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New York City, January 5, 2020: People marching from Manhattan to Brooklyn against the rise in antisemitism in New York. Antisemitic incidents reached an all-time high in the United States in 2021. Credit: Shutterstock.

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Dec 12 2022 (IPS)

It’s time to step up, speak out and object to antisemitism. Antisemitic remarks, behavior and events cannot continue to be swept under the rug, unethically edited for political media consumption, or ignored in hopes that they will simply go away.

Events several weeks ago as well as those from the recent past that took place at the highest political levels of an advanced developed country, the United States, are indicative of the worrisome rising trend of antisemitism in many parts of the world.

On 22 November former president Trump had dinner at his home with Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes and antisemite Kanye “Ye” West. The notorious event was followed by the largely silent responses of many Republican officials and leaders, including some seeking the presidential office.

The repeated behavior and words of the former president, including his troubling response to the Charlottesville tragedy in 2017, and the tepid reactions to antisemitism by most of his supporters legitimizes the animosity expressed toward Jewish Americans.

Such behavior and remarks cannot be excused as being insignificant instances that have been blown out of proportion by the news media. Nor can they be simply deflected, diminished or explained away with references to irrelevant overseas diversions.

The former president and his various enablers have minimized, dismissed and legitimized antisemitism events in the United States, including harassment, threats, vandalism, assaults, killings and bombings. The failures to address the antisemitism facing America are inexcusable, disgraceful and dangerous.

The Jewish population of the United States is a relatively small proportion of the country. In 2022 Jewish Americans are estimated to represent slightly more than two percent of America’s population of 333 million inhabitants. In contrast, the largest religious group, Christians, is close to two-thirds of country’s population (Figure 1)

 

Source: PEW Research.

 

Despite Jewish Americans representing a relatively small proportion of the U.S. population, the number of reported antisemitic incidents involving assault, harassment and vandalism reached an all-time high in 2021 of 2,717, or more than seven incidents per day and nearly triple the level in 2015 (Figure 2).

 

Source: Anti-Defamation League.

 

The reprehensible incidents of the recent past took place in various places across the United States, including in places of worship, community centers, schools and colleges. The motivations for the antisemitism were not always evident as they typically lacked an identifiable ideology or belief system.

One notable exception, however, is the “great replacement” theory being promoted by U.S. white supremacist groups. They believe in the conspiracy that white Christians are being intentionally replaced in the population by individuals of other races through immigration and other means.

That great replacement, they believe, is leading to white Christians no longer being the dominant majority in America. In their various demonstrations and gatherings, including the Charlottesville event in 2017, the neo-Nazi marchers often chant out such hateful antisemitic nonsense as ”Jews will not replace us”.

The former president and his various enablers have minimized, dismissed and legitimized antisemitism events in the United States, including harassment, threats, vandalism, assaults, killings and bombings. The failures to address the antisemitism facing America are inexcusable, disgraceful and dangerous

In the American Jewish Committee’s “The State of Antisemitism in America 2021” report, an estimated 60 percent of U.S. adults indicated that antisemitism is a problem for the country. However, approximately one-quarter of the respondents felt that antisemitism wasn’t a problem for the country.

In contrast, some 90 percent of Jewish Americans in the report indicated that antisemitism is a problem for the country and approximately three-quarters of Jewish Americans felt that there is more antisemitism in the country today than there was about five years ago. A majority of Jewish Americans, 53 percent, reported feeling personally less safe than they did in 2015.

Contributing to antisemitism is the apparent self-induced amnesia among some extremist groups regarding the methodical persecution followed by the horrendous events that were committed against Europe’s Jews approximately eight decades ago. That amnesia is easily dispelled by a viewing of the illuminating Ken Burns’ documentary, “The U.S. and the Holocaust”. The Holocaust resulted in the murder of approximately six million European Jews, or roughly 63 percent of Europe’s Jewish population at the time.

Sadly, antisemitism was also evident in America’s refugee policy with respect to European Jews seeking asylum from their harrowing persecution in Nazi Germany.

Perhaps the most memorable single event reflecting its ignoble refugee policy in the past is the refusal of the U.S. government in 1939 to grant entry to about 900 Jewish refugees seeking asylum aboard the USS St. Louis that had reached Miami, Florida. The ship was forced to return to Europe, where nearly one third of the passengers were murdered in the Holocaust.

In addition, America too often has chosen to ignore its troubling antisemitic past and the many popular figures who were openly antisemitic in their public attacks on the character and patriotism of Jewish Americans. Among those ignoble figures are Henry Ford, Charles Lindbergh, Charles Coughlin, Fritz Kuhn, Coco Chanel and Louis Farrakhan.

Furthermore, besides facing educational quotas at major universities in the 1920s, including Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Columbia, Jewish Americans experienced discrimination among the major professions and restrictions on residential housing. They were also denied membership to most clubs, camps, resorts and associations, with some hotel advertisements explicitly excluding Jewish Americans.

While that recent tragic history remains beyond doubt, many of America’s antisemitic white supremacists, including Fuentes and West, continue to deny the existence of the Holocaust, express hateful rhetoric and discriminate against Jewish Americans. They attempt to negate the historical facts of the Nazi genocide, promote the false claim that the Holocaust was invented or greatly exaggerated in order to promote the Jewish interests, and display the Nazi swastika flag and make the “Heil Hitler” gesture.

Antisemitism also fueled vocal criticism and opposition to many U.S. political leaders in the past who attempted to address the discrimination against Jewish Americans. For example, at conference of some 20,000 people in New York City in 1939, Fritz Kuhn, leader of the German American Bund, mocked President Franklin Roosevelt as “Frank D. Rosenfeld”, referred to the New Deal as the “Jew Deal”, and declared Jews to be enemies of the United States.

Some current U.S. political leaders, including some eagerly seeking to become president, continue to dismiss or ignore antisemitism. When confronted with offensive behavior and words such as the former president’s recent dining with two notorious antisemites, the initial reluctance verging on muteness of many political leaders to express outrage only contributes to antisemitism.

No matter the place, occasion or time, the U.S. electorate cannot tolerate or support those who promote, permit or condone antisemitism. In particular, U.S. elected and appointed government officials must be held accountable for their words and deeds.

An encouraging development in the U.S. was a letter recently signed by more than one hundred members of Congress to President Biden calling for a unified national strategy to monitor and combat antisemitism in the country. The letter also recognized that rising antisemitism is endangering people in Jewish communities both in the U.S. and abroad

Another encouraging development aimed at recognizing the rise of antisemitism was the 2022 Mayors Summit Against Antisemitism. More than 25 mayors from around the world and dozens of local government officials participated in the two-day Summit held in Athens, Greece, from 30 November to 1 December.

The Summit highlighted the significant problem of rising antisemitism worldwide and presented strategies and solutions to address it. Various countries around the world have reported a rise in antisemitic incidents between 2020 and 2021. In addition to the rise of incidents of approximately one-third in the United States, higher percentage rises were reported in Australia, Canada and France (Figure 3).

 

Source: Antisemitism Worldwide Report 2021.

 

The Mayors Summit also provided a framework for exchange of ideas and cooperation between cities. The meeting also emphasized the particular role of mayors in creating inclusive societies for their cities.

Finally, recalling the tragic lessons of the recent past and troubled by today’s rising antisemitism, it’s time for everyone to speak out and denounce the hate, discrimination and violence. Tolerating antisemitism is categorically wrong and poses a serious moral threat to the world in the 21st century.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division and author of numerous publications on population issues, including his recent book, “Births, Deaths, Migrations and Other Important Population Matters.”

 

By External Source
Dec 12 2022 (IPS-Partners)

A joint mission to Ethiopia by Education Cannot Wait (ECW), and Norway’s International Development Minister has drawn attention to one of the world’s largest education crises that have left 3.6 million children out of school. The number of out-of-school children has spiked from 3.1 million to 3.6 million, according to UNICEF. However, ECW-funded schools provide children with ‘whole-of-child’ interventions, including school feeding, psychosocial support, teacher training, school materials, accelerated learning, gender transformative approaches, and the construction and rehabilitation of school facilities.

 

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The author is Executive Director, Financial Transparency Coalition

By Matti Kohonen
LONDON, Dec 12 2022 (IPS)

The European Court of Justice on November 22, 2022, made a ruling that reversed much of the progress we have made in a decade in the fight against corruption, economic and natural resource crimes, tax abuses and other forms of illicit financial flows across the world. In the ruling, the court declared invalid the part of the European Union’s Anti Money Laundering Directive that allowed public access to registries about companies’ beneficial owners (that is, the real people who own or actually control them).

Matti Kohonen

This has a direct impact in the fight against environmental crimes, particularly illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing which is devastating the world’s fisheries resources, accounting for up to one-fifth of global catches.

The financial secrecy surrounding the owners of vessels is a key driver of IUU fishing as secrecy makes it harder to catch the real perpetrators of this illegal trade. In a report published by the Financial Transparency Coalition in October 2022, we discovered that among the top 10 operators of vessels reported to be engaged in this illicit practice, one was based in Spain while a total of 30 vessels were flagged to Italy, making it the highest European flag jurisdiction for IUU fishing. In total, we found that 12.8% of all vessels engaged in IUU fishing were flagged to a European country.

The ECJ ruling makes it impossible for a member of the public to investigate these linkages further. In Spain and Italy, the commitment to open up the registry was made in principle but remains unimplemented. This decision takes all pressure off to implement open beneficial ownership registries in these two countries that are most responsible for IUU fishing in the continent.

This is a welcome present to owners of IUU fishing vessels who often use complex corporate structures to hide their identities and evade punishment. Underscoring this problem, in our investigation we found the individual shareholder data was only available for 16% of industrial and semi-industrial vessels engaged in IUU fishing.

But the ECJ’s ruling impact will be felt well beyond Europe’s borders. Most of the world’s IUU fishing takes place in Africa which loses US$11.5bn in illicit financial flows linked to IUU fishing every year. A significant proportion of this illicit catch in Africa is caught in West Africa, with US$9.5bn losses in this region alone, with much of the fish caught there by foreign fleets ending up in Europe. In total, the European continent imports some US$14bn worth of seafood from the global South each year, making it a key market for seafood products.

The court’s decisions rested on a narrow interpretation of the purpose of the beneficial ownership registry, limited to fighting money laundering and terrorist financing. Fishing related offences are not yet recognised as ‘natural resource crimes’ by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the global anti-money laundering regulator, while illegal logging and illegal wildlife trade (IWT) related offences are already included in their definition of what constitutes money laundering. If this were to be upgraded by FATF, we could claim most, if not all, IUU fishing offences as money laundering crimes.

The ECJ decision also rests on a narrow interpretation of the ‘right to private life’ as a fundamental civil right as subscribed in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union that partly lays the legal foundation for the EU. Worryingly, the court did not consider any evidence of the benefits of public access to beneficial ownership information in both fighting money laundering and terrorist financing, let alone the risks that natural resource crimes pose to other rights, such as the right to a healthy environment recognised as a human right by the UN General Assembly in 2022.

Ultimately, the real winners of this ruling are the thousands of companies engaged in IUU fishing and other environmental crimes across the world, and which benefit from money laundering at the tune of billions of euros per year. The ruling undermines collective action to make the money trail of these crimes more traceable, at a time when countries especially in the global South are desperate for funds amid a cost of living crisis and high inflation.

Reacting to the ruling, the European Council signalled that member states should ensure that any natural or legal person demonstrating a legitimate interest has access to information held in the beneficial ownership registers, including especially journalists and civil society organisations as long as they can demonstrate legitimate interest in relation with fighting money laundering and terrorist financing.

However, this is insufficient since this will likely only apply to journalists and civil society in the same country as the registry, and application processes generally take a long time. Also one will need to know the company of interest before accessing any information, blocking the option of looking through public registries to spot risks and red flags.

The EU Parliament should be expected to start negotiations on a new anti-money laundering directive next spring. It must not allow the ECJ ruling to stand, for everyone’s sake.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Excerpt:

The author is Executive Director, Financial Transparency Coalition

Credit: United Nations

By Anwarul K. Chowdhury
NEW YORK, Dec 12 2022 (IPS)

Three weeks have gone by since the much-ballyhooed mega-gathering of the 27th Conference of Parties (COP) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), generally known by its easy-to-say-and-remember title – COP27, concluded at the resort city Sharm El-Sheikh in Egypt.

This year the annual rotational hosting of COP was the turn of Africa attended in total by 33,449 people, including 16,118 delegates from Parties, 13,981 observers, and 3,350 members of the media.

Think of the carbon footprint logged by the onrush of this huge crowd! Last COP26 in Glasgow in the United Kingdom – delayed by one year due to Covid – was the turn of West European and Others turn and the next one – COP28 – will be Asia’s turn and host would be the United Arab Emirates’ wonder-city Dubai.

ELUSIVE LOSS AND DAMAGE FUND?

Overshooting the scheduled date of closure on Friday 18 November by two days, COP27 finally ended on Sunday 20 November. This unusual delay was needed to pressurize the industrialized countries, the so-called developed nations, which finally gave up their three-decade long unjust, irrational, and steadfast opposition and agreed to creating a fund to help countries ravaged by consequences of climate change.

Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury

Citing legal implications for using the easily understandable term “compensation”, the foot-draggers prefer to call it a “loss and damage fund”. Yes, that is the in-principle agreement to use the term “fund”. That has been touted by the media as a breakthrough, a major success, a first-ever agreement, end of the deadlock.

Knowledgeable observers of the COP negotiations are of the opinion that such high-octane excitement – regret the use of this fossil fuel related term – was simply naïve and could have been a tactic of the fossil-fuel lobby to divert attention away from the failure of COP27 to include the much-needed agreement on serious measures to cut in the emissions.

HEARTBREAKING INDIFFERENCE:

While COP27 outcome is overplayed highlighting the agreement to create the Loss and Damage fund. On the other hand, there is an uncanny silence about the decision taken on women and climate change issues. A totally different picture emerges on this core issue, may be not considered by the media as well as country delegations and their leaders worthy of attention.

Some NGOs observed that while the media was flashing the agreement on the “compensation” fund as “Breaking News”, for them the total indifference to the relevance of gender and climate change was “Heartbreaking News”.

EARTH SUMMIT INITIATED CLIMATE ACTION:

The international political response to climate change began with the 1992 adoption of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It sets out the basic legal framework and principles for international climate change cooperation.

The Convention, which entered into force on 21 March 1994, has 198 parties. To boost the effectiveness of the UNFCCC, the Kyoto Protocol was adopted in December 1997. In December 2015, parties adopted the much-highlighted Paris Agreement.

The first Conference of the Parties of UNFCCC (COP1) took place in Berlin in 1995.

GENDER ACTION PLAN:

At COP25 in 2019 in Madrid, Parties agreed a 5-year enhanced Lima Work Programme on Gender and its Gender Action Plan (GAP). In 2014 the COP20 in Lima established the first Lima Work Programme on Gender (LWPG) to advance gender balance and integrate gender considerations into the work of Parties and the UNFCCC secretariat in implementing the Convention and the Paris Agreement so as to achieve gender responsive climate policy and action. COP22 in Marrakech decided on a three-year extension of the LWPG, with a review at COP25, and the first GAP under the UNFCCC was established at COP23 in 2017 in Bonn.

Gender inequality coupled with the climate crisis is one of the greatest challenges of our time. It poses threats to ways of life, livelihoods, health, safety and security for women and girls around the world.

CLIMATE CRISIS IS NOT GENDER NEUTRAL:

Women are disproportionately impacted by climate change but are also left out of decision-making. They are overwhelmingly displaced by climate disasters and are over 14 times more likely to be killed by climate-linked disasters, according to the UN Human Rights Commission. In spite of their vulnerability to climate insecurities, women are active agents and effective promoters of climate adaptation and mitigation.

In a recently published book, ‘Climate Hazards, Disasters and Gender Ramifications’, Catarina Kinnvall and Helle Rydstrom examine the gendered politics of disaster and climate change and argue that gender hierarchies, patriarchal structures and masculinity are closely related to female vulnerability to climate disaster.

The climate crisis is not “gender neutral”. Women and girls experience the greatest impacts of climate change, which amplifies existing gender inequalities and poses unique threats to their livelihoods, health, and safety.

CLIMATE CHANGE AS THREAT MULTIPLIER FOR WOMEN:

Climate change is a “threat multiplier”, meaning it escalates social, political, and economic tensions in fragile and conflict-affected settings. As climate change drives conflict across the world, women and girls face increased vulnerabilities to all forms of gender-based violence, including conflict-related sexual violence, human trafficking, child marriage, and other forms of violence.

In March this year, the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) considered for the first time questions of gender equality and climate change. It recognized that in view of the existential threat posed by climate change, the world needs not only global solidarity, but also requires concrete, transformative climate action, with women’s and girls’ involvement at its heart.

UN WOMEN ASSERTS GENDER EQUALITY CENTRAL TO CLIMATE ACTION:

In her remarks at the Conference, UN Women Executive Director Sima Bahous asserted that “UN Women is here at COP27 to challenge the world to focus on gender-equality as central to climate action and to offer concrete solutions.” She highlighted pointedly that “Climate change and gender inequality are interwoven challenges. We will not meet the 1.5 degrees Celsius goal, or any other goal, without gender equality and the full contribution of women and girls.”

Ms. Bahous rightly underscored at COP27 that “Eighty per cent of all people displaced by climate emergencies are women and girls. The impacts of the climate crisis have a distinctly female face.”

COP27 UNDERPERFORMS FOR GENDER:

But this articulated and substantive core of the issues in UNFCCC and COP did not get the needed attention. There was a basically housekeeping decision titled “Intermediate review of the implementation of the gender action plan” with many paragraphs beginning with “Notes with appreciation”, “Also notes with appreciation”, “Welcomes”, “Encourages”. The decision reads as if Parties are more beholden to the UNFCCC secretariat than to women and girls of the world.

COP27 took a so-called “cover decision” during extended period on 20 November on the “intermediate midterm review of the GAP” underscoring the need to promote efforts towards gender balance and improve inclusivity in the UNFCCC process by inviting future COP Presidencies to nominate women as UN High-Level Champions for Climate Action (embarrassingly, both the current Champions are men nominated by COPs 26 & 27 Presidents); and requesting Parties to promote greater gender balance in national delegations, as well as the Secretariat, relevant presiding officers, and event organizers to promote gender-balanced events.

It also encourages parties and relevant public and private entities to strengthen the gender responsiveness of climate finance. The decision also requests the Secretariat to support the attendance of national gender and climate change focal points at relevant mandated UNFCCC meetings.

The decision ends with the paragraph 22 which says that “Requests that the actions of the secretariat called for in this decision be undertaken subject to the availability of financial resources”. What an awful paragraph to be included in the decision on the implementation of the Gender Action Plan (GAP). Some participants quipped that the paragraph was reflecting the ubiquitous gender GAP at every aspect of human activity.

The cover decision on gender at COP27 showed starkly that since the GAP was adopted at COP23 in 2017, nothing much has progressed in terms of gender balance, inclusivity, and representation in the climate change context.

The omnibus cover decision titled “Sharm el-Sheikh Implementation Plan” encouraged “Parties to increase the full, meaningful and equal participation of women in climate action and to ensure gender-responsive implementation… including by fully implementing the Lima Work Programme on Gender and its Gender Action Plan …” It also invited “Parties to provide support to developing countries for undertaking gender-related action and implementing the Gender Action Plan.”

If the record of COPs is considered on gender and climate issues, there is no scope, no hope for optimism. To make this contention plausible and widely accepted, this opinion-piece quotes extensively the civil society leaders whose organizations have credibility, expertise, and experience.

MEN & GENDER ADVOCATES OUTRAGED:

The Women and Gender Constituency (WGC), the platform for the civil society working to ensure women’s rights and gender justice within the UNFCCC framework, has been one of the most vocal entities on the decisions of COP27.

In a press release after its conclusion on 20 November 2022, the WGC said that “As feminists and women’s rights advocates strategized daily to advocate for gender-just and human rights-based climate action, negotiators once again ignored the urgency of our current climate crisis.”

The WGC is a coalition of NGOs established in 2009 and is recognized as official observer by the UNFCCC Secretariat in 2011. It is one of the nine stakeholder groups of the UNFCCC, consisting currently of 33 women’s and environmental civil society organizations and a network of more than 600 individuals and feminist organizations or movements.

The WGC asserts that “Together we ensure that women’s voices are heard, and we demand the full realization of their rights and priorities throughout all UNFCCC processes and Agenda 2030.”

Calling COP27 outcome as failed talks, the civil society activists for gender and climate change, expressed their disappointment in strong terms about the exclusive negotiations, saying that “We condemn the fact that negotiators played politicking and wordsmithing at the cost of substance and action to deliver climate justice. “

“COP27 gave us crumbs, with some concessions here and there. But these come at a very high cost of sacrificing the healing of the planet with no real carbon emissions reduction from historical and current emitters. This is unacceptable!” said Tetet Lauron of Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, Philippines in a public statement.

As COP27 was the platform for the scheduled mid-term review of the UNFCCC Gender Action Plan, the WGC left COP27 “deeply disappointed with the process and outcome.”

Marisa Hutchinson of the International Women’s Rights Action Watch (IWRAW) Asia Pacific, Malaysia articulated this publicly by saying that “The WGC recognizes an eleventh hour decision under the Gender Action Plan but we remain deeply frustrated with the total lack of substantive review that occurred here and in the lead up to COP.

Gender experts and women’s rights advocates were left out of the rooms while Parties tinkered at the edges of weak and vague text that failed to advance critical issues at this intersection, nor deliver adequate funding. We demand that the social protection of women and girls in all their diversity be at the forefront of the gender and climate change negotiations of the UNFCCC.”

Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury is former Under-Secretary-General and High Representative of the United Nations, former Ambassador of Bangladesh to the UN and former President of the Security Council.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Excerpt:

Part One of Three

At the 17th Internet Governance Forum (GF) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, which concluded December 2. Credit: Daniel Getachew/UN ECA

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Dec 12 2022 (IPS)

The digital divide – between the world’s rich and poor nations —remains staggeringly wide.

For over 2.7 billion people, many of them living in developing and least developed countries (LDCs), meaningful connectivity remains elusive, according to a UN report released during the 17th Internet Governance Forum in Addis Ababa, last month.

“Bridging the gap will be a catalyst for advancing an open, free, secure and inclusive Internet, and achieving the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) “

Africa is one of the regions which is the least connected, with 60 per cent of the population offline, due to a combination of lack of access, affordability and skills training.

Africa’s burgeoning youth population, however, holds the key to transforming the region’s digital future. There is immense potential in empowering youth to thrive in a digital economy and leapfrogging technologies, says the UN.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres says. “With the right policies in place, digital technology can give an unprecedented boost to sustainable development, particularly for the poorest countries”.

This calls for more connectivity; and less digital fragmentation. More bridges across digital divides; and fewer barriers. Greater autonomy for ordinary people; less abuse and disinformation, he declared.

While COVID-19 accelerated digital transformation in some sectors like health and education, it also exacerbated various forms of digital inequality, running deep along social and economic lines, says the UN report.

Globally, more men use the Internet (at 62 per cent compared with 57 per cent of women). And in nearly all countries where data are available, rates of Internet use are higher for those with more education.

Besides the digital divide– between the world’s “haves and have-nots”– there is also a marked increase in “gender divide”. In Africa, only 21 % of women have access to the Internet. The gender divide starts early as Internet use is four times greater for boys than for girls.

Emma Gibson, the Campaign Lead, Universal Digital Rights, for Equality Now, told IPS challenges in our digital society, including unequal access to digital technology and platforms, online gender-based and sexual violence, internet shutdowns, and AI and algorithmic biases, profoundly affected those with the least power and privilege.

“Women, children, and people in other groups facing discrimination are all disproportionately impacted”, she said.

“Widespread patriarchy and misogyny found in the physical world are being replicated, exacerbated, and facilitated in the digital realm, with violence against women and children perpetrated online on a huge scale”.

Offenders are rarely held to account, and this is unsurprising considering that there is currently no universal standard for ending online sexual exploitation and abuse.

“From the explosion in online violence towards women and girls to the threats posed by internet shutdowns, it is clear that there is an urgent need to bring in a new global agreement to protect our human rights in the digital world”.

“All of us have a right to safety, freedom, and dignity in the digital space, and the Internet needs to work in our interests, not against them”, declared Gibson.

The increase in Internet use has also paved the way for the proliferation of its dark side, with the rampant spread of misinformation, disinformation and hate speech, the regular occurrence of data breaches, and an increase in cybercrimes, according to the UN.

“Access Now and the #KeepItOn coalition documented 182 Internet shutdowns in 34 countries in 2021, an increase from 159 shutdowns recorded in 29 countries in 2020, demonstrating the power governments have in controlling information in the digital space.”

The theme of Addis Ababa Forum, “Resilient Internet for a Shared Sustainable and Common Future”, called for collective actions and a shared responsibility to connect all people and safeguard human rights; avoid Internet fragmentation; govern data and protect privacy; enable safety, security and accountability; and address advanced digital technologies.

“The Internet is the platform that will accelerate progress towards the SDGs. Our collective task is to unleash the power and potential of a resilient Internet for our shared sustainable and common future,” said Li Junhua, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, during the Internet Governance Forum.

Gibson of Equality Now said in developing solutions, it is important to acknowledge the continuum of injustices, power imbalances, and gendered violence that predate technology and which manifest and multiply online.

The root causes of these need to be addressed when developing and implementing policies to ensure universal, secure, and safe access for all.

“A human-centered and resilient digital future not only includes ensuring affordable access but meaningful and secure access to digital technologies.”

“We need a universal approach to defining, upholding, and advancing digital rights so that everyone has universal equality of safety, freedom, and dignity in our digital future,” she noted.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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ECW Director Yasmine Sherif Statement on Human Rights Day

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Dec 10 2022 (IPS-Partners)

As we commemorate Human Rights Day, let us recall the opening preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948: “Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world… “

Yasmine Sherif

I dare to categorically state that the very first step to achieve this aspiration is to empower every child and adolescent to access an inclusive quality education. We have a special responsibility to do so for the 222 million children and youth already left furthest behind in armed conflicts, forced displacement and climate-induced disasters. In failing to provide them with access to an education, we are failing to empower them to claim, exercise, promote and protect human rights – both for themselves and for others, for their nations and for our world.

Our investment in the education and #222MillionDreams of these crisis-affected children and youth is our investment in human rights and the inextricably linked Sustainable Development Goals. Education is our investment in human dignity, freedom, justice and peace.

With today marking the kick off of a year-long celebration of the 75th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, we must hold true to the imperatives enshrined in the Declaration and the tenant that “Everyone has the right to an education,” and that “education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.”

As the United Nations global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises, it is Education Cannot Wait’s firm conviction that education is essential in achieving, protecting and promoting universal human rights.

Join us in ensuring the inherent human right to a safe, inclusive, quality education at next year’s ECW High-Level Financing Conference taking place in Geneva on 16-17 February 2023. This ground-breaking conference – hosted by ECW and Switzerland, and co-convened with Colombia, Germany, Niger, Norway and South Sudan – offers world leaders the chance to recognize the inherent dignity and inalienable rights of all members of the human family as the foundation of dignity, freedom, justice and peace in the world as put forth in 1948 with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Today 222 million children and adolescents are enduring armed conflicts, climate disasters and forced displacement. In the 21st Century, we urge governments, private sector, foundations and high-net-worth individuals to empower them with an education to experience and protect their human rights. They deserve no less.

 

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Excerpt:

ECW Director Yasmine Sherif Statement on Human Rights Day

Emilio Godoy, Inter Press Service (IPS) correspondent in Mexico and a specialist in environmental and climate issues, won the prestigious award in that area given by the United Nations Correspondents Association. He is pictured here during his work in the field. CREDIT: IPS

By IPS Correspondent
UNITED NATIONS, Dec 9 2022 (IPS)

Inter Press Service (IPS) correspondent in Mexico Emilio Godoy has won the prestigious Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation Award for coverage of climate change, biodiversity and water, awarded by the United Nations Correspondents Association (UNCA), receiving a gold medal.

UNCA stressed that Godoy “has covered the ramifications of the climate crisis in Mexico while holding the government accountable, and reported on critical mangrove restoration projects carried out without state support, insufficient measures in the fight against methane and a dangerous focus on liquefied gas.”

Among Emilio’s many journalistic reports, UNCA selected for the award first and foremost the successful story of mangrove conservation and restoration led by the coastal community of San Crisanto, in the southeastern Mexican state of Yucatan.

Along with that story, it highlighted another on the contrast between the Mexican government’s focus on extracting gas and using fossil fuels, leaving aside its commitment to an energy transition to decarbonize domestic consumption.

Emilio said that “I am deeply honored by this award” and expressed special gratitude to his family “and also to the media who have supported my sometimes wild ideas.”

“But above all, this award is for the local communities, like San Crisanto, who protect ecosystems, because their livelihoods depend on them; it also goes to environmental defenders, who are at great risk around the world, and to my fellow journalists in Mexico, who suffer threats and harassment,” he said.

“I say it loud and clear: Stop destroying the planet! No more violence against journalists in Mexico!” he added during his speech at the UNCA awards ceremony on Friday Dec. 9 at U.N. headquarters in New York.

The IPS Spanish language service issued a statement noting that “the award given to Emilio is a source of pride for IPS, because he is a highly committed and diligent journalist regarding the multiple aspects and consequences of the climate crisis, and an excellent researcher of the impacts it has on people.”

The award “also testifies to the importance of climate change in the production of IPS content, through its valuable and sensitized group of journalists,” the statement added.

“As an international news organization, IPS provides very valuable and innovative coverage of the climate emergency, from the perspective of the developing South and its societies, bringing this crucial issue to a very diverse readership,” it said.

Born in Guatemala and based in Mexico since 2002, Godoy has been an investigative journalist and correspondent for IPS since 2007. He writes mainly on the climate crisis, environment, human rights and sustainable development, from the perspective of the developing South, and with its people and communities as the main actors.

Dedicated to his profession since 1996, he has worked with media in Mexico, Central America, the United States, Belgium and Spain, and his articles have been cited in books and specialized magazines.

In 2012 he won the Journalism Prize for Green Economy and Sustainable Development and in 2017 the Seventh Annual Energy Journalism Feature Reporting Award.

This year, UNCA also rewarded the Prince Albert II Award, with silver and bronze medals, respectively, to Kourosh Ziabari of Asia Times, for his work on the water crisis in Iran, and Samaan Lateef of the German broadcaster Deutsche Welle, for his reports on the climate crisis in India and Pakistan.

Another UNCA distinction, the Elizabeth Neuffer Memorial Prize, which honors a journalist for The Boston Globe who died on assignment in Iraq, was presented with a gold medal to Francesco Semprini, correspondent for the Italian daily La Stampa, for his coverage of the war in Ukraine following the invasion by Russian forces.

The silver medal went to Michelle Nichols of Reuters for her breaking news on developments within the UN, and the bronze medal to freelance journalist Stéphanie Fillion for her coverage of Germany’s efforts to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic.

UNCA, made up of 200 correspondents who cover the UN, honored U.S. actress Kate Hudson, Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations World Food Program, as its guest of honor at the award ceremony.

A dog trained under Africa Wildlife Foundation's Canines for Conservation programme looks content with its handlers. Sniffer and tracker dogs deployed in six African countries have contributed to the arrests of over 500 suspects in the long-running fight against poachers and traffickers. Credit: Paul Joynson-Hicks

By Guy Dinmore
London, Dec 9 2022 (IPS)

Elephant populations are starting to recover in parts of Africa as law enforcement agencies and local communities turn the tide in their long-running battle against wildlife poachers and traffickers.

But criminal gangs are constantly shifting tactics and exploiting other species, while the greatest threat now is posed by the severe drought devastating swathes of East Africa, displacing hundreds of thousands of people, threatening famine in Somalia, and killing off wildlife and livestock.

“Poaching of big game is going down in most countries,” says Didi Wamukoya, senior manager of Wildlife Law Enforcement at African Wildlife Foundation (AWF), noting that poaching in Kenya and Tanzania of large iconic species for the international wildlife trade is now very rare. Elephant population numbers in those two countries are now increasing. It is a particularly dramatic turnaround for Tanzania, which lost some 60 percent of its elephants within a decade.

Elephant population statistics. Credit: AWF

Wamukoya, who heads AWF’s capacity training of law enforcement agencies to prosecute cases of wildlife trafficking, warns that criminals adapt. While elephants are faring better – also in part because major markets such as China have banned domestic trade in ivory — gangs trafficking to Asia are switching to other species, such as lions for their body parts, pangolins, and abalone.

Pangolins, which have been identified as a potential source of coronaviruses, are the most trafficked wild mammals in the world.

Combating cybercrime and enhancing the use of digital evidence in courts have become a key elements of AWF’s work as criminals adapted to Covid-19 lockdowns. “Criminals live in society and are part of us, and they moved online too,” Wamukoya told IPS in an interview, referring to social media platforms like Facebook used to market animals and wildlife products.

Much illegal wildlife trade – estimated by international agencies to be worth over $20 billion a year globally – has moved online, but the actual poaching and transporting of smuggled animals and products across borders is the target of AWF’s Canines for Conservation Programme, headed by Will Powell in Arusha, Tanzania.

Powell and his team train sniffer and tracker dogs as well as their handlers selected from ranger forces across Africa, including most recently Ethiopia.

“We are having to raise standards of our operations with dogs at airports as smugglers try to adapt and hide stuff in coffee, condoms, screened by tinfoil. First, rhino horn and ivory were the main target but now pangolin scales are the biggest thing, so dogs are trained on this,” he tells IPS.

Trafficking in lion bones and teeth for Asian ‘medicine’ has also gone up as criminals switch from tigers. “We have to be sure dogs are up to date,” he says.

Powell previously trained dogs to sniff out 32 kinds of explosives in the Balkans and says over 90 percent of dogs can refind a smell after a year without exposure to it. A new smell can be introduced with just hours of training.

“Ivory is a range of smells from freshly killed to antique pieces. Dogs are amazing at how they figure it out, for example, by not responding to cow horn but picking out tortoises,” he says.

A sniffer dog trained by AWF works in a Kenya airport. They are trained in wide ranges of smells and can learn to detect a new one within hours as traffickers constantly change their smuggling methods. Credit: Paul Joynson-Hicks

AWF canine teams currently work in Botswana, Cameroon, Kenya,

Mozambique, Tanzania, and Uganda. All staff are local nationals. Since 2020 teams operating in Manyara Ranch and Serengeti National Park in Tanzania have made over 100 finds, resulting in multiple arrests.

No elephants in the Serengeti have been lost to the international wildlife trade since the canine teams have been in place.

AWF says that dog units across the six countries have uncovered over 440 caches that led to the arrest of over 500 suspects. Finds have included over 4.6 tonnes of ivory, 22kg of rhino horns, over 220 lion claws, 111 hippo teeth. Seven live pangolins were recovered, and over 4.5 tonnes of pangolin scales.

Dogs and their handlers are also impacting corruption among officials and law enforcement agencies.

“Dogs are an incorruptible tool,” explains Wamukoya. Dealing with corruption is part of training for rangers and handlers. The transparency of their work and with handlers trained to send photos of seizures high up to authorities, corruption is made more difficult.

“Corruption is not zero but we are seeing light at the end of the tunnel,” she says.

Tanzania has been known as the world’s elephant killing fields, but a crackdown on poachers and traffickers in recent years has halted a horrendous decline in elephant numbers. On December 2, a Tanzanian high court sentenced to death 11 people for the murder of Wayne Lotter, a well-known South African conservationist who was shot in a taxi in Dar es Salaam in August 2017. The sentences are likely to be commuted to long jail terms.

Compiling accurate estimates of Africa-wide populations of various species, including big beasts such as elephants, is widely recognised as extremely difficult. So is the gathering of statistics on poaching and seizures of trafficked animals. The 2020 World Wildlife Crime Report by the UNODC attempts to unpick and track the trends since its 2016 edition, noting that lockdown measures taken by governments during the Covid pandemic forced organised criminal groups to “adapt and quickly change their dynamics”, possibly resulting in “illicit markets going even deeper underground, additional risks for corruption and shifts in market and transportation methodologies in the longer term”.

It estimates some 157,000 elephants were poached between 2010 and 2018, an average of about 17,000 elephants per year. Data suggests a declining trend in poaching since 2011 but rising again slightly in 2017 and 2018. While elephant numbers are growing in Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya, there is a worrying decline in ‘critically endangered’ forest elephants in Central and West Africa because of loss of habitat and poaching.

The UNODC said a “trafficking trend of note” was more mixed seizures containing both ivory and pangolin scales together, singling out a container coming from the Democratic Republic of Congo on its way to Vietnam in July 2019, found to hold nearly 12 tonnes of pangolin scales and almost nine tonnes of ivory. The consignment was declared as timber.

“It is possible that ivory traffickers, facing declining demand, are taking advantage of their established networks to move a commodity for which demand is growing: pangolin scales,” the report said.

Save the Rhino International, a conservation charity, says poaching numbers have decreased across Africa since the peak of 1,349 in 2015, but still at least one rhino is killed every day. South Africa holds the majority of the world’s rhinos and has been hardest hit by poachers.

A consignment of illegally trafficked pangolin scales and elephant ivory seized in Kenya. Pangolins are the most trafficked wildlife mammal in the world. Dogs trained by AWF have sniffed out a total of 4.5 tonnes of pangolin scales in six countries. Poaching of elephants and rhinos in Kenya is now rare as the government, local communities, and NGOs step up efforts to stop wildlife trade. Credit AWF

These are hard-fought gains against wildlife traffickers that still need to be reinforced through support and training of law enforcement agencies, greater participation of local communities in conserving wild areas and wildlife, and reforms of legal systems.  Support from governments outside Africa, particularly in Asia, is vital to tackle shifting markets and trading routes.

But now, the most devastating and immediate threat in East Africa is the worst drought in 40 years. Four consecutive seasons of drought over the past two years have taken a dramatic toll on people, livestock, and wildlife.

In early November, the Kenya Wildlife Service reported the deaths of 205 elephants, over 500 wildebeest, 381 common zebras, 49 endangered Grevy’s zebras, and 12 giraffes within nine months. Rangers are removing tusks from dead elephants to stop poachers taking them.

“It is a tragedy despite all our efforts,” says Wamukoya. “Wildlife is not dying for poaching but it is drought and affecting the human population. Pastoral cattle communities no longer have pasture or food. Livestock are dying.”

IFAW, a global non-profit that helps people and animals thrive together, quoted Evan Mkala, program manager for Kenya’s Amboseli region, as saying he has never seen anything so devastating.  “You can smell the rotting carcasses all around the area.” He says poaching is back on the rise as people lacking food security are desperate for money to buy water and hay for their cattle.

The Horn of Africa is described by the UN World Food Programme as “a region at the intersection of some of the worst impacts of climate change, recurring humanitarian crises and insecurity”.

It says over 22 million people face a severe hunger crisis in a swathe of territory covering parts of Somalia, Ethiopia, Djibouti, northern Kenya, and South Sudan. Over one million people have been displaced by drought; seven million livestock have died. A poor start to the October-December rains has initiated a fifth consecutive season of drought.

“This is the worst drought, the driest it’s ever been in 40 years. So, we are entering a whole new phase in climate change,” said Michael Dunford, WFP regional director for East Africa. “Unfortunately, we have not yet seen the worst of this crisis. If you think 2022 is bad, beware of what is coming in 2023. This means that we need to continue to engage. We cannot give up on the needs of the population in the Horn.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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COP15 negotiations aim to conserve at least 30 percent of the world’s diversity by 2030. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS

By Stella Paul
Montreal, Dec 9 2022 (IPS)

The long-awaited 15th Convention of United Nations Biological Diversity (CBD COP15) finally started this week in Montreal, Canada. After four years of intense negotiations and delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, nations have gathered again for the final round of talks before adopting a new global treaty – the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).

The GBF aims to conserve at least 30 percent of the world’s biodiversity by 2030. But even as the negotiations intensify, the job appears extremely tough, with many bottlenecks that make a clear outcome highly unlikely.

CBD COPs: A String of Failures

The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) was first adopted in 1992 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, alongside the Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the UN Convention to Combat Desertification. There are 196 member nations with the glaring exclusion of the United States. In 2010, at the CBD COP10 in Nagoya, Japan, countries adopted a set of 20 targets called the Aichi Biodiversity Targets. These targets were expected to stop the loss of biodiversity by 2020. But by 2020, various assessments made it clear that none of these targets had been met. Now more ambitious and emergency measures are needed.

The failure of the world to achieve the Aichi Targets makes it crucial that the world adopts a new treaty, and the GBF has more ambitious targets with adequate financial support to implement them. It should support groups already leading action on the ground, especially Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (IPLC), and ensure more accountability for regularly monitoring the collective progress. This is what makes Montreal COP so crucial, especially when it’s already 2022, and the world now has only eight years left (out of the ten allotted years) to achieve the targets.

Expectations vs Reality

At the last Working Group meeting of the CBD COP held in Nairobi, Kenya, in June this year, IPS reported that the progress was far lower than expected. To put it into perspective, only two of the 21 targets of the GBF had clean text after the Nairobi meeting. The rest of the texts remained within brackets – 1800 in total, indicating the enormous amount of negotiation left to reach an agreement on the draft agreement.

On December 8, the second day of the negotiations, David Ainsworth – head of CBD Communications, said that in addition to the 1800, there were another 900 newly-added brackets. To ease the uphill task of cleaning this text through different stages of negotiations, a slew of contact groups had been formed, with each group being responsible for working on one of the most contentious issues. Little details were shared about these Contact Groups except that each would hold several rounds of negotiations with the parties – presumably those who raised the brackets – and find a headway. These meetings are closed to media and non-parties, including NGOs and other participants.

However, various civil society organizations, including the leaders of the IPLC, have criticized the groups’ formation because they are barred from participating.

“With the Working Group meetings, we could at least know what is going on. But the contact groups are having closed-door meetings; we don’t even have permission to enter these rooms,” said Jennifer Corpuz, an indigenous leader and a prominent voice for indigenous rights from International Indigenous Forum on Biodiversity.

“It was always difficult for us Indigenous peoples to make our voice heard before, but now it’s impossible for us to be included in the discussion and know what is going on.”

The Missing Enthusiasm 

On Tuesday, at the opening ceremony of COP15, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said, “Every leader must tell their negotiator to bring this ambition (conserving 30%of the world’s land and water) to their table as we reach a final framework over the next two weeks.”

Trudeau also announced an additional 350 million dollars for international biodiversity funding by Canada. The announcement and the speech were both received with thunderous applause.

However, three days since then, the mood has quickly changed, with little visible progress. “We see the delegates’ mood going down, together with their energy and hopes that this can have any great outcomes. And we hear the frustration: for many delegates, what took them to pursue such careers was, in essence, a love for the environment, for our peoples, and for the planet. We must dig in to find that motivation that helped many of us start this journey 10, 20, and for many over 30 years ago in Rio,” says Oscar Soria, director of Avaaz, a global advocacy group keeping a keen eye on the developments within COP15.

The ‘Paris Moment’ That May Never Come

Adoption of the GBF and achieving clear, strong results at COP15 was touted by many as the biodiversity’s ‘Paris moment’ – a reference to reaching a crucial global consensus on the conservation of the earth’s biodiversity and scripting a crucial diplomatic victory as it was done in the climate change COP 15 in Paris under the leadership of UNFCCC.

However, at the moment, the chances of this ‘Paris moment’ seem quite bleak. Only two of the 21 targets are for adoption. There are several bottlenecks in the ongoing negotiations, including Digital Sequencing Information (DSI), Access and Benefit Sharing and Resource Mobilization.

In the resource mobilization sector, pledges have overshadowed actual contributions, just as in the recently concluded COP27. For example, a paltry 16 billion US dollars of the expected 700 billion US dollars per year has been contributed so far.

In addition, donors are introducing different “false solutions” that are more populist than effective. These include carbon credits, carbon removals, net zero, net gain or loss, and Nature-positive or Nature-based Solutions (NbS), according to Simone Lovera, Policy Director of the Global Forest Coalition (GFC).

“Alignment of these financial flows with the new global biodiversity framework must be at the heart of the negotiations if it is to have any chance of succeeding. Commercializing biodiversity, making it market-dependent, or allowing offsetting are pathways to failure,” Lovera says.

Others allege that financial institutions dealing with implementation are still stuck in old models and have yet to align their practices with sustainable development. Most financial corporations still fund projects that don’t align with sustainability goals, while debt servicing suffocates the budgets of many developing countries. Continuation of these practices would also destroy that ‘Paris moment’ in Montreal, even if multilateral negotiations here are successful.

The Path Ahead

Clearly, creating a ‘Paris moment’ at COP15 will require a full-scale course correction and far greater leadership and urgency than we have seen from the UN and governments to date. The CBD held emergency working group meetings immediately before COP15, but the discussions failed to achieve significant progress, leaving a successful and ambitious outcome of COP15 in jeopardy.

In a statement yesterday, Campaign for Nature – a global group that focuses on advocacy, communications, and alliance-building effort to help achieve CBD’s 30×30 goal (which calls for 30% conservation of the earth’s land and sea in protected and other area-based conservation measures.)

It laid out the steps that are needed to get past the bottleneck on finance: “The agreement must contain a package which should include a commitment by all governments to increase domestic spending on biodiversity and end subsidies that are harmful to nature, redirecting these funds to protecting and restoring nature; an increase of at least 60 billion USD in new public international biodiversity finance in the form of grants as well as directly to Indigenous Peoples and local communities.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Kiribati is located in the central Pacific Ocean. Credit: UNDP/Azza Aishath

By Enric Sala
WASHINGTON DC, Dec 9 2022 (IPS)

Delegates from more than 190 countries are donning thick coats and winter boots to attend the long-delayed UN biodiversity summit in Montreal, Canada—the land of caribou, beluga whales and wolverines.

They are gathering there to iron out the final details of a global deal for nature that seeks to curtail the extinction of one million species and the destruction of the ecosystems they help create.

I’ll join the delegates next week. As I trudge through the cold to speak with them about the urgent need to protect nature, I’ll be thinking of the distant southern Line Islands, a remote archipelago in the Republic of Kiribati, a nation known for its desperate battle against rising ocean levels.

Their islands could be among the first to disappear if we don’t phase off greenhouse gas emissions. But what is less known is that the southern Line Islands provide the strongest evidence that nature protection can foster ocean resilience to global warming.

In 2009, a team of scientists and I first surveyed the marine ecosystems surrounding the uninhabited southern Line Islands. What we saw was like a world from centuries ago. Fish abundance was off the charts; on every dive, we saw abundant large predators, such as sharks—an uncommon sight for even a seasoned diver. Thriving, living corals covered up to 90 percent of the ocean floor.

We thought the pristine and untouched corals were saved forever in 2015, when the government of Kiribati protected 12 nautical miles around the islands from fishing and other damaging activities in what is now the Southern Line Islands Marine Protected Area.

But then disaster struck. The same year, warmer-than-usual ocean temperatures killed half of the corals in the Southern Line Islands. The news discouraged many. If the most pristine reefs were to succumb so rapidly, then all hope is lost. Would they be able to recover?

To answer that question, we returned to the islands five years after the coral died off. I was terrified before the first dive—unsure if we’d see dead or recovering corals. But when I jumped in the water, I could not believe what I saw.

Amid massive schools of fish, the corals were back to their former richness – they had recovered completely. If we hadn’t known that half of the corals had recently died, I would have thought that nothing had changed since my first visit. They recovered faster than ever witnessed before, with millions of new coral colonies per square mile taking over the space left by dead corals.

This miracle was only possible because the reefs were fully protected from fishing. As a result, the fish biomass was enormous. Large parrotfish and schools of hundreds of surgeon fishes kept the reef healthy and seaweed-free by grazing and browsing continuously on the dead coral skeletons. Without seaweed smothering the dead corals, new corals could grow and restore the reef.

Our discovery on this expedition clearly showed that, when granted full protection from fishing and other extractive activities, marine ecosystems can bounce back. Strong protection yields resilience and replenishes our overfished ocean. We have seen this again and again, in Mexico, Colombia and the United States.

The Biden administration has pledged to protect more of the ocean under its jurisdiction, and even created a new Special Envoy for Biodiversity, currently held by Monica Medina. But there is more that countries around the world can do at a global and national level.

That is why I am carrying a strong message to Montreal: we must protect at least 30% of the Earth’s land and ocean by 2030, and we must hurry. Protecting a third of the planet is critical for biodiversity and all the benefits we obtain from it, such as oxygen, clean air and water, and food.

But it is also essential for mitigating climate change. Protecting vital areas in the ocean – and the land – will turn the tide against biodiversity loss and buy us time as the world phases out fossil fuels and replaces them with clean energy sources.

Ocean health hangs in the balance at COP15 in Montreal. But we’re already running out of time, with the summit delayed two years due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Right now, less than 8% of the ocean is under any kind of protection, and only 3% is highly protected like in the southern Line Islands.

We have eight years to quadruple all ocean protections ever achieved in human history. Some countries have announced new ocean protections, but we need a global action plan that targets the top priorities for conservation of the ocean—for the sake of biodiversity, food and climate.

This means that delegates must roll up their sleeves and do the hard work of ironing out a strong global agreement that doesn’t water down protection goals. There is no more time for podium pledges and empty speeches.

The only acceptable outcome of COP15 is a strong nature agreement including a serious commitment to protect at least 30% of our ocean by 2030.

Enric Sala is the National Geographic Explorer in Residence and the founder of National Geographic Pristine Seas. You can listen to an extended conversation about the Southern Line Islands expedition with Sala on the latest episode of the Overheard at National Geographic podcast.

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United Kingdom Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office Issues Position Paper Addressing the Climate, Environment, and Biodiversity Crises In and Through Girls’ Education.
 
The Position Paper calls for continued support to ‘strengthen Education Cannot Wait’s role in ensuring continuity of education for all in the face of increasing extreme weather events and emergencies.’

By External Source
LONDON, Dec 8 2022 (IPS-Partners)

The United Kingdom Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) issued a ground-breaking Position Paper today that draws clear linkages between the climate crisis and global education crisis.

The Position Paper calls for continued support to “strengthen Education Cannot Wait’s role in ensuring continuity of education for all in the face of increasing extreme weather events and emergencies.”

Worldwide, the climate crisis is impacting the education of 40 million children every year. Globally, 222 million vulnerable girls and boys are impacted by conflict, climate-induced disasters, forced displacement and protracted crises and are in need of urgent education support according to Education Cannot Wait, the UN global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises.

Climate-induced disasters affect children’s ability to go to or stay in school. And, even when children stay in school, climate and environmental changes – such as rising temperatures, droughts and floods – affect their ability to learn. These negative impacts on learning exacerbate cycles of poverty and inequality and drives conflict for increasingly scarce natural resources.

“Education is an assumed, but hugely undervalued, component of responses to climate change impacts, and efforts to mitigate and adapt to them. It is essential for reducing vulnerability, improving communities’ resilience and adaptive capacity, identifying innovations, and for empowering individuals to be part of the solution to climate and environmental change,” according to the Position Paper.

Climate change and girls’ education are two of the UK’s primary international development objectives, aligning closely with ECW’s focus on climate change, displacement and girls’ education.

Nevertheless, “too often climate and environmental change is viewed in isolation from education,” according to the paper. “If we want to effectively tackle these priority issues, we must better understand how they are linked and find integrated solutions.”

“Education must be put front and center of the climate agenda. By investing in girls’ education in places like Pakistan, the Horn of Africa and other countries on the frontlines of the climate crisis, we are investing in an end to hunger, and vicious cycles of displacement and violence. Education is also the single most powerful investment we can make to ensure a climate-resilient future for generations to come. As one of Education Cannot Wait’s founders and top-contributors, I am deeply grateful to the United Kingdom for the continued and bold support,” said Yasmine Sherif, Director of Education Cannot Wait.

The FCDO Position Paper calls for a paradigm shift in how education is viewed in relation to the climate crisis. Where education fosters positive cycles of improved resilience and ability to adapt to and mitigate the severe impacts of climate change.

The value of investing in girls’ education is a key component of this paradigm shift. “Girls’ education is a human right and a game changer for driving poverty reduction, and building prosperous, resilient economies and peaceful, stable societies. It has huge, undervalued, potential to contribute to tackling climate and environmental change. Girls’ secondary education has been identified as the most important socioeconomic determinant in reducing vulnerability to climate change.”

The United Kingdom is the second largest donor to Education Cannot Wait, with US$159 million in funding to date. Supported through leading civil society organizations, the Send My Friend To School Campaign is calling on the UK Government to pledge £170 million in additional funding to Education Cannot Wait.

The Education Cannot Wait High-Level Financing Conference on 16-17 February 2023 in Geneva offers a key moment for donors, the private sector and high-net-worth individuals to make substantial pledges to Education Cannot Wait, and deliver on the promises outlined in both the Paris Agreement and Sustainable Development Goals.

The Municipal Theater building, the main artistic and cultural venue in Santiago, the capital of Chile, was lit up with LED bulbs in order to show local residents the benefits of energy efficiency to reduce costs and provide bright lighting. CREDIT: Fundación Chile

By Orlando Milesi
SANTIAGO, Dec 8 2022 (IPS)

The Energy Efficiency Law began to gradually be implemented in Chile after the approval of its regulations, but more efforts and institutions are still lacking before it can produce results.

In Chile, the energy sector accounts for 74 percent of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, producing 68 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) per year. For this reason, energy efficiency is decisive in tackling climate change and saving on its costs.

The law passed in February 2021 and its regulations were issued on Sept. 13 of this year, but full implementation will still take time. The law itself states that its full application will take place “gradually”, without setting precise deadlines.

For example, the energy rating of homes and new buildings is voluntary for now and will only become mandatory in 2023. In addition, only practice will show whether the capacity will exist to oversee the sector and apply sanctions.

The aims of the law include reducing the intensity of energy use and cutting GHGs.

According to the public-private organization Fundación Chile, energy efficiency has the potential to reduce CO2 emissions by 44 percent – a decisive percentage to mitigate climate change in this long, narrow South American country of 19.5 million people.

“For the first time in Chile, we have an Energy Efficiency Law. This is a key step in joining efforts to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, since energy efficiency has the potential to reduce greenhouse gases by 35 percent,” the Foundation’s assistant manager for sustainability, Karien Volker, told IPS.

The law sets standards for transportation, industry, mining and the residential, public and commercial sectors. Land transportation accounts for an estimated 25 percent of the energy used in Chile and the 250 largest companies operating in the country consume 35 percent of the total.

Volker underscored that the law incorporates energy labeling, the implementation of an energy management system for large consumers and the development of a National Plan.

“Upon implementation of the law, a 10 percent reduction in energy intensity, a cumulative savings of 15.2 billion dollars and a reduction of 28.6 million tons of CO2 are expected by 2030,” she said.

She also argued that the law will push large companies to meet minimum energy efficiency standards, which will change the way they operate.

“New homes with energy efficiency certifications will raise the standard of construction in Chile and push builders to innovate,” said Volker.

She added that “the transportation sector will also be positively impacted by establishing efficiency and performance standards for vehicles entering Chile.”

Buildings with the new standards will consume only one third of the energy compared to the current ones.

In Chile, 53.3 percent of electricity is generated with renewable energy: hydroelectric, solar, biomass and geothermal. The remaining 46.7 percent comes from thermoelectric plants using natural gas, coal or petroleum derivatives, almost all of which are imported.

The refrigerators currently sold in Chile must have a mandatory label indicating their energy efficiency, where the highest A++ and A+ levels are labelled in green to demonstrate the savings they provide. CREDIT: Orlando Milesi/IPS

Negative track record on energy efficiency

But in the recent history of this South American country the experience of energy savings has not been a positive one. There was total clarity in the assessment of the situation and concrete suggestions of measures to advance in energy efficiency, but nothing changed, said engineer and doctor in systems thinking Alfredo del Valle, a former advisor to the United Nations and the Chilean government in these matters.

Del Valle told IPS that between 2005 and 2007 he acted as a methodologist for the Chilean Ministry of Economy’s Country Energy Efficiency Program to formulate a national policy in this field.

“With broad public, private, academic and citizen participation, we discovered almost one hundred concrete energy efficiency potentials in transportation, industry and mining, residential and commercial buildings, household appliances, and even culture,” he explained.

However, he lamented, “Chilean politicians fail to understand what politicians in the (industrialized) North immediately understood 30 years earlier: that it is essential to invest money and political will in energy efficiency, just as we invest in energy supply.”

Although a National Energy Efficiency Agency was created 12 years ago, “nothing significant is happening,” said Del Valle, current president of the Foundation for Participatory Innovation.

To illustrate, he noted that “the public budget for energy efficiency in 2020 is equivalent to just 10 million dollars compared to an investment in energy supply in the country of 4.38 billion dollars in the same year.”

According to the expert, “we need a new way of thinking and acting to be able to carry out social transformations and to be able to create our own future.”

Boric’s energy policy

The Energy Agenda 2022-2026 promoted by the leftist government of Gabriel Boric, in office since March, states that “energy efficiency is one of the most important actions for Chile to achieve the goal of carbon neutrality.”

The document establishes actions and commitments to be implemented as part of the National Energy Efficiency Plan. Published at the beginning of this year, it proposes 33 measures in the productive sectors, transportation, buildings and ordinary citizens, according to the Ministry of Energy.

“With all these measures, we expect to reduce our total energy intensity by 4.5 percent by 2026 and by 30 percent by 2050, compared to 2019,” the Agenda states.

The plan announces an acceleration of the implementation of energy management systems in large consumers to encourage a more efficient use in industry, “as mandated by the Energy Efficiency Law that will be progressively implemented.”

According to the government, by 2026, 200 companies will have implemented energy management systems.

The authorities also announced support to micro, small and medium-sized companies for efficient energy use and management and will support 2000 in self-generation and energy efficiency.

“Although as a country we have made progress in the deployment of renewable energies for electricity generation, we have yet to transfer the benefits of renewable energy sources to other areas, such as the use of heat and cold in industry,” the document states.

Cambia el Foco is the name of the program promoted by Fundación Chile that included educating students to raise awareness about the need for energy efficiency. CREDIT: Fundación Chile

Improvement in housing quality

In Chile there are more than five million homes and most of them do not have adequate thermal insulation conditions, requiring a high use of energy for heating in the southern hemisphere winter and cooling in the summer.

The hope is that by making the “energy qualification” a requirement to obtain the final approval, the municipal building permit, the quality of housing using efficient equipment or non-conventional renewable energies will improve. This will allow greater savings in heating, cooling, lighting and household hot water.

In four years, the government’s Agenda aims to thermally insulate 20,000 social housing units, install 20,000 solar photovoltaic systems in low-income neighborhoods, recondition 400 schools to make them energy efficient, expand solar power systems in rural housing, improve supply in 50 schools in low-income rural areas and develop distributed generation systems up to 500 megawatts (MW).

In recent years, the Fundación Chile, together with the government and other entities, has promoted energy efficiency plans with the widespread installation of LED lightbulbs along streets and in other public spaces. It also promoted the replacement of refrigerators over 10 years old with units using more efficient and greener technologies.

One milestone was the delivery of 230,000 LED bulbs to educational facilities, benefiting more than 200 schools and a total of 73,000 students, employees and teachers.

The initiative made it possible to install one million LED bulbs, leading to an estimated saving of 4.8 percent of national consumption.

Meanwhile, the campaign for more efficient cooling expects the market share of such refrigerators to become 95 percent A++ and A+ products, to achieve savings of 1.3 terawatt hours (TWh – equivalent to one billion watt hours).

That would mean a reduction of 3.1 million tons of CO2 by 2030.

An old refrigerator accounts for 20 percent of a household’s electricity bill and a more efficient one saves up to 55 percent.

There are currently an estimated one million refrigerators in Chile that are more than 15 years old.

Graham Lang, Education Cannot Wait Director of the High-Level Financing Conference and Chief of Education, enjoys a performance during the joint high-level mission to Ethiopia that included Anne Beathe Tvinnereim, the Minister of International Development for Norway, and Birgitte Lange, CEO of Save the Children Norway to take stock of urgent education needs. Credit: ECW

By Joyce Chimbi
Addis Ababa, Dec 8 2022 (IPS)

A silent catastrophe is unfolding in Ethiopia on the backdrop of years of inter-communal conflict and the most prolonged and severe drought in recent years. High inflation and food insecurity in the drought-ravaged country is among the worst in the world.

The risk of losing an entire generation of children is imminent as nature’s wrath and conflict stand in the way, undermining access to education, school infrastructure, and functional educational administrative systems. Girls, especially teenage girls, children with disabilities, and displaced children, are among the most at risk.

ECW is committed to supporting crisis-impacted communities in Ethiopia and beyond to reach as many vulnerable children as funds will allow. ECW’s strategic plan for 2023/2026 aims to reach 20 million children over the next four years. Credit: ECW

Graham Lang, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) Director of the High-Level Financing Conference and Chief of Education, visited Ethiopia on a joint high-level mission that included Anne Beathe Tvinnereim, the Minister of International Development for Norway, and Birgitte Lange, CEO of Save the Children Norway to take stock of urgent education needs.

“Ethiopia is facing one of the largest education crises in the world. The government estimates that over 13 million children are out of school. Of these 13 million, 3.6 million are out of school as a result of conflict and climate-related emergencies. This has increased from 3.1 million children in just a few months,” Lang told IPS.

“It is estimated that the worst drought in four decades is now impacting 1.6 million children alone, of whom over 500,000 have now dropped out of school. Additionally, there are over 430,000 refugee children, of whom close to 60 percent are out of school.”

He said the scale of the crisis is staggering and rapidly increasing. Within this context, Lang, Tvinnereim, and Lange visited schools and communities benefiting from holistic education support funded by ECW and delivered in partnership with UNICEF, Save the Children Ethiopia, and local partners in support of the Government.

Anne Beathe Tvinnereim, the Minister of International Development for Norway, said the field visit showed the positive impacts of bringing children back to school. Credit: ECW

“Education in crisis and conflict is a priority for the Norwegian government. In conflict, especially, girls drop out of school. What this field visit has shown us is that if you manage to bring children back into school, they will eventually help build the societies they live in,” said Tvinnereim.

ECW has invested $55 million in Ethiopia to date, which has reached over 275,000 children thus far, and is about to approve an additional $5 million for the drought response. The mission was an opportunity to highlight the needs, not just in Ethiopia but globally, and to further highlight the ongoing effort to get children back into school and keep them there.

The funding ECW provides through its multi-year resilience programme has supported the construction and rehabilitation of safe and protective learning environments such as schools, latrines, and canteens.

“It has also supported gender clubs. We witnessed boys and girls discussing issues such as gender-based violence and menstrual health management. Challenging deeply held norms around girl child education and empowering a new generation of girls to articulate their needs and fight for their right to education,” Lang expounded.

The high-level mission saw gender clubs and other innovative programmes in action during their visit to ECW-supported schools in Ethiopia. Credit: ECW

“The delegation also saw ‘speed schools’ – an innovative program – where through a condensed programme, over-age children can complete three years of primary education in just ten months. Thereafter, these children can re-enter the system in grade 4. A lifeline for children who have dropped out of school because of conflict-related violence and displaced or climate changes.”

The delegation also encountered climate clubs where children and adolescents were discussing the impact of climate change, a real and visible phenomenon in Ethiopia, and for the 1.6 million children forced out of school by the drought.

The provision of one school meal a day, Lang affirmed, is such a powerful factor in drawing children into schools and keeping them there. ECW is also supporting community participation, including community leaders, parents, and teachers’ engagement to encourage children to return to school and stay in school.

The impact of these ongoing efforts on affected children and host communities was visible to the delegation. For instance, Lang says enrollments in targeted schools have significantly increased, in some cases three-fold and in other cases even quadrupled.

“The main challenge we see is funding at the global level, for example, to funds such as ECW and country level through donor governments, private sector institutions, and other means. This is the critical issue,” Lang emphasized.

“Partners on the ground are working with the governments to implement activities and make desired tangible changes. They have the capacity, commitments, and ability to scale these actions up so that all children can benefit, but there is not enough financing.”

ECW is committed to supporting crisis-impacted communities in Ethiopia and beyond to reach as many vulnerable children as funds will allow. In this regard, Lang spoke about ECW’s new strategic plan for 2023/2026, which starts in January through which ECW aims to reach 20 million children over the next four years.

To do that, ECW needs at least $1.5 billion to provide safe, inclusive, quality education for 20 million children. To launch action towards raising the much-needed $1.5 billion, Education Cannot Wait’s High-Level Financing Conference will take place in Geneva on 16 and 17 February 2023.

Hosted by Switzerland and Education Cannot Wait – and co-convened by Colombia, Germany, Niger, Norway, and South Sudan – the Conference calls on government donors, private sector, foundations, and high-net-worth individuals to turn commitments into action by making substantive funding contributions to ECW to realize #222MillionDreams.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Places where Indigenous tenure is secure are where lands and waters are best protected. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

By Jennifer Tauli Corpuz and Stanley Kimaren Ole Riamit
Dec 8 2022 (IPS)

After four failed rainy seasons, the land of the Maasai has withered. The worst drought in 40 years is a slow-motion storm of devastation in the Greater Horn of Africa, ruining the livestock, the communities, the Maasai way of life. Their cattle have been their greatest source of wealth and nutrition, but with grazing lands shriveled from the dry heat and their livestock emaciated, the entire region is in peril.

In contrast, the storms that smash the Philippines bring intense rains and devastating winds. The Igorot communities on the Island of Luzon have a front-row seat for these storms, and they are hard pressed keeping their way of life intact.

We have lost and been damaged by the actions of the past. And we can see that governments negotiating this year at the UN’s talks on climate change and biodiversity failed to protect our peoples and our ecosystems from present and future loss and damage

Super-Typhoon Haiyan may have made the biggest impression, hitting south of Luzon during the UN climate change talks in 2013, but in 2018 Luzon was hit directly by Super-Typhoon Mangkhut. Three months ago, Super-Typhoon Noru hammered the same area.

As a Maasai from Kenya and an Igorot from the Philippines, we Indigenous Peoples wake up every day to realities that are a world apart. Our peoples, however, share a deep attachment to our ancestral territories and to the flora and fauna we depend on for spiritual, cultural and physical needs.

The Maasai and the Igorot, as Indigenous Peoples all over the world, also have in common a colonial history that has caused unimaginable loss to our communities and damage to ecosystems that are vital to the global battles against biodiversity loss and climate change.

We have lost and been damaged by the actions of the past. And we can see that governments negotiating this year at the UN’s talks on climate change and biodiversity failed to protect our peoples and our ecosystems from present and future loss and damage.

There was an agreement in principle that there should be a fund to compensate for losses and damages due to climate change, but no specifics or actual funding emerged. Our survival and that of our lands, our cultures, and our traditional knowledge, all of this is at risk.

In the UN negotiations, Indigenous Peoples are not just stakeholders. Instead, we are rights holders. There has been ample conversation about how the tropical forests and peatlands present both climate and biodiversity solutions. These are our lands that contain these carbon sinks and are teeming with life.

Indigenous Peoples and local communities manage half the world’s land and care for 80% of Earth’s biodiversity, primarily under customary tenure arrangements.

Looking at tropical forests in particular, our stewardship has been shown to be the most effective at keeping them intact—better than government run “protected areas” and better than management by other private interests. Places where Indigenous tenure is secure are where lands and waters are best protected.

In its most recent report on climate change this year, the UN’s scientific panel, said: “Supporting Indigenous self-determination, recognising Indigenous Peoples’ rights and supporting Indigenous knowledge-based adaptation are critical to reducing climate change risks and effective adaptation.”

Yet a 2021 study showed, however, that Indigenous communities and organizations receive less than 1% of the climate funding meant to reduce deforestation. Of the $1.7 billion pledged at COP 26 to support the tenure rights and forest guardianship of Indigenous peoples and local communities, only 7% of the funds disbursed have gone directly to organizations led by them, representing only 0.13% of all climate development aid.

There is very little money available for economic and non-economic loss and damage from the climate change induced extreme weather that tears through us. And the UN’s science panel report notes that “Climate change is impacting Indigenous Peoples’ ways of life, cultural and linguistic diversity, food security and health and well-being.”

The transformation that scientists are calling for to meet both climate and biodiversity crises requires just and effective responses, and can only be led by us. At the same time, we need assistance in coping with this extreme weather.

These crises have taken away the middle ground, that quixotic search for compromise that has inevitably delayed effective action. With limited funds available, we face a paradox. The wealth of past exploitation could help alleviate the damages that climate change has caused, or more of this money could be used for adaptation and mitigation, to reduce the worst impacts of what climate change will throw at us—now and in the future.

The urgency of funding both needs has yet to take hold, while the carbon in our lands continues to be viewed as a climate solution, a theoretical commodity to be bought and sold in markets run many thousands of miles away. Profits are made by people and entities who have no role in how we manage and protect our lands, yet very little of the proceeds—like the climate development aid—comes our way.

Ensuring and respecting land rights represents a risk reduction strategy for all of humanity, not just for the people seeking to invest in lands inhabited by the peoples who manage them best. Bringing us to the table in planning and implementing conservation and development solutions—both globally and locally—has never been more important.

We welcome those who want to work with us and provide assistance and resources as we strive to keep our lands and our community wellbeing intact. If we are to escape the worst of what climate change has in store for us, the time for grabbing land, money and power—and clinging to material wealth—has to be relegated to the past.

Instead, all parts of humanity must learn to work together and share equitably, in accordance with the principle of common but differentiated responsibility. The environmental problems of our planet threaten us all.

 

Jennifer Tauli Corpuz, from the Kankana-ey Igorot People of Mountain Province in the Philippines, and a lawyer by profession, is the Global Policy and Advocacy Lead for Nia Tero.

Stanley Kimaren ole Riamit is an Indigenous peoples’ leader from the Pastoralists Maasai Community in southern Kenya. His is the Founder-Director of Indigenous Livelihoods Enhancement Partners (ILEPA) a community based Indigenous Peoples organization based in Kenya.

 

By Sania Farooqui
NEW DELHI, India, Dec 8 2022 (IPS)

In 2019, when the President-elect of the European Union (EU) Ursula von der Leyen had presented a list for her soon-to-be European Commission, and on that list was a portfolio called “Protecting the European way of life”, a lot of noise was made questioning what that meant. “Protection” was later changed to the “Promotion” of the European Way of Life. It’s been over three years since this very controversial, much debated and widely criticised portfolio as many continue to question what uniquely is the ‘European way of life’?

Shada Islam

The European Union as of 2021 has 447.2 million inhabitants, out of which 23.7 million, that’s 5 percent of EU’s total population who are non-EU citizens and 37.5 million, almost 8.5% of all EU inhabitants were people born outside the EU.

“The European way of life, for many it’s about being christian and about being white. So anyone who doesn’t fall into those categories is seen as not belonging to Europe,” says Shada Islam, Brussels based specialist on European Union affairs.

“There are about 50 million people of colour, European of colour across the European Union, that’s a huge number of people, not just a small minority, and that means, migrants are part of that & refugees are part of that. The narrative of Europe is so out of date and out of touch with the reality of the diverse and multicultural Europe that there is today,” says Islam.

Over the years Europe has seen an increase in securitization of the migration, severe pushback and disturbing patterns of threat, intimidation, violence and humiliation at the borders leading to human rights violations, the closure of borders due to the COVID-19 pandemic, growing Islamophobia, racism and the rise of right-wing in Europe, all leading up to being very strong indicators of the continuously growing anti-immigrant sentiment.

Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine has created one of the biggest refugee crises of the modern times. Just a month into the war, more than 3.7 million Ukrainians fled to neighbouring countries seeking safety, protection and assistance – this is known to be the sixth-largest refugee outflow over the past 60- plus years. While most European countries have displayed an exceptionally generous stance on arriving refugees, unlike the 2015 refugee crisis when the EU called for detaining arriving refugees for up to 18 months.

Islam says while Europe has opened its arms, homes, schools and hospitals to millions of Ukrainian refugees, migration policies continue to remain hardened by European leaders against refugees especially from the Middle East and Africa. “It’s a sense of compassion, empathy and solidarity that we see towards refugees from Ukraine, but why can’t we show that to people fleeing wars, hunger and climate change from other parts of the world? Why are they kept in camps, why are they pushed back from Frontext, our border control. Why can’t they be welcomed with the same sense of compassion and empathy,” Islam says.

Earlier in March, in response to the Ukrainian crisis, the government of Bulgaria took the first steps to welcome Ukrainian refugees. At a time of one of the worst humanitarian catastrophe, this move by Bulgaria was most welcomed by all, however many human rights activists raised questions of discrimination and double standards when Prime Minister Kiril Petkov said, “these are not the refugees we are used to. This is not the usual refugee wave of people with an unclear past. None of the European countries are worried about them,”.

In February 2022, the refugee crisis on the Polish-Belarusian border had worsened with reports of migrants staying in a camp being forced out, pushed back by security forces with water cannons and tear gas.

According to this report in 2021 thousands of people fleeing conflicts in the Middle East and other areas tried to enter the European Union through Lithuania, Latvia and Poland from neighbouring Belarus. The situation at the borders had become critical during the winter months, with hundreds of people stranded for weeks in freezing conditions. According to Polish border guards, 977 attempts to cross the border were recorded in April 2022 and nearly 4280 since the beginning of 2022, far fewer than November 2021 when between 3000 – 4000 migrants had gathered along the border in just a few days. All at a time when the European Union had promised to accept everyone coming from Ukraine.

In Italy, life was tough for asylum seekers, as most were denied refugee status, barred from legal employment and regularly faced discrimination. In the lead-up to the recent elections, there were reports of several violent attacks against asylum seekers and migrants, including the killing of Alika Ogorchukwu, a Nigerian man living in Italy had sent shockwaves across the country and sparked a set of debates on racism.

Earlier in November, the Italian government refused to allow about 250 people to disembark from two non-governmental rescue ships docked in Catania. Human Rights organisations called out the move by the Italian government that gave the directive to the rescue ships to take them back to international waters stating it put people at risk and violated Italy’s human rights obligations.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has been quiet vocal about his anti-refugee views and stance, when he refused to take in refugees in 2018 and calling them “Muslim invaders”. His most recent comments said that countries “are no longer nations” if different races mix.

The current refugee crisis clearly highlights what the problem really is – it’s accepting the unavoidable gap between the inclusive logic of universal human rights and Europe’s prerogative to exclude those whom it believes to be outsiders. Despite international laws and obligations, or the very concept of political asylum, “Europe has displayed the arbitrariness of its borders, both internal and external”. Creating a system that others individuals based on colour, race, and religious background, it continues to reinforce the bias towards human lives.

People who flee their country of origin, flee for a reason, either due to armed conflicts, economic distress, war or political instability, and International law guarantees to each person fleeing persecution the right to request asylum in a safe country. Asylum laws differ in each European state because the EU considers immigration law a matter of national sovereignty. Except what we see being used for people fleeing and reaching out to European countries are terms like “invasion”, “flooding” and “besieging”.

Integration and inclusivity is a mind set, a long term process that requires accommodation from all sides. Refugee social integration is also in line with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 16, which includes integration into the economic, health, educational and social context. How Europe tackles its racism, discrimination and asks itself uncomfortable questions, including it’s legacy of colonialism and participation in the Atlantic Slave trade, will take it one step closer to creating a more racially diverse and inclusive Europe – which “lives up to its ideals and values”.

“Europe needs foreign labour, Europe needs the talents of all its citizens, we are going into a recession, an economic slowdown, and we need all hands on the deck. If you are going showing so much discrimination at home, you are hardly in a position as the EU to stand on the global stage and talk about human rights, and the rights of women and ethnic minorities. You are losing your geopolitical influence and edge that you could have in this very complicated world,” says Islam.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told news reporters on 28 September 2022 that Russia’s plan to annex four occupied regions in Ukraine would be an illegal move, a violation of international law, and should be condemned, as a “dangerous escalation” in the seven-month war. “In this moment of peril, I must underscore my duty as Secretary-General to uphold the Charter of the United Nations,” he told journalists in New York. “The Charter is clear. Any annexation of a State’s territory by another State resulting from the threat or use of force is a violation of the Principles of the UN Charter and international law.” Credit: UN Photo/Mark Garten

By John R. Bryson
BIRMINGHAM, UK, Dec 8 2022 (IPS)

The one thing that has become clear is that there is no point in negotiating with Putin. Ukraine is considered as the gates of Europe, or a borderland with a brutal past.

It is time to develop a permanent solution to the Ukrainian problem. This can only be achieved by Ukraine continuing to stand united against Russia and with the support of all nations and their leaders interested in supporting an independent nation against unwarranted aggression.

Every day that passes comes with more atrocities committed by Russia on Ukrainians. The current phase of Russia’s ‘rapid’ special military operation is focused on disrupting the everyday lives of Ukrainian citizens. This is about deliberately bombing critical national civilian infrastructure with a focus on electricity and water.

It has included a Russian missile strike killing a new born baby when a rocket struck a maternity ward in southern Ukraine. Evidently, to Russia maternity wards represent military assets.

This phase of Putin’s war with Ukraine is about trying to force President Zelensky to enter in to negotiations that might end with some temporary truce. Any truce would be temporary as Russia would use this period to rearm.

It is critical that no negotiations or truce occurs whilst Russia continues to occupy Ukrainian territory. Any truce would represent a defeat for Ukraine and a win for Putin. Moreover, Russia’s military capacity and capability must be eroded to ensure that there is no possibility for Putin to restart his special military operation.

Zelensky is very aware of the dangers of negotiating with Russia. On 21 November 2022, Petro Poroshenko, former Ukrainian president, outlined Ukraine’s reaction to any proposed negotiations with Russia to the Council on Foreign Relations, an American think tank, when he asked his audience to imagine that you are sitting in your own home and “the killer comes to your house and kills your wife, rapes your daughter, takes the second floor.

Then opens the door to the second floor and says, ‘OK come here. Let’s have a negotiation how to live further’. What would be your reaction?” He then went on to note that “from my personal experience. . . don’t trust Putin”.

Negotiations, or a truce, then should be avoided, but how will Russia’s war with Ukraine end? Perhaps Ukraine will be forced to negotiate when Russia has destroyed all the country’s critical civilian infrastructure.

Nevertheless, responsible nations should try to prevent this from happening. An important question to consider is which organisations have the interest and power to persuade Russia to cease its special military operation?

The answer to this question is intriguing. The United Nations is just a talking shop and has no power. Most of the UN members are against Russia’s war and this includes all the actions targeted at civilians. President Joe Biden appreciates the plight of the Ukrainian people and is ensuring that the American people provide assistance.

Nevertheless, Biden is powerless as he has no authority over Russia. The same is the case for Emmanuel Macron, President of France. Macron has tried to negotiate and influence Putin and discovered that he has no influence and no power.

Macron’s current plan is to try to resume direct contract with Vladimir Putin, but for what end and whose purpose. What right does Macron have to try to negotiate on behalf of Ukraine?

Olaf Scholz, German Chancellor, initially hesitated in supporting Ukraine and more recently has appealed to Putin to “stop the senseless killing, withdraw your troops completely from Ukraine and agree to peace talks with Ukraine”. Putin will perhaps not even hear this appeal and he certainly will not take advice from the German Chancellor, the French President, or the President of the United States.

The implication is that the UN and all the prime ministers and presidents are powerless in the face of Putin’s aggression in Ukraine. Thus, who has the power to persuade Putin to cease and desist? There are only three stakeholders who have any power over Putin.

First, there are the Ukrainian people who have shown that they have the capability, persistence, power, and courage to stand up against Russia. The best outcome is that Russia is defeated on the battlefield and is forced to leave Ukraine.

Second, there are the Russian people. They have the option of revolting against Putin and declaring that they have had enough, and it is time to stop sending Russians to their death.

Third, there is Russia’s political elite or the country’s political, economic, and military decision makers. They are increasingly concerned over Putin’s war but have yet to reach a tipping point that would lead to action.

The one thing that has become clear is that there is no point in negotiating with Putin. Ukraine is considered as the gates of Europe, or a borderland with a brutal past. It is time to develop a permanent solution to the Ukrainian problem.

This can only be achieved by Ukraine continuing to stand united against Russia and with the support of all nations and their leaders interested in supporting an independent nation against unwarranted aggression.

John R. Bryson is Professor of Enterprise & Economic Geography, Birmingham Business School

The University of Birmingham is ranked amongst the world’s top 100 institutions. Its work brings people from across the world to Birmingham, including researchers, teachers and more than 8,000 international students from over 150 countries.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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The gravity of the situation demands a holistic approach to tackle the hunger problem. We must take a human rights-based approach so as to apply human rights principles in our efforts. Credit: Patrick Zachmann/Magnum Photos/FAO

By Maximo Torero
ROME, Dec 7 2022 (IPS)

This year’s Human Rights Day marks the 74th year since the United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, an international document that enshrines the rights and freedoms of all people. The right to food became a legal obligation for countries to promote and protect as part of the economic, social and cultural rights in 1966.

That fundamental right every one of us is entitled to — to be free from hunger — is at risk today like never before. Amid multiple global crises, such as climate change, pandemics, conflicts, growing inequalities and gender-based violence, more and more people are falling into the hunger trap.

There is enough food to feed everyone in the world today. What is lacking is the capacity to buy food that is available because of high levels of poverty and inequalities

As many as 828 million people faced hunger in 2021, an increase of 150 million more people since 2019, before the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic. Most recent projections indicate that more than 670 million people could still not have enough to eat in 2030.

It’s a far cry from the “zero hunger” target the world has ambitiously committed to less than a decade ago. It also shows just how deep inequalities run in societies across the world.

There is enough food to feed everyone in the world today. What is lacking is the capacity to buy food that is available because of high levels of poverty and inequalities. The war in Ukraine has made things worse. It shocked the global energy market, which has caused food prices to surge even more. This year alone saw an increase of $25 billion in food import bills of the world’s 62 most vulnerable countries, a 39% increase relative to 2020.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, a health crisis rapidly evolved into a food crisis, as the virus caused a shortage of farm workers and threatened to break down food supply chains. It taught us the importance of understanding the interlinked challenges of meeting growing food demand while protecting environmental, social and economic sustainability, as envisaged under the Sustainable Development Goals.

Eighty percent of the global poor live in rural areas and rely on farming to survive. Many of them — women, children, indigenous people and people with disability — don’t have access to food and are struggling with poor harvest, expensive seeds and fertilizers, and lack of financial services. They are directly affected by the risks and uncertainties facing our agrifood systems.

The gravity of the situation demands a holistic approach to tackle the hunger problem. We have to fix our broken agrifood systems to make them more inclusive, resilient and sustainable.

It means that we must take a human rights-based approach so as to apply human rights principles in our efforts. International frameworks provide legal and policy guidance to achieve universal, fundamental human rights.

The United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, for example, states that the right to food is indispensable for the fulfilment of other human rights. It emphasizes sustainability in that food must be accessible for both present and future generations. From availability, accessibility and healthy diets to food safety, consumer protection and the obligation of states to provide adequate food to their populations, it provides the foundation upon which to rebuild our agrifood systems.

Creating a coherent policy and legal framework around those core content will promote the right to food.

Since human rights are indivisible and interdependent, a human right cannot be enjoyed fully unless other human rights are also fulfilled. Advocating policies that promote other human rights — like health, education, water and sanitation, work and social protection — can positively impact the right to food as well.

Human Rights Day calls for dignity, freedom, and justice for all. Let us remember the critical role the right to food plays in achieving these important principles. And without these principles, we cannot reduce poverty or improve the well-being of all.

Food is fundamental to life. And it is key to strengthening our global efforts to find lasting solutions to today’s challenges.

Excerpt:

Maximo Torero Cullen is the Chief Economist of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)

While corruption levels remain at a standstill worldwide, in Western Europe and the European Union, 84% of countries have declined or made little to no progress in the last 10 years, report finds. Credit: Shutterstock.

By Baher Kamal
MADRID, Dec 7 2022 (IPS)

“Western Europe and the European Union remains the highest scoring region in the world’s corruption index, progress has halted and worrying signs of backsliding have emerged.”

This is how Transparency International’s 2021 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) report introduces its section: A Decade of Stagnating Corruption Levels In Western Europe Amidst Ongoing Scandals.

European countries watered down a landmark proposal to clean up business and stop corporate abuse. It is a loss for the women and men who work in terrible conditions around the world to make the goods that end up in our shopping trolleys. The only ones celebrating today is the regressive business lobby

Marc-Olivier Herman, Oxfam EU’s Economic Justice Policy Lead

The report shows that while corruption levels remain at a standstill worldwide, “in Western Europe and the European Union, 84% of countries have declined or made little to no progress in the last 10 years.”

 

An excuse

The COVID-19 pandemic has given European countries “an excuse for complacency in anti-corruption efforts” as accountability and transparency measures are “neglected or even rolled back.”

Transparency International further explains that “weakening good governance and checks and balances heightens the risk of human rights violations and further corruption.”

The Transparency International’s 2021 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) ranks 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption on a scale of zero (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean).

According to the 2021 ranking, the Western Europe and European Union average holds at 66, and these are the region’s most signalled States:

• Countries like Poland (56) and Hungary (43) have backslid, with harsh crackdowns on rights and freedom of expression.
• Others still near the top like Germany (80), the United Kingdom (78) and Austria (74) faced serious corruption scandals.
• Denmark (88) and Finland (88) top the region and the world (alongside New Zealand), with Norway (85) and Sweden (85) rounding out the top.
• Romania (45), and Bulgaria (42) remain the worst performers in the region.
• Switzerland (84), Netherlands (82), Belgium (73), Slovenia (57), Italy (56), Cyprus (53), and Greece (49) are all at historic lows on the 2021 Index.

 

For each country’s individual score and changes over time, as well as analysis for each region, see the region’s 2021 CPI page.

In short, in the last decade, 26 countries in the region have either declined or made little to no significant progress.

 

Allowing corruption to fester

On this, Flora Cresswell, Western Europe regional coordinator of Transparency International said:

“Stagnation spells trouble across Europe. Even the region’s best performers are falling prey to major scandals, revealing the danger of inaction. Others have allowed corruption to fester, and are now seeing serious violations of freedoms…

… Nor does the region exist in a vacuum: lack of national enforcement in Europe means corruption is exported globally as foreign actors utilise weak laws to hide money and fund corruption back home.”

In the last decade, 26 countries in the region have either declined or made little to no significant progress, it warns.

Since its inception in 1995, the Corruption Perceptions Index has become the leading global indicator of public sector corruption. The Index uses data from 13 external sources, including the World Bank, World Economic Forum, private risk and consulting companies, think tanks and others.

The scores reflect the views of experts and business people. (See: The ABCs of the CPI: How the Corruption Perceptions Index is calculated.”

 

Europe waters down a law to clean up business

The European Justice ministers on 1 December 2022 agreed on a proposal for a law to make companies accountable for the damage they cause to people and the planet.

In response, Oxfam EU’s Economic Justice Policy Lead, Marc-Olivier Herman, said:

“Today, European countries watered down a landmark proposal to clean up business and stop corporate abuse. It is a loss for the women and men who work in terrible conditions around the world to make the goods that end up in our shopping trolleys. The only ones celebrating today is the regressive business lobby.”

The original proposal was already a far cry from the game-changer law we expected. Now, after EU countries played their part, it is only weaker, warns Herman.

 

Many loopholes

“There are more and more loopholes allowing companies to escape their obligations to clean up their business.”

“The financial sector can continue to bankroll human rights violations and damage to the planet without being held accountable as it remains up to each European country to decide whether they want to make banks and other financial players clean up business.”

 

Anti-Corruption?

The 2022 International Anti-Corruption Day on 9 December, states that the world today faces some of its greatest challenges in many generations – challenges which threaten prosperity and stability for people across the globe. The plague of corruption is intertwined in most of them.

An outstanding world body fighting crime: the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), reveals the following findings about the consequences of corruption:

Two Trillion US dollars in procurement is lost to corruption each year (OECD 2016)

89 billion US dollars a year is lost to corruption in Africa, close to double its 48 billion US dollars in foreign aid (UNCTAD 2020).

What else is needed to fight this human rights violation?

Part I of this story can be found here: Corruption: The Most Perpetrated –and Least Prosecuted– Crime – Part I

A school for Rohingya refugees in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, November 18, 2019. Credit: Human Rights Watch

By Bede Sheppard
RZESZOW, Poland, Dec 7 2022 (IPS)

Education is fundamental for children’s development and a powerful catalyst for improving their entire lives. International human rights law guarantees everyone a right to education. But it surprises many to learn that the international human rights framework only explicitly guarantees an immediate right to free primary education—even though we know that a child equipped with just a primary education is inadequately prepared to thrive in today’s world.

All countries have made a political commitment through the United Nations “Sustainable Development Goals” to providing by 2030 both access to pre-primary education for all, and that all children complete free secondary school education. Yet the world appears on track to fail these targets, and children deserve more than yet another round of non-binding pledges

Children who participate in education from the pre-primary through to the secondary level have better health, better job prospects, and higher earnings as adults. And they are less vulnerable to exploitation and abuse, including child labor and child marriage.

All countries have made a political commitment through the United Nations “Sustainable Development Goals” to providing by 2030 both access to pre-primary education for all, and that all children complete free secondary school education. Yet the world appears on track to fail these targets, and children deserve more than yet another round of non-binding pledges.

For these reasons, Human Rights Watch believes that it’s time to take countries that made these commitments at their word, and expand the right to education under international law. It should explicitly recognize that all children should have a right to early childhood education, including at least one year of free pre-primary education, as well as a right to free secondary education.

We are not alone in this belief.

In 2019, the World Organisation for Early Childhood Education and the Latin American Campaign for the Right to Education met with experts from the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child to share their research, concluding that the legally binding human rights framework failed to adequately specify that the right to education should begin in early childhood, before primary school.

In December 2021, UNESCO—the UN education organization—concluded that in light of 21st century trends and challenges, the right to education should be reframed, and that recognizing early childhood education as a legal right at the international level “would allow the international community to hold governments accountable and ensure there is adequate investment.”

In 2022, these sparks began to catch fire.

In June, various international children’s rights and human rights experts called for the expansion of the right to education under international law, to recognize every child’s right to free pre-primary education and free secondary education.

In September, the Nobel Prize laureate and education champion Malala Yousafzai and the environmental youth activist Vanessa Nakate were among over a half-a-million people around the world who signed an open letter from the global civic movement Avaaz, calling on world leaders to create a new global treaty that protects children’s right to free education—from pre-primary through secondary school.

Argentina and Spain announced their commitments to support the idea at the UN’s Transforming Education summit in September. In October, the UN’s top independent education expert recommended that the right to early childhood education should be enshrined in a legally-binding human rights instrument.

And the year ended on a high note with education ministers and delegations gathered at the November World Conference on Early Childhood Care and Education in Uzbekistan adopting the new “Tashkent Declaration,” in which they agreed to enhance legal frameworks to ensure the right to education “includes the right to at least one year of free and compulsory pre-primary quality education for all children.”

So what might happen in 2023? All concerned will turn to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva to see whether member countries will agree to start the process to begin drafting such a treaty.

At least half of all countries already guarantee at least one year of free pre-primary education or free secondary education under their own domestic laws and policies. This includes low- and middle- income countries from around the world. That means that there’d be a large constituency of countries potentially willing to sign such a treaty when adopted.

Even when human rights feel under threat around the world, it’s vital for the human rights movement not to be on the defensive. Making the positive case for strengthening and advancing human rights standards has a critical role in shaping and improving the future.

Guaranteeing the best conditions for children to access a quality, inclusive, free education — and thereby to develop their personalities, talents, mental and physical abilities, and prepare them for a responsible life in a free society—is the kind of positive human rights agenda that all countries should rally around in 2023.

Excerpt:

Bede Sheppard is deputy children’s rights director at Human Rights Watch

Scientist Marla Emery speaking to decision-makers at the Convention of Biological Diversity’s “Science Day” in Montreal. Credit: Juliet Morrison/IPS

By Juliet Morrison
Montreal, Dec 7 2022 (IPS)

Policymakers were encouraged to look at the economic and social aspects with the environmental elements of biodiversity losses to meet the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) targets.

Decision-makers gathered on the opening day of the 15th UN Biodiversity Convention for a “Science Day” to learn about the science underpinning the goals and targets of the post-2020 GBF. Held just before COP15’s opening ceremony, the event allowed attendees to hear from experts about the implications of the biodiversity issues under negotiation.

Opening the event, David Cooper, the Deputy Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, underscored the importance of scientific understanding for informing COP15 negotiations.

“We have seen increasing interest by the parties to get good scientific advice. The scientific community is super important to clarify some of the concepts and see how we can produce a framework where actions, targets are coherent with goals.”

In the first half of the workshop, scientists discussed findings from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) reports and their relevance for the COP15 post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework. A common thread throughout the presentations was the need for transformative change in how policymakers tackled biodiversity.

Sandra Díaz, Assessment Co-Chair of IPBES’s Global Assessment Report on Biological and Ecosystems Services, stressed the importance of focusing on the economic and social aspects of biodiversity loss—in addition to environmental elements—for transformative change to occur.

“Solutions that target only one of these elements, just nature or just drivers [of biological diversity loss], are not going to be enough. What is needed is for the whole transformative change, fundamental system-change across these ecological, social, and environmental actions,” Díaz said.

Mike Christie, Assessment Co-Chair of the Methodological Assessment Report on the Diverse Values and Valuation of Nature, highlighted that a total shift in societal values was also needed to protect biodiversity.

He said that society’s over-emphasis on material and individual gain has resulted in a devaluation of nature.

“We are currently focused on a narrow set of values that are market values—think, “I buy, you sell. That’s leading us to an unsustainable path. If we want true transformative change, we need to change societal norms; we need to change institutions and make sure we are sustainable in terms of achieving the outcomes.”

Christie added that the insights IPBES developed on considering diverse values in decision-making could support the implementation of the Global Biodiversity Framework as they underscore the benefits of stakeholder involvement and addressing power dynamics.

Among those identified as key stakeholders in biodiversity issues were Indigenous Peoples. Marla Emery, Co-Chair of the Assessment Report on the Sustainable Use of Wild Species, explained that their use of wild species through hunting, gathering, and logging helps maintain high biodiversity.

She emphasized that this was because of Indigenous Peoples’ unique orientation toward nature.

“The practices of Indigenous peoples and local communities are grounded in knowledge and worldviews. They are diverse […], but they have something in common with regards to uses of wild species and the relationships of people and other parts of nature, and that is a focus, a prioritization on respect, reciprocity, and responsibility in all those engagements.”

Scientists also discussed COP15’s monitoring framework, which is being developed alongside its goals and targets. They highlighted certain issues in the drafted framework, which included gaps in national capacity for certain indicators and a need for the additional data collection on biodiversity.

Andy Gonzales, Co-Chair of the Group on Earth Observations Biodiversity Observation Network (Geo Bon), outlined several pivotal steps to make the monitoring framework more effective. These included greater investment in biodiversity monitoring and knowledge sharing across borders. He noted that species records currently cover less than 7 percent of the world’s surface, and most of this data is from North America and Europe.

“Biodiversity change does not recognize borders, so if we are to understand detection and attribution of causes and drivers, we need to be working across borders to achieve a regional and global perspective on change.”

Throughout the workshop, scientists urged decision-makers to listen to their findings about biodiversity loss and act during COP15.

“The science is there. There is no excuse for ignoring the science,” Christie said, summing up his remarks. “It’s over to you as the decision-makers in the convention to listen to the science. Embed some of our ideas that we have left you within the global biodiversity convention so we can actually address the biodiversity crisis and the climate crisis […]  and ensure a sustainable future.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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