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Russian Envoy to US Suggests Putin-Trump Summit May Herald New INF Treaty

Sputnik – 04.07.2018

WASHINGTON – The upcoming summit between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin will allow for progress to be achieved in the areas of bilateral relations and global challenges, Russia’s Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said in an interview.

“I am sure that it is impossible to remove all obstacles out of the way of our mutual cooperation, but it goes without saying that there will be progress regarding bilateral relations as well as regional and global problems,” Antonov told RT in an interview that aired on Tuesday when asked about the forthcoming summit.

Antonov also said that if the United States treats Russia as an equal partner, Moscow and Washington can find a solution to every issue before them.

“I hope that in the very near future [as long as] I am here in Washington, DC we can get great results regarding our relations,” Antonov said.

The Russian ambassador also noted that there are excellent people-to-people, cultural and scientific relations between Russia and the United States.

“Our cooperation, you see it in space, in the Arctic, you see it in so many areas. We can work together. So it is up to us to decide whether we need each other or not,” Antonov said.

Russian Envoy to the US also epressed hope that a joint cybersecurity group would be established as a result of the upcoming summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.

“I hope that at least a group on cybersecurity will be established as a result of the forthcoming summit between our two leaders,” Antonov told RT in an interview.

In July, after holding talks with Putin at the G20 Summit in Germany, Trump announced that Moscow and Washington would create a joint working group on cybersecurity to discourage any possible cyberattacks targeting elections, but abandoned the idea after sharp criticism from domestic critics.

From 2009 to 2013, the US and Russian governments actively cooperated on cybersecurity initiatives. However, the work was suspended in 2014 when bilateral relations deteriorated over the Ukraine crisis.

Moreover, Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump might begin a detailed discussion of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) and Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) during the forthcoming summit in Helsinki, Anatoly Antonov suggested in an interview with RT broadcaster.

“The Russian Federation is not in favor of arms race. We made it clear many times and Russian President Putin has confirmed it many times, and even while presenting our new models of modern arms he made it clear that we would like to invite the United States at the table of negotiations and it is high time for us to find solutions on various issues such as the New START treaty. What should we do with this treaty by the way? What should we do with the INF treaty… It seems to me that two presidents could have time to discuss strategical issues,” Antonov stated.

The ambassador added that further details regarding the issue might be then discussed by the foreign and defense ministers of the two countries.

The first bilateral agreement between the United States and the Soviet Union on strategic offensive reductions (START) was signed on July 31, 1991 with a duration of 15 years. Negotiations on a new START treaty began in May 2009, and the new agreement entered into force on February 5, 2011.

Under the treaty, the United States and Russia were to meet the treaty’s limits on strategic arms by February 5, 2018. Aggregate number of weapons on each side was not to exceed 700 deployed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) and heavy bombers, 1550 warheads on the deployed ICBMs, SLBMs and heavy bombers, and 800 launchers.

The INF treaty was signed between the Soviet Union and the United States in December 1987 and required the parties to destroy their ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges of between 500 and 5,500 kilometers (from 311 to 3,317 miles). The United States and Russia have repeatedly accused each other of violating the treaty.

Moscow and Washington are currently preparing for the first full-fledged meeting between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, scheduled for July 16 in Helsinki, Finland.

During the meeting, the US and Russian presidents are expected to discuss bilateral relations and various issues on the international agenda.

July 4, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

Iran will import goods only from countries that buy its oil – MP

RT | July 4, 2018

The Energy Committee of Iran has announced that Tehran will buy goods only from those nations which purchase Iranian oil. This follows the US demand from its allies to stop buying Iranian crude.

“We will carry out barter exchange of oil and goods, which means the purchase of goods will depend on the sale of oil,” representative of Iran’s Energy Committee Asadollah Karekhani told ILNA news agency.

“We want to inform our target markets and countries that buy oil from us that we’ll purchase goods from them only if they purchase our oil,” he said, noting that a working group is being formed on barter deals.

Last week, a senior US State Department official told reporters that Washington would try to convince its allies to completely stop buying oil from Iran by early November. Discussions are also being held with other countries, including China.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has warned that if the country’s crude oil exports were threatened, the rest of the Middle East’s would be as well.

“Assuming that Iran could become the only oil producer unable to export its oil is a wrong assumption … The United States will never be able to cut Iran’s oil revenues,” he said.

Iran is OPEC’s second-largest crude exporter with more than 2 million barrels a day.

Rouhani is currently in Europe to gather support ahead of a meeting later this week between Iran and the five global powers that are still party to the 2015 nuclear deal.

July 4, 2018 Posted by | Economics | , , , , | Leave a comment

Cloud Seeding Water Wars Causing Eco-Disasters?

By Victor Thorn | American Free Press | November 4, 2011

Without realizing it, Diane Macmillan may have stumbled upon one of the biggest conspiracies currently taking place in America: A quiet war being waged over natural resources that could be behind heavy rains and huge snowfalls in some areas and droughts and wildfires in others.

As a licensed realtor in Colorado, Ms. Macmillan started noticing that rain and snowfall east of the Rocky Mountains had been undergoing significant changes. Researching this phenomenon for the past 15 years, Ms. Macmillan discovered a secret that may be adversely affecting the entire nation.

During an October 26 interview, she told this writer: “Water districts and ski areas west of the Continental Divide have engaged in cloud seeding that has produced a snow pack 500% above normal. Not only are ski resorts enjoying boom times, but the water runoff greatly benefits their housing divisions.

“Cloud seeding is actually permitted throughout the state of Colorado,” she said. “In fact, we even have an official Division of Weather Modification that acknowledges cloud seeding.”

As of now, this is being done almost exclusively on the west side of the Rocky Mountains. But there is a downside. East of the Rockies, the rain and snow that usually falls has been sucked away, resulting in severe weather on that side of the mountain range.

Ms. Macmillan continued: “Without getting their natural amount of rain and snow that they’d previously been getting for centuries, severe droughts have resulted, causing a heavy economic toll on farmers. Their crops are dwindling, cattle don’t have enough hay to eat and aquifers and underground wells are depleted.”

But that’s only the beginning. Ms. Macmillan noted another byproduct: “The lack of snow cover in winter creates soil diseases and E. coli in cows because certain bugs don’t die off. Most people aren’t aware of it, but the cantaloupe listeria outbreak that killed 25 people began in Colorado.”

This story, though, has broader ramifications. Ms. Macmillan paints the picture. “Because it’s so dry, eastern Colorado has suffered a rash of wildfires,” she said. “But we’re not the only ones. Every state along the Continental Divide permits cloud seeding. So, if you’ve noticed, there were deadly fires last summer in Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, all because of drought conditions.”

Like placing pieces together in a puzzle, Ms. Macmillan added: “Today, silver iodide is used for cloud seeding. Yet before, pilots dropped ashes onto clouds to produce rain. In this context, what do wildfires produce huge amounts of? Ashes.”

Here is where it gets interesting. Ms. Macmillan theorized: “Due to Colorado’s fires, ashes—acting as cloud seeding agents—filtered up into the atmosphere, drifted northeast toward Wisconsin, and then caused tremendous flooding. Plus, did ash produced by half-million-acre wildfires in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas create record-breaking rainfall and flooding in states along the Mississippi River such as Illinois, Missouri, Arkansas and Mississippi? Then, of course, there were hailstorms, 100-day long heatwaves, and a tornado that obliterated Joplin.”

Billions of dollars in destruction came in the aftermath, leaving families homeless, communities wrecked, and insurance companies scrambling to cover their costs. With so many lives ruined, what could possibly be the motive for this possible cloud-seeding plot? An answer might be found in something called the Colorado River Compact where cities built on desert land such as Las Vegas and Los Angeles are starved for water and therefore rely on surpluses from their northern mountain neighbors. Thus, with substantially more rain and snow west of the Continental Divide due to cloud seeding, teeming reservoirs spill into the Colorado River, which then feeds Las Vegas and the L.A. aqueducts.

What we’re talking about are water wars and astronomical amounts of money being paid to Colorado by water-hungry areas in the southwest. Ms. Macmillan weighed in: “Last year, the city and county of Denver spent $200,000 on cloud seeding. But in Colorado, there’s a blackout on this story among those in the press.”

When this reporter inquired as to why insurance companies haven’t investigated this matter, Ms. Macmillan responded, “I don’t think they’ve put the whole picture together yet.”

2018 video report:

Central Colorado Mountains Cloud Seeding Program goal is to increase snowpack in the Upper Colorado River Basin

See Also:

Israel’s CRAZY offer to Iran: we’ll give you water, you give us your LAND

July 3, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Environmentalism, Timeless or most popular, Video | | Leave a comment

The Trade War is Here: Some of the New “Facts of Life”

By Maximilian C. Forte | Zero Anthropology | July 2, 2018

In Madeleine Albright’s new book, dramatically titled Fascism: A Warning, she slams the anti-globalization crowd, claiming yet again that globalization is here to stay—it’s a “fact of life”. It must be another of those facts of life that we are seeing today, like “Donald Trump will never be elected president” or “UK voters will ultimately reject Brexit” or perhaps that there will never be a trade war?

If we believe Albright, humans have finally invented something permanent, nature-like, eternal–not coincidentally, eternity is the classic time of myth. Albright is not alone in being unable to recognize reality, even when staring straight at it: this morning Fox News kept speaking of a “potential” trade war being underway. When actual is pushed away into the zone of the potential, we have a serious reality-recognition problem at work. It means that neoliberal free traders—which unites both Fox News and Madeleine Albright, trivial “resistance” motifs regardless—lack the basic terms for speaking about what they are seeing, even as stock markets resume their plunge. But when is a trade war a trade war for Fox News ? What extreme, draconian conditions of spectacular conflict and destruction need to sweep over cities like a dark toxic fog for them to finally agree that there is a trade war? Were they expecting “shock and awe”?

Yes, the trade war is now on. We are officially in Day #2 of an international trade war that involves the biggest players in the world economy—the US, China, Japan, the European Union—along with Canada, Mexico, Brazil and others.

∗∗∗∗∗
Set everything else aside, this is a time not to be missed:
this is the biggest event since the last “can never happen” event,
that being the election of Donald Trump.
∗∗∗∗∗

In addition to a trade war between the US, Canada, and Mexico, that formally started yesterday (July 1, 2018), another big turn happened: Mexicans elected a populist and left-wing nationalist, Andrés Manuel López Obrador. North America now has two nationalists occupying the highest political office in two of the three nation-states of the continent. NAFTA is almost certain to die at this point.

It’s Canada’s turn next, and all signs are that Justin Trudeau is in very deep trouble. The next national election, which happens next year, will go to the party that sounds the most nationalistic. That almost inevitably strikes out the now ruling Liberal Party of Canada, and almost certainly takes down their ambiguously slightly more “left” twin, the New Democratic Party. It will be up to the Conservatives, who are Canada’s ideological equivalent of John McCain, to change their stripes, reach back decades into the history of Canada’s conservative politics, and rediscover ways of posing as nationalists. If the effort all proves futile, then the provinces are going to be left wondering what the real, material, practical benefits are of remaining within the confederation—and it’s not like there is a strong nationalist cultural and ideological content that holds the country together, so the material side of things matters an awful lot. (Ironically, Canada lacks a system of free trade domestically, between provinces, and if it had one what would be added to the Canadian economy would dwarf the value of agreements like the TPP by a dozen times). Material politics matter most now, because Canada lacks a national identity politics to fall back on. Right now the only identity politics that prevail in Canada are the identity politics of small fractions of minority groups, of niches within niches set in motion against other niches in the competition for rewards, recognition, and special rights. But by all means, keep “marching for women” if you think that is in any way relevant and a meaningful response at this time.

Canada as such is deeply unprepared for what is happening today. Already the ruling Liberals have signaled just how ill-equipped they are to meet this historical moment head on: they have announced a series of palliative, band-aid measures to compensate companies and workers for losses. That is what you do when you expect all of this to blow over soon. However, President Trump already made it clear that if counter-tariffs were slapped on the US, the US would then escalate further. Canada and Mexico have essentially called Trump’s bluff, a dangerous thing to do since they are playing Trump’s game, and you can therefore expect the US to follow through with more measures, and on and on this will go.

Thus the band-aid measures, being conceived by a short-term mentality, will simply not suffice as deglobalization becomes the new “fact of life”. The next party in Canada to win an election would not only need to sound like it is nationalist, if it is really smart it will do what Trudeau failed to do: establish an infrastructure, with incentives and subsidies, for new national industries that are fully protected, operating within a protected domestic market. Canada builds jets, trains, and ships: there is no credible reason it cannot have its own line of automobiles—Canadians need to rush to neutralize Trump’s planned auto tariffs. The Canadian government may need to launch new state-owned enterprises, and would need to decouple the pricing of petroleum from the world market. Canada is self-sufficient in oil, and could go for at least two centuries without imports—it is time to make oil as cheap as possible for Canadian consumers and producers, and it ought to be close to free.

(In my small corner of the world, I already started to work toward reestablishing a Canadian national anthropology, in spite of many criticisms, which would make a true decolonization more practical, because it begins where it needs to begin: by being anti-imperial. If you do not get that point, then you really ought to stop using words like decolonization. Likewise, just as Canadians are only now toying with ideas of boycotting US products and not traveling to the US, I have already been doing so for a decade, regardless of the definite professional costs and consequences.)

What is also quite amazing is how Trump is compelling everyone else to act like Trump. The international response to Trump’s economic nationalism, is the replication of economic nationalism. Tariffs are met by tariffs, protection met by protectionism. Nationalism is coming back, in full force. The defeated elites are right to cry over the loss of a “rules based international order,” what others have called a liberal international order, or what George H.W. Bush heralded as the “New World Order”. While the resurgence of mercantilism does not mean the end of imperialism, because the two are fully compatible (study the history of the British, French, German, Japanese, and American empires to see why), what this new phase in world history signals is the death knell for neoliberal globalism, and for the notion of a US-led global order serving an unmoored transnational capitalist class. Deglobalization will thus be matched by multipolarity. Sure the world can still prove to be a “dangerous” place—it’s not like the world was in any way a safe place under the dominance of neoliberal elites (or do I really need to mention Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen, Syria, Somalia, Colombia, DR Congo, plus all the debt crises, structural adjustment catastrophes, refugee surges, financial collapses, and 9/11 to make the point?)

Suddenly, I am left with the task of possibly dumping my reassessment of Trump on US empire, and going back to my original assessment, especially as Trump the nationalist of 2016 seems to have come back. Still, deciphering Trump’s position is not without its challenges, especially given the notorious chaos and factionalism in the White House on trade issues. Trump’s assistant on trade and manufacturing, Prof. Peter Navarro, in a fairly reasonable piece, articulated a position of maximum free trade—that is not economic nationalism, as much as it would appear to be unvarnished neoliberalism. However, this might just be a rhetorical tactic: to call out the hypocrisy of free traders given the lack of actually free trade, in order to permanently shut down any more talk of free trade. The fact of the matter is that for the last several years, protectionist measures have been on the rise worldwide, and most of the world had already receded from putting into practice the ideals of free trade. Trump seems to have decided to end with all the pretense, and to accelerate the process towards its logical final conclusion.

Canada is projected to be the number one country to be hit hardest by US tariffs. In the meantime, Canadians are routinely lied to by the Liberal government, the “defence” industry, think tanks and associated academics, which would have citizens believe—as an article of faith—that Russia is the biggest threat. Good call, “Russia,” nice one, real smart.

So welcome to the time of deglobalization. Anyone who is telling you that this time is otherwise, is just not worth your attention. Have a great day.

July 2, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

European Union extends economic sanctions against Russia

RT | June 29, 2018

EU leaders have extended economic penalties against Russia for six months until the end of January. The decision prolongs the ban on doing business with Russian banking and financial institutions and new energy projects.

“We had a very short discussion on Russia, Ukraine and the Minsk Agreements that led to a political decision to extend the sanctions for another six months,” an unnamed source in the EU Council told journalists in Brussels.

The decision came at the bloc’s summit and is expected to be confirmed in the coming days. According to the source, the move was triggered by French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who reportedly urged the leaders to prolong sanctions against Moscow due to the current state of implementation of the Minsk peace accord on Ukraine.

“It was said that there are no changes, so sanctions are prolonged, the sanctions regime remains unchanged,” the source added.

Meanwhile, Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said that the renewal of the punitive measures against Russia should not be automatic. Italy has repeatedly voiced concerns over the sanctions, saying they were having a huge negative impact on Italian firms’ exports to Russia.

“We will reaffirm the principle that there should be nothing automatic about the renewal of sanctions,” the official told parliament. “We need to be very careful about this. Sanctions should be a means and not constitute an end.”

The penalties were initially introduced in 2014 over Moscow’s alleged involvement in the Ukraine crisis and its reunification with Crimea. Sanctions target Russia’s financial, energy and defense sectors, along with some government officials, businessmen and public figures.

The Kremlin responded by imposing an embargo on agricultural produce, food and raw materials on countries that imposed sanctions on Russia. Since then both sides have repeatedly broadened and extended the restrictive measures.

June 29, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Hungary Accuses EU of ‘Double Standards’ Over Nord Stream 2

Sputnik – June 28, 2018

EU divisions and US sanctions threaten to delay the construction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline to bring Russian gas to Europe.

The European Union applies double standards to Nord Stream 2, Hungarian Foreign and Foreign Trade Minister Peter Szijjarto told Sputnik.

“We are not part of the project, we can’t resist it. But I can say there are unacceptable double standards,” the minister said. According to him, the former South Stream project, which would increase the diversification of natural gas supplies for Central Europe has been “killed” by the EU.

“And now we don’t see any encouragement on the part of the European Commission. I can’t imagine any excuses or reasons the Commission could bring,” Szijjarto added

In 2014, EU opposition forced Russia to cease work on the South Stream project, which was to run across Bulgaria, Serbia and Hungary in favor of a new pipeline to run under the Black Sea to Turkey [Turkish Stream].

Nord Stream 2

Nord Stream 2, which is a joint venture of Russia’s Gazprom with France’s Engie, Austria’s OMV AG, UK-Dutch Royal Dutch Shell, and Germany’s Uniper and Wintershall, aims to deliver 55 billion cubic meters of Russian natural gas a year to the European Union across the Baltic Sea to Germany.

Building permits have already been issued by Germany, Finland and Sweden.

A similar permit by Denmark is still pending, but on Tuesday it was announced that the Danish government wants to delay the implementation of the project. According to Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen, the idea needs to be discussed on a pan-European level.

Denmark’s decision came after the US State Department said it hoped that the EU would “independently” suspend the construction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline or “reformat” a Russian-proposed plan to this effect.

Some countries, above all Ukraine, who are afraid of losing revenues from Russian gas transit, are opposed to Nord Stream 2. The project is also facing opposition from the United States who has ambitious plans to export its LNG to Europe.

Russia has repeatedly urged its European partners not to perceive the Nord Stream pipeline as an instrument of influence. According to President Vladimir Putin, Moscow considers the project to be entirely economic.

June 28, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Russophobia | , , , | Leave a comment

Ever wonder where the 275 billion taxpayers money went that got poured down the EU carbon trading system hole?

eu democracy

By Tim Channon | Tallbloke’s Talkshop | June 28, 2018

Talkshop readers may remember a damning report by UBS about the billions of public money lost in the ETS carbon trading system. It calculated that if the money had been invested in modernising the European power generation fleet, CO2 could have been cut by 40% (and generate a huge number of high quality jobs). EU emissions rose 1.8% last year.

Despite all the recent turmoil over the UK steel industry and meetings in Brussels today, the reality is that the European Union has actually been subsidising the Chinese steel industry for years, in payments hidden amongst its efforts to combat Climate Change.

Using complex methods of carbon credits and carbon offsets, the EU devised rules on climate change ended up paying Chinese steel manufacturers billions to upgrade their steel mills and other energy intensive industry.

According to the analysis company, European Insights, almost €1.5 billion was paid to over 90 steel plants in China with the purpose of modernising them to consume less energy, and making the plants more efficient. Taken with the downturn in Chinese trade and the need for them to reduce world market prices to sell their product, the output of these mills has flooded onto the European market making steel products artificially cheap and endangering thousands of jobs in the UK. One plant alone, Anshan Iron and Steel, received a payment of €150 million to help pay for the installation of up to date equipment and replace the old inefficient Communist era machinery.

The money came from the EU’s self-claimed flagship Climate Directive, the Emission Trading System, and paid for by power and industrial companies in the EU who are, as part of their industry, emitters of carbon dioxide. This system forces big carbon emitters in Europe to buy carbon offsets, known as Certified Emission Reductions. They can buy these on the “carbon market” but companies in China, for example, who could show they intended to reduce their own levels of carbon emissions, would qualify.

The system then allowed Chinese steel producers to exploit a loophole that allowed their modernisation to be financed by the sale of these credits, as they received upfront payments of billions of Euros.

European installations that involve high energy consumption also can participate in this carbon trading market, but at a much lesser scale. Effectively around 12,000 European installations, including power stations and steel mills, were forced by the EU into subsidising Chinese industrial growth and development in a trade worth up to a total of €45 billion.

The Think Tank, European Insights, said: “These Chinese upgrades have now, sadly, assisted in record levels of Chinese steel production and are contributing to the low steel price that is endangering jobs in the UK. The system of carbon credit trading is highly complex, and we uncovered 91 individual steel mills in China that received funding of this nature. We estimate that the total paid to them was €1.4 billion.”

The EU approach to Climate Change is another example of the unintended consequences associated with policies made at an EU level. The initiative was well-meaning maybe, but failed totally to anticipate the consequences on world trade and impact on EU member states. Most damaging is that EU is also terribly slow to ameliorate the negative effects of its own policies.

The full report by European Insights can no longer be found here:

http://europeaninsights.org/carbon-credits-and-steel/

And you won’t find it on the wayback machine at Archive.org either

https://web.archive.org/web/20180628113838/http://europeaninsights.org?reqp=1&reqr=

June 28, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Environmentalism, Science and Pseudo-Science | | Leave a comment

US Sanctions May Force India Out of Iran’s Chabahar Port With China More Than Able to Fill This Gap

By Adam Garrie | EurasiaFuture | June 27, 2018

Iran’s Chabahar Port on the Gulf of Oman represents the crowning achievement of Indo-Iranian cooperation in recent decades. The port itself represents the centre of the wider North-South Transport Corridor (NSTC) which will link India to Russia and the wider north-western Eurasian space via Iran and Azerbaijan. While under Premier Narendra Modi, India has sought to sell NSTC as an alternative to China’s One Belt–One Road and in particular as rival to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor which links China to the wider Indian Ocean space via the Arabian Sea port at Gwadar, Iranian officials who themselves are eager participants in One Belt–One Road, have wisely distanced themselves from India’s zero-sum narrative on Chabahar and NSTC more widely.

Likewise, as Iranian relations with Pakistan continue to improve, it also remains clear that Iranian leaders are carefully avoiding being sucked into south Asia’s manifold rivalries by maintaining healthy ties with China, India and increasingly Pakistan simultaneously.

As it stands, Gwadar is a more substantial port vis-a-vis Chabahar in terms of its capacity and the fact that unlike the Indian built port in Iran, the Chinese built Gwadar is a Panamax deep water port. In this sense, both Gwadar and Chabahar could function together on the win-win model which would see some of the supplies shipped from China to Pakistan via Gwadar being routed on to Chabahar depending on their ultimate destination. Here one could see One Belt–One Road and the North South Transport Corridor functioning as integrated rather than as rival logistics networks – something that Pakistani officials recently spoke about with optimism.

Now though, India’s very presence in Chabahar may be impacted negatively as the US moves to sanction countries that conduct business with Iran. The US CAATSA sanctions aimed at Iran are back in the spotlight after the US withdrawal from the JPCOA (aka Iran nuclear deal) caused Washington to threaten many of its longstanding allies against conducting further business with Iran under the threat of so-called second party sanctions. These threats have most notably been aimed at the European Union, in spite of the fact that the bloc remains rhetorically adamant that it will continue to preserve the JCPOA without US involvement.

India has also come under threat of sanctions due to its healthy relationship with the Islamic Republic. The US has stated that it will sanction Indian companies who do business with Iran and this week, the US issued an even more specific threat to its Indian partner, stating that New Delhi will face sanctions if it continues to purchase Iranian oil.

Last month it was reported that international investors in Chabahar were beginning to show signs of nervousness in light of the new sanctions threats from Washington. As India is already facing tariffs on its exports to the United States while simultaneously cutting itself off from a would-be win-win Chinese partnership, India is scarcely in a position to economically leverage the United States which under Donald Trump has taken a merciless approach to conducting trade wars with allies as well as threatening partners with sanctions if they do business with countries including Russia, Iran and the DPRK (although this might soon change in the case of the DPRK).

This could mean that as the primary investor and operator of the Chabahar Port, India could find itself cut off from its own investment under the cloud of sanctions. If it comes to this and India is forced to either partially or even entirely withdraw from the Chabahar project, it would mean that Iran would seek a new international partner for the port.

The only realistic partner to take over Chabahar would be China, a nation with experience in port building and management, a country that has shown itself to be able to transact deals with Iran in spite of the attitude of Washington and a country that because of America’s own dependence on Chinese goods – is largely sanction proof for all practical purposes.

Not only could China help to revive the economic fortunes of Chabahar if India becomes frightened off due to threats from the United States, but China could actually help Chabahar to grow both infrastructurally and commercially by linking it into a uniformed trade route centred on the larger Gwadar port and existing One Belt–One Road lines of connectivity in the region. This would ultimately be a win-win for China, Iran and Pakistan.

If India were to abandon the underlying prejudices behind its zero-sum approach to antagonising both China and Pakistan, India could actually remain active in Chabahar as key player in a wider Sino-Iranian partnership which would necessarily also include Pakistan via CPEC. This could help to not only reduce tensions with India’s largest neighbours, but it could demonstrate that the only way for India to effectively leverage US threats of further tariffs and sanctions is by keeping at least one foot in China’s already open door.

However, given the attitude of the current Indian government, such a win-win model looks increasingly distant however theoretically attractive it might sound when analysed objectively. Because of this, the more likely scenario for Chabahar will be a short-term waiting game where India will see just how far the US is willing to punish its newfound south Asian partner due to its dealings with Iran.

If India’s involvement in Chabahar does come under a US financial attack, it is all but certain that India will minimise its involvement in the flagship project – thus paving the way for China to take over where India left off.

The choice for India therefore is three fold: New Delhi can simply hope for the best while possibly sweetening the deal by making concessions to the US over existing tariffs, India can bow out of Chabahar in order to possibly attain better trading relations with the US in the future or India can work with China to leverage the US over its anti-Iranian position.

At a time when the US is embracing unilateralism in its economic relations with the rest of the world – India must look realistically at its options, even if this means dropping its Sinophobic prejudices.

June 27, 2018 Posted by | Economics | , , , , , | Leave a comment

US tries to stop S-400 deal with India

By Frank Sellers | The Duran | June 27, 2018

In much the same manner as the US attempted to kill the S-400 deal with Turkey, they are now setting out to end India’s defense relationship with Russia, especially if they can manage to undermine this SAM deal. The idea is to utilize sanctions to get the job done. If the US can manage to dissuade India from buying their SAM systems from India over fear that they might contravene some sanction issued by Washington, then that’s what they aim to do, while simultaneously offering America’s THAAD system to New Delhi as a replacement.

The Economic Times reports:

NEW DELHI: The United States may try to persuade India to consider its ballistic missile defence options in an attempt to keep it from pressing ahead with the S-400 deal with Russia.

ET has learnt that the US could make ballistic missile defence an agenda point in the upcoming Indo-US 2+2 dialogue on July 6 for which external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj and defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman will be in Washington.

The likely option on the table would be the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system. It is a sophisticated missile defence system which is believed to be particularly effective against long-range missiles.

The S-400 missile defence system is, however, said to be effective against a larger array of aerial attacks, particularly fighter aircraft such as the F-18s and F-35s.

The latest version of the Russian made S-400 has a longer range but the jury is out on whether it’s more effective than the THAAD against intermediate range and intercontinental ballistic missile systems. ET has gathered that India’s proposed S-400 purchase from Russia has prompted a reassessment within Trump administration on whether India would have gone ahead with the nearly Rs 39,000-crore deal with Russia had the US moved faster with the THAAD offer.

Now, the S-400 deal has become a politically sensitive issue with the US. The US Congress is debating a Bill to allow for sanctions against Russian defence entities which could cover entities in recipient nations as well.

Given India’s strong defence partnership with Russia, the Trump administration, through secretary of defence James Mattis, has pitched for a waiver for countries such as India on the condition that it progressively reduce its military dependency on Russia.

The Congress has still not provided satisfactory relief despite hectic lobbying within Washington. The problem is compounded by the fact that the Countering America’s Adversaries through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) covers the S-400 system in the category of technologically sophisticated equipment which must be specifically targeted for this purpose.

India has argued that its S-400 deal with Russia was in the works before the US started debating the subject. In any event, it will predate the CAATSA if and when it’s written into law.

Besides, people close to the negotiations told ET, it is unreasonable for US to expect India to decouple its defence relationship with Russia, which has been a proven reliable partner through several conflicts.

The US, senior government officials said, must appreciate that unlike many of the other countries which purchase defence equipment from Russia, India does not target Russian armament against American interests and will not do so in future.

India is likely to elaborate on these lines at the inaugural 2+2 dialogue between the foreign and defence ministers of the two countries, while the US might urge India to first exhaust options the American industry can offer.

With the deal to purchase Russia’s S-400 SAM system predating America’s CAATSA sanctions act, the US is short on its options for blocking the deal. But sanctions are still playing a role in complicating its consummation as sanctions against Russia are rendering it somewhat difficult to relay compensation to the Russians for equipment and services rendered, therefore forcing both parties to find a way to deal outside of the dollar and outside of financial systems with exposure to Western markets. This particular moment in time for relations between India and the US is marked by trade tensions, as India finds itself in a position to dodge not just sanctions on its trade partners Russia and Iran, but also Trump’s trade wars, which affect goods sold in the American market, where India is imposing reciprocal tariff measures against the United States.

June 27, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

ATR gives up delivering planes to Iran: Report

The first four of the 72-600 ATR turboprops landed in Tehran’s Mehrabad Airport in May 2017
Press TV – June 27, 2018

Regional aircraft manufacturer ATR says it must give up delivering the remaining aircraft ordered by Iran because of new US sanctions and that it will try to reclassify 12 aircraft if it does not obtain a waiver.

“In 2018, our delivery target could be impacted given the Iranian context,” ATR CEO Christian Scherer said in an interview published on LaTribune.fr.

IranAir, the national flag carrier, signed a contract to buy 20 planes from turboprop maker ATR in April 2017. The deal came after Iran signed contracts with Europe’s Airbus and US rival Boeing to purchase about 180 jets.

“Of the 80 planes we expected to deliver in 2018, there were 12 for Iran, that’s a lot,” said Scherer whose company is joint-owned by France-based Airbus and Leonardo of Italy.

Iran took delivery of the first four ATR aircraft last May, two more in September, beside another two in December, with the rest due to be handed over to the country by the end of 2018.

Scherer said the Iranians want to take delivery of the planes, “but ATR will not take any risk of falling out with US authorities and exposing our shareholders Leonardo and Airbus to US sanctions.”

He said two aircraft have already been completed, six are being assembled and the last four have been launched and “customized” for Iran, particularly with pressurization devices, to fly over mountainous areas.

As a result, “these devices will be harder to reclassify,” he continued. “We are working hard but we have no firm tracks yet.”

To still deliver to Iran, ATR is trying to get a waiver from the Americans, but Scherer said he was “not entirely confident” about it.

“The Americans have promised a three-month period (from May to August) to allow companies to deliver the materials that were in production” after US President Donald Trump’s announcement to reimpose sanctions on Tehran.

“For the aviation industry, this three-month period is ridiculously short,” Scherer said.

ATR, Scherer said, intends to rely on the help offered by the French government to protect companies.

“We want to use the help of the French government to negotiate the best possible licenses during this period of three months to be able to deliver the aircraft manufactured or being manufactured to cushion this shock, which in any case will hurt us a lot.”

He also hoped to continue business in Iran with “a new license to support our customer, and we want to play our role as an after-sales service provider.”

“Here too, the Americans have made a declaration of intent explaining that they will not endanger the public,” Scherer said.

“The Iranians were in discussion with us to continue to develop their fleet; we were not going to stop at the first 20 aircraft” ordered in total by Iran, he said. “It was just the beginning of a story,” he lamented.

IranAir’s deal with ATR includes options for a further 20 aircraft and a training program for Iranian pilots and engineers.

The 70-seat planes are aimed at underserved local economies, used in flights over a maximum distance of 1,528 kilometers.

Iran has also received three Airbus jets – one Airbus A321 and two Airbus A330s – and will get another by year-end, but US sanctions have put further deliveries in doubt.

The first Boeing was due in Iran around May 2018, but the company said early this month that it will not deliver any aircraft to Iran in light of US sanctions.

Boeing in December 2016 announced an agreement to sell 80 aircraft valued at $16.6 billion to IranAir. It also announced a contract in April 2017 to sell Iran Aseman Airlines 30 Boeing 737 MAX aircraft for $3 billion, with purchase rights for another 30 aircraft.

“We have not delivered any aircraft to Iran, and given we no longer have a license to sell to Iran at this time, we will not be delivering any aircraft,” a Boeing spokesman said.

June 27, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

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