The China Card And Reality

What Every Nepali needs to know about getting petrol or LP gas from China during the petrol crisis

Each of these newspaper reports is a fantasy, and each of these is suggested to a gullible journalist to give the illusion that the end of the petrol crisis is just around the corner. पहिले गरेर देखाउनु अनि भन्नु! China will rescue Nepal! ..... Usually the people suggesting that China become the new supplier of petrol, have no idea that logistics exists, let alone how it applies. .... Nepalese trade entrepreneurs have been placing high hopes from the resumption of this trading point to recover their business loss. However, it might take some more weeks for smooth operation of the port, Chinese officials said....... “Today’s reopening is only the first step toward trade operation. Since the roads and infrastructures have been heavily damaged, it might take a long period of time for the smooth operation”. ..... The 14 km road section between the Chinese city Kerung and Nepali custom office is quite narrow and risky. ..... Cheng Ji said “The situation here is not so good since damage is severe. The Chinese side has difficulties such as lack of permanent structures including water and power supply.” ..... Since Tatopani, the largest trading point between China and Nepal, has remained closed due to the severe quake damage in Zangmu port and disruption in Araniko highway, traders have viewed Kerung as their second option. ......

the Chinese disaster prevention and mitigation experts said that the Kerung border port cannot be the alternative of Tatopani, at least for some years.

..... A visiting Chinese expert and professor from the Institute of Mountain Hazards and Environment Chen Xiaoqing who leads an 8 member delegation to Nepal, told Xinhua

“The road from Nepal’s bordering district Rasuwa to Kerung is quiet narrow and poor. It cannot resist the heavy loaded vehicles.”

....... the policy is, Chinese trucks do not enter Nepal and Nepali trucks do not enter China. Every cargo truck is unloaded at the border and re-loaded. In the case of petrol, you need a “tank farm” to accomplish this. They do not have a “tank farm,” and it would take a while to build. ....... If there were two barrels and one cost twice as much as the other, which would you buy? .....

Oil from China will be more expensive than oil from India.

..... China will need to prevent Nepalis from buying the cheapest oil, in order to protect their investment. ...... Why would China build all this just to supply Kathmandu? ...... Boudha is a vibrant and important neighborhood of Kathmandu due to Tibetan expatriates living there. What if Boudha were to become a bargaining chip? We all know that the Tibetans living in Nepal “belong” here – but then again, do they? The Tibetans are not “Gorkhali” – why would we pre-suppose that the Nepal government would protect them any more than they protect other ethnic minorities such as the Madhesis? .........

Without a doubt, the first victims will be the Tibetans living in Nepal. It would not be surprising if for every 100 KL of oil we are asked to hand over a Tibetan living in Nepal, and for every 1000 KL, we are asked to shut down a monastery or have our monasteries turn into highly guarded prisons.

We will be forced to go against the international conventions on refugees and human rights that we are signatory to. With international condemnation and probable isolation resulting from blatant violations of established global norms, we will be even more reliant on China and it will use the opportunity to change the name of Mount Everest/Sagarmatha to its Chinese name Qumolungma, an issue the Chinese have been raising on and off for many years. .......... Since such projects mean huge investment, logically, it will look for a regime that will secure its interests in Nepal. And it will instill and or support a regime favorable to its interests as it did in Myanmar until recently and which it continues to do in Zimbabwe.

Our international isolation will be complete and we will become a pre-2012 Myanmar.

...... China will not be rescuing Nepal. Also, there is a cost to be weighed – does Nepal want to give up it’s sovereignty to China? ...... Realizing the infrastructure shortcoming, China wasted no time to build and finance a 3,000 km oil pipeline – the Kazakhstan China Pipeline (KCP). Operational in 2011, the pipeline joined China’s Xinjiang Province to the Caspian Sea, a new milestone, beating the clock when its competitors were at the gates. ...... Kazakhstan’s oil reserves of 30 billion m3 is by no means j.v. China’s KCP has become a direct competitor of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium CPC, owned by Gazprom, Chevron, ExxonMobil and Baku-Tbilisi- Ceyhan (BTC), and controlled by BP. The Western world was still oblivious to the presence of the Dragon. Further onslaught was on the cards. ......... Turkmenistan has natural gas reserves of 17.5 trillion m3, the 4th largest in the world. In Central Asia, the China Gas Pipeline started construction in 2008 with pipelines A an B. In 2011, a delivery capacity of 30 billion m3 was achieved. With the completion of Line C, the 1839 km – A, B and C – triple parallel Pipeline of 55 billion m3 started flowing on 31 May 2014 ......... With breakneck speed, China signed inter-Governmental agreements with Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan for the 4th gas line or D line, and by September 2014, a deal was in the bag to increase supply to China to 65 billion m3, representing 20% of Chinese 2014 requirements. ....... When the plan to construct a pipeline from Kazahkstan and Turkmenistan to China was first announced at the beginning of the 21st century, it was dubbed the Energy Silk Road. ........

those announcements that somehow a magic alternative source of petrol or LP gas, are there to give you false hope, and to stall you into thinking that something amazing will happen, just around the corner. Only, this corner will never be turned.

....... All the Nationalists who want to get LP gas from China, should go to the Himalaya, and learn how to harness a yak caravan to bring it. After all, the bhote people aren’t “real Nepalis” – are they? can they be trusted to bring LP gas to Kathmandu?