China has filed a complaint against the Russian oil giant for not resuming oil shipments.

BEIJING, Oct. 31--China's state-owned oil conglomerate has filed a lawsuit seeking compensation from troubled Russian oil company Yukos for failing to fulfill its export contracts, state media said Sunday, AFP reported.
The China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) said it has sued the Russian oil giant for not resuming oil shipments which were suspended in September by October 20 as promised, the Beijing Youth Daily said.
The move followed repeated unsuccessful pleas by CNPC and a lack of indications from Yukos that it planned to honor its agreement, the paper quoted an unidentified CNPC official as saying.
"The lawsuit against Yukos completely conforms with commercial procedures because Yukos breached the contract, so the CNPC's filing of a lawsuit and its request for compensation are reasonable," the official said.
The report did not reveal the amount of compensation sought or when and where the lawsuit was filed.
Yukos had agreed to export 3.86 million tons of crude oil to CNPC this year, but so far only 2.85 million tons have been supplied, CNPC said.
Yukos, which has been locked in a year-long battle with the Russian government over payment of back taxes, had said it was no longer able to finance transport and other export costs.
The Russian government had promised that other Russian companies would maintain oil exports to its Asian neighbor, but several major oil companies have refused to pick up the slack.
China has said a "temporary suspension" in Russian exports would not have an impact on domestic oil supply.
Yukos's oil represents roughly seven percent of Chinese consumption.
CNPC has meanwhile taken measures to increase its crude oil imports from other border ports. Company officials could not be reached for comment Sunday.

SINGAPORE, Oct. 31--Singapore's bold move into the biomedical sciences industry five years ago is paying off handsomely, with several of the world's top scientists and pharmaceutical firms setting up base in the city-state, AFP reported.
Companies have invested millions of dollars in laboratories carrying out leading-edge research at the Biopolis, a futuristic, seven-building complex linked by skybridges located in the southwestern part of the island.
Officially opened last year, the 500-million-Singapore-dollar (301 million US) government-built complex is a symbol of Singapore's ambition to become among the world's leading centers for biomedical research.
Scientists working at the Biopolis include Scotland's Alan Colman, one of those who cloned Dolly the Sheep, and David Lane, a top British cancer researcher who now heads the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology. Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis in July opened a 122-million-US dollar research center at the high-tech complex dedicated to finding vaccines for tropical diseases.
All of Singapore's five public biomedical research institutes are also housed at the Biopolis, a move which officials say would facilitate greater interaction with the private sector researchers.
"This is really a dedicated biomedical sciences research complex," Beh Swan Gin, director for biomedical sciences at Singapore's Economic Development Board, told AFP. "What is unique about it is that by locating all the public research institutes here, it can provide a scientific anchor. It acts like a magnet so that all the companies will want to locate here."
Colman, now the chief scientific officer of stem cell therapy firm ES Cell International, agreed the set-up of a centralized location like the Biopolis was the ideal way for Singapore to overcome its lack of resources in the science sector.
Amid growing regional competition in its key electronics exports, Singapore moved to develop biomedical sciences as a new growth area in the all-important manufacturing sector. Singapore now has a thriving biomedical sciences industry boasting an international team of top-notch scientists and heavyweight pharmaceutical firms. Officials predict output from the biomedical sciences industry could be worth $12 billion by the end of this year, up from $11.3 billion in 2003, and one year ahead of the original schedule to achieve the target.

Jack Straw

LONDON, Oct. 31--British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw warned on Saturday that Britain's growing need for energy over the next decades has to be seen in a "changing context" due to declining production from the North Sea, IRNA reported.
"By 2020, we will probably be importing three-quarters of our primary energy needs--and we will need to adapt to that," he warned when launching his government's first-ever International Energy Strategy.
Straw's warning comes after the British Foreign Office identified energy security as being one of eight international priorities last December. The concern is that the country is no longer self-sufficient with oil and gas supplies from the UK's sector of the North Sea running out fast. The situation was underlined in July, when Britain recorded its first deficit in oil trade since 1991. The worry over gas was exemplified by the closure of the North Sea's
Frigg field on October 26 after one time supplying up to a third of the UK's domestic gas needs.
The UK's oil production has been in decline since production peaked at 2.8 million barrels per day in 1999. Although the current output of 2.1 m bpd is in line with the average of the past 20 years, it is predicted it could run dry within the next decade. According to the UK Offshore Operators' Association, the country will cease to be self-sufficient in 2007, production will drop to 1m bpd by 2010 and virtually end altogether five years later.
Of even greater concern is the situation of natural gas, where the UK is rapidly moving from a position from being a net exporter to a net importer. By 2010, it is expected to be importing around 50 percent of its gas. Like the rest of the EU, the dependency is expected to rise to 70 percent by 2020.
As part of the UK's International Energy Strategy, Straw announced that he would be tasking British ambassadors "in priority posts overseas" to take personal charge of implementing and delivering its objectives. "We will be developing with them individual Country Action Plans on energy and climate change. And we will be enhancing our posts' capacity on energy issues and making better use of our network of energy attaches," he said, underlining the importance being attached to the security of supplies.

KARACHI, Pakistan, Oct. 31--Pakistan's economy is likely to expand at over 6.0 percent this fiscal year but high world oil prices and water shortages threaten growth, the central bank said in its annual report released on Sunday, AFP reported.
Inflation is also expected to be a concern with the goal of bringing it down to below 5.0 percent from the current 9.0 percent unlikely to be achieved, the State Bank said.
Releasing its annual report for the 2003-2004 financial year that ended on June 30, the central bank did not specifically say whether the government's official target of 6.6 percent for the current year would be met. But it said growth momentum from the previous 12 months, in which the economy expanded by 6.4 percent, would generally continue and the forecast for the current financial year was an expansion of "over 6.0 percent".
"The risks to the fiscal year 2005 prospects emanate mainly from an exceptionally high escalation in oil prices that can adversely affect the current account and fiscal balance, putting pressure on exchange and interest rates," said the report, released on Saturday.
Pakistan has projected exports to reach a record $13 billion this year but the current account surplus risks falling into deficit on the back of a rising oil import bill, the central bank said. "As the country's oil import bill expands, it will turn the current account surplus into deficit and put pressure on the rupee," it said.
A domestic concern that could further worsen the economic growth targets is the growing water shortage.
Per capital water availability is declining due to the combined impact of rising population, falling water flows and erosion in the storage capacity.
"This exogenous shock can be amplified if the water shortages reduce wheat output and other crops and raise demand for imported fuel oil to generate electricity," it said.
The central bank said the risks posed by high oil prices and water shortages could be minimized if remittances from Pakistanis working overseas and the nation's exports continue to grow.

MADRID, Spain,
Oct. 31--Tourism, headed for the canvas in 2003 owing to SARS and the invasion of Iraq, is back on its feet and packing a punch after a stunning comeback this year according to the latest official figures, AFP reported.
The lucrative sector enjoyed double-digit growth almost across the board from January to August, according to the Madrid-based World Tourism Organization (WTO), which released its barometer report in Monaco.
"All regions saw a surge in international arrivals," said the report, which was unveiled by WTO Secretary-general Francesco Frangialli.
Asia and the Pacific led the way with 37 percent volume growth while North America ended three negative years to record a 12-percent rise, in line with the global average.
"Tourism has recovered strongly. The fear factor has clearly faded away," said Frangialli, who saluted the "continuing vigor of emerging markets such as China" as well as renewed strength in more established markets.
Yet globalization, almost by definition, strongly affects tourism, and while the WTO was exuding optimism others saw rain clouds approaching, such as the International Air Transport Association (IATA) which forecast crippling losses for airlines.
Frangialli himself alluded to the clouds in question by noting that "the world economy is performing well, notwithstanding concerns about the volatility of oil prices."
IATA director general Giovanni Bisignani said losses for global airlines may well exceed a 3.0-4.0 billion dollar forecast this year unless the price of a barrel descends from current record highs above $50.
And while global passenger traffic and cargo volumes have shown double-digit rises this year compared to 2003-"an exceptionally bad year" in Bisignani's words--oil prices hold the key to whether good times can keep on rolling for airlines and hence, the travel industry as a whole.
Airline analysts contacted by AFP said they agreed wholeheartedly with Bisignani's assertion that "the bottom line is worsening with the extraordinary price of fuel," particularly in the context of increased demand for long-haul travel.

MANILA, Philippines, Oct. 31--Poor contracts, a constitution which bans foreigners from owning real estate and shuts them out of certain industries, corruption at all levels, a biased court system, looming power cuts, an education system in decay and an impending fiscal crisis all add up to a poor investment environment in Philippines, AFP reported.
With government debts rising to 5.39 trillion pesos ($95.9 billion), or 137 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in 2003, the core budget for social services and infrastructure has shrunk to 2.65 percent of the gross national product last year compared to 6.17 percent in 1997.
Officials predict electricity demand will top available generating capacity sometime in 2008, but no new generating plants have been built for years.
The government would like to sell-off its debt ridden power assets but no one is showing much interest in them.
The shrinking social service and infrastructure budget is "seriously jeopardizing our capacity for growth that in turn produces our future revenues," said House of Representatives economic affairs committee chief Joey Salceda.
The budget crunch however is only one side of the issue, analysts say.
"The main issue at the moment confronting foreign investors is the question of sanctity of contracts on the one hand, the fear of government interference, the fear of shifting goalposts and the problems of overall policy directions," Manila-based business consultant Michael Clancy told AFP.
He said the Philippines compared "badly" with other Asian countries, because "over the last three years there's certainly been a lot of flip-flopping."
Clancy cited the airport terminal case, now under international arbitration, as the most famous example.
Built by a group led by Germany's Fraport AG, the 650-million-dollar new international terminal has been in mothballs for two years after President Gloria Arroyo tore up the contract, citing irregularities in the document's terms negotiated by her deposed predecessor Joseph Estrada.
Arroyo, who won a fresh six-year term in elections in May, has courted private sector help to defray the cost of building new roads, ports and other structures through build-operate-transfer and other franchising agreements.

BANGALORE, India, Oct. 31--As IT firms continue to swamp India's technology hub of Bangalore, the city is starting to choke under a heap of e-waste generated from obsolete computers and discarded electronic components, AFP reported.
"If we do not wake up now, in the next five years it will boomerang on us," said Bakul Rao, a consultant with the Environment Management and Policy Research Institute, a research body set up by Karnataka state's Pollution Control Board.
The institute says that next year about 1,000 tons of plastics, the same equivalent of iron, 300 tons of lead, 0.23 tons of mercury and 43 tons of nickel and 350 tons of copper will be generated as e-waste in Bangalore.
"This figure will increase by ten-fold in 2020 when Bangalore will generate one-third of the state's e-waste," Rao said.
Almitra Patel, an environmentalist and a member of the Supreme Court Committee for Solid Waste Management, said unscientific recycling was a part of the problem but lack of regulations for e-waste and its handling exacerbated the situation. "Import of e-waste, mainly from the US, under the garb of donations is adding to our woes. They basically dump obsolete computers in India," she said.
India is a signatory of the Basel Convention On The Transboundary Movements Of Hazardous Wastes And Their Disposal which came into force in 1992 and has been ratified by 159 countries. But the convention allows import of such waste from nations such as the United States which has not ratified the treaty.