A year after Hurricane Matthew, Haiti’s children still incredibly vulnerable to disasters – UNICEF

5 October 2017 (United Nations) – One year has passed since Hurricane Matthew made landfall in southwest Haiti – leaving terrible destruction in its wake – but children and adolescents on the island still remain highly vulnerable to the effects of natural disasters and extreme weather events, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has warned.“Hundreds […]

Interior Department whistleblower resigns, bipartisan former appointees object to Zinke’s statements – “I got 30 percent of the crew that’s not loyal to the flag”

By Darryl Fears 6 October 2017 (The Washington Post) – An Interior Department executive turned whistleblower who claimed the Trump administration retaliated against him for publicly disclosing how climate change affects Alaska Native communities resigned Wednesday. In a separate criticism of Interior’s leadership, a group of former department officials, from both Republican and Democratic administrations, […]

Fake news posts blame Puerto Rico truck drivers for refusing to ship relief supplies – “There’s no strike, and union truck drivers have been trying to move aid shipments across Puerto Rico”

By Joshua Gillin 3 October 2017 (Politifact) – Conservative news outlets have been spreading a false story online that wrongly says aid to Hurricane Maria victims isn’t being distributed in Puerto Rico because union truck drivers have gone on strike.The headline on a 30 September 2017, post on The Gateway Pundit read, “San Juan Teamsters […]

Hurricane Maria worsens Puerto Rico water woes

By Rachel Roubein 4 October 2017 (The Hill) – Amid the humanitarian disaster in Puerto Rico, most people can’t drink the water. But even before a Category 4 hurricane slammed the U.S. territory, the island’s water supply was in serious trouble.Some 55 percent of Puerto Ricans still don’t have access to drinking water as of […]

Global humanitarian needs have never been higher, says UN official

2 October 2017 (United Nations) – The number of those needing humanitarian assistance is at its highest since the end of the Second World War – some 145 million people. Several protracted crises in Africa and the Middle East are deteriorating and climate-induced emergencies, sometimes combined with violent conflict, continue to wreak havoc on vulnerable […]

Oxfam slams U.S. response in Puerto Rico as “slow, inadequate” – “Clean water, food, fuel, electricity, and health care are in desperately short supply and quickly dwindling”

By Avery Anapol 3 October 2017 (The Hill) – Oxfam America is stepping in to help Puerto Rico, saying the Trump administration’s response has been “inadequate.”The global nonprofit’s president, Abby Maxman, said in a statement Tuesday that the group is “outraged” at the U.S. government’s slow response in Puerto Rico, where more than half of […]

Puerto Rico death count much higher than currently reported – “People have dug mass graves and buried their relatives, because they are in places that have not yet been reached”

By Omaya Sosa Pascual [translation by Google] 28 September 2017 (Centro de Periodismo Investigativo) – Leovigildo Cotté died in the middle of desperation for not getting the oxygen that sustained his life in the only shelter that exists in the town of Lajas which has been without electricity since the passage of Hurricane Maria a […]

After first tour of Puerto Rico, top general calls damage “the worst I’ve ever seen” – Trump plays in golf tournament

By Jenny Marder 30 September 2017 (PBS) – Lt. Gen. Jeffrey S. Buchanan, the Department of Defense’s primary military liaison with FEMA, toured the damage in Puerto Rico for the first time Saturday during a helicopter ride from San Juan to Ceiba. After landing at a hangar in Ceiba with no power, internet or cellular […]

“Trump’s Katrina?” No, it’s much worse

By Juliette Kayyem 30 September 2017 (CNN) – It is a difficult task to turn the memory of Hurricane Katrina into a quaint story of well-meaning government actors unable to save a city from destruction.President Donald Trump managed to do that on Saturday morning when he essentially blamed Puerto Rico and its mayor, in a […]

Photo gallery: One day in the life of battered Puerto Rico

By Matt Ruby and Rumsey Taylor 30 September 2017 (The New York Times) – 6 a.m. Near Corozal: The sun rose Wednesday morning in the low mountains of north-central Puerto Rico, near the town of Corozal, to reveal the world that Hurricane Maria has made: shattered trees, traffic lights dangling precipitously from broken poles, and, […]

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