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WASHINGTON, Dec 1, bdnews24.com/Reuters) - US President Barack Obama's decision on a new strategy for the war in Afghanistan carries political peril as his Democratic Party gears up for tough midterm congressional elections next year. Obama will unveil the strategy on Tuesday in an address from the West Point military academy. He will significantly bolster US troop levels in Afghanistan and may also outline an exit strategy for the conflict. Republicans have urged Obama to take decisive action, while many Democrats have expressed serious doubts, making a delicate balancing act for a president already battling to deliver on his political promises. WHAT IS AT STAKE? Obama must decide whether to grant a request by his top Afghan commander, Army General Stanley McChrystal, for as many as 40,000 more U.S. troops or to side with more cautious advisers who favor a smaller deployment of 10,000 to 20,000 additional troops and a greater role for Afghan forces. Influential voices in Obama's Cabinet, including Defense Secretary Robert Gates as well as military chiefs, favor a US troop increase of 30,000 or more, and the final number could reach 35,000 once US trainers are factored in. The decision is critical for the future of the US-led war in Afghanistan, where 68,000 US soldiers already anchor a multinational force of about 110,000 troops battling resurgent Taliban militants. Part of a broader campaign against al Qaeda, the conflict carries risks for neighboring countries such as nuclear-armed Pakistan as well as for US allies such as Britain, where public support for the war is flagging. It could also imperil Obama's domestic agenda from healthcare to climate change as politicians in Washington and the voters who put them there weigh the wisdom of a costly US campaign in a country long known as "the graveyard of empires." WHAT DO AMERICANS THINK? Opinion polls show Americans -- exhausted by the long war in Iraq and their own economic problems -- are deeply divided on Afghanistan. A recent Washington Post-ABC News poll found 46 percent of Americans supported a large influx of troops to fight insurgents and train the Afghan military, while 45 percent favored sending a smaller number of troops. The poll showed 48 percent of Americans disapproved of how Obama was handling Afghanistan, against 45 percent who approved. Most worrisome for Democrats, approval among independents -- swing voters who helped put Obama in the White House in 2008 -- fell to a new low of 39 percent. Doubts over Afghanistan coincide with widespread concern among Americans over high unemployment, huge government bailout programs, a rising federal budget deficit and a divisive debate over reforming the expensive healthcare system. The anti-incumbent mood could cut into Democrats' legislative majorities in November 2010, when all 435 seats in the House of Representatives and a third of the seats in the 100-member Senate are up for election. HOW ARE DEMOCRATS REACTING? Many liberal Democrats oppose a major escalation of involvement in a conflict they no longer see as central to U.S. security. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, an advocate for other Obama initiatives such as healthcare reform, spoke out against upping the ante in Afghanistan, calling Afghan President Hamid Karzai an "unworthy partner" tainted by corruption who does not merit more U.S. aid. Other top Democrats have urged Obama to outline what the U.S. "exit strategy" will be for Afghanistan. McChrystal, in a briefing to a delegation of U.S. lawmakers last week, suggested the U.S. troop presence could begin to diminish after a post-surge peak by 2013, while an international conference on Afghanistan set for London in January would aim to set conditions for a gradual transfer of security responsibility to Afghan control. Several veteran Democratic lawmakers have proposed a "war tax" -- almost unthinkable in an election year -- on the richest Americans to pay for the conflict. Democrats hope that by reining in Obama on Afghanistan, they can prevent the party from becoming too closely associated with an unpopular war with no clear path to victory. They also hope to regain some credibility as fiscal managers by hitting the brakes on war spending that could rise by $30 billion to $40 billion per year. WHAT DO REPUBLICANS SAY? For Republicans, Obama's Afghanistan quandary has been an opportunity to showcase their traditionally strong views on national security and highlight what some portray as indecisiveness on the part of the Democratic president. Former Vice President Dick Cheney told a conservative talk radio host that Obama's three-month review of the options in Afghanistan had taken too long. "The delay is not cost-free," Cheney said. "Every day that goes by raises doubts in the minds of our friends in the region what you're going to do, raises doubts in the minds of the troops." Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell urged Obama to "keep the pressure on" the Taliban, while 14 House Republicans sent Obama a letter endorsing McChrystal's request for 40,000 more troops. Republicans hope the debate will show them as vigilant against threats to the United States and win back voters in swing districts who have grown disillusioned with Obama. Democrats say Republicans are trying to distract Americans from the failure to defeat the Taliban in seven years of military operations under former President George W. Bush, who committed far greater forces to his war in Iraq.

China urged rich nations on Wednesday to sign up to tougher 2020 targets to cut carbon emissions, as U.N.-led negotiations intensify on a broader climate pact meant to rein in the pace of global warming. An official with China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said rich nations must commit to cutting emissions by 25-40 percent by 2020 as well as ramp up funding for developing countries. The comments come as Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives neared an agreement on Tuesday on a climate-change bill that they expected to approve soon. Democrats had agreed to an emissions reduction target of 17 percent by 2020 from 2005 levels, said House Energy Committee chairman Henry Waxman. The NDRC official said China, the world's top emitter of planet-warming greenhouse gases, wanted to commit to emissions reductions in certain industries but was still figuring out how to do this. "The success of Copenhagen needs strengthened and deeper cuts and more aggressive targets from developed countries," said Li Liyan, deputy head of the Climate Change Office of the NDRC, China's chief economic planning agency. Delegates from about 200 nations meet in the Danish capital Copenhagen at the end of the year to try to agree on a broader climate pact to replace the Kyoto Protocol, whose first phase ends in 2012. Developing nations want rich countries to sign up to deeper emissions cuts than under Kyoto and also want pledges of greater funding to help poorer nations adapt to climate change and pay for clean-energy technology to help them move to lower-carbon economies. CALL FOR CASH A U.N. panel of scientists has said rich nations needed to cut emissions between 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 to avoid the worst of global warming. Asked by Reuters if China would commit to specific reduction targets from certain industries, Li told a conference in Beijing "we want to, we just don't know how to do it yet". China was also proposing to establish a specific financing mechanism for the transfer of green energy technology and funding for climate change adaptation for poorer nations, Li said. In a submission to the United Nations last month meant to guide the ongoing climate negotiations, China called for the creation of a U.N. body to pursue urgent action on adaptation. The head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat said on Tuesday rich nations have outlined "encouraging" cuts in greenhouse gas emissions so far but the United States and others might be able to make tougher curbs. "One of the main points from now on is to see how ... far the level of ambition can be increased," Yvo de Boer told Reuters. He said the marathon climate negotiations ahead of Copenhagen will get a spur from May 18, when a first draft negotiating text is due to be published. The text will sum up submissions from governments in recent weeks. Australia said last week it would commit to a 25 percent cut by 2020 from 2000 levels if the world agrees to an ambitious deal to stabilise CO2 levels in the atmosphere at 450 parts per million or less by 2050. The European Union has backed cuts of 20 percent from 1990 levels by 2020 and would raise this to 30 percent if other nations joined in. The next round of U.N. climate talks is in Bonn from June 1-12 at which rich nations are expected to press big developing nations to back national efforts to curb the growth of their emissions. China's total power generating capacity rose by more than 250 percent from 2000-2008 to reach 792.5 gigawatts. On present growth rates, China is projected to overtake the United States as the world's top power producer by 2015. While a large portion of China's energy comes from burning coal, the government has also embraced large-scale use of renewable energy such as wind and hydro.

These days he lives in a camp for displaced people in Herat province, with his surviving teenage daughter. They are cold, hungry and cannot meet their basic needs, according to a new report on climate migration in South Asia. "Increasingly, people in Afghanistan are being displaced not by conflict but by the impacts of climate change," said Massoud Eiman of the Tadbeer Consulting and Research Organisation in Afghanistan. "It is an untold story and many families, like Ali’s, are suffering, living in limbo without protection, and struggling to get by," he added in a statement on the report published by the Climate Action Network South Asia and charity ActionAid. Now those forced from their homes by weather-related disasters in impoverished, war-ravaged Afghanistan - about 1.2 million people at the end of 2019 - must also contend with the threat of the novel coronavirus. Since the outbreak began, Afghanistan has registered more than 3,600 cases and over 100 deaths from COVID-19. Eiman said infection rates were likely much higher - including among displaced people - than low levels of testing might suggest. Before the pandemic, he visited several camps in Herat, bordering virus-slammed Iran, where he saw people living more than 10 to a small tent without clean drinking water, healthcare or sanitation. "Social distancing cannot be properly observed and due to lack of access to adequate food, health services and proper shelter... risk of infection by coronavirus is higher among the displaced people," he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by email. Migration experts are worried that the COVID-19 respiratory disease could spread quickly in crowded, unhygienic camps and also in centres where people shelter to stay safe in storms or floods, or because their homes have been destroyed. OUT IN THE COLD Justin Ginnetti, head of data and analysis at the Geneva-based Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), said there were already examples - from the Philippines to North America - of people being turfed out of shelters or governments not opening evacuation centres due to coronavirus concerns. "People who are fleeing disaster hazards are either having to sleep outdoors or being sent back home to vulnerable conditions," he said. Figures issued last month by the IDMC showed that, in 2019, wild weather forced about 24 million people from their homes, either temporarily or for longer periods. That included 4.5 million who fled Cyclone Fani in India and Bangladesh, cyclones Idai and Kenneth in Mozambique and Hurricane Dorian in the Bahamas. Ginnetti and others warned that such pressures are likely to increase as large parts of the Americas and Asia face the onset from June of hurricane and cyclone seasons, as well as the monsoon in South Asia. Alex Randall, who coordinates the Climate and Migration Coalition, said that in 2020, strategies to protect people from weather disasters by moving them could clash with virus lockdowns or travel curbs, causing confusion, tensions and even violence. Evacuating people on shared transport could expose them to infection, as could putting them up in community facilities like sports centres or schools, he told a recent webinar on the challenges. "Some countries that suffer the worst impacts of climate change will encounter a situation where it is those climate change impacts and the displacement (they) create which additionally hampers them in preventing the spread of COVID-19," he said. NO SOCIAL PROTECTION Harjeet Singh, global climate lead for ActionAid, said South Asia's upcoming monsoon season would be extremely tough, with most humanitarian agencies yet to work out a plan for how to respond alongside a pandemic. In India, for example, there has been an exodus of migrant workers from cities who lost their jobs due to COVID-19 lockdowns and had no option but to head back to their villages, some walking hundreds of kilometres to get there. They and their families now face monsoon floods and cyclones with very little money in reserve and slim chances of finding work in stagnant rural economies, said Delhi-based Singh. Meanwhile, governments at national and state level have lost large chunks of their revenues during the shutdown and may not be in a financial position to provide emergency relief as usual, he noted. Singh said the COVID-19 crisis had exposed the tenuous situation of poor migrants who move to cities in search of work, increasingly because severe droughts or frequent floods back home make it impossible to survive off their land. "Migration cannot be seen just as an adaptation strategy because they are not living in a safe (urban) environment where they are getting access to basic services, security and protection," he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Government measures were needed both to provide migrants with essentials like food, education and shelter, and to help farmers and rural communities become more resilient to climate change so they do not have to leave, Singh added. "COVID-19 is a reality check," he said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is demanding foreign buyers pay for Russian gas in roubles from Friday or else have their supplies cut, a move European capitals rejected and which Berlin said amounted to "blackmail". Putin’s move, via a decree signed on Thursday, leaves Europe facing the prospect of losing more than a third of its gas supply. Germany, the most heavily reliant on Russia, has already activated an emergency plan that could lead to rationing in Europe's biggest economy. Energy exports are Putin's most powerful lever as he tries to hit back against sweeping Western sanctions imposed on Russian banks, companies, businessmen and associates of the Kremlin in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Moscow calls its Ukraine action a "special military operation". In televised remarks, Putin said buyers of Russian gas "must open rouble accounts in Russian banks. It is from these accounts that payments will be made for gas delivered starting from tomorrow," or April 1. "If such payments are not made, we will consider this a default on the part of buyers, with all the ensuing consequences. Nobody sells us anything for free, and we are not going to do charity either - that is, existing contracts will be stopped," he said. It was not immediately clear whether in practice there might still be a way for foreign firms to continue payment without using roubles, which the European Union and G7 group of states have ruled out. His decision to enforce rouble payments has boosted the Russian currency, which fell to historic lows after the Feb. 24 invasion. The rouble has since recovered much lost ground. Western companies and governments have rejected any move to change their gas supply contracts to change the payment currency. Most European buyers use euros. Executives say it would take months or longer to renegotiate terms. Payment in roubles would also blunt the impact of Western curbs on Moscow's access to its foreign exchange reserves. Meanwhile, European states have been racing to secure alternative supplies, but with the global market already tight, they have few options. The United States has offered more of its liquefied natural gas (LNG) but not enough to replace Russia. Germany Economy Minister Robert Habeck said Russia had not been able to divide Europe and said Western allies were determined to not be "blackmailed" by Russia. Berlin said it would continue paying for Russian energy imports in euros. FROZEN PAYMENTS France's economy minister Bruno Le Maire said France and Germany were preparing for a possible scenario that Russian gas flows could be halted. Le Maire declined to comment on technical details linked to latest Russian demands for rouble payment. The order signed by Putin creates a mechanism for payments to be made via special foreign currency and rouble accounts at Gazprombank, with the foreign money to be converted into roubles via currency auctions on a Moscow exchange. Putin said the switch would strengthen Russia's sovereignty, saying the Western countries were using the financial system as a weapon, and it made no sense for Russia to trade in dollars and euros when assets in those currencies were being frozen. "What is actually happening, what has already happened? We have supplied European consumers with our resources, in this case gas. They received it, paid us in euros, which they then froze themselves. In this regard, there is every reason to believe that we delivered part of the gas provided to Europe practically free of charge," he said. "That, of course, cannot continue." Putin said Russia still valued its business reputation. "We comply and will continue to comply with obligations under all contracts, including gas contracts, we will continue to supply gas in the prescribed volumes – I want to emphasise this – and at prices specified in existing, long-term contracts," he said. Several European companies with Russian contracts had no immediate comment or did not immediately respond as Putin's announcement sent further shivers through the market. European gas prices have rocketed higher in recent months on mounting tension with Russia raising the risk of recession. Soaring energy prices have already forced companies, including makers of steel and chemicals, to curtail production. Poland's PGNiG, which has a long term contract with Russia's gas pipeline export monopoly Gazprom that expires at the end of this year, had no immediate comment. The Polish Climate Ministry also had no immediate comment. The Polish contract with Gazprom is for 10.2 billion cubic metres of gas a year and is denominated in dollars. Italian energy firm Eni, another major European buyer of Russian gas, also had no comment. It bought around 22.5 bcm of Russian gas in 2020. Its contracts with Gazprom expire in 2035. Germany buyers of Russian gas - Uniper, RWE and EnBW's and VNG - did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

In Bangladesh, water is a matter of life and death. My country is a land of great rivers, vast coastlines and resilient people. But 2020 has been a test for us like no other. In May, cyclone Amphan left a trail of devastation in its path in the south-western parts and then monsoon rains marooned one-third of the country, leaving thousands of people displaced and damaging vast tracts of crops. When water batters through your house, destroying your possessions, leaving pollution and disease in its way, it is tough. It is doubly tough in a year when Covid-19 has struck, making it difficult to access clean water vital for sanitation and pandemic prevention. As I write in Dhaka, the waters of the Brahmaputra and Padma basins are receding. My people are getting their lives back, albeit under the shadow of coronavirus. We are assessing flood defences and providing relief to those affected. As ever, they are drawing up plans to ensure we are better prepared in the future, because in Bangladesh there is always a next time. The climate crisis does not sleep. I want to warn countries that feel they are immune to the climate crisis, to bankers and financiers who feel they can escape it: you cannot. Covid-19 has shown that no country or business can survive alone. Only together can we tackle global crises. It has also demonstrated that prevention is easier than cure. That makes 2020 the year we must commit to listen to scientists. We face a planetary emergency, a triple crisis of climate, health and nature. Biodiversity loss is accelerated by climate change and exacerbates it. Bangladesh is not alone in feeling the wrath of nature. This year fires have raged in the Amazon, Australia, California and Siberia. Cyclones and hurricanes have battered the US, Caribbean and much of Asia. The UK, host of the COP26 climate summit next year, suffered floods. Climate change stems from the lack of sustainability of human activities. We are experiencing floods, rainfalls, cyclones, heatwaves, landslides and droughts in recent years with more fury and intensity, which also endangers food security. We need to recognise their gravity. A metre rise in sea level will inundate numerous small island and coastal nations. Floods from melting glaciers will bring catastrophe to mountainside countries. Millions of people will become climate refugees. The world does not have the capacity to shelter such numbers. G20 countries are responsible for about 80 per cent of emissions while the bottom 100 countries only account for 3.5 per cent. The emitters have greater responsibility and must make larger contributions through the mitigation needed to cap the global temperature rise at 1.5C. As the current president of the Climate Vulnerable Forum, Bangladesh is seeking more support from the international community and the G20 for increased finance and access to technology to speed adaptation for those countries most at risk. In that group, Bangladesh is one of the best prepared for extreme weather. We are building sea walls, planting mangrove forests, embedding resilience in all governmental work. But we cannot walk this journey alone. Sixty-four countries and the EU have this week signed the Pledge for Nature to respond to the planetary emergency. They represent around 1.4bn people and one-quarter of global gross domestic product. From there, we need to build common political will at domestic and global level. As hosts of the next COP, G7 and G20 meetings, the UK and Italy must drive this agenda, which requires a comprehensive support package for hardest hit nations. Business leaders, CEOs, CFOs and investors at all levels have a role to play. You may believe your bottom line is quarterly results. But our common bottom line is far more important: if nature is degraded to the extent it cannot protect us, we will all suffer. What happens in Bangladesh affects stocks in London and New York. No one is immune to sea level rise. The only cure is a systemic shift in government policy and business practice, from high to low carbon, from exploitation of the planet to care. A recent analysis by Vivid Economics of the response to Covid-19 suggests that its impact on climate change has been mixed. I salute the EU for prioritising a green recovery. We plan to do the same in Bangladesh, and I fervently hope my fellow government leaders as well as business leaders will as well. Jobs must be a priority, but so too are the jobs of the future and building solid foundations for decades to come. Climate change, pandemics and the destruction of nature are common threats. They should unite us in working towards a common solution: a cleaner, greener and safer world. As we say in Bangla: “Bhabia korio kaj, koria bhabio na” (think before you do, not after you’ve done), we should not do anything that cannot be reversed.

The Brasilia government signed this week a 35 million reais (11.65 million pounds) agreement with two UN agencies under which they will procure services and items such as tents, generators and security cameras for the stadium, a UN official told Reuters on Wednesday. The contract is one of the clearest signs yet that Brazil is running behind on the construction of stadiums and other key infrastructure for upcoming sporting events. Brasilia is due in June to host the Confederations Cup, widely considered a warm-up to test logistics and prevent any major hiccups at the World Cup, which will take place a year later.The UN's main advantage: It can acquire goods and services without going through the complex and lengthy procurement process required by the Brazilian government.With the Mané Garrincha Stadium only 87 percent complete, and a rapidly approaching April 21 deadline imposed by world football body Fifa for its delivery, time is of the essence."With the short time frame and the need to focus on finishing the stadium, the federal district government was not able to do the procurement on time with public bidding," said Arnaud Peral, the UN Development Programme's deputy representative in Brazil.Some of the temporary structures to be procured by the UN agencies for the Confederations Cup, which pits winners of continental championships against each other, will remain in place for the seven World Cup games that will be played in Brasilia a year later, he said.Boaz Paldi, a UNDP spokesman in New York, said the arrangement with Brazil was "not entirely unprecedented" and the value of the contract could rise.He said the UNDP has helped with past projects related to the Pan-American Games and the agency would gain ‘visibility’ in Brazil due to its participation.A SHOWCASE FOR BRAZILA spokeswoman for Federal District of Brasilia's Governor Agnelo Queiroz said the governor as a rule does not comment on the city's contracts.Brazil hopes the Confederations Cup, World Cup and 2016 Olympic Games will be an opportunity to showcase it status as an emerging power and the world's seventh largest economy.Getting the event off without hitches and on time is such a priority for the President Dilma Rousseff's government that ‘political pressure’ was brought to bear on local authorities in Brasilia to get it right with outside help if necessary, an official source involved in the negotiations said.Brazil has tapped the organisational experience of UN agencies before, for last year's Rio+20 world climate change conference where the UNDP helped to ensure transparency in the procurement process, as well as accessibility for people with disabilities, environmental sustainability and social inclusion.Fifa has warned Brazil that it cannot afford any further delays in getting the venues ready.Brasilia's new 70,000-capacity stadium will be the second-largest venue for the World Cup in 2014. But its roof is not finished, fittings must still be added and the grass has yet to be planted on the pitch.The stadium will be tried out with two test games, the final of the local Brasilia football tournament on May 18 and a second to be played on May 25.

Flood victims in eastern India were eating raw wheat flour to survive as devastating monsoon flooding in South Asia continued to spread misery among millions. Nearly 2,000 people have been killed by snake bites, drowning, diarrhoea and in house collapses since July when swollen rivers burst their banks, inundating huge areas in eastern India and Bangladesh. The toll rose by 74 over the weekend. In India's impoverished state of Bihar, villagers were eating wheat flour after mixing it with water because they could not cook, underlying the inadequacy of government relief efforts, even after weeks of flooding. "My family has been chewing flour soaked in water to survive as we do not have access to firewood to make rotis (bread)," said Genu Sada, 90, in Begusarai district on Sunday. At least 60 bodies were found by authorities since Saturday, pushing the death toll to 480 in Bihar since floods began in mid-July, officials said. Angry at meagre relief supplies, villagers blocked roads on Saturday evening at eight places in the state, demanding more food, witnesses said. "We are doing whatever we can to help the people in crisis," said Satish Chandra Jha, a senior government official. In neighbouring West Bengal state, hundreds of people have turned trucks stranded on highways into makeshift homes. Flood waters have swamped vast areas, making elevated roads points of refuge. "We are sleeping and eating inside the trucks as there is water everywhere and we have nowhere to go," Anukul Samanta, a villager in West Midnapore district, said. In the eastern state of Orissa, at least four villagers have died from water-borne diseases since Saturday, pushing the overall toll to 43 in the state since floods began earlier this month. Water was receding in many places, officials said. Separately, health workers in the state were also struggling to contain a cholera outbreak that has killed 90 people in the past two weeks. At least 4,000 people in 70 villages were sick and efforts were underway to stop the disease from reaching epidemic proportions, officials said. The outbreak in Orissa has been caused by drinking polluted water and eating contaminated meat, they added. Across the border in Bangladesh, hundreds have died over the past few weeks during massive flooding, with thousands of people suffering from diarrhoea. At least 10 more people had died since Saturday, pushing the toll to 702 in the worst-ever floods in the densely populated country. "Water-borne diseases, including diarrhoea are still a threat," Maksuda Begum, a health official, said. Monsoon flooding occurs in the region each year but the rains this season has been particularly heavy and incessant, leading some experts to blame climate change as a possible cause.

Morrison played up economic uncertainties and security threats in announcing the election, saying this was not the time to hand the reins to an untested opposition Labour leader, Anthony Albanese. "Only by voting for the Liberals and Nationals at this election on May 21 can you ensure a strong economy for a stronger future," Morrison told reporters in the capital Canberra. The opposition Labour party says it would offer a better economic alternative for the Australian people. Morrison's conservative coalition trails Labour in opinion polls after nine years in power. But he similarly lagged before the previous election in May 2019, when he pulled off a win. In an opinion piece setting the stage for the election, Morrison said despite the wide range of challenges Australians have faced since the last election - including fires, floods, and the COVID-19 pandemic - the country has held up much better than others. "But I know our country continues to face very real challenges and many families are doing it tough," he said. He said Labour would weaken the country's economy with higher taxes and deficits at a time when the country has led most others in recovering from the pandemic slump. "Now is not the time to risk that," Morrison said on Sunday. Labour leader Albanese highlighted that food, fuel, child care and health care costs had jumped while wages had stayed flat since the conservative coalition took office in 2013, and said a Labour government would ease pressure on family budgets. "So when you cringe next time you pay your supermarket bill, remember it was the Morrison government that went out of its way to keep a lid on your pay packet," Albanese said in an opinion piece released on Saturday. Albanese is due to speak to media at 0345 GMT.

In a joint 28-point "vision statement" after a two-day meeting, the two sides took what analysts called a symbolic step of committing to raise their relationship from a strategic partnership to a "comprehensive strategic partnership" in November. On Ukraine they reaffirmed "respect for sovereignty, political independence, and territorial integrity," wording that a regional expert said went further than past ASEAN statements. The statement did not condemn Russia by name for its Feb 24 invasion. The summit marked the first time ASEAN leaders gathered as a group in Washington and their first meeting hosted by a US president since 2016.                                                   Biden's administration hopes the effort will show that the United States remains focused on the Indo-Pacific and the long-term challenge of China, which it views as its main competitor, despite Russia's invasion of Ukraine. He was also hoping to persuade ASEAN countries to toughen their stance on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Biden told the ASEAN leaders that "a great deal of history of our world in the next 50 years is going to be written in the ASEAN countries, and our relationship with you is the future, in the coming years and decades." Biden called the US-ASEAN partnership "critical" and said: "We're launching a new era - a new era - in US-ASEAN relations." Vice President Kamala Harris said the United States would remain in Southeast Asia for "generations" and stressed the need to maintain freedom of the seas, which the United States says is challenged by China. "The United States and ASEAN have shared a vision for this region, and together we will guard against threats to international rules and norms," Harris said. Neither she nor Biden mentioned China by name. The United States has accused China of using coercion against its neighbours. Harris said Washington would continue to respond with ASEAN to the threat of COVID-19, having already donated more than 115 million vaccine doses to the region. She said both sides needed to show collective ambition on climate change, accelerate the transition to clean energy, and meet infrastructure needs sustainably. ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Myanmar's leader was excluded from the summit over a coup last year. US treaty ally the Philippines, in transition after an election, was represented at the meeting by its foreign minister. Biden hosted a summit dinner at the White House on Thursday, and his administration promised $150 million for areas including infrastructure, security, pandemic preparedness and clean energy. CHINA RIVALRY, SHARED CONCERNS New US commitments will include deployment of a Coast Guard vessel to the region to help counter what the United States and regional countries have described as China's illegal fishing. Still, US spending pales in comparison to that of China, which in November alone pledged $1.5 billion in development assistance for ASEAN over three years to fight COVID and fuel economic recovery. Biden on Friday announced the nomination of Yohannes Abraham, chief of staff on his National Security Council, to be ambassador to ASEAN, filling a post vacant since the start of Donald Trump's administration in 2017. Biden is working on other initiatives, including "Build Back Better World" infrastructure investment and an Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF). Gregory Poling, a Southeast Asia expert at Washington's Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, said the summit was largely about symbolism with economics a missing component, as IPEF is not expected to be launched until Biden visits Japan later in May. Read full story "Everyone seems happy and the diplomatic message of commitment is landing. But ... a modest, to put it kindly, $150 million isn't going to impress anyone," he said. "That leaves a lot riding on IPEF." Raising the relationship to a comprehensive strategic partnership matched similar moves by ASEAN with Australia and China last year. "That's symbolically important, though it wouldn't change much in concrete terms," Poling said. He noted the statement on Ukraine did not condemn Russia by name, but said "the call to respect Ukraine's sovereignty, political independence and territorial integrity is an obvious criticism of Russia and would seemingly commit all the ASEAN leaders to never recognise any Russian annexation on Ukraine." ASEAN countries share many US concerns about China's assertiveness, including its claim of sovereignty over vast swaths of the South China Sea where several have rival claims. However they remain cautious about siding more firmly with Washington, given their predominant economic ties with China and limited US economic incentives. Some, like Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, have residual historical ties to Russia. ASEAN states have been frustrated by a US delay in detailing plans for economic engagement since Trump quit a regional trade pact in 2017. Biden announced the intention to create IPEF at a virtual summit with ASEAN leaders in October. Analysts and diplomats have said only two ASEAN countries - Singapore and the Philippines - are expected to be among the initial group to sign up for negotiations under IPEF, which does not currently offer the expanded market access Asian nations want given Biden's concern for American jobs.

In a study, they said peat bogs, wetlands that contain large amounts of carbon in the form of decaying vegetation that has built up over centuries, could help the world achieve climate goals like the limit of 2 degrees Celsius of postindustrial warming that is part of the 2015 Paris agreement. But without protection and restoration efforts, some targets for greenhouse gas emissions “would be very difficult or nearly impossible to achieve,” said Alexander Popp, an author of the study, which was published in Environmental Research Letters. Popp is a senior scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, where he leads a group studying land-use issues. Peatlands exist around the world, in tropical as well as colder regions. They make up only about 3% of global land area, but their deep layers of peat are practically treasure chests of carbon, overall containing roughly twice as much as the world’s forests. In pristine bogs, that carbon remains soggy and intact. But when a bog is dried out, for agriculture or other reasons, the carbon starts to oxidize and is released to the atmosphere as planet-warming carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. That process potentially can continue for centuries. Current estimates are that drained peatlands worldwide emit as much carbon dioxide annually as global air travel. But dry peat is also a fire risk, and peat fires have the potential to release a lot of carbon very quickly. In September and October 2015, peat fires in Indonesia, where bogs have long been drained for palm oil plantations and other purposes, released more carbon dioxide per day than all the fossil fuels burned in the European Union. Dried peatlands could be restored by allowing them to become wet again, which would saturate the decaying vegetation and prevent further release of carbon dioxide, and also eliminate the fire hazard. “Rewetting them is really the core for reaching mitigation targets,” Popp said. Most pathways for countering climate change predict that by the end of this century, land use, which includes forests and agriculture, would be a net carbon sink, meaning it would store more carbon than the amount being released to the atmosphere. That would slow the process of global warming. But most of those pathways do not take emissions from degraded peatland into account, the researchers said. When they plugged peatland data into their own land-use model, they found that land use would be a net carbon source, releasing more carbon dioxide than was stored. The researchers then calculated that protecting pristine wetlands and rewetting about 60% of the degraded ones would reverse that, making land use a net sink again. Mike Waddington, a peat researcher at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, who was not involved in the work, said the study “makes a very compelling case” in favour of restoring peatlands. “Despite covering a small area, they really pack a carbon punch when it comes to carbon storage in ecosystems,” Waddington said. “They are really important in global climate regulation.” He said the study made an important point: In current pathways for changing land use to aid the climate, through planting more trees or other measures, peatlands are often considered expendable. “When we think about storing carbon in ecosystems, it’s almost always about planting trees,” Waddington said. There’s often tremendous pressure to plant trees in drained peatlands, he said, but that’s the wrong choice given the carbon-storing ability of an intact bog. Peat bogs are usually dried by digging ditches through them, which allows the water to drain away. In addition to conversion to croplands, tree plantations or forests, some peatlands are drained so the peat can be extracted for use in horticulture or even, in some parts of the world, for fuel. “You only have to drain 10 to 15% of a peatland and start extracting peat to turn that entire system into a source,” Waddington said. Restoring them could be accomplished by blocking the ditches or building berms to keep the peat saturated, he said. In the study, the researchers found that there was considerable uncertainty in estimates of the costs of protecting and restoring peatlands. But even if the costs were at the high end, the basic finding of the research was unchanged, they said. “In a way it’s the low-hanging fruit,” Waddington said. © 2020 The New York Times Company

The white envelope filled with ten 500 rupee ($13) notes was dispatched to the electricity board official as a "goodwill gesture". Soon it came back, with a message from a subordinate. The official was not playing ball -- at least not at that price. "He refused to accept it, and now he is cooking up a problem," the factory manager said as the envelope was handed back. "I will have to pay the bugger 20,000 ($500) in the evening." The manager had wanted a second power line for an extension for his small factory in the Hajipur Industrial Area in India's eastern state of Bihar. A simple request, the official had threatened to tie it up in endless red tape, unless he was paid. The routine way the bribe was offered, and the way the episode unfolded in front of a Reuters correspondent, offers a tiny insight into the problems of doing business in a state which has become a byword for poverty, lawlessness and corruption. India's boom has not reached Bihar, a state of 90 million people almost completely disconnected from the global economy. It is the country's poorest and one of its slowest growing states, with "exceptionally low" levels of private investment, according to the World Bank. There is no sign of any foreign investment at all. Chief Minister Nitish Kumar took over two years ago promising to turn things around. Since then he has been wooing rich Indians at home and abroad, trying to attract the investment his state so desperately needs. Last December, the World Bank said he was moving in the right direction. His government had initiated comprehensive reforms, it said, improved the investment climate, stepped up public investment and improved the delivery of health and education services -- albeit from an extremely low base. The Bank loaned Kumar's government $225 million, but private investors have not been so enthusiastic. India's biggest industrialists have been visiting the state capital Patna, but so far they have kept their money firmly in their pockets. The sad fact of Bihar is that it has little or no raw materials, intermittent power, terrible roads, a reputation for kidnapping businessmen and some of the least business-friendly bureaucrats in the capitalist world. "People say things have changed, but we have yet to see that change," said the manager. "The red tape is the same, the bureaucracy is the same." Law and order may be improving but Kumar's reforms are still only scratching the surface of the problem, says Shaibal Gupta of the Asian Development Research Institute in Patna. "Why would anyone invest in Bihar?," he asked. "In a place like Bihar you have to build everything from scratch. Where is the rate of return?" A HOPELESS PLACE Hajipur is Bihar's premier industrial park. Its factories get power when the rest of the state is in darkness, but only because they pay bribes. There is no drainage -- factories just dump tens of thousands of litres of effluent every day in nearby ditches or ponds. Squatters camp on the grass verges beside the factory walls, cows munch grass and wander across the pot-holed roads. Armed guards man security gates to ward off kidnappers. "This so-called industrial area is really in a pathetic condition," the manager said. "Bihar really is a hopeless place to do business." On the wall behind his head he displays nearly two dozen licences he needs to keep his business open, standards for health, safety, labour laws and pollution. Each costs a few hundred rupees a year to renew, plus a 10,000 rupee bribe. "Twenty-three departments have the power to shut down this unit," he said. "They create problems, make money, go back." "So much for a liberal economy." Rajesh Singh took a Masters in Business Administration (MBA) at Bombay University, before returning to Bihar to set up a tiny factory on his family's farmland to manufacture jams, juices, sauces, pickles and canned fruits. "I realised things in Bihar were not very good, so I decided to start an agri-venture," he said. "It was a mix of good potential and good intentions." But Singh has found the odds stacked up heavily against A1 Farm Solutions. His friends and even his father tried to convince him out of the idea, before his bank manager took over. "The banker was telling me I was a fool to leave my job and start a business here," he said. "That is the attitude to coming back, to dissuade you." It took Singh five years to get a bank loan, of just 500,000 rupees ($13,000). To get it, he needed to offer 3 million rupees as security and have 250,000 parked in fixed-term deposits. Today, his loan has been extended to 4 million rupees -- still, in his terms, "a meagre amount", equivalent to just 10 days of raw material and labour costs. "I had a lot of orders from the UK, from Sainsbury's for lychees, but I couldn't complete them because bankers are not ready to back us," he said. "I am educated and I have assets. If I can't get finance, how can ordinary Biharis get finance?" If bankers were not hard enough to cope with, Singh has also found himself sucked into the divisive caste-based politics and society of Bihar. His high-caste parents feared they would be made outcastes because he employs Dalits or "untouchables" in a food processing factory, since upper-caste Indians are barred from eating anything which has touched a Dalit hand. Then a lower-caste boy was killed on his farm when he fell under a tractor trailer. A local politician tried to exploit the issue to get Dalit votes, filing a police complaint in which he claimed the boy had been shot in the head. Although everyone knew this was untrue, the accident cost him a year, he said. "No one was willing to work for us, we couldn't get financing," Singh said, adding that all the time the police had been demanding money to drop the charges. As we travelled down the pot-holed road to Singh's factory, a 35-km, three hour trip on a "state highway", he looked around at the congestion, the poverty, the crumbling infrastructure. "Look at this," Singh said. "Someone has to come back... but at times you feel like asking 'what am i doing with my life'." Is anywhere in the world more challenging to do business? "Maybe Somalia," he said. "They are shooting at you there."

The risk that deteriorating government finances could push economies into full-fledged debt crises tops a list of threats facing the world in 2010, according to a report by the World Economic Forum. Major world economies have responded to the financial crisis with stimulus packages and by underwriting private debt obligations, causing deficits to balloon. This may have helped keep a worse recession at bay, but high debt has become a growing concern for financial markets. The risk is particularly high for developed nations, as many emerging economies, not least in Latin America, have already been forced by previous shocks to put their fiscal houses in order, the WEF think tank said in its annual Global Risks report ahead of its meeting in Davos, Switzerland. "Governments, in trying to stimulate their economies, in fighting the recession, are (building) unprecedented levels of debt and therefore there is a rising risk of sovereign defaults," said John Drzik, Chief Executive of management consultancy Oliver Wyman, which was one of the contributors to the WEF report. He said higher unemployment levels could follow, with associated social and political risks. The report placed unsustainable debt levels and the looming shadow of the financial crisis among the top three risks, alongside underinvestment in infrastructure -- one of the fastest rising risks -- and chronic diseases such as Alzheimer's and diabetes driving up health costs and reducing growth. Other looming threats including the risk of asset price collapse, risks connected to Afghanistan and a potential slowdown in Chinese growth which could hit employment, fuel social unrest and hurt exports through the region and beyond. CREEPING RISKS The report, highlighting the risk developed nations could overextend "unsustainable levels of debt," said full-blown debt crises would have inevitable social and political consequences, not least higher unemployment. "Government debt levels of 100 percent of GDP -- which is where the United States and the UK are heading -- and higher are clearly not sustainable," said Daniel Hofmann, group chief economist at Zurich Financial Services, a contributor to the report. "There is an inherent risk that investors may take fright, they may question the sustainability of these debt levels -- the result (would be) sovereign debt crises and defaults. "Clearly Dubai and Greece were early warnings that should be heeded," he told a press conference. Worries over Dubai, Ukraine and Greece have spilled over into global markets , and all three look set to remain under pressure, with the threat also high for the Anglo-Saxon economies -- the United States and the United Kingdom. The WEF report said both faced with "tough choices" in the months ahead as they seek to time a "gradual and credible withdrawal of fiscal stimulus so that the recovery is sustained but not so late that fiscal deficits cause fear of sovereign debt deterioration." The report highlighted what it called a "governance gap" -- the gap between short-term pressures on governments and business and the need for long term decisions, not least on issues including health and pension reform and climate change. Too little was being done to address underinvestment in infrastructure, it said, which could hurt food and energy security. The World Bank puts global infrastructure investment needs at $35 trillion for the next 20 years. Greater life expectancy and unhealthy lifestyles would lead to a soaring financial cost from chronic disease, they said, which must be addressed by both developing and developed nations such as through prevention campaigns promoting healthier living. "The biggest risks facing the world today maybe from slow failures or creeping risks," said the report. "because these failures at risks emerge over a long period of time, there potentially enormous impact and long-term implications can be vastly underestimated."

Commonwealth states representing a third of the world's people said on Sunday momentum was growing towards a global climate deal, but nagging doubts remained over funding levels and degrees of commitment. Seeking to successfully tip the outcome of U.N. climate talks on Dec. 7-18 in Copenhagen, the group of more than 50 nations from across the world made the climate change issue the centerpiece of a three-day summit in Trinidad and Tobago. They declared firm support for an "operationally binding" deal to be achieved in Copenhagen that would cover tougher greenhouse gas emissions targets, climate adaptation financing for poorer nations and transfer of clean-energy technology. The Commonwealth group, which welcomed Rwanda as its 54th member, called for a full legally binding climate treaty to be adopted "no later than 2010" and insisted fast funding be made available to poor states to counter the global warming threat. Commonwealth leaders hailed the consensus achieved in their Port of Spain Climate Change Declaration as improving the odds for a comprehensive agreement in Copenhagen and as proof that their geographically diverse group was a viable institution. "There is heavy traffic on the road to Copenhagen. The good news is that it is converging and hopefully moving purposefully into a single lane," Commonwealth Secretary-General Kamalesh Sharma said in comments closing the Port of Spain summit. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the presidents of Denmark and France, had participated in the Commonwealth summit, adding weight to the group's climate deliberations. "I have no doubt it will make an impact on Copenhagen," South African President Jacob Zuma told reporters. But even as the Commonwealth leaders were congratulating themselves on their climate consensus, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso was declaring in China that pledges made so far by governments to cut greenhouse gases were not sufficient for an effective pact to fight global warming. "If you sum up all the commitments made so far, according to our estimates, we are not yet where we should be if we want Copenhagen to succeed," said Barroso, who will attend a European Union-China summit in Nanjing on Monday. "There is still much work to be done," acknowledged Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in Port of Spain. COSTS OF CLIMATE DEAL Although prospects for a broad political framework pact on climate change were brightened last week by public promises of greenhouse gas curbs by leading emitters China and the United States, Barroso's blunt comments delivered a reality check on the contentious path to next month's Copenhagen talks. The world's industrialized powers are under pressure to make substantial cuts in their greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, developing countries, including tiny island states which risk disappearing if ocean levels continue to rise through global warming, are clamoring for tens of billions of dollars of aid to help them fight climate change. Developed countries like Britain and France put an offer of a $10-billion-a-year Copenhagen Launch Fund on the table, but while developing countries welcomed what they called this "interim financing" they said much more, perhaps up to $300 billion, might be needed to make a global climate deal work. Canada, whose conservative government has been accused of dragging its feet on global warming, cautiously announced it would make "minor adjustments" in its existing plan to cut greenhouse gases by 20 percent by 2020 from 2006 levels. This responded to a pledge by U.S. President Barack Obama last week to reduce his country's emissions by roughly 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020. Reflecting the sensitivity of emissions cuts in industrialized economies, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper explained why his country needed to keep its emissions goals in line with its U.S. neighbor. "If the United States is making the same kinds of reductions that we are, yes, these still have costs, but they don't have costs that cause Canadian industry to relocate south of the border," he told reporters in Port of Spain. "So I think modest achievable targets, particularly in the short term, will get the planet on the right track," he added -- a position that counters calls from many quarters for much more substantial emissions cuts to make a climate pact viable. Despite the doubts, small island states that make up nearly half of the Commonwealth said the Port of Spain summit had addressed the risk some of them faced of being swamped by rising sea levels unless global warming was checked. "We need world attention and this conference made it possible for our voice to be heard," Papua New Guinea's Prime Minister Michael Somare said.

Australia's Prime Minister Kevin Rudd may have wowed China with his fluent Mandarin, but his obtuse, jargon-laced native English frequently leaves fellow countrymen scratching their heads in bewilderment. Australian newspapers this week took Rudd to task, calling the former diplomat "policy obsessed", and decrying his reliance on "diplo-babble" and acronyms. "Sometimes, it seems he fabricates a language all of his own. As he speaks, he does unspeakable things to the English language," said Sunday Age newspaper senior columnist Tom Hyland. Rudd won praise on Thursday for giving a speech in perfect Mandarin at an elite Chinese university, where he delivered a sometimes blunt message on human rights and Tibet. But Australian newspapers said the message in Beijing contrasted sharply with his use of the English language. Papers seized on a climate change comment by Rudd after a recent meeting with Britain's prime minister as an example of his "geek talk". "There has to be a greater synergy between, let's call it our policy leadership in this, which has been focused so much, legitimately, on targets and global architecture, almost reverse-engineered back to the means by which you can quickly deliver outcomes," Rudd told perplexed journalists. The Sydney Morning Herald said: "You can take the boy out of the bureaucracy but you cannot take the bureaucrat out of the boy", citing Rudd's frequent use of acronyms like EWS(early-warning system), RTP (right to protect) and CCS (carbon capture and storage).

BERLIN, Sun Mar 29,(bdnews24.com/Reuters) - The enthusiasm that greeted Barack Obama's election last year has begun to fade in some of Europe's major capitals, replaced by concerns about the new US president's economic policies and softer stance towards Russia. Ahead of his first trip to Europe as president, officials in Berlin, Paris, London and elsewhere have applauded his decision to close Guantanamo Bay prison, to pursue dialogue with Iran and to rebalance Afghan strategy. Europe also hopes it can work more closely with Obama than it did with George W. Bush on issues like climate change. His weekend call for a meeting in Washington next month to prepare a UN pact on global warming will reinforce this view. But the first months of Obama's presidency have also raised anxiety levels in parts of Europe -- particularly in Berlin and eastern European capitals. Top German officials have worried openly about the flood of US debt Washington will issue to finance Obama's $787 billion stimulus package and bristled at calls from members of his team for Europe to spend more to boost its own economy. Although Obama ended up softening the "Buy America" clause in that package, there is lingering concern that Washington could resort to protectionism as US economic woes deepen. European leaders will be looking for reassurances from Obama at this week's G20 summit in London that he will resist domestic pressures to set up new trade barriers and move to rein in the swelling U.S. deficit once the worst of the crisis is over. In a speech to the European Parliament last week, Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek, who holds the rotating EU presidency, described US fiscal spending as a "road to hell". RUSSIA Of bigger concern to Prague and its eastern neighbours has been the Obama administration's vow to "re-set" relations with Moscow and re-examine Bush's plans to deploy parts of a missile shield in central Europe. A senior official in Prague recently likened Obama's Russia stance to that of John F. Kennedy in his 1961 meeting with Nikita Khrushchev in Vienna, where the young U.S. president was lectured and bullied by the Soviet leader. Even in Berlin, officials have expressed surprise that Obama has not responded more forcefully to a hardening of Russian positions in Georgia and threats from Moscow to rearm its military to counter an expansion of NATO along its borders. "The Obama administration needs to talk with the central and eastern European members of the EU about Russia policy," Eckart von Klaeden, a foreign policy expert in Chancellor Angela Merkel's party, told Reuters. "It could well be that signals from Washington have stoked feelings of insecurity there." Obama remains highly popular in Europe. Henri Guaino, senior adviser to French President Nicolas Sarkozy, last week said his denunciations of executive bonuses and readiness to take control of U.S. financial institutions were a "wonderful revolution". And European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso has pointed to EU-U.S. "convergence" on issues like climate change and the need for more robust welfare states. "The Americans are coming closer to what is traditionally our position," he said in Strasbourg last week. EUROPE LESS OF A PRIORITY? But there is an underlying sense that Europe is not as much of a priority for the Obama administration as it was for Bush in his second term. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown was the first European leader to visit Obama in Washington, but the brevity of their meeting and lack of a formal dinner was interpreted in the British media as a snub. Germany's Merkel spoke regularly with Bush via video conference, but had to wait over two months to get a 40-minute chat with Obama. Her advisers say they tried hard to pin down Obama's people on a time when she could visit Washington this month but received no response. Days after informing the White House that the time to fix a meeting had passed, they received a date. The trip never happened and a date for a visit has still not been set, leading some in Berlin to speculate that Obama may be punishing Merkel for her refusal to let him speak at the Brandenburg Gate last summer during the US election campaign. "I don't think the apparatus is really working yet," a German official, who requested anonymity, said of the Obama White House. "In my view, the previous administration was more serious and disciplined in the way it worked."

As countries gathered at the United Nations COP26 climate conference in Glasgow this week hammer out pacts and issue pledge after pledge to cut greenhouse gas emissions, city mayors say they are increasingly using their own networks to tackle climate change, bypassing national politics to kickstart action on the ground. "National governments are slow to communicate - very bureaucratic, internally and between each other. We're just mayors," said Los Angeles mayor Eric Garcetti, who chairs the C40 global network of mayors https://www.c40.org for tackling climate change. Cities are both source and victim of the climate crisis. Home to over half the world's population and rising, they create 75 percent of global CO2 emissions, notably from transport and buildings, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) estimates. Garcetti said in an interview that he was under no illusion that action at local government level could ever be a substitute for the global emission-cutting pacts needed to avert a climate catastrophe. Instead, the aim was for town halls to leverage their often chunky resources and mandates - from levying local taxes to the policing of building regulations and waste management - to help make sure that those pacts actually lead to results, he said. Launched in 2005 by 18 big cities, C40 gained momentum after Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the 2015 Paris Agreement on curbing emissions. At an event on the sidelines of COP26 it announced it now includes 1,049 towns covering over 700 million citizens and a quarter of the global economy. Members have to prove they are contributing to the overall goal of halving net carbon emissions by the end of the decade en route to net-zero by 2050 - the deadline scientists say must be met to limit global warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels. Membership gets them access to training and technical support to develop climate plans, the chance to secure C40 funding and the encouragement and example of peers to take matters into their own hands at local level. Dhaka North Mayor Atiqul Islam, whose city expects its population to double to 50 million over a decade as rising sea levels uproot millions of Bangladeshis, is doing exactly that by launching a green bond to finance work on water resources. "If am depending on the government, it will take much more time," Islam said ahead of the bond's Nov. 4 launch in London. LIFE OVER DEATH Taxes are another tool for city authorities to bring about change. Islam, for example, last year offered a 10% rebate on a local levy to anyone who helped green his city by planting a rooftop garden. Perhaps the boldest example of city power this year was London mayor Sadiq Kahn's move to extend an ultra-low emission zone (ULEZ) charge to four million Londoners and their vehicles despite loud criticism by opponents in power at national level. "It was too important to delay further – literally a matter of life over death," Kahn said of a policy designed to clean up London's polluted air and also cut emissions. Stockholm mayor Anna König Jerlmyr told the event her city's schedule for a fossil fuel-free transport network was ahead of national targets, while Bogota mayor Claudia Lopez described a C40-backed plan to build a transport network for the sprawling, car-clogged Colombian capital virtually from scratch. Such examples suggest town halls can sometimes push ahead on policy faster than national leaders, illustrated by how US President Joe Biden's domestic climate agenda has been stymied by Joe Manchin, a senator from a coal-producing state. Often, they have no choice but to get on with it themselves. Lauren Sorkin, executive director of the 41-country non-profit organisation Resilient Cities Network, said the vast bulk of cities relied mostly on their own budgets to fund socially fair climate transitions rather than national grants. "There is a huge gap between what is necessary in terms of the spend in investing in net-zero resilience and what is currently happening," she told another event with city mayors. And increasingly, one motivation for mayors and would-be mayors alike is self-interest: surveys show that voters are increasingly worried about how climate change will affect their cities. As Laila Kildesgaard, Danish local government director, put it: "It is not possible to run for mayor in Denmark if you don’t have a (climate) plan."

The election-year call for change echoing through the 2008 presidential campaign is also being heard in U.S. House and Senate races as Democrats appear headed toward expanding their control of Congress. Polls show voters favor Democrats over Republicans on a host of issues -- including the Iraq war, the economy and energy -- and believe the country is on "the wrong track" as an unpopular President George W Bush nears the end of his term. Yet Democrats face challenges, too. Surveys show just one in five Americans approves of the closely divided Congress, where Democrats took control from Bush's Republicans in January 2007. Despite their loss, Republicans have blocked Democrats on a number of fronts, including efforts to withdraw from Iraq. "The public wants change," said Stu Rothenberg of the nonpartisan Rothenberg Political Report, which tracks presidential and congressional elections. "When voters think about who's in charge, they don't think about Congress. They think about the president. If voters are angry, they usually take it out on the party of the president," he said. Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois took the lead in the Democratic presidential race by preaching "hope and change" in Washington, often tied up in knots by political fighting. Obama's "change" refrain proved so popular that Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, his Democratic rival for the White House, now uses it. So does Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. In November, when voters pick a successor to Bush, they will also elect a third of the 100-member Senate and the entire 435-member House. Democrats now hold the Senate, 51-49, and the House of Representatives, 233-198 with four vacancies. Democrats are expected to gain at least a handful of seats in both chambers, with a remote shot at reaching 60 in the Senate, the number needed to end Republican procedural roadblocks known as filibusters. The last time either party held a "filibuster-proof" Senate was in 1977-78 with Democrats at the helm. "If everything goes right, Democrats could reach 60," said Jennifer Duffy of the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. But she added the chances were slim. 'TOUGH CLIMATE' Twenty-three of the Senate seats up for election are held by Republicans, five of whom are retiring. A number of others face tough challenges. All 12 Senate Democrats up for re-election are favored to win. "It's a tough climate," said Sen. John Ensign of Nevada, chairman of the Senate Republican campaign committee. "A very good night for us would be to hold at 47 or 48" seats, down from the current 49, Ensign said. But he said, "I don't see any way that they (Democrats) get 60." Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, chairman of the Senate Democratic campaign committee, said, "It's moving nicely in our direction." Democrats have raised more money than Republicans, have had far fewer congressional retirements and have generally had an easier time recruiting challengers. Yet they have begun fretting about possible fallout from the bitter battle between Obama and Clinton in the Democratic nominating primaries for their party's presidential nomination. "We're increasingly concerned that you could create wounds in the Democratic primary that don't heal by November," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, chairman of the House Democratic campaign committee. Van Hollen said he did not believe such damage would cost Democrats Congress, but it could hurt efforts to gain seats. Andrew Kohut of the Pew Research Center, which conducts political polling, said a strong showing by McCain in the White House race could help stem Republicans loses in Congress. "The top of the ticket is crucial," said Kohut. "McCain does well among independents. Independents decide elections." Democrats hope to blunt any claim that McCain or other Republicans are "agents of change" by tying them to Bush, long saddled with approval ratings of only about 30 percent. "George W. Bush is not on the ballot this year, but he casts a shadow over the elections," Van Hollen said. "House Republicans have to explain seven years of votes in favor of his failed Iraq and economic policies." Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma, chairman of the House Republican campaign committee, brushed off such talk, saying, "I think our prospects have been discounted beyond what they should be." Cole noted Democrats won control of Congress in 2006 while blaming Republicans for many woes, including the unpopular Iraq war, a struggling economy, soaring gas prices. "Now that Democrats control the House and Senate," he said, "they own a piece of the negativity toward Washington."

But the high cost of hotels, COVID-19 travel curbs and quarantine rules have left Dickson and other activists from developing countries concerned that their voices will not be heard at the COP26 conference in Glasgow from Oct 31-Nov 12. Reuters spoke with activists in countries including Bangladesh, Pakistan and Uganda. Some had secured funding, visas and vaccines to attend the summit but others gave up. Dickson is still aiming to get to COP26, where he hopes to tell delegates in person about trying to learn at school when temperatures reached 43°C. He believes developed countries need to hear the personal experiences of those most vulnerable to climate change. "I'm still looking out for funding," said the 28-year-old, who represents Nigeria’s Eco Clean Active NGO and estimates his trip would cost over $4,000 including accommodation and quarantine. "I am worried that the COP will lack representation from the African continent." The summit’s British hosts have offered some funding assistance and vaccines for delegates who could not otherwise access them. "We are working tirelessly with all our partners, including the Scottish government and the U.N., to ensure an inclusive, accessible and safe summit in Glasgow with a comprehensive set of COVID mitigation measures," a COP26 spokesperson said, adding that government-approved hotel provider MCI had offered delegates a range of fairly-priced accommodation. The United Kingdom this month scrapped quarantine requirements for 47 countries including South Africa and India, sparing delegates the 2,285 pounds ($3,150) cost of a 10-day hotel quarantine. Last month, it said it would cover quarantine costs for delegates from countries still on the UK's COVID-19 travel "red list" - currently seven states including Colombia and Venezuela. But some would-be delegates say they’ve been unable to access the help, or that it doesn’t go far enough. Others say their own governments should be doing more to ensure they can attend. "Visas and quarantines have been a nightmare," said Philippines-based activist Mitzi Jonelle Tan with youth movement Fridays for Future. The youth movement is sending around 55 delegates from regions vulnerable to climate change to COP26, but Tan said others dropped out before the UK revised its quarantine rules. OPEN FOR BUSINESS The UK government is expecting around 25,000 people to attend COP26, but has yet to release a list of delegates. As of Tuesday, prices for the few hotel rooms still available for the full 12-day conference on Booking.com began at 291 pounds per night, a total of 3,486 pounds. The cost was enough to deter Ugandan climate justice advocate Nyombi Morris, 23, who had been hoping to highlight campaigners’ concerns about the impact of EU biomass energy policies on forests. He turned down the UK’s accreditation offer because it came without financial support. "One day I'll face them, face-to-face," Morris said. Homestay groups have tried to provide more affordable accommodation, but are struggling to meet demand. The Human Hotel network said it had secured beds in local Glasgow homes for about 600 delegates. "We are aware of several thousand others who wish to come and make their voices heard at COP26, but who cannot afford the astronomical prices of hotels in Scotland," said the network’s community manager Michael Yule. For others, health risks and travel headaches caused by the pandemic were reason to skip the event. "I have not missed a COP since 2010 ... this will be the first," Li Shuo, senior climate adviser at Greenpeace China in Beijing, told Reuters. "I hope the smaller NGO presence will remind everyone that there are voices unrepresented." Government delegations without direct travel routes to Glasgow also face logistical challenges. The Cook Islands in the South Pacific will not send a delegation, and other small island nations are struggling to resolve visa issues. Nobert Nyandire, a climate activist in Nairobi, Kenya received a COVID-19 vaccine this month through the UK government scheme. He will attend COP26 to work on the technical UN negotiations for Kenya's non-profit Sustainable Environmental Development Watch, but said some colleagues are still awaiting vaccines or had been deterred by the cost. "If the same people who are affected and who actually should be able to participate in such negotiations are not going to attend, then it means that I'm not very sure of the kind of decisions that are going to be made," Nyandire said.

Australia will not be swayed from the new government's pledge to withdraw troops from Iraq by the middle of this year, Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said on Friday before a trip to Washington next week. Smith said he did not expect Australia's withdrawal to affect a long-standing alliance with the United States. New Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's center-left Labor Party won power in November, ending almost 12 years of conservative rule by John Howard, a close personal and political ally of US President George W. Bush. Rudd promised to pull about 500 Australian combat troops from Iraq by mid-2008 and has ratified the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, breaking with Washington on both issues. Speaking to reporters in New York after meeting UN officials, Smith said the Bush administration had already taken into account the withdrawal of Australian troops from Iraq. "So far as we're concerned there's no capacity or thought of reopening the issue," he said. Making his first visit as foreign minister to the United States, Smith said he would discuss how to implement the withdrawal in an "orderly fashion" with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Monday. "It's not something which I believe will disturb what to date has been a very good working relationship between the new government and the (U.S.) administration," Smith said. "Administrations come and go, governments come and go. The alliance is a long-term, enduring, fundamental relationship between our two nations." Smith said he would also discuss Afghanistan, to which Australia has committed troops, humanitarian aid and other civilian assistance -- an undertaking he said would continue. Smith said he had "very considerable concerns" about the adverse impact on Afghanistan of events in neighboring Pakistan, especially the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto in December. "I'm particularly interested to have a conversation with Secretary of State Rice and other officials about developments in Afghanistan and Pakistan," Smith said.

European Union leaders agreed on Friday to send administrators and police to Kosovo ahead of an expected declaration of independence from Serbia. In a bid to soothe Balkan tensions over Kosovo's push for independence, they also offered Serbia a fast-track route to joining the bloc once it met conditions for signing a first-level agreement on closer ties. But Belgrade bristled at suggestions that the move was designed to compensate it for the looming loss of Kosovo, the majority Albanian province. Serbian Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremic said any such trade-off would be "an indecent proposal". EU leaders declared after a one-day summit that negotiations on Kosovo's future were exhausted, the status quo was untenable and there was a need to move towards a Kosovo settlement. They stopped short of endorsing independence. "We took a political decision to send an ESDP mission to Kosovo. This is the clearest signal the EU could possibly give that Europe intends to lead on Kosovo and the future of the region," Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates, the summit chairman, told a news conference. ESDP is the European Security and Defence Policy. The 1,800-strong mission involves police, justice officials and civilian administrators. But when asked whether and when the EU would recognise Kosovo's independence, Socrates said talks on that issue were taking place at the United Nations. "The EU is not forgetting its responsibilities in this area. We are talking in terms of action and not inaction," he said. French President Nicolas Sarkozy told reporters the EU had "a difficulty with Kosovo, which everybody can see will be independent". Diplomats said Cyprus, Greece, Slovakia and Romania all object to recognising Kosovo's sovereignty without a UN Security Council resolution. "ON A PLANE"? A day after signing a treaty to end a long institutional stalemate, EU leaders switched focus to challenges posed by the Balkans -- a test of the EU's hopes of strengthening its foreign policy clout -- and by globalisation and immigration. On Serbia's bid to join the 27-nation bloc, the final summit communique said: "(The European Council) reiterated its confidence that progress on the road towards the EU, including candidate status, can be accelerated." Pro-EU moderates in Belgrade want EU candidate status by the end of next year, a timeframe EU Enlargement Commission Olli Rehn said last month was ambitious but feasible. Normally, it takes up to two years for Brussels to grant candidate status to an aspirant after signing a Stabilisation and Accession Agreement (SAA), the first rung on the EU ladder. The signing of an SAA with Belgrade has been held up by its failure to transfer Bosnian Serb wartime general Ratko Mladic to a UN war crimes tribunal in the Hague on genocide charges. Outgoing chief war crimes prosecutor Carla Del Ponte urged EU leaders in Belgium's Le Soir not to be lenient on Belgrade and to maintain firm pressure on it to deliver indictees. "I am stupefied by the attitude of France, Germany and Italy who want to soften their position. As decisions must be taken by unanimity, I am counting on Belgium and the Netherlands to remain tough," she told the newspaper. Signing the agreement requires unanimity in the EU and Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen told reporters: "I want Mladic on a plane to the Hague before I will sign the SAA." Separately, EU leaders named former Spanish Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez to head a new "reflection group" to discuss the long-term future of the EU on issues ranging from enlargement to climate change and regional stability, diplomats said. Ex-Latvian President Vaira Vike-Freiberga and the chairman of mobile phone company Nokia Jorma Ollila were named as two vice-chairs of the panel due to report in June 2010, they said. In addition to foreign policy issues, the leaders addressed public concern over the strain on European job markets from immigration and cheap imports, issues on which the EU hopes to focus now that the new Lisbon Treaty has been inked. Replacing the more ambitious constitution abandoned after French and Dutch voters rejected it in 2005, the Lisbon Treaty preserves most of the key institutional reforms but drops contentious symbols of statehood such as a flag and anthem. EU leaders hope the treaty will streamline the bloc's structures to cope with enlargement after it opened its doors to 12 mostly ex-communist states in 2004 and 2007. Critics say it will curb national sovereignty and put more power in Brussels.

In the village of Dhye, crops are stubby, dead stalks. Water is scarce. The only school closed a few years ago. With dwindling food, most families have packed their belongings and left, driven out by a faceless, man-made enemy. They are Nepal’s climate change migrants, and there will be more. “I love this village,” said Sonam Chhiring Gurung, 76, one of the final holdouts, “but I can’t survive here much longer.” Climate change is remaking the Himalayan region, putting at risk millions of South Asians who depend on its water resources and pushing mountain dwellers in northern Nepal, home to the world’s highest peaks, to build new settlements at lower altitudes. Glacial melt has accelerated in the 1,500-mile-long Himalayas. Land once used for growing vegetables has become barren. Yak herders say they are struggling to find grazing patches for their animals. Scientists have found that rising temperatures could spread malaria and dengue to new areas of the Himalayas, where mosquitoes have started to appear in the highlands. A resident walks through the village of Dhye Khola, Nepal on Thursday, March 12, 2020. The New York Times Around the world, tens of millions of people have already been displaced as a result of a warming planet. Researchers estimate that the number of climate change migrants — those fleeing natural disasters, droughts or other calamities — could reach 1 billion by the end of the century. A resident walks through the village of Dhye Khola, Nepal on Thursday, March 12, 2020. The New York Times South Asians are among the most vulnerable. Last year, after an unusually weak monsoon, water nearly ran out in Chennai, one of India’s biggest cities. In Bangladesh, up to 18 million people face displacement by 2050 from sea rise alone, according to the Environmental Justice Foundation. Extreme heat is making people sicker and poorer, and could sharply diminish the living standards of 800 million people in the region if goals for mitigating climate change are not met. Warmer Himalayas could have disastrous consequences for the subcontinent. Last year, in one of the most complete studies on mountain warming, scientists warned that even if the world’s most ambitious climate change targets were met, at least one-third of Himalayan glaciers would melt by the end of the century. If global warming and greenhouse gas emissions continue at their current rates, the region could lose two-thirds of its glaciers by 2100, according to the report, the Hindu Kush Himalaya Assessment. “In the long term, the impacts will be profound for hundreds of millions of people in the plains,” said David Molden, the director general of the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development in Kathmandu. “If we overlay significantly changed rain and river flow patterns, it will be a mess for people depending on Asia’s big rivers for irrigation and drinking water.” In a country where nearly 70% of people work in agriculture, an acceleration in extreme weather may “reverse and undermine decades of development gains and potentially undermine all our efforts to eradicate poverty,” said Ayshanie Medagangoda-Labé, the UN Development Programme’s representative for Nepal. “Nepal is ground zero for the impacts of climate change,” she said. “As a country with one of the most fragile ecosystems — the Himalayas — and an economy that is heavily reliant on favourable climate conditions, Nepal is probably one of the most exposed.” Glimpses of a warmer future are everywhere. In 2016, Nepal’s army drained a lake near Mount Everest after rapid glacial melting threatened to cause a catastrophic flood downstream. A study released last year found that the size of ponds on top of glaciers in the region — which can both signal melting and accelerate it — had rapidly increased over the past three years, far outpacing the rate of change from the first decade and a half of the 2000s. The number of climate change migrants in Nepal’s Himalayas is unknown, although local officials in mountain towns estimate it to be in the thousands. Min Bahadur Shahi, a member of the government’s commission for development work, said officials planned to track the impact of warming temperatures for the first time through coming census questions. “Our first priority should be helping those displaced from the climate crisis,” he said. Take the case of Dhye, in the remote Mustang region of Nepal, about 12,000 feet above sea level. More than a decade ago, the village’s families gathered for a meeting to ponder a heavy question: Should they stay? They looked around their landscape, a brown, dehydrated expanse that could barely sustain barley anymore. They weighed soil degradation, newly erratic rainfall and fears of starvation against centuries of lived history — the huts they had built with their hands, the pockets of earth where parents had buried each newborn’s umbilical cord. By the end of the meeting, 17 of 26 families, about 90 people, vowed to leave. “I couldn’t stay,” said Tsering Lamke Gurung, 54, a village leader and father of eight, four of whom have died. “My children and I were not able to survive from crop failure.” A resident collects pond water in Dhye Khola, Nepal where supplies are increasingly scarce, on Thursday, March 12, 2020. The New York Times The leavers have trickled out of Dhye in groups over the past few years. They strapped bundles of food and clothing to their backs and hiked nearly a mile down to the banks of a still-flowing stream. They called their new community Dhye Khola, a local name for the water body. A resident collects pond water in Dhye Khola, Nepal where supplies are increasingly scarce, on Thursday, March 12, 2020. The New York Times There were some moments of triumph. One resident sent pictures of the uncultivated land to a French aid agency, which agreed to plant fruit trees in the village and help build sturdier concrete homes for families. But the longer-term settlement process was fraught, illustrating the challenges migrants face in procuring resources for unrecognized villages where residents have no legal right to the land. Gurung, who took the lead in building Dhye Khola, said he approached a former prime minister of Nepal for guidance and aid. He met prominent lawmakers, a Nepal-based leader of the World Wildlife Fund and representatives from foreign embassies. “They didn’t support us,” Gurung said. “They wouldn’t help us get a land ownership certificate.” When a government conservation group backed away from its promise of providing apple seedlings for Dhye Khola, Gurung said he marched into its office and threatened to burn it down. He said the group eventually relented and sent about 275 seedlings. “To those who say climate change is fake and criticize us for occupying public land, I ask them to come visit our village,” Gurung said. “I am a victim of climate change.” Some wondered how long it would take before their next move, pointing out that broader warming trends were impossible to escape. To protect against flooding during the summer monsoon, residents of Dhye Khola have started building embankments near the stream. They strategized about what to do if their apple orchards were marauded by locals from other struggling villages. Tsering Bitik Gurung, 52, a farm labourer with a sun-creased face, said the stress was getting to her. Tsering Bitik Gurung, who is not related to Tsering Lamke Gurung, agonised over the recent death of her husband from cancer and her diminishing money. The well near her home has gone dry. She cursed local police officers who prevented her from selling wild herbs in one of the bigger cities — retribution, she said, for villagers’ persistent efforts to get Dhye Khola recognised. Sitting next to her stove, Tsering Bitik Gurung sighed. The apple orchards are bountiful for now, she said, but “our future is dark.” “We came here after hardship, not for fun,” she said. “I pray that God will save us.” c.2020 The New York Times Company

De Silva’s design responded sensibly to Ceylon’s tropical climate and treated European modernism as another tool in a toolbox already stocked with local traditions, materials and techniques. Ceylon, now Sri Lanka, had lately declared its independence. De Silva gave Ceylonese autonomy a new architecture. During the early 1970s, Pakistani architect Yasmeen Lari was experimenting with a different idea for housing. Anguri Bagh was a masonry development of shaded streets, sun-bleached courtyards and two- and three-story homes, constructed by mostly unskilled labourers using community-sourced bricks. Lari hoped the project could become a template for housing large masses of people. Its layout took inspiration from Greek architect Constantinos Doxiadis’ plans from the 1960s for Islamabad, the new capital of Pakistan, but also from the old walled cities of Multan and Lahore. In modern Pakistan, Lari believed, housing should adhere “to the measure of people’s songs, weaving the pattern of a village as if on the village looms.” “The Project of Independence: Architectures of Decolonization in South Asia, 1947-1985,” at the Museum of Modern Art — organised by Martino Stierli and a team of curators and advisers — surveys Sri Lanka, Pakistan, India and Bangladesh in the wake of the dissolution of the British Raj. It’s a sweeping, occasionally heartbreaking exhibition full of big ideas and beautiful work, too much of it not widely known. Spreading the word is naturally the show’s first goal: to go beyond the old tale of Le Corbusier and Louis Kahn bestriding South Asia, which, in the standard Western account of modernism, has exiled figures like Lari and de Silva to what Indian historian Dipesh Chakrabarty has termed “the imaginary waiting room of history.” You may remember that Stierli, the Modern’s chief curator of architecture and design, co-curated an exhibition a few years ago about postwar Yugoslavia called “Toward a Concrete Utopia.” One region at a time, he is retrieving great, underappreciated architects from that waiting room, unpacking a big-dream, blue-sky era, after World War II, when designers, planners and engineers from Brasília to Belgrade to New Bombay were suddenly tasked with constructing cities, societies and nation-states from scratch. Yugoslavia is not South Asia, of course. South Asia is a far more diverse, complex, geographically enormous swath of the world to explore through what is, ultimately, the same old lens. What I mean by old lens is that “The Project of Independence” is still premised on a Western theme, namely the end of British colonialism, and around ideas about the anxiety of Western influence — as if all the many centuries of South Asian temple architecture, Mughal architecture, local masonry traditions and other veins of vernacular construction and design, from which so much of the work in the exhibition clearly derives, can still only really be understood in relation to the West. I’m not sure how to get around this problem, if it is a problem, at a place like the Museum of Modern Art. I suspect the exhibition will spark debates about the topic among those who know the material far better than I do. I wonder, for instance, whether others will take issue with the absence of architecture from, say, Afghanistan or Nepalese Pakistan. And I’m curious whether anybody else misses more of a historical context for what happened in the lead-up to 1947. Modernism, after all, arrived years before the interests of India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, aligned with Le Corbusier’s interests in the foothills of the Himalayas. Art deco and an industry for concrete existed in India by the 1930s. At the same time, South Asia was left destitute when the British receded. Economist Utsa Patnaik recently estimated that, over nearly two centuries, the Raj looted the equivalent of $45 trillion from India. The former undersecretary-general of the United Nations, Shashi Tharoor, asserts that as many as 35 million South Asians died under colonial rule. But unlike in Europe or East Asia, there was no post-colonial Marshall or MacArthur recovery plan. What was possible with meagre resources? Someone reminded me the other day that Skidmore, Owings & Merrill designed the Istanbul Hilton in 1955. The Hilton was Europe’s first major modern hotel to be constructed ex nihilo after the war, built with glass, steel and White Portland cement from Germany, marble from Italy, aluminium windows, elevators and air-conditioning units from America. In newly partitioned India and Pakistan, designers had to cope the old-fashioned way with challenges like summer heat, using verandas and cross ventilation. They didn’t have German steel, glass and air conditioning. I don’t know about you but it’s a joy and relief, not to mention useful in an age of climate change, to see so many projects that aren’t sealed glass boxes, like nearly every big building today. Making do with less produced some of the most beautiful, textured, thoughtful designs of the midcentury. I’m thinking about works like Balkrishna Doshi’s edenic campus for the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore; and Chittagong University, in Bangladesh, by Muzharul Islam; and Laurie Baker’s decorative Center for Development Studies in Trivandrum, India, whose brick walls are perforated by latticed openings, called jali, that cast patterned shadows and let air circulate indoors. Judging from headlines about calls to tear down various landmarks of the period, there seem to be South Asians today who dismiss post-colonial architecture as a relic of deprivation, from an era now best forgotten. One can understand. Half a million people are said to have perished after India was partitioned. Millions suddenly found themselves refugees in their own homes, caught on the wrong side of freshly drawn religious borders. The scale of atrocities would haunt generations of Hindus and Muslims. And a tsunami of demands rose overnight for mass housing, schools, public institutions, whole new cities. Where would people live? What forms would independence take? Architects and engineers were called upon to solve these riddles. Nehru thought a cosmopolitan India needed to clear the architectural slate and erect modern temples to global commerce and industry. To him, Le Corbusier’s city of Chandigarh was admirably “unfettered” by history. Mahatma Gandhi had another idea. Gandhi believed an architecture of post-colonial self-determination depended on local traditions and tapped into native veins of handicraft and village culture. How these visions were reconciled runs as a motif through “The Project of Independence.” The show oddly omits an obvious example, the Gandhi Memorial Museum in Ahmedabad, Charles Correa’s first major independent project, which Nehru inaugurated and loved. Stierli stresses other cases like New Delhi’s Hall of Nations. Designed and completed in 1972 by Raj Rewal and the great structural engineer Mahendra Raj, the hall — a series of truncated pyramids, its free-span interior crisscrossed by oversized ramps — was the centrepiece for an international trade fair marking the 25th anniversary of Indian independence. Indira Gandhi, Nehru’s daughter and India’s third prime minister, cut the ribbon at the opening. Rewal and Raj had imagined using steel. But because there wasn’t enough of it at the right price in India — and no commercial space frames were available in the country for a structure the size of a football field — the hall was redesigned in concrete, engineered to suit what India did have in abundance: manual labourers, large numbers of them, casting each module one at a time, on site, by hand. What resulted was a tour de force of structural expressionism, a handcrafted variation on industrial-scale Brutalism that split the difference between Nehru and Gandhi. Rahul Mehrotra, an architect and Harvard professor, writes in the catalogue about the challenge of housing. Faced with millions of refugees, the new nations of South Asia ended up proliferating developments that doubled down on centuries of class division. Islamabad was built for Pakistan’s military and bureaucratic elites. Refugees and the poor were settled in Korangi. There were a few exceptions, like Anguri Bagh and also Correa’s Artists’ Village from the early 1980s, in Belapur, on the edge of Navi Mumbai, a new city that Correa also helped plan. As Mehrotra points out, Correa recognized an organic sort of intelligence in the evolution of Mumbai’s slums and other informal settlements: He took lessons from the creative ingenuity and optimism of people making homes for themselves, and urban spaces for shared communities, with few or no means. Correa tried to codify these lessons at Artists’ Village, a settlement of free-standing, whitewashed houses with stone yards and pitched-tile roofs, organised around common areas: a lost-cost, low-rise, high-density, incremental development for a mix of different classes. I gather that Artists’ Village by now has dissolved into the sprawling megalopolis of Navi Mumbai, a little worse for wear like all ageing developments. But as Correa hoped, it’s still expanding on the urban DNA he planted, upholding his dream for a better India. The same can’t be said about the Hall of Nations, alas. It was razed one night in April 2017, after officials on the heritage conservation committee for India’s current prime minister, Narendra Modi, turned a deaf ear to architects and historians around the world who pleaded to save the project. The hall wasn’t old enough to be protected, officials argued, and it needed to make way for glossy new development. In the show’s catalogue, Stierli calls the demolition “an act of vandalism” against a work of architecture that had symbolised a progressive vision of India now “fundamentally at odds with the Hindu nationalist stance of the present government.” As I said, heartbreaking. — 'The Project of Independence: Architectures of Decolonization in South Asia, 1947-1985' ©2022 The New York Times Company

The Sydney Opera House to San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge went dark as people switched off lights in their homes and skylines dimmed around the world on Saturday to show concern with global warming. Up to 30 million people were expected to have turned off their lights for 60 minutes by the time "Earth Hour" -- which started in Suva in Fiji and Christchurch in New Zealand -- completed its cycle westward. More than 380 towns and cities and 3,500 businesses in 35 countries signed up for the campaign that is in its second year after it began in 2007 in Sydney, Australia's largest city. "Earth Hour shows that everyday people are prepared to pull together to find a solution to climate change. It can be done," said James Leape of WWF International, which was running the campaign. Lights at Sydney's Opera House and Harbour Bridge were lowered as Australians held candle-lit beach parties, played poker by candlelight and floated candles down rivers. In Bangkok, some of the city's business districts, shopping malls and billboards went dark, although street lights stayed on. One major hotel invited guests to dine by candle light and reported brisk business. In Copenhagen, the Tivoli Gardens and the Royal Palace and the opera darkened for an hour, along with many street lights. "In the central square a lot of people were standing looking at the stars," said Ida Thuesen, spokeswoman for WWF Denmark. "It's not often you can see the stars in a city." GOOGLE GOES DARK In a tip of its virtual hat to the event, the background of Google's home page turned to black from white on more than a dozen country sites including Google.com. A message on the site read: "We've turned the lights out. Now it's your turn." and directed visitors to conserve energy when using computers. Floodlights went out at landmarks in Budapest, including its castle, cathedral and parliament. In Britain, 26 town and city councils signed up to switch off nonessential lights as did several historic buildings, including Prince Charles' private residence Highgrove House, London City Hall, Winchester Cathedral and the Government Communication Headquarters radio monitoring station. The south coast town of Brighton turned off the lights on its pier. The movement crossed the Atlantic to the United States and Canada, where the 1,815-foot (553-metre) CN Tower in Toronto and the surrounding skyline were plunged into temporary darkness. In Toronto, many restaurants offered candlelight dining. The golden arches at a corner McDonalds were dark, though the restaurant itself was brightly lit. Supporters held "dark parties," glow-in-the-dark soccer games and lantern walks. News helicopters swooped low over city streets, where banks had switched off the neon signs atop their skyscrapers. Landmarks such as San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge and Chicago's Sears Tower went dark in the closing hours of Saturday's round-the-world event. "It is not just about turning off the lights, it is about raising awareness," San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom said. "Energy efficiency is low-hanging fruit. Energy efficiency is the easiest thing we can do" to reduce global warming. Buildings account for about one-third of the carbon emissions that scientists say will boost global average temperatures by between 1.4 and 4.0 degrees Celsius this century, bringing floods and famines and putting millions of lives at risk. Organizers of Earth Hour said that while switching off a light for one hour would have little impact on carbon emissions, the fact that so many people were taking part showed how much interest and concern at the climate crisis had taken hold. They said they plan a similar event March 28, 2009.

This could be the first country to give the regulatory green light for the British drugmaker’s vaccine as the British medicine regulator continues to examine data from the trials. India, the world’s biggest vaccine-making country, wants to start inoculating its citizens next month and is also considering emergency use authorisation applications for vaccines made by Pfizer Inc and local company Bharat Biotech. Getting vaccines to the world’s second-most populous country with one of the highest infection rates will also be a big step in the battle against the pandemic. The AstraZeneca-Oxford shot is considered vital for lower-income countries and those in hot climates because it is cheaper, easier to transport and can be stored for long periods at normal fridge temperatures. India's Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) first reviewed the three applications on Dec. 9 here and sought more information from all the companies, including from Serum Institute of India (SII), which is making the AstraZeneca shots. SII, the world's biggest vaccine manufacturer, has now provided all the data, the two sources said. The authorities were still waiting for more details from Pfizer, a government health adviser told here a news briefing on Tuesday, while one of the sources said additional information was expected from Bharat Biotech. Both sources said Indian health officials were in direct contact with their British counterparts over the AstraZeneca shot and that there were “strong indications” an approval would come by next week. The expected approval comes after data from AstraZeneca’s late-stage trials in the UK and Brazil released earlier this month showed the vaccine had efficacy of 62% for trial participants given two full doses, but 90% for a smaller sub-group given a half, then a full dose. The Indian regulator is only considering the two full-dose regimen of the shot despite it showing a lower success rate, the sources said. “Serum is ready,” said one of the sources. “Initially, we may get around 50 million to 60 million doses.” The sources declined to be named as deliberations were ongoing and the timeline could change. CDSCO chief V.G. Somani did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Bharat Biotech and Pfizer declined to comment, while SII did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment. India has not yet signed a vaccine supply deal with any company, but SII has already stockpiled more than 50 million doses of the AstraZeneca shot and plans to make a total of 400 million doses by July.

It warned the Socialist government that the European football tournament that opens in France on Jun 10 could be disrupted if it refused to back down. As tens of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets, workers responded to the union call by stopping work at oil refineries, nuclear power plants and the railways, as well as erecting road blocks and burning wooden pallets and tyres at key ports like Le Havre and near key distribution hubs. Prime Minister Manuel Valls insisted the government would not withdraw the law and would break up refinery blockades, saying there could be some tweaks to the reforms but not on any of its key planks. He was backed by the country's other big trade union, the CFDT. After months of rolling protests sparked by a reform that aims to make hiring and firing easier, Thursday's stoppages and street marches were being watched closely as a test of whether the CGT-led opposition is solid or at risk of fizzling out. The street marches were joined by scores of marchers from a youth protest movement called Nuit Debout (Night Rising).  Police deployed to counter risks of the fringe violence in which 350 police and several protesters have been hurt and more than 1,300 arrested at similar rallies in recent weeks. CGT chief Philippe Martinez, asked by Reuters if his union was willing to disrupt the Euro 2016 football contest, said: "The government has the time to say 'let's stop the clock' and everything will be ok." Jean-Claude Mailly, leader of the smaller FO union that is also protesting, said as a Paris march began: "In football speak, it's time the prime minister took the red card back." No backing down "There is no question of changing tack, even if adjustments are always possible," said Valls, who flatly rejected calls to scrap the part of the law that put the CGT on the warpath. That section would let companies opt out of national obligations on labour protection if they adopt in-house deals on pay and conditions with the consent of a majority of employees. The SNCF state train company said that upwards of two-thirds of national, regional and local rail connections were operating, suggesting stoppages by railworkers were hurting less than last week when a similar strike halved the number of trains running. After police intervention in recent days to lift blockades at refineries and fuel distribution depots, Valls said 20-30 percent of fuel stations were dry or short of certain fuels. "The situation is less worrisome as of today," Transport Minister Alain Vidalies said. Deliveries of fuel from depots to the petrol pump were now improving, he said. The number of fuel stations short of petrol or diesel fell to 83 on Thursday from 140 on Wednesday in the Loire-Atlantique department of western France, the government office there said. French nuclear power capacity was cut by as much as five gigawatts due to stoppages. That is equivalent to just over six percent of the country's total production capacity. Even if power industry experts say the nuclear plant strike is unlikely to provoke major blackouts due to legal limits on strike action and power imports from abroad, the action usually raises running costs for the EDF power utility. With dockers striking at the southern port of Marseille, the number of ships waiting at sea to offload oil, gas and chemicals rose to 21 from what would normally be about five, the port authority said.  A protest over pension reform in 2010 died once police broke up pickets at supply depots and railworkers came under pressure by stoppages that hit their paycheck. Oil giant Total SA, said all but one of its fuel distribution depots were working. It warned, however, that two of its five refineries in France were at a standstill and two more set to halt in coming days. The CGT is waging a lonelier battle this time. Laurent Berger, head of the rival CFDT union and a backer of the planned labour reform, said: "The political and industrial relations climate has turned hysterical ... let's calm things down."

Both will compete for the prestigious best picture trophy against drama "Belfast," about a family living amid sectarian conflict in late 1960s Northern Ireland; deaf community film "CODA;" and "Don't Look Up," a darkly comic allegory about climate change. Other best picture nominees included Japanese drama "Drive My Car," "King Richard," about the father of tennis stars Venus and Serena Williams; coming-of-age story "Licorice Pizza;" thriller "Nightmare Alley;" and Steven Spielberg's remake of the classic musical "West Side Story." Jane Campion became the first woman nominated twice for best director with her nod for "Power of the Dog." She was a contender for her 1993 film "The Piano," but lost out that year to Spielberg, who won for "Schindler's List." "Power of the Dog" also received nominations across the top acting categories for stars Benedict Cumberbatch, Jesse Plemons, Kodi Smit-McPhee and Kirsten Dunst. Also in the running for lead acting honors are Nicole Kidman and Javier Bardem for playing TV comedy couple Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz in "Being the Ricardos." Will Smith was nominated for the title role in "King Richard," along with Andrew Garfield for biographical musical "Tick, Tick ... Boom!" and Denzel Washington for "The Tragedy of Macbeth." Kristen Stewart will compete for best actress for her portrayal of Princess Diana in "Spencer." The other best actress nominees were Jessica Chastain for "The Eyes of Tammy Faye," Olivia Colman in "The Lost Daughter" and Penelope Cruz for "Parallel Mothers." The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the group that hands out the Oscars, will reveal the winners at a live ceremony in Hollywood on March 27.

The ambitious promises world leaders made last year at a climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, were “naïve optimism,” Guterres said. Nations are nowhere near the goal of limiting the average global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius by the end of this century. That’s the threshold beyond which scientists say the likelihood of catastrophic impacts increases significantly. The planet has already warmed an average of 1.1 degrees Celsius. And the pollution that is dangerously heating the planet is continuing to increase. Global emissions are set to rise by 14% in the 2020s, and emissions from coal continue to surge, he said. “The 1.5 degree goal is on life support. It is in intensive care,” Guterres said in remarks delivered to a summit The Economist is hosting on sustainability via video address. “We are sleepwalking to climate catastrophe,” he said. “If we continue with more of the same, we can kiss 1.5 goodbye. Even 2 degrees may be out of reach. And that would be catastrophe.” Guterres’ speech comes as the European Union is trying to find ways to reduce its dependence on Russian oil and gas, and countries like the United States are scrambling to increase fossil fuel production to stabilize energy markets. President Joe Biden and European leaders have said that the short-term needs will not upend their longer-term vision of shifting to wind, solar and other renewable sources that do not produce dangerous greenhouse gas emissions. But the UN secretary-general said he fears that strategy endangers the goal of rapid reduction of fossil fuel burning. Keeping the planet at safe levels means slashing emissions worldwide 45% by 2050, scientists have said. In Glasgow in November world leaders promised to stave off climate change and, for the first time, planned to “phase down” coal — the dirtiest fossil fuel. Leaders from 100 countries also pledged to stop deforestation by 2030, a move considered vital since trees absorb carbon dioxide. The United States, Europe and about 100 other nations also said they would cut methane emissions 30% by 2030. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas produced from oil and gas operations. But there has been almost no progress, Guterres said. In addition, rich countries most responsible for polluting the planet have not met their obligation to help the poorest countries — already “slammed” by high inflation, rising interest rates and debt — to develop clean energy, he said. At the same time, he warned, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is upending global energy markets, further undermining climate goals. “As major economies pursue an ‘all-of-the-above’ strategy to replace Russian fossil fuels, short-term measures might create long-term fossil fuel dependence and close the window to 1.5 degrees,” Guterres said. He cautioned countries could become so focused on the immediate need to fill the oil, gas and coal gap “that they neglect or kneecap policies to cut fossil fuel use.” “This is madness,” he said. “Addiction to fossil fuels is mutually assured destruction.” Last week the International Energy Agency warned that the world faced its first global energy crisis, and recommended that major economies conserve energy by implementing 10 strategies, from carpooling to traveling by train instead of airplane. In his speech, Guterres said wealthy nations should be dismantling coal infrastructure to phase it out completely by 2030, with other nations doing so by 2040. He called for an end to fossil fuel subsidies and a halt to new oil and gas exploration. Guterres also said private sector financing for coal must end. “Their support for coal not only could cost the world its climate goals,” he said. “It’s a stupid investment — leading to billions in stranded assets.” The American Petroleum Institute, which represents oil and gas companies, said in a statement that the industry “can responsibly develop America’s vast resources while at the same time reducing emissions to address climate change.” Biden has promised a rapid clean energy transition in the United States but it has not started yet. Legislation he has championed to hasten the shift to renewable energy, the Build Back Better Act, is stalled in Congress. Meanwhile, his plans to stop new oil and gas leasing have faced challenges in the courts. © 2022 The New York Times Company

WHITTLESEA, Australia, Feb 9(bdnews24.com/Reuters) - Weary firefighters and rescuers pulled the remains of dozens of people from charred buildings on Monday as the toll from Australia's deadliest bushfires rose to 135. "Everybody's gone. Everybody's gone. Everybody. Their houses are gone. They're all dead in the houses there. Everybody's dead," cried survivor Christopher Harvey as he walked through the town of Kinglake, where most people were killed. Police believe some of the fires, which razed rural towns near the country's second biggest city, Melbourne, were deliberately lit and declared one devastated town a crime scene. "There are no words to describe it other than mass murder," Prime Minister Kevin Rudd told local television. "These numbers (of dead) are numbing ... and I fear they will rise further." The bushfires are the country's worst natural disaster in more than a century, and will put pressure on Rudd to deliver a broad new climate policy. One massive bushfire tore through several towns in the southern state of Victoria on Saturday night, destroying everything in its path. Many people died in cars trying to flee and others were killed huddled in their homes, yet some escaped by jumping into swimming pools or farm reservoirs. The inferno was as tall as a four-storey building at one stage and was sparking spot fires 40 km (25 miles) ahead of itself as the strong winds blew hot embers in its path. "It's going to look like Hiroshima, I tell you. It's going to look like a nuclear bomb. There are animals dead all over the road," said Harvey. More than 750 houses were destroyed and some 78 people, with serious burns and injuries, are in hospital. Many patients had burns to more than 30 percent of their bodies and some injuries were worse than the Bali bombings in 2002, said one doctor at a hospital emergency department. In Canberra, lawmakers fought back tears as they suspended parliament for the day after expressing condolences to the victims on behalf of the stunned nation. "It is the beauty and the wonder of our country," National Party leader Warren Truss said. "It can also be harsh and cruel. How can these idyllic landscapes also become killing fields?" CLIMATE CHANGE POLICY Wildfires are a natural annual event in Australia, but this year a combination of scorching weather, drought and tinder-dry bush has created prime conditions. The fires, and major floods in Queensland state in the north, will put pressure on Rudd, who is due to deliver a new climate policy in May. Green politicians are citing the extreme weather to back a tougher climate policy. Adding to the nation's grief, authorities in northern Queensland searched unsuccessfully for a five-year-old boy who they believe was killed by a crocodile when he chased his pet dog into the flooded Daintree River. Scientists say Australia, with its harsh environment, is set to be one of the nations most affected by climate change. "Continued increases in greenhouse gases will lead to further warming and drier conditions in southern Australia, so the (fire) risks are likely to slightly worsen," said Kevin Hennessy at the Commonwealth Scientific & Industrial Research Center (CSIRO). The Victorian bushfire tragedy is the worst natural disaster in Australia in 110 years. In 1899, Cyclone Mahina struck Australia's northern Cape York, killing more than 400. PLEAS FOR MISSING Thousands of firefighters continued to battle the main fires and scores of other blazes across Victoria on Monday, as well as fires in neighboring New South Wales state. While cooler, calmer conditions helped firefighters, 10 major fires remained out of control in Victoria. But the week-long heatwave that triggered the inferno was over. The fires burned out more than 330,000 ha (815,000 acres) of mostly bushland in Victoria, but a number of vineyards in the Yarra Valley were also destroyed. The Insurance Council of Australia said it was too early to estimate the bill. The small town of Marysville was sealed off by police as forensic scientists searched through the rubble for evidence. As dawn broke in the town of Whittlesea, near Kinglake, shocked residents wandered the streets, some crying, searching for loved ones still missing. "The last anyone saw of them, the kids were running in the house, they were blocked in the house," cried Sam Gents, who had not heard from his wife Tina and three children, aged 6, 13 and 15, since the fire swept through Kinglake. "If they let me up the mountain I know where to go (to try and find them)," Gents sobbed. Authorities sealed off Kinglake because bodies were still being recovered. Handwritten notes pinned to a board in the Whittlesea evacuation center told the same sad story, with desperate pleas from people for missing family and friends to contact them. Rudd said it would take years to rebuild the devastated towns and has announced a A$10 million ($6.8 million) aid package. He has also called in the army to help erect emergency shelter. The previous worst bushfire tragedy in Australia was in 1983, when 75 people were killed.

A surge in investment in solar power is bringing down costs of the alternative energy source, but affordability problems still dog hopes for the 1.6 billion people worldwide without electricity. The sun supplies only a tiny fraction -- less than one tenth of 1 percent -- of mankind's energy needs. But its supporters believe a solar era may be dawning, boosted by western funding to combat oil "addiction" and climate change. Governments from Japan to Germany and the United States are helping the public wean themselves off fossil fuels. An average German household, for example, can earn over 2,000 euros ($2,860) a year from subsidies to install solar panels -- double their electricity bill -- and pay off all costs within 10 years and earn a pure profit for a further 10. But there are few handouts in developing nations where it could be argued solar power is more relevant -- in sunnier countries where many people have no electricity at all. A scientific body which groups academies worldwide -- the InterAcademy Council -- said last week efforts to curb climate change must target vast numbers of people who lack basic energy. "It's sad that 1.6 billion people live without electricity and two to three billion use energy in a primitive way very damaging to health," said Professor Steven Chu, a Nobel laureate physicist based at the University of California, Berkeley, and co-chair of the report for the Dutch-based body. LOW INCOME Low incomes and low subsidies, if any, can make clean energy a hard sell in developing countries. In the Indian state of Karnataka private firms, backed by state government subsidies, have over the last 3-5 years been pushing solar power for households in towns and cities, including giving discounts on power bills if solar is installed. The picture is very different for off-grid rural Indian communities which until now were dependent on kerosene, or paraffin, lamps for lighting, having no electricity access. "Kerosene is quite heavily subsidised but has limited availability in some rural areas, which has helped solar PV (photovoltaic) sales," said J.P. Painuly, senior energy planner at the Denmark-based Risoe National Laboratory. "There are some solar PV programmes that provide an extremely limited capital subsidy. It's not at a scale that makes it viable. Solar PV is still really expensive... more expensive than kerosene." Worldwide about 1.5 million people die annually from indoor pollution due to lighting and cooking. It is the health benefits that sell the more expensive panels together with the promise of a much brighter source of light than paraffin lamps so users can work and make money after dark, or read and educate themselves or their children. The Solar Electric Light Company (SELCO) has supplied solar powered electricity to 75,000 households over the past 12 years in India, where 60 percent of households lack electricity. Their standard solar panel, replacing three smoky paraffin lamps, costs $250, equal to at least 12 months' income for many rural households, said SELCO Managing Director Harish Hande. Customers can spread the cost over five years, and microfinance creditors collect payments as often as weekly from those who struggle to put money aside. One downside is that large parts of Karnataka get monsoon rains for about 4 months a year and people complain that solar systems are not effective in cloudy conditions. Another is that SELCO's small profits are making it difficult for the company to compete with salaries offered by Bangalore's Internet industry and expand outside its core Karnataka state, said Hande. Many wealthier suburbs in Karnataka cities and towns have terraces of houses with solar water heaters -- a more basic and widely available technology which heats water but doesn't supply electricity, unlike the solar PV panels. MANUFACTURING BOOM SELCO cuts costs by making fluorescent light bulbs and designing solar panels itself, but the panels are still more expensive than the more heavily subsidised oil lamps. So when will costs come down? Rapidly developing countries like China are joining a silicon solar cell manufacturing boom, helping to pare the price of the alternative technology and simple, economy panels could soon be affordable even to the rural poor, said Chu. "Very inexpensive solar cells could be used by off-grid people to charge appliances that don't use a lot of power but make a world of difference," he said, listing life-enhancing items such as radios, mobile phones, water purifiers and bright, efficient lamps called light emitting diodes (LEDs). The World Bank last month announced a private sector competition to devise the best-value, low carbon light source for poor households in Africa, as a way to flag up what it estimates is a $17 billion African market in off-grid lighting. UK-based solar company G24 Innovations this month started production of a low-cost, non silicon-based solar panel, which it says it will supply into the LED market in developing countries from next year.

Germany is ruling out any substantive shift in its approach to Europe's debt crisis despite a rising chorus of opposition to Berlin's austerity policies that reached a crescendo in Sunday's elections in Greece and France. Chancellor Angela Merkel, speaking in Berlin on Monday, rejected the notion that Europe was on the brink of a major policy shift after Socialist Francois Hollande defeated her fellow conservative Nicolas Sarkozy and Greek voters punished ruling parties who slashed spending to secure a foreign bailout. Shunned by Merkel, who publicly backed Sarkozy's campaign, Hollande repeatedly criticized Germany's focus on budget cuts and labor law reforms as the solution to Europe's debt crisis. Many saw his victory and the outcome in Greece as heralding a shift in Europe toward higher-spending growth-oriented policies. But close Merkel allies made clear within hours that the expectation in Berlin was that it would be Hollande who would be making the lion's share of the concessions, and rowing back on policy promises made during the French campaign which the Germans view as dangerous for the entire single-currency bloc. "The position of the German government is clear. We will continue on our savings path," said Volker Kauder, parliamentary leader of Merkel's conservatives and one of her closest allies. After another bad night for her Christian Democrats (CDU) in a state election on Sunday, Merkel knows that if she is to win a third term next year she can ill afford to ignore German voters' demands that she give no more of their cash away to foreigners. "Germans could end up paying for the Socialist victory in France with more guarantees, more money. And that is not acceptable," her ally Kauder said. "Germany is not here to finance French election promises." FRENCH PROMISES Those promises appear potentially costly. Hollande has pledged to balance the French budget in five years, but he also wants to hire tens of thousands of new teachers, introduce a 75-percent tax on million-euro annual incomes and raise the minimum wage. He favors the introduction of joint euro zone bonds and a more active role for the European Central Bank in fostering growth - both taboos in Germany. Andreas Schockenhoff, a leading CDU lawmaker who heads a Franco-German parliamentary group, told Reuters he expected Hollande to commit "very quickly" to "stability policies". Pressed repeatedly at a news conference on whether the French and Greek votes might change the policy debate in Europe, Merkel's spokesman Steffen Seibert insisted the only way forward was growth through structural reform - such as of tax and labor rules aimed at improving trade - not debt-funded stimulus plans. Merkel herself made clear that, while there was scope to discuss tactics, the overall strategy EU leaders committed to by agreeing a compact on fiscal consolidation was "not negotiable". "We are in the middle of a debate to which France, of course, under its new president will bring its own emphasis," she said. "But we are talking about two sides of the same coin - progress is only achievable via solid finances plus growth." "OPEN ARMS" The German leader telephoned Hollande, whom she has never met, on Sunday night after his victory and the two spoke, with the help of interpreters, for nearly a quarter of an hour. Sources told Reuters the conversation was friendly and that Hollande assured Merkel he wanted very close ties. The president is expected to visit Berlin next week, most likely on May 16, the day after he takes office, on his first foreign trip. Merkel said Hollande would be welcomed with "open arms". Germany has already signaled it is ready to negotiate a "growth pact" with the new French leader. Though its terms may well be vague, that would allow Hollande to claim victory in his push for a more balanced approach to the crisis. But bold new initiatives that might give ailing economies like Greece and Spain a substantial boost are unlikely. "Boosting growth is fine, but the question is how," CDU budget expert Norbert Barthle told Reuters. "Our focus remains firmly on structural reforms." German officials have indicated they are prepared to explore a more flexible use of EU structural funds, bolster the capital of the European Investment Bank (EIB) and allow the issuance of so-called "project bonds" to fund investment in infrastructure. These steps would not require substantial new funds from Berlin and this is why they are acceptable. But launching new government stimulus programs, allowing euro members more time to cut deficits they have pledged to get down, or giving the ECB new powers to bolster growth remain anathema to Germany. "There will be no loosening of the deficit targets," one high-level German source said, pointing to Hollande's victory speech in Tulle as a sign of his readiness to work with Germany. "He mentioned cutting back the deficit as his second priority. That was significant and a signal." Hollande's chief economic adviser, former finance minister Michel Sapin, also said on Monday: "Nobody expects that we simply arrive in power and hand out money." HARD LINE ON GREECE On Greece, officials in Berlin and Brussels are also taking a hard line, making clear they see no room for the country to renege on or renegotiate the terms set out in its multi-billion euro rescues by the bloc and the IMF. The failure of the big parties that have dominated Greek politics for decades to secure a majority, and a surge in support for extreme parties from the left and right, has raised questions about whether Athens will stick to its commitments and sparked speculation it could be forced out of the euro zone. "Either they stick to the program and receive the financing from member states - or they will have to default," said a senior euro zone source before the pro-EU Greek Socialist party leader called explicitly for a renegotiated bailout deal. "What the default would lead to, I don't know," the source said. "But certainly to even more hardship for Greek citizens." At the core of the European project, formed around France and Germany to end a succession of wars, Hollande can look to the euro zone's third economy, Italy, for support. Sapped by a moribund business climate and budget cuts meant to appease wary creditors, Prime Minister Mario Monti's technocratic government endorsed the new French president's pro-growth agenda. An indication of whether Hollande is ready for confrontation with France's key partner, Germany, or will seek reconciliation will come when he names his government later this month. A leading candidate for the post of prime minister is Jean-Marc Ayrault, a German-speaker who knows the country well and who has sent conciliatory messages to Berlin in recent weeks. Choosing him over Martine Aubry, a more traditional Socialist who was responsible for introducing France's 35-hour workweek, would signal that Hollande is ready for compromise. "I will be very interested to see whether or not Hollande kicks off his presidency with a battle with Merkel," said Louis Gargour, chief investment officer of hedge fund LNG Capital. "This is a contest of Keynesian economics and a focus on growth versus an extended phase of austerity that electorates are fast becoming tired of."

The head of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) maintained a global climate treaty was better than a range of small-scale agreements, but said it was unlikely a deal to combat global warming would be reached this year. The prospect of a global climate treaty is fading as the world's top two carbon emitters, China and the United States, avoid legally binding action. Experts say a shift to a less ambitious goal might help. "The argument or suggestion that the world would be better off if we somehow found lots of little packages and agreed to them and found out how they fit together is not to me a viable scenario," Achim Steiner, UNEP executive director, said on Thursday in an interview with Reuters. Annual UN climate meetings have failed to achieve any major breakthrough since signing the Kyoto Protocol in 1997. The present round of that pact expires in 2012. The next annual meeting of environment ministers will be in Cancun, Mexico in November and December. "We might not be able to conclude the one big deal in the next conference but what we must produce is some concrete results that clearly take us toward a global framework for action," Steiner said on the sidelines of the Business for the Environment meeting in Seoul. Experts note a less formal deal, outside a legal framework, may now emerge, building on the actions of individual nations. More than 100 countries have backed a non-binding Copenhagen Accord to mobilise $30 billion in climate aid from 2010-2012 to help poor nations face the impacts of climate change, underscoring what could be agreed outside a legal framework. "What will be critical for Cancun is that the financial pledges that are part of the accord begin to be realised and that people see real money going to real projects," Steiner said. "Do not write Cancun off." Steiner also threw his support behind the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which has been attacked by sceptics after it published a report with errors in global warming forecasts. The UN launched a review of the panel last month after the IPCC acknowledged in January its report had exaggerated the pace of Himalayan glacier melting and overstated how much of the Netherlands is below sea level. "The premise that the integrity of the IPCC has been compromised is something that I reject," he said. The IPCC shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with former US Vice President Al Gore, and produces the main scientific document driving global efforts to agree to a more ambitious climate treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol. "It will remain the world's best resource on trying to appreciate the complex and continuously evolving state of our knowledge of global warming," he said.

WASHINGTON, Apr 28, (bdnews24.com/Reuters) - The outbreak of a flu virus that has led to a US public health emergency highlights the need for a strong government commitment to scientific research, President Barack Obama said on Monday. During remarks on science and technology that covered topics from climate change to the public-school curriculum, Obama set a goal of devoting 3 percent of gross domestic product to scientific research. "If there was ever a day that reminded us of our shared stake in science and research, it's today," Obama said in a speech to the National Academy of Sciences, a society of scientists and engineers who give advice to US policymakers. "Our capacity to deal with a public health challenge of this sort rests heavily on the work of our scientific and medical community," Obama said. "And this is one more example of why we cannot allow our nation to fall behind." Obama said that US cases of swine flu were "not a cause for alarm" but the administration was monitoring them closely. The administration said its declaration of a public health emergency was precautionary. The flu has killed 149 people in Mexico and spread to North America and Europe. Though no one outside of Mexico has died, pandemic fears have been raised. Obama invoked the space race between the United States and the Soviet Union during the 1950s and 1960s as an example of the importance of a major investment in research, and said science spending as a share of GDP has declined since that "high water mark." Through the goal of spending more than 3 percent of GDP on science, "we will not just meet, but we will exceed the level achieved at the height of the space race," Obama said. The goal refers to public and private spending. The United States now spends 2.66 percent of gross domestic product on research and development, according to the White House. Some of the increased spending is included in the $787 billion economic stimulus package that Obama signed in February. In his proposed fiscal 2010 budget, Obama called for making permanent tax credits for business investment in research and development. The science speech comes as the White House is trying to highlight Obama's accomplishments with the approach of the 100-day mark for his presidency on Wednesday. He also touted his proposals to tackle global climate change, which face a fight in the US Congress, saying it was "this generation's challenge to break our dependence on fossil fuels." The administration on Monday also opened a two-day meeting of major world economies on climate change. Obama wants to cut US emissions by roughly 15 percent by 2020 -- back to 1990 levels -- mostly through a cap-and-trade system that limits how much carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases big factories can emit. That proposal is at the heart of a bill under consideration in Congress. Republicans have criticized the cap-and-trade system as a backhanded energy tax. Some moderate Democrats are also worried about the impact of the plan on jobs and the economy.

A former top civil servant dubbed "Hong Kong's conscience" has won a highly symbolic by-election for a seat in the city's legislature in a vote widely seen as a referendum on democracy in the former British colony. The victory by Anson Chan, 67, former deputy to last British governor Chris Patten, was good news for the city's pro-democracy political camp, which suffered a beating in district council polls last month at the hands of the biggest pro-Beijing party. Accepting victory on Monday, a grinning Chan said the results from Sunday's election proved that Hong Kong people wanted universal suffrage by 2012, the date for the next election for the city's leader. "My experience on the campaign trail has convinced me even more that genuine democracy is the only way of ultimately safeguarding our freedoms and values and of building a compassionate, fair and more just society," she said. Britain handed Hong Kong back to Communist-ruled China in 1997, since when the territory has enjoyed sweeping autonomy in many areas, but not in political reform. The city's constitution makes universal suffrage the ultimate aim of political reform, but is vague on the timing and direction. The British themselves never pushed the idea until the dying days of colonial rule under Patten. Chan's margin over her main rival, Regina Ip, was higher than expected after opinion polls showed the gap narrowing in recent days. DEMOCRACY "I think it shows that a lot of middle class people in Hong Kong still care about democracy, even though the economy is getting better, the stock market is rising, and the economy is more dependent on China," said Ma Ngok, associate professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. "This is something that Beijing needs to think about." Since 1997, however, the democratic camp's traditional overall support rate of about 60 percent has slipped and some experts warn that it must rethink its single-issue approach to elections. Chan won about 54 percent of the vote. "This is the time for the pan-democrats to have a thorough review," said James Sung of City University. "But I'm suspicious ... since this was a clear victory for Anson I'm afraid that the pan-democratic group will not look thoroughly at the changing political climate." Despite losing, Ip's strong showing demonstrated once again, after the district council elections, that the pro-Beijing camp's election machine that backed her is formidable. It also marked the rebirth of a politician who is remembered for trying to force an unpopular anti-subversion law through the legislature in 2003 as security chief. That bid is blamed for sparking a protest that drew half a million people onto the streets, shocking leaders in Beijing. Analysts say, Ip, 57, is well positioned for a run in full Legislative Council elections next year. Currently, the chief executive is selected by an 800-seat committee under the influence of the Communist leadership in Beijing, half of the legislature is popularly elected and the other is picked by "functional constituencies" of professions and special-interest groups.

Britain can lead the fight against climate change using the same spirit of grit it displayed in World War Two, Prince Charles told business leaders on Tuesday. The heir to the throne has already flaunted his personal green credentials, at a time when fighting global warming is high on the British political agenda, and on Tuesday urged top industry executives to do the same for business. "Just think what they did in the last war," he said, referring to Britain's allied victory against Germany. "Things that seemed impossible were achieved almost overnight." "Business has that power and can really make a difference." At a May Day summit, the Prince addressed heads of British and other European businesses ranging from Boots and Marks & Spencer to EDF, KPMG and F&C. And he used the date to recall his days in Britain's navy, and evoke the urgent danger posed by climate change. "When I was serving in the Royal Navy ... "May Day, May Day, May Day" was the distress call used in cases of emergency." "It still is - and this is an emergency we face." Prince Charles recently pledged to exchange private planes and helicopters for public transport and biodiesel cars. He has improved energy efficiency at his country homes and provided bicycles to his London staff -- all to reduce his carbon footprint. The May Day business and climate change summit invited companies to make pledges to cut their contribution to climate change, and it did not fall on deaf ears. Casting electronic votes, the majority of the 110 top executives assembled in plush surroundings at St. James's Palace felt business could do more to fight climate change than government. EDF Chief Executive Vincent de Rivaz pledged to cut the utility's energy use by 30 percent and its transport carbon emissions by 20 percent by 2012.

All nations will have to do more to fight climate change, with deep greenhouse gas cuts by rich nations to avoid the worst impacts of a warmer world, a draft proposal at UN talks said on Saturday. The four-page draft, written by delegates from Indonesia, Australia and South Africa as an unofficial guide for delegates at the 190-nation talks, said developing nations should at least brake rising emissions as part of new global climate pact. It said there was "unequivocal scientific evidence" that "preventing the worst impacts of climate change will require (developed nations) to reduce emissions in a range of 25-40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020."

Abdur Rahim Harmachhi bdnews24.com senior correspondent Dhaka, June 8 (bdnews24.com) – The government is set to announce a budget of approximately Tk 100,000 crore for the coming fiscal year, with a proposal to allocate up to 15 percent of the amount in subsidising essential commodities, the finance adviser said Sunday. It will mark the first time in history that a caretaker government has proposed a complete budget for two successive fiscal years. Finance adviser AB Mirza Azizul Islam, who will make his second budget speech Monday, told bdnews24.com that up to Tk 15,000 crore would be proposed as allocations for fuel, food and fertiliser. This is three times greater than the outgoing fiscal year's allocation for similar subsidies. Spending on non-development sectors, including food, structural coordination and loans, will exceed Tk 70,000 crore but the overall budget deficit will not be more than five percent, the finance adviser said. Mirza Aziz said the government would not increase rates of tax in the next fiscal year but import duty on some goods might be hiked in the interests of local industry. He said the unusual fuel price hikes in the global market, the world food crisis and climate change causing natural disasters turned out to be the major challenges for Bangladesh in preparing the budget. The finance adviser said the spiralling oil prices on the international market put our economy under tremendous pressure but the government has not yet take any decision to hike fuel prices. "The price of oil has jumped to $ 139 a barrel on the global market as we are going to announce the budget; it rose by more than $ 10 in a single day. But we did not increase fuel prices in view of our overall situation," said Mirza Aziz. A barrel of fuel cost $ 62 on the global market when the government last raised fuel prices in the country in 2007, the adviser said. In the budget for fiscal 2007-08, overall deficit was projected at 4.2 percent. The finance adviser said Sunday the budget deficit was likely to increase a bit in the coming year due to higher subsidies to various sectors including fuel, fertiliser and foodstuffs. "But it will not be more than 5 percent," he added. The tax net would be widened on a large scale in efforts to increase revenue income, said the finance adviser. The projected revenue income in the next fiscal year is 17 percent. In the budget for 2008-09, Tk 43,850 crore was slated to come from NBR-controlled sources. The adviser said the tax structure in the budget would be business-friendly. "Discretionary power of tax officials will be curbed and tax realisation process will be made easier," he said. He said the target rate for gross domestic product would be 6.5 percent, and the annualised inflation rate was projected to be around 9 percent. GDP growth for the fiscal year 2007-08 was targeted to be 7 percent with an average inflation rate of 6 percent. The finance adviser said 7 percent growth in the fiscal year just ending had not been possible due to floods and cyclones. "It was earlier assumed that the growth rate in the present fiscal year would be below 6 percent. But the latest data from the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics shows that the growth rate is 6.21 percent," the adviser said. GDP growth in the previous fiscal year (2006-07) was 6.5 percent. Mirza Aziz said major concern for Bangladesh's economy was inflation. He reiterated that point-to-point inflation rate fell by three percentage points to 7.7 percent in April. Referring to data available at the Bureau of Statistics, he said the point-to-point inflation rate was 10.06 percent in March. Agriculture will receive the highest priority in the next budget. "The highest allocation has been made for the sector in the development budget," the adviser said. Mirza Aziz said the government had planned schemes to generate employment for poor people in the next fiscal year. Under the scheme, one person in a family will receive a fixed amount of money in return for 100 days of work. The number of beneficiaries of different government allowances under social safety net would also be increased. The adviser said the government would take an initiative to enhance the purchasing power of the people of fixed income groups. There will also be an announcement of a dearness allowance for government employees in order to cut the suffering caused by spiralling prices. The finance adviser's budget speech will be broadcast live by government and private-owned TV and radio channels at 3pm Monday. As it did last year, the government is inviting public scrutiny of the proposed budget by posting the budget speech, budget summary and the government's annual financial statement at www.mof.gov.bd. Hard copies will also be made available, from 3pm Monday. Any person or organisation can access any of the documents regarding the budget, download necessary information and submit comments and feedback to the government by filling in the available forms up to 5pm on June 16. Individuals or organisations may also post in comments, recommendations and criticisms in writing, which will all be considered and incorporated in the final approved budget, ensuring people's participation in the process. The following particular websites have also been listed by the government for access to the proposed budget by the public: www.bangladesh.gov.bd, www.nbr-bd.org, www.plancomm.gov.bd, www.imed.gov.bd, www.bdpressinform.org and www.cao.gov.bd. Links to the documents will also be available at other government websites under the finance ministry and at bdnews24.com.

CRAWFORD, Texas (bdnews24.com/Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel told President George W Bush on Saturday she would be willing to support a third round of UN sanctions against Iran if Tehran continues to resist demands to halt sensitive nuclear work. Merkel, in a visit to Bush's ranch in Crawford, also said she would consider possible cuts in her country's brisk trade flows with Iran should other efforts fail to secure Tehran's cooperation over its nuclear program. Bush agreed with Merkel that diplomacy was the best way to resolve the standoff with Iran. "We were at one in saying that the threat posed through the nuclear program of Iran is indeed a serious one," Merkel said at a joint news conference with Bush. "We both share this view, but we also were of the opinion that we think that this issue can be solved through diplomatic means; that the next step, then, obviously, would be a resolution," she said through a translator. Merkel said she would wait for reports on Iran's nuclear activities from the European Union negotiator and the UN atomic watchdog before making a final decision on sanctions. Britain, France, Germany, the United States, Russia and China are expected to meet on November 19 to assess reports from European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana and International Atomic Energy Agency head Mohamed ElBaradei. "If the reports remain unsatisfactory ... we need to think about further possible sanctions. ... We also have to then talk and agree on further possible sanctions," Merkel said. Merkel said she would talk with German companies about "further possible reductions of those commercial ties" with Iran. The West accuses Iran of seeking to develop a nuclear weapon but Tehran says its nuclear program is purely for civilian purposes of generating electricity. Bush alarmed some European allies last month when he said a nuclear-armed Iran could lead to World War III. The Bush administration insists it is committed to pursuing diplomacy with Iran, but also says all options are on the table. DIPLOMATIC ISOLATION "What the Iranian regime must understand is that we will continue to work together to solve this problem diplomatically, which means they will continue to be isolated," Bush said at the news conference. Bush and Merkel's two days of talks at the ranch also covered issues including Afghanistan, global warming and a planned conference on Middle East peace that Bush is due to host in a few weeks in Annapolis, Maryland. On climate change, Merkel has been pressing Bush to drop his resistance to mandatory caps on greenhouse emissions. But the U.S. president instead favors voluntary steps toward a long-term goal, resisting tougher measures he contends would harm businesses. Ahead of a UN-sponsored meeting on global warming in Bali, Indonesia next month, Bush gave no indication of a shift in his stance, saying he wanted to tackle climate change but "without ruining our economies." The ranch visit was also aimed at deepening ties between Washington and Berlin after a rift that opened over the Iraq war. Bush had a chilly relationship with Merkel's predecessor, Gerhard Schroeder, a vocal critic of the Iraq war. Bush and Merkel have a friendly rapport which was underscored by his suggestion that she visit the ranch, an invitation he usually reserves for his favorite world leaders. Bush this week also focused on a renewal of ties with France, hosting French President Nicolas Sarkozy at a formal dinner at the White House and then accompanying him on a tour of the estate in Mount Vernon, Virginia, of the first U.S. president, George Washington. Bush and Sarkozy pledged a common approach on Iran as well. Bush showed Merkel around his 1,600-acre (650-hectare) ranch during a morning walk. Joined by their spouses on Friday evening, the leaders dined on pecan-smoked beef tenderloin and green chili-cheese grits souffle. On Saturday, they continued their talks over hamburgers.

Sure, you might never soar among eagles or brush your cheek against a wisp of cloud. But you would also no longer flee from swarming clouds of mosquitoes, and you would be protected from the deadly diseases that the insects spread. For the first time, scientists have used the gene-editing tool Crispr-Cas9 to render humans effectively invisible in the eyes of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which use dark visual cues to hunt, according to a paper recently published in the journal Current Biology. By eliminating two of that mosquito’s light-sensing receptors, the researchers knocked out its ability to visually target hosts. “Nobody has studied this before,” said Neha Thakre, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, San Diego, who studies Crispr as a mosquito control tool. Thakre, who was not involved with the research, said she saw the study as a “great start” to understanding what controls mosquito vision. Aedes aegypti is a salt-and-pepper scourge on humans across the world. The females, in search of the blood they need to lay their eggs, infect tens of millions of people each year with flaviviruses that lead to dengue, yellow fever and Zika. “The better we understand how they sense the human, the better we can control the mosquito in an eco-friendly manner,” said Yinpeng Zhan, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the lead author on the paper. Anopheles mosquitoes, which spread malaria, hunt at night, whereas Aedes aegypti hunts under the sun, at dawn and dusk. The species depends on a fleet of senses to find blood. A mere whiff of carbon dioxide, a sign that someone or something has just exhaled nearby, sends the mosquito into a frenzied flight. “They can also detect some of the organic cues from our skin,” such as heat, humidity and stench, said Craig Montell, a neurobiologist at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and an author on the study. But if there is no suitable host, the mosquito will fly straight to the closest-seeming target: a dark spot. In 1937, scientists observed that Aedes aegypti mosquitoes were specifically attracted to people with dark clothing. But the molecular mechanism by which mosquitoes visually sensed their targets was largely unknown. Many experiments on mosquito vision take place in wind tunnels, large chambers that can cost tens of thousands of dollars. In prior experiments, mosquitoes placed in the wind tunnel and given a whiff of carbon dioxide chose to fly to a dark spot over a white one. Montell’s lab does not have a wind tunnel, so Zhan designed an inexpensive setup — a cage with a black circle and a white circle inside — that cost less than $100 and delivered the same results as a wind tunnel. In the spring of 2019, Zhan conducted spot tests in the cage. In the fall, Jeff Riffell, a biologist at the University of Washington, along with Claire Rusch, a graduate student, and Diego Alonso San Alberto, a postdoctoral fellow, ran the same experiments using a wind tunnel to double-check the original results. Montell and Zhan suspected that one of the five light-sensing proteins expressed in the mosquito’s eye might be the key to eliminating its ability to visually seek out human hosts by sensing dark colours. First, they decided to knock out the rhodopsin protein Op1. Op1, the most widely expressed vision protein in the mosquito’s compound eyes, seemed the best candidate for interfering with the mosquito’s vision. Zhan injected the mutation into thousands of tiny mosquito eggs using a tool with a special needle with a very tiny tip. After his wee mutants had grown into adults, Zhan sucked 10 or so females into a tube using a mouth-controlled aspirator. With each group, he held his breath, walked over to the cage and released the females with one big exhale. The Op1 mutants behaved exactly like the wild-type Aedes aegypti: After huffing carbon dioxide, they flew directly to the black dot in the cage. Montell and Zhan tried again, this time knocking out Op2, a closely related rhodopsin. Still, the Op2 mutants showed no meaningful decline in their vision. But when the researchers knocked out both proteins, the mosquitoes whizzed around aimlessly, showing no preference between the white circle and black circles. They had lost their ability to seek dark-coloured hosts. Were the mosquitoes blind altogether, or just blind to people? To answer this question, Montell and Zhan ran a series of tests to see how the double mutants responded to light. First, they tested whether the double mutants would move toward light. Next, they connected electrodes to the double mutants’ eyes to measure if the eyes displayed voltage changes in response to light. Finally, they placed the double mutants in rotating cylinders with vertical black and white stripes to see if the insects would walk in the direction of the moving stripes. The double mutants passed all three tests, although they had a weaker response than the wild types in the last two tests. The mosquitoes were not blind, after all. “My first transgenic mosquito,” Zhan said proudly. “We had a happy ending.” The new paper could inform future strategies to control mosquito populations. If female mosquitoes were unable to see hosts, they would have a harder time finding the blood required for their eggs to develop. “The population would crash,” Montell said. The researchers have yet to expose the double mutants to hosts. If and when they do, Thakre is curious to know exactly how impaired vision affects the ability of mosquitoes to actually feed on blood, given the insects’ many other senses. “The thing you want to control is a mosquito bite,” Thakre said. As climate change heats up regions of the planet, it lays out an unwelcome welcome mat for Aedes aegypti to enter new areas, including parts of China and North America. “Every year there’s a pandemic from mosquito-borne diseases,” Montell said from his home in Santa Barbara. In California, Aedes aegypti was first spotted in 2011 in Los Angeles County and has now spread as far north as Sacramento. The mosquitoes will only continue to spread, their eggs glued to our suitcases and cars, awaiting the day when they hatch into adults and begin hunting, compound eyes wide open. © 2021 The New York Times Company

The agreement emerged from two days of talks between Obama and the new Indian prime minister as they worked to revitalize a relationship hurt by a heated diplomatic dispute at the turn of the year and flagging optimism about India as a place to do business before the reform-minded Modi came to power in May. Obama and Modi, speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, said their discussions ranged from trade to space exploration to climate change to the Islamic State threat in the Middle East. "We already have the foundation of a strong partnership," said Modi, seated beside Obama. "We now have to revive the momentum and ensure that we get the best out of it for our people and for the world." Modi received a warm welcome in the United States, even though he was denied a visa in 2005 over rioting in his home state three years earlier that killed more than 1,000 people, mostly Muslims. Modi, a Hindu nationalist, was exonerated by an Indian Supreme Court investigation. A stronger relationship between the United States and India, the world's two largest democracies, has the potential to provide a counterweight to China, whose maritime moves in the Asia-Pacific have rattled regional nerves. A joint statement said Obama and Modi agreed "to intensify cooperation in maritime security to ensure freedom of navigation and unimpeded movement of lawful shipping and commercial activity, in accordance with accepted principles of international law." China's increasing assertiveness over territorial claims in the South China Sea and East China Sea has angered its neighbors. India and China have a long-running land border dispute and India's military has recently been monitoring Chinese activity in the Indian Ocean. Obama and Modi also agreed to negotiate a 10-year extension of a military cooperation framework due to expire at year-end, and will stress counter-terrorism cooperation and joint efforts against militant networks. However, Indian officials noted that while terrorism was a big shared concern, the joint statement made no reference to any plan for India to joint Obama's coalition against the Islamic State. NO BIG BREAKTHROUGHS While the leaders did not announce big-ticket agreements or breakthroughs in resolving significant trade and business irritants, the visit amounted to an official clearing of the air after Modi's visa issue and India's outrage at the arrest in New York last year of one of its diplomats, who was charged with visa fraud and paying her nanny less than the minimum wage. In a joint "vision statement" on Monday, Obama and Modi vowed to make what the two countries call a "strategic" partnership a model for the rest of the world. Obama said he was impressed by Modi's interest in addressing poverty and growing India's economy, as well as his determination that India should help bring about peace and security in the world. "I want to wish him luck in what I'm sure will be a challenging but always interesting tenure as prime minister," Obama said. In a unique departure from protocol, Obama took Modi on a short motorcade drive from the White House to the memorial honoring slain US civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. Modi met congressional leaders and members of the US India business lobby before leaving on Tuesday. After meeting the former, he stressed the importance of addressing environmental issues and cooperation on security. "The humanity of the entire world needs to come together to fight terrorism," he said. Speaking to the US India Business Council, Modi vowed to continue his war on red tape and urged US business to take advantage of the rapid changes in India. "My country has come awake," he said. "Please come. And together you will benefit and my country will also benefit." Rick Rossow of the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank said the effort Modi had made to interact directly with business leaders and the Indian diaspora during his visit would have been a great encouragement, given some doubts in the business lobby about his commitment to reform. "The numbers are already showing business is interested," Rossow said, referring to increases in foreign direct investment and institutional investment since Modi came to power. Ashley Tellis, an international security specialist at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, called the Obama-Modi vision statements "wonderfully aspirational," but added: "Now we’ve got to see whether the policies both sides pursue actually get them to where they want to go. The record thus far does not inspire confidence."

Germany's presidency of the G8 countries could lay the foundation for a radical climate deal embracing emerging powers and the United States, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said on Saturday. The Kyoto Protocol on climate change, which runs to 2012, aims to slash greenhouse gases but does not include countries like India, China and the United States, responsible for a quarter of the world's industrial greenhouse gas emissions. Blair used his closing speech at the World Economic Forum to highlight a changing mood in the United States, where President George W Bush this week recognised climate change as a challenge and told Americans to cut gasoline use. "The mood in the US is in the process of a quantum shift," Blair told the packed audience of business leaders in what he said would be his last speech at the forum as prime minister. Blair was unequivocal in his view that global warming needs to be addressed by the major global powers. "It would be madness not to act to prevent its realisation -- just as a precaution. It's challenge is the supreme expression of interdependence. America and China, even if they had no other reason for a relationship...would need one simply for this alone," he said. Blair said Germany's presidency of the G8 group of industrialised nations would provide the opportunity for world partners to agree "at least the principles of a new, binding international agreement" to replace Kyoto. "But one which is more radical than Kyoto and more comprehensive, one which this time, includes all the major countries of the world," he said. Blair said any agreement without binding commitments from the United States, China and India would not be able to deliver. "If Britain shut down our emissions entirely ... the growth in China's emissions would make up the difference within just two years," he said. "Without the biggest economies being part of a framework to reduce carbon dependence, we have no earthly hope of success." Senior officials from advanced and developing countries joined an "informal" conference in Tokyo this week to start work on a follow-up agreement to the Kyoto Protocol. Among participants were the United States, China and India. The Kyoto Protocol obliges 35 developed nations to cut emissions of greenhouse gases to 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2008-12. But the nations signed up to the protocol account for only about one-third of global greenhouse gas emissions.

WASHINGTON, Fri Feb 13, (bdnews24.com/Reuters) - The global economic crisis has become the biggest near-term US security concern, sowing instability in a quarter of the world's countries and threatening destructive trade wars, US intelligence agencies reported on Thursday. The director of national intelligence's annual threat assessment also said al Qaeda's leadership had been weakened over the last year. But security in Afghanistan had deteriorated and Pakistan had to gain control over its border areas before the situation could improve. "The financial crisis and global recession are likely to produce a wave of economic crises in emerging market nations over the next year," said the report. A wave of "destructive protectionism" was possible as countries find they cannot export their way out of the slump. "Time is our greatest threat. The longer it takes for the recovery to begin, the greater the likelihood of serious damage to US strategic interests," the report said. The report represents the findings of all 16 US intelligence agencies and serves as a leading security reference for policymakers and Congress. Besides reviewing adversaries, it also considered this year the security impact of issues including climate change and the economy. It said a quarter of countries have already experienced at least "low-level" instability, such as government changes, linked to the economy. There have been anti-government protests in Europe and the former Soviet Union, and growing economic strains in Africa and Latin America, the national intelligence director, Adm. Dennis Blair, told Congress in delivering the report. "Instability can loosen the fragile hold that many developing countries have on law and order, which can spill out in dangerous ways to the international community," Blair told the Senate Intelligence Committee. Steps such as devaluations, tariffs and export subsidies were possible from countries desperate to boost economies. AL QAEDA WEAKENED Last year's threat report warned of a resurgent al Qaeda leadership in the Pakistan border area with Afghanistan. But a pressure campaign by the United States and allies has killed several al Qaeda leaders and weakened its central command structure, the report said. Al Qaeda still wants to attack Europe and the United States, but views the West "as a harder target than in the past," the report said. In Afghanistan, where U.S. President Barack Obama plans to send more troops, Taliban insurgents are attacking more often and over a wider area, the report said. It said Pakistan must gain control of its border areas, but was losing authority in parts of its North-West Frontier Province. Tough economic times and frustration with the government were radicalizing people all over the country. The report called Iran a key Middle East flashpoint. Persuading Tehran to give up suspected nuclear weapons development would be difficult, requiring a combination of international pressure and incentives. "With Iran developing a nuclear weapon capability and Israel determined not to allow it, there is potential for an Iran-Israeli confrontation or crisis," the report said. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a champion of Iran's nuclear program, faces uncertain prospects for re-election in June. "Ahmadinejad's economic policies have reduced unemployment marginally, but have fueled significant inflation, providing his critics ample ammunition," the report said. Blair said a change in president would not necessarily mean a change in nuclear policy. Iran continues to seek influence in Iraq and resist a permanent US presence. But after six years of war in Iraq, security gains are enduring, a bright spot for US interests in the Middle East, the report said. "A more stable Iraq could counterbalance other negative trends in the region." Such trends include a widening gap between moderate and hardline Middle East states after the latest fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, and a more difficult path toward Israeli-Palestinian peace. Lower oil prices could crimp the "adventurism" of Iran and US Latin American antagonist Venezuela, the report said. It said if oil remained below $50 per barrel for some time, it could force major spending cuts or a devaluation in Venezuela.

Australia, criticised as a Kyoto Protocol holdout, on Wednesday stepped up its demands for the climate pact to be scrapped, saying 'Old Kyoto' belonged in the 'pages of climate change history'. Canberra, which signed but refused to ratify Kyoto, would meet its targets under the pact, despite warnings by Australia's Climate Institute that Greenhouse Gas emissions were set to rise sharply, Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull said. But Kyoto should be replaced with a global agreement which included emerging heavyweights India and China, as well as the world's biggest polluter, the United States, Turnbull said. "In my view the United States will never ratify the protocol as it stands," Turnbull told Australia's National Press Club. "Whatever the accounting washup of Kyoto may be, the fact is that the protocol's first commitment period, beginning next year, is rapidly moving into the pages of climate change history." The Kyoto Protocol, which sets emissions caps for many wealthy signatory countries while setting none for poorer ones such as China, will expire in 2012. Australia, the world's biggest exporter of coal, has refused to ratify the pact or set binding cuts on carbon emissions, saying the move would unfairly hurt the economy. Turnbull said on Wednesday that Canberra would spend A$18.5 million ($15.2 million) in energy-hungry China to help cut the country's emissions by capturing methane from underground mining and using it for electricity generation. China, which along with the United States, Australia, Japan, India and South Korea is a member of a rival Kyoto pact, rejected emissions caps, saying they may hurt growth. Turnbull, who champions practical measures to fight climate change rather than symbolic pacts like Kyoto, said the protocol had also ignored the need to stop deforestation in developing countries like Indonesia and Brazil. "It's no wonder Kyoto's results have been so anaemic," he said. The independent Climate Institute last week said Australia, the world's biggest polluter per capita, would pass its cap of 108 percent of 1990-level greenhouse emissions -- a charge Turnbull rejected on Wednesday with the latest 2005 figures. Australian Greens Senator Christine Milne said Turnbull was trying to bury the bad news that energy and transport emissions had risen in the last two years amid the country's mining and commodity export boom. Conservative Prime Minister John Howard argues climate change solutions need to be globally agreed rather than limited like 'Old Kyoto' to industrialised, mainly European, nations. But with the government facing re-election later in the year and opinion polls showing climate change is a major issue for 80 percent of voters, Howard has unveiled a range of environment measures to bolster his green credentials. Australia is expected to make measures to combat climate change the centrepiece of the May 8 Budget, with the government having already flagged spending A$10 billion to reform water use amid a decade of crippling drought.

I had been on Grand Cayman for more than a week, but I was no closer to speaking with him than when I arrived. The heir to a famously private foam-container dynasty and a reclusive businessman in his own right, Dart apparently hasn’t spoken to the press since 1993. Although he has lived on Grand Cayman for 25 years and is widely believed to be the biggest private landholder on the archipelago, almost nobody I interviewed was sure if they had seen him. Residents compared him to Batman, Howard Hughes, a Bond villain and both Warren and Jimmy Buffett. Dart lives on Seven Mile Beach, in an old hotel — the entire hotel — once known as the West Indian Club. He acquired the property in 1994 after renouncing his US citizenship, a tax dodge so audacious it inspired federal legislation. Although Cayman was initially a refuge for the financier, Dart, who is thought to be 64, has taken to his adopted home with zeal. With his fortune and his company, Dart Enterprises, he has increasingly come to define the islands’ future. In 2007, he opened a major development, a sprawling mix of retail and entertainment venues called Camana Bay, and began amassing a portfolio of high-end properties. His list now includes the Ritz-Carlton, the Yacht Club and a new Kimpton resort. In February, his group proposed a $1.5 billion “iconic skyscraper” that would rival the Eiffel Tower and the Burj Khalifa of Dubai. As a place to conduct business, Cayman’s appeal is obvious. The country, a British Overseas Territory, levies no income or corporate taxes, and, since the 1960s, it has become one of the world’s most sophisticated banking centres. While Cayman was once a shady place to stash illicit cash — a reputation cemented by the 1991 John Grisham novel “The Firm” and a subsequent Tom Cruise thriller — it has long since moved aggressively upmarket, courting institutional investors, private equity and trading firms seeking to minimise taxes and bureaucracy. As of 2016, according to one analysis, it domiciled 60% of global hedge fund assets. But for his base of operations, Dart has chosen an existentially vulnerable piece of land. At 76 square miles, Grand Cayman is roughly the size of Brooklyn and is, on average, only 7 feet above sea level. In 2004, Ivan, a Category 5 hurricane, submerged most of the island. The damage was valued at close to $3 billion. Bodies buried in beach cemeteries floated out to sea. Animals escaped their enclosures, and, to this day, rewilded chickens roam the islands. “Problem is, even if hurricanes don’t get any more prevalent, they’ll get stronger,” said James Whittaker, a Caymanian who is a former banker and regulator turned clean energy entrepreneur. “If sea-level rise is a foot, well, that means that a Category 1 now is going to do the same damage that a Category 4 used to do.” Even if Cayman built enough infrastructure to survive the rising water, he added, “The problem is insurance. You’ll never be able to insure the country anymore.” As I stood atop Mount Trashmore, looking out at the crystalline water, I wondered what Dart thought about the country’s vulnerability to rising seas. Or if, like me, he had quickly fallen into a tropical reverie — a feeling that nothing could possibly go wrong on this exclusive stretch of paradise. Would a wildly successful investor like him buy up so much of a country that was really doomed to disappear? Mount Trashmore, an eight-story dump on Grand Cayman, in the Cayman Islands, Oct 11, 2019. The dump, never trenched or lined, is a collection of almost every piece of garbage discarded on the island since it went all-in on financial services in the 1960s. The New York Times ‘A Caymanian Dream’ Mount Trashmore, an eight-story dump on Grand Cayman, in the Cayman Islands, Oct 11, 2019. The dump, never trenched or lined, is a collection of almost every piece of garbage discarded on the island since it went all-in on financial services in the 1960s. The New York Times Until the 1960s, when the first banking laws were put in place to attract international capital, the Cayman Islands was a backwater, with an economy dependent on seamen who would send their remittances back home. When a Cambridge-trained lawyer named William Walker arrived in 1963, he described the place as having “cows wandering through Georgetown, only one bank, only one paved road, and no telephones.” The population was just over 8,000, and the mangrove-covered island was swarming with mosquitoes. The banks moved in first, then the accounting and law firms. Seven Mile Beach, previously undeveloped, became an international tourist attraction for both divers and money managers. By the end of the 1990s, the jurisdiction had established itself firmly as a leading global banking center, and today financial services accounts for over half of its economy. Proponents of the Cayman business model argue that its benefits accrue to all of the islands’ citizens, who can boast of having one of the highest gross domestic products per capita in the world. Foreign capital, much of it in the form of duties and fees, helps fund schools and infrastructure. Regulations direct employers to give special consideration to Caymanians for jobs and require that Caymanians own shares in local businesses. But many islanders complain of a two-tiered system. Caymanians get jobs but are then passed over for promotions. The best-paid positions often go to highly educated expatriates, who make up just under half the resident population of about 66,000. “They say this is a trickle-down economy,” said Roy Bodden, a historian of the Cayman Islands and former member of the Legislative Assembly. “So, here’s my argument. Why should it be a trickle for us? Why aren’t we holding the cup?” Bodden has been a vocal critic of the islands’ unchecked development and what he sees as the disenfranchisement of the island population. “You talk about the American dream, well, we had a Caymanian dream,” he said. The way he told the story, the elites had sold the country out. When Dart relocated to Grand Cayman, his secretiveness and colourful business dealings aroused local suspicion. In 1993, his home in Sarasota, Florida, burned to the ground in an arson that was never fully explained. After Dart renounced his ties to the United States a few months later, he moved to Belize, whose government in 1995 proposed to the State Department a Belizean consulate in Sarasota, where Dart and his family could live, presumably tax-free. The idea was never seriously considered, and Dart settled on Grand Cayman. It is a closely guarded secret how much of the three-island territory — Little Cayman and Cayman Brac hover just to the northeast of the big island — Dart and his subsidiaries own. Many islanders take it for granted that he is the biggest private landholder on the islands, and some suspect he owns more land than the government. After the 2008 financial crisis, the Cayman economy contracted. But Dart picked up the slack. In addition to resorts, office buildings and residential properties, his company began planning and building major municipal infrastructure projects like tunnels and roads, reinvigorating long-held concerns on Grand Cayman that Dart and his subsidiaries controlled too much of the island. A 2015 audit of the government’s land management scolded ministers for allowing Dart subsidiaries such free rein. Grand Cayman in the Cayman Islands, Oct 11, 2019. Residents compared financier Kenneth Dart, who is widely believed to be the biggest private landholder on the archipelago, to Batman, Howard Hughes, a Bond villain and both Warren and Jimmy Buffett. The New York Times A Plan for Mount Trashmore Grand Cayman in the Cayman Islands, Oct 11, 2019. Residents compared financier Kenneth Dart, who is widely believed to be the biggest private landholder on the archipelago, to Batman, Howard Hughes, a Bond villain and both Warren and Jimmy Buffett. The New York Times Some speculate Dart is private because he fears for his safety. As the scion of a Michigan family business, Dart Container, that has long dominated the polystyrene foam market (it also makes plastic Solo cups and other iconic food service products), Dart was born into a significant fortune. But he also had a talent for trading, making lucrative investments over the decades in financial firms, biotech companies, Russian public vouchers and steeply discounted sovereign debt in Greece and Argentina, among many other companies and countries. Some investments made him enemies. His yacht was armoured to withstand torpedo fire, one of his two brothers, Tom, told Bloomberg News in 1995. When he first moved to the islands, he could be seen flanked by bodyguards. In 2014, Dart stepped down as president of his family’s container business and has, according to comments made in 2015 by the Dart Enterprises chief executive, Mark VanDevelde, become more focused on real estate development and conservation. He also oversees an extensive nursery on the island, where he collects native and endemic trees and plants. According to materials shared or published by Dart Enterprises, the company has invested more than $1.5 billion in the Cayman Islands, with another $1 billion in the development pipeline. This does not include the estimated price tag for the skyscraper. Bloomberg puts Dart’s net worth at $5.8 billion. “They’ll tell you they have ‘patient capital,’” Whittaker said. “That’s the word they like to use. Which means ‘I’m going to throw two, three billion dollars in the ground and my kids or my grandkids will reap the rewards once it gets built.’” Dart’s vision for Cayman is comprehensive. In a 2018 video presented at the local Chamber of Commerce, his company outlined a building program that would connect the white sands of Seven Mile Beach to a protected bay known as the North Sound, incorporating extensive landscaped pedestrian parks and revamped roadways — in effect, designing a whole town. It would include major new residential developments and offices, in addition to yet another five-star resort on a stretch of beach that abuts the billionaire’s residence. The plans reminded me of a game of Monopoly — if a player purchased all of the fanciest properties and packed them with houses and hotels for money managers. When I went to the island, I made an effort to book one of the few Seven Mile Beach hotels that Dart doesn’t own; halfway through my stay, I read an announcement in the local paper that he had bought it. Improbably enough, Kenneth Dart’s most audacious investment involves Mount Trashmore. Haphazardly established in the 1960s, the massive garbage pile was never trenched or lined, and no one knows what might be leaking from the dump into the ground. Parts of the mountain sometimes spontaneously combust, requiring evacuation of local businesses and a nearby Dart-developed private school. Since Dart started building on Grand Cayman, the dump has been an obstacle, impeding new development. His company has proposed to cap Mount Trashmore and build a new waste-to-energy facility to dispose of future garbage, which it would manage for the next 25 years, at an estimated cost of nearly half a billion dollars. The arrangement — the heir to a disposable-cup fortune offering to clean up an entire country’s garbage — seemed remarkable to me, but the Caymanians I spoke with didn’t bat an eye. Except when the stink wafted down the mountain; then they batted their eyes a lot, because they were watering. Risks of a Meltdown For three weeks before arriving on the island, I corresponded with a Dart company spokeswoman, who made it cordially clear that an interview with Dart was a nonstarter. At one point, she offered to consider written questions and present them to Dart executives. I asked what Dart saw from a real estate perspective in Cayman. “Not everyone who moves to a place they love invests in it so heavily,” I wrote. I also asked about the dump and the risks of global warming. As far as I knew, Dart was neither a climate sceptic nor a denier, and yet he continued to acquire significant parcels of a country that was, topographically speaking, one of the most vulnerable on Earth. Nick Robson, the founder of the Cayman Institute, a nonprofit organisation that has advocated better long-term planning on the island, said Cayman was nowhere near prepared for rising seas and extreme weather. We met on the terrace at a Westin resort, which, like many developments on Seven Mile Beach, is on an elevated concrete slab. The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, he said, predicted that sea levels would rise by roughly 1 meter by the end of the century. Some people minimise the risk, he said: “‘Well, OK, that’s three-and-a-quarter feet. Oh, no big thing.’ Sorry, we’re 7 feet above sea level, for the most part. That’s halfway up! When you model a hurricane with storm surge, you can have 15 feet of storm surge, and then you’re looking at 18 1/2 feet above normal sea level.” (None of the many elected officials I contacted would agree to be interviewed on the record, but Suzette Ebanks, the chief information officer, sent a three-page response to written questions that highlighted several initiatives, including “environmental impact assessments for major capital projects” and a focus on transitioning to renewable energy.) Robson said he also worried that Cayman’s economic reliance on financial services wasn’t sustainable. “It’s almost a post-colonial dispensation,” he said, describing the sometimes uneasy relationship that has always existed between Cayman, Britain and the international community. After the 2008 financial crisis, the political will to reform systems that facilitate tax avoidance reached a high. In 2010, the United States passed the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, which requires foreign financial institutions to identify American citizens who are account holders and report that to the Treasury. Since 2013, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has been creating an international framework that aims to reduce corporate tax avoidance, particularly for large multinational and internet-based firms. Meanwhile, Britain has promised to adopt a set of stringent EU policies designed to combat money laundering and terrorism. If fully put in effect, protectorates like Cayman would be expected to create public registers of company owners and provide access to the names of the beneficiaries of trusts. The registers could be accessible not only to law enforcement but also to those with “legitimate interest,” including investigative journalists and nongovernmental organisations. “What’s in the wind now is potentially existential for the financial services industry in Cayman,” said Alex Cobham, chief executive of the Tax Justice Network, a watchdog group. “I think it does start to look like it could be a perfect storm for Cayman.” If the colonial period was Cayman’s opening act, and financial services its middle, it seemed to me that Dart was quietly preparing for Cayman’s possible finale: as an upscale tax domicile and tourist attraction for the global ultrawealthy who could afford to come and go from an existentially imperiled island. Justin Howe, a Dart group executive vice president, talked up the proposed skyscraper’s benefits at a recent economic forum. “We’re looking to bring in more high net worth, ultrahigh net worth, potentially even more billionaires,” he said during a question-and-answer session. “They take virtually nothing out of the economy and they put massive amounts into the economy, so we think that’s what a five-, five-plus-star resort has the potential to do.” The plan is to build the tower set back from Seven Mile Beach, in the middle of the Camana Bay development. Whatever might happen with international tax legislation or volatile financial markets, the building would be a hedge of sorts, positioned to bring in capital and withstand the rising ocean. “Is everything he does great? I won’t say everything he does is great,” Whittaker said of Dart, after showing me a map of Hurricane Ivan’s devastation. “I think in overall net benefit, yes, he’s been a net benefit to the island. We need to get one or two more like him, and we’ll be insulated from world shocks.” © 2019 New York Times News Service

Developing nations will need at least $267 billion a year by 2020 to fight climate change and adapt to droughts, heat waves and rising seas, according to African nations. The figure, part of a new African text for negotiations on a U.N. climate treaty, is more than double current development aid from recession-hit rich nations which totaled a record $120 billion in 2008. "Africa is one of the most vulnerable continents to climate change, with major development and poverty eradication challenges and limited capacity for adaptation," according to the text submitted to the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat. It set a 2020 goal of $200 billion in investments to help all developing nations curb their rising greenhouse gas emissions -- for instance via energy efficiency or shifting from use of coal or oil toward renewable wind or solar power. The African Group, comprising more than 50 nations, said those flows totaled about 0.5 percent of the gross domestic product of developed nations. Cash needed to help developing nations adapt to climate change, such as building stronger defenses against rising sea levels or developing drought-resistant crops, needs to be at least $67 billion a year by 2020. The numbers are above levels of aid discussed by rich nations to curb greenhouse gas emissions, mainly from burning fossil fuels. A report by the European Commission in January said the worldwide costs of fighting climate change would be around 175 billion euros ($227.1 billion) a year by 2020. "It shows the scale of what's needed," Kathrin Gutmann, head of policy of the WWF environmental group's global climate initiative, said of the African text. "We're not talking about tens of billions of dollars -- it's far more." CHICKEN AND EGG "There's a very strange chicken and egg situation," Gutmann said. Rich nations want the poor to lay out their plans for fighting climate change before promising cash. The poor want funds pledged first before deciding what is achievable. The next U.N. climate talks, part of a series meant to end in Copenhagen in December with a new pact to succeed the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol, are set for June 1-12 in Bonn, Germany. The African group also said developed nations should cut emissions by at least 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 and by 80-95 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. The numbers are beyond goals by almost all developed countries. "At lower stabilization levels, the additional climate impacts are unacceptable to Africa," it said. The U.N. Climate Panel projects that up to 250 million people in Africa could face greater stress on water supplies by 2020 and that yields from rain-fed agriculture could fall by up to 50 percent by 2020 in some African nations.

EUROPEAN COMMISSION PRESIDENT URSULA VON DER LEYEN, IN A TWEET "The United States is back. And Europe stands ready. To reconnect with an old and trusted partner, to breathe new life into our cherished alliance. I look forward to working together with @JoeBiden." BRITISH PRIME MINISTER BORIS JOHNSON, SPEAKING IN PARLIAMENT "I look forward to working with him (Biden), and with his new administration, strengthening the partnership between our countries and working on our shared priorities: from tackling climate change, building back better from the pandemic and strengthening our transatlantic security." GERMAN PRESIDENT FRANK-WALTER STEINMEIER, IN A VIDEO STATEMENT "Today is a good day for democracy. In the United States of America, it has faced tremendous challenges – and endured. Despite the attempts to tear at America’s institutional fabric, election workers and governors, the judiciary and Congress, have proven strong. I am greatly relieved that, today, Joe Biden is being sworn in as president and will be moving into the White House. I know many people in Germany share this feeling." POPE FRANCIS, IN A MESSAGE TO BIDEN: "Under your leadership, may the American people continue to draw strength from the lofty political, ethical and religious values that have inspired the nation since its founding." "I likewise ask God, the source of all wisdom and truth, to guide your efforts to foster understanding, reconciliation and peace within the United States and among the nations of the world in order to advance the universal common good." SPANISH PRIME MINISTER PEDRO SANCHEZ, SPEAKING AT A PUBLIC EVENT "The (election) victory of Biden represents the victory of democracy over the ultra-right and its three methods, the massive deception, the national division and the abuse, even violent, of democratic institutions... Five years ago, we thought Trump was a bad joke, but five years later we realized he jeopardized nothing less than the world's most powerful democracy." ITALIAN PRIME MINISTER GIUSEPPE CONTE, SPEAKING IN PARLIAMENT ON TUESDAY "We are looking forward to the Biden presidency, with which we will start working immediately in view of our presidency of the G20. We have a strong common agenda, ranging from the effective multilateralism that we both want to see ,to climate change, green and digital transition and social inclusion." KREMLIN SPOKESMAN DMITRY PESKOV, ON EXTENDING THE NEW START ARMS CONTROL TREATY, SPEAKING TO REPORTERS "Russia and its president are in favour of preserving this agreement... If our American colleagues will in fact demonstrate a political will to preserve this pact by extending it, this can only be welcomed." CANADIAN PRIME MINISTER JUSTIN TRUDEAU, IN A STATEMENT: Canada and the United States "will continue this partnership as we fight the global COVID-19 pandemic and support a sustainable economic recovery that will build back better for everyone". "We will also work together to advance climate action and clean economic growth, promote inclusion and diversity, and create good middle class jobs and opportunities for our people while contributing to democracy, peace, and security at home and around the world." ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, IN A STATEMENT: “Congratulations President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on your historic inauguration. President Biden, you and I have had a warm personal friendship going back many decades. I look forward to working with you to further strengthen the US-Israel alliance, to continue expanding peace between Israel and the Arab world, and to confront common challenges, chief among them the threat posed by Iran." Netanyahu's office released a separate statement on Trump: “President Trump, thank you for all the great things you have done for Israel, especially your historic recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital and bringing four peace agreements between Israel and the Arab world.” PALESTINIAN ISLAMIST GROUP HAMAS SPOKESMAN FAWZI BARHOUM “There are no regrets at the departure of Trump, as he has been the biggest source and sponsor of injustice, violence and extremism in the world and the direct partner of the Israeli occupation in the aggression against our people.” “US President Joe Biden must reverse the course of misguided and unjust policies against our people and lay the foundations for security and stability in the region.” BELARUS OPPOSITION LEADER SVIATLANA TSIKHANOUSKAYA (EXILED IN LITHUANIA) ON TWITTER: "Congratulations Joe Biden & Kamala Harris! Best wishes in your work on behalf of all United States people. Looking forward to working with you on developing relations between Belarus and US!"

Large-scale solutions to help slow global warming often threaten the very indigenous peoples who are among those hardest hit by a changing climate, the UN University said on Wednesday. Biofuel plantations, construction of hydropower dams and measures to protect forests, where trees soak up heat-trapping carbon dioxide gas as they grow, can create conflicts with the ancestral lands of indigenous peoples. "Biofuel production, renewable energy expansion (and) other mitigation measures (are) uprooting indigenous peoples in many regions," the U.N. University said in a statement on a report released at a conference in Darwin, Australia. "Indigenous people point to an increase in human rights violations, displacements and conflicts due to expropriation of ancestral lands and forests for biofuel plantations -- soya, sugar cane, jatropha, oil-palm, corn, etc," it said. It said the world's estimated 370 million indigenous peoples, from the Arctic to South Pacific islands, were already exposed on the front line of climate change to more frequent floods, droughts, desertification, disease and rising seas. "Indigenous people have done least to cause climate change and now the solutions ... are causing more problems for them," said Victoria Tauli-Corpuz from the Philippines, who heads the U.N. Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. Tauli-Corpuz, who also represents the Igorot people, told Reuters that 500,000 indigenous people in the Philippines were suffering from an expansion of biofuel plantations. Millions more in Malaysia and Indonesia were affected by plantations, she said in a telephone interview. And in Brazil, forests were being cleared to make way for soya and sugar cane. The U.N. University study said the Ugandan Wildlife Authority had forced people to move from their homes in 2002 when 7,000 hectares (17,300 acres) of land was planted as forests to soak up greenhouse gases. Zakri said indigenous peoples' lifestyles produced none of the greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels in power plants, factories and cars that are blamed for stoking global warming. By contrast, the United States, with about 300 million people, contributed almost a quarter of world emissions. Indigenous peoples "have not benefited, in any significant manner, from climate change-related funding ... nor from emissions trading schemes," A.H. Zakri, head of the U.N. University's Institute of Advanced Studies, said in a statement. The study said indigenous peoples were exploiting traditional knowledge to help offset climate change. In northern Australia, Aborigines were getting aid to set small fires after rains that help renew the soil and create fire breaks to reduce risks of giant wildfires in the dry season. "This is fire abatement that reduces greenhouse gas emissions from wildfires," said Joe Morrison, head of the North Australian Indigenous Land and Sea Management Alliance. The deal involves funding from ConocoPhillips, which runs a plant processing natural gas from the Timor Sea.

- A poll of 15 nations, most of them in the developing world, including Bangladesh, finds that majorities of people want their governments to take steps to fight climate change, even if that entails high costs. The poll was carried out by the World Bank.

And then it got worse: Karachi is now plagued by swarms of flies. The bugs seem to be everywhere in every neighbourhood, bazaar and shop, sparing no one. They’re a bullying force on sidewalks, flying in and out of stores and cars and homes, and settling onto every available surface, from vegetables to people. Flies and flooding can often go together, and Karachi is no stranger to either. But Dr Seemin Jamali, executive director for the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, one of Karachi’s largest public hospitals, said this was the worst infestation of flies she had ever witnessed. “There are huge swarms of flies and mosquitoes,” she said. “It’s not just affecting the life of the common man — they’re so scary; they’re hounding people. You can’t walk straight on the road, there are so many flies everywhere.” Flies on produce at a market in Karachi, Pakistan, Aug. 28, 2019. Pakistan’s biggest city had heavy rains, bad drainage and a garbage problem — and now, bugs are everywhere. (Mustafa Hussain/The New York Times) The city started a fumigation drive, but the flies remain, and frustrations are growing. It’s all drawing new attention, and anger, to the city’s long-standing problems with garbage and drainage — an issue that feuding political factions have wielded against each other for years, but that hasn’t gotten any better. Flies on produce at a market in Karachi, Pakistan, Aug. 28, 2019. Pakistan’s biggest city had heavy rains, bad drainage and a garbage problem — and now, bugs are everywhere. (Mustafa Hussain/The New York Times) Experts say this infestation was probably brought on by the combination of stagnant rainwater, which stood in the city for days, with garbage on the streets and waste left behind from animals slaughtered during the recent Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha. Noman Ahmed, an expert on the city’s water issues and dean of the NED University of Engineering and Technology’s architecture and management sciences faculty, said the recent rainfall wasn’t really extraordinary. But what the rains revealed, he said, was Karachi’s compounding troubles with urban development, sewage, solid waste management and water contamination, including how the city’s natural drains are used as a dumping ground for solid waste. “The kind of havoc it created — if there are a couple of more spells like this, then the city will become completely dysfunctional,” Ahmed said. Flies coat a man's hat in the Bohri Bazaar in Karachi, Pakistan, Aug. 28, 2019. Pakistan’s biggest city had heavy rains, bad drainage and a garbage problem — and now, bugs are everywhere. (Mustafa Hussain/The New York Times) Jamali said a litany of medical ailments and diseases were on the rise as a result of the unsanitary conditions: malaria, gastroenteritis, typhoid, dengue fever, the chikungunya virus, respiratory disorders and Congo fever. Flies coat a man's hat in the Bohri Bazaar in Karachi, Pakistan, Aug. 28, 2019. Pakistan’s biggest city had heavy rains, bad drainage and a garbage problem — and now, bugs are everywhere. (Mustafa Hussain/The New York Times) “As a community, we also need to blame ourselves,” she said, noting how people dumped sacrificial animals’ offal onto the streets. “We have collected these heaps of garbage.” On a Monday afternoon, vendors around Bohri Bazaar sat fanning their wares to try to keep the flies at bay. Flies flew in and out of shops, settling on displays of fabric and towels. Muhammad Ismail Siddiqui, 54, a vendor selling traditional sweets like jalebi and gulab jamun, had covered them with clear plastic for protection. “No, no, no,” Siddiqui said, when asked if the flies were just a seasonal menace. In previous years, he said, the government would organise fumigation drives that took place in the early hours of the day. “But there’s nothing now — we can’t do anything; we’re helpless. Business has completely ended,” he said. “Whoever comes just looks at the flies.” Flies in a meat market within the Empress Market in Karachi, Pakistan, Aug. 28, 2019. Pakistan’s biggest city had heavy rains, bad drainage and a garbage problem — and now, bugs are everywhere. (Mustafa Hussain/The New York Times) Plenty of blame has been aimed at the city’s politics, and the parties tussling for influence in Karachi have not failed to notice. In recent days, sanitation has again become a rallying cry — and a political weapon — for politicians. Flies in a meat market within the Empress Market in Karachi, Pakistan, Aug. 28, 2019. Pakistan’s biggest city had heavy rains, bad drainage and a garbage problem — and now, bugs are everywhere. (Mustafa Hussain/The New York Times) The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or PTI, which holds power in the national government, is trying to assert its base in Karachi to fight the traditional provincial-level powerhouse, the Pakistan Peoples Party, or PPP. One local legislator for the PTI started a “Let’s Clean Karachi” campaign that has implicitly blamed the PPP for the garbage problem. Saeed Ghani, a PPP senator, claims that the campaign made the crisis worse with mismanaged cleanups. Truly cleaning up Karachi — where it has become common to see garbage piled up on roadsides and in empty plots — would be a tall and expensive order. The city produces about 12,000 tons of waste every day. Karachi’s resources and infrastructure have not kept up with the pressure of constant expansion, population growth and lifestyle changes among its 15 million-plus residents. And it is suffering from the same vulnerability to climate-change issues that is hitting the rest of Pakistan so intensely. Flies on produce at a market in Karachi, Pakistan, Aug. 28, 2019. Pakistan’s biggest city had heavy rains, bad drainage and a garbage problem — and now, bugs are everywhere. (Mustafa Hussain/The New York Times) Furthermore, Karachi’s management is complex and fragmented: Waste management and municipal services are dealt with by different agencies. Buildings are constructed over drains. Large swaths of the city, including some of its most upscale neighbourhoods, are cantonment areas, which are managed separately. Flies on produce at a market in Karachi, Pakistan, Aug. 28, 2019. Pakistan’s biggest city had heavy rains, bad drainage and a garbage problem — and now, bugs are everywhere. (Mustafa Hussain/The New York Times) “Karachi’s livability is falling,” said Ahmed, the water issues expert. “The city requires a kind of sanitation emergency,” he said — one that would mobilise provincial resources to clear the backlog of waste from streets and drains and build a new sanitation management system from scratch. That would require politicians to forge a working relationship. But the bugs don’t seem willing to observe political boundaries. “There is an abundance of flies,” said Ismail Lalpuria, a furniture trader in the Arambagh area of Saddar who was losing patience with the damage to his business. “All the political parties are just doing politics,” he said. “No one is doing any work.”c.2019 New York Times News Service

The #jestemLGBT (I am LGBT) campaign, was launched earlier this week by Twitter users. Poland's ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party has made its opposition to LGBT rights a campaign issue ahead of a parliamentary election expected in October, with some officials connecting gays and public displays of sexuality to paedophilia. "We're against the affirmation of LGBT ideology and the aggressiveness of this ideology which attacks our basic national and Catholic family values," a PiS lawmaker, Janusz Szewczak, told Reuters. Critics say PiS has fanned intolerance in the country. Earlier this month an equality march in the eastern city of Bialystok was marred by violence and attacks on those taking part. A conservative magazine distributed "LGBT-free zone" stickers last week, while a number of towns have declared in recent months that they are going "LGBT-free". Filip Pawlak, a 25-year-old freelance theatre consultant, said he took part in the #jestemLGBT campaign to show that LGBT people like him are not paedophiles or a threat to Poland. PROUD TO BE GAY AND POLISH He called the violence in Bialystok a pivotal point in the history of Poland's gay community, as it spurred LGBT people to fight more strongly for their rights. "I am a patriot, I am proud that I am a Pole and I also want to be proud of the fact that I am a gay Pole ... we want to show that we are simply people." According to an opinion poll by state pollster CBOS released in April, almost a quarter of citizens of the former Communist country think homosexuality is not normal and cannot be accepted, while 54% think it should be tolerated. Psychology associate professor at the University of Warsaw Michal Bilewicz said the hashtag showed the bravery of the LGBT community, as it marked a "mass coming out in Poland at the same time as the right is carrying out a homophobic campaign". The European Commission expressed its support for the campaign, with its @EU_Justice account tweeting: "#JestemLGBT! We support LGBTI rights in Poland, in all EU countries and worldwide #EU4LGBTI!" Since coming to power in 2015, the eurosceptic PiS has clashed with the EU over its adherence to rule of law as well logging, migration and climate change policies.

The language in the CIA memo was unequivocal: The 3,500-mile gas pipeline from Siberia to Germany is a direct threat to the future of Western Europe, it said, creating “serious repercussions” from a dangerous reliance on Russian fuel. The agency wasn’t briefing President Joe Biden today. It was advising President Ronald Reagan more than four decades ago. The memo was prescient. That Soviet-era pipeline, the subject of a bitter fight during the Reagan administration, marked the start of Europe’s heavy dependence on Russian natural gas to heat homes and fuel industry. However, those gas purchases now help fund Vladimir Putin’s war machine in Ukraine, despite worldwide condemnation of the attacks and global efforts to punish Russia financially. In 1981, Reagan imposed sanctions to try to block the pipeline, a major Soviet initiative designed to carry huge amounts of fuel to America’s critical allies in Europe. But he swiftly faced stiff opposition — not just from the Kremlin and European nations eager for a cheap source of gas, but also from a powerful lobby close to home: oil and gas companies that stood to profit from access to Russia’s gargantuan gas reserves. In a public-relations and lobbying blitz that played out across newspaper opinion pages, congressional committees and a direct appeal to the White House, industry executives and lobbyists fought the sanctions. “Reagan has absolutely no reason to forbid this business,” Wolfgang Oehme, chairman of an Exxon subsidiary with a stake in the pipeline, said at the time. Those efforts, nearly a half-century ago, show how some of the world’s largest oil and gas companies played a critical role in opening up Russia’s reserves by opposing sanctions and advocating for business interests over national security, human rights or environmental concerns. Today, Europe’s reliance on Russia’s gas has put European nations in a compromised position: They continue to purchase Russian energy, transferring enormous sums of money to Moscow, which fund a Russian invasion that they denounce. Reagan’s effort to block the pipeline decades ago, which ultimately failed, also laid the foundations for a huge build-out of natural gas, which is now hindering Europe’s attempts to tackle climate change. Even as natural gas has helped to replace dirtier coal, the pipelines and other gas infrastructure that followed have effectively committed Europe to a reliance on gas that not only continues today, but remains difficult to unravel even in a moment of global unity against Russian aggression. “The Soviet Union is a superpower that really emerged on the back of its oil and gas exports,” said Agnia Grigas, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and an expert on the security and energy issues of Russia and the former Soviet states. “Nothing has changed.” In the face of opposition both at home and abroad, Reagan in 1982 reversed the sanctions, which had stopped US companies from supplying or participating in the project. The pipeline from Siberia to West Germany opened two years later. The industry lobbying has continued to this day. In 2014, when the Obama administration imposed sanctions against Russia following its military seizure of the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine, Exxon fought the measures, meeting with White House officials. As Russia this year massed troops on the Ukrainian border, the American Petroleum Institute, the powerful industry group, lobbied against tougher sanctions, saying that any measures needed to be “as targeted as possible in order to limit potential harm to the competitiveness of US companies.” In the wake of Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine, Shell, BP and Exxon have said they will end their Russian operations. Casey Norton, a spokesperson for Exxon, said the company “does not advocate for or against sanctions” but had communicated with the US government “to provide information about the potential impacts on energy markets and investments.” He said that Exxon was complying with all sanctions, had discontinued its flagship project in Russia and was withholding new investment there. Bethany Williams, an American Petroleum Institute spokesperson, said that any interactions by its members with policymakers on sanctions had been limited to “ensuring retaliatory measures are clearly written to reduce any room for uncertainty and ensure maximum compliance.” John Murphy, senior vice president for international policy at the US Chamber of Commerce, said his organisation had a long-standing belief that sanctions would very likely fail if they were unilateral. Exxon, the American Petroleum Institute and the Chamber of Commerce all condemned Russia’s invasion. Shell and BP had no comment. The concerns raised during the Reagan administration four decades ago have been borne out. Before Russia’s attack on Ukraine last month, Germany relied on Russia for 55% of its gas, for example, complicating Europe’s response to Russian aggression in Ukraine. For Ukraine, the consequences have been devastating. “The companies that have been working with the Russian regime were driven only by pure financial interest,” said Oleg Ustenko, a top adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. “They closed their eyes to the morality of it, and now we are paying the consequences.” PARALLELS IN HISTORY On a frigid Sunday morning in December 1981, millions of Poles woke up to find their country under a state of martial law. Global condemnation of the Polish authorities, and of their backers in the Kremlin, was swift. Already wary of the Soviets’ plan to build a gas pipeline to Western Europe, the Reagan administration produced a list of economic sanctions that essentially banned US companies from helping to build it. “The fate of a proud and ancient nation hangs in the balance,” Reagan said in his Christmas address. The measure drew immediate ire from America’s European allies, where the $25 billion pipeline promised a stable source of gas at a time nations were still reeling from the oil shocks of the 1970s. But within the United States, it was the oil and gas lobby that fought back. The sanctions would “aggravate further our international reputation for commercial reliability,” the US Chamber of Commerce, which represented major oil and gas companies and pipeline manufacturers among numerous other industries, warned in a letter to the White House. The pipeline would, in fact, give Western Europe “a degree of leverage over the Soviets rather than vice versa,” Richard Lesher, the group’s president, later told The Washington Post. Following intense lobbying, the House Foreign Affairs Committee voted to lift the sanctions, despite a letter from Secretary of State George Shultz warning that such legislation would “severely cripple” the administration’s ability to deal with the Polish crisis. That battle four decades ago marked the start of a huge build-out of gas infrastructure in Europe. Today, an extensive network of pipelines stretches from Russia to Europe, supplying about 40% of the continent’s gas. That network has given Moscow leverage over its European neighbours. In 2009, when Russia and Ukraine became embroiled in a diplomatic dispute, Russia shut off its gas supplies, leaving tens of thousands of homes without heat. More than a dozen people froze to death, mainly in Poland, before Russia reopened its pipelines. An abundant flow of gas from Russia had consequences beyond security, slowing Europe’s efforts to tackle climate change by shifting toward renewables, experts say. The European Union has said it now aims to reduce its gas imports by two-thirds, and quickly ramp up its use of wind, solar and other forms of renewable energy. “Obviously they could have done that before, but there was no incentive to,” said Margarita Balmaceda, professor of diplomacy and international relations at Seton Hall University and an associate at the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute. Access to Russia’s gas, she said, had “definitely slowed the move toward renewables.” TIES TO RUSSIA BLOSSOM The fossil fuel companies’ early involvement in the Siberian pipeline was also the start of a courtship of a region with some of the world’s largest reserves of oil, natural gas and other commodities. Following the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, successive US administrations also traded their vigilance for an increasingly warm embrace of Moscow, pushing for closer energy ties. (In 2001, President George W. Bush famously said that he had looked Putin in the eye and got a sense of his soul, comments he later said he regretted.) Spurred by a thaw in East-West relations, fossil fuel companies pursued joint ventures to develop Russia’s oil and gas fields with Russia’s state-controlled oil and gas giants. BP took a nearly 20% stake in Rosneft, the Russian oil giant, that accounted for one-third of BP’s oil and gas production and more than half its reserves. Shell teamed with Gazprom, the state-owned gas company, to work on projects including Russia’s first liquefied natural gas plant, and invested in the Nordstream 2 gas pipeline. Both BP and Shell say they are now exiting those projects. Exxon, which invested in a gas project near the Pacific island of Sakhalin in the 1990s, in recent years had pursued a heftier stake in Russian oil and gas production, signing a deal with Rosneft for a possible $500 billion investment. A video produced by Rosneft in 2012 portrayed the wide-ranging nature of their planned partnership: joint headquarters in St. Petersburg and Houston, a slice of Exxon’s operations in the Permian Basin in Texas and Gulf of Mexico, and the sharing of fracking and offshore drilling technology. In 2013, Putin awarded the Exxon chief executive, Rex Tillerson, the Order of Friendship, one of the highest honours Russia gives to foreign citizens. The fallout from Russia’s annexation of the Crimean peninsula the following year forced Exxon to stall the deal, but not without a fight. Even after the United States adopted sanctions, Exxon tried to push ahead with the Rosneft deal, signing legal documents with the state-owned company’s chairman, Igor I. Sechin. Exxon was later fined $2 million for actions the Treasury Department said “demonstrated reckless disregard for US sanctions requirements.” Exxon sued, saying that the US sanctions covered only Sechin’s personal affairs, not the company he presided over. A Texas judge ruled in favour of Exxon, although the judge called Exxon’s conduct “risky and, perhaps, imprudent.” Exxon also worked to influence Congress’ attempts to pass sanctions against Russia around that time, its lobbying disclosures show. Because of reluctance among some members of Congress to oppose those sanctions, “we had to step in front of that and explain to them how that was hurting US businesses,” Keith McCoy, a former Exxon lobbyist said in a 2021 video released as part of a sting operation by the environmental group Greenpeace. As recently as January 2022, the American Petroleum Institute lobbied to soften sanctions against Russia, saying they should be targeted to limit the damage to American businesses. At his confirmation hearing to become secretary of state under former President Donald Trump, Tillerson, the Exxon chief executive, stated that he had “never lobbied against sanctions personally” and that “to my knowledge, Exxon never directly lobbied against sanctions.” Former Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., who was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at the time, interjected, “I think you called me at the time.” Asked about the call this week, Corker said the two men regularly discussed policy on the phone. © 2022 The New York Times Company

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 4, (bdnews24.com/Reuters) - UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon raised with Sri Lanka's human rights minister on Thursday allegations that his country's troops summarily executed Tamil rebels, the United Nations said. British television aired a video last week that, according to a Sri Lankan advocacy group, shows the troops killing unarmed, naked, bound and blindfolded Tamils during the army's final assault to smash Tamil Tiger rebels earlier this year. Ban discussed the refugee crisis that followed the defeat of the Tigers during a meeting in Geneva with Mahinda Samarasinghe, Sri Lanka's minister for disaster management and human rights, the United Nations said. "They talked about the importance of reconciliation," said a summary of the meeting issued in New York. "They also discussed accountability, particularly in the light of the recent accusations of extrajudicial executions." U.N. officials confirmed that Ban had raised with Samarasinghe the allegations in the video, broadcast by Britain's Channel 4 television, which said it got the footage from advocacy group Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka. The officials did not say how Samarasinghe had responded, but Sri Lanka's government has dismissed the video as fake. The Channel 4 video footage can be seen here: (here+video+is+this+evidence+of+war+crimes+in+sri+lanka/3321087) Ban's raising of the issue on the sidelines of a climate change conference in Geneva came after the United States voiced concern on Wednesday about the video footage. "These reports are very disturbing, they are of grave concern," US Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice told reporters. "We'd like more information as we formulate our own national response." Philip Alston, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said on Tuesday he hoped the United Nations would open an investigation to determine whether Sri Lankan soldiers did in fact summarily execute Tamils, which would be a violation of international law. Ban, who travelled to Sri Lanka just after the defeat of the Tigers in a visit some critics said was ill-timed, has not so far called for such an inquiry. But he did say in June that any allegations of war crimes should be investigated. Sri Lanka's government has repeatedly denied that its forces were guilty of war crimes or human rights breaches in the last months of its 25-year war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), whom it defeated in May.

The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN has launched distribution of agricultural inputs among Sidr-affected farmers at Bangladesh's coastal belt. The distribution, under the Emergency 2007 Cyclone Recovery and Restoration Project (ECRRP) funded by World Bank, included packages amongst beneficiaries in 13 southern Upazilas since its start on July 13. A statement from FAO office in Dhaka said that the team was being accompanied by related government and FAO officials. "Farmers in the south need more support with modern technologies to restore their livelihood after the devastations of cyclones Sidr and Aila," announced Bangladesh's FAO representative Ad Spijkers at Kathalia Upazila on Friday. The FAO chief also said that the support for crops, fisheries and livestock will continue over the next four years. Spijkers continued to say that, despite vulnerability to climate change and recurrence of natural disasters, farm production can be boosted by introducing stress-tolerant seeds and modern machineries like power tillers and irrigation pumps. He continued to elaborate on the ECRRP project's targets including promotion of balanced use of fertilizers and other inputs, augmenting surface water irrigation, and providing the farmers and fishers with training on modern technologies and best practices through Farmers Field Schools. Spijkers also claimed that the FAO has supported 1.4 million farmers in the aftermath of Sidr and Aila through emergency inputs for crop, fisheries and livestock. The FAO representative also revealed that 12 southern districts will be covered under a recent EU funding support in crops, fisheries and livestock sectors. "Bangladesh's government is exploring the opportunities for investment in the southern delta to attain sustainable food security for the country and introducing the modern technologies and practices could be the means to achieve the goals," pointed out Ad Spijkers. He put emphasis on the necessity of an investment master plan, which will strongly coordinate between the south's agriculture and water sector to bring about sustainable development and return the southern region to its position as the country's 'bread basket'. The FAO chief also assured that his organisation will work with the country's government and development partners to develop such a plan.

Climate fund will finance building of new cyclone shelters and roads as well as carry out renovation of old shelters in the coastal area. At the first meeting of the Bangladesh Climate Change Resilience Fund's (BCCRF) governing council on Thursday, the Tk 1.87 billion project was approved for nine coastal districts. State minister for environment, Hassan Mahmud, told reporters after the meeting that primarily, 50 cyclone shelters would be built and 40 old ones renovated. A stretch of around 50 km of roads would be built in the coastal districts, he added. Donor countries and agencies will be contacted for the funds. Mahmud said Bangladesh had been promised $147 million for this project. "Also, UK has assured of $10 million and Australia $16 million." He said two other projects, building of a cross dam at Noakhali-Urirchar-Sandip to recover land from the sea' and 'coastal forestation', had also been discussed at the meeting.

Striking images taken by NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft suggest the presence of liquid water on the Martian surface, a tantalizing find for scientists wondering if the Red Planet might harbor life. The orbiting US spacecraft enabled scientists to detect changes in the walls of two craters in the southern hemisphere of Mars apparently caused by the downhill flow of water in the past few years, a team of scientists announced on Wednesday. Scientists long have wondered whether life ever existed on Mars. Liquid water is an important part of the equation. On Earth, all forms of life require water to survive. Scientists previously established the existence of water on Mars in the form of ice at the poles and water vapor, and pointed to geological features that appear to have been carved by water ages ago. Kenneth Edgett of Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego, a scientist involved in the research, said there had been a quest for "smoking gun" evidence for liquid water currently on Mars. "Basically, this is the 'squirting gun' for water on Mars," Edgett told reporters. The scientists, whose research appears in the journal Science, compared images of the Martian surface taken seven years apart and also found 20 newly formed craters left by impacts from space debris. They said water seemed to have flowed down two gullies in the past few years, even though liquid water cannot remain long on the planet's frigid, nearly airless surface because it would rapidly freeze or evaporate. That seemed to support the notion that underground liquid water may reside close enough to the surface in some places that it can seep out periodically. The images did not directly show water. But they showed bright deposits running several hundred yards (meters) seemingly left by material carried downhill inside the crater by running water, occasionally snaking around obstacles and leaving finger-shaped marks diverting from the main flow. "It could be acidic water, it could be briny water, it could be water carrying all kinds of sediment, it could be slushy, but H2O is involved," Edgett said. Edgett said each apparent flow was caused by an amount equal to "five to 10 swimming pools of water." Michael Meyer, lead scientist for NASA's Mars Exploration Program, said the observations provided the strongest evidence to date that water still flowed occasionally on the surface of Mars. "The big questions are: how does this happen, and does it point to a habitat for life?" Meyer said. Among the planets in our solar system, only Earth has a more hospitable climate, and some scientists suspect Mars once sheltered primitive, bacteria-like organisms. Previous missions found evidence Mars at one time boasted ample quantities of water. The scientists conceded the images were only circumstantial evidence not proof. They cited a possible alternative explanation that those features were caused by the movement of dry dust down a slope. The researchers said their findings raised many questions, including the source and abundance of the water and whether it could serve as a resource in future missions to explore Mars. The researchers reported finding those gullies in 2000, but this was the first time they revealed the presence of newly deposited material seemingly carried by liquid water. Last month, NASA said it had lost contact with the Mars Global Surveyor after a decade-long mission in which it mapped the surface of Mars, tracked its climate and searched for evidence of water.

France's president-elect Nicolas Sarkozy takes his first step into international diplomacy on Friday when he meets Tony Blair, the British prime minister preparing to bow out after a decade in power. The two leaders, both in their 50s, say they get on well and share views on many issues, including moves to introduce a slimmed-down version of the European constitutional treaty that was rejected by French voters in 2005. Important European Union and G8 meetings next month will form the core of their discussions, due to start at 1530 GMT, after Blair calls on outgoing President Jacques Chirac. "With Nicolas Sarkozy, you can anticipate the discussions will cover key forthcoming international meetings such as the EU, looking at the treaty, and obviously the G8, looking at climate change and follow-up to the Gleneagles agenda," Blair's spokesman told reporters. Blair, who will step down on June 27, took the unusual step of welcoming Sarkozy's election on Sunday with a tribute delivered in French and posted on the YouTube Web site. He said the right-winger's success presented a "fantastic opportunity for Britain and France to work together in the years ahead". Sarkozy wants a less ambitious treaty modernising the EU's institutions to be passed by parliament and has ruled out another referendum on the constitution. "I don't speak for Nicolas Sarkozy and obviously that's something they will be discussing," Blair's spokesman said. The prime minister supported an amended treaty rather than a full-blown constitution, he said. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whom Sarkozy will meet next week after officially assuming his functions as president, has made reviving the charter a priority of her EU presidency. Sarkozy has stressed his desire to overcome the lingering suspicions caused by France's fierce opposition to the U.S.- and British-led war on Iraq and has made improving relations with Washington and London a priority. His recognition of the importance of the traditional alliance with Germany will be marked next week when he visits Berlin on Wednesday, the day he takes office. "For the chancellor, this is an extraordinarily strong signal of Franco-German friendship," German government spokesman Thomas Steg said.

Investment in renewable energy, energy efficiency and adaptation to climate change totalled $359 billion, $5 billion less than in 2011, as an economic slowdown hit state and private-sector budgets.The International Energy Agency estimated last year that $5 trillion of investment in clean energy alone was needed by 2020 to keep a rise in global temperatures to within 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit).Scientists say that threshold is the minimum required to avoid the most devastating effects of climate change, such as the melting of ice caps and catastrophic rises in sea level."Investment to combat and adapt to climate change is happening around the world, but it's short of where it needs to be and efforts to grow it have not been successful enough," said Thomas Heller, executive director of the Climate Policy Initiative. CPI promotes efforts to wean economies off the fossil fuels that scientists believe are almost certainly the main cause of industrial-era global warming.Private investment accounted for 62 percent, or $224 billion, of total global climate investment in 2012, while public sources of finance such as incentives, loans and project investment accounted for the rest, CPI's report said. ( www.ClimatePolicyInitiative.org )Rich countries invested $177 billion last year in climate change activities, while developing countries invested $182 billion, the Climate Policy Initiative said.Meanwhile, the OECD said this month that governments around the world spent $523 billion in 2011 on subsidising fossil fuels.Next month, more than 190 governments will meet in Warsaw, Poland, for United Nations climate negotiations, hoping to make progress on a deal to cut greenhouse gas emissions that should be signed by 2015.On the agenda at that meeting will be the question of raising money to support developing countries tackle and adapt to climate change.Governments have already agreed to raise $100 billion a year by 2020, but a fund set up to channel some of that money is still not operational.At a conference in London on Monday, UN climate chief Christiana Figueres said most of the money needed to combat climate change would have to come from the private sector."$100 billion is the tail that is going to wag the dog. The financing needed is $1 trillion a year - that is what needs to be mobilised," she said.

VATICAN CITY Dec 15, (bdnews24.com/Reuters) - Industrialised nations must recognise their responsibility for the environmental crisis, shed their consumerism and embrace more sober lifestyles, Pope Benedict said on Tuesday. The pope's call for more environmental commitments came in his message for the Roman Catholic Church's annual World Day of Peace, to be marked on Jan 1 and whose theme is "If You Want to Cultivate Peace, Protect Creation." The message is traditionally sent to heads of state, government and international organisations and its importance this year is more significant because its release coincided with the U.N. climate conference in Copenhagen. "It is important to acknowledge that among the causes of the present ecological crisis is the historical responsibility of the industrialized countries," he said in the message. While saying that developing countries "are not exempt from their own responsibilities with regard to creation," and had a duty to gradually adopt effective environmental measures, the bulk of his criticism was aimed at rich nations. Speaking of the need for all nations to address the issue of energy resources, he said: "This means that technologically advanced societies must be prepared to encourage more sober lifestyles, while reducing their energy consumption and improving its efficiency." He said no nation or people can remain indifferent to problems such as climate change, desertification, pollution, the loss of biodiversity, the increase of natural catastrophes and the deforestation of equatorial and tropical regions. Environmental concerns too often took a back seat to what he called "myopic economic interests," adding the international community and governments had a moral duty to "send the right signals" to effectively combat misuse of the environment. "Humanity needs a profound cultural renewal; it needs to rediscover those values which can serve as the solid basis for building a brighter future for all," he said. "Our present crises -- be they economic, food-related, environmental or social -- are ultimately also moral crises, and all of them are interrelated." He called on all people to "move beyond a purely consumerist mentality" so that they could "rethink the path which we are travelling together" and adapt "a lifestyle marked by sobriety and solidarity" between the haves and the have nots. Environmental issues deserved the attention of the world community because the were human rights issues that could influence the right to life, food, health and development. "Sad to say, it is all too evident that large numbers of people in different countries and areas of our planet are experiencing increased hardship because of the negligence or refusal of many others to exercise responsible stewardship over the environment," he said.

People affected will include drought-stricken farmers seeking new arable land or different work in urban areas, and others driven out by the need to find clean water, the Bank said in a report issued four days before the UN COP26 climate summit begins in Glasgow. East Africa's five nations - Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda and Burundi - have increasingly experienced extreme weather events in recent years. Apart from a worsening drought in a region heavily reliant on agriculture, there was extensive flooding in 2020, while a locust infestation of historic proportions that began in 2019 continues to wreak havoc. "Without broad, urgent action... as many as 38.5 million people could be internally displaced as a consequence of climate change by 2050," said Hafez Ghanem, World Bank vice president for the region. Concrete steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fund climate change and adaptation schemes could cut the projected number of displacements, but only by 30 percent, the bank's report said. The bank has committed to ensuring 35% of its financing over the next five years will go to projects that will help address the threat of climate change, Ghanem said. Kenya has demonstrated leadership in the region in establishing a policy framework to manage climate risk, "though climate action is still under-funded," said Keith Hansen, World Bank's country director for Kenya. Rich nations promised in 2009 to deliver $100 billion a year for five years from 2020 to poorer countries to help them tackle the impact of global warming. But that funding programme is set to be delayed by three years, COP26 president Alok Sharma admitted on Monday.

Bali climate talks could collapse "like a house of cards" unless 190 nations quickly settle rows blocking a launch of negotiations on a new global warming pact, the U.N.'s top climate official said on Thursday. "I'm very concerned about the pace of things," Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, said on the penultimate day of the December 3-14 meeting of more than 10,000 delegates on the Indonesian island. The Bali talks are deadlocked over the exact terms for launching two years of negotiations on a global climate deal to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, a pact that binds most industrial nations to cut emissions of greenhouse gases until 2012. "We are in an all-or-nothing situation in that if we don't manage to get the work done on the future (terms for negotiations) then the whole house of cards basically falls to pieces," de Boer told a news conference. Among disputes, the United States, Japan, Canada and Australia are resisting efforts to include a guideline for rich nations to cut emissions of greenhouse gases by 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 as a pointer for future negotiations. The European Union, which favors the range to show that the rich countries will lead the way, accused Washington of being the main obstacle in Bali. The range was in a latest draft on Thursday, outlining terms for talks meant to help avert famines, droughts, rising seas and a melt of Himalayan glaciers. BLOCKING "We are a bit disappointed that all the world is still waiting for the United States," said Humberto Rosa, Portugal's Secretary of State for Environment. Portugal holds the rotating EU presidency and Rosa is the EU's chief negotiator at the Bali talks. "The U.S. has been using new words on this -- engagement, leadership -- but words are not enough. We need action. (That's the) one main blocking issue," he told Reuters. Washington, which is outside the Kyoto Protocol, says guidelines would prejudge the outcome of the talks. And it says 25-40 percent range is based on relatively little scientific study. De Boer said the talks had to settle all outstanding disputes by midday (0400 GMT) on Friday to give time for documents to be translated into the six official U.N. languages. U.N. climate talks often stretch long into the night on the last day. Kyoto binds 37 industrialized nations to curb their emissions between 2008 and 2012. Poor nations, led by China and India, are exempt from curbs and President George W. Bush pulled out in 2001, saying Kyoto would harm the U.S. economy and wrongly excluded targets for developing nations. The United Nations wants all nations to agree on a successor to Kyoto by late 2009 to allow governments time to ratify the new deal by the end of 2012 and to give markets clear guidelines on how to make investments in clean energy technology. China wants talks on a new global compact to be extended. "The Chinese want talks to drag on into 2010 to give time for a new American president to come on board. Not many other countries think that's a good idea," one developing nation delegate said. Bush will step down in January 2009. Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg told delegates the objective must be that global temperatures rise no more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) and that global emissions peak no later than 2015. "Future generations will judge us on our actions." He also said that the rich would have to take on the "main part of the cost" of helping poor countries curb greenhouse gas emissions.

Prime minister Sheikh Hasina wants Bangladesh and the island nation of Maldives to join hands in battling the adverse effects of climate change as the two South Asian countries are among the worst at risk from rising seas. Hasina made the proposal when the Maldives ambassador in Dhaka, Ahmed Fareer, called on her at her office on Tuesday. The prime minister's deputy press secretary Md Nazrul Islam said the envoy informed the prime minister that the Maldives was moving to host climate change talks in Asia before the 16th United Nations climate change conference. He told reporters that Hasina called on leaders of the island country to work with Bangladesh to tackle the impacts of climate change, including extreme weather and rising sea levels, which threaten the two low lying countries. Hasina also requested the Maldives government to hire physicians and teachers, and import medicines, ready made garments and ceramic products, from Bangladesh. The prime minister assured the envoy of giving all-out support from Bangladesh to found the 'Bangladesh-Maldives University' in the Maldives, Islam added. PM's principal secretary MA Karim, PMO secretary Mollah Wahiduzzman and ambassador at large Ziauddin Ahmed were also present.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel called on Monday for the European Union and the United States to forge closer ties, and won firm US backing for her initiative to strengthen transatlantic trade relations. Merkel told a forum on globalisation the EU and the United States should foster closer trade relations, and also work together on issues such as combating terrorism and tackling climate change. "We live in a time, in which I think one can say that no one can tackle the new challenges alone -- neither the European Union, nor the United States," said Merkel, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency for the first half of this year. Isolationist tendencies on both sides of the Atlantic with regard to globalisation should be resisted, she said. "I am deeply convinced, that this is the wrong way entirely," she said, adding that she hoped a free trade deal could be reached. "I hope that we can use the little remaining time to make progress here." The World Trade Organisation (WTO) launched its Doha round of negotiations in 2001 to cut barriers to trade around the world as a way to lift millions of people out of poverty and boost the global economy. But it risks further long delays or even collapse if an agreement cannot be reached soon, top trade officials say. US Deputy Treasury Secretary Robert Kimmitt said Washington wanted a free trade deal. "Our common highest priority in the trade arena remains success in the Doha round, to which both Germany and the United States are active and committed," he told the forum. German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck took a downbeat view of the trade negotiations on Friday, saying he was more pessimistic about making headway in talks on the Doha round after meeting US Congress members in Washington. The Doha talks have been mired for years in differences over agricultural subsidies and tariffs on farm goods. The US National Farmers Union, which represents smaller farm interests, is lobbying for a complete withdrawal from Doha. As well as seeking a free trade deal, Merkel wants to expand trade flows between the United States and the EU by reducing regulatory and other "non-tariff" trade barriers in areas ranging from financial markets to energy and the environment. The trade initiative won firm US support. "The US strongly supports the Merkel initiative," Kimmitt told reporters. EU and German officials have stressed Merkel is not proposing a traditional free trade zone that would eliminate tariffs across the Atlantic and tackle other difficult issues such as agricultural trade reform. But there are opportunities in sectors such as automotive and medicine to reduce costs by eliminating duplicative testing procedures, German officials say. "Our goal is straightforward and clear: reduce regulatory burdens on both sides of the Atlantic to the greatest extent possible, then converge, harmonise, or mutually recognise the fewer regulations that remain," Kimmitt said. He said the United States and the EU hoped to deliver an initial set of concrete results by an EU-US summit in Washington on April 30. One accord within reaching distance was a deal on liberalising transatlantic air travel, he said.

The environment state minister has criticised the developed countries for their 'hide and seek' attitude on climate funds. Speaking at a discussion on the next climate summit, Hasan Mahmud said on Saturday the rich countries resorted to trickery while promising funds to tackle climate change in poor countries. "They have not fulfilled their promise to reduce carbon emission either." The junior minister said the developed countries had pledged $30 billion to the countries vulnerable to climate change impacts, more commonly known as the Fast Start Funding, at the Copenhagen conference in December 2009. "Only eight percent of the funds, which was supposed to be cleared within 2012, was paid until November 2011," Hasan said. "There is a trick in all this," he said. "They are saying that they have already given the money. But if we observe carefully, we can see that the money given in 2008 is shown as the Fast Start Funding," he added. The roundtable was organised ahead of an international climate change conference in Durban, South Africa scheduled to begin on Nov 28. The state minister said Bangladesh had proposed a central body to distribute the money at that conference. He also said that 'need' should get priority in getting the funds. "It should not be that countries with better relations [with the donors] will get more money. It should be distributed on the basis of need," he said. On the developed countries' pledge to reduce carbon emission, Hasan said, "The developed countries have not shown any significant improvement in reducing emission…they are responsible for global warming." According to him, a person in Bangladesh emits 0.3 tonne carbon in a year. "The number is 1.6 tonne in developing countries and 15-20 tonne in the developed world." He also expressed hope that Sunday's Climate Vulnerable Forum, to be attended by United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki-moon and prime minister Sheikh Hasina, will bring positive outcome. Palli Karma-Sahayak Foundation chairman Qazi Kholiquzzaman chaired the roundtable.

President Barack Obama had a message for Americans frustrated at high unemployment and skeptical of his handling of the US economy: I hear you. Facing strong pressure to change the course of his presidency after a year devoted to a now-stalled healthcare overhaul, Obama had no choice but to make a tactical shift. "Jobs must be our number one focus in 2010," Obama declared in his first State of the Union speech. The president entered the chamber of the US House of Representatives in the biggest trouble since he took power a year ago. His vision of hope and change has given way to voter anger over a stuttering, jobless recovery, bank bailouts and government spending, and polls show that Americans consider the country on the wrong track. Looking to restore Americans' confidence in him, Obama adopted an apologetic tone in acknowledging political setbacks and admitting he did not properly explain the complicated healthcare legislation. But, in line with a populist approach he has taken lately, he made no apologies about pursuing an overhaul of the US health system that he said is needed now more than ever and vowed "we will not quit" trying to help the middle class. And he spread the blame around, saying an ugly partisan tone infects Washington, fed by both parties and urged on by a willing news media. He once again pointed fingers at his predecessor Republican George W. Bush for the economic mess he inherited, without mentioning him by name. That drew fire from critics who believe Obama has contributed to the problems by driving up the budget deficit with a $787 billion stimulus. "I think it was unfortunate," Republican Senator John McCain told Reuters in response. "He said, 'I'm not here to look back' then on several occasions blamed it on Bush. I was disappointed." Just two weeks ago Obama was on the verge of a major victory on healthcare and had planned to celebrate passage of the legislation in his speech. But Republican Scott Brown's win of a US Senate seat in traditionally liberal Massachusetts changed all that. Democrats suddenly looked like a party under siege and vulnerable in November congressional elections. NOT BACKING DOWN Obama did not back down from his ambitious domestic agenda, but took pains to make it secondary to jobs. "People are hurting," he said, and he emphasized the need for a multi-billion-dollar jobs bill along with $30 billion in small business tax incentives and a three-year spending freeze on domestic spending. Will independent voters who helped elect Republican governors in Virginia and New Jersey last November and Brown last week give Obama a second chance? Economist William Galston of the Brookings Institution said they might, citing Obama's emphasis on spending restraint and deficit reduction. "I think independents will continue to have doubts about the course of the administration but I think at least some of them will be at least be willing to give him a second chance," he said. Obama urged members of the US Congress to take another crack at healthcare reform "as temperatures cool" and told fellow Democrats they still hold a strong majority in Congress and should "not run for the hills." But he offered no proposals on how to break a partisan deadlock on the issue, whether to fight on for an expansive overhaul or focus on a scaled-back plan. "There were a lot of mixed messages in that very long speech," said Larry Sabato, a political science professor at the University of Virginia. Obama also ceded ground on climate change, another item at the top of his 2009 list. He acknowledged it will be difficult to pass in an election year and called for energy efficiency measures. But he did not mention the item at the heart of the debate, the cap-and-trade market on emissions blamed for warming the planet and considered by Republicans a likely route to higher taxes and energy bills.

Yet business leaders are still struggling to find the economic incentives to change current practices.The World Economic Forum (WEF) has not held back in its own assessment of the dangers, with former Mexican president Felipe Calderon warning of "a climate crisis with potentially devastating impacts on the global economy".Christine Lagarde, managing director of the International Monetary Fund, summed it up for any Davos doubters: "Unless we take action on climate change, future generations will be roasted, toasted, fried and grilled."There is a disconnect, however, between increasing evidence of extreme weather - from Superstorm Sandy in the United States in October to record heat in Australia this month - and the limited response from politicians and businesses.In some cases the clash is stark, as highlighted on Friday when Greenpeace activists shut down a Shell gas station near the WEF meeting in protest at oil drilling in the Arctic that is made easier by a warmer world.Many companies tout the opportunities presented by a shift to a low-carbon economy, yet the reality is that the continuing economic crisis has discouraged businesses and governments from developing a truly long-term view.The rapid growth in shale gas - a greener alternative to coal when it is burned, although not when it leaks into the atmosphere - has also made renewables comparatively less attractive, adding to the challenge.LACK OF URGENCYThe result is that while global investment in renewables is rising, the world still needs to spend $700 billion each year to curb its addiction to fossil fuels, according to a study issued by the WEF this week."There is a clear lack of urgency in the climate debate," said Greenpeace Executive Director Kumi Naidoo. "Big business is holding us back."Business, in turn, complains that the failure of governments to provide a clear regulatory framework limits its ability to plan for the future.After past failures, governments aim to work out a new UN plan to address climate change in 2015 but it will only enter into force from 2020."Climate change is a long-term issue and it is not clear how it is going to play out or what the returns are going to be," said PricewaterhouseCoopers International Chairman Dennis Nally."So CEOs have to measure how this investment stacks up vis a vis other opportunities that can generate clearer returns."In practice, only a quarter of CEOs surveyed by PwC said they planned to raise investment in climate risks as cash is rationed and allocated to projects with the most obvious near-term commercial returns.That doesn't mean CEOs are not worried, according Fred Krupp, president of the Environmental Defense Fund, who said virtually every corporation was affected to some degree."There was mostly silence on climate change for the last two years at Davos," Krupp said. "But that has changed. The US drought, especially, has grabbed people's attention here in Davos because that has had a real effect on prices."Also chiming with business leaders is Obama's argument that the United States cannot afford economically to fall behind in a global clean energy race dominated by countries like China, South Korea and Germany."The US has to be among the leaders in this global discussion, so it is a positive development," Andrew Liveris, CEO of Dow Chemical, said of Obama's inauguration speech, in which he made climate change a priority for his second term.RECORD LOW CARBON PRICESUN chief Ban Ki-moon came to Davos with a similar message, saying he was very encouraged by Obama's speech, while warning that climate change was approaching "much, much faster than one would expect".For investors, however, the climate issue remains hard to assess, as shown when the price of European permits to emit carbon fell this week to a new low below 3 euros a tonne, providing minimal incentive for industry to change behavior.Analysts estimate prices need to be between 20 and 50 euros to make utilities switch to lower-carbon generation.The question is, when might that carbon risk turn and start to undermine the value of companies heavily reliant on fossil fuels?The International Energy Agency warned last month that the world will burn around 1.2 billion more tonnes of coal per year by 2017 than it does today - equal to the current coal consumption of Russia and the United States combined.And an analysis by Ecofys for Greenpeace, presented at Davos, found that just 14 carbon-intensive projects worldwide are set to increase global CO2 emissions by 20 percent, or 6 gigatonnes. They range from coal expansion in Asia to the tar sands of Canada.When completed, these projects promise to lock in "catastrophic" global warming, according to Greenpeace.

Al Gore -- star of an Oscar-winning movie, former US vice president and the object of 2008 presidential speculation -- on Wednesday took his crusade against global warming to Capitol Hill. Glad-handing like the lifelong politician he was until losing the 2000 presidential race to George W Bush, Gore called his return to Congress 'an emotional occasion.' But he did not mince words on what he termed the current climate crisis: "Our world faces a true planetary emergency." Before a joint House panel dealing with energy, air quality and the environment and the Senate Environment and Public Works committee, Gore stressed the need for quick action. Under often contentious but consistently civil questioning at both hearings, Gore discussed the risks of sea level rise, stronger storms, more wildfires and other ills associated with global climate change, and urged an immediate freeze on US carbon dioxide emissions. After that, he said, the United States should begin a program of sharp reductions in carbon emissions 'to reach at least 90 percent reductions by 2050.' He also proposed a tax on carbon emissions. Gore, a Democrat who represented Tennessee in Congress before serving as vice president under President Bill Clinton, had enough star power to pack a large hearing room and require three overflow rooms -- two for the public and one for media. He has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize and has prompted intense curiosity in Washington about whether another presidential bid is in prospect. So far, he has said no but has not categorically ruled it out. Sen James Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican and Washington's most vocal sceptic about the human causes of global warming, pressed Gore to commit to cutting his personal home energy consumption to no more than what the average American household consumes -- without paying for carbon offsets, which Inhofe dismissed as 'gimmicks used by the wealthy.' Gore demurred, but later said, "We live a carbon-neutral life, senator, and both of my businesses are carbon-neutral. We buy green energy, we do not contribute to the problem that I am joining with others to solve." Living a carbon-neutral life means calculating how much climate-damaging carbon you emit, cutting emissions where possible and balancing the rest by buying so-called carbon offsets, such as shares in windmills or by planting trees. Gore has lately faced public questions about his personal 'carbon footprint,' especially at his home in Tennessee. An aide noted that Gore and his wife Tipper drove to Wednesday's hearing in a black hybrid vehicle. At the House hearing, he was flanked by cardboard boxes that he said contained some 516,000 letters calling for congressional action to stop global warming. "This problem is burning a hole at the top of the world in the ice cover that is one of the principle ways our planet cools itself," Gore said. "If it goes, it won't come back on any timescale relevant to the human species." Rep Joe Barton, a Texas Republican, questioned the scientific basis for global warming as presented in 'An Inconvenient Truth,' the Academy Award-winning documentary that featured Gore. Barton said a carbon tax would 'harm the American family' adding, 'A Kyoto-style cap and trade system will mainly increase the cost of electricity.' As for Gore's proposed freeze on carbon emissions, Barton said it would mean 'no new industry, no new people and no new cars.' Other legislators, including former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican, said they agreed with much of what Gore said about climate change and its effects, but questioned the economics of tackling the problem and wondered whether any US measures would put it at a competitive disadvantage with countries like China and India.

For many devoted readers, the book, set in the 1950s and featuring multiple interreligious friendships and relationships, has endured because of its myriad relatable family dramas and also for being a kind of guide to what it means to be a secular, independent citizen. Now, after several stalled attempts, the beloved novel has been adapted into a lavish new six-part series, directed by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Mira Nair (“Salaam Bombay!,” “Monsoon Wedding”). When it debuted on BBC One in July, it was lauded in Britain as the network’s first prime-time drama filmed on location in India with an almost entirely Indian cast. In India, the reaction was more complicated: Members of the ruling Hindu nationalist party have called for a boycott over its depictions of interfaith romance, and police opened an investigation into Netflix, which distributes the show there. In the United States, where “A Suitable Boy” debuted Monday on streaming service Acorn TV, the series arrives a bit more quietly, but boycott-free. Given the show’s epic story and production, Nair, who grew up in India but is based in New York, has jokingly described it as “‘The Crown’ in Brown.” But beyond its scale and prestige, the project clearly carries deep personal and political meaning for her. “The main reason I wanted to do it was to make a mirror to the world that we were farther and farther away from,” Nair said in a recent video call from her home. “The ’50s has always been a real pull for me — 1951 was the year my parents got married,” she added. “It was a secular time and a time of real idealism, taking from the English what we had known, but making it our own.” The novel “A Suitable Boy” emerged as Hindu nationalist politics began to take centre stage in India following violent clashes over the destruction, in 1992, of a 16th-century mosque in Ayodhya. Seth set the novel in the aftermath of the violent 1947 division of India by the British along religious lines, which created Pakistan. But his approach was to pen a dramatic comedy of manners, spinning a prickly mother’s attempts at Indian matchmaking into a sprawling and heartfelt saga of four upper-class families, star-crossed lovers, religious coexistence and post-Partition politics. It became the definitive novelisation of India’s founding years. After several failed attempts to have the book adapted, Seth personally chose Welsh screenwriter Andrew Davies for the job, fresh off a successful 2016 BBC adaptation of another historical epic, Tolstoy’s “War and Peace.” As Seth continued to work on his long-gestating sequel to the novel, he entrusted his sister, Aradhana Seth, to ensure the integrity of the adaptation. (She is credited as both a producer and an executive producer.) The BBC commissioned the series in 2017; Nair, who had expressed interest from the beginning, was brought on the next year. Humorous comparisons aside, the “Suitable” adaptation, though similar in both soapiness and sweep to “The Crown,” had nothing like the budget devoted to the House of Windsor drama, one of the most expensive shows on TV. In order to afford the locations and period detail both Nair and Vikram Seth wanted, the production was trimmed from eight episodes to six and condensed the book’s serpentine narrative. “Every time you see something that’s being adapted, you have to go in with fresh eyes and leave the book outside the viewing room,” Aradhana Seth said. Rather than spread the attention among the novel’s many central characters, the TV version focuses primarily on two young protagonists, Lata and Maan (Tanya Maniktala and Ishaan Khatter), who are coming into adulthood as India prepares for its first post-independence elections, held in 1952. While Maan aids in his father’s election campaign in the countryside, opening his eyes to the wider politics of caste and religion, Lata learns what it means to find her own way despite her mother’s comedic insistence on finding her a suitable Hindu boy. “There is so much energy to Lata,” Maniktala said. “She’s fresh out of her university; she’s yet to explore the world. She lives in a bubble where, according to her, everything will be great.” Filming was completed in India last December and Nair took a break in March from editing the show in London with a visit home to New York. Then international borders closed because of the coronavirus. In the video interview, Nair demonstrated how she toggled between multiple screens to edit with her team across the world. Even the music was scored remotely, with a full orchestra in Budapest, Hungary, and her composers, Alex Heffes and sitarist Anoushka Shankar, in Los Angeles and London. When the show premiered in Britain, it was widely praised in the mainstream press as a milestone in representation on the BBC. South Asian critics were less kind, focusing on the mannered English dialogue and overly enunciated accents, with particular focus on why an 84-year-old Welsh writer had adapted this iconic story about the birth of modern India and a young woman’s romantic awakening. As social media criticism built, Vikram Seth broke his public silence to defend his choice of Davies, saying “race should have nothing to do with it” in The Telegraph. “It’s a balance between getting someone very, very Indian to write it or someone very, very experienced at adapting long books,” Davies explained from his home in the British Midlands. (His other TV adaptations include “Bleak House” and “Pride and Prejudice.”) “I feel a little prickly and needing to defend my territory and not have it taken away from me as a writer. I would claim the right to put myself in the mind of people who are different from me.” Nair, who was raised in a secular Hindu family, pushed to return more of the novel’s political themes back into the screenplay. “Politics was front and centre for me, and that was one of the biggest things that I could do was to reshift the balance of the story,” she said. “Less from ‘will she or won’t she marry’ — ‘Pride and Prejudice’ and Mrs Bennet, that trope — to really making Lata feel like the making of India.” Nair also set out to integrate as much spoken Hindi and Urdu into the screenplay as allowable within the strictures of BBC broadcasting. Asked about balancing the twin demands of her unapologetic brown gaze and prestige British television, she laughed. “It was a charming tussle, can I say.” It’s a familiar challenge for Nair. A seasoned veteran of the sometimes bruising battles for more truthful and artful representations of South Asians on Western screens, she has made several acclaimed films about India and its diaspora. “She tends to pick topics that reflect ongoing social issues grounded in everyday realities,” said Amardeep Singh, a professor of English at Lehigh University, in Pennsylvania, who wrote the book “The Films of Mira Nair: Diaspora Vérité.” “With her attempt to take on the changes occurring in modern India, ‘A Suitable Boy’ fits very nicely into an arc that includes films like ‘Monsoon Wedding’ and ‘Salaam Bombay!’.” The series was filmed on location amid the “grandeur and the decay” of real cities, as Nair described it, where production designers laboured to hide the electrified chaos of modern life to achieve the show’s layered, midcentury Indian minimalism. An appropriated mansion in Lucknow, in northern India, was refashioned into the salon of a Muslim singer and courtesan named Saeeda Bai. Her home is the luminescent force at the centre of Nair’s adaptation, the embodiment of an aristocratic Islamic court culture and literary sensuality that was in decline by the time the story begins. Saeeda is played by one of India’s most acclaimed actors, Tabu, who made her international debut in Nair’s 2007 adaptation of the Jhumpa Lahiri novel “The Namesake.” Her character’s poetry, singing and beauty seduces the younger Maan, the dashing son of an influential Hindu politician. “Mira is very particular about how her women are shown on screen,” Tabu said. “Saeeda Bai is not integrated into the normal society of the time, and there’s almost this ethereal, untouchable quality of this world.” Khatter, who plays Maan, noted that in a country as diverse and sometimes divided as India, stories of interfaith love remain a powerful theme. “The fact that we choose to tell these stories time and again, it is that relevant to us,” Khatter said. “I myself am the son of an interreligious marriage, and it’s very much who we are.” A few days after the filming ended last December, cities erupted in protests amid the Hindu nationalist government’s passage of a law that explicitly excludes Muslim migrants from a clear path to Indian citizenship. Sadaf Jafar, who plays Saeeda’s servant, Bibbo, participated in the protests; during a brutal police crackdown, she was arrested and put in jail, where she said she was beaten by the police. Against the advice of friends, Nair started a public campaign on Jafar’s behalf until the actor was released nearly three weeks later. Looking back on the difficult decision to speak out in an increasingly hostile political climate for artists, Nair quoted revolutionary Pakistani poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz: “Speak, for your lips are still free.” The optimistic multiculturalism reflected in “A Suitable Boy” may seem in many ways like a fading relic of both literary and political history. But Maniktala, who plays Lata, said she found Vikram Seth’s story of hopeful beginnings — and kindness — both resonant and relevant. Maniktala teared up over the phone as she reflected on her own grandfather’s trauma as a Hindu refugee forced by the 1947 partition to flee to India from what is today Pakistan. “I realise how important pain is, and the lessons” to be found in that, she said. “The kind of empathy people had — I feel the humanity aspect has been on the decline,” she continued. “We have to remember where we came from. We can never forget.” © 2020 New York Times News Service

More than a day of heavy, non-stop rain had caused the Brahmaputra River in Assam state to burst its banks, sending water rushing through Pegu's home village of Majdolopa. "I kept shouting for help as the water started flooding my stilted home. I was ready for the worst that day, had it not been for a couple of youths who rescued me," the septuagenarian told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Those youths were volunteers from the Majdolopa Village Disaster Management Committee, one of the hundreds of local groups that have formed across flood-prone Upper Assam to help their communities through increasingly frequent storms and floods. With the effects of climate change making flooding more sudden and destructive, even Majdolopa's indigenous residents, who have lived along the Brahmaputra for generations, can be caught off guard, said committee leader Paramananda Daw. "Even (for us) it is hard to predict the mood swings of the river. So the least we can do is help our fellow villagers, especially the elderly and children who get caught in its unpredictable floods," he said. Daw formed the Majdolopa committee in 2015 and today its 23 young men and women volunteers help with flood warnings, evacuations and rescues at least three or four times a year. "The biggest challenge for us is to first protect the lives of villagers by getting them to the nearest high-rise platform or embankments where they can be safe, and then we save the livestock," said Daw. Feni Doley, of the committee's early warning crew, explained how his team tap into a mix of traditional knowledge, radio news and weather apps to anticipate when floods might occur. They then use drums, megaphones and mobile phones to advise other villagers to evacuate. When Doley and other volunteers saw dark, thunderous clouds gathering over the distant mountains in July 2020, "we knew the flood waters would soon tumble over our village," he said. The team quickly spread the word to the rest of the committee, who started getting villagers to safety. "As the water inundated the village during the next few hours, there was absolute chaos... The flood-water seemed to be chasing us from behind," said Dilip Paw from the search and rescue team. On boats and makeshift rafts, Paw and his team of six picked up a stranded woman, a few small children and several elderly people, along with some calves, pigs and goats that day. "Soon (the boat) resembled Noah's Ark," said Paw. TRAINING AND SUPPLIES Flooding is a recurring problem in the tea-rich state of Assam, with persistent rains during the monsoon season causing the Brahmaputra to overflow with disastrous regularity. The exceptionally heavy rains that started in May 2020 triggered months of flooding in the state that displaced or affected 8 million people, like Pegu in Majdolopa, and killed more than 110, authorities said at the time. While flooding this year was less extreme, it still impacted more than 647,000 people, according to the Assam State Disaster Management Authority. To prepare for when the river rises, the Majdolopa committee and others around the state get supplies - including first aid kits, boats and megaphones - as well as training from the North-East Affected Area Development Society (NEADS), a grassroots nonprofit. NEADS holds mock drills and practical sessions with experts from the district authority's civil defence department and the local unit of the national disaster response force, said its joint director Tirtha Prasad Saikia. The organisation also supports local committees to provide clean drinking water and sanitation after floods, helping volunteers put together water filtration systems using sand, pebbles and bamboo charcoal, and build hand pumps and toilets on higher ground to protect them from future flooding. Simanta Sharma, deputy controller of the Jorhat district civil defence unit, said the committees are enthusiastic and quick to act, but their effectiveness is undermined by a lack of funding and time for training. "More frequent training and updates on the latest first aid (techniques), skills on capacity-building and leadership exercises could further add to their capabilities," he said. 'BOTTLE BELTS' Even with basic skills, community-based approaches to emergency and rescue operations make evacuations much faster than help sent in by government agencies or international charities, according to disaster management expert NM Prusty. That is something villages and towns around the world could learn from, as the impacts of climate change hit communities in different ways, said Prusty, who is president of Humanitarian Aid international, an Indian nonprofit. "Such basic units of disaster management, providing localised interventions, can prove to be the foundation for other climate-affected regions too. So, more lives can be saved and losses minimised," he said. The disaster management volunteers in Assam agree their work relies on local knowledge and indigenous techniques. "We can swim across the rough torrents of the flood-waters with the help of traditionally made, inexpensive life jackets," said Bhupen Borah, leader of the committee in Sumoni Chapori village, about 90 km (56 miles) east of Majdolopa. Volunteers secure at least eight 10-litre (2.6-gallon) plastic bottles side by side with cord to create "bottle belts" they tie around their chests to stay afloat, Borah explained. And in two hours, they can nail together several sturdy banana plant stalks to make a raft as an alternative to expensive boats, said Mintu Neog of the village's rescue team. In Majdolopa, Pegu is grateful that a group of young volunteers had the right mix of modern training and traditional solutions to make sure his memory of that day last July was one of relief, not disaster. "We cannot control the climate, and today it's hard for us to predict its sudden changes. But at least our villages have our own climate warriors, who can readily step in to protect us from its immediate dangers," he said.

Sounds and smells from the streets wafted in — fresh fish splayed out on the sidewalk, the muezzins’ call to prayer — as the tram passed vegetable wagons and ornate colonial buildings. “You get all the flavours of Calcutta here, so it’s the best way to travel,” said a medical student, Megha Roy, riding the tram with two friends. She used the Anglicized version of Kolkata, which residents deploy interchangeably with its current spelling and pronunciation. The three friends had jumped onboard spontaneously, with no clear idea of where the tram was going or when it was scheduled to get there. But it didn’t really matter. The ride itself was an unexpected treat. “It’s like a fairy tale,” Roy said. But in reality, Kolkata’s trams — the first in Asia and the last still operating in India — are in trouble. In recent years, hit by natural disasters and official neglect, the city’s tram system has become little more than a nostalgia ride, its passengers more often looking for a lark than an efficient trip home. Passengers aboard a tram in Kolkata, India, on July 20, 2021. The few tram riders left say the 140-year-old system makes sense for a city of 15 million struggling with pollution and overcrowding, but many trips now are more nostalgic than necessary. (Rebecca Conway/The New York Times) And authorities say that while trams should remain a part of the transit mix, buses and the city’s metro system better serve 21st-century riders in the city of some 15 million people. Passengers aboard a tram in Kolkata, India, on July 20, 2021. The few tram riders left say the 140-year-old system makes sense for a city of 15 million struggling with pollution and overcrowding, but many trips now are more nostalgic than necessary. (Rebecca Conway/The New York Times) The tram system, built in 1881, was instrumental in Kolkata’s growth into one of the world’s most populous cities, cutting the path for the development of a metropolis on the move. “We grew up as a city with the tramways,” said Aranda Das Gupta, some of whose earliest memories are of the tram rolling past his great-grandfather’s bookstore, which opened just five years after the tram first arrived. “It’s the heritage of Kolkata.” A few committed riders are fighting hard to preserve that heritage. Pointing to cities from San Diego to Hong Kong, they say light rail is being reevaluated globally and argue that Kolkata’s 140-year-old system makes sense for a city struggling with pollution and overcrowding. In an age of growing concerns about climate change, the emission-free trams, powered by overhead electric lines, are a better option than diesel-fuelled buses and private cars, activists say. The trams were briefly pulled by horses, an experiment that ended in less than a year after too many horses succumbed to the heat. “Scientifically, economically, environmentally, there is no reason to convert the tramways for buses,” said Debasish Bhattacharyya, president of the Calcutta Tram Users’ Association. But the scene at one tram stop suggested commuters may feel differently. Fewer than a half-dozen people were waiting for the tram, while nearby, hundreds were piling onto buses that sagged under the weight of so many passengers, belching black plumes of diesel exhaust as they careened over the tram’s tracks and onto the street. Admittedly, neither speed nor punctuality are hallmarks of the trams, which must contend with a mélange of traffic on their routes: trucks, buses, cars, vintage yellow Ambassador taxis, rickshaws manual and electric, pedestrians, herds of goats and the occasional cow. “Nobody knows when the next car will come,” Bhattacharyya said. “They say this is the control room, but nothing is controlled; everything is scattered,” he said, gesturing to a hub of the tram system in central Kolkata. Das Gupta Books, founded in 1886 near the tram tracks in Kolkata, India, on July 20, 2021. The few tram riders left say the 140-year-old system makes sense for a city of 15 million struggling with pollution and overcrowding, but many trips now are more nostalgic than necessary. (Rebecca Conway/The New York Times) Rajanvir Singh Kapur is the managing director of the public enterprise that oversees the tram and bus system. His office is perched on the third floor of the stately Calcutta Tramways headquarters building, little changed in outward appearance since the 1960s, when the company — now known as the West Bengal Transport Corp. — was a huge employer of organized labour that spawned some of the era’s powerful leftist leaders. Das Gupta Books, founded in 1886 near the tram tracks in Kolkata, India, on July 20, 2021. The few tram riders left say the 140-year-old system makes sense for a city of 15 million struggling with pollution and overcrowding, but many trips now are more nostalgic than necessary. (Rebecca Conway/The New York Times) Kapur said Kolkata used to be a public transit-oriented city, long run by the Left Front, an alliance of communist and left-leaning parties that, he joked, made it into the Cuba of India. But, he said, the city’s trams — a relic of the British Raj repurposed for a postcolonial era — “could not keep up with the pace of development.” As a result, cyclone-battered electrical lines have gone unrepaired. Tracks have been dug up to build underground metro lines. And traffic police have canceled routes, saying the tram takes up too much space on Kolkata’s crowded streets. In the view of Bhattacharyya, authorities are trying to relegate the tram service to history when it still has plenty of life left. In recent years, the Calcutta Tram Users’ Association has plastered posters across Kolkata and messages across Facebook demanding the trams be saved and speaking out against what Bhattacharyya described as a “culture of car worship.” Inside the tram system’s control room, employees worked the phones to coordinate trips. The system has become so haphazard that there is no longer a functioning timetable. “At present, in my view, it’s dying,” said a control room officer who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters. “Nothing is here. You cannot compare what we had with what we have now,” he said, looking out wistfully through the big picture windows at palm trees swaying over an active tram line — and an empty commuter parking lot. Aboard a tram crawling along Lenin Sarani, one of central Kolkata’s main thoroughfares and named in honor of the Russian revolutionary, Sumit Chandra Banerjee, a ticket taker, said he looked forward to mandatory retirement when he turned 60 in October. Passengers aboard a tram in Kolkata, India, on July 20, 2021. The few tram riders left say the 140-year-old system makes sense for a city of 15 million struggling with pollution and overcrowding, but many trips now are more nostalgic than necessary. (Rebecca Conway/The New York Times) “Tram service is very poor, but once upon a time, the tram was one of the best,” he said, turning to pull a white rope to sound the bell for a stop. “Now, poor tram, poor service, the number of trams cut,” he said, crossing his forearms into an X shape. Passengers aboard a tram in Kolkata, India, on July 20, 2021. The few tram riders left say the 140-year-old system makes sense for a city of 15 million struggling with pollution and overcrowding, but many trips now are more nostalgic than necessary. (Rebecca Conway/The New York Times) Monthly tickets have disappeared, but at 7 rupees a ride — about 9 cents — it is still one of the cheapest ways to get around. In the Shyambazar tram terminus, ticket takers, accountants and conductors escape the midday heat to drink tea in a room framed by portraits of Hindu gods and prominent Bengalis, like philosopher and poet Rabindranath Tagore. While the tramways are no longer the megaemployer they once were, government jobs are still highly coveted in Kolkata and across India since the private economy has fallen short of meeting the great demand for safe and decently paid work. Six tram routes remain operational in a system that used to resemble a bicycle wheel. Now most of the spokes have been broken off, leaving vast swaths of the city uncovered by tram lines. But to preservationists, what’s left of the trams — as much a Kolkata institution as the universities the steel carriages trundle past, or the city’s cantilever bridge — must be saved. “If they announce the discontinuation of tram service, there will be public unrest,” Bhattacharyya predicted. So instead of any sudden shutdown of service, he argued that authorities are allowing the system to disappear quietly, by failing to make critical repairs. Many of Kolkata’s urban landmarks — from cinemas and bookstores to museums and hospitals — were built near the tracks. One of those institutions was Das Gupta Books, founded in 1886. Aranda Das Gupta, the shop’s fourth-generation managing director, called the tram a “beautiful journey,” while acknowledging that it takes “maximum time.” “Nowadays,” he said, “people want to move fast.” © 2021 The New York Times Company

Law minister Shafique Ahmed has questioned the ability of local institutions to govern development of their electorates. However, other speakers at a seminar on Thursday which included members of parliament, politicians and economists, spoke out in favour of a strong local government and advocated the idea of establishing a local government commission. Qazi Kholiquzzaman Ahmad, president of the Bangladesh Unnayan Parishad and also co-chair of the Bangladesh Climate Change Trust, said that he expected the ruling Awami League would set up such a commission in line with its election pledge. Mujahidul Islam Selim, general secretary of the Bangladesh Communist Party, questioned the manner in which the local government ministry resorts to in retaining its control over the local government. "It is unconstitutional." The constitution obligates the government to ensure five layers of public representation of which only two are in place — at the Upazila and union levels. However, the local representatives hold that these locally elected bodies are not allowed to function without the influence of corresponding MPs. Abdul Majid, president of a platform of Upazila chairmen and vice-chairmen, said the Upazila councils were dysfunctional. "Everything is controlled by the MPs." "The Upazila chairman does exactly what the MP of that area says," he said at the meeting. Meher Afroz Chumki, an MP from Gazipur, said that it was a matter of changing one's mindset. She spoke in favour of giving more power to local government but blamed bureaucratic red tape for impeding sincere initiatives of the government. "If we begin to empower local governments, they would also learn to take on the responsibility. But our closed mindset prevents this from happening." President of the Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal and also an MP, Hasanul Haq Inu, said there must clearly defined roles for local and central government that would spell out the scope of their work. He noted that discrimination against the local representatives was only natural in a system with pronounced dualism. He said that the public representatives should be at the heart of development plans. "Development initiatives should be local government-based." Shafique Ahmed, speaking at the end said he did not disagree with the proposition of the other speakers and was all for decentralisation. The technocrat minister said, "One must evaluate whether the local agencies are at all qualified to take on the responsibility." The seminar was organised by the Governance Advocacy Forum and presided over by Kholiquzzaman Ahmad. Over 400 chairmen and vice-chairmen organised a hunger strike in the capital's Muktangan on Jan 22, putting forth a ten-point demand for empowerment. Their demands included cancellation of a law stating that the corresponding MP be appointed as advisor to the Upazila council. The charter also calls for 70 percent budget allocation and separate budgets for the local government, and empowering the chairmen to evaluate all government employees under the council. The local leaders also demanded that they be given charge of 13 offices under 10 ministries in line with the Upazila Parishad Act, allowing the local government organisations to make their own annual and five-year plans, reforming the district councils, formation of local government commission and an integrated law for the local government organisations. The strike was deferred until March 28 following an assurance from MPs Rashed Khan Menon and Hasanul Haque Inu to fulfil the demands.

The two leaders embraced warmly as they arrived at a US war cemetery overlooking Omaha Beach, where 2,500 American troops were killed by German gunners and artillery on June 6, 1944, the first day of the Allied effort to drive the Nazis out of France. While Trump laced his discourse with religious undertones and references to his nation’s rural and industrial hinterlands - key bastions of his support - he refrained from hurling barbs at his rivals, some of whom were in the audience. “The abundance of courage came from an abundance of faith,” Trump said. “They came here and saved freedom, and then they went home and showed us all what freedom is about.” “More powerful than the strength of American arms was the strength of American hearts. These men ran through the fires of hell, moved by a force no weapon could destroy: the fierce patriotism of a free, proud and sovereign people,” he added. Trump recognised several surviving veterans by name, including former Army medic Arnold Raymond “Ray” Lambert and Private Russell Pickett, 94, a teenager on D-Day when, tasked with operating a flame-thrower, he was wounded twice. As the frail Pickett struggled to his feet amid applause, Macron walked over and lent the veteran support. The American news network CNN, which has regularly sparred with Trump, called it “one of the finest” speeches by the US president. 'CHERISHED ALLIANCE' From the two leaders’ early bone-crunching handshake to the US president appearing to flick dandruff off the younger man’s shoulder, Macron and Trump have had a difficult relationship, at odds over the American’s unilateralist approach to trade, climate change and on Iran. At the centenary anniversary of World War One last year, their divergent views were on open display. On Thursday, Macron peppered his remarks with praise for America’s leading role in liberating western Europe from Nazi Germany, though he pressed home his message on the value of allies and multilateralism. “America, dear President Trump, is never greater than when fighting for others’ freedom,” he said, turning to Trump. “When free peoples unite, they can meet all the challenges.” Trump’s ‘America First’ diplomacy and forthright criticism of multinational institutions born out of the ashes of World War Two have shaken allies. But as he remembered America’s fallen war heroes, he told European allies they were bound by unbreakable ties. “To all our friends and partners, our cherished alliance was forged in the heat of battle, tested in the trials of war and proven in the blessings of peace. Our bond is unbreakable,” he said. Trump’s convivial words will soon be put to a stress-test: He and Macron later entered a bilateral meeting where hot-button issues such as trade, climate change and Iran’s activities in the Middle East will be discussed.

The battle against the insects on the streets of Brazil is the latest in an ancient war between humankind and the Culicidae, or mosquito, family which the pests frequently win. Today, mosquito invaders are turning up with increasing regularity from Washington DC to Strasbourg, challenging the notion that the diseases they carry will remain confined to the tropics, scientists documenting the cases told Reuters. Ironically, humans have rolled out the red carpet for the invaders by transporting them around the world and providing a trash-strewn urban landscape that suits them to perfection. The Aedes aegypti species blamed for transmitting Zika breeds in car tires, tin cans, dog bowls and cemetery flower vases. And its females are great at spreading disease as they take multiple bites to satisfy their hunger for the protein in human blood they need to develop their eggs. Around the world, disease-carrying mosquitoes are advancing at speed, taking viruses such as dengue and Zika, plus a host of lesser-known ills such as chikungunya and St Louis encephalitis, into new territories from Europe to the Pacific. "The concern is that we have these species spreading everywhere. Today the focus is on Zika but they can carry many different viruses and pathogens," said Anna-Bella Failloux, head of the department that tracks mosquito viruses at France's Institut Pasteur.  In 2014, there was a large outbreak of chikungunya, which causes fever and joint pains, in the Caribbean, where it had not been seen before, while the same virus sickened Italians in 2007 in a wake-up call for public health officials. Europe has seen the re-emergence of malaria in Greece for the first time in decades and the appearance of West Nile fever in eastern parts of the continent. Out in the Atlantic, the Madeira archipelago reported more than 2,000 cases of dengue in 2012, in a sign of the northerly advance of what - at least until Zika - has been the world's fastest-spreading tropical disease. In the past 40 years, six new invasive mosquito species have become established in Europe, with five arriving since 1990, driven in large part by the international trade in used vehicle tires. Mosquitoes lay their eggs in the tires and they hatch when rain moistens them at their destination. North American health experts are also racing to keep up, with the first appearance of Aedes japonicus, an invasive mosquito, in western Canada last November and Aedes aegypti found in Washington DC, apparently after spending the winter in sewers or Metro subway stations. Spread unprecedented The speed of change in mosquito-borne diseases since the late 1990s has been unprecedented, according to Jolyon Medlock, a medical entomologist at Public Health England, a government agency. For many experts, the biggest potential threat is Aedes albopictus, otherwise known as the Asian tiger mosquito, which is expanding its range widely and is capable of spreading more than 25 viruses, including Zika. "There is strong evidence that Aedes albopictus is now out-competing aegypti in some areas and becoming more dominant," said Ralph Harbach, an entomologist at London's Natural History Museum, who has been studying mosquitoes since 1976.  In the United States, Aedes albopictus has been found as far north as Massachusetts and as far west as California. In Europe, it has reached Paris and Strasbourg. Adding to the challenge for public health authorities are the blurred lines between diseases carried by different mosquitoes, as shown by research in Brazil this month that another common mosquito, Culex quinquefasciatus, may also be able to carry Zika. Both Aedes aegypti and Culex quinquefasciatus probably first arrived in the Americas from Africa on slave ships, scientists believe. In the centuries since, commerce has shuttled other species around the world, while air travel has exposed millions of people to new diseases. "You've got a global movement of mosquitoes and a huge increase in human travel. Humans are moving the pathogens around and the mosquitoes are waiting there to transmit them," said Medlock. Human incursions into tropical forests have aggravated the problem. Deforestation in Malaysia, for example, is blamed for a steep rise in human cases of a type of malaria usually found in monkeys. Don't kill the good guys There have been some victories against mosquitoes, thanks to insecticide-treated bed nets and vaccines against viruses like yellow fever and Japanese encephalitis, as well as a new one for dengue approved in December. But mosquitoes still kill around 725,000 people a year, mostly due to malaria, or 50 percent more than are killed by other humans, according to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Climate change adds a further twist. A 2 to 3 degree Celsius rise in temperature can increase the number of people at risk of malaria by 3 to 5 percent, or more than 100 million, according to the World Health Organisation. Hotter weather also speeds up the mosquito breeding cycle from around two weeks at 25 degrees to 7 to 8 days at 28 degrees, according to the Institut Pasteur's Failloux.  So is it time to wipe out mosquitoes altogether? Aggressive action in the 1950s and 1960s, including the use of the pesticide DDT, certainly pushed them back for a while. Today, genetic modification, radiation and targeted bacteria are being considered. Trying to eliminate all mosquitoes, however, would make no sense, since there are 3,549 species and fewer than 200 bite humans. "It might be possible to wipe out a few species but we don't want to wipe out the good guys because a lot of them serve as food for frogs, fish and bats," said Harbach. "Many also visit flowers to feed on nectar and may play a role in pollination." Some are even our friends. Harbach has a soft spot for the Toxorhynchites genus, which have a convenient penchant for eating Aedes aegypti larvae.

The message came as part of a rare public advisory from the nation’s top physician, Dr Vivek Murthy, in a 53-page report noting that the pandemic intensified mental health issues that were already widespread by spring 2020. The report cited significant increases in self-reports of depression and anxiety along with more emergency room visits for mental health issues. In the United States, emergency room visits for suicide attempts rose 51% for adolescent girls in early 2021 compared with the same period in 2019. The figure rose 4% for boys. Globally, symptoms of anxiety and depression doubled during the pandemic, the report noted. But mental health issues were already on the rise in the United States, with emergency room visits related to depression, anxiety and similar conditions up 28% between 2011 and 2015. The reasons are complex and not yet definitive. Adolescent brain chemistry and relationships with friends and family play a role, the report noted, as does a fast-paced media culture, which can leave some young minds feeling helpless. “Young people are bombarded with messages through the media and popular culture that erode their sense of self-worth — telling them they are not good-looking enough, popular enough, smart enough or rich enough,” Murthy wrote in the report. “That comes as progress on legitimate, and distressing, issues like climate change, income inequality, racial injustice, the opioid epidemic and gun violence feels too slow.” The surgeon general’s advisory adds to a growing number of calls for attention and action around adolescent mental health. In October, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and the Children’s Hospital Association joined to declare “a national emergency” in youth mental health. Although blame for adolescent distress is often pinned on social media, screen time alone does not account for the crisis, many researchers say. Rather, social media and other online activities act more to amplify an adolescent’s existing mental state, causing some young people to feel more distress and others to experience enhanced feelings of connection. Bonnie Nagel, a pediatric neuropsychologist at Oregon Health & Science University who treats and studies adolescents, said that online interactions appear not to satisfy core needs for connection. And recent research by her and her colleagues found that the feeling of loneliness is a key predictor for depression and suicidal ideation. “I don’t think it is genuine human connection when talking to somebody with a fake facade online,” Nagel said. Moreover, screen time may be displacing activities known to be vital to physical and mental health, including sleep, exercise and in-person activity, research shows. The current generation of adolescents expresses heightened levels of loneliness — more than any other age group — despite spending countless hours connected over media. Authorities and scientists widely acknowledge that there has been insufficient research into the underlying causes. “There’s a real dearth of scientists in this area just as there is a real dearth of clinicians,” said Dr Joshua Gordon, director of the National Institute of Mental Health. “Parents can’t get care for their kids.” Across the country in a variety of settings — rural and urban, richer and poorer — there is a shortage of specialists who can assess conditions such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety, depression and eating disorders. In May, Children’s Hospital Colorado declared its first state of emergency for pediatric mental health, citing emergency rooms “flooded” with young people struggling with suicidal ideation and other issues. Researchers have hypothesised that the pandemic intensified stress on young people, in part by isolating them during a period of their lives when social connection is vital for healthy development. But the pandemic does not tell the full story. In 2019, a group of US lawmakers issued a report, “Ring the Alarm,” focusing on a suicide crisis among Black adolescents, a group that historically has seen relatively low rates of suicide. Some statistics, like the increase in suicides and emergency room visits, are stark and undeniable. But accurately measuring the scale of the mental health threat faced by young people and adults, scientists say, is made difficult by the fact that such issues are more openly discussed and assessed than in the past. An increase in self-reports of depression and anxiety may be a reliable indicator of the crisis, or it may be that earlier generations also felt distressed but lacked the popular language to describe their emotions. “The question is whether it’s new or we’re medicalising it,” Gordon said. “Those are the kinds of answers it’s really, really hard to get.” Murthy’s advisory calls for more resources to be devoted to understanding and addressing mental health challenges, and it urges a greater appreciation of mental health as a key factor in overall health. “This is a moment to demand change,” the report concludes. ©2021 The New York Times Company

Biden’s victory and Bolsonaro’s reluctance to recognize it have cast a dark cloud over US-Brazilian relations, which had warmed to the point of discussing a free trade deal last year. Biden is likely to take a tougher line on Brasilia in areas such as the environment, human rights and trade, leaving the far-right Bolsonaro even more isolated on the global stage. “Greetings to the President Joe Biden, with my best wishes and the hope that the USA will remain ‘the land of the free and the home of the brave,’” Bolsonaro said in a statement published by Brazil’s Foreign Ministry. “I will be ready to work with you and continue to build a Brazil-USA alliance, in defense of sovereignty, democracy and freedom around the world, as well as in trade integration.” Bolsonaro, a former army captain, was one of the last global leaders to acknowledge Biden’s victory, doing so only after it was confirmed by the US Electoral College on Monday. Echoing Trump, Bolsonaro previously voiced concerns about alleged widespread US fraud in the November vote, without citing evidence. Trump has continued to make unfounded claims about fraud and refused to concede. Biden’s victory leaves Bolsonaro without a key diplomatic ally and further undermines his approach to the COVID-19 pandemic, whose gravity, like Trump, he has often sought to play down. Fresh US pressure to curb deforestation in the Amazon and spur global action against climate change has already caused friction with Bolsonaro, who bristled at Biden’s comments along those lines during a pre-election presidential debate. Frostier relations with Washington could ironically push Bolsonaro closer to China, some experts say. A longtime China skeptic, Bolsonaro may come to rely more on the world’s No. 2 economy – Brazil’s biggest trade partner – if environmental and human rights issues crimp the US-Brazil trade agenda.

Japan's prime minister hopes to make a splash with a speech on the environment this weekend in Davos, but the beleaguered leader faces hurdles convincing the world he can spearhead the fight against climate change. Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda, set to host the Group of Eight summit in July, will likely back a target for Japan to cut its carbon emissions beyond the 2012 expiry of the Kyoto Protocol at a meeting of political and business leaders in Davos, Switzerland, on Saturday, Japanese media have said. But emissions targets are a contentious issue at home, where business groups are fiercely opposed to profit-threatening policies such as a carbon tax or a European-style mandatory cap-and-trade system to penalise polluters. And with Fukuda's popularity sagging amid a policy deadlock with opposition parties, he may lack the clout for bold steps. "Japan needs to commit to targets if it wants to take leadership in fighting climate change, but for targets to be met, there need to be policies," said Fukashi Utsunomiya, professor emeritus of environment policy at Tokai University. "It won't be acceptable for Japan to announce a target it can't reach." At United Nations-led talks in Bali last month, Japan sided with the United States to reject a European Union-backed emissions cut target beyond 2012, prompting outrage among environmentalists. The criticism has raised doubts among analysts about whether Japan will be able to take the initiative at the G8 summit this year, where climate change looks set to become a major topic when leaders convene in the northern resort of Toyako in July. Under pressure to show his enthusiasm for the issue, Fukuda is also likely to urge major emitters to each set targets for reducing carbon dioxide to be achieved before 2050, media said. Fukuda's predecessor, Shinzo Abe, proposed last year a global target to halve greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, but the plan, dubbed "Cool Earth 50", was shrugged off as too vague and lacking teeth without binding targets. BEYOND 2012 Mutsuyoshi Nishimura, special adviser to the cabinet on climate change, said last week that Fukuda would present a "positive disposition" at Davos but that even without targets, Japan was still focused on fighting global warming beyond 2012. Japan is the world's fifth-biggest emitter of greenhouse gases blamed for global warming, but the only one among the top five under pressure to meet a Kyoto target. The United States refused to ratify the protocol, Russia is on track to meet its goal and the pact set no targets for China and India. While Japan has said it can meet its Kyoto goal of cutting emissions by 6 percent from 1990 levels over the 2008-2012 period, analysts say any midterm, post-Kyoto target would be tough to meet without fresh policy steps. "Given the technology now, there are going to be limits on how much energy Japan can save, and the only other option Japan has is to buy carbon credits from overseas," said Kuniyuki Nishimura, research director at Mitsubishi Research Institute. So far, Japan has encouraged industries to agree to voluntary emissions cuts, buy CO2 credits on the international market or claim credits by funding projects that cut emissions elsewhere. Broad public interest in fighting climate change was also lacking, analysts said, making it less likely the government or businesses would come up with aggressive steps to cut emissions. "One idea is for industries to raise goods prices, saying they will use the money to invest in energy-saving technology," said Mitsubishi Research's Nishimura. "But public awareness is not up to the level yet that they will support such an idea."

Japan's key economic panel will discuss private-sector proposals on tackling climate change on Tuesday but will not make them public because of the topic's sensitivity ahead of next month's G8 summit, Economics Minister Hiroko Ota said on Tuesday. The proposals by the panel's private-sector members will serve as a basis for discussions at the meeting of the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy, Ota told a news conference. "We decided to put (climate change) on today's agenda because it is a very important theme and needs to be discussed broadly within the government and private-sector members of the council," Ota said. "The discussions will offer important material" for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe when he visits Germany for the summit of the Group of Eight nations, she said. Japanese media reports said last week the government would propose at the summit a plan to halve global greenhouse gas emissions from current levels by 2050. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuhisa Shiozaki, the government's top spokesman, said later that nothing had been decided. Foreign Minister Taro Aso and Environment Minister Masatoshi Wakabayashi will join the meeting of the council, which mostly consists of economic ministers such as Ota and Finance Minister Koji Omi. The leaders of Britain, the United States, Russia, Canada, Japan, Italy and France will attend the summit hosted by Germany in the resort town of Heiligendamm from June 6-8. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is determined to push through wide-ranging pledges of global action on climate warming and energy security, but is meeting strong resistance from the United States, supported by Canada. Japan aims to cut its carbon dioxide emissions by 6 percent in the 2008-2012 period from 1990 levels under the United Nations-led Kyoto Protocol to help slow global warming. But its actual emissions rose 0.6 percent in the year to March 2006, leaving it 14 percent above the Kyoto goal. Japan has repeatedly said it will not let the Kyoto Protocol lapse without a framework to succeed it after its 2012 expiry, but it has shied away from any commitments of its own, although European nations have set tough targets.

LONDON, Sun Dec 28,(bdnews24.com/Reuters) - Britain's Gordon Brown will use his New Year address to call for a 'coalition for change' with US President-elect Barack Obama in a speech intended as a rallying call to Britons. Brown, who frequently uses the comparison of the Second World war to describe the current global financial crisis, will tell Britons they have the strength of resolve to tackle a recession. "Today the issues may be different, more complex, more global. And yet the qualities we need to meet them the British people have demonstrated in abundance before," Brown says in excerpts of the speech released by his office on Sunday. "So that we will eventually look back on the winter of 2008 as an other great challenge that was thrown Britain's way, and that Britain met. Because we had the right values, the right policies, the right character to meet it." Brown identifies the economy, climate change, and security as the main challenges facing the world in 2009 and pledges to work with the United States to tackle them, positioning the U.S. alliance beyond a traditional focus on military cooperation. "I look forward to working with President-elect Obama in creating a transatlantic, and then a global coalition for change," Brown will say. "We can demonstrate this in 2009 not just in how we address global economic challenges but in how we tackle climate change at the Copenhagen summit." World leaders are working to find a successor to the Kyoto Protocol, the U.N. pact on limiting greenhouse gas emissions, with talks due to end at a conference in Copenhagen next year. Brown identifies the economy as the single biggest challenge for 2009 and defends plans for a massive spending boost to prevent a recession spiraling into a slump. "The failure of British governments in previous downturns was to succumb to political expediency and to cut back investment across the board, thereby stunting our ability to grow and strangling hope during the upturn," he will say. "This will not happen on my watch. The threat that will come of doing too little is greater than the threat of attempting too much. We will direct the next stage of our strategy at creating jobs and making the investments our economy needs." The remarks are a swipe at the opposition Conservative Party, which has said that if they won the next election, due by mid-2010, they would not match Labor's spending plans. Labor trails the Conservatives in opinion polls ahead of elections due in the next 18 months, but the opposition's lead has shrunk since the summer as they struggle to convince voters about their ability to handle the economy.

Booming demand for food, fuel and wood as the world's population surges from six to nine billion will put unprecedented and unsustainable demand on the world's remaining forests, two new reports said on Monday. The reports from the U.S.-based Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI) said this massive potential leap in deforestation could add to global warming and put pressure on indigenous forest dwellers that could lead to conflict. "Arguably we are on the verge of the last great global land grab," said Andy White, co-author of "Seeing People Through the Trees," one of the two reports. "Unless steps are taken, traditional forest owners, and the forests themselves, will be the big losers. It will mean more deforestation, more conflict, more carbon emissions, more climate change and less prosperity for everyone." RRI is a global coalition of environmental and conservation non-government organizations with a particular focus on forest protection and management and the rights of forest peoples. White's report said that unless agricultural productivity rises sharply, new land equivalent in size to 12 Germanys will have to be cultivated for crops to meet food and biofuel demand by 2030. Virtually all of it is likely to be in developing countries, principally land that is currently forested. The second report, "From Exclusion to Ownership", noted that governments still claim ownership of most forests in developing countries, but said they had done little to ensure the rights and tenure of forest dwellers. It said people whose main source of livelihood is the forests were usually the best custodians of the forests and their biodiversity. RRI said governments were failing to prevent industrial incursions into indigenous lands. Its report noted that cultivation of soy and sugar cane for biofuels in Brazil is expected to require up to 128 million hectares of land by 2020, up from 28 million hectares now, with much of it likely to come from deforestation in the Amazon. "We face a deficit of democracy plagued by violent conflict and human rights abuses," said Ghanaian civil rights lawyer Kyeretwie Opoku, commenting on the reports. "We must address underlying inequalities by consulting and allowing forest peoples to make decisions the themselves regarding the actions of industry and conservation," he added.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair will unveil on Wednesday a raft of proposals on security, pensions and climate change as he struggles, in his final months in office, to salvage a legacy overshadowed by Iraq. In the last package of laws of his premiership, Blair wants to show his government, now in its tenth year, has fresh ideas. But he faces charges from the opposition that he is a lame duck leader of a government that has run out of steam and is hamstrung by rebellious lawmakers. Queen Elizabeth will present Blair's final legislative slate to parliament in a pomp-filled ceremony at 1130 GMT. "We will put forward an ambitious legislative programme designed to tackle the most serious long-term challenges we face," Blair wrote on his Downing Street office's website. Tackling global warming and reforming pensions will be part of that agenda. On crime and security, new measures will address "how we continue rebalancing the criminal justice system in favour of the law-abiding majority," he added. Blair, however, could face opposition from lawmakers in his ruling Labour Party to some of his anti-terrorism measures and critics say he will go out with a whimper rather than a bang. Labour's once massive majority was slashed in a 2005 election, partly due to voter anger over the Iraq war, and his announcement that he would not seek a fourth term has emboldened party rebels to oppose him in parliament. Blair is expected to step down by mid-2007. He was forced in September to say he would go within a year to quell a revolt among Labour lawmakers who increasingly see as a liability the man who was their best electoral asset. This legislative agenda is largely a joint effort between Blair and Finance Minister Gordon Brown, tipped to succeed him. The Conservatives, who analysts say have a shot at winning the next election, expected in 2009, say the government is rehashing old ideas and is obsessed with its leadership. Blair's pension reforms will focus on restoring the link between rises in the basic state pension and earnings by 2012 and boosting women's retirement income. On security, he will seek greater powers to seize terrorists' assets and to tighten control orders under which suspected terrorists are kept under virtual house arrest. He may also reintroduce plans to extend the maximum 28-day limit under which terrorism suspects can he held without trial. The government is also expected to propose new ways to tackle knife crime and anti-social behaviour. Despite global warming being high on Blair's agenda, environmentalists expect the climate change bill to contain little of substance and criticise the government for failing to back annual targets on carbon emissions.

He took office promising cautious reforms but almost halfway through his term, critics say Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's real agenda may be different -- to keep the Kremlin seat warm for a return by Vladimir Putin. Nearly two years after his election, analysts say there is scant evidence that Medvedev is implementing promises to open Russia's controlled political system, modernise its oil-fuelled economy, fight corruption and establish the rule of law. Local elections in October were dubbed Russia's dirtiest ever by opposition leaders. NGOs and business chiefs say corruption is as bad or worse. Kremlin-friendly regional bosses accused of unethical behaviour have been re-appointed. And abuses of police and court power are reported each day. "Medvedev has shown he doesn't want to reform," said Vladimir Ryzhkov, who served as the last independent deputy in the State Duma (Russian parliament) until changes to election law prevented him running again in 2007. "He keeps doing a few very small cosmetic things to pretend to reform but in fact there are no real reforms." Asked to list Medvedev's achievements since his March 2008 election, the Kremlin said it was preparing detailed information for the press to mark his two years in office in May this year but did not have such information available now. Medvedev's spokeswoman Natalya Timakova said the president would focus this year on more reforms to the political system, improving the investment climate, pacifying the troubled North Caucasus and agreeing a nuclear arms pact with Washington. State-run media has tried to boost the president's image -- an analysis by the Interfax news agency said references to Medvedev in Russian media last year outweighed those to Putin. But pollsters say rising prosperity and greater stability during Putin's 2000-2008 presidency has made him much more popular among ordinary people than Medvedev. This popularity continues now in Putin's role as prime minister. Russia's elite also respects Putin more. A typical example -- Chechen president Ramzan Kadyrov referred to Putin several times in a Reuters interview last month, terming him a "very strong leader of world stature". He did not mention Medvedev. Hopes among Western powers that Medvedev would prove a more pliable and accommodating partner than Putin quickly evaporated, as Medvedev led Russia into a brief war with Georgia in 2008. Last year, Moscow raised hopes it would finally enter the World Trade Organisation, ink a nuclear arms reduction pact with the United States and agree to tough sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programme -- only to disappoint on all three so far. In each case, officials say privately, Putin had the final say, not his formal superior Medvedev. This shows where power lies in Russia's ruling "tandem". Officials at the Kremlin and at the White House (Putin's prime ministerial offices) insist publicly that the "tandem" is a close and productive working relationship of two equals who respect each other's constitutional areas of competence. An example: Medvedev convened a meeting last week to discuss reforms to Russia's political system, so dominated by the Kremlin's United Russia bloc that critics compare it to the Soviet-era Communist Party. But Putin had the last word: "We should continually think about perfecting Russia's political system. But we must act...in this area with extreme caution," he said. "The political system must not wobble like runny jelly with every touch". "Putin's message was clear," said one senior diplomat. "There will be no serious political reform in Russia". Investors are also clear about where power lies. Asked how Russian markets would react to a Medvedev departure, one chief strategist replied at a Moscow bank replied: "Not a blip." When asked the same question about Putin, the answer was "mayhem". Nonetheless, the frequent differences in public tone between Putin and Medvedev have led some Russia-watchers to speculate about arguments between them, or even to suggest a power struggle might be taking place inside the elite. Promoters of Medvedev are especially keen on spreading that message to burnish his reformist credentials, diplomats say. In this version of events, Medvedev's lack of reform achievements is explained because he is moving cautiously so as not to upset Putin. Boosters of the president insist that at some unspecified future time Medvedev will move more boldly. But many close to the circles of power dismiss such talk. Opposition journalist Yulia Latynina has argued that it is impossible to have a struggle between a man who holds all the power (Putin) and a man who has none (Medvedev). Sceptics also argue that Medvedev, a consummate insider who has worked closely with Putin for 19 years, is highly unlikely to have a reform agenda which he has kept secret for so long from his boss -- a very well-informed former KGB spy. Many informed commentators believe that barring an upset such as a major financial crisis, Putin is likely to return in 2012 to the presidency, taking advantage of a constitutional reform extending the next Kremlin chief's term to six years _ the most significant political reform Medvedev has enacted. Re-election could take Putin, now 57, through to 2024 before he would be obliged by the constitution to leave office. Putin is more popular and more trusted than Medvedev, said Olga Kryshtanovskaya, an expert on the Russian elite and member of United Russia. "I'm just back from a trip to the provinces and everyone believes Putin will come back in 2012, that's the popular view. I share this view...Putin has more resources and more support".

Two scholars − one skilled in historical documents and another in interpreting tree rings to deliver weather reports through history − say that cold and heavy snowfalls may have blighted the pastureland of the Great Hungarian Plain in 1242. This would have produced marshy conditions that would have made it difficult or impossible for 130,000 horsemen to campaign or even survive so far from home. Genghis Khan’s vast but fleeting empire began in 1206, when the leader united the Mongol tribes, and by 1279 one hitherto impoverished group of nomads had swept across China, Russia, central Asia and Iran. Genghis died in 1227, but by 1242 an army of 130,000 Mongol cavalry had entered Hungary. On the march In 2014, a team of US scientists looked at tree ring and other data and found that the explosion of Mongol power from a harsh, dry homeland coincided with a mild climate spell that must have produced good pasture that was ideal for nomads on the march. So conditions made military adventure possible, they hypothesised. Now Ulf Büntgen, a dendrochronologist at the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, and Nicola Di Cosmo, a historian at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton in the US, think that another change in the weather may have saved Europe from the Mongols. They suggest in the Scientific Reports journal that local climate change may have been behind the sudden and unexplained decision of the Mongol army to withdraw to Russia. Their study is just the latest in a long list of papers that link social turmoil and collapse of imperial power with changes in climate. Dr Büntgen himself was one of a team that recently linked the turmoil of Europe’s so-called Dark Ages with a Little Ice Age between 556 and 660 AD. Photo reuters Such arguments are necessarily tentative: history is complex and records unreliable. But the tree ring chronologies from the period tell a story of cold, wet conditions in early 1242, when the seemingly-invincible Mongols crossed the Danube into western Hungary. Photo reuters But after two months they withdrew, through Serbia and Bulgaria. And although historians have been conjecturing reasons for the retreat for the last 700 years, the Mongol generals left no record or explanation of the decision to leave Hungary alone. So climate scientists took up the challenge. “Marshy terrain across the Hungarian plain most likely reduced pastureland and decreased mobility, as well as the military effectiveness of the Mongol cavalry, while despoliation and depopulation ostensibly contributed to widespread famine,” the researchers write. “These circumstances arguably contributed to the determination of the Mongols to abandon Hungary and return to Russia.” Initial victories Geography certainly played a part in the Mongol advance. A great stretch of open grassland or steppe links the Mongolian homeland with the Hungarian plain, and the invaders entered Europe through the Carpathians to win convincing initial victories. Hungary’s King Bela IV fled to Austria and the Mongol cavalry pursued him to the Dalmatian coast, and seemed to prepare for a long campaign. And then, abruptly, the Mongols departed. Some believe it may have been because of the death of the Great Khan’s successor in 1241; others believe that the Mongols were really pursuing another set of nomads, the Cumans. But medieval armies provided for themselves only by forage and pillage, and there is also evidence that, given the climate conditions, the grasslands of Hungary could not have provided for so vast an army. This is not the kind of debate that could ever be satisfactorily concluded, but authors of the Scientific Reports study are content that climate aspects may have played a part and contributed to withdrawal. “Our ‘environmental hypothesis’ demonstrates the importance of minor climatic fluctuations on major historical events,” they write.

Climate change has likely intensified the monsoon rains that have triggered record floods in Australia's Queensland state, scientists said on Wednesday, with several months of heavy rain and storms still to come. But while scientists say a warmer world is predicted to lead to more intense droughts and floods, it wasn't yet possible to say if climate change would trigger stronger La Nina and El Nino weather patterns that can cause weather chaos across the globe. "I think people will end up concluding that at least some of the intensity of the monsoon in Queensland can be attributed to climate change," said Matthew England of the Climate Change Research Center at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. "The waters off Australia are the warmest ever measured and those waters provide moisture to the atmosphere for the Queensland and northern Australia monsoon," he told Reuters. The Queensland floods have killed 16 people since the downpour started last month, inundating towns, crippling coal mining and are now swamping the state's main city of Brisbane. The rains have been blamed on one of the strongest La Nina patterns ever recorded. La Nina is a cooling of ocean temperatures in the east and central Pacific, which usually leads to more rain over much of Australia, Indonesia and other parts of Southeast Asia. This is because the phenomena leads to stronger easterly winds in the tropics that pile up warm water in the western Pacific and around Australia. Indonesia said on Wednesday it expected prolonged rains until June. WEATHER SWITCH The Pacific has historically switched between La Nina phases and El Ninos, which have the opposite impact by triggering droughts in Australia and Southeast Asia. "We've always had El Ninos and we've had natural variability but the background which is now operating is different," said David Jones, head of climate monitoring and prediction at the Australia Bureau of Meteorology in Melbourne. "The first thing we can say with La Nina and El Nino is it is now happening in a hotter world," he told Reuters, adding that meant more evaporation from land and oceans, more moisture in the atmosphere and stronger weather patterns. "So the El Nino droughts would be expected to be exacerbated and also La Nina floods because rainfall would be exacerbated," he said, though adding it would be some years before any climate change impact on both phenomena might become clear. He said the current La Nina was different because of the warmest ocean temperatures on record around Australia and record humidity in eastern Australia over the past 12 months. Prominent U.S. climate scientist Kevin Trenberth said the floods and the intense La Nina were a combination of factors. He pointed to high ocean temperatures in the Indian Ocean near Indonesia early last year as well as the rapid onset of La Nina after the last El Nino ended in May. "The rapid onset of La Nina meant the Asian monsoon was enhanced and the over 1 degree Celsius anomalies in sea surface temperatures led to the flooding in India and China in July and Pakistan in August," he told Reuters in an email. He said a portion, about 0.5C, of the ocean temperatures around northern Australia, which are more than 1.5C above pre-1970 levels, could be attributed to global warming. "The extra water vapor fuels the monsoon and thus alters the winds and the monsoon itself and so this likely increases the rainfall further," said Trenberth, head of the Climate Analysis Section at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado. "So it is easy to argue that 1 degree Celsius sea surface temperature anomalies gives 10 to 15 percent increase in rainfall," he added. Some scientists said it was still too soon to draw a definite climate change link to the floods. "It's a natural phenomena. We have no strong reason at the moment for saying this La Nina is any stronger than it would be even without humans," said Neville Nicholls of Monash University in Melbourne and president of the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society. But he said global atmospheric warming of about 0.75C over the past half century had to be having some impact. "It has to be affecting the climate, regionally and globally. It has to be affecting things like La Nina. But can you find a credible argument which says it's made it worse? I can't at the moment."

China has promised to bring greenhouse gas emissions to a peak by "around 2030" as part of its commitments to a global pact to combat global warming, signed in Paris last year. Evidence that the country has peaked much earlier could lead to concerns that its existing targets are too easy. The study, by the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and the ESRC Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy at the London School of Economics, said that the 2030 peak was a very conservative estimate. "It is quite possible that emissions will fall modestly from now on, implying that 2014 was the peak," said the report, noting that recent data already showed that China's emissions fell in 2015. "If emissions do grow above 2014 levels ... that growth trajectory is likely to be relatively flat, and a peak would still be highly likely by 2025," the authors said. While total energy consumption rose 0.9 percent to 4.3 billion tonnes of standard coal in 2015, coal consumption fell 2.2 percent year on a year earlier, according to Reuters calculations based on official data. Chinese carbon experts said any fall in emissions in 2015 would be mainly due to a slowdown in China's economy, and it was unlikely that emissions had peaked so early. "I would like to believe that the peak will be around 2030, and if stricter policies for carbon reduction and some reforms in the way local leaders are evaluated on GDP growth, the peak will come in 2025," said Xi Fengming, a carbon researcher with the China Academy of Sciences. "But I do not think China has reached peak emissions in 2014," he said. The government said on Saturday that it would cap total energy consumption at 5 billion tonnes of standard coal by 2020, amounting to an increase of 16.3 percent from 2015. It also said that it would cut carbon intensity - or the amount of CO2 emissions per unit of economic growth - by 18 percent over the 2016-2020 period. The 2030 peak pledge was made in a joint declaration with the United States in late 2014. China also agreed it would make its best efforts to peak earlier. One of the main bones of contention during the Paris climate talks was a regular five-year "stocktaking" process that would compel countries to adjust their targets in light of new economic or technological circumstances, with China arguing that any such adjustments must be voluntary. US climate change envoy, Todd Stern, said in Beijing last week that China could come under pressure to draw up tougher targets if it became clear that the existing goals were too easy. "It will be up to the Chinese government whether they increase their target but there will obviously be a lot of international opinion looking forward to additional measures - whether it is China or anyone else," he told reporters.

Dhaka, Sep 9 (bdnews24.com)—Irrigation-rich Netherlands has expressed an interest in helping Bangladesh to modernise its irrigation system. Foreign adviser Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury had separate meetings on Monday with the Dutch foreign minister and development cooperation minister at Amsterdam, the foreign affairs ministry said Tuesday. At the meeting with development cooperation minister Bert Koenders, foreign adviser Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury highlighted the importance of channelling Dutch assistance through the government which now mainly routed through NGOs and multilateral agencies, a statement of the foreign ministry said. They agreed on modern irrigation systems, livestock and dairy, food processing, and agro-business development as new avenues of cooperation between the two countries. Meanwhile, the foreign adviser also met with his Dutch counterpart Maxime Verhagen. Bangladesh expressed its view of the Netherlands as a dependable development partner at the latter meeting, the foreign ministry said. Iftekhar urged the Dutch foreign minister to extend its imports from Bangladesh beyond the ready-made garments sector, to include other areas of manufacturing such as like small and medium size ships. They also agreed to work together on common grounds like climate change issues. Verhagen assured his support to the electoral process and learnt about the preparations for the Jatiya Sangsad polls from the adviser. While briefing the Dutch minister about the current government's reform programs, Iftekhar emphasised on the need for a European Union Observer Mission during the upcoming polls. Bangladesh Ambassador to the Netherlands Mizanur Rahman, director general of the foreign ministry M Zulfiqur Rahman and the Dutch envoy to Bangladesh Bea Ten Touscher were also present at the meetings.

Well, kind of. They were living in an “aspiring utopia,” as Kapur describes it in his new book, “Better to Have Gone,” which Scribner publishes Tuesday. The community was called Auroville, located on the eastern edge of India’s southern tip, and it had been founded in the late ’60s by Mirra Alfassa, an elderly Frenchwoman known to everyone there as the Mother. Inspired by the philosophy and yoga of a sage named Sri Aurobindo, the Mother intended for Auroville to be a place where people could live freely and “money would no longer be the sovereign lord” — the same kind of philosophy undergirding the peace-and-love hippie movements that were blossoming around the world in that era. People who were unmoored were drawn to the community’s ideals of anti-consumerism, equality and unity, and they were undeterred by the lack of clean water and other modern comforts. They were powered by hope and determination. The community began to come apart after the Mother died in 1973, but it was the 1986 deaths of two of its first inhabitants — Diane Maes, a woman from a small town in Belgium, and John Walker, a wealthy Manhattanite — that are central, along with Auroville’s unusual history, to Kapur’s book. Maes and Walker were also Graft’s mother and stepfather (her biological father left Auroville early in her life to earn a living), leaving her alone when she was just 14. Although Kapur, 46, wrote “Better to Have Gone,” the research was a collaboration with his wife. They discussed interviews in advance and went through them together afterward, excavating stories Graft was too young to remember and piecing together the mystery of her mother and stepfather. “The process has been very healing,” said Graft, 49. “There are a lot of dark corners in my story,” she added, “and this process has shone a light into those corners.” The book comes almost a decade after Kapur’s first, “India Becoming,” which took a broad look at the pain and promise of the subcontinent’s modernization. In “Better to Have Gone,” he turns his gaze inward, reexamining everything he and his wife thought they knew about the place where Graft was born and Kapur lived since before he was a year old. Although the book is nonfiction, it has the pace and feel of a novel, said William Dalrymple, author of several books on India, most recently “The Anarchy,” a 2019 history of the East India Company. “You forget at times that you’re dealing with real characters, and the story itself is so crazy,” he said. “It reminded me in some ways of ‘The Beach’ — that sense of hopefulness — and a bit of ‘Lord of the Flies.’” One of the Mother’s and Sri Aurobindo’s beliefs was that human beings could evolve to have a heightened consciousness, enabling them to transcend physical constraints. There were whispers that the Mother, who had been working on her yoga for years, might achieve immortality. That kind of thinking persisted after her death, with other members of the community, including Walker and Maes, developing an aversion to Western medicine in favor of yoga, Ayurvedic medicine and focus. Walker died of an illness that was never diagnosed, but those around him suspect it was a kidney infection or intestinal worms, both easily curable. Maes died from poison that she ingested, refusing treatment. “One of the core questions of the book is: At what point does faith tip over the edge into darkness?” Kapur said. “Utopia and dystopia are very linked.” After Graft’s mother and stepfather died, Walker’s sister brought her to New York, where she experienced the perks of modern civilization for the first time: running hot water, washing machines, refrigerators and cars. She also faced culture shock, since the lack of a formal, Western education in Auroville left her ill-prepared for New York’s school system. She remembers being mystified by a test question involving a touch-tone phone. “It was a question that would be very obvious to many people, but I hadn’t grown up with a telephone,” Graft said. She adapted, eventually attending the University of Southern California and then graduate school at Columbia University. Kapur’s parents — his Indian father attended classes at Sri Aurobindo’s ashram as a child and his American mother grew up on a farm in Minnesota — held more moderate beliefs. At one point in Auroville’s history, the community went through its own version of an anti-establishment revolution in which zealousness was prized, books were burned and schools were closed. So Kapur’s parents moved to nearby Pondicherry to ensure that his education was never disrupted, he said, and at 16, he transferred to boarding school in the United States, then went to Harvard. All this time, Kapur and Graft remained friends. It would be somewhat awkward for them to date other people in America who could never understand their background — “What could we talk about? Our favorite sports team?” Kapur said — and it is their overlapping journeys that eventually brought them together. “How many people are there in the world who’ve lived in a place like Auroville? And then who ended up in some version of the East Coast establishment?” Kapur said. But Kapur and Graft’s story — and by extension the story of Auroville — isn’t one of escape, of unshackling themselves from the clutches of a toxic cult for the safety of the real world. “Growing up, a lot of people asked us, ‘Do you come from a cult?’” Kapur said, but he said that is a misinterpretation. Its founder died early on in the town’s history, and there isn’t a single leader ruling over the community, prescribing how people should live and what they can or can’t do. “There are no rules, to a fault, almost,” he said. Kapur and Graft moved back to Auroville in 2004, partly from homesickness but also to understand what exactly happened to Graft’s parents. Matrimandir temple in Auroville, a Utopian community near Puducherry, India, Jan. 5, 2018. (Saumya Khandelwal/The New York Times) Now they’ve planted roots there, raising their two sons amid the lush forest that has sprung up where there was once only parched earth. Early Aurovillians, out of necessity, learned to grow and create new life on eroded, unfertile soil, laying the groundwork to turn the town into one on a shrinking list of places in India today where the air isn’t choked with smog. Matrimandir temple in Auroville, a Utopian community near Puducherry, India, Jan. 5, 2018. (Saumya Khandelwal/The New York Times) “Not to sound cheesy, but I do feel like I grew up with a forest,” Graft said. “I recognize many of the trees.” She now works as a consultant on climate change policies in India and around the world. Auroville continues to attract people searching for a simpler life, fleeing the grind of capitalism or, for women, conservative or traditional cultures with rigid gender roles. The Mother’s idealistic dream of creating a cashless society bumped into reality and has since evolved into a kind of “hybrid economy,” Kapur said. Auroville’s roughly 2,800 residents receive a monthly food stipend. No one can own private property, although the houses now have running water and are built from brick and cement, not mud as they once were. Taxes are voluntary for those who can afford to pay. And, unlike when Graft and Kapur were growing up, there are now high-quality schools providing free education. “We have a small, beaten-down car, and my kids are ashamed if we drop them off at school, not because our car is beaten down, but because we have, like, one of the only cars there,” Kapur said. “So the values of the community are still relatively anti-materialistic and anti-consumerist,” he added. “It’s noble and beautiful.” © 2021 The New York Times Company

Despite climate change warnings issued by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) since 1990, global emissions have continued to rise in the last decade, reaching their highest point in history. The result: global emissions are on track to blow past the 1.5 degrees C warming limit envisioned in the 2015 Paris Agreement and reach some 3.2 degrees C by century's end. "We left COP26 in Glasgow with a naive optimism, based on new promises and commitments," UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said with the report's release. "But current climate pledges would (still) mean a 14 percent increase in emissions. And most major emitters are not taking the steps needed to fulfill even these inadequate promises." At this point, only severe emissions cuts in this decade across all sectors, from agriculture and transport to energy and buildings, can turn things around, the report says. Even then, governments would also need to bolster efforts to plant more trees and develop technologies that could remove some of the carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere after more than a century of industrial activity. "It's now or never," IPCC report co-chair Jim Skea said in a statement with the report – the last in a three-part series by the IPCC, with the next review cycle not expected for at least another five years. DRAMA AND DELAY While other recent IPCC reports addressed the latest findings in climate change science as well as ways for the world to adapt to a warmer world, Monday’s tackled ways of curbing emissions – making it one of the more contentious reports of the pack for governments. Some scientists described the process as "excruciating," and the IPCC was forced to delay the report's public release by six hours on Monday. Final approval of the report's key summary for policymakers - which requires sign-off from all countries - followed a marathon weekend overtime session as government officials quibbled over the wording. "Different countries have different interests," IPCC co-author and climate scientist Jan Minx. "Everyone wants to make sure that their concerns are addressed ... but scientists have the last word."

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said the growth outlook and business climate have weakened but warned of upward risks to inflation, a day before it is widely expected to keep interest rates on hold. The RBI also gave little indication that it might cut the cash reserve ratio (CRR), the share of deposits banks must maintain with the central bank, potentially disappointing growing market hopes it would do so. The RBI left interest rates unchanged in December after raising them 13 times between March 2010 and October 2011. "The critical factors in rate actions ahead will be core inflation and exchange rate pass-through," the RBI said on Monday in its quarterly macroeconomic and monetary review. Core inflation, which measures price changes in non-food manufactured products, has been at or above 7 percent for 11 straight months, compared to its long-term trend of about 4 percent, the RBI said. Adding to inflationary pressures, the rupee fell 16 percent against the dollar in 2011, boosting the cost of critical imports such as oil. Annual headline inflation, as measured by the wholesale price index, slowed to a two-year low of 7.47 percent in December, thanks to a sharp decline in food inflation. However, manufactured product inflation edged up from the previous month. "Upside risks to inflation persist from insufficient supply responses, exchange rate pass-through, suppressed inflation and an expansionary fiscal stance," the RBI said, adding that inflation was likely to ease to its target of 7 percent by the end of the fiscal year in March. Investment in industrial capacity that would ease supply bottlenecks in Asia's third-largest economy has been slowed by sluggish decision-making in New Delhi, while programmes that increase the spending power of rural Indians have driven up demand for items such as protein-rich foods. CRR CUT HOPES DASHED? Indian government bond yields and overnight indexed swap rates eased on Monday, before the RBI's report was released, on growing expectations that the central bank may lower the CRR. Of 20 economists polled by Reuters last week, 7 expected a CRR cut on Tuesday. None of 22 expected a cut in interest rates. The 10-year benchmark bond yield closed 1 basis point lower at 8.17 percent, the one-year swap rate settled 8 bps lower at 7.93 percent and the five-year shed 3 bps to 7.23 percent. However, some market watchers said the central bank's Monday review appeared to dampen the prospect of a CRR cut on Tuesday. While the RBI acknowledged significant liquidity tightening since November, it also said "liquidity stress was handled" through open market operations (OMOs), or buybacks of bonds by the central bank. "This probably provides a sense that the RBI could be happy to continue to conduct OMOs to infuse rupee liquidity at the margin, rather than reducing the CRR immediately, given the risks that are there to the inflation trajectory," said Indranil Pan, chief economist at Kotak Mahindra Bank. A senior trader at a foreign bank who declined to be identified said Monday's statement appeared to rule out a cut in the CRR, which he said was bearish for bonds on Tuesday. Others said a CRR cut on Tuesday was still a possibility. The central bank said that while open market operations have been its weapon of choice for addressing tight market liquidity, other measures could be considered if needed. "Enabling smooth functioning of other markets by ensuring that the liquidity deficit remains within acceptable limits is also a policy priority," it said. The RBI said it expected growth to improve in the fiscal year that starts in April, but that weak investment and external demand may keep the recovery slow. "The growth outlook has weakened as a result of adverse global and domestic factors," it said.

In a defeat for the Bush administration, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday that a US government agency has the power to regulate greenhouse gas emissions that spur global warming. By a 5-4 vote, the nation's highest court said the US Environmental Protection Agency "has offered no reasoned explanation" for its refusal to regulate carbon dioxide and other emissions from new cars and trucks that contribute to climate change. The ruling in one of the most important environmental cases to reach the Supreme Court marked the first high court decision in a case involving global warming. President George W Bush has opposed mandatory controls on greenhouse gases as harmful to the US economy, and the administration has called for voluntary programs instead of regulation. The states and environmental groups that brought the lawsuit hailed the ruling. "As a result of today's landmark ruling, EPA can no longer hide behind the fiction that it lacks any regulatory authority to address the problem of global warming," Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley said. "Today the nation's highest court has set the White House straight. Carbon dioxide is an air pollutant, and the Clean Air Act gives EPA the power to start cutting the pollution from new vehicles that is wreaking havoc with our climate," said David Doniger of the Natural Resources Defense Council. Greenhouse gases occur naturally and also are emitted by cars, trucks and factories into the atmosphere. They can trap heat close to Earth's surface like the glass walls of a greenhouse. Such emissions have risen steeply in the past century and many scientists see a connection between the rise, an increase in global average temperatures and a related increase in extreme weather, wildfires, melting glaciers and other damage to the environment. Democrats in Congress predicted the ruling could add pressure on lawmakers to push forward with first-ever caps on carbon dioxide emissions. The United States is the world's biggest emitter of such gases. Writing for the court majority, Justice John Paul Stevens, rejected the administration's argument that it lacked the power under the federal clean air law to regulate such emissions. He said nothing suggested that Congress in adopting the law meant to curtail the EPA's power to treat greenhouse gases as air pollutants. Stevens wrote that the EPA's decision was "arbitrary, capricious or otherwise not in accordance with law." In sending the case back for further proceedings, Stevens said the EPA can avoid regulation only if it determined that the gases do not contribute to climate change or if it provided a reasonable explanation. "If the scientific uncertainty is so profound that it precludes EPA from making a reasoned judgment as to whether greenhouse cases contribute to global warming, EPA must say so," he said. The EPA said the administration was committed to reducing greenhouse gases and it was "reviewing the court's decision to determine the appropriate course of action." The court's four most conservative members -- Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, both Bush appointees, and Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas -- dissented. They said the environmental groups and the states lacked the legal right to bring the lawsuit in the first place. "No matter how important the underlying policy issues at stake, this court has no business substituting its own desired outcome for the reasoned judgment of the responsible agency," Scalia wrote.

Predictions of incessant rainfall by the weather office meant that the army had to work on a war footing to rescue survivors trapped in inundated parts of Chennai, India's fourth most populous city. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has blamed climate change for the deluge, travelled to Chennai to get a first-hand view of a rescue effort that has so far been halting. "Chennai has become a small island. This is unprecedented," Home Minister Rajnath Singh told parliament. "Rapid rescue and relief is the need of the hour. We are working very hard to restore normality." People travel on a boat through a flooded road in Chennai. Reuters After auto manufacturers and IT outsourcing firms suspended operations on Wednesday, state-run Chennai Petroleum shut down its 210,000 barrels per day oil refinery due to the heavy flooding. People travel on a boat through a flooded road in Chennai. Reuters There was sporadic rainfall on Thursday, after a 24-hour cloudburst dumped as much as 345 mm (14 inches) of rain on the city earlier this week. "We live in a city expecting that we will have access to basic facilities. But today, we have no drinking water, no fresh food and no control over our lives," said Sudha Raman Murthy, a mother of two teenage daughters. Murthy said parts of her house were under water. She was using pots and pans to bail water out of her rooms. Cut off Floods cut off more than three million people from basic services and hampered rescue efforts by the army, which has so far evacuated 18,000 people from rooftops and outlying villages. City authorities were deploying bulldozers and bags of concrete to repair collapsed roads, while several bridges were under water as urban lakes in the low-lying coastal city of six million overflowed. Train services and flights to Chennai, capital of Tamil Nadu, remain cancelled and the navy has pressed fishing boats into service to evacuate people from the worst-hit suburbs to temples, schools and wedding halls. A senior central government official said more than 1,000 people had been critically injured and were rushed to government hospitals by paramilitary forces. "We want to do everything but the problem is beyond our control. The airport is flooded, train networks have collapsed and the weather is still not conducive," Home Ministry spokesman KS Dhatwalia said in New Delhi. Additional rainfall of 100-200 mm (4-8 inches) was predicted from Thursday through Sunday, meaning the situation could remain critical for several more days. The central government pledged $141 million in immediate relief and launched a survey to assess losses to life and property. Experts said haphazard construction work, faulty drainage and a build-up of garbage has contributed to the flooding. An aerial view shows the submerged airport in Chennai. Reuters "Chennai is stinking and it is shocking to see how it has collapsed in the last 48 hours," said Anant Raghav, 56, a professor at the University of Madras. An aerial view shows the submerged airport in Chennai. Reuters More than 5,000 houses were under water with many people still trapped on rooftops, while others crowded in relief camps. About 30 families have been sleeping rough under a flyover in central Chennai for the last week after their huts and small concrete houses were washed away. Cultural activist VR Devika, 61, said many people were offering free accommodation and home cooking via social media. "People are giving out food. Those with big vehicles are driving around rescuing people," she said by telephone.

He made the remark at a programme in Dhaka on Sunday in the backdrop of the recent murders of two foreigners in the country. Radical group Islamic State reportedly claimed responsibilities for the murders.The president was addressing the inaugural ceremony of the 44th national council of Bangladesh Scouts as the chief guest.He urged the scouts to inspire young people with patriotism and make them aware of the Bangladesh's decades-old tradition of communal harmony. “…there is no room for zealotry, fundamentalism, extremism and militancy in this country," he said. Hamid, the chief scout, appreciated the members of the organisation for their role in tackling natural disasters. He urged them to raise awareness among people about maintaining ecological balance in order to tackle impacts of climate change.He also called for building a social movement against drug addiction. The president bestowed awards Silver Tiger on nine scouts, Silver Hilsa on 17, President's Rover Scout on two and President's Scout on 122. Bangladesh Scouts President Abul Kalam Azad, who is Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister’s Office, chaired the programme. The organisation’s chief national commissioner Home Secretary Md Mozammel Haque Khan also spoke.

‘South of Somewhere’ by Robert V. Camuto Through three books, the first set in France, the second in Sicily and the latest, in southern Italy, Robert V. Camuto has explored the passions, personalities and convictions that compel idiosyncratic winemakers to push against institutional forces to achieve their visions. His new book, “South of Somewhere: Wine, Food and the Soul of Italy” (University of Nebraska Press, $25), is his best yet, a razor-sharp evocation of the people, places and points-of-view that captures both the fatalism so often encountered in southern Italy and the stubborn refusal of its inhabitants to knuckle under. As a journalist with family roots on the Sorrento Peninsula south of Naples, Camuto feels the allure of the region. Where others might, uncharitably, see solely a culture benighted by poverty, he is enchanted by its natural riches, the vitality of its people and its beautiful bureaucratic messiness that he sees as a saving grace. This relative lack of organisation slowed its march to modernity, Camuto suggests, saving the south from many of the mistakes that have plagued other winemaking areas, like planting international grapes at the expense of indigenous varieties or adopting nontraditional winemaking techniques. Not that the south has been immune, but it occurred to a lesser degree than in other regions. Camuto succeeds in capturing southern Italy at just the right moment, when a younger generation, better educated and more worldly than their parents, is taking over. They want to improve farming, make wine with more precision and sell it for profits around the world rather than pennies locally, and they want to do it without compromising cultural traditions. His underlying message is that wine is both cultural expression and self expression. With a culture as singular and personal as depicted by Camuto, it’s no accident the wines are just as beautiful and distinctive. One more point: Food and wine are entwined in southern Italy. None of Camuto’s visits to producers proceeded, apparently, without great meals reflecting the power of the local cuisines. In his CNN series “Searching for Italy,” Stanley Tucci touched the surface of how Italian cuisine reflects its people. In “South of Somewhere,” Camuto gets to the heart of the matter. ‘Foot Trodden’ by Simon J. Woolf and Ryan Opaz Few historic wine-producing countries have evolved as quickly and intriguingly over the past 30 years as Portugal. Likewise, few are as little known and as sparingly chronicled. “Foot Trodden: Portugal and the Wines That Time Forgot” (Interlink Publishing, $35) by Simon J. Woolf and Ryan Opaz is an excellent introduction to the obscure history of Portuguese winemaking and its vitality and dynamic potential. “Foot Trodden,” named for the traditional method of crushing grapes with the feet — still common among port-producers in the Douro Valley — is not a textbook that surveys Portuguese grapes and methods. Rather, it’s an impressionistic travel guide through the major wine regions. “Foot Trodden” introduces readers to a well-chosen group of growers and producers whose deftly rendered individual stories and distinctive wines shine a light on the insularity of Portuguese history, the opening of the country, the challenges that continue to confront growers and producers, and the potential future of its wines. Woolf, the author of “Amber Revolution,” an absorbing look at the orange wine genre, is a genial host with a knack for selecting the best and more representative stories. Opaz, his collaborator, took the many striking photos that underscore and amplify the writing. In one particularly fascinating chapter on the southeastern region of Alentejo, Woolf dwells on the tradition of home winemaking in clay talha, amphora like vessels that at one time could be found in almost any cellar or garage. The tradition began to die out in the mid-20th century as the government pushed the country to centralised wine production, but it was resuscitated in the 21st century thanks to a few die-hards who refused to give up the practice. Portugal’s peculiar wine history needed a book like this. As is increasingly the case with wine books, “Foot Trodden” was self-published with the help of Kickstarter supporters, of which I was a small contributor. This was a worthy project, beautifully done. ‘Champagne Charlie’ by Don and Petie Kladstrup For a wine salesman, Charles Heidsieck led a surprisingly tempestuous life, with dizzying highs and unexpected, harrowing lows. In “Champagne Charlie: The Frenchman Who Taught Americans to Love Champagne” (Potomac Books, $33), Don and Petie Kladstrup offer not only a fascinating portrait of the 19th-century founder of the Charles Heidsieck Champagne house but an evocative sketch of America and the wine business around the time of the Civil War. Heidsieck’s life seems almost improbable. He was born into a family (and a community) of Champagne producers and merchants, but unable to find his place in the family business he started his own. He promoted his Champagne energetically and, against much advice, set his eyes on the United States as the market on which his company could make its fortune. He achieved great success at first, selling Champagne through force of personality, a 19th-century model for today’s “brand ambassadors.” Through several arduous trips to the United States, he became something of a celebrity — Champagne Charlie — who was the toast of politicians and socialites and whose travels were chronicled by newspapers. “A glass of Charles” became a synonym for Champagne. Though dogged by fraudulent bottles and a dishonest American representative, Heidsieck hit bottom during the Civil War. Travelling through the South in an effort to recover payments owed to his company, Heidsieck was arrested in Union-occupied New Orleans as a spy, locked in a disease-ridden prison and, after he was freed, forced into bankruptcy. Compelled by honour to repay his debts in full, he restarted his company, achieving renewed success. His situation stayed grim, however, as the debt proved intractable until, startlingly, something of a miracle occurs. As compelling as Heidsieck’s story is, I was especially absorbed by the descriptions of 19th-century business, before automobiles and telephones, when bottles of Champagne travelled across the Atlantic in cushioned baskets and across the country by rail and coach. The writing is easygoing and inviting, and the Kladstrups do not shy away from the moral contradictions of Heidsieck, who strongly denounced slavery in the United States yet hoped for the South to win because it was good for business. You won’t learn much about Champagne in this book. But it’s engaging social history and excellent storytelling. ‘Inside Burgundy’ by Jasper Morris Many books have been written about Burgundy over the years, but none currently is as useful and comprehensive a reference as the new second edition of “Inside Burgundy” (Berry Bros. & Rudd Press, $90), by Jasper Morris. The book includes all one might expect in a guide: detailed characterisations of Burgundy’s appellations, leading vineyards and producers, all enhanced by clear, detailed maps, along with examinations of the region’s history, weather and geology, grapes, viticulture and production and a look at how its wine trade is organised. Morris also addresses issues of terroir and style, which are particularly appropriate to Burgundy. Even in the decade or so since the first edition was published, much in Burgundy has changed. Morris, a retired wine merchant who lives in the region, has extensively updated and expanded the book. Readers appalled by the skyrocketing price of Burgundy will be happy to see additional information on the Côte Chalonnaise and the Mâconnais, where they might still find affordable wines. Morris also addresses the fallout of climate change, the rise of aligoté (possibly a byproduct of climate change) and how the rising price of land in Burgundy affects the small family estates, which have formed much of the region’s image. At nearly 800 pages, this is a big book. What it does not contain are detailed tasting notes, a wise editorial decision that permits more important issues to be explored. While Morris briefly addresses the issue of premature oxidation, which has plagued white Burgundies off and on over the last 25 years, I wish he had dedicated a little more space to clarifying exactly where things now stand. Nonetheless, if you love Burgundy, this is an essential volume. ‘You Had Me at Pét-Nat’ by Rachel Signer Natural wine has spawned all sorts of fantasies among those peering in at that world. The unkind and deluded might sneer at hipster sommeliers saddling unwilling customers with their funky wines, made by unwashed hippies. More empathetic sorts might think of its denizens as wayward youth who must be permitted their mistakes before coming to their senses. Rachel Signer’s new book, “You Had Me at Pét-Nat: A Natural Wine-Soaked Memoir” (Hachette, $28) offers a view from inside the world, demonstrating that young people in natural wine can be much like young people anywhere, trying to find a way to make a living doing what they find meaningful while searching for love and companionship. As the story opens, Signer is a young, would-be writer in New York supporting herself by working in restaurants. After falling in love with pétillant naturel, an ancient style of sparkling wine revived by natural wine producers, she is drawn headlong into this alt-community, which seems to have its own networks of shops, wine bars, restaurants and wine fairs. She decides to focus her writing on natural wine, start a natural-wine periodical and, with a friend, open a wine bar in Paris, a natural wine mecca. Things take an abrupt turn when, despairing of her romantic relationships, she unexpectedly hits it off with a natural wine producer. Only one problem: He lives in Australia. What follows is an inviting coming-of-age story that, though it takes place in a world of indigenous yeast and native grapes, crown caps and biodynamic, back-to-the-earth farming, speaks to the universal yearning of anybody trying to find herself, overcome insecurities and settle on her place in the world. Signer is an engaging writer whose story will certainly make you thirsty for a bottle of natural wine and maybe even compel you to reexamine the twists and turns of your own journey. ‘On California’ Académie du Vin Library is kind of a cultural miner, prospecting for worthy-but-forgotten wine books to republish interspersed with occasional new works. Its latest book, “On California: From Napa to Nebbiolo ... Wine Tales From the Golden State” ($45), offers a little of both. Its short selections from nearly three dozen writers offer impressionistic, thought-provoking views of the state and its winemaking history. Most were written within the last decade but a few stretch back to the 1980s and ’70s, offering a wealth of perspectives on how California wine culture arrived at its current state. My favourite selections were historical rather than critical, including Kelli White’s look at some of the wine scientists who played crucial roles in guiding the growth of the industry in California, Elaine Chukan Brown on how the Gallos achieved dominance among American wine companies, and Steven Spurrier and Patricia Gastaud-Gallagher’s retrospective look at the Judgment of Paris, the famous 1976 wine tasting that they organised and which decisively thrust California into the global consciousness as a leading wine producer. Over the decades, California wine has been glorified and vilified, but its importance is indisputable. This book is unlikely to change minds, but it is illuminating. © 2021 The New York Times Company

But first, it is going to have to go on a scavenger hunt in the Australian outback. This weekend, bits of an asteroid will land in a barren region near Woomera, South Australia. These are being ferried to Earth by Hayabusa2, a robotic space probe launched by JAXA, Japan’s space agency, in 2014 to explore an asteroid named Ryugu, a dark, carbon-rich rock a bit more than half a mile wide. The success of the mission and the science it produces will raise Japan’s status as a central player in deep space exploration, together with NASA, the European Space Agency and Russia. JAXA currently has a spacecraft in orbit around Venus studying that planet’s hellish climate and is collaborating with the Europeans on a mission that is on its way to Mercury. In the coming years, Japan plans to bring back rocks from Phobos, a moon of Mars, and contribute to NASA’s Artemis program to send astronauts to Earth’s moon. But the immediate challenge will be searching in darkness for a 16-inch-wide capsule containing the asteroid samples somewhere amid hundreds of square miles in a region 280 miles north of Adelaide, the nearest large city. “It’s really in the middle of nowhere,” said Shogo Tachibana, the principal investigator in charge of the analysis of the Hayabusa2 samples. He is part of a team of more than 70 people from Japan who have arrived in Woomera for recovery of the capsule. The area, used by the Australian military for testing, provides a wide-open space that is ideal for the return of an interplanetary probe. The small return capsule separated from the main spacecraft about 12 hours before the scheduled landing, when it was about 125,000 miles from Earth. JAXA will broadcast live coverage of the capsule’s landing beginning at 11:30 am Eastern time Saturday (pre-dawn hours on Sunday in Australia). The capsule is expected to hit the ground a few minutes before noon. In an interview, Makoto Yoshikawa, the mission manager, said there is an uncertainty of about 10 kilometres (about 6 miles) in pinpointing where the capsule will reenter the atmosphere. At an altitude of 6 miles, the capsule will release a parachute, and where it will drift as it descends will add to the uncertainty. “The landing place depends on the wind on that day,” Yoshikawa said. The area that searchers might have to cover could stretch some 60 miles, he said. The trail of the fireball of superheated air created by the reentering capsule will help guide the recovery team, as will the capsule’s radio beacon. The task will become much more difficult if the beacon fails or if the parachute fails to deploy. There is a bit of a rush, too. The team hopes to recover the capsule, perform initial analysis and whisk it back to Japan within 100 hours. Even though the capsule is sealed, the worry is that Earth air will slowly leak in. “There is no perfect sealing,” Tachibana said. Once the capsule is found, a helicopter will take it to a laboratory that has been set up at the Australian air force base at Woomera. There an instrument will extract any gases within the capsule that may have been released by the asteroid rocks as they were shaken and broken during reentry. Yoshikawa said the scientists would also like to see if they can detect any solar wind particles of helium that slammed into the asteroid and became embedded in the rocks. The gases would also reassure the scientists that Hayabusa2 did indeed successfully collect samples from Ryugu. A minimum of 0.1 grams, or less than 1/280th of an ounce, is needed to declare success. The hope is the spacecraft brought back several grams. In Japan, the Hayabusa2 team will begin analysis of the Ryugu samples. In about a year, some of the samples will be shared with other scientists for additional study. To gather these samples, Hayabusa2 arrived at the asteroid in June 2018. It executed a series of investigations, each of escalating technical complexity. It dropped probes to the surface of Ryugu, blasted a hole in the asteroid to peer at what lies beneath and twice descended to the surface to grab small pieces of the asteroid, an operation that proved much more challenging than expected because of the many boulders on the surface. Small worlds like Ryugu used to be of little interest to planetary scientists who focused on studying planets, said Masaki Fujimoto, deputy director general of the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science, part of JAXA. “Minor bodies, who cares?” he said. “But if you are serious about the formation of planetary systems, small bodies actually matter.” Studying water trapped in minerals from Ryugu could give hints if the water in Earth’s oceans came from asteroids, and if carbon-based molecules could have seeded the building blocks for life. Part of the Ryugu samples will go to NASA, which is bringing back some rocks and soil from another asteroid with its OSIRIS-Rex mission. The OSIRIS-Rex space probe has been studying a smaller carbon-rich asteroid named Bennu, and it will start back to Earth next spring, dropping off its rock samples in September 2023. Ryugu and Bennu turned out to be surprisingly similar in some ways, both looking like spinning tops and with surfaces covered with boulders, but different in other ways. The rocks on Ryugu appear to contain much less water, for one. The significance of the similarities and differences will not become clear until after scientists study the rocks in more detail. “When the OSIRIS-Rex sample comes back, we will have lessons learned from the Hayabusa2 mission,” said Harold Connolly, a geology professor at Rowan University in New Jersey and the mission sample scientist for OSIRIS-Rex. “The similarities and differences are absolutely fascinating.” Connolly hopes to go to Japan next summer to take part in analysing the Ryugu samples. Hayabusa2 is not Japan’s first planetary mission. Indeed, its name points to the existence of Hayabusa, an earlier mission that brought back samples from another asteroid, Itokawa. But that mission, which launched in 2003 and returned in 2010, faced major technical problems. So did JAXA’s Akatsuki spacecraft, currently in orbit around Venus, which the Japanese agency managed to restore to a scientific mission after years of difficulty. A Japanese mission to Mars failed in 2003. By contrast, operations of Hayabusa2 have gone almost flawlessly, even though it retains the same general design as its predecessor. “Actually, there are no big issues,” Yoshikawa, the mission manager, said. “Of course, small ones.” He said the team studied in detail the failures on Hayabusa and made changes as needed, and also conducted numerous rehearsals to try to anticipate any contingencies it might encounter. The Japanese missions generally operate on smaller budgets than NASA’s and thus often carry fewer instruments. Hayabusa2’s cost is less than $300 million while OSIRIS-Rex’s price will run about $1 billion. Dropping off the Ryugu samples is not the end of the Hayabusa2 mission. After releasing the return capsule, the main spacecraft shifted course to avoid a collision with Earth, missing by 125 miles. It will now travel to another asteroid, a tiny one designated 1998 KY26 that is only 100 feet in diameter but spinning rapidly, completing one rotation in less than 11 minutes. Hayabusa2 will use two flybys of Earth to fling itself toward KY26, finally arriving in 2031. It will conduct some astronomical experiments during its extended deep space journey, and the spacecraft still carries one last projectile that it may use to test that space rock’s surface. © 2020 The New York Times Company

US policy on global warming seems headed for a tipping point, with politicians, business leaders and economists joining environmentalists to call for new laws to limit greenhouse gases that spur climate change. So far, the Bush administration has rejected these calls, but has been at pains to stress its commitment to dealing with global warming. President George W. Bush's fleeting mention of the problem in his State of the Union address last month was seen as significant, even as he stressed alternative fuels and new technologies -- not legal limits on emissions -- as solutions. On Capitol Hill, there have been almost daily hearings on the consequences of and responses to human-induced climate warming, including an extraordinary Senate meeting where dozens of lawmakers themselves testified on the subject. Sens John McCain and Joe Lieberman, an Arizona Republican and a Connecticut independent, have introduced legislation that would require caps on carbon emissions. Lieberman predicted that a US measure requiring cuts in greenhouse gas emissions would be law by late 2008 or early 2009. They were among other legislators, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat with longstanding environmental credentials, who addressed a World Bank-sponsored global forum on climate change last week. Their talk of mandatory US emissions limits got a warm response from participants from the Group of Eight industrialised nations, as well as developing countries China, India, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa. The forum's final statement, non-binding but ringing, stated: "Climate change is a global issue and there is an obligation on us all to take action, in line with our capabilities and historic responsibilities." The statement said that establishing a market value for greenhouse gas emissions was "the most efficient and powerful way to stimulate investment" in new technologies. That is in line with an extraordinary call by an unexpected coalition of corporate leaders and environmental groups for federal legislation to cap carbon. The group, known as the US Climate Action Partnership, made it plain at a Jan 22 Washington news conference that this would offer opportunities for business, and that a national law was preferable to a patchwork of state and local regulations. The Bush administration has rejected mandatory caps on emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases that contribute to a documented rise in world temperatures -- which in turn are linked to more severe storms, worse droughts, rising seas and other ills. The White House has recently been on the defensive, especially since the Feb 2 release of a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which called global warming 'unequivocal' and said with 90 percent probability that human activities help cause it. White House spokesman Tony Snow said on Feb 7 that the United States had done a better job of cutting carbon emissions than had the European Union; he was referring to figures from 2000 to 2004, a narrow timespan that some analysts have said gives a misleading picture of US progress. James Connaughton, head of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, defended Snow in a telephone interview. "Tony was responding to a lot of assertions ... that the United States is doing nothing to address its emissions," Connaughton said. "When all is said and done, we're all making about the same rate of progress. So this is the most important point: There's a popular mythology that somehow Europe is doing more than the United States is. That's not true." He said the 2000-2004 period covered President George W Bush's time in office. Bush came to the White House in 2001; Energy Department figures show that between 2001 and 2004 the European Union outstripped the United States in curbing carbon emissions. The 2004 figures are the most recent available.

Six months after the US invasion, Esam Pasha, a 30-year-old Iraqi artist and writer, proudly painted a mural called "Resilience" over a giant portrait of Saddam Hussein on the wall of a government building. Now he lives in the United States. Pasha is among hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who have been driven abroad since the war, many of them doctors, businessmen, academics and other professionals whose skills Iraq can ill-afford to lose. Pasha talks wistfully about sipping tea and chatting all day at a gallery in Baghdad: "I can still hear the sounds and the birds and almost smell the tea." His mural was a colourful celebration of Baghdad life and what he called "the ever-shining sun of Iraq". "I didn't use a single drop of black paint in it. I felt like Baghdad had enough of black burnt in its memory," Pasha said in a telephone interview from Connecticut. The mural is on a wall of the Ministry of Labour, which like all government offices in Baghdad is now surrounded by blast walls and guards, off limits to the general public. "Hopefully someday it will be safe enough to have public artworks in Baghdad that people walk by safely and enjoy," he said. "That was what I had in mind, that if other artists do as I did, Baghdad would be beautiful and clean as it once was. But if there's no security, nothing can be done." Abu Mina, a ceramic artist and university professor, still goes to the gallery Pasha remembers so fondly, but he says nobody is buying art anymore and he too is considering leaving. He hasn't been paid for a month by the university and most of his students don't come to class because it's too dangerous. "Maybe only three students will graduate this year. The other 27 never showed up," he said. "I wouldn't even recognise their faces." The Higher Education Ministry says at least 185 university teachers have been killed since April 2003, another 52 kidnapped and 41 wounded. A double bombing at a Baghdad university this month killed at least 70 people, mostly students. Abu Mina's son is studying medicine but classes are only held about once every two weeks, and many professors have moved to the safety of Damascus to teach at a private university. Finding a dentist or a specialist surgeon or consultant can take weeks and often proves impossible, driving those who can afford it to seek medical treatment abroad. Hospital emergency rooms faced with a flood of casualties from bombings and shootings are often short-staffed and overwhelmed. A United Nations report this month said there was a worrying increase in attacks on professionals such as teachers, doctors, artists, lawyers, ex-military officers and journalists. "These attacks are typically perpetrated by extremists practicising conformist ideology and by militant/terror groups intent on spreading fear and intimidation," the report said, adding that a growing climate of Islamic extremism was also linked to attacks on academics. Asam Rifaat, 38, a criminal lawyer living in the upscale Mansour district of Baghdad, said he has decided to take his wife and two children out of Iraq. "I can't live in Baghdad any more. It's turned into a city for dead people and I'm not ready to have my children grow up as orphans," he said. "I can't work for justice in a country run by militias which act above the law," he said, referring to armed groups blamed for operating death squads responsible for hundreds of killings every week, many thought to work in collusion with the police. "I mean it, we are living according to the rules of the jungle," Rifaat said. "Every time I leave my home, I take a long look at (my children) Nora and Mahmoud because I always have the feeling that I'm not coming back, I'll be killed or abducted." His wife, a 35-year-old teacher, has quit her job to stay home with the children. "Every time Asam leaves for work I keep praying for his safety. And when I see urgent news on television about bombs, I start crying until he comes home." Salim al-Taie, a former army officer, 45, lives with his wife and three children aged five to 12 in Amriya in western Baghdad. "In the last four years many things have changed in Baghdad and definitely for the worse. No one respects the law any more, which is a disaster," he said. "Life in Baghdad is like living in a city run by the mafia where anybody can be killed in cold blood," he said, recalling two friends and former pilots who were killed by gunmen. "Every time I convince my wife that we mustn't give up hope, the ever-increasing blasts and sectarian killing prove I'm wrong," he said, adding that he had stopped sending his children to school and decided to move to Egypt. "When I stopped Nahida and Jumana from going to school they started crying about not seeing their friends any more," Taie said. "They broke my heart and their tears encouraged me to pack up and leave Iraq forever." "I want no more tears in my children's eyes, even if the price is never to return to Iraq."

G7 officials, set to meet in London on June 4-5, will also say that once the recovery is well established, they will need to "ensure long-term sustainability of public finances", which is understood to be code for a gradual withdrawal of stimulus. The G7 comprises the United States, Japan, Britain, Germany, France, Italy and Canada. "We commit to not withdrawing policy support too soon and investing to promote growth, create high-quality jobs and address climate change and inequalities," the draft communique, seen by Reuters, said. "Once the recovery is firmly established, we need to ensure the long-term sustainability of public finances to enable us to respond to future crises," the draft said, without specifying how the G7 would deem the recovery to be considered firm. G7 governments have been pumping trillions of dollars into their economies to keep them alive since the start of the pandemic in March 2020 as repeated lockdowns pushed the world into a deep recession. To help alleviate the strain on public finances, the draft said the G7 strongly supported the efforts of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to set a global minimum corporate tax level that would ensure large multinationals paid their fair share of taxes. Such a tax would aim to solve the problem of large companies that generate huge revenues but pay very little tax because they set up offices for tax purposes in low-tax jurisdictions. The solution the OECD is working on would force a minimum global level of tax on all corporate revenues, no matter where a company chooses to set up its headquarters for tax purposes. "We commit to reaching an equitable solution on the allocation of taxing rights and to a high level of ambition on the rate for a global minimum tax," the draft said, without mentioning any numbers. The United States proposed earlier in May to set the minimum tax at 15%, down from the 21 percent it proposed in April, and the lower level seemed to quickly receive broad backing in Europe. "We ... look forward to reaching an agreement at the July meeting of G20 finance ministers and central bank governors," the G7 draft said. It said there was an overwhelming moral, scientific and economic case for ensuring wide access to COVID-19 vaccines, as the global economy would not be safe until the virus is under control everywhere. The G7 will therefore call on the International Monetary Fund to use its funds for buying vaccines and on the private sector to step up its contribution too. The draft said the G7 would also support mandatory climate-related financial disclosures by companies that provide "consistent and decision-useful" information for markets. "We commit to properly embed climate change and biodiversity loss considerations into economic and financial policymaking, including addressing the macroeconomic impacts and the optimal use of policy levers such as carbon pricing," the draft said. The G7 would also seek to coordinate globally on what constitutes sustainable, green investment to avoid confusion among investors.

Warming trends in a third of the world's large ocean regions are two to four times greater than previously reported averages, increasing the risk to marine life and fisheries, a UN-backed environmental study said. Overfishing, coastal pollution and degradation of water quality were common in all 64 large marine ecosystems studied by scientists who contributed to the UN Environmental Programme report presented at an international conference on oceans, coasts and islands in Vietnam this week. "These marine ecosystems are under great stress and that stress is increasing because of climate change, by global warming," co-author Ken Sherman of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said in an interview. "We really need to have policy makers and donors recognise that we need to fund efforts to reduce the stress," Sherman said. The report said that in 18 of the 64 regions, "the accelerated warming trends are 2-4 times greater than the average trends reported in 2007 by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change". The week-long 4th global conference on oceans, coasts and islands in Hanoi is a forum for developing countries trying to improve ocean governance and coastal management, especially in the light of climate change. US academic and conference co-chair Biliana Cicin-Sain said there had been widespread changes in management of national jurisdiction. "But governance of the 64 percent of the ocean that lies beyond national jurisdiction remains largely sectoral based and fragmented, making it difficult to address the effects of uses." RISK TO SUSTAINED TRADE Scientists said the 800-page report focuses on the risk to the sustainability of the $12.6 trillion value of goods and services produced each year in the so-called large marine ecosystems. The most rapid warming was recorded in the Baltic Sea at 1.35 degrees Celsius in the past 25 years. Other areas under threat included the Yellow Sea, one of the most heavily over-fished and environmentally degraded seas in the world. Hundreds of millions people live along or near its shores in China and the Korean Peninsula and pollution from industry and farmland was a particular threat. South Korean scientist Hyung Tack Huh said China, South Korea and North Korea were working together to work out and amend plans for managing the Yellow Sea coasts and environment. The report recommended that 29 ocean areas adjacent to developing countries should also cap the yield of annual fishery catches as a precaution. To help poorer nations better manage marine ecosystems, the Washington-based Global Environment Facility is funding projects worth $1.8 billion in 16 countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe. Monique Barbut, chief executive officer of the GEF, said in an interview that oceans had been taken for granted in the global warming debate, including the Kyoto Protocol talks in Bali, Indonesia last year and the Convention on Biodiversity. "The message that has to be brought into the Bali roadmap and the follow up to the climate change talks is how all the international waters are ecosystems which suffer from climate change and the risks they are putting to world security," Barbut said. "Risks are increasing in terms of food security, immigration and diseases because of the non-protection of international waters." About 190 nations agreed in Bali last year to launch two years of talks to work out a replacement for the Kyoto Protocol, which binds only rich nations to greenhouse gas emission curbs till 2012. Vietnam, which has a 3,200 km (2,000 miles) coastline and one of the fastest-expanding economies in the world after China, is the first country outside of Europe to host the conference at which 430 delegates from about 70 countries are attending.

The Bush administration will seek a capable manager for the World Bank who can heal rifts that opened under Paul Wolfowitz's tenure but will also pursue an anti-corruption agenda, analysts and people close to the White House said. President George W. Bush made clear in an interview with Reuters this week he wants an American to replace Wolfowitz, who resigned amid an uproar over the hefty pay raise he authorized for his companion. The White House has offered few other clues about the type of candidate it is seeking. But US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who is leading the search, has promised to consult European governments, in a signal Bush will avoid candidates who would stir controversy the way Wolfowitz, a key architect of the Iraq war, did when he was chosen in 2005. "I'm sure Paulson has heard an earful about the need for someone to come in who could heal very deep wounds that have developed over Wolfowitz at every level -- at the staff level and at the level of the shareholders," said Dennis de Tray, vice president of the Center for Global Development, a poverty think tank. The top contenders include former US Trade Representative Robert Zoellick and US Deputy Treasury Secretary Robert Kimmitt, according to Republicans close to the Bush administration. Among other names mentioned are Stanley Fischer, governor of the Bank of Israel, former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, former US Senator Bill Frist and US Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez. The next head of the World Bank faces the unfinished task of streamlining a bureacracy-mired institution and positioning it to tackle new global challenges like climate change and the economic rise of China and India, countries less interested in its money and more in its knowledge. Republican sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said neither Fischer nor Volcker appeared likely to get the job. Some said the administration may want someone more closely associated with Republican policies. The United States, the bank's largest shareholder, has traditionally selected the head of the World Bank since the institution's establishment six decades ago. Its sister organization, the International Monetary Fund, has always been led by a European. Despite calls in some quarters to overhaul the selection process, French Foreign Ministry spokesman Jean-Baptiste Mattei said he had not heard countries with seats on the World Bank's board calling into question those traditions. Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz told US lawmakers on Tuesday that if the World Bank is to be effective and a role model to countries it lends to, its governance -- namely the way its leader is selected -- must change. "It should be the most qualified person, chosen in an open and transparent system," said Stiglitz, a former World Bank chief economist. Neither Zoellick nor Kimmitt are viewed by Europeans with the skepticism that greeted Wolfowitz, a former deputy US defense secretary. Wolfowitz had made an anti-corruption drive a signature issue. The White House has said that the push to cut down on corruption among countries that receive loans would remain an important focus. "It is essential that anti-corruption be a priority," said White House spokesman Tony Fratto. Grant Aldonas, a former US Commerce Department official now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the types of candidates that are being mentioned are likely to be "fully supportive" of the anti-corruption drive.

- launched 10 years ago -- by 2015. While countries agree with the goals for slashing global poverty, rich nations struggling with high unemployment and rising debt, want the debate to focus on getting the best development results from anti-poverty progra

After the sort of exhausting, grinding process for which the bloc is now infamous, European leaders nominated two conservatives, the German defence minister, Ursula von der Leyen, as European Commission president, and the French head of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde, as head of the European Central Bank. They ascended weeks after a new Parliament was elected that saw the larger parties losing ground to smaller, more ideological ones, testing the limits of the bloc’s need for consensus among 28 members that are increasingly divided — between West and East, conservative versus progressive, federalist European versus populist. German Minister of Defence Ursula von der Leyen visits the site where German armed forces helicopter crashed in Dehmke near Hanover, Germany, Jul 1, 2019 REUTERS Ultimately, the negotiations were all about papering over those differences. If it was messy, the haggling also underscored how the EU matters more and more as the bloc struggles to respond to the challenges of migration, climate change, President Vladimir V Putin of Russia, inequality and the rise of populists. German Minister of Defence Ursula von der Leyen visits the site where German armed forces helicopter crashed in Dehmke near Hanover, Germany, Jul 1, 2019 REUTERS Not least, there is a lot of chaos now in Europe and in the trans-Atlantic relationship, with President Donald Trump threatening a trade war, serious divisions over how to deal with Iran and the continuing psychodrama of Brexit, which is a slowly ticking crisis with a possible no-deal explosion at its end. Von der Leyen, 60, the multilingual German defence minister, will now replace Jean-Claude Juncker as the bloc’s most prominent bureaucrat, attending G-20 summit meetings and advancing EU interests in negotiations with the United States, China and other major powers. In a package deal of political ideologies, gender and region, the leaders also decided to name Charles Michel, 43, the young acting Belgian prime minister, a liberal, as president of the European Council of heads of state and government, replacing Donald Tusk, and proposed Josep Borrell Fontelles, 72, a former Spanish foreign minister, as the new foreign-policy chief, to replace Federica Mogherini. Arriving at a consensus, always a challenge for the diverse members of the EU, was particularly hard this time around. Divisions in a more fragmented Europe proved harder to bridge. © 2019 New York Times News Service

It showed that in Southeast Asia alone, up to 20 percent of annual work hours may already be lost in jobs with exposure to extreme heat with the figures set to double by 2050 as the effects of climate change deepen. Across the globe, 43 countries will see a fall in their gross domestic product (GDP) due to reduced productivity, the majority of them in Asia including Indonesia, Malaysia, China, India and Bangladesh, researcher Tord Kjellstrom said. Indonesia and Thailand could see their GDP reduced by 6 percent in 2030, while in China GDP could be reduced by 0.8 percent and in India by 3.2 percent. "Current climate conditions in tropical and subtropical parts of the world are already so hot during the hot seasons that occupational health effects occur and work capacity for many people is affected," said Kjellstrom, a director at the New Zealand-based Health and Environment International Trust. He said the increasing need for rest "is likely to become a significant problem" as climate change makes the hottest days hotter and leads to longer periods of excessively hot days. Kjellstrom authored one of six papers on the impact of climate change on health that were put together by the United Nations University's International Institute for Global Health in Kuala Lumpur and published in the Asia Pacific Journal of Public Health. Kjellstrom warned that the lowest-paid workers - those in heavy labour, agricultural and manufacturing - were most at risk of exposure to extreme heat. He urged countries to take "decisive action" to tackle global warming. Reuters file photo "Failure will cause the frequency and intensity of disasters to worsen dramatically beyond 2050, and the situation at the end of this century will be especially alarming for the world's poorest people," the researcher said. Reuters file photo The other papers in the series showed around 2.1 million people worldwide died between 1980 and 2012 due to nearly 21,000 natural catastrophes such as floods, mudslides, extreme heat, drought, high winds or fires. In Asia Pacific, 1.2 billon people have been affected by 1,215 disasters - mostly flood, cyclones and landslides - since 2000. In April, 175 countries signed a Paris climate deal to restrain the global rise in temperatures to "well below" 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels. The first three months of 2016 have broken temperature records and 2015 was the planet's warmest year since records began in the 19th century.

“Theoretically a good cook should be able to perform under any circumstances, but cooking is much easier, pleasanter, and more efficient if you have the right tools,” Child said. Among the essentials she named were a heavy-duty electric mixer, a skillet and a knife — specifically, a quality, stainless steel knife that’s “sharp as a razor.” What Child could not anticipate was that decades later, researchers in science labs would disagree. Last year, a group of researchers announced they had developed wood that they say is 23 times harder than its natural counterpart. They used the hardened wood to make a table knife that their study shows is nearly three times sharper than commercial table knives, like those made from steel, plastic and natural wood. To create the hardened wood, researchers used a process involving a chemical treatment, water rinsing, and both cold and hot presses on basswood. They then soaked it in food-grade mineral oil to increase its water resistance and carved the material into knives. Basswood, a soft wood commonly used for woodworking and constructing the bodies of musical instruments, was selected for its high performance after processing, said Teng Li, a professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Maryland, College Park, and the lead researcher on the project. But the manufacturing strategy used in the study is applicable to other types of wood, too, he said. Researchers tested the knife by cutting a steak, along with cucumbers, carrots, onions and tomatoes. Although they worked relatively well for researchers in the lab, could a wood knife really replace a traditional one in the real world? Bob Kramer, a master bladesmith in Bellingham, Washington, said he wanted to see more data, and try using the knife, before forming an opinion. “I say get the thing in front of you, try to cut a lemon, try to cut an onion with it,” he said. “Cut up a raw chicken and see how that goes.” Having kitchen tools that work well is a “pleasurable thing,” said Kramer, who has made knives for 30 years. “When it works, you feel the power of it.” KNIVES: A BRIEF HISTORY While the future of knives could be taking shape in a lab, historically, they have always changed with the times. Knives are the oldest known manufactured objects. At least 2 1/2 million years ago, prehistoric humans butchered animals with small stones that were sharpened by striking one stone with another, according to “The Cooks’ Catalogue,” an encyclopedia of cookware published in 1975 and edited by chef James Beard and others. The knife took on different shapes and materials in the Iron and Middle Ages, and around 1600, the table knife was invented. Even though knives gained popularity at the dinner table, they were still used as weapons, drawing fears of danger while dining, according to the California Academy of Sciences. In order to reduce violence, in 1669 King Louis XIV of France declared all pointed knives — both for the street and table — illegal and ordered them ground down. While knife production soared across Europe in the late 18th century, it has declined and moved to the Asia in recent decades, said Alastair Fisher, a director at Taylor’s Eye Witness Ltd., a knife manufacturer in Sheffield, England, that has been in business since 1838. Sheffield, a city about 170 miles north of London, played a significant role in producing knives for the English-speaking world, he said. Hundreds of knife manufacturers were once located in Sheffield, he said, and a wide range of knives were produced there. The city’s proximity to multiple natural resources, including iron ore, coal and limestone, made it ideal, he said. In recent decades, knife production in England has declined, partly because of the growth of fast food and its plastic cutlery, Fisher said: “Unfortunately people have moved on to having TV dinners.” But even with the rise of disposable utensils, a niche community of knife enthusiasts is flourishing, and its members have opinions about the idea of a hardened wood knife. Yao-Fen You, a senior curator at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York, said she is picky about her knives. She learned how to use a cleaver around the age of 5 and now owns about 10 kitchen knives, one of them a Miyabi Koh stainless steel knife, costing her about $130. “I am sceptical,” You said of a knife made of wood, which contracts and expands. “That tends to be the problem with wood handles. I like the feel of them, but they will deteriorate over time.” Li, the University of Maryland professor who helped create the hardened wood, has heard such concerns. Natural wood utensils, like chopsticks, spoons and cutting boards, are widely used in kitchens, he said, and while they do degrade, they can also last a long time. With proper maintenance, he said, he expects hardened wood utensils to last longer than natural wood items. Hardened wood knives can also be resharpened just like steel knives, he said. WHICH IS BETTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT? It’s complicated. Li argued that the production of metal and alloy-based hard materials is energy intensive and leads to a heavy carbon footprint. However, a typical knife uses less than a pound of stainless steel, according to Chris Pistorius, a co-director at the Center for Iron and Steelmaking Research at Carnegie Mellon University. He said a steel knife’s climate impact was tiny, and its ability to be recycled was a major advantage. To really assess if a hardened wood knife is better for the environment would require a “life-cycle analysis,” said Jesko von Windheim, a professor at the Nicholas School of the Environment at Duke University. It’s a “cradle to grave analysis” that conducts carbon accounting along the way, he said. Sometimes products appear more environmentally sustainable on the surface but may not actually be depending on their production process and how they’re disposed of, he said. “If you want to make the statement that wood knives are better,” von Windheim said, “you have to do that accounting.” Zak Eastop, in Durham, England, said he recently spent about 150 pounds, or $200, on a new kitchen knife. Eastop described his relationship with the tool as “semi-symbiotic” and said “it feels like an extension of my hand.” He said he worried hardened wood knives wouldn’t last as long as steel and wondered if wood knives could be sharpened. “I can’t imagine replacing high-end steel knives for cooking,” he said. “For dining, yeah, sure.” Back in Sheffield, Fisher appeared unconvinced by the researchers and said he thought the knife would struggle cutting wafer-thin slices of smoked salmon. “I’d love to try one,” he said. “But I don’t think there’s too much panic in Sheffield at the moment.” ©2022 The New York Times Company