February 16:
China-Russia bilateral trade fell 42 percent year-on-year in January 2009 Russia's trade representative to China Sergei Tsyplakov has said in comments carried by Russia’s Interfax News Agency. Russian exports to China fell 55.9 percent and Chinese exports dropped 27 percent. "It is alarming to witness such a drastic fall in trade for the first time in the past seven or eight years. The prevention of protectionism between Russia and China is important," Tsyplakov said.
February 17:
U.S. Admiral Timothy J. Keating, commander of the U.S. Pacific Command, has said he hopes “China dispatch of warships to the Gulf of Aden” will lead to closer “cooperation with the Chinese side” and “will become a springboard for resuming U.S.-China military exchanges." Beijing, still protesting Washington’s sale of $6.5 billion in military equipment to Taiwan, cancelled several military exchange activities and cooperation projects. Although the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has yet to resume military-to-military dialogue with the U.S. Army the Beijing-leaning, Hong Kong-based Wen Wei Po newspaper notes improvement in cooperation in the Gulf of Aden, Beijing’s permission for the Hong Kong port call of US aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis, and President Hu Jintao's suggestion that Beijing and Taipei carry out military exchanges and “explore the establishment of a military-security mutual-trust mechanism.” Taken together the newspaper suggests that these indicators “show that the Chinese military is still showing good faith in resuming bilateral military exchanges.”
February 19:
Russia’s Interfax News Agency reports that China’s economic slowdown has had a deleterious impact on the country’s oil refining sector. Weak demand and falling downstream prices, especially in the diesel market, have caused China’s small-scale and local oil refineries to lower operating rates to less than 23 percent of total capacity. Many small-scale and local refineries are suffering sustained losses on sales of oil. For the remainder of the month Guangdong’s refineries are being forced to suspend 600,000 tons of production capacity and Shandong will have 12.5 million tons of idle production capacity. To cope with excess capacity China National Petroleum Corp. is planning to build depots capable of storing 40 million cubic meters of commercial crude oil.
February 23:
Excess coal supply and mining capacity have caused prices at Qinhuangdao Port, China's largest coal trans-shipment port, to decline sharply this month. China’s Coal Transportation and Development Association reports that stockpiles at the port grew by more than 2 million tons since February 1. Russia’s Interfax News Agency predicts that China’s coal prices might continue to drop in the coming weeks.
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