RAMALLAH, West Bank — A man died early Sunday from a gunshot wound he suffered during confrontations with Israeli troops in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.
It was the latest death connected to clashes during Israeli raids in the Palestinian territory, which the military says target wanted Palestinians involved in planning or taking part in recent attacks on Israelis.
The ministry identified the dead man as 30-year-old Mujahed Daoud. He was among five Palestinians wounded Saturday by live fire during clashes in the town of Qarawat Bani Hassan. Daoud was shot in the chest, the report said.
The official Palestinian news agency, Wafa, said the clashes broke out when Israeli forces entered the town and tried to seize agricultural machinery from farmers working off their land.
Also early Sunday, the Israeli military said its troops shot a Palestinian who hurled a Molotov cocktail at a civilian bus near Hebron. The army gave no other details, including the man’s condition.
More than 120 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli-Palestinian fighting in the West Bank and east Jerusalem this year, making 2022 the deadliest year since 2015. The fighting has surged since a series of Palestinian attacks in the spring killed 19 people in Israel.
Israel says most of the Palestinians killed have been militants. But stone-throwing youths protesting the incursions and others not involved in confrontations have also been killed.
Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Mideast war, along with east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. The Palestinians seek those territories for their hoped-for independent state.
In the latest prominent attack on Russian forces, two people opened fire at a Russian military training ground in Belgorod, killing 11 people and injuring 15 on Saturday morning, Russian news agencies reported, citing the country’s defense ministry. The two gunmen were shot and killed shortly afterward, according to Baza, a Russian Telegram channel.
ISLAMABAD — Pakistan pushed back Saturday against a comment by President Joe Biden in which he called the South Asian country “one of the most dangerous nations in the world.”
Biden was at an informal fundraising dinner at a private residence in Los Angeles on Thursday sponsored by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee when he made the comment. Speaking about China and its leader Xi Jinping, he pondered the U.S.’s role in relation to China as it grapples with its positions on Russia, India and Pakistan.
“How do we handle that?” he said, according to a transcript on the White House web page. “How do we handle that relative to what’s going on in Russia? And what I think is maybe one of the most dangerous nations in the world: Pakistan. Nuclear weapons without any cohesion.”
Pakistan’s current prime minister and two former prime ministers rejected the statement as baseless, and the country’s acting foreign secretary summoned the U.S. ambassador on Saturday for an explanation of Biden’s remarks.
“Pakistan’s disappointment and concern was conveyed to the US envoy on the unwarranted remarks, which were not based on ground reality or facts,” said the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said earlier in Karachi that he believed it was the sort of misunderstanding that was created when there was a lack of engagement, apparently referring to the former government of Imran Khan and its perceived lack of engagement in international diplomacy.
“When Pakistan has nuclear assets we know how to keep them safe and secure, how to protect them as well,” Zardari said.
Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif in a statement rejected Biden’s remarks calling them factually incorrect and misleading. He said Pakistan over the years has proved itself to be a responsible nuclear state, and its nuclear program is managed through a technically sound command and control system. He pointed to Pakistan’s commitment to global standards including those of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Sharif said Pakistan and the U.S. have a long history of friendly and mutually beneficial relations. “It is our sincere desire to cooperate with the U.S. to promote regional peace and security,” he said.
Zardari, speaking to reporters, said if there is any question about nuclear weapons security in the region, it should be raised with Pakistan’s nuclear-armed neighbor, India. He said India recently fired a missile that landed accidentally in Pakistan.
Pakistan and India have been arch-rivals since their independence from British rule in 1947. They have bitter relations over the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir, which is divided between them and claimed by both in its entirety. They fought two of their three wars over Kashmir.
Two former prime minsters took to Twitter to respond to Biden’s comments.
Former premier Nawaz Sharif, the current prime minister’s brother, said Pakistan is a responsible nuclear state that is perfectly capable of safeguarding its national interests while respecting international law and practices. Pakistan became a nuclear state in 1998 when Sharif was in power for the second time.
“Our nuclear program is in no way a threat to any country. Like all independent states, Pakistan reserves the right to protect its autonomy, sovereign statehood and territorial integrity,” he said.
Former premier Imran Khan tweeted that Biden is wrong about the security of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, saying he knows for a fact that they are secure. “Unlike US which has been involved in wars across the world, when has Pakistan shown aggression especially post-nuclearization ?”
Khan was ousted in April in a no-confidence vote in parliament and has put forward, without giving evidence, a claim that he was ousted as the result of a U.S.-led plot involving Sharif. The U.S. and Sharif deny the accusation.
Zardari noted that Biden’s statement was not made at any formal platform like a news conference but at an informal fundraising dinner. “I don’t believe it negatively impacts the relations between Pakistan and the U.S.,” he said.
Pakistan and the U.S. have been traditional allies but their relations have been bumpy at times. Pakistan served as a front-line state in the U.S.-led war on terror following the 9/11 attacks. But relations soured after U.S. Navy Seals killed al-Qaeda leader and 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden at a compound in the garrison city of Abbottabad, not far from Pakistan’s military academy in May 2011.
LONDON — What do British Prime Minister Liz Truss’s political tenure and a wilting head of lettuce have in common, you might ask? They both have an expiration date.
Installed by her party just last month after her predecessor Boris Johnson was dramatically ousted, Truss has been in office less than six weeks. But already some pundits say her days in the job are numbered, as she clings to her political life on a dizzying economic roller coaster she has been largely blamed for.
She has also become the butt of quintessentially British jokes — most notably by being compared to a head of lettuce by both The Economist newspaper (considered one of the world’s preeminent news journals) and The Daily Star, an entertainment-focused tabloid that brands itself the “home of fun stuff” and regularly features photos of scantily-clad celebrities.
The gag began in an article by The Economist which earlier this week dubbed Truss “The Iceberg Lady,” bluntly predicting her career has “the shelf-life of a lettuce.”
By Friday, the Daily Star was offering its readers a live-stream camera feed of a store-bought lettuce (worth 60 pence — just under a dollar — and with a shelf-life of around 10 days), positioned next to a framed photograph of Truss, accompanied by the question: “Day one: Which wet lettuce will last longer?”
The live-stream decay has since attracted more than 350,000 viewers, as people tune in to see whether Truss’s political career or the salad staple (which briefly donned a wig and googly eyes) will expire faster.
The Daily Star accused Truss of being a “lame duck PM” following a “shambolic day,” on Friday as she fired her finance minister, Kwasi Kwarteng, after just 38 days in office and u-turned on tax policies, in a bid to steady the wobbling economy.
Kwarteng, who will go down in history books as Britain’s second shortest-serving chancellor of the exchequer, was also subject to jokes from the British press — who pointed out that the shortest-serving chancellor had died (Iain Macleod in 1970 after 30 days in the job) rather than being ousted.
On social media Saturday the hashtag “#lettuceliz” was gaining steam, with users unsure whether to laugh or cry at the state of national affairs.
“That’s just the tip of the iceberg,” wrote one person on Twitter. “Brilliant,” wrote another.
Some online complained they had cheese in the fridge that had lasted longer than Kwarteng’s spell in office, while one trans-Atlantic observer quipped: “In the US we measure such things in Scaramuccis,” referring to Anthony Scaramucci — the short-serving White House communications director, who lasted less than a week in the Trump administration.
The British prime minister also faced criticism for holding an abnormally brief news conference after announcing Kwarteng’s departure on Friday, lasting just eight minutes and 21 seconds.
The Daily Mail newspaper called the news conference a “car crash,” the Guardian front page decried “A day of chaos,” while the Mirror tabloid simply said “Time’s up.”
Britain’s opposition political parties, meanwhile, are calling for a general election.
“Changing the Chancellor doesn’t undo the damage made in Downing Street. Liz Truss’ reckless approach has crashed the economy, causing mortgages to skyrocket, and has undermined Britain’s standing on the world stage,” said Labour leader, Keir Starmer, whose party is enjoying a boost in opinion polls. “We need a change in government.”
The smaller Liberal Democrat Party echoed a similar sentiment: “Enough is enough. It started with Boris Johnson failing our country, and now Liz Truss has broken our economy. It is time for the people to have their say.”
Truss’s promise to simultaneously slash taxes and maintain social programs without deep borrowing has left the market and her party members reeling over the last few weeks, plunging the pound and forcing the Bank of England to take unprecedented interventions to quell the financial revolt.
She swiftly replaced Kwarteng (who had been attending a meeting of the International Monetary Fund in Washington D.C. before frantically flying back to the U.K.), with a former foreign minister Jeremy Hunt, who pledged Saturday to restore economic credibility. Hunt lost the Conservative Party leadership race to Johnson in 2019.
Truss also walked back one of her top campaign pledges — and will now allow corporate taxes to rise from 19 percent to 25 percent in April 2023, she said.
Like other nations in Europe, Britain is grappling with rising inflation, a cost of living crisis and multiple worker strikes from transport to health and postal sectors, with some predicting a possible winter of discontent on the horizon.
The latest surge in violence began in August, after a fragile five-month humanitarian truce, which has halted aid deliveries into the northern Ethiopian region, where around five million civilians are in need of aid.
Aid distribution continues to be hampered by a lack of fuel, and a communications shutdown across Tigray, while Tigrayan commanders have claimed that Eritrea has launched an offensive in support of Ethiopian Government forces, according to news reports.
Aid worker, civilians killed
UN partner organisation the International Rescue Committee, has reported that one of its workers was killed in an attack in Tigray, while delivering aid to women and children in the town of Shire, on Friday.
In a statement on Saturday, the agency said another IRC staff member was also injured in the attack, and two other civilians reportedly killed and three injured during the bombing. Aid workers and civilians should never be a target, IRC added.
There has been no claim of responsibility for the attack, but Shire and other Tigrayan areas have suffered multiple airstrikes since August.
‘Devastating impact’
UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in the statement issued by his Spokeperson, that the uptick in fighting was having “a devastating impact on civilians in what is already a dire humanitarian situation”.
He is calling for an immediate cessation of hostilities.
“The Secretary-General reiterates his full support to an African Union led mediation process and reaffirms the United Nations readiness to support the urgent resumption of talks in order to reach a lasting political settlement to this catastrophic conflict.”
Just last month, African Union-mediated talks were due to take place in South Africa, but were postponed.
Hundreds of thousands have been displaced in Tigray as well as neighbouring northern regions of Amhara and Afar, while tens of thousands are believed to have been killed. Millions of lives are being impacted by the conflict.
Aid update
In a humanitarian update on 4 October, UN Spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric, said UN staff were now being allowed to rotate in and out of Tigray once more, but life-saving air supplies by road and air needed to resume urgently.
“Those flights have remained suspended since 25 August, halting the transportation of supplies and operational cash into the region, which is vital for operations”, he said, briefing journalists in New York.
“Despite security concerns, access restrictions and lack of resources, our partners continue to respond in areas they can access in the three regions”, he said.
“In Tigray, the remaining humanitarian stocks continue to be distributed and basic services provided, despite the very difficult operational challenges.”
As of 26 September, 32 mobile health and nutrition clinics were still operating in 58 health facilities and displacement sites in the region, he said. In Amhara and Afar, newly displaced families are being helped with food, water, emergency shelter and other supplies, as well as health services, Mr Dujarric added.
ISTANBUL — An explosion in a coal mine in northern Turkey killed at least 40 workers and injured nearly a dozen others, authorities said Saturday, adding that the fate of one remaining miner was still unclear.
The explosion occurred Friday in a state-owned mine in Turkey’s Bartin province on the Black Sea coast. Officials said the cause of the explosion was still under investigation but that an initial assessment suggested it was caused by firedamp, referring to concentrations of flammable gas like methane.
As fire burned in the mine early Saturday, rescue workers hoped to reach about 15 workers believed to be alive but trapped roughly 1,000 feet underground, Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said. But later Saturday, officials said all but one of the 15 had been confirmed dead.
“There is uncertainty about one of our miners. Currently, both efforts of search and rescue and clarification of the uncertainty are ongoing down there,” Soylu told reporters Saturday afternoon.
At least 110 people had been working inside the mine when the explosion occurred. Eleven workers were being treated for injuries in Istanbul and in Bartin province, Soylu said. Fifty-eight workers were rescued or escaped the mine, he added.
Photographs showed throngs of people gathered at the entrance of the mine, including rescue workers, a waiting row of ambulances, and an injured miner covered in what appeared to be black soot.
Turkey suffered its worst-ever mining accident in 2014, when 301 people were killed after an explosion in a coal mine in Soma, about 225 miles south of Istanbul, sparked a fire that burned for days. Protests after the accident targeted the mine’s owners as well as Erdogan, after he downplayed the incident, suggesting that such accidents were commonplace.
Government officials appeared anxious to strike a different tone after the latest accident. Erdogan, who traveled to Bartin on Saturday, said on Twitter that the rescue work had started “immediately” after the accident and that the “families and children of our lost miner friends are in our caring hands.”
“We will not allow the slightest grievance,” he said. “Our judicial authorities will investigate this tragic incident thoroughly and even the slightest negligence will not be left unanswered.”
Fahim reported from Doha, Qatar. Beril Eski contributed reporting.
All nations need to make major cuts to fossil fuel emissions and transition to a low-carbon economy, if we are to have any chance of achieving the aim of reducing global temperatures to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels.
This continues to be the message from the UN but, with so many countries suffering as a result of more frequent extreme weather events, that are threatening food security and global stability, more urgent measures need to be taken, to help countries to adapt to an increasingly hostile planet.
Here are five tried and tested ways that nations can become more resilient, in the face of climate change.
1 Early warning systems
Research shows that a 24-hour warning of an oncoming heatwave or storm can reduce the subsequent damage by 30 per cent. Early warning systems that provide climate forecasts are one of the most cost-effective adaptation measures, yielding around nine dollars of total benefits for every dollar invested.
With timely warnings, people can take early action by blocking up doors with sandbags to anticipate floods, stockpiling resources or, in some extreme cases, evacuating from their homes.
In Bangladesh, for example, even as climate change becomes more severe, the number of deaths from cyclones has fallen by 100-fold over the past 40 years, due mainly to improved early warnings.
Earlier this year, the UN Secretary-General tasked the World Meteorological Organization to lead the development of an action plan to ensure every person in the world is covered by early warnings within the next five years. The plan will be presented at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP 27) next month.
2 Ecosystem Restoration
The UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration launched by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and partners in 2021 triggered a global movement to restore the world’s ecosystems. This global restoration effort will not only absorb carbon but also increase ‘ecosystem services’ to defend the world from its most devastating impacts.
In cities, restoring urban forests cools the air and reduces heatwaves. On a normal sunny day, a single tree provides a cooling effect equivalent to two domestic air conditioners running for 24 hours.
On coasts, mangrove forests provide natural sea defences from storm surges by reducing the height and strength of the sea waves. Moreover, protecting mangroves is 1,000 times less expensive per kilometre than building seawalls.
In high altitudes, re-greening mountain slopes protects communities from climate-induced landslides and avalanches. For example, on Anjouan Island in Comoros, deforestation was drying up the ground and turning forests into deserts. With support from UNEP, a project has set out to plant 1.4 million trees over four years to hold back erosion and retain water and nutrients in the soil.
3 Climate-resilient infrastructure
Climate-resilient infrastructure refers to assets and systems such as roads, bridges, and power lines that can withstand shocks from extreme climate impacts. Infrastructure is responsible for 88 per cent of the forecasted costs of adapting to climate change.
A World Bank report finds that climate-resilient infrastructure investments in low and middle-income countries could produce roughly $4.2 trillion in total benefits, around four dollars for each dollar invested. The reasoning is simple. More resilient infrastructure assets pay for themselves as their life-cycle is extended and their services are more reliable.
Tools for encouraging investments in climate-resilient infrastructure include regulatory standards like building codes, spatial planning frameworks such as vulnerability maps, and a strong communication drive to ensure the private sector is aware of climate risks, projections and uncertainties.
4 Water supplies and security
The story of climate change is, in many ways, a story about water, whether it is floods, droughts, rising sea levels, or even wildfires. By 2030, one-in-two people are expected to face severe water shortages.
Investing in more efficient irrigation will be crucial, as agriculture accounts for 70 per cent of all global freshwater withdrawals. In urban centres, roughly 100-120 billion cubic metres of water could be saved globally by 2030 by reducing leaks. Governments are being encouraged to develop holistic water management plans, known as Integrated Water Resource Management, that take into account the entire water cycle: from source to distribution, treatment, reuse and return to the environment.
Research shows that investments in rainwater harvesting systems need to be sustained to make them more widely available. In Bagamoyo town, Tanzania, for instance, rising sea levels and drought from declining rainfall were causing wells to dry up and become salty. With no other options, children from the local Kingani School had to drink salt water, leading to headaches, ulcers, and low school attendance.
With support from UNEP, the government began constructing a rainwater harvesting system involving rooftop guttering and a series of large tanks for storing water. Diseases soon began to fall, and the children returned to school.
5 Long-term planning
Climate adaptation solutions are more effective if integrated into long-term strategies and policies. National Adaptation Plans are a crucial governance mechanism for countries to plan for the future and strategically prioritize adaptation needs.
A key part of these plans is to examine climate scenarios decades into the future and combine these with vulnerability assessments for different sectors. These can assist in planning and guiding government decisions on investment, regulatory and fiscal framework changes and raising public awareness.
Around 70 countries have developed a National Adaptation Plan, but this number is growing rapidly. UNEP is currently supporting 20 Member States in developing their plans, which can also be used to improve adaptation elements in Nationally Determined Contributions – a central part of the Paris Agreement.
Om, a homestay owner in Paro, is hoping to value add after growing strawberries in her small greenhouse. Credit: Chhimi Dema/IPS
by Chhimi Dema (paro, bhutan)
Inter Press Service
PARO, Bhutan, Oct 14 (IPS) – Zam, 57, sits at her kitchen table looking out the window at her orchard of four dozen apple trees. In the past eight years she has sold only two crates (100 kilogrammes) of the fruit because of poor harvests. She turned her attention to vegetables instead but the production was low because of a water shortage.
Zam (who uses one name only) lives in the village of Jukha in Paro district, near Bhutan’s international airport. She is now pinning her hopes on growing strawberries. “It’s my only hope for better earnings, although it is a niche product,” she tells IPS.
The farmer is optimistic after seeing her neighbours grow the fruit, and increase their income. “I am inspired by that, and hope that I earn better from strawberries. I would like to save money for emergencies and spend on maintenance of my house.”
The two-storey, mud home is perched alone atop a hill, looking onto a small valley bisected by a river. Other similar houses dot the landscape. But part of the roof of Zam’s house was blown away in high winds last winter.
She is among the country’s farmers who have registered with the Ministry of Agriculture and Forests (MoAF) to grow a selection of crops identified for their potential to improve nutrition, withstand impacts of climate change and improve export earnings: strawberry, quinoa, black pepper and asparagus.
The agriculture ministry will support these farmers through the Hand-in-Hand Initiative (HiH) of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
Hand-in-Hand (HiH) is an evidence-based, country-owned and led initiative to accelerate agricultural transformation, with the goal of eradicating poverty, ending hunger and malnutrition, and reducing inequalities. The initiative was supporting 52 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East as of May 2022.
Bhutan joined the HiH in June 2021. Through it, the agriculture ministry has since carried out baseline studies on food security and nutrition and agri-food systems. Results from the food security study showed “production gaps and nutrition gaps in current food systems,” according to the ministry’s records. The agri-food systems study identified entry points for diversifying and improving food systems.
Farmers in Paro district are shifting their cash crop from apples to asparagus due to high earnings from asparagus. Credit: Chhimi Dema/IPS
The value addition of strawberries is another opportunity that some farmers are waiting to explore. According to the finance ministry, a total of 2,477 kg of strawberries in preserved, fresh or canned form, were imported from 2019 to 2021. No records of exports were noted in those years.
Thinley Yangzom and her family run a homestay on their farm in Paro, just west of the capital Thimphu. Established in 2002, it was among the first homestays in Bhutan and grows all the food needed for the family and their guests.
The 37-year-old says that she is aiming to make strawberry jams, juice and smoothies for guests, and to sell any surplus in the market. “Growing strawberries on our farm will save us the cost of buying imported food. We hope to be able to export after some years,” adds Yangzom.
Kinley Tshering grows asparagus on 0.4 hectares of land along with paddy and apples. Credit: Chhimi Dema/IPS
Some farmers are already successfully growing the HiH-identified crops.
Kinley Tshering has been raising asparagus for more than one decade. Nestled between two ridges and among a vast paddy field, he has cultivated an acre of asparagus. “I was growing potatoes before but what I earn from asparagus farming is more profitable,” says Tshering, 51, who supplies the vegetable to hotels and restaurants in the district.
The farmer earns US$2,500 to $3,000 a year from selling the crop. “My hard work on growing asparagus is rewarded with the earnings,” he says.
In 2021, 177.7 metric tonnes of asparagus were produced in the country, according to the MoAF. That compares to 126.6 MT in 2020, and 79.1 MT in 2019.
Many farmers throughout the country were hard hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. The shock became a lesson for them to diversify their sources of income.
Tenzin Choden, 27, from Jangsa-Jooka in Paro, was supporting her family by rearing mules to carry the belongings of tourists trekking from her village. But in the past two years her income dropped 60 to 70 percent, leaving them with barely $200 a month.
In the kitchen garden at the back of her two-storey house is a small greenhouse where Choden grows chillies, but with little demand she sells only small amounts.
The farmer explains that Bhutan’s high altitude in the Himalayas does not allow the family to successfully grow other vegetables and that human-wildlife conflict is a major threat to their crops and livestock. Wild boars dig up their potatoes and bears break the apple trees.
But having heard about asparagus, Choden borrowed a few seedlings from a neighbour and they grew well, in part because wild animals ignored the crop. “The trial was a success and this encouraged me to seek further support from the ministry,” she says. “We are hoping that asparagus will improve our earnings.”
Jambay Dorji grows strawberries in his farm at Paro. With the Hand In Hand Initiative, he hopes to grow on a commercial scale. Credit: Chhimi Dema/IPS
There is some concern that if farmers succeed in growing the HiH crops, they will lack access to a large enough market. According to Bhutan Alpine Seeds’ chief executive officer, Jambay Dorji, himself a farmer, while the local market for vegetables such as asparagus is growing, “if we are going on a commercial scale then we will need a market to countries such as Thailand, India and others.”
A private company, Bhutan Alpine Seeds supplies seeds to government agencies and the private sector.
“If the export route is fixed, then production within the country isn’t an issue,” adds Dorji. “People will make the effort to grow the vegetable because they can earn well from it.”
Protesters attend a march against the military coup in Myanmar. Credit: Unsplash/Pyae Sone Htun
Opinion by Jan Servaes (brussels)
Inter Press Service
BRUSSELS, Oct 14 (IPS) – The update on September 26, 2022, of the human rights situation in Myanmar to the UN Human Rights Council says it all: “The people of Myanmar have been caught in a rapid downward spiral, with growing suffering, fear, and insecurity. Urgent action is needed to reverse this catastrophic situation and to restore peace, democracy, and sustainable development”.
Since the military overthrew an elected government on February 1, 2021, and took power in a country ruled by generals for five of the past six decades, the situation for the majority of the population has become increasingly desperate.
The coup, which ended 10 years of provisional democracy initiated by the previous junta, has devastated Myanmar’s economy, leading to mass displacement of people as a result of fighting between armed groups and the military, and relentless bombing on civilian targets of the Burmese Air Force.
According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP), a non-profit organization that tracks military action and is frequently cited by the United Nations, 2,343 is the number of opponents of the junta that have been killed since the coup. Killed.
1,5,821 opponents of the coup have been arrested by the junta, the AAPP says.
160 people were killed in one day on March 27, 2021, as the junta celebrated the annual Armed Forces Day, the bloodiest day in its crackdown on democracy activists.
According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), 1,320,000 people have been displaced by fighting. It is estimated that about 14.4 million people—about a quarter of Myanmar’s population—have been displaced from their homes and are in need of humanitarian assistance.
30 is the percentage by which Myanmar’s economy has shrunk as a direct result of the coup, the World Bank says. According to the World Bank, 1 million jobs were lost in Myanmar in 2021.
Potentially $2.8 billion in economic losses from internet shutdowns in Myanmar by 2021.
More than 60 is the percentage of the value of the kyat currency that has been lost against the dollar since the coup. Capital flight and a decline in foreign investment & aid, and money transfers have led to a shortage of foreign currency. The military regime’s attempts to restrict imports and ration foreign currencies have boosted illegal border trade with China and Thailand. A widening disparity between Thailand’s and Myanmar’s trade figures suggests that smuggling from Thailand has not only recovered to pre-coup levels, but also appears to have reached an all-time high. This boom questions the junta’s claim of a trade surplus. Moreover, it has been fueled by the regime’s own heavy-handed efforts to control trade.
Compared to March 2020, poverty is estimated to have tripled. With about 40 percent of the population living below the national poverty line by 2022, nearly a decade of progress in poverty reduction has been undone.
18 was the percentage contraction the World Bank predicted for Myanmar’s economy in the fiscal year starting April 1, 2021. Failure to see a substantial rebound in economic growth – with GDP estimated to remain in 2022 at around 13 percent lower than in 2019 – continues to test the resilience of the Myanmar population. Food insecurity is on the rise and households are increasingly resorting to negative coping mechanisms – including reducing consumption and asset sales – in the face of uncertainty.
The suicide rate has continued to rise since the coup as financial hardship, political repression and the collapse of the health care system are negatively impacting mental health.
26 is the total number of years in prison that deposed 77-year-old Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi will face if given the maximum sentences in the remaining lawsuits against her.
Press freedom regresses fast. The country has become a worse jailer of journalists than China. Since the coup, military authorities have arrested about 142 journalists and media workers, an estimated 57 of whom are still in prison in Myanmar, six more than are believed to be imprisoned in China. The junta has forced at least 12 media outlets to shut down, pushing hundreds of media workers to flee the country and revive the exiled media outlets that reported on the country under the last military junta prior to 2011.
ASEAN is increasingly frustrated with the lack of progress on the Five Point Consensus – a non-binding agreement drafted in April 2021. While many countries have criticized the junta’s lack of “willingness” to comply with the framework, Malaysia has gone a step further and put forward the idea of suspending Myanmar.
Jan Servaes was UNESCO-Chair in Communication for Sustainable Social Change at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He taught ‘international communication’ in Australia, Belgium, China, Hong Kong, the US, 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. https://link.springer.com/referencework/10.1007/978-981-10-7035-8
A school destroyed during a Russian air strike in Kharkiv, Ukraine. September 2022. Credit: UNICEF/Ashley Gilbertson
by Thalif Deen (united nations)
Inter Press Service
UNITED NATIONS, Oct 14 (IPS) – The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has resulted in a never-ending flow of arms to the battle-scarred country— elevating the besieged nation to the ranks of one of the major recipients of US weapons and American security assistance.
As of last week, the US has provided a hefty $17.5 billion in arms and military assistance to Ukraine.
The five biggest arms buyers from the US during 2017-2021 were Saudi Arabia, which accounted for 23.4 percent of all US arms exports –followed by Australia 9.4 percent, South Korea 6.8 percent, Japan 6.7 percent and Qatar 5.4 percent.
The figure for Ukraine during the same period was 0.1 percent, according to the latest statistics released by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
But this measly figure is expected to skyrocket in 2022, judging by the uninterrupted flow of American weapons.
In a statement to reporters October 4, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said pursuant to a delegation of authority from the President, “I am authorizing our 22nd drawdown of U.S. arms and equipment for Ukraine since August 2021.”
This $625 million drawdown, he said, includes additional arms, munitions, and equipment from U.S. Department of Defense inventories.
This drawdown will bring the total U.S. military assistance for Ukraine to more than $17.5 billion since the beginning of the Biden Administration in January 2021.
Pieter Wezeman, Senior Researcher, Arms Transfers Programme at SIPRI, told IPS arms supplies to Ukraine were very small compared to those of the top-15 recipients of US arms.
This will change in 2022 as Ukraine has received major weapon systems from the US, such as 20 HIMARS long range rocket launchers, close to 1000 older model used light armoured vehicles, radars and 142 M-777 towed guns, he said.
“These are most valuable systems per item which Ukraine has received from the US, but the numbers involved and the military or financial value of these weapons are modest compared to what certain other countries have received in major systems in recent years.”
He pointed out that Ukraine has not received other items that per piece or especially valuable such as modern tanks, combat aircraft, major ships and long-range air defense systems.
Dr. Natalie J. Goldring, a Visiting Professor of the Practice in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University, told IPS these weapons transfers entail numerous risks.
One significant risk is that the weapons will be captured by Russian forces and potentially used against Western forces. Another is that weapons that remain when the conflict ends will be transferred to other areas of conflict, she warned.
One of the nightmare scenarios, she pointed out, is US weapons being used against US forces. Transferring vast quantities of weapons in such a short period of time increases this risk by making it more difficult to ensure accountability and prevent diversion of the weapons.
Perhaps the largest risk, she said, “is that Russian President Vladimir Putin will not accept the argument that these weapons are only being supplied to help Ukraine defend itself, particularly if we’re supplying weapons that can attack targets inside Russia.”
That may lead to an escalation and expansion of the conflict, and would likely produce even more threats of nuclear weapons use than President Putin has already made she noted.
“Escalating threats in turn increase the risk of actual use of nuclear weapons, whether deliberate or through accident or miscalculation”, said Dr Goldring, who also represents the Acronym Institute at the United Nations, on conventional weapons and arms trade issues.
In the end, she argued, regardless of the outcome of the conflict itself, the military contractors win. The Defense Department has already started ordering replacements for some of the weapons shipped to Ukraine. US weapons manufacturers are profiting from what appears to be an open-ended commitment to supply Ukrainian forces.
Even for weapons that are still in production, supply line challenges may make it difficult to replace the weapons transferred to Ukraine in a timely manner. This raises the question of how long the US military will be able to sustain these shipments without threatening US force readiness, she added.
According to the US Department of Defense, the security assistance package for Ukraine that was announced on 4 October 2022 is the 22nd drawdown from US stocks in less than a year.
In the 4 October 2022 press statement on the additional drawdown authority, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said, “The capabilities we are delivering are carefully calibrated to make the most difference on the battlefield and strengthen Ukraine’s hand at the negotiating table when the time is right.”
“But without an indication of when real peace negotiations will take place, the seemingly unending flow of weapons from the United States is likely to continue and US defense contractors will continue to increase their profits. At the same time, though, the risks of these transfers also increase as the quantity of weapons transferred grows,” she declared.
Justifying US arms sales, Blinken said: “We will continue to stand with the people of Ukraine as they defend their freedom and independence with extraordinary courage and boundless determination. The capabilities we are delivering are carefully calibrated to make the most difference on the battlefield and strengthen Ukraine’s hand at the negotiating table when the time is right. We stand United with Ukraine”.
At the UN General Assembly last month, President Biden made it clear yet again that the US will support the people of Ukraine for as long as it takes.
Blinken said “recent developments from Russia’s sham referenda and attempted annexation to new revelations of brutality against civilians in Ukrainian territory formerly controlled by Russia only strengthens our resolve.”
“United with our Allies and partners from 50 nations, we are delivering the arms and equipment that Ukraine’s forces are utilizing so effectively today in a successful counter-offensive to take back their lands seized illegally by Russia,” he declared.
Wezeman said it is very large numbers of anti-tank missiles, such as over 8,000 Javelin anti-tank missiles, and over a million rounds for heavy artillery and probably thousands of advanced guided rockets for the HIMARS systems that account for the bulk of the US military aid to Ukraine.
Such amounts of ammunition, he said, surpass by far the amount of ammunition normally imported by any recipient of US arms in a given year.
Even though tens of thousands rounds of such ammunition need to be supplied to equal the value of let’s say 1 new F-15SA combat aircraft and related infrastructure, training, munitions spare parts etc., the numbers are so large that they do matter, said Wezeman.
He said there has already been discussions about sending further major weapons to Ukraine, even the possibility of supplying tanks and combat aircraft, as suggested. And if this happens, Ukraine will further rise amongst in the ranks of arms recipients from the US.
Thalif Deen is a former Director, Foreign Military Markets at Defense Marketing Services; Senior Defense Analyst at Forecast International; and military editor Middle East/Africa at Jane’s Information Group, US. He is also the author of a recently-released book on the United Nations titled “No Comment and Don’t Quote me on That” available on Amazon.
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