Day: May 24, 2023

The “senseless” fighting in Sudan must stop now, and the warring generals have to insist on zero tolerance for sexual violence among their troops, the UN rights chief said on Wednesday.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk appealed to the leaders of the Sudanese Armed Forces and of the Rapid Support Forces, locked in conflict since 15 April, to “issue clear instructions” to those under their command that sexual violence will not be tolerated, and to ensure that all perpetrators are held accountable.

Mr. Türk called reports of sexual violence in Khartoum and Darfur “very troubling” and said that while his Office was aware of at least 25 cases, he feared the real number to be much higher.

“General al-Burhan, General Dagalo… you must stop this senseless violence now,” he insisted, stressing that efforts to bring the conflict to an end “must have human rights” at their core.

Crackdowns on women’s rights

At a press conference in Geneva, in a wide-ranging overview of human rights hotspots and “dangerous” anti-rights tendencies on the rise, Mr. Türk called misogyny a “disease” and slammed the crackdown on women’s rights in Afghanistan.

“I will never understand how anyone can trample so cruelly upon the spirit of girls and women, chipping away at their potential and driving one’s country deeper and deeper into abject poverty and despair,” he said.

He also commented on “intensified” harassment of women in Iran, calling on the country’s authorities to repeal regulations that criminalize non-compliance with mandatory dress codes, and condemning the continued use of the death penalty “in significant numbers”.

Disinformation stoking rights crackdown

The UN rights chief warned that “peddlers of lies and disinformation” were fuelling anti-rights movements, notably against LGBTQI+ people. He sounded the alarm against the “vilification of segments of society”, saying that driving people against one another was invariably detrimental to society as a whole.

Mr. Türk deplored in particular the worsening of laws criminalizing LGBTQI+ people, such as recent legislation in Uganda, which he had previously called “devastating”.

The High Commissioner also called out hate speech against migrants and refugees, as well as anti-migrant laws and policies, citing recent developments in the United Kingdom, the United States, Italy, Greece and Lebanon. He highlighted the need for solidarity and respect for the rights of all people in situations of vulnerability.

‘Systemic racism’

Recalling that Thursday will mark three years to the day since the murder of George Floyd by a policeman in the United States, Mr. Türk said that he was deeply concerned about regular reports of death and injuries of people of African descent “during or after interactions with law enforcement in a number of countries”, and that this targeted police brutality pointed to “systemic racism”.

Racist taunts at Real Madrid

Highlighting the recent case of Brazilian footballer Vinícius Júnior as a “stark reminder” of the prevalence of racism in sport, the UN rights chief called on sports organizers to redouble efforts to eradicate racial discrimination and highlighted the need to listen to and involve people of African descent in the search for solutions.

Vinícius Júnior, a Real Madrid player, was the victim of racist abuse by football fans last week. Spanish police arrested several suspects on Tuesday over their involvement in alleged hate crime incidents targeting the footballer.

A stronger rights system

With human rights in dire straits in so many places around the world, Mr. Türk said that he saw an urgent need to strengthen the UN rights office (OHCHR) through additional funding.

He said that his ambition was to double the budget to $800 million, which could allow for the strengthening of OHCHR’s field presence. He recalled that while human rights was one of the three pillars of the UN, it only mobilized a very small portion of the Organization’s regular budget.

Stating his belief in the Office’s presence on the ground, the High Commissioner said that he saw “great value” in an OHCHR acting as “the bridge between civil society, human rights defenders, victims, and the institutions of the state”.

‘Back to basics’

Emphasizing the universality of human rights, Mr. Türk called it “a matter for everyone, everywhere”.

“All States can and should do better on human rights,” he insisted.

Mr. Türk also expressed his “fervent” hope that the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, marked this year, will “provide the space and inspiration for all of us to go back to the basics – to find the roots of human rights values in each of our cultures, histories, and faiths, uniting us in pushing back against the instrumentalization and politicization of human rights within and between countries”.

Source: EMM/ United Nations

Des Powell, Nenagh, Co. Tipperary, operates a sheep and beef farm in conjunction with his parents George and Frieda. Here he gives us an update on his farm for May.

Lambing complete

I am glad to be out the other side of lambing. Lambing went reasonably well for me this year, with no major issues with lambing. But we did have a few difficult nights when stock could not be at grass because of the difficult March / early April. I think it was the highest rainfall on record in March. The bad weather made things challenging, but we managed to create space for groups of ewes and their lambs to be held in the sheds until conditions improved. I tried to make the work a little bit easier this spring by not rearing any bucket calves, which I would normally do. Labour has become a major issue and it just didn’t make sense stretching myself too thinly, particularly in the middle of lambing.

Grass cover

I did a grass cover this week and I have 18 days ahead of me, which is spot on. This means that I have enough grass for 18 days. Walking the farm and doing the grass measuring has given me the confidence to make decisions around grassland management. I am waiting for the rotation to settle down, as I had a herd test last week, which complicated the matter with keeping the cattle close to the yard to make things easier.

Grazing the right cover

I have now closed up the silage ground and working on the basis that I am better off being a little tight rather than having too much grass around the farm. If I have lots of grass and flocks are going into heavy covers, the quality of that grass is not great and then it’s a cascading problem in that the following paddock is even heavier because it’s taking so long to graze out the current paddock. I would prefer to be a little tight on grass for the current paddock on the basis that the next paddock will be the right cover and keep the quality high, especially when lambs are relying more and more on grass for their feed. I learnt my lesson last year by letting the grass get ahead of me and the digestibility suffered. I hope I have the confidence this year to close up paddocks for silage, even if I am a bit tight for a few days, it will turn around quickly at this time of year.

Dosing for nematadirus

I am dosing for nematadirus at the moment using a white drench. I am doing this based on the DAFM forecast. For the summer, my dosing regime will be based on faecal egg sampling. I will take a composite sample from 12-15 lambs each time. It needs to be a fresh sample. I get the sample bottles from Athenry, because I am in the Signpost Programme, but I assume you could also get these from the vet. I get the results back quickly. The cattle were egg sampled recently and they came back clean, which means I don’t need to dose for the moment. The faecal egg sampling takes the guess work out of dosing. The sheep are first egg sampled at the end of May and done every 2-3 weeks thereafter, depending on the previous tests results.

Source: EMM/ The Agriculture and Food Development Authority

There is a nightmare nuclear scenario in Ukraine that does not involve Russia letting loose its arsenal.

Since early March 2022, the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) has been under Russian occupation. This is Europe’s largest nuclear power plant and the tenth largest in the world. The plant is not operational. All six reactors were taken offline at the start of the conflict. But even nuclear power plants that are not running require constant cooling to keep the reactors from melting down. That, in turn, requires that a steady stream of electricity. But ZNPP is near the frontlines and fighting in the vicinity has routinely interrupted power supplies. This is really dangerous.

On Monday, May 22, for the seventh time since Russia’s invasion, the plant was knocked off the main power grid. Thankfully, backup diesel generators kicked in and the cooling systems held.

But make no mistake: this was yet another near miss.

As Ukraine prepares for a much anticipated counteroffensive to re-take its sovereign territory, including occupied Zaporizhzhia, there is mounting concern that a major nuclear power may be the scene of heavy fighting. In that situation, the worst case scenario — a full blown nuclear meltdown — is not the kind of remote possibility it ought to be.

“There have been some models done by U.N. and other treaty organizations to look at the potential spread of radioactivity,” nuclear expert Jon Wolfsthal told me last year on an episode of Global Dispatches. “And in the case of a meltdown, the worst case you could see radioactivity spread all over Europe and beyond very quickly. This is something that would have dramatic effects both on the health and the economies of the populations in Europe. I think it would actually drive a much greater escalation of the fighting in Ukraine because of the fact that the damage being done would no longer be contained to Ukraine itself, but would be basically a European conflict.”

THE RISK OF A MELTDOWN AT THE ZAPORIZHZHIA NUCLEAR POWER PLANT IS FAR HIGHER THAN IT SHOULD BE.

For months, International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Grossi has been floating proposals to reduce that risk. Last August, Grossi negotiated access across battle lines to ZNPP where he literally shouted from the rooftops that the area around the plant ought to be a sort of demilitarized zone, immune from fighting. He was able to station a handful of IAEA safety technicians at the plant, but his bigger warning has gone unheeded. Despite his best efforts, Russia and Ukraine have not agreed to a protection zone around ZNPP.

Now, as Ukraine readies an apparent counter-offensive, Grossi is trying a new tactic: taking his calls directly to the UN Security Council. Per the Washington Post , Grossi has been floating a five point plan to reduce the risk of a nuclear accident at ZNPP.

The diplomatic dynamics of getting this through the Security Council are tough—but not impossible. Moscow is reportedly on board with this proposal, which should not be a surprise given that it would essentially preclude Ukraine from fighting over territory Russia stole in 2022. For that same reason, Ukraine is not on board.

But the consequences potential nuclear accident at ZNPP are far reaching enough that Ukraine’s backers on the Security Council — the USA, France and the UK — may consider Grossi’s proposal prudent risk management in an uncertain conflict. The proposal does not cede Ukrainian territory, but only suggests that this one bit of land not be the scene of hot fighting. (Also: a ZNPP plan supported by Ukraine’s key backers may protect the Zelensky government from accusations that it is needlessly acquiescing to Russia. It could give Ukraine the political space required to support such an agreement.)

The IAEA — and Grossi — are stepping up in a big way. They are doing what we would expect of an international organization dedicated to nuclear security. This is not a proposal to stop the war— far from it. But if enacted, the proposal would reduce the risk of a cataclysmic nuclear accident that could devastate entire populations in Europe and beyond.

If the Washington Post’s reporting is accurate, Grossi will publicly float his proposal in the coming days at the Security Council. This is a debate worth having.

Source: EMM/ UN DISPATCH

German police have carried out raids in seven states in a probe into climate campaigners suspected of forming or backing a criminal group because of their controversial activities.

Among those raided was Last Generation spokeswoman Carla Hinrichs, whose door was broken down by armed police while she was in bed, the group said.

For months Last Generation has disrupted traffic in German cities.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz has condemned their campaign as “completely crazy”.

For weeks in Germany there has been a ferocious culture war about whether Last Generation can be legally defined as a criminal organisation.

Conservative MPs have demanded tougher penalties including jail sentences, while left-wingers have warned of a dangerous authoritarian clampdown.

Some 170 police took part in Wednesday’s raids on flats and other buildings in Berlin, Bavaria, Dresden, Hamburg and elsewhere, shutting down the group’s website and freezing two accounts.

Ms Hinrichs’s flat in the Berlin district of Kreuzberg was targeted at 07:00 on Wednesday by 25 police officers carrying guns, her colleagues said.

No arrests have been reported but seven people aged 22 to 38 are suspected of organising a campaign to collect at least €1.4m (£1.2m) in funding mainly to finance “further criminal acts”. Police and prosecutors said the raids were aimed at establishing Last Generation’s membership structure.

Two of the activists under investigation are suspected of trying to sabotage an oil pipeline running across the Alps from the Italian coast at Trieste to Ingolstadt last year.

In Berlin, Last Generation activists are making an impact. Roads blocked by activists have become a regular feature in radio traffic reports. Households have been getting leaflets inviting locals to Last Generation information or training events.

Last week,12 streets were blocked in the city as activists glued themselves to the road or to cars. But these street sit-ins have resulted in some drivers lashing out. Countless social media videos show outraged drivers screaming at campaigners.

In polls, most Germans disagree with the group’s tactics. In a survey carried out by left-leaning magazine Der Spiegel this month, 79% of respondents said the group’s actions were wrong, with only 16% agreeing with the activists.

But that doesn’t mean all Germans support a clampdown either.

Many left-wing and Green politicians as well as commentators say they disagree with the group’s tactics because they enrage people rather than win them over to environmentalism. But they argue activists should still have the right to campaign peacefully.

Last Generation criticised Wednesday’s raids using the chancellor’s “completely crazy” quote, VölligBekloppt, as a hashtag, asking when the authorities would instead search “lobby structures and confiscate government fossil funds”.

Another climate action group, Ende Gelände, complained that the raids were targeting people seeking to “raise the alarm about the climate crisis rather those responsible for it”.

Last Generation said it would continue its activities and some supporters online suggested the raids would galvanise support for their campaign.

The police response has been welcomed by conservatives, as well as some politicians from two ruling parties, the FDP and centre-left SPD. Some Green politicians said while they disagreed with the group’s radical actions, they suggested the raids may have been too heavy-handed.

Left-wing and environmental groups announced a march in Berlin on Wednesday afternoon with further demonstrations in Leipzig, Munich and Potsdam. Greenpeace and politicians from the left-wing Linke party called the raids a “new level of escalation” from police that undermined the basic democratic right to protest.

Last Generation is campaigning for a speed limit on motorways of 100km/h (62mph).

It played a key role in protests against the expansion of an open coal mine in the village of Lützerath in January, where campaigner Greta Thunberg was briefly detained.

Last October two activists threw mashed potato at a Claude Monet painting at a museum in Potsdam near Berlin and then glued themselves to a wall, an action that mirrored similar protests in the UK by the climate action group Just Stop Oil.

Last Generation is not limited to Germany. Two activists glued themselves to an area in front of the Austrian parliament in Vienna on Wednesday, defying a ban on protests outside the building.

In Italy, three Italian activists were due in court on Wednesday for gluing themselves to a Vatican museum sculpture dating back to Roman times last August. Activists belonging to the group had also coloured the Trevi fountain in Rome black as a statement against fossil fuels.

Source: BBC

Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu has promised a “harsh response” to cross-border incursions from Ukraine.

His comments came after Moscow said it had defeated an attack in the Belgorod region.

However, regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said there had been a “large number” of drone attacks overnight.

Ukraine denies involvement in the raid – and two Russian paramilitary groups opposed to Russian President Vladimir Putin say they were behind it.

Attackers entered Russian territory from Ukraine on Monday.

Reporting to defence ministry officials on the incursion, Mr Shoigu said “more than 70 Ukrainian nationalists” had been killed and the rest pushed back into Ukraine.

“We will continue to respond to such actions by Ukrainian militants promptly and extremely harshly,” he said.

The two Russian paramilitary groups – the Russian Volunteer Corps (RDK) and Liberty of Russia Legion (LSR) denied that they had sustained any casualties, and said a Russian motorised rifle company had been destroyed.

The casualty claims by the warring sides have not been independently verified.

Russia also says that Western military vehicles were used in the incursion.

It posted pictures of destroyed US vehicles apparently at the scene of the fighting but some Ukrainian military experts and bloggers have suggested they could have been staged.

The US said it was sceptical that reports of US-supplied weapons being used in the incursion were true and did not “encourage or enable strikes inside of Russia”.

But Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the vehicles were evidence of growing Western military involvement in Ukraine.

“It is no secret for us that more and more equipment is being delivered to Ukraine’s armed forces. It is no secret that this equipment is being used against our own military,” he said.

“We are drawing the appropriate conclusions.”

Meanwhile attacks in the region appear to be continuing.

Mr Gladkov said overnight attacks by drones were mostly dealt with by air defences, but some damage was caused to cars, private houses and administrative buildings in and around Belgorod city, as well as in the border district of Borisovka.

No-one was injured in the attacks, he added.

A “small fire” began after a gas pipeline was damaged in Grayvoron district.

Low-level attacks in Russian border regions such as Belgorod and Bryansk have become frequent in recent weeks.

Mr Gladkov said that agricultural workers were going out into the fields wearing helmets and bulletproof vests because of the threat of attacks.

Villages in Belgorod near the border were evacuated on Monday after coming under fire.

Monday’s raid led Moscow to declare a counter-terrorism operation, giving the authorities special powers to clamp down on communications and people’s movements.

The measures were only lifted the following afternoon, and even then, one of the paramilitary groups was claiming it still controlled a small piece of Russian territory.

Source: BBC

The European Commission recommends that Cyprus speed up the implementation of its recovery and resilience plan, and reduce reliance on fossil fuels placing an emphasis on developing electricity interconnections, in the context of country-specific recommendations issued as part of the 2023 European Semester Spring Package.

The package focuses on what needs to be done so member states build a robust and future proof economy that secures competitiveness and long term prosperity in the face of a challenging geopolitical environment. This, the Commission notes in a press release, requires an integrated approach across all policy areas: promoting environmental sustainability, productivity, fairness, and macroeconomic stability.

Among other elements included in the package, the Commission has assessed the existence of macroeconomic imbalances for the 17 Member States, including, Cyprus, selected for in-depth reviews in the 2023 Alert Mechanism Report.

‘Cyprus is experiencing imbalances after experiencing excessive imbalances until 2022 as vulnerabilities related to private, government, and external debt have overall declined but remain a concern,’ according to the European Commission.

Regarding the post-programme surveillance report issued for Cyprus (along with those for Ireland, Greece, Spain and Portugal), the Commission finds that Cyprus and the other countries that have benefited from financial assistance programmes retain the capacity to repay their debt.

Recommendations for Cyprus

————–

More specifically, the recommendations proposed by the European Commission to Cyprus for the years 2023 and 2024 are for the country to:

1. Wind down the energy support measures in force by the end of 2023. Should renewed energy price increases necessitate support measures, ensure that these are targeted at protecting vulnerable households and firms, fiscally affordable, and preserve incentives for energy savings. While maintaining a sound fiscal position in 2024, preserve nationally financed public investment and ensure the effective absorption of RRF grants and other EU funds, in particular to foster the green and digital transitions.

Facilitate the reduction of private debt, including by implementing an effective foreclosure framework.

For the period beyond 2024, continue to pursue investment and reforms conducive to higher sustainable growth and preserve a prudent medium-term fiscal position.

2. Accelerate the implementation of its recovery and resilience plan, also by ensuring an adequate administrative capacity, and swiftly finalise the REPowerEU chapter with a view to rapidly starting its implementation. Proceed with the speedy implementation of cohesion policy programmes, in close complementarity and synergy with the recovery and resilience plan.

3. Take measures to improve the governance of the state-owned entities in line with international standards.

4. Reduce reliance on fossil fuels and diversify the energy supply. To better exploit all untapped potential for renewable energy generation, accelerate renewables deployment by using suitable economic instruments and making further investments to upgrade and modernise the electricity grid, including energy storage facilities.

Speed up the development of electricity interconnections. Extend and accelerate energy efficiency measures, also to address energy poverty, as well as the shift towards sustainable transport. Step up policy efforts aimed at the provision and acquisition of the skills needed for the green transition.

Source: Cyprus News Agency

Ten years after the financial crisis Cyprus has exited the European Commission’s excessive imbalances procedure (EIP), on the basis of EU documents issued under the spring package of the 2023 European Semester.

The EIP procedure shows that a member state is experiencing excessive vulnerabilities and it is placed under enhanced surveillance to ensure compliance with EU fiscal rules.

An EU official in Nicosia also said that Cyprus has already achieved its medium-term fiscal target, as the EU is poised to restore its fiscal rules as the Stability Pact’s escape clause will be terminated in the end of 2023.

‘Cyprus has achieved significant progress and it is on a path of gradual correction,’ the official said, noting that the island is now in the imbalances procedure.

The exit from the EIP was mainly due to the reduction of private debt from 250% of GDP in end-2021 to 217% in the end of 2022, the reduction of public debt by 14.5 percentage points to 85% of GDP in 2022, as well as the decline of the stock of non-performing loans (NPLs) to 5.2% under the Commission’s methodology. The same official said that these indices are placed on a downward path.

Cyprus also showed improved Net International Investment Position to -105.3% of GDP which excluding special purpose entities declines further to -40.9% GDP.

Furthermore, echoing the EU Commission’s recommendations for Cyprus, he said that the government should expedite the implementation of its pound 1.1 billion National Recovery and Resilience Plan as Cyprus has received just one disbursement so far, achieving 14 milestones of the plan’s total 271. He also recalled that under the EU Recovery and Resilience Facility disbursements will end in June 2026.

The same official said that Cyprus should do more to promote renewable energy, in a bid to reduce dependency on fossil fuels highlighting that Cyprus should promote sustainable transport which accounts for 42% of energy demand in Cyprus.

Source: Cyprus News Agency

Cyprus’ Ministry of Finance welcomed on Wednesday the upgrade of Cyprus in the context of European Semester Spring Package.

“The government welcomes the fact that the package of measures announced today by the European Commission in relation to the European Semester, which among other things includes its decisions regarding the macroeconomic imbalances procedure, upgrades Cyprus to a higher category,” the Ministry notes in a press release.

It is pointed out that Cyprus is now classified as a country with “existence of macroeconomic imbalances” instead of “excessive macroeconomic imbalances” in 2022.

“We also welcome the fact that the EU is seeing a significant decline in non-performing loans ratio (NPLs), while predicting that the decline will continue,” it is noted.

The Ministry also notes that the EU records that private debt, as a percentage of GDP, will continue to decrease, supported both by nominal GDP growth and by the deleveraging of households and businesses.

‘At the same time the EU records that the public debt is steadily decreasing and is expected to decrease further in 2023 and 2024,’ it adds.

The Ministry also notes that according to the Commission, measures implemented in the context of the national Resilience and Recovery contributed significantly in the improvement of the indicators.

Also, the Commission sees the end of the moratorium on foreclosures as positive, since it is expected to encourage borrowers to participate in restructuring their loans, leading to a further reduction in NPLs and freeing up resources to expand economic activity.

The government, the press release concludes, ‘will continue to promote measures to strengthen the competitiveness of the economy and expand the production base, ensuring macroeconomic stability and sustainability of public finances’.

Source: Cyprus News Agency