Hiding the truth is anti-national; I won’t lie: Rahul to Modi on Chinese transgressions in Ladakh

London, Jul 10: India's Reliance will load its first cargo of Venezuelan crude in three months this week in exchange for diesel under a swap deal the parties say is permitted under the US sanctions regime on the Latin American country, according to a Reliance source and a shipping document from state oil firm PDVSA.

Washington has exempted some Venezuelan oil trade from sanctions when transactions are in exchange for fuel and food or to repay debts rather than for cash. But that trade slowed as the US tightened restrictions and refiners, shippers and insurers have been steering clear of Venezuela to avoid any risk they may fall foul of sanctions.

Washington aims to deprive Venezuelan socialist President Nicolas Maduro of his main source of revenue with the sanctions, which have driven Venezuelan oil exports to their lowest level since the 1940s.

Reliance gave the US State Department and the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) notice of the diesel swap and received word back that the policies that allowed the transaction were still in place, the Reliance source told Reuters.

Reliance has previously said that its supplies of fuel to PDVSA in exchange for crude were permitted under sanctions.

An oil tanker named Commodore would load the cargo of crude in Venezuela and ship it to India, the tanker's manager NGM Energy said.

"All details of the transaction and transportation were shared with US authorities, who confirmed that the U.S. policy authorizing such transactions remained in place," NGM Energy said in a statement to Reuters.

"The shipment is made in connection with the humanitarian exchange of oil for diesel fuel."

The Commodore is loading a 1.9-million barrel cargo of crude for Reliance at Venezuela's main oil port of Jose, according to an internal PDVSA cargo schedule seen by Reuters.

The Liberian-flagged Commodore was at the Jose Terminal on Thursday, ship tracking data on Refinitiv Eikon showed.

The US State Department, Treasury's enforcement arm OFAC, and PDVSA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Reliance has a swap deal to provide diesel to Venezuela in exchange for fuel but has not received a cargo of crude since April. Sources at Indian refiners told Reuters earlier this year they planned to wind down their purchases of Venezuelan oil to avoid any problems with supply due to sanctions.

Other long-time customers of PDVSA, including Italy's Eni and Spain's Repsol, have continued taking cargoes of Venezuelan crude this year under permission granted by the US Treasury Department to exchange the oil for diesel supply as part of debt repayment deals, according to sources from the companies.

NGM Energy also manages the Voyager I tanker, which the United States removed from its list of sanctioned vessels last week after NGM and the ship's owner Sanibel Shiptrade said they would increase measures to ensure vessels complied with international sanctions.

"Last month, NGM Energy SA adopted a firm policy of not allowing vessels under its commercial management to trade to Venezuela, or to carry Venezuelan petroleum cargoes, absent US government authorization," NGM said.

"NGM continues to stand by that pledge."

New Delhi, April 2: The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has developed a bio suit to keep the medical, paramedical and other personnel engaged in combating COVID-19 safe from the deadly virus.

"Scientists at various DRDO laboratories have applied their technical know-how and expertise in textile, coating and nanotechnology to develop the Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) having specific type of fabric with coating," read a statement.

The suit has been prepared with the help of the industry and subjected to rigorous testing for textile parameters as well as protection against synthetic blood. The protection against synthetic blood exceeds the criteria defined for body suits by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

"DRDO is making all efforts to ensure that these suits are produced in large numbers and serve as robust line of defence for the medics, paramedics and other personnel in the front line combating COVID-19," the statement said.

The industry is geared up for production of the suit in large quantities. Kusumgarh Industries is producing the raw material and coating material, with the complete suit being manufactured with the help of another vendor. The current production capacity is 7,000 suits per day.

Another vendor is being brought in with the experience in garment technology and efforts are on to ramp up the capacity to 15,000 suits per day.

The bio suit production in the country by DRDO industry partners and other industries are being hampered due to non-availability of seam sealing tapes, the statement said.

"The DRDO has prepared a special sealant as an alternative to seam sealing tape based on the sealant used in submarine applications.

Presently, bio suits prepared using this glue for seam sealing by an industry partner has cleared test at Southern India Textile Research Association (SITRA) Coimbatore," it said.

"This can be a game changer for the textile industry. The DRDO can mass produce this glue through industry to support the seam sealing activity by suit manufacturers," the statement added.

New Delhi, Mar 31: India is likely to blacklist about 300 foreigners who came from 16 countries, including Malaysia and Thailand, on tourist visas but attended an Islamic congregation at Nizamuddin here that has become a key source for the spread of coronavirus in the country, officials said on Tuesday.

These foreigners were among around 8,000 people who attended the Tabligh-e-Jamaat at Nizamuddin Markaz facility in March, many of whom have shown symptoms of COVID-19, a Union Home Ministry officlal said.

About 30 of those who attended the Nizamuddin event in mid-March tested positive and at least three have succumbed to the infection in last few days.

"Those who came on tourist visa but attended the Nizamuddin event stands being in our blacklist as they have violated the visa conditions. Tourist visa holders can't attend religious function," a Union Home ministry official said.

If a foreigner is put in the Home ministry's blacklist, he or she can't travel to India in future.

A total of 281 foreigners were found by the police at the Nizamuddin campus in the last two days.

They include 19 people from Nepal, 20 people from Malaysia, one from Afghanistan, 33 from Myanmar, one from Algeria, one from Djibouti, 28 from Kyrgystan, 72 from Indonesia, 7 from Thailand, 34 from Sri Lanka, 19 from Bangladesh, three from England, one from Singapore, four from Fiji, one from France and one from Kuwait.

Most of these foreigners came on a tourist visa, an official said.