'Unseen' News and Views – By Baher Kamal & The Like
Nature beckons during a global pandemic
Kishin-en Garden © Alma ReyesThere are moments when all anxiety and stated toil are becalmed in the infinite leisure and repose of nature. (Henry David Thoreau)
16 April 2020 (Wall Street International)* — At the time of this writing, the world is trying desperately, and in some levels, chaotically, fighting an incomprehensible contagion, the COVID-19 Coronavirus.
Stockholm, March 2020 (Stockholm International Peace Research Institute – SIPRI)* — International transfers of major arms during the five-year period 2015–19 increased by 5.5 per cent compared with 2010–14.
According to new data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the largest exporters of arms during the past five years were the United States, Russia, France, Germany and China. The new data shows that the flow of arms to the Middle East has increased, with Saudi Arabia clearly being the world’s largest importer.
– The deadly coronavirus COVID-19, which has shut down the UN secretariat in New York, along with 32 of its agencies globally, has forced over 37,500 UN staffers worldwide to work from their homes.
Credit: United Nations
Asked about a decision to re-open the Secretariat building after nearly a month-long hiatus, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said: “I don’t know. I think, some experts have said, it’s the virus that will decide.”
Still, there are several other lingering questions which remain unanswered– specifically against the backdrop of a severe new cash crisis threatening the survival of the UN and aggravated by a global economic meltdown.
Somali medic Yasin translates documents for asylum seekers on lockdown in France. © UNHCR/admin
14 April 2020 (UNHCR)* –The COVID-19 crisis has sparked an outpouring of solidarity from people around the world and that includes refugees, keen to help in the countries where they now live.
I am a professor of biology at the University of West Attica in Greece, and a volunteer at Greenpeace. Given the tremendous impact of this pandemic on people’s lives combined with the fact that many experts believe that global heating and other environmental disturbances could facilitate the development of more novel viruses such as COVID-19, I would like to explain how climate change relates to the transmission and spread of infectious diseases.
