Day: July 1, 2018

A.Q. KHAN: NUCLEAR HERO TO PAKISTAN, VILLAIN TO WEST

To provide some background and context to the current nuclear and missile situation in Pakistan, North Korea and Iran one could do worse than read the Yahoo News article of 29^th June on AQ Khan, the “father of the Islamic bomb”.  It says that Pakistani atomic scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan, is hailed as a national hero for transforming his country into the world’s first Islamic nuclear power but regarded by the West as a dangerous renegade responsible for smuggling technology to rogue states.  He also found himself accused of illegally proliferating nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea. His crucial contribution to Pakistan’s nuclear programme was the procurement of a blueprint for uranium centrifuges, which transform uranium into weapons-grade fuel for nuclear fissile material.  He stole it from the Netherlands while working for Anglo-Dutch-German nuclear engineering consortium, Urenco, and brought it back to Pakistan in 1976, where the then prime minister put Khan in charge of the government’s nascent uranium enrichment project, and by 1978 his team had enriched uranium and by 1984 they were ready to detonate a nuclear device.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/q-khan-nuclear-hero-pakistan-villain-west-174331532.html

BELGIUM SUSPENDS 4 ARMS EXPORT LICENCES TO SAUDI ARABIA

On 30^th June, the Brussels Times reported that 4 export licences issued by the Walloon regional government for sales of weapons by FN Herstal to Saudi Arabia have been suspended.  It was said that the Walloon government had not carried out enough research into whether the arms in question would be used in a manner in keeping with Belgian law on arms exports., including whether they would be intended for use against their own or other people outside of self-defence.  The article says that in 2017 Walloon arms producers sold €153 million of goods.

http://www.brusselstimes.com/business/11781/council-of-state-suspends-arms-export-licences-to-saudi-arabia

INSIDE LONDON FAKE PASSPORT FACTORY ‘WHERE HUNDREDS OF COUNTERFEIT DOCUMENTS WERE SOLD ON’

On 1^st July, the Metro in London provided photographs of an alleged fake passport ‘factory’ in London used to supply hundreds of forged documents which has been raided by police.

https://metro.co.uk/2018/07/01/inside-fake-passport-factory-where-hundreds-of-counterfeit-documents-were-sold-on-7674303/

CANADA RETALIATORY TARIFFS ON US GOODS FROM KETCHUP TO LAWN MOWERS BEGIN

The Daily Mail on 1^st July reported that Canada has begun imposing tariffs on $12.6 billion in US goods as retaliation for the Trump administration’s new taxes on steel and aluminium imported to the US.  Some U.S. products, mostly steel and iron, face 25% tariffs, and other U.S. imports, from ketchup to pizza to dishwasher detergent, will face a 10% tariff at the Canadian border.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/ap/article-5906785/Canada-tariffs-US-goods-ketchup-lawn-mowers-begin.html

RECOMMENDED

A Reuters special report on 29^th June begins by saying that in January the Comoros Islands quietly cancelled a batch of its passports that foreigners had bought in recent years.  It published no details of its reasons, saying only that the documents had been improperly issued.  However, a list of the  recipients found that more than 100 of 155 people who had their Comoros passports cancelled in January were Iranians, and included senior executives of companies working in shipping, oil and gas, and foreign currency and precious metals – all sectors that have been targeted by international sanctions on Iran – and despite the fact that Iran does not formally allow the country’s citizens to hold a second passport.  Some had bought more than one Comoros passport.  None of the people or companies involved faced sanctions themselves.  The Comoros Islands began its programme to sell passports in 2008 as a way of raising much-needed income and arranged a deal with the UAE and Kuwait, who wanted to provide stateless inhabitants there known as the Bidoon with identity documents, but not local citizenship – however, later reports suggested that the programme was corrupted, with passports sold to persons outside the intended scope of the scheme.  Comoros was also forging ties with Iran at the time, a policy later changed.  The passports issued by the Comoros Islands were produced by a Belgian company called Semlex, which supplies identity documents to various African countries, and whose Brussels office was raided in January in connection with allegations involving DRC passports, then in May its offices in the Comoros was raided as part of the investigation into passport sales.

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/iran-passports-comoros/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=twitter

For the Reuters 2017 article on the DRC passports scandal, see –

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/congo-passports/

Irish law firm Matheson on 29^th June published an article explaining the term geo-blocking as meaning the practice of using territorial licensing restrictions in online and offline transactions of physical goods and the provision of electronic services.  In practice, it says, geo–blocking stops customers in one country from accessing websites in other countries through the use of factors such as location of IP addresses.  EU Regulation 2018/302/EU, the ‘Geo-blocking Regulation’, will apply across the EU from 3^rd December.  The article examines how the Regulation affects traders in the EU, which it says aims to provide the same opportunities to consumers and businesses transacting across the EU.  It also considers the possible effect of Brexit.

https://www.matheson.com/news-and-insights/article/what-the-new-geo-blocking-laws-mean-for-website-operators