1 January 2016, Truthdig, So what was the most significant event of 2015? It wasn’t a single event. Rather, it was a worsening of something that started several years before. It was the fast-increasing, huge migration of immigrants—many running for fear of their lives—making their dangerous and often fatal way by land and across the Mediterranean, the Gulf of Aden, the Red Sea and the oceans of Asia. It is the greatest forced mass movement of refugees since World War II, caused by the confluence of civil war, brutal regimes, sectarian and ethnic hatred, and climate change all coming together in a world too weak and preoccupied to deal with such powerful forces….. While war is the biggest single force behind the mass migration, there are other causes, interrelated in complex ways. The best illustration of this is climate change. An organization that has been assisting refugees since 1951, the International Organization for Migration, reported that “Climate change is expected to trigger growing population movements within and across borders, as a result of such factors as increasing intensity of extreme weather events, sea-level rise and acceleration of environmental degradation. In addition, climate change will have adverse consequences for livelihoods, public health, food security, and water availability. This in turn will impact on human mobility, likely leading to a substantial rise in the scale of migration and displacement.” According to the organization, there are no reliable estimates of climate change-induced migration but 200 million people by 2050 is “the most widely cited estimate.” Read More here
Category Archives: Security & Conflict
29 December 2015 IACentre, Winner of Project Consored top 25 articles for 2009 – 2010 news stories: Pentagon’s role in global catastrophe. In evaluating the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen — with more than 15,000 participants from 192 countries, including more than 100 heads of state, as well as 100,000 demonstrators in the streets — it is important to ask: How is it possible that the worst polluter of carbon dioxide and other toxic emissions on the planet is not a focus of any conference discussion or proposed restrictions? By every measure, the Pentagon is the largest institutional user of petroleum products and energy in general. Yet the Pentagon has a blanket exemption in all international climate agreements.
The Pentagon wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; its secret operations in Pakistan; its equipment on more than 1,000 U.S. bases around the world; its 6,000 facilities in the U.S.; all NATO operations; its aircraft carriers, jet aircraft, weapons testing, training and sales will not be counted against U.S. greenhouse gas limits or included in any count. The Feb. 17, 2007, Energy Bulletin detailed the oil consumption just for the Pentagon’s aircraft, ships, ground vehicles and facilities that made it the single-largest oil consumer in the world. At the time, the U.S. Navy had 285 combat and support ships and around 4,000 operational aircraft. The U.S. Army had 28,000 armored vehicles, 140,000 High-Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles, more than 4,000 combat helicopters, several hundred fixed-wing aircraft and 187,493 fleet vehicles. Except for 80 nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers, which spread radioactive pollution, all their other vehicles run on oil. Even according to rankings in the 2006 CIA World Factbook, only 35 countries (out of 210 in the world) consume more oil per day than the Pentagon. Read More here
18 December 2015, Climate News Network, Climate swells tide of migrants. A new report coinciding with the UN’s International Migrants Day says that climate change is one of the many factors increasing the flow of refugees worldwide. Thousands of people – old, young and babies –struggle to reach the coasts of Europe, many dying en route. In south-east Asia, dozens of Rohingya refugees from Burma suffocate on packed boats, locked by people traffickers below deck while trying to escape their homeland. Children from Central America die of thirst in the desert, trying to cross into the US. Some of these refugees are escaping persecution or warfare back home. Others are fleeing from gang violence, or simply searching for a better life. And some have seen their lands degraded by climate change and their livelihoods threatened by floods or drought. A new report produced by the UK-based Ethical Journalism Network (EJN), and partly authored by journalists from the Climate News Network, concludes that much needs to be improved in the way the world’s media reports on migration issues. Read more here
18 December 2015, News Hour, More than 16 million babies born into conflict in 2015, says, UNICEF. More than 16 million babies were born in conflict zones in 2015 – 1 in 8 of all births worldwide this year – UNICEF said on 17th December 2015, a figure that underscores the vulnerability faced by increasing numbers of children. “Every two seconds, a newborn takes its first breath in the midst of conflict, often in terrifying circumstances and without access to medical care,” said UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake. “Too many children are now starting their lives in extreme circumstances – from conflict to natural disasters, poverty, disease or malnutrition. Can there be a worse start in life?” Read More here