Saturday, September 05, 2009

DTN News: WTO Rules European Subsidies Given To Airbus Were Illegal

DTN News: WTO Rules European Subsidies Given To Airbus Were Illegal *The World Trade Organisation is understood to have ruled that subsidies provided by European countries for Airbus’s A380 superjumbo were illegal.
*Source: DTN News / Int'l Media (NSI News Source Info) BRUSSELS, Belgium - September 5, 2009: The World Trade Organisation has ruled that Europe's Airbus benefited from illegal subsidies, US and European officials said Friday. Airbus, which also made the A350, pictured, received 'launch aid' from European countries for the A380. A US lawmaker and European sources confirmed some of the main contents of the decision which comes amid a bitter battle with Airbus's US rival Boeing, but which was not publicly released. But European sources said the interim WTO ruling indicated that the US complaint against Airbus, a unit of European Aeronautic Defence & Space Co., was only partially upheld by the global trade watchdog. "For many years we have contended that direct financial assistance from the European governmental partners of EADS/Airbus has represented an unfair launch subsidy that has allowed Airbus to increase its market share in the large civil aircraft market and to steal US aircraft manufacturing jobs," said US Representative Norm Dicks. "Today's interim ruling from the WTO panel definitively confirms that contention, which was the basis for the WTO complaint filed by the US Trade Representative filed in October 2004," said Dicks, a Democratic lawmaker from Washington state, where a key part of Boeing's manufacturing operations are based. Dicks said "all Airbus aircraft have received illegal subsidies and that these have caused material harm to Boeing". The WTO verdict was contained in a report of around 1,000 pages, with hard copies only going to EU governments and the US government. A European source confirmed to AFP in Brussels that "some elements" of the original US complaint to the WTO on the matter were upheld by the Geneva-based global trade body. The Wall Street Journal reported Friday from Brussels that the WTO concluded that every launch-aid package given to Airbus for the development of its A380 double-decker long-range airliner was an illegal subsidy. But, rebutting part of the Journal report, the European source added that funds extended to Airbus for the A380 "were not considered illegal in their totality". "The EU launch aid has not been considered as a (support) programme," the source added, referring to a key part of the dispute. Boeing executives said before the ruling that they hoped it would stifle future state aid for Airbus, particularly for the planned A350 airliner, for which France, Germany and Britain have already pledged about 2.9 billion euros (4.2 billion dollars) in launch loans. Another European source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said: "From our reading of this report 70 percent of the US claims have been rejected." However, government grants were ruled illegal, he added. "That'll have an impact for the next case," the source claimed. Another WTO ruling is pending on the EU's tit-for-tat complaint against Washington over US state aid to Boeing, which is being dealt with by the Geneva-based trade body separately. The WTO does not publish or comment on interim rulings, which are only issued to each side in the case on a confidential basis. US and EU trade officials declined comment. In the case brought against the EU in October 2004, Washington charged that it illegally provided subsidies to Airbus. It said an accord that allowed Brussels to provide up to a third of development costs of new airliners was no longer valid since Airbus is now a major industry player and not the fledgling firm when the deal was struck. While Airbus and Boeing are implicated in the case, the WTO only deals in cases brought by its member states and not individual companies. The cases are some of the most complex to reach the international trade watchdog in Geneva. Some analysts said a clear-cut judgment was unlikely given the complexity of the EU-US disputes over their flagship plane makers.

DTN News: Afghanistan TODAY September 5, 2009 ~ NATO Raid Kills 90 In Afghanistan, World Urges Probe Into Incident

DTN News: Afghanistan TODAY September 5, 2009 ~ NATO Raid Kills 90 In Afghanistan, World Urges Probe Into Incident
*Source: DTN News / Int'l Media
(NSI News Source Info) BRUSSELS, Belgium - September 5, 2009: World leaders call for a NATO probe into an air strike in Afghanistan, which resulted in 90 civilian causalities, as the incident could trigger a backlash against foreign troops.
A German KZO drone, or unmanned aerial reconnaissance vehicle, takes off from the German base outside Kunduz, Afghanistan, Friday, Sept. 4, 2009. NATO jets blasted two fuel tankers hijacked by the Taliban outside Kunduz, setting off a huge fireball Friday that killed up to 90 people, Afghan officials said.
"I am very concerned by the reports we have seen this morning of casualties among civilians from an air strike against stolen trucks in Aliabad district of Kunduz Province," deputy UN envoy in Afghanistan, Peter Galbraith, remarked.
The United Nation official went on to add, "As an immediate priority, everything possible must be done to ensure that people wounded by this attack are being properly cared for and that families of the deceased are getting all the help they need."
This is while the Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Friday described the loss of civilian lives in any form as 'unacceptable'.
He underscored that representatives from the Interior Ministry and National Directorate of Security are commissioned to investigate how the incident took place. Moreover, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen also pledged to conduct a comprehensive inquiry into the lethal attack.
"The Afghan people should know that we are clearly committed to protecting them and that we will fully and immediately investigate this incident," Rasmussen told reporters in Brussels. British Foreign Secretary David Miliband called for an 'urgent investigation' into the NATO air strike that killed as many as 90 people in Kunduz.
Afghan security forces stand guard near a burnt fuel tanker in Kunduz, north of Kabul, Afghanistan, Friday, Sept. 4, 2009. NATO jet blasted two fuel tankers hijacked by the Taliban in northern Afghanistan, setting off a huge fireball Friday that killed up to 90 people, Afghan officials said.
"It's important that we are very open and clear about what happened and make sure that it doesn't happen again," Miliband told reporters in Stockholm.
If the civilian deaths are confirmed, the incident could reignite outrage against foreign troops in war-battered Afghanistan. Under new orders issued in July by the ISAF commander,
US Army General Stanley McChrystal, aircraft can only open fire if they can confirm no civilians are in danger or that the lives of coalition forces are not at stake.

DTN News: China Stages Its Biggest Maritime Rescue Exercise

DTN News: China Stages Its Biggest Maritime Rescue Exercise
*Source: DTN News / Int'l Media
(NSI News Source Info) NINGBO, China - September 4, 2009: China's maritime rescue services staged their biggest exercise so far in the East China Sea Friday by involving 35 ships, three aircraft and 1,000 personnel.
Chinese maritime rescue personnel participating in an exercise in the East China Sea, off Ningbo, east China's Zhejiang province on September 4, 2009, involving 35 ships and three aircraft, simulating a collision between a passenger ship and a cargo vessel. China staged its largest-ever maritime rescue drill to test its security and emergency services before next year's World Expo in Shanghai.
The exercise was jointly held by the Ministry of Transport and east China's Zhejiang province, said He Yipei, deputy director of the Zhejiang Maritime Safety Administration. The exercise began at 9 a.m. off the coast of Ningbo and lasted about an hour.
The exercise simulated a collision between a passenger ship carrying 390 people and a cargo vessel loaded with chemicals, resulting in a fire on the passenger ship and a benzene leak. Rescuers transferred the people in danger, treated those overcome by fumes, controlled the chemical leak, searched for people in the water, put out the fire and evacuated 16,000 people living along the coast in the area of the exercise.
Only one passenger "died" in the "accident". "The exercise was successful," said Xu Zuyuan, vice minister of transport and director of the China Maritime Search and Rescue Center. He said the exercise also tested the country's maritime security for the Shanghai World Expo in 2010, which is expected to attract 70 million visitors from May 1 to Oct 31 next year.
The exercise site was Fodu harbour, at Ningbo-Zhoushan port. "It is not only one of the busiest navigation channels in the world, but also an area that sees frequent maritime accidents and chemical leakages. That is why we chose this area," Xu said.

DTN News: China TODAY September 5, 2009 ~ Five dead Amid Urumqi Protests / China Blames Muslim Separatists For Needle Attacks

DTN News: China TODAY September 5, 2009 ~ Five dead Amid Urumqi Protests / China Blames Muslim Separatists For Needle Attacks
*Source: DTN News / Int'l Media
(NSI News Source Info) URUMQI, China - September 5, 2009: Five people died in unrest this week in the far-west Chinese city of Urumqi, its deputy mayor said, after a third day of protests which were broken up by police using tear gas. Chinese security forces chase Han Chinese demonstrators at a road block during a protest at the center of Urumqi in China's Xinjiang Autonomous Region September 4, 2009. Tension flared in China's western city of Urumqi on Friday, when hundreds of Han Chinese tried to push past security barriers into an ethnic Uighur neighbourhood and shouted demands for better security. The confrontation came a day after many thousands of Han Chinese massed in the streets in Urumqi, regional capital of Xinjiang, protesting that they were the targets of mysterious attacks with syringes and that authorities had been too slow to punish Uighurs behind deadly riots on July 5. Han Chinese protesters massed in the capital of the Xinjiang region, angry at authorities they blamed for failing to control a spate of syringe attacks and being slow to bring to trial ethnic Uighurs charged with deadly rioting on July 5. The demonstrations are a rare direct challenge to the government by middle class urbanites, and could inflame ethnic resentments as Beijing prepares to showcase the nation's achievements on October 1, the 60th anniversary of Communist rule. Troops blocked protesters' access to neighbourhoods that are home to Uighurs, a Turkic-speaking Muslim people native to the energy-rich region. Faced with deteriorating support among the majority Han Chinese, Beijing dispatched public security minister Meng Jianzhu to Urumqi, where he urged officials to "restore social order as soon as possible". The unrest came two months after deadly ethnic riots swept the city, killing at least 197 people, most of them Han Chinese. The July 5 riots began after police stopped Uighurs demonstrating against the deaths of Uighur factory workers attacked by Han co-workers in southern China in late June. Among the five who died on Thursday, two were "innocent civilians", while police were still investigating the other deaths, Deputy Mayor Zhang Hong told a news conference. He did not specify the ethnic backgrounds of the dead nor how they died. On Thursday, thousands of Han Chinese demanded the resignation of the region's powerful Communist Party secretary, Wang Lequan, who has held the post for 14 years. Friday's evening television news showed Mr Wang grimly taking notes at a meeting held by public security minister Mr Meng. Mr Meng repeated government accusations that separatists, trying to stir up instability, were behind the syringe attacks. Chinese security forces block a road during a protest by Han Chinese at the centre of Urumqi in China's Xinjiang Autonomous Region September 4, 2009. Tension flared in China's western city of Urumqi on Friday, when hundreds of Han Chinese tried to push past security barriers into an ethnic Uighur neighbourhood and shouted demands for better security. The confrontation came a day after many thousands of Han Chinese massed in the streets in Urumqi, regional capital of Xinjiang, protesting that they were the targets of mysterious attacks with syringes and that authorities had been too slow to punish Uighurs behind deadly riots on July 5. "Maintaining stability is the central task of overriding importance in Xinjiang at the present time," he said. Twenty-one Uighurs had been detained for the syringe attacks, Mr Zhang said, adding that four have already been indicted. Most of the victims were Han Chinese, he added, but other ethnicities were also attacked.