China Bans Shark Fin Soup From Official Receptions

Jakarta Globe – AFP, December 16, 2013

This file photo take on September 1, 2007 shows workers preparing shark
 fins for sale in Hong Kong. Environmentalists hailed on December 9, 2013 a Chinese
 government ban on serving shark’s fin, bird’s nest soup and other wild animal products
 at official functions, saying it will set a precedent that will help protect endangered species.
(AFP Photo/Andrew Ross)

China announced a ban on the serving of shark fin and bird’s nest soup at official banquets Sunday, as part of a sweeping government crackdown on corruption and excessive spending.

Shark fin has effectively been off the menu at official dining tables since 2012 when Beijing pledged to bar the popular yet controversial delicacy as part of its anti-extravagance campaign.

Demand for shark fin has plummeted after many high-end hotels and restaurants stopped serving the dish, along with other expensive delicacies favoured by Communist Party officials such as abalone and bird’s nest soup.

An order from the Communist Party Central Committee and the State Council “explicitly ruled out dishes containing shark fins, bird nests and wild animal products in official reception dinners,” the official Xinhua news agency reported Sunday.

“Officials on business tours should arrange their own meals according to relevant expenditure standards and the local hosts are allowed to provide only one reception dinner if needed,” it said, citing the regulation.

The detailed document also bars expensive liquors and cigarettes from being offered at local authority receptions, as it aims to “regulate” spending on receptions given by local authorities for visiting party or government officials, Xinhua said.

Officials below provincial level are also banned from renting hotel suites on business trips, while local hosts are forbidden to give them cash, securities or souvenirs as gifts.

Chinese officials have long held lavish liquor-drenched receptions as a way of building business relationships, greasing the wheels of power, and showing off wealth and status.

The new rules are intended “to promote frugality, oppose extravagance and enhance the anti-corruption efforts among party and governmental authorities,” Xinhua said.

Xi Jinping, who took office as president in March after becoming Communist Party chief in November 2012, has vowed to crack down on corruption at all levels of government, calling it a threat to the future of the ruling party.

State media said last month that nearly 17,000 people have been punished for flouting the party’s “frugality” guidelines.

Offences included violating a “ban on government building projects, excessive spending on receptions, use of government vehicles for private purposes, unnecessary trips in China and abroad, using public money, as well as excessively large wedding banquets,” Xinhua said at the time.

Shark-fin soup was once a luxury enjoyed by China’s elite, but shark populations have been decimated around the world as the country’s 1.3 billion people have grown wealthier and incorporated it into their festivities.

Hong Kong’s government said in September it would stop serving shark fin at official functions as “a good example,” following years of lobbying by conservation groups.

Companies including the Shangri-La hotel group and Cathay Pacific have also moved to stop serving or carrying shark fin.

Agence France-Presse

Related Article:

Beijing bans rare animal delicacies at official dinners

Japan offers Asean countries $20bn in aid and loans

BBC News, 14 December 2013

Japan is looking to boost ties with Asean nations

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Japanese PM Shinzo Abe has offered SE Asian countries almost $20bn (£12bn) in aid and loans, in what is being seen as an effort to combat Chinese expansion.

The announcement came at a summit in Tokyo, weeks after China's declaration of a new air defence zone overlapping areas claimed by Japan and South Korea.

Japan seeks to rally support from the 10 Asean nations, some of whom also have territorial disputes with China.

But Indonesia said good China-Japan ties were "critical" for the region.

The Tokyo summit marks 40 years of Japan's ties with the Association of South East Asian Nations (Asean).

'Freedom of navigation'

Mr Abe said the financial package will be spread over five years, and will mostly take the form of concessional loans.

It will focus on development in the Mekong river region, which stretches from China in the north down through south-east Asia, and fund transport projects.

Regional ties with China are riven
with territorial disputes

"Together with Asean, I want to build the future of Asia where laws, rather than power, rule and people who worked hard will be rewarded - which would lead to a prosperous society with mutual respect," Mr Abe said at the start of the meeting.

"I hope we will adopt a mid- to long-term vision that would define the way Japan and Asean co-operate in the future," he added.

Tensions have been exacerbated by China's unilateral declaration, last month, of an air defence zone above the East China Sea - the Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ).

A joint statement issued by Japanese and Asean leaders called for free passage and commerce in the region, Reuters news agency reported, without making explicit reference to the ADIZ.

"We underscored the importance of maintaining peace, stability and prosperity in the region and promoting maritime security and safety, freedom of navigation, unimpeded commerce, exercise of self-restraint and resolution of disputes by peaceful means in accordance with universally recognised principles of international law," the statement said, according to Reuters.

Earlier, Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said good relations between China and Japan were "critical to the future" of the region.

"Indonesia is deeply concerned at the prospect of the disputes erupting into open conflicts, which will have adverse impacts on all countries in the region," he said.

The Philippines, which is involved in an ongoing row with China over islands in the South China Sea, said it was committed to freedom of flight in international airspace without specifically mentioning China.

Defence zone

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei, asked about the summit on Thursday, said the relevant countries should work to maintain regional stability.

The countries "in developing their relations, should not target third parties or hurt third-party interests", he said.

The ADIZ over the East China Sea includes disputed islands which are controlled by Japan. It also includes a partially submerged rock claimed by South Korea.

China had said that aircraft flying through the ADIZ must follow its rules, including filing flight plans and identifying themselves. There are fears a similar zone will be declared above the resource-rich South China Sea, which China largely claims as its own.

Military aircraft from the US, Japan and South Korea have defied the ADIZ, flying unannounced through the area.

Washington has called China's declaration of an ADIZ a bid to unilaterally change the status quo in the region.

Asean groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar (Burma), the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

Related Article:

Japan, China Ties ‘Critical’ for Asia: Indonesia

‘Stunning’ Tsunami Record Discovered in Aceh Cave

Jakarta Globe – AFP, December 14, 2013

Scientists said they have discovered a cave Lhonga Leupung, Aceh, that provides
 a ‘stunning’ record of Indian Ocean tsunamis over thousands of years. (AFP
Photo/C.M. Rubin)

Scientists said Friday they have discovered a cave on the Indonesian island of Sumatra that provides a “stunning” record of Indian Ocean tsunamis over thousands of years.

They say layers of tsunami-borne sediments found in the cave in northwest Sumatra suggest the biggest destructive waves do not occur at set intervals — meaning communities in the area should be prepared at all times for a tsunami.

“It’s something that communities need to know,” research team leader Charles Rubin told AFP, adding that the team wanted to “promote safety of coastal communities”.

Professor Rubin and other researchers from a Singapore institute were working with scientists from an Indonesian university when they discovered the cave, south of Banda Aceh, the capital of Aceh province.

A quake-triggered tsunami devastated Aceh and areas across the Indian Ocean in 2004, leaving some 170,000 people dead in the province alone.

Inside the cave the researchers found layers of sandy sediment, which had been washed in by tsunamis thousands of years previously, Rubin said.

The layers, which contained small fossils from the seabed, were well-preserved and separated by droppings deposited by bats in the cave, he added.

“This is a beautiful, stunning record of tsunamis that you just don’t have very often,” Rubin said.

Only huge tsunamis and storm surges can get into the cave, which has a raised entrance — and afterwards the sediment is protected inside from erosion by wind or water.

Rubin said the scientists dated the layers and believe they show that between 2,800 and 3,300 years ago, some four to five tsunamis battered the area.

Before the 2004 tsunami, it had been hundreds of years since such a huge destructive wave had hit Aceh, the scientist said.

But he said the new discovery suggests that tsunamis are not evenly spaced through time, which should provide food for thought for those involved in policy and planning in the region.

“These don’t happen like clockwork, they have variations in time and variations in size,” he said.

Rubin works at the Earth Observatory of Singapore, an institute that forms part of Nanyang Technological University.

Scientists from the institute were working with researchers from Syiah Kuala University in Banda Aceh.

Agence France-Presse

Coal port plan will kill Great Barrier Reef: activists

Google – AFP, 11 December 2013

Conservationists have slammed Australia's approval for an Indian firm to

 expand a major coal port on the Great Barrier Reef coast, shown in a NASA

satellite image, warning it would hasten the natural wonder's demise (NASA/

AFP/File, Ho)

Sydney — Conservationists on Wednesday slammed Australia's approval for an Indian firm to expand a major coal port on the Great Barrier Reef coast, warning it would hasten the natural wonder's demise.

"The Great Barrier Reef is dying and (Prime Minister) Tony Abbott is hastening its death," Greens leader Christine Milne told reporters.

"(He) has made it clear that industrialising the reef, giving approvals to coal mines and gas facilities for his big business mates, is a much greater priority for him than protecting the reef and the 63,000 jobs that depend on it," she said.

Environment Minister Greg Hunt on Tuesday gave the green light to the project by India's Adani Group, under what he labelled as "some of the strictest conditions in Australian history" governing environmental protection.

Adani can now dredge some three million cubic metres from the seabed to allow for freighters to dock at the port in Abbott Point, lifting the facility's capacity by 70 percent to make it one of the world's largest coal ports.

WWF Australia said the material dredged during the expansion would be enough to fill 150,000 dump trucks that "lined up bumper-to-bumper would stretch from Brisbane to Melbourne", a distance of more than 1,000 kilometres (620 miles).

Greenpeace said Hunt had ignored the "serious concerns of scientists, tourism operators, fishers and UNESCO" to approve a development just 50 kilometres (31 miles) from the pristine Whitsunday Islands.

The Great Barrier Reef is now formally considered to be in "poor" health

 by scientists, with overall coral cover declining by 15 percent since 2009 due to

 cyclones and floods, pollution and attacks by the coral-eating crown-of-thorns

starfish (AIMS/AFP/File, Ray Berkelmans)

UNESCO's World Heritage Committee is to decide in June whether to list the Great Barrier Reef as being in danger, Greenpeace campaigner Louise Matthiesson noted, "and this decision will cause alarm among the international community".

"If these plans succeed, and Abbot Point becomes the world's biggest coal port, Australia will be speeding up the climate crisis that threatens our children's future."

The reef is now formally considered to be in "poor" health by government scientists, with overall coral cover declining by 15 percent since 2009 due to cyclones and floods, pollution and attacks by the coral-eating crown-of-thorns starfish.

The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority -- whose board is currently under investigation for its links to the mining industry -- must now issue a permit allowing the dredge material to be disposed of within the park.

It said it would reveal its intentions within the next 10 days.

Hunt has also approved a major liquefied natural gas plant and transmission pipeline at Curtis Island, which is also within the reef marine park, for Australian firm Arrow Energy under 53 environmental conditions.

Related Article:

Australia probes Great Barrier Reef board over 'mining links'

Western Australia implements shark 'bait and kill' zones

Google – AFP, 10 December 2013

Surfers ride the waves at Redhead Beach near Newcastle on February 23,

 2012 (AFP/File, Torsten Blackwood)

Sydney — Sharks swimming too close to popular beaches in Western Australia will be hunted and killed by professional fishermen, under a controversial new programme launched Tuesday.

State Premier Colin Barnett said the new shark mitigation plan, which follows a fatal attack off the west coast last month, is aimed at reducing the risks to water users.

Under the strategy, baited drum lines designed to capture sharks will be set one kilometre (0.62 miles) offshore at busy beaches from January-April 2014.

Any shark longer than three metres (10 feet) snagged by the lines or found in the surrounding area would be fair game for commercial fishermen to hunt and kill.

"We are aware of the risks sharks pose to our beach users and the Western Australian way of life and we are implementing strategies to reduce these risks," said Barnett.

Critics have branded it a "culling" scheme.

The crackdown was triggered by the fatal mauling of a surfer at Lefthanders Beach, in the popular Margaret River tourist region, in late November -- the sixth shark killing in WA in two years.

Fisheries Minister Troy Buswell said there would also be more vessels dedicated to "aggressive" responses once a shark attack took place.

"Through our new response plan the state government will become faster and more proactive in catching and removing sharks after an attack," said Buswell.

"The preservation of human life is our number one priority and these measures are designed to do that, with minimum impact to the surrounding environment."

Conservationists were critical of the new WA mitigation plan, with shark researcher Christopher Neff describing it as "culling by definition".

He added that the drum lines had little proven benefit to water users.

Jeff Hansen, from the militant environmental group Sea Shepherd, said great whites -- the main culprit in attacks on humans off WA -- were a vulnerable species that needed protection.

Local marine scientists have described Australia's west coast as the deadliest shark attack zone in the world, and a tagging and tracking programme is already underway in a bid to limit fatalities.

Sharks are common in Australian waters but deadly attacks are rare, with only one of the average 15 incidents a year typically proving fatal.

Experts say attacks are increasing in line with population growth and the popularity of water sports.

Related Article:

Kryon Q&A

Question (2002): Dear Kryon, A friend and I are meditating on the recent shark attacks and feel that it has to do with the planetary changes. We just can’t understand why they have become aggressive. What is the message the sharks are bringing? Why is this happening?

—Thank you,

Maryann

Answer: Indeed there are changes with the environment and also with biology regarding the 12-year grid change. I will first give you what was happening in general: What you are seeing are mammals, amphibians, insects, and even fish that are in areas that are new to them. Every life-form that migrates is effected by magnetics. All life forms that follows certain feeding scenarios and are “following the food” have the potential to be affected. This is due to the changing of the magnetic ley lines of the earth as we have stated before.

The areas where you can see in the ocean most clearly are within those migration patterns closest to the land. Where the ocean interfaces with the land, there are challenges for all these creatures for at least one of their generations. Whales will beach themselves by following old magnetics headings that now “drive” them into peninsula’s and other land areas that were marginally on the edge of their old paths. Birds, amphibians, and insects will be seen to do odd things for awhile.

So these shark fish may be in greater numbers in these coastal areas than in the past, but the increased aggressive behavior was actually something else: There was a tremendous “release” of energy due to the Sept. 11 event. Much like the energy of earthquakes and other earth movement, much of the environment “feels it” coming. We have spoken about how the Sept. 11 event was not a surprise to the earth. [See Lee’s article “Did Kryon give us hints”] So, some of the new actions of these fish were due to an actual energy buildup of coming events... of which you now understand.

If you are paying attention, therefore, you might ask, “Does this mean that Human consciousness issues affect the actual earth?” Yes they do! Finally you may begin to see how global consciousness is tied into the environment, and even to basic physics and reality. They are not separate, and never were. The indigenous knew it, and now the “modern” world is beginning to wonder.

Blessed is the Human Being who understands that what they think, do, and intend, actually drives the reality of the dirt of the planet!

Beijing bans rare animal delicacies at official dinners

Want China Times, Xinhua 2013-12-10

A selection of dishes at a restaurant in Zhengzhou, Henan province. (Photo/CNS)

China's central authorities on Sunday published a regulation that explicitly ruled out dishes containing shark fins, bird nests and wild animal products in official reception dinners.

The document, jointly issued by the general offices of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and the State Council, detailed regulations of the use of public funding on receptions by local authorities to receive visiting Party or governmental officials.

Shark fins, bird nests and products of rare wild animals are popular materials in luxury dinners in China.

FRUGAL RECEPTIONS

Officials on business tours should arrange their own meals according to relevant expenditure standards and the local hosts are allowed to provide only one reception dinner if needed, the regulation said.

The regulation said cigarettes and up-market liquors are not allowed to be served at official dinners and such receptions should not be held in private clubs or upscale places.

It is also prohibited to organize conference and activities at tourist attractions or commercial entertainment venues and government funds should not be used to cover officials' personal recreational visits, according to the documents.

Moreover, officials below provincial level should not live in suite rooms on their business trips, it said.

Local hosts are also banned from giving cash, negotiable securities, souvenirs or local products as gifts for the officials.

The regulation reiterated the requirements that no welcoming ceremony, banners or carpets should be arranged in receiving officials at airports and stations and the number of the officials' team should be strictly controlled.

The use of government vehicles and police cars in reception activities should also be kept within a reasonable level, it said.

TIGHTENED SUPERVISION

The regulation said public spending on official receptions should be listed as a separate item in the authorities' budgets and relevant information should be made open for the public's supervision.

Disciplinary and supervisory agencies are told to strengthen supervision over the use of government funds on such activities and officials who violated the rule should be held accountable.

In addition to simplicity and transparency, the document stated that traditions of relevant ethnic minority groups should also be well respected.

According to the document, the new rules are to promote frugality, oppose extravagance and enhance the anti-corruption drive among Party and governmental authorities.

The new regulation will also be applied to state-owned enterprises, state-owned financial institutions and state-sponsored organizations.

FURTHER REFORMS

In addition to strict rules, the document also features reform efforts to curb extravagance in official receptions, said a statement by the Government Offices Administration on Sunday.

The regulation has mapped out reforms in the administrative system of official receptions and a system of centralized management of the resources for the reception expenses, the statement said.

Moreover, the statement said rules in the new regulation are practical, making the enforcement much easier.

Lin Jiabin, an analyst with the social development division of the Development Research Center of the State Council, said the new regulation is expected to put a halt to the lavishing on official reception banquets as the rules are very detailed and practical.

However, he also urged further improvement to the systems for the administration of financial and fiscal expenditures to ensure the long-term enforcement of the anti-extravagance drive.

Local authorities tend to offer excessive reception for visiting officials as part of their ostentation displays, and the root for such problems lies in the loopholes with relevant systems, said Lin Shuanglin, director of the public finance research center of Peking University.

Such practices have caused huge waste and fueled the lavish life styles among some officials, said Xie Chuntao, a professor with the Party School of the CPC Central Committee in Beijing.

As the new regulation has clearly defined the limits and restrictions in relevant activities, it is expected to generate positive effects to the frugality campaign, Lin Shuanglin said.

Israel, Jordan, Palestinians to sign Red Sea-Dead Sea deal

Yahoo – AFP, 9 December 2013

Israeli soldiers patrol the coast at the Dead Sea on the Israeli side of the popular
 tourist site known for it's mineral-rich mud, on August 10, 2013.

Israeli soldiers patrol the coast at the Dead Sea on the Israeli side of the popular tourist site known for it's mineral-rich mud, on August 10, 2013 (AFP Photo/Hazem Bader)

Jerusalem (AFP) - Representatives of Israel, Jordan and the Palestinians will on Monday sign a "historic" agreement to link the Red Sea with the shrinking Dead Sea, an Israeli minister said.

Energy and Regional Development Minister Silvan Shalom told army radio that under the agreement to be signed at the World Bank in Washington, water will be drawn from the Gulf of Aqaba at the northern end of the Red Sea.

Some will be desalinated and distributed to Israel, Jordan and the Palestinians, while the rest will be transferred in four pipes to the parched Dead Sea, which would otherwise dry out by 2050.

Shalom noted the economic aspects of supplying cheap desalinated water to neighbouring states, the environmental angle of "saving the Dead Sea" and the "strategic-diplomatic" aspect of the deal, being signed at a time when peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians are floundering.

"This is a breakthrough after many years of efforts," he said. "It is nothing less than a historic move."

According to Yediot, the Palestinian Authority's minister in charge of water issues, Shaddad Attili, and Jordanian Water Minister Hazem Nasser will be signing the agreement with Shalom.

Shalom said that following the signing, "an international tender will be issued for the entire project -- building the desalination plant in Aqaba and laying the first of the four pipes."

According to Yediot Aharonot newspaper, which first broke the story, the idea dates back to the 1994 signing of a peace treaty between Israel and Jordan.

The World Bank in 2012 published a feasibility study report on the project.

But Friends of the Earth Middle East and other environmental groups warned that a large influx of Red Sea water could radically change the Dead Sea's fragile ecosystem, forming gypsum crystals and introducing red algae blooms.

Israeli Minister Shalom, the Jordanian Minister Hazem

and Palestinian Minister Attili (AFP)

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US attempts to halt Paris auction of sacred Native American artefacts

Embassy calls for delay to see whether masks and headdresses can be reclaimed by Hopi and San Carlos Apache tribes

theguardian.com, Kim Willsher in Paris, Sunday 8 December 2013        

A Kachina Angwushahai-i mask, circa 1860-1870, which is one of 25 Native
 American artefacts due to be auctioned in Paris. Photograph: Arnaud
Guillaume/AFP/Getty Images

International campaigners are making last-minute efforts to halt the sale in Paris of sacred ceremonial masks and headdresses from Native American tribes.

The US embassy appealed to the auction house to delay the sale, due to be held on Monday and Tuesday, so the 25 items from the Hopi and San Carlos Apache tribes can be identified to see whether they can reclaim them.

The battle follows attempts to halt an auction of 70 Hopi masks in Paris in April. Even the intervention of the Hollywood actor Robert Redford, who described the earlier sale as a "criminal act … that could have serious moral consequences", was not enough to halt the €930,000 (£780,000) sale.

On Friday, Survival International, which campaigns for the rights of indigenous peoples, lost a legal challenge over the latest auction. The French judge, Claire David, said neither moral nor philosophical considerations could justify preventing a legal sale.

On Saturday, Mark Taplin, the US charge d'affaires in Paris, delivered a letter to the EVE auction house asking for the sale to be delayed.

"The embassy made this request on behalf of the two tribes so that they might have the opportunity to identify the objects, investigate their provenance and determine whether they have a claim to recover the items under the 1970 Unesco convention on the export and transfer of ownership of cultural property, to which France is a signatory, or under other laws," the embassy said in a statement.

US diplomats emphasised the "great importance" of the objects to the Native Americans and said they should not be sold "precipitously and in the absence of consultation" with the two tribes.

The sale of sacred Native American artefacts was banned in the US in 1990 but there is no similar legislation in France.

The EVE auction will sell more than 100 Amerindian artefacts, but the rare masks, described as "exceptional" are the most contested. Among them, is a version of the Tumas Crow Mother mask dating from the 1860s and given a catalogue price of between €60,000 and €80,000.

EVE auctioneer Alain Leroy said: "Never has a sale of Amerindian art gathered together as many ancient and rare objects."

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Killer whales have been thrilling whale watchers this week in Puget Sound. But
they were especially exciting Tuesday when nearly three dozen orcas surrounded
 the ferry from Seattle as it approached the terminal on Bainbridge Island. NOAA
Fisheries Service photo by Candice Emmons

.

Italy rescues boat with 105 Syrian refugees

Google – AFP, 7 December 2013

Italian Coast Guards rescue Syrian refugees off Sicily early on December 7,

 2013 (Guardia Costiera/AFP)

Rome — The Italian navy and coastguard said Saturday they rescued overnight over 100 Syrian refugees after their boat got into difficulties off the coast of Sicily.

The boat, which had launched distress signals while more than 300 miles south of Sicily, was located in the night by two naval vessels, said officials, adding that life jackets were then given to all passengers.

Weather conditions had initially made ??it difficult to transfer the refugees from their ailing craft. But on Saturday morning the coastguard was able to recover 105 passengers, including six women and 25 children, all of them Syrians.

Italian Coast Guards rescue Syrian

 refugees off Sicily early on December

7, 2013 (Guardia Costiera/AFP)

They were taken to Syracuse, in the southeast of Sicily's main island.

Their rescue comes just days after another group of 120 refugees, mainly Syrians, were saved on December 2 after their ship was found adrift off of Calabria, on Italy's southern mainland.

More than 400 immigrants died in early October in two shipwrecks, one near the Italian island of Lampedusa, the other near the coast of Malta.

Shortly after the tragedy, the Italian government launched a major operation called "Mare Nostrum", mobilising warships, amphibious vessels and aircraft to prevent further incidents.

Also on Saturday, Spanish authorities announced they had saved some 46 refugees. The group had been plucked from four boats off of Spain's southeastern coast.

Japan whaling ships leave for Antarctic hunt

Google – AFP, 7 December 2013

Anti-whaling protesters march through the Shibuya shopping district in

Tokyo on November 4, 2013 (AFP/File, Toru Yamanaka)

Tokyo — Two Japanese whaling ships and a surveillance vessel left Saturday for the annual hunt in the Antarctic Sea, Kyodo News said.

The three ships departed from the western port of Shimonoseki to join other ships to hunt up to 935 Antarctic minke whales and up to 50 fin whales through March, the news agency said.

The Fisheries Agency had kept secret the departure date of the whaling fleet as a precaution against obstruction by militant anti-whaling groups such as Sea Shepherd, Kyodo said.

Japan's whale hunts have long drawn criticism from activists and foreign governments, but Tokyo defends the practice saying eating whale is part of Japanese culinary tradition.

Japan says whales are studied as part of a bid by its whaling research institute to prove their populations can sustain commercial whaling.

Activists charge Tokyo's "research whaling" is cover for commercial whaling that is banned under an international agreement.

Japanese whalers and Sea Shepherd activists have routinely clashed violently in exchanges that have seen stink bombs thrown at Japanese crew and water jets trained on protesters.

Japan's whaling catch fell to a record low of 103 Antarctic minke whales in the last season due mainly to the anti-whaling group.

Greenland Inuit village fights for survival

Deutsche Welle, 5 December 2013

When it comes to pulling together globally in battling climate change, some small island nations have to fight to get their voices heard. Many of them have been wrestling with the effects of climate change for years.

In the small Inuit community of Uummannaq on the northwest coast of Greenland, a 1,200-meter (3,937-foot), heart-shaped mountain forms a dramatic backdrop to a town of colorful houses that dot the rocky landscape. The climate can be unforgiving here with winter temperatures commonly reaching minus 30 degrees Celsius (-22 Fahrenheit). Fishing and hunting have been a way of life in Uummannaq since the town was established 250 years ago. But nowadays, as local fishermen prepare to set out for their daily catch, they have more than just the wind and weather conditions on their minds.

"In wintertime, the ice is a lot thinner than it used to be and a lot of the fishermen who fish in the ice water are unable to catch as much as we have in the past," said Maligiak, a 41-year-old Inuit fisherman. In recent years, he's noticed significant environmental changes that aren't just hindering the fishing industry, but they can be dangerous too. "When the warm wind comes through, it melts everything very quickly and creates larger waves," he said. "Our small fishing vessels are not designed for these big waves, which can damage our boats and equipment."

Maligiak says that climate change

makes fishing more dangerous

Impacts of climate change

Located on a small island off the Greenland coast, 600 km (372 miles) north of the Arctic Circle, Uummannaq is one of many Inuit communities in the North that are already experiencing the impacts of climate change. Not only is the massive Greenlandic ice sheet melting, sea ice is starting to disappear too.

"The sea ice in Uummannaq now melts two months earlier than it did only a few years ago and the whole year the ice is thinner than it used to be, so it's really dangerous to go out," Maligiak added.

Adapt to survive

Local residents gathered this year outside of Uummannaq city hall to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the town's founding. The whole community of 1,300 people joined in.

One of the locals was Rene Christensen, who has been living in Uummannaq for 13 years. Originally from Denmark, Rene works as an educator and therapist at a children's home in town. He said he is seeing more and more families facing difficulties in the fishing industry. "Most of the economy in Uummannaq is based on fishing and to be able to go out fishing, they need stable weather and in the winter, they need solid ice cover."

The people of Uummannaq are trying to adapt in order to survive

But as the climate has changed over the past 10 to 15 years, there are sometimes periods when ice conditions are very poor and it's too difficult for fishing. A lot of families whose incomes come from fishing have no or very little money, and then have to go on social welfare. "We've seen problems in the last 10 years where families are actually starving," said Christensen, describing the tense situation.

Fishing in Uummannaq

Traditionally, fishers here worked on a dog sled on the sea ice in winter and by boat when the ice melted in the summer. But now, as the ice is melting earlier and becoming less stable, there is a period of several months in the spring when the ice is not strong enough to hold dog sleds but can also not be penetrated by small fishing boats. So fishermen like Maligiak simply can't go out to work.

Local politicians are also concerned about the impact on the people here. Ellen Christophersen grew up in Uummannaq and until recently, was one of Greenland's three representatives to the Danish Parliament. She said that climate change is no longer just an abstract issue for Greenlanders, yet there are few programs to help communities adapt.

Some small projects have been launched, but Christophersen said the world needs to pay more attention to what's happening here. "It would help people here to get financial support in order to develop other areas - especially if the fishermen and hunter would like to choose another way of life."

In 2009, the European Parliament banned the trading of seal products produced in or imported to the EU. Christophersen said that the ban has directly impacted communities like Uummannaq - preventing it from being able to supplement its income through the sale of seal products. Christensen is seeing the impacts first hand. "We've seen a huge increase in the number of suicides. And some of the suicides I know are related to people not having any money and being ashamed of not being able to take care of their family," she said.

Uncertain future

A recent study by the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found that by September of last year, sea-ice cover had retreated to its lowest levels since the beginning of satellite records.

As Maligiak gets into his fishing boat and prepares to set out for the day, he wonders how his community will be able to deal with this latest threat.

Related Articles:

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