Climate bill would put US back in global race for EV leadership

Bloomberg News | August 2, 2022 |

Electric vehicle. (Image by bixusas, Pixabay).

This week, everyone working on energy and climate issues in the US is intensely focused on the Inflation Reduction Act, looking for smoke signals as to whether it will pass and if any modifications will be made.


The bill is a potential boon to many sectors of the green economy, including electric vehicles. Here are my team’s takeaways on some of the important EV-related aspects of the bill:


Tax credit extension

The revival of the $7,500 tax credit is a big deal, especially for Tesla, General Motors and Toyota. All three have sold at least 200,000 vehicles that were eligible for the incentive as the system is set up now. Once manufacturers cross that threshold, buyers of their cars start to receive reduced credits, and eventually none at all. Ford and Nissan are nearing this point, as well.

The bill would make the full incentive available again starting next year, and importantly, would allow consumers to access the perk at the point of sale instead of during tax season.

Automakers that have had sold fewer EVs might, in theory, be upset to see the 200,000-vehicle cap lifted, since it was bound to give them an advantage in the near term. But in practice, most should be happy to see the additional purchase support, since fuel economy regulations are set to tighten in the years ahead. This change will make it much easier to sell EVs and hit their targets.

While tax credits are important, it’s worth noting that Tesla buyers haven’t been eligible for federal tax credits for well over two years, and that hasn’t stopped the company from dominating the EV segment by accounting for more than 70% of battery-electric models sold in the US last year. Making products that consumers actually want is still more important than making products that qualify for tax credits.

Content requirements

As my Bloomberg News colleagues have pointed out, the requirement that battery materials are sourced locally could be challenging for carmakers to navigate. There’s also a requirement that a share of other components are manufactured in North America.

In auto board rooms across the country this week, there are likely requests flowing down the organization and out to suppliers to determine which models will qualify and how quickly sourcing can be localized. BNEF’s analysis indicates mid-stream refining capacity for battery metals is more likely to be an issue than raw material supply.

A boost for commercial EVs

New commercial EV provisions allow vehicles weighing less than 14,000 pounds to claim the $7,500 clean car tax credit. Heavier vehicles can have the lesser of two amounts: 30% of the differential between the clean vehicle and a comparable internal combustion engine vehicle, or a $40,000 incentive.

This would fully cover the cost of a 150 to 250 kilowatt-hour battery pack today, and will do more in the future as prices come down. It would be an immediate and significant boost to the nascent commercial EV market in the US, which lags Europe and China in most segments.

The bill also includes $3 billion to help the US Postal Service decarbonize its fleet and shift to EVs. The Postal Service recently announced it was increasing the portion of its initial 50,000 mail-truck purchase from Wisconsin-based Oshkosh that will be electric to 50%, a major win for activists who fought against the initial decision to go almost exclusively with combustion vehicles.

Loan programs

The package also includes $2 billion to help automakers retool and convert existing facilities to manufacture clean vehicles, and allows for as much as $20 billion in loans to help auto companies build new clean-vehicle facilities across the country. Ford, GM and Stellantis are likely to benefit from the conversion portion going into a contract-bargaining year with the United Auto Workers union. EV manufacturing in the US is already ramping up quickly, and this provision — which has largely flown under the radar — will further accelerate progress.

Importantly, many plants being built or retooled for EVs are in Republican states. For example, VW invested $800 million in its plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and just announced last week it has started producing the first ID.4 electric sport utility vehicles there. Having a strong EV manufacturing base in red states should help prevent EVs from being a political football as the next federal election cycle rolls around.

Outlook

A sense of scale is important here. The bill would extend EV tax credit availability out to 2032. Over that period, BNEF expects around 175 million light-duty vehicles will be sold in the US. As it stands now, a sizable and growing portion of those will be eligible for a tax credit.

There’s lots more to process — BNEF clients can access our full initial take here — but my initial feeling is that the bill, coupled with the stricter fuel-economy regulations the Biden administration is putting in place, should put the US right back in the race for EV leadership. China is off to a very strong head start, but these are still early days. Don’t count the US out.

(By Colin McKerracher, with assistance from Corey Cantor and Ethan Zindler)

First mover New Pacific, other juniors make headway in once off-limits Bolivia

Tom Azzopardi | August 1, 2022 

Silver Elephant’s Pulacayo silver-lead-zinc project in Bolivia. 

Credit: Silver Elephant Mining Corp.

Once considered a pariah, Bolivia is quickly gaining a reputation as an exciting jurisdiction for mineral exploration.


First in was New Pacific Metals (TSXV: NUAG) which acquired the Silver Sand project in 2017 and signed a first-of-its-kind mining production contract with state mining firm Comibol for the surrounding 56-sq.-km land package. The company is now advancing the project in central Bolivia’s silver-tin belt to production and exploring several promising satellite targets.

But since New Pacific Metals pushed the door open five years ago, half a dozen more listed companies have entered Bolivia, attracted by its huge and largely untapped geological potential.

Backed by Yamana Gold (NYSE: AUY) chairman Peter Marrone, among others, Eloro Resources (TSXV: ELO) is exploring the Iska Iska polymetallic deposit, close to Pan American Silver’s (TSX: PAAS; NASDAQ: PAAS) San Vicente mine. Silver Elephant (TSX: ELEF) is also exploring the Pulacayo project, 139 km north of San Vicente.

Related: Lithium mining: ‘A new Bolivia’, says EnergyX CEO

As multinationals pull out of the country, juniors are seeing opportunities in operating assets which could then provide a platform for exploration.

Last March, Santacruz Mining (TSXV: SCZ) completed its acquisition of three mines from Glencore (LSE: GLEN), which announced plans to sell the mines after beginning arbitration proceedings in 2019 against Bolivia over the 2007 nationalization of the Vinto smelter). and is preparing to explore its largely ignored claims portfolio. Andean Precious Metals (TSXV: APM) is exploring a couple of sites after buying the San Bartolome silver mine in 2017 from Coeur Mining (NYSE: CDE), which pivoted to a focus on North America.

More juniors are jostling to come in.

NOCs, Not Big Oil, Are Responsible For Most Emissions

THE OLD STATE CAPITALI$M VS MONOPOLY CAPITALI$M TROPE

By Haley Zaremba 

- Jul 31, 2022

Big Oil has caught a lot of flack for its slow decarbonization efforts, but much of the criticism may be misguided.

Emissions from National Oil Companies far outpace those of Big Oil.

Not only do National Oil Companies emit more, but they also rake in more profit and receive much less attention than their private counterparts.


While much of the global pressure toward decarbonization has been directed toward privately owned and operated oil supermajors like BP, ExxonMobil, and Shell, a new report from the Economist suggests that much of this pressure and blame is misguided. It’s not that Big Oil doesn’t need to change its focus, strategy, and commitments in order to cut greenhouse gas emissions quickly and significantly enough to avoid the worst impacts of climate change – it does. The thing is, the emissions of privately owned oil companies pale in comparison to the enormity of state-owned oil enterprises, which are producing most of the oil, emitting most of the greenhouse gases, raking in most of the profits, and receiving much less attention. In fact, the Economist article, titled “State-run oil giants will make or break the energy transition,” says that in comparison to Big Oil, national oil companies (NOCs) are “enormous oil.” Together, NOCs represent three-fifths of the world’s crude oil production, half of global natural gas production, and two-thirds of the world’s remaining proven oil and gas reserves. “Four—Adnoc of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Aramco, pdvsa of Venezuela and QatarEnergy—possess enough hydrocarbons to continue producing at current rates for over four decades.”

Taking into consideration the sheer scale of NOCs’ production power, it does make the global attention to these institutions’ climate actions (or rather non-actions) particularly stark and worrying. Especially when you take a look at just how bad most NOCs’ track records are when it comes to going green. To be clear, Big Oil’s track record isn’t stellar either, especially west of the Atlantic, but the greenhouse gas emissions of most supermajors have already stabilized or peaked. By contrast, just two NOCs can say the same: Brazil’s Petrobras and Colombia’s Ecopetrol.

So why aren’t we going after the big fish? The answer, of course, is complicated. Decarbonization is political no matter how you slice it, but pressuring governments themselves to divest of the very industry keeping their state economies afloat and their politicians in office is tricky and divisive business. Many countries with state-run oil companies are volatile nations with monopolized economies and no contingency plan if oil was to go the way of the dodo. What’s more, all too often, petrostates make for oil autocrats with itchy trigger fingers. “No matter how you define a petrostate – whether you look at a state’s oil-derived wealth, its dependence on oil revenues, or its exports and relative importance to world markets – there is strong evidence that petrostates are more likely than other countries to start wars,” Foreign Policy reported last month.

Not all NOCs are created equal, of course. They are as diverse as the nations that house them. Unsurprisingly, richer countries tend to have better run, more ecologically responsible outfits. They also often happen to have more geologically advantageous oil reserves – part of what made them rich in the first place. By contrast, many poor nations’ NOCs are poorly run, with tendencies toward inefficient and dirty practices. “The Algerian and Venezuelan companies emit three to four times as much carbon in oil production as do the more geologically blessed and better-managed firms such as [the United Arab Emirates’] Adnoc and Saudi Aramco, and flare seven to ten times as much methane, another potent greenhouse gas, per barrel as does QatarEnergy,” the Economist reports.

Ultimately, the “easy” tactics of boycotting, protesting, and naming and shaming that have some impact in the private sphere are effectively toothless strategies when it comes to state-run oil companies. Again, many of the NOCs with the dirtiest operations are operating in some of the world’s poorest countries, and no amount of public pressure will change their economic reality. Ultimately, it comes down to climate finance and holding the world’s richest nations accountable for their pledges to financially support the costly decarbonization efforts of the world’s poorest countries – a promise which has so far proven to be an empty one.

By Haley Zaremba for Oilprice.com

Globally more is being spent on coal than copper mining

Frik Els | August 1, 2022 

Coal mining is back in the black. Stock Image.

New data from Industrial Info Resources show 4,790 metals and minerals capital projects (including mining, processing and refining) with a combined investment value of $443 billion are currently under construction around the world. A further 10,586 projects are under active planning and engineering – for a combined total of $1.11 trillion.


Joe Govreau, VP of Research at Industrial Info Resources, says that is an 8% increase from the preceding period as projects delayed by the pandemic are being restarted. Mining projects – from early exploration through to construction – make up half the global total.

The top seven miners have now upped capital outlays by more than 50% from the depths of the industry downturn in 2017. Govreau sees “no reason why expenditures won’t continue to be elevated for the next several years or more as companies look to increase production to meet expected demand growth from the energy transition.”

Red metal goes green

The decarbonisation revolution is not off to a great start though, not if you compare investments in the worst of the fossil fuels in terms of emissions – coal – with that of copper, without which there simply is no green energy transition.

Copper’s metal intensity – kilograms required per MW produced – of renewable energy sources like solar and wind is nowhere near that of coal or gas. To generate 1MW of offshore wind energy around 8.2 tonnes of copper have to be installed. The same figure for coal is 882kg.

According to one study, in order to reach net-zero by 2050, 19 million tonnes of additional copper need to be delivered. That implies a new La Escondida – the world’s largest copper operation by a wide margin – must be discovered and enter production every year for the next 20 years.

IIR tracks 708 active copper projects with construction kickoff in 2022/2023 around the globe. The combined value of these projects, which includes mining, processing and smelting, is $68.5 billion.


Unsurprisingly, Chile, the world’s largest copper producer and reserves holder, leads the way with 123 projects worth $18.3 billion followed by China boasting 119 projects with a combined value of $13 billion and Russia which is spending $12.7 billion on 24 new copper projects.

In contrast, the US is spending $3.8 billion while Canadian spending on new copper ventures is a paltry $484 million, behind Iran and Vietnam. Govreau also points to Peru, the world’s number two producer, which is spending only $602 million after pandemic lockdowns and social unrest brought development to a standstill.

Back in black

In contrast to copper, coal has a pipeline of 1,863 projects around the globe with a value of $80.8 billion.

Govreau says coal consumption and production jumped over the past year on the back of increased demand for power generation and steelmaking. Consumption of metallurgical coal is expected to be strong again this year.

The Chinese ban on Australian coal is a boost for swing suppliers – US coal exports were up 26% last year, says Govreau. Asian nations are also upping investment in coal mining, and in contrast to Europe and the US, more coal-fired plants are being built than are being retired.

China derives 65% of its electricity from coal, has vast amounts of reserves and is heavily investing in consolidating and automating its coal mines to supply its massive power generation fleet. Coal mining is also attracting investment in the near term because soaring gas prices makes it a cheaper alternative for electricity generation.

Glencore is cashing in on coal to dodge big mining’s slowdown

Bloomberg News | August 2, 2022 

Mount Owen thermal and coking coal mine in Australia. Image: Glencore

The world’s biggest miners have spent the past two weeks reporting lower profits, shrinking dividends and a worsening outlook as the year rolls on. Next up: Glencore Plc looks set to buck the trend.


While commodities like iron ore and copper have retreated as gloom settles over the global economy, Glencore is enjoying two key advantages over its mining rivals — a powerful trading business that thrives in volatile markets, and a suite of coal mines now churning out previously unimaginable earnings thanks to the global energy crunch.

As a result, analysts are forecasting record profits and returns when Glencore reports on Thursday, with first-half earnings seen more than doubling from a year ago.

It’s a sharp reversal from previous years. The company had lagged its biggest rivals, largely because it doesn’t mine any iron ore, a commodity that helped supercharge earnings for mega miners BHP Group and Rio Tinto Group. But China’s Covid controls have sapped demand for the steelmaking ingredient as investor worries about a global recession weigh on commodity prices more broadly.

Rio Tinto last week reported a sharp decline in first-half profit and cut its dividend in half, while Anglo American Plc announced lower earnings and shareholder returns. Other miners from Vale SA to Lundin Mining Corp. also disappointed.

For now, the companies are still making good money, if not at last year’s record levels. It was Anglo’s second-best first half on record, while Rio paid its second-biggest interim dividend. But the increasingly uncertain outlook and weakening prices have cast a shadow over the underlying numbers, particularly as relentlessly rising costs across the industry add to profit-margin pressures.

“Prices have sharply declined from first-half averages, so these reported results do not reflect the reality of the markets today,” said Christopher LaFemina, an analyst at Jefferies Group LLC. “We are in a stage of the cycle during which prices are falling and costs are still rising. Not a good combination.”

Against this backdrop, Glencore is expected to deliver its best-ever results. The company has already said that its trading profit will exceed the top end of its guidance range, after it cashed in on volatile markets.

But it’s coal — the dirtiest fuel — that is seen as the really big earner.

Prices have soared to records this year as a global energy crisis boosts demand for fossil fuels around the world. Utilities are curbing imports from Russia due to the war in Ukraine, tightening the amount of available supply, while surging natural gas prices are also increasing demand for coal.

That’s put Glencore in a position to return cash to shareholders on a scale that was previously the reserve of the iron-ore majors, with some analysts forecasting payouts could exceed $10 billion in total this year.

The current dividend policy is to pay $1 billion from its trading unit, plus 25% of free cash flows from the sprawling mining business.

Still, some of those expectations — at least for the half year — have been tempered after Glencore flagged that its profitable bets on volatile commodity markets have tied up more working capital than normal.

“The underlying result will be very strong, and when markets return to lower volatility this working capital will be released making it a temporary impact,” said Tyler Broda, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets. “For now, however, this could temper the cash returns expected at the half-year results.”

(By Thomas Biesheuvel)

Sinkhole drags down Lundin shares as analysts weigh mine impact

Bloomberg News | August 2, 2022 |

Workers at Lundin’s Candelaria mine. (Credit: Lundin)

Lundin Mining Corp. fell the most among copper-mining peers Tuesday after a giant sinkhole opened up above one of its underground mines in Chile, sounding alarms over safety and production.


Chilean authorities are investigating the sinkhole at Alcaparrosa, one of two underground operations that make up Ojos del Salado, which in turn is part of the Candelaria complex.

Lundin said Monday it had halted development work near the site, but that the sinkhole didn’t affect the community, workers or its annual output guidance. Still, analysts at BMO Capital Markets lowered their Candelaria production estimate to the midpoint of the guidance range.

The event is playing out as the mining industry lobbies against planned tax hikes in Chile and faces more onerous rules regarding the environment and local communities as part of a new constitution that will go to a popular vote next month. Lundin is looking into further expansions in Chile after recently spending $1 billion upgrading its operations there.

Company shares were down 6.1% at 10:41 a.m. in Toronto, the steepest decline among global rivals tracked by Bloomberg, with markets in Canada resuming after a public holiday Monday.



A photo of a circular hole of about 25 meters (82 feet) in diameter was posted on the Twitter account of geology and mining service, Sernageomin, which ordered work in the immediate area to stop as it evaluates the situation.

Candelaria produced 118,600 metric tons of copper last year, government data show. It’s indirectly owned by Lundin (80%) and Sumitomo (20%), with the former acquiring its stake from Freeport-McMoRan Inc. in 2014. Lundin Mining was founded by Swedish-Canadian billionaire Lukas Lundin, who died last week.

“Minera Ojos del Salado is carrying out technical analyzes and gathering external information to determine the causes of this event to update the information that has been provided to the authorities,” Lundin said in an emailed statement on Monday.

(By James Attwood)

Sinkhole larger than tennis court has Chile perplexed

Experts in Chile on Tuesday were investigating the appearance of an enormous sinkhole, bigger than a tennis court, that has appeared near a copper mine in the Atacama desert.

byAFP
August 3, 2022, 

Aerial view taken on August 1, 2022, showing a large sinkhole that appeared over the weekend near the mining town of Tierra Amarilla, Copiapo Province, in the Atacama Desert in Chile. – A 100-metre security perimeter has been erected around the hole which appeared in the Tierra Amarilla municipality near the Alcaparrosa mine operated by Canadian firm Lundin Mining. 

Johan Godoy / AFP

Experts were dispatched to examine the hole, some 32 meters (104 feet) across and twice as deep, which appeared in an area about 800 kilometers (nearly 500 miles) north of Santiago over the weekend, the National Geology and Mining Service (Sernageomin) said in a statement.

A 100-meter security perimeter has been erected around the hole in the Tierra Amarilla municipality, near the Alcaparrosa mine operated by Canadian firm Lundin Mining.

The company said in a statement there had been “no impact to personnel, equipment or infrastructure,” and the sinkhole has remained stable since its detection.

As a preventive measure, “development work in an area of the Alcaparrosa underground mine has been temporarily suspended,” the company said.

Sernageomin director David Montenegro said experts would seek to determine the cause of the collapse and “ensure that all safety measures are taken to safeguard the lives of workers and communities close to the site.”

Cristian Zuniga, mayor of the Tierra Amarilla municipality of some 13,000 inhabitants, told journalists the sinkhole was unprecedented.

“We ask that the cause be clarified: whether the collapse is the product of mining activity or something else,” he said.

Chile is the world’s largest copper producer, responsible for a quarter of global supply.

America’s Climate Crisis

is Also A Prison Crisis

According to a July 2022 study by Texas A&M’s Hazard Reduction and Recovery Center, only 20% of Texas prison units have air conditioning.

By Talia Smith

Published on 8/2/2022 

America is experiencing a dire mass incarceration crisis and an equally dire environmental crisis. When the two merge, it creates unbearable conditions for thousands of vulnerable individuals.

According to a July 2022 study by Texas A&M’s Hazard Reduction and Recovery Center, only 20% of Texas prison units have air conditioning. And, as many areas of the Southern U.S. experience record-breaking heat, the remaining 80% of uncooled cells can reach temperatures as high as 110°F. The study also found evidence of at least one unit rising as high as 149°F.

“The lack of air-conditioning in prisons, especially housing areas, has been argued to be in violation of human rights, the U.S. Constitution’s Eighth Amendment protection against cruel and unusual punishment, the 14th Amendment guaranteeing equal protection to citizens, as well as the Americans with Disabilities Act and Rehabilitation Act,” the study’s authors wrote.

The effects of record-breaking heat on prison populations isn’t exclusive to Texas, either. Thirteen other states do not have universal air conditioning in their prisons, per a 2019 Prison Policy Initiative report: Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, and Virginia.

Due to a regular increase in unbearable temperatures year over year, many incarcerated folks are at greater risk of life-threatening illnesses such as heat strokes and injury to their kidneys, heart, brain, and liver. Speaking to VICE News, Jamila Johnson, a Louisiana-based prison reform activist, expressed concern that the inmates living through these adverse heat conditions often also must complete “grueling” mandatory labor on a daily basis.

“Extreme heat disproportionately impacts incarcerated people with medical or mental health vulnerabilities. Such vulnerabilities are overrepresented in prison systems across the U.S. and especially in Texas. Increasing annual temperatures and the increase of days over 100 degrees in Texas will continue to exacerbate the degradation of health for both incarcerated people and staff,” the Texas A&M study reads.

Researchers estimate that outfitting all Texas prison facilities with proper air conditioning would cost approx $1 billion, with another $140 million required annually for “utilities and maintenance.”

“People don’t understand how much of an issue this is, and it has enormous spillover effects for our prison systems and our communities,” said Texas A&M research assistant J. Carlee Purdum, when presenting the study’s findings to state lawmakers last month. “We’re not talking about a luxury – it’s a necessity. Especially in months like this when we’re going through these extreme heat waves. We’re talking about a human right – the right to live and the right to be in a safe place.”

Taliban under scrutiny as US kills al-Qaida leader in Kabul
By RAHIM FAIEZ and MUNIR AHMED

yesterday

 In this 1998 file photo made available Friday, March 19, 2004, Ayman al-Zawahri, left, listens during a news conference with Osama bin Laden in Khost, Afghanistan. A U.S. airstrike has killed al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri in Afghanistan, according to a person familiar with the matter. President Joe Biden will speak about the operation on Monday night, Aug. 1, 2022, from the White House. (AP Photo/Mazhar Ali Khan, File)


ISLAMABAD (AP) — The U.S. drone strike that killed al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri on the balcony of a Kabul safe house intensified global scrutiny Tuesday of Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers and further undermined their efforts to secure international recognition and desperately needed aid.

The Taliban had promised in the 2020 Doha Agreement on the terms of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan that they would not harbor al-Qaida members or those seeking to attack the U.S.

Yet a mastermind of the 9/11 terror attacks, who has called for striking the United States in numerous video messages in recent years, lived for months apparently sheltered by senior Taliban figures.

The safe house where al-Zawahri was staying in Kabul’s upscale Shirpur neighborhood was the home of a top aide to senior Taliban leader Sirajuddin Haqqani, according to a senior U.S. intelligence official. Haqqani is deputy head of the Taliban, serves as interior minister in its government and heads the Haqqani network, a powerful faction within the movement.

Still, there have been persistent reports of unease among Taliban leadership, particularly tensions between the Haqqani network and rivals within the movement.

The Taliban initially sought to describe the strike as America violating the Doha deal, in which the U.S. committed not to attack the group. The Taliban have yet to say who was killed in the strike.

“The killing of Ayman al-Zawahri has raised many questions,” said one Pakistani intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press as he wasn’t authorized to speak publicly to reporters. Al-Zawahri took over as al-Qaida’s leader after Osama bin Laden was killed in Pakistan in 2011, in an operation by U.S. Navy SEALs.

“The Taliban were aware of his presence in Kabul, and if they were not aware of it, they need to explain their position,” the official said.

Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry issued a very carefully worded statement, which referred to a “counter-terrorism operation by the United States in Afghanistan” but did not mention al-Zawahri. “Pakistan condemns terrorism in all its forms and manifestations,” it said. Pakistan has been lobbying for the world to give greater recognition and support to the Taliban government.

The strike early Sunday shook awake Shirpur, once a district of historic buildings that were bulldozed in 2003 to make way for luxury homes for officials in Afghanistan’s Western-backed government and international aid organizations. After the U.S. withdrawal in August 2021, senior Taliban moved into some of the abandoned homes there.

The targeted safe house is only a few blocks from the British Embassy, which has been closed since the Taliban takeover in August. Taliban officials blocked AP journalists in Kabul from reaching the damaged house on Tuesday.

The U.N. Security Council was informed by monitors of militant groups in July that al-Qaida enjoys greater freedom in Afghanistan under the Taliban but confines itself to advising and supporting the country’s new rulers.

A report by the monitors said the two groups remain close and that al-Qaida fighters, estimated to number between 180 to 400, are represented “at the individual level” among Taliban combat units.

The monitors said it’s unlikely al-Qaida will seek to mount direct attacks outside Afghanistan, “owing to a lack of capability and restraint on the part of the Taliban, as well as an unwillingness to jeopardize their recent gains” such as having a safe haven and improved resources.

During the first half of 2022, al-Zawahri increasingly reached out to supporters with video and audio messages, including assurances that al-Qaida can compete with the Islamic State group for leadership of a global movement, the report by the Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team said.

IS militants have emerged as a major threat to the Taliban over the past year, carrying out a series of deadly attacks against Taliban targets and civilians.

The Haqqani network is an Afghan Islamic insurgent group, built around the family of the same name. In the 1980s, it fought Soviet forces and over the past 20 years, it battled U.S.-led NATO troops and the former Afghanistan government. The U.S. government maintains a $10 million bounty on Serajjudin Haqqani for attacks on American troops and Afghan civilians.

But the Haqqanis, from Afghanistan’s eastern Khost province, have rivals within the Taliban leadership, mostly from the southern provinces of Helmand and Kandahar. Some believe Sirajuddin Haqqani wants more power. Other Taliban figures have opposed the Haqqanis’ attacks against civilians in Kabul and elsewhere during the insurgency.

Jerome Drevon, the International Crisis Group’s senior analyst studying Islamist militant groups, said the tensions are focused on how to direct the new regime — “how to share power ... who gets what position, who gets to control what ministries, to decide the general policies and so on.”

The timing of the strike also couldn’t come at a worse time politically for the Taliban. The militants face international condemnation for refusing to reopen schools for girls above the sixth grade, despite earlier promises. The United Nations mission to Afghanistan also criticized the Taliban for human rights abuses under their rule.

The U.S. and its allies have cut off billions in development funds that kept the government afloat in part over the abuses, as well as froze billions in Afghan national assets.

This sent the already shattered economy into free fall, increasing poverty dramatically and creating one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Millions, struggling to feed their families, are kept alive by a massive U.N.-led relief effort.

The Taliban have been trying to reopen the taps to that aid and their reserves. However, al-Zawahri’s killing already has been seized upon by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken as a sign that the Taliban “grossly violated the Doha Agreement and repeated assurances ... that they would not allow Afghan territory to be used by terrorists to threaten the security of other countries.”

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid alleged the U.S. violated the Doha Agreement by launching the strike. Afghanistan’s state-run television channel — now under the Taliban — reported that President Joe Biden said al-Zawahri had been killed.

“The killing of Ayman al-Zawahri closes a chapter of al-Qaida,” said Imtiaz Gul, the executive director of the Islamabad-based Center for Research and Security Studies.

Al-Zawahri’s death coincided with the 32nd anniversary of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait — creating a sort of a bookend to al-Qaida’s era of militancy. Saddam’s invasion prompted the U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia, which in turn was one factor that drove bin Laden to turn his guns on America, culminating in the 9/11 attacks.

AFGHANISTAN

EXPLAINER: A look at the missile that killed al-Qaida leader

The downside: US strike shows Afghanistan still terror base

Watching al-Qaida chief's 'pattern of life' key to his death

___

Associated Press writers Jon Gambrell and Isabel DeBre in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report.

Bullfighting fans attend festival in southern France as opponents call for outright ban

August 3, 2022
in Europe, News



“I think the majority of French people share the view that bullfights are immoral, a spectacle that no longer has its place in the 21st century,” said Aymeric Caron, a popular former TV journalist and animal rights activist who was recently elected to parliament as part of the hard-left France Unbowed party.

For years, critics have sought a final legal blow against what they call a cruel and archaic ritual, but none of the draft bills presented have ever been approved for debate by National Assembly lawmakers.

French courts have also routinely rejected lawsuits lodged by animal rights activists, most recently in July 2021 in Nimes, home to one of France’s most famous bullfighting events.

But Caron, based in Paris, told AFP that the time was ripe for a new proposal given growing concerns about animal welfare, with a draft bill to be submitted this week.

“I do indeed hope this bill will be debated in parliament in November… it would be a first,” he said.

The prospect seems all the more likely after France Unbowed won dozens of new seats in recent elections, helping to strip President Emmanuel Macron of his centrist majority in parliament.

The goal is to modify an animal welfare law that allows exceptions for bullfights — as well as cock fighting — when it can be shown that they are “uninterrupted local traditions.

Such exceptions are granted to cities including Bayonne and the mediaeval jewel of Mont-de-Marsan in southwest France near Spain, where the practice has its origins, and along the Mediterranean coast including Arles, Beziers and Nimes.
‘Respecting the animal’

For Caron, “it’s not a French tradition, it’s a Spanish custom that was imported to France in the 19th century to please the wife of Napoleon III, who was from Andalusia,” the countess Eugenie de Montijo.

That argument is unlikely to convince the jostling crowds who packed the streets of Bayonne for the bullfighting feria that ended Sunday, a sea of fans clad all in white except for bright red bandanas or sashes.

“The people who want to ban it don’t understand it. Bullfighting is a drama that brings you closer to death… You’re afraid, but that’s a part of life,” said Jean-Luc Ambert, who came with friends from the central Auvergne region.

Like many other fans, his friend Francoise insisted that bullfighting is an art as much as a sport, where “a man puts his life on the line, while respecting the animal.”

“We’re not trying to convert anyone — I just want the people against it to leave us alone,” she told AFP.

The guest star of the Bayonne feria, Spanish matador Alejandro Talavante, did indeed find an appreciative audience, with the crowd demanding the award of the bull’s ear for his performance.

It’s a conflict that echoes the widening rift in France between rural dwellers steeped in deep agriculture traditions, and Parisians and other urban residents accused of trampling on the country’s cultural heritage — often derided as “the Taliban of Paristan.”

Widespread support ?

Andre Viard, president of the national bullfighting association, shrugged off the threat of a ban.

“This comes up in every parliamentary session,” Viard told AFP of Caron’s efforts to find allies for the France Unbowed initiative.

“We tell the other parties: Why do you want to be associated with a bill that attacks a cultural freedom protected by the Constitution, and territorial identity?”

The debate echoes similar opposition in other countries with bullfighting histories, including Spain and Portugal as well as Mexico, Colombia and Venezuela.

In June, a judge in Mexico City ordered an indefinite suspension of bullfighting in the capital’s historic bullring, the largest in the world.

Caron is banking on support from across the political spectrum, including top members of Macron’s party such as the head of his parliamentary group Aurore Berge, who was among 36 lawmakers who called for a bullfighting ban last year.

An Ifop poll earlier this year found that 77 percent of respondents approved of a ban, up from 50 percent in 2007.

“More and more people are concerned about animal suffering, including in bullfights,” Claire Starozinski of the Anti-Bullfighting Alliance told AFP, adding that many people don’t realise that the bulls are actually killed.

“I know there are MPs from other parties who will support me, and have said so,” Caron said — though he admitted that more mainstream lawmakers such as Berge might be reluctant to join his leftish campaign.

“Is she going to remain true to her convictions, or make a political calculation that prevents her from supporting me? That’s what will be at stake in the talks over the coming weeks and months.”

(AFP)

KETTLE CALLING POT; BLACK

ASEAN warns Myanmar against more executions

AFP - 

Current ASEAN chair Cambodia warned Myanmar on Wednesday not to execute any more prisoners after the hanging of four people -- two of them prominent pro-democracy figures -- caused international outrage.


© Mohd RASFANAn empty chair representing Myanmar is seen during an ASEAN meeting in Phnom Penh on Wednesday

Foreign ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are discussing how to address the growing crisis in Myanmar at talks in Phnom Penh.

The 10-nation regional bloc has spearheaded so far fruitless efforts to restore peace to the country after a military coup last year, and anger is growing at the junta's stonewalling tactics.

Myanmar executed four prisoners last month in a move roundly condemned by ASEAN members, who are voicing increased frustration at the lack of progress on the regional bloc's "five-point consensus" plan on Myanmar's conflict.

Agreed in April last year, the plan calls for an immediate end to violence and dialogue between the army and coup opponents.

"If more prisoners are to be executed, we will be forced to rethink our role vis a vis ASEAN's five-point consensus," Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen said as he opened the foreign ministers' gathering.

Hun Sen said the bloc was "disappointed and disturbed by the execution of these opposition activists despite the appeals from me and others for the death sentences to be reconsidered for the sake of political dialogue, peace and reconciliation".

But with no Myanmar representatives present for the summit -- highlighted by the country's prominently placed empty chair -- Cambodia's ASEAN spokesman admitted Tuesday that progress over the conflict might be tricky.

The February coup has left Myanmar in disarray, with the death toll from a brutal military crackdown on dissent passing 2,100, according to a local monitoring group.

rbu/pdw/smw

CLAIMING A SPIRIT ANIMAL
Rare white elephant born in Myanmar: state media

Issued on: 03/08/2022 - 

A rare white elephant born in Myanmar's western Rakhine state is seen walking around Taungup township on Tuesday

 Handout MYANMAR MILITARY INFORMATION TEAM/AFP


Yangon (AFP) – A rare white elephant has been born in western Myanmar, state media said on Wednesday, unveiling what many in the Buddhist-majority country believe to be an auspicious creature.


Born last month in western Rakhine state, the baby weighs about 80 kilograms (180 pounds) and stands roughly 70 cm (two-and-a-half feet) tall, according to the Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper.

Footage released by state TV showed the tusker tot following his mother to a river and being washed by its keepers, and later feeding from her.

The mother -- a 33-year-old called Zar Nan Hla -- is kept by the Myanma Timber Enterprise in Rakhine state, the Global New Light said, adding the baby possessed seven of the eight characteristics associated with rare white elephants.

"Pearl-coloured eyes, plantain branch-shaped back, white hair, a distinctive tail, auspicious plot signs on the skin, five claws on the front legs and four on the back legs and big ears," the newspaper reported.

Social media users first posted about the birth of the elephant -- which has not been named yet -- late last month.

Historically, white elephants were considered extremely auspicious in Southeast Asian culture, and the region's ancient rulers acquired as many as they could to boost their fortunes.

But the ruinous cost of keeping the beasts in appropriately lavish style gave rise to the modern expression in which a "white elephant" is a useless, if beautiful, possession.

There are currently six white elephants in captivity in the military-built capital Naypyidaw, according to state media -- mostly from Rakhine state and the southern Ayeyarwady region.

With Myanmar reeling from a military coup last year and its bloody crackdown on dissent, the reaction of many on social media was muted or sceptical.

"Am I colourblind if it just looks brown to me?" posted one user.

"Elephants were important only in the old eras," said another.

"Now the poor elephant will have to go to jail."

© 2022 AFP