The United Nations has designated May 21 as International Tea Day to celebrate the cultural heritage, health benefits and economic importance of the drink. Tea is the most popular drink across the globe after water, and it is valued for its anti-inflammatory and antioxidant qualities. Nearly all words for tea across the globe can be derived from the root words “cha” or “te,” with China producing nearly half of the world’s tea. Tea drinking is very common among many nations, from being a marker of hospitality to the idiosyncratic methods in which different teas are made.
Iran has executed three men on charges of drug smuggling, the latest in a series of death penalty sentences in the country. The men were accused of “corruption on Earth” after more than 39 kilogrammes of heroin and other drug-related materials were confiscated from them. The charges were confirmed by the Supreme Court. The international community has expressed horror at Iran’s execution practices, with the country set to execute more individuals than since 2015. Amnesty International reported earlier this year that Iran executes more people each year for drug offences than any country except China.
A leading campaigner for nuclear disarmament, Setsuko Thurlow, has condemned the Group of Seven nations’ summit as a "huge failure" after the leaders released a statement backing existing nonproliferation policy. The three-day Japanese conference was designed by Prime Minister Fumio Kishida to support a "world without nuclear weapons." Thurlow, who supports the nuclear-ban treaty, said the statement was "blasphemy against atomic bomb survivors." In the document, the leaders, including nuclear states such as the US, France and Britain, promised to "maintain and create a global environment in which all countries fully observe relevant international law" but did not outline specific new ideas for disarmament. The statement was issued on the same day as the G7 leaders visited Hiroshima’s Peace Park and the museum. Thurlow was 13 when an atomic bomb destroyed her home city of Hiroshima in 1945, and eight of her relatives were killed. She has since given over 2,000 speeches promoting disarmament and has supported the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons.
A delegation of African leaders, including South Africa, Egypt and Zambia, are set to discuss a peace process and the easing of economic sanctions against Russia during talks in Ukraine and Moscow next month. Jean-Yves Ollivier, an international negotiator involved in brokering the talks, said the six African leaders would also discuss bringing in more grain shipments from Ukraine and the issue of prisoner exchanges. The talks have also won the support of the UN, EU, the African Union, China and the US. Since being sanctioned by the US and other Western firms, Russia has struggled with exporting fertiliser, leaving African and other countries, such as Brazil and India, with limited access to the resource, a fundamental item for farming. African nations are also keen to expand trade ties with Russia and China as an alternative to traditional Western partners.
Ralph Babet, the Australian senator for Victoria, has relinquished his directorship of the family estate agency Babet Brothers. He said that although he continues to work for the firm, he was too busy with his parliamentary duties to remain a director. He has transferred full control of the business to his brother Bertrand. Babet is one of the Australian Conservatives' elected representatives and was elected after receiving significant electoral funding from mining magnate Clive Palmer. Although nominally a member of the party, Babet has vocally criticised his colleagues and complained that his Senator's income, which is over AUD $200,000 ($145,193), was a pay cut from his previous earnings in real estate.
Ralph "Deej" Babet, an Australian senator from the Liberal Democratic Party, has stepped down as a director of his family real estate company. The move was aimed at avoiding a conflict of interest, although he claimed to continue to work for the company at weekends. Babet was initially elected in 2019 after Clive Palmer spent AUD116m ($87m) funding his campaign. Babet has raised controversy in parliament by criticising drag queen story time and the United Nations.
A campaign to overturn a decline in condom sales and use in India's northern states was developed by an advertising team called Condom Bindass Bol, which included comical scenarios to encourage men to say the word condom without embarrassment in public. The family planning campaign became among a series promoting contraception and birth control. India set up a department devoted to family planning in the 1950s and aggressively promoted the use of contraception and sterilisation to respond to rapid population growth. The campaigns have helped create a new vocabulary for sensitive topics and helped change social norms, although the push has largely focused on women, who have borne the burden of choice. Critics maintain the programmes have been ineffective because they focused on women and kept men on the margins. However, campaigners say that some programmes sparked awareness which led to attitudinal change. Campaigners say behaviour modification often involves "sparking a conversation".
Republican Senator Tim Scott has launched his presidential bid in South Carolina. He is the only Black Republican senator and made the announcement at his alma mater, Charleston Southern University, after filing with the Federal Election Commission last week. Scott's team hopes he can find a way to stand out in a field led by Donald Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis by leaning into more optimistic rhetoric than his rivals, while emphasising his faith. Scott has rejected teaching of critical race theory, which presents the idea that the nation’s institutions maintain the dominance of white people.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is urging a last-minute agreement to protect Ukraine's enormous Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant as a counteroffensive is planned, which could see forces driven directly through the station. After nearly nine months of failed efforts to establish a protection zone around the plant between Ukraine and Russia, Rafael Grossi, the head of the IAEA, is pushing for a proposal to reduce the possibility of a catastrophic nuclear disaster. He intends to present five set principles for the UN Security Council to endorse later this month, however obtaining agreement among the council’s permanent members is a tall task given the acidic relations between Moscow and Washington coupled with Kyiv’s reluctance to let Russia broker any deal other than its complete withdrawal from Enerhodar, the city where the power station is based, and surrendering the plant. Negotiations on Grossi’s plan are ongoing. A senior European diplomat has said the chances for an agreement and the briefing to go ahead are “50-50”.
Iraq is suffering increasingly from drought, spurring a wave of climate migrants. Years of severe water shortages forced farmer Haydar Mohamed to abandon his rural village and join the ranks of workers in Karbala, where he works in construction and drives a taxi. A UN report last month warned of the risk of increased "social unrest" in the Middle East, and Iraq specifically, due to climate factors. Making up 5% of GDP and employing 20% of the workforce, agriculture is Iraq's second-largest economic sector and has already been hit hard.
Pakistan's development vision, held by the country's elite and international development establishment, warns against a significant crisis, according to Samira Shackle in Al Jazeera. She posits that this vision has remained unchanged for six decades and is a "much bigger crisis" than Pakistan's current standoff between its authoritarian populist Prime Minister, Imran Khan, and its military. Pakistan's goal to become the "next Asian Tiger" is a familiar vision held by the Global South, with both governments and organisations pursuing a top-down, modernising approach which prioritises export production, ever-more intensive energy use and burning of fossil fuels, and high-productivity cash cropping, Shackle explains. However, researchers have noted the environmental and social impact of this trajectory, most notably in Pakistan's recent floods of 2010 and 2022. This can be attributed to hydrological engineering works in the country which have caused increased flood risks and ignored natural flows of water. Shackle believes that breaking the idea that there is no alternative to capitalist industrialisation, mega projects, and consuming the planet for profit and pleasure is essential for Pakistan to achieve a better alternative to its current development vision.
Weather-related disasters have caused 2 million deaths and $4.3tn in economic losses over the past 50 years, according to a report by the UN's World Meteorological Organization. The report said that 11,778 weather-related incidents had been recorded since 1970, with fatalities disproportionately concentrated in poor countries. Although early warnings and coordinated disaster management have reduced casualties, the report made clear that economic losses were escalating. Wealthy nations accounted for over 60% of losses but most of these were no greater than 0.1% of GDP.
China's demographic data is 'unreliable'. Local governments have an incentive to inflate population figures, because more residents mean larger financial transfers from the central government, while households might claim to have more members in order to receive more benefits from local governments, the author argues. There is also political incentive to inflate birth figures. For example, to show that the shift from a one- to a two-child policy worked, the National Health and Family Planning Commission announced 18.85 million births in 2016, a 27% increase from the previous year. In Shandong and Zhejiang provinces, the reported increase was even larger: 56% and 75%, respectively. However, the simplest explanation is that it never happened. The number of administered doses of the Bacillus Calmette-Guerin vaccine (which is required for every newborn) barely increased in 2016. While population aging may not directly cause economic recession, a higher aging index – the number of people aged 59 and over per 100 individuals younger than 15 – has a strong negative correlation with GDP growth, as does higher median age and proportion of people over 59.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) celebrated its 150th anniversary on May 23, marking 150 years since the establishment of the North-West Mounted Police in 1873. The anniversary comes amid ongoing controversy around the force’s conduct, including its handling of cases involving Indigenous people, and allegations of harassment and discrimination within its ranks. The RCMP’s mandate has evolved over the past century and a half, expanding to include provincial and national policing duties, forensic laboratories, marine and air services, and participation in international peacekeeping missions. The force has also faced various cultural shifts, including the integration of women, visible and religious minorities, and the adoption of more diverse and inclusive recruitment policies. However, many Indigenous people and other critics argue that the RCMP’s structural and legislative framework reflects a history of colonialism, systemic racism, and violence, which affects its ability to serve and protect all Canadians equally.
Republican Senator Tim Scott launches U.S. presidential bid
CBC
23-05-22 17:13
Tim Scott, the US Senate's only Black Republican, has launched his bid for the presidency with a message of hope and opportunity that contrasts with the aggressive attitudes of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Donald Trump. Scott announced his presidential run in his hometown of North Charleston, offering an optimistic approach in contrast to the divisive politics of other leading Republicans. The senator is expected to mount a serious challenge for the nomination, possibly taking advantage of his large campaign war chest and success in South Carolina politics. However, he faces competition for attention from other presidential GOP hopefuls.
As agricultural fertiliser prices rise for West African farmers as a consequence of the ongoing geopolitical crisis in Ukraine, farmers in the region have been turning to a Japanese fertilisation method, called bokashi. The practice utilises the process of fermentation, a method, which can prepare local crops in just 12 days and uses ingredients such as rice bran, straw, manure, yeast, clay and sugar cane molasses. Bokashi is a “cheaper” alternative to synthetic fertilisers and has served as a means of empowering farmers and reducing their reliance on “products linked to volatile global markets and transnational corporations”. In West Africa, the nutritional practice has spread through word-of-mouth and has been credited with helping farmers increase their harvest yields, with some reporting that their produce has doubled.
Aid worker in Sudan fears the worst if latest ceasefire doesn't hold
CBC
23-05-22 21:55
A seven-day ceasefire negotiated by the US and Saudi Arabia began Monday in Sudan to allow the flow of humanitarian aid to civilians who have been cut off from most basic necessities due to conflict between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. The United Nations estimates that 700 people have been killed and more than a million displaced since mid-April, with most of the fighting taking place in the capital Khartoum. No previous ceasefires have held and lack of supplies for aid workers continues to be a problem. The Norwegian Refugee Council continues to try to help children who have fled the conflict.
Russia’s sanctioned interior minister visits Saudi Arabia just after trip by Ukraine’s Zelenskyy
The Toronto Star
23-05-23 05:18
Russian Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev visited Saudi Arabia on Tuesday to hold talks with his counterpart Prince Abdulaziz bin Saud. The visit follows Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's address to an Arab League summit in Saudi Arabia, highlighting the kingdom's and Gulf Arab states' relations with Moscow despite the ongoing Ukraine war. Kolokoltsev has been sanctioned by the US and other countries since 2018 over Russia's activity in Ukraine and Syria. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has attempted to position the kingdom as a potential mediator between Ukraine and Russia to end the conflict. Since the start of the war, Saudi Arabia has purchased Russian diesel fuel at a discount due to Western sanctions against Russia.
The European Union's (EU) use of the Temporary Protection Directive for the first time to cope with Ukrainian refugees from Russia's invasion of Ukraine in March 2022 could provide lessons for dealing with contentious refugee issues amidst the current refugee crisis. The directive grants temporary protection whereby refugees receive immediate access to housing, welfare, healthcare and education, almost the same as local nationals, and fast-tracks residency rights by waiving the need to examine applications individually, thus avoiding bottlenecks, overwhelmed asylum systems and deterrent conditions. Despite largely being regarded as a success, it has led to a two-tier system. Some Member States feared activating temporary protection in other cases would attract more migrants to Europe. Further, geography plays a significant role in migrant policy debates, with countries of origin having different perspectives on border countries versus destination countries, which tend to be preferred by refugees.
