Pollution stripping peaks of ice cover
Africa’s two highest mountains – Mount Kilimanjaro and Mount Kenya – will lose their ice cover within 25 to 50 years if deforestation and industrial pollution are not stopped, environmentalists warned Thursday.
Kilimanjaro has already lost 82 percent of its ice cover over 80 years, said Fredrick Njau of the Kenyan Green Belt Movement. Mount Kenya, one of the few places near the equator with permanent glaciers, has lost 92 percent over the past 100 years.
“This is a major issue because declining ice caps mean the water tap is effectively going to be turned off and that is a major concern,” said Nick Nuttall from the U.N.’s Environment Program.
All the evidence shows climate change is under way and Africa is the must vulnerable continent to this, he said, adding that foreign aid must address the threat of climate change.
Industrial nations also need to step up support to help poor nations adapt to global warming with drought and heat resistant crops and alternative energy sources so people do not cut down trees for fuel, Nuttall said.
African forests, he added, are soaking up pollution from industrialized nations for free and should reap some kind of reward or benefit for that.
Jerusalem
Israeli forces kill Palestinians in Gaza
Israeli forces killed at least eight Palestinians on Thursday in the Gaza Strip during hours of sporadic ground fighting and airstrikes. Five of those killed were from a single family.
Israeli military officials said forces entered the strip before dawn near the central Gaza city of Khan Younis in search of cross-border tunnels that Palestinian armed groups use for smuggling.
The troops were fired on soon after, Israeli military officials said, and returned fire during a series of small-scale attacks for the next few hours. In addition to the dead, casualties included at least 11 Palestinians reported wounded in the exchanges.
The most severe strike occurred when an Israeli military aircraft, which Palestinian witnesses identified as an Apache attack helicopter, fired on ground targets near the eastern border town of Abassan.
Palestinian medics reported that five members of the Gdaih family were killed in the strike, including three gunmen from the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s military arm.
Berlin
Ban sought on entry of CIA agents
Prosecutors in Germany have asked federal authorities to forbid CIA agents suspected of being involved in the alleged kidnapping and five-month imprisonment of a German citizen from entering the country, a German television program reported Thursday.
The request is the newest twist in the case of Khaled Masri, a German citizen of Lebanese descent who was detained in Macedonia in 2003 and ended up in American-run prison in Afghanistan. Masri claims he was a victim of a U.S. rendition program that captures and jails suspected terrorists.
Munich state prosecutor August Stern sent the names and aliases of CIA operatives and contractors to the Federal Criminal Police Office, asking that the agents not be allowed to enter Germany for fear of committing more crimes.