Showing posts with label Australia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Australia. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 15, 2016

OBOR unmasked : Chinese led, Australian front suggests OBOR must be treated with caution,recent lessons from ASEAN should be heeded

by Ganesh Sahathevan
In its PR effort, the so-called "Australian" One Belt One Road advisory council presented itself with an Australian face, that of Malcolm Broomhead, the chairman of Asciano and Orica and director of BHP Billiton, who will chair the “OBOR” advisory group,
The OBOR website on the other hand, proves otherwise.As one can see, Broomhead is no where near the top of  OBOR's leadership. 
Add to this the fact that China's HKTDC will not even admit to this map on its own website (a story for another day) ,showing the extension of the belt to Darwin ,and one has every reason to treat OBOR with caution.

As ASEAN has just discovered, China can use OBOR to force its own position.China's investment in Malaysia pursuant to OBOR (and brought on by the 1 MDB scandal) was obviously a lever that was used to disrupt the joint communique ASEAN had intended on the matter of China's intrusion into the South China Sea. 

OBOR ought to be treated with caution.Doing so is in Australian national interests.

END 


The Australia China OBOR Initiative
Our Team



Jean Dong
Executive Director


Felicity Ford
Director


Mark Wu
Director


Xu Wang
Research Associate


Advisory Board



Malcolm Broomhead
Chairman -Orica Limited
Director -BHP Billiton Limited
Chairman -Plc, Asciano Limited


Dr Liu Jian Xing
Director
-International Cooperation Center, National Development & Reform Commission


Dr. Shuaihua Wallace
Managing Director
-International Center for Trade and Sustainable Development China



Paul Cooper
Chairman -Normal Disney and Young
Chairman -Gane Energy & Resources Pty Ltd (GEAR) and Gane Energy & Resources (China) Limited
Former Non-Executive Director -AXA Asia Pacific Holdings Ltd (AXA APH)



Prof. Wei An Li
President & Chancellor
-Tianjin University of Finance & Economics.

Monday, April 25, 2016

Doing business with the corruption prone DCNS-Are Australian politicians ,civil servants, exceptionally honest,pure ,possessing moral fortitude lacking in others?



by Ganesh Sahatevan

It is being reported that DCNS of France is to be awarded the AUD 50 billion contract to build Australia's next generation of submarines.

Meanwhile, there has been no commentary in Australia about DCNS's history of corruption.

In Malaysia:

Malaysia's government has denied allegations of corruption in its $1.25 billion purchase of two submarines as it responded for the first time to a French investigation into alleged bribery payments in the deal.

The allegations have emerged in a French investigative case examining whether French shipbuilding giant DCNS paid bribes to Malaysian officials.

Malaysian human rights group SUARAM and its French lawyers have alleged that DCNS bought classified Malaysian defence ministry documents to help its bid for the 1 billion euro ($1.25 billion) contract it won in 2002. They say investigation documents show that about 36 million euros ($44.90 million) were paid by Thales International, a subsidiary of DCNS, to a company called Terasasi, controlled by a former associate of Najib.



In Taiwan:


The Taiwanese government has filed a US$98.4 million lawsuit against the French state-owned DCNS over a long-running, massive corruption case that puts added pressure on the defense contractor at a time when it faces multiple investigations that could bring down top French politicians.

The allegations, announced by Taiwan’s Defense Minister Kao Hua-chun in Parliament last week, are also an indication that the French contractors apparently continued with illegal activities well after the original scandal was uncovered. Kao said additional kickbacks prohibited by a 1996 order agreement have been found relating to supplying parts for the problem-plagued stealth frigates, which cost US$2.8 billion in 1991. Taiwan is seeking the additional penalty for alleged violation of the 1996 agreement, bringing the total to well over US$1 billion.


The purchase of the six frigates has been marked by earlier allegations of massive corruption, multiple murders, and demands for fines against the French shipbuilder for US$950 million, most of it already owed by the defense contractor and the French state under international court rulings. The French government has already agreed to pay €457 million in damages to Taiwan, which is a big enough amount to require an emergency amendment to the national operating budget.


In Pakistan,The Karachi Affair
So convoluted, one report is reproduced in full:



Political scandal brews over 11 Frenchmen killed in Pakistan
By Michael Cosgrove Jun 19, 2009 in Politics
A major political scandal is gaining momentum in France after revelations that 11 Frenchmen killed in a 2002 Karachi bus bombing were victims of a Pakistani plot to punish France for non-payment of commission on a deal involving the sale of submarines.








Not only is it a scandal here in France, but it may well turn into an international affair.
The Karachi bombing victims were all engineers employed by the DCN, the French company which holds a quasi-monopoly on the construction of French warships and submarines. The attack also killed three Pakistanis and injured many others.
They were in Pakistan to work on three Agosta 90 B submarines which were sold to the Pakistan military in a deal signed in 1994. Payment was to be spread over ten years and, as is usual in business deals involving military hardware, commission was promised to the middlemen involved. These middlemen included Pakistani and Saudi Arabian nationals. Saudi Arabia has traditionally been a source of cash funding for Pakistan, and its role in the deal was that it paid up front for the submarines.
The attack shocked the French, who immediately sent investigators to Karachi. They almost instantly claimed that Al Qaida, which was very active at that time, was behind the bombing. The affair slowly drifted out of public view in the months that followed.
It has resurfaced with a bang with revelations that the attack was indeed carried out by Islamic militants, but with the help of the Pakistani military and secret services.
The claims have been made by family members of those killed, lawyers representing them, and even judges, in the context of the official enquiry into the bombing, which is still ongoing.
At the time the deal was signed, French politicians, notably Edouard Balladur and Jacques Chirac, were trying to outdo each other in their search for campaign funds for the upcoming Presidential elections in 1995. Balladur was the French Prime Minister at that time, and as such he was an essential player in any international arms deal.
Balladur's Budget Minister at the time was current French President Nicolas Sarkozy. Sarkozy supported Balladur's candidature for the Presidency, a gesture for which Chirac would never forgive him.
The deal represented a lot of money and a source of campaign funding too.
Balladur was beaten in the election however and Chirac became President. Soon afterward, he ordered the cancellation of the progressive commission payments being made to senior Pakistani military personnel and others.
“The Al Qaida track has been totally abandoned. The mobile for the attack now appears to be linked to the stopping of commission payments. This is turning into a state affair” said Olivier Morice, lawyer for seven of the bereaved families, after a recent meeting with anti-terrorist judges Marc TrĂ©vidic and Yves Jannier.
“The commission payments (to Pakistan) were stopped when Jaques Chirac became President in 1995 in order that retro-commissions (..destined for the financing of Balladur’s campaign..) were not paid” he continued.
One of the anti-terrorist judges “said that this scenario had a cruel logic to it” said Magali Drouet, the daughter of one of the victims.
In this scenario, the attack was carried out in reprisals for the non-payment of commission. The current Pakistani President, Asif Ali Zardari, was the Investment Minister at the time in his wife Benazir Bhutto’s government. Zardari has been accused of corruption and money laundering many times.
Drouet went on to say that “this is a state-level affair which implicates France, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, a source of funding for Pakistan.”
This new track was uncovered last year by police but has only just been revealed. The police, acting under orders from judges, were investigating affairs of corruption and arms deals. They found documents on the premises of the DCN (now called DCNS) which revealed the names of companies who transited arms sales commissions.
One of the documents mentions the “instrumentalisation” of Islamic militants by Pakistani Secret Service and Army personnel. It says that “the Karachi attack was carried out thanks to connivance from within the Army and from elements of support for Islamic guerrillas” within the Pakistani Secret Services. It goes on to mention that the bombing was carried out “for financial reasons....designed to obtain the payment of unpaid commission.”
In another strange development, investigators are also looking into the judicial aspects of the bombing enquiry carried out at the time by French police in Pakistan. The judicial enquiry was suddenly halted in 2003.
Initially included in the evidence was a collection of photographs taken by Randall Bennett, the head of the American diplomatic security service in Pakistan at that time. Bennett also ran the investigation into the kidnapping of Daniel Pearl, the American journalist later executed by Al Qaida.
The photographs in question were those that Bennett took at the scene of the bombing. They were later destroyed under a French court orde

Read more: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/274427#ixzz46tS0Ih00


END 

Monday, July 21, 2014

MH 17-Najib's deal leaves Australia out on a limb: Abbott let down by DAFT,Bishop ,Peta & co?



NOTE
For the sake of efficiency , I am copying and pasting an email posted to recipients on my mailing list .


That Malaysian PM Najib concluded  a deal with the rebels/separatists/bastards even as 
 Julie Bishop was doing her thing at the UN, illustrates the point raised below, that while Tony Abbot rightly demanded that Russia cooperate in the matter of MH 17, he was likely to find himself out on a limb while the other parties involved approached the matter in the context of their own national interest. 

Australians ought to be concerned that an understanding of the competing priorities seemed to be lacking in Abbott's words and actions. Again, he seems to have been let down by his advisers. 
END

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Ganesh Sahathevan <ganesh.sahathevan@gmail.com>
Date: Sun, Jul 20, 2014 at 1:04 PM
Subject: Standing up to Putin-Europe needs Russia's energy, and Malaysia its fighter jets? Why Australia might be left out on a limb
To:


NOTE 
While Tony Abbott has rightly demanded that Russia take responsibility and cooperate with other interested countries in the 
the MH 17 investigation, it does look as if Malaysia and Europe may have other priorities to consider.
Europe's dependence on Russian gas has been well documented.
Malaysia's reliance on Russia for air defence is less clear, especially in context of this intriguing report:


MH17 Rosmah Mansor has sent word to Russian President Vladimir Putin to call her husband, Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak, over the MH17 tragedy.

According to a brief report in Sin Chew Daily website, Rosmah said she had asked someone, who is close to her as well as Putin, to convey the message.
However, there is no mention as to who this person is.
The report stated that Rosmah is hoping Putin would take the initiative to call Najib and explain the issue in order to calm down Malaysians, who are enraged over the incident.
Sin Chew also did not state where she had made the remarks.
Rosmah was present at a Wanita Umno function in Kuala Lumpur earlier butBernama, which reported on the event, made no mention of her commenting on the ill-fated plane.
Upon completing Maghrib prayers, Najib received a call from Putin.
However, the report was removed from Sin Chew website later in the day.

Meanwhile, Abbott and Julie Bishop have had no luck getting hold of their Russian counterparts-and are instead being publicly scolded  by the Russians:



 

Malaysia Invests In Sukhoi Fighter Readiness

PARIS AIR SHOW » 2013
Malaysia has allocated RM300 million to increase the combat readiness of the Royal Malaysian Air Force’s fleet of Sukhoi Su-30MKMs.
Malaysia has allocated RM300 million to increase the combat readiness of the Royal Malaysian Air Force’s fleet of Sukhoi Su-30MKMs.
June 17, 2013, 4:10 AM
The events in Sabah, Malaysia, this past March, when local forces conducted Operation Daulat used combat jets to quell the resistance of the Filipino gunmen on the island of Borneo, may have prompted a spate of arms sales to that country and her closest neighbors. The armed forces do have a big wish list for weapons, but procurement processes for the most expensive and longest-lead items are likely to be launched properly only after the general elections in Malaysia later this year. In the meantime, the ministry of finance and the royal treasury–the two main watchdogs–are loosening their grips somewhat so as to give the air force the means to improve its fleet readiness.
In late March, Sukhoi won a three-year contract called “The supply of articles, services and technical assistance for Su-30MKM aircraft” worth RM300 million (more than U.S.$100 million), three times the allocation over the previous three-year period. Respective documents were signed by MOD secretary general Datuk Dr. Haji Ismail Haji Ahmad, with Sukhoi deputy general director for marketing Alexander Klementiev and director for after-sales support Vyacheslav Lozan. The increased spending is meant to boost combat readiness of the Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) Su-30MKM fleet from the current level of 65 to 70 percent to 85 percent in the “near term” and eventually increase this to 100 percent. TheRMAF’s 11th Squadron stationed at Gong Kedak has 18 heavyweight twin-engine vectored-thrust fighters received new from Irkut’s IAZ factory in 2007-2011. After the manufacturer’s guarantee period expired, most of the Russian support team departed Gong Kedak AFB, leaving only three of their number–and they then left this past January following expiration of the previous service contract.
“The notable increase in spending on our services will allow our specialists to more closely monitor the aircraft operations and shorten the reaction time to RMAF requests for spares and repair services. Importantly, the new contract calls for a permanent presence of Sukhoi advisors and technicians at Gong Kedak,” Klementiev told AIN. The contract calls for deliveries of additional aerodrome equipment, increase of spares and expendables stocks, carrying out on-site repairs of onboard equipment, consultancy and training forRMAF maintainers.
As part of the aircraft delivery contract, Russia built the Sukhoi Technical Center (STC) at Gong Kedak. It was completed and handed over to the Malaysian government, which appointed Aerospace Technology Systems Corp. (ATSC) to be the operator. To work at full capacity, STC’s warehouses need to be filled with spares, expendables and maintenance tools, as necessary, which will be done under the new contract. The facility has several workshops and will permit RMAF and ATSC to perform maintenance, except major overhaul of airframes, engines and the most complex parts of onboard systems. Sukhoi assessed ATSCstaff members as “well educated” but indicated they need more training in performing manufacturer-prescribed work on Russian-made jets.
RMAF crews have mastered aerobatics and use of vectored thrust, attracting praise from the Russian air force commander Gen. Victor Bondarev, while he was attending the LIMA 2013 show. Following training of the initial group of Malaysian fighter pilots, Sukhoi and Irkut ceased such services four years ago. They hoped the customer would award them a new contract for pilot training “sometime in the future to ensure that the RMAF 11th Squadron crews are able to use the Su-30MKM capabilities to full extent,” including application of precision-guided munitions. “This would require us to send a group of highly skilled engineers and pilots there who have the complete knowledge of the type’s functional capabilities,” said Klementiev.
ATSC was founded in 1994 as a joint venture with a 70-percent stake held by National Aerospace and Defense Industries, and the rest by Russian partners, and runs the MiG Technical Center at Kuantan AFB and MiG Component Repair Center at MEC City. The company claims to have mastered checks on the Su-30MKM after each 200 flight hours and servicing procedures on the airplane’s OEPrNK optronic aiming and navigation complex system, OLS optical locator, N011M “Bars” fire control radar and fly-by-wire systems, as well as AL-31FP engine module changes.
Despite the increase in funding for RMAF, salesmen remain cautious about prospects of replacement for 18 MiG-29N/NUBs delivered in 1995. “We know about the plans of the military, but we also hear about the economy slowdown and the respective position of the ministry of finance. Cost-effective upgrade solutions may win over,” Victor Komardin, deputy head of Russia’s Rosoboronexport arms sales agency, told AIN.
Guided by this knowledge, Rosoboronexport is offering an upgrade package to the RMAF’s 18-year-old MiGs, which will boost their capability and extend their lifetime to 40 years. Should the customer decide to replace the MiGs with newer aircraft, Russia is ready to supply additional quantities of advanced Su-30MKMs or even consider a request for a fifth-generation fighter. “We are keen to take part in any competition in Malaysia that is officially opened,” Komardin said. Other candidates to replace RMAF MiG-29s are the Boeing F/A-18F Super Hornet, EF-2000 Eurofighter Typhoon, Dassault Rafale and Saab Gripen.
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