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.”
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
Driver dies after crashing into White House perimeter gate, Secret Service says
- The driver was not immediately identified
WASHINGTON: A driver died after crashing a vehicle into a gate at the White House Saturday night, authorities said.
The driver was found dead in the vehicle following the crash shortly before 10:30 p.m. at an outer perimeter gate of the White House complex, the US Secret Service said in a statement.
Security protocols were implemented but there was no threat to the White House, the agency said.
The driver was not immediately identified.
The Secret Service will continue to investigate the matter, while turning over the fatal crash portion of the investigation to the Washington Metropolitan Police Department, the agency said.
Fake videos of Modi aides trigger political showdown in India election
- Indian police arrest nine people for circulating fake video of Indian Home Minister Amit Shah
- With more than 800 million Internet users, tackling misinformation in India is a huge challenge
BENGALURU/LUCKNOW: Manipulated videos are taking center stage as campaigning heats up in India’s election, with fake clips involving two top aides of Prime Minister Narendra Modi triggering police investigations and the arrest of some workers of his rival Congress party.
In what has been dubbed as India’s first AI election, Modi said last week fake voices were being used to purportedly show leaders making “statements that we have never even thought of,” calling it a conspiracy “to create tension in society.”
Indian police — already investigating the spread of fake videos showing Bollywood actors criticizing Modi — are now investigating a doctored online clip that showed federal home minister Amit Shah saying the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party will stop certain social guarantees for minorities, a subject sensitive for millions of voters.
Shah retorted on X, posting his “original” and the edited “fake” speech and alleging — without providing any evidence — that the main opposition Congress was behind the video it created to mislead the public. The minister said “directions have been issued to the police to address this issue.”
Indian police arrested at least nine people, including six members of Congress’ social media teams, in the states of Assam, Gujarat, Telangana and New Delhi last week for circulating the fake video, according to police statements.
Five of the Congress workers were released on bail, but the most high-profile arrest made by the cybercrime unit of New Delhi police came on Friday, when they detained a Congress national social media coordinator, Arun Reddy, for sharing the video. New Delhi is one region where Shah’s ministry directly controls police. Reddy has been sent into three-day custody.
The arrest has sparked protests from Congress workers with many posting on X using the #ReleaseArunReddy tag. Congress lawmaker Manickam Tagore said the arrest was an example of “authoritarian misuse of power by the regime.”
Congress’ head of social media, Supriya Shrinate, did not respond to messages and an email seeking comment.
MISINFORMATION
India’s election from April 19 to June 1 will be the world’s largest democratic event. With nearly a billion voters and more than 800 million Internet users, tackling the spread of misinformation is a high stakes job. It involves round-the-clock monitoring by police and election officials who often issue take down orders to Facebook and X as investigations start.
In India’s most populous state of Uttar Pradesh, more than 500 people keep tabs on online content, flagging controversial posts and coordinating with social media companies for their removal when needed, police chief Prashant Kumar told Reuters on Saturday.
Another fake video that sparked a storm last week showed Yogi Adityanath, the state’s chief minister, criticizing Modi for not doing enough for families of those who died in a 2019 militant attack. Though fact checkers said the video was created using different parts of an original clip, state police called it an “AI generated, deepfake.”
Using Internet address tracking, state police arrested a man named Shyam Gupta on May 2 who had shared the fake video post on X a day earlier, receiving over 3,000 views and 11 likes.
The police have accused Gupta of forgery and promoting enmity under Indian law provisions that can carry a jail term of up to seven years if convicted. Reuters could not reach him as he is currently serving a 14-day custody period.
“This person is not a tech guy. Had he been tech savvy, arresting him quickly would not have been possible,” said police officer Kumar.
Australian police shoot boy dead after stabbing with ‘hallmarks’ of terrorism
SYDNEY,: Australian police said on Sunday they had shot dead a boy after he stabbed a man in Western Australia’s capital Perth, in an attack authorities said indicated terrorism.
There were signs the 16-year-old, armed with a kitchen knife, had been radicalized online, state authorities said, adding they received calls from concerned members of the local Muslim community before the attack, which occurred late on Saturday night.
The attack, in the suburb of Willetton, had “hallmarks” of terrorism but was yet to be declared a terrorist act, police said.
“At this stage it appears that he acted solely and alone,” Western Australia Premier Roger Cook told a televised press conference in the state capital Perth, regarding the attacker.
The victim, stabbed in the back, was stable in hospital, authorities said.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he had been briefed on the incident by police and intelligence agencies, which advised there was no ongoing threat.
“We are a peace-loving nation and there is no place for violent extremism in Australia,” Albanese said on social media platform X.
The incident comes after New South Wales police last month charged several boys with terrorism-related offenses in investigations following the stabbing of an Assyrian Christian bishop while he was giving a live-streamed sermon in Sydney, on April 15.
The attack on the bishop came only days after a stabbing spree killed six in the Sydney beachside suburb of Bondi.
Gun and knife crime is rare in Australia, which consistently ranks among the safest countries in the world, according to the federal government. (Reporting by Sam McKeith in Sydney; Editing by Christian Schmollinger and William Mallard)
North Korea’s UN ambassador says new sanctions monitoring groups will fail
- Earlier this year, Russia vetoed the annual renewal of a panel of experts amid US-led accusations that North Korea has transferred weapons to Russia for use in its war in Ukraine
SEOUL: Efforts led by the US and other Western countries to form new groups to monitor sanctions on North Korea will fail, the country’s UN envoy said on Sunday, according to state media KCNA.
Ambassador Kim Song made the comment in response to a joint statement the US and its allies issued this week calling to continue the work of a UN panel of experts monitoring longstanding sanctions against Pyongyang for its nuclear weapons and missile programs.
Earlier this year, Russia vetoed the annual renewal of the panel amid US-led accusations that North Korea has transferred weapons to Russia for use in its war in Ukraine.
“The hostile forces may set up the second and third expert panels in the future but they are all bound to meet self-destruction with the passage of time,” KCNA quotes Kim as saying in a statement.
Last month, US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield visited the Demilitarized Zone, a heavily fortified border between the two Koreas, which remain technically at war and urged Russia and China to stop rewarding North Korea for its bad behavior.
Her trip came after Russia rejected the annual renewal of the multinational panel of experts that has over the past 15 years monitored the implementation of UN sanctions aimed at curbing North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.
China publicizes for the first time what it claims is a 2016 agreement with Philippines
- The move threatens to further raise tensions in the disputed waterway, through which much of the world’s trade passes and which China claims virtually in its entirety
TAIPEI, Taiwan: For the first time, China has publicized what it claims is an unwritten 2016 agreement with the Philippines over access to South China Sea islands.
The move threatens to further raise tensions in the disputed waterway, through which much of the world’s trade passes and which China claims virtually in its entirety.
A statement from the Chinese Embassy in Manila said the “temporary special arrangement” agreed to during a visit to Beijing by former president Rodrigo Duterte allowed small scale fishing around the islands but restricted access by military, coast guard and other official planes and ships to the 12 nautical mile (22 kilometer) limit of territorial waters.
The Philippines respected the agreement over the past seven years but has since reneged on it to “fulfill its own political agenda,” forcing China to take action, the statement said.
“This is the basic reason for the ceaseless disputes at sea between China and the Philippines over the past year and more,” said the statement posted to the embassy’s website Thursday, referring to the actions of the Philippines.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Duterte have denied forging any agreements that would have supposedly surrendered Philippine sovereignty or sovereign rights to China. Any such action, if proven, would be an impeachable offense under the country’s 1987 Constitution.
However, after his visit to Beijing, Duterte hinted at such an agreement without offering details, said Collin Koh, senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies based in Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and an expert on naval affairs in the Indo-Pacific region, particularly Southeast Asia.
“He boasted then that he not only got Chinese investment and trade pledges, but also that he secured Philippine fishermen access to Scarborough Shoal,” Koh said, referring to one of the maritime features in dispute.
Beijing’s deliberate wording in the statement “is noteworthy in showing that Beijing has no official document to prove its case and thus could only rely mainly on Duterte’s verbal claim,” Koh said.
Marcos, who took office in June 2022, told reporters last month that China has insisted that there was such a secret agreement but said he was not aware of any.
“The Chinese are insisting that there is a secret agreement and, perhaps, there is, and, I said I didn’t, I don’t know anything about the secret agreement,” said Marcos, who has drawn the Philippines closer to its treaty partner the US “Should there be such a secret agreement, I am now rescinding it.”
Duterte nurtured cozy relations with Chinese President Xi Jinping during his six-year presidency while openly being hostile to the United States for its strong criticism of his deadly campaign against illegal drugs.
While he took an almost virulently anti-American stance during his 2016 visit to Washington’s chief rival, he has said he also did not enter into any agreement with Beijing that would have compromised Philippine territory. He acknowledged, however, that he and Xi agreed to maintain “the status quo” in the disputed waters to avoid war.
“Aside from the fact of having a handshake with President Xi Jinping, the only thing I remember was that status quo, that’s the word. There would be no contact, no movement, no armed patrols there, as is where is, so there won’t be any confrontation,” Duterte said.
Asked if he agreed that the Philippines would not bring construction materials to strengthen a Philippine military ship outpost at the Second Thomas Shoal, Duterte said that was part of maintaining the status quo but added there was no written agreement.
“That’s what I remember. If it were a gentleman’s agreement, it would always have been an agreement to keep the peace in the South China Sea,” Duterte said.
House Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez, Marcos’s cousin and political ally, has ordered an investigation into what some are calling a “gentleman’s agreement.”
China has also claimed that Philippine officials have promised to tow away the navy ship that was deliberately grounded in the shallows of the Second Thomas Shoal in 1999 to serve as Manila’s territorial outpost. Philippine officials under Marcos say they were not aware of any such agreement and would not remove the now dilapidated and rust-encrusted warship manned by a small contingent of Filipino sailors and marines.
China has long accused Manila of “violating its commitments” and “acting illegally” in the South China Sea, without being explicit.
Apart from China and the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Taiwan and Brunei also have overlapping claims in the sea that is rich in fishing stocks, gas and oil. Beijing has refused to recognize a 2016 international arbitration ruling by a UN-affiliated court in the Hauge that invalidated its expansive claims on historical grounds.
Skirmishes between Beijing and Manila have flared since last year, with massive Chinese coast guard cutters firing high-pressure water cannons at Philippine patrol vessels, most recently off Scarborough Shoal late last month, damaging both. They have also accused each other of dangerous maneuvering, leading to minor scrapes.
The US lays no claims to the South China Sea, but has deployed Navy ships and fighter jets in what it calls freedom of navigation operations that have challenged China’s claims.
The US has warned repeatedly that it’s obligated to defend the Philippines — its oldest treaty ally in Asia — if Filipino forces, ships or aircraft come under an armed attack, including in the South China Sea.
