China takes to ‘Polar Silk Road’, bypassing Red Sea to halve shipping times as global trade faces disruptions

BEIJING, Aug 16 — A Chinese container vessel has set sail for Europe through the Arctic, part of a new weekly service on a route that cuts shipment times in half but which environmental groups warn could speed up the melting of polar ice. The “Dubai Tower” left the eastern port city of Ningbo on Saturday evening heading north, where it will pass through the Bering Strait, then turn west through the frigid waters along Russia’s northern coast. It is expected to reach Felixstowe in the United Kingdom on September 7, followed by stops in Hamburg, Germany and Gdynia, Poland…