On The Wind...
Suspicious Chinese ‘investment’ in Nauru, Cook Is‑flagged tanker accused of slicing undersea cables, and Fiji deckhand jailed for five murders at sea.
Billion dollar Nauru scam?
Is a Chinese corporation buying the world’s smallest republic, or is Nauru being scammed - again?
On 11 August the Nauru Government Facebook page announced its Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Lionel Aingimea, had signed a AU$1 billion investment deal with the “China Rural Revitalisation and Development Corporation”. The deal was sealed with a signing deal in Beijing with the CRRDC’s chairman Zhang Yong (dressed rather casually for such a deal) and Aingimea. A simple problem: the corporation does not exist.
The Nauru Government statement:
“The estimated $3-5 billion-yuan (US$411-683 million) proposal further cements economic injection for Nauru’s socio-economic development….
The Phase 1 Project Proposal is the first of a 3-phase step with each phase focusing on developing key sectors in Nauru - renewable energy, the phosphate industry, marine fisheries and sea infrastructure, water resource and environmental system, modern agriculture systems, eco-tourism, green transport system, health and cultural exchange platforms.”
The statement says a CRRDC team will arrive in Nauru in October, to engage with key local ministries and stakeholders for the development of a successful road-map guideline.
CRRDC has no official websites and has not made it into any news streams. It exists only in a single Nauru Government press statement. There’s no formal body dubbed the “Rural Revitalisation and Development Corporation” on official lists.
A “China Rural Revitalization Development Center” and other similar named groups do exist, focused on rural revitalisation in China itself. It is possible, of course, that an internal Chinese organisation has been tasked and armed with money to restore Nauru. But there are warning red flags around this, especially as no other announcement or new story refers to this. Without more documentation—like corporate registry listings, official press releases in Chinese media, or government confirmations—it remains an oddity, not necessarily a bona fide, longstanding institution.
The charitable explanation is a badly worded press release or a naming error. A darker possibility is misinformation or a communications breach (Nauru’s site and Facebook have been targeted before). And there's history: some years back the Nauru Agency Corporation, a government body, had 450 banks registered to its single mail box. Most of them turned out to be Russian Mafia owned. Nothing is ever quite what it seems in Nauru.
Meanwhile, as Nauru issues questionable restoration statements, it is also further strip mining what is remaining of its 21 sq km island. The government announced a bulk carrier, Taihua Star, was loading 24,145 tonnes of phosphate for Tasmania, sold via a South Korean company:
“This is the sixth shipment organised by Samsung C and T corporation, a major global player in sourcing and trading fertilisers evolving to meet demands in future trends in agriculture and clean energy.”
Homepage photo: Zhang Yong and Lionel Aingimea signing… what?
A Quote…
“I don't want us to go back to the colonial era where people are telling you how you need to live your life, as a sovereign country we have the right to make the decision. Cook Islands secretary of culture Emile Kairua in an interview with DW German TV.
Cook Islands tanker in Finnish court
Membership of Vladimir Putin’ dark fleet is continuing to get the Cook Islands into international strife.
While Maritime Cook Islands continues to sell the Cook Islands flag to aging oil tankers, the captain and two officers of the Cook’s flagged Eagle S now face charges over its cutting Baltic Sea undersea cables last December.
This comes as a new public listing reveals the Cook Islands, always willing to get into a corrupt business, has its flag flying off the sterns of 27 internationally sanctioned oil tankers. Most of them are carrying Putin’s cargo.
Reuters quoted Finland's national prosecutor's office said the officers from Eagle S, Georgian and Indian nationals, suspected of aggravated criminal mischief and aggravated interference with communications by dragging the ship's anchor for around 90 km across the seabed.
The defendants, who are not permitted to leave Finland, have denied committing the offences and consider that Finland also lacks jurisdiction in the case as the incident took place outside Finnish territorial waters, it said.
Finnish authorities have said the Cook Islands-registered Eagle S broke the Estlink 2 undersea power cable connecting Finland and Estonia as well as four internet lines.
"The owners of the cables have suffered a total of at least 60 million euros ($70 million) in immediate damage in the form of repair costs alone," the prosecutors' office said.
A lawyer for United Arab Emirates-based Caravella LLC FZ, the owner of the Eagle S, has previously said Helsinki lacked jurisdiction to intervene in the case.
The New York Times reported Eagle S was seized in late December by the Finnish authorities. They said at the time that the ship might belong to Russia’s so-called “shadow fleet,” a group of older tankers that covertly transport Russian crude oil around the world, raising concerns about a potential covert campaign to sabotage European infrastructure.
Not so far mentioned is the Cook Islands liability over the costs linked to Eagle S.
Meanwhile an authoritative marine website, Tankertrackers.com lists 1202 oil tankers that are operating despite a range of international sanctions imposed on them.
Sixty one of these tankers are flying the flag of Palau, the Cook Islands 27. Also in this dubious enterprise are the Marshall Islands with 10 and Vanuatu with six.
Surprisingly Tonga has sold its royal flag to three tankers. The surprise is that under King Taufa’ahau Tupou IV they had a disastrous earlier performance at the flag-of-convenience scam. From 2000 on it came apart when Tonga and the world learnt the major user for the Tongan flag was the terrorist group al-Qaeda. In its first two years three foreign-owned Tonga flagged ships were caught ferrying terrorists, weapons and explosives for al-Qaeda. Tonga’s behaviour so angered Washington that Nuku’alofa was required to deploy much of its Tonga Defence Force to Afghanistan where it served as a less than successful guard at Bagram Airfield.
From the Net…
Life imprisonment for deep sea killing
As reported earlier, Fiji’s deep sea horror began late at night on the stern of a tuna longliner as the crew hauled in the catch. One man heard a scream and looked back to see Tevita Qaqa Kapawale brandishing an axe, hacking at a fellow deckhand. Soon enough, five men were dead.
On 11 July, Justice Dane Tuiqereqere, sitting alone, found Kapawale, 32, guilty and on 12 August he was sentenced to life imprisonment.
FijiVillage said he had been given a minimum term of 26 years and 2 months.
Justice Tuiqereqere says Kapawale's actions will traumatise the families of the five victims he killed for the rest of their lives, as well as the two survivors.
FijiVillage said the court found that Kapawale murdered Alfat Kodri and Qiritavabea Cagilabakomeli by striking them with an axe and forced Benjamin Mattaputty, Eme Warma and Samuela Sukera to jump overboard.
The incident took place on 18 May, 2021, following a heated argument among the crew in the Mamanuca and Yasawa Waters.
While being escorted to the waiting vehicle, a handcuffed Kapawale tried to attack a journalist and a photographer as they were taking his photos and videos.
©Michael J Field
