A UK foreign office minister has suggested that the Bank of England grant access to £1.2bn in Venezuelan gold reserves to the self-proclaimed interim leader Juan Guaido rather than Nicolás Maduro.

In a statement to British MPs, Sir Alan Duncan said the decision was a matter for the Bank and its governor, Mark Carney, and not the government. But he added: “It is they who have to make a decision on this, but no doubt when they do so they will take into account there are now a large number of countries across the world questioning the legitimacy of Nicolas Maduroand recognizing that of Juan Guaidó.”

Guaidó has already written to Theresa May asking for the funds to be sent to him.

KATHMANDU: The Greenlife Hydropower Limited (GRHPL) is issuing initial public offerings (IPOs) of worth Rs. 180 million next week.

According to the company, 1.8 million units of ordinary shares will be issued for public from February 5 to 19. The deadline will be extended to till March 19 if the issued number of shares goes unsold in this period, the company said.

The project is based in Dolakha and 20 units are fixed as a minimum quantity for apply while the maximum quantity is 9,000 units.

The company is the developing the 40-megawatt Khanikhola Hydropower Project. The project is expected to start the power generation in two months.

WASHINGTON, Jan 29: The Trump administration on Monday sanctioned Venezuela’s state-owned oil company, ratcheting up pressure on socialist President Nicolas Maduro to cede power to the U.S.-backed opposition in the oil-rich nation in South America.

The action means Maduro’s embattled government would lose access to one of its most important sources of income and foreign currency along with around $7 billion in assets of the state-owned company, Petroleos De Venezuela S.A.

Hours after the White House announced the sanctions, Maduro went on state TV and called the U.S. action “immoral, criminal.” In words directed at President Donald Trump, he said, “Hands off Venezuela!”

The sanctions follow the unusual decision by more than 20 countries, including the U.S., to recognize the opposition leader of the National Assembly, Juan Guaido, as the interim president of Venezuela. Maduro was re-elected last year in an election widely seen as fraudulent. The once prosperous nation has been in an economic collapse, with several million citizens fleeing to neighboring countries.

“We have continued to expose the corruption of Maduro and his cronies, and today’s action ensures they can no longer loot the assets of the Venezuelan people,” national security adviser John Bolton said at a White House news conference to announce the sanctions with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin.

Bolton said he expects Monday’s actions against PDVSA — the acronym for the state-owned oil company — will result in more than $11 billion in lost export proceeds during the next year.

Oil production — the lifeblood of Venezuela’s economy — has been collapsing for years. Despite sitting atop the world’s largest reserves, Venezuela currently pumps just a third of the 3.5 million barrels a day it did when the late Hugo Chavez took power in 1999.

The nation’s refining capacity has also declined because of poor maintenance and lack of skilled personnel. That has left it reliant on Citgo, the Houston-based refining arm of PDVSA, to refine the oil and send gasoline back to Venezuela to meet domestic needs.

“They have just lost that source,” said Russ Dallen, managing partner of Caracas Capital, a brokerage company.

Venezuela is very reliant on the U.S. for its oil revenue, sending 41 percent of its oil exports to the U.S. Maduro can divert the roughly 500,000 barrels per day of oil currently being sold to Gulf Coast refineries to markets in Russia, China, India, Malaysia and Thailand.

But processing international financial transactions is hard without going through the U.S. or European banks. Transport costs would also jump because Venezuela’s ports aren’t well-equipped to load supertankers for transporting oil to distant markets.

That means the country, which depends almost entirely on oil exports for hard currency, will be able to purchase even less food and other imports, potentially worsening shortages and deepening its economic collapse.

Outside the PDVSA headquarters in Caracas, office workers lining up to board red company buses were seeking information about the immediate impact of the U.S. sanctions. As he hurried home with his two children, one employee told The Associated Press that the sanctions signaled tough times ahead.

“Things are going to get difficult,” said the man, who refused to identify himself by name because he feared reprisals from the company. “The United States is one of the few buyers who pays for the oil up front, and it’s probably where most of our income comes from.”

Mnuchin said any money that U.S. entities use to buy Venezuelan oil will go into a blocked account in the United States, not the Maduro government.

He said if PDVSA wants to see the sanctions lifted, there would have to be a speedy transfer of control to the interim, U.S.-backed president and a democratically elected government that is “committed to taking concrete and meaningful actions to combat corruption.”

He said the Treasury Department has taken steps to allow refineries to continue importing oil from Venezuela temporarily. Also, he said Citgo will be able to continue importing oil as long as the revenue is sent to the blocked account in the United States.

“This is a country that is very rich in oil resources,” Mnuchin said. “There is no reason why these resources shouldn’t be used for the economic benefit of the people there.”

Mnuchin said he did not expect the sanctions would cause U.S. consumers to see higher prices at gas pumps.

The American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, which represents 95 percent of the refining sector, has lobbied hard during the past two years against any sanctions that would disrupt imports of Venezuelan oil. The association issued a statement saying it supported the Trump administration’s goal to bring change to Venezuela.

“To that end, we will work with the administration to minimize any unnecessary disruptions or negative impacts to the market and American consumers,” the association said.

Mnuchin insisted the sanctions would have only a “modest” impact on U.S. refineries because Venezuelan oil exports to the U.S. have declined steadily over the years, falling particularly sharply over the past decade as its production plummeted amid its long economic and political crisis.

The U.S. imported less than 500,000 barrels a day of Venezuelan crude and petroleum products in 2017, down from more than 1.2 million barrels a day in 2008, according to the Energy Information Administration.

Still, Venezuela has consistently been the third- or fourth-largest supplier of crude oil to the United States, and any disruption of imports could be costly for refiners. In 2017, the most recent year that data were available, Venezuela accounted for about 6 percent of U.S. crude imports. Valero and Citgo are among the largest importers of Venezuelan crude. (AP)

BHARATPUR, Jan 29: The Federation of Computer Association Nepal, Chitwan is organizing the Fourth CAN Info-Tech-2075 from February 8 to 12 in Bharatpur, Chitwan.

The IT fair aims at spreading awareness and importance of information, technology and entertainment sector, the organizers said.

Bhanu Sharma, President of the CAN Federation, Chitwan informed that the fair with the slogan with ‘Chitwan’s Prosperity: Information and Technology’, is expected to help built a tech-friendly workforce and expose new technology of IT.

A total of 80 stalls will be set up featuring various electronic appliances like mobiles, smart televisions, printers, laptops and desktop computers.

The fair is expected to be visited by around 150,000 people, according to the organizers.

KATHMANDU: The government has started constructing big water supply projects in 10 dry areas. Such projects are being constructed in settlements designated as ‘water scarcity areas’ by the government at various times.
The projects to be constructed include the Yasok large-scale pumping water supply project, Panchthar; Agna Mauwa Large-scale pumping water supply project, Panchthar; Halesi area large-scale pumping water supply project, Khotang; Timal large-scale water supply project, Kavrepalanchok and Chaurikhola Dhokadanda large-scale pumping water supply project, Kavrepalanchok.
Such projects are also being constructed at Pakarbas of Ramechhap district, Daraundi of Gorkha district, Tansen of Palpa district, Bijeshwari Chaurajahari of Rukum district and Harre Tunibote of Surkhet district.
Out of these 10 projects, the construction of four – Yasok large-scale water supply project, Pakabas large-scale water supply project, the Ramechhap large-scale water supply project and Timal large-scale water supply project, Kavrepalanchok – had been started four years back.
Chief of the Dry Area Water Supply Project, Ram Chandra Ghimire said that although the construction of the four projects had been started four years back it has not yet completed.
According to him, it took time to complete these four projects as they are large scale projects with an investment of more than Rs 200 million. The government has designated areas without water source within the range of 250 metres vertical distance and two kilometers horizontal distance as the ‘dry area’.
Similarly, the areas in which the inhabitants have less than 10 litres availability of water per day from the traditional water source, which receive less than 1200 millimetres annual rainfall or snowfall in the hilly region and the areas in the Tarai region where the ground water level is more than 50 metres deep are included as ‘dry area’.
Information officer at the Department of Water Supply, Ratna Prasad Lamichhane said that the Project is implemented in areas with a population of 5,000 in the mountainous region, of 10 thousand in the hilly region and of 30 thousand in the Tarai (southern plains) region. Lamichhane said that the government has delegated the authority for the construction of small and medium-scale water supply projects to the province and local levels.
Moreover, the government is constructing deep-boring water supply projects in most places of the Tarai region.