The 11 projects and programmes, with a total value of USD 392.86 million, were approved at a three-day meeting of the fund's board in Cairo that concluded on Monday.

The Mongolian project, called Renewable Energy Programme #1 – Solar, involves the financing of a 10-MW solar park in Sumber soum of Govisumber province, southern Mongolia. The funding proposal comes from KhasBank LLC.

According to GCF documents, the plant will supply about 15,400 MWh of electricity and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 12,270 tonnes per year. Mongolia has a goal of supplying 20% of its energy through renewables by 2020 and 30% by 2030 under its Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC), these being linked to its Paris Climate Accord commitments.

Copper for delivery in December jumped over 3% from yesterday’s close to 3.05 a pound ($6,724 a tonne) in midday trade. Last month copper touched a three-year high just shy of $3.18 a pound (more than $7,000 a tonne) and year to date gains are in excess of 20%.

Chile accounts for nearly 30% of the world’s copper output and some of the world’s biggest mines are located near the city of Calama in the Antofagasta region where the 5.4 magnitude earthquake occurred.

State-owned giant Codelco which operates the Radomiro Tomic and Ministro Hales mines in the region and London-listed Antofagasta, owner of the Centinela mine reported no significant damage to property or injuries and the mines were operating normally.

Chilean production declined by 9% or 245,000 tonnes during the first half of the year due to an extended strike at the BHP-operated Escondida mine, the world’s largest copper operation, and lower output from Codelco mines according to the International Copper Study Group.

Utoikamanu congratulated the Ambassador-at-Large E.Odbayar on their initiatives and hard work in the last five years and on becoming an independent inter-governmental organization.

After emphasizing ITTLLDC’s effort in involving LLDCs in the multilateral agreement on establishing the organization, the High Representative expressed her gratitude towards ITTLLDC for conducting international-level researches for LLDCs on overcoming their difficulties.

Also, she expressed that the High Representative’s Office is ready to cooperate with ITTLLDC on overcoming the transitional period of becoming an independent inter-governmental organization effectively and in a short time, and providing financial support to conducting joint researches and organizing events.

Ambassador-at-Large E.Odbayar congratulated Fekitamoeloa Utoikamanu on her appointment as the Deputy Secretary General of the UN and High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States, and presented ITTLLDC’s works in details, handing out the five researches conducted by ITTLLDC in 2017.

Also, Ambassador-at-Large expressed his interest in jointly presenting ITTLLDC’s studies focused on LLCDs with High Representative’s Office at international events and developing mutually beneficial cooperation.

At the end of the meeting, the sides agreed on co-organizing opening conference of ITTLLDC, which is expected to take place in Ulaanbaatar in 2018, and opportunities for organizing High Representative’s official visit to Mongolia within the frames of the conference.

SAMI also confirmed the signing of the Kalashnikov deal with Russia to Reuters.

The agreement was one of the multitude announced by Moscow and Riyadh during King Salman’s visit to the Russian capital.

Among them was a preliminary deal to purchase S-400 air defense systems and receive “cutting edge technologies” from Russia, SAMI said as cited by Arab News.

The Russian contracts are “expected to play a pivotal role in the growth and development of the military and military systems industry in Saudi Arabia,” SAMI said in a statement.

AK-103 is an offshoot of the iconic AK-47 rifle, which was designed by Mikhail Kalashnikov back in 1947.

The AK-47 has been the standard issue assault rifle of the Soviet and then Russian Army since 1949.

Its durability, low production cost, availability and ease of use promoted the AK-47 to becoming the most circulated weapon in the world.

The militaries of more than 100 nations are armed with Kalashnikovs, with an estimated 100 million working AK-47s currently in circulation.

Besides Russia, the Kalashnikov rifles are being produced in more than 30 countries, including China, India, Poland, Ukraine and the US.

However, Kalashnikov Concern has been complaining on numerous occasions that their product is being copied without proper licensing by many foreign manufacturers.

The MSE ALL Index rose 00.41 percent to stand at 1076.29. The MSE market cap stands at MNT 2,078,528,353,028.57.

Agreeing with suggestions of the ambassador, Chairman of Hanoi’s People Committee said: “Hanoi is willing to offer support to foreign enterprises, including those from Mongolia, to coordinate with Hanoian partners”.
The host also wished that during his tenure, the ambassador would accelerate the effective cooperation activities between Hanoi and Ulan Bator as well as Vietnam and Mongolia. He suggested enhancing bilateral tourism and labor cooperation and expressed his belief that the ambassador would fulfill his assigned tasks to contribute to the developing bilateral ties.
Dash, for his part, vowed to do his best to lift bilateral cooperation on par with the two capitals’ potential.

According to parliamentarians, the 2017 budget revenue performance has surpassed by over MNT 900 billion and amendment is to be made in the budget to distribute the revenue of MNT430 billion.

Some MPs suggested to spend the money for raising salaries of teachers and doctors while Ch.Ulaan MP expressed his opposition to distribute the money.

“Budget adjustment should be made to improve budget indicators. However we are talking about distributing some extra money gained than expected, when the 2017 budget deficit reached MNT2.7 trillion which is the biggest deficit in history of Mongolia. We should consider it seriously,” he said.

As the first discussion of the budget adjustment bill concluded, the bill has been transferred to the second hearing.

The company will begin a comprehensive 3D seismic programme for BGP Inc., which will include additional 2D seismic focused on adjacent leads of the Tugrug Basin and a new basin in Block IV, Petro Matad said in a statement. It also expects to add further drillable prospects to its growing exploration portfolio.

The planned 218 square kilometre 3D survey will focus on defining and de-risking near term drilling targets within the Tugrug Basin which could contain over 3 billion barrels of oil in place and additional potential within stratigraphic traps, it said.

The Tugrug Basin has a proven working petroleum system confirmed with a stratigraphic core hole drilled by the Company in 2011 near the basin margin. The core-hole contained live, un-biodegraded oil in good quality sandstone reservoirs.

Petro Matad said the 3D survey will cover the key prospects and leads, which are part of the primary structural play fairway within the basin, identified on existing 2D seismic data. The survey is also expected to image a major stratigraphic play fairway, which has been proven in prolific petroleum producing plays in Africa, India and the Falkland Islands, to name a few. In addition, 150km of new 2D seismic data are also planned in the Tugrug Basin to better define other leads and prospects.

In addition, 204km of new 2D data is planned over the Khangai Basin in the northern part of Block IV. This survey aims to better define some attractive leads identified on regional 2D seismic gravity and magnetic surveys acquired in 2015. 

BGP has started mobilisation and expects to begin work on the blocks in late October 2017, Petro Matad said, adding that it expects the results of the survey to advance farmout discussions currently taking place.

The most remarkable piece, dating back more than 2000 years, is a bronze cauldron. During the excavation of a tomb at the site of Tsatsyn Ereg, archaeologists discovered the cauldron containing a wooden spoon.

According to the scientists, this object, dating from the second century BC, was buried near a human body, in a pit three-metres deep with a series of other artefacts. This would probably have been the burial site of a nomadic rider, many of whom crossed the Great Wall of China to sow terror among the Chinese peasantry.

The search of the contents of the cauldron will be carried out in a laboratory in order to clear the instrument and to try to discover the traces of any possible substance.

Funded by the Monaco Government since 2006, the Monaco-Mongolia joint missions, under the patronage of HSH Prince Albert and under the aegis of UNESCO, are carried out each summer by the teams of Jamyian-Ombo Gantulga, head of the Institute of Archeology of the Academy of Sciences of Mongolia, and Jérôme Magail of the Museum of Prehistoric Anthropology of Monaco.

The two teams cooperate on three sites in the Arkhangai province: Khunnu of Gol Mod, the Buddhist monastery of Zayan Khüree and the Bronze Age necropolis of Tsatsyn Ereg, on which a research and exhibition centre was built two years ago with the support of the Prince’s Government.

Elisabeth Gramaglia Gondeau, Honorary Consul of Mongolia in Monaco, has visited the site of Tsatsyn Ereg for the third time, which has just been inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List thanks to the work of the archaeologists.