Australia Bidding To Host UN Climate Summit, Set New Emissions Target


By AFP News
05/26/22

Australia will present a more ambitious UN emissions target "very soon" and is bidding to co-host a COP summit with Pacific island neighbours, Foreign Minister Penny Wong said Thursday, signalling a ground shift in climate policy.

During a first solo overseas visit since her centre-left government was sworn in, Wong admitted that on the climate, "Australia has neglected its responsibility" under past administrations.

She told hosts in Fiji's capital Suva that there would be no more "disrespecting" Pacific nations or "ignoring" their calls to act on climate change.

"We were elected on a platform of reducing emissions by 43 percent by 2030 and reaching net-zero by 2050," Wong said.

"And we're not just going to say it, we will enshrine it in law and we will submit a new nationally determined contribution to the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) very soon."

Under conservative leadership, Australia -- already one of the world's largest gas and coal exporters -- has also become synonymous with playing the spoiler at international climate talks.

Wong said the new Labor government wanted to upend that record by co-hosting a future climate summit.

Australia's new Foreign Minister Penny Wong has said her government will present a more ambitious UN emissions target soon 

Photo: AFP / SAEED KHAN

"We have proposed a bid to co-host a future UN Conference of the Parties with Pacific Island countries and I'm looking forward to further discussions in the region about this idea."

Asked by a reporter whether Australia was simply paying lip service to climate action given its vast coal exports, Wong said: "It is true we export a lot of coal to China."

But she added that Australia was seeking to manage its economic transition in "a way that enables continued economic prosperity and equity".

Labor had proposed before its May 21 election victory that it would seek to co-host a UN climate summit in 2024.

To do so, it would need to win the support of two UN country blocs to skip the queue, as well as its proposed Pacific islands co-hosts, said a report this month by the independent research group, the Australia Institute.

But Australia could "reset" its reputation as a climate laggard and a poor regional neighbour if it did so, Richie Merzian, climate director at the institute, said.

Australia's 2019-2020 "Black Summer" bushfires and subsequent east coast floods highlighted the deadly and catastrophic consequences of climate change.

But past Australian governments have resisted calls to cut carbon emissions from 2005 levels faster than its current commitment of up to 28 percent by 2030.

COLOMBIA

Diaz's indigenous community that breeds 'toughness'




Daniel Bolivar was a local football star in Barrancas alongside Liverpool's Colombian winger Luis Diaz, but his own football career never took off (AFP/DANIEL MUNOZ)

David SALAZAR
Wed, May 25, 2022

Running around barefooted on a dust bowl of a pitch, a young indigenous Colombian began kicking a ball more than 20 years ago. Now he is on the verge of becoming champion of Europe.

In the town of Barrancas, where almost half the population is from the Wayuu indigenous community, everyone remembers how the timid "Luisfer" would never get tired.

Liverpool's newest star Luis Diaz emerged from this desert outback in the northern La Guajira department that borders the Caribbean Sea to the northwest and Venezuela to the southeast, to become a national phenomenon.

From a young age, Diaz, whose father Luis Manuel was a coach at the only football school in the small town of 38,000, stood out for his speed, toughness and ability to weave around opponents with the ball at his feet.

In just four months since Liverpool signed Diaz for an initial 45 million euros ($48.1 million) from Portugal's Porto, he has taken English football by storm.

With six goals in 25 matches for the Reds, he has already helped his new side lift the League Cup, FA Cup and reach the Champions League final against Real Madrid on Saturday.

For his uncle Yelkis Diaz, the winger's success is down to his indigenous Wayuu "tradition".

The impoverished community's "transport is walking, jogging ... running," he told AFP.

- 'Almost impossible' conditions -

Thousands of miles away from England, Diaz's family and friends watch excitedly whenever he gallops down the wing for Liverpool.

It is the first time an indigenous Colombian has reached football's elite in a country whose greatest sports stars generally come from the Afro-Colombian community on the Pacific coast and whose indigenous population amounts to just 4.4 percent of the 50 million.

Young people in Barrancas have few options outside of working for multinationals exploiting the neighboring El Cerrejon, the largest open air coal mine in Latin America.

The dreamers imagine themselves playing football or Vallenato folk music.

Diaz would often walk onto the town pitch in his bare feet and wearing the jersey of the local Club Barrio Lleras that his father used to play for.

Playing in "almost impossible" conditions was what forged his talent, says his uncle.

"Running and controlling a ball where there are stones, holes, earth" is not easy and many have given up the dream.

La Guajira is the poorest department in Colombia with more than two thirds of the population living in poverty.

More than 5,000 children have died of hunger there in the last decade, according to the main indigenous organization.

When he returns home, Diaz kicks off his shoes for a nostalgic feel of his native earth.

He was last home in July 2021, welcomed by the entire town, following his starring role at the Copa America in which he finished as joint top goalscorer alongside global superstar Lionel Messi.

In a recent interview, Diaz said his style of play shows "my roots, where I grew up".

- The Wayuu James -

In 2015, the Wayuu community took part in Colombia's first ever indigenous football tournament.

Colombian great Carlos Valderrama was in the stands to spot the talent he would pick for an indigenous team to represent Colombia in a continental tournament in Chile.

Diaz and his best friend Daniel Bolivar, an attacking midfielder, made the team and would be its stars.

"In these villages so lost to sport," impressing Valderrama "was something that really motivated us," said Bolivar.

Once compared to Colombian star James Rodriguez, Bolivar would not follow Diaz's path and now works as a machinery operator in El Cerrejon.

Thanks to Diaz's success, the local government in Barrancas started building synthetic pitches. Grass pitches are an impossibility in this arid landscape where running water is only available three days a week.

Diaz's profile has put his home department on the radar of scouts eager to find the next hidden "star" from the La Guajira peninsular.

Before Diaz, the region's biggest name was Arnoldo Iguaran, a player who began his career in the late 1970s and was Colombia's record goalscorer when he retired in the 1990s until he was passed by Radamel Falcao in 2015.

John Angarita, the president of FC La Guajira, has opened his doors to the indigenous youngsters from Barrancas whose "physical toughness" he says allows them to run all game without getting tired.

His football school has 70 youngsters, some from families displaced by Colombia's interminable half-century conflict, dreaming of following in Diaz's footsteps.

"Seeing him on television and thinking that I could be over there is very motivating. Many people are taking note of the Wayuu and indigenous culture," said Denilson Pushaina, a 23-year-old FC La Guajira defender.

das/ag/cl/bc/jc

Taliban 'making women invisible' in Afghanistan: UN expert


Thu, 26 May 2022

Richard Bennett, UN special rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan, said the Taliban have 'failed to acknowledge the magnitude and gravity of the abuses being committed' 

(AFP/Wakil KOHSAR) (Wakil KOHSAR)

The Taliban government's restrictions on women are aimed at making them "invisible" in Afghan society, a UN human rights observer said Thursday during a visit to the nation.

Since the Taliban stormed back to power last year, they have imposed harsh restrictions on women and girls to comply with their austere vision of Islam.

Teenage girls have been shut out from secondary schools, while women have been forced from some government jobs and barred from travelling alone.


This month Afghanistan's supreme leader and Taliban chief Hibatullah Akhundzada ordered women to cover up fully in public, including their faces.

These policies show a "pattern of absolute gender segregation and are aimed at making women invisible in the society", Richard Bennett, UN special rapporteur on human rights in Afghanistan, told reporters in Kabul.

"The de facto authorities have failed to acknowledge the magnitude and gravity of the abuses being committed, many of them in their name," Bennett said.

His comments came as Taliban fighters on Thursday broke up a women's protest calling for the reopening of secondary schools for girls.

"Angry Taliban forces came and dispersed us," Munisa Mubariz, an organiser of the rally, told AFP.

In March the Taliban ordered all secondary schools for girls to shut, just hours after opening them for the first time since taking power in August.

The government has yet to offer a clear reason for the decision, but officials claim the institutions will reopen soon.

Foreign governments have insisted the Taliban's record on human rights, especially women's rights, will be key in determining whether the administration will be formally recognised.

During two decades of US-led military intervention in Afghanistan, women and girls made marginal gains in the deeply patriarchal nation.

Some Afghan women initially pushed back against the new Taliban curbs, holding small protests where they demanded the right to education and work.

But hardliners soon rounded up the ringleaders, holding them incommunicado while denying that they had been detained.

Since their release, most have gone silent.

Rembrandt painting comes home: Work by Dutch artist returns to south west French village

A 1631 oil on canvas painting by Rembrandt, "The Christ on the Cross", is installed in the Saint-Vincent church in the French town of Le Mas-d'Agenais on May 24, 2022 after it arrived from the Saint-Andre Cathedral of Bordeaux, southwestern France.

 Does 'the root of Haiti's misery' date back to France's 19th-century extortion?

 (Part 1)

 France 24 

Modified: 27/05/2022 

Video by:  Delano D'SOUZA

A newspaper exposé has reignited debate over the ongoing legacy of debts that Haiti was forced to pay to former colonial ruler France in the 19th century -- but the country's elites are surprisingly keen to bury the issue. After months of poring over archives, The New York Times estimated that debt payments starting in 1825 cost poverty-stricken Haiti between $21 billion and $115 billion -- or as much as eight times its GDP in 2020. One of the New York Times journalists who worked on this in-depth historical report, Constant Méheut, joins FRANCE 24 to recount exactly what ensued following Haiti's resounding victory against France and Napoleon's forces in 1803. When it declared independence in 1804, Haiti became the world's first Black-ruled republic and an outcast in an era dominated by countries that engaged in slavery. But, as Mr. Méheut explains, Haiti's new-found freedom came at a heavy price. In 1825, more than two decades after Haiti's victorious revolt over their former colonial power, "the French came back with a fleet of warships and told Haiti you have to pay us an astounding amount of money in reparations to the former French slaveholders or we will [wage] war again." For more than half a century, Haiti would be forced to pay exorbitant "reparations" to their former enslavers, all the while taking out loans from French banks to cover the forced reparations and thereby suffering from a "double debt" phenomenon. By the 1880's, with the extortion payments nearly paid off, Haiti was ready to break free from the French financial shackles, open a new central bank and ring in an exciting new era of freedom and prosperity. They had big dreams of investing in the nascent country's future: infrastructure, public works, schools, hospitals, etc. But Haitian hopes were quickly dashed. Haiti's new national bank was set up by French bank Crédit Industriel et Commercial (CIC) which functioned more as a Trojan horse. As The New York Times describes it, "The National Bank of Haiti, on which so many hopes were pinned [...] was national in name only. Far from an instrument of Haiti’s salvation, the central bank was, from its very inception, an instrument of French financiers and a way to keep a suffocating grip on a former colony into the next century."

 (Part 2)

Cancer patients forced to testify anonymously in Fukushima nuclear disaster case

The plaintiffs are facing a backlash as they argue that the 2011 disaster is the cause of their ill health.

ByJulian Ryall 

TOKYO29 May 2022 • 

Screening of local children has revealed unusually high levels of thyroid cancer

LIKE AFTER CHERNOBYL

 CREDIT: REUTERS/Toru Hanai

A court in Japan this week began hearings against the operator of a Fukushima power plant over cases of thyroid cancer in children allegedly linked to the 2011 nuclear disaster.

Six people are seeking Y616 million (£3.8 million) in damages from Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), claiming they were exposed to radiation after a massive tsunami destroyed the plant's cooling systems and caused three of the six reactors to suffer meltdowns.

The people - all aged between 6 and 16 at the time - have been living with the effects of that day ever since.

Four had their thyroid removed entirely and will need to take hormone medication for the rest of their lives. The other two had portions of their thyroids removed. One of the plaintiffs said the cancer has spread to their lungs.

"Because of the treatments, I could not attend university, or continue my studies for my future job, or go to a concert. I had to give up everything", testified one woman who is now in her 20s. "I want to regain my healthy body, but that's impossible no matter how hard I wish."
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Their stories are compelling, but the four women and two men are having to testify anonymously in the landmark case - in part because many people simply do not believe them.

Doctors in Fukushima have screened hundreds of thousands of people for thyroid cancer in the years since the disaster 

CREDIT: Simon Townsley

A culture of discrimination and misunderstanding around cancer in Japan that dates back to the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings of 1945 has meant they have become the target of insidious online abuse.

Some have suggested they are exaggerating or making their illnesses up. Others have accused them of damaging the reputation of Fukushima, which has tried hard to rehabilitate its image since the disaster.

One message posted on the site of a local Fukushima website said the plaintiffs’ parents were to blame because they failed to evacuate the children immediately after the disaster.

Another message said the people “appear to be annoyed that they cannot live perfect lives”.

A third person said the case was being encouraged “by an anti-Japanese, leftist group”.

The plaintiffs involved hope that this case will finally put all that to bed.

Their lawyers will argue that screening of 380,000 local children since 2011 has identified around 300 cases of thyroid cancer. That incidence rate of 77 cases per 100,000 people is significantly higher than the typical one or two cases per million and can only be linked to radiation from the accident, they say. A similar pattern was seen among children following the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine.

Japanese police wear suits to protect them from radiation as they search for victims after the disaster 

CREDIT: AP Photo/David Guttenfelder


“The doctor told my father that the cancer was highly malignant and had spread widely. He said it appeared to be less than five years old,” one man told local media before the hearing.

TEPCO has always maintained that there is no link between the leak of radiation from the plant and the spike in cancer cases, adding that tests of 1,080 children from three cities around the plant showed no one received more than 50 millisieverts of radiation, the annual limit for nuclear workers.

Their lawyers are set to argue that the high rate of thyroid cancers in Fukushima is the result of overtesting.

The company’s attempts to discredit them has added fuel to widespread hostility towards the plaintiffs.

“The people of Hiroshima were shunned by the rest of Japan after the atomic bombing of the city in 1945 because they did not understand about radiation and they feared they could catch it as a disease,” Chisato Kitanaka, an associate professor of sociology at Hiroshima University told The Telegraph.

“We cannot say that people do not lack information on the Fukushima case, but these people are still being singled out. They attack because they prefer to believe TEPCO or because they support the government’s plan to restart the nation’s nuclear reactors.”

In a separate case, earlier this year Japan's Supreme Court upheld an order for TEPCO to pay damages of 1.4 billion yen (£9.5 million) to about 3,700 people whose lives were devastated by the Fukushima nuclear disaster, in the first decision of its kind.

GENTRIFICATION KILLS

Do wood burners add to air pollution in cities? Yes, say citizen scientists

Pioneering Bristol study blames the solid-fuel burners in people’s homes for breaches of World Health Organisation guidelines

Rapidly gentrifying Bristol, where many residents have installed wood burners. 

Photograph: Shahid Khan/Alamy


Tom Wall
Sun 29 May 2022 

Like many parts of the country, Bristol has experienced a huge rise in the number of houses installing wood burners over the past decade. But as they have proliferated, mainly in the wealthier parts of the city where many Victorian and Georgian houses have been renovated, so too have fears that they cause pollution.

And now a group of citizen scientists taking part in the first community-led project targeting toxic smoke from wood burners has discovered new evidence about their dangers.

Ten volunteers based in a rapidly gentrifying Bristol inner-city neighbourhood with one of the highest concentrations of solid fuel-burning appliances in the city, recorded 11 breaches of World Health Organization daily guidelines for ultra-fine particulate pollution over a period of six months.

The project is thought to be the first where volunteers have been given newly affordable monitoring technology to gauge pollution partly caused by domestic combustion.

Sensors were placed throughout Ashley ward, which encompasses deprived parts of St Pauls and better-off Bristol neighbourhoods such as Montpelier. Oluwatosin Shittu, 40, who lives in St Pauls, found his sensor picked up more pollution during the weekend when some residents were burning wood and during rush hours when cars queued on local roads.

“At the weekend [pollution] was high because obviously up the hill [in Montpelier] people were burning wood,” he said.

Steve Crawshaw, who manages the project for the council, said domestic wood burning was a serious and growing problem. He added that the number of days exceeding WHO pollution guidelines in the ward were broadly in line with the city average, but still a cause of concern.

Wood burning and traffic produces tiny airborne particles – so called PM 2.5, or fine particulate matter of 2.5 micrometres or less in diameter – that can pass through the lungs and into the bloodstream, causing cardiovascular problems, respiratory disease, and cancers.

“The evidence is that virtually any level of PM 2.5 is harmful – there is no threshold below which you don’t see health effects,” Crawshaw said. “There are around 300 deaths a year in Bristol due to poor air quality and at least half of those deaths – 150 – are down to PM 2.5.”

The number of solid fuel appliances such as log burners installed in Bristol increased sevenfold in the decade after 2007, with just over 900 installations recorded in 2017.

“We’ve forgotten the journey we’ve been on with clean air. In the 1950s at least 4,000 people died in the smog in London in five days,” said Crawshaw. “That led to the clean air act, then natural gas started to get piped into homes in the 1960s. Most people stopped burning wood because it was dirty and inconvenient. Now it’s become a fashionable lifestyle choice.”

The council hopes the project will raise awareness of the health impact of wood smoke and encourage residents to turn on their central heating instead of loading up their log burners in the colder months. Crawshaw added: “We want citizen scientists to become community ambassadors for improving air quality and help change behaviour in the city.”

From the start of this year all new wood burners sold must be so-called “ecodesign”, but Crawshaw said: “Even if people burn clean, dry wood, those stoves are still grossly polluting compared with gas and electric.”

The smoke in the ward is not just coming from middle-class homes. There is a van-dwelling community in the area, with some burning wood to stay warm. Soaring energy costs are also driving some struggling families to use open fires again.


Avoid using wood burning stoves if possible, warn health experts

“Increasingly people are keeping warm by having an open fire in one room and turning off the central heating,” he said. “We recognise some people living in poverty don’t have an alternative. We’re not saying ‘you must freeze’ – we are taking a socially just approach.”

The latest analysis from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) reveals that wood burners and open fires are now responsible for 17% of the country’s total PM 2.5 pollution – more than the pollution caused by road traffic. Nationally, emissions from domestic wood burning increased by 35% between 2010 and 2020.


Wood burners emit more particle pollution than traffic, UK data shows

The government is consulting on introducing a new target for small particulates of 10 micrograms per cubic metre for England by 2040. However, this is close to existing levels in cities such as Bristol and double safe concentrations set by the WHO.

A Defra spokesperson said PM 2.5 pollution had fallen by 18% since 2010 but more needed to be done: “We have legislated the phasing-out of the sale of the most polluting solid fuels in domestic combustion, and have committed to driving down emissions across all modes of transport.”

A look at the moon

May 29, 2022
By Giancarlo Elia Valori
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

The statements made recently by Dr. Mohamed Ebrahim AI-Aseeri, chief executive officer of the National Scientific Space Agency of the Kingdom of Bahrain, give pause for thought, as more than five decades have elapsed since the first astronauts walked on the Moon. Since then, only one fleet of probes has visited the Moon, and they have done an extraordinary job in providing research centres with a huge amount of information about the lunar environment. Such research efforts have contributed to a deeper understanding of the Moon and paved the way for an afterthought, but this time for different purposes than before.

Over the past two decades, with the growing role played by the private sector in the space industry, investors have begun to think seriously about exploiting space in a way that can ensure a return on their investment. The idea emerged about mining on the surface of the Moon and expanding the implementation of scientific research, as well as promoting space tourism, including visits to the Moon.

In recent years there has been a positive shift toward returning to the Moon, as such an initiative has been announced by the United States of America, the European Union, Russia, the People’s Republic of China, Japan, India, the United Arab Emirates, Israel and the Republic of Korea (South Korea). It is their ambition to explore the Moon through huge investment in major projects.

The most important of all has been the 100 billion dollar Artemis programme devised by NASA (Artemis, the Greek goddess of the moon, was equated by the Romans with the goddess Diana).

The Artemis programme includes scenarios to stay on the Moon and its orbit for long periods of time, and establish a space base that would be used as a launch station for deep space missions since the Moon has lower gravity than Earth’s, thus enabling rockets to take off with ease. This also makes the venture more economically feasible, besides providing the possibility of mining, based on the scientific research results that have confirmed the presence of precious metals on the lunar surface.

One of the significant goals of the Artemis mission is to land men and the first woman on the surface of the Moon in 2025. The final Artemis programme will include 37 launches and establish a permanent base on the Moon. Traveling to the Moon, however, will still be expensive. Nevertheless the programme planners are very confident that benefits will outweigh costs. More importantly, the U.S. government expects a good return on investment. Comparing future Moon missions with Apollo missions will lead us to recognize the fact that Apollo‘s initial investment in technology, climate satellite systems, Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), and advanced communication devices created to support Moon missions, are now part of everyday life on Earth.

As previously happened, the new technologies developed to support future missions to the Moon will surely find their way into world economies, thus stimulating a good return on investment.

The People’s Republic of China and Japan are investing heavily in space missions and are looking quite seriously at sending missions to the Moon. China and Russia have announced a collaborative effort to build a lunar base before 2030. China has been very clear about its intentions and has good capabilities to carry out a long-term Moon mission. It is planning a crewed mission landing on the Moon and developing new spacecraft for such missions.

The People’s Republic of China is also planning to build a scientific research station on the Moon’s south pole within the next ten years. Efforts by other countries to reach the Moon and study it from its orbit, or to land on its surface, vary considerably.

Only a few States have so far succeeded in reaching the surface of the Moon as part of successful or semi-successful missions. Current scientific advances and technologies being developed for Moon missions will enable scientists to conduct more detailed studies of the lunar surface and subsoil. Scientists will also seek answers to the big questions about how the solar system was formed, as well as the formation of the Moon and its geology. Moon exploration missions will stimulate large-scale scientific research and innovation.

Much investment, research efforts and innovation are required to overcome the problem of Moon’s hostile environment and enable humans to establish colonies on the surface of the closest celestial body to Earth. Scientific evidence corroborates the abundance of a range of worthy natural resources with high industrial value that can be extracted through mechanical processes. This is one of the most important returns on investment in current Moon missions.

Studies based on the analysis of lunar soil and rocks collected during the six missions that landed humans on the Moon surface between 1969 and 1972 indicate the presence of valuable resources that can be used in other space missions. For example, NASA believes that liquid oxygen can be easily extracted from the Moon and stored for use in other space missions, particularly missions to explore Mars, since the aforementioned oxygen is an important component of the fuel needed for space missions.

We should not overlook the fact that, over the past two decades, NASA has deployed a series of probes to the surface of the Moon to measure the amount of water inside or under the rocks. What they found was surprising. There was much more water than previously thought. There is evidence of water ice at the lunar poles, hidden in craters not reached by sunlight. NASA plans to use this water to support the colonization of the lunar surface and for upcoming deep space missions.

Returning to the Moon is an important move in planning future missions to Mars that have been attracting increased attention in recent years. The hope is that humans can learn from their stay on the Moon how to live in a hostile environment before setting foot on more distant places like Mars. The experience gained and the solutions developed will therefore pave the way for missions beyond the asteroid belt as well.

The Moon is a treasure chest, which is the reason why several countries are investing many of their resources to visit the Moon as soon as possible in an undeclared space race. Scientists from different fields firmly believe that man’s expected return to the lunar surface in the coming years could help life on Earth and bring about a huge all-round change.

Besides the above mentioned benefits of returning to the Moon, here are some main examples summarized in the following points:

1) the Moon could be a source of unlimited solar energy for Earth, by collecting that energy through very low-cost panels and then transmitting it to Earth in the form of a microwave beam;

2) the Moon is rich in helium-3 that is used for clean and safe nuclear fusion energy, medical applications, etc.;

3) the dark side of the Moon could be used to build radio and optical telescopes to advance human knowledge of the Cosmos and search for signals from extraterrestrial civilizations without any interference from Earth’s radio transmissions and frequencies;

4) the Moon could be an alternative place to store Earth’s hazardous industrial materials, waste and pollutants without worrying about their side effects on the environment;

5) the establishment of laboratories in lunar orbit will contribute to the implementation of numerous scientific tests and experiments that will have a direct impact on world progress and welfare. Such laboratories will also sustain human presence on the Moon surface for long periods of time and may help in the design of future similar laboratories in orbit around Mars;

6) colonization of the Moon surface cannot be done and sustained by a single State, and hence different countries sharing the same interests must work together; this will strengthen international collaboration for the benefit of all mankind, and joint efforts could lend significant support to peace on Earth.

The relationship between Earth and the Moon is fundamental to the existence of life on our planet. The Moon has been decisive in sustaining human existence on Earth for billions of years. A team of scientists from the University of Cologne analysed chemical signatures of rare elements in lunar rocks collected by the Apollo missions, dating their formation to about 4.51 billion years ago.

Today the Moon’s role is becoming increasingly important and will support human development and growth for many decades to come. With a view to achieving this goal, we need to return to the Moon, study it in situ, understand it well and make fair use of it to preserve its environment and ensure the sustainability of its natural resources.

While using the natural resources of the Moon, humans should avoid repeating the previous mistakes made on Earth. Future generations will be connected in an unprecedented way to the Moon, and this could be the source of great human achievements beyond our imagination.

IPAC New Zealand Co-Chairs Urge Pacific Neighbours To Exercise Sovereignty Over Police Presence

Sunday, 29 May 2022, 5:43 pm
Press Release: IPAC

The announcement in the last 24 hours by two Pacific Island countries that China will build police infrastructure there shows how quickly China is intending to militarise the Pacific. Plans to provide fingerprinting facilities in Samoa and the Solomon Islands, and possible arms to police in the Solomons, are the first step in militarisation by stealth.

We are deeply cynical about the timing of these announcements, and the deals being done with individual nations, ahead of two looming Pacific Islands Forum meetings — including the leaders’ meeting in July.

The whirlwind tour by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi ahead of the July PIF reveals that China is wanting to get ink on paper before the leaders have time to come together and think through the regional implications of their decisions.

It’s a classic case of divide and conquer.

While climate change is undoubtedly the priority long term issue, the immediate focus must be on the scale, speed and breadth of China’s intentions to expand into our region. This is evidenced by security deals done already in Samoa and the Solomon Islands, and the leaked draft regional pact which would see China have cooperation deals with 10 Pacific nations.

'We urge our Pacific neighbours to exercise their sovereignty and self-determination by holding their own strategic talks first before coming together at the behest of foreign actors — whether East or West.'

China will meet with the Foreign Ministers of 10 Pacific nations in Fiji tomorrow (Monday).

George W Bush, Freudian Confessions And Foiled Assassinations

Sunday, 29 May 2022, 5:37 pm
Opinion: Binoy Kampmark

Death, remarked Gore Vidal about Truman Capote’s passing, was a good career move. The novelist Saki also considered the good qualities of shuffling off the mortal coil. “Waldo,” he writes in “The Feast of Nemesis”, “is one of those people who would be enormously improved by death.” But what of those instances when death is foiled, the Grim Reaper cheated?

Former US President George W. Bush has had the good fortune of facing such a foiling, though the claims remain fresh. On May 24, Shihab Ahmed Shihab Shihab, an Iraqi national living in Columbus, Ohio, was arrested and charged with aiding and abetting the attempted murder of a former US official and charges of attempting to bring foreign nationals to the US. The nationals in question are said to be affiliated with the Islamic State group.

According to court documents, the FBI foiled the alleged plot through using informants. In November last year, Shihab is said to have told one of them that he “wished to kill former President Bush because they felt that he was responsible for killing many Iraqis and breaking apart the entire country of Iraq.”

In subsequent discussions with the informants, Shihab is alleged to have said how he “wanted to be involved in the actual attack and assassination of former President Bush and did not care if he died as he would be proud to have been involved in killing former President Bush.” One may fault the intended outcome, but the historical reasoning behind the motive is hard to rebut.

A statement from Bush’s chief of staff Freddy Ford had the former president expressing “all the confidence in the world in the United States Secret Service and our law enforcement and intelligence communities.”

This would have caused a gasp from those in the intelligence community so wilfully maligned in the lead-up to the Iraq War in 2003. The issue again surfaced in March 2019, when former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer took to Twitter to wash his hands while dumping on those who had supplied the intelligence. “There is a myth about the war that I have been meaning to set straight for years,” he began. “After no WMDs [weapons of mass destruction] were found, the left claimed ‘Bush lied. People died.’ This accusation is a lie. It’s time to put it to rest.”

Unconvincingly, Fleischer proceeded to shift and spread blame, claiming both he and Bush “faithfully and accurately reported to the public what the intelligence community concluded.” He implicated the CIA and other intelligence services, including those of Egypt, France and Israel. “We all turned out to be wrong. That is very different from lying.”

Bush’s role in the Iraq War was again appraised in his May 19 speech on election integrity, when he enlivened his gaffe-strewn legacy with a momentous Freudian slip or, as John Fugelsang described it, “a Freudian confession”. In referring to Vladimir Putin and Russia’s “absence of checks and balances”, Bush had something of a coming out moment: “the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq … I mean, of Ukraine.” On realising his error, and no doubt hoping to strike a note of levity, he suggested, “Iraq, too” and pointing to age as an excuse (“Anyway, 75!”).

Guffawing followed and could only come across as ghoulishly telling about the predations of power and cant. It was reminiscent of the light-hearted response to his cringeworthy performance at the 2004 White House Correspondents’ Dinner. While narrating a slideshow featuring a picture of himself peering under furniture in the Oval Office, Bush could not resist quipping: “Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be here somewhere.”

David Corn, writing at the time for The Nation, found little reason to be amused. “Before an audience of people who supposedly spend their days pursuing the truth, Bush joked about misstatements (if not lies) he had used to persuade (if not hornswoggle) the American people and the media.”

The same could be said about the Iraqi poet Sinan Antoon, who refused to partake in the merriment, however nervously expressed, by the audience gathered at the Southern Methodist University. “Freudian slip about past massacres (of other barbarians) amuses audience,” he tweeted gloomily. “All is well in the settler colony.”

All is certainly well for Bush, who, as absent-minded dauber, has undergone a rapid rehabilitation as elder statesman. Little is mentioned these days of his culpable role in leading an invasion of a sovereign state that saw the deaths and maiming of hundreds of thousands, displacements, poisonings, and the destabilisation of the Middle East. “When your guilty consciousness catch [sic] up with you and you end up confessing but no one cares to hold you to account,” observed Representative Ilhan Omar.

The Trump era aided the process of revision and cleansing, with traumatised Democrats and some notional progressives longing to return to the good times of the Bush imperium marked by illegal wars, warrantless surveillance and state sanctioned torture.

In 2019, Yale University, via a delegation of students who might have known better, bestowed upon Bush the Yale Undergraduate Lifetime Achievement Award. The decision to select the former president as the recipient was drawn from a vote by over 1,000 students, suggesting that collective amnesia is rife. In a statement, Bush acknowledged the role played by the university in shaping him, expressing pride in joining the ranks of Anderson Cooper, Maya Lin and Jodie Foster, concluding with the triumphant, “Boola Boola!”

With Shihab’s arrest, Bush can draw upon a well of sympathy by claiming that Freedom’s Land had, at the very least, a president worthy of being the target of an alleged assassination plot. But in prosecuting a man nursing a grievance over the role played by Bush in perpetrating the destruction of his homeland, another brutal invasion will receive some renewed attention, if only briefly.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He currently lectures at RMIT University. Email: bkampmark@gmail.com