Month: October 2020

Erdogan anger amid fossil fuel decline

Blog, Conflict, International, Uncategorized

Brussels 26.10.2020 Anna van Densky OPINION Recent President Erdogan verbal attacks on France have many reasons rooted in frustrations, not least is the economic difficulty of Turkey, experiencing sharp decline of demand of fossil fuels on world markets. Related to COVID-19 pandemic reduction of demand has dropped to record 30%, however the experts explain that the trend is here to stay. Before the pandemic broke out Turkey has been gaining strength as an energy corridor, supplying oil and gas to Europe from oil-rich suppliers of the region. However now, in so rapidly changing world, will Ankara be able to preserve its plans, or following the hydrocarbons definite decline of demand, it will face the economic consequences of end of fossil fuel era?

In the beginning of the pandemic, China’s economy slowed down, impacting fossil fuel demand, subsequently the OPEC tried to negotiate with Russia the limitations of production, but failed, the price struggle erupted between Saudi Arabia and Russia, and oil prices collapsed. Moreover, end October crude oil prices sank after Libya’s National Oil Corp (NOC) announced the output would reach one (1) million barrels per day in four weeks. Futures in New York fell 2.3% to drop below $39 a barrel.

In this volatile context Turkey will begin to discuss the new long-term energy contacts with a number of suppliers – Russia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Algeria and Nigeria, of total 45 billion cubic meters of gas. Three of them are covering one third of the energy imports – with Russia, Azerbaijan and Nigeria – will expire next year. The Turkish state-owned crude oil and natural gas pipelines and trading company BOTAŞ and Russian Gazprom had to negotiate delivery of 8 billion cubic meters of gas; the contract with Azerbaijan is covering 6.6 billion cubic meters of natural gas and with Nigeria for 1.3 billion cubic meters of LNG will – all of them expire in 2021.

Till present Russia remains the largest gas supplier to Turkey – 33.6% of total imports, followed by Azerbaijan 21.2% and Iran 17.1%. The rest 28.1% is covered by the liquefied gas (LNG) from other sources. However fossil fuel companies have entered the state of “terminal decline”, and fossil fuel companies are set to face it because of falling demand and higher investment risks caused by competition from clean technologies and tougher government climate and energy security targets, according to climate finance analysts, because of falling demand accelerated by COVID-19 pandemic, and higher investment risks explained by competition from clean technologies and strict government climate and energy security targets.

In this contemporary context the belligerent rhetoric of Erdogan against President of France, reflects tensions in Turkish society, facing the economic crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic. The government has no plan B to answer to the fossil fuel decline impact of the economy. According to official figures Turkey’s unemployment rate improved slightly to 12.8% in April despite the raging pandemic, while the alternative calculations indicate that more than 50% were jobless. These figures might grow sharply while fossil fuels demand is declining, and plans of President Erdogan to create Turkish energy hub became dim.

The exaltation of the crisis of the relations between Turkey and France did not come as a surprise: France had systematically criticised Turkey’s role in Syria and Libya, and nowadays the unfolding conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, defending human rights of the Armenian inhabitants there. This recent conflict has added to the other tactics of President Erdogan to deviate the attention of his compatriots from gravity of economic situation in Turkey to various conflicts and crisis he stirs in outside world.
But not only, the active Ankara political support of Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabach conflict, will certainly reflect on energy talks of next year expired contracts, the moment when Erdogan will attempt to convert his political influence into preferences and privileges enshrined in new energy energy agreements with Russia and Azerbaijan, allowing Turkey better gains from gas and oil transit.

Brussels at eve of II lockdown

Blog, EU, Europe

Brussels 18.10.2020 The sector of hospitality is in total disappointment, injustice, disaster, shock. The sector does not have strong enough words to describe the measure taken by the Concertation Committee: the closure of all restaurants and cafes in the country as of Monday, October 19 for a period of four weeks. “We were prepared to accept interim measures like a 11 p.m. shutdown, or even 10 p.m. if necessary”, but the authorities were not open to negotiations, said Thierry Neyens, president of the Wallonia Horeca Federation.

Brussels, rue de Marché aux Fromages, 18 October 2020

A new closure of the Horeca has been a decision received with tears, a real blow to the hospitality sector, facing the second lockdown in the atmosphere of the financial uncertainty dominates. However nobody knows if the shutdown will actually last for a month or more. There is also uncertainty over the amount of aid promised by governments.

Brussels, Parc d’Egmont, 18 October 2020

“It’s a cleaver, it’s a misunderstanding, it’s very painful to hear. The entire sector has reacted on social networks. We believe we are being sacrificed, punished. We have a lack of prospects. There is a I think there is even a little disrespect for an entire sector which has made a lot of effort, ” underlined  Thierry Neyens.

Brussels, Grand Sablon, 18 October 2020

Following the Concertation Committee on Friday, October 16, a curfew was declared by the federal government. As of Monday, October 19, it will be forbidden to leave your home between midnight and 5 a.m.

The Horeca represents more than 60,000 companies in Belgium.

Brussels, Grand Place neighbourhood, 18 October 2020

The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Belgium since the declaration of the pandemic by WHO in March now stands at 213,115. The total reflects all people in Belgium who have been infected, and includes confirmed active cases as well as patients who have since recovered, or died.

Brussels, Grand Place, 18 October 2018

During curfew, take-out food orders can be made until 10 p.m. in restaurants. Some establishments have the option of transforming into a catering service. A solution to try to cover the fixed costs, but many will keep their doors closed.

Brussels, Grand Place, 18 October 2020

Meanwhile in Sweden the government wishes to exempt restaurants, bars and cafés from the specific rules for public events, the Culture Minister Amanda Lind announced at the press conference. The exemption for bars and restaurants came into effect on October 8th. After this date, restaurants were no longer a subject to the 50-person limit in case they host events, but they should continue to comply with the existing restrictions for restaurants including table service only and a one-metre distance between groups of people, the Local reports.

Brussels, rue Royale, 18 October 2020

#COVID19: Scientists against lockdown

Africa, Blog, Human rights, World

Brussels 16.10.2020 REVIEW: From October 1-4, 2020, the American Institute for Economic Research hosted a remarkable meeting of top epidemiologists, economists, and journalists, to discuss the global emergency created by the unprecedented use of state compulsion in the management of the Covid-19 pandemic. The result is The Great Barrington Declaration, which urges a “Focused Protection” strategy. (Image above: EU Council 15-16 October, Brussels).

DECLARATION:
he Great Barrington Declaration – As infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists we have grave concerns about the damaging physical and mental health impacts of the prevailing COVID-19 policies, and recommend an approach we call Focused Protection.

Coming from both the left and right, and around the world, we have devoted our careers to protecting people. Current lockdown policies are producing devastating effects on short and long-term public health. The results (to name a few) include lower childhood vaccination rates, worsening cardiovascular disease outcomes, fewer cancer screenings and deteriorating mental health – leading to greater excess mortality in years to come, with the working class and younger members of society carrying the heaviest burden. Keeping students out of school is a grave injustice.

Keeping these measures in place until a vaccine is available will cause irreparable damage, with the underprivileged disproportionately harmed.

Fortunately, our understanding of the virus is growing. We know that vulnerability to death from COVID-19 is more than a thousand-fold higher in the old and infirm than the young. Indeed, for children, COVID-19 is less dangerous than many other harms, including influenza.

As immunity builds in the population, the risk of infection to all – including the vulnerable – falls. We know that all populations will eventually reach herd immunity – i.e. the point at which the rate of new infections is stable – and that this can be assisted by (but is not dependent upon) a vaccine. Our goal should therefore be to minimize mortality and social harm until we reach herd immunity.

The most compassionate approach that balances the risks and benefits of reaching herd immunity, is to allow those who are at minimal risk of death to live their lives normally to build up immunity to the virus through natural infection, while better protecting those who are at highest risk. We call this Focused Protection… (Full text on the site: https://gbdeclaration.org )

Curfew against virus

Blog, EU, Europe, Human rights, Politics

Brussels 14.10.2020 Tonight the speech of President Macron is awaited in many EU capitals: will he apply method of curfew as a tool of defeating COVID-19 pandemic also in the Hexagone? Neighbouring Belgium has already imposed this drastic measure from 14 October in some provinces.

Several French media evoked the possibility of curfews in the most affected territories of the V-th Republic, the strategy promoted by the president of the National Academy of Medicine, the former Minister of Health Jean-François Mattéi.

The curfew option is also being considered by the Covid-19 Scientific Council in an alert note dated September 22. The body chaired by Jean-François Delfraissy recalls that a curfew has notably been introduced in Guyana, where Jean Castex went shortly after his appointment to Matignon.

At this stage of the epidemic, the Scientific Council does not envisage proposing the option (of a curfew) at the national level, but cannot exclude its use in certain metropolitan areas and of course in the event of deterioration. later ”, the text of this note reads, which mentions curfews for a period of a fortnight.

On Monday, October 12, referring to a “very difficult” situation facing the “reality of a second epidemic wave”, the Prime Minister, Jean Castex, did not rule out the new period of re-confinement in the country where the health crisis will last according to him several more months. (However the World Bank in its documents mentions 15 month of the second wave).

“General re-confinement must be avoided by all means,” the head of government told France Info, referring to the “absolutely dramatic” consequences of such a drastic measure. “Nothing should be excluded when we see the situation in our hospitals,” he replied when asked about possible local.

The Scientific Council warns that the population’s support for such a measure would be “probably weak, with detrimental effects in terms of social cohesion and confidence” and indicates that its economic cost would be “all the greater as it occurs. after a first period of confinement and that it feeds negative economic expectations with potentially disastrous effects ”.

As in other European countries, France is facing a marked deterioration in health indicators this autumn. The threshold of 1,500 patients treated in intensive care for a Covid-19 infection was crossed again on Monday for the first time since May 27.

One of the leading world experts in virology Professor Didier Raoult initially regretted “the global state of nervous crisis in which the country is dived”, while invited by CNews to comment on certain measures taken by political authorities in regions of France to slow the spread of Covid-19.

“It is beyond reason and understanding,” he proclaims. “This leads to adopting strategies that put more health at risk.”

#TBT: BRAFA Art Fair

Europe, Lifestyle

Brussels 1.10.2020 In the evening of the first day of October a sad for the art lovers news came – the cancellation of the Brussels Fine Art Fair 2021 due to volatile COVID-19 pandemic context. (Images: @AnnaVanDensky)

The members of the non-profit organisation (organiser of the BRAFA Art Fair) held an Extraordinary General Meeting during which they decided to postpone the event to 2022.

The first ever BRAFA was held in the Arlequin Hall of the Galerie Louiza in 1956. Charles Van Hove and Mamy Wouters, the long standing President and Vice-President of the Belgian Chamber of Antiques Dealers, were behind the initiative to set up the salon. This first Belgian Antiques Fair or ‘Foire des Antiquaires de Belgique’, as it was known then, followed in the footsteps of the fairs already held at Grosvenor House in London and at the Prinsenhof in Delft, but preceded those set up in Paris, Florence and Munich.

The growing success of the fair and the increasing number of participants meant that a location had to be found capable of keeping up with the event’s development. The range of art objects on display also continued to expand. From 1967 to 2003, the fair was held in the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels. Up until 1994, only Belgian antiques dealers who were members of the Royal Chamber of Antique Dealers could take part in the fair which was, at the time, a purely national event. The number of participants fluctuated between forty and fifty.

The first major change occurred in 1995 when Christian de Bruyn opened the fair to foreign antique dealers for the first time. The Belgian antique dealers saw this as a revolutionary step and they were right; in no time the fair had outgrown the Palais des Beaux-Arts and a new, much bigger location had to be found. In 2004 the Belgian Antiques Fair therefore moved to Tour & Taxis, a gem of Belgian industrial architectural heritage situated in the north of Brussels, next to the Willebroek canal. Now that exhibition space was no longer restricted, the BRAFA actively sought to increase the number of participants. Having started with no more than twenty Belgian antique dealers it grew to incorporate about one hundred and thirty exhibitors from both Belgium and abroad in the space of a few years. The fair is now recognized worldwide as one of the leading international fairs in Europe.

BRAFA, or the Brussels Art Fair, is one of the longest running art and antiques fairs in the world and is organized every year by the nonprofit Belgian Antiques Fair Association.

The uncertainty created by the coronavirus pandemic in Europe is the main reason for the postponement. BRAFA, which is traditionally the first top international fine art fair of the year, showcases 130 exhibitors on average, of which two thirds come from abroad.

Last year, the fair welcomed a record number of 68,000 visitors, collectors and professionals, including a significant number from neighbouring countries. The current health situation and its potential evolution this autumn and winter have caused serious concerns. New restrictions on intra-European travel related to coronavirus pandemic and the safety measures imposed by the authorities have only added to the fear of the organisers.