Wednesday, September 18, 2024

Antibiotic-resistant superbugs could kill 39 million people by 2050, researchers warn

Published on 17/09/2024 -

Antimicrobial resistance is already killing millions around the globe, but deaths could surge by 68 per cent between 2021 and 2050, according to a major new study.

More than 39 million people worldwide could die from antibiotic-resistant infections over the next 25 years, and another 130 million could die of related causes, according to a landmark new study that comes days before global leaders convene in New York to sign off on a pledge to combat the growing public health threat.

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) – when bacteria or other pathogens evolve to the point where antibiotics are no longer effective against them – happens when people overuse antibiotics in medicine and animal and crop farming.

These so-called superbugs make infections harder to treat as doctors scramble for alternatives, and have directly killed about a million people every year since 1990, according to a new study published in The Lancet journal.

The hazards of AMR are on the rise. By 2050, there could be 1.91 million deaths directly from AMR and 6.31 million deaths from AMR-related causes, meaning a drug-resistant infection played a role in someone’s death, but resistance itself may or may not have been a factor, according to the new estimates from the Global Research on Antimicrobial Resistance (GRAM) Project.

"This is really a very silent pandemic, and it's growing. Our attention needs to be there now," Ahmed Ogwell, vice president of global health strategy at the UN Foundation and former acting director-general of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), told Euronews Health.

AMR-related deaths surging in over 70s

For the new study, researchers used 520 million records to estimate the number of deaths and disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs) – a quality-of-life measure – that can be directly attributed to or associated with AMR across 22 pathogens, 84 pathogen-drug combinations, and 11 infections. The analysis spanned 204 countries and territories.

They found that from 1990 to 2021, AMR-related deaths fell by roughly 60 per cent among children younger than 5, but surged by more than 80 per cent for adults 70 and older. That’s because vaccination programmes and other infection prevention and control measures protected children, and because many countries’ ageing populations left older people vulnerable.

Older people will continue to bear the brunt of the rising death toll in the coming years, the analysis shows. But they are far from the only ones at risk.

"Regardless of where people live, they're going to require antibiotics if they go through procedures, cancer chemotherapy, if they are hospitalised ever, because everyone is at risk of a bacterial infection,” Ramanan Laxminarayan, who leads the research institute One Health Trust, told Euronews Health.

"Antibiotics don't work reliably anymore because of drug resistance," he added. "Twenty years ago, the chance of that happening was like a one in 100 chance, maybe less than that. Today, that likelihood is one in three [or] one in four, and that makes all of these other aspects of modern medicine much more risky".

People in South Asia, including India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, as well as other parts of southern and eastern Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and Latin America and the Caribbean, are also expected to be hard hit.

Lower and middle-income countries are grappling with a dual challenge, given many patients lack access to antibiotics in the first place, according to Laxminarayan, who was not involved with the new report but contributed to a Lancet series on antimicrobial resistance earlier this year.

That means that simply developing new antibiotic drugs only tackles half the problem.

"Drug resistance is not their primary issue [in low-access regions] – their primary issue is bacterial infections itself," Laxminarayan said.

Despite the disparities, no region is immune from the risks. The annual number of AMR-attributable deaths in high-income countries is expected to grow from 125,000 to 192,000 between 2021 and 2050, the study found. Many hundreds of thousands more will die from associated causes.

Global steps to counter AMR

The United Nations General Assembly will meet next week for its second-ever high-level meeting on AMR, the last one being in 2016. Global leaders are expected to sign off on a political commitment to curb human deaths from AMR.

But the declaration was also watered down during negotiations in recent months, underscoring the lack of consensus on specific AMR targets.

For example, a goal to curb antimicrobials in animal farming by at least 30 per cent, which was included in a prior draft, was stripped out in the latest version and replaced with a promise to "strive meaningfully” to reduce their use.

"We have had a tough ride on this one," Dr Sally Davies, the United Kingdom’s special envoy on AMR and England’s former chief medical officer, told Euronews Health.

"We would like to steadily ratchet up and improve where we're going… but governance is a very difficult thing, and at this point, we don't have an effective governance mechanism".

Davies called for the creation of an independent scientific panel on AMR, additional data collection and funding, a greater focus on the risks to food systems and the environment, and incentives for drug companies to develop new antibiotics.

Eventually, she’d like global AMR cooperation to resemble the international tobacco treaty, which entered into force in 2005.

According to the Lancet study, many of the projected AMR deaths could be curtailed with a few key measures such as better infection control, widespread immunisations, the development of new antibiotics, and minimising their use when it isn’t necessary in medical and farm settings.

With improved antibiotic access and better infection care, for example, 92 million deaths could be avoided between 2025 and 2050. If drugs are developed to target Gram-negative bacteria – which are some of the most antibiotic-resistant – 11.1 million deaths could be averted.

"You just need each sector to deliver on what they need to do," Davies said.

Efforts to reduce antibiotics dependence

Some countries and industries have already taken steps to reduce their reliance on antimicrobials. Norwegian fish farms, for example, started using vaccines in the late 1980s, leading to a steep drop-off in antibacterial use.

Across the European Union, average microbial use for medical treatment fell by 2.5 per cent between 2019 and 2022, indicating the bloc is making "slow progress" toward its goal of curbing use by 20 per cent by 2030, according to the EU public health agency.

Despite that progress, however, lessons from other global health crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the HIV/AIDS epidemic, suggest that high-income countries could be slow to rein in a problem that disproportionately impacts low- and middle-income countries.

"We must budget in our response that the situation is not going to change rapidly," Ogwell said, "which means that the planning of low- and middle-income countries needs to accommodate that, and they need to put in place policies that make it easier for them to work together".

He added that better surveillance and data-sharing will be key to identifying and responding quickly to emerging pathogen threats.

Beyond government or industry action, people can also take steps to protect themselves, Laxminarayan said.

"It doesn't require someone else to tell you to wash hands, to get vaccinated, to make sure that you don't overuse antibiotics, to make sure that when you buy chicken – if you do eat chicken – that it is antibiotic-free," Laxminarayan said.

New data reveals exactly when the Chinese government blocked ChatGPT and other AI sites

Rest of World received exclusive access to a platform that tracks patterns and timing of Chinese online censorship.

Ruwangi Amarasinghe for Rest of World

By JOANNA CHIU
18 SEPTEMBER 2024

GFWeb provides precise tracking of when Chinese authorities block domains, including sites like ChatGPT, Hugging Face, and Perplexity.

Chinese censors appear focused on blocking AI tools for content generation, such as video and image editing applications.

Censorship spikes might be linked to significant events, such as China’s introduction of AI regulations.

A few months after OpenAI launched ChatGPT in November 2022, the service began to take off in China, with citizens using it to satirize pro-government figures and for homework help. Because OpenAI restricted access to China-based users, local developers created mirror sites to facilitate access to the service. But the ChatGPT boom in China was short-lived. The Chinese government blocked ChatGPT’s domain on March 2, 2023, new research has found.

Historically, tracking when exactly Chinese authorities blocked specific domains was difficult because researchers had to choose to test individual domains. But according to a newly launched platform, GFWeb, which granted Rest of World exclusive first access, the same month that the Chinese government blocked ChatGPT for the first time, authorities also blocked dozens of alternative chatbots and websites that use ChatGPT’s technology. Rest of World also discovered that Hugging Face, the popular machine-learning platform, was blocked in China months before the company reported issues.

GFWeb is now available to the public for free and continuously tests millions of websites from both inside and outside China to identify when exactly they are no longer available to users in China. It detects which sites are blocked by leveraging the Great Firewall’s unique filtering behaviors. The service is primarily funded by the nonprofit Open Technology Fund and received research input from faculty at the University of British Columbia, University of Toronto, University of Chicago, and Stony Brook University.

“This system not only enhances our ability to track the timing and scope of censorship events but also helps identify patterns and shifts in the strategies employed by the Great Firewall,” Nguyen Phong Hoang, the platform’s developer and a University of British Columbia computer scientist, told Rest of World. “I hope GFWeb can empower researchers, policymakers, and the general public to gain deeper insights into the evolving landscape of China censorship.”

It was previously unclear when Hugging Face was first blocked in China. In October 2023, the company reported “regrettable accessibility issues” in the country. In fact, GFWeb data suggests that Huggingface.co was actually blocked on May 7, 2023, months before the company identified the issue.

Data from GFWeb allows observers to spot long-term trends. For instance, it shows that Chinese authorities are particularly concerned with AI tools used for content generation. Besides websites that appear to use ChatGPT’s technology, the majority of blocked AI websites include tools that assist with video and image editing. That includes services like OpenArt and VoiceDub.

This suggests the Chinese Communist Party is “quite sensitive to content-generation platforms not controlled by the regime. That’s the main threat,” Jeffrey Ding, assistant professor of political science at George Washington University and a leading expert on China’s technological capabilities, told Rest of World.

“Blocking AI sites might not keep developers from using VPNs [virtual private networks] to access those tools but presents friction for the average Chinese person to use AI to generate politically sensitive content, such as a video making fun of CCP leaders, or a couplet about Chinese corruption,” Ding said.

He pointed to a viral AI-manipulated video that circulated on Western social media platforms last year showing Chinese President Xi Jinping saying flattering things about American society in fluent English. It contained numerous inaccuracies, and Xi has never given a full address in English.

AI-manipulated content that can misrepresent Chinese leaders is exactly the kind of content that Beijing does not want to see on its own social media, Ding said.

Rest of World’s analysis using the tool found a correlation between spikes in censorship activity and significant events, such as the passing of new AI regulations. For instance, hundreds of religion-related AI websites, including Biblechat.ai and Church.ai, were blocked this spring — coinciding with a surge in launches of spirituality-related AI applications.

“This system not only enhances our ability to track the timing and scope of censorship events but also helps identify patterns and shifts in the strategies employed by the Great Firewall.”

In January 2023, China became one of the first countries in the world to introduce rules governing AI deepfake technology and, in August 2023, to enforce comprehensive generative AI regulations. Those dates also correspond to increased blocking of AI domains.

The data suggests authorities are applying preexisting censorship protocols to new AI technology, according to Jeremy Daum, a senior fellow at Yale Law School’s Paul Tsai China Center.

“The big names with heaviest traffic are going to get blocked. Beyond that, there seems to be a period of discovery, so you see batches of sites getting censored,” he told Rest of World. “The process is always mysterious with some automation at lower levels, but when blocking comes in batches, that’s usually a decision by CAC [Cyberspace Administration of China] officials.”

Popular AI chatbots from Chinese companies that must comply with censorship regulations include Baidu’s Ernie Bot, Alibaba’s Tongyi Qianwen, and ByteDance’s Doubao as well as a range from Chinese startups.

Phong was previously the lead researcher on GFWatch, a large nine-month study that provided insights into China’s domain-blocking behaviors and paved the way for the design of GFWeb. He has worked on smaller-scale studies on internet censorship in Turkmenistan and parts of the Middle East.

Charlie Smith, who uses a pseudonym for safety reasons, is a co-founder of GreatFire.org, which offers tools for analyzing and circumventing Chinese internet censorship. Smith said Phong’s work opens up exciting possibilities for researchers.

“Knowing the exact date of censorship is helpful for a number of reasons. We can, for instance, identify if sites are getting blocked around certain events,” he told Rest of World. “It also helps to show how the authorities block these sites. Do they block mostly on Mondays? Do they work on the weekends? We would be able to identify if the authorities block websites according to a pattern.”

“The GFWeb system should encourage more people to initiate tests themselves, which can greatly expand what we know about China’s internet controls,” Smithsaid.

As Norway wealth fund reviews ties with Israel, experts push for more divestment

Norway divesting from companies aiding Israel in Gaza war, occupied territories, could cause ‘Israeli occupation to crumble’: Oxfam

Leila Nezirevic |18.09.2024

Amnesty International demands governments, companies ‘take responsibility,’ calls for immediate cessation of military equipment exports to Israel

LONDON

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled in an advisory opinion in July that the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory is unlawful and must end as soon as possible and that third countries must do nothing to aid or assist that occupation.

Norway's $1.7 trillion wealth fund may have to divest shares of companies that have provided Israel with weapons and other military equipment used in its attacks on Gaza after its ethics council sent a letter on Aug. 30 to the Finance Ministry explaining the recently expanded definition of unethical corporate behavior.

Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM) is responsible for managing the Government Pension Fund of Norway, the world's largest sovereign wealth fund, which holds shares in more than 8,700 companies worldwide. As of the end of June, it owned stock in 77 Israeli companies valued at about $1.5 billion and corresponding to 0.1% of its total investments, according to recent reports.

Based on the recommendation of the Council on Ethics, nine companies have already been excluded from the fund because of activities related to the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

The first exclusion was back in 2009, "so this is by no means a new topic for the Council or for the fund," the Council’s Chair, Svein Richard Brandtzaeg, said in an interview with Anadolu.

"This is a constant and ongoing effort by the Council. As stated in the letter, we have already recommended the exclusion of one company in addition to the nine that are currently excluded. There may also be some additional recommendations arising from this issue in the time ahead.

"We are considering companies’ possible involvement in the occupation of the OPT (Occupied Palestinian Territory) and in the settlements. We are also looking into companies’ sales of weapons used in Gaza," Brandtzaeg added.

Gerald Folkvord, political adviser at Amnesty International Norway, spoke to Anadolu about the role of the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund "in financing crimes under international law in the Palestinian territory," both regarding arms "fueling the Gaza war and Israel’s unlawful economic exploitation of the occupied West Bank."

"I’m not sure whether the recent statement by the petrol fund’s ethics council really means there will be substantial changes, but of course we hope so. They refer to the advisory judgement by the ICJ, which is promising," said Folkvord.

However, he noted that even before the judgements, the fund was aware that the Israeli settlements in the West Bank were unlawful.

"Still the fund has been investing in many companies contributing to them," he said.

Folkvord hopes that the horrendous death toll in Gaza and in the West Bank will get both "the petrol fund and the Norwegian government to rethink."

Since Israel launched its brutal war on Oct. 7 last year, nearly 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, most of them women and children, while over 95,000 others are injured, according to Gaza’s local health authorities.

Folkvord highlighted the fund's significant influence as the largest public investment fund globally, which could pressure other investors to avoid companies involved in international law violations.

He stressed the need for governments and companies to take responsibility for their roles in these violations and called for the immediate cessation of military equipment exports to Israel.

"It is very clear that if Norway invests money in a company that contributes to war crimes, Norway is also part of that problem, and that cannot be acceptable," he said.

According to Folkvord, the fund is invested in several companies that are blacklisted by the United Nations because they directly or indirectly contribute to violations of the law in the West Bank.

"If the United States and Germany and other countries say we just keep on providing equipment to Israel, and if the Norwegian oil fund says we keep on financing the companies whose equipment is being used, then there is no incentive for the Israeli authorities to stop their serious crimes they are committing every day," he warned.

Israeli occupation will crumble

Martin Butcher, Oxfam’s policy advisor on arms, conflict and international humanitarian law, in an interview with Anadolu emphasized the importance of the Arms Trade Treaty in preventing arms sales to countries committing war crimes and crimes against humanity.

In his opinion, the more wealth funds and private investors withdraw money from arms companies or any other kind of company, the less easy they will find it to conduct their operations.

"So with the situation of the occupation, if companies can no longer get investment, then the occupation will crumble," Butcher added.

Israel cannot maintain the occupation "without investment from countries like Norway, without businesses from the United States or from the UK," he pointed out.

He listed several companies potentially affected by the divestments, including General Electric, British Aerospace and Hewlett Packard.

Apart from companies that sell weapons to Tel Aviv, there are many other businesses that are involved "in the Israeli apartheid wall," including tech companies like Hewlett Packard, which assists Israel in maintaining the data systems that are essential for keeping border controls and the occupation running.

According to Butcher, these companies would find it difficult to sell shares, to raise loans, and they could increasingly find it impossible to do business with Israel because of the ruling of the Council of Ethics.

Western hypocrisy

The International Court of Justice has ruled that there is a plausible risk of genocide in Gaza, and war crimes and crimes against humanity are also being committed, yet Israel continues to receive arms imports from around the world, primarily from the United States, but also from countries such as Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK.

Butcher criticized the hypocrisy of Western states in upholding international humanitarian law while arming Israel.

"We’re seeing absolute hypocrisy from many states when it comes to their declarations about international law, and particularly international humanitarian law, the laws of war.

"We have seen a huge outcry from Western states about Russian actions in Ukraine and the destruction of civilian infrastructure and the killing of civilians. Yeah, there that outcry is absolutely justified.

"But at the same time, Western states continue to arm Israel, to give financial assistance to Israel, to protect Israel at the United Nations, and to refuse to do anything to uphold international humanitarian law in Gaza," he pointed out.

Currently, several court cases are being held as non-governmental organizations are taking governments to court to get them to act on their legal obligations. For instance, the Dutch courts ruled months ago that the Netherlands could not send parts and components to Israel for F-35 fighter aircraft, while the UK is in the middle of a court case and has just been forced to act to restrict supplies of arms to Israel.

"So we're seeing incredibly, increasingly, citizens taking action against their governments to get them to obey international law, and it's really shameful that we have to do that," said Butcher.

Iconic Food Storage Brand Tupperware Files For Bankruptcy In The US | Here's Why

Despite sales booming during the pandemic, the company raised "substantial doubt" about its ability to keep its operations going.

Outlook Web Desk
Updated on: 18 September 2024

Tupperware Files For Bankruptcy In The US | Photo: AP

Iconic food storage brand Tupperware has officially filed for bankruptcy. The beloved food storage brand filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States after a drastic drop in its demand.

Despite sales booming in the pandemic, the company raised "substantial doubt" about its ability to keep its operations going.

"Over the last several years, the company's financial position has been severely impacted by the challenging macroeconomic environment," said Laurie Ann Goldman, the president and CEO of Tupperware in an official statement.

Tupperware Was 'Trying To Revive' Since 2020

The kitchenware company witnessed a short-lived demand during the COVID-19 pandemic due to the lockdown lifestyle and uptick in home cooking.

However, as the pandemic ended, Tupperware noted a spike in raw material costs and increased labour and freight costs, further making a hole in the company's margins.

After filing for bankruptcy, Tupperware shared it will seek court approval to continue operations during its bankruptcy proceedings and a sale process to protect its brand.

For the past four years, your favourite kitchenware brand has been trying to revive its sales. However, Tupperware reported a fall in sales for six successive quarters since the third quarter of 2021.

One of the reasons for this was the impact of inflation on its low and mid-income consumer base.

Origins Of Tupperware

Tupperware's history goes back to 1946, shortly after the Great Depression. The kitchenware brand came into existence after chemist Earl Tupper "had a spark of inspiration while creating moulds at a plastics factory."

The brand went on to create entrepreneurial opportunities for women and was sold in over 100 countries for the past seven decades.

Sri Lanka's plantation workers live on the margins. But politicians still want their votes

Published: 18 Sep 2024 - 10:26 am | Last Updated: 18 Sep 2024 - 10:35 am

In this photograph taken on September 2, 2024, tea pickers listen to Palani Shakthivel, national organiser of the Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC), at a village in Hatton.

Photo by Ishara S. KODIKARA / AFP.

Spring Valley, Sri Lanka: Whoever Sri Lanka's next president is, Muthuthevarkittan Manohari isn't expecting much to change in her daily struggle to feed the four children and elderly mother with whom she lives in a dilapidated room in a tea plantation.

Both leading candidates in Saturday's presidential election are promising to give land to the country's hundreds of thousands of plantation workers, but Manohari says she's heard it all before.

Sri Lanka's plantation workers are a long-marginalized group who frequently live in dire poverty, but they can swing elections by voting as a bloc.

Mahohari and her family are descended from Indian indentured laborers who were brought in by the British during colonial rule to work on plantations that grew first coffee, and later tea and rubber.

Those crops are still Sri Lanka's leading foreign exchange earners.

For 200 years, the community has lived on the margins of Sri Lankan society.

Soon after the country became independent in 1948, the new government stripped them of citizenship and voting rights.

Around 400,000 people were deported to India under an agreement with Delhi, separating many families.

The community fought for its rights, winning in stages until achieving full recognition as citizens in 2003.

There are around 1.5 million descendants of plantation workers living in Sri Lanka today, including about 3.5% of the electorate, and some 470,000 people still live on plantations.

The plantation community has the highest levels of poverty, malnutrition, anaemia among women and alcoholism in the country, and some of the lowest levels of education.

They're an important voting bloc, turned out by unions that double as political parties that ally with the country's major parties.

Despite speaking the Tamil language, they’re treated as a distinct group from the island’s indigenous Tamils, who live mostly in the north and east.

Still, they suffered during the 26-year civil war between government forces and Tamil Tiger separatists.

Plantation workers and their descendants faced mob violence, arrests and imprisonment because of their ethnicity.

Most plantation workers live in crowded dwellings called "line houses,” owned by plantation companies.

Tomoya Obokata, a U.N. special rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, said after a visit in 2022 that five to ten people often share a single 10-by-12-foot (3.05-by-3.6 meter) room, often without windows, a proper kitchen, running water or electricity. Several families frequently share a single basic latrine.

There are no proper medical facilities in the plantations, and the sick are attended to by so-called estate medical assistants who do not have medical degrees.

"These substandard living conditions, combined with the harsh working conditions, represent clear indicators of forced labour and may also amount to serfdom in some instances,” Obokata wrote in a report to the U.N. high commissioner for human rights.

The government has made some efforts to improve conditions for the planation workers, but years of fiscal crisis and the resistance of powerful plantation companies have blunted progress.

Access to education has improved, and a small group of entrepreneurs, professionals and academics descended from planation workers has emerged.

This year, the government negotiated a raise in the minimum daily wage for a plantation worker to 1,350 rupees ($4.50) per day, plus an additional dollar if a worker picks more than 22 kilos in a day.

Workers say this target is almost impossible to achieve, in part because tea bushes are often neglected and grow sparsely.

The government has built better houses for some families and the Indian government is helping to build more, said Periyasamy Muthulingam, executive director of Sri Lanka's Institute of Social Development, which works on plantation worker rights.

But many promises have gone unfulfilled. "All political parties have promised to build better houses during elections but they don’t implement it when they are in power,” Muthulingam said.

Muthulingam says more than 90% of the planation community is landless because they have been left out of the government's land distribution programs.

In this election, sitting President Ranil Wickremesinghe standing as an independent candidate has promised to give the line houses and the land they stand on to the people who live in them, and help develop them into villages.

The main opposition candidate, Sajith Premadasa, has promised to break up the plantations and distribute the land to the workers as small holdings.

Both proposals will face resistance from the plantation companies.

Manohari says she's not holding out hope.

She's more concerned with what's going to happen to her 16-year-old son after he was forced to drop out of school due to lack of funds.

"The union leaders come every time promising us houses and land and I would like to have them," she said. "But they never happen as promised.”

China opens 12 nuclear research facilities to global scientists

China will open 12 nuclear research facilities and testing platforms to international scientists and institutions to enhance global cooperation, a senior Chinese official said here on Monday, Xinhua reports.

These include the China Advanced Research Reactor, the new-generation tokamak device Huanliu-3, and the Beishan Underground Research Laboratory, Liu Jing, vice chairman of the China Atomic Energy Authority (CAEA), said at a meeting on the sidelines of the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) annual general conference.

The facilities span areas such as basic nuclear research, isotope production, nuclear environment simulation, equipment testing, and radioactive waste treatment and disposal.

Monday's meeting, themed "Share for Development," was organized by the CAEA to promote international cooperation in nuclear technology research and development, as China marks the 40th anniversary of its accession to the IAEA.

Yu Jianfeng, chairman of China National Nuclear Corporation, said at the event that the company aims to deepen cooperation with the IAEA and expand international collaboration. He expressed hope that opening China's nuclear research facilities will contribute to advancing nuclear technology globally.

IAEA's Deputy Director General Mikhail Chudakov commended China's remarkable achievements in nuclear energy development and highlighted the long-standing, fruitful relationship between the IAEA and the CAEA.

Welcoming China's decision to open up more of its nuclear research and development facilities, Chudakov said the move will further strengthen the agency's technical capacity to support its member states.

On Monday evening, the CAEA and China's permanent mission to the United Nations (UN) and other international organizations in Vienna jointly held a reception at the UN headquarters in Vienna to celebrate the 40th anniversary of China's accession to the IAEA. More than 200 participants, including IAEA representatives and foreign envoys to Vienna, attended the event.

Li Song, China's permanent representative to the UN and other international organizations in Vienna, said at the reception that China and the IAEA have expanded practical cooperation and jointly promoted the development of nuclear energy over the past 40 years.

China, he said, will continue to strengthen collaboration with the IAEA and its member states to address emerging challenges in international security, safeguard the global non-proliferation regime, and promote the use of nuclear energy and technology for the benefit of the Global South.

At the reception, Liu, Li and IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi jointly unveiled a bronze statue of Qian Sanqiang, a renowned Chinese nuclear physicist and one of the founders of China's nuclear industry.

The statue, donated by China, will be permanently displayed at the IAEA headquarters, alongside sculptures of Polish-French physicist Marie Curie and other prominent figures who have made significant contributions to the peaceful use of nuclear energy.

Saving the Aral Sea: Central Asian states debate transboundary water use

Kazakh Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov met with the heads of the delegations of the member states of the 1st meeting of the Executive Board of the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea (IFAS) chaired by Kazakhstan, Kazinform News Agency reports referring to the Government’s press service.

The meeting focused on the joint use of transboundary water resources and further measures to tackle ecological and socioeconomic issues in the Aral Sea basin.

Kazakhstan assumed the chairmanship over the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea (IFAS) in 2042-2026.

The Prime Minister said Heads of State pay great attention to water sector issues. The Kazakh President prioritized the saving of the Aral Sea in long-term international cooperation. The Fund’s main task is the complex and rational use, and protection of water and energy resources of Central Asia given their socioeconomic, energy, irrigation and environmental significance.

He stressed despite the measures taken regarding the deficit of water resources in the Aral Sea basin growing due to climate change as well, the Fund should consolidate the efforts of the concerned states.

The Kazakh Prime Minister highlighted the role of regional cooperation institution and defined the top priorities of the Fund set by the Heads of State of the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea (IFAS).

The International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea (IFAS) was founded in 1993 by five Central Asian countries, including Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. Its goal is to unite the countries' efforts to mitigate the impacts of the Aral Sea crisis on the environment and population. The Fund finances joint interstate ecological and scientific programs and projects.

As earlier reported, Kazakh Ecology and Natural Resources Minister Yerlan Nyssanbayev suggested building an international center for the afforestation of the dried bottom of the Aral Sea and semidesert areas at the V Meeting of the Heads of Environmental Protection Ministries and Agencies of the SCO member states.

US Senate hearing exposes deep bias as Arab activist faces vile attacks

During hearing on rise in hate crimes, Republican Senator John Kennedy tells Maya Berry, Executive Director of the Arab American Institute, she "should hide her head in a bag," an expression epitomising hostile atmosphere of hearing.

Zahra Yarali
TRT/AA

Supporters of the Palestinian cause advocate for the passage of the Wadee Act.

Photo: TRT World

During a US Congressional hearing that was designed to counter the unprecedented increase in hate crimes nationwide, an American Senator John Kennedy (R-LA) attacked an Arab American community advocate, shedding light on the overarching attitude of the Senate to suppress Palestinian-American voices.

The hearing, held on Tuesday in Washington, DC, took place in the shadow of Israel's war on Gaza and was supposed to explore the wave of hate-fuelled violence sweeping the nation.

Instead, it devolved into political mudslinging, with Republican lawmakers targeting Arab American advocates and derailing discussions meant to provide accountability and justice.

One of the most glaring omissions during the hearing was the failure to acknowledge Wadea Al Fayoume, the 6-year-old Palestinian-American boy, who was brutally murdered in Illinois last year in what has been recognised as a hate crime.

Wadea's mother, Hanan Shaheen, was among the attendees, alongside prominent figures like Yaqeen Institute founder Dr Omar Suleiman and emergency physician Dr Thaer Ahmad.

However, the killing of her son, who was stabbed 26 times, was conspicuously absent from the discussion.

"I was surprised that these Republican Congress folks could not even muster up the compassion to offer a word of condolence," Dr Omar Suleiman told TRT World in an interview after the hearing.

"[It] was extremely telling of the cruelty, the callousness, the apathy that exists in the halls of Congress today, especially as it relates to Palestinian life. I was particularly disgusted to be honest with you."

'You support Hamas'

Instead of discussing Wadea's death or the uptick in anti-Arab and anti-Muslim hate crimes, Republican senators used the hearing as a platform to attack Maya Berry, Executive Director of the Arab American Institute, who was the sole Arab witness called to testify.

Senator Kennedy began by reading her biography, which noted her advocacy for Arab and Middle Eastern causes in the US, before launching into a series of inflammatory and unfounded accusations.

He asked Berry, "You support Hamas, do you not?"

Following up with similarly loaded questions about her supposed support for Hezbollah, Kennedy’s line of questioning represented the kind of anti-Arab sentiment that Palestinian Americans had come to fear from this hearing.

Berry handled the attacks with composure, responding to Kennedy's provocations by saying, "Oddly enough, I’m going to say thank you for that question. It demonstrates the purpose of our hearing today."

She denied any support for Hamas and quickly shifted focus back to the real issue: "You asking that question very much puts focus on the issue of hate in our country."

But the attacks did not stop there. At one point, Kennedy even told Berry that she "should hide her head in a bag," an expression that epitomised the hostile atmosphere of the hearing.

Wadee Act introduced

Throughout the second half of the hearing, Republican senators, including Ted Cruz (R-TX), Josh Cornyn (R-TX), and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), took turns deriding Berry and Arab Americans.

Instead of focusing on the very real hate crimes that had brought Shaheen and others to testify, the senators shifted the conversation to free speech policies on college campuses, criticising student protests against Israel's actions in Gaza.

Asked how the concept of political violence became so warped in today's senate hearing, Suleiman responded, "Because it's American exceptionalism, right? America sees what happens to it, not what it does. [It sees] what happens to a very specific part of it and not to the whole of it. And we've never been a part of America."

Despite the disappointment of many attendees, there was one small legislative victory that came out of the hearing: the introduction of the Wadee Act in both chambers of Congress.

The Act, named in honour of Wadea Al Fayoume, aims to address the rise in hate crimes against Arab and Muslim communities.

Dr Suleiman called it a "success," but emphasised that this was just one step in a long fight for justice.

"It requires people to simply insist that they will not be intimidated into silence, and we will not allow our land, our identity, our cause to disappear without us being visible [and] without us standing, especially with those that have unfortunately faced the brunt of this hatred."

SOURCE: TRT World

Historic US hate crimes hearing overshadowed by senator's 'extremism' on Muslim advocate

Senator John Kennedy's accusation of extremism against a leading Muslim civil rights advocate at a senate hearing has faced strong backlash from rights groups.

Brooke Anderson
18 September, 2024

At a US hate crimes hearing, a prominent activist faced intense questioning by US Senator John Kennedy (pictured) regarding Hamas and student protests in support of Gaza. [Getty]

A historic US congressional hearing on the proliferation of hate crime in the US was overshadowed by a series of questions seemingly accusing an Arab speaker of supporting Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran.

At the centre of the hearing was the case of Wadea Al-Fayoumi, a 6-year-old Palestinian boy from Plainfield, Illinois near Chicago, who was stabbed to death by his family's landlord 11 months ago, reportedly because of his background.

In his remarks, Senator Dick Durban of Illinois, who was chairing the hearing, pointed to the danger by white supremacists in the US.

"Since 2000, according to federal law enforcement, white supremacists have been responsible for more homicides than any other domestic extremist group," he said, adding that public figures have a responsibility to not incite hatred.

However, by the end of the hearing, the focus on cases such as that Al-Fayoumi were had been overshadowed by an unusual line of questioning of one of the speakers.

Republican US Senator John Kennedy accused a leading Muslim civil rights advocate, Arab American Institute Executive Director Maya Berry, of supporting extremism during a Senate hearing on hate incidents in the US, drawing criticism from many rights groups.

"You support Hamas, do you not?" Kennedy told Berry, who replied by saying: "You asking the executive director of the Arab American Institute that question very much puts the focus on the issue of hate in our country."

In a follow-up question, the senator asked, "You support Hezbollah, too, don't you?" He later told her, "You should hide your head in a bag."

Berry repeatedly said in her responses that she did not support those groups, and added that she found the line of questioning "extraordinarily disappointing."

Hamas, which carried out a deadly 7 Oct. attack on Israel, and Hezbollah are both designated as "foreign terrorist organisations" by the US government.

Multiple rights advocates denounced Senator Kennedy.

"It is absolutely reprehensible that a US senator would weaponise the racial identity of a witness and accuse her of supporting terrorism by using an anti-Arab and anti-Muslim trope in a hearing meant to tackle precisely that kind of bigotry," Council on American Islamic Relations Government Affairs Director Robert McCaw told news agency Reuters.

"This harassment is alarming," Muslim American advocacy group Engage Action said.

James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, who attended Tuesday's hearing, told The New Arab that he thought Berry's answers were "masterful."

"Maya didn't take the bait. She focused on the broader issues after she was asked demeaning questions. She remained on the high ground," he said.

"In the end, Senator Kennedy provided her with the opportunity to respond, and she scored the final point with her ability to turn the tables on him," he added.

Despite widespread praise for Berry's responses by advocacy groups, Zogby pointed to a more concerning aspect to Berry's exchange with Kennedy, which is the possibility that his comments may have now exposed her to public threats against her, the very reason many advocates felt the need to convene such a hearing.

The Democratic-led Senate Judiciary Committee, which organised Tuesday's hearing, also condemned the senator and called Berry's response to him "powerful."

Rights advocates have warned about rising threats against American Muslims, Arabs and Jews since the eruption of Israel's war on Gaza.

US incidents in recent months include the attempted drowning of a 3-year-old Muslim girl in Texas, the fatal stabbing of a 6-year-old Muslim boy in Illinois, the stabbing of a Muslim man in Texas, the beating of a Muslim man in New York, threats of violence against Jews at Cornell University that led to a conviction and sentencing, and an unsuccessful plot to attack a New York City Jewish centre.

Finland's Stubb calls for UN Security Council reform amid Russia-Ukraine conflict

Finland's President calls for UN Security Council reform, veto abolition, and suspension of members in 'illegal wars'

By REUTERS

SEPTEMBER 18, 2024

Finland's President Alexander Stubb attends the European Political Community meeting at the Blenheim Palace near Oxford, Britain July 18, 2024.

(photo credit: REUTERS/HOLLIE ADAMS)

Finland's President Alexander Stubb has called for expansion of the UN Security Council, abolition of its single state veto power, and suspension of any member engaging in an "illegal war" such as Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Stubb, who leads the Nordic nation's foreign policy, said he would support reform calls at next week's UN General Assembly in New York, which will discuss the composition of the global body's Security Council.

The council, which consists of five permanent and then rotating member states, is mandated to maintain global peace. Still, geopolitical rivalries have deadlocked it on issues ranging from Ukraine to Gaza.

In an interview on Tuesday, Stubb said he would propose expanding the number of permanent members from five to 10, with one more from Latin America, two from Africa, and two from Asia.

"No single state should have veto power in the UN Security Council," he told Reuters.

The US, Russia, China, France, and Britain are among five nations with veto power. It has also backed two permanent seats for Africa.

Delegates react to the voting results during the United Nations General Assembly vote on a draft resolution that would recognize the Palestinians as qualified to become a full UN member, in New York City, US May 10, 2024. (credit: Eduardo Munoz/Reuters)

Stubb said any member engaging in an illegal war, "such as Russia is in right now in Ukraine," should be kicked off.

Moscow has justified its invasion of Ukraine by saying it is creating a buffer against Western aggression and taking territory that is historically Russia's.
Backing Ukraine

Stubb said he knew his Security Council proposals were "beyond what is usually said from small member states" but added that the big nations would otherwise not propose weakening their own influence.

"So they talk the talk but don't walk the walk," he said, hoping others would help take the plan forward by the UN's 80th birthday next year.

Any changes to Security Council membership need approval by two-thirds of the General Assembly, including the five veto powers.

"My basic message is that if countries from the global South, Latin America, Africa, and Asia do not get agency in the system, they will turn their backs on the United Nations. And that we do not want," he said.

The former Finnish prime minister and European parliamentarian, who took office in March as president, urged support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who will address the UN assembly about his "victory plan.

"He has informed us that 90% is already there, and the 10% that he will present is what will be needed for him to win this war," Stubb said.

He urged Western nations to lift restrictions on the use of donated arms that leave Ukraine "with one hand tied behind its back."

"We need to let that hand go and allow Ukraine to do what Russia is doing to it," he said.

Stubb did not give credence to Russian President Vladimir Putin's threats of nuclear escalation. "Last time we saw Putin using aggressive language on nuclear weapons, the global South and China basically told Putin to stop," he said.

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