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News for a Sustainable World
Published by The Non-profit International Press Syndicate Group
with IDN-InDepthNews as the Flagship Agency
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Dear Reader,
We are pleased to send you Edition 45 | 2021. This weekly is the flagship news product of the Non-Profit International Press Syndicate Group with registered offices in Canada, Germany, Japan and Singapore, and correspondents around the world. Feel free to share and re-publish articles pro bono mentioning the source. Previous editions are available on https://newsletter-archive.indepthnews.net. Your feedback is most welcome.
Kind regards from the Non-Profit
International Press Syndicate
By Kurt Reynolds
LONDON (IDN) — As the COP26 climate summit in Scotland was winding down, the long-term pledges and bountiful promises made by world leaders seemed never ending—stretching all the way to 2070.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres issued a global roadmap to achieve a radical transformation of energy access and transition by 2030, while also contributing to net zero emissions by 2050.
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Viewpoint by the Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown
Mark Brown, Prime Minister of the Cook Islands, is also the Pacific Political Champion for Climate Finance at COP26. While not attending the COP this year due to COVID-19 travel restrictions, Prime Minister Brown is providing support and undertaking this role remotely. This article is republished with permission from Radio New Zealand and Asia Pacific Report.
AVARUA DISTRICT (IDN) — After years of empty promises by major emitters, it’s time to deliver on climate financing.
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By Kalinga Seneviratne
SYDNEY (IDN) — Last year, New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was hailed by the western media as the heroine of fighting the Covid-19 pandemic because her country was able to weather the first onslaught of the pandemic, but today she is fighting to keep away thousands of protestors invading the parliament calling for an end to Covid lockdowns and other restrictions.
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Viewpoint by Jonathan Power
LUND, Sweden (IDN) — Belem is the Brazilian city at the mouth of the Amazon. Unlike its slummy counterpart, Kinshasa, at the mouth of the Congo, it’s full of resplendent streets with stylish nineteenth century houses. It has squares and marketplaces replete with variegated cafes, pluming fountains and the bustle of an interesting, cosmopolitan, life.
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By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network
NEW YORK (IDN) — “Fortune Men” is the third novel by acclaimed novelist Nadifa Mohamed and the first by a British Somali to be shortlisted for the prestigious Booker Prize.
Her latest book tells the story of a notorious miscarriage of justice and the real-life wrongful conviction of British Somali sailor Mahmood Mattan for a 1952 murder in Cardiff, capital of Wales.
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By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network
NEW YORK (IDN) — The party that governed South Africa since the end of apartheid appears to have lost its grip on Black voters who turned away from the party of Nelson Mandela this month in large numbers.
For the first time in the country’s post-apartheid democracy, the African National Congress (ANC) received only 46% of—less than half of the national vote and an 11% drop from the last election—in polls for mayors and councillors.
Although the turnout ended up being slightly better than initially feared, at 12.3 million voters, it amounts to fewer than half of those registered.
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By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network
NEW YORK (IDN) — At a large pro-war rally held recently in Meskel Square in the heart of the capital city, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, surrounded by thousands of his supporters, made clear that the battle against Tigrayan rebel fighters would continue unabated, despite mounting fatalities and famine.
Residents of the capital were told to arm themselves to repel the rebel forces if they managed to reach the city. To some analysts, this suggested that Abiy’s own Ethiopian National Defence Force (ENDF) was not up to the challenge of defending the capital.
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Viewpoint by Rahul Singh
The writer is a former Editor of Reader's Digest, Indian Express and Khaleej Times (Dubai). He is presently a columnist for the Tribune, and a freelance writer.
NEW DELHI (IDN) — Two persons have been in the news lately, both connected to films: Actor Naseeruddin Shah, and lyricist Javed Akhtar. I don’t know them personally, except that I once played tennis with Naseeruddin and interviewed Javed for a major Indian daily. But that was many years ago.
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By Thalif Deen
NEW YORK (IDN) — The United Nations has long held the dubious distinction of not practicing at home what it preaches to the outside world—whether it is racism in the UN system, inequities in high-level appointments or gender inequalities in its staff.
But it has proved its success at least in one particular field: its efforts to reduce its environmental footprint system-wide this time, not by design but by accident.
In its 2021 annual report “Greening the Blue”, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), focuses on the environmental impact of over 315,000 UN staffers in New York, its field offices, and peacekeeping operations worldwide.
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By Radwan Jakeem
NEW YORK (IDN) — Forty years of war, recurrent natural disasters, chronic poverty, drought and the COVID-19 pandemic have devastated the people of Afghanistan. The recent upheaval has only exacerbated needs and further complicated an extremely challenging operational context, notes the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in its latest situation report.
Even prior to the events of August 15, when the Taliban took control of the presidential palace in Kabul after former President Ashraf Ghani fled the country, the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan was one of the worst in the world.
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By J Nastranis
NEW YORK | GLASGOW (IDN) — Mother Nature, or "Pachamama", as they say in Latin America, took centre stage as the critical UN climate conference in Glasgow, Scotland, reached the halfway point on November 6.
No one knows more about how best to protect nature, than the indigenous peoples of the world, which have been very active inside and outside the COP venue in Glasgow, working to influence negotiations in every way possible, including street protests.
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Viewpoint by Jan Servaes
The author was UNESCO Chair in Communication for Sustainable Social Change (2011-2016). He taught ‘international communication’ in Australia, Belgium, China, Hong Kong, the US, the Netherlands, and Thailand, in addition to short-term projects at about 120 universities in 55 countries. He is editor of the 2020 Handbook on Communication for Development and Social Change.
BRUSSELS (IDN) — Since the February 1 coup in Myanmar, analysts have been anticipating a protracted civil war scenario, citing the example of Syria.
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By Asia Pacific Report Newsdesk
SUVA (IDN) — Australia is accused of using “diplomatic strong-arm tactics” to water down outcomes in Pacific climate negotiations and “buy silence” on climate change, a new report has revealed.
Greenpeace Australia Pacific’s report, Australia: Pacific Bully and International Outcast, reveals that the Australian government uses “bullying tactics” in regional negotiations on climate change, according to former Pacific Island leaders interviewed as part of the study.
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By Mosh Matsena
The writer is the founder and CEO of a 100 per cent black female-owned company Africa Consulting, a South African-based strategic communications and business solutions agency.
NEW YORK (IDN | Africa Renewal) — January 2021 marked a historic event for African economic development—the launching of free trading under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
The agreement promotes socio-economic growth and development in Africa through liberalised trade processes and structures.
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By Kalinga Seneviratne
SYDNEY (IDN) — Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison returned to Canberra on November 5 after presenting a “plan” to the UN climatic summit COP 26, which he claims will help Australia to reach a Net Zero strategy that will reduce emissions, protect regional communities, and meet an emissions reduction strategy consistent with science. But, environmental organisations, opposition leader and Australia’s Green MPs have described the plan as a “plan without a plan”.
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By Busani Bafana
BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe (IDN) — Livestock has been vilified as one key sources of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas which has contributed to global warming.
There have been global calls for a shift in livestock production and even removing meat off the menu in favour of plant-based diets to save the planet.
But there is greater need to differentiate livestock production systems because not all milk and meat are the same, according to a new report by the PASTRES research programme published ahead of the COP26 climate conference.
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Viewpoint by Somar Wijayadasa*
“The dead cannot cry out for justice. It is a duty of the living to do so for them—Lois McMaster Bujold.
NEW YORK (IDN) — The phrase “the land like no other” justifiably portrays Sri Lanka—the resplendent island to attract tourists but the country is also condemned for its murders, abductions, tortures, and disappearances of thousands of its citizens—without justice.
Justice is still pending in the April 2019 gruesome Easter Sunday suicide attacks on three churches and luxury hotels that killed almost 300 and injured at least 500 persons.
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