Palestinian teenager dies days after being shot near Israeli settlement


At the time of the shooting, Ramzi Fathi Hamed, 17, was in a car close to the Ofra settlement, the mayor of the town of Silwad in the occupied West Bank said.

The Palestinian teenager was reportedly shot by a settlement guard 

[AHMAD GHARABLI/AFP/Getty-archive (2020)]

A Palestinian teenager died on Monday, days after reportedly being shot by an Israeli settler in the occupied West Bank.

Seventeen-year-old Ramzi Fathi Hamed succumbed to his injuries after being shot by the "occupation", the Palestinian health ministry announced, without giving further details. Raed Hamed, the mayor of the town of Silwad in Ramallah and Al-Bireh province, said a settler was responsible.

Ramzi was in a car close to the Ofra settlement when he was hit, the mayor said according to Wafa, the official Palestinian news agency, which also claimed he was shot by a guard.

He suffered a severe pulmonary embolism in hospital, leading to his death, according to medics.

Three Palestinians killed by Israeli forces south of Jenin

Israeli forces and settlers routinely use deadly violence against Palestinians, with over 200 fatalities so far this year.

Israeli settlements are illegal under international law and are considered a key barrier to a workable two-state solution.

There are more than 700,000 settlers residing in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Palestinian teenager dies after he was shot by Israeli troops in the West Bank last week


Mourners pray over the body of Ramzi Hamed, 17, during his funeral in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Monday, Aug. 7, 2023. Ramzi Hamed, who was shot by Israeli troops last week after throwing a firebomb at soldiers in the occupied West Bank died Monday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. 

Mourners carry the body of Ramzi Hamed, 17, during his funeral in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Monday, Aug. 7, 2023. 
Adam Hamed, center, the eldest brother of Ramzi Hamed, 17, cries during his funeral in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Monday, Aug. 7, 2023. 

The body of Ramzi Hamed, 17, is carried by a Palestinian honor guard during his funeral in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Monday, Aug. 7, 2023. 

Mourners help Fatehi Hamed, second left, father of Ramzi Hamed, 17, while his son is carried by a Palestinian honor guard during his funeral in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Monday, Aug. 7, 2023. 

(AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)

ugust 7, 2023

JERUSALEM (AP) — A Palestinian teenager who was shot by Israeli troops last week after throwing a firebomb in the occupied West Bank died Monday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.

It was the latest in a long string of violent incidents involving Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank in the last year and a half. It came after a bloody weekend in which a settler killed a Palestinian man and a Palestinian gunman killed an Israeli security guard in Tel Aviv.

The Palestinian official news agency Wafa reported that Ramzi Hamed, 17, was shot near the West Bank settlement of Ofra, near his hometown of Silwad north of Ramallah.

Fathi Hamed, the boy’s father, told The Associated Press that his son was shot by Israeli troops early last Wednesday after throwing firebombs at soldiers operating near Silwad.

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The Israeli military said “it appears” that Hamed had thrown the firebomb toward the settlement’s front gate. It provided security camera footage of what it said was the incident, in which a young male is seen getting out of a vehicle, throwing a firebomb and speeding away in a car after an explosion. It was not immediately clear how close the explosion was to security forces or when the teen was shot

Violence has surged across the northern West Bank with the rise of shooting attacks by Palestinian groups against Israelis, near-daily arrest raids by the Israeli military, and growing attacks by extremist Jewish settlers.

On Monday, the Israeli military said troops arrested 17 Palestinians across the West Bank overnight. Israeli media reported that five of those arrested were suspected of involvement in clashes with Israeli settlers on Friday that left one Palestinian dead.

Israeli settlers attacked a Palestinian village in the West Bank on Friday. They set fire to cars and fired on Palestinians who threw stones at them. Two Israeli settlers suspected of killing 19-year-old Palestinian Qusai Matan remained in police custody on Monday.

The surge in fighting is one of the worst between Israelis and Palestinians in recent decades. More than 160 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire this year in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, according to a tally by The Associated Press.

Israel says most of those killed have been militants, but stone-throwing youths protesting army raids and innocent bystanders have also been killed.

At least 30 people have been killed in Palestinian attacks against Israelis so far this year.

Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Mideast war, along with the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem. Palestinians seek those territories for their hoped-for independent state.

Gaza Protests Struggle to Gain Traction as Police Crack Down

Demonstrators’ efforts to rally against Hamas, including at protests on Monday, have been foiled by a heavy security presence.

A Palestinian girl in the Gaza Strip tries to stay cool during a heat wave last week when power outages compounded frustrations with Hamas.

Credit...Mahmud Hams/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

By Patrick Kingsley and Iyad Abuheweila
Reporting from Jerusalem and Gaza

NEW YORK TIMES
Aug. 7, 2023,

Security forces in the Gaza Strip prevented protesters from holding rallies across the territory on Monday, quelling a rare expression of dissent against Hamas, the authoritarian Islamist group that controls the territory.

For the third time in recent days, protest leaders had called for demonstrations — but a heavy police presence throughout the territory deterred efforts to gather in large numbers.

The failed effort followed more successful rallies last week, when several hundred Gazans — an unusually high number given the limits on free expression — evaded police interventions to march through several neighborhoods. But, a second attempt to hold demonstrations on Friday was also prevented by large numbers of police, who detained several journalists attempting to cover the protests.

The protest organizers — some of them Palestinians based abroad — said the attempted demonstrations were mainly a reaction against Hamas’s authoritarian rule, as well as its failure to improve dire living conditions.

Hamas captured the Gaza Strip in 2007 from the secular Palestinian leadership, prompting Israel and Egypt to place the territory under a blockade to stymie the flow of arms to the group.

Israeli-Palestinian Relations

Israeli Raid in Jenin:

 A 48-hour military operation in the city was one of the largest in many years against armed militant groups in the occupied West Bank. But did it solve anything?

A State of Despair: In the aftermath of the raid, Palestinians in the West Bank said they felt betrayed by their leaders, forgotten by world powers and unable to protect themselves from attacks by Israelis.

Writing Out Their Last Words: In one of the deadliest periods in years in the West Bank, young Palestinians drawn into the struggle against Israel are preparing farewell messages for their loved ones.

West Bank Settlements: Efforts to expand Jewish settlements in the West Bank have intensified this year, reflecting the agenda of Israel’s right-wing government and prompting international condemnation.

The blockade restricts the importing of goods, including electronic and computer equipment, that could be used to make weapons and prevents most people from leaving the territory.

Protests against chronic power shortages last week in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip. Hamas leaders have said the protests were not genuine expressions of local dissent, and were instead organized by collaborators with Israel.

Credit...Associated Press

The restrictions have helped undermine the economy in Gaza, where more than 2 million people live in one of the world’s most crowded territories. Last year, the unemployment rate was higher than 45 percent. Only 10 percent of residents have direct access to clean water, according to a UNICEF analysis from 2020; electricity works for only several hours a day; and many complex medical procedures are not available.

Hamas says that the blockade is wholly to blame for the situation, a view shared by many Gazans. Israel and Egypt control how much fuel enters the territory, for instance, which affects how much electricity the Gazan power plant can provide.

But some feel Hamas itself is at least partly at fault because of its poor governance. The group is frequently accused of nepotism and corruption, and of focusing too much on military operations instead of economic and infrastructure projects. Public anger has also been spurred by the fact that many senior Hamas officials, including its leader Ismail Haniyeh, live in safer conditions outside of the Gaza Strip.

Frustrations were further compounded by an unusual surge in power outages during the July heat wave, as well as a decision by the authorities to demolish an unauthorized recent addition to a building in southern Gaza. The owner was buried under rubble during the demolition, killing him and setting off an outcry.

“All of these people went out to demand their rights and their daily bread,” said Jasser Barbakh, a protester who broadcast part of a demonstration on July 30 from his social media account. “These people you can see went out for their livelihoods and their electricity.”

Some anger has also been directed at Mahmoud Abbas, the leader of the Palestinian Authority, the administration that controlled the strip until Hamas captured it in 2007. The authority is also widely accused of corruption and of failing to do enough to improve the situation in Gaza, where it still pays the salaries of several thousand government officials.

“O Haniyeh, O Abbas, we want a decent life,” some protesters were filmed chanting last week.

Hamas leaders have said the protests were not genuine expressions of local dissent, and were instead organized by collaborators with Israel.

“The outsiders and the collaborator agitators have been disappointed,” a Hamas spokesman, Salah al-Bardawil, wrote on social media after the police successfully prevented protests on Friday.

“The sick agitators’ storm in a teacup against Gaza has died,” he added.


Patrick Kingsley is the Jerusalem bureau chief, covering Israel and the occupied territories. He has reported from more than 40 countries, written two books and previously covered migration and the Middle East for The Guardian. 

 END FUR FARMING

Finland orders cull of 50,000 mink and foxes due to bird flu

The Finnish food authority said  it has ordered 50,000 farmed mink and foxes to be culled at three fur farms hit by bird flu infections as mink can host the virus, increasing the chance of it mutating and affecting humans.

By

 Reuters

 -

1 August 2023

Caged minks in fur farm. EYEPRESS via Reuters Connect.

COPENHAGEN (Reuters) – The Finnish food authority said on Tuesday it has ordered 50,000 farmed mink and foxes to be culled at three fur farms hit by bird flu infections as mink can host the virus, increasing the chance of it mutating and affecting humans.

Finland and Norway are facing record outbreaks of the H5N1 virus strain this year. The virus has killed thousands of seagulls and other bird species, put livestock at risk and restricted travel in some areas.

“Mink is an especially problematic species when it comes to avian influenza infections,” the authority said, as it can be an effective intermediate host for bird flu, enabling the virus to mutate more effectively into a form that will infect humans.

This year, avian influenza, commonly called bird flu, was found at 20 fur farms in Finland as of the end of July, with samples from another four farms currently being analysed, according to the food authority.

It said it was preparing further cull orders this week.

(Reporting by Louise Breusch Rasmussen, editing by Alexandra Hudson)

Banning Abortion will Please Russian Conservatives but Do Nothing to Help Country’s Demographic Problems

            Staunton – Imposing restrictions on abortions or even totally banning them will please Russian conservatives who want to do everything in their power to preserve “traditional values;” but it will do little or nothing to help their country overcome its demographic disaster, according to Russian analysts.

            There are two basic reasons for that, they say. On the one hand, the state can only ban currently legal abortions; it can do little or nothing to prevent women from seeking illegal ones if legal ones are not available (tochno.st/materials/za-dva-goda-minzdrav-predotvratil-pochti-100-tysyach-abortov-zhenshchin-otgovarivayut-ot-preryvaniya-beremennosti-s-pomoshchyu-spetsialnykh-metodichek-no-demografii-eto-ne-pomozhet-i-vot-pochemu).

            And on the other hand, the decline in the number of births in the Russian Federation has occurred over precisely the same period as the decline in the number of abortions, an obvious indication that factors other than the availability of abortions are behind this change and other policies will have to be adopted if it is to be changed.

            Since the end of Soviet times, the number of abortions both absolutely and relative to the number of women in prime child-bearing age groups have declined. The total number of abortions fell from 3.5 million in 1992 to 411,000 in 2021, and the number per 1000 women between the ages of 15 and 49 declined from 94.7 to 12 over the same period.

            As other means of contraception became more widely available after the collapse of Soviet power, women used abortions less as part of their family planning strategies. Until 2007, there were more abortions in the Russian Federation than births; now, the number of abortions is less than 20 percent of the total number of live births.

            Despite this pattern, many Russian politicians and commentators continue to believe that restricting abortions will boost the number of births. But that isn’t the case either over time or among regions. If it were, births would increase more in federal subjects where restrictions are imposed but in fact the reverse is true.

            Sergey Zakharov, a scholar at the Moscow Institute of Demography of the Higher School of Economics, says that “the government must support the striving of families to have a desired child at a desired time and not to try to talk people out of abortions” or otherwise restrict their access to legal ones. Doing otherwise, he suggests, will be counterproductive.

            But he and other Russian experts say that one reason politicians believe that restricting abortion will boost birthrates is that in contrast to the first two decades after the end of Soviet times, there has not been a boost in other means of contraception in the last ten years. Consequently, they assume that restricting abortion will work as they hope.

GEOTHERMAL IS FRACKING

Alaska Division of Oil and Gas plans geothermal lease sale for volcano near Anchorage

Mount Spurr, 80 miles from Alaska’s biggest city, was the site of past lease sales and ambitions — new policies might help make development a success, the division says

By

 Yereth Rosen, Alaska Beacon

 -

7 August 2023

The summit crater of snowy Mount Spurr is seen on Aug. 27, 2020, from the air. The volcano, which dumped ash on Anchorage in 1992, has for many years been considered a potential source of geothermal energy to be used by people in the region. (Photo by Cyrus Read/Alaska Volcano Observatory-U.S. Geological Survey)

The Alaska Division of Oil and Gas is preparing to hold a lease sale offering rights to explore for geothermal energy resources of Mount Spurr, a snow-capped volcano about 80 miles northwest of Anchorage.

The decision was announced on July 28 by Division Director Derek Nottingham

It comes two years after the division issued noncompetitive permits to two companies to explore geothermal energy resources on specific parcels on the 11,070-foot Spurr, the closest of Alaska’s numerous active volcanoes to the state’s largest city.

If the division follows through, this would be the fourth competitive lease sale held for Mount Spurr geothermal resources, after sales in 1983, 1986 and 2008.

The most successful of those past competitive auctions, the 2008 sale, resulted in the leasing of about 36,000 acres and an exploration drilling program carried out by Ormat Technologies, one of the world’s leading geothermal companies. However, Ormat dropped its Mount Spurr program in 2015.

There are reasons to believe that leasing this time will produce a more successful result, according to the analysis issued by Nottingham.

Under the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, there are several new financial incentives for geothermal energy development, including a federal tax credit up to 30% through 2032, tax credits for geothermal power plants and credits for makers of geothermal technologies, the document siad.

“In sum, federal energy policy has shifted significantly since the noncompetitive permits were issued in 2021, which has generated renewed interest in geothermal exploration,” the document said.

 Mount Spurr and Crater Peak are seen on June 14, 2018, during an overflight. Crater Peak is a feature of the volcano that developed in a breach in the caldera, and is located about 2 miles south of Spurr. All of Spurr’s eruptions in the past few thousand years have been from Crater Peak, according to the Alaska Volcano Observatory. (Photo by M.W.Loewen/Alaska Volcano Observatory-U.S. Geological Survey) 

The companies granted permits in 2021 for Mount Spurr exploration were GeoAlaska LLC., which got rights to explore 6,376 acres, and Raser Power Systems LLC., which got rights to explore 7,666 acres.

The Division of Oil and Gas plan for a future lease sale, with a date yet to be determined, includes a provision for those leaseholders to submit bids in the competitive process. Leases would be for 10-year terms, the typical duration in leases offered by the division.

The state’s plan to sell leases competitively makes sense, said Paul Craig, GeoAlaska’s president.

The Mount Spurr exploration permits granted in 2021 were for terms of only two years, with an option for a one-year extension, which is “not a realistic timeline” for getting a geothermal prospect explored, Craig said.

“We’re really pleased that the state made this decision,” he said.

Craig declined to say whether GeoAlaska would bid in an upcoming competitive lease sale. “What I can guarantee you is GeoAlaska has the rights to highly prospective geothermal prospects, and we fully intend to explore and develop those prospects to the benefit of Alaska,” he said.

GeoAlaska has been doing on-site work at Mount Spurr, and it is also using data collected by Ormat during that company’s exploration program, Craig said.

GeoAlaska also holds a similar state exploration permit for Augustine Volcano, the 4,134-foot Cook Inlet island peak located about 175 miles southwest of Anchorage, and the company has done some preliminary on-site work there. The Augustine permit was granted by the Division of Oil and Gas last year.

 Augustine Volcano is seen reflected in an island lake on June 25, 2022. The volcano is located about 175 miles southwest of Anchorage. (Photo by Kristina Walowski/Provided by the Alaska Volcano Observatory)

 

There has been interest in Augustine’s geothermal prospects but never any exploration drilling like that conducted by Ormat at Spurr.

The division is currently soliciting public comment on possible plans to allow more geothermal exploration at Augustine, either through permits or leases.

Both Spurr and Augustine have had explosive eruptions in the recent decades.

A series of explosions at Spurr in 1992 dumped ash on Anchorage and other Cook Inlet communities, according to the Alaska Volcano Observatory, a joint program of the U.S. Geological Survey, the University of Alaska Fairbanks and the Alaska Division of Geological and Geophysical Surveys.

Augustine’s most recent eruption was in early 2006 and produced both ash clouds and lava flows, the observatory reported. A 1986 eruption also sent ash across the Cook Inlet region, including to Anchorage, according to the observatory.

The history of eruptions is considered when GeoAlaska sends work crews to the sites, Craig said. If the Alaska Volcano Observatory issues any kind of alert about potential eruptions, crews are pulled out, he said.

There are more than 50 Alaska volcanoes that have been active since the mid-18th century, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The Alaska Volcano Observatory monitors more than 20 of them with continuously recording devices that are installed on the volcanos to measure their seismic activity. On Friday, five Alaska volcanoes were showing varying signs of activity. One, Shishaldin in the eastern Aleutians, was erupting explosively and sending an ash cloud to more than 30,000 feet above sea level, into the zone used by commercial aircraft. Another, Great Sitkin in the western Aleutians, was producing a slow stream of lava with its ongoing eruption. Three others had signs of seismic unrest that might be a precursor to eruptions, the observatory reported.

---

Alaska Beacon is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Alaska Beacon maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Andrew Kitchenman for questions: info@alaskabeacon.com. Follow Alaska Beacon on Facebook and Twitter.

TOPSOE SELECTED BY WORLD ENERGY GH2 TO SUPPLY AMMONIA LOOP FOR CANADA’S LARGEST RENEWABLE HYDROGEN PLANT

Topsoe, a global leader in carbon emission reduction technologies, has signed an agreement with World Energy GH2 solutions provider, to provide Topsoe’s dynamic ammonia loop technology for Canada’s largest, and one of the world’s first-to-market, renewable hydrogen projects – Project Nujio’qonik.

Located in the Bay St. George region of Newfoundland and Labrador, Project Nujio’qonik was announced by World Energy GH2 in spring 2022 with an intended investment of USD $12 billion to produce renewable hydrogen, also referred to as green hydrogen, to decarbonize the hard-to-abate sectors globally. World Energy GH2 will supply 250,000 metric tons of renewable hydrogen per year to global markets at the completion of its renewable hydrogen project. The project will use wind energy power for production on the site, which is expected to begin producing hydrogen in 2025.

Topsoe’s ammonia loop technology will be used to generate up to 1,650 metric tons per day of renewable ammonia on the site.

John Risley, Chairman of World Energy GH2, said:
“Project Nujio’qonik is one of Canada’s first-to-market projects to produce hydrogen and ammonia at scale using renewable wind energy, and is a key cornerstone of the country’s agreement with Germany to stimulate hydrogen production by 2025. Following a rigorous analysis, we are pleased to have selected Topsoe’s proven technology for our project. Project Nujio’qonik will be instrumental in ensuring Newfoundland and Labrador takes its place as a preeminent global leader in the fight against climate change and becomes a catalyst for the development of other renewable hydrogen projects across Canada and across the world.”

Henrik Rasmussen, Managing Director, the Americas, Topsoe, said:
“We are very pleased to support World Energy GH2 in one of the world’s first-to-market renewable hydrogen and ammonia production projects, highlighting our commitment to lead the development of the renewable hydrogen industry. The agreement is testament to the quality and depth of Topsoe’s ammonia production expertise and a huge sign of confidence in our world leading technology. We look forward to working with World Energy GH2 to deliver on its targets for production in 2025.”

Renewable hydrogen and ammonia are under the Power-to-X umbrella, and a key enabler to make the energy transition happen.

Sundus Cordelia Ramli, CCO Power-to-X at Topsoe, said:
“We need projects like Nujio’qonik. Large scale projects that can deliver the called for renewable fuels and chemicals to decarbonize hard-to-abate sectors like steel, aviation and shipping. On a global scale, much more commercial-size plants are needed, but World Energy GH2 project bears testimony to the fact, that it can be done.”

About World Energy GH2
World Energy GH2 Inc. is a Newfoundland and Labrador-based renewable energy company. Project Nujio’qonik is a consortium of Canadian and international partners focused on developing a cost-effective, wind energy to green hydrogen/ammonia production facility located on the west coast of the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Project Nujio’qonik aims to be Canada’s first commercial green hydrogen/ammonia producer created from 3+ gigawatts of wind energy in one of the world’s best wind resource regions. https://worldenergygh2.com/

About Topsoe
Founded in 1940, Topsoe is a leading global developer and supplier of decarbonization technology, catalysts, and services for the energy transition.

Our mission is to combat climate change by helping our partners and customers achieve their decarbonization and emission-reduction targets, including those in hard-to-abate sectors such as aviation, shipping, and the production of raw materials. From carbon reduction chemicals to renewable fuels and plastic upcycling, we are uniquely positioned to aid humanity in realizing a sustainable future.

Topsoe is headquartered in Denmark, with over 2,400 employees serving customers all around the globe. To learn more, visit www.topsoe.com

Brazil: Oil exploitation project worries fishermen at Amazon River estuary

State-owned Petrobras' plans have divided ministries in the Lula government

Written byPública - Agência de jornalismo investigativo

Translated byLiam Anderson

Translation posted 7 August 2023 

In the city of Oiapoque, in the far north region of Brazil, most inhabitants use artisanal phishing for their income | Image: Willy Miranda/Agência Pública

This report, written by Rayane Penha, is the result of the Oil and Climate Change Microgrants, run by Agência Pública in partnership with WWF-Brazil. It was originally published on Agência Pública's website on June 12, 2023, and is republished by Global Voices under a partnership agreement, with edits.

Júlio Teixeira arrived in the northern state of Amapá at age 12, on a fishing boat from Salvaterra, about 1,150 kilometers away, where he had been working since he was 8. There, he joined the residents of the fishing village of Taperebá, within the Cabo Orange National Park, an 18-hour boat ride from the nearest town of Oiapoque.

“There were only fishermen there, stilts, bridges, there was no dry land. It was there that I grew up and I was already working,” he recalled. Now, he is president of the fishermen's settlement of Oiapoque, a city on the border of Brazil and French Guiana.  

Teixeira says that state-owned Petrobras has been conducting studies for oil exploration in the region for more than four decades. Data from the National Agency of Petroleum, Natural Gas and Biofuels corroborate this: in 1969, the company had a presence at the Amazon River estuary for geophysical survey studies. 

In August 2021, Petrobras filed an application for a license with Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (Ibama) to search for oil at the Amazon River estuary, even though the agency had previously denied requests from the former owner of the concessions, the French company Total E&P. The area is located 175 kilometers from Amapá's coast, on the Equatorial Margin, a coastal region that extends from Oiapoque to the northeastern state of Rio Grande do Norte, seen as Brazil's new frontier of oil exploration.

Last May, Ibama denied Petrobras the license, stating that, among other things, the company did not provide guarantees for the protection of local fauna in the event of an accident. But the state-owned company said it had met “all requirements thoroughly,” and it appealed the decision.

The debate over extraction at the Amazon River estuary has prompted politicians to take a position and divided the government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, in particular causing friction between the Ministry of Mining and Energy and the Ministry of the Environment.  

The “oil issue”

The oil issue is also hanging over residents in Amapá. According to the state's Institute of Scientific and Technological Research, there are at least 7,000 local fishermen there, which may be an underestimate. 

When walking around Oiapoque, a town with 28,500 inhabitants, you hear the chatter about Petrobras’ plans. As in most communities in the Amazon where such large-scale projects take place, fear of damage is a constant in the local people's lives.

Cláudia Barbosa, who makes a living selling crabs that she catches with her husband, was worried about the livelihoods of workers like her. “If there's an oil spill, how will we survive? Many are born already working in fishing,” she said. “There are no jobs here. And for those who only know how to live doing this work? How will they support their families?”. 

According to Teixeira, a fisherman spends at least 6,000 reais (about US$ 1,200) to go out fishing, which moves the local economy.  “It's not just selling fish. [You] buy the oil, buy the ice, pay the advance to the fisherman – fishermen don't go out if you don't advance R$300, 400, 500 for each one,” he said. “You have to buy food, [and] materials. There are boats that take materials worth up to 20,000 reais to spend 20 days [fishing].”

The production chain, mostly family and artisan-level, also generates work, making fishing and the jobs associated with it an alternative for many people who stop working in illegal mining and logging in the region.

Political pressure 

Amapá is Brazil's most-preserved state, with the largest intact forest cover, with mangroves, fields, meadows, savannah, firm land forests, floodplain forests, and igapó forests. Despite its great socio-environmental importance, it is constantly pressured by the political and business classes to exploit natural resources. 

The fishermen in the village feel that governments and public authorities, in general, are not interested in the effects of oil extraction on the region, said the fishermen interviewed by Agência Pública. 

“They're in a fairy tale, they only think about the royalties,” Teixeira says.

Royalties are financial compensation paid to the federal government, states, and municipalities by oil and natural gas companies for the use of non-renewable resources.  

The current leader of the government in the senate, Randolfe Rodrigues, senator for Amapá, is one of those arguing for research into possible oil extraction in the state. The issue led to him leaving the Rede party (in English, Sustainability Network), to which the Minister for the Environment, Marina Silva, belongs. 

Rodrigues claims that the debate now is only about exploratory drilling. “The people of Amapá must have the right to know whether or not there is oil [on the state's coast],” he said through his press representatives.

The senator argues that, if the federal government chooses not to extract, Amapá state should receive compensation. 

Janaína Calado, a researcher at the Centre for Sustainable Territorial Development of the State University of Amapá, has been working since 2018 to understand residents’ perceptions about the exploitation of oil and the Amazon's reefs. For her, the problem is that there is no broad popular consultation, nor has a robust environmental impact study been presented to give certainty about the project's impact. 

“Our main problem here at the Amazon River estuary is the lack of basic knowledge about this region. If well carried out, planned, and with wide popular participation, the initiative can, indeed, bring economic benefits to the state,” she said.

The researcher points out, however, that this economic impact would be through bringing royalties, with no expected creation of directly-linked jobs for local people. 

In May, Amapá's Legislative Assembly held a public hearing in Oiapoque to discuss oil exploitation with the local community. However, the fishermen claimed that the event was a “political stage” and that they were not allowed to speak, according to the fishermen interviewed by Agência Pública. Traditional and Indigenous communities also criticized the event for being poorly publicized and lamented that they were not invited in a timely manner to attend the hearing. 

In conversation with journalists during an official trip to Japan in May, President Lula said he will veto any intention to extract oil at the Amazon River estuary if there is a real risk to the environment.

In a message released on social media, the Network of Indigenous Peoples and Organizations of Amapá and Northern Pará (APOIANP) said that they are against oil exploitation at the Amazon River estuary that does not assess the impacts or include prior consultation with Indigenous peoples, and they support Ibama's decision to deny Petrobras the license.

UK
Stick with net zero, Tory voters tell Sunak

Tory voters overwhelmingly back the government’s target of reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050.

The data comes as the government continues to shift its tone on green policies

 | Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images

BY ABBY WALLACE

POLITICO UK
AUGUST 7, 2023 

LONDON — Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has been under pressure ever since he watered down government rhetoric on net zero targets — from campaigners, industry leaders, and his own warring MPs. Now he faces a challenge on another front: his own voters.

Even as the Tories prevaricate on key climate policies, new polling shows that voters planning to support the Conservative Party at the next election overwhelmingly back the government’s target of reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050.

Around two thirds of all voters support the 2050 deadline, with support among Conservative voters slightly higher at 73 percent, according to a poll from the research company Focaldata, alongside the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) think tank.

The data comes as the government continues to shift its tone on green policies, more than a fortnight after the Conservatives narrowly clung onto their Uxbridge seat in a by-election by campaigning against the expansion of an anti-air pollution scheme pushed by London’s Labour mayor.

Sunak, while stressing he is committed to the 2050 target, has called for net zero to be pursued in a “proportionate and pragmatic” way that does not burden households with additional cost pressures and declared himself “on the side of motorists.” The government has softened its demands for improving energy efficiency at privately-rented homes but — after a period of uncertainty — has stuck to its target of banning sales of combustion engine cars by 2030.

Sunak last week gave the green light to over 100 new oil and gas licenses, widening policy splits with the opposition Labour party — which has ruled out granting new licenses — ahead of a general election.

About two-thirds of people polled by Focaldata at the end of July said they would be proud to support a party which was in favor of generating more electricity from renewable sources such as solar and wind.

A further 47 percent said they would be proud of backing a party which supported lifting the de facto ban on onshore wind farms. Rishi Sunak’s government has pledged to ease restriction on onshore wind but not yet acted on this promise.

Almost half of those polled said they would be embarrassed if the party they voted for reduced the number of homes being insulated, while 44 percent would be embarrassed if they backed a party which banned solar farms in fields.

Alasdair Johnstone, head of parliamentary engagement at the ECIU, said any roll back in net zero pledges in recent weeks has not “translated into public hostility towards it.”

“With public support for the target still strong, and broad support for the kind of policies required to achieve it, politicians will need to be careful when thinking about how they will campaign on climate and the environment,” he added. “If parties want to build a broad base of voters, then a strong offering on the environment and tackling climate change is clearly important.”

AFRO COMIC CON

 

The racist politics of confinement in Virginia’s high security prisons

  https://sfbayview.com/   August 7, 2023

Abu Ghraib prison where US soldiers used extreme brutality against prisoners.

by Kevin ‘Rashid’ Johnson

July 25, 2023

I was awakened early this morning (just after 3 a.m.) to the sounds of several men in the solitary confinement unit here at Sussex 1 State Prison (S1SP) being rounded up for transfer. Because of the early hours, I knew they were in for a day-long trip to either Red Onion State Prison or Wallens Ridge State Prison – two still unneeded supermax prisons located in the remote mountains of Southwestern Virginia.

Racial classifications in Virginia’s prisons

As usual most of the men being transferred to these prisons were Black, while both are operated by an all-white staff from rural racially segregated white communities that are hostile to people of color. It is a political and racial dynamic that has persisted in Amerika since chattel slavery and the old system of Jim Crow, where disenfranchised and defenseless Blacks are violently contained by hostile communities of armed whites. And as with slavery and Jim Crow, this is by design.

One of several dirty secrets of Virginia’s prison system is that it is racially segregated and affords privileged housing to whites. In other words, the state’s high and low security prisons are populated according to race. The disproportionate numbers of Black and Brown prisoners in Virginia are concentrated in its high security, brutal and less privileged prisons (especially Red Onion, Wallens Ridge and the two Sussex prisons), whereas white prisoners are concentrated in the lowest security prisons where they enjoy the most privileges.

And as they have been used since they opened in 1998 and 1999 respectively, Red Onion and Wallens Ridge are sites where hostile white staff are given free reign to act out racist fantasies against their dark prisoner populations. In fact these prisons are operating using systems of terror and control developed and refined during slavery and Jim Crow and which almost no other prison systems in Amerika use.

Abuses of firearms

First there are the shotguns and other firearms that are routinely used by guards inside these prisons. These guns have been a subject of controversy since these prisons opened, largely because almost no other U.S. prison systems allow or use firearms inside their perimeters, and because of the frequent exposures of repeated abuses of these weapons by guards at these remote prisons. 

Abuses of attack dogs

Then there are the attack dogs. Throughout these prisons, guards with dogs menace the prisoners throughout the day. Everywhere the men go they are confronted by guards with dogs lunging at them attempting to bite them, straining at their leashes, barking and growling. The intent is as it was with U.S. soldiers who were exposed by photos leaked to the international press during 2004, where they were torturing and menacing Arab detainees in Iraq with attack dogs. It has nothing to do with security and everything to do with terrorizing people of color.

This Dec. 12, 2003, file image obtained by The Associated Press, shows Sgt. Michael Smith, left, with his black dog Marco, Sgt. Santos Cardona, second right, with his tan Belgian shepherd Duco, detainee Mohammed Bollendia and Pvt. Ivan L. Frederick II, right, during an incident at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad, Iraq. Years after being released by the U.S. military, former detainees held in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay Naval Base are suffering debilitating injuries and mental disorders from their interrogation and alleged torture, according to a new report by a human rights group. Frederick testified on Tuesday, May 23, 2006 that he saw Cardona’s dog bite Bollendia twice after the prisoner “attacked” former Cpl. Charles A. Graner Jr. in a prison hallway. Frederick also testified Cardona had told him that he and Smith were having a contest to see how many detainees they could make urinate on themselves. Cardona, an Army dog handler, was part of a small crew of corrupt soldiers who enjoyed tormenting detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, a prosecutor at his court-martial said in an opening statement Tuesday. (AP Photo)

But Virginia prisons go much further. These dogs aren’t used to merely terrorize the prisoners. On a daily basis these animals are used to maul and mutilate the prisoners. 

At Virginia’s high security prisons dogs are a FIRST RESORT to force in almost any situation where guards invent or claim justification to use force on prisoners. In response to such minor infractions as failing to answer guards, fist fights, arguing with guards and so on, men have been set upon by the dogs resulting in some of the worst and most terrifying maulings and mutilations one can imagine. Just as “Negro packs of hounds” were the primary weapon used to terrorize and mutilate Black slaves.

Prisoners like Carl Hughes #1415783 have had their genitals ripped apart, other’s faces have been mutilated, nerves severed and have been paralyzed and worse by these animals. Think of the scene in the Jamie Foxx movie “Django Unchained,” when the hounds were set loose on the Black slave who didn’t want to be used any more by his owner to beat up other slaves for sport. This is an accurate depiction of the abuses of dogs on Blacks during antebellum times and today in Virginia prisons.

On May 13, 2013, Carl Hughes, who is transgender, was involved in a minor fistfight with another prisoner in which Carl never threw a punch. In response a guard had his dog target Carl’s genitals. Carl was nearly castrated and received 46 stitches to their groin. During the mauling, the dog handler made homophobic remarks to Carl.

And of course there are the routine beatings and more traditional abuses inflicted on these prisoners for which Red Onion and Wallens Ridge have always been notorious.

Actually the entire culture at these prisons is one adopted from the antebellum and Jim Crow South. For example, as in the Old South, whenever the white staff approach any prisoners moving along a walkway, the prisoners must step off the pavement into the mud or grass and allow the staff person to pass. This sort of inferior racist deference is compelled in all contacts and interactions between staff and prisoners at these prisons.

This is but a brief outline of the racist manner in which Virginia officials operate their high security prisons, and why public oversight, involvement and accountability are necessary. A more in depth expose is forthcoming.

Dare to Struggle Dare to Win!

All Power to the People!

Send out brother some love and light: Kevin Johnson #1007485, Sussex 1, 24414 Musselwhite Dr., Waverly, VA 23891.