Selasa, 30 Maret 2021
China's top legislative body passes sweeping Hong Kong electoral reforms - South China Morning Post
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2021-03-30 13:05:24Z
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With Suez Canal crisis ended, it's time to add up the damages - The Straits Times
ISMAILIA, EGYPT (BLOOMBERG) - The immediate crisis of the Suez Canal blockage may have ended, but the battle over damages from the waterway's longest closure in almost half a century is just beginning.
The long-term cost of the canal's estimated US$10 billion (S$13.5 billion) a day closure will likely be small, given that global merchandise trade amounts to US$18 trillion a year.
Yet with cargoes delayed for weeks if not months, the blockage could unleash a flood of claims by everyone affected, from the shipping lines to manufacturers and oil producers.
"The legal issues are so enormous," said Ms Alexis Cahalan, a partner at Norton White in Sydney, which specialises in transport law.
"If you can imagine the variety of cargoes that are there - everything from oil, grain, consumer goods like refrigerators to perishable goods - that is where the enormity of the claims may not be known for a time."
The Ever Given was successfully pried from the sand on Monday (March 29), and traffic has resumed through the canal.
But the blockage, which began last Tuesday, was the canal's longest closure since it was shut for eight years following the 1967 Six-Day War and offered a reminder of the fragility of global trade infrastructure and threats to supply lines already stretched by the pandemic.
The Egyptian authorities were desperate to get traffic flowing again through the waterway that's a conduit for about 12 per cent of world trade and around one million barrels of oil a day.
Leth Agencies, one of the top providers of Suez Canal crossing services, said 37 ships exited from Great Bitter Lake by 3.30am local time and 76 are scheduled to go on Tuesday.
South Korea's shipping giant HMM said the HMM Gdansk, one of the world's largest container vessels and which can carry 24,000 20ft boxes, was scheduled to transit through the waterway on Tuesday after being held up since last week.
It may take as long as four days to return the canal to normal, Suez Canal Authority chairman Osama Rabie said at a Monday evening press conference.
That assessment may be optimistic, and it could take weeks for the situation to be fully resolved, according to Mr Arthur Richier, senior freight analyst at energy market intelligence firm Vortexa.
Freight rates for the affected shipping routes are already rising due to lower availability of tankers as some stay stuck and some are taking the longer route around the Cape of Good Hope.
"Coordinating the logistics of who gets to go through first and how that's going to be sorted out, I think the Egyptians have quite a job on their hands," Mr John Wobensmith, chief executive officer of Genco Shipping and Trading, said on Tuesday in an interview with Bloomberg Television.
To prevent future disruptions and help accommodate higher volumes of shipping traffic, the authorities could consider widening the Suez Canal, he said.
The canal's blockage will reduce global reinsurers' earnings, which have already been hit by winter storms in the US and flooding in Australia, as well as the pandemic, according to Fitch Ratings.
Prices for marine reinsurance will rise further as a consequence, it said. Fitch estimates losses may amount to hundreds of millions of euros.
In a potential merry-go-round of legal action, owners of the goods on board the Ever Given and other ships could seek compensation for delays from their insurers, if they have one.
Those insurers for cargo on board can in turn file claims against Ever Given's owners, who will then look to their insurers for protection.
Taiwan's Evergreen Line, which chartered the Ever Given, says Japan's Shoei Kisen Kaisha - the ship's owner - is responsible for any losses. Shoei Kisen has taken some responsibility, but says charterers need to deal with the cargo owners.
Evergreen is being represented by Ince Gordon Dadds as legal adviser, according to people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified because they aren't authorised to speak to the media. London-based Ince Gordon Dadds and Evergreen declined to comment.
An official at Shoei Kisen said the company hasn't received any compensation claim from various parties yet.
The firm doesn't have an estimate on the amount of potential claims and is still examining what it is responsible for.
The ship's hull is insured through three Japanese companies.
Responsibility for the giant ship's grounding will be determined after an investigation, the Suez Canal's Mr Rabie said, adding that the authority isn't at fault and that the ship's captain - and not the pilot - was responsible for the vessel.
Inspections of potential damage are continuing to the Ever Given, which has been moved north to the Great Bitter Lake.
Those checks will determine whether the vessel can resume its scheduled service, and what happens to the cargo onboard, Evergreen said in a statement.
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2021-03-30 09:06:32Z
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Rubbish piles up on Yangon streets as Myanmar protesters launch 'garbage strike' - CNA
YANGON: Rubbish piled up on the streets of Myanmar's main city on Tuesday (Mar 30) after activists launched a "garbage strike" to oppose military rule as the toll of pro-democracy protesters killed by the security forces since a Feb 1 coup rose to more than 500.
Out of 14 civilians killed on Monday, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP) said at least eight were in the South Dagon district of the biggest city, Yangon.
Security forces in the area fired a heavier calibre weapon than usual on Monday towards protesters crouching behind a barricade of sand bags, witnesses said. It was not immediately clear what weapon it was but it was believed to be some type of grenade launcher.
State television said security forces used "riot weapons" to disperse a crowd of "violent terrorist people" who were destroying a pavement and one man was wounded.
READ: Myanmar crackdown death toll passes 500
A South Dagon resident said on Tuesday security forces had been cracking down in the area overnight, raising concern of more casualties.
"There was shooting all night," said the resident who declined to be identified.
Residents found a badly burned body on a street in the morning, the resident said, adding it was not known what had happened to the person and the military took the body away.
Police and a junta spokesman did not answer calls seeking comment.
Thousands of protesters came out in several other towns across the country, according to media and photos on social media. There were no immediate reports of violence.
READ: US suspends all trade engagement with Myanmar until elected government returns
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged Myanmar's generals to stop the killings and repression of demonstrations.
A civil disobedience campaign of strikes against military rule has paralysed large parts of the economy and in a new tactic, protesters sought to step up the campaign by asking residents to leave garbage at main road intersections.
"This garbage strike is a strike to oppose the junta," read a poster on social media. "Everyone can join."
Pictures posted on social media showed piles of rubbish building up in Yangon.
The campaign comes in defiance of calls issued via loudspeakers in some neighbourhoods of Yangon on Monday urging residents to dispose of garbage properly.
"UNACCEPTABLE"
At least 510 civilians had been killed in nearly two months of opposition to the ouster of an elected government led by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, and the return of military rule after a decade of tentative steps towards democracy, according to a tally by the AAPP advocacy group.
The total killed on Saturday, the bloodiest day of the protests, had risen to 141, its figures showed.
One of the main groups behind the protests, the General Strike Committee of Nationalities, called on Monday in an open letter for ethnic minority forces to help those standing up to the "unfair oppression" of the military.
READ: Toddler survives Myanmar airstrike that killed father
In a sign that the call may be gaining more traction, three groups - the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, the Arakan Army (AA) and Ta'ang National Liberation Army - called in a joint statement on Tuesday for the military to stop killing protesters and resolve political issues.
If not, they said they would cooperate with all ethnic groups "who are joining Myanmar's spring revolution" to defend themselves.
"This kind of brutal killing of innocent civilians is unacceptable," AA spokesman Khine Thu Kha told Reuters in an audio message.
Insurgents from different ethnic groups have battled the central government for decades for greater autonomy. Though many groups have agreed to ceasefires, fighting has flared in recent days between the army and forces in both the east and north.
READ: France denounces 'blind and deadly' violence in Myanmar
Heavy clashes erupted on the weekend near the Thai border between the army and fighters from Myanmar's oldest ethnic minority force, the Karen National Union (KNU), which has also denounced the coup.
About 3,000 villagers fled to Thailand when military jets bombed a KNU area.
Thailand has denied accounts by activist groups that refugees were being forced back. Its foreign ministry said there was no policy of turning away refugees fleeing conflict and they would be accepted on humanitarian grounds.
More than a dozen people were allowed to cross into Thailand on Tuesday for medical treatment at a border village, Reuters witnesses said.
Myanmar's military has for decades justified its grip on power by saying it is the only institution capable of preserving national unity. It seized power saying that November elections won by Aung San Suu Kyi's party were fraudulent, an assertion dismissed by the election commission.
But foreign criticism and Western sanctions have failed to sway the generals and Aung San Suu Kyi remains in detention at an undisclosed location and many other figures in her party are also in custody.
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2021-03-30 08:15:16Z
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End of Suez Canal snarl marks beginning of new stress on global trade - The Straits Times
LONDON (BLOOMBERG) - Now removed from the Suez Canal's main channel, the Ever Given ship leaves in its wake several weeks or months of disruptions across a world economy where the pandemic revealed both the sturdy backbone of global trade and an Achilles' heel.
"It's not a cork-out-of-a-bottle moment," said Mr Peter Aylott, director of policy at the UK Chamber of Shipping. "We could still be days away from the canal being completely free."
The reopening kicks off a new wave of stress on supply chains - the intertwined network of ships, ports, trucks, trains and warehouses that shuttle products from a factory on one side of the planet to a retail shelf or production line on the other. A surge in e-commerce means even greater consumer demand for speed, putting added strain on transportation and boosting freight rates to record highs.
Even a temporary clog in a major artery like the Suez is problematic because the world's nearly 6,000 container ships run on schedules, with a finite number of steel boxes to go around. They cannot be repositioned to where demand pops up or quickly shifted away from regions where economic activity is slow. Capacity can be tweaked by adjusting the speed of vessels but also with a blunter tool: cancelling sailings that are not possible anymore or are not economically viable. The Suez incident may unleash plenty of those.
That leaves the owners of cargo - and all the logistics industries handling imports and exports - at the mercy of the container carriers.
Toppling dominoes
"The metaphorical dominoes have already been toppled," said Mr Lars Jensen of SeaIntelligence Consulting. "We will continue to see the unfolding of congestion issues in Europe as the cargo arrives, blank sailings resulting from the severe delay of many vessels, as well as a deterioration of the equipment situation."
In the near term, ports from Europe to Asia are bracing to be inundated with goods held up near Egypt for almost a week.
The Port of Rotterdam, Europe's largest seaport, late last week counted 59 container ships ensnared in the Suez congestion that were headed its way, though it was not possible to estimate when they would arrive. In Spain, ports in Algeciras, Barcelona and Valencia were reviewing revisions to arrival schedules and preparing contingency plans for more working hours to handle the unpredictable flow of ships.
The disruption spreads well beyond container shipping: scores of oil, gasoline, natural gas and other tankers and vessels were halted by the blockage, stunting normal supply and delivery routines across the energy and chemical sectors. Before the Ever Given ran aground, about two million barrels of crude and petroleum products transited the canal every 24 hours.
Strained ports
In the near term, the traffic jam may hamper efforts by European gas buyers to restock inventories eroded by winter demand. That may present US gas exporters with an opportunity to grab market share, said Mr Andy Weissman, chief executive of EBW Analytics.
Freight rates for bulk ships used to haul grains and metal may also remain elevated. The Baltic Dry index recently hit an 18-month high amid strong Chinese corn and soybean buying, and growing metal demand.
Meanwhile, a Chinese logistics executive warned that the impact on global trade could linger as backlogs in Europe worsen.
Scramble for air freight
Ports are already struggling to handle normal shipping volumes because of the pandemic, and now they'll need to cope with many delayed vessels all arriving at once or in quick succession, said Max Wei, general manager of international business at Speedaf Logistics Ltd.
Under the best-case scenario, it will take a month of more to work through the congestion, he said.
With ocean freight maxed out, importers are looking for other modes even if they are more expensive.
Ms Vivian Lau, a Hong Kong-based logistics executive, said the surge in demand for air freight is set to continue even after the Suez logjam clears. Online shopping and the scarcity of available containers are among reasons why sellers and buyers will continue to scramble.
"Over the weekend I was up trying to find a few 747s," said Ms Lau, vice-chair and group chief executive officer of Pacific Air Holdings. "I was able to find one, I wasn't able to find a few."
In a sign of that demand, Abu Dhabi's Etihad Airways will temporarily convert a fifth Boeing 777-300ER jetliner to cargo duty.
While the squeeze on air freight was already happening without the Suez blockage, Ms Lau sees another legacy from the past week's events: more debate on reshaping supply lines.
"You can't just sit in one part of the world assuming that things are going to be running like clockwork and you don't need to keep any inventory because they will arrive 'just in time'," she said. "The Suez Canal blockage is just another reminder."
Rail alternative
Ms Sigrid Nikutta, a DB Cargo management board member, said rail offers another option when barriers arise.
"During Covid, we have seen that trains can go through borders where roads were closed and we see this at the moment, when the seaway is closed trains can go on," she said on Monday in an interview with Bloomberg Television.
The Suez-related turmoil may ripple beyond Europe and Asia.
US-based Premier Inc helps more than 4,000 hospitals manage purchasing and supplies. Last year, huge increases in demand caused shortages for items like gloves, gowns and masks. While crisis-level shortages have abated, it left US hospitals and suppliers with less inventory on hand and more sensitive to fresh hiccups in the supply chain.
"For many, many, many products, there is no safety stock in the channel," said Mr David Hargraves, Premier's senior vice-president of supply chain.
The Suez backlogs are just the latest in a series of cascading events that will delay a key input to plastic medical gear: resins. The company has warned member hospitals to prepare for "a higher number of shorter duration or sporadic shortages," Mr Hargraves said.
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2021-03-30 05:30:26Z
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Senin, 29 Maret 2021
Traffic in Suez Canal resumes after stranded ship refloated - The Straits Times
ISMAILIA, Egypt (REUTERS) - Shipping was on the move again late on Monday (March 29) in Egypt’s Suez Canal after tugs refloated a giant container ship which had been blocking the channel for almost a week, causing a huge build-up of vessels around the waterway.
After the 400-metre-long Ever Given was dislodged, 113 ships were expected to transit the canal in both directions by early Tuesday morning, Suez Canal Authority (SCA) chairman Osama Rabie told reporters.
He said a backlog of 422 ships could be cleared in three and a half days.
The Ever Given had become jammed diagonally across a southern section of the canal in high winds early on March 23, halting traffic on the shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia.
Evergreen Line, which is leasing the Ever Given, said the ship would be inspected for seaworthiness in the Great Bitter Lake, which separates two sections of the canal.
“The ship was ready for limited navigation after an initial inspection and not a single container was damaged, but a second investigation will be more precise and if it was affected it will show,” Rabie said.
At dawn on Monday, rescue workers from the SCA working with a team from Dutch firm Smit Salvage partially refloated the ship and straightened it in the canal.
After several hours it shifted briefly back across the canal before being manoeuvred free by tugs as the tide changed, a canal source said.
“The time pressure to complete this operation was evident and unprecedented,” said Peter Berdowski, CEO of Smit Salvage owner Boskalis after the Ever Given was refloated.
The company said approximately 30,000 cubic metres of sand was dredged to refloat the 224,000-ton container ship and a total of 11 tugs and two powerful sea tugs were used to pull the ship off.
Evergreen Line, which is leasing the Ever Given, confirmed the ship had been successfully refloated and said it would be repositioned in a lake that sits between two sections of the canal and inspected for seaworthiness.
Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement (BSM), the technical managers of the container ship, said there were no reports of pollution or cargo damage.
Queue
Vessels waiting to transit the canal include dozens of container ships, bulk carriers, oil tankers and liquefied natural gas (LNG) or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) vessels, Nile TV reported.
Rabie said that within four days, traffic would return to normal. “We’ll work day and night to end the backlog."
Vessels similar in size to the Ever Given, which is one of the world’s largest container ships, could pass through the canal safely, he added, and the SCA would not change its policy on admitting such ships.
Shipping group Maersk said the knock-on disruptions to global shipping could take weeks or months to unravel.
Owners and charterers of delayed ships face at least US$24 million in expenses they will be unable to recoup as their insurance policies do not cover them and cargo owners could also face uninsured losses, industry sources said.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who had not publicly commented on the blockage, said Egypt had ended the crisis and assured resumption of trade through the canal.
Oil prices fell 1 per cent after the ship was refloated while shares of Taiwan-listed Evergreen Marine Corp rose.
About 15 per cent of world shipping traffic transits the Suez Canal, which is an important source of foreign currency revenue for Egypt. The stoppage was costing the canal US$14-15 million a day.
Shipping rates for oil product tankers nearly doubled after the ship became stranded, and the blockage has disrupted global supply chains, threatening costly delays for companies already dealing with Covid-19 restrictions.
Maersk was among shippers rerouting cargoes around the Cape of Good Hope, adding up to two weeks to journeys and extra fuel costs.
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2021-03-29 21:14:13Z
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One-year-old Singaporean girl among 21 new Covid-19 cases in S'pore, all imported - The Straits Times
SINGAPORE - A one-year-old Singaporean girl travelling from India was among the 21 new coronavirus cases confirmed as at Monday (March 29), which took Singapore's total tally to 60,321.
All of the cases were imported and were serving stay-home notices or had been isolated on arrival in Singapore, said the Ministry of Health (MOH).
Among the new cases announced, 20 were asymptomatic, including the one-year-old, and detected through proactive screening and surveillance, while one had symptoms.
There were no new cases in the community or workers' dormitories.
The imported infections included Singaporeans, permanent residents, and long and short term pass holders travelling from India, Myanmar, the Philippines, Bangladesh and Turkey.
They also included a 34-year-old man who travelled from Malaysia to assist in police investigations, said the Health Ministry.
It added that the number of new cases in the community has increased from none in the week before, to two cases in the past week.
The number of unlinked cases in the community has also increased from zero to two in the same period.
MOH added that among the 113 confirmed cases reported from March 23 to Monday, 44 have tested positive for their serology tests, while 51 have tested negative. A further 18 serology test results are pending.
With nine cases discharged on Monday, 60,116 have fully recovered from the disease.
A total of 39 patients remain in hospital, including one in critical condition in the intensive care unit, while 121 are recuperating in community facilities.
Singapore has had 30 deaths from Covid-19 complications, while 15 who tested positive have died of other causes.
Globally, the virus outbreak, which began in December 2019, has infected more than 125 million people. More than 2.75 million people have died.
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2021-03-29 15:44:54Z
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Traffic in Suez Canal resumes after stranded ship refloated - The Straits Times
ISMAILIA/CAIRO (REUTERS) - Shipping traffic through Egypt’s Suez Canal resumed on Monday (March 29) after a giant container ship which had been blocking the busy waterway for almost a week was refloated, the canal authority said.
The 400-metre-long Ever Given became jammed diagonally across a southern section of the canal in high winds early last Tuesday, halting traffic on the shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia.
Live footage on a local television station showed the ship surrounded by tug boats moving slowly in the centre of the canal on Monday afternoon. The station, ExtraNews, said the ship was moving at a speed of 1.5 knots.
“Admiral Osama Rabie, the Chairman of the Suez Canal Authority (SCA), announces the resumption of maritime traffic in the Suez Canal after the Authority successfully rescues and floats the giant Panamanian container ship EVER GIVEN,” a statement from the SCA said.
“She’s free,” an official involved in the salvage operation said.
After dredging and excavation work over the weekend, rescue workers from the SCA and a team from Dutch firm Smit Salvage had succeeded in partially refloating the ship earlier on Monday using tug boats.
“The time pressure to complete this operation was evident and unprecedented,” said Peter Berdowski, CEO of Smit Salvage owner Boskalis after the Ever Given was refloated.
The company said approximately 30,000 cubic metres of sand was dredged to refloat the 224,000-ton container ship and a total of 11 tugs and two powerful sea tugs were used to pull the ship off.
Evergreen Line, which is leasing the Ever Given, confirmed the ship had been successfully refloated and said it would be repositioned in a lake that sits between two sections of the canal and inspected for seaworthiness.
Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement (BSM), the technical managers of the container ship, said there were no reports of pollution or cargo damage, and initial reports ruled out any mechanical or engine failure as a cause of the grounding.
At least 369 vessels are waiting to transit the canal, including dozens of container ships, bulk carriers, oil tankers and liquefied natural gas (LNG) or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) vessels, the SCA’s Rabie said.
Egypt’s Nile TV reported that more than 400 ships were waiting to pass through.
The authority said earlier it would be able to accelerate convoys through the canal once the Ever Given was freed. “We will not waste one second,” Rabie told Egyptian state television.
He said it could take up to three days to clear the backlog, and a canal source said more than 100 ships would be able to enter the channel daily. Shipping group Maersk said the knock-on disruptions to global shipping could take weeks or months to unravel.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who had not publicly commented on the blockage, said Egypt had ended the crisis and assured resumption of trade through the canal.
Oil prices were more than 1 percent lower at US$63.85 a barrel after the ship was refloated.
Shares of Taiwan-listed Evergreen Marine Corp – the vessel’s lessor – closed 1.75% higher after the ship was partially refloated earlier on Monday.
About 15 per cent of world shipping traffic transits the Suez Canal, which is an important source of foreign currency revenue for Egypt. The stoppage was costing the canal US$14-15 million a day.
Shipping rates for oil product tankers nearly doubled after the ship became stranded, and the blockage has disrupted global supply chains, threatening costly delays for companies already dealing with Covid-19 restrictions.
Maersk was among shippers rerouting cargoes around the Cape of Good Hope, adding up to two weeks to journeys and extra fuel costs.
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2021-03-29 15:26:59Z
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