ATHENS: Residents were evacuated on Saturday as a wildfire which started in mountainous forests in the eastern Aegean island of Lesbos threatened properties at the beach resort of Vatera. Thick billowing smoke fanned by strong winds could be seen in the area. One fleeing resident told state TV ERT that her home was on fire. “We are battling to save homes,” Taxiarchis Verros, mayor of western Lesbos, told the broadcaster. Vatera, an 8 km (five miles) long sandy beach in the southern part of Lesbos, is a popular tourist attraction. A wildfire in mountains near Athens earlier this week damaged homes and forced hundreds of people to flee, with authorities calling this summer one of the toughest in the Mediterranean. Last year, wildfires ravaged about 300,000 acres (121,000 hectares) of forest and bushland across Greece during the country’s worst heatwave in 30 years.

GENEVA: Little snow cover and glaciers melting at an alarming rate amid Europe’s sweltering heatwaves have put some of the most classic Alpine hiking routes off-limits. Usually at the height of summer, tourists flock to the Alps and seek out well-trodden paths up to some of Europe’s most iconic peaks. But with warmer temperatures speeding up glacier melt and thawing permafrost — which scientists say are driven by climate change — routes that are usually safe this time of year now face hazards like falling rocks released from the ice. “Currently in the Alps, there are warnings for around a dozen peaks, including emblematic ones like Matterhorn and Mount Blanc,” Pierre Mathey, head of the Swiss mountain guide association, told AFP. This is happening far earlier in the season than normal, he said. “Usually we see such closures in August, but now they have started at the end of June and are continuing in July.”

Alpine guides who usually lead thousands of hikers up toward Europe’s highest peak announced earlier this week that they would suspend ascents on the most classic routes up Mont Blanc, which straddles France, Italy and Switzerland. The Guide Alpine Italiane said on its Facebook page that the “particularly delicate conditions” caused by the temperature spike made it necessary to “postpone the climbs.” Mountain guides have also refrained — reportedly for the first time in a century — from offering tours up the classic route to the Jungfrau peak in Switzerland. And they have advised against tours along routes on both the Italian and Swiss sides of the towering pyramid-shaped Matterhorn peak. Ezio Marlier, president of the Valle D’Aosta guides association, said having to steer clear of routes most coveted by tourists was a blow after the Covid slowdowns. “It is not easy... after two almost empty seasons to decide to halt work,” he told AFP. He stressed that the Italian Alpine region had shut only two and that there were many other breathtaking and safe routes to take. But he lamented that many people simply canceled their trip when they heard their preferred route was off-limits. “There are plenty of other things to do, but usually when people want Mont Blanc, they want Mont Blanc.”

Climbing on some of the thousands of glaciers dotting Europe’s largest mountain range is also proving trickier. “The glaciers are in a state that they are usually in at the end of the summer or even later,” said Andreas Linsbauer, a glaciologist at Zurich University. “It is sure that we will break the record for negative melts,” he told AFP. He said a combination of factors were contributing to a “really extreme” summer, starting with exceptionally little snowfall last winter, meaning there was less to protect the glaciers. Sand also blew up from the Sahara early in the year, darkening the snow, which makes it melt faster. And then the first heatwave hit Europe in May, with subsequent ones following in June and July, pushing up temperatures even at high altitudes. The rapid melting can make glaciers more dangerous, as seen with the sudden collapse of Italy’s until then seemingly harmless Marmolada glacier earlier this month, which saw 11 people killed as ice and rock hurtled down the mountain. While scientists have yet to draw clear conclusions on what caused the disaster, one theory is that meltwater may have reached the point where the glacier was frozen to the rock, loosening its grip.

Mylene Jacquemart, a glacier and mountain hazard researcher at Zurich’s ETH university, told AFP there were many unknowns about the catastrophe. “But the general theme is definitely that more meltwater... makes things complicated and potentially more dangerous.” Mathey, who said warmer temperatures had put mountain guides on high alert, also voiced concern that meltwater filtering under a glacier posed an “additional and invisible threat.” But despite the challenges, he voiced confidence that guides would find solutions, seeking out alternative routes to keep showing off Alpine splendours. “Resilience is really in the mountain guides’ DNA,” as is adaptability, he said. “Humans have to adapt to nature and to the mountains, not the other way around.”

KANO, Nigeria: Gunmen killed eight Nigerian security personnel, including three policemen and five vigilantes, in an ambush in a central state, a local government spokesman said Sunday. In the attack on Saturday, gunmen “suspected to be bandits ambushed and killed eight security officers in Ajaokuta local government area,” Onogwu Muhammed, Kogi state governor’s spokesman, said in a statement. No group claimed responsibility for the attack but Kogi has seen an uptick in attacks recently, including some claimed by Daesh terrorists operating outside their usual base in the northeast. Security will be a major issue in next February’s election to replace President Muhammadu Buhari, who is under increasing pressure over the country’s worsening violence. Kogi state governor Yahaya Bello suspended a traditional chief of the area and questioned the political administrator of the district over Saturday’s killings, the statement said without giving details. “The governor strongly warned other traditional rulers across the state who may have connection in one way or the other with criminal elements in their domains to desist forthwith,” Muhammed said. Nigeria’s traditional chiefs and emirs have no official political power but are very influential as guardians of local culture and religion. Bello vowed to “deal ruthlessly with anybody who romances with criminal elements no matter how highly placed they are.” Last month, gunmen bombed a police station in Kogi’s Okehi district, killing a policeman and razing the facility. In April three policemen were killed when gunmen attacked a police station in the town of Adavi. Both attacks were claimed by Daesh West Africa Province or ISWAP terrorist group, which split from Boko Haram in 2016 to become a dominant militancy in northeast Nigeria. The group claimed responsibility for this month’s attack on a prison just outside the nation’s capital Abuja, freeing hundreds of inmates including dozens of high profile terrorists.

MANILA: When President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. delivered his first speech as the newly elected leader of the Philippines at the end of June, he touched on the country’s massive plastic problem. 

The Southeast Asian nation was ranked third in the world for failing to deal with its plastic, according to a widely cited 2015 study by the University of Georgia. The Philippines generates about 2.7 million metric tons of plastic garbage annually, 20 percent of which ends up in the ocean. 

“We too have our part to play; we are the third biggest plastics polluter in the world,” Marcos had said. 

“But we won’t shirk from that responsibility; we will clean up.” 

The plastic problem has only grown more recently, with a 2021 study published in the Science Advances journal identifying the Philippines as the largest contributor of plastic waste that ends up in the world’s oceans, emitting more than 356,000 metric tons each year. 

Every day, almost 48 million shopping bags are used throughout the Philippines, adding up to about 17.5 billion pieces a year, according to a report by the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives. 

In a world grappling with the increasingly devastating impacts of climate change, there has been a renewed urgency to address the plastic crisis in the Philippines. 

“The Philippines has a massive plastic pollution problem at the moment, and it’s been a long while coming,” Marian Ledesma, Greenpeace Philippines’ zero waste campaigner, told Arab News. 

“It is essential that we act on the plastic crisis right away,” she said. “We need government action as well as the action of large corporations to really shift the tide.” 

The Philippines could start by implementing existing laws, Ledesma said, such as the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000, which critics say has been poorly enforced over the last two decades. 

It is also important to reduce the production of single-use plastic and for the government to adopt complementary policies that would help businesses transition to reuse and refill systems, Ledesma added. 

Under a new law known as the Extended Producer Responsibility Act, large companies are required to adopt and implement policies for the proper management of plastic packaging wastes, paving a regulatory pathway for the Philippines to combat its plastic pollution problem seriously. 

Many environmental groups in the Philippines campaigned to raise more awareness across the country during Plastic Free July, a global movement aimed at real actions to end plastic waste. 

Thony Dizon, a chemical safety campaigner with BAN Toxics, told Arab News that finding a solution to the crisis is crucial. 

“We really need to address this, we have to find a solution,” Dizon said. “We need action.”

At the individual level, Filipinos should reduce the usage of single-use plastic and switch to alternative materials, such as canvas bags, and bring reusable containers when buying fillable products. 

“These are some of the ways to reduce the volume or use of single-use plastic,” Dizon said. “It reaches the main goal, which is to lessen the production and lessen the consumption and throwing away of plastic.”

Plastic waste also contributes to flooding in the Philippines as it clogs drains, he said. Not only does such waste end up in our oceans, but it could also affect our food sources. 

Some local governments have moved faster to combat plastic pollution. Quezon City, for example, has banned plastic bags and single-use plastic. 

“That’s because they have seen the effects of the problem,” Dizon said. “They have experienced the problem — flooding because of plastic.” 

The plastic problem spiraled further during the COVID-19 pandemic as people’s consumption patterns shifted to adapt to life under lockdown and reliance on online deliveries for food and groceries turned into a new normal. 

“The pandemic has reshaped people’s shopping behavior,” Dizon said. 

“We thought that during the pandemic there would be less volume of plastic waste, but that’s not what happened. Plastic wrappers and packaging from online deliveries added to the problem.”

Filipino lawmakers like Senator Loren Legarda are among those renewing calls to tackle the growing crisis. In July, she pushed for a bill to regulate single-use plastic. 

“The plastic crisis we face right now calls for a rethinking of our approaches to our governance and market systems and operations,” Legarda said in a statement. 

Though adopting more sustainable practices is important, Legarda said Filipinos also “need to continue demanding more effective policies and solutions” to help address plastic pollution.

Despite calls from environmental groups to highlight the plastic crisis, the issue did not make it to President Marcos’ first state of the nation address in July, which lays out the government’s agenda for the next year. 

But in a comprehensive policy speech that outlines plans for growth and development, the 64-year-old leader spoke of the Philippines’ vulnerability to climate change. 

“If we cannot mitigate climate change, all our plans for the economy, all our plans for our future, will be for naught,” he said.

COLOMBO: President Ranil Wickremesinghe has pushed for an all-party government to resolve Sri Lanka’s worst economic crisis in memory, as the new leader expects an agreement with the International Monetary Fund to be delayed after unrest over the past weeks.

The island nation of 22 million people, struggling with daily power cuts and shortages of essential goods such as fuel, food and medicines, saw anti-government protests that began in March spread across the country and culminate in the resignation of former president, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, in early July.

Wickremesinghe was elected by parliament on July 20 to complete the five-year term of Rajapaksa, who fled to Singapore after demonstrators stormed his official residence and occupied several key government buildings in protests over economic hardship.

“The best way to solve the problems of the country is through an all-party government,” Wickremesinghe said during a meeting on Saturday with the influential monks of the Temple of the Tooth in Kandy, one of Buddhism’s most sacred shrines.

He had invited members of parliament to join discussions for a unity government just a day earlier, he said, as assistance from the IMF alone will not be enough for the debt-laden country.

Sri Lanka defaulted on its $51 billion foreign debt payments in April due to a severe lack of foreign currency, which led to a shortage of critical imports that have persisted in the country.

The South Asian country has held discussions with the IMF for a bailout, but reaching a staff-level agreement that would be key for that has been pushed back due to the turmoil of recent weeks, the president said.

“Nothing happened since July 9 until now. Now it has been delayed until the end of August and we are expecting to get it approved by September only,” Wickremesinghe said.

The IMF’s rescue package would not be enough to pull the country out from the crisis, he said.

“Just because we take money from the IMF, do not think that all problems will be solved. Our debts have increased. How will we pay these debts?”

“We need more foreign exchange and need new ways to bring in forex to the country.”

Murtaza Jafferjee, economist and chairman of the Colombo-based think tank Advocata Institute, told Arab News on Sunday that an all-party government would help to reach the political consensus needed to carry out the necessary reforms in Sri Lanka.

“Furthermore, the more competent MPs who can help with the economy are with the SJB, thus he wants them to come over,” Jafferjee said, referring to the main opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya.

Reviving the country’s once-thriving tourism industry would be key, Jafferjee said, as travelers bringing in dollars would help to reduce shortages in the island nation.

“The sector that can have the fastest rebound is tourism, but the bad publicity is not helping our cause,” he said.

Tourism was a key source of Sri Lanka’s foreign exchange reserves.

In 2019, the South Asian country welcomed more than 1.9 million tourists. As COVID-19 restrictions upended the hospitality industry, the number dropped to less than 200,000 last year. But activity is slowly picking up again, as 380,000 tourists have arrived in the country in the first half of 2022, according to the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority.

The upcoming winter season for countries in the northern hemisphere is usually the peak season for Sri Lanka’s tourism.

“So one hopes that there will be a retraction of the travel warnings that will make people more comfortable with travel to the country,” Jafferjee said.

BEIJNG: The speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, confirmed Sunday she will visit four Asian countries this week but made no mention of a possible stop in Taiwan that has fueled tension with Beijing, which claims the island democracy as its own territory. Pelosi said in a statement she is leading a congressional delegation to Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea and Japan to discuss trade, the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, security and “democratic governance.” Pelosi has yet to confirm news reports that she might visit Taiwan. Chinese President Xi Jinping warned against meddling in Beijing’s dealings with the island in a phone call Thursday with his American counterpart, Joe Biden. Beijing sees official American contact with Taiwan as encouragement to make its decades-old de facto independence permanent, a step US leaders say they don’t support. Pelosi, head of one of three branches of the US government, would be the highest-ranking elected American official to visit Taiwan since then-Speaker Newt Gingrich in 1997. The Biden administration didn’t explicitly urge Pelosi to avoid Taiwan but tried to assure Beijing there was no reason to “come to blows” and that if such a visit occurred, it would signal no change in US policy. “Under the strong leadership of President Biden, America is firmly committed to smart, strategic engagement in the region, understanding that a free and flourishing Indo-Pacific is crucial to prosperity in our nation and around the globe,” Pelosi’s statement said. Taiwan and China split in 1949 after the communists won a civil war on the mainland. Both sides say they are one country but disagree over which government is entitled to national leadership. They have no official relations but are linked by billions of dollars of trade and investment. The United States switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979, but maintains informal relations with the island. Washington is obligated by federal law to see that Taiwan has the means to defend itself. Washington’s “One China policy” says it takes no position on the status of the two sides but wants their dispute resolved peacefully. Beijing promotes an alternative “One China principle” that says they are one country and the Communist Party is its leader. Members of Congress publicly backed Pelosi’s interest in visiting Taiwan despite Chinese opposition. They want to avoid being seen as yielding to Beijing. Beijing has given no details of how it might react if Pelosi goes to Taiwan, but the Ministry of Defense warned last week the military would take “strong measures to thwart any external interference.” The foreign ministry said, “those who play with fire will perish by it.” The ruling party’s military wing, the People’s Liberation Army, has flown growing numbers of fighter planes and bombers around Taiwan to intimidate the island. “The Air Force’s multi-type fighter jets fly around the treasured island of the motherland, tempering and enhancing the ability to maintain national sovereignty and territorial integrity,” military spokesman Col. Shen Jinke said on Sunday, referring to Taiwan. Pelosi said her delegation includes US Reps. Gregory Meeks, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee; Mark Takano, chairman of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs; Suzan DelBene, vice chair of the House Ways and Means Committee; Raja Krishnamoorthi, a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and chair of the Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, and Andy Kim, a member of the House Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees. A visit to Taiwan would be a career capstone for Pelosi, who increasingly uses her position in Congress as a US emissary on the global stage. She has long challenged China on human rights and wanted to visit Taiwan earlier this year. In 1991, as a new member of Congress, Pelosi irked Chinese authorities by unfurling a banner on Tiananmen Square in central Beijing commemorating those killed when the Communist Party crushed pro-democracy protests two years earlier. “It’s important for us to show support for Taiwan,” Pelosi, a Democrat from California, told reporters this month. But she had made clear she was not advocating US policy changes. “None of us has ever said we’re for independence, when it comes to Taiwan,” she said. “That’s up to Taiwan to decide.” On Friday, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby tried to tamp down concerns. “There’s no reason for it to come to that, to come to blows,” Kirby said at the White House. “There’s no reason for that because there’s been no change in American policy with respect to One China.”