An earthquake was recorded on the border of Russia and Mongolia 1,284km away from Almaty city, Kazinform reports.

A quake measuring 6.0 on the MPV scale rocked the Russian-Mongolian border 1,284km northeast of Almaty city at 5:56am Almaty time today.

Mongolia will need to create more and better jobs than created over the past decade while increasing opportunities for women, young people, and urban residents, according to a World Bank report released today.

Mongolia’s sustained economic growth of 5.4 percent on average between 2000 and 2019 powered job growth and an increase in real wages. More recently, the COVID-19 pandemic has brought real challenges, with employment dropping by around 5 percent in 2021, though the government’s recovery package mitigated a potentially steeper decline, according to the Mongolia Jobs Diagnostic.

“Mongolia’s current challenge is that the labor market is not strong enough to create sufficient quality jobs for a growing labor force and reduce unemployment,” said Andrei Mikhnev, World Bank Country Manager for Mongolia. “There is a continuous supply of a young and increasingly educated labor force, but more and better jobs need to be created to meet their aspirations. This calls for a more conducive policies for business environment to encourage quality job creation in the private sector.”

The report highlights that less than 60 percent of the working-age population (ages 15 and older) participated in the labor market, and only about half were employed in 2021. Women, urban residents, and people with an intermediate level of education have the lowest participation rates. The transition of young people into the labor market is not going well, especially for the less educated. Even young people with tertiary education have high unemployment rates.

Skills mismatches pose another challenge as an inadequate number of skilled workers are prepared in strategic sectors, according to the report. In addition, many recent graduates do not have the skills needed in the labor market, especially to fill higher-skilled jobs.

The Mongolian labor market challenges require a diverse set of interventions that include all parts of government, especially those responsible for private sector development. The report recommends more dynamic job creation in the private sector, upgrading the workforce via reforms to improve the skills development system, and enabling social assistance beneficiaries to work. Other recommendations include improving the functioning of the labor market via a comprehensive labor market information system, transforming active labor market programs into effective tools for employment, and improving the protection offered by unemployment insurance.

Support for the Mongolia Jobs Diagnostic report was provided by the Korea-World Bank Group Partnership Facility.

Mongolia exported 4.39 million tonnes of iron ore in January-November 2022, down 38.1% or 2.7 million tonnes from a year ago, showed latest data from the Mongolian Customs General Administration (MCGA).

The total export value slumped 61.09% on the year to $370 million during the first 11 months, data showed.

China was the only destination of Mongolian iron ore during the period.

MCGA didn't release the specific figure for last month, yet Sxcoal calculated the exports at 512,100 tonnes based on the overall exports published by the customs authority, down 4.12% year on year and 24.33% on the month.

The iron ore exports amounted to $32.84 million in November, with average price at $64.13/t, down $18.81/t from a year ago and $3.13/t from a month earlier, data showed.

(Writing by Alex Guo Editing by Tammy Yang)

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The Minister of Energy, Choijilsuren Battogtokh, led the working team in the western region’s Khovd, Uvs, and Bayan-Ulgii aimags.

Specifically, the working team visited the Erdeneburen Hydropower Plant construction site to get acquainted with the project’s progress on December 7-9.

This project is being implemented across four soums of three aimags. Thus far, 22 boreholes have been drilled near the port, water transfer tunnel, and power station, and the construction of utility access roads in the project area is in progress. Henceforth, the training of Erdeneburen Hydroelectric Power Plant staff, placement of families and citizens in the new settlement area, compensation, construction work, and other related research work are expected to continue gradually.

Minister of Energy B. Choijilsuren also met with the residents of Erdeneburen and Myangad soums while working in Khovd aimag.

During the meeting, the officials said that to ensure the continuity and reliability of electricity in the western region, the Erdeneburen Hydropower Plant project will be advanced and special attention will be paid to intensifying the construction work.

Local citizens raised issues such as receiving compensation for being relocated as the area was taken as state special use for the implementation of the Erdeneburen HPP project, ensuring their normal living conditions, reducing negative environmental impacts, building roads, and improving agricultural irrigation systems.

The western region where more than 390 thousand people reside imports 75 percent of its energy needs from Russia and China, which means it uses five or six times more expensive energy than that being produced at Durgun HPP. The establishment of the hydropower plant will create the possibility to provide the country’s western region with domestically produced energy.

An irregular meeting of the Cabinet was held yesterday and a decision was made to impose an emergency regime for “Tavantolgoi Railways” JSC for a duration of six months. Head of the Legal Department of the Cabinet Secretariat N. Myagmar was appointed as the Government’s Special Representative for the company.

The resolution on the decision was presented by Minister of Road and Transport Development S. Byambatsogt and Deputy Chief of the Cabinet Secretariat U. Byambasuren. During the 6-month special regime, the following measures will be taken:

-Operations of the company will be made transparent and open to the public

-Governance of the company will be improved and operations and financial records and reports will be evaluated and reviewed

-Funding spent by the company on the construction project for the Tavantolgoi-Gashuunsukhait railroad will be reviewed by an independent audit and a review will be issued.

-Contracts and activities that violate the law, conflicts of interest, and are not in line with the interests of the company will be transferred to the legal authorities for investigation.

The Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in a TV interview in Moscow on Sunday, when asked about where the relationship between Russia and the West is moving, “Well, we are not moving. We have already arrived at a station named ‘Confrontation’, and we have to be reserved, strong, to have underlying strength, because we will have to live in the environment of this confrontation.”

There are no peace talks and no end in sight to the conflict in Ukraine. President Vladimir Putin said last week that Moscow’s near-total loss of trust in the West would make an eventual settlement over Ukraine much harder to reach, and warned of a protracted war.

In such an apocalyptic scenario, Russia’s immediate neighbourhood is turning into severely contested zones of superpower confrontation, as the US and EU try to encircle Russia with a ring of unfriendly states.

Such confrontation can take different forms. In the Transcaucasian region, the Western efforts aim to replace Russia as the arbiter between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The EU has presented itself as an alternative to the Russian mediation and peacekeeping.

Moscow viewed such attempts rather complacently initially, but has lately has begun worrying that the ground beneath its feet is shifting in Transcaucasia. The Western ploy is to incrementally elbow out the Russian peacekeeping force deployed to the region following the renewed conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan last year over the breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Moscow plays both sides in the conflict and, quite obviously, the trapeze act is very delicate and taxing. Thus, in the period since Moscow’s special military operation began on February 24, the EU has succeeded in establishing a “monitoring mission” in Armenia and is advancing its plan to establish an OSCE mission to the region, which will challenge Russia’s monopoly in peacekeeping on the Armenia-Azerbaijan border.

Another active theatre of contestation is Kazakhstan where the West is constantly working to erode that country’s close relations with Russia. Kazakhstan’s multi-vector foreign policy aimed at attracting western investment has created pro-western interest groups among the country’s elites. Kazakhstan’s nationality question also creates sensitivity in its relations with Russia. Kazakhstan is a high stakes game for the West, as it borders China, too.

In comparison, the covert Western role in fuelling the recent clashes between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan as well as in encouraging Dushanbe to provide a “transit corridor” for the anti-Taliban rebels in Panjshir Valley poses a direct challenge to Russia in the security sphere. But much to the disappointment of the US, as tensions between Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan flared last September and soldiers from Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan exchanged gunfire along several points of the countries’ undemarcated border, Moscow and Beijing chose to remain on the sidelines.

To be sure, the conflict was among the most serious interstate military escalations in Central Asia’s history since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. The conflict posed a big embarrassment to Moscow and Russia-led regional security organisations in Central Asia.

If the Western role in the Kyrgyz-Tajik conflict was a covert one, that is not the case with its increasingly proactive moves to build up the Panjshiris in Afghanistan as a “moderate” resistance movement to overthrow the Taliban government in Kabul, which enjoys cordial relations with Russia. The Panjshiris enjoyed the patronage of the French intelligence during the anti-Soviet struggle in the 1980s and the old links have been revived. The French President Emmanuel Macron has taken a hands-on role to cultivate his Tajik counterpart Emomali Rahmon.

Quite obviously, both in the case of the Kyrgyz-Tajik hostilities and in the spectre of another round of civil war in Afghanistan haunting the region, Russia’s security interests come under profound challenge. Russia remains the dominant presence in Central Asia and at the leadership level, Moscow wields much influence in Bishkek and Dushanbe. But the intra-regional strife and instability provide fertile ground for western manipulation of the ruling elites.

However, the latest wave of unrest in Mongolia carries ominous signs of a colour revolution. As in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, the social media is active in stirring up protests. The protests began a week ago against the “coal mafia,” which has been allegedly profiteering from doing business with Chinese companies. But various conspiracy theories are spreading on Twitter, including that there would be an internal power struggle within the ruling party elites.

The government responded promptly with the cabinet deciding to put in the public domain for scrutiny nine contracts related to the state mining company at the heart of the affair and announcing that all future business deals on coal export will be with public knowledge. The government further announced that a parliamentary committee will probe the scandal.

Several hundred protesters gathered in the freezing cold at the city’s Sukhbaatar Square during the weekend and marched to the presidential residence with some people attempting to force their way inside the building, chanting and singing while stamping their feet to stay warm — eerily similar to the coup in Kiev in 2014.

Indeed, what lends enchantment to the view, from the geopolitical perspective, is that China is the destination of most of landlocked Mongolia’s exports of coal, cashmere, livestock and other resources.

The attempt at transforming the protests into an ocular revolution proper is still work in progress. According to the Associated Press, “Economic conditions have deteriorated in the country of roughly 3.3 million as inflation has soared to 15.2% which has been exacerbated due in part to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”

Coincidence or not, the protests in Ulaanbaatar followed the state visit by the president of Mongolia Ukhnaagiin Khurelsukh to Beijing last month. This was the second meeting between Xi and Khurelsukh in two months. Beijing understands that it is also in the crosshairs of the West’s diplomacy in Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Afghanistan. All these four countries fall in the first circle of Chinese interests in one way or another.

They give “strategic depth” to China; the economic ties with these resource-rich countries are not only hugely beneficial but also growing rapidly; they are irreplaceable partners from the angle of connectivity and the Belt and Road Initiative; and, regional security and stability are common concerns.

The paradox is, despite the convergence of interests and strong political and economic interests, and although their core interests are involved, it is becoming increasingly uncertain whether Russia or China can deliver on regional security guarantees. Moscow is under Western sanctions and Beijing remains extremely wary of confronting the US or the EU — although Mongolia is one country in Central Asia where the core interests of Russia and China overlap.

The US and EU are calculating that this is the best opportunity to consolidate and expand their influence in Russia’s Trans-Caucasian, Caspian and Central Asian backyard. Clearly, the Western powers are wading into the regional tensions and the probability of the Russian and Chinese opposition to it falling short cannot be ruled out.

The geopolitical stakes are high. Mongolia is the transit country for the proposed Power of Siberia 2 gas pipeline channeling up to 50 billion cubic meters of gas from the Yamal Peninsula in the Russian Arctic to eastern China, and the construction work is due to start in 2024. Similarly, China, Mongolia and Russia have extended the Outline of the Development Plan on Establishing the China-Mongolia-Russia Economic Corridor by five years, which will unleash great economic potential and upgrade Mongolia’s role as a transit hub.

China-Mongolia cooperation on the construction of transportation routes and corridors has been greatly boosted in recent years, which has strengthened the logistics between China and Mongolia and greatly increased their transport capacity for bulk commodities, especially mineral products. The two countries are looking to dock multiple new railway lines with Chinese ports.

The US and the EU will do their utmost to wean Mongolia away from the Sino-Russian orbit, no matter what it takes. Interestingly, a NATO military delegation from Brussels travelled to Ulaanbaatar last week and held two days of talks with the Mongolian military leaders. Mongolia presents a combustible mix where all the key elements of the US’ confrontation with Russia and China are present, ranging from NATO’s mission creep to the Asia-Pacific to the BRI and Russia’s energy exports and of course the vast deposits of rare earths in the steppe.

By:

MK Bhadrakumar is a former diplomat. He was India’s ambassador to Uzbekistan and Turkey. The views are personal.

44 new COVID-19 cases were recorded in Mongolia on December 13.

19 of them were contacts in Ulaanbaatar, and 25 were registered in the regions. No imported cases were found.

The death toll from coronavirus remained 2,135.

BHP (ASX: BHP) has joined billionaire Robert Friedland’s I-Pulse Inc. and Breakthrough Energy Ventures, a clean-tech venture backed by Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos, to speed up technologies that can help the mining sector save on energy.

I-Pulse and Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV)-Europe launched earlier this year a company called I-Rox, a France-based firm focused on demonstrating a pulsed-power technology said to reduce the amount of energy needed to crush rocks.

The value of BHP’s equity investments in I-Pulse and I-Rox wasn’t disclosed, but the world’s largest miner will join I-Pulse and BEV Europe as shareholders of I-Rox, the firms said.

I-Rox uses high-voltage pulses of power to disintegrate rock, an approach that has been trialled in laboratories for years but has yet to be applied in commercial mining operations.

The agreements not only give BHP access to the new technology, but it also makes it an active partner in I-Pulse and BEV Europe’s quest to identify new applications for pulsed-power technology in a mining context.

Curbing emissions

Crushing and grinding mined rock into small particles to extract valuable metals and minerals consumes more than 4% of the world’s electricity and are a major source of miners’ direct emissions.

“BHP’s investment and our collaboration offer a meaningful step forward in the development and commercialization of I-Pulse technologies for the mining industry,” Friedland, chairman of I-Pulse said in the statement. “Particularly in relation to the prospect of the crushing and grinding of rocks for a fraction of today’s energy consumption, environmental impact and costs.”

I-Pulse has developed several applications of its pulsed-power technology, including solutions for geological exploration, finding water and manufacturing.

BHP chief executive Mike Henry said the collaboration with I-Pulse and I-Rox will contribute to the company’s growing portfolio of options with potential to both improve competitiveness of and help decarbonize its operations.

The Melbourne, Australia-based mining giant also has a 5.5% stake in Ivanhoe Electric (NYSE, TSE: IE), another Friedland-founded miner with copper projects in Arizona, Utah and Montana, along with a battery storage business.

Before listing in New York in June this year, Ivanhoe Electric was a unit of I-Pulse.

Shareholders of Turquoise Hill have accepted Rio Tinto’s USD 3.3 billion bid to buy all of the shares in the Canadian miner it did not already own, drawing to a close a tumultuous takeover battle that at times appeared on the brink of failure.

The deal gives Rio greater control over the Oyu Tolgoi copper mine in Mongolia, which has been a priority for chief executive Jakob Stausholm, who travelled to the country a year ago in an effort to “reset” the relationship with Ulaanbaatar.

Oyu Tolgoi, one of Rio’s most valuable assets and crucial to its metals expansion strategy, will be one of the largest copper mines in the world when it reaches full production of about 500,000 tonnes per year by 2030.

It has struggled with cost overruns and delays. Rio operates the mine and owns 51 percent of Turquoise Hill, which owns 66 percent of Oyu Tolgoi. The remaining stake is held by the Mongolian government. Rio was forced to raise its offer price for Turquoise Hill twice this year following an initial bid in March, as it sought to buy out the remaining 49 per cent of Turquoise Hill that it did not already own.

In Friday’s vote 60.5 per cent of minority shareholders in Turquoise Hill voted to approve Rio’s offer, while an undisclosed number registered a dissenting vote or rejected the offer. Approval by a majority of the minority shareholders was needed for the deal to pass. Those shareholders who dissented will be paid C$34.30 per share, then go through a court process that will determine the final level of their compensation. “This transaction will deliver significant benefits for all shareholders, and allow us to progress the Oyu Tolgoi project in partnership with the government of Mongolia with a simpler and more efficient governance and ownership structure,” said Rio Tinto copper chief executive B.Bold.

The two largest minority shareholders in Turquoise Hill, SailingStone Capital and Pentwater Capital, have been vocal opponents of Rio’s offer on the grounds that it undervalues the mine. The shareholder vote on Rio’s C$43 a share offer was delayed several times this autumn, as Rio did not initially have the votes to approve the deal. Rio subsequently struck an agreement with SailingStone and Pentwater that would have allowed the deal to proceed, but it was withdrawn after being investigated by Canadian regulatory authorities.

Recommended ExplainerCharts that Matter Nickel dogged by liquidity concerns and price volatility Shares in Rio rose 1 per cent in London on Friday. Turquoise Hill gained 0.4 percent in New York. Valuing the mine’s resources has been tricky because producers expect a global shortage of copper in the coming years amid growing demand from electrification and the clean energy transition.

However, this year benchmark copper prices have sunk 12 percent because of reduced demand from China and concerns about a global economic slowdown. (Financial Times)

For the ninth day, Mongolians are protesting at Sukhbaatar square against the “coal mafia”, led by ex-President Kh.Battulga who have apparently robbed the public purse of billions of dollars. Today (12 December), Mongolian Cabinet has held irregular meeting and Kh.Nyambaatar, Minister of Justice and Internal Affairs gave daily briefings on the coal theft scandal.

Kh.Nyambaatar

According to him, ‘All contracts related to the state mining company at the heart of the affair, Erdenes Tavan Tolgoi (ETT), were declassified and made public. Most of the contracts were signed based on recommendations in June 2019 of the National Security Council (NSC), which consisted of former president Kh.Battulga. The confidentiality of non-disclosure agreements (NDA) is terminated.

Since the establishment of “Erdenes Tavantolgoi” company, 25,000 vehicles have been involved in coal transportation. The information of the owner of these trucks will be disclosed according to the information registered in the General State Registration Office. As of today, 5,647 vehicles of 150 companies are carrying out short-distance transportation with C permit.

The Cabinet decided to submit an international audit to the finances of “Erdenes Tavantolgoi” company. Therefore, one of the world’s top audit companies will be selected for conducting a comprehensive audit.

The government investigation committee is considering about 1 million tonnes of coal may have been released without registration. During the investigation, it was revealed that 207,000 tons of coal exported to China without Mongolian customs registration between 20 May and 20 June, 2017, inspectors at the time determined that 3,758 coal haul trucks were registered as “empty” at customs.

“Erdenes Tavantolgoi” company has been made sales worth of MNT 12.8 trillion during the 12 years of operation’.