Word: ironical
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...armed personnel on either side of the road, bunkers with dugouts manned by soldiers, occasionally a bomb-damaged building. The railroad that ran parallel to the trunk road had been reduced to a long mound of earth, as if it were the trail left by some giant worm. The iron tracks had long been removed to construct the many bunkers...
...Webb's visit occurred at a moment when the Obama administration has been making noise about a possible shift in the U.S. position on Burma. During President George W. Bush's tenure, Washington strengthened economic sanctions against the Burmese regime, which has maintained an iron grip over the country since 1962, and ruled out any talk of engagement. But earlier this year Secretary of State Hillary Clinton acknowledged that such trade barriers weren't having an effect on the junta's behavior. (Shortly after the Suu Kyi verdict, the European Union announced the tightening of its own sanctions against...
...China's second tack is to prolong negotiations over the contract price of iron ore with the two main suppliers, hoping to wear them down while frantically moving to line up other potential sources beyond Rio and BHP Billiton for next year and beyond. China is the world's largest steel producer, and despite the global recession, its factories are running close to flat-out thanks to enormous infrastructure construction and brisk sales for new autos and apartments. That means it would appear to have little leverage in pursuit of the price cuts on iron ore that it seeks...
...Ministry of Commerce was just venting after the Chinalco deal failed. But a banking source with close ties to the Australian mining industry says that perception is wrong. "The antitrust review is real, and right now if I had to bet, I'd bet that [the Rio-BHP Billiton iron-ore tie-up] doesn't happen. The Chinese are going to block...
...Contrary to constant press reports in China and abroad, which say the Chinese side of the iron-ore price negotiations are being conducted on Beijing's side by the Chinese Iron and Steel Association, they are, in fact, being run straight out of Premier Wen Jiabao's office. And Wen, says the banking source, has "not been a happy man" since the Chinalco deal fell apart earlier this summer. Don't misread, in other words, the absence of the state-secrets charge against the Rio Four as evidence that the extraordinary face-off between China and one of the world...