Environment

Penang (Malaysia), Jan 20 (AP/PTI) Malaysia has sent back 150 containers of plastic waste to 13 mainly rich countries since the third quarter last year, with the environment minster warning on Monday that those who want to make the country a rubbish bin of the world can "dream on".

Shipments of unwanted rubbish have been rerouted to Southeast Asia since China banned the import of plastic waste in 2018, but Malaysia and other developing countries are fighting back.

DOHA, Jan 20 (NNN-QNA) – Qatar signed an agreement with France’s Total and Japan’s Marubeni, to build a solar power plant, with a capacity of 800 megawatts, according to Qatar’s energy minister, on Sunday.

“The cost of the project is about 1.7 trillion Qatari riyals (467 million U.S. dollars),” Saad al-Kaabi, who is also chief executive of Qatar Petroleum (QP), told a news conference, in the Qatari capital, Doha.

SANTIAGO, Jan 18 (NNN-Prensa Latina) — At least three communes in central Bio Bio region are now on red alert due to forest fires that have already destroyed five homes and more than 600 hectares.

The fires, started on Thursday, have affected the Cabrero, Nacimiento and Santa Juana communes, where authorities ordered the preventive evacuation of hundreds of people from inhabited areas that were threatened by the flames, Radio Bio Bio station reported.

SUVA, Jan 17 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Fiji opened evacuation centres and warned of “destructive force winds” Friday as a cyclone bore down on the Pacific island nation for the second time in three weeks.

Two people were missing after attempting to swim across a swollen river late Thursday when heavy rain fell ahead of the advancing Cyclone Tino, police said.

On the outer islands, locals prepared to go to emergency shelters while many tourists fled beach resorts and made their way to the capital Suva before regional flights and inter-island ferry services were suspended.

HARARE, Jan 13 (NNN-AFRICANEWS) — At least 36 people were killed by wild animals in Zimbabwe in 2019 up from 20 in 2018.

The Zimbabwean further reports that the authorities recorded 311 animal attacks on people last year, up from 195 in 2018.

This increased attack on people has been blamed on the extreme drought in the country which is driving wildlife into human settlments in search of nourishment.

BOGOTA, Jan 11 (NNN-MERCOPRESS) — Colombia, a top source of coca, the base ingredient in cocaine, eradicated more than 100,000 hectares of the crop last year, President Ivan Duque said.

The Andean country has come under repeated pressure from the United States, an important destination for cocaine shipments, to reduce coca cultivation, especially as crop figures shot up in recent years.

The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has praised Duque’s stepped-up eradication efforts. The Colombian government set out to eradicate 80,000 hectares last year.

Shisper Glacier (Pakistan), Jan 10 (AFP/PTI) The villagers of Hassanabad live in constant fear. Above them the vast Shisper glacier dominates the landscape: A river of jagged black ice moving towards them at as much as four metres per day.

Climate change is causing most glaciers worldwide to shrink, but due to a meteorological anomaly this is one of a few in the Karakoram mountain range in northern Pakistan that are surging.

New Delhi, Jan 9 (PTI) Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday accused the BJP of making Delhi the "garbage capital of India" and claimed that the dump at Ghazipur landfill will soon cross the height of Taj Mahal.

Addressing a press conference, Kejriwal said the saffron party has reduced the national capital to a "garbage dump".

The "biggest gift" of the BJP to Delhi is the Ghazipur landfill which has been filled with garbage and the height of the garbage dump would soon cross the height of Taj Mahal, he said.

MELBOURNE, Jan 9 (NNN-AGENCIES) — A state of emergency has been declared for Saturday in Victoria, as the ongoing bushfire in Australia continued to rage in several of its states.

Australia’s NineNews (9News) reported that the fires are expected to merge and expand in Victoria’s east, and this has prompted the Victorian government to declare a state of emergency.

The Victorian government is using unprecedented powers to keep people safe, 9News quoted Premier Daniel Andrews saying.

SANTIAGO (Chile), Jan 7 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The cloud of smoke caused by raging bushfires in Australia has been spotted more than 12,000km away in Chile and Argentina, weather authorities in the South American countries said.

In the early hours “the effect was seen in the sun through red tones. This effect was produced by a cloud of smoke that comes from the fires,” Chile meteorology chief, Patricio Urra, said.

The cloud has risen to 6,000m above sea level and there is no meteorological reason for it to fall back to Earth, said Urra.

It poses no threat to Chileans.