The World Today for June 19, 2023

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CANADA

In an example of climate change arousing an international effort, firefighters from around the globe have rushed to help put out the Canadian wildfires that have burned 13 million acres of forest and choked the US Midwest and Eastern seaboard with smoke in the past month, reported France 24.

The smoke even moved over Greenland and Iceland and was expected to hit Norway.

“From Northern Hemisphere to Southern Hemisphere, from one region of the world to another, the fire seasons aren’t always aligned and that allows for a traveling of resources that is part of how we’re going to make sure we’re protecting communities all around the world,” said Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, according to the Canadian Press.

Canada has been battling more than 400 fires in nine provinces and two territories, Deutsche Welle reported. More than half of those are out of control.

In Quebec, the fires have displaced thousands of people and disrupted services and businesses, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported.

The adverse health effects of the smoke, meanwhile, led a medical analyst to advise CNN readers that they should purchase air filters and keep “go bags” in case they need to evacuate an area due to toxic conditions.

While it can be difficult to directly draw a cause-and-effect relationship for a specific fire, scientists told the BBC that wildfires around the world have become more severe due to climate change. The United Nations, furthermore, recently warned that the next five years will be the hottest on record, foreshadowing potentially worse fires, the Hindu wrote.

Accordingly, as the smoke subsided but the fires continued to burn or flare up – the Washington Post cautioned that they could worsen – Trudeau and other leaders warned that the current ecological and health crisis was a taste of the future, reported Reuters.

More heat and therefore more wildfires are the new normal, quipped the New York Times. Humans have been burning untold quantities of coal, oil, and gas for more than 150 years. That’s not stopping anytime soon. International efforts to limit global warming to a rise of 1.5 degrees Celsius from the preindustrial era have also come up short. Temperatures on the planet are now expected to increase by more than 2 degrees Celsius by 2035.

A Canadian Forest Service fire scientist, Morgan Crowley, explained to Vox that hotter temperatures dried out the trees and the underbrush, creating a tinderbox that has a greater chance of igniting. The Canadian government, he said, was launching a satellite designed specifically to observe wildfire patterns and behavior.

This particular cycle of fires occurred because Eastern Canada was unusually hot and dry in May, added Scientific American. Lightning provided the spark to kick off the conflagration.

The forests surely contain a plethora of reasons why they might burn.

THE WORLD, BRIEFLY

No Quarter

UGANDA

Suspected militants killed 42 people – mostly students – at a school in western Uganda over the weekend, the latest bout of violence from rebel groups operating near Uganda’s border with the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Sky News reported.

Ugandan authorities said the death toll included 38 students, adding that the attackers set the school on fire. Six other students were kidnapped by the militants.

Police believe that rebels from the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) militant group were behind the attack in the town of Mpownde, near the border with the DRC. Ugandan troops tracked the attackers into the DRC’s Virunga National Park, with military representatives saying they “are pursuing the enemy to rescue those abducted.”

The Mpownde attack prompted condemnation from Ugandan politicians and international organizations, the Washington Post noted.

The attack is just the latest violence by the ADF, which was created in the early 1990s by Ugandan Muslims opposing the rule of President Yoweri Museveni.

Since its founding, the group has conducted a series of deadly attacks across Uganda, including a 1998 massacre that killed 80 students in the west of the country.

The Ugandan military later forced the ADF to flee to the DRC, where many armed groups are able to operate because the central government has limited control there.

In 2018, the ADF established ties with Islamic State, prompting the United States to designate the group as a foreign terrorist organization in 2021.

Ugandan authorities have long vowed to track down ADF militants, even outside the country’s borders. In 2021, Uganda launched joint air and artillery strikes against the militants in the DRC.

Inching Upward

JAPAN

Japan raised the age of consent from 13 to 16 and broadened the definition of rape, measures many sexual assault victims have argued are long overdue, the New York Times reported.

Lawmakers in the upper house approved a new sexual crimes law that will define rape as “nonconsensual sexual intercourse,” and removes a previous requirement that the crime includes physical force.

It specifies various conditions under which a person might be afraid to say no to sex, including when a victim is intoxicated or when an offender “frightens or startles” them. The statute of limitations for filing rape charges was also raised from 10 to 15 years.

The raising of the age of consent is the first time the country has altered it in more than 100 years. Japan has long had one of the lowest ages of consent among wealthy nations, which left children vulnerable to sexual abuse by adults.

Under the new provisions, engaging in sexual activities with those between the ages of 13 to 15 will be considered a criminal offense if the perpetrator is at least five years older than the minor.

Activists for victims of sexual assault welcomed the amendments as a “great step forward.”

They hope that the new legislation will encourage more people to report sexual assaults.

Sliding-Scale Morality

AFGHANISTAN

The Taliban will start selling tickets to visit the site of an ancient monument the militant group blew up more than 20 years ago, a move seen as an attempt to shore up finances in the cash-strapped country, Insider reported.

The new tickets will allow tourists – both local and foreign – to visit the remains of the Bamiyan Buddhas in the Hazarajat region. Locals will pay around 57 US cents, while foreigners will be charged around $3.45.

Built around the sixth century CE, the monument consisted of two large Buddha statues standing around 120 and 180 feet high. The Bamiyan Buddhas had been a major tourist attraction in Afghanistan, but political instability and the rise of the Taliban in the 1990s raised concerns for the monuments and much of Afghanistan’s cultural heritage.

In 2001, the Taliban destroyed them using anti-aircraft guns and explosives after decreeing the two Buddhas to be false gods and violating the tenets of Islam, according to the Washington Post. The Buddhas’ destruction quickly prompted international criticism, including from friendly countries such as Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

That year, the United States-led invasion ousted the Taliban from power. The group regained control of the country in 2021 following the withdrawal of foreign troops.

Despite the instability, tourism to Bamiyan has continued even after the statues’ destruction: In 2022, around 200,000 people visited the site.

The recent efforts by the Taliban come as Afghanistan’s finances have plummeted, causing what one United Nations official described as “an economic contraction that we’ve never seen before, ever.”

Many locals and officials hope that the sites can still attract tourists and lead to more investment in the poor Central Asian nation.

DISCOVERIES

Neanderthal Science

A new paper suggested that the early modern humans – Homo sapiens – were not the inventors of an important substance used during prehistoric times, Science Alert reported.

Scientists recently analyzed artifacts created by our close relatives, the Neanderthals, using birch tar. The special substance is a sticky black goo extracted from the bark of birch trees, using heat.

Birch tar was known for its various adhesive, water-repellent, and even antimicrobial properties. Early humans in Europe would use it to bind parts of their tools together.

Neanderthals also used the tar, but scholars have been divided on whether they purposefully produced it or accidentally came across it after burning some birch bark.

The new findings determined that the extinct hominids were sophisticated inventors: The team studied the artifacts’ chemistry and found that the tar was deprived of oxygen during its formation.

Following a series of experiments, they determined that the Neanderthals used a method that burned birch bark underground in order to produce the sticky substance. Researchers explained that the production would require specific and precise knowledge that the hominids mastered through trial and error.

They added that if Neanderthals were creating birch tar, they were making it as far back as 200,000 years ago – preceding any evidence of H. sapiens doing the same by 100,000 years.

The study is another example that documents the “advanced technology, forward planning, and cultural capacity in Neanderthals.”

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