(UN News)* — National pledges to reduce harmful emissions offer little hope of avoiding climate disaster, UN climate experts said on Thursday [], in an urgent appeal for a radical transformation of the energy sector, before it’s too late.
Unsplash/Shane Stagner | Kelp, a type of seaweed, can be fed to animals and could help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
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There’s “no credible pathway to 1.5C in place” today, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) insisted in a new report, despite legally binding promises made at the 2015 Paris Climate Conference to prevent average temperatures rising by more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.
(UN News)* — In west and central Africa, some 3.4 million people need help after destructive flooding, the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, said on Friday [28 October 2022].
The alert comes amid the worst floods in a decade, which have swept across Nigeria, Chad, Niger, Burkina Faso, Mali and Cameroon.
UNHCR spokesperson Olga Sarrado said that hundreds of people had died in Nigeria, where floodwaters in the northeast swept through sites for internally displaced people and host communities in Borno, Adamawa, and Yobe States.
WMO records biggest increase in methane concentrations since start of measurements.
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Geneva/New York, 26 October (WMO)* – In yet another ominous climate change warning, atmospheric levels of the three main greenhouse gases – carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide all reached new record highs in 2021, according to a new report from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
(UN News)* — Israel’s occupation is illegal and indistinguishable from a “settler-colonial” situation, which must end, as a pre-condition for Palestinians to exercise their right to self-determination, the UN’s independent expert on the occupied Palestinian territory said on Thursday [].
UN News/Shirin Yaseen | The separation wall in occupied Palestinian territory.
“For over 55 years, the Israeli military occupation has prevented the realisation of the right to self-determination of the Palestinian people, violating each component of that right and wilfully pursuing the ‘de-Palestinianisation’ of the occupied territory,” said Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967, in her report to the UN General Assembly.
MADRID, Oct 27 2022 (IPS)* – No. No lettuce, no matter how British it may be, could outlast such a steady depletion of the very foundation of life.
One third of all plastic waste ends up in soils or freshwater. Most of this plastic disintegrates into particles smaller than five millimetres, known as microplastics, and these break down further into nanoparticles. Credit: UN Environment
Now, new facts about such depletion come to add to the already reported ones regarding the unstopped, man-made dangers threatening the present and future of indispensable natural resources.
These are some of the biggest reasons explaining how the web of life is unrelentlessly agonising:
(UN News)* — Heatwaves have become an unavoidable health hazard for many nations, but new data indicates that they are set toaffect virtually every child on earth by 2050, the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, warned on Tuesday [].
Today, at least half a billion youngsters are already exposed to a high number of heatwaves, placing them on the front lines of climate change, the UN agency noted.By the middle of this century, moreover, it estimates that more than two billion children will be exposed to “more frequent, longer lasting, and more severe” heatwaves.
MADRID, Oct 24 2022 (IPS)* – European politicians continue to run in all directions to find a way out of their energy crisis. One of them – Simonetta Sommaruga, the Swiss Environment Minister, asked people to ‘shower together’. Others are competing to grant the business of transporting energy from the North of Africa to the continent.
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All this is not new.
European Union leaders struggle to find solutions for the energy crisis. Credit: Bigstock
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 18 2022 (IPS)* – Preoccupied with enhancing their own ‘credibility’ and reputations, central banks (CBs) are again driving the world economy into recession, financial turmoil and debt crises.
Anis Chowdhury
Wall Street ‘cred’
Most CB governors believe ‘credibility’ is desirable and must be achieved by fighting inflation at any cost. To justify their own more harmful policies, they warn inflation is ‘damaging’.
They argue CBs need ‘independence’ from governments to pursue ‘credible’ monetary policy. Inflation targeting to ‘anchor’ inflation expectations is supposed to generate desired ‘confidence’. But CBs have been responsible for many costly failures.
The US Fed deepened the 1930s’ Great Depression, the 1970s’ stagflation and the early 1980s’ contraction, besides contributing to the 2008-09 global financial crisis (GFC). Hence, CB notions of ‘credibility’ and ‘independence’ need to be reconsidered.
20 October 2022 (openDemocracy)* — Prime minister Rishi Sunak – reportedly the richest MP in Parliament – would be a boon for the financial lobby, tax justice campaigners have warned.
As talk turns to the next Conservative leader, the man trounced by Liz Truss just weeks ago is now the favourite to replace her.
UNITED NATIONS, Oct 14 2022 (IPS)* – The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has resulted in a never-ending flow of arms to the battle-scarred country— elevating the besieged nation to the ranks of one of the major recipients of US weapons and American security assistance.
A school destroyed during a Russian air strike in Kharkiv, Ukraine. September 2022. Credit: UNICEF/Ashley Gilbertson
As of last week, the US has provided a hefty $17.5 billion in arms and military assistance to Ukraine.
The five biggest arms buyers from the US during 2017-2021 were Saudi Arabia, which accounted for 23.4 percent of all US arms exports –followed by Australia 9.4 percent, South Korea 6.8 percent, Japan 6.7 percent and Qatar 5.4 percent.
The figure for Ukraine during the same period was 0.1 percent, according to the latest statistics released by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 