‘Ugly History’: The Battle To Restore Japan’s Iconic Brothel Building

WASHINGTONNEWSDAY.COM -- NOV 12

An unusual architectural jewel stands at the corner of a red-light district in the Japanese city of Osaka: a century-old former brothel at the center of a restoration operation.

Although Taiyoshi Hyakuban hasn’t been used as a brothel in decades and is now a restaurant, it is nonetheless considered as a symbol of the surrounding area, which is still linked with the sex business.

According to experts, the timber two-story structure is an unique authentic example of Taisho era architecture from 1912 to 1926.

“Most Japanese building from a century or more was destroyed in WWII air raids or large flames,” said Shinya Hashizume, an architectural historian at Osaka Prefecture University.

On a visit to the site, he observed, “Old brothel houses, in particular, have rarely survived.”

Taiyoshi Hyakuban contains dozens of Japanese and Western-style party rooms, some with ornately inlaid ceilings and beautifully painted sliding doors.

The apartments, which surround a garden with towering “yin and yang” rocks representing men and women, are adorned with murals of festivals, goddesses playing traditional instruments, and Dutch merchants dressed in period attire.

“What is so great about it is that the art is part of the architecture,” Masakazu Rokuhara, an architect engaged in the restoration effort, said.

Swinging red lanterns strung along the outside of the building’s second floor add a nostalgic elegance to the edifice at night, gently illuminating its red wooden siding.

However, sunlight reveals the urgent need for restoration, such as cracks in a massive wooden plaque over the entrance door and fading paint.

SECTIONS

  

India's Born-again Elephants Repel Four-legged Rampages


By Laurence THOMANN
11/11/21

Moorthy killed 21 people and terrorised entire villages in southern India for years before he was captured and retrained to repel similar attacks by other wild elephants starved due to deforestation.

The 58-year-old grey beast, recognisable from the bright pink spots that pockmark his face, was already spared a death sentence after trampling nearly a dozen people in the southern state of Kerala.

Despite an official order to shoot him, Moorthy escaped across state lines into neighbouring Tamil Nadu, where he proceeded to kill 10 more people.

Human encroachment on elephants' forest homes has put them in conflict with humans Photo: AFP / Manjunath Kiran

But state authorities there "forbade harming the elephant" and in 1998 he was instead taken into the Theppakadu camp for taming, said Kirumaran M., his trainer.

"Ever since I've been training Moorthy, for so many years, he is like an innocent child and doesn't hurt anybody," the diminutive 55-year-old told AFP.

"He is so calm that even if a small child goes and plays with him or hugs him, he won't ever hurt them."

Mahouts bathe an elephant at the Theppakadu elephant camp Photo: AFP / Manjunath Kiran

Established in 1927, the Theppakadu elephant camp is India's largest.

Semi-wild but brought to heel by human hands, "Kumkis" like Moorthy are brought there by their minders every morning for a thorough wash, and released every evening back into nearby forests.

They have been trained to assist with manual labour -- their ability to carry up to 150 kilograms (330 pounds) makes them valuable workers.

More than 2,300 people were killed in elephant attacks in the five years to 2019, according to Indian government data Photo: AFP / Manjunath Kiran

The herbivores are also "ecosystem engineers" who spend up to 16 hours a day foraging in their surroundings, leaving a trail of debris that sows seeds and helps forests to flourish.

But most importantly for the communities surrounding the camp, they help thwart increasingly frequent and aggressive incursions by wild elephants who venture into settled areas in search of food, leaving their inhabitants fearful of attack.

"Kumkis" -- tamed elephants -- are trained to assist with manual labour Photo: AFP / Manjunath Kiran

"Wild elephants come to the village and our children are vulnerable," said Shanti Ganesh, a woman living near the Theppakadu camp.

"They (the children) have to come to the main road to get to school, so we are always worried that they might be attacked."

Working hand-in-trunk with their "mahouts", or handlers, the Theppakadu herd are trained to physically confront and drive away outside elephants from the villages.

Graphic on Asian elephant populations. Photo: AFP / STAFF

Sometimes they also help surround and catch the interlopers so they can be brought into the camp and trained to serve the surrounding community.

"Sankar here had attacked and killed at least three people in the village and so we were ordered to capture him," said Vikram, an elephant handler at Theppakadu, gesturing to the beast behind him.

"We captured him with the help of other kumkis and now we are training Sankar too."

India is home to around 25,000 elephants, according to the Worldwide Fund for Nature -- around 60 percent of the wild Asian elephant population.

But human encroachment on their forest homes has put them in conflict with humans.

"The reason an elephant attacks humans or property is solely because of habitat loss," said Kirumaran, the trainer.

"All of the forests where they used to live have now turned into human residential towns or villages -- they attack because they are hungry."

More than 2,300 people were killed in elephant attacks in the five years to 2019, according to Indian government data.

In the same period more than 500 elephants died, including 333 from electrocution and around 100 from poaching and poisoning, the figures show.

Ananda Kumar of India's Nature Conservation Foundation said that any elephant involved in a fatal trampling had likely been provoked by violent confrontations with humans trying to drive the creatures away.

"That elephant may have been chased and driven for months," he told AFP.

"It's a kind of torture that elephants go through that has to be stopped."

He said he had personally seen one elephant which had been shot so many times that a veterinarian was able to extract nearly 100 bullets from its body once it finally died.

Experts say that stopping human-elephant conflict depends on protecting and expanding elephant habitats and linking up isolated patches of forest to create corridors that give them greater space to roam.

"When a developmental project is planned, it has to consider the effect on... species like elephants, and the people depending on these forest areas," Kumar added.

Russian prosecutors move to shut down respected human rights watchdog 'Memorial'

AFP

Issued on: 12/11/2021 - 

Oleg Orlov, head of "Memorial" human rights watchdog, is pictured at his office in Moscow, September 19, 2012. © Maxim Shemetov, REUTERS

Russian prosecutors are moving to shutter the country's most respected rights group Memorial, it announced Thursday, in the latest legal effort to silence independent voices critical of President Vladimir Putin.

Memorial, founded in 1992 in Moscow, said it was notified by Russia's supreme court that prosecutors had filed a demand to dissolve the group over systematic violations of "foreign agent" legislation.

The group is among several investigative news outlets, journalists and rights organisations to have been hit with the label this year in what observers have described as a historic crackdown on independent organisations.

Memorial said there was "no legal basis" for the case, saying it had been accused of failing to identify itself publically as a designated foreign agent.

"This is a political decision aimed at destroying the Memorial Society, an organisation dedicated to the history of political repression and the protection of human rights."

"We have repeatedly stated that the law was originally conceived as a tool to crack down on independent organisations, and insisted that it should be abolished," Memorial said in a statement.

A hearing is scheduled for November 25 at 11:00 Moscow time (0800 GMT) according to the court website.

A term with Soviet-era undertones, the status forces individuals or organisations to disclose sources of funding and label all their publications, including social media posts, with a tag or face fines.

Memorial said late last month that the number of political prisoners in Russia had risen sharply in recent years in a trend that recalls late Soviet-era repression.

It listed at least 420 political prisoners, including top Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny who survived a poisoning attempt with Novichok nerve agent last year, compared to 46 in 2015.

Russia earlier this week declared the country's main group defending LGBTQ rights a foreign agent as well as several lawyers close to the Russian opposition.

Putin himself said that the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Russian newspaper editor Dmitry Muratov would not "shield" him from being branded a foreign agent if he breaks the law.

(AFP)

Beijing Olympic sponsors must speak up on rights in China: HRW

Thu, 11 November 2021, 

Activists rallied in front of the Chinese consulate in Los Angeles earlier this month (AFP/Frederic J. BROWN)

Corporate sponsors of February's Beijing Winter Olympics must speak up on rights abuses in China or risk being tainted by association, Human Rights Watch said on Friday.

Preparations for the Games have been overshadowed by the Covid-19 pandemic and calls from rights groups for a partial or full boycott.

New York-based Human Rights Watch is now urging sponsors, which include Intel, Omega, Panasonic, Samsung, Toyota, Visa, Airbnb, Coca-Cola, Allianz and Alibaba, to do more.

HRW said they wrote to sponsors earlier this year but received only one response.

"There are just three months until the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, but corporate sponsors remain silent over how they are using their influence to address China’s appalling human rights record," said Sophie Richardson, HRW's China director.

She accused Games sponsors of "squandering the opportunity to show their commitment to human rights standards" and said they "risk instead being associated with an Olympics tainted by censorship and repression".

The Olympic flame arrived in China last month after a lighting ceremony in Greece which was disrupted by a small number of activists who brandished a Tibetan flag and a banner saying "no genocide".

Human rights campaigners and exiles have accused Beijing of religious repression against the Uyghur minority in Xinjiang, as well as massively curtailing rights in Hong Kong and Tibet.

Beijing has consistently railed against what it calls the "politicisation" of sport, while the International Olympic Committee says that it is not within its remit "to go into a country and tell them what to do".

bys-rox/pst

Sponsors asked to defend support for Beijing Winter Olympics


 Exiled Tibetans use the Olympic Rings as a prop as they hold a street protest against the holding of 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing in Dharmsala, India on Feb. 3, 2021. Leading sponsors of the Beijing Winter Olympics should explain publicly why they remain silent about alleged human rights abuses in China with the Games opening there in just under three months, Human Rights Watch said Friday, Nov. 12, 2021 in a statement.

 (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia, File)More

STEPHEN WADE
Thu, November 11, 2021

Leading sponsors of the Beijing Winter Olympics should explain why they remain largely silent about alleged human rights abuses in China with the Games opening there in just under three months, Human Rights Watch said Friday.

The rights group said in an on-line briefing that it had reached out to all but one of the IOC's so-called TOP sponsors — and leading broadcast rights holder NBC — in lengthy letters almost six months ago.

The only reply came from sponsor Allianz, which it wrote only last month.


“We stand behind the Olympic Movement and our longstanding support for its ideals will not waver,” Allianz said.

The Beijing Games open Feb. 4.

The letters asked sponsors to be aware of the rights climate in China, and to scrutinize supply chains and other operations to assure they do not “contribute to human rights violations.”

“There are just three months until the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, but corporate sponsors remain silent over how they are using their influence to address China’s appalling human rights record,” Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

The statement said sponsors risk "being associated with an Olympics tainted by censorship and repression.”

The TOP sponsors, at the time of the letter, included: Airbnb, Alibaba, Allianz, Atos, Bridgestone, Coca-Cola, Dow, General Electric, Intel, Omega, Panasonic, Procter & Gamble, Toyota, and Visa.

Two sponsors — Dow and General Electric — have completed contracts with the IOC that ended with the recent Tokyo Olympics.

In total, TOP sponsors paid about $1 billion in cash and in-kind payments to the IOC in the 2013-2016 Olympic cycle, a figure that was expected to double when complete figures are released for the 2017-2020 cycle. This cycle has been delayed by the one-year postponement of Tokyo due to the pandemic.

The American network NBC accounted for about 40% of IOC income in the 2013-2016 cycle.

“The time for quiet diplomacy is over," said Minky Worden of Human Rights Watch during the briefing. “It's time for the TOP sponsors to urge the International Olympic Committee to adopt human rights. It's time for them to disclose their own supply chains in China, particularly any products that have the five rings of the Olympics.”

In Beijing, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin denounced the sponsor accountability calls from Human Rights Watch.

“To politicize sports by fabricating lies and rumors and undermining the Olympic cause is unpopular and will never succeed,” Wang told media at a daily briefing.

The statement from the rights group comes just three days after a global trade union group issued a scathing report that questioned the propriety of China holding the Games in the face of alleged genocide and crimes against humanity reportedly taking place in the Xinjiang in northwestern China.

The report from the International Trade Union Confederation is titled “ China: A gold medal for repression.”

China has repeatedly denied that a genocide is taking place, terming it the “lie of the century.” It has said camps in northwestern China are for education, not arbitrary internment of a reported 1 million Uyghur Muslims and other religious and ethnic minorities.

American and European lawmakers and activist groups have asked the Games be postponed or moved from China. Center Enes Kanter of the NBA's Boston Celtics, a Muslim with roots in Turkey, has criticized China's rights record and called General Secretary Xi Jinping a “brutal dictator.”

For its part, the IOC says its only focus is sports and has no remit to act on the polices of a sovereign state. The IOC does, however, hold an observer seat at the United Nations, unlike any other sports business.

“We have a lot of respect for other organizations that have other purposes in life,” Juan Antonio Samaranch, the IOC member in charge of Beijing preparations, said earlier this week in responding to the ITUC report. “But we believe that our responsibility is what it is — celebrate the Olympic Games as a celebration of humanity, altogether, despite our differences."

Most of the IOC sponsors have signed on to the so-called United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. They spell out the obligation of states and businesses to “respect, protect and fulfil human rights and fundamental freedoms.”

However, the IOC did not include these guidelines in its host city contract for the Beijing Olympics, but did add it to the contract for the 2024 Paris Olympics and other future Games.

When the IOC awarded Beijing the 2008 Summer Olympics it said they would improve human rights in China.

“The failure of Chinese authorities to uphold the rights-related commitments they made to win the 2008 Summer Olympic Games, and their deepening repression since that time, make clear that the government cannot be expected to respect human rights around the 2022 Winter Games,” Human Rights Watch said.

___

More AP Winter Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/winter-olympics and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports

___

More AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/olympic-games and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports

Olympic gold medalist Suni Lee says she was pepper-sprayed in racist attack

ESPN News Services

American gymnast and Olympic gold medalist Suni Lee said she was pepper-sprayed in a racist attack last month while out with a group of friends in Los Angeles.

Lee, the first Hmong American to represent the U.S. in the Olympics, told PopSugar she was waiting for a ride when a car drove by with people shouting racial slurs.

According to Lee, who said she was with a group of friends who were all of Asian descent, one of the passengers sprayed her arm with pepper spray before the car drove away.

"I was so mad, but there was nothing I could do or control because they skirted off," Lee told PopSugar as part of a cover story on the gymnast. "I didn't do anything to them, and having the reputation, it's so hard because I didn't want to do anything that could get me into trouble. I just let it happen."

Anti-Asian incidents have risen sharply in the United States since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Stop AAPI Hate, a national coalition that became the authority on gathering data on racially motivated attacks related to the pandemic, has received more than 9,000 incident reports from March 19, 2020, through this June.

Lee, 18, won gold in the individual all-around at the Tokyo Olympics.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this story.

Cheetahs fast running to extinction as cub trade thrives


Cheetahs fast running to extinction as cub trade thrives
Fighting the criminal trade in cheetah cubs is particularly challenging because it revolves around Somaliland, a self-declared republic without international recognition, and one of the world's poorest regions (AFP/EDUARDO SOTERAS)

Cheetahs fast running to extinction as cub trade thrives
The cheetah cubs seized from the illegal wildlife trade in Somaliland are often in poor health, and about half succumb to illness (AFP/EDUARDO SOTERAS)

Cheetahs fast running to extinction as cub trade thrives
Cheetah have been sought after as exotic pets for centuries but today demand for cubs is placing enormous strain on the vulnerable species (AFP/EDUARDO SOTERAS)

Cheetahs fast running to extinction as cub trade thrives
The number of cheetahs sheltered at safe houses run by the Cheetah Conservation Fund in Somaliland has soared as the government has cracked down on the illegal cub trade (AFP/EDUARDO SOTERAS)

Cheetahs fast running to extinction as cub trade thrives
Snatched from their mothers, shipped out of Africa to war-torn Yemen and onward to the Gulf, a cheetah cub that survives the ordeal can fetch up to $15,000 on the black market (AFP/EDUARDO SOTERAS)

Cheetahs fast running to extinction as cub trade thrives
Somaliland is expanding intelligence sharing with neighbouring countries and Yemen to better tackle the illegal trade (AFP/EDUARDO SOTERAS)



Cheetahs fast running to extinction as cub trade thrives
Every year an estimated 300 cheetah cubs are trafficked through Somaliland to wealthy buyers in the Middle East seeking exotic pets (AFP/EDUARDO SOTERAS)


Nick Perry
Thu, 11 November 2021

Tiny, weeks-old cheetah cubs suckled from baby bottles and purred weakly, their condition still dangerously precarious after their rescue from the Horn of Africa's illegal wildlife trade.

Around half the cubs saved from traffickers do not survive the trauma -- and there are real concerns for the smallest of this lot, a frail infant nicknamed "Green" weighing just 700 grams (25 ounces).

"It was very touch and go with Green," said Laurie Marker, founder of the Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF), inspecting the mewling cub at the non-profit organisation's rescue centre in Somaliland.

They are the lucky ones -- every year an estimated 300 cheetah cubs are trafficked through Somaliland to wealthy buyers in the Middle East seeking exotic pets.

Snatched from their mothers, shipped out of Africa to war-torn Yemen and onward to the Gulf, cubs that survive the ordeal can fetch up to $15,000 on the black market.

It is a busy trade, one less familiar than criminal markets for elephant ivory or rhino horn, but equally devastating for Africa's most endangered big cat.

- Loved to death -

A century ago, there were an estimated 100,000 cheetahs worldwide. Today barely 7,000 remain, their numbers slashed by human encroachment and habitat destruction.

The steady plunder of cubs from the wild to satisfy the pet trade only compounds this decline.

More than 3,600 live cheetahs were illegally traded worldwide in the decade to December 2019, according to research published this year that documented hundreds of advertisements for cubs on social media platforms including YouTube and Instagram.

"If this keeps going... that kind of offtake causes the population to go extinct in a very short time," said Marker, a leading authority on cheetahs.

Cheetahs have been prized as pets and hunting companions since the Roman Empire and breeding them in captivity is notoriously difficult, making wild-caught cubs the only option.

Part of the campaign to stop the modern-day trade has focused on changing attitudes in prosperous Gulf states, the main buyer market where cheetahs are still coveted status symbols.

Marker said wealthy owners liked to show off their cheetahs in selfies as much as their cars and cash.

"There's kind of a one-upmanship on it, and there's bragging power. One of our messages is do not 'like' this kind of thing on social media," Marker said.

- Cruel trade -

Combatting this criminal trade is particularly challenging because it revolves around Somaliland, a self-declared republic without international recognition, and one of the world's poorest regions.

Roughly the size of Syria, with 850 kilometres (530 miles) of coastline facing Yemen, the breakaway region between Ethiopia, Djibouti and Somalia is stretched thin policing its porous borders.

Somaliland's interior minister Mohamed Kahin Ahmed told AFP that a small coastguard unit was doing its best but apart from patrolling for cheetahs they had human traffickers and gun runners to contend with.

The cubs that slip through the net suffer terrible mistreatment along the smuggling route, fed improperly and confined to tiny cages, sometimes with their legs bound with zip ties.

Marker said one particular seizure in 2019 illustrated the cruelty: "When they dumped them out, there were live ones dying on top of dead ones... It was just horrible," she said.

In recent years, confiscations have soared as the government has cracked down on the trade.

From just a handful of cubs in 2018, today CCF shelters 67 rescued cheetahs across three safe houses in the Somaliland capital Hargeisa.

Laws criminalising the sale of cheetahs have also started being enforced.

In October 2020, a smuggling ring was shattered and a high-profile trafficker prosecuted in a landmark trial.

- Future generations -

Through a UK government-funded programme, Somaliland is expanding intelligence sharing with neighbouring countries and Yemen to fight the criminals robbing Africa of the iconic species.

But the government is also working with impoverished rural communities, whose conflict with cheetahs is another driver in the trade.

Of the 13 cubs confiscated between September and November, at least four were taken by farmers hoping to sell them and recoup losses after claiming their livestock were killed by cheetahs.

"The next generation may never see a cheetah if this illicit trade continues," Edna Adan Ismail, Somaliland's former foreign minister, told an anti-poaching conference in September.

Local veterinarian Ahmed Yusuuf Ibrahim is determined this grim prophecy does not pass.

The 27-year-old has been learning how to nurse sickly cubs back to health and has developed a close fondness for the cheetahs under his care.

They cannot fend for themselves, and eventually will be relocated to a larger natural enclosure outside Hargeisa.

But for now, Ibrahim is their doting custodian -- right down to making sure cheetahs young and old get their fair share of camel meat.

"I care for them. I feed them, I clean them. They are my babies," he said.

np/txw/oho

First rhino horn NFT sold at auction in South Africa


Rhinos in Africa are slaughtered for their horns, which are smuggled into Asia where they are highly prized for traditional and medicinal purposes (AFP/Philip FONG)

Fri, November 12, 2021

A digital replica of a rhino horn sold at an auction in South Africa late Thursday, as conservationists tapped into the craze for NFTs to raise money to protect real rhinos.

Cape Town businessman Charl Jacobs paid 105,000 rand (6,850 dollars, 6,000 euros) for the digital horn, which he said he plans to place into a trust for his children.

"If worst-case scenario, if rhinos go into complete disarray then I would still own a rhino horn, because the NFT is a token of the physical rhino horn," he told AFP.

Proceeds from the sale go to the private Black Rock Rhino conservancy, home to 200 rhinos that are able to breed while protected from poachers.

"We are doubling our population every four years. So it’s a really important conservation project," said conservationist Derek Lewitton.

"But it costs a fortune. If you don’t want to get poached, you have to spend a ton in terms of manpower and security infrastructure. and this a way to help us fund that."

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have made a huge splash among art collectors who have spent millions of dollars on digital drawings, music, and videos.

An NFT's authenticity is certified by block-chain technology, which is considered immutable, making the digital objects something that can be bought and sold.

The NFT technology also allows a beneficiary to receive commissions from future sales, so if Jacobs sells his NFT in the future, Black Rock Rhino would receive a portion of that sale.

It's legal to trade in real rhino horns within South Africa, but in this case, the original horn is locked away for safekeeping.

Poachers killed at least 249 rhinos in South Africa during the first six months of the year -- 83 more than in the first half of 2020.

The animals are slaughtered for their horns, which are smuggled into Asia where they are highly prized for traditional and medicinal purposes.

str-gs/yad

Outspoken Cambodian Union Leader Released From Jail


By AFP News
11/12/21 AT 6:17 AM

An outspoken Cambodian union leader jailed for comments about the country's border was released on Friday after a court reduced his sentence.

Rong Chhun, the leader of the Cambodian Confederation of Unions, was arrested and jailed last year after accusing the government of "irregularities" over the demarcation of the eastern border with Vietnam.

Activists at the time said he had been targeted as part of premier Hun Sen's crackdown on opposition voices.

As he left jail on Friday evening, Rong Chhun, who denies the charges against him, told AFP: "My arrest and conviction is an attempt to silence my voice."

Rong Chhun was detained in July and sentenced to two years in jail in August 2020.

An appeal court on Friday reduced his prison term to time already served, his lawyer Sam Sokong told AFP, with the remaining sentence suspended for three years.

Four other activists, who were jailed over protests demanding his release, will also be released, he added.

Rong Chhun, the jailed leader of the Cambodian Confederation of Unions, is expected to be released after a court reduced his sentence

 Photo: AFP / TANG CHHIN Sothy

On Friday evening, wearing a headband adorned with the Cambodian flag, Rong Chhun was greeted outside Prey Sar Prison by a throng of supporters.

He vowed to continue his activism.

"I will continue my mission because Cambodia is facing a danger," he told AFP, adding his arrest was "a message to intimidate people, teachers, intellectuals and youths not to speak the truth against the government".


The comments for which Rong Chhun was jailed involved a newly agreed borderline between Cambodia and Vietnam, which the activist said encroached on some locals' farmland.

The territorial dispute has long been a lightning rod for controversy, fuelled by strong anti-Vietnamese sentiment in Cambodia.

Opposition activists accuse Hun Sen of ceding territory to Hanoi, in a bid to whip up nationalist feeling against him.

Hun Sen is one of the world's longest-serving leaders and has been in power for 36 years.

Critics say he has wound back democratic freedoms and used the courts to stifle opposition.

Cambodia Hits Back at US Sanctions Over Naval Base
November 12, 2021
Agence France-Presse

FILE - Cambodian navy crew members stand on a patrol boat at the Ream Naval Base in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, July 26, 2019. The U.S. Treasury Department on Nov. 10, 2021, imposed sanctions on two senior Cambodian defense officials over allegations of graft.

Cambodia on Friday angrily condemned a U.S. decision to sanction two senior military officials over a contentious naval base, accusing Washington of showing "utter contempt" for its sovereignty.

The U.S. Treasury Department this week announced it was freezing any U.S. assets and criminalizing transactions with senior defense ministry official Chau Phirun and naval commander Tea Vinh over alleged corruption linked to the Ream Naval Base.

Washington accused the pair, along with other Cambodian officials, of conspiring to inflate costs at the base to pocket the proceeds.

"Cambodia strongly deplores the long-arm jurisdiction of the United States over Cambodian officials on the basis of groundless allegations driven by geopolitical motives," the Cambodian foreign ministry said in a statement.

"The smear campaign and unilateral sanction of the United States against public figures of a sovereign state... [displays] an utter contempt for the independence of another country as well as acts as a serious interference in its domestic affairs," the statement said.

The Cambodian foreign ministry also warned that the move was "another step in the wrong direction" for ties between the two countries.

The base on the Gulf of Thailand has been a running sore in U.S.-Cambodia relations in recent years, with Washington suspecting it is being converted for use by China.

Cambodia has been dismantling facilities at the base that were built partly with American money and played host to U.S. exercises.

Satellite imagery taken in August showed the construction of two new buildings, likely indicating that China is pushing ahead on a new agreement, according to the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

Hun Sen has repeatedly denied his country would host the Chinese military at the base.

Senior U.S. officials have warned Cambodia that hosting a Chinese base would damage relations with Washington.

China has been increasingly assertive over its extensive territorial claims in the South China Sea and the East China Sea, raising tensions with numerous Asian nations, but Cambodia has increasingly appeared as an ally.

Pet Cats Are Spreading a Brain Parasite to Wildlife, New Research Suggests

New research shows the extent to which cats are likely driving the spread of a problematic brain parasite to wild animals and how the ongoing deterioration of our environment is making this problem even worse.

© Photo: Timothy D. Easley (AP) Cats sitting on a side road in Glendale, Kentucky.

A study published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Science connects densely populated urban areas with increased cases of Toxoplasma gondii among wild mammals. Domestic cats are common carriers of the parasite, and cats are often allowed to freely roam outside, so the researchers naturally suspect our feline friends as being the driving mechanism behind this process. Veterinarian and ecologist Amy Wilson from the University of British Columbia led the new research.

Toxoplasma gondii is a parasite that causes an upsettingly common infection known as toxoplasmosis, or toxo; it infects approximately one-third of the world’s population. The parasite is famous for altering the behavior of mice, making them more susceptible to predation by cats. Once infected, a single cat can shed half-a-billion toxo eggs in just two weeks. These eggs, known as oocysts, are super resilient, capable of living in moist soil and water for a full year and possibly even longer.

Scientists refer to toxo as a generalist zoonotic parasite, which means it’s highly capable of living and spreading to all sorts of different animals. For toxo, this means it can make the leap to any warm-blooded animal, including birds and mammals. For healthy animals, a toxo infection shouldn’t be a problem, but when in the presence of a weakened immune system, the parasite goes into action, triggering all sorts of illnesses and death in some extreme cases. In humans, the disease is especially dangerous for pregnant people.

Going into the study, Wilson and her colleagues knew that toxo isn’t spread evenly among the world’s wild animals, but the processes driving this variation were not well understood. The new study was an attempt to fill this gap in our knowledge. To that end, the team analyzed 45,079 documented cases of toxo in free-ranging wild mammal species. This data was pulled from 202 international studies and included 238 different mammalian species.

The connection became clear: Wildlife living near dense urban areas were more likely to be infected with toxo, and it didn’t matter where these animals were positioned within their respective food webs.

“As increasing human densities are associated with increased densities of domestic cats, our study suggests that free-roaming domestic cats—whether pets or feral cats—are the most likely cause of these infections,” Wilson explained in a press release. “This finding is significant because by simply limiting free roaming of cats, we can reduce the impact of Toxoplasma on wildlife.”

The researchers also noticed a higher prevalence of the parasite in warmer climates and among animals with aquatic diets. That animals living in aquatic ecosystems have increased exposure to toxo did not come as a surprise to the researchers, “due to the potential for substantial and localized oocyst influxes through runoff and increased exposure area through suspension through the water column,” as they wrote in their study.

Got a couple of caveats to point out, however.

The researchers didn’t have the desired global coverage, lacking data for central Eurasia and east-central Africa. That’s unfortunate, because ”countries on these continents have relatively high human T. gondii prevalence,” according to the paper. Also, the team would like to dive deeper into the various ecosystems studied, to get a more nuanced sense of where and how toxo might be spreading within the identified hotspots.

The paper identifies high-risk areas for wild animals to acquire a toxo infection, but as the researchers themselves admit, cause and effect was not firmly established; the scientists are merely inferring that cats are the primary drivers of the disease, which, to be fair, is probably a very good inference. Accordingly, “proactively targeting pathogen pollution from domestic cats would be the most pragmatic and impactful intervention for decreasing wildlife infections,” the authors write.

Ooh, that is such a good term: ‘pathogen pollution.’ That’s a nice way of describing the problem. We are literally polluting the environment with the toxo parasite by allowing some cats—a creature moulded by the processes of artificial selection and now reproducing to impossibly high numbers—to roam free. It’s well documented that domestic cats, when allowed to roam free, are an ecological menace, killing huge numbers of birds and other creatures; we can now add another item to the list, as likely spreaders of toxo to wildlife.

An important point made in the paper is that vibrant and healthy ecosystems are a natural defense mechanism against the spread of pathogens, toxo included.

“We know that when wetlands are destroyed or streams are restricted, we are more likely to experience runoff that carries more pathogens into the waters where wild animals drink or live,” Wilson said. “When their habitats are healthy, wildlife thrives and tends to be more disease-resistant,” she said, adding: “Conservation is really preventative medicine in action.”