Russia hits back at claims it supported rebels suspected of downing MH17

Source: theguardian

President Vladimir Putin and Russia's military top brass have attempted to strike back at accusations that they had supported the pro-Russian rebels suspected of shooting down Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over easternUkraine.

"We can say with confidence that if military actions hadn't been resumed in eastern Ukraine on 28 June, this tragedy probably wouldn't have happened," Putin said. "In addition, no one has the right and no one should use this tragedy to achieve selfish political goals."

The Kremlin also announced that the country's security council would meet on Tuesdayto discuss "maintaining the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Russian Federation". It was not clear whether Moscow meant to raise the issue of fighting near the Russian-Ukrainian border, which it said killed a Russian citizen earlier this month, or take steps to close the border to Russian volunteers and possibly weapons.

Officials and pro-Kremlin pundits have protested that the west is jumping to premature conclusions about the rebels' guilt and Russia's involvement. Meanwhile, the media has reported on a variety of theories, many of them since debunked, alleging that Ukrainian forces were trying to shoot down Putin's presidential jet or that the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 had been full of dead bodies.

Over the weekend, the defence ministry released 10 questions for the Ukrainian government which implied that Kiev was covering up evidence pointing to its own culpability. At a briefing on Monday, the defence ministry presented what it said was evidence suggesting that Ukrainian warplanes or air defence forces could be to blame, lambasted the west for "unfounded accusations" against Russia, and hinted at a possible conspiracy involving the United States.

Andrei Kartopolov, head of the military's main operations directorate, said the aircraft had deviated from its flight path. He showed Russian satellite images which he said revealed that "three to four divisions" of Buk missile launchers, the weapon widely suspected to be involved in downing the plane, had been deployed near Donetsk in eastern Ukraine. One Buk complex had been moved from Donetsk to near rebel-controlled areas right before the tragedy, he claimed.

"Why and against whom did Ukrainian forces deploy such a powerful air defence formation near Donetsk, since it's well known that the rebels don't have aviation?" Kartopolov said.

Kartopolov also argued that a Ukrainian fighter jet, "probably an Su-25", had been detected two to three miles away from the Malaysian plane before it went down. Igor Makushev, head of the air force general staff, showed a video of a radar screen in Rostov-on-Don that he said revealed an unidentified aircraft, probably a military plane, appearing in the area after the Boeing went down. "Earlier, Ukrainian authorities stated that on this day warplanes were not in the area of the incident. As you can see, that isn't true," Makushev said.

Kartopolov finished by calling on Washington to release satellite imagery proving the missile was fired from rebel-controlled territory, wondering if "it was accidental or not" that a US satellite was overhead at the time of the incident.

"I'd like to note that the information we've presented is based on objective and authentic data of different Russian monitoring systems, in contrast to the unfounded accusations against us," he said. "I want to stress that Russian Federation did not give the rebels Buk surface-to-air missiles, or any other weapons or military equipment."

Kiev, Washington and Nato have all argued that Russian weapons have come across the border into eastern Ukraine in recent months, including a large group of military vehicles this month.

China Imports Record Amount of Iranian Crude

       The WSJ reports, "China imported a record amount of crude oil from Iran in the first half of the year amid a loosening of U.S. sanctions, further increasing its reliance on Middle East oil supplies.

The increase came as the U.S. is trying to reach a new agreement with Iran over its nuclear program while still keeping pressure on Tehran. Last week, Iran agreed to new steps to contain its nuclear program in exchange for additional sanctions relief from the U.S. The two sides also extended negotiations for four more months.

Chinese customs data Monday showed that Iranian oil imports in the first six months of 2014 were 630,000 barrels a day, up 48% from the same period last year. That is the most crude China has ever imported from Iran in any first half in history, according to Li Li, head of research and analytics at consultancy ICIS C1 Energy. Iran represented about 10% of China's foreign crude purchases in the first half.

Maziar Hojjati, managing director of the China office of National Iranian Oil Co., or NIOC, said he believes the easing of U.S. sanctions has contributed to the surge in imports.

"The American government has put less pressure on the Chinese due to a deal between Iran and the West," Mr. Hojjati said. "There is an opportunity to export more to the Chinese market."

A spokesman at the U.S. embassy in Beijing referred questions to the U.S. State Department in Washington''.

Rising supply to pressure copper prices in 2014

 Supply growth is seen putting downward pressure on copper prices this year, but the falls are expected to be cushioned by steady demand for the metal used in power and construction as the global economy recovers, a Reuters poll showed.

Of the six base metals, nickel prices are expected to record the biggest percentage rise for the year, with the rest also seen posting gains in 2014 except copper and aluminium.

The average forecast for 2014 cash copper prices from 26 market participants surveyed over the last three weeks was $6,900.10 a tonne, down 6 percent from 2013 average prices, and not far from the previous prediction of $6,816.50 a tonne in a similar poll in April.

In 2015, prices are predicted to drop slightly to $6,889.40 a tonne, weighed by higher supplies.

The copper market is expected to be in a 226,000-tonne surplus by the end of 2014, compared with the previous poll's consensus of a 228,000-tonne surplus. The surplus is seen rising to 285,000 tonnes in 2015, up from a previous forecast of 262,000 tonnes.

"Copper mine supply is still expected to experience strong growth in 2014. As such, it would not surprise us for copper supply to cyclically recover from recent production setbacks," said Justin Lennon, analyst at Mitsui Bussan.

The economy of top copper consumer China grew by 7.5 percent between April and June from a year earlier, slightly above expectations and quickening from the 7.4 percent pace in the first quarter, reinforcing hopes that a recovery is under way after a flurry of government stimulus measures. [ID:nB9N0P602G]

A recent investigation into metal financing in China's Qingdao port had put pressure on prices, as investors worried that a clampdown could hit copper imports. The effects, however, were expected to be temporary, analysts said.

"There is a risk of a disruptive run-down of stocks being held off exchanges for financing deals. However, given the outlook for global interest rates, we suspect that these volumes will re-enter the market relatively gradually," said James Glenn, senior economist at National Australia Bank.

Aluminium is expected to post a surplus of 235,500 tonnes this year, up from a previous forecast of a 68,107-tonne surplus, but the market is seen tightening significantly in 2015 to show a 4,444-tonne deficit.

Low aluminium prices have prompted cutbacks from some producers, and aluminium stocks held in London Metal Exchange-registered warehouses are at their lowest since September 2012.

Cash aluminium is expected to average $1,825 per tonne in 2014, up 2 percent from previous forecasts, according to 25 analysts. The projected price is 1 percent lower than last year's average.

Source: Reuters

China's MMG a step closer to sealing $5.9 bln Las Bambas buy

 China's MMG Ltd <1208.HK> won unanimous approval from its shareholders on Monday to buy the Las Bambas copper project in Peru from Glencore Plc for $5.85 billion and sell more than half the output to MMG's majority owner.

The sale to a consortium led by MMG is expected to be completed by September pending final consents, boosting MMG's growth prospects and putting Glencore in a strong position to return capital to its shareholders.

Las Bambas, which is due to begin producing in 2015, is expected to produce 300,000 tonnes of copper a year over 20 years. Output is expected to be higher in the early years at more than 500,000 tonnes by 2016.

"We estimate Las Bambas would not only place MMG among the top 10 global copper producers (number one in Asia), it could also increase its net income multi-fold," Barclays analyst Ephrem Ravi said in a note in June.

MMG declined to comment on Monday on what further approvals were needed for the deal. Its CEO, Andrew Michelmore, said last week that funding arrangements were in place and the company was

"very close" to completing the acquisition.

MMG's parent, state-owned China Minmetals Corp, abstained from the vote on selling 57 percent of the mine's output to its subsidiary China Minmetals Non-ferrous Metals Company.

Source: Reuters

Zinc, aluminium at multi-month highs, copper steady

Zinc and aluminium prices hit their highest in more than a year as investors sought exposure to commodities with improved fundamentals, but gains in copper were held back by worries over China's property sector and over a build-up of stocks.

Investors are slowly being drawn back into commodities, attracted by stronger global economic growth and more volatility within sub-sectors, typified by current investment flows out of grains into industrial metals. 

"Investors are looking for commodities that have a good story behind them, especially those perceived to have improving fundamentals like zinc and aluminium, but copper is an outlier," said Nic Brown, head of commodities research at Natixis.

Three month aluminium on the London Metal Exchange was untraded in official midday rings but last bid up 1.26 percent to $2,006 a tonne, having hit a 16 month peak of $2,015 a tonne earlier, while zinc traded up 0.83 percent in rings to $2,312 a tonne, having hit a near three year high earlier of $2,345 a tonne.

Helping aluminium, LME stocks fell to 4.947 million tonnes, their lowest point since September 2012 . Also, cash aluminium traded at a discount of just $16.50 a tonne to the three month price , its narrowest since September 2012.

Daily average primary aluminium output excluding China fell to 67,000 tonnes in June, from 67,500 tonnes in May, data from the International Aluminium Institute (IAI) showed on Monday.
Zinc meanwhile continued to gain from falling production rates at large mines such as Century in Australia, with little in the way of giant new projects on the horizon. Also LME stocks are at their lowest since December 2010.

By contrast, the case to sell copper going forward is compelling.

Shanghai copper stocks rose 28.9 percent last week, LME stocks have risen since late June, while Comex copper stocks have climbed to eight-month peaks. 

"We are negative on copper. Our current forecasts anticipate copper surpluses of 225,000 tonnes in 2014, followed by 285,000 tonnes in 2015," said Brown.

Copper traded at $6,989 a tonne in official midday rings, up 0.06 percent from Friday's close but not far off this month's 3-week low of $6,960 a tonne.

China's imports of refined copper stood at 255,041 tonnes in June, down 8.16 percent from a year ago, data out earlier showed. China consumes some 40 percent of the world's copper.

Also a concern, some of the wealthiest Chinese are paring their property investments and turning to private equity or overseas holiday homes, a sign of fading hopes that the once red-hot market can bounce back any time soon.

Elsewhere, COMEX copper speculators boosted net 'long' or buy positions to their highest since at least 2006 in the week to July 15, according to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and Reuters data

"There is also likely to have been profit-taking (in copper) on the part of speculative financial investors after they had increased their net long positions considerably for the fourth straight week," said Commerzbank in a note.

In other metals, lead was last bid up 0.23 percent in rings at $2,192 a tonne, tin was last bid flat at $22,100 a tonne while nickel traded up 1.15 percent in rings at $18,875 a tonne.

Source: Reuters

Gold above $1,300/oz on lower shares, geopolitical concerns

 Gold rose above $1,300 an ounce on Monday as European shares weakened and political tensions simmered after the downing of a Malaysian airliner in eastern Ukraine last week and incessant fighting in Gaza.

Spot gold was up 0.5 percent at $1,317.10 an ounce by 1218 GMT, while U.S. gold futures for August delivery were up 0.6 percent at $1,317.70 an ounce.

Gold jumped 1.4 percent last Thursday as some investors sought protection against any drop in equities after news of the loss of the Malaysian passenger plane.

But participants quickly banked profits the following day, contributing to a 2 percent weekly fall in prices, the first weekly drop in seven.

Some in the market reckon the jet disaster could help to bring about a diplomatic solution to the worst crisis between Russia and the West since the Cold War.

However, reports that Ukrainian forces were moving into the eastern city of Donetsk added to concerns that the conflict may instead escalate further.

In the Middle East, Hamas's armed wing said on Sunday that it had captured an Israeli soldier as fighting in Gaza led to the highest losses in a military offensive that has lasted nearly two weeks, with 100 Palestinians and 13 Israeli soldiers killed.
"Today we are likely to remain in narrow range, with some buying coming in as traders watch the headlines on the geopolitical side," VTB Capital analyst Andrey Kryuchenkov said.

"Depending on the U.S. CPI data tomorrow, prices may test support at $1,295."

In wider markets, the dollar <.DXY> was up 0.1 percent against a basket of main currencies, while European shares fell and U.S. stock futures also edged lower.

The market will continue to monitor U.S. economic data after recent reports supported views that the world's largest economy is on a steady recovery path, suggesting that the Federal Reserve could raise U.S. interest rates sooner than expected.

In a measure of investor sentiment, holdings of the SPDR Gold Trust , the world's largest gold-backed exchange-traded fund, rose 1.8 tonnes to 805.14 tonnes on Friday.

Speculators, however, cut bullish bets on gold futures and options in the week to July 15 for the first time in six weeks as prices fell.

In other precious metals, palladium was up 0.6 percent at $882.25 an ounce on possible supply worries that could emanate from stricter sanctions on top producer Russia.

Platinum was up 0.8 percent at $1,493.20 an ounce. The world's biggest producer, Anglo American Platinum , said on Monday that it plans to sell its Union mine, Rustenburg operations and a South African joint venture in a widely expected move after a five-month strike.

Spot silver rose 1.1 percent to $21.05 an ounce.

Source: Reuters

WSJ: Israel Repels Hamas Infiltrations From Gaza After Night of Attacks

Israel repelled two underground infiltrations by Hamas militants into its territory from the Gaza Strip on Monday following a night of Israeli attacks that left a heavy toll of casualties in the Palestinian territory.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said the Palestinian death toll in the two-week-old Israeli offensive, aimed at destroying Hamas's cross-border tunnel network, rose by more than 80 during the night and now exceeds 500, with another 3,150 wounded. Many of the dead were killed in heavy Israeli shelling and airstrikes in southern Gaza, the ministry said.

Israeli tank shells struck a hospital in central Gaza on Monday, killing at last five people and wounding 60, including 30 medical staff. Twelve shells hit the Al Aqsa hospital in the town of Deir el-Balah, landing in the administration building, the intensive care unit and the surgery department, said Ashraf al-Kidra, a health official.

Hamas's predawn incursions came a day after Israeli troops pushed into a neighborhood of Gaza City to strike at the tunnels. The battle left 13 Israeli soldiers and 60 Palestinians dead on the bloodiest day of the conflict.

Israeli border surveillance detected a team of Palestinian militants emerging from a tunnel opening near the border and then a military aircraft targeted the fighters, the army said.

Shortly afterward, Hamas fighters emerged from a separate tunnel and fired an antitank missile at an Israeli armored vehicle, the army said. Soldiers returned fire, killing 10 militants, the army said.

Hamas's military wing, the Qassam Brigades, said it sent forces to attack targets in Israel east of the northern Gaza Strip village of Beit Hanoun and destroyed an Israeli military jeep during "very strong clashes."

Israel's Haaretz newspaper reported on its website that Israeli forces suffered some casualties in the second encounter. An Israeli army spokeswoman wouldn't comment on the report.

The army released two video clips of that incident, one showing a group of five militants in camouflage combat gear hunkered down in an overgrown field firing machine guns. A second clip showed the figures firing while running in the opposite direction, in what the army called a retreat into the tunnel.

"We heard a lot of a lot of gunfire of all kinds and bombing. We couldn't sleep," said Micha Ben Hillel, who lives on the nearby Nir Am kibbutz. "The tunnel opening was in a field where we used to have picnics."

Residents of the Israeli border kibbutzim of Nir Am and Erez were ordered to lock themselves in their houses Monday morning for fear the militants would reach the homes of the farming collectives, and the Israeli military police put up roadblocks on highways around Gaza's northwest corner.

The infiltrations were the fifth and sixth in five days. Military officials said they there may be dozens of cross border tunnels and have uncovered more than 10 during the current offensive.

The army said its offensive in Gaza was continuing Monday. Palestinian officials reported consistent shelling and many casualties in the southern Gaza cities of Rafah and Khan Younis during the night.

Ahsraf Al Kidra, the Palestinian Health Ministry spokesman, said 28 people died in a home flattened by an Israeli airstrike in Khan Younis; he said four people in the home survived. In Rafah, at the Egyptian border, nine members another family were killed, including seven children, the spokesman said.

The Israeli army said it was checking the report and had no immediate comment.

The sharply rising Palestinian casualty count also reflected the deaths overnight of some of those wounded Sunday in Gaza City. Eighteen Israeli soldiers have been killed, 13 of them in Sunday's battle, along with two Israeli civilians.

The United Nations said about three quarters of the Palestinian casualties have been civilians. The Israeli military said it had killed at least 80 militants since its ground forces entered Gaza last Thursday.

Following an emergency session late Sunday, the U.N. Security Council Sunday expressed "serious concern" about Gaza's rising civilian death toll and demanded an immediate end to the fighting.

Fighting flares in Ukraine as crash investigators arrive

Fighting flared in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk on Monday as investigators began to inspect the bodies of victims of the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 last week.

The fighting in Donetsk served as a reminder of the dangers the experts face working in a war zone. International inspectors got access to the remains of hundreds of victims stored in refrigerated railway wagons near the crash site but governments expressed concern over broader access to the rebel-held area.

The government in Kiev denied sending the regular army into the centre of Donetsk, which pro-Russian separatists captured in April, but said small "self-organised" pro-Ukrainian groups were fighting the rebels in the city.

Three people were killed in clashes near the railway station and close to the airport outside Donetsk, health officials said.

Artillery fire sent plumes of smoke skywards near the Donetsk railway station, around 60 km (40 miles) from the crash site, in what the separatists said was an attempt by government forces to enter the city they seized in April. The clashes quickly subsided.

Donetsk is at the heart of a rebel uprising against rule by Kiev, and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has vowed to retake the city as part of what Kiev calls its "anti-terrorist operation" against the separatists.


DISASTER VICTIMS

Against a background of international horror over the fate of the remains of the 298 victims of the Malaysia Airlines disaster, the first international investigators reached eastern Ukraine on Monday.

Three members of a Dutch disaster victims identification team arrived at a railway station near the crash site where rebels say 247 bodies have been stored in refrigerated wagons. About two thirds of the crash victims were Dutch.

The head of the team inspected the storage of the bodies in the rail cars and, despite an overwhelming stench of decomposition when the doors were opened, said it was fine.

"The storage of the bodies is of good quality," said Peter van Vliet, whose team went through the wagons dressed in surgical masks and rubber gloves.

Van Vliet said he had been told the train would be leaving the station at Torez later on Monday so that bodies can be taken to where they can be identified and repatriated. He could not say where it was going.

Ukrainian officials said as of Monday morning 272 bodies and 66 fragments of bodies had been found.

The shooting down of the airliner on Thursday has sharply deepened the Ukrainian crisis, in which separatists in the Russian-speaking east have been fighting government forces since protesters in Kiev forced out a pro-Moscow president and Russia annexed Crimea in March.

The United States and its allies have pointed the finger at the pro-Russian rebels and at Moscow itself over the downing of the plane. Russia has denied involvement and blamed the Ukrainian military for the disaster.


SHOCK TURNS TO ANGER

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry laid out what he called overwhelming evidence of Russian complicity in the shooting down of the Malaysia Airlines plane, and expressed disgust at how the bodies of the victims had been treated at the crash site.

"Drunken separatists have been piling bodies into trucks and removing them from the site," he said on NBC television on Sunday. "What's happening is really grotesque and it is contrary to everything President Putin and Russia said they would do."

Television images of the rebel-controlled crash sites, where the remains of victims had lain decomposing in fields among their personal belongings, have turned initial shock and sorrow after Thursday's disaster into anger.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said he had spoken to Putin for the first time about the disaster. At least 27 Australians were on the flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.

Abbott said an Australian investigation team was in Kiev but had been unable to travel to the site. He said there had been some improvement with the Ukrainian government offering access.

"But there's still a hell of a long way to go before anyone could be satisfied with the way that site is being treated," Abbott said. "It's more like a garden cleanup than a forensic investigation. This is completely unacceptable."

Emotions ran high in the Netherlands, where Prime Minister Mark Rutte told parliament his government's priority was to recover and identify the bodies of the passengers.

"It is clear that Russia must use her influence on the separatists to improve the situation on the ground," Rutte said.


ALL OPTIONS

"If in the coming days access to the disaster area remains inadequate, then all political, economic and financial options are on the table against those who are directly or indirectly responsible for that," he said.

Putin, in a televised address, said the downing of the airliner must not be used for political ends and urged separatists to allow international experts access to the crash site.

The U.N. Security Council is scheduled to vote on Monday on a resolution that would condemn the downing of the plane, and demand that those responsible be held accountable and that armed groups not compromise the integrity of the crash site.

European Union foreign ministers are due to meet on Tuesday and could announce more sanctions. Britain is pushing for tougher measures, and Italy said it expected a "strong and unified response".

But the EU is not expected to take tough action.

"Everything will depend on the determination of Dutch Prime Minister Rutte. As you can see, for now he is having difficulty in coming up with a clear Dutch position", said an EU diplomat.

"Other EU countries will be happy to help him, but the impulse must come from The Hague because they have the moral mandate to demand a resolute, firm reaction. Everything depends on that."


U.S. CASE

Ukraine said it was willing to hand over coordination of the crash investigation to international partners, perhaps led by the Netherlands, but Kiev was convinced the plane was shot down by "professionals".

"At the moment, we have no doubt that the plane was shot down. The reason for it - a missile strike most likely from a BUK-M1 (SA-11 radar guided missile system)," Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk told a news conference.

"It is clear that this system could not be operated by drunk pro-Russian terrorists. There were professional people."

Kerry said the United States had seen supplies moving into Ukraine from Russia in the last month, including a 150-vehicle convoy of armoured personnel carriers, tanks and rocket launchers given to the separatists.

It had also intercepted conversations about the transfer to separatists of the Russian radar-guided SA-11 missile system, which it blames for the Boeing 777's destruction.

Source: Reuters