This page is the archived News Page from the July to September 2016 period. All contents have been dispatched in the respective stamp description pages. However there may still be open questions. Any complementary information remains welcome. As soon as an information is archived, the text will not be changed anymore. So if additional information are linked to the below, this will be displayed as a new heading in the currently open News page.

September 29, 2016
Information gathered in the past three weeks:

Morocco comfirmed its participation to the July 9, 2016 EuroMed joint issue and the image of its stamp became available (information provided by Grzegorz Omelanczuk, Poland):

Correction: this stamp, although belonging to the Euromed 2016 series, was not issued together with all other countries on July 9, 2016, but on September 22, 2016.

Similarly Don Birschel (USA) provided the information that Iraq participated to the Arab Postal Day joint issue from August 3, 2016, with the picture of the stamps:

The Bulgaria - Israel joint stamps have been issued as scheduled on September 13, 2016 (migrating birds - storks). Jaap Sarelse (The Netherlands) discovered that Bulgaria issued the stamps on two types of paper, with or without fluorescent threads (UV visible).

Enzo Cafaro (Italy) was able to provide the first images of the San Marino and Malta stamps to be jointly issued on October 18, 2016. Both countries will release a souvenir sheet with two stamps.

At the occasion of the issue of stamps related to the Brest fortification battle on June 22 2016, Russia issued also a postcard. The front side of the card shows the joint design, while the stamp on the reverse side is of standard stamp design. This item will be reported as part of this series involving also Belarus (Information provided by Jaap Sarelse, The Netherlands).

Jaap discovered also that Indonesia overprinted 1,500 copies of the souvenir sheet with silver/hologram stamps from the joint issue Thailand-Indonesia (May 5, 2016) at the occasion of the 32nd Stamp Exhibition in Bangkok. The 1,500 copies are sold out and can only be found on eBay or Delcampe.

From Niket Bubna (USA): The joint issue between Papua New Guinea and India is likely to be released on September 30, 2016. The theme of the joint issue will be National Birds, with Papua New Guinea's Bird of Paradise and India's Peacock being depicted on the stamps. Designs have not been released so far. Niket informed us also that the India - Portugal joint issue initially planned for September 26, 2016 will be postponed and released only during the first quarter of 2017.

The Belarus - Pakistan issue will be released on October 5, 2016 and the first images of the Belarus stamps could be provided by Grzegorz Omelanczuk (Poland).

Grzegorz found also the description and image of the Japan stamps from the joint Japan - Singapore issue that will eventually be released on November 29, 2016.

The story about the stamps to be released by Turkey, Croatia and Hungary has been clarified and several friends did send almost the same day explanations with pictures (Grzegorz Omelanczuk, Poland - Don Birschel, USA - Enzo cafaro, Italy). Thanks to all of them.
In fact two joint issues involving Hungary have been released the same day (September 5, 2016) with a similar design, once with Croatia and once with Turkey. Both are related to the battle of Szigetvar (Siget) in 1566.
The stamps and the first day cover of the common Hungarian Turkish souvenir sheet show the statues of Miklós Zrínyi and Suleiman the Magnificent by the sculptor Metin Yurdanur in the Hungarian-Turkish Friendship Park in Szigetvár. A depiction of Szigetvár from the period serves as the background of the souvenir sheets from all three countries and all four sheets.
The stamps of the common Croatia - Hungary souvenir sheets show a detail of Bertalan Székely’s painting "Charge from the Fortress of Szigetvár" and the other shows the arms of the town of Szigetvár.

And finally our friend Wayne Chen (USA) informed us about the latest article he published in Linns' News about the philatelic sites in Taipei, Taiwan. The link is here.

September 29, 2016
Mansoor Moazzeni (Iran) discovered an omnibus series that has not been reported so far. This series of 8 countries issuing each a block with the same 7 stamps is honoring the 7 members of the spaceship Columbia crew who died during the February 1, 2003 accident while coming back to the Earth. The series includes Gambia, Grenada, Grenada Carriacou and Petite Martinique, Liberia, Maldives, Micronesia, Palau and Sierra Leone and all stamp seems to have been issued on July 4, 2003. Thank you Mansoor. Here are three samples of this series:

September 5, 2016
Some recent news:

The joint issue between Belarus and the Republic of Moldova to be issued on September 8, 2016 is confirmed. Both countries will release two stamps devoted to folk crafts and the artistic processing of wood.

The issue between Luxemburg and the Vatican State initially scheduled for December 6, 2016 will be released on September 13, 2016. Enzo Cafaro and Fabio Bonacina (Italy) provided the information as well as the pictures of the stamps which will be identical for both countries and released in miniature sheets of 4 stamps.

Don Birschel and Niket Bubna (USA) confirmed that the United Arab Emirates participated to the Arab Postal day issue from August 3, 2016 with the release of two stamps.

As already announced, and similarly to the 2011 joint issue related to the 100th Anniversary of Xinhai Revolution, there will be this year stamps released by China, Macao  and Hong Kong to celebrate the 150th Anniversary of the birth of Dr. Sun Yat-sen. All these stamps will have different designs and Grzegorz Omelanczuk (Poland) could provide the first images of the Macao series. The stamps will be released on November 12, 2016. Designs of the Hong Kong stamps had been provided earlier in this section (see below).

September 5, 2016
Adam Paish (UK) provided information about a joint issue that has not been reported so far. At the time The Grenadines of Saint Vincent took some independence from Saint Vincent, both countries issued identical stamps. On February 14, 1979 Saint Vincent issued four stamps at the occasion of the International Year of Child. These same stamps were issued by Grenadines of Saint Vincent on October 24, 1979. As these stamps were produced by the same printer and as there is only postal independency, we continue to consider a relationship between the two administrations and these issues will be considered as of type [CD]. This series will get the entry number [D19790214]. At that time Adam was deeply involved in the production of these stamps. Note that his name appears at the bottom left of each stamp as the designer.

August 22, 2016
Enzo Cafaro (Italy) was able to provide additional information about the siamese omnibus series issued during the 2016 New York World stamp show, described under the headings [O20160528a-c] and showing skylines from New York. In fact all these souvenir sheets had been issued prior to this show:
The Gambia, Ghana and Tuvalu souvenir sheets showing a nightlight New York skyline had been released respectively on April 1, 2016, April 8, 2016 and April 29, 2016. The folder itself including the three souvenir sheets became available during the show on May 28, 2016. This series is renamed [O20160401].
The Palau, Nevis and Grenada souvenir sheets showing a daylight New York skyline had been released respectively on April 19, 2016, April 29, 2016 and May 16, 2016. The folder itself including the three souvenir sheets became also available on May 28, 2016. This series is now newly headed [O20160419].
The Grenada Carriacou & Petite Martinique and Young Island Grenadines of Saint Vincent souvenir sheets also showing a nightlight skyline had been respectively released on May 2, 2016 and April 29, 2016. These two souvenir sheets had not been proposed as a special folder during the show. The entry is renamed [O20160429].
All this information has been corrected in the "New Issues Q2 2016" page.

Enzo confirmed also that Kuwait will not participate to the 2016 Arab Post day issue.

Don Birschel (USA) could provide the missing image from the Czech Republic of the stamp that will be released in parallel with the Liechtenstein stamp on September 5, 2016.

August 20, 2016
Enzo Cafaro (Italy) could provide the first illustrations of the Macedonia - Russia stamps to be issued on October 5, 2016. Both countries will release the stamps as se-tenant pairs in miniature sheets of 4 pairs in a [3x3] structure with central label. While topics are identical, the pictures are completely different and therefore this issue will be filed in the category parallel [P].

Jaap Sarelse (the Netherlands) learned from Singapore Post that "due to unforeseen circumstances, the Singapore-Pakistan Joint Stamp Issue has been delayed till further notice". This issue was expected to be released on August 17, 2016. Usually this is the formulation to tell that the issue is cancelled. Just as a reminder, we had received the design of these stamps a few days ago, which means the Singapore stamps have been printed. Are we in the same situation as with the 2014 Israel - Ecuador joint issue for which we are still waiting for the Ecuadorian counterpart?

Jaap provides also regularly the new issues from all over the world to our subscribers. This is a tremendous task and we really have to thank him for this a lot. I recently received my own half-yearly package and made a couple of discoveries of products I had not described in these pages so far.

- Germany - Poland T20160602: Beside the standard ETB and normal mixed first day covers, the German Post offers also a special mixed first day cover with four stamps (2 German stamps, cancelled in Bonn and Berlin) and 2 Polish stamps, one single cancellation, containing cardboards with mint stamps from previous German Poland joint issues (5 stamps): the German stamp from the [T19910409] issue, the German stamp from the [T19931014] issue, the German stamp from the [T19970423] issue and both German and Polish stamps from the [T20120712] issue. Just wondering from where they got the stocks of all these mint stamps and how many of these special covers were produced.

- Indonesia - Thailand T20160505: Indonesia produced a self-adhesive miniature sheet with four pairs of stamps in two blocks of four stamps, but it appears that this miniature sheet can easily be split in two halves, size 191x105 mm, generating two items that we could call souvenir sheets containing two pairs of stamps each. On top of this Indonesia produced also a self-adhesive souvenir sheet with both stamps in silver. The size of this item is 151x94 mm.

Grzegorz Omelanczuk (Poland) discovered that three countries issued during May 2016 stamps with the common English inscription "Shrines of Europe": Austria on May 12, 2016 honoring the Mariazell Basilika, Germany on May 2, 2016 celebrating the site of Altotting and showing the Gnadenkapelle and Portugal with the pilgrimage site of Fatima on May 2, 2016 as well. There is only a similar period but no common design, nor an official statement from postal administrations linking these three stamps and therefore it cannot be considered as a joint issue. Nevertheless, the "Shrines of Europe" as an association could one day lead to a true joint, probably parallel issue. The documentation produced by the Portuguese postal administration mentions the issue of the two other stamps. It is worth to note that the year 2016 starts the centenial celebration of Fatima's shrine story. The documentation of the two other countries are just explaining the existence of the association "Shrines of Europe" but do not refer to the two other stamps.
Unter the title of "Shrines of Europe", five of the major shrines and European pilgrimage places came together in 1996 while Mariazell joined in 2004 and since then the mayors of all these six towns come together at one of these places to exchange about their experience related to the pilgrimage organization and related events. Next to the three places mentioned above, we have to add the sites of Lourdes (France), Loreto (Italy) and Czestochowa (Poland). The year 2016 corresponds to the 20th anniversary of the creation of this association and it is not excluded that the three other cities may also issue stamps at this occasion before end of the year, although the Portuguese documentation does not make mention of other stamps to come.

Grzegorz discovered also that on September 5, 2016, Croatia will issue a souvenir sheet jointly with Hungary. The details of this Croatian issue are already available on the Croatian Post web site, but there is still a doubt regarding the already announced Turkish - Hungarian joint issue from September 7, 2016 which remains in the Turkish philatelic program and for which the topic is also not disclosed. Information from Hungary is missing. The Croatian stamps celebrate the 450th anniversary of the battle of Siget in which Hungarian and Croatian forces fought against a larger in number Turkish army. Although the Hungarian/Croatian coalition was defeated, this battle stopped the progression of the invasion of the Ottoman troops towards the rest of Europe. During this battle, Suleiman the Magnificent died from natural causes. This issue may eventually become a three country issue involving Croatia, Hungary and Turkey. Any additional information is welcome.

August 12, 2016
Additional information became available from collectors after publication of the previous news.

The 2016 France - Italy joint issue is now scheduled for November 30, 2016. Each country will release two stamps honoring both the 60th anniversary of the twinning between the capital cities of Paris and Rome and the 350th anniversary of the foundation of the Academy of France in Rome. The France - Portugal joint issue is scheduled for October 21, 2016. The design of these stamps became already available:

Don Birschel (USA) provided new and/or better images of the Arab Postal Day stamps from Bahrein, Egypt and Jordan issued on August 3, 2016.

Don found also the first images of the United Nations stamps to be jointly released with the Czech Republic on September 8, 2016. Unfortunately pictures are all different so it will not be a twin issue [T], but only a parallel issue [P].

The joint issue between Israel and Bulgaria to be released on September 13, 2016 will be devoted to bird migration and represents white storks. The first information was provided by Grzegorz Omelanczuk (Poland).

August 8, 2016
New issue: on August 17, 2016, Pakistan and Singapore will release a joint issue commemorating 50 years of relationship. The theme is national flowers of both countries - Orchid Vanda Miss Joaquim (Singapore) and Jasmine (Pakistan). Each country will release two stamps (in miniature sheets of 10 for Singapore) and there will be a souvenir sheet with the two stamps produced by at least Singapore. Information was provided by Grzegorz Omelanczuk (Poland). So far only low quality images of the Singapore stamps are available.

Liechtenstein has released the design of the stamp that will be issued together with the Czech Republic on September 5, 2016. These stamps can already be purchased ahead of the issue date, not sure they will be delivered that much ahead. The country will release the stamp in miniature sheets of 4, but also as black print stamps. Mixed first day covers and mixed maxi cards will also be available as well as a folder containing mint stamps and mixed FDC. A high quality picture of the Czech stamp is not yet available, but the designs are very similar.

The 2016 Arab Post day will be illustrated by a design that is common to all involved countries. The first stamps have already appeared and the total series is supposed to include the following countries: Bahrein, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and United Arab Emirates. All of the stamps seen so far have been released on August 3, 2016. This series will of course be considered as a twin issue that was not known up to now. Designs from Bahrein, Jordan and Tunisia stamps have been provided by Grzegorz Omelanczuk Poland and Michael Aldridge (UK). So far we have had access only to low quality images. The previous Arab Post Day series was issued on August 3, 2012 [T20120803]. At that time the following countries participated as well Oman, Palestine, Sudan and Yemen. Among the list of countries that could participate as well we should add potentially Algeria, Comoros, Djibouti, Kuwait, Lybia, Mauritania, Somalia, and Syria. Some of these 2012 identical design stamps were issued as late as January 2013. The previous issue from August 3, 2008 [T20080803] saw the latest stamp of the series issued exactly one year later on August 3, 2013. So there is a lot to explore before confirming the series is complete.

On August 5, 2016, as expected, Thailand and Vietnam released a pair of stamps commemorating the 40th anniversary of diplomatic relationship. Each stamp represents puppetry of both countries: the first tells the legend of Hoan Kiem Lake where Le Loi returned his magic sword to the Golden Turtle after his forces defeated the Ming Chinese army in 1428; while the second features Thailand’s folk puppet play, Hun Krabrok, by King Bhumibol Adulyadej. Thailand stamps are available as miniature sheets of five se-tenant pairs. Vietnamese stamps are available as isolated stamps from panes [5x5], a booklet containing one block of four from each stamp, and a souvenir sheet with 2 pairs of se-tenant stamps.

Wayne Chen (USA) discovered that the United Nations will issue at the occasion of the 32nd Asian International Stamp Exhibition in Bangkok, Thailand on August 10, 2016, a souvenir sheet bearing three stamps, each from one of the different UN offices, and therefore bearing three different currencies. This is a very original item, but cannot be considered as joint because UNPA keeping the control of the production of all their stamps, i.e. the three offices, must be considered as a single entity issuing stamps in three currencies. This item will be reported in the non-accepted joint stamp chapter [N]. A similar mixed souvenir sheet had been produced by UNPA on April 12, 2011, topic being space exploration, and had at that time already been filed as non-accepted. A nice item for those who are not so strict with the joint issues definition.

Finally, just some information about two special stationeries (postal cards) issued by the Polish postal administration on June 17, 2016 (see illustration below). These cards have no link with the Polish German joint issue of the same period. However they refer directly to German Polish relations. Grzegorz Omelanczuk asked for some explanations from the Polish postal authorities and as expected it was confirmed that there was no cooperation with the German Post in any stage of design, nor issuance of these postcards. The items were issued unilateraly by Poland with cooperation with two Polish-German foundations which plan many anniversary events this year.

July 20, 2016
Cyprus, Greece and Lebanon have also issued their EuroMed stamps on July 9, 2016. Here are the pictures provided by Don Birschel (USA). Don provided also additional pictures from the Portuguese series.

Slovenia and Croatia released on July 18, 2016 stamps to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the battle of Lissa. The Battle of Lissa (also called Battle of Vis in Croatian) took place on July 20, 1866 in the Adriatic Sea near the Dalmatian island of Lissa and was a decisive victory for an outnumbered Austrian Empire force over a numerically superior Italian force. It was the first major sea battle between ironclads and one of the last to involve deliberate ramming. Both countries released a souvenir sheet with one single stamp.

From Niket Bubna (USA): Although the joint issue between Portugal and India did not get released as originally planned in May, it is now likely to be released in September 2016. The theme for this will be folk dances from both countries. The Indian government put out a press release for the joint issue and selected Dandiya dance from Gujarat (India) to be depicted on one of the stamp. More recently, Portugal Post has indicated that the release date for this joint issue is September 26, 2016 and the Portugal folk dance on the stamp will be Pauliteros de Miranda. Folk dances, specifically stick dances from both the countries will be depicted on the stamps. It is likely that Portugal Post will also issue a souvenir sheet along with two stamps.

From Grzegorz Omelanczuk (Poland): November 12, 2016 is the 150th anniversary of the birth of Dr. Sun Yat-sen (1866-1925).  To mark the occasion, China PR Post, Hongkong Post and Macao Post each issue a set of commemorative stamps on that date. In addition, a Joint Souvenir Pack which features a souvenir sheet on the 150th Anniversary of the Birth of Dr. Sun Yat-sen containing commemorative stamps from each of the three postal administrations will be launched. Representations of the Hong Kong stamps are already available. We have yet no idea if stamps will be similar.

Grzegorz reported also about stamps to be released by Japan on August 28, 2016 at the occasion of the 150th Anniversary of Diplomatic Relations between Japan and Italy, but no counterpart has been announced yet by Italy. We will wait before announcing this as a new joint issue or as a unilateral issue. The Belgium - Japan stamps announced only by Japan and to be released by August 1, 2016 may have to be filed in the same category. Any additional information is welcome.

July 9, 2016
A high number of collectors did send the information and pictures about the new joint issue involving Portugal and Vietnam and released on July 1, 2016. We will here just mention the name of Niket Bubna (USA) who was the first of all to mail pictures. Thanks to all of you.

The Euromed stamps to be released on July 9, 2016 triggered also attention and the first pictures were sent by Grzegorz Omelanczuk (Poland), Niket Bubna (USA), Don Bisrchel (USA). This series is devoted to Mediterranean fishes and so far we have seen pictures from Slovenia, France, Croatia, Malta, Palestine, Portugal . Probably another ten countries will join.

July 1, 2016
The News from the period April to June 2016 have been archived.

All previous information reported in this section is to be found in the News Archives.