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Bangladesh fighting back against climate domination by rich nations
original: Remote control
John Vidal, The Guardian,
While the least developed countries suffer the worst effects of climate change, brought about by the actions of the rich, they have no voice in global warming talks. Now Bangladesh is leading a fightback.
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On September 27 last year, Fakhruddin Ahmed, chief adviser – or head – of the interim government of Bangladesh, stood in the UN general assembly in New York and appealed on behalf of all the most vulnerable countries in the world for help and justice to cope with climate change. “This year we in Bangladesh have witnessed one of the worst floods in recent times . . . there is little we can do to prevent significant damage . . . a one-metre sea level rise will submerge about one-third of Bangladesh, uprooting 25 million to 30 million people. I speak for Bangladesh and many other countries on the threshold of a climatic Armageddon,” he said.
All his fears were justified. Within a few months, the super cyclone (or hurricane) Sidr had devastated southern Bangladesh. Sweeping off the bay of Bengal and making landfall at 223km/h, it was one of the biggest storms ever measured in Bangladesh, stronger even than the one in 1991, when 138,000 people died. This time, more than 3,000 people perished and 7 million were affected. It would have been far more had it not been for the string of shelters that have been built all along the coast, and the precise, early warning given by Bangladesh’s Met Office.
Last week, Ahmed was in London to see Gordon Brown and the UK development secretary, Douglas Alexander, and he appealed for help directly from Britain on behalf of Bangladesh and the other 50 least developed countries (LDCs) in the world. “There is every reason to feel angry and upset,” he said. “The least developed are suffering the most. It is unfair. We are suffering the most from climate change, but we did not contribute [to it] at all. We are prepared to do our part, but we require, and demand, access to a large amount of investment, resources and technologies that will be needed to adapt.”
(26 March 2008)
Swiss-Iran energy deal angers United States
SwissInfo
The United States has criticised an agreement for the delivery of natural gas signed on Monday between a private Swiss energy company and Tehran.
The deal was signed in the Iranian capital in the presence of the Swiss foreign minister, Micheline Calmy-Rey.
The natural gas from Iran together with supplies from Azerbaijan is expected to feed into a gas pipeline running from Greece via Albania to Italy, according to officials.
The deal with National Iranian Gas Export Company (NIGEC) and EGL covers the delivery of 5.5 billion cubic metres of gas per year to Europe through a pipeline by 2012. The contract runs over 25 years, according to EGL, which refused to reveal the worth of the contract.
Calmy-Rey said it was Switzerland’s strategy to diversify its source of energy supplies. “We decrease our dependence, and the dependence of Europe, on Russian gas,” she said.
Switzerland currently buys its supplies in northern Europe (Norway, Netherlands, Germany), Algeria (through France) and Russia. Consumption of gas represents about 12 per cent of Switzerland’s energy needs.
(17 March 2008)
Iraq oil animation (video)
Jim Hightower, Hightower Download
A bumper sticker about the Iraq war asks, “What’s OUR oil doing under THEIR sand?”
Of course the Bushites hotly denied that their disasterous war was about grabbing the second largest oil reserve in the world.
“It has nothing to do with oil, literally nothing to do with oil,” barked Donny Rumsfield. …
National radio commentator, writer, public speaker, and author of Thieves In High Places: They’ve Stolen Our Country And It’s Time to Take It Back, Jim Hightower has spent three decades battling the Powers That Be on behalf of the Powers That Ought To Be – consumers, working families, environmentalists, small businesses, and just-plain-folks.
(March 2008)
Short explanation of the war in Iraq from a US populist perspective. Jim Hightower was Texas Agriculture Commissioner from 1982-91.
Suggested by Contributor Andrew Evans who writes: “the real reason for the Iraq war.”
-BA
