As Saudi Arabia handed death sentences to five people and sent three others to jail for the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, the United Nations Secretary-General continued to stress the need for “an independent and impartial investigation”. (*).
UN Photo/Cia Pak | The United Nations General Assembly and Secretariat buildings at UN headquarters.
At a press conference at UN Headquarters in New York on Monday [24 December 2019], UN Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric, in response to a question, told journalists that an investigation was necessary “to ensure full examination of and accountability for human rights violations committed in the case”.
DAYLESFORD, Australia, 18 December 2019 — At the beginning of the nineteenth century, it is estimated that the total number of passenger pigeons in the United States was about three billion birds.
Robert J. Burrowes
The bird was immensely abundant, as illustrated by this passage written by the famous ornithologist, naturalist and painter John James Audubon:
‘I dismounted, seated myself on an eminence, and began to mark with my pencil, making a dot for every flock that passed. In a short time finding the task which I had undertaken impracticable, as the birds poured in countless multitudes, I rose, and counting the dots then put down, found that 163 had been made in twenty-one minutes. I traveled on, and still met more the farther I proceeded. The air was literally filled with Pigeons; the light of noon-day was obscured as by an eclipse, the dung fell in spots, not unlike melting flakes of snow; and the continued buzz of wings had a tendency to lull my senses to repose… Before sunset I reached Louisville, distance from Hardensburgh fifty-five miles. The Pigeons were still passing in undiminished numbers, and continued to do so for three days in succession.’ See ‘Passenger Pigeon’.
Madrid, 11 December 2019, (UN Environment)*— Dramatic improvements in the way the world’s buildings are built, designed and operated are urgently needed if the vast, globally significant building and construction sector is to play its part in meeting international goals under the Paris Agreement.
With every passing day, it becomes clearer that the military coup in Bolivia on November 10th was masterminded in Washington DC.
Bolivian president Evo Morales who is now in exile in Mexico.(Photo: Sebastian Baryli)
This reality will create yet a new difficulty in relations between the U.S. regime and Mexico to its direct south, because the Mexican Government, under progressive President Lopez Obrador, took the courageous and very meaningful step of providing refuge to the U.S.-couped Bolivian President Evo Morales and therefore posed overtly a resistance to the U.S. dictatorship.
UNITED NATIONS, Dec 3 2019 (IPS)* – The greatest single climate-induced threat facing the world’s 44 small island developing states (SIDS) is rising sea waters which could obliterate some of the low-lying states, including Maldives, Marshall Islands, Kiribati, Nauru, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Palau and Micronesia.
Credit: UNICEF
The Marshall Islands alone, says the UN, has seen more than a third of its population move abroad in the last 15-20 years. Many have moved for work, healthcare and education – but climate change is now threatening those who have chosen to stay.
25 November 2019 (UN Environment)* — Our health and what we eat are inextricably linked. A balanced, nutritious diet gives us energy, keeps us focused and keeps many medical conditions at bay.
Rome, 14 November 2019— This year the Worldwide Web is thirty years old. For the first time since 1435, a citizen from Brazil could exchange their views and information with another in Finland. The Internet, the communications infrastructure for the Web is a little older.
The rights group said the demolitions left 238 Palestinians including 127 minors without a home.
Israel claims demolishing the family homes of alleged militants deters violence, while the Palestinians see it as a form of collective punishment. | Photo: Reuters (posted here fromteleSUR).
24 October 2019 (teleSUR)* — At least 140 Palestinian homes in east Jerusalem have been demolished so far this year by the Israeli authorities according to the rights organization B’Tselem who said Thursday that the figure was the highest since it began keeping records in 2004.
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The rights group added the demolitions left 238 Palestinians including 127 minors without a home.
19 October 2019 (Wall Street International)* – The non-United States of America is in dire need of replacing a “reality” president with a real president, one who is mentally, morally and physically strong and with enough intelligence to manage the complexity and stamina that the position requires. Such attributes as intelligence, mastery of knowledge, mental stability, honesty and courage matter, as we have learned too well in the last three years. Without this change, I doubt that the country can survive and certainly not as a world leader and a democracy.
September will be a month of action, packed with moments that will be pivotal in our efforts to take on the climate emergency. There’s something every one of us can do.
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 