Prime Minister sets up council of national brands www.montsame.mn

Oyu Tolgoi Board Of Directors appoints Armando Torres as Chief Executive Officer www.ot.mn

Oyu Tolgoi has announced the appointment of Armando Torres as Chief Executive Officer of Oyu Tolgoi LLC.

Euro strengthens as 'pro-business' Macron wins French presidency www.bbc.com

The euro has risen after pro-EU Emmanuel Macron won France's presidential vote by a large margin.
The single currency strengthened 0.2% against the dollar as investors were reassured over the future stability of the European project.
The reaction was muted, however, as investors were expecting Mr Macron, a former investment banker and an economic liberal, to prevail.
He has proposed cutting corporation tax and changes to the labour market.
"Voters elected for Emmanuel Macron's pro-business policy proposals, which have the potential to unlock long-held-back investment and stimulate French markets," said Stephen Mitchell at London-based fund manager, Jupiter Asset Management.
His opponent in the race for the presidency, Marine Le Pen, is a critic of globalisation and had proposed withdrawing France from the single currency.

Bayan Khundii, Mongolia: 131.5m grading 3.86g/t Au from 39m depth (BKD-98) www.mining-journal.com

The first results from Erdene Resource Development’s (CN:ERD) 2017 drilling at Bayan Khundii in southwest Mongolia have carried on from where the previous year’s programme left off.

Delta Air Lines kicks US family off flight after row over toddler www.bbc.com

US airline Delta is facing a public-relations problem after a family claimed they were kicked off a flight for refusing to give up a child's seat.
"This is a federal offence and then you and your wife will be in jail and your kids will be in foster care," a crew member can be heard telling the family.
A YouTube video of the incident has clocked up more than two million views.
Delta said it was "sorry for the unfortunate experience" and would compensate the family.
The incident follows the case of passenger Dr David Dao, who grabbed global headlines when he was injured while being physically removed from a United Airlines flight last month.
He settled in court last month for an undisclosed sum.

The latest incident happened on a flight from Maui in Hawaii to Los Angeles on 23 April, but only came to light when the video was posted online.
The eight-minute video shows Brian Schear arguing that he has paid for the seat, while crew members try to convince him to give up the seat, on a flight Mr Schear claims was overbooked.
Mr Schear said he had originally booked the seat for his older son, who had taken an earlier flight to make sure one of his other children would have a seat.
One crew member initially told him that his other son owned the seat so the toddler could not sit there.
His two-year-old was sitting in a child safety seat, which crew members then claimed was banned under Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regulations and said the child would have to sit in an adult's lap.
That is at odds with Delta's published advice, which says that for children under two years "we recommend you purchase a seat on the aircraft and use an approved child safety seat". The company's advice says an infant under two may be held in a parent's lap if they choose.
The FAA's website also "strongly urges" parents to put young children in a safety device in their own seat.
An airline employee then told Mr Schear "the plane is not going to move... we can all sit here all night if that's what you guys want to do".
Despite Mr Schear later relenting and agreeing to hold the child, the crew member tells him the family was being removed from the plane because "it's come too far".
When he responds that there is nowhere for his family, including two infants, to go and no more flights, the crew member can be heard saying: "You guys are on your own."

The family eventually left the flight, and Mr Schear said their seats were filled by four other passengers waiting with tickets.
Later, he told CBS News: "The bottom line is, they oversold the flight."
His wife, Brittany, who recorded the video, told NBC News that she was upset they were threatened with prison.
"When you're a mother and you have your one-year-old and your two-year-old and they threaten to take your kids away from you, I mean whether that's possible or whether that's, you know against the law, it just, it made my heart drop," she said.
On Thursday evening, a day after the video was posted, Delta released a statement about the incident.
"We are sorry for the unfortunate experience our customers had with Delta, and we've reached out to them to refund their travel and provide additional compensation," the company said.
"Delta's goal is to always work with customers in an attempt to find solutions to their travel issues. That did not happen in this case and we apologise."

MPRP names Chairman N.Enkhbayar as presidential candidate www.montsame.mn

Ulaanbaatar /MONTSAME/ In connection to the ongoing nomination of presidential candidates, Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party held its convention today, May 4 at its headquarters.

Political trust will help Sino-Mongolian ties www.english.sina.com

Paradoxes abound along route of Belt, Road

In Beijing, you beg for the wind to start, here, in Erenhot, you beg for the wind to stop.
Bordering Mongolia, Erenhot in North China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region is located 700 kilometers north of Beijing. A recent visit to the city brought me messages from the North.
"Mongolia is a brutal and green force, if you plant genetically modified food, they send you to jail."
"Mongolia has no industrial exports, all it has is meat."
"Most Mongolians are quite friendly toward Chinese people, but there are those who treat Chinese otherwise."
These messages came from border people who frequently had social and economic interactions with Mongolians, and the proximity to these sources makes Erenhot a perfect place to contemplate the progress of and impediments to the China-Mongolia-Russia economic corridor, a key component of the China-proposed "One Belt and One Road" (B&R) initiative.
Officially called the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, the B&R initiative was proposed in 2013.
To be sure, there are some paradoxes. Take the transportation sector, for example. On the one hand, China, Mongolia and Russia are jointly experimenting with an overland route to be serviced by freight trucks crossing the borders and delivering goods to clients in all three countries.
On the other, seasoned transportation operators at Erenhot said they just dump their goods onto Mongolian trucks waiting at the border and skip the rest of the journey, because years ago they were harassed by some Mongolians to such an extent that they now avoid the business.
The railway is an even more appropriate example. On the one hand, Mongolia has expressed its willingness to attract more CHINA RAILWAY Express [freight] services to traverse its territory by offering a discounted access fee, according to a document seen by the Global Times.
On the other hand, traders who had actually used the Mongolian railway system sharply criticized its outdated infrastructure and low efficiency. "[In transportation], the Mongolian section has become a bottleneck for the China-Mongolia-Russia economic corridor," said one.
It leaves one wondering: Why is it that even as Chinese-funded railways have flourished from the plateaus of Ethiopia to the savannah of Kenya, a China-related railway infrastructure project in Mongolia is largely ignored?
The matter is at root one of political distrust. Just as Mongolians adamantly defend their traditional, self-sufficient, nomadic lifestyle against globalization and modernization, some Mongolians are also carefully evading the influence of a rising China.
While the two sentiments are understandable, albeit for different reasons, neither is likely to survive.
Many Mongolians visiting Erenhot said that they just feel like visiting a relative's home, and it is based on this cordial relationship of trust that border trade has prospered.
It is undeniable that the Mongolian economy is closely related to China's and Russia's. The effect of a third country, such as Japan, is very limited.
How Mongolia ended in a bust from a boom and it solved its recent debt woes are to a large extent related to its attitude toward China.
On the state level, maybe something can be learned. Only when there is mutual trust, can the bonds of the Silk Road Economic Belt truly link the two complementary economies.

Mongolia opposition taps former judo star as presidential candidate www.reuters.com

Mongolia's opposition Democratic Party on Thursday tapped former judo star and self-made millionaire Khaltmaa Battulga as its candidate in next month's presidential election in the landlocked country which is facing economic crisis.

Russia to resume wheat exports to Turkey, Ankara told to keep tomatoes www.rt.com

Ankara has withdrawn a 130 percent tariff on Russian grain following the meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Sochi.

China-made C919 no challenge to Boeing, Airbus dominance www.chinadaily.com

BEIJING - While the much-awaited first Chinese-built passenger jet C919 is ready to make its maiden flight Friday, it may take much longer for the newcomer to take off in the aviation market.

Shaking the dominance of aviation giants Boeing and Airbus in the near future is unrealistic, observers say, but the Chinese jetliner could be a strong option for global carriers in decades to come.

Scheduled to depart from Shanghai Pudong International Airport on May 5, the C919, with 158 seats and a standard range of 4,075 kilometers, is expected to compete with the updated Airbus 320 and Boeing's new generation 737.

A total of 23 foreign and domestic customers, including China's national carrier Air China and leasing company GE Capital Aviation Service, have placed orders for 570 aircraft, according to the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC).

But this is only the very first step. Even in China's domestic market, COMAC has a long way to go to turn technical success into business success.

Currently, Chinese airlines seem to be more keen to spend money on wide-body aircraft to enhance their global routes with rising enthusiasm for overseas travel. Those jets are still the exclusive province of Boeing and Airbus.

China Eastern Airlines signed contracts in 2016 to buy 20 A350-900 aircraft from Airbus and 15 B787-9 aircraft from Boeing to be delivered between 2018 and 2022.

China Southern Airlines announced in April that it will buy 20 A350-900 with a total catalog price of nearly $6 billion.

Boeing and Airbus are very mature aircraft manufacturers, and COMAC should seek further cooperation with them to learn from their experiences, according to aviation analysts.

But looking ahead, single-aisle planes like C919 will be the market mainstream and COMAC should do well in the Chinese market, one of the most competitive.

Boeing predicted last year that China will become the world's top aviation market within 20 years, projecting a demand for 6,810 new aircraft in the next two decades with a total value of $1 trillion.

China will need 5,110 new single-aisle airplanes through 2035, accounting for 75 percent of the total new deliveries, according to Boeing.

The C919 will be a strong competitor in this field being economical and comfortable, according to a research note from Guosen Securities.

If the maiden flight is successful, COMAC will seek airworthiness certificates from the Civil Aviation Administration of China and foreign aviation safety regulators before making its first deliveries.

Also, to pave way for C919 to enter foreign markets, the airworthiness certification of the jet will be a part of bilateral air safety agreement talks between China and the EU.

China has invested heavily in commercial passenger jet manufacturing. In 2007, plans to develop a domestic large passenger jet were approved by the State Council. In November 2015, the first C919 jet rolled off the assembly line.

The ARJ21, the country's first regional aircraft also produced by COMAC, began commercial operations in June 2016 following its maiden flight in 2008.