Day: March 4, 2024

Hanoi: Vietnam is capable of selling some 40 million carbon credits for a revenue of 200 million USD annually, the Department of Forestry has calculated.

It said the country has freshly signed an emissions reduction purchase agreement with Emergent, a non-profit intermediary engaging between tropical forest countries and the private sector to mobilise finance to support emissions reductions in deforestation. Accordingly, Vietnam is set to transfer to the forest financing organisation 5.15 million tonnes of carbon dioxide that cost at least 10 USD per tonne in the 2022-2026 period.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has already put forth seven targets and 11 solutions for forestry work this year, with a focus on completing the national forestry planning and supporting firms involved in transition from forestry production to forestry business.

Vietnam currently houses 14.79 million ha of forest, a coverage rate of 42%. The forestry production value grows stably at a rate of 4.6% and revenue fr
om environmental protection services nears 11 trillion VND (445.56 million USD).

Last year, the nation, for the first time, sold more than 10 million carbon credits for over 50 million USD, ranking among the 60 countries worldwide with the highest capacity for the carbon trade./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency

MANILA: The Philippine Embassy in Washington D.C. on Monday disputed the recent remarks of the Chinese Embassy in Manila against Ambassador Jose Manuel Romualdez.

In a statement, the Philippine Embassy said Romualdez is not a mouthpiece for ‘another country’ nor is he spreading ‘erroneous ‘China threat’ and ‘Sinophobia’ remarks.’

‘His statements regarding the developments in the South China Sea have been consistent with the position expressed by the Philippine Government’s highest officials, particularly regarding the threat posed by unlawful, aggressive, and provocative actions of the Chinese Coast Guard and Chinese maritime militia against Philippine vessels and personnel and Filipino fishermen,’ the statement read.

These actions, it added, include the use of lasers, water cannons, and other dangerous maneuvers in violation of international maritime regulations.

The Chinese Embassy has urged Romualdez to “stop spreading erroneous information’. It also accused him of stirring up trouble in the South Chin
a Sea.

‘China has always been committed to properly handling the South China Sea disputes with relevant parties through dialogue and consultation, while firmly safeguarding its territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests,” the Chinese embassy said on Sunday.

Despite the 2016 Permanent Court of Arbitration’s decision invalidating China’s nine-dash line map to claim nearly the entire South China Sea, Chinese maritime assets continue to assert aggression in Bajo de Masinloc and the Spratly Island group.

‘Conflating Philippine efforts to defend its territorial and maritime entitlements with serving the interests of another country negates the Philippines’ legitimate rights and interests to protect and defend our nation’s sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction in the West Philippine Sea, and the Philippine Government will not stand for it,’ the Philippine Embassy said.

‘The Philippines consistently maintains its respect and support for, and commitment to an international rules-based order
, particularly the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), and the 2016 Arbitral Award, and will continue to work closely with like-minded partners in this regard,’ it added.

Source: Philippines News Agency

MANILA: Bureau of Internal Revenue Commissioner Romeo Lumagui Jr. said the BIR won the criminal case against the corporate officers and accountant of Buildforce Trading Inc.

“Just this February 2024, we won criminal cases before the DOJ against the ghost receipts syndicate. The first day of March 2024, we won another criminal case against the syndicate. This syndicate ends now. The culture of using ghost receipts ends now,” he said in a statement on Monday.

Lumagui said that after the DOJ win, criminal cases have been filed before the courts against the corporate officers and accountant of Buildforce Trading Inc.

He said seven criminal cases before the Regional Trial Court and Metropolitan Trial Court of Quezon City were filed for violations of Sections 254 and 255 in relation to Sections 253(d) and 256 and violation of Section 257(A)(2) of the National Internal Revenue Code, as amended.

Last Feb. 15, 2024, Lumagui, together with representatives from the DOJ, also went to the Regional Trial Court and Metr
opolitan Trial Court for the filing of criminal cases against the corporate officers and accountant of Decarich Supertrade Inc. and Redington Corporation.

“The use of ghost receipts is economic sabotage. It is the highest form of tax evasion,” Lumagui said.

“The BIR will not stop auditing and filing criminal cases against those involved. The consecutive victories we have before the DOJ shows that what the perpetrators are doing is criminal in nature,” he added.

Lumagui said that after winning at the DOJ level, the criminal cases against Decarich Supertrade Inc., Redington Corporation and Buildforce Trading Inc. are now pending before the courts.

Source: Philippines News Agency

DUMAGUETE: Political leaders in Negros Oriental have agreed to set aside differences by fielding common candidates in the 2025 midterm elections.

Negros Oriental 2nd District Rep. Manuel Sagarbarria made the announcement on Monday as the province commemorated the first death anniversary of slain governor Roel Degamo at the latter’s family’s residence in Barangay Bonawon in Siaton town.

Sagarbarria said the decision to field candidates to major provincial positions was a result of meetings and discussions with national government and local officials.

‘Speaker of the House Martin Romualdez called me recently, saying that President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. was seated right next to him, and he said I was given the task to unite Negros Oriental,’ Sagarbarria said.

Sagarbarria said the job is not easy but he took it and started meeting with Degamo’s widow, Pamplona Mayor Janice Degamo, and other members of her camp.

The congressman said they decided that his son, incumbent Governor Chaco Sagarbarria, will seek
reelection; Siaton Mayor Cezanne Fritz Diaz will run for vice governor; and Mayor Degamo for Third District representative.

The older Sagarbarria said it was not an easy decision for him and the mayor to relent since they were eyeing different positions.

Degamo’s widow thus dropped her plan to seek the gubernatorial post.

Mayor Degamo sought support for the arrangement.

‘They expressed apprehension that whoever gets to sit at the helm of the provincial government may not be as approachable, open, helpful, and friendly as Gov. Roel especially because they are kachila or Filipino-Spanish mestizos,’ she said.

But the mayor urged them to give the Sagarbarria camp a chance in the name of peace and development.

‘It is time to forge alliances with them,’ she said.

The governor also briefly spoke about their first association about a decade or so ago, when he was still a city councilor, mentioning the acronym ‘SagDe’ for Sagarbarria and Degamo.

He said they already had amiable relations despite different poli
tical alliances and is looking forward to rekindling the relationship.

During the past elections, the Sagarbarrias were allies of the Teveses, who are the Degamos’ rivals.

The suspected mastermind in the Degamo slay, expelled Third District congressman Arnolfo Teves Jr., is still in hiding.

Murder case

Meanwhile, the Degamo widow is optimistic that a final judgment on the case of her husband and other victims would be reached soon.

She thanked the national government for exerting all efforts to bring the perpetrators to court and hoped that the mastermind will be brought to justice soon.

Hundreds of supporters, including local officials and ex-politicians, joined the motorcade from the crime scene in Pamplona, where a mass was held, to Bonawon.

Also present were some survivors and their families.

Dr. Liland Estacion, the Provincial Health Officer who suffered serious leg injury after being shot by the gunmen during the attack, said the pain remains but life has to go on.

‘I am very emotional because
I still feel pain in my feet and justice has not yet been served,” Estacion said.

Four trials are scheduled in June, August, September and October.

Source: Philippines News Agency

CEBU CITY: Anti-drug operatives confiscated PHP68 million worth of suspected shabu during a sting operation near a cemetery that also led to the arrest of an alleged ‘bodegero’ (caretaker) and his brother on Monday morning.

Jaime Dajao, 47, who just got out of jail two months ago, was arrested in Barangay Carreta here with his 53-year old brother, Roberto, when they yielded 10 kilos of shabu.

Both are residents of Talibon, Bohol.

The Regional Police Drugs Enforcement Unit-7 said the sting operation was launched after the suspects’ names emerged in an intelligence report that a huge supply of shabu from outside Visayas was transhipped via Bohol province.

The Dajao siblings were transacting with a poseur buyer beside the Carreta Cemetery along A. Soriano Avenue

when they were collared.

The siblings are temporarily detained at Camp Sergio Osmeña Sr. here while drug charges are being prepared.

Source: Philippines News Agency

MANILA: The United States and China both play an important role in maintaining strategic stability and limiting the proliferation of nuclear arms, President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. said on Monday.

Speaking at the Lowy Institute in Australia, Marcos said it is time to bring Indo-Pacific issues to the fore of global conversations on nuclear disarmament.

‘Amidst the alarming reversal of the historic trend of decreasing nuclear stockpiles in the region, we must remember that the tragic humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons use were borne by peoples of this region, the hibakusha of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the victims of nuclear tests in the Pacific,’ Marcos said.

‘It is time to bring Indo-Pacific issues to the fore of global conversations on nuclear disarmament. The People’s Republic of China and the United States must engage in meaningful dialogue to maintain strategic stability, and to limit any nuclear arms build-up,’ he added.

The President assured that the Philippines and Australia, along with
Japan, are at the forefront of efforts to reduce nuclear risks in the region.

He added that nuclear risks demonstrate the need for great powers to manage their strategic competition responsibly.

The President, meanwhile, also urged the Indo-Pacific community to ensure that the ‘great powers’ do not treat the world as an ‘arena for their competition.”

He said that ‘the pursuit of the great powers’ respective strategic goals must never come at the expense of the interests of smaller states, nor of regional and international peace’ as he underscored the importance of ‘put things into the proper perspective.’

‘Great power rivalries constitute only one of several storms that render turbulent the waters that confront humanity’s common journey at this crucial juncture,’ Marcos said.

‘In addition to widening geopolitical polarities and sharpening strategic competitions, we are also confronted with uncertainties posed by transformative technologies and the existential threat of climate change, even as persistent
inequities and inequalities within and among our nations remain unresolved,’ he added.

Source: Philippines News Agency