Conversations on Vietnam Development
Lettersdated 11 December 2023 from the Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine to the United Nations addressed to the Secretary-General, the President of the General Assembly and the President of the Security Council
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Palestinian ambassador to the UN Riyad Mansour addresses General Assembly (Oct. 26, 2023)
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Analysis by Stephen Collinson, CNN
Published 12:40 AM EST, Fri January 5, 2024
A picture taken from a position in southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli bombardment on January 4, 2024, amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.Jack Guez/AFP/Getty ImagesCNN —
Anxiety mounts every day that a full-scale Middle East war could erupt from the flames of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
“We feel and we’re afraid of it,” Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour this week. “We don’t want any escalation in the war. … We don’t like a regional war because it’s dangerous to everybody. Dangerous to Lebanon, dangerous to Israel and to the countries surrounding Israel,” he said, adding, “A regional war is bad for everybody.”
Tiếp tục đọc “A widened Middle East war would be a disaster, but it can still be avoided”With 2023 the warmest year on record, 2024 could see the unwelcome milestone of 1.5C of warming reached for a full year
Kate Ravilious @katerav TheGuardian
Thu 4 Jan 2024 06.00 GMT
The year 2023 has been confirmed as the warmest in recorded history, with average global temperatures topping 1.5C of heating above preindustrial levels for more than one third of the year. It continues the rapid warming trend, with the 10 warmest years in human history all having occurred since 2010.
So what could 2024 hold? Forecasts suggest the year ahead is likely to be another record breaker, with a strong possibility that this could be the first full year to go beyond 1.5C of warming.
Tiếp tục đọc “Is 2024 going to be the first full year to breach 1.5C of warming?”SUMMARY
BY ISABELLA O’MALLEY, JENNIFER MCDERMOTT AND ALEXA ST. JOHN Updated 9:50 PM GMT+7, December 27, 2023 AP
Led by new solar power, the world added renewable energy at breakneck speed in 2023, a trend that if amplified will help Earth turn away from fossil fuels and prevent severe warming and its effects.
Clean energy is often now the least expensive, explaining some of the growth. Nations also adopted policies that support renewables, some citing energy security concerns, according to the International Energy Agency. These factors countered high interest rates and persistent challenges in getting materials and components in many places.
The IEA projected that more than 440 gigawatts of renewable energy would be added in 2023, more than the entire installed power capacity of Germany and Spain together.
Here’s a look at the year in solar, wind and batteries.
Tiếp tục đọc “The year in clean energy: Wind, solar and batteries grow despite economic challenges”Kori Schake, a senior fellow and the director of foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, sits down with James M. Lindsay to discuss where the fighting in Ukraine is headed.
December 18, 2023 — 31:10 min CFR
Here are five highlights from their conversation:
1.) The front lines of the war haven’t changed much since the start of the counteroffensive. Kori pointed to the difficulty of clearing deeply entrenched Russian troops sitting behind heavily mined front lines. She attributed Russia’s ability to fortify its defenses in part to the Joe Biden administration, whose “six months of slow dispersal of weapons to Ukraine gave the Russians time to dig in.” She also noted the incredible difficulty of clearing minefields, while adding “the Ukrainians are doing it methodically.”
Tiếp tục đọc “The Future of the War in Ukraine, With Kori Schake”
Tue 26 Dec 2023 11.00 GMT The Guardian
Donald Trump’s packing of the supreme court, to which he appointed three members, to create a reliable conservative majority, has been hailed by the right as his greatest achievement. The Wall Street Journal editorial page has stated that the most important prospect of a second Trump term would be his appointment of federal judges in their mold. But Trump’s candidacy for that second term now poses an existential threat to the legitimacy of the court’s conservative majority.
Tiếp tục đọc “The court can only rescue Trump from the Colorado ruling by shredding originalism and textualism. Will it?”By Linh Huong December 26, 2023 | 09:50 am GMT+7 vnexpress
Traveling along Highway 4C to Sa Pa Town in the northern highlands, visitors are greeted by rows of cherry blossom trees standing out against the green tea hills.
In the final days of December, as one journeys approximately 7 kilometers from O Quy Ho Pass to Sa Pa along Highway 4C, they can come across thousands of cherry blossom trees blooming in striking shades of pink amid an oolong tea farm.
Tiếp tục đọc “A photographer’s journey to Sa Pa’s cherry blossoms”By Minh Nga December 26, 2023 | 01:26 pm GMT+7 vnexpress
See how Vietnam navigated the tumultuous currents of 2023 in a series of images capturing moments of both sorrow and joy, highlighting the unique and everyday moments of life.
Crowds fill Nguyen Hue Pedestrian Street in downtown Ho Chi Minh City for the countdown to 2023.
Photo by Thanh Tung
Tiếp tục đọc “Vietnam’s vibrant 2023: a pictorial review”Patrick Wintour, Diplomatic editor, The Guardian
The west’s equivocation on Gaza exposes a global order facing mutiny over its domination of the international discourse
Tue 26 Dec 2023 05.00 GMT
Richard Haass, the distinguished global analyst, once wrote: “Consistency in foreign policy is a luxury policymakers cannot always afford.”
But, equally, glaring national hypocrisy can come with a high price tag, in terms of lost credibility, damaged global prestige and diminished self-respect.
So Joe Biden’s decision to defend Israel’s methods in Gaza so soon after, in a different context, condemning Russia’s in Ukraine, is not just an occasion for hand wringing from liberals and lawyers.
Tiếp tục đọc “Why US double standards on Israel and Russia play into a dangerous game”Dec 22, 2023 at 9:52 AM EST00:32
Chinese Ships Confronts Philippine Vessels Near Second Thomas Shoal
China News Reporter, Newsweek
The maritime militia fleet is the vanguard of Beijing’s strategy to reshape the geopolitical landscape in the region, experts say, with its blue-hulled ships a frequent sight at territorial standoffs in the South China Sea.
The maritime militia is considered by analysts to be China’s third sea force alongside its navy and coast guard. The Chinese government maintains the fleet is little more than a group of patriotic fishermen.
Dubbed “little blue men” by Andrew Erickson, professor of strategy at the U.S. Naval War College’s China Maritime Studies Institute, the ships regularly join China’s coast guard in blockades against supply missions to a Philippine military outpost at the Spratly Islands’ Second Thomas Shoal, including the most recent tense showdown on December 10. A blockading militia ship was involved in a collision with a Philippine coast guard boat in October, and Manila accused another of using a sonic weapon against a fisheries bureau convoy on December 9.
Tiếp tục đọc “China’s Maritime Militia: The ‘Gray Zone’ Force in the South China Sea”Estimates show small modular nuclear reactors would provide most expensive power and will not be available until 2030
Graham Readfearn @readfearnWed 20 Dec 2023 19.55 GMT TheGuardian
Electricity generated by solar and on-shore wind is the cheapest in Australia, even after the significant expense of integrating them into the power grid is factored in, according to new analysis from the CSIRO.
Tiếp tục đọc “Solar and on-shore wind provide cheapest electricity and nuclear most expensive, CSIRO analysis shows”BY FABIANO MAISONNAVE, ASSOCIATED PRESS AND RUBENS VALENTE, AGENCIA PUBLICAU pdated 6:42 AM GMT+7, December 20, 2023 AP
JACI-PARANA, Brazil (AP) — Meat processing giant JBS SA and three other slaughterhouses are facing lawsuits seeking millions of dollars in environmental damages for allegedly purchasing cattle raised illegally in a protected area in the Brazilian Amazon.
The lawsuits, filed December 5 to 12 by the western Brazilian state of Rondonia, target the exploitation of a protected area known as Jaci-Parana, once rainforest but now mostly transformed into grassland by decades of misuse by land-grabbers, loggers and cattle ranchers. Despite a law forbidding commercial cattle in the reserve, some 216,000 head now graze on pasture there, according to the state animal division.
Tiếp tục đọc “[2 articles] Brazil lawsuits allege direct relationship between meatpackers, deforesters on protected land – Cocoa grown illegally in a Nigerian rainforest heads to companies that supply major chocolate makers”US DEPARTMENT OF STATE
MEDIA NOTE
DECEMBER 18, 2023
The text of the following joint statement was released by the Governments of the United States of America, Canada, the European Union and its Member States (Belgium, Bulgaria, Czechia, Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Ireland, Greece, Spain, France, Croatia, Italy, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Hungary, Malta, Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Slovakia, Finland, Sweden), Japan, and the United Kingdom expressing support for ICAO’s efforts to address the challenges and opportunities associated with higher airspace operations.
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Tiếp tục đọc “Joint Statement on Higher Airspace Operations (HAO)”
People, especially politicians, in the West are afraid of being called antisemite, and they may hang the antisemite label on the neck of their enemies if they get a chance.
What is so powerful about “antisemite” or “antisemitism”? Tiếp tục đọc “Antisemite? Really?”
CVD 