'Unseen' News and Views – By Baher Kamal & The Like
The phaseout of controlled uses of ozone depleting substances and the related reductions have not only helped protect the ozone layer for this and future generations, but have also contributed significantly to global efforts to address climate change; furthermore, it has protected human health and ecosystems by limiting the harmful ultraviolet radiation from reaching the Earth.
(UN Environment)* — 16 September is World Ozone Day. Thanks to international cooperation, this year we celebrate 35 years of the Vienna Convention and 35 years of global ozone layer protection.
Unsplash/Thomas Bennie
World Ozone Day shows that collective decisions and action, guided by science, are the only way to solve major global crises.
In 1985, the world’s governments adopted the Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer. Under the Convention’s Montreal Protocol, governments, scientists and industry worked together to cut out 99 per cent of all ozone-depleting substances.
Lessons for today from the 1960’s
Everyone agrees that the 1960’s were very special. Those of us who lived through that era remember it as a time when the danger of a nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union was very real indeed.
John Scales Avery
The world came extremely close to disaster during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
In response to the threat of nuclear destruction, there were massive public protests against nuclear weapons. Millions of people all over the world took to the streets.
Where is that passion and engagement today? When the Cold War supposedly ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall, everyone heaved a sigh of relief, and decided that the threat of global nuclear annihilation had gone away. But it has not gone away. It is still with us, and is perhaps greater today than ever before. Why do we not protest? Where are the millions of protesters that we saw in the 1960’s?
(UN News)* — Clampdowns on the media have increased sharply in 2020, the UN cultural agency said on Monday [14 September 2020], highlighting 21 protests around the world this year in which State security forces have violated journalists’ rights.
(UN News)* — The COVID-19 pandemic has upended a world embroiled in chaos, unleashing catastrophic health, social and economic consequences along with irreparable harm to humanity, according to UN-backed report published on Monday [14 September 2020].
