Overfishing, seabed mining, corporate greed: let’s take back control of our marine environment for the common good.
A protest by Ocean Rebellion against deep-sea mining, Rotterdam, February 2022 | Zuma Press Inc / Alamy Stock Photo
29 July 2022 (openDemocracy)* — For most of human history, the oceans have been seen as a global commons, the benefits and resources of which belong to us all in equal measure.
But our seas – and the marine environment as a whole – are being ravaged by exploitation for corporate profit. The result is a social, economic and ecological crisis that threatens the very life support system of the Earth.
(UN News)* — Ten years since Jordan’s Za’atari camp opened its doors to 80,000 displaced Syrians, poverty now affects an increasing number of residents who face an uncertain future, the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, said on Friday [29 July 2022].
.
UN Photo/Mark Garten | An aerial view of Zaíatri refugee camp near Mafraq, Jordan, host to tens of thousands of Syrians displaced by conflict. 7 December 2012.
“With the increase in food prices across the world, many refugee families are struggling to meet their basic needs on a daily basis,” said Dominik Bartsch, UNHCR Representative in Amman.
“There is of course food assistance provided, but overall, household incomes are declining rapidly and we’re seeing the level of poverty increasing in the camp.”
(UN News)* — The arbitrary shutdown of hundreds of civil society organizations in Nicaragua is deeply concerning and will have a chilling effect on activists and human rights defenders across the country, UN-appointed independent human rights experts said on Friday [29 July 2022].
Artículo 66 | “They were students, not criminals” reads a 2018 demonstrator’s placard in Managua, Nicaragua. (file)
In a letter to the Nicaraguan Government last Monday, the group of 16 UN experts upheld that the action “represents a clear pattern of repressing civic space”.
The UN experts echoed a statement earlier this year by the High Commissioner for Human Rights regarding the crackdown. They expressed shock over the extent of the shutdowns by the National Assembly at the request of the Government – counting more than 700 closures, 487 in just the past month.
MADRID, Jul 29 2022 (IPS)* – Strangely enough, two major scientific findings, both announced in July, did not attribute the current dangerous world’s disasters to the proxy war unfolding in Ukraine.
Due to its structure, methane traps more heat in the atmosphere per molecule than carbon dioxide (CO2) making it 80 times more harmful than CO2 during the 20 years after it is released into the atmosphere.. Credit: Bigstock
One of them, launched by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), focuses on the dangers of what it calls: “secret methane leaks.” Methane is a colourless, odourless gas, responsible for more than 25% of the global warming the Earth is experiencing today.
(UN News)* — The UN Committee against Torture on Friday [29 July 2022] concluded its current session by releasing findings on Botswana, Nicaragua, the State of Palestine and the United Arab Emirates.
.
Unsplash/Nathan Wright | People who have endured the ordeal of torture have an enforceable right to fair and adequate compensation.
From 2019 to 2021, Pukaldi Saswanto did not touch land for 30 months whilst working on a fishing vessel. Originally from Bengkulu, a coastal province in Sumatra, Indonesia, Pukaldi had signed up with a recruitment agency to be a fisher based on a friend’s recommendation.
29 July 2022 (UNEP)* — From the United States to Europe and China to Japan, extreme temperatures have soared for weeks, killing hundreds of people, sparking wildfires in Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, and Greece and displacing thousands of residents, as many seek refuge in public cooling centers.
Photo by Reuters
Close to 90 cities have issued heat alerts, including several Japanese cities that broke heat records dating as far back as 1875, according to the Japanese Meteorological Agency.
Meanwhile, in the United States, more than 100 million people are under heat alerts as wildfires rage in California, leading President Joe Biden to consider declaring a climate emergency.
MADRID, Jul 28 2022 (IPS)* – A wide majority, including the United States, has cheered the 22 July Turkey-brooked agreement between Russia and Ukraine to resume cereals and fertilisers exports from both countries.
Credit: Bigstock
Such exports had been stopped since last February due to the ongoing proxy war in Ukraine, on the one hand, and the successive United States-led Western sanctions imposed on Russia.
The Istanbul agreement is set to allow both countries to release their cereals and fertilisers exports, under UN and international supervision.
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Jul 26 2022 (IPS)* – Like so many others, Africans have long been misled. Alleged progress under imperialism has long been used to legitimize exploitation. Meanwhile, Western colonial powers have been replaced by neo-colonial governments and international institutions serving their interests.
‘Shithole’ pots of gold
Anis Chowdhury
US President Donald Trump’s “shitholes”, mainly in Africa, were and often still are ‘pots of gold’ for Western interests. From 1445 to 1870, Africa was the major source of slave labour, especially for Europe’s ‘New World’ in the Americas.
Walter Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa noted “colonised Africans, like pre-colonial African chattel slaves, were pushed around into positions which suited European interests and which were damaging to the African continent and its peoples.”
The ‘scramble for Africa’ from the late nineteenth century saw European powers racing to secure raw materials monopolies through direct colonialism. Western powers all greatly benefited from Africa’s plunder and ruin.
14 Jul 2022 – Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, headlines have been dominated by the warnings of risk in global food supply shortages and rising global food prices, all due to the conflict. But, according to many international groups, there is currently no risk of global food supply shortages. So why are so many countries now facing an increased risk of food insecurity, and in worst cases famine?
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 