SAO PAULO: Scientists warn that Brazil’s president-elect could push the Amazon rainforest past its tipping point — with severe consequences for global climate and rainfall.
Jair Bolsonaro, who takes office Jan. 1, claims a mandate to convert land for cattle pastures and soybean farms, calling Brazil’s rainforest protections an economic obstacle.
Brazilians on Oct. 28 elected Bolsonaro, a far-right candidate who channeled outrage at the corruption scandals of the former government and support from agribusiness groups.
Next week global leaders will meet in Poland for an international climate conference to discuss how to curb climate change, and questions about Brazil’s role in shaping the future of the Amazon rainforest after Bolsonaro’s election loom large. New Brazilian government data show the rate of deforestation — a major factor in global warming — has already increased over the past year.
Brazil contains about 60 percent of the Amazon rainforest, and scientists are worried.
It’s nearly impossible to overstate the importance of the Amazon rainforest to the planet’s living systems, said Carlos Nobre, a climate scientist at the University of Sao Paulo.
Each tree stores carbon absorbed from the atmosphere. The Amazon takes in as much as 2 billion tons of carbon dioxide a year and releases 20 percent of the planet’s oxygen, earning it the nickname “the lungs of the planet.”
It’s also a global weather-maker.
Stretching 10 times the size of Texas, the Amazon is the world’s largest rainforest. Billions of trees suck up water through deep roots and bring it up to their leaves, which release water vapor that forms a thick mist over the rainforest canopy.
This mist ascends into clouds and eventually becomes rainfall — a cycle that shapes seasons in South America and far beyond.
By one estimate, the Amazon creates 30 to 50 percent of its own rainfall.
Now the integrity of all of three functions — as a carbon sink, the Earth’s lungs, and a rainmaker — hangs in the balance.
On the campaign trail, Bolsonaro promised to loosen protections for areas of the Brazilian Amazon designated as indigenous lands and nature reserves, calling them impediments to economic growth. “All these reserves cause problems to development,” he told supporters.
He has also repeatedly talked about gutting the power of the environmental ministry to enforce existing green laws.
“If Bolsonaro keeps his campaign promises, deforestation of the Amazon will probably increase quickly — and the effects will be felt everywhere on the planet,” said Paulo Artaxo, a professor of environmental physics at the University of Sao Paulo.
Bolsonaro’s transition team did not respond to an interview request from the Associated Press.
Brazil was once seen as a global environmental success story. Between 2004 and 2014, stricter enforcement of laws to safeguard the rainforest — aided by regular satellite monitoring and protections for lands designated reserves for indigenous peoples — sharply curbed the rate of deforestation, which peaked in the early 2000s at about 9,650 square miles a year (25,000 square kilometers).
After a political crisis engulfed Brazil, leading to the 2016 impeachment of president Dilma Rousseff, enforcement faltered. Ranchers and farmers began to convert more rainforest to pastureland and cropland. Between 2014 and 2017, annual deforestation doubled to about 3,090 square miles (8,000 square kilometers). Most often, the trees and underbrush cut down are simply burned, directly releasing carbon dioxide, said Artaxo.
“In the Brazilian Amazon, far and away the largest source of deforestation is industrial agriculture and cattle ranching,” said Emilio Bruna, an ecologist at the University of Florida in Gainesville.
Now observers are parsing Bolsonaro’s campaign statements and positions as a congressman to anticipate what’s next for the Amazon.
Bolsonaro — who some call “tropical Trump” because of some similarities to US President Donald Trump — is a former army captain with a knack for channeling outrage and generating headlines. As a federal congressman for 27 years, he led legislative campaigns to unravel land protections for indigenous people and to promote agribusiness. He also made derogatory comments about minorities, women, and LGBT people.
Much of his support comes from business and farming interests.
“These farmers are not invaders, they are producers,” said congressman and senator-elect Luiz Carlos Heinze, a farmer and close ally of Bolsonaro. He blamed past “leftist administrations” for promoting indigenous rights at the expense of farmers and ranchers.
“Brazil will be the biggest farming nation on Earth during Bolsonaro’s years,” said Heinze.
Indigenous-rights advocates are worried about the new direction signaled. “Bolsonaro has repeatedly said that indigenous territories in the Amazon should be opened up for mining and agribusiness, which goes completely in the opposite direction of our Constitution,” said Adriana Ramos, public policy coordinator at Social Environmental Institute in Brasilia, a non-governmental group.
In a Nov. 1 postelection interview with Catholic TV, Bolsonaro said, “We intend to protect the environment, but without creating difficulties for our progress.”
Bolsonaro has repeatedly said that Brazil should withdraw from the Paris Climate Accord, a treaty his predecessor signed in 2016 committing to reduce carbon emissions 37 percent over 2005 levels by 2030. After the election, he has publicly wavered.
Meanwhile he has named a climate-change denier, Ernesto Araujo, to become the next foreign minister.
Nelson Ananias Filho, sustainability coordinator at Brazil’s National Agriculture and Cattle Raising Confederation, which backed Bolsonaro’s campaign, said, “Brazil’s agribusiness will adapt to whatever circumstances come.”
Whether or not Brazil formally remains in the Paris Climate Accord, the only way for the country to make its emission targets is to completely stop deforestation by 2030 and to reduce agricultural emissions, said Nobre, the climate scientist. “If Bolsonaro keeps moving in the current direction, that’s basically impossible.”
There’s another danger lurking in deforestation.
Aside from the oceans, tropical forests are the most important regions on the planet for putting water vapor in the air, which eventually becomes rainfall. “It’s why we have rain in the American Midwest and other inland areas — it’s not just the Amazon, but it’s the largest tropical rainforest,” said Bill Laurance, a tropical ecologist at James Cook University in Cairns, Australia.
Carlos Nobre and Thomas Lovejoy, an environmental scientist at George Mason University, have estimated that the “tipping point for the Amazon system” is 20 to 25 percent deforestation.
Without enough trees to sustain the rainfall, the longer and more pronounced dry season could turn more than half the rainforest into a tropical savannah, they wrote in February in the journal Science Advances.
If the rainfall cycle collapses, winter droughts in parts of Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Argentina could devastate agriculture, they wrote. The impacts may even be felt as far away as the American Midwest, said Laurance.
Bolsonaro’s rhetoric about potentially dismantling the environmental ministry and rolling back indigenous rights worries Nobre who says, “I am a scientist, but I am also a Brazilian citizen, and a citizen of the planet.”
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Scientists warn new Brazil president may smother rainforest
Scientists warn new Brazil president may smother rainforest
- Brazil contains about 60 percent of the Amazon rainforest, and scientists are worried
- The Amazon takes in as much as 2 billion tons of carbon dioxide a year and releases 20 percent of the planet’s oxygen
Hundreds of people storm US Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan
- Police say hundreds of people have stormed the US Consulate in Pakistan’s port city of Karachi
- A police official said police and paramilitary forces used batons and fired tear gas to disperse the crowd Sunday
DUBAI: Hundreds of people stormed the US Consulate in Pakistan’s port city of Karachi on Sunday, smashing windows after the US and Israeli attacked Iran and killed the country’s supreme leader, police said.
Police and paramilitary forces used batons and fired tear gas to disperse the crowd, said Mohammad Jawad, a police official. At least one protester was killed and several others were wounded in clashes between protesters and security forces, he said.
The attack on the consulate came hours after Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in a major attack carried out by Israel and the United States.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates: Iran fired missiles at targets in Israel and Gulf Arab states Sunday after vowing massive retaliation for the killing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei by the United States and Israel, prompting US President Donald Trump to threaten Tehran against further escalation.
Iran acknowledged 86-year-old Khamenei’s death in the joint Israeli-American airstrike Saturday at his Tehran office, which has thrown the future of the Islamic Republic into question and raised the risk of regional instability.
“This is the single greatest chance for the Iranian people to take back their Country,” Trump said.
Iran’s Cabinet vowed that this “great crime will never go unanswered” and the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened to launch its “most intense offensive operation” ever, targeting Israeli and American bases.
“You have crossed our red line and must pay the price,” Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf said in a televised address Sunday. “We will deliver such devastating blows that you yourselves will be driven to beg.”
“Iran just stated that they are going to hit very hard today, harder than they have ever hit before,” Trump fired back in a social media post. “THEY BETTER NOT DO THAT, HOWEVER, BECAUSE IF THEY DO, WE WILL HIT THEM WITH A FORCE THAT HAS NEVER BEEN SEEN BEFORE!”
As Israel and the US targeted other top officials, an airstrike on a meeting of the country’s defense council killed Iran’s army chief of staff and defense minister, alongside the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and a top security adviser to Khamenei.
Gen. Abdol Rahim Mousavi and Defense Minister Gen. Aziz Nasirzadeh were killed at the meeting, along with Maj. Gen. Mohammad Pakpour took over as the Guard’s top commander after Israel killed its past commander in the 12-day war last June. The adviser, Ali Shamkhani, had long been a figurehead within Iran’s security establishment.
Iran retaliates
After the initial strikes, Iran immediately launched missiles and drones toward Israel and US military installations in Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar. The Israeli military said Iran fired dozens of missiles at Israel, with many intercepted. The Magen David Adom rescue service said Saturday night that a woman in the Tel Aviv area died after being wounded in an Iranian missile attack.
Flights across the Middle East were disrupted, and air defense fire thudded over Dubai, the United Arab Emirates’ commercial capital, with explosions continuing into Sunday morning. Shrapnel from an Iranian missile attack on the UAE capital killed one person, state media said, and debris from aerial interceptions caused fires at the city’s main port and on the facade of the iconic Burj Al Arab hotel.
Saudi Arabia said Iran targeted its capital and eastern region in an attack that was repelled and Jordan said it “dealt with” 49 drones and ballistic missiles.
The strikes could rattle global markets, particularly if Iran makes the Strait of Hormuz unsafe for commercial traffic. A third of worldwide oil exports transported by sea passed through the strait in 2025.
The attack on Iran opened a stunning new chapter in US intervention, and carried the potential for retaliatory violence and a wider war, representing a startling flex of military might for an American president who swept into office on an “America First” platform and vowed to keep out of “forever wars.”
The killing of Khamenei in the second Trump administration assault on Iran in eight months appeared certain to create a leadership vacuum, given the absence of a known successor and because the supreme leader had final say on all major policies during his decades in power. He led Iran’s clerical establishment and the Revolutionary Guard, the two main centers of power in the governing theocracy.
Iran quickly formed a council to govern the country until a new supreme leader is chosen.
As reports trickled out about Khamenei’s death, eyewitnesses in Tehran told The Associated Press that some residents were rejoicing, cheering from rooftops, blowing whistles and letting out ululations.
Mourners raised a black flag over the Imam Reza shrine in Mashhad and the Iranian government declared 40 days of public mourning and a seven-day nationwide public holiday to commemorate Khamenei’s death.
Citing unidentified sources, the semiofficial Fars news agency reported that several relatives of Khamenei were also killed, including a daughter, son-in-law, daughter-in-law and grandchild.
Strikes were planned for months
The joint US-Israel operation, which officials say was planned for months, started Saturday during the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan and at the start of the Iranian workweek. It followed stilted negotiations and warnings from Trump.
The US military said targets in Iran included Revolutionary Guard command facilities, air defense systems, missile and drone launch sites, and military airfields. It reported no US casualties and minimal damage at US bases despite “hundreds of Iranian missile and drone attacks.”
Democrats decried that Trump had taken action without congressional authorization. White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said the administration had briefed several Republican and Democratic leaders in Congress in advance.
Tensions soared as US built up military forces
Tensions have soared in recent weeks as the Trump administration built up the largest force of American warships and aircraft in the Middle East in decades. The president insisted he wanted a deal to constrain Iran’s nuclear program while the country struggled with growing dissent following nationwide protests.
Though Trump had pronounced the Iranian nuclear program obliterated in strikes last year, the country was rebuilding infrastructure that it had lost, according to a senior US official who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity to discuss Trump’s decision-making process. The official said intelligence showed that Iran had developed the capability to produce its own high-quality centrifuges, an important step in developing the highly enriched uranium needed for weapons.
Iran had said it hoped to avert a war, but it maintained its right to enrich uranium.
Iran has said it has not enriched since June, but it has blocked international inspectors from visiting the sites the US bombed. Satellite photos analyzed by AP have shown new activity at two of those sites, suggesting Iran is trying to assess and potentially recover material.
Attack was coordinated between Israel and US
Israel said the operation had been planned for months with the United States. Air Force pilots struck “hundreds of targets across Iran,” Israeli military chief of staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir said in a statement.
Targets in the Israeli campaign included Iran’s military, symbols of government and intelligence targets, according to an official briefed on the operation, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss nonpublic information on the attack.
In southern Iran, at least 115 people were reported killed when a girls’ school was struck, and dozens more were wounded, the local governor told Iranian state TV. US Central Command spokesperson Capt. Tim Hawkins said he was “aware of reports” that a girls’ school was struck and that officials were looking into them.
An Iranian diplomat told the United Nations Security Council that hundreds of civilians were killed and wounded in the strikes.
Iran’s state news agency IRNA said at least 15 people were killed in the southwest, quoting the governor of the Lamerd region, Ali Alizadeh, as saying a sports hall, two residential areas and a hall near a school were hit.
Police and paramilitary forces used batons and fired tear gas to disperse the crowd, said Mohammad Jawad, a police official. At least one protester was killed and several others were wounded in clashes between protesters and security forces, he said.
The attack on the consulate came hours after Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in a major attack carried out by Israel and the United States.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates: Iran fired missiles at targets in Israel and Gulf Arab states Sunday after vowing massive retaliation for the killing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei by the United States and Israel, prompting US President Donald Trump to threaten Tehran against further escalation.
Iran acknowledged 86-year-old Khamenei’s death in the joint Israeli-American airstrike Saturday at his Tehran office, which has thrown the future of the Islamic Republic into question and raised the risk of regional instability.
“This is the single greatest chance for the Iranian people to take back their Country,” Trump said.
Iran’s Cabinet vowed that this “great crime will never go unanswered” and the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened to launch its “most intense offensive operation” ever, targeting Israeli and American bases.
“You have crossed our red line and must pay the price,” Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf said in a televised address Sunday. “We will deliver such devastating blows that you yourselves will be driven to beg.”
“Iran just stated that they are going to hit very hard today, harder than they have ever hit before,” Trump fired back in a social media post. “THEY BETTER NOT DO THAT, HOWEVER, BECAUSE IF THEY DO, WE WILL HIT THEM WITH A FORCE THAT HAS NEVER BEEN SEEN BEFORE!”
As Israel and the US targeted other top officials, an airstrike on a meeting of the country’s defense council killed Iran’s army chief of staff and defense minister, alongside the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and a top security adviser to Khamenei.
Gen. Abdol Rahim Mousavi and Defense Minister Gen. Aziz Nasirzadeh were killed at the meeting, along with Maj. Gen. Mohammad Pakpour took over as the Guard’s top commander after Israel killed its past commander in the 12-day war last June. The adviser, Ali Shamkhani, had long been a figurehead within Iran’s security establishment.
Iran retaliates
After the initial strikes, Iran immediately launched missiles and drones toward Israel and US military installations in Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar. The Israeli military said Iran fired dozens of missiles at Israel, with many intercepted. The Magen David Adom rescue service said Saturday night that a woman in the Tel Aviv area died after being wounded in an Iranian missile attack.
Flights across the Middle East were disrupted, and air defense fire thudded over Dubai, the United Arab Emirates’ commercial capital, with explosions continuing into Sunday morning. Shrapnel from an Iranian missile attack on the UAE capital killed one person, state media said, and debris from aerial interceptions caused fires at the city’s main port and on the facade of the iconic Burj Al Arab hotel.
Saudi Arabia said Iran targeted its capital and eastern region in an attack that was repelled and Jordan said it “dealt with” 49 drones and ballistic missiles.
The strikes could rattle global markets, particularly if Iran makes the Strait of Hormuz unsafe for commercial traffic. A third of worldwide oil exports transported by sea passed through the strait in 2025.
The attack on Iran opened a stunning new chapter in US intervention, and carried the potential for retaliatory violence and a wider war, representing a startling flex of military might for an American president who swept into office on an “America First” platform and vowed to keep out of “forever wars.”
The killing of Khamenei in the second Trump administration assault on Iran in eight months appeared certain to create a leadership vacuum, given the absence of a known successor and because the supreme leader had final say on all major policies during his decades in power. He led Iran’s clerical establishment and the Revolutionary Guard, the two main centers of power in the governing theocracy.
Iran quickly formed a council to govern the country until a new supreme leader is chosen.
As reports trickled out about Khamenei’s death, eyewitnesses in Tehran told The Associated Press that some residents were rejoicing, cheering from rooftops, blowing whistles and letting out ululations.
Mourners raised a black flag over the Imam Reza shrine in Mashhad and the Iranian government declared 40 days of public mourning and a seven-day nationwide public holiday to commemorate Khamenei’s death.
Citing unidentified sources, the semiofficial Fars news agency reported that several relatives of Khamenei were also killed, including a daughter, son-in-law, daughter-in-law and grandchild.
Strikes were planned for months
The joint US-Israel operation, which officials say was planned for months, started Saturday during the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan and at the start of the Iranian workweek. It followed stilted negotiations and warnings from Trump.
The US military said targets in Iran included Revolutionary Guard command facilities, air defense systems, missile and drone launch sites, and military airfields. It reported no US casualties and minimal damage at US bases despite “hundreds of Iranian missile and drone attacks.”
Democrats decried that Trump had taken action without congressional authorization. White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said the administration had briefed several Republican and Democratic leaders in Congress in advance.
Tensions soared as US built up military forces
Tensions have soared in recent weeks as the Trump administration built up the largest force of American warships and aircraft in the Middle East in decades. The president insisted he wanted a deal to constrain Iran’s nuclear program while the country struggled with growing dissent following nationwide protests.
Though Trump had pronounced the Iranian nuclear program obliterated in strikes last year, the country was rebuilding infrastructure that it had lost, according to a senior US official who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity to discuss Trump’s decision-making process. The official said intelligence showed that Iran had developed the capability to produce its own high-quality centrifuges, an important step in developing the highly enriched uranium needed for weapons.
Iran had said it hoped to avert a war, but it maintained its right to enrich uranium.
Iran has said it has not enriched since June, but it has blocked international inspectors from visiting the sites the US bombed. Satellite photos analyzed by AP have shown new activity at two of those sites, suggesting Iran is trying to assess and potentially recover material.
Attack was coordinated between Israel and US
Israel said the operation had been planned for months with the United States. Air Force pilots struck “hundreds of targets across Iran,” Israeli military chief of staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir said in a statement.
Targets in the Israeli campaign included Iran’s military, symbols of government and intelligence targets, according to an official briefed on the operation, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss nonpublic information on the attack.
In southern Iran, at least 115 people were reported killed when a girls’ school was struck, and dozens more were wounded, the local governor told Iranian state TV. US Central Command spokesperson Capt. Tim Hawkins said he was “aware of reports” that a girls’ school was struck and that officials were looking into them.
An Iranian diplomat told the United Nations Security Council that hundreds of civilians were killed and wounded in the strikes.
Iran’s state news agency IRNA said at least 15 people were killed in the southwest, quoting the governor of the Lamerd region, Ali Alizadeh, as saying a sports hall, two residential areas and a hall near a school were hit.
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