The Syrian government’s campaign to clear rebels from the city of Aleppo by pummeling residential neighborhoods with so-called barrel bombs constitutes a war crime because the weapons cannot be aimed at combatants, according to a detailed report released Monday by the advocacy group Human Rights Watch.
The report, which cataloged what it said were 266 bombings that affected 340 different sites around the city from Nov. 1, 2013, to the end of February this year, provided a legal rationale for viewing the barrel bombs, which often are nothing more than barrels filled with explosives dropped from helicopters, as different from other munitions used in the war.
Human rights group labels Syria’s use of barrel bombs a war crime
Environment Climate change Global warming to hit Asia hardest, warns new report on climate change
People in coastal regions of Asia, particularly those living in cities, could face some of the worst effects of global warming, climate experts will warn this week. Hundreds of millions of people are likely to lose their homes as flooding, famine and rising sea levels sweep the region, one of the most vulnerable on Earth to the impact of global warming, the UN states.
The report – Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability – makes it clear that for the first half of this century countries such as the UK will avoid the worst impacts of climate change, triggered by rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere. By contrast, people living in developing countries in low latitudes, particularly those along the coast of Asia, will suffer the most, especially those living in crowded cities.
Recording shows that Army punished soldiers who asked for help
After three combat tours, Sgt. Dennis Tackett was kicked out of the Army for punching a man in the face while drunk. It didn’t matter that he had been diagnosed with PTSD (by the Army) and had tried to get help (from the Army) for the drinking it led to. It didn’t matter that he was in the late stages of a medical discharge that would get him out soon anyway — with benefits.
What mattered to the commanding general at Fort Carson, Colo., who spoke to him that day in November 2012 was that he had tried to fight the discharge with the help of a pair of civilian watchdogs, Georg-Andreas Pogany and Robert Alvarez.
Exoxon Valdez 25years later: 'Beaches and wildlife will never entirely recover'
[On March 24, 1989] more than 11 million gallons of black crude gushed into the pristine waters of Prince William Sound.
...Oil reached beaches 650 miles away. Killer whales, eagles, otters, seals and thousands of sea birds died excruciating deaths while Alaska's famous salmon and herring were ruined. The pictures of distressed animals expiring and grief-stricken locals trying to scrub beaches coated with toxic filth shocked the world.
The event is still seared into the minds of those who witnessed it, even a quarter of a century later. But the Exxon Valdez has left more than memories.
U.S. Fisheries Killing Thousands of Protected and Endangered Species
A new report by Oceana exposes nine U.S. fisheries that throw away half of what they catch, and kill dolphins, sea turtles, whales, and more in the process. These fisheries are even fishier than they smell.
A new study released this week called Wasted Catch: Unsolved Bycatch Problems in U.S. Fisheries reveals the nine dirtiest fisheries in the United States. It’s a dirty bunch indeed, the waste between them accounting for nearly half a billion wasted seafood meals in the U.S. alone.
Culled by Oceana, the largest international organization for ocean conservation, the fisheries are ranked based on bycatch—the amount of unwanted creatures caught while commercial fishing. Combined, they’re responsible for 50 percent of reported bycatch nationwide.
Wash. mudslide kills 3: searchers seek survivors
Rescue crews searched into the night for survivors from a massive mudslide in Washington state that killed at least three people, after hearing voices from the debris field pleading for help.
The slide of mud, trees and rocks happened about 11 a.m. Saturday morning. Several people — including an infant — were critically injured and at least six houses were destroyed. Snohomish County Fire District 21 Chief Travis Hots said at a news briefing late Saturday that searchers weren't giving up on finding more people.
"We have people who are yelling for our help, and we are going to take extreme risks," Hots said.
Crews mopping up oil spill in Texas' Galveston Bay
Cleanup efforts have begun after a barge carrying nearly a million gallons of thick, sticky oil collided with a ship in Galveston Bay.
Coast Guard Petty Officer Andy Kendrick said Sunday morning that skimmers are recovering the oil that spilled in Saturday's collision and a boom is in place to protect environmentally sensitive areas.
Kendrick said the remaining oil is being moved off of the damaged barge.
Oakland to pay $4.5M to 'Occupy' vet wounded by police
An Iraq War veteran whose skull was fractured during an Occupy Oakland protest when he was hit by a beanbag round fired by police has reached a tentative $4.5 million agreement to settle a federal lawsuit with the city of Oakland, his lawyers and city officials announced Friday.
Scott Olsen, 26, sued the city in 2012 for medical expenses and injuries that also included a fractured vertebrae and hemorrhaging of the brain. Olsen was among more than 1,000 demonstrators protesting the police clearing of an Occupy Oakland encampment when struck by a beanbag fired by an officer outside City Hall on Oct. 25, 2011.
Alex Baer: In Brain Function We Stand
A rectangle of nice, restful, healthy, vibrant green below and sky blue above, in the upper half -- just the thing to celebrate the vernal equinox. Then, a set of finely thin-ribboned, parallel bars in pure white, sunshine yellow, and rich cream, arranged in the lazy X of a saltire, ranging from corner to corner, and intersecting in the center. Then, on this center spot, a large apple-red sphere, not unlike an actual apple, silhouetted, and sporting wavering rays of varying lengths.
Finally, within the large center spot, the stark white of a rippling strait jacket, with the hard red of a slashing bar through it, from upper left to lower right -- the clear international symbol for NO.
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