Nairobi, 24 February 2021 (UNEP)* –Ministers of environment and other leaders from more than 150 nations on 23 February 2021 concluded a two-day online meeting of the Fifth United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA-5) in which the Assembly warned that the world risks new pandemics if we don’t change how we safeguard nature.
New ‘Red Alert’ Scientific Report: Countries Must Redouble Efforts, Submit Stronger Action Plans in 2021, ‘A Make or Break Year’ to Confront the Global Climate Emergency
Money Laundering: the Darker Side of the World’s Offshore Financial System
Human Wrongs Watch
– A sign outside a laundry in New York city had a frivolously flippant slogan: “We launder dirty clothes, not dirty money.”
Credit: UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)
And a 2019 movie titled “Laundromat,” based on a book ‘Secrecy World’ by Pulitzer Prize winning author Jake Bernstein, exposed the byzantine world of money laundering.
That’s the insidiously darker side of the world’s financial system – with millions of dollars in ill-gotten gains finding safety in offshore banks– a crime perpetrated on a global scale, says a High-Level Panel on International Financial Accountability, Transparency and Integrity for Achieving the 2030 Agenda (FACTI).
Opening the CIA’s Can of Worms
Human Wrongs Watch
By Edward Curtin | Behind the Curtain – TRANSCEND Media Service*
“The CIA and the media are part of the same criminal conspiracy,” wrote Douglas Valentine in his important book, The CIA As Organized Crime.
This is true. The corporate mainstream media are stenographers for the national security state’s ongoing psychological operations aimed at the American people, just as they have done the same for an international audience.
We have long been subjected to this “information warfare,” whose purpose is to win the hearts and minds of the American people and pacify them into victims of their own complicity, just as it was practiced long ago by the CIA in Vietnam and by The New York Times, CBS, etc. on the American people then and over the years as the American warfare state waged endless wars, coups, false flag operations, and assassinations at home and abroad.
Another way of putting this is to say for all practical purposes when it comes to matters that bear on important foreign and domestic matters, the CIA and the corporate mainstream media cannot be distinguished.
“There Can Be No Conversation on Climate Change without Including Forests and Deforestation” – The Green Gigaton Challenge
24 February 2021 (UNEP)* — As environmental leaders and change makers meet virtually for the Fifth Session of the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) in February 2021, the issue of deforestation has been central to their discussions.
Millions of Yemenis Facing ‘Death Sentence’ in the World’s Worst Humanitarian Crisis
Digital Labour Increased Five-Fold in Last Decade, with Challenges Relating to Working Conditions, the Regularity of Work and Income, the Lack of Access to Social Protection…
Human Wrongs Watch
Rapid growth of digital economy calls for coherent policy response. The growth of digital labour platforms is presenting opportunities and challenges for workers and businesses and a need for international policy dialogue.
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GENEVA, 24 February 2021 (ILO)* – Digital labour platforms have increased five-fold worldwide in the last decade according to the ILO’s latest World Employment and Social Outlook 2021 report.
Chinese New Year or Spring Festival – Two Celebrations in One
Human Wrongs Watch
By Igor Micunovic*
24 February 2021 (Wall Street International)* — Chinese New Year is the biggest holiday of utmost importance for Chinese people around the world. In fact, it represents two celebrations in one.
Chinese New Year (农历新年 nónglì xīn nián) is the official name for Chinese New Year in the Republic of China (Taiwan), while Spring Festival (春节Chūn Jié) or the Lunar New Year, is the festival that celebrates the beginning of a Chinese New Year in P.R. China.
Customs
Traditionally Chinese believe that everyone’s birthday is celebrated on New Year’s Day. This period of time for all Chinese is the time of the year for families to get together and reunite again.
Mexico to Ban Glyphosate, GM Corn Presidential Decree Comes Despite Intense Pressure from Industry, U.S. Authorities
Human Wrongs Watch
– Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador quietly rocked the agribusiness world with his New Year’s Eve decree to phase out use of the herbicide glyphosate and the cultivation of genetically modified corn. His administration sent an even stronger aftershock two weeks later, clarifying that the government would also phase out GM corn imports in three years and the ban would include not just corn for human consumption but yellow corn destined primarily for livestock. Under NAFTA, the United States has seen a 400% increase in corn exports to Mexico, the vast majority genetically modified yellow dent corn.