It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Friday, July 14, 2023
Ancient 'Outsider' Human Species Pinpointed in Oldest Genetic Study Yet
Researchers have managed the incredible feat of predicting genetic relationships between some of the earliest hominins to live on planet Earth, using little more than some proteins scraped from 2 million year old fossilized teeth.
The team behind the new study, mostly from the University of Copenhagen in Denmark and the University of Cape Town in South Africa, says the analysis will be vitally useful in tracing the distant family tree of human beings.
"The evolutionary relationships among extinct African hominin taxa are highly debated and largely unresolved, due in part to a lack of molecular data," write the researchers.
"Even within taxa, it is not always clear, based on morphology alone, whether ranges of variation are due to sexual dimorphism versus potentially undescribed taxonomic diversity."
The research will help paleoanthropologists chart out which differences in the fossil record are down to natural variations between men and women (sexual dimorphism), and which signify separate species of hominids altogether.
When it comes to timescales of thousands and millions of years, answering those questions isn't at all straightforward. The DNA molecule is fragile, prone to disintegrating quickly. Nuclear DNA from 430,000 year old hominin remains of has been deciphered, yet the process itself was far from productive.
Proteins can be a little more robust, and their amino acide sequences can be translated back into a possible genetic code that produced them. Although far from precise, it could serve as a reasonable proxy for estimating a genetic relationship where the genes themselves can't be read.
In this case the data was interpreted enamel on teeth recovered from Swartkrans cave, an important site for archaeological material that's about 40 kilometers (25 miles) to the northwest of Johannesburg. They were thought to belong to an ancient relative of ours, Paranthropus robustus.
By cross-checking their results against DNA information from other fossils and today's hominids – from orangutans to humans – the researchers were able to tentatively show that P. robustus represented an "outgroup" (like distant cousins, in a way) to the evolutionary line that includes Homo sapiens, Neanderthals, and Denisovans.
Flash floods in an otherwise arid area were responsible for these teeth being so well buried and preserved, the team reports. That may limit how many other fossils we can find like this, but the techniques used here should be able to be applied elsewhere too.
"This study demonstrates the feasibility of recovering informative Early Pleistocene hominin enamel proteins from Africa," write the researchers.
"We anticipate that this approach can be widely applied to geologically-comparable sites within South Africa, and possibly more broadly across the continent."
The study has yet to be peer reviewed, but is available to view on the preprint server bioRxiv.
CANADA As rents soar, tenants organize local protests. But what's needed for a national housing movement?
Story by Vanessa Balintec • CBC
Striking tenants who are refusing to pay big rent increases in several buildings in Toronto's west end say they've been flooded with support from across the country.
York South-Weston Tenant Union organizer Bruno Dobrusin said support for their rent strike has been "overwhelming." Not only are people paying attention, but he said they're interested in learning how to organize themselves.
"It's a hopeful sign that people are rising up and fighting back," said Dobrusin.
"We're seeing that there is more and more demand for broader movements. But provincially or nationally, the question now is how can we support each other?"
Advocates like Dobrusin say Canadians shut out of the country's tight housing market may be more likely to consider organizing as a way to push for solutions to the housing crisis.
While they say there's an appetite for change that can make way for a widespread movement aimed at creating more affordable and accessible housing, there's enough obstacles facing both organizers and residents to keep it from getting off the ground.
"Folks are seeing no change, no improvements year after year," said Ricardo Tranjan, a political economist at the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, a research group based in Ottawa.
Rents have been steadily increasing nationally since 2021 and hit a record-high last month. According to real estate research firm Urbanation, average asking rents nationally sat at $2,042 in June, passing the previous record set in November 2022.
"I think folks are starting to be more open to the notion that the missing link is not ideas, the missing link is not technical solutions. The missing link is the political will to make change and … it will require some pressure," Tranjan said. Is a broad housing movement warranted?
While discontent may be brewing among precariously housed Canadians, that doesn't mean new homes aren't being built.
Data from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) shows Canada has ramped up construction in recent years, including over 240,000 new home starts in 2022, just slightly down from the record-high 244,000 units started in 2021. Additionally, Statistics Canada data shows that from 2019 to 2021, housing stock growth outpaced population growth in Toronto and Vancouver, two of the hottest markets in the country.
But CMHC has said at the current pace of construction, Canada is still short on supply. It projects almost 2.3 million housing units will be added to the market by 2030, bringing the country's total housing stock to 19 million — but that's 3.5 million units short of achieving "housing affordability for everyone living in Canada," the CMHC said.
Mary Rowe, president and CEO of the Canadian Urban Institute research group, said it's not necessarily how many units are being built, it's about what kind, and where.
"The pattern of development has gone where the highest rate of return is," said Rowe, pointing to a push toward single-family and detached homes when private developer housing took off. That mainly started after the federal government ended programs geared toward social housing in the 1990s.
It left a real deficit in affordable, family and supportive housing, along with different types of rental and ownership schemes such as co-ops, rent-to-own and shared ownership, she said.
"We've got to get smart here in Canada and figure out what are the interventions we need to keep a kind of balance and make that a healthy ecosystem that provides a wide range of choice."
While embracing activism might not be everyone's calling, Rowe said it makes sense some people will join social movements in order to be "engaged in the quality of our communities."
"There are people with extraordinary frustration and people that have been disadvantaged by ... the way the housing market has been driven for decades," said Rowe.
"Now there's a moment for all of us to look at how that needs to be corrected."
What's stopping people from getting involved?
While there may be an appetite for change, it's not easily tapped into — both for residents and those looking to organize.
Alejandra Ruiz Vargas, a national leader with multi-issue advocacy organization Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), said the group has been focused on issues like housing, fair banking and internet accessibility since its inception in 2004.
It opened new chapters in Calgary and Waterloo, Ont., in the past year due to demand, she said, bringing their membership to over 140,000 nationally.
While they welcome the growth, Vargas said they're still working within a system where many people are too burned out or busy to get involved, and actively feel "defeat" when it comes to their ability to make a difference in Canadian politics.
"Right now there are people that have to work three jobs to [make] ends meet. So what time do you really have to participate?"
Vargas said despite how bleak things may seem, it's important to continue getting their message out.
"We're going to continue fighting, we're going to give our 100 per cent, we're going to try our best," said Vargas, pointing toward tenant information sessions, social media campaigns and door-knocking blitzes as examples. What does it take to build a movement?
Tranjan said having broader conversations about politicization, financialization and the lack of housing regulation might open the doors for more people to get involved.
"There's actually folks trying to make things worse because they enormously benefit from the kind of money that they can make on the backs of tenant families right now," said Tranjan, pointing toward weakening rent control and tenant protections as examples.
"We need to have that grown up conversation — stop pretending that supply and demand is what explains everything."
For Dobrusin, the fight continues locally by encouraging people to talk to their neighbours, sparking the idea of collective action.
That's what he and other organizers hope to do on Saturday. Tenants, joined by supporters, trade unions and community organizations, are marching down Toronto's Weston Road to local MPPs and MPs offices to call for fair rent and landlord accountability.
"Whether you're in a rent strike or not, it's important to join those forces," he said.
"Hopefully from that we'll be able to build something bigger."
First daily over-the-counter birth control pill approved in the U.S.
Story by Washington Post • Yesterday This undated illustration photo courtesy of the Perrigo Company, shows the Opill oral contraceptive.
Federal regulators Thursday approved the first over-the-counter daily birth control pill available in the United States, a milestone in decades-long efforts to make oral contraceptives easier to obtain, especially by teenagers and women who don’t regularly see a doctor.
The Food and Drug Administration’s approval of Opill, made by the consumer health giant Perrigo, comes six decades after birth control pills were introduced in the United States, drastically changing the lives of countless women and American society. And it means the country will join about 100 other nations that allow the sale of nonprescription birth control pills.
Health experts, citing the pill’s lengthy record of safety and effectiveness, have pushed for a nonprescription pill for years, but their campaign took on new urgency after the Supreme Court last year struck down the fundamental right to abortion established by Roe v. Wade.
“It’s a transformative change in contraceptive access and reproductive health,” said Victoria Nichols, project director of Free the Pill, a coalition of dozens of groups working for over-the-counter birth control pills in the United States.
Opill is expected to be available over the counter in stores starting in January or February, according to Perrigo. It will not have an age restriction. The suggested retail price is expected to be announced this fall. The FDA decision applies only to Opill, not to other birth control pills.
Dyvia Huitron, who is 19 and lives in McAllen, Tex., was 16 when she started having sex and was not able to get the pill; she said she used condoms. Her parents told her to stop having sex. Huitron said several of her friends became pregnant in high school.
“Young people absolutely need this,” said Huitron, a member of Advocates for Youth, a nonprofit organization that has been pressing for easier access to birth control. “For them to be able to get something so important in terms of taking care of their bodies, at an age when historically we have not been allowed to . . . it will have a really significant impact on our lives and our ability to plan for the future.”
The OTC decision comes amid ongoing turmoil following the decision overturning Roe. Today, about a quarter of women of reproductive age live in states where abortion is banned or mostly banned, with dozens of clinics across the South and Midwest no longer providing abortions. New restrictions have led to almost 25,000 fewer legal abortions.
Among the biggest outstanding questions about Opill: cost and insurance coverage. The company has said it would keep the drug affordable and offer financial assistance to people who qualify.
Under the Affordable Care Act, group health plans and insurance companies are required to cover women’s preventive services, including birth control, at no cost. But that applies to prescription products; typically, insurers do not cover OTC drugs – something that women’s health groups want the Biden administration to change.
Some states require the insurance companies they regulate to cover contraceptive products sold without a prescription, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights. Almost 30 states and the District of Columbia allow pharmacists to write prescriptions for contraceptives, but some of the laws have age and other restrictions.
Almost half of the pregnancies in the United States are unplanned, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Because Opill has been shown to be more effective than other forms of contraception, such as condoms, experts say it could reduce the number of unintended pregnancies.
Major medical groups, including the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the American Medical Association, have called for the change for years, saying nonprescription pills could be a boon for public health.
Opill, also called norgestrel, is sometimes called a “mini pill” because it contains only progestin, a synthetic form of the hormone progesterone. It works by thickening cervical mucus to inhibit sperm and suppressing ovulation. Opill does not contain a synthetic form of the hormone estrogen.
Birth control pills that contain both progestin and a synthetic form of estrogen – called combination pills – are more popular in the United States than progestin-only pills. But there are more medical conditions, including blood clots, that preclude use of those combination pills.
The first birth control pill was approved in 1960. Norgestrel was first cleared in 1973 under the brand name Ovrette. It was discontinued by Pfizer in 2005 for business reasons.
HRA Pharma, a Paris company, acquired the medication in 2014 and in recent years has worked closely with Ibis Reproductive Health, a Cambridge, Mass., research group that heads Free the Pill. HRA Pharma applied to the FDA for over-the-counter status for the drug in July 2022 shortly after being acquired by Perrigo, a giant Dublin-based manufacturer of generic medications. Perrigo applauded the FDA’s approval Thursday.
“Today marks a truly momentous day for women’s health nationwide,” said Patrick Lockwood-Taylor, Perrigo’s president and chief executive. He said Opill has the potential to sharply improve access to contraception.
In May, outside experts advising the FDA voted unanimously that the benefits of approving OTC status for Opill outweigh the risks. They overrode reservations expressed by agency staffers who wondered whether physician oversight might be needed to ensure the pill was used safely and effectively.
The staffers were especially concerned that women might not adhere to directions to take the pill every day, around the same time, and to use another form of contraception or abstain from sex if they missed a dose. They also worried that some women with breast cancer and other medical conditions might not follow instructions to avoid the medications.
Opposition to Opill’s application for nonprescription status mostly came from Catholic groups that have traditionally opposed birth control in favor of natural family planning methods that rely on tracking a woman’s cycle, and fertility, throughout the month. Catholic groups that oppose OTC status focus, in part, on safety issues.
“We strenuously oppose the non-prescription availability of Opill,” the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, National Catholic Bioethics Center, Catholic Medical Association and National Association of Catholic Nurses wrote to the FDA’s outside advisers in November.
Antiabortion groups that pushed hard to dismantle Roe have not spent a lot of time focusing on oral contraceptives.
COWABUNGA, MAN
An 'aggressive sea otter' is scaring surfers and stealing their boards
Story by Chris Knight • National Post -Yesterday
Santa Cruz Police released this image of Otter 841 in the act of commandeering a surfboard.
Police in Santa Cruz are warning surfers of an unusual threat in the waters of the California community. An “aggressive sea otter” is approaching, biting and scratching surfboards – and in some cases climbing aboard and making off with them.
A widely shared video shows one hapless surfer trying to fight off the creature, which hangs onto the board and at one point seems to rush the man, forcing him to let go. When the map flips the board, it briefly dislodges the animal, but moments later it’s back and chewing on the side of the board.
Unlike recent reports of various orcas attacking boats in what appears to be learned group behaviour, the surfboard-munching marine mammal is a singular scofflaw. It even has a name. The New York Times reports that it’s Otter 841, a five-year-old female, one of about 3,000 endangered southern sea otters remaining along California’s central coast, after the sub-species was almost wiped out in the early 20th century.
Otter 841 is the offspring of an otter that was raised in captivity and, after being released in the wild, started approaching humans for handouts, which they willingly offered. As a result, she was taken in at a local wildlife veterinary care and research centre, where she gave birth to 841.
The Times says 841 was kept from forming close attachments to humans before being released. “After one year of being in the wild without issue, we started receiving reports of her interactions with surfers, kayakers and paddle boarders,” Jessica Fujii, sea otter program manager at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, said. “We do not know why this started. We have no evidence that she was fed. But it has persisted in the summers for the last couple of years.”
It’s also increased in frequency and boldness, with the otter observed stealing surfboards on three separate occasions over a recent weekend.
In the video, onlookers seem to be more amazed than horrified at what is happening. This was also the reaction of 16-year-old Noah Wormhoudt, who related his experience to the Times.
“I started paddling away trying to avoid it but it kept getting closer and closer. I jumped off my board and then it jumped onto my board,” he said. “It seemed friendly, so we got comfortable with it. It was a pretty cool experience.”
But he then realized that this was a wild animal, and that he “wasn’t really like thinking about how it could bite my finger off.” He also added admiringly: “The otter was shredding, caught a couple of nice waves.”
Others are less impressed. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFW) has released a statement that, “While there have been no confirmed reports of injury, due to the highly unusual behavior of this otter, kayakers, surfers, and others recreating in the area should not approach the otter or encourage the otter’s interactions.”
The sea otter is the largest member of the weasel family and can tip the scales at over 45 kg or 100 pounds. The carnivorous creature has left claw and bite marks on several surfboards.
Meanwhile, a team from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Monterey Bay Aquarium is looking to catch Otter 841. Aquarium spokesperson Kevin Connor told NPR that she won’t be able to return to the wild, however.
“Trying to recapture the otter is an effort to avoid anything more drastic. If the otter were to harm or bite a person, the USFW, which is responsible for managing the population of these animals, would have to begin discussions of euthanizing the animal,” he said. “That’s the reality, and nobody wants to see that.”
The United States has decided to send cluster munitions to Ukraine to help its military push back Russian forces entrenched along the front lines.
The Biden administration announced that it will send thousands of them as part of a new military aid package worth $800 million.
The move has triggered outrage from some allies and humanitarian groups that have long opposed the use of cluster bombs. More than 120 countries signed onto a 2008 treaty banning all production, transfer and stockpiling of cluster munitions, including the U.K., Germany and Canada.
Proponents argue that Russia has already been using the controversial weapon in Ukraine, and that the munitions the U.S. will provide have a reduced dud rate, meaning there will be far fewer unexploded rounds that can result in unintended civilian deaths.
Here is a look at what cluster munitions are, where they have been used, and why the U.S. plans to provide them to Ukraine now.
What is a cluster munition?
A cluster munition is a bomb that opens in the air and releases smaller “bomblets” across a wide area. The bomblets are designed to take out tanks and equipment, as well as troops, hitting multiple targets at the same time.
The munitions are launched by the same artillery weapons that the U.S. and allies have already provided to Ukraine for the war — such as howitzers — and the type of cluster munition that the U.S. is planning to send is based on a common 155 mm shell that is already widely in use across the battlefield.
In previous conflicts, cluster munitions have had a high dud rate, which meant that thousands of the smaller unexploded bomblets remained behind and killed and maimed people decades later. The U.S. last used its cluster munitions in battle in Iraq in 2003, and decided not to continue using them as the conflict shifted to more urban environments with more dense civilian populations.
On Thursday, Brig.-Gen. Pat Ryder said the Defense Department has “multiple variants” of the munitions and “the ones that we are considering providing would not include older variants with [unexploding] rates that are higher than 2.35 per cent.” Why provide them now?
For more than a year the U.S. has dipped into its own stocks of traditional 155 mm howitzer munitions and sent more than two million rounds to Ukraine. Allies across the globe have provided hundreds of thousands more.
A 155 mm round can strike targets 15 to 20 miles (24 to 32 km) away, making them a munition of choice for Ukrainian ground troops trying to hit enemy targets from a distance. Ukrainian forces are burning through thousands of the rounds a day battling the Russians.
Yehor Cherniev, a member of Ukraine’s parliament, told reporters at a German Marshall Fund event in the U.S. this spring that Kyiv would likely need to fire 7,000 to 9,000 of the rounds daily in intensified counteroffensive fighting. Providing that many puts substantial pressure on U.S. and allied stocks.
The cluster bomb is an attractive option because it would help Ukraine destroy more targets with fewer rounds, and since the U.S. hasn’t used them in conflict since Iraq, it has large amounts of them in storage it can access quickly, said Ryan Brobst, a research analyst for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
A March 2023 letter from top House and Senate Republicans to the Biden administration said the U.S. may have as many as three million cluster munitions available for use, and urged the White House to send the munitions to alleviate pressure on U.S. war supplies.
“Cluster munitions are more effective than unitary artillery shells because they inflict damage over a wider area,” Brobst said. “This is important for Ukraine as they try to clear heavily fortified Russian positions.”
Tapping into the U.S. stores of cluster munitions could address Ukraine’s shell shortage and alleviate pressure on the 155 mm stockpiles in the U.S. and elsewhere, Brobst said.
Is using them a war crime?
Use of cluster bombs itself does not violate international law, but using them against civilians can be a violation. As in any strike, determining a war crime requires looking at whether the target was legitimate and if precautions were taken to avoid civilian casualties.
“The part of international law where this starts playing [a role], though, is indiscriminate attacks targeting civilians,” Human Rights Watch’s (HRW) associate arms director Mark Hiznay told The Associated Press. “So that’s not necessarily related to the weapons, but the way the weapons are used.” The U.S., Russia and Ukraine haven’t signed on to the convention banning cluster bombs joined by more than 120 countries. Where have they been used?
The bombs have been deployed in many recent conflicts, including by U.S. forces.
The U.S. initially considered cluster bombs an integral part of its arsenal during the invasion of Afghanistan that began in 2001, according to HRW. The group estimated that the U.S.-led coalition dropped more than 1,500 cluster bombs in Afghanistan during the first three years of the conflict.
The Defense Department had been due by 2019 to stop use of any cluster munitions with a rate of unexploded ordnance greater than one per cent. But the Trump administration rolled back that policy, allowing commanders to approve use of such munitions.
Syrian government troops often used cluster munitions — supplied by Russia — against opposition strongholds during that country’s civil war, frequently hitting civilian targets and infrastructure. And Israel used them in civilian areas in south Lebanon, including during the 1982 invasion.
During the month-long 2006 war with Hezbollah, HRW and the United Nations accused Israel of firing as many as four million cluster munitions into Lebanon. That left unexploded ordnance that threatens Lebanese civilians to this day.
The Saudi-led coalition in Yemen has been criticized for its use of cluster bombs in the war with the Iran-backed Houthi rebels that has ravaged the southern Arabian country.
In 2017, Yemen was the second deadliest country for cluster munitions after Syria, according to the U.N. Children have been killed or maimed long after the munitions originally fell, making it difficult to know the true toll.
In the 1980s, the Russians made heavy use of cluster bombs during their 10-year invasion of Afghanistan. As a result of decades of war, the Afghan countryside remains one of the most heavily mined regions in the world. What’s happening in Ukraine?
Russian forces have used cluster bombs in Ukraine on a number of occasions, according to Ukrainian government leaders, observers and humanitarian groups. And human rights groups have said Ukraine has also used them.
During the early days of the war, there were repeated instances of Russian cluster bombs cited by groups such as Human Rights Watch, including when they hit near a preschool in the northeastern city of Okhtyrka. The open-source intelligence group Bellingcat said its researchers found cluster munitions in that strike as well as multiple cluster attacks in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, also in the northeast.
More recently, in March, a Russian missile and drone barrage hit a number of urban areas, including a sustained bombardment in Bakhmut, in the eastern Donetsk region. Just west of there, shelling and missile strikes hit the Ukrainian-held city of Kostiantynivka, and AP journalists in the city saw at least four injured people taken to a local hospital. Police said Russian forces attacked the town with S-300 missiles and cluster munitions.
Just a month later, Donetsk Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko accused Russian forces of attacking a town with cluster munitions, wounding one person. An AP and Frontline database called War Crimes Watch Ukraine has cataloged how Russia has used cluster bombs.
Additional reporting from National Post
NEEDLE IN HAYSTACK Search for 300 migrants reported missing in Atlantic shows difficulty of locating lost ships
Story by Nick Logan • Yesterday
Three boats, carrying more than 300 migrants combined, are reported to have disappeared in the Atlantic Ocean while making a long and risky 1,700-kilometre journey from the coast of Senegal to Spain's Canary Islands.
A search and rescue operation has been underway since a Spanish migrant aid group, known in English as Walking Borders, sounded the alarm on Sunday, after families had not heard from loved ones who had departed last month for the archipelago, situated off the coast of Morocco and Western Sahara.
As desperate families hold out hope the boats will be found, the search demonstrates how difficult it is to track down missing vessels in the vast ocean with little — and sometimes conflicting — information.
The voyage, which can take several days or even weeks, is one of the deadliest in the world. At least 559 people lost their lives trying to reach the Canary Islands in 2022, according to the United Nations' International Organization for Migration (IOM). The IOM recorded 178 deaths in the first half of this year.
Walking Borders estimates that number is far higher, at 778 deaths, in the first six months of 2023.
Mixed messages on missing migrant boats
Walking Borders reported one boat, believed to have 200 passengers on board, set off on June 27 from the Senegalese fishing village of Kafountine, while two others, one with 65 people and another with 50 to 60 people, left on June 23 from the town of Mbour, near the capital, Dakar.
The Senegalese government is disputing the organization's claims that boats that set out from the country are missing, saying it carried out checks showing "that this information is completely unfounded."
The Foreign Ministry said Tuesday that 260 of its citizens were rescued in Moroccan territorial waters between June 28 and July 9, and that Senegalese and Moroccan authorities are ensuring those who were rescued were taken care of and repatriated as soon as possible.
In a statement sent to CBC News Wednesday, Walking Borders insisted the government's comments were incorrect and that the details of the rescues don't match up with the information it received about missing boats.
The aid group also said 86 people rescued from a boat spotted by a Spanish rescue plane on Monday was unlikely to be one of those it reported missing.
"The main thing is to search for these people, to protect their right to life and to provide answers to the families who are desperately calling," the organization said in its statement. "With every passing minute we are losing some precious time to find them alive."
The traditional canoe-like fishing boats that are generally used to transport migrants from Senegal are "relatively safe," she said, compared to some of the dilapidated vessels or rubber dinghies used on other migration routes, like in the Mediterranean Sea or English Channel.
She said the search and rescue zone along the migration route to the Canary Islands encompasses about one million square kilometres — an area bigger than British Columbia. It is covered by a rather small search and rescue crew from Spain's Maritime Safety and Rescue Society, also known as Salvamento Maritimo.
"We're talking about a crew of about 30 people with about five boats, two helicopters and one plane who are responsible for rescuing over 7,000 [migrants] in this area in 2023 so far," Vives said.
"Unless you come upon one of these boats by accident, the only way to find it is if you know exactly from where and when they left, and the approximate route that the boat followed."
Vives said it's often families of the missing who alert aid groups when they don't hear from their loved ones after several days at sea. In turn, those organizations, like Walking Borders, contact rescue crews or the relevant authorities who then deploy a plane or helicopter to begin searching from the air.
Intensified scrutiny of search and rescue efforts
Search and rescue efforts for migrant boats that are in distress or go missing have been under scrutiny following the sinking of a trawler carrying up to 750 people off the coast of Greece last month. Only 104 people are confirmed to have survived the disaster, one of the deadliest migrant boat incidents on record.
There are questions about the Greek Coast Guard's handling of the incident, as well as scrutiny of the resources dedicated to rescuing migrants at sea, compared to the international response to the missing OceanGate Titan submersible, which imploded while carrying wealthy travellers to the site of the Titanic wreckage in the North Atlantic.
Vives said the broad response to the Titan is actually what is supposed to happen, with search and rescue resources scrambled to assist distressed vessels. But that's not the case with boats carrying migrants from poor or conflict-stricken countries.
She said some countries in Europe are shirking their international search and rescue obligations when it comes to migrant vessels. Rescues have become increasingly politicized, as countries put in place policies meant to deter migrants from arriving by irregular sea routes, and have even penalized non-government organizations attempting to carry out rescues.
Vives said Spain's Salvamento Maritimo is generally successful at saving migrants at sea, when they have the necessary information to guide them.
She worries the situation could change now that Spain and the European Union have reached an agreement to support more involvement from Morocco and other countries in migrant search and rescue efforts.
She said Morocco, for example, does not have the same search and rescue capabilities as Spain, which could ultimately put more lives at risk.
"It's not a combination of efforts, it's a retreat of Spain to let Morocco step in," she said. "Deaths are going to increase along this route."
This week, prosecutors in the Canary Islands filed a lawsuit alleging that negligence led to the deaths of 36 migrants last month off Gran Canaria, the largest of the islands, after a Spanish rescue vessel did not immediately assist, because Morocco had taken charge of the rescue operations.
DECRIMINALIZE DRUGS Coca price crash contributing to Colombia food insecurity-UN
Ariel view of coca fields in Tumaco, Colombia, 26 de febrero, 2020.
BOGOTA (Reuters) - A crash in the price of coca, the chief ingredient in cocaine, is contributing to food insecurity in Colombia and causing displacement, as people leave areas that depend on the illicit crop, according to an internal United Nations presentation seen by Reuters.
Historically coca crops have provided better incomes than legal alternatives for thousands of rural Colombian families, with drug-trafficking groups often footing the costs of transport, fertilizers and other supplies.
Now coca-growing farmers have no buyers for the leaves or coca base leading to economic hardship amid high inflation, according to an internal presentation from the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP).
"There is no cash to buy food and the inflation of (food prices) is rising," the presentation, dated June, said.
The WFP confirmed the document's provenance.
Oversupply of coca - including more productive plants and record crops - is contributing to the crash, along with slow growth of trafficking routes and new coca cultivation in Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico, the presentation said.
Other reasons for falling coca prices include territorial disputes between trafficking groups and imports of synthetic opioid fentanyl to the United States, a major cocaine consumer, it added.
Some 400,000 families nationwide rely on income connected to coca cultivation, the presentation said, adding coca markets have been paralyzed in Colombian provinces, including Narino, Putumayo and Norte de Santander for between three months to a year.
The government will send 2 million pesos (around $487) each to just over 77,000 families as part of an existing program to replace illicit crops, said Valerin Saurith, an adviser for the presidency's Zero Hunger initiative, adding the government will work to build viable economic options for affected communities in the medium-term.
"It's not just substituting crops, but the economy," Saurith said.
Coca prices are currently at around 30% of their former levels, said Elizabeth Dickinson, a senior analyst for International Crisis Group in Colombia, adding rural areas are suffering "complete economic collapse" as a result.
A kilo of coca base could previously fetch up to approximately $975 in Narino, but would now go for around $240 if buyers could be found at all, Dickinson said, adding that local economies in coca-growing areas - including shops and other commerce - rely on income from the crops.
"This has created not only an economic crisis but frankly a humanitarian crisis," Dickinson said.
(Reporting by Oliver Griffin; Editing by Aurora Ellis)
FORCE IS FORCE REGARDLESS OF LEGITIAMCY
Peru vows to use only legitimate force during upcoming protests
LIMA (Reuters) - Peru's government vowed on Friday to use only appropriate force in protests planned for next week and guarantee demonstrators' safety, following alleged abuses during the previous series of clashes.
President Dina Boluarte met with top officials on Friday to discuss the need to guarantee protesters' human rights.
"We call upon the authorities to apply the legitimate use of force in accordance with the law and to guarantee the safety and integrity of those who will participate," Prime Minister Alberto Otarola said in a statement.
The government's pledge follows months of violent protests between December and March, during which human rights groups documented abuses and multiple "extrajudicial killings" committed by security forces against protesters.
The country has been gripped by unrest since former President Pedro Castillo was ousted and arrested in December after he illegally tried to dissolve Congress.
Various left-wing groups and unions in Peru have announced new protests starting on July 19 to demand Boluarte's resignation, the closure of Congress, early elections and a new constitution.
The organizers of the new protests say they expect thousands of people will be mobilized in the capital and around the southern area, where the country's largest mines are located.
The police have said they will deploy 8,000 officers to prevent possible disturbances and that they are already controlling the entry into capital Lima from outside.
The government also this week extended the state of emergency in key regions for 30 days.
"We call on citizens who want to exercise the right of assembly, the right to demonstrate and protest, to do so peacefully," Otarola added.
(Reporting by Marco Aquino, Writing by Isabel Woodford, Editing by Sandra Maler)
CANADA 'Money talks': Federal environment minister calls on businesses, banks to fight climate change
Story by David Thurton • Yesterday
Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault says businesses and financial institutions around the world need to do more to fight climate change — and climate finance needs to be on the agenda for the next United Nations climate summit.
Guilbeault spoke about the need to mobilize private international climate capital on Wednesday in Brussels, where he announced that Ottawa is allocating $450 million to the world's largest climate fund — the Green Climate Fund — increasing its previous pledge in 2019 by 50 per cent.
Ottawa's most recent contribution consists of $180 million in loans and $270 million in grants.
"We need more money, and we need more money from all sources," said Guilbeault.
It's widely acknowledged that richer countries and international businesses based there have been responsible for the bulk of global carbon emissions.
Minister of Environment and Climate Change Steven Guilbeault responds to a question during a news conference in Ottawa on June 14, 2023.
The $450 million for the Green Climate Fund comes from the $5.3 billion the federal government has earmarked for international climate finance over five years.
The Green Climate Fund supports developing countries' efforts to transition to low-carbon, climate-resilient economies and protect nature.
"Money talks, so we encourage other contributors, traditional and new, to use this second replenishment of the Green Climate Fund to raise their ambition," Guilbeault said.
He specifically called on the private sector to step up.
"We clearly know that there's not enough public money to meet the challenge of fighting climate change or adapting to climate change, which is where the private sector capital mobilization comes into play," Guilbeault said.
Related video: Rise in investment in clean & green energy sector (WION)
The private sector must be "held accountable" for dragging its heels on climate action in Canada and globally, said Julie Segal, senior manager of climate finance at Environmental Defence, a Canadian-based environmental organization.
Protesters from Greenpeace interrupt a luncheon speech by Gregoire Baillargeon (not shown), president of BMO Financial Group Quebec, at the Montreal Chamber of Commerce in Montreal on May 10, 2023
Segal said Canadian banks are still investing billions of dollars annually in "climate-damaging activities" like fossil fuel production.
"So they are under-investing, particularly Canadian financial institutions, in climate solutions and over-investing in climate pollution," she said.
If the Canadian government got serious about encouraging private investments in efforts to fight climate change, Segal said, it would introduce rules and regulations for Canada's financial institutions to help shift Canadian money away from high-emitting sectors. World Bank needs to do more: Guilbeault
Guilbeault meets Thursday with his ministerial counterparts from China and the European Union in Brussels for the Ministerial Meeting on Climate Action (MoCA).
These talks are focused on implementing the Paris Agreement. They're also meant to help wealthier countries iron out their concerns ahead of the UN's upcoming COP 28 climate conference in Dubai.
Guilbeault said one of the outcomes of November's COP28 should be a "firm commitment" to getting financial institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to address the existential threat of climate change while preventing millions from slipping into poverty.
World Bank President Ajay Banga arrives for the closing session of the New Global Financial Pact Summit on June 23, 2023 in Paris.
In a recent joint op-ed with Australia's climate change and energy minister, Guilbeault wrote that the efforts of multilateral institutions to finance climate-related measures at affordable rates have been "patchy and at times inaccessible to the nations that need it most."
Patricia Fuller, who served as Canada's ambassador for climate change from 2018 to 2021, said discussions have been happening for years about boosting access to climate finance for developed countries.
"I think the new aspect here is just the levels of debt distress in developing countries, which unfortunately coincide to a great degree with the impacts of climate change," Fuller said.
The United Nations recently estimated that 52 developing countries — home to half of the world's population living in extreme poverty — suffer from severe debt problems. Almost half of these countries spend 20 per cent or more of their public revenue on servicing external public debt.
Fuller said the issue isn't whether multilateral institutions must step up their climate finance, but rather how they do it. The question that needs to be answered, she said, is whether these institutions reallocate existing funds — or countries like Canada contribute more money to expand their balance sheets.
After Earth's hottest week on record, extreme weather surprises everyone — even climate scientists
Story by Benjamin Shingler • 15h ago
The heat has been unprecedented, as extreme weather from wildfires to floods ravage various corners of the world.
Temperatures have soared across much of southern Europe and the southern United States, while powerful rain storms led to flooding in Vermont, India, Japan — and Montreal on Thursday.
This follows the hottest June on record, with unprecedented sea surface temperatures and record low Antarctic sea ice coverage.
"There's a lot of concern from the scientific community and a lot of catch up in the scientific community trying to understand these incredible changes we're seeing at the moment," said Michael Sparrow, head of the WMO's world climate research program.
A homeless man sleeps under the sun in the Hollywood district of Los Angeles on Wednesday, another city feeling the heat.
(Damian Dovarganes/Associated Press)
'We can expect more records to fall'
All this comes at the onset of El Niño, which is expected to further fuel the heat both on land and in the oceans, according to Prof. Christopher Hewitt, WMO's director of climate services.
"We are in uncharted territory and we can expect more records to fall as El Niño develops further," he said. "These impacts will extend into 2024."
Global sea surface temperatures hit new records for the time of the year both in May and June, according to the WMO.
In Florida, for instance, the water temperature near Johnson Key was 36 Celsius, about 5 degrees warmer than normal this time of year, meteorologists said.
"As we go forward, we will see more extreme weather," said Altaf Arain, a professor in the school of earth, environment and society at McMaster University and director of McMaster's Centre for Climate Change.
Related video: Current extreme weather a direct consequence of climate change, climatologist says (cbc.ca) Oh my God Oh my God. Duration 1:59 View on Watch
While Arain isn't entirely surprised by the surging temperatures, he said the idea of a "new normal" should be thrown out the window.
"It may not be fair to use that term because when you talk about the new normal, then you have to look at the time scale," he said.
"We will have a new normal for the next decade. What about the following decade and the following decade? So would we keep on changing these normals? So I think this discussion should not be there."
Experiencing the wildfire smoke in Ontario earlier this summer was a reminder that the effects of climate change are far reaching, he said.
"The message you get is we are all in it together," he said. "We all will be impacted, one way or the other."
'Statistically impossible' becomes possible
Despite the heat and extreme weather of recent weeks, the planet hasn't necessarily reached a "tipping point" moment, said Nicholas Leach, a postdoctoral researcher in climate science at the University of Oxford.
"To the best of our knowledge these extreme weather events essentially will continue," said Leach, who was a part of a team of scientists that examined the "statistically impossible" 2021 heatwave in B.C.
Canada's all-time record was smashed that summer by nearly 5 Celsius, with a recorded high of 49.6 C in Lytton, B.C.
In looking over historical data from 1959 to to 2021, Leach's study found that 31 per cent of Earth's land surface has already experienced such statistically implausible heat.
These regions are spread all across the globe with no clear pattern, he said.
The conclusion? Other statistically improbable events are likely.
"Countries that traditionally haven't seen really big jumps in their record, or particularly extreme events, shouldn't be complacent about that and should start kind of implementing these action plans and things that we know are effective at reducing mortality risk from heat waves," he said.
A learning curve for scientists
Scientists are learning as events evolve, allowing for better forecasting and preparedness, said Vermont State Climatologist Lesley-Ann Dupigny-Giroux.
Her state experienced up to two months worth of rainfall within two days this week. The mass flooding resulted in damage to homes and properties and hundreds of people needing rescue.
Despite the storm being "very well-forecasted," Dupigny-Giroux said, it was still surprising to see such an impact in river levels.
"Looking at some of the river record levels and seeing values that are like 10 feet above flood stage, that is just mind boggling," she said.
"Even if you had a model that predicted that, it's still mind boggling to actually see that in real life."
