MADRID, Dec 17 2024 (IPS)* – Planet Earth is drying up, relentlessly. Over three-quarters of all lands have become permanently drier in the last three decades. This is not jut a statistic but a stark scientific fact. But while such an ‘existential crisis’ affects nearly every region, guess where -and who- are the most hit?
“Without concerted efforts, billions face a future marked by hunger, displacement, and economic decline.” Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS
They are the 1.35 billion humans living in Asia’s drylands, that’s more than half the global total. And they are the 620 millions people who inhabit Africa’s drylands, e.g. nearly half of the continent’s population.
(UN News)* — A new UN plan for Libya aims to overcome political deadlock, put the country back on the path to long-awaited presidential elections and renew the legitimacy of its institutions, the Security Council heard on Monday [].
Stephanie Koury, Deputy Special Representative for Libya and acting head of the UN Support Mission in the country, UNSMIL, briefed ambassadors on the initiative a day after presenting it to the population.
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Dec 17 2024 (IPS)* –– The new geopolitics after the first Cold War undermines peace, sustainability, and human development. Hegemonic priorities continue to threaten humanity’s well-being and prospects for progress.
Jomo Kwame Sundaram
End of first Cold War The end of the first Cold War has been interpreted in various ways, most commonly as a US triumph.
Francis Fukuyama famously proclaimed the ‘end of history’ with the victory of capitalism and liberal democracy.
With the collapse of the Soviet Union and allied regimes, the US seemed unchallenged and unchallengeable in the new ‘unipolar’ world. The influential US journal Foreign Affairs termed ensuing US foreign policy ‘sovereigntist’.
(UN News)* —Ongoing military operations by Israeli forces in Gaza continue to cause devastation for civilians trying to escape the fighting, with mounting casualties and a critical lack of humanitarian aid for the desperate population.
16 December 2024 — Thousands of families in Gaza are struggling as the winter season brings heavy rains, causing floods in their tents and exposing them to the cold and wind.
Only 23 per cent of Gaza’s shelter needs have been met this autumn, leaving nearly one million Palestinians vulnerable to exposure during the harsh winter months, according to the Norwegian Refugee Council-led Shelter Cluster in Palestine.
The Shelter Cluster estimated in September that 2,000 trucks of tents or 200 trucks of sealing-off kits were urgently needed to provide basic winter protection for 1.13 million displaced Palestinians in Gaza. By late November, only 285,000 displaced people had received essential shelter materials.
(UN News)* — Central African nations continue to grapple with multidimensional crises, including security threats, extreme weather events and geopolitical tensions, a senior UN official said on Friday [], calling for renewed solidarity with nations in the region.
Abdou Abarry, UN Special Representative for Central Africa, told ambassadors in the Security Council that disasters and extreme weather events displaced more than three million people in the region this year alone.
This has worsened an already fragile socio-economic situation and underscored the need for stronger climate action.
SAN SALVADOR, Dec 10 2024 (IPS)* –Metal mining has a renewed momentum in Central America, encouraged by populist rulers who, in order to soften environmental damage, claim they can develop it in harmony with nature, which is hard to believe. | En español
Representatives of a dozen environmental organisations, united in the Roundtable Against Metal Mining in El Salvador, speak out against Salvadoran president Nayib Bukele’s goal to reopen this industry, banned by law since 2017. Credit: Roundtable Against Metal Mining in El Salvador
Thus, they seek to win the approval of a majority that seems to follow them blindly, but not environmentalists or other social sectors, activists told IPS.
(UN News)* —The UN Secretary-General has expressed concern over the hundreds of Israeli airstrikes against targets in Syria since the overthrow of the Assad regime, calling for the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the demilitarized zone in the strategically important Golan.
In a note to correspondents issued on Thursday [], António Guterres said he was “deeply concerned by the recent and extensive violations of Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.”
(UN News)* — Describing the level of devastation across the Gaza Strip as “absolutely staggering”, the Head of Emergency Communications for the World Food Programme (WFP) has told UN News in an interview that civilians are desperate for lifesaving aid and there’s a growing risk of widespread famine.
Speaking from Gaza, Jonathan Dumont said many people have been displaced multiple times, and that families are living either in tents or in the rubble of collapsed buildings, with no access to electricity or running water.
MADRID, Dec 11 2024 (IPS)* – The available data is self-explanatory: business-prompted human activities have already altered over 70% of the Earth’s lands, with 24 billion tonnes of fertile soil lost due to industrial agriculture, the excessive use of chemicals, overgrazing, deforestation, pollution and other major threats.
Human activity has degraded over 70% of Earth’s land, with 24 billion tonnes of fertile soil lost annually. It takes up to 1,000 years to produce just 2-3 cm of soil. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 