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)
Thursday, November 28, 2024
Making a difference: Efficient water harvesting from air possible
Copolymer solution uses water-loving differential to induce desorption at lower temperatures
Water molecules in vapor are drawn to a water-loving polymer in a copolymer solution. The presence of the less hydrophilic polymer causes an exchange that helps release the water under near ambient conditions.
Harvesting water from the air and decreasing humidity are crucial to realizing a more comfortable life for humanity. Water-adsorption polymers have been playing a key part in atmospheric water harvesting and desiccant air conditioning, but desorption so that the polymers can be efficiently reused has been an issue. Now, Osaka Metropolitan University researchers have found a way to make desorption of these polymers more efficient.
Usually, heat of around 100°C is required to desorb these polymers, but Graduate School of Engineering student Daisuke Ikegawa, Assistant Professor Arisa Fukatsu, Associate Professor Kenji Okada, and Professor Masahide Takahashi developed a liquid moisture adsorbent that requires only a temperature of around 35°C to do so.
This became possible through the use of random copolymers of polyethylene glycol, which adsorbs water well, and polypropylene glycol, which adsorbs water slightly less well. The difference in their water-loving properties created a transfer mechanism that broke down the water clusters, freeing the water more easily.
“This technology has the potential to be applied not only to water supply in arid regions and places with limited energy resources, but also to ensuring access to water in times of disaster and emergency,” Dr. Fukatsu proclaimed.
“Improvements to this technology are also expected to lead to reductions in greenhouse gases and more efficient use of water resources,” Professor Takahashi added. “From now on, we will aim to improve the liquid moisture adsorbent and increase the efficiency of the entire system in order to make it practical.”
The findings are published in ACS ES&T Water.
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About OMU
Established in Osaka as one of the largest public universities in Japan, Osaka Metropolitan University is committed to shaping the future of society through “Convergence of Knowledge” and the promotion of world-class research. For more research news, visit https://www.omu.ac.jp/en/ and follow us on social media: X, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn.
Credit: Illustration by Alex Bosoy, Design & Illustration, LLC
An international team of scientists recently published a study highlighting the potential role of iron sulfides in the formation of life in early Earth’s terrestrial hot springs. According to the researchers, the sulfides may have catalyzed the reduction of gaseous carbon dioxide into prebiotic organic molecules via nonenzymatic pathways.
This work, which appeared in Nature Communications, offers new insights into Earth’s early carbon cycles and prebiotic chemical reactions, underscoring the significance of iron sulfides in supporting the terrestrial hot springs origin of life hypothesis.
The study was conducted by Dr. NAN Jingbo from the Nanjing Institute of Geology and Paleontology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dr. LUO Shunqin from Japan’s National Institute for Materials Science, Dr. Quoc Phuong Tran from the University of New South Wales, Australia, and other researchers.
Iron sulfides, abundant in early Earth’s hydrothermal systems, may have facilitated essential prebiotic chemical reactions, similar to the function of cofactors in modern metabolic systems. Previous studies on iron sulfides and the origin of life have focused primarily on deep-sea alkaline hydrothermal vents, which provide favorable conditions like high temperature, pressure, pH gradients, and hydrogen (H₂) from serpentinization—factors thought to support prebiotic carbon fixation.
However, some scientists have proposed terrestrial hot springs as another plausible setting for life’s origins, due to their rich mineral content, diverse chemicals, and abundant sunlight (Figure 1).
To explore the role of iron sulfides in terrestrial prebiotic carbon fixation, the research team synthesized a series of nanoscale iron sulfides from mackinawite (Figure 2), including pure iron sulfide and iron sulfides doped with common hot spring elements such as manganese, nickel, titanium, and cobalt.
Their experiments showed that these iron sulfides could catalyze the H₂-driven reduction of CO₂ at specific temperatures (80–120 °C) and atmospheric pressure. Gas chromatography was used to quantify the methanol production (Figure 3).
The study found that manganese-doped iron sulfides exhibited notably high catalytic activity at 120 °C. This activity was further enhanced by UV-visible (300–720 nm) and UV-enhanced (200–600 nm) light, suggesting that sunlight might play a role in driving this reaction by facilitating chemical processes. Additionally, the introduction of water vapor boosted catalytic activity, further supporting that vapor-laden terrestrial hot springs may have served as key sites for nonenzymatic organic synthesis on early Earth.
To further investigate the mechanism behind the H₂-driven CO₂ reduction, the team conducted in-situ analyses using diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform spectroscopy (DRIFTS).
Results indicated that the reaction likely proceeds via the reverse water-gas shift (RWGS) pathway, in which CO₂ is first reduced to carbon monoxide (CO), which is subsequently hydrogenated to form methanol. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations provided additional insights, revealing that manganese doping not only lowered the reaction’s activation energy but also introduced highly efficient electron transfer sites, thereby enhancing reaction efficiency (Figure 4). The redox characteristics of iron sulfides make them functionally analogous to modern metabolic enzymes, providing a chemical foundation for prebiotic carbon fixation.
This research underscores the potential of iron sulfides to catalyze prebiotic carbon fixation in early Earth’s terrestrial hot springs, opening new directions for exploring life’s origins and supporting efforts to search for extraterrestrial life.
Figure 2: Scanning transmission electron microscopy reveals characteristics of the iron sulfide (mackinawite) catalyst.
Figure 3: Simulated reaction of metal-doped iron sulfides catalyzing the H₂-driven reduction of CO₂ under various terrestrial hot spring conditions.
Figure 4: Density Functional Theory (DFT) calculations of CO₂ hydrogenation on the surfaces of pure iron sulfide and manganese-doped iron sulfide.
Iron sulfide-catalyzed gaseous CO2 reduction and prebiotic carbon fixation in terrestrial hot springs
Article Publication Date
28-Nov-2024
Unexplained heat-wave ‘hotspots’ are popping up across the globe
So extreme, they cannot be explained by global warming models
Columbia Climate School
image:
Regions where observed heat waves exceed trends from climate models. Boxed areas with the darkest red colors are the most extreme; lesser reds and oranges exceed models, but not by as much. Yellows roughly match models, while greens and blues are below what models would project.
Earth's hottest recorded year was 2023, at 2.12 degrees F above the 20th-century average. This surpassed the previous record set in 2016. So far, the 10 hottest yearly average temperatures have occurred in the past decade. And, with the hottest summer and hottest single day, 2024 is on track to set yet another record.
All this may not be breaking news to everyone, but amid this upward march in average temperatures, a striking new phenomenon is emerging: distinct regions are seeing repeated heat waves that are so extreme, they fall far beyond what any model of global warming can predict or explain. A new study provides the first worldwide map of such regions, which show up on every continent except Antarctica like giant, angry skin blotches. In recent years these heat waves have killed tens of thousands of people, withered crops and forests, and sparked devastating wildfires.
"The large and unexpected margins by which recent regional-scale extremes have broken earlier records have raised questions about the degree to which climate models can provide adequate estimates of relations between global mean temperature changes and regional climate risks," says the study.
"This is about extreme trends that are the outcome of physical interactions we might not completely understand," said lead author Kai Kornhuber, an adjunct scientist at the Columbia Climate School's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. "These regions become temporary hothouses." Kornhuber is also a senior research scholar at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Austria.
The study was just published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The study looks at heat waves over the past 65 years, identifying areas where extreme heat is accelerating considerably faster than more moderate temperatures. This often results in maximum temperatures that have been repeatedly broken by outsize, sometimes astonishing, amounts. For instance, a nine-day wave that hammered the U.S. Pacific Northwest and southwestern Canada in June 2021 broke daily records in some locales by 30 degrees C, or 54 F. This included the highest ever temperature recorded in Canada, 121.3 F, in Lytton, British Columbia. The town burned to the ground the next day in a wildfire driven in large part by the drying of vegetation in the extraordinary heat. In Oregon and Washington state, hundreds of people died from heat stroke and other health conditions.
These extreme heat waves have been hitting predominantly in the last five years or so, though some occurred in the early 2000s or before. The most hard-hit regions include populous central China, Japan, Korea, the Arabian peninsula, eastern Australia and scattered parts of Africa. Others include Canada's Northwest Territories and its High Arctic islands, northern Greenland, the southern end of South America and scattered patches of Siberia. Areas of Texas and New Mexico appear on the map, though they are not at the most extreme end.
According to the report, the most intense and consistent signal comes from northwestern Europe, where sequences of heat waves contributed to some 60,000 deaths in 2022 and 47,000 deaths in 2023. These occurred across Germany, France, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and other countries. Here, in recent years, the hottest days of the year are warming twice as fast the summer mean temperatures. The region is especially vulnerable in part because, unlike places like the United States, few people have air conditioning, because traditionally it was almost never needed. The outbreaks have continued; as recently as this September, new maximum temperature records were set in Austria, France, Hungary, Slovenia, Norway and Sweden.
The researchers call the statistical trends "tail-widening"―that is, the anomalous occurrence of temperatures at the far upper end, or beyond, anything that would be expected with simple upward shifts in mean summer temperatures. But the phenomenon is not happening everywhere; the study shows that maximum temperatures across many other regions are actually lower than what models would predict. These include wide areas of the north-central United States and south-central Canada, interior parts of South America, much of Siberia, northern Africa and northern Australia. Heat is increasing in these regions as well, but the extremes are increasing at similar or lower speed than what changes in average would suggest.
Climbing overall temperatures make heat waves more likely in many cases, but the causes of the extreme heat outbreaks are not entirely clear. In Europe and Russia, an earlier study led by Kornhuber blamed heat waves and droughts on wobbles in the jet stream, a fast-moving river of air that continuously circles the northern hemisphere. Hemmed in by historically frigid temperatures in the far north and much warmer ones further south, the jet stream generally confines itself to a narrow band. But the Arctic is warming on average far more quickly than most other parts of the Earth, and this appears to be destabilizing the jet stream, causing it to develop so-called Rossby waves, which suck hot air from the south and park it in temperate regions that normally do not see extreme heat for days or weeks at a time.
This is only one hypothesis, and it does not seem to explain all the extremes. A study of the fatal 2021 Pacific Northwest/southwestern Canada heat wave led by Lamont-Doherty graduate student Samuel Bartusek (also a coauthor on the latest paper) identified a confluence of factors. Some seemed connected to long-term climate change, others to chance. The study identified a disruption in the jet stream similar to the Rossby waves thought to affect Europe and Russia. It also found that decades of slowly rising temperatures had been drying out regional vegetation, so that when a spell of hot weather came along, plants had fewer reserves of water to evaporate into the air, a process that helps moderate heat. A third factor: a series of smaller-scale atmospheric waves that gathered heat from the Pacific Ocean surface and transported it eastward onto land. Like Europe, few people in this region have air conditioning, because it is generally not needed, and this probably upped the death toll.
The heat wave "was so extreme, it's tempting to apply the label of a 'black swan' event, one that can't be predicted," said Bartusek. "But there's a boundary between the totally unpredictable, the plausible and the totally expected that's hard to categorize. I would call this more of a grey swan."
While the wealthy United States is better prepared than many other places, excessive heat nevertheless kills more people than all other weather-related causes combined, including hurricanes, tornadoes and floods. According to a study out this past August, the yearly death rate has more than doubled since 1999, with 2,325 heat-related deaths in 2023. This has recently led to calls for heat waves to be named, similar to hurricanes, in order to heighten public awareness and motivate governments to prepare.
"Due to their unprecedented nature, these heat waves are usually linked to verysevere health impacts, and can be disastrous for agriculture,vegetation and infrastructure,” said Kornhuber. “We’re not built for them, and we mightnot be able to adapt fast enough."
The study was also coauthored by Richard Seager and Mingfang Ting of Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, and H.J. Schellnhuber of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis.
More information: Kevin Krajick, Senior editor, science news, Columbia Climate School/Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory kkrajick@climate.columbia.edu 917-361-7766
Journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Method of Research
Data/statistical analysis
Subject of Research
Not applicable
Article Title
Global emergence of regional heatwave hotspots outpaces climate model simulations
Article Publication Date
26-Nov-2024
Ban medical research with links to the fossil fuel industry, say experts
Investigation reveals a case for stronger action against the influence of these health-harming companies on academic research. Of the top five medical journals, only The BMJ bans fossil fuel-tied research
BMJ Group
An investigation published by The BMJ today reveals the extent of fossil fuel industry involvement in medical research, leading to fresh calls for academics and publishing companies to cut ties with companies.
An analysis by journalists Hristio Boytchev, Natalie Widmann and Simon Wörpel found that over the past six years, more than 180 medical articles have acknowledged fossil fuel industry funding, and an additional 1000 articles feature authors who worked for a fossil fuel company or related organisation.
While many studies don’t have an obvious link with fossil fuel industry interests, experts told The BMJ that publishing research benefits the companies by enhancing their reputation and buying influence with researchers and health practitioners.
The BMJ analysis found that Saudi Aramco, Saudi Arabia’s national oil company, was involved in around 600 articles, mostly through Johns Hopkins Aramco Healthcare (JHAH), a joint project between the oil giant and Johns Hopkins Medicine. Many of these papers concerned infectious diseases such as covid-19 and Mpox.
ExxonMobil was linked to the second largest group of articles. The ExxonMobil Foundation has funded the WorldWide Antimalarial Resistance Network, which supports malaria research. Until recently, the company spent almost three decades drilling for oil in Equatorial Guinea, a country with a high risk of malaria.
Johns Hopkins University, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and ExxonMobil did not respond to The BMJ’s requests to comment. Saudi Aramco declined to comment.
More than 1,000 articles were co-authored by employees of the companies. Often this was due to the involvement of hospitals or research institutes that are directly related to the companies, such as Kuwait Petroleum Corporation’s (KPC) Ahmadi Hospital.
The BMJ also found around 75 articles written by co-authors affiliated with fossil fuel companies without academic partners. These included Shell, ExxonMobil and the KPC (involved through Ahmadi Hospital). “Shell has a strong record of supporting important academic research and our involvement is always made clear,” a company spokesperson said.
Today’s findings come as some experts demand that the fossil fuel industry be treated similarly to tobacco companies. “Fossil fuel companies and the tobacco industry are similar in both the vast scale of harm they cause to health and their tactics of deliberately distorting science”, said Anna Gilmore, director of the Tobacco Control Research Group at the University of Bath. “Research journals and academic institutions must rethink their collaborations with the fossil fuel industry.”
Of the world’s five leading medical journals, only The BMJ has a policy banning fossil fuel-tied research. In 2020, The BMJ committed to ban advertising and research funded by companies that produce fossil fuels and this is now being extended to cover more BMJ journals. “We are extending this policy to BMJ Open and BMJ Medicine, and will begin a process of rolling out this policy to other BMJ Group journals,” says editor in chief Kamran Abbasi.
The BMJ has also strengthened its advertising policy by banning advertising from banks that fund fossil fuel companies. “Medical journals have an important role in not only advocating for climate action but also taking action,” adds Abbasi.
A spokesperson for the Lancet Group, publisher of the Lancet, said editors would “strongly scrutinise any fossil fuel industry funded research” and the “Lancet journals are very unlikely to publish such research unless it provided a clear benefit to public and human health.”
A spokesperson for Nature Reviews Disease Primers said competing interests are made available to referees and “there is a high degree of editorial oversight for reviews published in the journal.” The New England Journal of Medicine, and The Journal of the American Medical Association did not comment.
There have also been calls for medical organisations to divest from the fossil fuel industry. John Middleton, president of the Faculty of Public Health, said that in addition to divesting, organisations should consider restricting researching and publishing together with the industry.
One common theme of 2024 election postmortems is that Vice President Kamala Harris lost to President-elect Donald Trump because her campaign was too far-left. Zeteo News editor-in-chief and CEO Mehdi Hasan took issue with that argument.
In a video posted to X, Hasan tore into Democratic establishment figures like James Carville and Adam Jentleson who said the "far left" was holding the Democratic Party "hostage." He blasted headlines in major media outlets like the Washington Post that read: Harris defeat is a stinging verdict for the left," and a New York Times op-ed titled: "When will Democrats learn to say no?"
"Are you f—ing kidding me? This is gaslighting of Trumpian proportions," Hasan said.
"There was nothing 'left wing' about Harris. I mean, the centrists literally got the presidential candidate they wanted: A tough-on-crime prosecutor who bragged about owning a gun and spoke about her love for a 'lethal' military," he continued. "A candidate who famously told migrants: 'Don't come to this country.'" And, during the one and only presidential debate, attacked Trump for not backing a bipartisan and very draconian border security bill."
Hasan went on to bash arguments that the vice president's campaign was too left-wing "ridiculous," "detached from reality" and "demonstrably and obviously false." He noted that she didn't once use the phrase "Latinx" or "defund the police" on the campaign stump, and "barely said anything about transgender rights." And he noted that in 2020, when "defund the police" was a more common saying, Democrats won the White House.
"It's as clear as day. Harris did not run a left-wing campaign. She didn't run on Medicare for All. She didn't run on student debt relief. She didn't run on a Green New Deal. And she didn't break with Joe Biden on Gaza," he said. "So when you say she ran 'left,' what on earth are you talking about?"
"This is a presidential candidate who campaigned way more with Liz Cheney and Mark Cuban than with AOC and Shawn Fain. Who listened to her brother-in-law, the chief legal officer of Uber, than to Bernie Sanders," Hasan added. "The truth is, in 2016 and again in 2020, the Democratic establishment united to block Bernie Sanders, an actual leftist, from becoming their nominee. And in 2024, due to Joe Biden's stubbornness, they didn't even have a contest, just a coronation."
"So look, the centrists, the moderates, got their candidate in every single election in which the Republicans nominated Donald Trump: 2016, Hillary Clinton. 2020, Joe Biden. 2024, Kamala Harris. And they lost to Trump two out of three times," he concluded. "And now they're going to blame the left for that? No f—ing way."
Edmonton police and the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service have charged journalist Duncan Kinney for allegedly vandalizing a Waffen SS monument under an offence seemingly intended to protect cenotaphs honouring Canadian war veterans.
Kinney vehemently denies the allegations and is contesting the charges in court.
It is likely the first time a Canadian journalist has been charged with vandalizing a war memorial, as well as the first time anyone has been charged with vandalizing a memorial to Canada’s wartime enemies.
The charge – “mischief relating to war memorials” – which carries a maximum 10-year prison sentence, seems to have been intended to punish vandalism of cenotaphs and monuments dedicated to Canada’s war dead.
The Criminal Code specifies that the charge relates to “mischief in relation to property that is a building, structure or part thereof that primarily serves as a monument to honour persons who were killed or died as a consequence of a war, including a war memorial or cenotaph […].”
The monument in question, located in St. Michael’s Cemetery in north Edmonton, honours Ukrainian veterans of the SS “Galicia Division,” which fought on the side of Nazi Germany during the Second World War.
Kinney was also arrested and charged in October 2022 with one count of mischief for allegedly spray painting the words “Actual Nazi” on a statue of Roman Shukhevych, a Ukrainian nationalist and Nazi collaborator responsible for the extermination of tens of thousands of Poles and Jews during the Second World War.
Edmonton police allege the incident took place on Aug. 10, 2021, the same day the monument in St. Michael’s Cemetery was similarly vandalized with the words “Nazi Monument 14th Waffen SS.”
Kinney is represented by Edmonton lawyer Tom Engel and vehemently denies both charges, arguing that they are a deliberate attempt by the Edmonton Police Service (EPS) to intimidate and silence him.
A prominent critic of the Edmonton police, Kinney has reported on numerous matters of police misconduct, as well as the difficulties he has encountered in trying to do his job. Alluding to those difficulties, Kinney described EPS Chief Dale McFee’s demeanour towards him as “hostile, dismissive, sarcastic, and evasive” in court documents.
Though Kinney had previously received media accreditation with EPS, beginning in February 2022 he alleged that he faced numerous and often arbitrary obstacles that have denied him access to police press briefings.
In addition, Edmonton police have not been forthcoming with documents that Kinney said are necessary for his defence.
Lawyer Tom Engel believes Kinney is being persecuted for criticizing the police, and not for allegedly vandalizing a monument.
“When you look at the investigation and the resources poured into it by the EPS, you have to ask yourself the question: ‘why would they devote such scarce police resources to an investigation like this?’ And the only reasonable explanation is because they targeted him,” said Engel in an interview with The Maple.
“He was identified, in my opinion, as an enemy of Chief McFee and the Edmonton Police Service.”
According to Engel, Kinney and his immediate family had been the subject of extensive police surveillance. Kinney has accused EPS of spying on him.
Engel said the initial investigation was handled by the EPS’ investigative response team, which he characterized as being designed to handle complex cases.
“They basically decided they would close the file because there didn’t appear to be any point in investigating any further,” said Engel. “And then it mysteriously resurfaces and it goes to the hate crimes unit. The officer there spent many hours investigating it, including surveilling Duncan and his wife and kid.”
Engel is incredulous that so much time and effort would be exhausted investigating a case of petty vandalism, let alone the alleged spray painting of a memorial to members of the Waffen SS.
“Normally it would involve a patrol constable,” said Engel. “Like somebody gets a swastika painted on their fence [...] (the police) are not going to go very far in trying to investigate it.”
Several other monuments to SS volunteers and other organizations complicit in Nazi war crimes have been defaced across Canada.
Engel thinks it may be the first time a charge meant to protect war memorials honouring Canadians has been used to try to prosecute an individual for allegedly defacing a monument to Canada’s war time enemies.
According to journalist and author Peter McFarlane, the Edmonton Galicia Division monument that Kinney is alleged to have vandalized was created thanks to the efforts of Waffen SS veteran Peter Savaryn, and deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland’s maternal grandfather, Michael Chomiak, who voluntarily served as a Nazi propagandist in occupied Poland during the war.
“Chomiak was on the committee, he helped raise the money for [the monument],” said McFarlane in an interview with The Maple. “Savaryn of course was an SS man himself.”
The presence of monuments to an SS division and a prominent Nazi collaborator has long been criticized and opposed by Canada’s Jewish community, but it is also opposed by members of Canada’s Polish community. Both members of the Galicia Division and Shukhevych are alleged to have been involved in ethnic cleansing campaigns directed against Poles as well as Jews.
Alex Cosh Polish-born former Alberta deputy premier and cabinet minister Thomas Lukaszuk feels the law is being misused by people who could use a refresher on the history of the Second World War.
“I think it clearly shows that Edmonton police and the Crown prosecutor’s office, who obviously reviewed the charges and consented to them, are lacking, grossly, in historical knowledge,” said Lukaszuk in an interview with The Maple.
Lukaszuk also said he believes both the police and prosecutor have a poor understanding of the intention behind the law meant to protect war memorials in Canada.
“Clearly that section [of the Criminal Code] is intended to honour and sanctify monuments to Canadian war heroes from all wars,” said Lukaszuk. “I am certain that it was not the spirit of the law to extend that protection to those who committed war crimes or were fighting on the opposing side of the war.”
“I don’t imagine that a similar charge would be filed if, allegedly, Mr. Kinney defaced a statue of Mussolini or Adolf Hitler.” History of War Crimes
Roman Shukhevych was the military leader of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army up until his death in 1950.
A Nazi collaborator during the Second World War, Shukhevych led Ukrainian units created by the German army, and is believed to have been responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of Poles, as well as Jews and Soviet partisans during the war.
He is considered a national hero by members of the Ukrainian ultranationalist community.
The Galicia Division, meanwhile, was a Ukrainian formation of the Waffen-SS, the combat arm of the Nazi Party’s Schutzstaffel (SS) organization. The entire SS was determined to have been a criminal entity responsible for the Holocaust during the Nuremberg Trials after the Second World War.
The Galicia Division came to relatively recent prominence in September 2023 when 98-year old Yaroslav Hunka, who volunteered to join the division during the Second World War, was honoured by the Canadian Parliament as a Canadian and Ukrainian “hero” for having fought the Soviet Union.
It was the Soviet Union, which fought on the same side as Canada and the Allies during the war, that was chiefly responsible for defeating Nazi Germany and liberating Nazi extermination camps.
The incident caused considerable international embarrassment, and re-opened a national debate over Canada’s history of providing refuge to Nazis, their collaborators and other assorted fascists.
In the wake of the Hunka scandal, Kinney reported that the University of Alberta’s Canadian Institute for Ukrainian Studies (CIUS) had received approximately $1.4 million in donations and endowments in the names of Nazi collaborators.
In October 2023, Governor General Mary Simon apologized for the fact that Peter Savaryn, a Waffen SS veteran and former chancellor of the University of Alberta, had been awarded the Order of Canada some four decades prior.
While ultranationalist elements in Canada’s Ukrainian community have long defended monuments honouring Nazi collaborators, others from the community are aghast that such monuments remain standing.
“The existence, in Edmonton and elsewhere in Canada, of monuments honouring Ukrainian Nazi collaborators deeply offends me simply as a Canadian, and more particularly as a Ukrainian-Canadian,” said Alex Boykowich, president of the Association of United Ukrainian Canadians Branch 2 in Edmonton.
Like many Ukrainian-Canadians, Boykowich’s ancestors came to Canada from the Austro-Hungarian Empire before its collapse after the First World War. Boykowich’s father and two uncles volunteered to fight for Canada against Nazi Germany and fascist Italy during the Second World War.
“I’m sure if they were alive today they would be absolutely disgusted by the existence in Canada of monuments honouring Nazis,” Boykowich told The Maple. “It’s a gross betrayal of everything they, and Canada, fought for — a real slap in the face.” Protecting Nazi Monuments
Canadian police have a track record of levying serious charges against individuals alleged to have defaced Nazi monuments.
In December 2019, the bust of Roman Shukhevych in Edmonton was defaced with the words “Nazi Scum.”
In July 2020, Kinney revealed that Edmonton police had initiated a hate crime investigation into the incident.
Around the same time, Halton Regional Police in Ontario faced serious backlash when they initiated a hate crimes investigation into vandalism of the Galicia Division monument in Oakville’s St. Volodymyr’s cemetery.
Halton police ultimately dropped their hate crimes investigation and apologized, arguing they thought the vandalism was directed at Ukrainians in general, and not a monument to a specific Ukrainian SS division.
By contrast, as The Maple reported in September 2021, the Edmonton Ukrainian Youth Unity Complex applied for and received a $35,000 grant from the federal government to install a security system to deter further vandalism of the Shukhevych bust.
But the effort to rid Canada of its Nazi monuments isn’t happening quickly enough for some members of Canada’s Ukrainian community. Boykowich doesn’t believe any lessons have been learned at an official level since the Hunka scandal.
“Why do these cases of pro-Nazi celebration, betraying the legacy of Canada’s participation in the Second World War, and embarrassing Canada internationally, regularly occur? Because a portion of the Ukrainian-Canadian community [...] is pro-Nazi,” said Boykowich.
“Their heroes are those Ukrainians who fought for Hitler and Nazi Germany, not the thousands of Ukrainian-Canadians who fought together with millions of Soviet Ukrainians to defeat Nazi Germany.”
Taylor C. Noakes is an independent journalist and public historian from Montreal.
When Indigenous activists walk the land to honor their past and reshape their future
Walelasoetxeige Paiter Bandeira Surui, known as Txai Surui, an indigenous activist from the Paiter Surui people of the state of Rondonia, Brazil leaves after her accreditation was removed after protesting during the 16th United Nations Biodiversity Summit (COP16), in Yumbo, Colombia October 30, 2024. REUTERS/Luisa Gonzalez
For Indigenous activists, walking the land can take on powerful spiritual and political significance. It has been, and continues to be, an important way Indigenous nations pursue healing, environmental stewardship and diplomacy across Turtle Island, the name many Indigenous groups use to refer to North America.
The Journey of Nishiyuu – which translates to"human beings" or “new people” – took place from January-March 2013. More broadly, that season was known as the winter of Idle No More, a movement in support of First Nations’ rights in Canada.
Led by Indigenous women, Idle No More arose when the Canadian government passed C-45, legislation that they feared would reduce environmental protections and weaken consultation with Indigenous communities. The winter of 2012-13 was also when Theresa Spence, the chief of Attawapiskat First Nation, held a hunger strike near Parliament Hill – an effort to hold the government accountable for its treaty obligations and to address the inadequate living conditions in northern reservations. Activists in the Idle no More movement stage a flash protest inside the Eaton Centre in Toronto on Dec. 30, 2012. Steve Russell/Toronto Star via Getty Images
The Nishiyuu walkers announced that they were walking the land to demonstrate that the Iiyiyiuch are still “keepers” of their “language, culture, and tradition,” and honoring their ancestors. Many individual walkers also spoke about the experience as a healing journey.
“For the youth here there is no better place to be than out on the land,” said David Kawapit, the young walker who initiated the journey, when I interviewed him in Whapmagoostui.
The walkers started off their journey in snowshoes, traveling along traditional trap lines and trading routes. As they moved farther south, the trail turned to highways, and walkers exchanged moccasins and snowshoes for boots and running shoes. Throughout the journey, walkers were hosted by other Iiyiyiu, as well as other Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities, where they shared stories, food and prophecies with one another.
When the group set off in January, it consisted of only six young walkers from Whapmagoostui and their elder guide, the late Isaac Kawapit. By the time they reached Parliament Hill, however, the movement had grown to approximately 270 people of many ages and cultural backgrounds.
This was not just a walk for the Cree Nation. The journey was also intended to strengthen inter-Indigenous relations across Canada during Idle No More. The Nishiyuu walkers embarked on their journey to emphasize the important role land plays in shaping their sense of well-being, their culture and their communities’ political autonomy. The Journey of Nishiyuu. Walking land and lakes
The Journey of Nishiyuu is one of many Indigenous-led social justice movements that engage in walking the land. In 1978, for example, the American Indian Movement led a 3,000-mile walk from Alcatraz Island in San Francisco all the way to Washington, D.C.
Activists who participated in this “Longest Walk” did so to hold the U.S. government accountable to its treaty obligations. The United States signed approximately 374 treaties with Indigenous nations from 1778 until 1871, but Native American groups argue the government has often eroded rights these treaties were meant to protect.
The Longest Walk helped prevent the passage of 11 bills in Congress that would have restricted Native communities’ jurisdiction and social services and diminished their land and water rights, among other consequences.
In 2008, Indigenous activists embarked on a second Longest Walk and once more made the long journey from Alcatraz to Washington. This time, the walkers called attention to the need to respect sacred sites, protect the environment and create better futures for young people.
Nathan LeRoy, who was part of the original Longest Walk, takes part in the 2008 recreation of the walk from San Francisco to Washington, D.C. Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
Other walks have brought together Indigenous activists from Canada and the U.S., such as the Mother Earth Water Walkers. The late Josephine Mandamin, an Anishinaabe Grandmother and member of Wikwemikong First Nation, initiated the first Water Walk on Easter morning in 2003. She walked the entire perimeter of Lake Superior, on the U.S.-Canada border – an act of prayer and an effort to live out her obligations to care for and heal the waters.
Mandamin was joined by other “water walkers” who have kept her traditions and teachings alive. They have continued to walk around numerous bodies of water, including Lake Ontario in 2006, Lake Erie in 2007 and the Menominee River in 2016. Their walks embody an Anishinaabe perspective that water is a sacred medicine, and also aim to educate the public on the importance of Indigenous peoples’ access to water and jurisdiction over their ancestral waterways.
Affirming freedom
When Indigenous activists walk the land, they are restoring their firsthand knowledge of place and reknitting their relationships with plants, animals and other human beings. They are also revitalizing traditional forms of governance and diplomacy through visits with other Indigenous nations along the way – and sometimes inviting non-Indigenous people to walk with them. These invitations offer non-Indigenous walkers opportunities for reconciling their own relationships to land and to the Indigenous peoples whose territories they inhabit
American Indian Movement members involved in The Longest Walk trek along the Mall in Washington, D.C., in 1978. Wally McNamee/Corbis via Getty Images
Part of such walks’ significance stems from history. For centuries, the United States and Canada attempted to control Indigenous peoples’ freedom of movement – often with support from religious institutions. In the U.S., the reservation system segregated Indigenous nations and allocated them to small portions of land. In Canada, the pass system mandated that Indigenous people present a travel document to an appointed Indian agent in order to leave and return from their reservations.
While these social movements commemorate history, and try to heal from it, they are also a reminder that the past is present.
By walking the land, Indigenous people assert their sovereignty and carry out their sacred obligations to care for their lands and waters – which I believe can inspire a more just and beautiful future. Meaghan Weatherdon, Assistant Professor of Theology and Religious Studies, University of San Diego
