BHP signs conditional port services deal for Canada potash mine

TORONTO (Reuters) - BHP Group has reached conditional agreement with a unit of Westshore Terminals Investment Corp for port services for the global miner's proposed Jansen potash mine in Canada, the terminal operator said late on Thursday, moving the project closer to fruition

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© Reuters/CHRIS HELGREN FILE PHOTO: Visitors to the BHP booth speak with representatives during the PDAC convention in Toronto

The port agreement is subject to approval by BHP's board and conditional on it moving ahead with Jansen's first phase, Westshore said in a release.


The world's biggest listed miner has estimated Jansen would cost up to $5.7 billion in its first phases.

The project in Canada's Saskatchewan province offers diversification into agricultural markets given that potash is a key element in plant nutrition that also makes crops more drought resistant.

Last month BHP said it would present its board with a decision on whether to move ahead with Jansen after choosing between two port options.

"If the Jansen project does proceed, the agreement requires Westshore to handle potash for BHP for a term to 2051, subject to extension," Westshore said.

Under the agreement, Vancouver-based Westshore would construct infrastructure to handle potash at Westshore’s Roberts Bank Terminal by 2026, with BHP funding the construction.

The pact would become binding on BHP if it announces a final decision to proceed with Jansen's first stage, Westshore said.

(Reporting by Jeff Lewis; editing by Jason Neely)

Hungary's LGBTQ community: 'We are afraid of losing everything'

Hungary's anti-LGBTQ legislation has raised the specter of censorship for many who work in the culture branch. Some people even plan to leave the country.



Protests took place in Budapest to oppose curtailing LGBTQ rights

Over the past months, Boldizsar Nagy has had to grapple with things he never expected. He was never anyone "special," the journalist and children's book editor said — certainly not a household name, as he is today.

When he and his team published a fairy tale book titled Meseorszag mindenkie, or Wonderland Belongs to Everyone, in 2020, he expected no more than a few reviews in the papers. He was wrong: A right-wing politician shredded the book live on camera because it included gay men and lesbians, transgender people and Roma. Hungary's chancellery minister slammed the book as "homosexual propaganda."

Nagy still receives daily death threats on social media. He is gay. He says he looks over his shoulder when he goes out, especially at night. He no longer feels safe.

"This is my new reality," he told DW. With a shy gesture, he points out his ring. He and his partner have been in a registered civil partnership for five years. They want to adopt a child, but the authorities have kept putting obstacles in their way. For this reason they had already decided to leave the country, Nagy says, declining to add where they plan to go.

Hungarian editor Boldizsar Nagy plans to move to a new country

Referendum announced

Prime Minister Viktor Orban's right-wing nationalist government has been toughening its stance on the LGBTQ community for quite some time.

In May 2020, lawmakers passed a law banning trans people from changing their gender, and, in December, they enacted a constitutional amendment stipulating that "the mother is a woman, the father is a man." Recent legislation also makes it virtually impossible for same-sex couples to adopt children.

This June, parliament passed a purported child protection act that prohibits the "portrayal and promotion" of homosexuality and sex to minors in general.

Faced with ongoing outrage and widespread criticism, Orban announced on Wednesday that he will hold a referendum on the law, all the while urging the population to support it.
'Will they ban Shakespeare?'

The EU has voiced its opposition to the law, but it is also controversial within Hungary. People who work in the culture sector are particularly concerned about arbitrary censorship measures.

"Do they want to close art exhibitions and libraries now? Do they want to ban Shakespeare in schools because there are gay characters in it?" wondered Kriszta Szekely, director at Budapest's Jozsef Katona Theater.

The law is hurtful, the artist, who is lesbian, told DW. "It's like they're saying, 'Stay hidden, stay unnoticed, and just be happy that we let you live like this.'" She fears artists will self-censor in the future or that they could be fined if they don't comply with the new law.

Earlier this month, Lira Konyv, Hungary's second-largest bookstore, was fined the equivalent of €700 ($824) because, according to the authorities, customers were not adequately warned about a book showing a family with same-sex parents. The book should have come with a notice stating that its "content deviates from the norm," the government agency said.

To try to avoid having to pay fines in the future, Lira Konyv, which is against the new law, has placed a warning to that effect at the entrance of all its stores. The sign's wording says the store content deviates from "the traditional."

Customer warning in a bookstore in Budapest: "In this bookstore we also sell books with content that is different from traditional ones"

Disclaimers and customer warnings

Andras Urogdi, the CEO of Pagony, Hungary's largest chain of children's bookstores, refuses to put up customer warnings in his 11 stores. "Of course we will not start censoring books on the Hungarian market now," Urogdi told DW.

He pointed to the law's vague wording, explaining that it is almost impossible to implement in practice. But this is not the only reason why almost the entire Hungarian book market firmly rejects the law, he added. "The term censorship has a very bad connotation in Hungary when you think of the 40 years of Soviet dictatorship," he said. "Anything even remotely resembling censorship sets alarm bells ringing among Hungarian booksellers."

"Do you fear for your child because of homosexual propaganda?" the poster in Budapest reads

Urogdi recalls what happened when he, too, had Wonderland Belongs to Everyone on his bookshelves: harassment in the form of emails and phone calls, "disgusting" posters stuck to the walls of his stores.

At the time, people hostile to LGBTQ communities — and to books merely mentioning such communities — had no legal basis to harass bookstores and publishers, Urogdi said. "But now, because of this incoherent and incomprehensible law, they can go from bookstore to bookstore and report them to the authorities. And that's very, very disturbing."
Worldwide solidarity

People involved in Hungary's culture scene seem to have resigned themselves to the situation. Many are even thinking of leaving the country, especially LGBTQ people. "With this law, anything can happen. We are afraid of losing everything," Nagy says.

Tibor Stefan-Racz, a well-known gay author who frequently addresses LGBTQ issues in his books for young adults, told DW in an email that he plans to "leave the country if Fidesz [Orban's party] wins the elections again in 2022."

In June, thousands took to the streets in Budapest to protest the new law

At the same time, the country's LGBTQ communities can count on international solidarity. The European Commission strongly condemned the law and has launched legal action against Hungary. "Celebrities, actors, artists, and politicians are now more actively advocating for our community than ever before," Szekely said.

"It [the law] unites many people who oppose it. Now we are finally visible," Nagy said, adding that he hopes many people will take to the streets for the Budapest Pride March on July 24.

Meanwhile, the Hungarian government has remained unimpressed by growing opposition to its law and dismissed any criticism as an "international hate campaign against Hungary."

This article has been translated from German.

Lessons on flooding drawn by one filmmaker

Johan Nijenhuis has produced a film and a series focusing on the risk of storms and floods in his native Holland. He tells DW why disaster preparedness was his focal point.



"The flooding in western Europe has created more awareness than any series can"

Dutch film producer Johan Nijenhuis was a 16-year-old exchange student in Los Angeles, California, when he experienced his very first earthquake drill.

"Everybody was instructed what to do when an earthquake hits Los Angeles. All the students had to get under the table. We were told how to feel the aftershock, what to do when the building comes down, and where to gather to meet rescue workers," he explained to DW.

At the time, he wondered aloud how his Californian friends could live their whole life in an area prone to earthquakes. They retorted that he was one to talk, since he hailed from a country where much of its landmass is below sea level.

Nijenhuis time as an exchange student in Los Angeles helped develop his awareness of the need for disaster preparedness

"From their point of view, we're the silly ones. The strange thing is we never train for it. I guess it's the same thing for the German towns that are affected now," Nijenhuis said, referring to the recent deadly floods that devastated swathes of western Germany. "It's never really at the top of our minds what to do when the water comes," he added.
Be prepared — always

It was this reality that inspired him to create and produce both a film and a miniseries that focus on the damage caused by storms and floods.

Preparedness — or the lack of it — was a focal point of his six-part Dutch miniseries called The Swell. The 2016 production imagines what happens when the most powerful storm in history hits the Netherlands and neighboring Belgium. The drama features several storylines: A prime minister contemplating mass evacuations, prison wardens facing agitated inmates in a prison located below sea level, and a family grieving the loss of a child washed away by the waters.

While researching for the miniseries, Nijenhuis stumbled upon some intriguing reports. One was on an emergency drill once conducted by Dutch fire and emergency services that involved evacuating 60 residents of a senior care home. This included immobile residents who had to be evacuated with their beds.

"And they [the emergency services] did a wonderful job. They had the first person out within two hours! So imagine: What would happen if you had to evacuate 60 elderly people? ... You have to get these people out in the proper way."

That drill's outcome contrasts with what happened last week in real-time as floodwaters hit Sinzig, a town in the badly flooded district of Ahrweiler. There, 12 individuals in a home for disabled people drowned because they could not be evacuated in time.

While Nijenhuis hasn't been personally affected by any flood events, he researched flood risks in Amsterdam after his ex-wife, whom he calls a "prepper" — someone who prepares for catastrophic eventualities — suggested they move out of their home to someplace on higher ground.

"I found out that Amsterdam is actually a pretty safe place. The historic center is on high enough ground," he said. Yet very few Dutch know how high their homes are and what flood risks they could face, he added.

German flood victims were largely caught unprepared for the scale of the devastation, and many are now asking why authorities didn't act on an extreme flood warning that was issued early last week by the European Flood Awareness System (EFAS). Professor Hannah Cloke, the hydrologist who set up and advises EFAS, told Politico that the death toll in Germany was "a monumental failure of the system."

"I would have expected people to be evacuating. You don't expect to see so many people dying from floods in 2021," she said.


The capacity of rivers to cause extensive damage was underestimated, such as in the town of Schuld

Art presaging reality

Nijenhuis also produced The Storm in 2009. The film is set against the 1953 North Sea flood that struck the Netherlands, northwest Belgium, England and Scotland. A combination of wind, high tides and low pressure caused the sea to breach most water defenses, resulting in land flooding of up to 5.6 meters (18.4 ft) above sea level.

This led to the construction of the Delta Works in the southwestern Netherlands, an extensive series of devices at the mouths of most estuaries that can be closed in an emergency and prevent flood surges.

"The film [The Storm] was of course inspired by the historic events, but the series [The Swell] is very much inspired by how well we are protected now. When I did research for the series, I found that most people in the Netherlands do worry about the sea flooding the land. But in fact, rivers flooding the land are a far more realistic danger," Nijenhuis said.

Aerial view of a section of the Delta Works, which protects millions against flooding in the southwest of the Netherlands

Climate awareness or unnecessary fear?

Can a series like The Swell, or films and books with similar angles, help create more awareness about climate change, or do they trigger unnecessary fear instead?

Nijenhuis said that going by the reactions he saw on Twitter to the miniseries, "The danger did become real to many people, and the ones who got worried did their research."

However, he said that the recent flooding in western Europe has created far more awareness than any series ever can.

"The fact that climate change is here is something I think 99% of the people of both our countries agree upon and perhaps question in what part human behavior has contributed to it. Climate change is here… it's almost too late to stop it. The thing we should learn now is how can we protect ourselves."
Heed the warnings

Despite producing a film and a series that somehow eerily presaged the current state of affairs in western Europe, Nijenhuis said he is not a pessimist.

He has observed that how people treat the planet changes every 50 years. Transportation, for instance, has transitioned from water-based to land-based methods, he said.

"Same goes for the way we use energy. One hundred years ago, it was coal and wood. And then we changed to gas, and now we have to move to solar panels and maybe nuclear energy. These changes happen every 50 or 100 years, and the same goes for the way we protect ourselves from the water."

This, however, means rethinking where homes should be built. Nijenhuis explained how in the Netherlands, farmers' warnings against building homes too close to bodies of water have sometimes gone unheeded — to the eventual detriment of the homeowners.

"We have to have a good look at where we build houses. From the series, I learned that certain areas will be affected by floods and swells. You can't prevent a floor getting wet now and then; we should only make sure that we don't have tragic deaths when it happens."

Court ends Samoa constitutional deadlock, declares new PM

The HRPP had been in power for nearly 40 years with the 76-year-old Malielegaoi, who claimed he was "appointed by God", spending 22 years as prime minister.

Issued on: 23/07/2021 - 

In May, Fiame Naomi Mata'afa was sworn in as prime minister at a ceremony inside a makeshift tent after her FAST party was locked out of the parliament building

 Keni LESA AFP

Apia (Samoa) (AFP)

A top Samoan court on Friday ended a 15-week constitutional crisis, confirming Fiame Naomi Mata'afa as the Pacific island nation's first woman prime minister.

The country has been in a political deadlock since April, when long-ruling Tuilaepa Sa'ilele Malielegaoi narrowly lost in elections and refused to cede power.

In May, Mata'afa was sworn in at an extraordinary ceremony inside a makeshift tent after her FAST party was locked out of the parliament building.


Samoa's Appeal Court said it did not recognise Malielegaoi's caretaker government, ruling that his Human Rights Protection Party (HRPP) was occupying government offices unlawfully.

It also overturned a previous Supreme Court decision that the tent swearing-in was unconstitutional.

"It is now for the new prime minister and her government to give effect to this judgment and the declaration contained within," the Appeal Court said.

"We declare that the swearing in carried out on May 24, 2021 at the Tiafau Malae of elected members of parliament, to be consistent with the terms of the constitution, the supreme law of Samoa, and therefore lawful."

The ruling, which came in response to an appeal by the FAST party, said Samoa now has a lawful government.

"For the avoidance of doubt, this means there has been a lawful government in Samoa since May 24, 2021, and that lawful government is the FAST party which holds the majority of the seats in parliament," the court said.

Samoa's politics have been embroiled in controversy and legal challenges since the election, which ended with Mata'afa's FAST party holding 26 seats -- one more than the HRPP in the 51-seat parliament.

The HRPP had been in power for nearly 40 years with the 76-year-old Malielegaoi, who claimed he was "appointed by God", spending 22 years as prime minister.

© 2021 AFP

Philippines approves GMO 'golden rice' for commercial production

Issued on: 23/07/2021 

'Golden rice' is enriched with the vitamin A precursor beta-carotene to make it more nutritional Handout INTERNATIONAL RICE RESEARCH INSTITUTE/AFP

Manila (AFP)

The Philippines became the world's first country Friday to approve the commercial production of genetically modified "golden rice" that experts hope will combat childhood blindness and save lives in the developing world.

A biosafety permit issued by government regulators paves the way for the rice -- enriched with the vitamin A precursor beta-carotene to make it more nutritional -- to be grown by farmers across the country, its developers said.

"It's a really significant step for our project because it means that we are past this regulatory phase and golden rice will be declared as safe as ordinary rice," Russell Reinke of the Philippine-based International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) told AFP ahead of the announcement.

The next step was to "take our few kilos of seed and multiply it... so it can be made more widely available", he said.

IRRI has spent two decades working with the Department of Agriculture-Philippine Rice Research Institute to develop golden rice -- named for its bright yellow hue.

It is the first genetically modified rice approved for commercial propagation in South and Southeast Asia, officials said Friday.

Golden rice has faced strong resistance from environmental groups opposed to genetically altered food plants. At least one test field in the Philippines was attacked by activists.

Despite passing the final regulatory hurdle, the rice is still a way off appearing in food bowls.

"Limited quantities" of seed could start to be distributed to Filipino farmers in selected provinces next year, Reinke said.

Ordinary rice, a staple for hundreds of millions of people particularly in Asia, produces beta-carotene in the plant, but it is not found in the grain.

"The only change that we've made is to produce beta-carotene in the grain," Reinke said.

"The farmers will be able to grow them in exactly the same way as ordinary varieties... it doesn't need additional fertiliser or changes in management and it carries with it the benefit of improved nutrition."

Vitamin A is essential for normal growth and development, the proper functioning of the immune system, and vision.

World Health Organization data show vitamin A deficiency causes up to 500,000 cases of childhood blindness every year, with half of those dying within 12 months of losing their sight.

Nearly 17 percent of children under the age of five in the Philippines are deficient in vitamin A, according to IRRI.

"We've always said we will provide 30-50 percent of that estimated average requirement (of vitamin A), and when you add that to what is existing in the diet you push up a whole cohort of the population from insufficiency to sufficiency," Reinke said.

Golden rice was analysed by food safety regulators in Australia, the United States and Canada and was given the thumbs up, he said, but it has not been approved in these countries for commercial production.

It is also being reviewed by regulators in Bangladesh.

China warned of future disasters as Zhengzhou floods toll passes 50

Issued on: 23/07/2021 - 

Rescuers evacuate people from a hospital amid record flooding in China's Zhengzhou. © Stringer, AFP

The catastrophic floods that struck the central city of Zhengzhou this week have given China's urban planners a foretaste of future disasters as climate experts reckon the country had better learn to live with record-breaking rainfall.

An unprecedented downpour dumped a year’s rain in just three hours on the city of Zhengzhou on Tuesday, instantly overwhelming drains and sending torrents of muddy, swirling water through streets, road tunnels and the subway system.

Officials said the death toll had climbed to 51 as of noon on Friday, with more than 395,000 people forced to evacuate their homes.

Questions have turned to how China’s bulging cities could be better prepared for freak weather events, which experts say are happening with increased frequency and intensity due to climate change.

Official data shows about 98% of China's 654 major cities are vulnerable to flooding and waterlogging, with rapid growth in recent decades creating urban sprawls that covered floodplains with impermeable concrete.

The deluge on July 20 dumped 800-900 millimetres of rainfall in what was described by Chinese media as a "once in a thousand year" event.

"We can't verify whether this is 'once in a thousand years', said Zhou Jinfeng, Secretary-General of the China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation (CBCGDF), a non-government group.

"But because of global climate change, the rainfall statistics will continue to break new records in the future," he added.

Almost two-thirds of China's 1.4 billion people live in cities compared with a third two decades ago, and coping with future calamities will depend on building infrastructure, most notably flood prevention and drainage systems, experts say.

Currently, many cities rely on the height and strength of dykes as a first line of defence.

"We know these big events are going to come along, and just don't know when," James Griffiths, a hydrologist at New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, said.

"City planners need to consider the hydrology of the larger landscape – floodplains and natural basins –when they design new cities, and ensure that the drainage network can continue to utilise such areas when the big rains arrive."

China published a policy report this month listing some of the measures taken to mitigate risks. More than 6,700 reservoirs were reinforced and there were plans for drainage infrastructure at 53 flood-prone sites along the Yangtze, the country's biggest river.



Sponge cities

Located just south of the Yellow River, Zhengzhou is one of hundreds of cities that need to be retrofitted with flood-proof infrastructure.

In Zhengzhou in the last few days, China has relied on the giant South-North Water Diversion Project to try to ease flood pressures.

It frequently uses giant dams along flood-prone rivers like the Yangtze and the Yellow to try to regulate water flows and minimise flood peaks.

But China has also been looking for more natural, low-impact solutions to solve its growing flood vulnerability.

China launched a programme in 2015 to create "sponge cities" that could safely retain and drain more rainwater.

The first phase covered 30 cities across the country, including Hebi, 150 kilometres (93 miles) from Zhengzhou.

Among the potential technological solutions were permeable asphalt and pavements, and cities were also encouraged to expand green spaces, build ponds and restore wetlands to take on surplus water.

Faith Chan, associate professor with the School of Geographical Sciences at the University of Nottingham Ningbo, said "sponge city" measures are designed to cope with around 180-200 millimetres of rain over 24 hours, and would have been powerless against the downpour of biblical proportions that swamped Zhengzhou.

Zhou of CBCGDF said in a blog post that practical measures such as waterproofing subway systems needed to be backed up by fundamental changes in how cities are designed, noting that the challenges will get harder in the coming years.

He added: "We hope this will serve as an important warning and ring an alarm bell for our industries and government departments to take action quickly, to change quickly, and prevent this kind of disaster from happening again."

(FRANCE 24 with REUTERS, AFP)

Frontrunner to succeed Merkel on back foot after floods

Issued on: 23/07/2021 - 

Laschet has faced criticism for his hesitant, u-turn-prone handling of the pandemic Christof STACHE AFP/File

Berlin (AFP)

From criticism of his climate policy to a woefully ill-timed bout of laughter, the deadly floods in western Germany have exposed weaknesses of frontrunner Armin Laschet in his bid to succeed Chancellor Angela Merkel.

As the death toll from the flooding has risen to more than 170 in Germany, Laschet's response has revived a longstanding debate over his suitability to fill fellow conservative Merkel's shoes when she retires after September's election.

In a recent poll by the Civey institute for Spiegel magazine, only 26 percent of 5,000 respondents said they considered Laschet to be a good crisis-manager.

Laschet, who is currently state premier in Germany's most populous state North-Rhine Westphalia, had already faced criticism for his hesitant, u-turn-prone handling of the pandemic.

And with his own state one of the worst-hit regions by last week's deluge, he is now under fire for his gaffe-marred response to the disaster.

- 'Communications disaster' -

"Laschet took some time to find the right tone" after the floods hit, Hans Vorlaender, political scientist at Dresden's Technical University, told AFP.

He pointed to a "communications disaster" over images that emerged last week.

The 60-year-old candidate was caught on camera convulsed in laughter with local officials as German president Frank-Walter Steinmeier in the foreground paid homage to the flood victims.

Though he later apologised for his "mistake", Laschet faced fierce criticism online and in the German media.

"Does the supremely self-controlled Merkel really trust this man, who has shown no self-control, with her job?" demanded Der Spiegel weekly.

"It is no laughing matter! If Laschet wants to be chancellor, he has to be able to manage crises. This would not have happened to Merkel," wrote Berlin daily Der Tagesspiegel.#photo1

While the veteran leader has long been praised for her steely nerves under fire, Laschet has often shown "a lack of determination", Vorlaender told AFP.

"In general, politicians show what they are capable of in times of crisis," he said, pointing not only to Merkel, but also to her predecessor Gerhard Schroeder, who impressed voters with his hands-on response to floods ahead of his re-election in 2002.

In a survey this week for the Forsa institute, meanwhile, Laschet and Merkel's CDU/CSU alliance was polling two points lower than the previous week on 28 percent.

By Friday, however, a poll for public broadcaster ARD showed the conservatives up a point to 29 percent.

- Climate debate -

With a lead of around 10 points ahead of the opposition Greens party in second place, Laschet is still the strong favourite to succeed Merkel.

In recent months, he has benefited from a collapse in support for the Greens, whose initially strong campaign was hit hard with a series of missteps by co-leader and candidate Annalena Baerbock.

Yet the floods have slowed his march to victory and returned climate policy to the top of the agenda just two months before the election.

The ARD poll showed 81 percent of Germans seeing a need for stronger action to protect the climate.

"The floods have shown the urgent need for climate policies," wrote Der Tagesspiegel, while Merkel herself called for "speeding up" the fight against climate change as she leaves the stage.

"Laschet needs to set clear goals and go beyond what is in the conservatives' manifesto," Vorlaender said, as natural disasters become more frequent due to global warming.

Merkel's ruling right-left coalition tightened its emissions targets in May to put the country on course for carbon neutrality by 2045.

Bavarian state premier Markus Soeder, who mounted a fierce challenge against Laschet for the conservative candidacy in the spring, has increased the pressure by setting an ambitious goal of phasing out coal by 2030 -- eight years ahead of deadline set by the federal government.

As premier of a coal-dominated region, Laschet has been considerably more cautious on climate issues.

And that has not been lost on voters. In a Civey poll on Wednesday, just 26 percent said they believed Laschet would provide effective climate protection policies.

© 2021 AFP

Great Barrier Reef avoids UNESCO 'in danger' listing


Issued on: 23/07/2021 - 

The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest living structure Sarah LAI AFP/File

Brisbane (Australia) (AFP)

Australia on Friday avoided having the Great Barrier Reef listed as an endangered world heritage site by UNESCO, despite concerns about climate change-fuelled damage to the ecosystem's corals.

At a World Heritage Committee meeting chaired by China, delegates voted not to downgrade the reef to "in danger", after a concerted lobbying effort by Canberra.

"May I sincerely thank the esteemed delegates for recognising Australia's commitment to protecting the Great Barrier Reef," Australia's Environment Minister Sussan Ley said in a statement to the body.

The United Nations' cultural agency had recommended in June that the reef's World Heritage status be downgraded because of its dramatic coral decline, largely due to the impacts of climate change and poor water quality.

Tim Badman, director of the agency's World Heritage Programme, argued that the reef "unambiguously" met the criteria for an endangered listing.

"Despite the major efforts that have been made by the state party, both the current status of the outstanding universal value of the Great Barrier Reef and the prospects for future recovery have significantly deteriorated," he said.

Ley had flown to Paris earlier this month to personally lobby member states on the committee, while Australia also took key ambassadors on a reef snorkelling trip.

The decision had already been postponed from 2015, when Australia successfully waged a similar diplomatic campaign and committed billions of dollars to reef protection.

But the 2,300-kilometre-long (1,400-mile-long) ecosystem has since suffered three mass coral bleaching events, which are caused by rising ocean temperatures due to global warming.

Though government scientists say corals have shown signs of recovery in the past 12 months, they admit the reef's long-term outlook remains "very poor".

Two thirds of the reef is believed to have been damaged in some way.

As well as coral bleaching, the reef is also susceptible to damage from cyclones and outbreaks of crown-of-thorns starfish, which eat the coral.

UNESCO had accused Australia of failing to meet key water quality and land management targets, while also taking aim at the country for its lacklustre climate efforts.

Canberra is facing growing international criticism for refusing to commit to net zero emissions by 2050.

The conservative government has said it hopes to meet the target "as soon as possible" without harming the country's fossil fuel-reliant economy.

But World Heritage Committee members -- including China, Russia and Saudi Arabia -- agreed Australia should have more time to report on its reef conservation efforts.

The delegates also asked UNESCO to send a monitoring mission to inspect the reef, after Canberra criticised the agency for relying on existing reports to make its recommendation.

© 2021 AFP

UNESCO keeps Great Barrier Reef off “in danger” list after Australian lobbying

By Colin Packham
Posted on July 23, 2021

FILE PHOTO: Assorted reef fish swim above a staghorn coral colony as it grows on the Great Barrier Reef off the coast of Cairns, Australia

CANBERRA (Reuters) – The Great Barrier Reef will not be added to a list of World Heritage Sites that are “in danger” after a UN panel on Friday agreed to defer a vote until 2022 amid intensive lobbying by Australia.

A United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) committee last month recommended the Great Barrier Reef be classified as “in danger”, drawing an angry response from Australia.

Desperate to avoid a politically embarrassing classification for a tourist attraction that draws about 5 million people each year and supports nearly 70,000 jobs – Australia’s Minister for the Environment Sussan Ley travelled to more than a dozen countries in recent weeks to secure support.

Speaking ahead of the decision, Ley assured the 21-country panel that Canberra was committed to tackling climate change, one of the key factors in the initial recommendation.

“Every Australian is heavily invested in the protection of our barrier reef,” Ley told the virtual meeting.

Shortly afterwards committee members agreed to an amendment that would require Australia to produce an updated report on the state of the reef by February 2022 when a vote could follow on whether to classify the site as in danger.

Environmental groups criticised the decision.

“This is a victory for one of the most cynical lobbying efforts in recent history,” said David Ritter, chief executive officer of Greenpeace Australia.

“This is not an achievement – it is a day of infamy for the Australian government.”

Australia’s reliance on coal-fired power makes it one of the world’s largest carbon emitters per capita, but its conservative government has steadfastly backed fossil fuel industries, saying tougher action on emissions would cost jobs.

(Reporting by Colin Packham; Editing by Tomasz Janowski)

Crafty cockatoos master dumpster diving and teach each other

By CHRISTINA LARSON

In this 2019 photo provided by researcher Barbara Klump, a sulphur-crested cockatoo lifts the lid of a trash can while several others watch in Sydney, Australia. At the beginning of 2018, researchers received reports from a survey of residents that birds in three Sydney suburbs had mastered the novel foraging technique. By the end of 2019, birds were lifting bins in 44 suburbs. (Barbara Klump/Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior)

WASHINGTON (AP) — A few years ago, a Sydney scientist noticed a sulfur-crested cockatoo opening his trash bin. Not every resident would be thrilled, but ornithologist Richard Major was impressed by the ingenuity.

It’s quite a feat for a bird to grasp a bin lid with its beak, pry it open, then shuffle far enough along the bin’s edge that the lid falls backward — revealing edible trash treasures inside.

Intrigued, Major teamed up with researchers in Germany to study how many cockatoos learned this trick. In early 2018, they found from a survey of residents that birds in three Sydney suburbs had mastered the novel foraging technique. By the end of 2019, birds were lifting bins in 44 suburbs.

“From three suburbs to 44 in two years is a pretty rapid spread,” said Major, who is based at the Australian Museum.

The researchers’ next question was whether the cockatoos had each figured out how to do this alone — or whether they copied the strategy from experienced birds. And their research published Thursday in the journal Science concluded the birds mostly learned by watching their peers.

“That spread wasn’t just popping up randomly. It started in southern suburbs and radiated outwards,” said Major. Basically, it caught on like a hot dance move.

Scientists have documented other examples of social learning in birds. One classic case involves small birds called blue tits that learned to puncture foil lids of milk bottles in the United Kingdom starting in the 1920s — a crafty move, though less complex and physically demanding than opening trash bins.

But observing a new “cultural trend” spreading in the wild — or suburbs — in real time afforded the cockatoo researchers a special opportunity, said Lucy Aplin, a cognitive ecologist at Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavioral in Germany and co-author of the study. “This is a scientist’s dream,” she said.

During summer of 2019, trash-collection day in suburban Sydney was the team’s research day. As garbage trucks rolled down their routes and people shoved bins to the curb, Max Planck Institute behavioral ecologist Barbara Klump drove around and stopped to record cockatoos landing on bins. Not all cockatoos succeeded in opening them, but she took around 160 videos of victorious efforts.

Analyzing the footage, Klump realized the vast majority of birds opening bins were males, which tend to be larger than females. The birds that mastered the trick also tended to be dominant in social hierarchies.

“This suggests that if you’re more socially connected, you have more opportunities to observe and acquire new behavior — and also to spread it,” she said.

Cockatoos are extremely gregarious birds that forage in small groups, roost in large ones, and are rarely seen alone in Sydney. While many animals have declined with the expansion of Australian cities, these bold and flamboyant birds generally have thrived.

“In an unpredictable, rapidly changing environment with unpredictable food sources, opportunistic animals thrive,” said Isabelle Laumer, a behavioral researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles, who was not involved in the research.



Over the past decade, research has shown that “urban adaptability is correlated with traits like innovativeness, behavioral flexibility and exploration,” said Max Planck Institute’s Aplin. What the new research adds to that understanding is that critters that easily transmit knowledge and new skills socially also have an advantage.

Parrots — which include cockatoos — are known for being among the most clever birds. They have a brain just the size of a walnut, but the density of neurons packed into their forebrains gives many species cognitive abilities similar to great apes, said Irene Pepperberg, an animal cognition researcher at Harvard, who has studied African grey parrots and was not involved in the new paper.

While African grey parrots are known for their ability to mimic and sometimes comprehend human speech, cockatoos are famously adept at using and manipulating new tools, such as puzzle boxes in the lab or trash bin lids in the wild, she said.

“Everyone in Sydney has an opinion about cockatoos,” said the Australian Museum’s Major. ”Whether you to love to watch these big flamboyant social birds, or think they’re a pest, you have to respect them. They’ve adapted so brilliantly to living with humans, to human domination of the environment.”

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Follow Christina Larson on Twitter: @larsonchristina

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Volunteers hunting for Mexico’s ‘disappeared’ become targets

By MARK STEVENSON

FILE - In this March 11, 2019 file photo, Lidia Lara Tobon, center, whose brother Angel Gabriel Tobon went missing, works with other relatives of the disappeared from the Solecito Collective, as they search for clandestine graves inside a municipal dump after an anonymous source sent the group a map suggesting hundreds of bodies were buried in the area, in the port city of Veracruz, Mexico. The mainly female volunteer searchers who fan out across Mexico to dig for the bodies of their murdered relatives are themselves increasingly being killed, putting to the test the government’s promise to help them in their quest for a final shred of justice: a chance to mourn. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez, File)

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The mainly female volunteers who fan out across Mexico to hunt for the bodies of murdered relatives are themselves increasingly being killed, putting to the test the government’s promise to help them in their quest for a final shred of justice: a chance to mourn.

Those who carry on the effort tell tales of long getting threats and being watched — presumably by the same people who murdered their sons, brothers and husbands.

But now threats have given way to bullets in the heads of searchers who have proved far better than the authorities at ferreting out the clandestine burial and burning pits that number in the thousands. Two searchers have been slain the past two months.

Aranza Ramos had spent over a year searching for her husband, Bryan Celaya Alvarado, after he vanished Dec. 6, 2020. That day he became one of Mexico’s 87,855 “disappeared” people. Most are thought to have been killed by drug cartels, their bodies dumped into shallow graves or burned.

Searchers have learned over the last decade, since the height of Mexico’s 2006-2012 drug war, that the gangs often use the same locations over and over again, creating grisly killing fields.

It was at one such field, known as Ejido Ortiz, in the northern border state of Sonora, where Aranza Ramos had been helping search on July 15 — the day she herself was killed.

“In Ejido Ortiz several clandestine crematoriums have been found, some still smoking and burning when they were found,” Ramos’ search group said in a statement. “This ejido (collective farm plot) is an active extermination site.”

So active that searchers say they get nervous when the burials they happen on are too fresh. It means the killers may still be around and using the site.

After a day of searching — the volunteers plunge metal rods into the soil to release the tell-tale odor of death — Ramos returned to her home near the city of Guaymas. Just before midnight, she was abducted from her home. The killers drove her a short distance and dumped her bullet-ridden body on the roadside.

Cecilia Duarte, who has spent three years working with the search group “Buscadoras por la Paz” (Searchers for Peace), attended meetings with Ramos in the week before she was killed. Duarte, who found the body of her own missing son and is now searching for a missing nephew, said Ramos always tried to play it safe.

“She tried not to stand out, she wasn’t a spokeswoman,” said Duarte. Indeed, Ramos avoided attention. The Associated Press had tried to contact her two months before she was killed, but she did not answer messages.

“Aranza posted a message the week before she died, saying she was searching for her husband, not for the suspects,” Duarte recalled.

There are three golden rules that Mexico’s volunteer search groups follow:

—Human remains aren’t referred to as corpses or bodies. The searchers call them “treasures,” because to grieving families they are precious.

—Searchers usually call law enforcement when they think they’ve found a burial, mostly because authorities often refuse to conduct the slow but critical DNA testing unless the remains are professionally exhumed.

—Searches are not conducted to find perpetrators, only to find loved ones.

It is the latter rule that volunteers hoped would keep them safe from retaliation.

“As searchers, we are not seeking to find out who is guilty. We are searching for treasures,” said Patricia “Ceci” Flores, founder of Madres Buscadores de Sonora (Searching Mothers of Sonora).

For a long time, it has meant that searchers, and the police who often accompany them, focus on finding graves and identifying remains — not collecting evidence of how they died or who killed them. Search groups sometimes even get anonymous tips about where bodies are buried, knowledge probably available only to the killers or their accomplices.

But that longstanding arrangement appears to have broken down.

The day after Ramos was killed, Flores received a phone threat. “I got a call saying, ‘You’re going to be next,’” Flores said. Since then, police have assigned a patrol car to stand guard outside her home in Hermosillo.

Sonora state officials have agreed to provide security for searchers deemed to be in danger. The state also agreed to assign excavation teams to potential burial sites found by searchers within three to five days. But officials seem more interested in damage control. They got the searchers to agree not to take photos of burial sites.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador gave a vague and self-assured statement when asked about the killing of Ramos. “We are going to continue to protect all women. We condemn these crimes.”

But Ramos was not the first. On May 30, a volunteer search activist, Javier Barajas Piña, was gunned down in the state of Guanajuato, Mexico’s most violent.

And two journalists have been killed in Sonora in the space of about two months; on Thursday, reporter Ricardo López was shot to death in a parking lot in Guaymas, the same township where Ramos was killed.

Altogether, 68 human rights and environmental activists have been killed since López Obrador took office.

Fear has always accompanied the searchers. They go to wild, remote, abandoned places where terrible crimes have been committed. But up to now, they mostly shrugged it off.

Cecilia Duarte, the volunteer with Ramos, recalled of those days: “They sent us a message from a false Facebook account saying they were going to flay the skin from us. But I always thought that if they are really going to do something to you, they are not going to warn you.”


FILE - In this March 11, 2019 file photo, members of the Solecito Collective, who are seeking their missing loved ones, look for signs of clandestine graves at a municipal dump after an anonymous source sent the group a map suggesting hundreds of bodies were buried in the area, in the port city of Veracruz, Mexico. The mainly female volunteer searchers who fan out across Mexico to dig for the bodies of their murdered relatives are themselves increasingly being killed, putting to the test the government’s promise to help them in their quest for a final shred of justice: a chance to mourn. (AP Photo/Felix Marquez, File)

At another search site, Duarte said, she once felt the sense of being watched — and she spotted somebody observing her group from a nearby hillside. Still, the searchers kept on.

But Ramos’ killing changed things, she said. “That did hit us hard. Some people stopped the searches.”

Multiple cartels, including one run by Rafael Caro Quintero — improperly released from prison while serving a sentence for the 1985 murder of a DEA agent — have been fighting for control of Sonora and its valuable trafficking routes to the U.S. They include the two main factions of the Sinaloa cartel, operating through local gangs.

“The authorities should do more, it’s not enough,” said Flores of Madres Buscadores de Sonora. “They should do more investigation, provide more security, they should be investigating so that the mothers aren’t the ones who have to go out in the fields searching.”

The U.N. human rights office in Mexico made the same point: “When a government does not fulfill its duty (to carry out searches), it puts the families of the disappeared at risk.”