Economic development updates

Catholic Cardinal in Syria Tells World ‘Time Is Running Out’ for Syria Reconstruction

March 30, 2021by madeleine in Economic development updates, General, Geopolitics updates, Global Diplomacy, World Land-Bridge updates

Roman Catholic Cardinal Mario Zenari, the representative of the Vatican in Syria since the beginning of the Syria war, issued an appeal for international support to reconstruct the country, as time is running out. “Peace, I repeat, will not come to Syria without reconstruction and without economic recovery,” Zenari said March 23. “But how long will Syrians have to wait? Time is running out. Many of the people have lost hope. Urgent and radical solutions are needed.”

Zenari said that the “present political deadlock” between the parties in the Syrian conflict must be overcome through “mutual and reciprocal [steps], step by step from the Syrian government and the opposition and key international players.” He further stated, “While the peace process is in this moment in a complete deadlock, poverty, on the contrary, is moving forward fast.”

Zenari was speaking via Zoom from Damascus at a virtual event organized by the Catholic charity Caritas Internationalis.

Zenari said about 90% of the population of Syria is living below the poverty line, which according to UN figures is “the highest percentage in the world.” He cited the Lebanese financial crisis, the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, internal corruption, and foreign sanctions have all contributed to the deepening poverty in Syria caused by 10 years of war.

“The Syrian pound has lost much of its value against the U.S. dollar. The price of food has significantly increased. At the bakeries, people queue to try to get limited subsidized bread that is available. The same scene for petrol all around the country. … The people call this difficult time an ‘economic war,’ worse than that of previous years,” he said.

The World Bank estimates that the country has suffered at least $197 billion worth of infrastructure damage during the war.

Pope Francis marked the 10th anniversary of the start of the Syrian war by praying for an end to the war and a renewed commitment from the international community for rebuilding efforts, at the end of his Sunday Angelus on March 14. Zenari first arrived in Syria as apostolic nuncio in 2008, and in 2016 Pope Francis made him a cardinal as a sign of the Pope’s closeness to Syria, Cardinal Pietro Parolin told Catholic News Agency (CNA) at the time.

Here we review a proposal for the reconstruction of Syria called Project Phoenix, focusing on how Syria, which enjoys an ideal position at the crossroads of three continents, can benefit from connecting to the New Silk Road and the emerging World Land-Bridge. This video was produced for the June 25-26, 2016 Schiller Institute conference in Berlin, Germany, “Common Future for Mankind, and a Renaissance of the Classical Cultures”

Wang Yi: Five Point Initiative for Security in Southwest Asia

March 29, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Economic development updates, General updates, Space updates

Wang Yi Proposes Five Point Initiative for Security in Southwest Asia

March 28 (EIRNS)- In a March 24 interview with Arabiya newspaper in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi presented a wide-ranging, coordinated Five-Point Initiative on Achieving Security and Stability in the Middle East, better known as Southwest Asia. The March 28 briefing presented the plan’s very important fifth point for economic development of the region. Two other points stand out, as China attempts to shift Southwest Asia from the instability caused by British geo-politics and its plots for war, to a trajectory of peace through development.

On the question of Israel and Palestine, the second point, Wang stated: “Nothing represents equity and justice in the Middle East more than a sound solution to the question of Palestine and earnest implementation of the two-state solution. We support active mediation by the international community toward this objective and holding an authoritative international meeting on this matter when conditions are ripe. In its presidency of the UN Security Council this May, China will encourage the Security Council to fully deliberate on the question of Palestine to reaffirm the two-state solution. China will continue to invite peace advocates from Palestine and Israel to China for dialogue, and also welcome Palestinian and Israeli representatives to China for direct negotiations”

On his fourth point, Wang averred: “In promoting security and stability in the Middle East, the legitimate concerns of all parties should be accommodated. It is important to encourage equal dialogue and consultation, mutual understanding and accommodation and improved relations among Gulf countries. It is imperative to resolutely combat terrorism and advance deradicalization. China proposes holding in China a multilateral dialogue conference for regional security in the Gulf region to explore the establishment of a Middle East trust mechanism, starting with such subjects as ensuring the safety of oil facilities and shipping lanes, and building step by step a framework for collective, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security in the Middle East.”

On March 28, Wang, while on a diplomatic visit to Iran, said about his five-point Mideast plan that it is to call Middle East countries to carry forward the spirit of independence and get rid of the interference of geopolitical competition. While there, Wang and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif discussed the signing of the China-Iran comprehensive cooperation agreement March 27 between Iran and China, which contains a massive development package. Zarif praised China as a friend in hard times

Rosatom To Build More Floating NPPs

August 9, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Economic development updates, General updates, Power & Energy, Russia

Rosatom To Build More Floating NPPs—

Aug. 7 (EIRNS)–Russia’s state nuclear corporation Rosatom is committed to building four new floating nuclear power stations over the next six years, in order to power mining ventures in Siberia’s far northeastern tip. The new waterborne facilities will be similar to the Akademik Lomonosov, the audacious floating nuclear plant that Rosatom connected to Pevek, a remote port in Chukotka in 2019 after spending more than a decade constructing it.

In the new projects, the four plants will be deployed to the nascent Baimsky copper mining project, also in Chukotka, by the end of 2026. Under the $2 billion plan, Rosatom would construct four floating plants at St. Petersburg’s Baltic Shipyard, each centered on a pair of 55 MW RITM-200 reactors, the type featured in Russia’s new generation nuclear icebreakers.

Three would supply power to the mining sites. The fourth plant would be kept in reserve and rotate in when any of the first three require refueling or maintenance, Rosatom’s CEO Aleskei Likhachev told TASS last week. He also said that this fourth plant could also act as a reserve unit for the Akademik Lomonosov, whose older KLT-40 reactors require refueling every 12 years.

The first two of new floating nuclear plants are due at their working location on Chaunskaya Bay in the East Siberian Sea by 2026. Once there, they will be connected to power lines spanning 400 km to the Baimskaya mine. The third unit is due to be connected at the end of 2027, increasing the total power supply to about 330 MW.

NASA’s Perseverance Rover Prepares for Humankind’s First Flight on Mars

March 29, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Economic development updates, General updates, Space updates

NASA, Perseverance Rover Prepare for First Powered Flight of an Aircraft on Another Planet

March 28 (EIRNS)—NASA, and its Perseverance rover, are making preparations for the first attempt at the powered, controlled flight of an aircraft on another planet. This would be the 4 pound (1.8-kilogram) Ingenuity rotor craft, which is presently attached to the belly of the Perseverance rover, which touched down on Mars on Feb. 18.

From the point that Ingenuity is detached from Perseverance and deployed, it will have 30 Martian days, or sols (31 earth days) to conduct its test flight campaign. NASA is setting the test flight campaign at no earlier than April 8, which is less than 2 weeks away.

A NASA news release, “NASA Ingenuity Mars Helicopter Prepares for First Flight,” presents some of the challenging steps ahead:

“Flying in a controlled manner on Mars is far more difficult than flying on Earth. The Red Planet has significant gravity (about one-third that of Earth’s) but its atmosphere is just 1% as dense as Earth’s at the surface. During Martian daytime, the planet’s surface receives only about half the amount of solar energy that reaches Earth during its daytime, and nighttime temperatures can drop as low as minus 130 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 90 degrees Celsius), which can freeze and crack unprotected electrical components.

“To fit within the available accommodations provided by the Perseverance rover, the Ingenuity helicopter must be small. To fly in the Mars environment, it must be lightweight. To survive the frigid Martian nights, it must have enough energy to power internal heaters. The system – from the performance of its rotors in rarified air to its solar panels, electrical heaters, and other components – has been tested and retested in the vacuum chambers and test labs of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California.

“’Every step we have taken since this journey began six years ago has been uncharted territory in the history of aircraft,’ said Bob Balaram, Mars Helicopter chief engineer at JPL. ‘And while getting deployed to the surface will be a big challenge, surviving that first night on Mars alone, without the rover protecting it and keeping it powered, will be an even bigger one.’”

At the same time, the Perseverance’s soulmates at Mars, the United Arab Emirates’ Hope satellite will study Mars’ daily and seasonal weather cycles and weather events in the lower atmosphere, as China’s Tianwen 1 satellite will locate a landing site for its rover, which rover will then carry out a mission that includes studying the morphology and structure of Mars, the current and past presence of water, and Mars’ ionosphere. This is a fun and interesting time for science.

Brazil COVID Crisis Careens Out of Control

March 29, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in COVID-19, Economic development updates, General updates, Healthcare

Brazil COVID Crisis Careens Out of Control

March 28 (EIRNS) – Numerous Brazilian medical and other authorities are sounding the alarm that the COVID pandemic in Brazil is careening out of the control, threatening not only the country but the entire planet. At present, one in every four COVID deaths worldwide is occurring in Brazil. “Before, the risk factor to dying from Covid-19 was being older, having some co-morbidity,” said Domingos Alves, a professor of medicine who’s part of a national monitoring group. “Now, the risk is being Brazilian,” Bloomberg reported.

The mortality rate in Brazil has risen from 2% at the end of last year to 3.1% in mid March, according to Fiocruz, one of the country’s leading R&D centers in epidemiology. That is more than a 50% increase in less than three months. Only 7% of the population have received a vaccine shot; 2% are fully vaccinated. More than 300,000 Brazilians have died of Covid to date; some experts expect the half-million mark to be hit by June, and for Brazil to surpass the U.S. in deaths by the end of the year – a grim achievement.

An alarming new trend is a sharp rise in the number and proportion of younger Brazilians who are getting sick and dying from Covid – this in a country that is largely young. According to official statistics, from Jan. 1 to mid March the rate of new cases among those aged 30 to 59 rose by nearly twice the national average of 316%. Deaths in those age groups jumped by at least 317%, compared with 223% for Brazil as a whole.

Scientists are still trying to figure out why that is happening. One theory is that younger patients wait longer to seek health care and are sicker when they arrive at the hospital. Another factor may relate to the new variants appearing in Brazil. Bloomberg cited Jaques Sztajnbok, who helps run the ICU at Sao Paulo’s Emílio Ribas hospital, one of Brazil’s main facilities for infectious diseases, saying that patients are largely getting sick with the variant that first appeared in the Amazonian city of Manaus or the U.K. one, both of which are more contagious than the original strain.

“Fernando Brum, a director at Sorocaba’s Santa Casa hospital [near Sao Paulo], said the mutation of the virus into a much more contagious version with a viral load that makes people sick in a faster and more aggressive way has meant young people have gone from mostly asymptomatic cases to being gravely affected… `The intensive care unit is constantly and uninterruptedly occupied,’ he [Brum] said. Patients in their 30s make up at least half of those beds, and their average time spent in the hospital has tripled from last year. It has come down recently for a grim reason — patients are dying more quickly.”

The country’s health system is on the brink of total collapse. Miguel Nicolelis, professor of Neurobiology at Duke University who advised several Brazilian governors and mayors on pandemic control, told AP: “We have surpassed levels never imagined for a country with a public health care system, a history of efficient immunization campaigns and health workers who are second to none in the world. The next stage is the health system collapse.”

Brazil’s state-run science and technology institute, Fiocruz, on Tuesday called for a 14-day lockdown to reduce transmission by 40%. “We need to open our eyes and understand this is no joke,” Rio’s Mayor Eduardo Paes said in a recorded message on the eve of a 10-day shutdown in that city. “People are dying and, if everything continues as is, nothing is done, God only knows what could happen. No one knows this disease’s limit. No one knows how many variants could emerge.”

Central Asian Heads of State Meet in Turkmenistan on Energy, Transit Corridors and Fighting the Pandemic

August 8, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Economic development updates, General updates, Global Diplomacy, Healthcare, Kazakhstan, Power & Energy, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan

Central Asian Heads of State Meet in Turkmenistan on Energy, Transit Corridors and Fighting the Pandemic –

Aug. 6 (EIRNS)–Today the Third Consultative Meeting of the Heads of State of Central Asia was held in Turkmenistan, at the Caspian Sea resort town of Avaza, bringing together the presidents of Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrghizstan, plus others including Natalia Gherman, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General for Central Asia. There were many parallel sessions, including the Economic Forum of the Central Asian Nations.

Turkmenistan President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov said during his speech, “Based on UN documents, we are moving towards the formation in Central Asia of favorable political-legal and economic conditions for a safe, sustainable energy partnership focused on meeting regional energy demand and on accessing world markets through international transit corridors.” Another focus was collaboration against the COVID-19 pandemic. Including furthering joint research on mutations, as well as methods of treatment and prevention of infectious diseases. The heads of state issued a statement.

China Announces Two Billion COVID-19 Vaccines to Be Exported in 2021

August 8, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in China, COVID-19, Economic development updates, General updates, Global Diplomacy, Healthcare, Healthcare

China Announces Two Billion COVID-19 Vaccines to Be Exported in 2021—

Aug. 6 (EIRNS)–President Xi Jinping announced today that China will export two billion COVID-19 vaccines in 2021. The massive expansion of production capacity this year has allowed China to export between 600 to 750 million doses so far, while also applying over 1.7 billion doses within China. The track record of Sinovac and Sinopharm so far indicates that they will produce almost 5 billion doses this year, and Tao Lina, a vaccine expert in Shanghai confirms this. Otherwise, China is presently vaccinating their population at the rate of 17.9 million shots a day, which is seven times the rate of the European Union, and 30 times that of the United States.

President Xi sent a written message today to the International Forum on Covid-19 Vaccine Cooperation, hosted by China Central Television and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang-Yi. He described the vaccine as a “global public good,” and stressed common action on world health as part of building a community with a shared future for mankind. He recognized the problem with the resurgences of the coronavirus allowing for the proliferation of mutations and variant strains. Besides exporting vaccines, he described China’s work with countries to develop and produce vaccines, with joint production already begun in the UAE, Indonesia, Malaysia, Egypt, Brazil, Turkey, Pakistan and Mexico — a new capacity of over 200 million doses, which needs further expansion.

Afghanistan: the Role of the Neighboring Countries in Development

August 6, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Activity of the Schiller Institute, Afghanistan, Economic development updates, Finance, General updates, Pakistan, Uzbekistan

Afghanistan: the Role of the Neighboring Countries in Development—

Aug. 5, 2021 (EIRNS) – During a Schiller Institute conference July 31, Prof. Pino Arlacchi, the former head of the United Nations Office of Drug Control who negotiated near-elimination of Afghan opium production with the Taliban 20 years ago, noted that immediately neighboring countries should play a primary role in planning South Asian regional development to include Afghanistan, and in stopping drug traffic from that country. One country clearly taking the point for this kind of development is Uzbekistan, under President Shavkat Mirziyoyev.

A July 31 article in EastAsiaForum.org by Nasriddinov Salokhiddin, a researcher at the Institute for International Security of Tokyo International University, calls the February 2021 conference with Pakistan and Afghanistan organized by Mirziyoyev, “the event of the century for Central Asia”, because it will connect landlocked Central Asian countries to the Indian Ocean through Afghanistan and Pakistan. The conference attendees decided on a 600-kilometer Tashkent-Mazar e-Sharif-Kabul-Peshawar railroad and requested $4.8 billion in World Bank funding for it, Apparently the railroad corridor project was planned from the first to include new electricity transmission lines through it.

Noting the criticism that surmounting the Hindu Kush Mountains will make the project very expensive, Salokhiddin wrote: “Uzbekistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan filed an appeal for investment to international financial institutions, which [appeal] received support from the United States, China and Russia. Representatives of the World Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the Asian Development Bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank also expressed their willingness to assist the project through technical consulting and financing. Such wide support for the project means that the source of investment is no longer a concern.” He did not give dates or details regarding these other nations’ and international institutions’ support. He did add that the route transits Afghanistan through regions and cities which are under relatively secure government control now.

The author wrote that freight traffic in Afghanistan was about 4 million tons for 2020 and had risen by 25%. “Estimates suggest that if implemented, the trans-Afghan railroad will increase annual volume of rail freight by 20 million tons.” Some economists in Uzbekistan have advocated a railroad corridor to Chabahar in Iran instead, as allegedly more secure. But, “To achieve its economic objectives, access to the ports of Karachi and Gwadar is Uzbekistan’s highest priority.” Full article is here.

World Health Organization: COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout To Accelerate in Africa

August 6, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in COVID-19, General updates, Healthcare, Healthcare

World Health Organization: COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout To Accelerate in Africa—

Aug. 5, 2021 (EIRNS) – A World Health Organization article published in Consortium News July 30 reports on the 520 million vaccine doses that will be shipped to Africa by the end of 2021 by COVAX. Can they be administered in that 4-plus-month time frame by the public health systems of the African countries? That is a vital question.

Ethiopian biologist Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization, said that poorer countries worldwide have administered, on average, 1.5 shots per 100 people, while developed countries have administered 100 shots for 100 people, on average.

Up to the present, only 79 million COVID doses have arrived in Africa, and 21 million people, or just (1.6 percent) of Africa’s population are fully vaccinated.

Fed Looks Like Losing Control of Interbank Lending, as in September 2019

August 6, 2021by Mary Jane Freeman in Economic development updates, Finance, General updates

Fed Looks Like Losing Control of Interbank Lending, as in September 2019—

Aug. 5, 2021 (EIRNS) – A new Standing Repo Facility has been created by the Federal Reserve with an authorization of $500 billion subject to unlimited increase by Fed chair Jerome Powell. The Fed announced the facility July 28 and activated its operation July 29, indicating some urgency to cope with a liquidity problem in the interbank lending market, according to economists Pam and Russ Martens in their “Wall Street on Parade” column of July 28.

In September 2019 the Fed suddenly confronted a serious freeze-up in the interbank lending market and was forced to make emergency liquidity loans to the primary dealer banks which burgeoned up to hundreds of billions a day. There were many calls then for a standing repo facility, which was not created. Now it is set up, and will make repo loans not only to primary dealer banks, but to hedge funds, private equity funds, money-market mutual funds…. And, there is a second Standing Repo as well, for “foreign and international monetary institutions.”

So, the situation has clearly gotten much more unstable and contagious. The Federal Reserve has crammed the big banks with $4.5 trillion more in reserves just since the restart of QE in October 2019; those banks are crammed with trillions in new deposits while they have {withdrawn} loan and lease credit, net, from the economy, doubling their speculative {securities assets} the while.

Equally ominous, although the Martenses did not report it June 28: The Fed embarks on these new facilities to pump in liquidity, after about six weeks of reverse repo operations – where the Fed makes overnight loans of Treasuries in exchange for cash loans from banks; i.e., it {soaks up liquidity from the banking system} – which have run as high as $1 trillion/day! This indicates it is dealing with, or perhaps lurching around in, real volatility stemming from the very masses of deposits and stock-price gains it has caused to appear.

Worst of all, in the Martenses’ view, is that the Fed announced the Standing Repo Facility on the afternoon of the day it had been called for, in the morning, by the G30 Working Group on Financial Markets headed by the consummate bad actor in a financial crash, Tim Geithner. Geithner, as head of the New York Federal Reserve, “sluiced out $29 trillion to bail out the Wall Street banks” in 2008, as they wrote.

The Standing Repo Facility will be operated by the New York Federal Reserve Bank.

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