwindled amid the coal’s industry steep decline, including continued layoffs and a rash of bankruptcy filings that have spread to the industry’s largest companies. Without congressional intervention, some pension funds could run out of cash by next year, the union says.

For the moment, Congress appears focused on health benefits.

In West Virginia, about 8,500 retired miners and their families face loss of benefits if Congress does not act. Some mining families have been unable to make doctor’s appointments after May 1 because of uncertainty over whether medical bills will be paid, Smith said.

Other states affected include Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Virginia and Alabama.
…

Motorists in Pyongyang are scrambling to fill their tanks as gas stations begin limiting services or closing amid concerns of a spreading shortage.

A sign outside one station in the North Korean capital said Friday that sales were being restricted to diplomats or vehicles used by international organizations, while others were closed or turning away local residents. Lines at other stations were much longer than usual and prices appeared to be rising significantly. 

The cause of the restrictions or how long they might last were not immediately known. 

Fuel from China

North Korea relies heavily on China for its fuel supply, and Beijing has reportedly been tightening its enforcement of international sanctions aimed at getting Pyongyang to abandon its development of nuclear weapons and long-range missiles.

The issue was raised at a regular Chinese Foreign Ministry news conference in Beijing Friday after a Chinese media outlet, Global Times, reported gas stations were restricting service and charging higher prices. 

But spokesman Lu Kang gave an ambiguous response when asked if China was restricting fuel deliveries.

“As for what kind of policy China is taking, I think you should listen to the authoritative remarks or statements of the Chinese government,” he said, without elaborating on what those remarks or statements are. “For the remarks made by certain people or circulated online, it is up to you if you want to take them as references.” 

New sanctions an option

One of China’s top North Korea scholars, Kim Dong-jil, director of the Center for Korean Peninsula Studies of Peking University, said he had not heard of new restrictions on fuel to pressure Pyongyang, but said they are considered to be an option.

China’s Ministry of Commerce had no immediate comment 

Gasoline was selling at $1.25 per kilogram at one station, up from the previous 70-80 cents. According to a sign outside a station where ordinary North Korean vehicles were being turned away, the restrictions took effect Wednesday.

Gasoline is sold in North Korea by the kilogram, roughly equivalent to a liter (0.26 gallon).

When buying gas in North Korea, customers usually first purchase coupons at a cashier’s booth for the amount of fuel they want. After filling up the tank, leftover coupons can be used on later visits until their expiration date. A common amount for the coupons is 15 kilograms (19.65 liters or 5.2 U.S. gallons).

Supply is controlled by the state, but prices can vary from one station to another. 

More cars to fuel

The military, state ministries and priority projects have the best access. Several chains of gas stations are operated under different state-run enterprises, for example, Air Koryo, the national flagship airline, operates gas stations as well. 

Traffic in Pyongyang has gotten heavier than in past years, when visitors had often been struck by the lack of cars on the capital’s broad avenues.

The greater number of cars, including swelling fleets of taxis, has been an indication of greater economic activity, as many are used for business purposes, such as transporting people or goods.
…

Even after disembarking from North Korea’s Air Koryo plane at Pyongyang airport, it’s difficult to miss the airline’s brand. The Air Koryo conglomerate makes cigarettes and fizzy drinks, besides owning a taxi fleet and petrol stations – and all have the same flying crane logo as the carrier.

The military-controlled airline expanded into consumer products in earnest in recent months, visitors to the isolated country say. It was not clear if the diversification into the domestic market was related to the loss of many international routes when the United Nations slapped economic sanctions on North Korea for its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

Washington is now considering tougher measures, including a global ban on Air Koryo itself, to punish North Korea for continuing weapons tests, U.S. officials have said.

But any U.S. action on Air Koryo would not be binding on other nations and would have little effect unless joined by China and Russia – both of which have sought to introduce exceptions to United Nations sanctions on North Korea in the past.

“China may indeed agree to this kind of ban on Air Koryo since it seems like China and the U.S. have reached an agreement that North Korea needs to be dealt with in some way. But the question is whether Russia will agree to sanctions against Air Koryo,” said Sun Xingjie, an associate professor at China’s Jilin University.

North Korean officials are rarely accessible to reporters, and it was not possible to get comment from Air Koryo or from the Pyongyang government.

Air Koryo now flies only to Beijing and three other cities in China, and to Vladivostok in Russia. Flights to Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur and Kuwait were dropped last year but just last month, Air Koryo added a route from Pyongyang to the Chinese city of Dandong, the main transit point for trade between the two countries.

Air Koryo has 15 active planes on its fleet, either Russian or Ukrainian-made, and uses refuelling, maintenance and repair facilities in China and Russia, according to aviation databases and U.N. documents.

The airline has a number of domestic flights connecting the capital Pyongyang to Orang, Sondok and Samjiyon towns, according to a schedule available last year.

Businesses in secretive North Korea do not publicly share information about revenues or costs, so it was not possible to determine what effect any existing sanctions have had or may have in future.

But visitors to North Korea say the Air Koryo conglomerate, owned by the country’s air force, is clearly expanding.

Cabs, Gas Stations

In 2015, the conglomerate launched its own brand of sky-blue taxis which now parade the streets of Pyongyang alongside cabs from at least eight other state-owned companies.

Air Koryo colas and cigarettes are available in shops across Pyongyang.

Air Koryo started branching into soft drinks late last year, said Simon Cockerell of Beijing-based Koryo Tours, which organizes travel to North Korea.

It got into retail sales of petrol in January. “They have at least one petrol station in Pyongyang, perhaps two,” Cockerell said. “I wouldn’t be surprised to see more Air Koryo products make it to market before too long.”

A United Nations panel which investigates North Korean sanctions infringements said in a report in February there was an “absence of boundaries” between Air Koryo and the air force.

“The airline’s assets are actively utilised for military purposes,” the report said.

“Outwardly, this seems like a commercial airline, but in effect, this is run by the government,” said Kim Yong-hyun, a professor of North Korean Studies at Dongguk University in South Korea.

The United Nations has not sanctioned Air Koryo, although it has accused it of being involved in the smuggling of banned goods. Civilian aircraft are exempt from the U.N. ban on jet fuel exports to North Korea when refuelling overseas. Member states are required to inspect any cargo originating from North Korea, including on Air Koryo flights.

In December, the United States designated Air Koryo, 16 of its aircraft and 10 of its offices as “sanctioned entities,” meaning that U.S. citizens are generally prevented from engaging in transactions with them. It was not clear if the ban extended to Americans flying on the airline for tourism.

Officials at Pyongyang’s airport said they were unconcerned about any attempts by the global community to strengthen sanctions that could target Air Koryo directly.

“We are not afraid, we have our own counter actions prepared,” said a customs official, without elaborating, standing at the Air Koryo check-in counter.

Kim, the South Korean professor, said any sanctions on Air Koryo would have mostly a symbolic effect.

“It will not cause huge damage to the North Korean economy,” he said in the Korean language. “Air Koryo is not a ‘dollar box'[which makes a lot of foreign money].”
…

U.S. President Donald Trump has ordered a full review of the powers given to government regulators to oversee the banking and finance industries following the financial meltdown of 2008.

Trump went to the Treasury Department on Friday to sign three executive orders that start the process of fulfilling his campaign pledges to undo regulations that he says unduly strain the U.S. economy.

“My entire administration [is] working around the clock to help struggling Americans achieve their financial dreams … and have real confidence in the future,” Trump said as he signed the orders. “Together we will restore prosperity to this nation.”

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin explained that two of the orders could eventually lead to a significant revision of controversial provisions of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform law.

“Our goal is to make this a smarter, more effective process that reduces the kind of systemic risk that harmed so many Americans during the financial crisis of 2008,” Mnuchin said.

Dodd-Frank reform

One order temporarily freezes a portion of Dodd-Frank known as the Orderly Liquidation Authority, which gives the federal government broad discretion in making loans to failing financial institutions. The Trump administration argues that the OLA encourages excessive risk-taking by banks because taxpayers are potentially liable for bad loans.

Trump on Friday called the Dodd-Frank regulations “unfair” and “damaging,” saying they had “failed to hold Wall Street firms accountable.”

Critics say the review is aimed at revoking Obama-era reforms that have brought stability and transparency to the sometimes murky world of high finance, and helped to prevent another crisis.

Edwin Truman, who served as a senior Treasury official in the Clinton and Obama administrations, says Dodd-Frank encourages banks to raise more capital and be more open about their activities.

“That doesn’t mean that a complicated piece of legislation like Dodd-Frank couldn’t be improved and tweaked,” Truman told VOA. “It’s like Obamacare. It could be improved while maintaining its basic principles. So there’s scope for reform but not really repeal or replacement.”

Boston University law professor Tamar Frankel, an expert in financial system regulation, said Dodd-Frank has not achieved the purpose for which it was designed, which is to create consumer confidence in the banking industry. But she worries that a rollback of Obama-era regulations could bring about a return to dangerous lending practices.

“Loans of the kind banks made before 2008 are the poison of any financial system,” Frankel said.

Tax laws

Trump’s latest orders also authorize a review of tax laws, which the president argues impose an undue burden on taxpayers.

“This is such a privilege for me to sign,” he said during the ceremony. “This is really the beginning of a whole new way of life that this country hasn’t seen in really many, many years.”

Secretary Mnuchin told reporters Friday he was looking forward to taking a hard look at the tax code.

“We are going to go through and look at every significant financial regulation that’s been done in the past year and a half,” Mnuchin explained. “We’re going to determine if they’re needed in the tax code, or if they’re unnecessary.”

In making his case, Mnuchin pointed to statistics showing individuals and businesses cumulatively spend a total of 6.1 billion hours complying with the tax code each year, at a cost to the U.S. economy of $234.4 billion. He said the basic Form 1040 used to file taxes had grown from 34 lines and two pages of instructions to 79 lines and 211 pages of instructions.

Mnuchin has 180 days to report back to the president with recommended reforms.

Trump also hinted Friday that he’s almost ready to make another big announcement on taxes, saying he was ready to unveil a “massive tax cut” next week, shortly before he reaches the symbolic 100-day mark of his presidency.

“The process has begun long ago, ” he said, “but it really formally begins on Wednesday.”

In a separate interview with The Associated Press, Trump said the plan would provide tax cuts for both individuals and businesses. He would not provide details of the plan, saying only that the tax cuts will be “bigger I believe than any tax cut ever.”
…

Greece far exceeded its international lenders’ budget demands last year, official data showed on Friday, posting its first overall budget surplus in 21 years even when debt repayments are included.

The primary surplus — the leftover before debt repayments that is the focus of International Monetary Fund-European Union creditors — was more than eight times what they had targeted.

Data released by Greek statistics service ELSTAT — to be confirmed on Monday by the EU — showed the primary budget surplus at 3.9 percent of gross domestic product last year versus a downwardly revised 2.3 percent deficit in 2015.

This was calculated under European System of Accounts guidelines, which differ from the methodology used by Greece’s in bailout deliberations.

Under EU-IMF standards, the surplus was even larger.

Government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos said the primary budget surplus under bailout terms reached 4.19 percent of gross domestic product last year versus the 0.5 percent of GDP target.

“It is more than eight times above target,” Tzanakopoulos said in a statement. “Therefore, the targets set under the bailout program for 2017 and 2018 will certainly be attained.”

Debt-strapped Greece and its creditors have been at odds for months over the country’s fiscal performance, delaying the conclusion of a key bailout review which could unlock needed bailout funds.

The IMF, which has reservations on whether Greece can meet high primary surplus targets, has yet to decide if it will fund Greece’s current bailout, which expires in 2018.

The 2016 outperformance could lead the fund to revise some of its projections. The IMF’s participation is seen as a condition for Germany to unlock new funds to Greece.

Athens hopes to discuss the fund’s participation and its projections at the sidelines of the IMF’s spring meetings in Washington. EU and IMF mission chiefs are expected to return to Athens on Tuesday to discuss the bailout review.

After meeting Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos in Washington, IMF chief Christine Lagarde said: “We had constructive discussions in preparation for the return of the mission to discuss the two legs of the Greece program: policies and debt relief.”

ELSTAT said the overall surplus including debt repayments reached 0.7 percent of GDP compared with a 5.9 percent deficit in 2015.

Analysts attributed the outperformance to the implementation of bailout measures and increased efforts to improve the state’s revenue collection capacity.

“It’s an impressive outperformance versus the bailout program target for the primary surplus,” said Athens-based Eurobank’s chief economist Platon Monokroussos.

“The data suggests that the 2017 fiscal target under the bailout program is fully attainable under the current baseline macroeconomic scenario,” he said.

Athens faces a primary surplus target of 1.75 percent of GDP this year.
…

As economic and political leaders gather in Washington for the annual spring meetings of the World bank and International Monetary Fund — new warnings Thursday about the impact of rapid change on the global economy. At issue, the pace of technological advance and its Impact on jobs, particularly in developing economies. Mil Arcega has more.
…

U.S. officials are reviewing Venezuela’s seizure of General Motors’ assets in the country, U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner said Thursday.

“We are reviewing the details of the case,” Toner said in a statement, saying the United States hoped to resolve the matter “rapidly and transparently.”

GM said Wednesday that Venezuelan authorities had taken over its plant in the industrial hub of Valencia, adding that it was halting operations and laying off 2,700 workers due to the “illegal judicial seizure of its assets.”

The largest U.S. automaker vowed to “take all legal actions” to defend its rights. The seizure comes amid a deepening economic crisis in leftist-led Venezuela that has already roiled many U.S. companies.

The seizure is the result of a civil dispute with a Venezuelan concessionaire dating back to 2000 and does not represent a nationalization as such, according to local media reports.

GM, the market leader in Venezuela for 35 years, said in a statement that in addition to the plant seizure “other assets of the company, such as vehicles, have been illegally taken from its facilities.”

Total auto production in Venezuela fell to a historic low of 2,849 cars in 2016, nearly 75 percent less than the year before, according to Venezuela’s automotive industry group.

In the first two months of 2017, GM has not produced any vehicles, while total Venezuelan auto production was just 240 vehicles, down 50 percent over the same period last year. The New York Times reported the GM plant had been closed for the last six weeks as a result of a takeover by members of one of its unions.

Nearly all vehicles built in Venezuela in the first two months this year were assembled by Toyota Motor Corp, which said Thursday that its plant was operating normally.

But a spokesman added the automaker was “only producing based on orders that come in.”

Venezuela’s car industry has been hit by a lack of raw materials stemming from complex currency controls.

In early 2015, Ford Motor Co wrote off its investment in Venezuela when it took an $800 million pre-tax writedown. The company said Thursday it was not producing vehicles in Venezuela.

The South American nation’s economic crisis has hurt many other U.S. companies, including food makers and pharmaceutical firms. A growing number are removing their Venezuelan operations from their consolidated accounts.
…

President Donald Trump has ordered an investigation into whether foreign steel imports are damaging U.S. national security, saying his administration would “fight for American workers and American-made steel.”

The probe is authorized under a rarely used section of a 1962 trade law that allows a president to restrict imports in cases where security interests are at stake.

“This has nothing to do with China,” Trump insisted, adding, “This has to do with worldwide, what’s happening. The dumping problem is a worldwide problem.”

Steel industry

Surrounded by steel industry executives at an Oval Office signing ceremony Thursday, Trump clearly stated the probe was not directed at China, which has long been accused of dumping its excess steel production on U.S. markets.

The president said the investigation could be completed within 50 days, far ahead of the nine months prescribed by law.

Shares of steel companies surged on news of the probe. The price of United States Steel Corporation stock was up more than 8 percent soon after the announcement.

“The important question is protecting our defense needs,” said Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who added the investigation is designed to find a balance between free trade and national security while building up the U.S. military. “And we will do whatever is necessary to do that.”

Ross noted that steel imports rose nearly 20 percent in the first two months of this year, much of it from China, and now make up more than 26 percent of the entire American marketplace.

“Steel imports, despite measures already taken, have continued to rise despite repeated Chinese claims that they were going to reduce their steel capacity,” he said. “Instead, they have actually been increasing it consistently.”

Investigation sought

Steel industry executives attending Thursday’s Oval Office ceremony applauded Trump’s call for an investigation.

Mario Longhi, the CEO of U.S. Steel Corporation, said, “The signing of this executive order clearly demonstrates your understanding of the fundamental importance that our industry has, not just to the national economy, but to the national defense.”

Trade experts and free market advocates, however, were skeptical of Trump’s rationale for the investigation.

“It’s just a bogus attempt to limit imports,” said Dan Griswold, a research fellow at the Mercatus Center at Virginia’s George Mason University.

Griswold said any move to restrict imports would be bad for U.S. industry and consumers because it would drive up prices for products that contain steel, from appliances to automobiles to new houses.

“But it will make certain steel producers and their politically active unions increase their profits and the gains they make by restricting competition,” he said.

Issue of national security

Gary Hufbauer, senior fellow at the Peterson Institute of International Economics in Washington, questions the idea that dependence on foreign steel is a national security issue.

Hufbauer, who served as a senior Treasury Department official under former President Jimmy Carter, said the probe reflects the thinking of Commerce Secretary Ross, a billionaire investor with close ties to the steel industry.

“It’s not coming from the defense industry,” Hufbauer said. “It’s coming from the steelmakers, and key administration figures starting with Ross and others who feel the steel industry has been beset by steel from abroad and that’s weakening the U.S. steel industry. But that’s from a commercial standpoint, not a defense standpoint.”

Ross stepped down from the board of the Luxembourg-based steel giant ArcelorMittal after accepting the job as Trump’s commerce secretary.

A financial disclosure form he filed with the Office of Government Ethics shows Ross served on ArcelorMittal’s board for nearly a decade, and was paid more than $100,000 in director’s fees last year. He was also reported to have divested himself of between $750,000 and $1.5 million in equity holdings in the company, which is described on its home page as “the world’s leading integrated steel and mining company.”

Bloomberg News reported this week that while U.S. steelmakers may be counting on Trump to help business, any regulatory change could take years.

In a note to clients, Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Caitlin Webber wrote that changes would also likely be challenged at the World Trade Organization.
…

The head of the International Monetary Fund says she “has every reason to believe” that the global lender can cooperate with the Trump Administration to support and improve global trade.

IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde spoke in Washington as economic and political officials gathered from around the world at this week’s meetings of the IMF and the World Bank.

Candidate Donald Trump blamed what he called unfair trade for the loss of many jobs in the United States, and proposed tax increases for imported goods. President Trump recently signed an order to give U.S. firms a better shot at selling goods to the U.S. government, and has been sharply critical of immigration policies.

Lagarde says trade is one of the “pillars” of prosperity. She vowed to continue to support the growth of trade, seeking ways to make it more efficient and fair, and fight against protectionist measures.

Lagarde said the global economy is “picking up momentum,” because of “sensible” policies in many nations. Speaking a little earlier, World Bank President Jim Yong Kim said he is “encouraged” to see stronger economic prospects after years of “disappointing” global growth. He said growth is hampered by conflict, climate shocks, the worst refugee crisis since World War II, and famine in certain areas.
…

Anti-corruption activists in Nigeria say the president’s suspension of two top officials is only a first step and must be followed up with more action.

On Wednesday, Buhari suspended national intelligence agency chief Ayo Oke, who was linked to more than $40 million found in an empty Lagos apartment, and the secretary of his government, David Babachir Lawal, who allegedly collected money on a phony contract.

Abdulkarim Dayyabu is chairman of the Movement for Justice in Nigeria, a non-governmental organization.  He says the suspensions are overdue.

“This should have been done a long time ago,” Dayyabu told VOA’s Hausa Service on Thursday.  “Someone like Buhari ought to take immediate measures against any official accused of corruption; he should not wait for too long.”

Abdulmajid Dan Bilki Kwamanda is a member of the ruling APC coalition who recommends the president move against other aides.

“Buhari is finally fighting corruption from within.  He must continue to look inwards and confront his senior officials who are accused of corruption head-on,” he said.”

Another activist, Naja’atu Mohammed, is skeptical that the suspended officials will be held accountable, saying the administration shielded Lawal previously when senators accused him of corruption.

“We are looking for results,” she told VOA.

There have been calls, including one from Nigeria’s Senate, for the removal of Lawal over his alleged complicity in the mismanagement of funds meant for a presidential initiative on northeastern Nigeria

Rholavision Engineering, a company owned by Lawal, received payments of about $500,000 from a contract he awarded for the clearing of “invasive plant species” in Yobe state.

Oke, director-general of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA), is embroiled in the discovery of $43 million in cash by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.

So far, no one has claimed ownership of the money, which was in both local and foreign currencies.

Ownership of the apartment complex in which the funds were found, Osborne Towers Lagos, is still unclear, but the building is occupied by many powerful Nigerians including the former chairman of the opposition party, Ahmadu Muazu, whose PDP ruled Nigeria for years under former president Goodluck Jonathan.

Government spokesman Femi Adesina said the government has launched an investigation into the funds.

Another presidential spokesman, Garba Shehu, told VOA’s Umar Farouk Musa in Abuja that Buhari has given two probe panels, headed by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, two weeks to investigate and submit their findings.

The suspensions follow recent discoveries of large amounts of money by the EFCC in strange places, including homes of senior government officials.

Last month, the EFCC found about $1.25 million abandoned in large bags at the Kaduna airport.

Earlier, nearly $10 million was seized from the home of a former head of Nigeria’s National Petroleum Company, NNPC, in the northern state of Kaduna.

The EFCC also uncovered yet another unclaimed $1 million in two shops at a shopping mall in Victoria Island, Lagos.  

A new government initiative to reward whistleblowers is encouraging many Nigerians to reveal the secret locations of money stashed away by corrupt officials. The EFCC, Nigeria’s anti-corruption agency, has offered to give up to 5 percent of amounts recovered to the informants, whose identities it protects.
…

Atlantic salmon farming companies are designing huge pens to raise fish in the open seas in a radical shift from calm coastal waters where marine lice have slowed growth of the billion-dollar industry.

The drive for new designs by Norway, producer of 54 percent of all farmed Atlantic salmon in 2016, will have to cope with ocean storms that can rip cages and free thousands of fish.

Escapees disrupt natural stocks by breeding with wild cousins.

“The industry has to develop and to solve the environmental challenges it has, especially linked to salmon lice,” Norwegian Fisheries Minister Per Sandberg told Reuters, referring to parasites that often spread infections resistant to antibiotics.

One in five salmon farmed in Norway dies before reaching maturity, partly due to tiny blood-sucking lice that latch onto the outside of the pink fish.

Lice, also a problem in other countries, tend to concentrate in the more stagnant waters of Norway’s bays and fjords where farms are now based. A shift offshore would expose farms to ocean currents that should help to sweep away the lice larvae.

The Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries is seeking innovative fish farm designs, both for offshore and coastal waters, in a two-year drive open until November 2017. So far it has approved a handful and is reviewing about 40 others.

Many borrow ideas from the offshore oil and gas industry.

The lure of offshore pens is that they would open almost unlimited areas for fish farms beyond bays and fjords, attracting investors and transforming the global aquaculture industry.

Norway produced 1.1 million tons of salmon in 2016, more than double the output of number two producer Chile, and earned $7.6 billion in exports. Smaller producers include Britain, the Faroe Islands and Canada.

But Norway’s production, by companies including Marine Harvest, SalMar and Leroy Seafood, has been little changed since 2012 due to lack of space and disease, even as rising demand has pushed prices to record highs.

Storm risks 

“We’ll take the project that works best, has no salmon lice, the lowest cost, no escapes and is industrial,” Marine Harvest’s chief executive officer Alf-Helge Aarskog told Reuters of a range of designs the company has proposed.

Nets in coastal farms sometimes tear in storms, harming wild stocks from Scotland’s Spey River to Norway’s Alta River, and offshore farms will be exposed to far stronger winds and waves. Last year, 126,000 salmon broke out of Norwegian farms.

“Escaped fish mix with the wild salmon – that creates problems with genetics,” said Ingrid Lomelde, of the WWF Norway Farmed fish are bred to grow fast and fatter than their sleek wild cousins. Interbreeding could produce fish too weak, for example, to leap up waterfalls to reach spawning grounds.

Among approved designs, SalMar is building what it calls the “world’s first offshore fish farm” to start in late 2017 — a floating circular construction 110 metres (360 ft) across that looks like a drilling rig, apart from huge nets dangling below.

The 700 million Norwegian crown ($82 million) yellow and white steel construction is being built at a Chinese yard, and will be big enough to raise more than a million salmon.

“We’re starting to install the anchoring systems,” off the coast of mid-Norway, chief financial officer Trond Tuvstein said. “No one wants escapes,” he said.

In Chile, Felipe Sandoval, head of industry group SalmonChile, said the government wanted more research into farming in more exposed and offshore areas. “We will have to wait a bit to see how this takes off,” he said.

Most approved designs in Norway are still on the drawing board, such as a sealed 44-metre (144.36 ft) tall egg-shaped tank by Marine Harvest where the fish swim inside in seawater filtered to keep out lice, or a 400-metre long farm by Nordlaks shaped like a supertanker.

Egg

Marine Harvest hopes to start building an “Egg” prototype in mid-2017, CEO Aarskog said. The sealed design would be suited for calm waters in fjords and is favored by environmentalists and river owners as a way of isolating any disease.

If successful, “the technologies will allow aquaculture in more exposed areas globally” including for other types of farmed fish such as sea bass or bream, said Tore Toenseth, an analyst at SpareBank 1 Markets in Oslo.

Huge new cages able to withstand storms could be used anywhere, from Japan to the United States, he said.

But river owners say not enough is done to protect wild stocks by the expansion of farming.

“It’s a very vulnerable system,” said Erik Sterud, of the river owners’ association Norske Lakseelver, who estimates there are now just 500,000 wild salmon off Norway against half a billion farmed fish.

Companies are willing to invest hundreds of millions of crowns in the new technologies partly because Norway will award licenses to operate the new fish farms, almost for free.
…

A federal judge in Miami fined Princess Cruise Lines $40 million Wednesday for illegally dumping oil waste into the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico, and for falsifying records.

It is the largest such water pollution fine in U.S. history.

The Miami Herald newspaper says the British engineer who reported the dumping to the U.S. Coast Guard will get a $1 million reward.

According to the Herald, engineers aboard the Caribbean Princess in 2012 and 2013 were ordered to dump the oily water straight into the sea and avoid the ship’s filtration system, in order to save money. It said the ship’s two senior engineers falsified the vessel’s records.

The British engineer recorded the dumping on a cellphone.

Four other Princess ships also were involved in the illegal dumping off the East Coast, and near Florida and Texas.
…

Peru’s economy will recover in coming years with investment in construction after recent flooding, likely growing 4.5 percent in 2018 and 5 percent in 2019, Finance Minister Alfredo Thorne said on Wednesday.

Previously, the government had expected growth of 4.3 and 4.1 percent for the next two years.

The estimate for 2017 growth was lowered this month to 3 percent from 3.8 percent previously due to flooding.

“The shock will be temporary,” Thorne said in a presentation at Lima’s Chamber of Commerce.

The floods have damaged 6,000 kilometers (3,728 miles) of roads, destroyed thousands of houses and killed 106 people since December.

Peru’s economy, which has also been hurt by paralyzed infrastructure projects due to a corruption investigation involving Brazil’s Odebrecht, grew at its lowest rate in more than two years in February.
…

Over the last six months, the skyline over the sleepy fishing city of Gwadar has been transformed by machines that dredge the Arabian Sea and cranes that set up shipping berths in what is projected to become Pakistan’s biggest international port.

Infrastructure developments have enabled the hammer-shaped Gwadar peninsula to emerge as the centerpiece of China’s determined effort to shorten its trade route to the Persian Gulf and obtain access to the rich oil reserves there.

A mini-“Chinatown” has appeared, with prefabricated living quarters, a canteen and a karaoke center. After hours, the workers have the grounds to play their favorite game, badminton.

A spokesman for the Chinese team in Gwadar said in an interview that his government had invited employment bids in China, then brought the workers here.

He proudly touted the successful test run conducted by China in November when it used Pakistan’s land route from Kashgar to Gwadar to transport a convoy of 60 containers for export to the Middle East and North Africa.

Prior to that, he said, China had sailed materials through the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean to reach Gwadar.

The Chinese propose to cut down that 12,000-kilometer sea route by about one-fourth once they adopt the land route from the northwestern province of Xinjiang to Gwadar.

So eager is China to save on distance, time and expense — and the challenge posed by the U.S. Navy in the South China Sea — that it has weathered Pakistan’s unstable law-and-order situation to build its economic corridor.

Small wonder that the Chinese spokesman omitted an incident — related by locals to VOA — that the test convoy came under fire in Hoshab, Baluchistan, despite protection from a special security force.

Since then, Pakistan has enhanced its 12,000-plus security force to protect the Chinese. That has turned Gwadar into a military zone, with strict checks of vehicles and ID cards, plus an encampment of intelligence officials.

Still, Baluch insurgents use attacks on “soft targets,” like laborers from other provinces, to drive away investors from the China Pakistan Economic Corridor. On April 5, as road workers from Sindh were gunned down in Kharan in targeted killings claimed by the Baluchistan Liberation Front, former army Col. Farooq Ahmed said suspicion fell on militants operating from Afghanistan.

The Chinese, for their part, have taken heart from the security provided by Islamabad to plan ahead. A prefabricated coal plant will be brought from China to Gwadar to fire up its energy needs. Moreover, China will finance Gwadar international airport, according to the spokesman.

Distances inside Pakistan have shortened as the Frontier Works Organization builds a 3,000-km network of roads funded by Chinese investment.

Symbolizing skepticism

Despite Pakistan’s ongoing military operation against the Taliban, sporadic terror attacks are the biggest hurdle to the country’s development. After 9/11, when Pakistan allied with the U.S. in combating terrorism in Afghanistan, militant organizations put down their roots and threatened the nation from inside.

As social indicators fell and Pakistan became one of the world’s most food-insecure nations, it opened its doors to China — one of America’s rivals — to help fight poverty, a key factor in fundamentalism and terrorism.

When U.S. envoy Nikki Haley recently spoke of nations that use their United Nations veto to stop non-state actors from being designated as terrorists, it was seen as a reference to China’s refusal to let Kashmiri militant Masood Azhar be so named. Pakistani analysts interpreted this to mean the U.S. would move closer to India, even while revisiting ties with Pakistan because of its key role in Afghanistan.

Now the road from Karachi to Gwadar is smooth and empty, with awe-inspiring, wind-carved hills and mysterious canyons that dip into golden sands that run for kilometers along the deep blue-green Arabian Sea. It has enabled locals to rediscover their country — even as some marvel at the speed of construction.

But in a country that suffers from grinding poverty, little industry and high unemployment, the benefits of China’s investment are still hard to sell to the average person.

Gwadar symbolizes the skepticism. A miniscule amount has been spent by Islamabad and Beijing on people’s welfare, including a vocational training center, a hospital and school. The peninsula’s natural beauty belies erratic electricity, scarce drinking water and lack of proper sewerage.

Gwadar Port Authority Chairman Dostain Jamaldini explains to delegations arriving daily from across the country that revenue generation is the key to uplifting the area.

He showed off a huge quadrangle in the center of Gwadar that “can even be seen on Google Earth.” There, he has recommended to Islamabad that a multipurpose lighthouse be constructed to guide incoming ships and generate revenue.

Until that happens, the fishermen who build wooden boats along Gwadar beach will likely lose their livelihood as their shanty homes are removed.

Already, the vacant plots in Gwadar’s Sinjhaar area overlooking the sea have been repossessed by the Pakistan Navy and earmarked for sale to military officials and politicians.

For the well-connected, a real estate boom is on the horizon. Trader Abbas Rashanwala said he waited for years for peace to come to Gwadar. Now his real estate business has taken off, with investors flocking in to buy land.

Many realtors are betting on Gwadar as on the stock market — making deals online or on the phone. Several sit in the Punjab, selling property they have never seen in Gwadar, all on speculation that prices will soon skyrocket.

Meanwhile, China’s investment in Gwadar is helping control maritime crime. Officials tell how traffickers from Africa and the Middle East used to dock on the beach at night to swap slaves for narcotics.

In February, 36 nations, including the U.S. and Russia, participated in the Pakistan Navy’s multinational patrolling of the Arabian Sea in a global recognition of China’s role in making the waterways safer.

Still, China’s emerging role in Pakistan has raised many questions. The most prominent criticism is that China will become Pakistan’s “East India Company” — a metaphor for the British empire’s plunder of India.

Notwithstanding the doomsayers, there also is a readiness to accept that development and peace are inextricably linked to Pakistan’s future.
…

У Павлоградському міськрайонному суді на Дніпропетровщині 19 квітня винесли рішення у справі про вибух у житловому будинку і вбивство жінки. Обвинуваченого у скоєнні вибуху та вбивстві засудили до 15 років в’язниці.

За інформацією суду, вирок набуде чинності за 30 днів, якщо його не оскаржать в апеляційному суді.

Свою провину обвинувачений частково визнав.

За даними суду, обвинуваченим у справі є 60-річний житель міста, колишній чоловік загиблої жінки Олександр Коломоєць. На початку судового процесу він звернувся до суду з проханням здійснювати слухання справи у закритому режимі й дозволу брати участь у засіданнях в режимі відеозв’язку, однак суд відхилив ці клопотання.

За інформацією правоохоронців, у ніч з 17 на 18 вересня 2016 року обвинувачений не тільки скоїв убивство дружини, нанісши їй 128 ножових поранень, а й влаштував вибух у 5-поверховому будинку, здійснивши пошкодження системи постачання побутового газу.

За даними слідчих, у результаті вибуху і пожежі в багатоквартирному будинку була зруйнована частина споруди, декілька квартир лишаються в аварійному стані, на реконструкцію будинку необхідно витратити понад 1,5 мільйона гривень.

Восени 2016 поліція відкрила кримінальне провадження через вибух у 5- поверховому житловому будинку Павлограда Дніпропетровської області. Як повідомили в обласному управлінні Нацполіції, вибуху передувало вбивство. На місці пожежі виявили тіло 53- річної жінки з численними ранами. Загибла була колишньою дружиною власника квартири, де стався вибух. Чоловіка затримали за підозрою в умисному вбивстві і порушенні вимог пожежної безпеки.

Водночас у Держслужбі з надзвичайних ситуацій уточнили, що внаслідок вибуху газоповітряної суміші з подальшим загоранням зруйновано 5 квартир. Міська рада Павлограда відселила мешканців пошкоджених квартир.
…