Parliamentary Elections News

Chinese state media unveiled new images of China's most advanced aircraft carrier yet, including next generation launch tracks that can catapult a wider range of aircraft from its deck.First shown to the public in June 2022, the Fujian was entirely designed and built domestically.Yet to conduct its first sea trials, the aircraft carrier is larger and technologically more advanced than the Shandong, commissioned in 2019, and the Liaoning, which China bought second-hand from Ukraine in 1998 and refitted domestically.On state television late on Tuesday…

A Chinese carrier group is exercising near Taiwan and such drills will become regular, China’s navy said late on Monday in a further escalation of tensions near the island that Beijing claims as its sovereign territory.Taiwan has complained of an increase in Chinese military activity near it in recent months, as China steps up efforts to assert its sovereignty over the democratically run island.China’s navy said the carrier group, lead by the Liaoning, the country’s first aircraft carrier put into active service…

Europe's largest multimodal transport group by freight volume Samskip said it is fully prepared for a North Sea container traffic surge, as attitudes harden in the run up to October's revised Brexit deadline.The global logistics company offering transport and related services by land, sea, rail and air said in a release that UK exporters and importers to start switching away from trailers and towards containerisation very soon, repeating a trend established in the run-up to the original deadline for Brexit.“We saw a significant push in container volumes up to March 2019, especially into Hull, as decision-makers facing uncertainity opted for the reliability and proven procedures of container shipping,” says David Besseling, Samskip UK Trade Manager.

Accountant and shipping adviser Moore Stephens says shipping will continue to attract investors in 2019 if it fulfills its ESG (environmental, social and governance) responsibilities.In the latest issue of Bottom Line, the Moore Stephens shipping sector newsletter, Richard Greiner, a partner in the firm’s Shipping & Transport team, says, “It has been suggested that the future is very much like the present, only longer. Should that prove to be the case for the shipping industry…

A suicide truck bomb hit the entrance of Somalia's biggest port on Sunday, killing at least 29 people, police said, an attack claimed by Islamist al Shabaab militants. The fighters said they were trying to disrupt protracted parliamentary elections - part of efforts to rebuild the fractured nation after decades of war. The three-month vote is due to end on Dec. 29. Gunfire rang out after the blast at Mogadishu Port, Mohamed Hussein, a worker there, told Reuters. Two others said work had been halted and staff sent home. The bodies of victims lay strewn outside the capital's terminal in a street filled with rubble from damaged tea shops. "At least 29 civilians died and 50 others have been injured in the blast.

The Cyprus government managed to push through parliament legislation finalizing the privatization of commercial operations at the island's primary Limassol port despite lacking a majority in parliament, reports Famagusta Gazette. 27 deputies voted in favor of regulations detailing the privatization and 20 voted against during a stormy session of the 56-member chamber. Strong opposition by socialist and left wing parties, fanned by an electoral campaign for parliamentary elections in May, had threatened the deals between the government and three international consortium which had obtained the concessions at the port. The Cyprus Transport…

Greek dock workers walked out on Thursday in protest at the planned privatisations of the country's two biggest ports, a condition of a multi-billion euro bailout from international lenders. Setting a date to submit binding bids for Piraeus and Thessaloniki ports is one of the actions that Athens needs to conclude its first bailout review and unlock more funds for its 86 billion euro bailout. Shipping ministry officials said the industrial action did not appear to be disrupting traffic at the ports. A statement from the dock workers' labour union vowed to avert privatisations and accused the government of attempting to sell out to "foreign owned monopolies". "Ports should be developed by utilizing own capital, through credit facilities and tapping European Union funds," it said.

Venezuela's petroleum export basket dropped to $42.44 per barrel this week from $47.05 last week to reach a 5-1/2-year low, the Petroleum Ministry said on Friday. The South American OPEC member's basket, which includes crude oil and refined products, trades at a discount to other benchmarks because of its higher content of heavy oil. Venezuelan oil prices averaged $88.42 last year, down from $98.08 in 2013. The tumble in oil prices is a blow to Venezuela's finances as it struggles to cover arrears with companies, bond payments, arbitration awards, hefty social projects, and spending ahead of this year's parliamentary elections. Global oil markets resumed their slide on Friday, with Brent and U.S.

Italian navy and coastguard vessels have rescued around 1,800 more people from boats in rough seas off Sicily, authorities said on Friday, as the chronic migrant crisis continued around the southern island. More than 20,000 migrants have arrived by sea in Italy though North Africa and the Middle East so far this year, adding to a movement of people which has intensified since the "Arab Spring" upheavals of 2011 and the civil war in Syria. The Italian navy said a coastguard patrol…

A day-long nationwide strike called by Bangladesh's opposition parties last Tuesday (Nov. 16) dealt a fresh blow to the country's shipping sector, already hit by political unrest in the country, officials and traders said. "Fifty ships including 11 carrying about 150,000 tons of foodgrains were stranded at berths and at the outer anchorages on Tuesday," said Mohsin Sarkar, traffic director of Chittagong Port, which handles 80 percent of the country's exports and imports. More than 10,000 tons of ready-made garments and frozen foods were awaiting export at the port on Tuesday, he said. Sarkar said cargo handling has slowed and the maximum "stay time" for a ship has shot up to 15 days from earlier five days due to frequent strikes.