Future historians may well agree that the 21st century Silk Road first opened for business on December 14, 2009. That was the day a crucial stretch of pipeline officially went into operation, linking the fabulously energy-rich state of Turkmenistan (via Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan) to Xinjiang province in China’s far west. Hyperbole did not deter the spectacularly named Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, Turkmenistan’s president, from bragging: “This projecthas not only commercial or economic value. It is also political. China, through its wise and farsighted policy, has become one of the key guarantors of global security.”
Wednesday, October 13, is the 40th forging anniversary of Sino-Canadian diplomatic ties, which is worthy of much celebration and expectation. Bilateral relations have gone through a splendid journey with eminent successes made over the past 40 years. In fact, the history of Sino-Canadian relations has already traversed over a century.
The French foreign minister on Tuesday said that the European Union could be “real” for Turkey if necessary reforms were carried out, adding that the ball is in Turkey’s court. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, who is on an official visit to Turkey, said Turkey needed to carry out a number of reforms for talks on three negotiation chapters to begin.
“The initial feedback we’re getting is that this is something the government should be very happy to see, which is the return of American capital into our country so that we can use it to create high-paying American jobs and also reduce oil imports a few years down the road.”
State-owned Chinese energy giant CNOOC is buying a multibillion-dollar stake in 600,000 acres of South Texas oil and gas fields, potentially testing the political waters for further expansion into U.S. energy reserves.
With the announcement Monday that it would pay up to $2.2 billion for a one-third stake in Chesapeake Energy assets, CNOOC lays claim to a share of properties that eventually could produce up to half a million barrels a day of oil equivalent.
Unilateral sanctions against Iran by the EU threaten the Nabucco pipeline project to bring natural gas from the Caspian region to Europe, a German paper reports.
“Based on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), proliferation of nuclear weapons should be prevented. There is a main question in the Muslim world that where the Zionist regime [of Israel] has obtained its nuclear weapons from,” the IRIB quoted Jalili as saying on Monday.
Defeated during the Second World War, occupied by the United States after its liberation, integrated into NATO by force during the Cold War, compelled to dissolve into the European Union, Italy is today a prisoner of its past while international relations are speeding ahead. According to Tiberio Graziani, even though Rome may not yet be in a position to frame an independent foreign policy, the time is ripe to start contemplating an exit strategy in keeping with its historical and geographical characteristics. Italy feels the call of its natural environment … the wide Mediterranean sea.
The embattled Euro has gotten a surprise boost from an unexpected quarter―China. The country with the world’s largest foreign exchange currency reserves, China, has pledged to support Greek debt as well as the Euro in what is clearly a geopolitical decision. In doing so, China has signaled it seeks to prevent the US financial warfare attack on Europe and to play the EU off against the USA in a geopolitical chess game of a fascinating dimension.
In the last phase of the election campaign, an issue has emerged which allows voters to separate Wall Street stooges in both parties from real advocates of the middle class. The issue is the massive campaign of foreclosures against the American middle class being carried out by Wall Street zombie bankers who owe their very existence to taxpayer bailouts. Since the world derivatives panic began in 2007, millions of homes each year have been seized by the Wall Street predators, sometimes under the legal color provided by adjustable rate mortgages and, as has now been revealed, often using completely illegal paperwork to throw average Americans and their families out on the street and frequently into poverty and destitution.
Mobile phone technology is basically military technology- any limitations on public exposure to protect public health would compromise military operations. Therefore in NATO countries , at least, such limitations must be prevented.
