Penulis: Agus S

Renewables push in Queensland for cooperation between state and federal governments

The Queensland state government is being urged to do a deal with the commonwealth for national support to build more local renewable energy and storage projects.

The federal government has made renewable energy transformation agreements with every other state, meaning billions of dollars of Commonwealth funding become available for green power projects like batteries and solar.

Stephanie Gray, a campaigner with the Queensland Conservation Council, said regional communities deserve their fair share of federal funding.

We’re concerned recent moves by the Queensland government indicate they’re opposed to new clean energy investment, which if true, is bad news for regional economies, power bills and climate action.

The Queensland government has recently cancelled a windfarm they previously approved and moved to implement controversial legislation changes that will make it very challenging to get a large-scale renewable project approved.

Gray said Queensland’s coal-fired power stations had broken down “a staggering 78 times over the last summer period”.

As our ageing coal fleet heads towards retirement, it’s only practical to make sure that new renewable energy supply is coming online to keep the lights on, manage power bills and reduce emissions in our most polluting sector …

We simply cannot depend on our coal clunkers any more, and their unreliability is driving up wholesale power prices.

The Guardian’s Latin America correspondent, Tom Phillips, recalls the moment that he and others on the search team found Dom and Bruno’s belongings in a hidden area of flooded forest. The team finally discover what has happened to the men

Warning: this episode has descriptions of violence and some swearing

US president said Ukraine war would not have happened if Moscow had not been thrown out in 2014 over Crimea

Donald Trump has displayed his disdain for the collective western values supposedly championed by the G7 group of industrialised countries by again demanding that Russia be readmitted to the group. He also said the war in Ukraine would not have happened if Moscow had been kept in the club.

Trump made his remarks in front of media, alongside Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney, who is hosting the G7, at the start of the summit’s first round of talks.

Russia wasthrown out of the G8 after it invaded Crimea in 2014, and Trump’s defence of Vladimir Putin came a day before the US president is scheduled to meet his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, on the fringes of the summit. It will be the first meeting between the two men since Pope’s Francis’s funeral in April.

Zelenskyy is pressing for a reluctant Trump to respond to Putin’s refusal to agree a 30-day ceasefire byapplying sanctions on Russia that the US Senate has already approved.

Trump, however, has shown little sign of losing patience, and on Monday he repeated his opinion that expellingRussiafrom the G8 was a “big mistake”.

“You wouldn’t have that war,” he said. “You know you have your enemy at the table, I don’t even consider, he wasn’t really an enemy at that time.”

He blamed the former Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau and Barack Obama for Putin’s expulsion.

“Obama didn’t want him, and the head of your country didn’t want him,” Trump said, naming Trudeau several times and calling the ousting a mistake.

The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, signalled that the EU would be asking the US and other G7 member states to tighten sanctions on Russia by lowering the cap at which Russian oil can be bought from $60 a barrel to $45.

The aim is to reduce Russian revenues from oil sales. TheG7originally set up the complex price cap, so the EU needs the support of all G7 states to lower it.

Von der Leyen told reporters: “To achieve peace through strength we must put more pressure on Russia to secure a real ceasefire, to bring Russia to the negotiating table, and to end this war.

“Sanctions are critical to that end. As a result of the G7 and EU sanctions combined, for example, Russian oil and gas revenues have fallen by almost 80% since the beginning of the war.”

The EU is preparing an 18th round of sanctions heavily focused on cutting off Russia’s oil revenues.

Ahead of his meeting with Trump, Zelenskyy said: “Russia spits in the face of everything the international community is trying to do to stop this war.”

He said the latest Russian attacks on energy infrastructure came right after Putin had spoken to Trump offering to act as a mediator in the Iran-Israel crisis.

“This war could have ended long ago if the world had reacted to Russia in a principled way instead of falling for manipulation and lies,” he said.

He said that unlike Russia, Ukraine had complied with US requests not to target its opponent’s energy facilities.

Trump also gave no obvious ground on tariffs in his bilateral meeting with Carney. “I’m a tariff person,” he said. “It’s simple, it’s easy, it’s precise and it just goes very quickly.

“I think Mark has a more complex idea, but also very good.”

Trump has imposed levies on steel, aluminium, cars and other Canadian products that do not comply with the continental free trade agreement’s rules of origin.

Apex predators are one of several large and unpredictable animals concerning officials in foothills of Rockies

G7 summit on wildfire watch for Trumpian explosions in Canada

Security preparations forG7summits normally involve the elite close protection afforded to world leaders, and then a series of of concentric defences against street demonstrations and protests.

Asworld leaders gather at the G7 summit in Kananaskis, organizers have also had to factor in the potential threats posed by local wildlife.

Access to Kananaskis Country, one of the region’s main springboards to the rugged foothills and front ranges of the Rockies, has been cut off to all vehicles and air traffic as political elites gather. But officials are rightly worried about the region’s large and unpredictable mammals: moose, cougars, wolves, black bears – and the six dozen grizzlies known to live in the region.

Alberta’s ministry of public safety and emergency services told the Globe and Mail it has a “comprehensive wildlife mitigation strategy” in order to corral world leaders.

The province installed miles of fencing with a “minimum height of eight feet to limit wildlife access”. In areas where animals are often spotted, electric fences have also been installed.

Most people who have spent extended time in the Rocky Mountains have come across a bear. Often, the apex mammals are far more attuned to human presence than vice versa and flee the area before any encounters. Even when startled, bears – both black and grizzly – will scamper off into the forest.

But in recent weeks, charges by a grizzly with two cubs prompted officials to close parts of Kananaskis Country. On 13 June, officials warned visitors to Ole Buck Mountain to be vigilant after a cougar was spotted. A day later, officials closed a portion of the Peter Lougheed trail after a grizzly was spotted feeding on a carcass.

A further potential complication for summit organizers is the love of golf courses shared by both the bears in the region and the US president, Donald Trump. The 600-acre course within Kananaskis Valley is known both for its rugged beauty. And in spring, when food sources in the high country are still inaccessible, open urban environments scattered throughout the wilderness draw in curious bears.

“One of the things that people sometimes forget about is what an incredible environment these golf courses are for all sorts of wildlife,” Darren Robinson, the course’s longtime general manager, told CBC News, adding that cougars and moose have also stalked the greens.

“There’s been days last summer where I literally saw, from in the clubhouse, five different bears. Some black, some grizzlies, some young, some parents. It’s beautiful.”

A tragic incident last yearunderscored both the persistence of grizzlies – and their vulnerability to humans. Nakoda, a famed white grizzly, easily scaled one of the wildlife fences after she was struck by a car – an injury that later proved fatal.

Her “devastating” death shook park workers, who spent “hundreds upon hundreds of hours” with her over the years, said Saundi Stevens, Parks Canada’s wildlife management specialist with the Lake Louise, Yoho and Kootenay field unit. “Just weeks ago, everyone in our office was actually celebrating her emergence from the den with two new cubs,” Stevens told reporters.

Nakoda’s death was also a stark reminder that despite the fretting over security for world leaders, the biggest risk to the region’s inhabitants will almost always be humans.

UN rapporteur calls for move as food deliveries are attacked and starvation becomes a weapon of war in Gaza and Sudan

UN peacekeepers should be routinely deployed to protect aid convoys from attack in places such as Gaza and Sudan, a seniorUnited Nationsexpert has proposed.

With starvation increasinglyused as a weapon of war, Michael Fakhri said armed UN troops were now required to ensure that food reached vulnerable populations.

“I’m calling for the UN general assembly to authorise peacekeepers to accompany humanitarian convoys,” said the UN’sspecial rapporteur on the right to food.

Fakhri’s call for intervention comes amid deepening concern over the increased targeting of aid convoys inAfricaand the Middle East.

The UN’s human rights office said it was “deeply disturbed” by the rising number of attacks, warning that any attempt to block aid or target humanitarians was a war crime.

Recently, humanitarian convoys have beendeliberately targetedin Central African Republic and also in Haiti in the Caribbean.

Earlier this month, a UN aid convoy of 15 trucks – the first attempt to reach the besieged Sudanese city of El Fasher for a year – wasattacked, killing five people.

The most high-profile obstruction of aid, however, involves the Gaza Strip. Three months ago, Israel imposed a fullhumanitarian blockade on Gaza, cutting off food and other critical supplies to the Palestinian territory. Aid convoys entering Gaza have also been repeatedlyattacked.

Fakhri said that unless there was concerted international intervention to protect aid delivery throughout the world, humanitarian organisations would eventually cease distribution, creating a “dystopia”.

He said the UN security council, whichpassed a resolution in 2018condemning the unlawful denial of aid to civilians, had been rendered ineffective because members kept vetoing attempts to help.

“Where the security council is blocked by a veto, the general assembly has the authority to call for peacekeepers,” said Fakhri.

He said such a move could happen quickly with a majority vote of the 193 member states required – a proportion that Fakhri predicted would easily be reached.

“What the general assembly would do is politically implement what countries are already obliged to do.”

Frustration over the lack of international action to safeguard vital aid supplies – particularly inGaza– has forced activists to take matters into their own hands.

Last week,a yacht attempted to break the Israeli blockadeand deliver aid to Gaza but was prevented by Israel.

On the same day the boat was intercepted, a land aid convoy set off from Tunisia with the similar intention of breaking Israel’s blockade of humanitarian aid for the Palestinian territory.

In Africa, aid delivery in Sudan has becomeincreasingly fraughtas key routes are blocked or attacked while aid facilities and humanitarian workers have been targeted.

Jeremy Laurence, a Geneva-based spokesperson for the UN human rights office, said: “We are deeply disturbed by the intentional obstruction of aid trying to reach civilians from Gaza toSudanand elsewhere, including through attacks on aid convoys.

“Worryingly, these practices appear to be on the increase,” Laurence said. “Wilfully impeding relief supplies to starve civilians as a method of warfare is a war crime.”

Meanwhile,Human Rights Watchdescribed as “horrifying” the spike in the frequency and severity of attacks on humanitarian workers.

Louis Charbonneau, United Nations director at HRW, said:“Last year set a grim record for the number of humanitarian workers killed in conflict zones – more than 360 – most of them in Gaza but also in Sudan, Ukraine and elsewhere.”

Fakhri added: “Whoever controls aid has a significant amount of power in a particular region and conflict.”

He warned that if attacks continued then traditional aid distributors such as the UN could be forced to give up.

“It makes it less likely for the UN, for the international community, for the Red Cross, for civil society organisations, to do that work and then who will take over? These militarised operations seen in Gaza?” he said.

Fakhri was referring to theGaza Humanitarian Foundation(GHF), a US and Israel-backed logistics group that aims to replace Gaza’s UN-led food and humanitarian supply distribution network.

Last Wednesday, Israeli forceskilled at least 60 Palestinians in Gazawho were seeking food from a GHF distribution centre, with dozens more wounded.

Charbonneau urged greater justice for attacks on humanitarians and aid convoys. “One big motivator is impunity, which emboldens the governments of Israel, Russia, the warring parties in Sudan and others to target or fire indiscriminately at civilians, including humanitarian workers,” he said. “The problem is they feel confident they can get away with it.”