By Nina Chestney26 March 2019 LONDON (Reuters) – Global energy-related carbon emissions rose to a record high last year as energy demand and coal use increased, mainly in Asia, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Tuesday. Energy-related CO2 emissions rose by 1.7 percent to 33.1 billion tonnes from the previous year, the highest rate […]
By Navin Singh Khadka 21 March 2019 (BBC News) – Expedition operators are concerned at the number of climbers’ bodies that are becoming exposed on Mount Everest as its glaciers melt. Nearly 300 mountaineers have died on the peak since the first ascent attempt and two-thirds of bodies are thought still to be buried in […]
By Robert Kagan 14 March 2019 (The Washington Post) – Of all the geopolitical transformations confronting the liberal democratic world these days, the one for which we are least prepared is the ideological and strategic resurgence of authoritarianism. We are not used to thinking of authoritarianism as a distinct worldview that offers a real alternative […]
By Stephanie Hegarty 24 March 2019 (BBC News) – All over the world cities are grappling with apocalyptic air pollution but the capital of Mongolia is suffering from some of the worst in the world. And the problem is intrinsically linked to climate change. The country has already warmed by 2.2 degrees, forcing thousands of […]
23 March 2019 (BBC News) – A Russian man has been arrested in Bali on suspicion of trying to smuggle a young orangutan out of Indonesia. The two-year-old male was found drugged inside a rattan basket when Andrei Zhestkov was stopped at security at Denpasar airport on Friday night. Mr Zhestkov is said to have […]
By Justin McCurry 13 March 2019 (The Guardian) – South Korea has passed emergency measures to tackle the “social disaster” being unleashed by air pollution, after record levels of fine dust blanketed most of the country in recent weeks. The national assembly passed a series of bills on Wednesday giving authorities access to emergency funds […]
By Hannah Ellis-Petersen 4 March 2019 (The Guardian) – Police in the Philippines have discovered 1,529 live turtles wrapped in duct tape inside suitcases abandoned in an airport. The customs bureau seized four suitcases in Manila on Sunday and found they were filled with rare and protected varieties including star tortoises, red-footed tortoises, sulcata tortoises […]
GANDHINAGAR, 28 February 2019 (Press Trust of India) – Nearly 50 per cent of the country is currently facing drought with at least 16 per cent falling in the “exceptional” or “extreme” category, according to IIT Gandhinagar scientists managing India’s real time drought prediction system. This ongoing drought will pose a lot of challenges in […]
5 February 2019 (Freedom House) – Freedom in the World has recorded global declines in political rights and civil liberties for an alarming 13 consecutive years, from 2005 to 2018. The global average score has declined each year, and countries with net score declines have consistently outnumbered those with net improvements [Full report: Freedom in […]
By Michael J. Abramowitz and Arch Puddington25 February 2019 (The Diplomat) – Ethnic cleansing, a staple of geopolitical crises in the 1990s, is making a comeback. According to Freedom in the World, the annual report on political rights and civil liberties published by Freedom House, the number of countries earning a score deduction for some […]
