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)
Tuesday, September 12, 2023
Two years after escaping Kabul, evacuees find joy among the struggle of life in Canada
When Canada put out the call for help during their 14-year mission in Afghanistan, Ahmad Ferdaws Rahimi was among the thousands of Afghan nationals who lent a hand.
And when Canada announced their limited efforts to evacuate them ahead of the Taliban’s surprise 2021 return, he was among those left behind.
Now living in Mississauga, the story of the Rahimi’s escape from Kabul highlights the problems with Canada’s lamentable evacuation of its people from the country, but also the importance of maintaining hope.
“We are so happy because we are here, we are safe,” he told the National Post.
“In Afghanistan it was big trouble for us, especially for me, because I was working with foreigners.”
Local interpreters, security personnel and embassy workers were the unsung heroes of Canada’s 14-year Afghanistan mission.
Rahimi served as a watch commander for contracted security forces at Canada’s diplomatic mission in Kabul, acted as an adviser to the Canadian Forces’ Operation ARGUS advisory team, and performed security work for the Germans at their embassy.
He also managed security for Afghanistan’s largest private airline, Kam Air.
Those jobs landed Rahimi on a Taliban hit list, culminating in a 2019 attempt on his life involving armed gunmen opening fire as he stopped to buy food on his way home from work.
As the Taliban continued their march towards Kabul during the summer of 2021, members of the sect reportedly conducted door-to-door searches for those who gave aid to the allies.
That prompted Rahimi to start seeking an exit plan — and he turned to Canada for help.
Instead of freedom, Rahimi, wife Farida, and their five children found themselves among the hundreds of would-be evacuees who found themselves mired in the bureaucracy of both Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) and Global Affairs Canada (GAC) — waiting for one final email that would’ve secured space on one of the evacuation flights Canada and allies were staging at Kabul’s besieged airport.
Rahimi’s email from Global Affairs never arrived, leaving the family to fend for themselves.
He was comforting his then-baby son Omar when they were accosted by a Taliban thug, calling him a “foreign servant” before unleashing a brutal beating.
“I tried to put myself between him and my wife and children,” Rahimi told the Toronto Sun from Kabul in 2021.
Related video: Afghan interpreter shares long struggle to bring his family to Canada (cbc.ca)
This was witnessed by a passing Royal Air Force officer, who took pity on the family and ushered them through the gate.
Rahimi’s previous work for a U.K. contractor was enough to get his family aboard a British evacuation flight while Canadian officials sorted things out.
Rahimi got a job with the Ontario government, and managed to secure a small three-bedroom rental apartment in Mississauga — thanks to a kind-hearted refugee advocate who allowed Rahimi to use her as a guarantor.
“If we were stuck in Afghanistan, there would be no opportunities for my daughters to go to school,” he said, adding that his 14-year-old daughter Marwa — who started attending high school this week — has aspirations of becoming a doctor.
“I’m glad for my children — because they are living here, they have futures. They will be educated.”
While he’s beyond happy at their shot at a safe and fruitful life in Canada, life here hasn’t been without its challenges — particularly surrounding affordability.
“Rent is very high, like 70 per cent of our income,” he explained, saying they pay nearly $2,700 per month to rent their three-bedroom apartment.
The high cost of living have all but extinguished Rahimi’s hopes of owning a home in Canada.
Registering his children for school was also a challenge, he said — but he was pleasantly surprised at how quickly his kids managed to pick up English, saying that even his two-year-old son Omar has started using English words.
His wife, while fluent in six languages, is having a harder time learning English — something that Canadian Forces veteran and evacuee advocate Amanda Moddejonge said is common.
“There’s a particular saying that I laugh at every time I hear it — it’s ‘happy wife, happy life,'” she said.
“If you can find a way to make your wife just a little bit happier here, the entire family could adjust easier — but the families where the wife doesn’t speak English, they’re having a difficult time adjusting.”
That, she said, is thanks to a lack of government support for evacuees once landing in Canada, who were largely left to underfunded community support services to provide language training.
Many families, Moddejonge said, are also dealing with broken family bonds.
Those fortunate enough to escape almost always left loved ones behind, many living in hiding.
Rahimi says his brothers managed to flee to Iran and Pakistan, while his elderly father remains in Afghanistan in poor health.
His wife Farida is currently dealing with the recent death of her father, also left behind two years ago.
This remains a very real problem for evacuees, says retired CAF veteran Robin Rickards, who spent years securing safe passage for the Afghan national who served alongside him as an interpreter for Canada.
“The people that have come to Canada are burdened with survivor’s guilt,” Rickards said.
To this day, Rickards, Moddejonge and those who managed to flee to Canada are still inundated with cries of help from those left behind.
“That’s the burden that these families are struggling with, and to some degree there’s an expectation — either spoken or unspoken — that refugees should be grateful for what Canada gives them,” Rickards said.
“But it’s easy to see the way Canada is treating people that worked for us could lead to resentment.”
This was the consequence, he said, of Canada’s government of treating the evacuation — which occurred on the same day Prime Minister Justin Trudeau dissolved parliament ahead of that fall’s federal election — as a political issue rather than a humanitarian one.
“This is the consequence of the government’s failed policy.”
Vivek Ramaswamy wants to trigger mass layoffs at federal agencies — and he thinks the Supreme Court will back him up
Ramaswamy previewed his effort to shut down federal agencies ahead of a speech at the America First Policy Institute, a think tank stacked with former Trump administration officials.
Vivek Ramaswamy believes he has the perfect approach to undermine the administrative state and the power wielded by career civil servants — trigger mass layoffs at federal agencies and defend his effort before the Supreme Court.
Speaking with NBC News ahead of a major policy speech at the America First Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, where he is scheduled to explain how he would shrink the federal workforce, Ramaswamy, the businessman-turned-candidate, detailed his plans, which include shutting down a series of federal agencies and using "reduction in force" regulations to trim the number of government workers.
"The reality is the adviser class from the D.C. swamp has convinced Republican presidents from Reagan to Trump that they can’t reorganize the federal government or lay off large numbers of federal employees without congressional permission or within federal regulations," he said. "And we’re going to lay out tomorrow why that view is wrong."
The proposals Ramaswamy is putting forward would add up to some of the most sweeping short-term changes ever to the federal government. And he proposes to do large parts of it by executive action, without votes in Congress — which enacted the laws forming agencies Ramaswamy wants to end — reaching far beyond what past Republican administrations concluded were the limits of their power.
Ramaswamy predicted the legal challenges he would face would center on civil service protections for career officials. His understanding is that they apply to individual employee firings, not mass layoffs.
"We are pointing out parts of the U.S. Code that expressly highlight that they don’t apply to mass layoffs," Ramaswamy said. "Yes, they apply to individual employee firings, which is what they use to convince prior presidents, including Trump, that they couldn't do it.
"But if you actually read the U.S. Code in full," Ramaswamy continued, "they don’t apply to mass layoffs they call reductions in force. And large-scale reductions in force are absolutely the method that I’ll be using."
Vivek Ramaswamy in Contoocook, N.H., on Sept. 2.Erin Clark / Boston Globe via Getty Images file
Ramaswamy welcomes legal challenges to his effort and predicted the Supreme Court would side with him in a 6-3 decision. Six of the justices were appointed by GOP presidents.
"And that then codifies the changes we’re driving into judicial precedent so that the president won’t have his hands tied in the same way," Ramaswamy said. "We’re going to get far more powerful than a game of pingpong on this."
Ramaswamy has been campaigning for months on eliminating federal agencies, with initial targets including the FBI; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; the Education Department; the Nuclear Regulatory Commission; and the Food and Nutrition Service within the Agriculture Department. Ramaswamy has said he would effectively shut down or reorganize each of those agencies at the start of his presidency.
Thousands of FBI employees, he said, would be reallocated to other agencies, including the U.S. Marshals Service and the Drug Enforcement Administration.
He added that the agencies he is targeting are just "five of many more to come."
Ramaswamy said his speech Wednesday will offer additional clarity about what authority he believes a president has to make such changes without congressional authorization, going beyond the briefly enacted Trump administration executive order known as "Schedule F" — an effort Donald Trump and other Republican aspirants want to reinstitute at the start of a new administration. The order would reclassify tens of thousands of federal employees involved in policy decisions as at-will employees, effectively canceling their employment protections and making it much easier for a president to fire them.
Republicans have sought for years to shrink government and get past bureaucrats they see as hostile to their initiatives, but right-wing efforts to crack down on the civil service have intensified recently. That has been especially true as Trump has painted federal law enforcement as biased against him and as Republicans pilloried officials like Dr. Anthony Fauci, formerly the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, over the role they played in responding to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Max Stier, the president and CEO of the Partnership for Public Service, a nonprofit organization dedicated to an effective federal government, said this year that the Republican calls to fundamentally alter how the civil service works are causing "quite a bit of anxiety in the federal workforce and in the broader community of organizations that are focused on trying to help our government work more effectively," adding that there is "a lot of uncertainty" over what a potential GOP administration could do.
And it is Ramaswamy who has arguably gone the furthest in the field on these issues.
"Everything else has been danced around with Schedule F exceptions, and everyone is tiptoeing around the front door argument," he said. "Now, I’m actually just shutting down these agencies. This speech is going to lay out a level of detail that I think will further take a sledgehammer to that Overton window."
The "Overton window" is a term referring to the ideological boundaries of a political debate.
Ramaswamy this year argued that existing Article II powers in the Constitution allow a president to undertake such a reshaping of the federal workforce without congressional buy-in. Acknowledging there is "nuance and complexity" to his effort, he says now that it is more about using laws on the books, like the Presidential Reorganization Act of 1977, rather than making a strictly constitutional argument.
Some rivals, including former Vice President Mike Pence and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, have ripped Ramaswamy's ideas. After the first GOP presidential primary debate last month, Pence's campaign sent a release to reporters saying Ramaswamy's call to shutter the FBI amounted to an embrace of "the Radical Left’s pro-crime, anti-cop ‘Defund the Police’ agenda.”
On Monday, Christie called Ramaswamy's idea to eliminate the FBI "one of the stupidest ideas I’ve ever heard," citing anti-terrorism efforts the bureau has undertaken in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
"Don’t throw that out for a sound bite at a debate to make yourself sound like you’re really smart and aggressive when you’re really shallow and only 38 years old," Christie said at an event in New Hampshire.
In response, Ramaswamy said the "Chris Christie, Mike Pence, Nikki Haley, John Bolton, Karl Rove wing of the party, I think, has a very different vision for the future of the Republican Party than the future that I’m going to be leaning into."
It is notable that Ramaswamy will deliver his speech before the America First Policy Institute, a think tank stacked with former Trump administration officials that some view as a government-in-waiting for a second Trump administration.
But Ramaswamy, who has aligned himself closely with Trump, does not think the group is in the tank for Trump. He said he wanted to speak before the group because it has been "at the leading edge" of the effort to reinstitute Schedule F and could offer a "neutral venue" in the fractious 2024 primaries.
Art detective helps Dutch police recover stolen van Gogh painting
Story by Aliza Chasan •8h
A Dutch art detective returned a Vincent van Gogh painting to a museum Tuesday more than three years after it was stolen.
Arthur Brand, known as the "Indiana Jones of the Art World," announced the recovery of "The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen in Spring," also known as "Spring Garden," on his Instagram account. He returned the painting to the Groninger Museum director.
"A great day for all Van Gogh lovers worldwide," Brand wrote.
Brand said he worked closely with Dutch police to recover the painting, which van Gogh painted in 1884. It was swiped on March 30, 2020 — van Gogh's birthday — from The Singer Laren museum, where it was on loan for an exhibition. The museum was closed at the time of the theft to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Police arrested a 58-year-old suspect in 2021, but the painting remained missing. Brand did not share details about how the painting was finally recovered. Groninger Museum director Andreas Blühm also did not elaborate on the recovery, though he said Brand played a key role in the case.
"The Groninger Museum is extremely happy and relieved that the work is back," Blühm said. "It is currently in good company in the Van Gogh Museum."
The artwork will be scientifically examined in the coming months. The Groninger Museum said it hopes to have the painting back on display soon, but it "could take weeks, if not months."
"The painting has suffered, but is – at first glance – still in good condition," the museum wrote.
"The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen in Spring" was painted in 1884. It's an oil on paper painting depicting a person surrounded by trees, with a church tower in the background. The painting is the only van Gogh work in the Groninger Museum's collection.
CBS News has reached out to police in the Netherlands for additional details on the painting's recovery.
Brand's accomplishments include returning a stolen Roman statue last year. The sculpture had been taken from Musee du Pays Chatillonnais in December of 1973. He also recovered Salvador Dali's "Adolescence," a Picasso painting and "Hitler's Horses," sculptures that once stood outside the Nazi leader's Berlin chancellery.
The art detective in 2017 told "CBS Mornings" that he's brokered deals with terrorist groups, the mafia and a slew of shady characters in order to track down pieces on the black market.
"On one hand you have the police, insurance companies, collectors, and on the other hand you have the criminals, the art thieves and the forgers. So there are two different kind of worlds, and they do not communicate. So I put myself in the middle," Brand said.
CLIMATE CRISIS
Eight catastrophic floods in 11 days: What’s behind intense rainfall around the world?
Story by Denise Chow •NBC
The catastrophic flooding in Libya that has left as many as 10,000 people feared dead is just the latest in a string of intense rainfall events to hammer various parts of the globe over the past two weeks.
In the first 11 days of September, eight devastating flooding events have unfolded on four continents. Before Mediterranean storm Daniel sent floodwaters surging through eastern Libya, severe rains inundated parts of central Greece, northwestern Turkey, southern Brazil, central and coastal Spain, southern China, Hong Kong and the southwestern United States.
Seeing this many unrelated extreme weather events around the world in such a short period of time is unusual, said Andrew Hoell, a research meteorologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Physical Sciences Laboratory.
“Sometimes we have a clustering of these events, whether it’s in a given country, given hemisphere or globally,” he said. “And it seems like right now, globally, this is prime time for a number of flooding events.”
Like with many other forms of extreme weather, scientists say climate change is likely having an impact on rainfall and flooding, but understanding precisely what that relationship is can be tricky.
In general, studies have shown that global warming is intensifying the planet’s water cycle. Warmer temperatures increase evaporation, which means a warmer atmosphere can hold more moisture. As a result, when storms occur, they can unleash more intense precipitation and thus cause severe flooding.
Researchers have observed those changes over time as the world warms. Since 1901, global precipitation has increased at an average rate of 0.04 inches per decade, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
However, a number of factors can influence flooding events and their severity, and teasing out the fingerprints of climate change when they all interact can be challenging, Hoell said.
“From a 1,000-foot view, it’s definitely true that if you have higher temperatures, you have more water vapor, and therefore you can have more precipitation fall from the sky,” he said. “But when you look at a specific event, and the specific set of physical processes relevant to that event, it then becomes difficult to attribute every single process in that causal chain.”
For one, the types of extreme weather that caused each of the eight catastrophic flooding events in September had different origins.
Torrential downpours caused flash flooding in central and coastal regions of Spain, northwest Turkey and thousands of miles away in the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul.
With certain types of extreme flooding events, such as those associated with Mediterranean cyclones like Daniel, there simply isn't enough data to observe shifts over time.
“We really don’t have a long enough sample or record to be able to detect a change, because they’re not really that common of an occurrence,” Hoell said.
In other cases, local factors such as how wet or dry the ground is, or an area’s basic topography, can have an enormous influence on how floods develop — and their consequences.
Beyond loss of life and property, floods increase the risks of people being exposed to waterborne pathogens, which have important implications for outbreaks of deadly disease.
Hoell said the number of devastating floods this month is distressing, but said he's especially concerned about the situation unfolding in Libya.
“If you look at the damage and the amount of people who have lost their lives,” he said, “it just blows your mind.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
CLIMATE KRISIS
World leaders offer solidarity after devastating Morocco earthquake Leaders and diplomats the world over expressed condolences and offered their support for Morocco Saturday after a devastating earthquake struck the mountains southwest of Marrakesh. Issued on: 10/09/2023 -
01:12
People gather next to a damaged building on a street in Marrakesh, following a powerful earthquake in Morocco, September 9, 2023.
The 6.8-magnitude earthquake that hit late Friday killed more than 2,000 people and left more than 2,000 injured, many critically, according to Moroccan authorities.
Support has poured in from leaders across the world. Europe
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, of Morocco's cross-strait neighbour Spain, expressed his "solidarity and support to the people of Morocco in the wake of this terrible earthquake... Spain is with the victims of this tragedy".
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said "our thoughts are with the victims of this devastating earthquake. Our sympathy goes out to all those affected".
French President Emmanuel Macron said he was "devastated" and said that "France stands ready to help with first aid".
The pope expressed his "profound solidarity" with Morocco after the quake, according to the Vatican.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni underlined "Italy's willingness to support Morocco in this emergency".
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen expressed sympathy "with the Moroccan people in the face of the terrible earthquake".
And the European Union member countries, through the European Council said in a statement: "We are deeply saddened by the devastating consequences of this tragic event.
"As close friends and partners of Morocco, we are ready to assist in any way You may deem useful," said the statement, addressed to King Mohammed. Russia, Ukraine
The leaders of both Russia and Ukraine also offered their sympathies.
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky expressed his "deepest condolences to HM King Mohammed VI and all Moroccans for the lives lost in the horrible earthquake".
"Ukraine stands in solidarity with Morocco during this tragic time," he said on social media.
Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed similar sentiments and said, in a message to Morocco's king, "we share the pain and the mourning of the friendly Moroccan people". India, Turkey
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is hosting the G20 summit this weekend, said he was "extremely pained by the loss of lives due to an earthquake in Morocco".
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan offered support to "our Moroccan brothers in every way in this difficult hour". Middle East
Algeria, which broke off diplomatic relations with Morocco in August 2021 at the height of the crisis between the two countries, offered "its sincere condolences to the brotherly Moroccan people for the victims of the earthquake", said its foreign ministry.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "instructed all government bodies and forces to provide any necessary assistance to the people of Morocco, including the preparations for sending an aid delegation to the area", his office said.
It is the latest show of support in the wake of the 2020 Abraham Accords that saw Israel normalise ties with a number of Arab countries, including Morocco.
The president of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, said we "stand with the Kingdom of Morocco during this difficult time and wish a speedy recovery ahead to all those affected".
He also ordered an "air bridge to deliver critical relief" to the country, state news agency WAM reported.
Iran expressed its condolences for the "terrible earthquake".
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said he was "ready to provide any form of assistance to deal with the repercussions of the devastating earthquake". King of Jordan Abdullah II urged his government to provide all possible assistance to Morocco. Africa
Nigerian President Bola Tinubu extended his heartfelt condolences to King Mohammed: "In the face of this adversity, Nigeria will continue to stand in solidarity with Morocco as they recover, rebuild and come out stronger than ever from this unfortunate event."
The head of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, expressed his "sincere condolences" to the king, the Moroccan people and the families of the victims. World bodies
A statement from the World Bank said: "Our hearts go out to the people of Morocco.
"Our sole focus at this stage is on the Moroccan people and the authorities who are dealing with this tragedy."
The secretary-general of the Jeddah-based Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, Hissein Brahim Taha, prayed for "mercy on the victims and a speedy recovery for the injured".
World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus described the quake as "heartbreaking", adding: "We stand ready to support the immediate health needs", a sentiment echoed by UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said the response to the devastating quake could take years.
UNESCO, the UN heritage organisation, said it would help Morocco draw up an inventory of damage to national heritage sites and a repair strategy.
(AFP)
Red Cross raising $100m to aid Morocco facing 'massive destruction unlike anything we have seen'
The Red Cross appealed on Tuesday for more than $100 million to provide desperately needed assistance in Morocco, days after a powerful earthquake killed thousands of people. Friday's 6.8-magnitude quake was the most powerful in Morocco on record. As the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) seeks to provide "health, water, sanitation, hygiene, shelter relief items and basic needs", FRANCE 24's Tom Burges Watson is joined by Hossam Elsharkawi. Regional Director at International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies - IFRC, Middle East & North Africa.
In the wake of the quake's devastation, Morocco's 'local civil society is really coming together'
Morocco continues an incredibly challenging search and rescue mission, following the most powerful earthquake to hit Morocco in a century that has killed thousands of people, most of them in remote villages in the High Atlas Mountains. Search-and-rescue teams from the kingdom and abroad continue digging through the rubble of broken mud-brick homes, hoping for signs of life in a race against time following the 6.8-magnitude quake late Friday. In the tourist hub of Marrakesh, whose UNESCO-listed historic centre suffered cracks and other major damage, many families still slept out in the open, huddled in blankets on public squares for fear of aftershocks. As remote and poor mountain villages such as Missirat remain in dire need, awaiting urgent assistance, FRANCE 24's Tom Burges Watson is joined by Sara Almer, Humanitarian Director at ActionAid International.
CLIMATE CRISIS
STORM DANIEL HITS LIBYA,
DAMS BURST
How Libya’s chaos left its people vulnerable to deadly flooding
NATO NATION BUILDING
LONDON (AP) — A storm that has killed thousands of people and left thousands more missing in Libya is the latest blow to a country that has been gutted by years of chaos and division.
The floods are the most fatal environmental disaster in the country’s modern history. Years of war and lack of a central government have left it with crumbling infrastructure that was vulnerable to the intense rains. Libya is currently the only country yet to develop a climate strategy, according to the United Nations.
The north African country has been divided between rival administrations and beset by militia conflict since NATO-backed Arab Spring uprising toppled autocratic ruler Moammar Gadhafi in 2011.
The city of Derna in the country’s east saw the most destruction, as large swaths of riverside buildings vanished, washed away after two dams burst.
Videos of the aftermath show water gushing through the port city’s remaining tower blocks and overturned cars, and later, bodies lined up on sidewalks covered with blankets, collected for burial. Residents say the only indication of danger was the loud sound of the dams cracking, with no warning system or evacuation plan.
Here’s a look at why the storm was so destructive and what obstacles stand in the way of getting aid to those who need it most: TWO GOVERNMENTS, TWO PRIME MINISTERS
Since 2014. Libya has been split between two rival governments, each backed by international patrons and numerous armed militias on the ground.
In Tripoli, Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah heads Libya’s internationally recognized government. In Benghazi, the rival prime minister, Ossama Hamad, heads the eastern administration, which is backed by powerful military commander Khalifa Hiftar.
Both governments and the eastern commander have separately pledged to help the rescue efforts in the flood-affected areas, but they have no record of successful cooperation.
Rival parliaments have for years failed to unify despite international pressure, including planned elections in 2021 that were never held.
As recent as 2020, the two sides were in an all-out war. Hifter’s forces besieged Tripoli in a year-long failed military campaign to try to capture the capital, killing thousands. Then in 2022, former eastern leader Fathi Basagah tried to seat his government in Tripoli before clashes between rival militias forced him to withdraw.
The support of regional and world powers has further entrenched the divisions. Hifter's forces are backed by Egypt, Russia, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates, while the west Libya administration is backed by Turkey, Qatar and Italy.
The UAE, Egypt and Turkey are all helping rescue efforts on the ground. But as of Tuesday, rescue operations were struggling to reach Derna.
Claudia Gazzini, a senior Libya analyst at International Crisis Group, says the problem is partially logistical with many of the roads entering the port city having been severed by the storm. But political strife also plays a role.
“International efforts to send rescue teams have to go through the Tripoli-based government,” said Gazzini. That means permissions to allow aid inside the most affected areas have to be approved by rival authorities.
She was skeptical the Benghazi government could manage the problem alone, she said. GROWING UNREST AND DISCONTENT
The flooding follows a long line of problems born from the country’s lawlessness.
Earlier in August, sporadic fighting broke out between two rival militia forces in the capital, killing at least 45 people, a reminder of the influence rogue armed groups wield across Libya.
Libya has become a major transit point for Middle Eastern and African migrants fleeing conflict and poverty to seek a better life in Europe. Militias and human traffickers have benefited from the instability in Libya, smuggling migrants across borders from six nations, including Egypt, Algeria and Sudan.
Meanwhile, Libya’s rich oil reserves have done little to help its population. The production of crude oil, Libya’s most valued export, has at times slowed to a trickle due to blockades and security threats to companies. Allocation of oil revenues has become a key point of disagreement. TALE OF A NEGLECTED CITY
Much of Derna was constructed when Libya was under Italian occupation in the first half of the 20th century. It became famous for its scenic white beachfront houses and palm gardens. But in the aftermath of Gaddafi’s ouster in 2011, it disintegrated into a hub for Islamist extremist groups, was bombarded by Egyptian airstrikes and later besieged by forces loyal to Hiftar. The city was taken by Hiftar’s forces in 2019.
Like other cities in the east of the country, it has not seen much rebuilding or investment since the revolution. Most of its modern infrastructure was constructed during the Gaddafi era, including the toppled Wadi Derna dam, built by a Yugoslav company in the mid 1970s.
According to Jalel Harchaoui, an associate fellow specializing in Libya at the London-based Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies, Hiftar views the city and its population with suspicion, and has been reluctant to allow it too much independence. Last year, for instance, a massive reconstruction plan for the city was led by outsiders from Benghazi and elsewhere, not natives of Derna.
“Tragically, this mistrust might prove calamitous during the upcoming post-disaster period,” Harchaoui said.
___
Associated Press writer Cara Anna contributed to this report from Nairobi, Kenya.
Jack Jeffery, The Associated Press
More than 5,000 presumed dead in Libya after ‘catastrophic’ flooding breaks dams and sweeps away homes
Story by By Hamdi Alkhshali, Mostafa Salem and Kareem El Damanhoury, CNN •4h
CNN Video shows water gushing through port as 8 months worth of rain falls on Libya
More than 5,000 people are presumed dead and 10,000 missing after heavy rains in northeastern Libya caused two dams to collapse, surging more water into already inundated areas.
Tamer Ramadan, head of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies delegation in Libya, gave the numbers of missing people during a briefing to reporters in Geneva, Switzerland, on Tuesday. “The death toll is huge,” she said.
At least 5,300 people are thought dead, said the interior ministry of Libya’s eastern government on Tuesday, state media LANA reported. CNN has not been able to independently verify the number of deaths or those missing.
Of those who were killed, at least 145 were Egyptian, officials in the northeastern city of Tobruk, in Libya, said on Tuesday.
In the eastern city of Derna, which has seen the worst of the devastation, as many as 6,000 people remain missing, Othman Abduljalil, health minister in Libya’s eastern administration, told Libya’s Almasar TV. He called the situation “catastrophic,” when he toured the city on Monday.
Whole neighborhoods are believed to have been washed away in the city, according to authorities.
Hospitals in Derna are no longer operable and the morgues are full, said Osama Aly, an Emergency and Ambulance service spokesperson.
Dead bodies have been left outside the morgues on the sidewalks, he told CNN.
“There are no first-hand emergency services. People are working at the moment to collect the rotting bodies,” said Anas Barghathy, a doctor currently volunteering in Derna.
Relatives of people who lived in the destroyed city of Derna told CNN they were terrified after seeing videos of the flooding, with no word from their family members.
Ayah, a Palestinian woman with cousins in Derna, said she has been unable to reach them since the floods.
“I’m really worried about them. I have two cousins who live in Derna. It seems all communications are down and I don’t know if they are alive at this point. It is very terrifying watching the videos coming out of Derna. We are all terrified,” she said.
Emad Milad, a resident of Tobrok, said eight of his relatives died in the flooding in Derma.
“My wife Areej’s sister and her husband both passed away. His whole family is also dead. A total of eight people are all gone. It’s a disaster. It’s a disaster. We are praying for better things,” he said on Tuesday.
‘Ferocious’ weather conditions
The rain, which has swept across several cities in Libya’s north-east, is the result of a very strong low-pressure system that brought catastrophic flooding to Greece last week and moved into the Mediterranean before developing into a tropical-like cyclone known as a medicane.
Just as ocean temperatures around the world soar off the charts due to planet-warming pollution, the temperature of the Mediterranean is well-above average, which scientists say fueled the storm’s heavy rainfall.
“The warmer water does not only fuel those storms in terms of rainfall intensity, it also makes them more ferocious,” Karsten Haustein, climate scientist and meteorologist at Leipzig University in Germany, told the Science Media Center.
Libya’s vulnerability to extreme weather is increased by its long-running political conflict, which has seen a decade-long power struggle between two rival administrations.
The UN-backed Government of National Unity (GNU), led by Abdulhamid Dbeibeh, sits in Tripoli in northwest Libya, while its eastern rival is controlled by commander Khalifa Haftar and his Libyan National Army (LNA), who support the eastern-based parliament led by Osama Hamad.
Derna, which lies some 300 kilometers (190 miles) east of Benghazi, falls under the control of Haftar and his eastern administration.
The country’s complex politics “pose challenges for developing risk communication and hazard assessment strategies, coordinating rescue operations, and also potentially for maintenance of critical infrastructure such as dams,” Leslie Mabon, lecturer in Environmental Systems at The Open University, told the Science Media Center. Dams collapse
The collapse of two dams, which sent water rushing towards Derna, has caused catastrophic damage, authorities said Tuesday.
“Three bridges were destroyed. The flowing water carried away entire neighborhoods, eventually depositing them into the sea,” said Ahmed Mismari, spokesperson for the LNA.
Homes in valleys were washed away by strong muddy currents carrying vehicles and debris, said Aly, the Emergency and Ambulance authority spokesperson.
Phone lines in the city are down, complicating rescue efforts, with workers unable to enter Derna due to the heavy destruction, Aly told CNN.
Aly said authorities didn’t anticipate the scale of the disaster.
“The weather conditions were not studied well, the seawater levels and rainfall [were not studied], the wind speeds, there was no evacuation of families that could be in the path of the storm and in valleys,” he said.
“Libya was not prepared for a catastrophe like that. It has not witnessed that level of catastrophe before. We are admitting there were shortcomings even though this is the first time we face that level of catastrophe,” Aly told Al Hurra channel.
‘Unprecedented flooding’ The storm looks certain to be one of the deadliest on record in North Africa.
Libya is facing an “unprecedented” situation, said Hamad, the head of the eastern administration, according to a report from state news organization Libyan News Agency (LANA).
Mismari, the LNA spokesperson, said the floods have affected several cities, including Al-Bayda, Al-Marj, Tobruk, Takenis, Al-Bayada, and Battah, as well as the eastern coast all the way to Benghazi. At least 37 residential buildings were swept away into the seas.
“We are not prepared for such a scale of devastation,” Mismari said.
Libyan authorities need three types of specialized search groups including teams to recover bodies from rugged valleys after torrents dispersed them, teams to recover bodies from under the rubble, and teams to recover bodies from the sea, he added.
Tens of thousands of military personnel have been deployed, but many of the flood-stricken regions are still inaccessible to emergency workers, according to Mismari.
Several countries and human rights groups have offered aid as rescue teams scramble to find survivors under the debris and rubble.
The International Rescue Committee (IRC) said the country faces “an unprecedented humanitarian crisis,” in the wake of the disaster.
Ciaran Donelly, IRC’s senior vice president for crisis response, said the challenges in Libya “are immense, with phone lines down and heavy destruction hampering rescue efforts.” He added that climate change has compounded the “steadily deteriorating” situation in the country after years of conflict and instability.
Turkish aircraft delivering humanitarian aid have arrived in Libya, according to Turkey’s Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) on Tuesday.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the country would send 168 search and rescue teams and humanitarian aid to Benghazi, according to state run news agency Anadoulu Agency on Tuesday.
Italy is sending a civil defense team to assist with rescue operations, the country’s Civil Protection Department said Tuesday.
The US Embassy in Tripoli, Libya, announced that its special envoy, ambassador Richard Norland, had made an official declaration of humanitarian need.
This “will authorize initial funding that the United States will provide in support of relief efforts in Libya. We are coordinating with UN partners and Libyan authorities to assess how best to target official US assistance,” it posted on X (formally known as Twitter).
United Arab Emirates President, Zayed Al Nahyan, has directed to send aid and search and rescue teams while offering his condolences to those affected by the catastrophe, state news agency reported.
Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi sent a military delegation, led by the Egypt’s Armed Forces’ chief of staff Osama Askar, whom arrived in Libya on Tuesday to coordinate the provision of logistical and humanitarian assistance.
The storm reached a peak in northeastern Libya on Monday, according to a statement from the World Meteorological Organization, citing Libya’s National Meteorological Centre.
Libya’s storm follows deadly flooding in many other parts of the globe including southern Europe and Hong Kong.
More than 2,300 dead, thousands missing as floods devastate eastern Libya
At least 2,300 people were killed in Libya and thousands more were reported missing after catastrophic flash floods broke river dams and tore through an eastern coastal city, devastating entire neighbourhoods.
Issued on: 12/09/2023 -
Libyan Red Crescent rescuers in the flood-hit town of al-Bayda.
As global concern spread, multiple nations offered to urgently send aid and rescue teams to help the war-scarred country that has been overwhelmed by what one UN official labelled "a calamity of epic proportions".
Massive destruction shattered the Mediterranean coastal city of Derna, home to about 100,000 people, where multi-storey buildings on the river banks collapsed and houses and cars vanished in the raging waters.
Libyan emergency services reported an initial death toll of more than 2,300 in Derna alone and said over 5,000 people remained missing while about 7,000 were injured.
"The situation in Derna is shocking and very dramatic," said Osama Ali of the Tripoli-based Rescue and Emergency Service. "We need more support to save lives because there are people still under the rubble and every minute counts."
The floods were caused by torrential rains from Storm Daniel, which made landfall in Libya on Sunday after earlier lashing Greece, Bulgaria and Turkey.
Derna, 250 kilometres (150 miles) east of Benghazi, is ringed by hills and bisected by what is normally a dry riverbed in summer, but which has turned into a raging torrent of mud-brown water that also swept away several major bridges.
'The death toll is huge and might reach thousands,' warned Tamer Ramadan of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
The number of dead given by the Libyan emergency service roughly matched the grim estimates provided by the Red Cross and by authorities in the eastern region, who have warned the death toll may yet rise further.
"The death toll is huge and might reach thousands," said Tamer Ramadan of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, three of whose volunteers were also reported dead.
"We confirm from our independent sources of information that the number of missing people is hitting 10,000 persons so far," Ramadan told reporters via video link from neighbouring Tunisia.
Elsewhere in Libya's east, aid group the Norwegian Refugee Council said "entire villages have been overwhelmed by the floods and the death toll continues to rise".
"Communities across Libya have endured years of conflict, poverty and displacement. The latest disaster will exacerbate the situation for these people. Hospitals and shelters will be overstretched." 'Catastrophic' situation
Footage on Libyan TV showed dozens of bodies, wrapped in blankets or sheets, on Derna's main square, awaiting identification and burial, and more bodies in Martouba, a village about 30 kilometres to the southeast.
More than 300 victims were buried Monday, many in mass graves -- but vastly greater numbers of people were feared lost in the waters of the river that empties into the Mediterranean.
Oil-rich Libya is still recovering from the years of war and chaos that followed the 2011 NATO-backed popular uprising which toppled and killed longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi.
The North African country is divided between two rival governments -- the UN-brokered, internationally recognised administration based in Tripoli in the west, and a separate administration in the disaster-hit east.
Access to the eastern region is limited. Phone and online links have been largely severed, but the administration's prime minister Oussama Hamad has reported "more than 2,000 dead and thousands missing" in Derna alone.
A Derna city council official described the situation as "catastrophic" and asked for a "national and international intervention", speaking to TV channel Libya al-Ahrar.
Rescue teams from Turkey have arrived in eastern Libya, according to authorities, and the UN and several countries offered to send aid, among them Algeria, Egypt, France, Italy, Qatar, Tunisia and the United States. 'Harrowing images'
The storm also hit Benghazi and the hill district of Jabal al-Akhdar. Flooding, mudslides and other major damage were reported from the wider region, with images showing overturned cars and trucks.
Libya's National Oil Corporation, which has its main fields and terminals in eastern Libya, declared "a state of maximum alert" and suspended flights between production sites where it said activity was drastically reduced.
Flood damage in the eastern city of Derna where torrential rains caused a flashflood in a river that destroyed dams, bridges and buildings.
Libya's UN-brokered government under Abdelhamid Dbeibah announced three days of national mourning on Monday and emphasised "the unity of all Libyans".
Aid convoys from Tripoli were heading east and Dbeibah's government announced the dispatch of two ambulance planes and a helicopter, as well as rescue teams, canine search squads and 87 doctors, and technicians to restore power.
Italy's Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani wrote that Rome was "responding immediately to requests for support" with an assessment team on its way.
The United States embassy said it had "issued an official declaration of humanitarian need in response to the devastating floods in Libya".
European Council president Charles Michel, writing on X, formerly Twitter, noted the "harrowing images from Libya" and vowed the "EU stands ready to help those affected by this calamity".
(AFP)
Warmer seas, political chaos drive Libya flood toll: experts
Issued on: 12/09/2023 -
Paris (AFP) – Warmer seas, political chaos and inadequate infrastructure combined with devastating effect in the flooding that has killed more than 2,300 people in Libya, experts said on Tuesday.
Riverside buildings in the eastern Mediterranean coastal city of Derna collapsed after Storm Daniel brought heavy rainfall
Riverside buildings in the eastern Mediterranean coastal city of Derna collapsed after Storm Daniel brought heavy rainfall that broke river dams and engulfed entire neighbourhoods.
Daniel formed around September 4, bringing death and destruction to Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey last week.
These Mediterranean storms which bear the features of tropical cyclones and hurricanes, known as "medicanes", only occur one to three times a year.
They need fluxes of heat and moisture, which are "enhanced by warm sea surface temperatures", noted Suzanne Gray, a professor at the meteorology department at the University of Reading in Britain.
The surface waters of the eastern Mediterranean and Atlantic are two to three degrees Celsius warmer than usual and are "likely to have caused rainfall to be more intense", said scientists taking part in a UK National Climate Impacts meeting.
But it is unclear if the persistent high-pressure blocking pattern that caused the heavy rainfall and flooding will become more common in the future, they said.
The last assessment report by the UN's scientific advisory panel on climate change, released earlier this year, concluded that a warming world increases the strength of medicanes even if they become less frequent, added Gray.
Most scientists are cautious about making direct links between individual weather events and long-term changes in the climate.
But Storm Daniel "is illustrative of the type of devastating flooding event we may expect increasingly in the future" as the world heats up, said Lizzie Kendon, a climate science professor at the University of Bristol.
The European Union's climate monitoring service Copernicus said rising global sea surface temperatures were driving record levels of heat across the globe, with 2023 likely to be the warmest in human history.
Oceans have absorbed 90 percent of the excess heat produced by human activity since the dawn of the industrial age, according to scientists. A 'natural' disaster?
Some analysts believe the fragmented political scene in Libya -- torn apart by more than a decade of civil conflict following the fall of longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi in 2011 -- contributed to the devastation.
The North African country is divided between two rival governments: the UN-brokered, internationally recognised administration based in the capital Tripoli in the west, and a separate administration in the eastern region impacted by the flooding.
"There is no such thing as a natural disaster," argued Leslie Mabon, a lecturer in environmental systems at the UK-based Open University.
Although climate change can make extreme weather events more frequent and intense, social, political and economic factors determine who is at greatest risk, he said.
The loss of life was also a consequence of the limited nature of Libya's forecasting ability, warning and evacuation systems, said Kevin Collins, senior lecturer at the Open University.
Weaknesses in the planning and design standards for infrastructure and cities were also exposed, he added.
The UK National Climate Impacts scientists also noted that "infrastructure tipping points", such as extra strain on the dams, make extreme weather events deadlier and more destructive.
The political conditions in Libya "pose challenges for developing risk communication and hazard assessment strategies, coordinating rescue operations, and also potentially for maintenance of critical infrastructure such as dams", Mabon added.
Libya floods wipe out quarter of city, 10,000 feared missing
At least 10,000 people were feared missing in Libya on Tuesday in floods caused by a huge storm, which burst dams, swept away buildings and wiped out as much as a quarter of the eastern city of Derna. More than 1,000 bodies had already been recovered in Derna alone, and officials expected the death toll would be much higher, after Storm Daniel barrelled across the Mediterranean into a country crumbling from more than a decade of conflict. FRANCE 24's Delano D'Souza tells us more.
Libya floods: Global concern spread, multiple nations offer to send aid
Issued on: 12/09/2023 -
01:49
At least 2,300 people were killed in Libya and thousands more were reported missing after catastrophic flash floods broke river dams and tore through an eastern coastal city, devastating entire neighbourhoods. As global concern spread, multiple nations offered to urgently send aid and rescue teams to help the war-scarred country that has been overwhelmed by what one UN official labelled "a calamity of epic proportions".
At least 2,300 dead in Libya floods 'calamity', thousands missing
Issued on: 12/09/2023 -
01:48
At least 2,300 people were killed in Libya and thousands more were reported missing after catastrophic flash floods broke river dams and tore through an eastern coastal city, devastating entire neighbourhoods. As global concern spread, multiple nations offered to urgently send aid and rescue teams to help the war-scarred country that has been overwhelmed by what one UN official labelled "a calamity of epic proportions".
NATO NATION BUILDING
Rival Libya govts 'completely neglected failing infrastructure' that succumbed to treacherous floods
At least 10,000 people were feared missing or dead in Libya in floods caused by a huge storm that burst dams, swept away buildings and wiped out as much as a quarter of the eastern city of Derna. More than 1,000 bodies have already been recovered in Derna alone and officials expected the death toll would steadily rise, after Storm Daniel barrelled across the Mediterranean into a country divided and crumbling following a decade of conflict raging unabated since the fall of Gaddafi. For more analysis and perspective on the catastrophic floods unleashed on the fragile people of a crisis-ridden country engulfed in conflict, FRANCE 24's Nadia Massih is joined by Claudia Gazzini, International Crisis Group's Senior Analyst for Libya.
'Basic needs are huge' in Libya: IFRC is calling for 'long-term support to invest in infrastructure'
Emergency workers uncovered hundreds of bodies in the wreckage of Libya’s eastern city of Derna on Tuesday, and it was feared the toll could spiral with 10,000 people reported still missing after floodwaters smashed through dams and washed away entire neighborhoods of the city. For more on the startling death and devastation wreaked by Mediterranean storm Daniel and further exacerbated by a ruthless decade-old conflict, FRANCE 24's Nadia Massih is joined by Mey Al Sayegh, Head Of Communications at the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies - (IFRC).
Libya floods: Turkey sending aid aircraft, rescue team
Issued on: 12/09/2023 -
02:26
Turkey is sending three aircraft to transport a rescue team and humanitarian aid to Libya, its foreign ministry said on Tuesday, after a massive flood caused by heavy rain killed at least 2,000 people in the city of Derna. FRANCE 24's Jasper Mortimer reports from Ankara, Turkey.
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