International
Deforestation in Brazilian Amazon hits January record
AFP
Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon set a new record for January just three weeks into the year, according to data released Wednesday, a worrying sign of the surging destruction of the world’s biggest rainforest.
Nearly 360 square kilometers (140 square miles) of forest cover — an area more than six times the size of Manhattan — were destroyed in the Brazilian Amazon from January 1 to January 21, said Brazil’s national space research institute, INPE.
With 10 days to go in the month, the figure was already the worst for January since the institute launched its DETER satellite monitoring program in 2015.
Environmentalists said that translated into a high risk that 2022 would be another devastating year for the Brazilian Amazon, where deforestation has surged since far-right President Jair Bolsonaro took office in 2019.
“A number that high in January, which is the peak of the rainy season” — when deforestation usually falls — “certainly demands attention and leaves us extremely worried,” said Claudio Angelo of the Climate Observatory, a network of environmental groups.
“We’ll have to see how the coming months go, but it’s definitely not a good sign.”
By comparison, deforestation for January 2021 was 83 square kilometers — less than one-fourth the figure for the first 21 days of January 2022.
Last year was nevertheless a terrible year for Brazil’s 60-percent share of the Amazon. The amount of forest cover lost during INPE’s reference period, from August 2020 to July 2021, surged almost 22 percent year-on-year, to a 15-year high of 13,235 square kilometers.
It was the third straight increase under Bolsonaro, who has pushed to open protected rainforest lands to agribusiness and mining.
Bolsonaro has faced international outcry over the surging destruction of the Amazon, a key resource in the race to curb climate change.
The Climate Observatory revealed Tuesday that Brazil’s main environmental protection agency, Ibama, had spent just 41 percent of its enforcement budget in 2021.
International
Meta Says Russia Seeks to Ban WhatsApp for Defending Secure Communication
U.S. tech giant Meta, the parent company of WhatsApp, said that Russia is seeking to ban the messaging app because it “challenges government attempts to violate people’s right to secure communication.”
Russian authorities have encouraged citizens to switch to state-backed applications, and in August they already blocked WhatsApp’s calling feature.
On Friday, the communications regulator Roskomnadzor claimed that the platform was being used to “organize and carry out terrorist acts in the country, recruit perpetrators, and facilitate fraud and other crimes.”
“If the messaging service does not comply with Russian law, it will be completely blocked,” the regulator warned.
WhatsApp remains one of Russia’s most widely used messaging services, alongside Telegram.
Moscow is pressuring both platforms to grant authorities access to user data upon request for investigations into fraud and activities the government labels as “terrorist.”
Human rights advocates fear the demand could be used to target critics of the Kremlin, President Vladimir Putin, or the war in Ukraine.
International
Archbishop Wenski criticizes Trump’s deportation policies, calls for stronger push for reform
The Archbishop of Miami, Thomas Wenski, has called for increased pressure on the U.S. Congress to advance comprehensive immigration reform and criticized President Donald Trump’s mass deportation policies, arguing that they “do nothing to help.”
“We need to apply more pressure on Congress so lawmakers can make the necessary changes. It is also important for the Administration to listen to our voice. We do not want to be anyone’s enemy—we are Americans,” Wenski said in an interview with EFE.
The religious leader, who heads one of the dioceses with the largest Latino and Haitian populations in the United States, issued a call to defend the rights of migrants. He also emphasized that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has maintained a strong and public stance in favor of migrants for decades.
International
Trump relaunches diplomatic push to finalize U.S.-Backed peace plan for Ukraine War
U.S. President Donald Trump announced on Tuesday that his diplomatic team will resume meetings with delegations from Russia and Ukraine in an effort to pressure both sides to accept the peace plan proposed by Washington to end the war in Ukraine.
As part of this new round of talks, U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff will travel to Moscow to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Meanwhile, Army Secretary Dan Driscoll will hold discussions with Ukrainian representatives to narrow differences on the remaining points of the agreement.
Trump also confirmed his intention to meet personally with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and with Putin, though he emphasized that such meetings will only take place “when the agreement is fully finalized or in its final stage.”
The president claimed that his administration has made “tremendous progress” toward resolving the conflict and reiterated that the war “never would have started” if he had been in the White House at the onset of the crisis.
The U.S.-backed peace plan consists of 28 points and has been revised following feedback from both sides. According to Trump, only “a few points of disagreement” remain under active discussion.
One of the most controversial aspects of the proposal is the suggestion that Ukraine cede parts of the Donbas region to Russia and limit the size of its armed forces. Kyiv is working closely with Washington to soften these clauses in search of an arrangement that does not compromise its sovereignty or security.
With this diplomatic push, Trump aims to solidify his role as the main mediator in the conflict and steer the war toward a political resolution after years of devastation, humanitarian crisis, and rising global geopolitical tensions.
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